You see Bernard and I don't agree on much but in this case everyone in the forum is on the same side against Carrier because he has developed a terrible argument which has very little going for it (other than a general 'sense' that there is some common cultural touchstone). But these things were already evident from John's use of the Logos in his prologue. These points are all valid:
1) "from his place below" is not in the Greek.
2) "the son of Jehovah the righteous" is not in the Greek.
3) Carrier omitted the ending of Zec 6:13 (but pretended to quote the whole verse, showing the one upon his throne is not a priest (such as Jesus, son of Josedec)).
But this is just the starting point. Any one who bothers to read Philo knows at once that Philo doesn't say anything close to what Carrier is suggesting anywhere in his known writings, so why should anyone believe Carrier? He's not an authority on Philo and hasn't demonstrated that he spent the time to understand what Philo thought about this Logos figure.
Indeed YOU haven't demonstrated that you've given much thought to Philo or what he wrote, how he thought yet you are utterly convinced that Carrier is 'right' here. The argument here goes beyond (a) what Philo said (b) how LXX Zechariah was rendered. This isn't what has convinced you to march with the Carrier mythicist banner. You and Carrier seem only to 'like' this theory because of its implications on atheist cultural activism - i.e. that 'evidence' has 'finally' been found that Jesus was 'really' an angel known to Jews. As such you only seem to believe this argument because you think it advances 'mythicism' not because of (a) or (b). In reality however it makes mythicists look no less subjective in their treatment of Biblical texts than religious apologists.
Last edited by Secret Alias on Mon Dec 14, 2015 10:14 am, edited 3 times in total.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Giuseppe wrote:
I would like you [to] read these words:
First, the Talmud ... explicitly says the suffering servant who dies in Isaiah 53 is the messiah (and that this messiah will endure great suffering before his death). The Talmud likewise has a dying-and-rising 'Christ son of Joseph' ideology in it, even saying (quoting Zech. 12.10) that this messiah will be 'pierced' to death. Modern scholars are too quick to dismiss this text as late (dating as it does from the fourth to sixth century), since the doctrine it describes is unlikely to be. For only when Jews had no idea what Christians would do with this connection would they themselves have promoted it. There is no plausible way later Jews would invent interpretations of their scripture that supported and vindicated Christians. They would not invent a Christ with a father named Joseph who dies and is resurrected (as the Talmud does indeed describe). They would not proclaim Isaiah 53 to be about this messiah and admit that Isaiah had there predicted this messiah would die and be resurrected. That was the very biblical passage Christians were using to prove their case.
Moreover, the presentation of this ideology in the Talmud makes no mention of Christianity and gives no evidence of being any kind of polemic or response to it. So we have evidence here of a Jewish belief that possibly predates Christian evangelizing, even if that evidence survives only in later sources.
The alternative is to assume a rather unbelievable coincidence: that Christians and Jews, completely independently of each other, just happened at some point to see Isaiah 53 as messianic and from that same passage preach an ideology of a messiah with a father named Joseph (literally or symbolically), who endures great suffering, dies and is resurrected (in accord with the savior depicted in Isaiah 53, as by then understood). Such an amazing coincidence is simply improbable. But a causal connection is not: if this was a pre-Christian ideology that influenced (and thus caused) both the Christian and the Jewish ideologies, then we have only one element to explain (the rise of this idea once, being adapted in different ways), instead of having to believe the same idea arose twice, purely coincidentally.
Two improbable events by definition are many times less likely than one. That means the invented-once theory is many times more likely than the invented-twice one. Conversely, if we choose instead to fall on this sword of improbability and insist, against all likelihood, that yes, the same ideas arose twice independently of each other within Judaism, then this entails the idea was very easy for Jews to arrive at (since rabbinical Jews, independently of Christians, clearly arrived at it), which then entails it was not an improbable development in the first place. And thus neither will it
have been improbable for Christians (or their sectarian predecessors among the Jews), any more than it was for Talmudic Jews. Clearly dying messiahs were not anathema. Rabbinical Jews could be just as comfortable with the idea as Christians were (more on this point in Chapter 1 2, §4).
In this article http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/4617121 ... eptTC=true
the author does a case that Zech 6:12 did refer originally to Zorobabel as the man hailed Ἀνατολὴ, but then Zorobabel was replaced by Joshua as the man hailed Ἀνατολὴ.
Kunigunde Kreuzerin says that these identifications were made after Philo but I have shown in my previous post that:
1) no Talmudic Jew had an interest in emphasizing the identity Joshua son of Josedec = man hailed Ἀνατολὴ because this would amount to confirm the truth of the Christian religion (that Jesus of Nazaret is the Messiah foretold in the scriptures)... 2) yet it is a fact that a post-Philo Jew has replaced Zerubbabel with Joshua (per the author of that article). 3)the simplest explanation for this apparent contradiction is that before Philo there was already a reading of Zeccaria 6:12 alluding to Jesus son of Josedek as the Tsemach.
I hope the Carrier's critics will confute this my strong argument. Otherwise they are only fool Christian apologists.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Why does any of this matter? These arguments and citations are becoming increasingly tangential. The question that Carrier opened had to do with Philo's interpretation of Zechariah. The further we get away from this the weaker any of these supporting arguments become. Carrier began with an incredibly weak argument even from its premise - i.e. can anyone 'know' with any degree of certainty how someone interpreted a text in antiquity beyond what is recorded or preserved in their known writings? But even in this case the limitations of LXX Zechariah would seem to work against Carrier's thesis (i.e. it is not possible or at least there is no reason to think that Philo would have gone against the plain meaning of the
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Who has "repeatedly acknowledged" that 'the LXX of Zechariah 6 does NOT to allow for Jesus the high priest to be the Anatole' ??
Because it has been demonstrated by an appeal to evidence by other members of the forum and you've just acted as if this evidence doesn't exist. Do you have a problem reading? Do you have a problem hearing? I don't understand how it is you can pretend that this evidence hasn't been laid out before you.
What evidence? Lay it out and argue for it: don't just "appeal to evidence".
I have seen it. As I alluded to, there is enough indications that people (Carrier v his detractors) are arguing from using different texts.
it is about how Philo philosophized over it and other theological passages & concepts.
But where is the evidence that Philo did this with the text from Zechariah? This is what we mean by repeated argument by assertion. There simply is no evidence that Philo did what Carrier suggests with Zechariah and what's more it goes against the plain meaning of the text so what Carrier is suggesting is an unlikely - if not a dubious - assertion. Why don't you get this?
FFS - Carrier has laid out quite full reasoning: address Carrier's arguments rather than bitching at me.
What evidence? Lay it out and argue for it: don't just "appeal to evidence".
We've gone over this time and time again. You've laid out a thesis and then refused to defend it.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias wrote:
... Any one who bothers to read Philo knows at once that Philo doesn't say anything close to what Carrier is suggesting anywhere in his known writings, so why should anyone believe Carrier? He's not an authority on Philo and hasn't demonstrated that he spent the time to understand what Philo thought about this Logos figure.
Indeed YOU haven't demonstrated that you've given much thought to Philo or what he wrote, how he thought yet you are utterly convinced that Carrier is 'right' here. The argument here goes beyond (a) what Philo said (b) how LXX Zechariah was rendered. This isn't what has convinced you to march with the Carrier mythicist banner. You and Carrier seem only to 'like' this theory because of its implications on atheist cultural activism - i.e. that 'evidence' has 'finally' been found that Jesus was 'really' an angel known to Jews. As such you only seem to believe this argument because you think it advances 'mythicism' not because of (a) or (b). In reality however it makes mythicists look no less subjective in their treatment of Biblical texts than religious apologists.
Bernard has just listed three problems with the translation made by Carrier. You've just ignored these objections but they are serious objections. This has nothing to do with people using 'different translations' but problems inherent in Carrier's citation of material from the LXX and a lack of supporting argumentation to show that Philo used Zechariah the way Carrier claims. Carrier has not shown in any way or form that Philo knew anything about a 'Jesus angel' from Zechariah or otherwise. That is all that matters here. You can try to draw us into your rabbit holes of distraction from that main difficulty but it is an extremely serious difficulty. Carrier has not brought any actual evidence to support his assertions. He's just created a bad English translation of Zechariah to make it seem there is evidence that Philo 'could' have thought this or that. But nothing in the way of the most critical piece of evidence - the writings of Philo. This is an even more serious
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
