For Kapyong: Defending a historical Jesus

[David Mo]

What that paragraph says is not that Josephus and Tacitus cannot be credible or reliable sources of general historical evidence about other non-religious issues (although I expect sources like these are probably very often regarded as strongly biased and/or inaccurate about a great deal of what they wrote as “history”), but instead what it says is that 11th century Christian copying, where those Christian copyists were in general well known to have been in the habit of altering such writing wherever they later came disagree with it,

Therefore we can reject whatever else was written by the chroniclers and historians till the Modern Age. All subjective. There is not history of the Roman Empire nor the Middle Age. This is a little extremist, is it not?
Of course the ancient historians were not modern chroniclers (even in the case that these are "objective"). But the historian's task is to work on the ancient texts in orden to drawn -more or less- objective conclusions. This is not easy, although possible.
Throwing to the wastepaper basket hundred of thousand of manuscripts because they are Christians is not very inteligent.

 

[TubbaBlubba]

While I generally like Ehrman as an author, some of his popular works (DJE? being a prime example) are written in an excrutiatingly painstaking pedagogical style, to the point where he sometimes treats his audience like idiots with five-second attention spans. It really should've been possible to go over the evidence in a briefer yet more measured manner, but I guess he needed to fill a paperback.

 

[Craig B]

Why did Joseph Smith make up the whole cast of his Book Of Mormon? Doesn't matter. Fact is that he did. It's pointless to look for a historical Alma The Elder or Nephi or all those other characters in his book. There is no historical Alma. Joseph Smith made him up.

Joseph Smith and L Ron Hubbard were swindlers who created phoney religions for profit. It is not at all clear, or even probable, that Christianity falls into that category, so the fact that Smith made up the Book of Mormon doesn't mean that Moses made up the Torah, Paul made up the gospels or Muhammad made up the Quran. Indeed the disparate origins of the texts completely exclude a "Book of Mormon" type explanation in any of these cases.

 

[Kapyong]

Gday all

It is customary, when making such statements, to include in them the name of the book, and the page, to which allusion is being made. I would be grateful if you could provide that reference here.

You can read Ch. 3 (The Gospels as Historical Sources) of Prof Ehrman's Did Jesus Exist ? from the First Harper Collins paperback 2013 edition right here :
http://kapyong.info/Ehrman/Gospels.html

It's like IanS said -

In there, Prof Ehrman explicitly names seven gospel sources :

1. G.Mark
2. G.Luke
3. G.Matthew
4. G.John
5. G.Thomas
6. G.Peter
7. P.Eg.2

Then he doubles down further with another list (that doesn't quite match the seven gospels he named; note the _{count} is by me) :

In addition to Mark _{1}, we have Q _{1}, M (which is possibly made of multiple sources _{1-2+}), L (also possibly multiple sources _{1-2+}), two or more passion narratives _{2+}, a signs source _{1}, two discourse sources _{2}, the kernel (or original) Gospel behind the Gospel of Thomas _{1}, and possibly others _{0-2+}.

Minimum ten books, possibly fourteen or more.

Plus five missed from above - G.Matthew, G.Luke, G.John, G.Peter, P.Egerton 2 - gives a grand-total of :

15 - 19+ sources for a historical Jesus, according to Prof Ehrman, apparently.

A stirling effort, I've never a top-tier NT professor list so many witnesses to Jesus


Kapyong

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Joseph Smith and L Ron Hubbard were swindlers who created phoney religions for profit. It is not at all clear, or even probable, that Christianity falls into that category, so the fact that Smith made up the Book of Mormon doesn't mean that Moses made up the Torah, Paul made up the gospels or Muhammad made up the Quran. Indeed the disparate origins of the texts completely exclude a "Book of Mormon" type explanation in any of these cases.

People make up stuff for all sorts of reasons.

But in Paul's case.... are you sure? THE one theme that appears in his epistles more than anything else is 'gimme money'.

And apparently some people were starting to suspect he was a swindler. The main theme of 2 Cor is basically a long nonsense handwaving about 'why you should trust me with your money. Look how much I suffered for Jesus! You can trust me!' Notice however how it could have been solved in a paragraph by just promising to get a receipt or letter of confirmation for whatever group he was collecting the money for. But he'd rather handwave instead.

But really, who is he collecting for? For what poor? He actually takes from those dirt poor. He commends churches, e.g., those in Macedonia, who were dirt poor for giving more than they can afford. But he never mentions one single church he actually gave money to.

The image I'm getting is of a reverse Robin Hood, taking from the poor and giving... well, probably to himself.

And he has quite the good life for it. He has churches (e.g., iirc the Philippians) bankrolling whole expeditions. They put servants at his disposal. IF we believe the church theology -- which is admittedly a big IF -- he even has a personal physician travelling with him at all times, like he's frikken nobility. He has groupies. No, really, he needs to argue why shouldn't he be allowed to take a believing woman with him, and I don't think anyone would have protested bringing a WIFE along. Etc.

Briefly, he's living the life of Crassus.

So are you sure that Joseph Smith isn't an apropriate analogy?

 

[GDon]

Well, as I was saying, mostly because in the end it's irrelevant for the scope of the HJ discussion...

So who cares? Whether Paul made him up or not, he's a dead end anyway.

So, yeah, we should need corroboration if the existence of James is important for anything.

Sorry but I find that approach hard to understand, if I understand you correctly here: that the bar for the evidence of someone's existence is determined by that person's importance for something else. I can't see why we'd evaluate the evidence found in Paul differently based on the importance of James' existence to the question of Jesus' historicity.

If we found that Jesus wasn't historical, how would that impact on Paul's statements about meeting James, IYO?

 

[Kapyong]

Gday David Mo all,

See the formulation of Ockham's Razor:

For nothing ought to be posited without a reason given, unless it is self-evident (literally, known through itself) or known by experience or proved by the authority of Sacred Scripture. (Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard I, dist. 30, q. 1)​

That's not right, sorry David Mo

Rather - according to a succeeding writer, this is what Occam's Razor says (because the works of William of Occam (Ockham) do not quite contain the exact Razor, and there are variant versions in different authors) :

"entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem"​

which rendered into literal English is :

"entities must not be multiplied without necessity"​

But nowadays it is interpreted to mean something like :

"the simplest explanation is most likely the correct one".​

But that is what it IMPLIES, perhaps even what it means to some people - but not what it SAYS. Because Occam's Razor is not a CHOOSER - it's a CUTTER, a razor. It does NOT say anything about alternatives, it does NOT say anything about CHOOSING at all - that is merely a later interpretation or implication.

In fact - the key verb is "do NOT multiply"; and what is not to be multipled is "entities" (i.e. things); and to "not multiply" means to not add extra - or to CUT OFF what is not needed.

That's why it's called Occam's Razor and not Occam's Chooser or Occam's Decider.

So here is Kapyong's Rendition of Occam's Razor :

"Cut off un-necessary things."​

Kapyong

 

[Craig B]

People make up stuff for all sorts of reasons.

But in Paul's case.... are you sure? THE one theme that appears in his epistles more than anything else is 'gimme money'.

I didn't deny that Paul wrote at least some of the epistles. I denied that

Paul made up the gospels​

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

I didn't deny that Paul wrote at least some of the epistles. I denied that

Paul made up the gospels​

Hmm, well, I don't think I ever claimed that Paul made up the gospels. I mean, they're traditionally dated decades after him.

 

[David Mo]

That's not right, sorry David Mo

Rather - according to a succeeding writer, this is what Occam's Razor says (because the works of William of Occam (Ockham) do not quite contain the exact Razor, and there are variant versions in different authors) :

"entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem"​

which rendered into literal English is :

"entities must not be multiplied without necessity"​

But nowadays it is interpreted to mean something like :

"the simplest explanation is most likely the correct one".​

Hello, Kapyong.

Sorry, but “"Entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity" (Non sunt multiplicanda entia sine necessitate) was formulated by the Irish Franciscan philosopher John Punch in his 1639 commentary on the works of Duns Scotus”. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_razor). In the original Ockham’s version the principle is a methodological rule to choose between different explanations of the same event with similar degree of evidence. The principle supposes that we have a good established fact and we have some problem of interpretation. This is not the case of gospel narrative.

I don’t know what is the “contemporary” meaning of Ockham’s Razor, because there are many, but my quote was literal from https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ockham/#4.1
About some interpretations of “simplicity” it is interesting: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/simplicity/
Ockham’s Razor prevents us to give a supernatural explanation when a more economical one is possible. But, hélas, Ockham was a monk and introduces the Bible as a justification. (William of Baskerville would not have done so).

ADDED: From the article of the Encyclopedia of Stanford I quoted above:

The philosophical issues surrounding the notion of simplicity are numerous and somewhat tangled. The topic has been studied in piecemeal fashion by scientists, philosophers, and statisticians. The apparent familiarity of the notion of simplicity means that it is often left unanalyzed, while its vagueness and multiplicity of meanings contributes to the challenge of pinning the notion down precisely.[2] A distinction is often made between two fundamentally distinct senses of simplicity: syntactic simplicity (roughly, the number and complexity of hypotheses), and ontological simplicity (roughly, the number and complexity of things postulated).[3] These two facets of simplicity are often referred to as elegance and parsimony respectively. For the purposes of the present overview we shall follow this usage and reserve ‘parsimony’ specifically for simplicity in the ontological sense. It should be noted, however, that the terms ‘parsimony’ and ‘simplicity’ are used virtually interchangeably in much of the philosophical literature.​

 

[Craig B]

Gday all

You can read Ch. 3 (The Gospels as Historical Sources) of Prof Ehrman's Did Jesus Exist ? from the First Harper Collins paperback 2013 edition right here :
http://kapyong.info/Ehrman/Gospels.html

It's like IanS said -

<snip IanS' list>

Then he doubles down further with another list (that doesn't quite match the seven gospels he named; note the _{count} is by me) :

Minimum ten books, possibly fourteen or more.

Plus five missed from above - G.Matthew, G.Luke, G.John, G.Peter, P.Egerton 2 - gives a grand-total of :

15 - 19+ sources for a historical Jesus, according to Prof Ehrman, apparently.

A stirling effort, I've never a top-tier NT professor list so many witnesses to Jesus


Kapyong

GDay Kapyong. Thank you very much for the text you sent, which I will study carefully. The first thing I notice is that things are not in any way at all as crude as depicted in IanS' unreferenced commentary. I need to look at this carefully:

Matthew and Luke did indeed use Mark, but significant portions of both Gospels are not related in any way to Mark's accounts. And in these sections of their Gospels Matthew and Luke record extensive, independent traditions about Jesus's life, teachings, and death. So while in their shared material they do not provide corroboration without collaboration, in their unique material they do.​

Now I have tended to ignore this unique material as a valid source of anything at all, because it includes disparate versions of the preposterous birth stories, along with M's weird zombie tale of the crucifixion.

But that doesn't mean that these accounts are necessarily not to be regarded as independent attestations of the existence of a Jesus. I will need to look at the question in that light. But meantime I don't accept the unadorned "double count" assertion. It's not as simple as that at all. Suppose a mediaeval Welsh author was to give us a story - obviously false - about a meeting in Avalon between Arthur and the Lady of the Lake, and this story was unique to that source. Even if false, would its very existence represent an attestation of the historicity of Arthur? That's an interesting question, and I'm not sure of the answer. I don't think it has been discussed in these otherwise exhaustive threads either.

I'll be interested to see dejudge's opinion on my comments about it, when I have collected my thoughts on the subject.

As I say, thanks again.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Sorry but I find that approach hard to understand, if I understand you correctly here: that the bar for the evidence of someone's existence is determined by that person's importance for something else. I can't see why we'd evaluate the evidence found in Paul differently based on the importance of James' existence to the question of Jesus' historicity.

Well, it's mostly a matter of pragmatism, rather than actually affecting the bar in general. I'm focusing on what actually is important to the hypothesis being discussed, and ignoring the extra details.

Think of it this way:

- if we're talking about how fast a car can go, then engine power, aerodynamics, etc, are important. Colour, time of day, etc, are not.

- if we're talking about who ran that guy over, then colour actually matters, while engine power doesn't.

You just have to pick the parts that matter in your model, and ignore those who don't make much of a difference. It's not that the bar for establishing whether the car was midnight blue or black changed, it's that if we're talking acceleration, it doesn't matter. If someone wants the car to be specifically red with racing stripes, well, who cares? He can have it red, for all I care.

If we found that Jesus wasn't historical, how would that impact on Paul's statements about meeting James, IYO?

Not much.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Suppose a mediaeval Welsh author was to give us a story - obviously false - about a meeting in Avalon between Arthur and the Lady of the Lake, and this story was unique to that source. Even if false, would its very existence represent an attestation of the historicity of Arthur? That's an interesting question, and I'm not sure of the answer. I don't think it has been discussed in these otherwise exhaustive threads either.

Well, maybe not about King Arthur, but I think I've touched on this before in a very long and boring message about applying the criteria of Bible Studies to prove a historical Cthulhu.

Well, I'm not going to do the king-size version again, but thing is, a lot of authors have written about Cthulhu or other parts of the Lovecraft universe. People have composed hymns about it. Seriously, you can get two CD's worth of hymns and carols from the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society.

Now let's take a much smaller byte at the problem, by finding an analogy to your Arthurian example. And it will be about the Esoteric Order Of Dagon in Innsmouth, instead of Great Cthulhu, but same idea.

In the song The Worst Hotel (sung by the Dagon Tabernacle Choir, so, you know, extra confirmation), the protagonist has a somewhat similar experience to the protagonist of The Shadow Over Innsmouth by H.P. LOvecraft, yet it's clearly a different story. He even gets an *ahem* indecent proposal, that wasn't in The Shadow Over Innsmouth. And it confirms several key points of The Shadow Over Innsmouth, without seeming to outright copy from it.

Even more significantly, we have the song The Innsmouth Look, which tells an even more radically different story: one from the perspective of a local cultist of Dagon. It's not even a horror story, it's just a touching story of fish-boy meets fish-girl at the local EOD chapter, they fall in love, etc. But again, it confirms all the key points from The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

Hell, we now even have corroboration from two opposing points of view. The Shadow Over Innsmouth has a protagonist disgusted and terrified by the whole thing, and trying to destroy it, while The Innsmouth Look gives us the point of view of a villager who's quite content with it all. It's unlikely that if they were to make stuff up, they'd make up the same things, right?

So, to paraphrase your arthurian question... does that mean we have corroboration of a historical Innsmouth and all? Or maybe derivative fiction doesn't count for much, after all?

 

[Craig B]

Hmm, well, I don't think I ever claimed that Paul made up the gospels.

Indeed you didn't!

t So, yeah, I wouldn't take Paul as gospel

 

[David Mo]

But that doesn't mean that these accounts are necessarily not to be regarded as independent attestations of the existence of a Jesus. I will need to look at the question in that light. But meantime I don't accept the unadorned "double count" assertion. It's not as simple as that at all. Suppose a mediaeval Welsh author was to give us a story - obviously false - about a meeting in Avalon between Arthur and the Lady of the Lake, and this story was unique to that source. Even if false, would its very existence represent an attestation of the historicity of Arthur? That's an interesting question, and I'm not sure of the answer. I don't think it has been discussed in these otherwise exhaustive threads either.

King Arthur’s legend has nothing that suggests that he was a real man. He is the classical heroic knight of the Middle Ages that appears in many other literary legends. La Chanson de Roldan is based on a real character (Count Roldan) and in a true fact: the attack of Vascons (likely) against the army of the King Charlemagne. The details of the story and the secondary characters are invented in order to emphasize the chivalric tragedy. Nothing new in that sense. Arthur, Roldan or Charlemagne were great characters of the history (real or supposed). The enquiry about their real or fictive status is easy on the basis of documents and artefacts of their times. This is not the case of Jesus of Galilee. The hints of Jesus' existence are faint or dependent from doctrinaire texts. It is difficult to ascertain what is invented and what is true. The so called "criteria of authenticity" are diffuse guides subjected to interested bias and ideological assumptions.

I don't think that the gospels or even Paul are evidences of the existence of Jesus of Galilee. Only the very contradictory fact of a sect with global intentions based on the infamous death of their prophet, a death reserved to slaves and anti-Roman rebels, is a reliable indicator of the existence of a certain Jesus the Galilean. But this is a hint. I wouldn't say that this is something like a strong evidence or similar.

In any case, who cares? What disturbs me is the dogmatism in one or other sense.

And I don’t see that gospels are independent of each other. Only in particular aspects. Not in the basic events. They are not independent like Seneca was independent of Tacitus when they spoke of Nero.

 

[Nick Terry]

But meantime I don't accept the unadorned "double count" assertion.

Re-reading the chapter, it's not so much that Ehrman has a list of 14 witnesses composed of final texts and hypothesised/identified traditions. He has two quasi-lists of seven sources, but these are presented in sequential sections and it's very easy to read them as if they add up cumulatively. Also, he talks of "numerous accounts of his life" and then includes things like "the kernel (or original) Gospel behind the Gospel of Thomas", which is a sayings collection and not a life-story account. (pp.82-3).

I really did not like Ehrman referring to the written texts (gospels) as 'witnesses' and then turning to discuss the probable written and oral sources underlying the gospels. An eyewitness account can be considered a witness, but the gospels were synthesised from different sources, some of which may be oral or written eyewitness accounts and some of which may be second or third-hand (or worse) oral tradition. Earlier datings increase the likelihood that disciples and followers of Jesus could pass on eyewitness testimony to gospel writers, or have them recorded to be used as primary sources; later datings mean oral tradition instead. But how much of either is unclear.

I do think the texts display a good amount of evidence for oral transmission of the material, though. Which fits with the social context from which the gospels arose (low literacy rates, recitals of religious and other texts in communal settings, the gospels being written in part for further recital in communal settings).

 

[Craig B]

Also, he talks of "numerous accounts of his life" and then includes things like "the kernel (or original) Gospel behind the Gospel of Thomas", which is a sayings collection and not a life-story account. (pp.82-3).

"Accounts of his life" is a very ambiguous expression which should not have been used. It might mean "narration of the events of his life", which would not be right at all as a description of any "kernel" of Thomas. However, the expression might (at a pinch) be read as meaning: "statement asserting that he really lived".

I suppose if I compile a list of sayings and attribute them to a person, I am implying my belief that the person existed, even though my text contains no biographical details. In itself the statement that person X said thing Y is a kind of biographical detail, I suppose. It is a "witness" at least to the existence of the person in question.

 

[dejudge]

"Accounts of his life" is a very ambiguous expression which should not have been used. It might mean "narration of the events of his life", which would not be right at all as a description of any "kernel" of Thomas. However, the expression might (at a pinch) be read as meaning: "statement asserting that he really lived".

I suppose if I compile a list of sayings and attribute them to a person, I am implying my belief that the person existed, even though my text contains no biographical details. In itself the statement that person X said thing Y is a kind of biographical detail, I suppose. It is a "witness" at least to the existence of the person in question.

Your statement is incredibly absurd.

Sayings from fiction characters are not "witnesses" of existence"

Christian writings are loaded with sayings of fiction characters.

This is a partial list of sayings in the Christian Bible.

1. Sayings of an ass.

2. Sayings of a serpent.

3. Sayings of Satan.

4. Sayings of God.

5. Sayings of angels.

Examine Numbers 22.

Numbers 22

27When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD, she lay down under Balaam; so Balaam was angry and struck the donkey with his stick.

28And the LORD opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, "What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times?"

29Then Balaam said to the donkey, "Because you have made a mockery of me! If there had been a sword in my hand, I would have killed you by now."…

The sayings of Jesus are fabrications like the sayings of an ass.

 

[Craig B]

Your statement is incredibly absurd.

Sayings from fiction characters are not "witnesses" of existence"

Christian writings are loaded with sayings of fiction characters.

This is a partial list of sayings in the Christian Bible.

1. Sayings of an ass.

2. Sayings of a serpent.

3. Sayings of Satan.

4. Sayings of God.

5. Sayings of angels.

Examine Numbers 22.

Numbers 22


The sayings of Jesus are fabrications like the sayings of an ass.

This illustrates with even more resplendent magnificence than on the last occasion - if that is even possible - the dangers inherent in misuse of the word "fiction". You have been wilfully exposing yourself to these dangers and unfortunately you have now succumbed to them, and have suffered irremediable intellectual collapse.

A "fiction character" is a character not intended as authentic by the author; and moreover the author neither expects nor intends the reader to believe in the reality of the character either.

So it goes without saying that words attributed to fiction characters are not witnesses of belief in their existence. That is part of the definition of "fiction". You see now why I warned you against using the term. I knew it would cause confusion and induce even the wise to fall into error.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Again, that's not in the definition of "fiction". I even quoted a definition and example ('We've all heard the fiction of her poor health') where clearly it was intended to be believed, and possibly the one doing it believed it too (if she's a hypochondriac.)

And if you'd scrolled down the dictionary page I linked, you'd have seen that the list of synonyms includes...

3. fable, fantasy.

Fiction, fabrication, figment suggest a story that is without basis in reality.

Fiction suggests a story invented and fashioned either to entertain or to deceive: clever fiction; pure fiction.

Fabrication applies particularly to a false but carefully invented statement or series of statements, in which some truth is sometimes interwoven, the whole usually intended to deceive: fabrications to lure speculators.

Figment applies to a tale, idea, or statement often made up to explain, justify, or glorify oneself: His rich uncle was a figment of his imagination. ​

ALL of them -- YES, INCLUDING EXPLICITLY FICTION -- are EXPLICITLY including (but not limited to) the intention to deceive.

Hell, the last example there is directly contradicting your notion that a fictive character has somehow other rules. The rich uncle in that example, yes, it's intended to deceive others.

I dunno where you got this idea that fiction means only the literary fiction genres, but it does not.