Absence of evidence is evidence of absence only when that evidence is expected.
But a Strongest Argument From Silence would be this:
Absence of evidence is evidence of absence only when that evidence is expected in the interest of someone whose power is based on the alleged existence of that evidence.
(About that 'someone', I'm assuming that he is someone which is in the position, in principle, to be able to recover the evidence that interests him).
Question 1: Do you think that it's correct?
Question 2: Do you think that it works about Jesus?
I confess to being persuaded by the demonstration that Jesus never existed made by RG Price.
http://www.rationalrevolution.net/artic ... _jesus.htm
For a short synthesis, see here:
http://vridar.org/whos-who-among-mythic ... ment-68847
But note that RG Price is a sustainer of Mark priority and of Doherty/Carrier paradigm.
However, since I suspect more and more that Mcn (and not Mark) is the oldest gospel and since I do not trust the authenticity of the letters of Paul (or at least, I am agnostic about), I wonder if the basic logic of his case can be applied to the conflict between Marcionites and Proto-catholics, ignoring for the moment all the questions about Paul.
I do not want to be misunderstood. I think that the marcionites were historicists.
But in order to react against a Marcionite opponent (if you assume a 'Catholic' identity just by doing this reaction), then you inevitably need something of more: the quasi-obsessive collection of all the available evidence that Jesus was truely human, he was truely Jewish, put bluntly: that he was basically historical.
If the historical collectors of all that available evidence were the proto-Catholics - and what they did find were only 4 Gospels based on Mcn - this is the proof that no other evidence did exist, because no historical Jesus most likely did exist.
It is essential in order to apply my Strongest Argument From Silence on Jesus, demonstrate this precise difference between 'docetic' historicists and 'normal' historicists: in a historical conflict among them, the former had no need to insist that Jesus was truely human and that he was truely Jew - therefore no need of two major obvious markers of the historicity of a man (his humanity and his cultural matrix) - while the latter yes, the catholics had desperately -- quasi obsessively -- that strong need of evidence satisfying it.
if I can prove this point, then I can reconnect with the words of RG Price and conclude:
Note the principal difference between my argument and Price's argument is that I base myself solely on the controversy between Catholics and Marcionites in the second century.There were significant doubts about the early existence of Jesus among several so-called Christian sects, which 2nd-4th century apologists had to combat. The ONLY evidence that they ever mustered was theological reading based on the Gospels, THAT’S IT.
The issue is not that we can’t go back today and find evidence because it was too long ago, the issue is that within 100-200 years of this person’s supposed lifetime there was a compelling need to provide evidence for his existence, and we know that early Christians did in fact search for many of the physical pieces of evidence of Jesus’s existence, like his tomb, like the place where he was crucified, etc., but the fact is that THEY NEVER FOUND ANY, within 100 years of his supposed life.
And the issue is that these guys were trying very hard.
The 2nd-4th century apologists had a lot of opposition and they were trying desperately to PROVE that Jesus had in fact been incarnate “in the flesh”, but the ONLY evidence they EVER mustered was the Gospels. The entire case for Jesus having existed “in the flesh”, made by apologists within 100-300 years of his supposed existence, rested entirely on the Gospels. And their case for the “reliability” of the Gospels rested entirely on the belief that what they had was four separate independent eyewitness or second hand accounts that corroborated each other.
So without the Gospels, the 2nd-4th century case for the “humanity of Jesus” utterly falls apart, and basically the Docetists and Marcionites win.
Do you think it works?
What criticisms could you raise against this argument (without denying obviously the premises) ?
Very thanks,
Giuseppe