For Kapyong: Defending a historical Jesus

[GDon]

Defending a historical Jesus

This is a continuation from another thread here: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=313197&page=11

I've titled this "For Kapyong", but anyone can jump in at any time. This thread is for me to defend my claim that the evidence is strong to support the idea of a historical Jesus.

Gday GDon and all

GMark and Paul writing about the same person, ...
We have those two texts. We have them apparently writing about the same person as a person who actually lived.

Sorry GDon, I do not think you have shown that at all.

Because, I don't think you have answered my challenge to your view -

• Althought Paul apparently considered Jesus to be a Jewish man who lived, he never claimed Jesus lived on EARTH.

Paul believed in a REAL, LIVING, MAN Jesus, yes, I so stipulate

It appears you just assume that real, and living, and born of woman, meant so on Earth, when Paul does not give any earthly place, date, or name.

I think it is more reasonable to argue Paul meant the crucifixion happened in heaven, considering all the heavenly terms an phrases he uses about Jesus Christ.

Can you show why we should interpret Paul to mean an EARTHLY Jesus Christ ?

Yes, it is a good question. If Paul supports an earthly Jesus, then IMO that puts the evidence quite clearly into HJ territory. One issue confusing this is that Paul definitely places Jesus in heaven AFTER the crucifixion. But what about beforehand?

Paul doesn't place Jesus on earth. But he uses language about Jesus that indicates that Jesus was a man, including calling him a 'man' ('anthropos').

Compare the language Paul uses about himself: In Romans 11:1

I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, [of] the tribe of Benjamin.​

Paul also calls Jesus 'seed of Abraham' (Gal 3:16) as well as 'seed of David'.

Also, Romans 9:

3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh,
4 who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises;
5 of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came​

This places Jesus at the end of a line of earlier Israelites, with those earlier Israelites presumably being people on earth.

The issue that needs to be highlighted here is one that confronts us numerous times in trying to reconstruct a historical Jesus: in the absence of a clear-cut statement from Paul indicating that Jesus was on earth, what can we decide? Is it:
(a) we can't make any evaluation?
(b) we can make some evaluation?

Here I think we can make some evaluation: in the absence of a clear-cut statement from Paul indicating that Jesus was on earth, we can look at the other writings on the time to determine what the ancient people made of such statements.

Here I can only conclude that (IMHO) Paul thought that Jesus was on earth, because he is using language consistent with that idea. Paul uses "my countrymen according to the flesh" for himself, and Jesus coming from the fathers of the Israelites "according to the flesh". Paul is a "seed of Abraham", and Jesus is also a "seed of Abraham".

And that is the mythicist challenge: to show that Paul could use such language but mean that Jesus was never on earth. And to show this, I mean by providing evidence that such language could be used in that way. I've looked at the cases provided by Dr Carrier and Doherty, and they do not have that evidence. Carrier comes closest with his "cosmic sperm bank", but even his examples are medieval and frankly incorrect.

Kapyong, what do you make of Romans 9? Can you show that such language was used to indicate men who were not born on earth?

 

[GDon]

I'll add this from the other thread as well, since it makes up my 'bare bones' case for a historical Jesus:

If there was a historical Jesus, we can't really know much about him, to the point that he may as well have not existed. All we have are the agreements between Paul and GMark. Given what we think we know about them, that is enough IMO to establish with high confidence the historicity of a Jewish man later known as Jesus Christ, Son of God, seed of David, who was crucified in the first half of the First Century, but not much more beyond that.

GMark and Paul are writing about the same person, and writing within a short time frame after that person apparently lived, with both texts apparently being treated as presenting that person as real, and the audience by all accounts treating those texts in that way.

So we have those two texts. We have them apparently writing about the same person as a person who actually lived. What best explains this? In my view, the best explanation is that that person really existed. It is by far the best explanation that is out there, in my non-expert amateur opinion. Of course, people have posited a whole range of views on what the texts are, when they were written, etc, and fair enough too. But none of those explanations seem to provide as strong a case.

You could argue that neither Paul and the author of GMark met Jesus. Fair enough. You could argue we don't FOR SURE when the items were written and by whom. Fair enough. But at the end of the day you still have those two texts, with trying to find an explanation about what best explains why they exist. That's the question. I'll go back to the Internet Infidel article by Lowder on the Secular Web: http://infidels.org/library/modern/jeff_lowder/indconf.html

... independent confirmation is not necessary to establish the mere existence of the Jesus of the New Testament. There simply is nothing epistemically improbable about the mere existence of a man named Jesus. (Just because Jesus existed does not mean that he was born of a virgin, that he rose from the dead, etc.) Although a discussion of the New Testament evidence is beyond the scope of this paper, I think that the New Testament does provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus. It is clear, then, that if we are going to apply to the New Testament "the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material,"[19] we should not require independent confirmation of the New Testament's claim that Jesus existed.​

Paul and GMark do indeed provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus. I don't see how that can be denied. A mythicist case may overthrow that prima facie conclusion, but I just haven't seen one that does. In the absence of such a case, the 'bare bones' historicist argument wins AFAICS.

 

[Kapyong]

Gday GDon

Just quickly - may I politely ask if you could change the title to remove my name please ?

Everyone is equal here, I don't need to be in the title.

Otherwise, I'm brewing the coffee and stoking up the fires ...


Kapyong

 

[GDon]

Hi Kapyong. No worries, but I'm not sure how I do that. I'll send a note to the moderators to change it.

 

[Mcreal]

If there was a historical Jesus, we can't really know much about him, to the point that he may as well have not existed.

I'll go back to the Internet Infidel article by Lowder on the Secular Web: http://infidels.org/library/modern/jeff_lowder/indconf.html

independent confirmation is not necessary to establish the mere existence of the Jesus of the New Testament.

Paul and GMark do indeed provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus. I don't see how that can be denied.

To say overlapping stories about what is essentially a character in those stories (especially a revered theological character) is all the evidence one needs for that character, without other independent confirmation, such as non-biblical information, is largely wishful thinking & special pleading.

One may as well say the series of Harry Potter movies, starting with Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Harry Potter; or that the Titanic movie proves the historicity of the main characters, Rose DeWitt Bukater (Winslet's) and Jack Dawson (DiCaprio's).

This, by Lowder,

It is clear, then, that if we are going to apply to the New Testament "the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material,"[19] we should not require independent confirmation of the New Testament's claim that Jesus existed.

is disingenuous as we do seek to apply other criteria to determining the veracity of historical information about people or events.

A mythicist case may overthrow that prima facie conclusion, but I just haven't seen one that does.

There is increasingly nuanced discussion around the data that comprises early Christianity, not just discussions on internet forums such as this, & beyond the wide-ranging efforts of AcharyaS and her followers, and beyond overly narrow focus on Earl Doherty's & Richard Carrier's concept of crucifixion of a celestial being in outer space. Carrier has added the notion of anthropomorphization to the concepts, and there is increasing reflection on the relationship of the NT texts to pseudepigraphical and other non-canonical texts.

Investigations into when & how the ancients talked about the nature or substance of Jesus are likely to give us more clues about the development of the NT stories.

 

[Craig B]

One may as well say the series of Harry Potter movies, starting with Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Harry Potter; or that the Titanic movie proves the historicity of the main characters, Rose DeWitt Bukater (Winslet's) and Jack Dawson (DiCaprio's).

I have no idea what you are on about. Paul and gMark are not a series of movies about an admittedly fictitious person. Or if you think they are, please tell us why.

... we do seek to apply other criteria to determining the veracity of historical information about people or events.

Again, I don't understand what you mean. Can you expand on this?

Investigations into when & how the ancients talked about the nature or substance of Jesus are likely to give us more clues about the development of the NT stories.

For that to be true, there must be an abundance of ancient sources discussing the nature and substance of Jesus, but I have been sharply told that there is no trace of him in the record. Can you enlighten me in this matter?

 

[GDon]

One may as well say the series of Harry Potter movies, starting with Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Harry Potter; or that the Titanic movie proves the historicity of the main characters, Rose DeWitt Bukater (Winslet's) and Jack Dawson (DiCaprio's).

Except that we know that those stories are fiction, or presented as fiction. From what we know, the stories in Paul and GMark are presented as fact, and received as fact, at least as far as the idea of Jesus as an actual man. So a decision has to be made. Based on the evidence that we have, I can't see it going anywhere other than that the authors of Paul and GMark thought that Jesus was an actual man.

There is increasingly nuanced discussion around the data that comprises early Christianity, not just discussions on internet forums such as this, & beyond the wide-ranging efforts of AcharyaS and her followers, and beyond overly narrow focus on Earl Doherty's & Richard Carrier's concept of crucifixion of a celestial being in outer space. Carrier has added the notion of anthropomorphization to the concepts, and there is increasing reflection on the relationship of the NT texts to pseudepigraphical and other non-canonical texts.

Investigations into when & how the ancients talked about the nature or substance of Jesus are likely to give us more clues about the development of the NT stories.

I would differentiate "the development of the NT stories" with the origin of those stories. I'm not saying that Paul and GMark provide evidence that Jesus was the Son of God, etc, just for him being a man who lived in the author's near past.

 

[Kapyong]

GDay GDon

( See Thor 2 ? That looks much better than G'day GDon )

Paul doesn't place Jesus on earth. But he uses language about Jesus that indicates that Jesus was a man, including calling him a 'man' ('anthropos'). ...
Paul also calls Jesus 'seed of Abraham' (Gal 3:16) as well as 'seed of David'.

Yes, I agree that Paul saw Jesus Christ as :

• a man
• a Jewish man
• the Sperm of David
• the Sperm of Abraham

But consider the comparand Enoch.

A real Jewish man, all of the above, but not a physical man - rather a heavenly man (presumably with a new heavenly body) although he started on Earth.

I just do not agree that a listener of Paul would assume that a 'man' who was also the son of God, who was crucified for our salvation etc., necessarily meant a physical man on Earth.

BTW: Enoch clearly started on Earth, but is now in Heaven. You agree that (Paul thought) Jesus Christ was now in heaven, but suggest that before the resurrection/ascension he was on Earth. Where does Paul give any clear description of a change of location ? From Earth to Heaven ?

Furthermore - I think we have to address your obvious bias on this issue

Paul went OOB, he rose to Pi3H, he met a supernatural being, he learned divine secrets. Have you done that GDon ? Do you believe such things are genuine ? (I suggest we avoid that slippery word 'real'.)

My point being that your view (like everyone else's) on Paul's view is skewed by the big difference in our society's views on heavenly beings. Paul's listeners were clearly far more likely to consider and accept a heavenly being, because they actually believed in such things.

Of course, that leads to the interesting question :
If I personally claimed to have risen to Paradise in the Third Heaven and met heavenly beings - would that make me more or less credible ?
Funny how things change - it sounds like Paul's own claim to fame.


Kapyong
P.S. Of course I make no such claim.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Just a reminder:

It is fundamentally dishonest to pretend that evidence of the existence of a meat Jesus (or one or more meat Jesuses) can be used to bootstrap claims about the Fairy Jesus.

 

[Craig B]

Yes, I agree that Paul saw Jesus Christ as :

• a man
• a Jewish man
• the Sperm of David
• the Sperm of Abraham[/rth.
  
  I just do not agree that a listener of Paul would assume that a 'man' who was also the son of God, who was crucified for our salvation etc., necessarily meant a physical man on Earth.

• Paul in fact refers to Jesus as "Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; 4 and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead." So he was a physical human descendant of David, and became a Son of God through the process of resurrection. That indeed necessarily means a physical man on Earth.
  
  Your "the Sperm of David" is a bizarre and truncated version of the statement in Romans 1.

 

[Kapyong]

GDay GDon

Also, Romans 9:

3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh,
4 who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises;
5 of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came​

This places Jesus at the end of a line of earlier Israelites, with those earlier Israelites presumably being people on earth.

Indeed.
You have put your finger on the central hole in my theory - the references to 'according to the flesh'. I have abandoned my argument that it was about the 'fleshly' Air B.the Moon, which leaves the 'flesh' as an apparently clear reference to Jesus Christ being physical and historical - destroying my argument in one fell swoop.

I don't see it that way
Because Paul's use of the term kata sarka (after the flesh) is so odd, similarly odd to the way he talks about Jesus Christ :

Cor. 5:16 "Therefore we know no one after the flesh from now on. Even though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now we know him so no more."​

We no longer know anyone kata sarka ?
We used to know Christ kata sarka, but not any more ?

How can that possibly be a reference to physicality ?
Paul never knew Jesus physically, and he must still know people physically.

Paul is filled with metaphors :

Gal. 2:20 "I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I that live, but Christ living in me. That life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself up for me. "​

There are many signs that Paul is not talking in literal and historical terms. Occam's Razor says there is no need for a Historical Jesus.

But how can Jesus be 'after the flesh', without being historical ?

By being 'in' Paul, and other Christians. Or some other metaphorical view that connects Jesus Christ with his physical believers. Now - I have no argument for such a specific metaphorical view, but nor do I need a specific argument, to show that a historical Jesus Christ is not the only possible interpretation - especially in light of Paul's frequent use of heavenly terms and concepts, and references which can only be metaphorical.


Kapyong
(The Razor is the argument-de-jour, everyone wants to use it, so I plan to use it as often as possible )

 

[Kapyong]

GDay GDon

And that is the mythicist challenge: to show that Paul could use such language but mean that Jesus was never on earth. And to show this, I mean by providing evidence that such language could be used in that way. I've looked at the cases provided by Dr Carrier and Doherty, and they do not have that evidence. Carrier comes closest with his "cosmic sperm bank", but even his examples are medieval and frankly incorrect.

On the specific case of 'Seed of David' and 'Seed of Abraham', all I have to say at this point is that : 1) I do not agree that it must mean a physical historical person, 2) Paul's frequent and obvious use of metaphorical language clearly allows for a non-literal and/or metaphorical interpretation.

What is your explanation for Paul previously knowing Jesus Christ kata sarka, but no longer ?

Kapyong, what do you make of Romans 9? Can you show that such language was used to indicate men who were not born on earth?

1I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit—2that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.​

Speaking the truth in Christ, nothing historical.

3For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh. 4They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.​

Cut off from Christ ?

5To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.​

Well, I suppose that could mean Christ was born as a historical man. But a God over all ? It seems more likely to be a metaphorical point.

Perhaps you could be more specific ?


Kapyong

 

[Kapyong]

GDay GDon

GMark and Paul are writing about the same person,

G.Mark likely uses the names found in Paul as its central characters.

and writing within a short time frame after that person apparently lived,

Not Paul. There is no evidence of any time-frame.

with both texts apparently being treated as presenting that person as real, and the audience by all accounts treating those texts in that way.

Really ? That word 'real' is real useless here. God is real. The Risen Christ is real. Hercules is real. Bacchus is real.

Paul's Jesus Christ was real, a man who lived and was crucified.
But not on earth.

(Bed soon, more tomorrow Thanks all.)


Kapyong

 

[Kapyong]

Gday Craig B and all

Paul in fact refers to Jesus as "Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; 4 and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead."
So he was a physical human descendant of David, and became a Son of God through the process of resurrection. That indeed necessarily means a physical man on Earth. Your "the Sperm of David" is a bizarre and truncated version of the statement in Romans 1.

No it doesn't, sorry

' made of the seed of David according to the flesh '​

does NOT necessarily mean :

' physical human descendant of David '.​

Would you like to explain why you think it does ?

BTW - 'sperm of David' is a direct translation of the words, I just thought we should strive for accuracy.


Kapyong

 

[pgwenthold]

Just a reminder:

It is fundamentally dishonest to pretend that evidence of the existence of a meat Jesus (or one or more meat Jesuses) can be used to bootstrap claims about the Fairy Jesus.

This is the problem with all these discussions. Before you can talk about "Historical Jesus" you need to define Jesus.

How dissimilar from the bible can you go before you decide that said person is not actually Jesus any more?

If he doesn't do a single miracle, is he really Jesus? Certainly not Jesus of the Bible, I would say. I mean, when the case for the "historical Jesus" turns into "there was a Jewish preacher in the region at the time," are you really referring to Jesus? Nah, that's not Jesus. Jesus wasn't just some Jewish preacher in the region at the time.

 

[Jrrarglblarg]

This is the problem with all these discussions. Before you can talk about "Historical Jesus" you need to define Jesus.

How dissimilar from the bible can you go before you decide that said person is not actually Jesus any more?

If he doesn't do a single miracle, is he really Jesus? Certainly not Jesus of the Bible, I would say. I mean, when the case for the "historical Jesus" turns into "there was a Jewish preacher in the region at the time," are you really referring to Jesus? Nah, that's not Jesus. Jesus wasn't just some Jewish preacher in the region at the time.

Hence slowvehicle's terms Meat vs Fairy Jesus; I generally use the name Yesu ben Yusuf to refer to the probably-extant meat source of at least the name part of the story of FairyJesus.

 

[Craig B]

Gday Craig B and all




No it doesn't, sorry

' made of the seed of David according to the flesh '​

does NOT necessarily mean :

' physical human descendant of David '.​

Would you like to explain why you think it does ?

BTW - 'sperm of David' is a direct translation of the words, I just thought we should strive for accuracy.


Kapyong

I think it does, because both "sperm" and "flesh" denote physical substances. If you think that this physicality should be removed from the connotation of your self-declared "direct translation of the words", please state why.

 

[smartcooky]

If HJ really existed, why is it that we have no independent mention of him in contemporaneous secular texts? I would have thought that a priest or holy man who caused as much trouble to the Roman authorities as the Biblical accounts purport, would have been recorded by the scribes of the time, yet Jesus is not even mentioned at all in any Roman texts.

The SGospels were not written until long after Jesus' alleged execution, so none of the authors ever actually met him. Even the Roman historian Flavius Josephus, whose works are sometimes quoted as supporting HJ, never met him. Josephus was born in AD 37, about seven years after said execution, and his writings didn't begin until after the first Roman-Jewish war (AD 67-73) when was in his late 30's.

In short, Jesus is a hugely important man in the foundation of Christianity, yet there is not one single, verified mention of him anywhere before GMark which most scholars agree was not written before AD 70. And then there is the GJohn problem, written around AD 100, which is full of additions to, omissions from and conflicts with the SGospels.

IMO, Jesus is more likely to be a semi-fictional construct than a real man; inspired by stories about a number of different wandering holy men (who were a dime a dozen in those days). Those histories were handed down orally, and Mark, Mathew and Luke put them in writing and simply attributed all those different stories to one character., in much the same way that Ian Fleming based James Bond on a number of different individuals. A number of minor individual holy men might escape mention in the Roman texts.

Now, while I have no evidence for this other than the circumstantial lack of any contemporaneous mention of Jesus the man in any independent sources, it nonetheless seems a plausible theory.

 

[Aepervius]

Except that we know that those stories are fiction, or presented as fiction. From what we know, the stories in Paul and GMark are presented as fact,

It is religion, which is always presented as facts. Now here is a riddle for you : how do you extract the factual point from the mythological one ? Good luck on that one.

 

[Craig B]

It is religion, which is always presented as facts. Now here is a riddle for you : how do you extract the factual point from the mythological one ? Good luck on that one.

Your tone suggests that you take it for granted that there is no way even of approaching such a task, but I don't think that's true.