Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

to cienfuegos,

If you press, too hard, you'll find historicists are not willing to accept an ignoble Jesus (for example Jesus ben Ananias) as a model for the Gospel Jesus.

Why should historicists accept an ignoble Jesus?
If Jesus was not ignoble, would that make historicists wrong?
And Jesus ben Ananias was not so ignoble after all.
Do you believe Jesus ben Ananias being the model for Mark's Jesus?

Cordially, Bernard

ficino wrote:I did not mean to say that the above sorts of presuppositions are directly operative in the work of ALL scholars who maintain an HJ. These presuppositions might influence them subtly, I don't know. Am I holding onto a belief that there was an HJ because of my upbringing and later education? I don't think so... but only my shrink knows for sure.

I think that the field of psychology is quite relevant. Our upbringing generally determines our religious conditioning from childhood. Whether Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist or <INSERT HERE> most propositions are often jet-propelled into the psyche of children two years and upwards during their formative years. Of course, some people develop the ability to critically examine their conditioning, so all this social religious conditioning can be often fully or partially removed.

Here is Bird attacking yet another flimsy argument:
"Scholars who take the line that the primitive Christian communities...had only the faintest interest in the life of Jesus...retroject their own ...disinterest..onto the early church" (p 37). In fact, the existence of the Gospels themselves argue sharply against this line of argument.

The existence of the Gospels?

The later the Gospels are dated the greater their "retrojected disinterest". This is a two edge sword. There are plenty of members here who place the Gospels in the 2nd century, and a few late 2nd century. If we allowed 25 years each generation, how many generations after "Dear Saint Paul" did the gospel authors take up their pen and commence to write proficiently in the Greek language?

• Generation 0: 030 - 055 CE: Paul, Apollonius and the "Apostolic Age"
  Generation 1: 055 - 080 CE: "Apostolic Age"? and Masada.
  Generation 2: 080 - 105 CE: the "Therapeutic Missing Link" to the Apostolic Age [Philo & Eusebius]
  Generation 3: 105 - 130 CE: The Early Christian "Universal Church" - the church organisation.
  Generation 4: 130 - 155 CE: etc
  Generation 5: 155 - 180 CE: Marcus Aurelius writes "Meditations"
  Generation 6: 180 - 205 CE:

"

The later the Gospels are dated the greater is the generation gap between the epochs and greater their "retrojected disinterest".
Long Mark does not inspire confidence in anything other than a retrojection.

Perhaps the most intriguing topic in biblical scholarship lately has been oral tradition. After a century or so hunting for early, primitive written strands, for the every elusive Q, and for literary relationships to be discovered hidden in the Gospels, literacy itself is coming under siege, as more and more evidence comes in of how the ancients transmitted oral tradition.

Isn't the purported "Early Christian [Greek language] oral tradition" essentially legless nowdays?

Along with oral tradition, "the problem for those who argue for widespread variation and drastic inventiveness in the Jesus tradition is that they fail" (p 49) to take into account the presence of eyewitnesses. Eyewitnesses who wrote. Eyewitnesses who travelled.

Is he talking about Paul? Is he talking about Papias or someone? Is he talking about the gospel authors? Which eyewitness wrote?




LC

to cienfuegos,

The presuppositions i am referring to relate to the Gospels conveying factual information.

Your presupposition is that the gospels cannot convey any factual information. Can you prove it, verse by verse?

Cordially, Bernard

Bernard Muller wrote:to cienfuegos,

The presuppositions i am referring to relate to the Gospels conveying factual information.

Your presupposition is that the gospels cannot convey any factual information. Can you prove it, verse by verse?

Cordially, Bernard

My presupposition is based on standard historical methods:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_method

Garraghan divides source criticism into six inquiries:[1]

When was the source, written or unwritten, produced (date)?

We don't know for sure when the Gospel of Mark was written. I know you believe it to be written in 70-71. The range of beliefs is from about 40 to 130s. That's a large range. Similarly large ranges have been prosposed for the dates of origin of the other Gospels as well as other Christian sources (such as the Gospel of Thomas). So...we don't know.

Where was it produced (localization)?

We don't know for sure. Again, scholars have proposed a vast range for the location of the production of these sources.

By whom was it produced (authorship)?

We don't know.

From what pre-existing material was it produced (analysis)?

From nothing to oral tradition to hypothetical literary documents no longer extant. Again, it's a muddled mess with no clear answers.

In what original form was it produced (integrity)?

It is probable that all this material originated in Greek, but advocates for Hebrew or Aramaic origins for some of it do exist. We aren't sure...again.

What is the evidential value of its contents (credibility)?

Credibility can be assessed internally by what the author claims to have happened. In the case of the Gospels, we have ample evidence that authors relayed pure fiction: miracles, nativity stories, faked endings (such as Mark 16:9 on). The credibility can then be assessed as low.

[wiki]R. J. Shafer on external criticism: "It sometimes is said that its function is negative, merely saving us from using false evidence; whereas internal criticism has the positive function of telling us how to use authenticated evidence."[/wiki]

The first five criteria, as the article states, are external and as Shafer observes "save us from using from false evidence." In the case of the Gospels, we really have to go no further than this. We can't authenticate the validity of what the Gospels relate, so we have to discard them as evidence. This is not to say that there is no factual information in the Gospels. There was a Pilate, there may well have been a John the Baptist, there's a Sea of Galilee, there really was a tax imposed in 6 AD, etc. Those facts can be confirmed from other sources.

[wiki]An author's trustworthiness in the main may establish a background probability for the consideration of each statement, but each piece of evidence extracted must be weighed individually.[/wiki]

We don't know who the author is or how reliable he is. We have no other works to compare. so the background probability for each statement starts out low. For every statement that you make about the historical Jesus that is derived from the Gospels should be subjected to this process. without external confirmation, there isn't much to say. That doesn't mean there is absolutely no hope. As I showed before, there is no reason to accept that Jesus of Nazareth was baptized by John, there is attestation that Jesus was crucified (in Paul's writings). The probability of the crucifixion being historical then is greater than the event described in the opening pages of GMark. Paul does not confirm though that Jesus was crucified by Pilate (and I think there is evidence against it in Paul's own writings, particularly Romans 13).

This is how it works. You ask for a special method, not "traditional" historical methods. I explained in a previous the flaw in that logic. Compare the treatment of Gospel sources to this:

http://www.arthuriana.co.uk/historicity/arthur.pdf

Against the evangelical inerrantist presuppositionalists of recent discussion, NOT against Bernard, I note that cienfuegos' points SHOULD be adopted by them, if they aspire to produce genuine historical scholarship. But they give the Bible a pass. They are fine with applying the above principles to, say, Arthurian romances or sacred texts of other religions, but when it comes to their Bible, they fall into special pleading big-time. So to cover their tracks, they play around with pseudo-philosophical arguments that have their roots in TAG.

to cienfuegos,
Garraghan divides source criticism into six inquiries:[1]
When was the source, written or unwritten, produced (date)?
Where was it produced (localization)?
By whom was it produced (authorship)?
From what pre-existing material was it produced (analysis)?
In what original form was it produced (integrity)?
What is the evidential value of its contents (credibility)?

There is nothing here to say if we cannot answer with 100% confidence & 100% accuracy these questions, the source has to be trashed.
Furthermore, the following from Wiki, clarifies the issue:
Noting that few documents are accepted as completely reliable, Louis Gottschalk sets down the general rule, "for each particular of a document the process of establishing credibility should be separately undertaken regardless of the general credibility of the author." An author's trustworthiness in the main may establish a background probability for the consideration of each statement, but each piece of evidence extracted must be weighed individually.
And I must say, I followed Louis Gottschalk's directives.

We don't know who the author is or how reliable he is. We have no other works to compare. so the background probability for each statement starts out low.

You don't know how reliable "Mark" was? I determined he was not reliable and everything he wrote had to be analysed with great scrutiny. Being not reliable does not mean everything he wrote has to be rejected. But you admit that each statement starts out low. Low does not mean necessarily false.

For every statement that you make about the historical Jesus that is derived from the Gospels should be subjected to this process.

But this is what I did, rejecting a good 90% of what "Mark" wrote.

without external confirmation, there isn't much to say.

I have some external confirmation from Paul's epistles:

1) His name is Jesus (Ro 5:15 "the one man Jesus Christ", 1 Cor 11:23 "the Lord Jesus the night in which he was betrayed [or delivered] took bread", 2 Cor 8:9, etc).
2) He was a Jew (said to be descendant of Abraham (Gal 3:16), Israelites (Ro 9:4-5), Jesse (Ro 15:12) & David (Ro 1:3)).
3) He was a minister/servant to Jews (Ro 15:8).
4) He was of no reputation (Php 2:7).
5) He was crucified (1 Cor 1:23, 2:2, 2:8, 2 Cor 13:4).
6) The crucifixion happened in the heartland of the Jews: see http://historical-jesus.info/19.html.
7) He had brothers (contemporaries of Paul) (1 Cor 9:5).
8) These brothers were travelling with "a "sister", a wife" (1 Cor 9:5).
9) One of Jesus' brothers was named "James" (Gal 1:19), whom Paul met several times (Gal 1:19, 2:9).
10) James lived for a long time in Jerusalem (Gal 1:19, 2:9).
11) James was also an important member of some Jewish sect (Gal 2:2, 9, 12).
Also Paul wrote Jesus was poor, in poverty (2 Cor 8:9), "humble" (Php 2:8) and coming from a woman (Gal 4:4).

And, through analysis, I am certain that "Mark" had to take in account what eyewitness said and did not say, which he felt he had to counteract, because the testimony was against key Christian beliefs:

Solution 1: Disciples getting gag order from Jesus:
a) NOT saying Jairus' daughter was resurrected (5:43)
b) NOT claiming Jesus was Christ (8:30)
c) NOT telling about the events on the high mountain, which included transfiguration, God saying Jesus is his Son and Moses & Elijah alive in bodily forms (9:9-10)

Solution 2: Disciples being ignorant or kept in ignorance:
a) NOT aware of the (Christian) meaning of Jesus' future passion (8:33)
b) NOT understanding what "rising from the dead" meant (right after seeing Moses & Elijah!) (9:10)
c) NOT asking about the meaning of (among other things) Jesus' future rising (9:32b)
d) NOT told about the Empty Tomb (16:8)

Solution 3: Disciples being too dumb to notice extraordinary events:
a) NOT "seeing" the miraculous feeding(s) (6:52, 8:4, 17-21)
b) NOT considering "walking on the sea" or/and the following stoppage of the wind as divine miracle(s) (6:52)

Solution 4: Damage control on witnessed failure & objectionable conduct/saying:
a) Jairus' daughter not resurrected (damage control: 5:42).
b) Rejection of Jesus in his hometown and his failure to heal people there (damage control: 6:4, 5b).
c) Near-impossibility for wealthy to enter the Kingdom of God (damage control: 10:27).
d) Disturbance in the temple (damage control: 11:17).
e) Peter saying Jesus cursed at a fig tree which withered later (damage control: 11:22-25).
f) Disciples falling away after Jesus' arrest (damage control: 14:27b).

Finally, there is Josephus' Antiquities XX, 9, 1 "the brother of Jesus called Christ, James by name".

As I showed before, there is no reason to accept that Jesus of Nazareth was baptized by John,

Why not? because it showed only in gMark (and copied in gLuke & gMatthew). Since when a single attestation cannot be true?

there is attestation that Jesus was crucified (in Paul's writings). The probability of the crucifixion being historical then is greater than the event described in the opening pages of GMark.

If you accept that, how can you be a mythicist? You have your double attestation here.

Paul does not confirm though that Jesus was crucified by Pilate (and I think there is evidence against it in Paul's own writings, particularly Romans 13).

So what? Paul said that the Romans ('archons') were agents of God, about administrating law & order, but according to 1 Cor 2:8, these Romans 'archons' did not know Jesus was the Son of God (http://historical-jesus.info/68.html).
Romans executing a lower class Galilean, who made a disturbance in the temple and believed by some to become king of the Jews, makes a lot of sense, more so as a deterrent against any messianic movement.

Cordially, Bernard

cienfuegos wrote: you'll find historicists are not willing to accept an ignoble Jesus

Simply not true.

This is debated fiercely along the lines of socioeconomics of Aramaic Galileans in Nazareth. Many including me propose a man who lived below a peasant, this list is growing and lines are starting to be drawn between apologetics and anthropology.

I am certain that "Mark" had to take in account what eyewitness said and did not say, which he felt he had to counteract, because the testimony was against key Christian beliefs:

Solution 1: Disciples getting gag order from Jesus:
a) NOT saying Jairus' daughter was resurrected (5:43)
b) NOT claiming Jesus was Christ (8:30)
c) NOT telling about the events on the high mountain, which included transfiguration, God saying Jesus is his Son and Moses & Elijah alive in bodily forms (9:9-10)

Solution 2: Disciples being ignorant or kept in ignorance:
a) NOT aware of the (Christian) meaning of Jesus' future passion (8:33)
b) NOT understanding what "rising from the dead" meant (right after seeing Moses & Elijah!) (9:10)
c) NOT asking about the meaning of (among other things) Jesus' future rising (9:32b)
d) NOT told about the Empty Tomb (16:8)

Solution 3: Disciples being too dumb to notice extraordinary events:
a) NOT "seeing" the miraculous feeding(s) (6:52, 8:4, 17-21)
b) NOT considering "walking on the sea" or/and the following stoppage of the wind as divine miracle(s) (6:52)

Solution 4: Damage control on witnessed failure & objectionable conduct/saying:
a) Jairus' daughter not resurrected (damage control: 5:42).
b) Rejection of Jesus in his hometown and his failure to heal people there (damage control: 6:4, 5b).
c) Near-impossibility for wealthy to enter the Kingdom of God (damage control: 10:27).
d) Disturbance in the temple (damage control: 11:17).
e) Peter saying Jesus cursed at a fig tree which withered later (damage control: 11:22-25).
f) Disciples falling away after Jesus' arrest (damage control: 14:27b).

'Mark' was responding to critics of his cult, and the key here as you observed, "which he felt he had to counteract, because the testimony was against key Christian beliefs:"
The writing of the Gospel required no actual witnesses, and none of these 'events' need ever actually occurred.
The text was fashioned to answer and to supply exactly what critics of the christos cult were saying was lacking, his life details.
And also supply old 'sayings' and Scripture sourced 'prophecy fulfillment details' that the cult members agreed should be included.
The earthly Christos of the Christos cult was unknown to all of known history, so the Gospel writer(s) undertook to fabricate a detailed background 'history' for their god.
First things first 'he', their imagined incarnated god needed a 'historical' background, a birth, and a name. Check.

Around forty years ago I was well acquainted with an old Christian named Jake. Old Jake testified (often and publicly) that Christ Jesus had met with him in the woods while he was out hunting. Testified that Jesus had sat down on a log with him and shared his lunch as they conversed.
As a bit of fun, I asked Jake for more details of this meeting. As Jake was willing to oblige, I asked him what day of the week this had happened, and at what time of day, what kind and color of clothes Jesus was wearing, what kind of shoes, and how did he know it was really Christ Jesus?
Knew old Jake for years and asked him hundreds of such questions, and his tale got more and more elaborate in its details, more meetings with Jesus (once Jesus appeared and took the wheel of his car, saving him from having a wreck! ,(Wonder how many times that 'testimony' has been given by Christers?) _another time he fell in the river while fishing and certainly would have drowned, but of course Jesus appeared in the air, and magically miraculously levitated right him out of the river and floated him safely to dry ground. This kind of 'testifying' went on till finally even Jake himself could not remember what it was that he had 'testified' to just a month before.

Just like with old Jake, the Gospel had to be written down, or the Christer 'testifiers' would never be able to recall all of the ridiculous horse shit they had made up, and 'testified' to as being the 'Gospel truth' of Jesus their christus god.

Sheshbazzar

outhouse wrote:

cienfuegos wrote: you'll find historicists are not willing to accept an ignoble Jesus

Simply not true.

This is debated fiercely along the lines of socioeconomics of Aramaic Galileans in Nazareth. Many including me propose a man who lived below a peasant, this list is growing and lines are starting to be drawn between apologetics and anthropology.

I've asked for sources to support this assertion, toejam provided a few that don't appear to me to pan out. Maybe you could provide an assist?

bernard wrote:Furthermore, the following from Wiki, clarifies the issue:
Noting that few documents are accepted as completely reliable, Louis Gottschalk sets down the general rule, "for each particular of a document the process of establishing credibility should be separately undertaken regardless of the general credibility of the author." An author's trustworthiness in the main may establish a background probability for the consideration of each statement, but each piece of evidence extracted must be weighed individually.

I didn't leave this out, I included it. In your rush for confirmation of your bias you skip this: the trustiworthiness of an author establishes the background probability of each statement. We start with low probability.

bernard wrote: And I must say, I followed Louis Gottschalk's directives.

We don't know who the author is or how reliable he is. We have no other works to compare. so the background probability for each statement starts out low.

You don't know how reliable "Mark" was? I determined he was not reliable and everything he wrote had to be analysed with great scrutiny. Being not reliable does not mean everything he wrote has to be rejected. But you admit that each statement starts out low. Low does not mean necessarily false.

For every statement that you make about the historical Jesus that is derived from the Gospels should be subjected to this process.

But this is what I did, rejecting a good 90% of what "Mark" wrote.

without external confirmation, there isn't much to say.

I have some external confirmation from Paul's epistles:

1) His name is Jesus (Ro 5:15 "the one man Jesus Christ", 1 Cor 11:23 "the Lord Jesus the night in which he was betrayed [or delivered] took bread", 2 Cor 8:9, etc).
2) He was a Jew (said to be descendant of Abraham (Gal 3:16), Israelites (Ro 9:4-5), Jesse (Ro 15:12) & David (Ro 1:3)).
3) He was a minister/servant to Jews (Ro 15:8).
4) He was of no reputation (Php 2:7).
5) He was crucified (1 Cor 1:23, 2:2, 2:8, 2 Cor 13:4).
6) The crucifixion happened in the heartland of the Jews: see http://historical-jesus.info/19.html.
7) He had brothers (contemporaries of Paul) (1 Cor 9:5).
8) These brothers were travelling with "a "sister", a wife" (1 Cor 9:5).
9) One of Jesus' brothers was named "James" (Gal 1:19), whom Paul met several times (Gal 1:19, 2:9).
10) James lived for a long time in Jerusalem (Gal 1:19, 2:9).
11) James was also an important member of some Jewish sect (Gal 2:2, 9, 12).
Also Paul wrote Jesus was poor, in poverty (2 Cor 8:9), "humble" (Php 2:8) and coming from a woman (Gal 4:4).

This is all through your lens. And, even then, you haven't established that Mark is independent of Paul.

Bernard wrote: And, through analysis, I am certain that "Mark" had to take in account what eyewitness said and did not say, which he felt he had to counteract, because the testimony was against key Christian beliefs:

Solution 1: Disciples getting gag order from Jesus:
a) NOT saying Jairus' daughter was resurrected (5:43)
b) NOT claiming Jesus was Christ (8:30)
c) NOT telling about the events on the high mountain, which included transfiguration, God saying Jesus is his Son and Moses & Elijah alive in bodily forms (9:9-10)

Solution 2: Disciples being ignorant or kept in ignorance:
a) NOT aware of the (Christian) meaning of Jesus' future passion (8:33)
b) NOT understanding what "rising from the dead" meant (right after seeing Moses & Elijah!) (9:10)
c) NOT asking about the meaning of (among other things) Jesus' future rising (9:32b)
d) NOT told about the Empty Tomb (16:8)

Solution 3: Disciples being too dumb to notice extraordinary events:
a) NOT "seeing" the miraculous feeding(s) (6:52, 8:4, 17-21)
b) NOT considering "walking on the sea" or/and the following stoppage of the wind as divine miracle(s) (6:52)

Solution 4: Damage control on witnessed failure & objectionable conduct/saying:
a) Jairus' daughter not resurrected (damage control: 5:42).
b) Rejection of Jesus in his hometown and his failure to heal people there (damage control: 6:4, 5b).
c) Near-impossibility for wealthy to enter the Kingdom of God (damage control: 10:27).
d) Disturbance in the temple (damage control: 11:17).
e) Peter saying Jesus cursed at a fig tree which withered later (damage control: 11:22-25).
f) Disciples falling away after Jesus' arrest (damage control: 14:27b).

Oh Bernard. Ok.

Bernard wrote: Finally, there is Josephus' Antiquities XX, 9, 1 "the brother of Jesus called Christ, James by name".

As I showed before, there is no reason to accept that Jesus of Nazareth was baptized by John,

Why not? because it showed only in gMark (and copied in gLuke & gMatthew). Since when a single attestation cannot be true?

there is attestation that Jesus was crucified (in Paul's writings). The probability of the crucifixion being historical then is greater than the event described in the opening pages of GMark.

If you accept that, how can you be a mythicist? You have your double attestation here.

Paul does not confirm though that Jesus was crucified by Pilate (and I think there is evidence against it in Paul's own writings, particularly Romans 13).

So what? Paul said that the Romans ('archons') were agents of God, about administrating law & order, but according to 1 Cor 2:8, these Romans 'archons' did not know Jesus was the Son of God (http://historical-jesus.info/68.html).
Romans executing a lower class Galilean, who made a disturbance in the temple and believed by some to become king of the Jews, makes a lot of sense, more so as a deterrent against any messianic movement.

Josephus: spurious
1 Cor2:8: does not say Roman archons, he says the rulers of this age, which is more inline with the Ascension of Isaiah:

4:2 Beliar the great ruler, the king of this world, will descend, who hath ruled it since it came into being

Romans 13 contradicts Mark which depicts a rigged trial. Therefore, Paul's statement:

Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3 For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong.

is curious indeed.

Cordially, Bernard

I know, Bernard. You are still making the same mistakes. You know the drill on all the questions you raise.