Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Giuseppe wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 4:52 amHence my contempt for Acharya (peace to her soul) remains all, while my admiration for Carrier/Doherty/Price/Couchoud increases vertiginously becoming quasi an authentic worship.
I think we can all sense that quasi-religious fervor on your part.
perseusomega9 wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 7:58 am So this is more about riding Price's, Doherty's, and Carrier's nuts than anything else eh?
One thing it is decidedly not about is the sincere application of sound reasoning to figure out what (may have) happened 2000 years ago.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Ben C. Smith wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:17 am One thing it is decidedly not about is the sincere application of sound reasoning to figure out what (may have) happened 2000 years ago.


I do mine, against Ben, this quote, using it in the context about "the sincere application of sound reasoning to figure out" where Hebrews placed the crucifixion of Jesus:
Secret Alias wrote: Sat Apr 04, 2020 11:00 pm It's just your faith in your ancestors that decides matters for you. Your ancestors were wrong. Get over it.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Giuseppe wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:24 am
Ben C. Smith wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:17 am One thing it is decidedly not about is the sincere application of sound reasoning to figure out what (may have) happened 2000 years ago.


I do mine, against Ben, this quote, using it in the context about "the sincere application of sound reasoning to figure out" where Hebrews placed the crucifixion of Jesus:
Secret Alias wrote: Sat Apr 04, 2020 11:00 pm It's just your faith in your ancestors that decides matters for you. Your ancestors were wrong. Get over it.
I am not sure what you are trying to say. Stephan was clearly wrong in that quotation; he is often wrong when he goes off on one of his rants. Are you saying that he was wrong, or are you agreeing with him in his wrongness? I cannot tell.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Ben C. Smith wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:28 am I am not sure what you are trying to say. Stephan was clearly wrong in that quotation; he is often wrong when he goes off on one of his rants. Are you saying that he was wrong, or are you agreeing with him in his wrongness? I cannot tell.
It is a way to say that I can sense that the true reason behind your reluctance to (even only) see a crucifixion in Outer Space in Hebrews is the fact that it is "your faith in your ancestors that decides matters for you".
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Giuseppe wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:33 am
Ben C. Smith wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:28 am I am not sure what you are trying to say. Stephan was clearly wrong in that quotation; he is often wrong when he goes off on one of his rants. Are you saying that he was wrong, or are you agreeing with him in his wrongness? I cannot tell.
It is a way to say that I can sense that the true reason behind your reluctance to (even only) see a crucifixion in Outer Space in Hebrews is the fact that it is "your faith in your ancestors that decides matters for you".
Okay, then, you are clearly wrong, as well. Faith in my ancestors? This kind of critique is not even helpful to me, because I know instantly that there is nothing to it. I have spent years and years trying to rid myself of the biases which would impede being able to get an accurate handle on the evidence — on any evidence, really, from any field of study, though I have done far more work in this respect in Christian origins than in any other field (my most current endeavor is to rid myself of those biases when it comes to sociopolitical issues; and I am definitely not there yet).

If you wanted to salvage a kernel of an idea from behind Stephan's accusation, you could accurately suggest that sometimes I am slow to see things that others have seen in the evidence. The conventional way of looking at things carries an enormous inertia which can impede critical inquiry, and yes, I have been guilty of being conventional many, many times. You yourself have witnessed this in me a number of times on this forum.

But convention is not faith, at least not in the sense implied in a heavy phrase such as "faith in your ancestors." Far more importantly, though, even if one can see similarities between convention and faith, it has absolutely nothing to do with ancestors in this case. I do not default on occasion to the conventional view because my ancestors did so; I default on occasion to the conventional view because it is easier, which is also why many of my ancestors (and yours) defaulted to that view, as well. Duh. (And I mean that sincerely: duh.)

(Let me add here that there are some people for whom bucking convention is easy. In fact, their kneejerk reaction is to think that the conventional view is wrong simply by virtue of it being the conventional view. Such a tendency is completely uncritical. Bucking convention in any meaningful way is always going to be hard, whereas it is very easy for some people to leap to the conclusion: Ipse dixit, therefore it must be wrong.)

Take my work on the whole issue of Messiah ben Joseph. I currently lean toward the view that Jesus (who, I remind you, I am not even sure existed, whatever my bleeding ancestors may think) was (A) not even thought to be the scion of David at first, (B) thought at some point to be the scion of Joseph and Ephraim, and (C), even if he existed, not a member of the family to which James the Just belonged. This is not the conventional view; nor, obviously, is my position that Jesus may not have existed at all, that much/most/all of the evidence may be explained just about as well on grounds other than his historicity. But getting to my currently preferred view on Jesus and Messiah ben Joseph was hard. I spent months in limbo, trying to figure out what was going on in a few of the texts, trying to piece together plausible trajectories. I expressed some of my frustration during this time at one point on this forum:
perseusomega9 wrote: Sun Jul 07, 2019 2:06 pm Perhaps you can throw out some of your recent conjectures Ben, you obviously have a few in mind.
I hate to disappoint, but most of my recent investigations have been been hitting dead ends. I have, for example, been trying to piece together what is going on with James the Just, the other "brothers of the Lord," and the δεσπόσυνοι, but none of my reconstructions seem to come out measurably better than other reconstructions which draw conclusions opposite to mine. I mean, my reconstruction seems viable, but I cannot articulate very many or very good reasons for preferring it over others.
So, when you come along (or, actually, Doherty comes along) to suggest reading Hebrews in an unconventional way, a negative response on my part is very, very unlikely to have anything whatsoever to do with any ancestors, whether mine or others'. It is far more likely due either (A) to unconventional readings being hard to put together in a convincing way (by which I mean convincing to myself), as I mentioned, or (B) to my already having put in some effort on this very matter, some of that effort in debate with Doherty himself years ago.

Now, I may be wrong about Hebrews and a celestial crucifixion. That is always possible. But that is not the accusation on the table.

One last thing: if the idea actually struggling to be expressed in that expression, "faith in your ancestors," is, in your view, the same as how I am describing convention, then that phrase is wholly unsuited to the task, and another one ought to be used. If you were to have accused me, for example, of not always being sufficiently critical of the conventional (often also the prima facie) reading, I would have cheerfully replied, "Yes, that is true. I am not always sufficiently critical of the conventional reading." But to pin the matter on something like "faith in my ancestors," well, the idea is laughable and ridiculous.
Last edited by Ben C. Smith on Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

Post by Secret Alias »

As the one who issued the 'rant' let me say that in THAT situation we had too letters to decide the meaning of and Justin gives two plausible explanations, I said that his ancestors decided the choice of 'Jesus' because of its familiarity to him and others. I still defend Ben's brilliance. I am just saying that in this particular case (the case of him not agreeing with me incidentally) the reason he thought Iota-Sigma makes more sense as 'Jesus' than an attempt to render ish into Greek was because he had always thought imagined that the founder of Christianity was named Jesus. This is not a slight on Ben's abilities. We all take things for granted. I was only suggesting that the appropriateness of the nomen sacrum being 'Jesus' would be stronger in those who had been raised in traditional Christian homes and environments.

I was merely offering up the argument that in a heretical or Marcionite environment - that is, in a gospel where Iota-Sigma descends from above - Jesus seems less plausible an interpretation of the nomen sacrum (assuming it was that one i.e. Iota-Sigma that the heretics used) than the Hebrew IS. Enough of my intrusion. Thanks.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Part of my difficulty to justify your apology of yourself from accusation of crypto-Christianity, Ben, is my own difficulty to understand how one could be sincere at all, when he says that Jesus could be mythical, when the same guy denies so dogmatically and a priori a Crucifixion in Outer Space in Hebrews.

That is equivalent to say :
  • That I don't recognize intellectual consistency for mythicists who assume an earthly crucifixion in Hebrews;
  • That the dichotomy: Outer Space AUT historical Jesus, for me is a correct true dichotomy.
Paradoxically, I am more near to GDon, here. You would have noted the (apparently unexpected) GDon's rapidity to post in the only threads where I argue for a crucifixion in Outer Space. He tacitly is assuming that mythicists à la Wells are crypto-historicists. Hence he doesn't waste his time to confute them.

As corollary, for me Bob Price is historicist and even crypto-Christian (!) when he argues for an earthly crucifixion in Hebrews.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
perseusomega9
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

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Did you have a label maker as a kid?
The metric to judge if one is a good exegete: the way he/she deals with Barabbas.

Who disagrees with me on this precise point is by definition an idiot.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

Post by Giuseppe »

perseusomega9 wrote: Fri Apr 24, 2020 10:15 am Did you have a label maker as a kid?
where I realize that you are claiming implicitly that, differently from me, you have learned as a kind that to make labels has to be considered necessarily as "highly offensive".
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Re: Both Paul and Minucius Felix had a problem with euhemerizers

Post by perseusomega9 »

no, you're claiming that
The metric to judge if one is a good exegete: the way he/she deals with Barabbas.

Who disagrees with me on this precise point is by definition an idiot.
-Giuseppe
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