Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

Working in the morning, catch you later

outhouse wrote:

Peter Kirby wrote:you're going to have to prove it.

No Peter. It is on you to place text in proper context. And by reading ALL of the text, he certainly is NOT claiming where the resurrection took place

5 For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. 6 But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) 7 “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); 9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. 11 For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. 13 For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

It is in the proper context. I've read all the text. We can quote the passage back and forth to each other all day long.

The text in Rom 10:6-7 says that Christ's resurrection is in the abyss, just as Christ's other location is in heaven.

You're telling me that the context ("ALL of the text") puts that statement in a different light. You're claiming that there are additional clues around the text, in the "context," that controvert the plain sense. Just quoting more and more sentences surrounding will not show your point. You'll need to actually produce the thing that shows where the context alters our perception of what the text says.

That's what your claim means. You must realize that much, so I can only take your refusal as evasiveness meant to hide the fact that you're just blowing smoke again with your whole "context is key" platitude routine. Anybody can do that to try to wriggle themselves out of the text saying something that they don't like. It's without substance and meaningless without being put to specific use and demonstration from the context.

outhouse wrote:Working in the morning, catch you later

Well, you have no point so far, so I hope you'll come back to it with a much fuller take on the whole subject. I don't have time to argue endlessly with somebody who doesn't just come out with a point if they have one and instead wastes my time with mere platitudes and nonsense.

outhouse wrote:

Peter Kirby wrote:So have I got this right?

The phrase "son of God" and the bare description of death and resurrection are enough for you to know that this is happening to a someone on earth at the hands of other men?


.

Did I say hands of men?


Paul is flat telling the Romans Jesus was the son of god, and resurrected from the dead.

Well that attempt to get you to clarify your point went nowhere.

(Just to put in a little Stephan Huller-esque monologue... ) I know it's a little silly to make a direct comparison with Bobby Fischer, a chess genius, but this is exactly why Bobby Fischer played chess openings against himself. It was the fastest and easiest way to find somebody else who could play on his level and test his strategies. He could find the weaknesses in his approach better than his opponents could, and eventually he could find the best openings known at the time all on his own.

There are weaknesses in my suggested approach here, but it's not this "context of Romans 10:7" thing, and it's not this "son of god" thing, and it's not this "death and resurrection" thing, and it's not the "no mention specifically regarding the only heavenly nature of Christ" thing. We'll never get anywhere if this is the quality of the criticism. Come on, devastate this whole interpretation of Paul already! Surely it can be done, if the extremely harsh rhetoric routinely used against the 'mythicists' is sustainable.

Peter Kirby wrote:We'll never get anywhere if this is the quality of the criticism

.

BS

First of all, those proposing the heavenly only Christ have the burden of proof. And when reading Romans alone, that proof is not met. Paul factually did not teach the Romans about a heavenly Jesus. Only by perverting Pauls text out of context can that even be used.

Criticism cuts both ways my friend.

9:5 Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen.

Interpolated to?

14:9 For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.

NO mention anywhere of death in heaven.


By reading all of Romans, no where does his master piece even elude in any way shape or form, a heavenly death, or a heavenly resurrection.

Ulan wrote:However, nothing in Paul's statement distinguishes it from statements about Christ at other times. So we have to be careful with thoughts like "Christ + crucifixion = right timeframe, so probably historical". What does "right timeframe" mean? Did Paul specify the time of the crucifixion, yes or no? Do we just retroject baggage from the gospels?

.

The problem is Paul wrote in rhetorical prose. His sole purpose was to persuade readers with his words. If he was hammering a living being over and over again it would be a reactionary process to those who believed differently.

He doesn't hammer anything in this respect, but does hammer the resurrection and the value of such through Jesus for followers. A 100% death in heaven has no real value here, and no reason to posit such nonsense.

Had the community/ies of Romans been under any kind of different assumptions about the death and resurrection, Paul would have addressed it in full as a major purpose of this Epistle/letter was to set straight his teachings before false teachers good get there and teach something different.

Peter Kirby wrote:

Peter Kirby wrote:As a matter of fact, how do we prove that Paul is a "Christian"? He does not use the word. .... the question becomes whether Paul was a pre-Christian author who had some ideas that fed into the birth of Christianity proper....

Apparently William Arnal has already published on this topic (but without the same exact angle, of course).

http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/23555779
The Collection and Synthesis of "Tradition" and the Second-Century Invention of Christianity

The following paper argues that "Christianity" as a discursive entity did not exist until the second century CE. As a result, the first-century writings that constitute the field of inquiry for "Christian origins" are not usefully conceived as "Christian" at all. They were, rather, secondarily claimed as predecessors and traditions by second-century (and later) authors engaged in a process of "inventing tradition" to make sense of their own novel institutional and social circumstances. As an illustration, the paper looks at the ways that a series of second-century authors cumulatively created the figure of Paul as a first-century predecessor, and how this process has affected the way the first-century Pauline materials are read. At issue in all of this are our imaginative conceptions of social entities (including "religions") and what they are, and of how canons and notions of social continuity attendant on them are formed.

This process certainly has "affected the way the first-century Pauline materials are read."

Now I understand why this horse crap was placed forward. Your trying to rewrite history that Paul started the 100% heavenly Jesus movement, so you don't have to answer to the complete absence of evidence you have for this tradition existing before Paul as a heavenly only Jesus.

Paul was not well accepted by all. And we have plenty of people that were against his teachings. And in all these reports against him, not one states how mad they were because of his heavenly Jesus concept. You cannot use any other source because its not vague enough to pervert. Carrier and Doherty have you brainwashed using extreme criticism applied one way.

His debating skills are limited.

There is plenty against his theology and teachings, but not for the this part.