Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

No, the subject line is not a joke.

The problem for the myriad mythicist positions & theories is that the NT, and in general the apostolic fathers and ante-Nicene fathers, are overwhelmingly consistent and on message in describing the Christian religion. Of course there are a multitude of contradictions, in much the same way that any two ancient NT manuscripts differ in thousands of ways yet are nonetheless in overwhelming agreement.

The problem for the mythicists, and I logically gravitate to the mythicist viewpoint in one way or another, is that despite the bumbling ancients allegedly borrowing from Jewish, Greek, pagan and God-knows-what-other mythology, completely independent of any true historical figure, over the course of a hundred years or so they've managed to cobble together an extremely extensive, ancient, and internally consistent testament to the key historical and eschatological messages they seek to present as core tents of the faith.

wow, great use of "tents" like for "big tent harmony" instead of 'tenet". ("tenants" might portray the unity in diversity as well)

gmx wrote:an extremely extensive, ancient, and internally consistent testament to the key historical and eschatological messages they seek to present as core tents of the faith.

forgive me if maybe I am too partial about Marcion (likely the risk is that I go off topic threfore excuse me in advance), but what do you mean by 'internally consistent'?

If I read about a simple phrase of the Epistles or of the Gospels where the suspicion is raised that the enemy of Jesus is the same god of the Jews, how can we say that the New Testament is ''internally consistent'' when we can not even remove the doubt that some passages of it did sound originally (gnostic) dualistic and not monotheistic?

I recognize that you would be right about your discourse of 'internally consistent' if and only if *at least* that doubt is removed, but, alas... ...I don't believe.

It cannot be a mere coincidence that, independently one from other, two different scholars, an auto-didact as Roger Parvus sees the original author of the epistles as a proto-gnostic and a scholar as prof Vinzent sees Marcion's gospel as the first...

gmx wrote:No, the subject line is not a joke.

The problem for the myriad mythicist positions & theories is that the NT, and in general the apostolic fathers and ante-Nicene fathers, are overwhelmingly consistent and on message in describing the Christian religion. Of course there are a multitude of contradictions, in much the same way that any two ancient NT manuscripts differ in thousands of ways yet are nonetheless in overwhelming agreement.

The problem for the mythicists, and I logically gravitate to the mythicist viewpoint in one way or another, is that despite the bumbling ancients allegedly borrowing from Jewish, Greek, pagan and God-knows-what-other mythology, completely independent of any true historical figure, over the course of a hundred years or so they've managed to cobble together an extremely extensive, ancient, and internally consistent testament to the key historical and eschatological messages they seek to present as core tents of the faith.

Consistency is often manufactured . Religions are usually sold as the eternal unchangeable revelation of God; the war on heresy typical of many religions is founded on this belief, which admits no variation from the-one-revealed -truth.


How much could any religion change while remaining true to the revealed message?. This is one way of doing it.


Church votes in favour (16 May, 2015)
The Church of Scotland has voted in favour of allowing people in same sex civil partnerships to be called as ministers and deacons. The historic decision was made by the General Assembly on the Mound in Edinburgh today, where the motion was passed by 309 votes in favour and 182 against.

http://www.churchofscotland.org.uk/news ... rtnerships

gmx wrote:The problem for the myriad mythicist positions & theories is that the NT, and in general the apostolic fathers and ante-Nicene fathers, are overwhelmingly consistent

Some questions here:

1) Are they "overwhelmingly" consistent?

2) What role does the canonization process (for both the NT and fathers) have to play in the verisimilitude of "consistency" among these writings?

3) What role does textual alteration have to play?

4) More to the point, whom are you excluding from this claim to consistency (starts with a "g"?) -- and (to be a little assertive here) why is that inappropriate in the context of this kind of argument?

5) Why would we assume that 'consistency' is an indicator or 'predictive'? Has this assumption been rigorously checked against comparable cases?

(Answer key: 1 - nope, 2 - a lot, 3 - a bit, 4 - isn't it obvious, 5 - hell if I know, probably not.)

Peter Kirby wrote:

gmx wrote:The problem for the myriad mythicist positions & theories is that the NT, and in general the apostolic fathers and ante-Nicene fathers, are overwhelmingly consistent

Some questions here:

1) Are they "overwhelmingly" consistent?

2) What role does the canonization process (for both the NT and fathers) have to play in the verisimilitude of "consistency" among these writings?

3) What role does textual alteration have to play?

4) More to the point, whom are you excluding from this claim to consistency (starts with a "g"?) -- and (to be a little assertive here) why is that inappropriate in the context of this kind of argument?

5) Why would we assume that 'consistency' is an indicator or 'predictive'? Has this assumption been rigorously checked against comparable cases?

(Answer key: 1 - nope, 2 - a lot, 3 - a bit, 4 - isn't it obvious, 5 - hell if I know, probably not.)

Well those are definitely questions. My point is that they are questions, not proofs -- you have to be able to prove that your (or any critic's) bias is less vociferous than the Christian establishment. You say "verisimilitude of consistency", they say "refutation of heresy". Why are you more correct? That's not a barb... to me it's the reality of the challenge that the mythicist faces. You can't just assert to be correct. That's what the Christian establishment does.

The fact that on any given day, any genuine Christian initiate can flick to any page of the NT and make sense of it in the context of their general understanding of Christian dogma, is no mean feat. That's a set of documentation that's ~1800 years old. I think it speaks strongly to dogmatic consistency. The Church says they received that documentation from Christ via apostolic witness and succession. Adherents attesting to that assertion are evidenced in very ancient non-canonical documentation.

The (paraphased) charge that "they destroyed or prevented the propagation of anything that disagreed with the orthodox position" is impossible for the Church to defend against. How can the Christian establishment prove they didn't do that? Or to what extent they did it? These are things that (allegedly) no longer exist. Countless documents failed to survive to modernity, many with no obvious motive for having been suppressed, such as the Didache (lost for many centuries).

Monarchianism, sometimes called Monarchism, is a (now heretical) theological movement that arose within the second and third century Church. It consists of a set of beliefs that emphasize God as being one, that God is the single and only ruler.

This emphasis conflicted with the doctrine of the Trinity, of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Models of resolving the tension between the two principles in favour of God's oneness were proposed in the 2nd century but rejected as heretical by the Church.
Monarchianism in and of itself is not a complete theory of the relation of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but a simple tenet that requires further extension.

There are basically two contradicting models of Monarchianism :

Modalism considers God to be one person appearing and working in the different "modes" of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The chief proponent of Modalism was Sabellius, hence the view is also called Sabellianism. It has also been labeled Patripassianism by its opponents because it purports that God the Father suffered on the cross.

Adoptionism holds that God is one being, above all else and wholly indivisible and of one nature, it reconciles the "problem" of the Trinity (or at least Jesus) by holding that the Son was not co-eternal with the Father, and that Jesus essentially was granted deity-hood (adopted) for the plans of God and his own perfect life and works. Different flavors of Adoptionism hold that Jesus was "adopted" either at the time of his baptism, or ascension. An early exponent of this belief was Theodotus of Byzantium.

What a pity that Jesus never explained these détails...

Arianism is a nontrinitarian belief that asserts that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, created by God the Father, distinct from the Father and therefore subordinate to the Father.

Arian teachings were first attributed to Arius (c. AD 250–336), a Christian presbyter in Alexandria, Egypt. The teachings are opposed to mainstream Christian teachings on the nature of the Trinity and on the nature of Christ.

The Arian concept of Christ is that the Son of God did not always exist, but was created by God the Father. This belief is based on an interpretation of a verse in the Gospel of John (14:28): "You heard me say, 'I am going away, and I am coming back to you.' If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I."

De Hæretico Comburendo (1401)


Text : Statutes of the Realm, 2:12S-28: 2 Henry IV

http://www.ric.edu/faculty/rpotter/heretico.html

...and that this wicked sect, preachings, doctrines, and opinions, should from henceforth cease and he utterly destroyed... after such sentence promulgate shall receive, and them before the people in an high place cause to be burnt, that such punishment may strike fear into the minds of others, whereby,nosuch wicked doctrine and heretical and erroneous opinions, nor their authors and fautors, in the said realm and dominions, against the Catholic faith, Christian law, and determination of the holy church, which God prohibit, be sustained or in any way suffered...

A brief summary:

The De heretico comburendo (2 Hen.4 c.15) was a law passed by Parliament under King Henry IV of England in 1401, punishing heretics with burning at the stake. This law was one of the strictest religious censorship statutes ever enacted in England
...


And if any person...such books in the form aforesaid do not deliver, then the diocesan of the same place in his diocese such person or persons in this behalf defamed or evidently suspected and every of them may by the authority of the said ordinance and statute cause to be arrested...". If they failed to abjure their heretical beliefs, or relapsed after an initial abjuration, they would "...be burnt, that such punishment may strike fear into the minds of others...".[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_heretico_comburendo

gmx wrote:

Peter Kirby wrote:

gmx wrote:The problem for the myriad mythicist positions & theories is that the NT, and in general the apostolic fathers and ante-Nicene fathers, are overwhelmingly consistent

Some questions here:

1) Are they "overwhelmingly" consistent?

2) What role does the canonization process (for both the NT and fathers) have to play in the verisimilitude of "consistency" among these writings?

3) What role does textual alteration have to play?

4) More to the point, whom are you excluding from this claim to consistency (starts with a "g"?) -- and (to be a little assertive here) why is that inappropriate in the context of this kind of argument?

5) Why would we assume that 'consistency' is an indicator or 'predictive'? Has this assumption been rigorously checked against comparable cases?

(Answer key: 1 - nope, 2 - a lot, 3 - a bit, 4 - isn't it obvious, 5 - hell if I know, probably not.)

Well those are definitely questions. My point is that they are questions, not proofs -- you have to be able to prove that your (or any critic's) bias is less vociferous than the Christian establishment. You say "verisimilitude of consistency", they say "refutation of heresy". Why are you more correct? That's not a barb... to me it's the reality of the challenge that the mythicist faces. You can't just assert to be correct. That's what the Christian establishment does.

The fact that on any given day, any genuine Christian initiate can flick to any page of the NT and make sense of it in the context of their general understanding of Christian dogma, is no mean feat. That's a set of documentation that's ~1800 years old. I think it speaks strongly to dogmatic consistency. The Church says they received that documentation from Christ via apostolic witness and succession. Adherents attesting to that assertion are evidenced in very ancient non-canonical documentation.

The (paraphased) charge that "they destroyed or prevented the propagation of anything that disagreed with the orthodox position" is impossible for the Church to defend against. How can the Christian establishment prove they didn't do that? Or to what extent they did it? These are things that (allegedly) no longer exist. Countless documents failed to survive to modernity, many with no obvious motive for having been suppressed, such as the Didache (lost for many centuries).

This reply shows plenty of confusion over how an argument is constructed. It also contains red herrings and other informal fallacies.

The argument the OP presents can be simply represented as:

If writings x are consistent then there is historical truth to writings x.
Writings x are consistent.
Therefore...

So far the first, major premise has received no support whatsoever. You've offered absolutely no reason for thinking that it is true.

You have said a little more about the second, minor premise, yet you've also failed to do something so simple as to define your terms. What exactly do you mean by consistent? A definition that is the same for both premises is required to evaluate the argument.

Please drop the emotive appeals and focus on the structure and soundness of the argument. You are also, of course, free to formulate the argument as you see fit. You may, for example, wish to frame it in probabilistic terms.

(For what it's worth this argument appears to be worthless, with both premises being false under the meaning of the word consistent as I understand it, but as a reasonable fellow I am offering you enough benefit of the doubt to give you the opportunity to clarify and justify your argument.)

(Also a rational Christian or atheist or whatever should be able to identify unsound arguments, regardless of their opinion of the truth value of the conclusion. I would appreciate it if we could avoid unnecessary rhetoric regarding bias. Obviously one "can't just assert to be correct." I'm disappointed if that is what you've interpreted my posts as doing, especially because I'm not even a "mythicist.")