Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

[Belz...]

Dejudge, How recent is HJ ?

 

[maximara]

Dejudge, How recent is HJ ?

Which HJ?

The one person miracle machine god man of the Gospels who dominated Western thought until the Renaissance?

The various reconstructions that might as well be unconscious ventriloquist dummies mirroring the views and beliefs of their theorists?

The blink and you'd miss him insignificant preacher who through a fluke of history developed a legend that propelled a religion no non believer felt was worth mentioning, if they even noticed it, for a minimum of half a century into the spot light?

"We shall land in considerable confusion if we embark on an inquiry about the historical Jesus if we do not pause to ask ourselves exactly what we are talking about." (Marshall, Ian Howard. I Believe in the Historical Jesus. Regent College Publishing, 2004, p. 27-29.)

 

[Craig B]

Which HJ?

The one person miracle machine god man of the Gospels who dominated Western thought until the Renaissance?

No.

The various reconstructions that might as well be unconscious ventriloquist dummies mirroring the views and beliefs of their theorists?

No again.

The blink and you'd miss him insignificant preacher who through a fluke of history developed a legend that propelled a religion no non believer felt was worth mentioning, if they even noticed it, for a minimum of half a century into the spot light?

Yes! Bingo! Well done.

 

[Belz...]

Which HJ?

Stop trying to muddle the issue. HJ, broadly defined, is a Jewish preacher at the origin of Christianity. Whatever sub-version Dejudge chooses, he said it was recent. So take it up with him.

 

[pakeha]

Stop trying to muddle the issue. HJ, broadly defined, is a Jewish preacher at the origin of Christianity. Whatever sub-version Dejudge chooses, he said it was recent. So take it up with him.

Wait.
Isn't a Jewish preacher at the origin of Chrisitianity an MJ premise?

As for dejudge, if I've understood their argument, it's that a non-supernatural Jesus is a recent idea, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Belz...]

Isn't a Jewish preacher at the origin of Chrisitianity an MJ premise?

I'm seriously confused by your post. Jesus in the gospels is a Jewish preacher to start with. Broadly defined, that's HJ. MJ is mainly the opposite: no man behind the curtain.

 

[dejudge]

....And yes, dejudge, those two shipwrecks at the same place around the same time seem like a fantastic coincidence, don't they?
They also remind me of yet another shipwreck in Nero's reign, that of his mother in 59 CE.

Well, it is not only those two shipwrecks around the same time and place that are fantastic coincidences.

In the Life of Flavius Josephus, he went to Rome to plead for priests who were sent bound to Rome by Felix the procurator of Judea.

Amazingly, Paul was put in detention by Felix procurator of Judea in Acts of the Apostles and was sent to Rome to plead his case before Caesar.

The Life of Flavius Josephus

At the time when Felix was procurator of Judea there were certain priests of my acquaintance, and very excellent persons they were, whom on a small and trifling occasion he had put into bonds, and sent to Rome to plead their cause before Caesar. These I was desirous to procure deliverance for......

The Pauline character was fabricated using the Life of Josephus composed around the end of the 1st century.


Acts 25

14 And when they had been there many days, Festus declared Paul's cause unto the king, saying , There is a certain man left in bonds by Felix: 15 About whom, when I was at Jerusalem, the chief priests and the elders of the Jews informed me, desiring to have judgment against him. ........ 21 But when Paul had appealed to be reserved unto the hearing of Augustus, I commanded him to be kept till I might send him to Caesar.

 

[Belz...]

Ok Dejudge. I'll take that as a silent admission that HJ is not recent.

 

[maximara]

I'm seriously confused by your post. Jesus in the gospels is a Jewish preacher to start with. Broadly defined, that's HJ. MJ is mainly the opposite: no man behind the curtain.

Except for the MJ theories that say Jesus was a c100 BCE Jewish preacher (Mead 1903)

Except for the MJ theories that are regarding the story of Jesus are having no more validity that the stories of Robin Hood and King Arthur rather then the man himself not existing (Doherty 1999, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J 1982, 1995)

Except for the MJ theories that were about Jesus as a historical myth (Remsburg 1909; Frazer per Schweitzer 1913, 1931)

Except for the MJ theories that are about a Jesus in the 1st century CE that doesn't fit the requirements of "taught as reported in the Gospels and was put to death in the circumstances there recorded" (Robertson, John 1900, Wells, GA 1996 to present day)

Except for the MJ theories that are about "an historical but insignificant figure" (Wood 1934)

ALL of these have been called MJ at one time or another. You can't go Daffy Duck and shove the genie back into the lamp.

MJ as a whole does NOT mean what you claim it means and no amount of pulling your hat over your eyes and going 'la la la I can't hear you' is going to change that FACT.

To rephase Marshall 'We shall land in considerable confusion if we embark on an inquiry about the mythical Jesus position if we do not pause to ask ourselves exactly what is being talked about.'

 

[dejudge]

We know when the Quest for an HJ started--it is documented--it was the 18th century.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quest_for_the_historical_Jesus

The quest for the historical Jesus is the academic effort to use historical methods to provide a historical portrait of Jesus.[1]

Since the 18th century, three separate scholarly quests for the historical Jesus have taken place, each with distinct characteristics and based on different research criteria, which were often developed during each specific phase...

Up to today, Scholars cannot determine who their assumed Jesus was from since the 18th century.

The many differences of emphasis among mainstream interpretations in the third quest may be grouped together based on a number of primary interpretations of Jesus as variously an apocalyptic prophet, charismatic healer, Cynic philosopher, Jewish Messiah or prophet of social change.[14][52] But there is little scholarly agreement on a single interpretation of his life, or the methods needed to construct it..

Since the 18th century No evidence for an HJ has ever been found and that is precisely why no-one knows who their ASSUMED HJ really was.

If anyone today claims an HJ has been found it is a HOAX.

The second Quest reached a plateau in the 1970s and by the 1980s a third Quest had started and gained a formal following

The QUESTERS are now in the Third attempt to locate evidence for an HJ after TWO failed attempts.

It is only about 30 years since the THIRD attempt to find HJ has started.

 

[Craig B]

The Pauline character was fabricated using the Life of Josephus composed around the end of the 1st century.

Mmm. Maybe Josephus was forged by Luke using Paul's epistles as a source. He would have done it so that he could find a context for the TF, which can be presented as evidence for Jesus. And also to act as evidence for the forged hoax speech he makes Gamaliel deliver in Acts 5, about various rebels mentioned in the forged Josephus.

This would have been perpetrated in the second century, by unknown persons, and the Josephus text would have been hidden away for many centuries, for no manuscripts with it earlier than the eleventh century are now extant.

It all makes sense to me!

 

[Belz...]

Except for the MJ theories that say Jesus was a c100 BCE Jewish preacher (Mead 1903)

That's not much of a myth, is it ?

Except for the MJ theories that are regarding the story of Jesus are having no more validity that the stories of Robin Hood and King Arthur rather then the man himself not existing (Doherty 1999, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J 1982, 1995)

Except for the MJ theories that were about Jesus as a historical myth (Remsburg 1909; Frazer per Schweitzer 1913, 1931)

Except for the MJ theories that are about a Jesus in the 1st century CE that doesn't fit the requirements of "taught as reported in the Gospels and was put to death in the circumstances there recorded" (Robertson, John 1900, Wells, GA 1996 to present day)

Except for the MJ theories that are about "an historical but insignificant figure" (Wood 1934)

Some of those sound remarkably similar to each other.

 

[Belz...]

We know when the Quest for an HJ started--it is documented--it was the 18th century.

HJ is a recent Hoax--No HJ has ever been found in the history of the Quest for HJ.

One of those two things is not like the other.

 

[IanS]

I think Dejudge is talking about the notion of a “HJ”, which seems to have been a relatively recent invention from Christians, theolgians and bible scholars, apparently from the time when modern science slowly began to convince most educated people that the belief in a miraculous biblical Jesus, which had held sway for almost 2000 years, could not be physically true.

I asked at the very start of one of these HJ threads (or perhaps even in the pre-cursor Piggy thread) if anyone wanted to venture a guess as to when Christians and theologians first began to propose a HJ as distinct from belief in a biblical Jesus, but there was never any answer to that.

Presumably the HJ idea arose only because sometime after modern science got going, educated people gradually had to admit that the biblical accounts of Jesus were impossible … so at a very rough guess, I suppose that would be some time around 1800-1900 onward (where 1900 would be very recent indeed … though if we go back to the time of Newton c.1700, then afaik almost everyone still insisted that Jesus was fully miraculous.

That is an odd mode of expression. The idea that Christian theologians invented a historical Jesus as a method of preserving the Christian faith. Of course I would expect such a weird statement from you.

It’s not at all an “odd mode of expression” (whatever those weasel words are supposed to mean). What I said was a very clear and very direct statement saying that the idea of anything called a “HJ” seems to be a relatively recent invention from “Christians, theologians and bible scholars, apparently from the time when modern science slowly began to convince most educated people that the belief in a miraculous biblical Jesus, which had held sway for almost 2000 years, could not be physically true." …

… from what date was this non-biblical HJ first widely being proposed? who first proposed it? and why? on what basis? … afaik, it seems likely that up until the first beginnings of modern science, roughly from around the time of Galileo, almost everyone still insisted that the biblical Jesus was real, miracles and all.

My question was

Who is responsible for this Hoax, and when was it perpetrated?

Evidently you reject dejudge's word, i.e. that the historical Jesus is a "hoax", which is the issue I was raising. If you accept it, you must assert that these pious theologians were sustaining their religion by perpetrating a hoax upon themselves. A charming idea.

Where did I say I rejected anything dejudge ever said about any “hoax”. ?

Please quote where I said that I rejected anything dejudge said about any “hoax”.

 

[Craig B]

Where did I say I rejected anything dejudge ever said about any “hoax”. ?

Please quote where I said that I rejected anything dejudge said about any “hoax”.

I inferred that you must reject it, by a sort of process of reasoning founded on an implicit reductio ad absurdum argument. But it seems that I was wrong, and you agree with dejudge that the entire corpus of NT writings is a "hoax". Very well. I note your opinion.

 

[pakeha]

I'm seriously confused by your post. Jesus in the gospels is a Jewish preacher to start with. Broadly defined, that's HJ. MJ is mainly the opposite: no man behind the curtain.

Sorry, Belz..., but there are plenty of variants of the MJ proposition and one is that there's a heap of legends draped on a Jewish preacher. It's likely we'd never recognise the fella as the starting point of Christianity.

maximara reposted some of the MJ definitions that are out there.
Are you quite sure you've never seen them on the current threads?

Except for the MJ theories that say Jesus was a c100 BCE Jewish preacher (Mead 1903)

Except for the MJ theories that are regarding the story of Jesus are having no more validity that the stories of Robin Hood and King Arthur rather then the man himself not existing (Doherty 1999, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J 1982, 1995)

Except for the MJ theories that were about Jesus as a historical myth (Remsburg 1909; Frazer per Schweitzer 1913, 1931)

Except for the MJ theories that are about a Jesus in the 1st century CE that doesn't fit the requirements of "taught as reported in the Gospels and was put to death in the circumstances there recorded" (Robertson, John 1900, Wells, GA 1996 to present day)

Except for the MJ theories that are about "an historical but insignificant figure" (Wood 1934)

ALL of these have been called MJ at one time or another. You can't go Daffy Duck and shove the genie back into the lamp.

MJ as a whole does NOT mean what you claim it means and no amount of pulling your hat over your eyes and going 'la la la I can't hear you' is going to change that FACT.

To rephase Marshall 'We shall land in considerable confusion if we embark on an inquiry about the mythical Jesus position if we do not pause to ask ourselves exactly what is being talked about.'

I myself have posted on a number of occasions the view that a number of HJ definitions actually coincide with a number of MJ definitions.
A more able poster could prolly make a Venn chart to illustrate this.

ETA Venn diagram, not chart.

 

[Belz...]

Sorry, Belz..., but there are plenty of variants of the MJ proposition and one is that there's a heap of legends draped on a Jewish preacher.

It becomes a bit frustrating when your opponents in a debate begin to argue that your argument is really theirs, so when one points out what HJ means and MJ proponents try to include that in their own definition in order to "win" the debate, it's a bit grating.

The point of the matter is that HJ argues that there was a guy who was a vague Jesus at some point. It follows that MJ argues otherwise. If not, then we've all been in agreement all along which is a silly proposition. HJ doesn't take miracle claims seriously, for instance, and no one is proposing that it should. Neither is anyone saying that all non-miraculous occurances of the gospel accounts really happened.

 

[pakeha]

It becomes a bit frustrating when your opponents in a debate begin to argue that your argument is really theirs, so when one points out what HJ means and MJ proponents try to include that in their own definition in order to "win" the debate, it's a bit grating.

The point of the matter is that HJ argues that there was a guy who was a vague Jesus at some point. It follows that MJ argues otherwise. If not, then we've all been in agreement all along which is a silly proposition. HJ doesn't take miracle claims seriously, for instance, and no one is proposing that it should. Neither is anyone saying that all non-miraculous occurances of the gospel accounts really happened.

Actually, Belz..., that's the view I've had long before the beginning of the threads here.
I haven't begun to argue differently at all.

In fact, given the little that we can know about Jesus, M or J, is based on hagiography written after the destruction of Jerusalem, with the possible exception of Paul's letters, it's impossible to have a definite idea of the source of those tales.

Haven't you found that the more we examine any aspect of the tale, it falls apart?
I have.

In any case I've a great deal of sympathy for those who think that there's simply no man behind the curtain, but I suspect there's likely a figure, an actual person upon whom the stories were based, rather like the case of Robin Hood or King Arthur.
I even have doubts this person was crucified, Belz...

 

[dejudge]

In any case I've a great deal of sympathy for those who think that there's simply no man behind the curtain, but I suspect there's likely a figure, an actual person upon whom the stories were based, rather like the case of Robin Hood or King Arthur.
I even have doubts this person was crucified, Belz...

You suspect Robin Hood was based on a real Robber?

You suspect King Arthur was based on a real King?

You suspect Jesus Christ, the Son of God was based on a real Christ and real Son of God?

Let us get real. There is no need to speculate. There is an abundance of evidence from antiquity.

Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Logos and God Creator is based on Jewish mythology in the Septuagint, the writings of Josephus and Greek/Roman mythology.

Jesus Christ was the last Adam made by a Spirit by God.

1 Corinthians 15:45 KJV

And so it is written , The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

In the Bible, Jesus is like Adam--Adam was the First Myth man--Jesus was the Last Adam.

 

[pakeha]

You suspect Robin Hood was based on a real Robber?

You suspect King Arthur was based on a real King?

You suspect Jesus Christ, the Son of God was based on a real Christ and real Son of God?

Let us get real. There is no need to speculate. There is an abundance of evidence from antiquity.

Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Logos and God Creator is based on Jewish mythology in the Septuagint, the writings of Josephus and Greek/Roman mythology.

Jesus Christ was the last Adam made by a Spirit by God.

1 Corinthians 15:45 KJV

In the Bible, Jesus is like Adam--Adam was the First Myth man--Jesus was the Last Adam.

"You suspect Robin Hood was based on a real Robber?"
It's possible, or a series of robbers.


"You suspect King Arthur was based on a real King?"
Yes, or war leader.



"You suspect Jesus Christ, the Son of God was based on a real Christ and real Son of God?"
No way. I think you'll find there's no one here who does, dejudge.