The Historical Jesus III
- Thread starter IanS
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Well that may be one reason why you might notice that I have never mentioned John Frum at all here, or ever tried to use any argument about John Frum.
But, what I think Max is probably doing with the example of John Frum, is responding to people who make the HJ claim, where they say that the biblical stories of Jesus could not have arisen unless there was a real person somewhere at the root of the stories. What I suppose Max is doing is just pointing out that it's not true that such stories need any real person behind them ... hence his example of John Frum, where afaik Max says that there was no such real person, and where he also points out that these and similar stories were also created in relatively modern times when you might have thought it would be much easier for people to check and quickly realise that the stories were untrue (unlike claims being made in biblical times when almost everyone hearing miracle stories of Jesus would probably not have thought to question it, but would instead be persuaded by the very fact that so many amazing miracles were performed, so that such a person must indeed have been the true son of Yahweh).
IOW - I don't suppose Max would have bothered ever to mention John Frum, were it not for the fact that HJ people so often claim that the biblical writing could not have arisen unless there really was an individual of some sort at behind it all.
Belz...
Fiend God
I'm sure you're right. However no one here is doing that. What they are saying is that a real person is the most likely explanation. Simply mentioning alternatives is, therefore, not a counter-argument.
Yes. I think I've said before that Frum teaches us that imaginary people are possible. Alexander the Great tells us that real people can be retrofitted with mythical characteristics, and so forth, with other possibilities.
Which one of these things has applied in any given case has to be elucidated, if that is possible,by examining the case in question.
But some things are intrinsically more possible than others, so it is permissible to remove impossible features from a story, see what's left and test it against the known data. That may or may not be the right thing to do in any given case.
Suppose all accounts of Arthur say he had a magic sword. In fact they don't, but anyway ... We can rule out that he had a magic sword. But of course we still need to consider the remaining alternatives, to wit:
There was no Arthur.
There was an Arthur, but he didn't have a magic sword.
Either of these is possible.
It is most fascinating that the earliest Greek Christian Bible does not contain the words Christian/Christians.
But what is most bizarre is that the authors of the Christian Bible could NOT spell their OWN NAME.
Anyone who is familiar with Koine Greek would see that the Greek word meaning the Anointed [χριστος] is easier to write that the Greek word for Good [χρηστος].
Incredibly, up to the 4th century, Christians could NOT spell or write their OWN name in Greek.
Acts of the Apostles and 1 Peter in the 4th century Sinaiticus Codex contain the Greek word for CHRESTIANOS--not CHRISTIANOS.
4th century Sinaiticus Acts 11.26.... χρηϲτιανουϲ--CHRESTIANS
4th century Sinaiticus Acts 26.28.... χρηϲτιανον-- CHRESTIAN
4th century Sinaiticus 1 Peter 4.16 ... χρηϲτιανοϲ --CHRESTIAN
It took at least 300 years for Christians to spell their OWN Name.
Christians appear to have NO idea that Christians got their name from CHRISTUS --NOT CHRESTUS.
5th century Alexandrinus Acts 11.26 χριστιανους--CHRISTIANS
5th century Alexandrinus Acts 26-28 χριστιανον--CHRISTIAN
5th century Alexandrinus 1 Peter 4.16 χριστιανος--CHRISTIAN
The evidence is clear there was NO person called Christus--the Greek word for CHRESTIAN is derived from CHRESTUS.
The Lord God of the Jews is CHRESTUS [χρηστος].
The Greek Psalms 106.1 τω κυριω οτι χρηστος
The CHRESTIANS χρηϲτιανον were followers of the [χρηστος] the GOOD Lord God --NOT Dead Obscure HJ.
Dead Obscure HJ is fiction.
Dead Obscure HJ was neither Christus or Chrestos.
But what is most bizarre is that the authors of the Christian Bible could NOT spell their OWN NAME.
Anyone who is familiar with Koine Greek would see that the Greek word meaning the Anointed [χριστος] is easier to write that the Greek word for Good [χρηστος].
Incredibly, up to the 4th century, Christians could NOT spell or write their OWN name in Greek.
Acts of the Apostles and 1 Peter in the 4th century Sinaiticus Codex contain the Greek word for CHRESTIANOS--not CHRISTIANOS.
4th century Sinaiticus Acts 11.26.... χρηϲτιανουϲ--CHRESTIANS
4th century Sinaiticus Acts 26.28.... χρηϲτιανον-- CHRESTIAN
4th century Sinaiticus 1 Peter 4.16 ... χρηϲτιανοϲ --CHRESTIAN
It took at least 300 years for Christians to spell their OWN Name.
Christians appear to have NO idea that Christians got their name from CHRISTUS --NOT CHRESTUS.
5th century Alexandrinus Acts 11.26 χριστιανους--CHRISTIANS
5th century Alexandrinus Acts 26-28 χριστιανον--CHRISTIAN
5th century Alexandrinus 1 Peter 4.16 χριστιανος--CHRISTIAN
The evidence is clear there was NO person called Christus--the Greek word for CHRESTIAN is derived from CHRESTUS.
The Lord God of the Jews is CHRESTUS [χρηστος].
The Greek Psalms 106.1 τω κυριω οτι χρηστος
The CHRESTIANS χρηϲτιανον were followers of the [χρηστος] the GOOD Lord God --NOT Dead Obscure HJ.
Dead Obscure HJ is fiction.
Dead Obscure HJ was neither Christus or Chrestos.
The arguments which you yourself have used throughout all these threads, are exactly the same ones that you have repeated here literally hundreds of times, are they not?
You have not ever admitted that your beliefs were wrong on any relevant issue here, have you? Afaik, like everyone else here (on either side), you have repeated the exact same argument many hundreds of times.
At least what I have tried to do is to explain all my arguments in great detail, and often in different ways with different wording so as to help make the arguments clear for anyone who actually wanted to understand why those arguments are certainly correct. And they are "certainly correct", because almost every part of any central or important argument that I have presented here, is backed up by "proven fact" (as much as it's possible ever to "prove" anything in this entire universe).
For example, what I have mostly tried to explain about the biblical writing as the primary source of any and all Jesus claims, is that, that writing is completely discredited as a reliable source by it's constant claims about so many miracles and so many divine insights and other supernatural events. And that is as much a "proven" fact as you can ever actually have, That is -
- in the bible, iirc, there are about 40 separate claims of different miracles performed by a figure called Jesus. It took almost 2000 years, but eventually a relatively new and extremely accurate method called "science" was developed, which inadvertently "proved" that such miracles are physically impossible. And that's true also of course of other supernatural events claimed in the bible, such as Jesus rising from the dead, or speaking to people as a spirit in the skies, or all the dead rising up and walking about in Jerusalem etc., and in fact also true of the constant divine insights that Jesus was claimed to have made which so amazed his dumbfounded disciples.
A source like that, i.e. the biblical writing, packed with as many false claims as that, all claims once thought to be the very thing which proved Jesus to be true and to be truly the son of God, but eventually all shown to be fictional completely untrue ignorant superstitious nonsense, is most definitely not credible as a source of reliable information about a Jesus figure who was even admitted there by it's authors to be entirely unknown to any of them!
That is about as far from being a credible source of genuine evidence as it's possible to imagine. And yet every HJ poster here (and every biblical scholar) is totally dependent upon that as their source for claiming to show that Jesus was a real person.
There's much more of course. For a start, it now turns out, courtesy of authors like Randel Helms, that it's quite easy to show that all of the gospel writers were certainly creating Jesus stories from the OT. So that explains exactly where they were getting their Jesus belief, and it explains precisely why they had those beliefs, i.e. because it was already written centuries before as divine unarguable prophecy from God!
There is almost no end to the modern-day evidence which shows as a matter of "proven fact", how and why the gospels and letters were created, and how any why none of them are the reliable personal eye-witness accounts which they had been claimed to be for almost 2000 years. That's now all disproven beyond all doubt.
And yet, all HJ posters here, all HJ posters on all other forums (inc. of course many Christian religious forums), all biblical scholars (individuals who are afaik still almost all the devout Christians that they certainly all were when they entered that profession), are relying completely and entirely on that same absolutely absurd and totally discredited and proven untrue writing in a 2000 year old holy book of religious faith, as their only source of evidence.
And that certainly is their "only" source, because there is absolutely no evidence at all to support any claim that later non-biblical writing that made ultra brief passing mentions of such names as "Chrestus" or "Christ" (or even "James"), was actually independent of the biblical writing at all. That is - there is no credible argument whatsoever to suggest that writers like Tacitus and Josephus (who are in any case known only in what Christians themselves wrote 1000 years later!), ever had any of their own independent knowledge or acquaintance with Jesus or with "James" or with "Paul" or with any disciples or anyone else in the biblical accounts ... all the known evidence suggests that such later non-biblical writers were almost certainly doing no more than commenting (extremely briefly as passing mention) on what earlier Christians themselves had claimed from their biblical preaching.
So all you are really left with is the bible. And that, as just described (and explained!), is just about the most unreliable, and most “proven” unreliable, source ever in the history of mankind. And yet, that is what we are being offered as the source of evidence of Jesus. In fact, that is all we are being offered as the evidence of Jesus.
But it’s surely by now far beyond obvious that if people are so irresponsible and so incredibly gullible as to be using the bible as their source to claim evidence for Jesus (a Jesus who was not even known to any of the biblical writers themselves, and in fact not even claimed ever to have been known by anyone), that it’s utterly pointless for any sceptics here to expect any HJ posters ever to understand what is wrong with their arguments and their beliefs, until and unless they ever understand why a source like the bible is not even by the wildest stretch of any educated imagination, a credible source to be used for anything it claims about Jesus.
Finally here is something I have said in these very same words at least 20 times before, lets see if Craig would like to report this to the moderators as “repetition” and see if he can get the whole post censured and banned from being read or seen by anyone on this website -
- does the above mean that I claim Jesus did not exist? No. I don’t claim that. But what it does mean is that the bible is not by the wildest streak of anyone’s imagination, a credible source of evidence in the claims it makes about him. So that, whilst he might have existed, at least in some sense (though obviously not as described in the bible), it needs something vastly better than the bible to be produced as credible evidence of his existence as a human person ever known to anyone. And so far, it seems that there actually is nothing except the holy bible.
I don't know if anyone should call it a "counter argument". But why is this so difficult for you to understand?
What is being said by Max afaik (not said by me, because I don’t know any details of any John Frum stories) - is simply that cases like that of John Frum, show why it’s wrong for HJ believers to claim that biblical stories of Jesus could only have occurred if there was a real person somewhere at the heart of the stories, someone who actually was doing the non-miraculous things described there.
As far as I understand it from Max, and he can tell us if this is what he says about John Frum or Tom Navy or others - those stories, complete with all sorts of detail, did in fact arise about figures who never existed at all (or else who were not doing any of the things described in any of those quite detailed accounts).
On that basis, it would not be a credible argument to say that Jesus probably was real because such stories could never have arisen unless there was some real person at the hearts of it ... because that is refuted by stories like that of John Frum (or iirc Betty Crocker in one of Carriers examples). That is, afaik, what is claimed for the example of John Frum and similar imaginary figures.
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Belz...
Fiend God
I don't understand what "this" is refering to. Maximara bringing up Frum certainly is an argument.
I have addressed this in the post you quoted, Ian. NO ONE is saying that it's the ONLY explanation. Therefore it is unhelpful to mention other possibilities. One must attack the probability.
I deny and have always denied, that there is any single source definable as "the Bible". So there is no point in my perusing your dissertation any further.
Except as I have pointed out before there are examples of Jesus Chrestos (Jesus the Good) rather then Jesus Christ (Jesus the Messiah): a record of baptism in a Cemetery of Callisto's sepulchral inscription (268 CE), the Deir Ali Inscription (318 CE) PGM IV. 3007-86 (c 4th century), and The Manichaean Manuscripts (4th century).
The stories of John Frum are very simple even simpler then Paul's accounts Jesus.
Very simply the current story is that John Frum appeared to the elders in a vision and promised that when he returned he would drive away all the whites and then planes of cargo would come. He also supposedly has an army ranging from 5,000 to 20,000 with him in the local volcano which one assumes is going to fight the whites.
That is more or less it...or at least as much as the anthropological works have provided.
The story of Ned Ludd is even simpler: either as the result of being whipped for being idle or being taunted by local youths in a "fit of passion" he smashed two knitting frames.
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The fact that people call their god 'The Good' does not mean this god is somehow derivative of a different god who was also well liked by his followers. No more than Philip the Good of Burgundy is derived from Charles the Good of Flanders, even though they both lived in what is now known as Belgium.
Jesus the Messiah of the Jews is a fiction character completely unknown and undocumented in the history of the Jews.
Jesus called anointed χριστος [christos] was Jesus the High Priest the son of Damneus who was killed in the reign of Nero.
It is documented that Jewish High Priests and Kings were called χριστος by Jews.
The supposed Dead Obscure HJ was neither a Messianic ruler, King or an High Priest.
A dead obscure HJ makes no sense as a competing alternative religion.
It appears to be completely absurd that a dead Jewish criminal was offered to people of the Roman Empire as their new Lord and Savior and God Creator.
A Dead Obscure HJ is completely theologically ridiculous and logically barren.
Your statement does not help the HJ argument.
You have no evidence of a dead obscure HJ.
Even Christians of antiquity admitted that the supposed TOMB of Jesus was found EMPTY.
All we have from the supposed dead obscure HJ is the FAKE shroud of Turin.
Porpoise of Life
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Dear dejudge, one does not have to claim that everything one says supports one singular predetermined conclusion. If you'd spend less time pontificating, and copying and pasting your own posts, you would have seen that I have not argued for an historical Jesus.
However, this does not mean that I should treat every argument against it as valid. Conspiratorial thinking and assertions without evidence are poor form, whether one likes the conclusion they support or not.
By "this" - it means what it says, which was - "why is it so difficult for you to understand that what Max says about cases such as John Frum, as complete refutations of the common HJ claim that the biblical stories of Jesus could not have arisen unless Jesus was a real person" ... what is difficult to understand about that as a frankly unarguable statement showing that it is NOT a valid or credible argument for any HJ people to claim that biblical stories of Jesus could not arise unless there was a real figure of Jesus actually doing some of things claimed in the bible????
That is not difficult to understand at all.
Nobody is saying “what” as the only explanation?? We are talking specifically about the HJ claim that the biblical stories could not have arisen unless Jesus was a real person doing at least some of the things described in the bible. And what Max has pointed out to you is that the example of John Frum (and others) disproves that claim completely.
So it is definitely untrue to claim that the biblical stories of Jesus could not arise without some real figure actually doing at least some of the things claimed in the bible ... that is what is being shown by the example of John Frum.
If you are now saying that there is some other explanation different from HJ people claiming that the biblical stories could not have arisen without a real figure as their basis doing at least some of things claimed in the bible, then you have changed the subject (!!) and are now talking about something else entirely. The discussion here was and is specifically about why the example of John Frum is said to disprove any claim that says the biblical stories of Jesus could not exist unless there really was some human person doing some of things claimed for Jesus in the bible ...
... that particular HJ claim is manifestly untrue, and said to be disproven by cases like that of John Frum (Max describes that case of John Frum; I have never offered that, because I know little about the John Frum case).
But nobody needs any comparison with John Frum to say immediately that it is certainly false to claim that the biblical writing about Jesus could never have arisen unless there was some sort of human Jesus figure as it’s basis. That claim is manifestly untrue. Because there are millions of such fantasy stories & superstitions that need no real person as their basis. All the thousands of different god stories ever told are examples of that.
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When we use that tern “the bible”, what everyone here means is the collection of letters and gospels that comprise the book known as the “New Testament Bible”.
And you know that perfectly well.
Are you claiming that there is some other “biblical” work that is not part of that “new testament”?
In 99.9% of the issues here, when HJ people claim evidence from the “Bible”, it means evidence claimed to be in the writing of Paul’s letters and the writing of the four canonical gospels.
If you are claiming something else as “the bible”, then you had better tell us what it is that you have as your “biblical evidence“.
Where does your biblical evidence come from?
That's plain daft. You can't really mean that. You're having a laugh. I wrote that there is in my opinion no "single source" definable as the bible. Please try again.
If you are not arguing for an historical Jesus then perhaps you don't know what you are arguing about.
I am arguing that Jesus of Nazareth in the NT was a figure of myth/fiction based on the MASSIVE amount of evidence from antiquity.
Christians of antiquity did NOT know and could NOT spell their own name for at least 300 years and did not know that CHRESTIANS derived their name from CHRESTUS.
Christians of antiquity could spell Christos but could NOT spell CHRISTIANOS
Tacitus' Annals 15.44 with Christos is a most CRUDE forgery.
It has been proven conclusively that the word CHRESTIANOS in Tacitus Annals 15.44 was manipulated.
There was NEVER EVER any Jesus cult called Christians in the time of Nero.
The Jewish Christos had NOT yet come according to the very same TACITUS in "Histories".
Ians said:
Thanks a lot!!!
In any event, we already know that the Christian Bible is a product of no definable historical source.
By the way, Biblical evidence must come the Bible.
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