Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

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.

At last, he gives a reason to justify his weak historicist faith by pointing the absence, in the proto-catholic Traditio, of explicit polemics against hypothetical "Mythicist" heresies (heirs of a previous "orthodox" Christianity).

I confess my perplexity about how a historicist Christian of the time may speak about "Mythicist" Christians.

For example, if he reports that some Christians adore Jesus "as one of the archangels", and nothing other, does this count as mythicism's evidence or not?

Even so, I think that this is the best case for a historical Jesus.

Biography

Mark Craig has published nine books on the topic of spirituality. Craig is currently a school teacher in Brisbane, Australia and served as a Catholic Priest for several years prior to this. He has a Bachelor of Theology, a Graduate Certificate in Religious Education and a Master’s Degree in Education, specialising in Religion.

Craig acknowledges the divide between Spirituality and Religion exploring in a new way the indestructible non-material dimension to human identity. The problem, he suggests, is that too many mistake the metaphors used by religion for ultimate truth. Even the word 'God' is a metaphor pointing beyond itself to a more profound reality than words can capture.

Craig has been published in academic Journals, including the Australian Journal of Religious Education (JRE), the Journal of Catholic School Studies (JCSS), now defunct, as well as the EJournal of Theology. His website religiousandspiritualbooks.weebly.com provides further opportunity for spiritual reflection and discussion.

Top customer reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsThe Righteous Reign of a Good God
BySharonKathleenJohnsonon December 5, 2015
Format: Kindle Edition

Mark Craig takes a diplomatically middle-of-the-road stance on the Historical Jesus debate that has been raging among scholars for the last couple of decades. Like John Dominic Crossan, Craig may appear radical at first, in his fastidiously meticulous unpacking of scriptural and apocryphal literature, but his conclusions are on the conservative side--that there WAS a rural rabbi whose teachings reached out to an unwashed unsung rabble, whose message was about social justice and love, but that reconstructing him as a historical entity is impossible because of the multiple Judaic, Greek, and Roman layers of metaphysical mutation that muddy the waters. According to Craig, the original Jesus was not likely to have claimed Messianic or divine status. He simply promulgated a utopian Judaic vision of the righteous reign of a good God which ended up having a remarkable resonance with the poor and powerless. Craig is in alignment with the Jesus Seminar in this. Ultimately, Craig is more concerned with the message rather than the messenger, in that he believes, like Joseph Campbell, that ALL religion is allegorical instead of literal, and one can only judge a belief by the behavior that results from it, not the idiosyncratic ideology it espouses.

According to Craig, the original Jesus was not likely to have claimed Messianic or divine status. He simply promulgated a utopian Judaic vision of the righteous reign of a good God which ended up having a remarkable resonance with the poor and powerless.

Craig is in alignment with the Jesus Seminar in this.

Conclusion (p.155 of the book; p. 161 of the pdf)

... However, whether one believes Jesus existed or not is immaterial to the fact that, either way, what is undeniable is that the Christ narrative, as we have it today, has less in common with history and more in common with mythology. Mythology is regarded with great suspicion as people equate it with fiction. Mythology, as it has been explored in this book, is primarily the paradigm or image by which one makes sense of the world.


The Quantum Myth and Christ Myth are never literal, but always non-literal terrains. They are non-literal as one can never get at the causal reality of each and only ever encounter its effects. Consequently, they are also ahistorical. The Christ is a non-literal encounter with essential reality mediated via the world of relativity. Thus, Christ is about encounter with reality in its fullness. The Christ signifies that we are the occasion of transcendence appearing as an immanent entity, reminding us we are more than materialism would have us believe.

Jesus is not someone to believe in, for that renders him an idea with little potential to influence and transform our lived reality now. Jesus, who is the Christ, is the profoundest longing of each human heart to bring out into the light of day treasures concealed by the darkness...

... The Christ Myth is the terrain of the soul, populated with miraculous signs, larger than life characters and occurrences defying the usual course of nature. It is the abode of truth seeking to be unshackled from its moorings in the unconscious, to alight on the shores of the conscious.

When understanding the Christ Myth, not everyone sees the same craft approaching their shore of conscious apprehension. Some perceive a mighty ship with billowing sails, slicing its course through the shadowy waters of the world leading the way for all other ships to follow. Others see a simple raft amidst a multitude of other sea worthy vessels, its fragile form moving silently across tumultuous seas.

Paul the Uncertain wrote: ↑Sat Aug 12, 2017 10:17 am Since the original link is an entire book, we might do well to point out that the focus of inquiry is just pp. 164-166.

Contrary to a categorical finding there by Craig, the patristic party line was that Simon Magus or his followers taught that there was no actual Jesus, just something that Simon cooked up and performed in Judea.

The principal marker Craig says he is looking for, the traces of a showdown between the hypothetical mythicist heretics and the proto-orthodox, seems to be there for the Simonians. Also, although Simon himself could easily have been mythical, the followers seem real enough. Celsus apparently ran into some.

https://uncertaintist.wordpress.com/201 ... dnt-exist/

neilgodfrey wrote: ↑Sat Aug 12, 2017 5:39 am
What would McGrath, Ehrman, West and Hurtado make of him!?

Of course Simon Magus and his followers are themselves fictional character invented by Irenaeus, so you are now introducing the testimony of fictional characters to prove another character fictional.

davidbrainerd wrote: ↑Wed Aug 16, 2017 10:44 am
themselves fictional character invented by Irenaeus,.

Celsus may be fictional too,