For Kapyong: Defending a historical Jesus

[dejudge]

It is dejudge's general contention that the only evidence of date of authorship is the date of the earliest surviving manuscript. This leads him to suppose that very many ancient texts are the work of gangs of mediaeval forgers. In this, he is a disciple of Jean Hardouin^WP, and nothing seems to be able to shift him from that intellectually untenable position.

Your statement is baseless or nothing more than propaganda.

You are writing fiction.

 

[Brainache]

@Brainache
Well, maybe, but it's still an ad-hominem circumstantial when it comes to whether he has a point or not about Jesus.

And I have to wonder why people who didn't even read the book put this much effort into doing all sorts of such irrelevant considerations as if, verily, it was some kind of last-ditch now-or-never kind of effort where they have to attack the author, if they can't do athing else.

Especially because here's what you'd find on the first page of the preface. In fact, in the first half page of the preface:

[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=540&pictureid=11089[/qimg]

He doesn't actually claim to have the definitive answer. He doesn't claim to have settled it that, that's it, it's p>0.5 for his theory, we can all pack our bags and go home. He only really claims that it's a possible alternative theory, and you need more than just handwaving to address the MJ case. Hell, even the second half of the title of the book might have given you a hint: "why we have reason for doubt." And really that's all that he establishes there: that it's not entirely unreasonable to doubt a HJ.

Seems to me like the easiest thing to do, especially if you're not really all that interested in actually reading and arguing the whole thing, is to just agree and move on. Think, "sure, mate, it's possible, but, as you say, you haven't reached the level of evidence to actually settle it as THE thing that happened. Maybe next time."

That's what I did. (In case it wasn't clear to someone or another how come I think he has a point or two, yet I'm not convinced that his conclusion cleared that P>0.5 threshold.)

You don't really need to establish a credibility level for whether his MJ is right, when he's saying up front that there's a lot of probability room for it to be wrong. You can basically just agree with him that yeah, verily, there's a LOT of room for a lot of other possibilities to have happened back in ye olde Jesus days, and you save yourself the rest of the effort

OK. I agree.

Now all we need to do is convince some of Carrier's fanboys, but if Carrier himself can't do it, I don't like our chances...

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Well, it's not even just a matter of fanboys. In the meantime there are actual RELIGIOUS people who have picked the celestial Jesus as their religion. They're a very tiny percentage of Christians, but yeah, we got ourself a new (or maybe just revived) sect.

I think it's kinda ironic that a prominent atheist would end up being basically one of the apostles of a new religion, but that's people for ya

But, eh, personally I'm not worried about convincing anyone about any religion. (Seriously, you don't have to believe my version of Ragnarök) We can discuss the evidence, and if anyone is ready to be convinced, ok. If not, not.

 

[dejudge]

The claim that letters under the name of Paul were composed before the Gospels because the author wrote virtually nothing about the Gospel story is hopelessly flawed since the supposed letters to the Hebrews and those under the name of James, Peter, John, and Jude also have virtually nothing about the Gospel story.

If it is argued that the supposed non-Pauline letters were composed after the Gospels while still having little or nothing about the Gospel Jesus then it should be obvious that lack of stories of Jesus in Epistles under the name of Paul do not determine that they were written early.

The fact is that virtually all the hundreds upon hundreds of Epistles found in or out the NT have almost nothing about the Gospel story.

Examine the Epistles attributed to Peter.

Examine the Epistles attributed to John.

Examine the Epistle attributed to James.

Examine The Epistle to the Hebrews.

Examine the Epistle attributed to Jude.

The pattern is consistent---little or nothing about the Gospel is found in NT Epistles.

NT Epistles are not biographies of the Jesus character.

Even the supposed Apostles of Jesus and brother James appear to know virtually nothing of the Gospel even though Scholars argue they were composed after the Jesus stories.

 

[David Mo]

First point, I did not "discard Romans 1:3 as a genuine Pauline text". (…)I can only say there are a number of reasons to suspect it is an interpolation.

This is what I call “to discard” a text as authentic. I don’t think in any absolute evidence.

That is not a dogmatic discarding of the passage. I don't think it is wise to be dogmatic either way when discussing these letters.

I never said that you were dogmatic. I agree: The possibility of total evidence in ancient history and specially in the issue of the “historical Jesus” is slightly higher than zero.

From what you have set out here I understand that you have a different interpretation of the verses in question from the perspective I expressed.

I can only say I see the implications of the verses differently from you. I can do nothing more than repeat what I wrote in that original post --- but notice also that #3 was but one of 6 lines of evidence that I think cast suspicion on the authenticity of the passage.
I see the contradictions for the reasons stated. You do not see any contradiction for the reasons you state.
I'm happy to agree to disagree, each with our different perspectives.

I would have liked to discuss and delve into our “different perspectives” but you seem unwilling to do it. A sudden attack of acute scepticism?
I hope to be luckier next time.

 

[IanS]

If we are talking about people posting here, then I don't see any Carrier “fanboys”.

As far as I am concerned, Carrier is just someone with a PhD in ancient history, who writes books for a living and engages in public debates on the historicity of Jesus.

By that route he's become widely known as a prominent Jesus-Mythicist. But there must be many thousands of people on this forum alone, who have PhD's in far more demanding and more rigorous subjects that ancient history and bible studies etc.

Despite any insinuations to the contrary, I have never endorsed any specific myth theory, either from Carrier or anyone else. And I have made clear many times that although a book like OHJ may be regarded as “peer reviewed” in a subject like biblical studies or the “historicity” of Jesus, a mere book like that is not (for example) what we normally know as “peer review” in science (e.g.; where most of us know that term “peer review” as a scientific term relating to the refereeing of research papers submitted for publication in science research journals).

Nevertheless, Carriers book does seem to have been submitted to some sort of external referees (they are not “editors” … “editors” are a very different thing in book publishing), and it is very extensively and properly referenced for all the substantive points that Carrier discusses. And that is a great deal more than can be said for the competing books of bible scholars such as “Did Jesus Exist?” from Bart Ehrman (which is, for example, a book very often compared to, and argued against, Carriers book).

But the bottom line in all of this, is that despite all the side issues about Richard Carrier, or about what can be debated in Paul's letters etc., in all these many years of HJ threads, still the HJ side has never produced any credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone.

So when is the evidence ever going to be produced?

 

[dejudge]

When will historical evidence be presented for Jesus and Paul?

All we have are 2nd century or later manuscripts of fiction, falsehood, forgeries, false attribution and implausibilities about Jesus, Paul and Apostles.

It is most bizarre that the very Scholars who claim there is no historical evidence for Jesus assume the historicity of Paul without ever presenting a shred of historical evidence.

The historicity of Paul is a baseless assumption.

No writer of antiquity outside apologetics ever mentioned Paul for hundreds of years.

Paul in the NT was a fiction character fabricated as a witness to the non-historical resurrection and fiction characters called Peter, James and John.

 

[Brainache]

If we are talking about people posting here, then I don't see any Carrier “fanboys”.

As far as I am concerned, Carrier is just someone with a PhD in ancient history, who writes books for a living and engages in public debates on the historicity of Jesus.

By that route he's become widely known as a prominent Jesus-Mythicist. But there must be many thousands of people on this forum alone, who have PhD's in far more demanding and more rigorous subjects that ancient history and bible studies etc.

Despite any insinuations to the contrary, I have never endorsed any specific myth theory, either from Carrier or anyone else. And I have made clear many times that although a book like OHJ may be regarded as “peer reviewed” in a subject like biblical studies or the “historicity” of Jesus, a mere book like that is not (for example) what we normally know as “peer review” in science (e.g.; where most of us know that term “peer review” as a scientific term relating to the refereeing of research papers submitted for publication in science research journals).

Nevertheless, Carriers book does seem to have been submitted to some sort of external referees (they are not “editors” … “editors” are a very different thing in book publishing), and it is very extensively and properly referenced for all the substantive points that Carrier discusses. And that is a great deal more than can be said for the competing books of bible scholars such as “Did Jesus Exist?” from Bart Ehrman (which is, for example, a book very often compared to, and argued against, Carriers book).

But the bottom line in all of this, is that despite all the side issues about Richard Carrier, or about what can be debated in Paul's letters etc., in all these many years of HJ threads, still the HJ side has never produced any credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone.

So when is the evidence ever going to be produced?

My bold.

We've been here before, haven't we?

You have been shown how Historians evaluate this question, but you find their methods inadequate. You keep asking for: "credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone". I'm not sure what such evidence would look like:
- An ancient document by someone saying "I knew Jesus"? That would be no more evidential than the gospels.
- A portrait painted from life? Again, no way to verify such a thing.
- A statue?
- A gravestone?
None of those things could ever be totally "credible".

Please explain what you would consider: "credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone".

What do you expect from ancient Historians?

 

[dejudge]

My bold.

We've been here before, haven't we?

You have been shown how Historians evaluate this question, but you find their methods inadequate. You keep asking for: "credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone". I'm not sure what such evidence would look like:
- An ancient document by someone saying "I knew Jesus"? That would be no more evidential than the gospels.
- A portrait painted from life? Again, no way to verify such a thing.
- A statue?
- A gravestone?
None of those things could ever be totally "credible".

Please explain what you would consider: "credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone".

What do you expect from ancient Historians?

It is most frightening when a person who argues for an historical Jesus is not sure what credible evidence is.

It is simply absurd to suggest that claims in the Gospels about the water walking transfiguring son of a Ghost--[the Logos God Creator] would be as credible as writings from known or accepted ancient historians.


The argument for an historical Jesus is baseless since no historical evidence has ever been presented or can be up to this very day 01 December 2016.

 

[vridar]

But not important enough to bother finding any contrary evidence? Or is there no contrary evidence to what I've produced?

This is a new standard of accountability for me. I never realized it was legitimate to repeat gossip and innuendo (as on the all too common 'let's kick carrier' wagon) and then infer it's all okay because it's other people's jobs to check the facts for themselves.

That's what your method amounts to. Looking only for evidence that supports our own viewpoint means we will always be able to reject every criticism and find only evidence to support our own viewpoint.

That's called confirmation bias. It makes debate pointless.

 

[vridar]

I would have liked to discuss and delve into our “different perspectives” but you seem unwilling to do it. A sudden attack of acute scepticism?
I hope to be luckier next time.

If you have something specific and particular to discuss that's fine. I have attempted to raise discussion with you when you have commented on my posts in ways that have confused me.

But the in depth comment you posted recently really just amounted to a difference of interpretation, as far as I could see.

 

[Brainache]

This is a new standard of accountability for me. I never realized it was legitimate to repeat gossip and innuendo (as on the all too common 'let's kick carrier' wagon) and then infer it's all okay because it's other people's jobs to check the facts for themselves.

That's what your method amounts to. Looking only for evidence that supports our own viewpoint means we will always be able to reject every criticism and find only evidence to support our own viewpoint.

That's called confirmation bias. It makes debate pointless.

No.

I've stated my position based on evidence.

You can contest that evidence if you want and produce something which contradicts it, but you haven't.

Do you concede the point?

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

My bold.

We've been here before, haven't we?

You have been shown how Historians evaluate this question, but you find their methods inadequate. You keep asking for: "credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone". I'm not sure what such evidence would look like:
- An ancient document by someone saying "I knew Jesus"? That would be no more evidential than the gospels.
- A portrait painted from life? Again, no way to verify such a thing.
- A statue?
- A gravestone?
None of those things could ever be totally "credible".

Please explain what you would consider: "credible evidence at all of Jesus as a living person ever known to anyone".

What do you expect from ancient Historians?

Well, in all fairness, a lot of what's gets called "how historians do it" in relation to Jesus is really the completely different topic of "how Bible Studies does it." Some of them do come close enough to the modern historical method, except when it's about the existence of Jesus. (E.g., Ehrman.) A few seem still stuck in the 19'th century or so, as historical methods go. And a lot are in between.

The very short version is that while, yes, any of the things you listed can be fake, that's just the reason why we want more than one, corroborating each other, but being independent of each other. As Ehrman aptly puts it, if you have 20 accounts of something, but they all copied from the same guy, you don't have 20 sources, you only have one.

We also like sources to be mentioned, preferably even quoted, by other sources. Among other things, because it shows that the latter source actually existed at the time.

We also like sources to be unbiased, not propaganda material. Well, that's rarely available, but having sources with different agendas or attitudes corroborate something is the next best thing. If Plato really likes Socrates and promotes him as an example, while Aristophanes takes the piss out of Socrates in "The Clouds", but both confirm that he did X or said Y, then it's less probable that they both made the same thing up to further their very conflicting agendas.

We also REALLY don't like oral transmission. In fact, there are some fairly hefty requirements in the modern historical method for it to not get promptly discarded. You have to be able to support stuff like that there are multiple independent oral traditions about that guy (which we don't really know for Jesus), and/or that he was basically a superstar that everyone knew and it limited how much BS you can make up about him.

So, yes, if you just have Plato telling you about the great arguments of the great philosopher Timaeus in his talks to Socrates, but nobody else seems to have even heard of such a great philosopher, not even other students of Socrates (e.g., Xenophon) who should have been interested in those arguments, then Timaeus probably never existed. But if we were to find some new document from that era, preferably arguing AGAINST the same teachings of Timaeus, then we'd almost certainly go with Timaeus being very real.

So, short version, it's not that there's anything wrong with any of the kinds of evidence you mentioned, but basically yeah, alone and on their own any single one of them wouldn't do much about any historical character. You'd want to have SOME corroboration.

We also REALLY like the criterion of historical necessity, among other criteria. Which is really just Occam for historians. Basically you'd want to have SOME evidence that NEEDS those extra entities to explain that evidence. E.g., if you dig up a lot of skeletons and arrow heads in some location, you pretty much NEED someone to have lead an army and had a battle there.

But if it's just Plato using Timaeus to promote his own ideas, or Paul writing about Jesus, then you don't really need a Timaeus or a Jesus to explain those. You need someone who wrote the dialogues or the epistles, but you don't need a historical character to explain how an author created a character. We need a historical Plato who wrote the dialogues, because the dialogues didn't just materialize out of thin air, but we don't need a historical Timaeus to explain how Socrates could come up with a character like Timaeus. We know that people are perfectly able to make up characters for their stories.

Etc.

 

[Brainache]

Well, in all fairness, a lot of what's gets called "how historians do it" in relation to Jesus is really the completely different topic of "how Bible Studies does it." Some of them do come close enough to the modern historical method, except when it's about the existence of Jesus. (E.g., Ehrman.) A few seem still stuck in the 19'th century or so, as historical methods go. And a lot are in between.

The very short version is that while, yes, any of the things you listed can be fake, that's just the reason why we want more than one, corroborating each other, but being independent of each other. As Ehrman aptly puts it, if you have 20 accounts of something, but they all copied from the same guy, you don't have 20 sources, you only have one.

We also like sources to be mentioned, preferably even quoted, by other sources. Among other things, because it shows that the latter source actually existed at the time.

We also like sources to be unbiased, not propaganda material. Well, that's rarely available, but having sources with different agendas or attitudes corroborate something is the next best thing. If Plato really likes Socrates and promotes him as an example, while Aristophanes takes the piss out of Socrates in "The Clouds", but both confirm that he did X or said Y, then it's less probable that they both made the same thing up to further their very conflicting agendas.

We also REALLY don't like oral transmission. In fact, there are some fairly hefty requirements in the modern historical method for it to not get promptly discarded. You have to be able to support stuff like that there are multiple independent oral traditions about that guy (which we don't really know for Jesus), and/or that he was basically a superstar that everyone knew and it limited how much BS you can make up about him.

So, yes, if you just have Plato telling you about the great arguments of the great philosopher Timaeus in his talks to Socrates, but nobody else seems to have even heard of such a great philosopher, not even other students of Socrates (e.g., Xenophon) who should have been interested in those arguments, then Timaeus probably never existed. But if we were to find some new document from that era, preferably arguing AGAINST the same teachings of Timaeus, then we'd almost certainly go with Timaeus being very real.

So, short version, it's not that there's anything wrong with any of the kinds of evidence you mentioned, but basically yeah, alone and on their own any single one of them wouldn't do much about any historical character. You'd want to have SOME corroboration.

We also REALLY like the criterion of historical necessity, among other criteria. Which is really just Occam for historians. Basically you'd want to have SOME evidence that NEEDS those extra entities to explain that evidence. E.g., if you dig up a lot of skeletons and arrow heads in some location, you pretty much NEED someone to have lead an army and had a battle there.

But if it's just Plato using Timaeus to promote his own ideas, or Paul writing about Jesus, then you don't really need a Timaeus or a Jesus to explain those. You need someone who wrote the dialogues or the epistles, but you don't need a historical character to explain how an author created a character. We need a historical Plato who wrote the dialogues, because the dialogues didn't just materialize out of thin air, but we don't need a historical Timaeus to explain how Socrates could come up with a character like Timaeus. We know that people are perfectly able to make up characters for their stories.

Etc.

I agree.

In the case of the HJ we have Paul, gMark, M, L and possibly Q. Probably others I can't recall right now.

For MJ we have Carrier's interpretation of Paul and AFAICT not much else.

For HJ we have the existence of 1st Century Ebionites who regarded him as a human Prophet, not divine. I know these guys were first reported in the west in the 2nd century, but I highly doubt they had only just suddenly appeared all Christian and Jewish revering James the Just. They must have been around for a while, no matter when Irenaeus first noticed them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebionites

...The term Ebionites derives from the common adjective for "poor" in Hebrew (singular: אֶבְיוֹן ev·yōn, plural: אביונים ev·yōn·im),[10][11][12] which occurs fifteen times in the Psalms and was the self-given term of some pious Jewish circles (e.g. Psalm 69:33 ("For the LORD heareth the poor") and 1 QpHab XII, 3.6.10).[13] The term "Ebionim" was also a self description given by the people who were living in Qumran, as shown in the Dead Sea Scrolls. The term "the poor" was at first a common designation for all Christians - a reference to their material and voluntary poverty.[11][14][15]...

 

[vridar]

No.

I've stated my position based on evidence.

You can contest that evidence if you want and produce something which contradicts it, but you haven't.

Do you concede the point?

No, I don't. For the reasons I have stated. Why the belligerence?

I have not encountered many friendly people here. Mostly people with hostile and combative attitudes.

 

[Brainache]

No, I don't. For the reasons I have stated. Why the belligerence?

I have not encountered many friendly people here. Mostly people with hostile and combative attitudes.

It's not being "combative" to expect someone to support their position with evidence.

You apparently think I'm "besmirching" Carrier by pointing out that he erroneously claimed his book was published by the publishing arm of Sheffield University. I see it as putting the record straight.

I also quoted people from this site who pointed out that "peer review" in the case of books like Carrier's doesn't mean the same thing as it does for scientific articles. I posted that because people kept saying that Carrier's book was "peer reviewed" as if that made it somehow special or more credible than other works in the field.

I'm not being belligerent, I'm just disagreeing with your opinion.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

I agree.In the case of the HJ we have Paul, gMark, M, L and possibly Q. Probably others I can't recall right now.

The only problem is that out of those:

- gMark is writing fiction, and conspicuously covering his ass for why nobody ever heard of any of that. And IF he has any sources, well, they don't seem to know jack about the area, language or customs

- M is by Matthew, who has no idea what actually happened there, because he copies gMark's fiction wholesale

- same problem for L

- Q is AT BEST an unknown. We have NO idea when in was written, by whom, etc.

And that's in addition to other major problems they have. They're not even close to the kind of sources you'd take seriously in the historical method.

So really, what we are left with is Paul -- IF the letters we have actually are his -- and several dozens of guys who wrote fan-fic gospels about his character. Four of which were selected just because when Irenaeus helped make a church cartel out of several churches, that's the four they could all live with, not because they could be supported as more historical than the other 3 dozen or so gospels we know about.

That's not corroboration.

Just because several people wrote their own fiction, songs, movies and computer games about Cthulhu doesn't mean we have evidence of a historical Cthulhu. Unless one can show that they're actually independent. If they all just get their character from Lovecraft, and wrote their own derivative works instead of anything historical, then you don't have 20 sources for Cthulhu, you have one.

 

[vridar]

I'm not being belligerent, I'm just disagreeing with your opinion.

And I try not to be belligerent. I disagree with your opinion. So let's agree to disagree.

 

[vridar]

We also like sources to be mentioned, preferably even quoted, by other sources. Among other things, because it shows that the latter source actually existed at the time.

Actually some ancient writers of "history" sometimes did make up sources for the sake of making their fabrications sound authentic. See K.M. Stott's "Why did they write this way?" and the controversial Fehling's "Herodotus and his sources". In another forum here the question of Thucydides' plague came up -- and there are even reasons to doubt Thucydides' supposedly eyewitness (and personal) testimony for that: Woodman's "Rhetoric in classical antiquity".

 

[vridar]

Nevertheless, Carriers book does seem to have been submitted to some sort of external referees (they are not “editors” … “editors” are a very different thing in book publishing), and it is very extensively and properly referenced for all the substantive points that Carrier discusses.

It goes without saying (or should) that merely being published by a publisher that promotes authors like Stanley Porter, Emmanuel Pfoh, Robert Myles, Keith Whitelam, David J.A. Clines, F. Gerald Downing. . . automatically brings a certain level of credibility to the work.

Publishers seek to establish certain market niches and scholarly prestige is important to Sheffield Phoenix.

Naturally there is room for disagreement and argument with Carrier in his book as there is in any scholarly work.

Having said that, though, some publishers do tend to rely upon the reputations of scholars and routinely publish their work simply because of their high standing. That way it is indeed possible for the occasional rubbish by an otherwise good scholar to see its way into print.

But with a new name on the block, such publishers want to be pretty sure their reputation is not going to be diminished by a poor choice of manuscript.

The contrary opinions bandied about here seem to come from those quarters that love to hate Carrier on principle, or so it seems. I would expect anyone who had concerns about the credibility of Carrier's work to study it for themselves, and to even contact Carrier and Sheffield Phoenix to ask them questions of interest directly.

I don't think anyone would confuse peer-review in biblical studies as having the same rigid and clear-cut right-wrong standing as we find in, say, sciences -- although even in the sciences that image of peer-review is very often more myth than reality.