The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

Post by neilgodfrey »

andrewcriddle wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 1:57 am
Peter Kirby wrote: Sun Aug 20, 2017 8:50 pm Fun fact: a young Napoleon Bonaparte wrote an essay (supposedly in the style of Voltaire) comparing the parallels of Apollonius of Tyana and Jesus Christ, uncharitably for the latter.
Whately argued against the existence of Napoleon.

Andrew Criddle
And others have argued against the existence of Abraham Lincoln.

These sorts of parodies in fact underline what strikes me as a disunderstanding of the arguments about valid historical methods. They do not restrict themselves to a true analogy of a limited set of literary documents within a certain literary culture, but draw upon ideas and details from anywhere and everywhere in the cosmos, history, the world, etc. They take the warnings of Samuel Sandmel about Parallelomania and repeat every one of the errors he warned about and have fun with them all.

But that's not how the historians argue the existence of Demonax, Pythagoras, Socrates, or Jesus.

In other words the parodies are straw men jokes, good for a laugh, and a valid warning against the sins Sandmel warned of.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

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andrewcriddle wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 1:38 am
neilgodfrey wrote: Sun Aug 20, 2017 4:00 pm

As for Pythagoras, we do have serious evidence for his existence.
Technically I agree. There is IMO no real doubt about the existence of a religious guru called Pythagoras in the 6th century BCE who founded a political association in Greek speaking Italy and Sicily. However we have very little solid evidence as to what Pythagoras taught or what his original followers believed. Almost all of our evidence goes back to writers influenced by Platonists and or Aristotelians who had their own agenda. Whether a Pythagoras even vaguely like the later picture ever existed is not at all clear.

Andrew Criddle
The evidence I was thinking of that comes closest to a verification of the historicity of Pythagoras are references to two contemporaries of Pythagoras.

The discussion is about valid historical method. Ancient historians and classicists can't (though some do) lower their standards because they don't have as much evidence as modern historians to work with. They tailor their questions and research according to what the extant evidence will allow.

We have a smattering of references to Pythagoras in the centuries after he lived but they in principle can confirm nothing about the historicity of Pythagoras. Hence we sometimes read about question marks hanging over the notion of his existence.

But we do have those reported contemporaries of Pythagoras. WIth thanks to Riedweg, Christoph. 2005. Pythagoras: His Life, Teaching, and Influence. . . . .

1. Xenophanes of Colophon c. 570 – c. 475 BC)
That he [Pythagoras] was sometimes this person, sometimes that, Xenophanes confirms in the elegy that begins:

Now I turn to another tale and I shall show the way.

But what he says about him [Pythagoras] goes like this:

And once, when he passed by as a puppy was being beaten, they say, he pitied it and said these words:

“Stop, don’t beat it, for truly it is the soul of a friend:
I recognized it when I heard it utter sounds.”

(Diog. Laert 8,36, within it Xenophanes 21 B 7 D.-K.) -- 3rdC CE
2. Heraclitus of Ephesus (fl ca 503--500) (ca 535-475)
Pythagoras, the son of Mnesarchus, practiced inquiry (historíe) most
of all men; he made a selection of these writings and created his own
“wisdom” (sophíe)—much learning, artful knavery. (Heraclit. 22 B
129 D.-K.).
Here Pythagoras is son of Mnesarchus speaking of Pythagoras for the first time. The context is of dismantling authorities of Homer, Hesiod, and others. Pythagoras is an example of how even “the most respected person knows and harbors only opinions”

Thus Pythagoras studied writings and made a selection he called his own wisdom (and “artful knavery”)

“these writings” H previously mentioned Homer, Hesiod, Archilochus, Xenophanes, Hecataeus -- also accused of much learning with little insight.
Much learning does not teach understanding, otherwise it would
have taught Hesiod and Pythagoras, and also Xenophanes and
Hecataeus. (Heraclit. 22 B 40 D.-K.).
They are by no mean decisive references proving beyond doubt the historicity of Pythagoras. They still leave room for doubts.

But imagine how significant reports independent of Christianity about what two of Jesus' contemporaries said about him would be if we had them!

If only we had evidence for Jesus comparable to what we have for Pythagoras, or Apollonius of Tyana, or Demonax, . . . there would still be room for doubt, but the case of historicists would have a lot more historical methodological validity to it than it does currently.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

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A related question:

What difference would it make to anything if we were to learn that Pythagoras, Socrates, Hillel the Elder, Demonax, Apollonius of Tyana were all literary cum ideological creations and had no historical existence?

I suggest the answer would be: Not very much.

We would still have Pythagoreanism and Plato and Aristotle and Pharisees. So their founders turned out to be eponymous inventions. So what? It would change nothing relating to the historical and cultural forces at work that produced Pythagoreanism, Western philosophy, Pharisees, etc. The figures were all too insubstantial for any seriously personal biographies anyway.

No, I am not saying and I do not believe that all of the above were not historical. I strongly suspect Socrates was historical, and probably Pythagoras, too, (probabilities seem to lean in their favour, especially Socrates) but I can't really be sure enough to be prepared to bet my house on any of them.

There is a difference between denying historicity and simply saying "I don't know" or "I can't be certain". I do not deny their historicity. I cannot be completely certain about the historicity of any of them.

For the same reason I cannot flatly deny the historicity of Jesus.

Ironically, though, we have far more writings about Jesus we have actually less evidence for the historicity of Jesus than we have for the historicity of the above figures.

There are biblical scholars who have had no apparent problem explaining the origins of Christianity and/or the canonical gospels without reference to anything directly done or said by Jesus. They are not ostracized. They wisely do not make explicit the logical conclusions it is possible to draw from their research. Or maybe they sincerely believe Jesus was historical despite just about everything we have about him being mythical -- e.g. Spong.

So it is possible for Christian origins (and the gospel narratives) to be explained without reference to a historical Jesus within the academy. The important thing appears to be to simply ignore the potential ideological significance of one's studies. -- and for god's sake hope to hell some crazy myther doesn't get a hold of it.
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andrewcriddle
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

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neilgodfrey wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 2:04 am

Is there any detail about Hillel that is not a product of "late rabbinical reflection"? How does one decide between late and later accounts when none can be independently verified from the time in question? Where is Josephus when we need him?
FWIW Mishnah Hagigah refers to Menahem as a contemporary of Hillel
Hillel and
Menahem did not differ, but Menahem went forth and Shammai entered
in.
This Menahem may be the same as Menahem the Essene mentioned by Josephus.
See viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2572 on this site for a discussion.

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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

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neilgodfrey wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 2:58 am

There are biblical scholars who have had no apparent problem explaining the origins of Christianity and/or the canonical gospels without reference to anything directly done or said by Jesus. They are not ostracized. They wisely do not make explicit the logical conclusions it is possible to draw from their research. Or maybe they sincerely believe Jesus was historical despite just about everything we have about him being mythical -- e.g. Spong.

So it is possible for Christian origins (and the gospel narratives) to be explained without reference to a historical Jesus within the academy. The important thing appears to be to simply ignore the potential ideological significance of one's studies. -- and for god's sake hope to hell some crazy myther doesn't get a hold of it.
Do you mean that these biblical scholars explain the origin of Christianity on the basis of the beliefs of the early (mid 1st century CE) Christians without feeling the need to raise the question of how far these beliefs are objectively true ?
Or do you mean that they explain the origin of Christianity without requiring an early belief in an historical Jesus ?

The second position is IMO less plausible than the first.

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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

Post by Kunigunde Kreuzerin »

Giuseppe wrote: Sat Aug 12, 2017 4:09 am http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-304659045/pdf

This Author is very comprensive and honest about what makes mythicism so diffuse today.
Thanks. I think the author's calm discussion of MJ-theories and arguments is noteworthy.
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

Post by Giuseppe »

My all personal (and therefore not universal) test of historicity to apply on these other figures is:

1) have we evidence of them by people who really loved them at the same way as Paul (claimed that he) loved his Christ?

2) have we good historical evidence of them by the people of the point 1?

I doubt and deny their historicity only if the answer to question 1 is YES and at the same time the answer to question 2 is NO.
I believe their historicity in all the other cases.

For example, Socrates is historical because Xenophon loved him and described him as historical man.

Apollonyus is historical because it is impossible even to prove that Philostratus loved him. Idem for Demonax and Hillel: how can we be sure that who wrote about them loved soundly them (at the manner of a disciple with the his master)?

Jesus is not historical because we have Paul (or some other writer of epistles) who loved him, but he described him never as a historical man.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

Post by Bernard Muller »

to Giuseppe,
Jesus is not historical because we have Paul (or some other writer of epistles) who loved him, but he described him never as a historical man.
(bolding mine)
WRONG, if you mean by historical a human who lived on earth in the past:
See http://historical-jesus.info/6.html for Paul
and http://historical-jesus.info/40.html for 'Hebrews'

Cordially, Bernard
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

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Bernard Muller wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 12:13 pm
WRONG

Cordially, Bernard

Agreed.

He will never be able to explain the current evidence we have for the factual origins of Christianity. No one has been able to explain anything that even comes close to a mythical origin or a center of origin.

Without a center of origin, they all fail, and no mythicist agree on origin. Even if they pick paul alone they lose.
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Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

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andrewcriddle wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 4:25 am
neilgodfrey wrote: Mon Aug 21, 2017 2:58 am

There are biblical scholars who have had no apparent problem explaining the origins of Christianity and/or the canonical gospels without reference to anything directly done or said by Jesus. They are not ostracized. They wisely do not make explicit the logical conclusions it is possible to draw from their research. Or maybe they sincerely believe Jesus was historical despite just about everything we have about him being mythical -- e.g. Spong.

So it is possible for Christian origins (and the gospel narratives) to be explained without reference to a historical Jesus within the academy. The important thing appears to be to simply ignore the potential ideological significance of one's studies. -- and for god's sake hope to hell some crazy myther doesn't get a hold of it.
Do you mean that these biblical scholars explain the origin of Christianity on the basis of the beliefs of the early (mid 1st century CE) Christians without feeling the need to raise the question of how far these beliefs are objectively true ?
Or do you mean that they explain the origin of Christianity without requiring an early belief in an historical Jesus ?

The second position is IMO less plausible than the first.

Andrew Criddle
I mean that Dennis MacDonald (there are others but his name comes to mind most quickly), for example, explains the narrative of the Gospel of Mark as a mimesis and rewriting of Greek and Hebrew narratives. Yet he explicitly does not deny the historicity of Jesus.

James Crossley is one who presents a model for Christian origins that do not directly relate to Jesus, but more specifically to the dynamics of the Pauline movement between Jewish and gentile environments.
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