Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

[Stephan Huller]

At least that guy is honest when confronted with better evidence and arguments.

[Stephan Huller]

And Charles, how is it possible that all that you say, all that maryhelena says, all that ghost says could all be true at the same time? It's madness.

[theomise]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sy8iUI_ayuo

[Charles Wilson]

And Charles, how is it possible that all that you say, all that maryhelena says, all that ghost says could all be true at the same time? It's madness.

1. All nonsense aside, SH, I have enjoyed your work - as you should know from your site. I believe that we are on opposite sides of a dividing line. On one side: You and most of the people on this site: Transvalued and looking back. Other side: UNTransvalued and looking forward. A Rip Van Solomon, going to sleep just before Vespasian and Titus, would awaken in 20 years or so and not recognize even the most basic Symbolism on which his life was centered. The entire area had the Mishmarot Priesthood governing the Religious Life. When the Temple is coming up for destruction, there are 3 factions inside the dying Culture - They are trapped and yet they fight on. The faction above the Temple shoot arrows towards the Altar and kill...GREEKS! All this is gone and it has been replaced.

(*Warning*: I am NOT accusing anyone here of Anti-Semitism!) What followed was an unrelenting drive to deny that some filthy Jews could have had a Growing and Complex Culture. "It was Retrograde. Didn't Matthew tell us that?". Century after century of denying an entire Culture. We still see it today and it makes looking at what came before very difficult - as you should well know, Stephan. It is virtually impossible because the Transvaluation minimizes contributions of a highly complex and highly developed Culture.

2. We look back and try to find explanations. I'll cut to the chase: I find one basic appearance of Julius Caesar in the NT. JC gave Aristobulus 2 a coupla' Legions to go back into Syria and Kick Ass. I see the "Two Witnesses" in mid-Revelation as Aristobulus 2 and his son Alexander. *Kook Alert*: I even know the method (taken from Mithradates) that Pompey used to kill Aristobulus 2: Rhododendron Honey. If, however, there are only one or two references to JC, that leaves out ghost and Carotta. The very-non-explicit Criteria for Falsification are that almost ANY complex Social Scheme may be found in some Set of Symbolic Values. Ask any Marxist. That Marxists still exist at all is testimony to that fact. Ghost and Carotta are Incomplete and Probably Wrong in the Consistency and Completeness Categories. They will argue for Completeness and Consistency for Explanatory Value. Nahhhhh...

3. Maryhelena is Close but Incomplete. She has observed a feature that has possible truth-value: Antigonus is Hasmonean, a King and High Priest and the nature of his treatment at the hands of the Romans is most interesting. If the Romans did it, they might have looked at this tableau for a Symbolic System.

Maryhelena, however, has two matters to shore-up: The Hasmoneans and those who were High Priests and Kings of Israel. Among the areas of Tension between the old and the new is the treatment of Hyrcanus 2 and the nature of Jesus, our new High Priest. Hyrcanus gets his ears Customized by the Parthians and he is INELIGIBLE for the High Priesthood since he is now "blemished". A short set of generations later, we are told that our new High Priest has holes in his hands, his side has been ripped open, he has suffered and he died a horrible death. "Here's your new High Priest". HUH?!??

This suggests that the New Religion was imposed from somewhere else (Hint: The Romans) and that this imposition was intended to erase mention of the Rules for Being an Israelite King and High Priest. "We'll take the parts we want and discard the fact that God promised that the High Priesthood and Kingship would come through the House of Eleazar and Ithamar, especially Eleazar. We'll GRAFT the tame olive branches onto the wild roots and have good Caesar worshipping and taxpaying Jews."

Antigonus as Model: Close but incomplete.

4. Charlie's stuff: Closer but still Incomplete. What was the Political Situation before Vespasian and Titus? What was important about the Priesthood, Mishmarot and the Rulers of Judaea? When you get to examining this, you simply must get to Alexander Jannaeus and Queen Salome and the ambitions of Jannaeus to reclaim Greater Israel - "I was sent only to the House of Israel". What does that mean? NOT the Transvalued Study of "What came before Jesus?" nonsense. This leads to the following:

Is it possible to find material left in the NT, left by the people who were conquered and fighting back in the only manner they had left?

I believe the answer is "YES!". The results are more general than maryhelena's and more complete in explanatory power. I often have stated that when I see this material, it is as if they are screaming at me from over the centuries. Maybe I'm not listening enough, for, in the methodical march of knowledge, it's really not "My Stuff". "It's there, it really is there!" Other people now have to look at it and declare that it's there. And so on. This is where I am now. I'm not a pothead. There's someone in my head and it's me. And there was a Temple Slaughter written about by Josephus and the math of the Mishmarot Service matches up perfectly, if Jehoiarib was on duty when the Temple was destroyed. An so on.

It may not have happened at all. But "It's there, it really is there." Real skollers will have to decide and the Social Development of Scientific Knowledge kicks in.

5. So, where to go. At this point, I'm a Lone Kook shouting at the wind. I don't know about "Ogdoad" as you do. That's on the other side of that line. I'm just sayin' that there is much to learn on the UnTransvalued side.
I wish you the best Stephan. I even bought your book.

CW

[ghost]

2. We look back and try to find explanations. I'll cut to the chase: I find one basic appearance of Julius Caesar in the NT. JC gave Aristobulus 2 a coupla' Legions to go back into Syria and Kick Ass. I see the "Two Witnesses" in mid-Revelation as Aristobulus 2 and his son Alexander. *Kook Alert*: I even know the method (taken from Mithradates) that Pompey used to kill Aristobulus 2: Rhododendron Honey. If, however, there are only one or two references to JC, that leaves out ghost and Carotta. The very-non-explicit Criteria for Falsification are that almost ANY complex Social Scheme may be found in some Set of Symbolic Values. Ask any Marxist. That Marxists still exist at all is testimony to that fact. Ghost and Carotta are Incomplete and Probably Wrong in the Consistency and Completeness Categories. They will argue for Completeness and Consistency for Explanatory Value. Nahhhhh...

Carotta gives dozens or even hundreds of examples of coincidences. But it's also the emplotment, and how the Divus Iulius cult came before Christianity. Also, the Divus Iulius cult predates even Antigonus's execution. The Hasmonean elements came via Josephus. What you see by the time of the Flavians is already a composite character, but it doesn't mean he was always a composite.

[Stephan Huller]

But Charles I am not 'insulting' you for the sport of insulting you. How do you account for ghost's argument that Carotta 'proves' (with the same subjective methodology you employ) that both you and maryhelena are wrong in your respective analyses of the same data? Don't you see that this underscores the worthlessness of cherry picking passages to support a cherished pre-supposition? I find it fascinating that you obvious have an intelligent mind, you can write and think but won't allow yourself to see that the presence of ghost and maryhelena employing similar methodologies ends up cancelling out your conclusions. Or at least demonstrate why your methodology is superior to theirs or why your conclusions are more believable.

[maryhelena]

Yes David, the crazies are getting WAY out of hand. It's like they make four or five assumptions and then think they've 'proved' that Jesus is something other than what's been recorded in the ancient texts. I don't understand how we can have four or five lunatics at the forum, each taking similar leaps into fantasyland talking over one another. How can Charles, maryhelena, ghost, Pete all 'agree to disagree' with each other but then turn around to basically declare war on reality? How can Jesus = Caesar coexist with Jesus = Antigonus? It's almost as if they've conspired to allow encourage one another to make up shit in order to forget that the gospel is about a crucifixion of Jesus in a particular year of the reign of Tiberius while Pilate was in Judea. These conversations are getting more and more ridiculous. There isn't even an attempt to address the original posts in a thread. The threads simply become opportunities to air the stupidest opinions ever conceived about Jesus and the early Church.

Can't we have a rule that if an opinion isn't witnessed in ancient literature or cannot be demonstrated to have any basis in reality that we just place these discussions in a subforum or a specific thread devoted to stupid theories?

It was the same problem at the other forum. Real conversation gets drowned out by the basest inanities.

Stephan, I'm getting tired of your misrepresentation of my position. Well and truly tired of it. Please stop this blatant misrepresentation. You will not find, in anything that I have posted, that "Jesus = Antigonus?".

[Stephan Huller]

Why don't you take the opportunity here to clarify your position. As I understand it you encourage us to ignore the specific dating of the gospel from 'the time of Pilate' to some period before the Common Era based on the 'expert' opinion of the Toledoth Yeshu. My assumption was that Jesus had to have been identified as Antigonus in some way, whether a herald for or a witness to the last Hasmonaean king in order to justify the appeal to time travel or accepting what is universally considered to be one of the cornerstones of Christian history (i.e. the appeal to Pilate as a witness to the crucifixion).

As you may be aware the Marcionites certainly knew of Pilate. Irenaeus similarly reports that the Carpocratians were in the possession of representative art of some sort (paintings) which they claim Pilate made of Jesus while in Judea. But most serious of all is Justin Martyr's testimony that in his day 'Acts of Pilate' were known to exist. In other words, as long as we hear from Christians they connect the death of their Savior with Pilate. I just can't see how time travel is justified in any way on your part.

If I am in error it should hardly be considered indicative of my inability to understand complex thought or the direct result of my trying to humiliate you. Once you argue for time travel or ignoring the involvement of Pilate in the Passion narrative something just switches off in my brain. Perhaps you can demonstrate to all of us why Carrier and I are wrong not to spend more time acquainting ourselves for your theory.

[MrMacSon]

.
How can Jesus = Caesar coexist with Jesus = Antigonus? It's almost as if they've conspired to allow encourage one another to make up shit in order to forget that the gospel is about a crucifixion of Jesus in a particular year of the reign of Tiberius while Pilate was in Judea.

Proposition -

• The NT/gosepl Jesus is a character in a narrative; a narrative set "in a particular year of the reign of Tiberius while Pilate was in Judea".
• The NT/gospel-character includes aspects of histories or other narratives available when the NT/gospel-narratives were developed.

[maryhelena]

Why don't you take the opportunity here to clarify your position. As I understand it you encourage us to ignore the specific dating of the gospel from 'the time of Pilate' to some period before the Common Era based on the 'expert' opinion of the Toledoth Yeshu. My assumption was that Jesus had to have been identified as Antigonus in some way, whether a herald for or a witness to the last Hasmonaean king in order to justify the appeal to time travel or accepting what is universally considered to be one of the cornerstones of Christian history (i.e. the appeal to Pilate as a witness to the crucifixion).

As you may be aware the Marcionites certainly knew of Pilate. Irenaeus similarly reports that the Carpocratians were in the possession of representative art of some sort (paintings) which they claim Pilate made of Jesus while in Judea. But most serious of all is Justin Martyr's testimony that in his day 'Acts of Pilate' were known to exist. In other words, as long as we hear from Christians they connect the death of their Savior with Pilate. I just can't see how time travel is justified in any way on your part.

If I am in error it should hardly be considered indicative of my inability to understand complex thought or the direct result of my trying to humiliate you. Once you argue for time travel or ignoring the involvement of Pilate in the Passion narrative something just switches off in my brain. Perhaps you can demonstrate to all of us why Carrier and I are wrong not to spend more time acquainting ourselves for your theory.

Stephan, you cannot support your misrepresentation of my position - "Jesus = Antigonus" by anything that I have posted. Anyone interested in my position has only to search this forum for my postings. Your continual blatant misrepresentation is unacceptable.