Historical Jesus

[HansMustermann]

But basically here's the problem with believing that actually something like 3000 people per day were converting: the archaeology doesn't support it.

E.g.,https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org...aeological-quest-for-the-earliest-christians/

For the first two centuries, the number of Xians in Roman cities can be summed up with the words "bugger" and "all".

Hell, in another archaeological analysis of Roman tombs, it turns out that even a century or two later you can't really support a population of more than a couple thousand Xians total. In Rome. A city which had anywhere between 1 and 2 million people, depending on the exact point in time we're talking about. The Christians were in the low fractions of a percent.

So, yeah, thousands a day converting in smaller cities is kinda silly. I don't doubt that whoever wrote Acts wished that was the case, but reality was sadly a lot more modest.

But in any case, when talking about fractions of a percent of the population, I don't think it stretches any suspension of disbelief that yeah, there were at least that many gullible and uninformed people.

 

[HansMustermann]

As for where the idea comes from that people were meeting in their own homes, well, even the epistles (forged or not) make exactly that claim. Whether they're forged or not, whoever wrote that, didn't feel a need to talk about congregations being any larger than that.

E.g., Romans 16:5 goes, "Greet also the church that meets at their house." Whose house was that? Well, that of "Priscilla and Aquila, my co-workers in Christ Jesus" he greets in 16:3. Yeah, at least one church fit quite nicely inside that family home.

 

[acbytesla]

Considering that I already told you to look at the Greek original, yet you insist that everyone is inventing stuff if they don't stick to your particular translation (presumably because many other translations preserve that "even if"), this is moving from the realm of merely uninformed into the realm of dishonest.

Here, catch: https://biblehub.com/text/1_corinthians/4-15.htm

And I mean, literally, the very first two words are "even if". Well, "if even", technically.

And again, you only need to read until the end of the line to see what is the real claim there. Paul isn't telling them how many instructors there are. What he's saying is pretty much that he doesn't give a flip about how many there may be, he's the one that's important, because he's their "father". Those other guys can't override him, no matter how many of them you may or may not get on your side of the argument. THAT is the claim he's making there.

I don't speak ancient Greek. I have no interest in learning ancient Greek. Therefore I'm dependent on others to translate these writings. But what is clear is they are reverse engineering which is leading to different scholars coming to different meanings. Words and languages evolve. The same words can have radically different meanings at different times and places. Being confident of precise translations seems ludicrous.

 

[dejudge]

Considering that I already told you to look at the Greek original, yet you insist that everyone is inventing stuff if they don't stick to your particular translation (presumably because many other translations preserve that "even if"), this is moving from the realm of merely uninformed into the realm of dishonest.

For your information the English translation of 1 Corinthians 4. 15 from the Codex Sinaiticus states the following

1 Cor.4 15

For, though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I begot you through the gospel.

The Codex Sinaiticus is regarded as the earliest extant Canon.

I accept the translation of the Sinaiticus Codex.

http://www.codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=38&chapter=4&lid=en&side=r&zoomSlider=0

 

[dejudge]

As for where the idea comes from that people were meeting in their own homes, well, even the epistles (forged or not) make exactly that claim. Whether they're forged or not, whoever wrote that, didn't feel a need to talk about congregations being any larger than that.

E.g., Romans 16:5 goes, "Greet also the church that meets at their house." Whose house was that? Well, that of "Priscilla and Aquila, my co-workers in Christ Jesus" he greets in 16:3. Yeah, at least one church fit quite nicely inside that family home.

Now, tell how many houses were used for meetings?What was the size of the houses? And what was the area of those properties? You very well know that the term "meeting at a house" cannot determine the number of people inside or on the property.


Your arguments are almost always unsubstantiated and fallacious.

 

[HansMustermann]

Heh. Ok, so you accept that codex as canon? I'm absolutely fine with that, because 4:15 THERE TOO STARTS WITH THESE TWO WORDS: εάν γαρ. Even if you can't read greek, just frikken look at the shape of the letters and you can recognize those.

So, yeah, your point is... what? That a translation trumps the original? Or WTH is needed to make your BS exercise work?

 

[HansMustermann]

Now, tell how many houses were used for meetings?What was the size of the houses? And what was the area of those properties? You very well know that the term "meeting at a house" cannot determine the number of people inside or on the property.

Right. So you actually think the 3000 a day from Acts could meet in any particular house in the city?

Your arguments are almost always unsubstantiated and fallacious.

Considering that yours is based on
A) taking Acts as a more authoritative source than actual archaeology, AND
B) you simultaneously argue that a source is later forgery but take it as something true anyway to make that argument work...
yeah, I'm not losing any sleep over what YOU consider to be fallacious. At this point it seems to mean just whatever contradicts your fantasy

 

[HansMustermann]

I don't speak ancient Greek. I have no interest in learning ancient Greek. Therefore I'm dependent on others to translate these writings. But what is clear is they are reverse engineering which is leading to different scholars coming to different meanings. Words and languages evolve. The same words can have radically different meanings at different times and places. Being confident of precise translations seems ludicrous.

Maybe, but then a lot of words don't seem to have been used any different. An "if" still meant "if". No matter how far back or sideways you go, if I tell you something like "IF my grandma had wheels she'd be a car", it's still not the same thing as claiming that my grandma did have wheels. Taking anything that is after an "if" as an actual claim is not warranted in any language I know of.

 

[dejudge]

Heh. Ok, so you accept that codex as canon? I'm absolutely fine with that, because 4:15 THERE TOO STARTS WITH THESE TWO WORDS: εάν γαρ. Even if you can't read greek, just frikken look at the shape of the letters and you can recognize those.

So, yeah, your point is... what? That a translation trumps the original? Or WTH is needed to make your BS exercise work?

The translators of the Codex Sinaiticus must know Greek.

This is their translation.
1 Cor.4 15

For, though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I begot you through the gospel.

 

[acbytesla]

Maybe, but then a lot of words don't seem to have been used any different. An "if" still meant "if". No matter how far back or sideways you go, if I tell you something like "IF my grandma had wheels she'd be a car", it's still not the same thing as claiming that my grandma did have wheels. Taking anything that is after an "if" as an actual claim is not warranted in any language I know of.

As a wannabe actor, common exercise was to read a single sentence multiple ways to convey multiple meanings "if only" can mean exactly the same thing as "only if" or something different altogether.

My point is there are limits to the precision of translating. Here's an example in modern English. What does the word "bad" mean? Sometimes "bad" is bad and sometimes "bad" is good.

 

[dejudge]

Right. So you actually think the 3000 a day from Acts could meet in any particular house in the city?

I simply told you what is written in Acts but you made up an unsubstantiated story about an hallucinating schizophrenic whose followers were about 0.01% of the population.

Considering that yours is based on
A) taking Acts as a more authoritative source than actual archaeology, AND
B) you simultaneously argue that a source is later forgery but take it as something true anyway to make that argument work...
yeah, I'm not losing any sleep over what YOU consider to be fallacious. At this point it seems to mean just whatever contradicts your fantasy

You are mis-representing my position.

I regard Acts of the Apostles as total fiction.

It would appear to me that the Pauline writers pretended to be witnesses of the fictitious events in Acts.

In Acts, Paul met with thousands of believers in Jerusalem and in the Pauline Epistle the writer implied there were thousands of Christian instructors.

I don't know where you got the story for your hallucinating schizophrenic and his followers.

You made it up, right?

 

[HansMustermann]

The translators of the Codex Sinaiticus must know Greek.

This is their translation.
1 Cor.4 15

Right. So your argument IS that a particular translation -- and not even the only one, I might add -- is the alpha and omega, and trumps all others, including the original. It trumps dictionaries, word concordances like Strong's, other translations, EVERYTHING, just because it's the one you can base your nonsense on. If you like that particular one, it has to be the 100% accurate one. AKA, magical thinking at its finest. Got it. You really are THAT much into magical thinking

 

[HansMustermann]

I simply told you what is written in Acts but you made up an unsubstantiated story about an hallucinating schizophrenic whose followers were about 0.01% of the population.

Your sticking your fingers in your ears and pretending not to hear the argument, doesn't make it disappear and everything you don't like be unsubstantiated. But see, here's the thing: your being into magical thinking does not constitute any obligation on my part to play by those arbitrary rules of yours

You are mis-representing my position.

I regard Acts of the Apostles as total fiction.

It would appear to me that the Pauline writers pretended to be witnesses of the fictitious events in Acts.

In Acts, Paul met with thousands of believers in Jerusalem and in the Pauline Epistle the writer implied there were thousands of Christian instructors.

Even skipping past your trying to shoehorn one particular inaccurate translation out of DOZENS, as THE only one that matters, for no other apparent reason than it has to be true because it supports your conclusion -- i.e., the very definition of magical thinking -- THAT is the problem. You're attempting to have it both ways that:

A. that source is a lie as a whole, but
B. you can use it as a premise for such things as how many people were there.

You can't have it both ways, silly. For an inferrence to be SOUND, you need BOTH that the logic is valid, AND that the premises are true. As in supportable to be true.

Once you discredit one of your sources as a lie, you CAN'T use any claims from it in any kind of sound logic. If you get a premise P1 from such a false source, the ONLY kind of reasoning you can use it in is an ad-absurdum to show that specifically that claim P1 is false.

More to the point, if you think that 1 Cor is a lie, then any claim that comes from it -- such as "there were 10,000 priests" -- you CAN'T use as a premise in ANYTHING other than an ad absurdum to claim that no, there weren't that many. Anything ELSE is by definition unsound, since you just said that the source is false.

So basically even skipping past the silliness of it all hinging on one translation out of several, you're fundamentally using UNSOUND logic at that point.

I don't know where you got the story for your hallucinating schizophrenic and his followers.

You made it up, right?

It's been explained before. If you want to challenge it, go ahead. I'm open to being proven wrong, if you can make a sound case for it. But sticking your fingers in your ears and just proclaiming that what you can't address doesn't exist, is still not it.

 

[HansMustermann]

As a wannabe actor, common exercise was to read a single sentence multiple ways to convey multiple meanings "if only" can mean exactly the same thing as "only if" or something different altogether.

While that is true -- well, except it says "even if" rather than "if only" -- I think it still don't think you can take it to say that conclusively, definitely, what comes after the IF is a statement of what IS.

I mean, even working with your example, I could say that "my grandma would be a car if only she had wheels" or I could say that "my grandma would be a car only if she had wheels". And there's STILL not much room to argue that I positively, definitively, conclusively was saying that my grandma had wheels. You can feel free to use your acting experience and expertise, which is probably a lot more than mine, and I still don't see how what comes after that "if" can be taken definitely as a positive claim.

Which, really, is what dejudge is doing there. Or would be, if he actually were qualified enough to discuss the original text. His argument seems to hinge more on that if he found one translation that he likes, out of literally about two dozen, that must be exactly what the original says. For no other reason than that he likes what it says

 

[dejudge]

Once you discredit one of your sources as a lie, you CAN'T use any claims from it in any kind of sound logic. If you get a premise P1 from such a false source, the ONLY kind of reasoning you can use it in is an ad-absurdum to show that specifically that claim P1 is false.

My goodness!!! What nonsense!!!

Well, since you claim Paul was a hallucinating schizophrenic then you have discredited all your Pauline sources and can't use any claims in the Epistles as credible.

 

[HansMustermann]

But anyway, here's a whole different argument for why, no, Corinth didn't have 10,000 priests (or whatever Paul called "παιδαγωγούς", i.e., paidagógos or teachers of young boys). The whole population of Corinth was about 90,000. IF as much as a third of the TOTAL population of the city were to convert, which frankly would mean most adults and make it pretty much the dominant and official religion of the city, to have 10,000 priests there'd have to be 1 priest for every 2 non-priests. Once you factor in other roles such as deacons (which, yes, Paul mentions) you have a church that's all church personnel and pretty much no other members.

So, no, of course Paul doesn't actually claim that Corinth had 10,000 priests. It would be a physical impossibility.

Maths is fun like that

 

[HansMustermann]

My goodness!!! What nonsense!!!

Got it, you really don't understand logic, if the basic soundness requirements sound like nonsense to you. Well, there's no limit to the kind of stuff you can rationalize, once that's the case

Well, since you claim Paul was a hallucinating schizophrenic then you have discredited all your Pauline sources and can't use any claims in the Epistles as credible.

Which is why I brought in such more reliable stuff as archaeology and tomb statistics. Of course, you just continue to claim that that doesn't exist, because if it doesn't agree with the conclusion you like and you can't address it, it must verily not even exist, right? Aka, the tried and tested pre-school technique of sticking your fingers in your ears and going "LA-LA-LAA! I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

 

[HansMustermann]

Look, just to make it clear, I don't claim to be sure that some guy called Paul actually started a bunch of churches. I don't know that.

There is a historical necessity that SOMEONE must have started those gentile churches, but frankly, nothing hinges on him being actually named Paul. He could have been called Jerry for all I care. Or a composite figure of the apostles Curly, Larry and Moe. I'll keep calling that SOMEONE Paul, for clarity sake, but otherwise it's as open as it gets.

And I have the feeling that we're not all that much in disagreement about the core issue either. Basically you seem to call that SOMEONE "Peter" while I call him "Paul", but we're still basically talking about the same SOMEONE. But frankly, you could call him "Larry" for all I care. It's not like a name changes that much about it.

I'm also claiming that the name "Paul" must have been important in SOME way and carried SOME authority to people in the 2nd century, or they wouldn't go to all the effort of:
A) writing forgeries in his name to support their own position. It doesn't work as an appeal to authority, unless that name carries SOME authority already. AND
B) trying to make their forgeries out of fragments of other writings in his name, using the characters from them (e.g., Timothy), etc.

Now I don't know if that means he was real. I mean, it could be the same as hypothetically people nowadays forging quotes from Sherlock Holmes or Robin Hood, just because their audience thinks that they're real and the name carries some sort of authority. You don't necessarily need the figure of authority to be real for an appeal to authority to work, you just need people to BELIEVE they were real and had some kind of authority.

But basically that's just it: for people in the 2nd century to forge their appeals to authority in the name of Paul -- and quite overwhelmingly so; even more than in the name of Peter or any other apostle, really -- their audience had to ALREADY know that name and think it has any claim to authority. I don't know what for. Maybe some church did claim to be founded by a berk named Paul, or maybe the name appeared in some earlier writing, or whatever. But there was already some claim to authority by specifically that name.

Edit: I'm also claiming that the character named Paul in those writings -- whether he was real or not -- is describing textbook schizophrenia symptoms, such as Cotard Syndrome and delusions of reference. Several times for each of them, in fact. As such, it makes it rather dismissable as evidence for anything real either way. That doesn't hinge on the character Paul being real. I can say that Darth Vader was evil, or that Sherlock Holmes was an Asperger's Syndrome sufferer, without needing either Anakin or Sherlock to be real. I'm just saying that the character as characterized in those works is that way. I don't neeed Anakin to be real to say that, you know, his slaughter of the Jedi toddlers or his strangling admiral Needa aren't exactly painting him as the good guy there.

 

[smartcooky]

Which explanations? You really are struggling to understand people..

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail!

 

[acbytesla]

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail!

[qimg]https://www.dropbox.com/s/fegu0posyw2p7zc/Hammer.gif?raw=1[/qimg]

Everyone is wrong and only Dejudge is right. Haven't you got that by now?