Given that the thread has been inundated with pages of meaningless stuff from MrMacSon (and equally meaningless sniping from Secret Alias), allow me to restate Carrier's argument (as presented in that blog post) and the criticism of it.
Or when we look for evidence that the Jewish scholar Philo understood a character named Jesus in Zechariah 6 to be the same archangel Paul thinks his Jesus is, by noting that the alternative explanation requires so many coincidences to have occurred as to be extraordinarily improbable (On the Historicity of Jesus, pp. 200-05), including the fact that Paul and Philo assign all the same unusual attributes to the same figure, and the fact that Philo said he made the connection because the archangel in question was already known to him as the Son of God and the High Priest, and the only person in Zechariah passage he quotes who is identified as the Son of God and the High Priest, is Jesus.
When Carrier refers to:
the fact that Paul and Philo assign all the same unusual attributes to the same figure
Pretty much anyone (other than some hardcore conservative Christians, perhaps) would already be fully aware that Paul and Philo are both first century Jews and are both drawing on a rich tradition of Hellenistic philosophy and Jewish thought around the turn of the era. Both authors held beliefs about an intermediary figure, whatever it is named. Both were informed by a shared cultural and religious background.
These "coincidences" do not necessitate Carrier's particular explanation of them.
Carrier's argument (apparently) for his
particular belief here is this (from the quote above):
Philo said he made the connection because the archangel in question was already known to him as the Son of God and the High Priest, and the only person in Zechariah passage he quotes who is identified as the Son of God and the High Priest, is Jesus.
The premises and conclusion:
1) Philo said that he identified a figure in Zechariah 6 as the archangel Logos because the Logos was the Son of God and the High Priest.
2) The Zechariah 6 passage quoted identifies Jesus as the Son of God and the High Priest.
3) Therefore, Philo understood a character named Jesus in Zechariah 6 to be the same as the archangel Logos.
Regarding the first premise:
Does Philo say why he identifies the figure in Zechariah 6 as the archangel Logos? And, if so, what is the reason given? Here is the passage.
http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/text ... ook15.html
But those who conspired to commit injustice, he says, "having come from the east, found a plain in the land of Shinar, and dwelt There;"{16}{#ge 11:2.} speaking most strictly in accordance with nature. For there is a twofold kind of dawning in the soul, the one of a better sort, the other of a worse. That is the better sort, when the light of the virtues shines forth like the beams of the sun; and that is the worse kind, when they are overshadowed, and the vices show forth. (61) Now, the following is an example of the former kind: "And God planted a paradise in Eden, toward the East,"{17}{#ge 2:8.} not of terrestrial but of celestial plants, which the planter caused to spring up from the incorporeal light which exists around him, in such a way as to be for ever inextinguishable.
(62) I have also heard of one of the companions of Moses having uttered such a speech as this: "Behold, a man whose name is the East!"{18}{#zec 6:12.} A very novel appellation indeed, if you consider it as spoken of a man who is compounded of body and soul; but if you look upon it as applied to that incorporeal being who in no respect differs from the divine image, you will then agree that the name of the east has been given to him with great felicity. (63) For the Father of the universe has caused him to spring up as the eldest son, whom, in another passage, he calls the firstborn; and he who is thus born, imitating the ways of his father, has formed such and such species, looking to his archetypal patterns.
This premise is simply incorrect. If you look at the passage itself, you could easily find out why Philo says that he identified this figure as being the same as the Logos (if anything is said by Philo in this regard). Again:
A very novel appellation indeed, if you consider it as spoken of a man who is compounded of body and soul; but if you look upon it as applied to that incorporeal being who in no respect differs from the divine image, you will then agree that the name of the east has been given to him with great felicity.
Philo says that the
name "East" (or "Rising") is
inappropriate for a man, made of both body and soul, and appropriate for an incorporeal being, such as the Logos is. That's what Philo says in this quote from Zechariah 6:12.
Nothing like Carrier's "Philo said that he identified a figure in Zechariah 6 as the archangel Logos because the Logos was the Son of God and the High Priest" is actually said by Philo. Either you might argue that Philo doesn't give his reasons for making the identification explicitly in his text, or you'd have to argue that the reasons given are not those that Carrier describes. Either way, the premise is wrong.
Regarding the second premise:
Joshua son of Jozadak is the high priest at the time. He is not exactly "
the" High Priest (so much as one in a long line of high priests on earth) and not "the Son of God." The equivalence drawn with the attributes of the Logos is false.
Regarding the conclusion:
Not only are the premises false, but the conclusion also plainly contradicts what Philo says.
"...Philo understood a character named Jesus in Zechariah 6 to be the same archangel..."
Jesus in Zechariah 6 is "a man who is compounded of body and soul," while the archangel is not. By Philo's own reasoning for identifying "East" as referring to the intermediary archangel that is the Logos, the Logos is also
not Jesus.
This makes sense, of course, because the text of Zechariah itself also does not identify the high priest Joshua with the expected future messianic figure of 'the man named Branch' (Hebrew) / 'East' (Septuagint).
Neither Philo nor the author of Zechariah makes the identification that Carrier does.