Gullotta and Hurtado versus Carrier: a 'dialogue' between deaf

[karavan]

ABuddhist, stop the utter clownery. You presented "proof" that you can search through the entire annals of academia and find one or two guys that agree with the interpolation thesis, ROFL. That's not "proof" of anything. Seriously dude, I'm waiting for you to back up this wholesale wishful thinking: provide *actual evidence* for an interpolation here. But I'm starting to think that this point of yours is moreso a mental aid, something like "Well ... I know I think this is an interpolation ... and I know I have absolutely zero basis for thinking that ... but I found this one guy from the 1960s that also thought that .... so I can't be completely crazy." Little did ABuddhist know ... he could still be crazy despite that.

"It is possible to be a mythicist without asserting that Jesus was a "heavenly saviour figure Jesus"/"space Jesus". CF., mythicism asserting that Jesus was a dying/rising fertility god."

Obvious false dichotomy dude, mythicists who make the absurd "Jesus is a dying/rising god" (e.g. the pseudohistorian Carrier of course) also hold to a celestial Jesus.

The last point is a total red herring, "it's not IMPOSSIBLE that a Christian believes in a celestial Jesus". It's also not IMPOSSIBLE that a Christian believes that their teapot is the Holy Mother Mary. But I guess that's the best you can do at this point. Please: ACTUAL EVIDENCE FOR MYTHICISM, PLEASE, LOL.

[neilgodfrey]

What about the other things, like your false assertion that I "apologized" for calling you a .. erm .. Carrier fanboy? ROFL. Sorry dude, . . . .

Oh boy -- i see you have no understanding of irony ... which is what my thanks to you was.

And no, I do not know if Rom 1:3 is an interpolation at all. Maybe it is; maybe it isn't.

You are so black and white, k. Shallow proof-texting mentality is all you know. No sense of irony; no humour except in malice and insult; ......

[neilgodfrey]

2. It is possible to be a mythicist without asserting that Jesus was a "heavenly saviour figure Jesus"/"space Jesus". CF., mythicism asserting that Jesus was a dying/rising fertility god.

Indeed. I don't know why the two (mythicism and celestial figure) are often assumed to be the same. Is it testimony to the strength of Doherty's arguments for initiating the current wave of interest?

My own view is that the Jesus of the gospels is entirely an allegorical construction and that it is not unreasonable to suggest that the Jesus idea began as an allegorical figure that came to be accepted as a literal figure -- on earth as much as in heaven.

[karavan]

"Oh boy -- i see you have no understanding of irony ... which is what my thanks to you was. "

Uhh, OK? LOL. Got me there dude! OR something, whatever it is you were trying to say. By the way, cute face you get there, I'm sure Carrier must love seeing it in his DMs every time you let him know that you've vanquished one of his enemies, LOL.

"And no, I do not know if Rom 1:3 is an interpolation at all. Maybe it is; maybe it isn't."

That's obviously a light way to say "I am completely closeted about my belief that Romans 1:3 is an interpolation". Come on dude, I literally predicted your views on the interpolation of passages I had never prior read you saying anything about.

Galatians 1:18-19 says Jesus had a brother? Nah, that's too earthly for mythicism to work. Must be an interpolation.

Galatians 4:4 says Jesus was born of a woman? Yeah freakin right! Interpolated.

Romans 1:3? HELL NAW, GET THAT BS OUTTA HERE HOW COULD PAUL POSSIBLY THINK JESUS WAS EARTHYL MATR? HASN'T PAUL READ RICHARD CARRIER???

LAST SUPPER IN 1 CORINTHIANS 11? PISS OFF BOY IT'S AN INTERPOLATION!!!!

Come on Neil, lighten up. You do have to admit, it is a *bit* funny that you think literally all these passages are interpolated.


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"Is it testimony to the strength of Doherty's arguments for initiating the current wave of interest?"

Nope, Doherty got the idea from some random French philosopher in the 1950s. It's just a wave of nobodies saying it until the more popular kookoo Carrier picked it up.

"My own view is that the Jesus of the gospels is entirely an allegorical construction and that it is not unreasonable"

Yeah it is dude LOL

[Peter Kirby]

By the way, no one ever made that into an argument.

It is, in fact, a common fallacy.

the obvious originality of Gal. 1:18-19

What is the argument for the "obvious originality of Gal. 1:18-19"?

[ABuddhist]

1. Nah ABuddhist, you dropped your mountain of mythicist arguments because I rubbished them. Godfrey tried to save you, but ended up blatantly falsely claiming, with a rather grand refutation at my hands, that academia either ignores mythicists or hasn't seriously responded to them. Of cours they have, I gave half a dozen examples LOL.

2. There's literally nothing to address, you got triggered and accused me of defamation when I called myself "Dick (the Jesus Buster Duster) Carrier" but then only had excuses for yourself for why you didn't report Godfrey in the way you did me when I blatantly tried to identify me two separate times.

3. Nah kiddo, if your point is unclear, it's your fault. Stop desperately searching for any point against me andjust clarify your point man, LOL. Also, "the Qu'ran was written for Muhammad by some combination of Umar and/or Salman the Persian, who used Muhammad as their spokesperson" sounds like a ridiculous, wishful thinking delusion to me.

4. Nope, you're blatantly lying. I never said Muhammad "WROTE" the Quran, but I did say the Quran is his, whether he wrote it or recited it (and some copyists put it to paper). And yup, the Sanaa manuscript ABSOLUTELY proves the Quran is contemporary to Muhammad. And any model where Muhammad had nothing to do with the composition of the Quran, i.e. he either wrote or recited it, is completely nuts.

5. "I FOUND SOMEONE WHO DISAGREES!" isn't an actual response my guy.

6. Nah, it's not complicated whether Jesus had a brother. Anyways, you just keep lying that Paul's epistles have no knowledge of an earthly Jesus. I mean, this is just a blatant and perpetual lie at this point. Paul says that Jesus had twelve disciples, was crucified, buried, had a brother, was a Jew descended from David, notes several of his teachings, the last supper, and so on. There is literally no possible rational model where a bunch of people figment a new religion and Jesus purely through visions, beginning as a celestial Jesus and then getting historicized. It's a form of hyper-wishful thinking. You then say "but Hong Xiuquan founded a religion based upon visions", thus completely refuting your own argument by proving you need a historical founder of a religion, LOL. Plus, you failed to provide a citation. That makes the claim a red herring.

7. WTH? LOL. Buddha is also a historical figure and Buddhists believe that dude. Besides, your logic is totally and utterly fallacious. Let's assume Buddha is not a historical figure — that proves literally zit, zero, nadda, nothing. It's a blatant association fallacy, "Buddhism could originate without a historical Buddha therefore so could Christianity". Nah dude, logic doesn't work like that. You need to give actual evidence from the origins of Christianity to back that up.

Your whole discussion on Chris Hansen produces not an iota of evidence he was ever "SUPPRESSED" or anything for his views on Josephus, you literally just quoted yourself saying the same thingin earlier points.



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Godfrey:

"Notice: it is not my post. That is, I did not write it."

LOL, that's ABuddhist's mistake, the dude cited it and said you wrote it, and I quickly skimmed it under that presumption. And damn dude, why cherry pick a response to that point in my comment LOL? What about the other things, like your false assertion that I "apologized" for calling you a .. erm .. Carrier fanboy? ROFL. Sorry dude, you literally vigilantly defend Carrier from literally all criticism that comes his way. That's not my opinion, that's literally a fact documented by you yourself over numerous years.

EDIT: HOLY JESUS, ROFL. https://vridar.org/2015/02/17/jesus-the ... rpolation/

God damn, so Romans 1:3 is ALSO AN INTerpolation per the Neil freaking Godfrey. Notwithstanding the total pseudo-"evidence" cited in the post above, wishful thinking *really does* have a hold on this guy. What about the last supper part that Paul mentions, Neil? That also an interpolation?

EDIT 2: BAHAHAHHA, I LITERALLY PREDICTED IT MATE. https://vridar.org/2007/03/14/pastoral- ... ans-10-11/

So the part where Paul records the last supper with Jesus is ALSO an interpolation per Neil "the real freaking dea - , well, clown" Godfrey. Amazing how someone can live in such a world of wishful thinking as this. Literally EVERYTHING in Paul clearly proving his belief in an earthly Jesus is an interpolation.

1. Why must you always accuse other people, including myself, of lying?

2. Ah, the fault was mine - but not due to my lying. Rather, I thought that when you said that the Qu'ran was Muhammad's, you were saying that he had written it. But now I see that we apparently were fumbling around the same model, in which Muhammad recited a text which he may not have written in full.

3. Your assertion that Hong Xiuquan as a preacher founding a religion proves that Christianity was founded by a preaching Jesus is evidence of your poor understanding of my arguments. I am not suggesting that Christianity was not founded by a preacher or group of preachers, but only that Jesus was not a preacher upon the Earth; rather, other people who knew him, possibly including his brother James, were the first preachers based upon posthumous visions that they had had of Jesus - like Hong Xuiquan with his visions of Jesus. Evidence for this is that the earliest Christian literature never refers to Jesus as preacher.

4. You are profoundly ignorant of of Buddhism when you assert that "Buddha was historical figure" not because such a statement is false but because I was not referring to the Buddha (Gautama Buddha: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gautama_Buddha) to whom you were referring, but rather to Amitabha Buddha (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amit%C4%81bha: "also known as Amida or Amitāyus, is a celestial buddha according to the scriptures of Mahayana Buddhism."), who is a completely different figure - one of many Buddhas within Buddhism. paraphrasing the mantra of Vairocana Buddha (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vairocana "a cosmic buddha from Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism"), "Ha ha ha ha ho!". Even if I live long enough to encounter Metteya Buddha (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maitreya: Maitreya (Sanskrit) or Metteyya (Pali) "a future Buddha of this world in Buddhist eschatology"), I will never forget how you exposed yourself as as person unwilling to do even the most basic research about whether Amitabha Buddha is really different from the "Buddha" (whom you probably think vague about as that that fat god bood) whom most non-Buddhists think about when they here the word "Buddha" (who is really Gautama Buddha). I repeat: "Ha ha ha ha ho!" karavan has revealed himself as being unwilling to research the arguments that he addresses!

5. I was not asserting that Hansen was suppressed - rather, I was pointing out that he was insulted and denigrated for daring to suggest that he believed that Josephus had never mentioned Jesus Christ.

6. I FOUND SOMEONE WHO DISAGREES!" isn't an actual response my guy." is not setting forth evidence that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet, nor is it refuting arguments that other people have raised in response to claims that Jesus was an apolcalyptic prophet. But given your demonstrated unwillingness to even briefly research aspects of arguments unfamiliar to you, I have little confidence that you can provide such an argument (and even if you were to do so, then you would probably only create it withoutr arguments due to having served Kassapa Buddha (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kassapa_Buddha : "known as Kāśyapa in Sanskrit, is one of the ancient Buddhas whose biography is chronicled in chapter 24 of the Buddhavamsa, one of the books of the Pāli Canon.") in a past life).

[karavan]

"What is the argument for the "obvious originality of Gal. 1:18-19"?"

Literally all manuscript evidence bruh. Remember, manuscripts are capable of identifying interpolations in both the end of Mark and the adulteress pericope. Plus, the burden of proof is on the one claiming interpolation. It's very, VERY obvious that the suggestion of interpolation is to preserve mythicism. But the fact of the matter is that there is no more reason to think Gal. 1:18-19 interpolated than to think Gal. 1:16-17 interpolated. The whole position is just circular and arbitrary, in other words.

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"Your assertion that Hong Xiuquan as a preacher founding a religion proves that Christianity was founded by a preaching Jesus is evidence of your poor understanding of my arguments. I am not suggesting that Christianity was not founded by a preacher or group of preachers, but only that Jesus was not a preacher upon the Earth; rather, other people who knew him, possibly including his brother James, were the first preachers based upon posthumous visions that they had had of Jesus - like Hong Xuiquan with his visions of Jesus. Evidence for this is that the earliest Christian literature never refers to Jesus as preacher."

Your reference to Hong obviously just reconfirms the model where you actually need someone to begin a religion or new sect or something. Nope, not a "group of preachers" is supported by that example but, once again, time after time, a literal actual person. By the way, how can people have known him and be a brother to him if he wasn't on Earth? ROFL. Your reference to the "earliest Christian literature" is a red herring, given the fact that you blatantly ignore the earliest Christian literature when it rejects the crazy space Jesus theory. That's all there is to it, wishful thinking. By the way, you seem to have some sort of idea of James as the first Christian in your wild scenario, sort of debunked by the pre-Pauline creed in 1 Cor. 15 where James is listed almost last.

"You are profoundly ignorant of of Buddhism"

That's actually true, I've never studied Buddhism. Which is now your best argument against me ROFL. Anyways, what's your claim? You obviously concede that Buddhism began with a historical founder, so what's the relevance of this other figure? Of course people can believe in deities that are 'out there' so to speak, but that's not how movements are created dude. There wasn't, one day, this group of people who had no belief in Buddhism whatsoever and suddenly began to have visions and suddenly began to be this alternate form of Buddhists.

ABuddhist has cited himself to prove that some random dude on reddit once insulted Chris Hansen. Because that magically proves something, ROFL. Point 6 right there is a total red herring. I'm vastly more well-read on the relevant subject matter than you are dude, I know all about this topic. If you want to produce evidence against Jesus the apocalyptic prophet, go ahead, because we BOTH know about the evidence that he was: i.e. that he was making prophecies about the apocalypse, LOL.

ABuddhist, why are you utterly wasting my time and diverting to freaking Buddhism? I'm going to repeat this again: this whole point is one giant association fallacy. You're not going to be proving literally anything about the origins of Christianity if your evidence doesn't come from the origins of Christianity.

[ABuddhist]

ABuddhist, stop the utter clownery. You presented "proof" that you can search through the entire annals of academia and find one or two guys that agree with the interpolation thesis, ROFL. That's not "proof" of anything. Seriously dude, I'm waiting for you to back up this wholesale wishful thinking: provide *actual evidence* for an interpolation here. But I'm starting to think that this point of yours is moreso a mental aid, something like "Well ... I know I think this is an interpolation ... and I know I have absolutely zero basis for thinking that ... but I found this one guy from the 1960s that also thought that .... so I can't be completely crazy." Little did ABuddhist know ... he could still be crazy despite that.

"It is possible to be a mythicist without asserting that Jesus was a "heavenly saviour figure Jesus"/"space Jesus". CF., mythicism asserting that Jesus was a dying/rising fertility god."

Obvious false dichotomy dude, mythicists who make the absurd "Jesus is a dying/rising god" (e.g. the pseudohistorian Carrier of course) also hold to a celestial Jesus.

The last point is a total red herring, "it's not IMPOSSIBLE that a Christian believes in a celestial Jesus". It's also not IMPOSSIBLE that a Christian believes that their teapot is the Holy Mother Mary. But I guess that's the best you can do at this point. Please: ACTUAL EVIDENCE FOR MYTHICISM, PLEASE, LOL.

1. Again, you keep conflating proof, evidence, and good evidenmce - and then blatantly acting in a way that others would dismiss as lying by claiming that we have not provided evidence to you.

2. Prove to me that all mythicists who have claimed that Jesus was a dying/rising fertility god have claimed that Jesus was celestial. Do you assume that all gods who are taught to have never walked upon the Earth's surface (except perhaps during some mythic time) are celestial? Because I hate to break it to you, but cthonic gods are a real category of deities. "Chthonic gods are gods of the realm beneath the earth, which is the realm of souls. They are not gods of the souls (...) They are rulers of souls; while from the standpoint of men who offer them worship, they are gods whose home is below the earth, gods who are associated with souls.". [source: Fairbanks, Arthur. "The Chthonic Gods of Greek Religion". In: The American Journal of Philology 21, no. 3 (1900): 246. doi:10.2307/287716.]

3. Given the vitriol that you and other anti-mythicists have flung against both mythicists and those who try to deal sympathetically with mythicism, your concession that "it's not IMPOSSIBLE that a Christian believes in a celestial Jesus" is a major concession. You keep conflating evidence and evidence that you deem acceptable.

[karavan]

1. You wish dude LOL. 2. Not needed to be proven at all. We can grant that a mythicist need not outright lie to themselves that Paul's Jesus was celestial. But if you can't even have that, you can't be an honest mythicist. Because you *know* Paul knew Jesus' own disciples and family. Which means Jesus existed. Plus Paul was a contemporary of Jesus, therefore we have someone who was a contemporary of Jesus who wrote of him. And unless you claim Jesus was a "CHTHONIC GOD" (LOL), YES, if a god doesn't come to Earth, ever, that god is celestial. 3. Nah that's not a concession at all, and the fact that you think it's a concession in literally any way whatsoever, that it is not an outright logical mathematical impossibility that mythicism is wrong, proves just how blatantly desperate you are. It's also not impossible that the moon is made of green cheese and we've all been brainwashed by a mass of aliens into thinking otherwise. It's also not impossible that Zeus is real. You've failed to prove that mythicism is any more of a reality than freakin Zeus dude, if your only point is that it isn't strictly impossible, LOL. Please bro, <<<actual evidence for your claim is needed.>>>

[Peter Kirby]

"What is the argument for the "obvious originality of Gal. 1:18-19"?"

Literally all manuscript evidence bruh. Remember, manuscripts are capable of identifying interpolations in both the end of Mark and the adulteress pericope.

Also incapable of identifying interpolations in Antiquities 18.3.3 and incapable of discovering that the Torah is a composite text.

Plus, the burden of proof is on the one claiming interpolation.

That defense would make the originality hypothesis just an assumption, rather than "obvious."