tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post1795000484282987669..comments2024-03-29T07:36:41.429-04:00Comments on Incinerating Presuppositionalism: In Response to David on I Corinthians 15:3-8Bahnsen Burnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comBlogger73125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-89922906875700492862009-03-25T12:17:00.000-04:002009-03-25T12:17:00.000-04:00Hello Josh,I hope you and your family are doing we...Hello Josh,<BR/><BR/>I hope you and your family are doing well!<BR/><BR/>I’m back from Thailand and have finally had a chance to finish up my response to <A HREF="http://www.bebo.com/BlogView.jsp?MemberId=6020631317&BlogId=8610911807" REL="nofollow">your critique</A> of <A HREF="http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/2008/07/in-response-to-david-on-i-corinthians.html" REL="nofollow">my post</A>. I wrote most of it while I was still in Thailand, as I was recuperating from something I probably shouldn’t have ingested… That gave me a little downtime that I could use at the computer at my in-laws’. It got a little long (which is typical for me), but I had a lot of points to make. You can check it out here:<BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/2009/03/response-to-josh-ratliff-on-creed-in-i.html" REL="nofollow">A Response to Josh Ratliff on the “Creed” in I Corinthians 15</A><BR/><BR/>Please let me know if you have any thoughts you’d like to share on what I’ve written.<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-64940006989649340182009-02-23T22:13:00.000-05:002009-02-23T22:13:00.000-05:00Hey Dawson,I greatly apologize for the misundersta...Hey Dawson,<BR/><BR/>I greatly apologize for the misunderstanding. Before you posted your comment, I suspected that it might not be you, but the e-mails that were sent to me gave that impression. But, to be safe I put a disclaimer on the blog that said that I wasn't sure if it were you or not. So, just know that I'll be posting an update that informs everyone of the misunderstanding.<BR/><BR/>Until then, I'll be waiting for your response. Had I read much of your comments before I read the e-mails sent to me, I would have known that it wasn't you. You seem much friendlier than the person I was interacting with. Again, sorry about the mishap. Enjoy your time in Asia!<BR/><BR/>Sincerely,<BR/>JoshJosh Ratliffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05048043461605028245noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-89098954158598035432009-02-18T19:22:00.000-05:002009-02-18T19:22:00.000-05:00Hello Josh,Thank you for your comment. I took a lo...Hello Josh,<BR/><BR/>Thank you for your comment. I took a look at your response and in it you say that I e-mailed you on 7 February. That is impossible. I have never e-mailed you, and until you posted your comment on this blog, I had never heard of you before. On 7 February I was on a series of international flights and negotiating through several foreign airports. I would not have been able to e-mail you even if I wanted to. In fact, this is the first time I've had any access to the net since 6 February. I suspect someone else is posing as me and trying to incite some interaction. I don't know why anyone would want to do that, but it is the internet, and some treat it as a free-for-all.<BR/><BR/>At any rate, I did review your response and saw a lot of problems with it. Once I return from Asia I will work answer your comments.<BR/><BR/>Until then...<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-46757874732057084342009-02-07T20:07:00.000-05:002009-02-07T20:07:00.000-05:00For all interested, I've responded to Bethrick...For all interested, I've responded to Bethrick's objections here:<BR/><BR/>http://www.bebo.com/BlogView.jsp?MemberId=6020631317&BlogId=8610911807Josh Ratliffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05048043461605028245noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-63054773953894482362008-08-16T15:58:00.000-04:002008-08-16T15:58:00.000-04:00I think we wrote a book here, even when you exclud...I think we wrote a book here, even when you exclude the redundant quotes its still well over 50 pages. With quotes its in excess of 100 pages.davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08071763988772047093noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-69816586931064268922008-08-16T15:56:00.000-04:002008-08-16T15:56:00.000-04:00Dawson,On a less polemic note, I have enjoyed our ...Dawson,<BR/><BR/>On a less polemic note, I have enjoyed our discussion and I have actually been a subscriber to your blog for awhile. I think about a year ago I was searching for "The Great Debate" of Greg Bahnsen and stumbled across your site.<BR/><BR/>Needless to say you are extremely intelligent, and I wouldn't touch your philosophical arguments with a ten foot pole; however, this particular subject draws my attention as it is very foundational to my worldview. Thanks for sticking it out, and I promise no more ridiculously long responses :)davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08071763988772047093noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-79367500088894343952008-08-16T15:48:00.000-04:002008-08-16T15:48:00.000-04:00Dawson, in my first response to your blog article,...Dawson, in my first response to your blog article, I missed that you were trying to posit that Jesus’ existence was legendary. I’m accustomed to people arguing that the resurrection was legendary and not the entire events in the Gospels. Perhaps I will back up a moment since I have gotten a hold of the book you were originally referring to, as well as some of Wells’ work.<BR/><BR/>1. You made some statements about Geisler/Turek (G/T) that strike me as quite heavy and unsupported:<BR/><BR/>In your original blog article, you attempted to cast G/T’s argument in opposition to your rendition of Wells’ legend theory. I assumed that G/T was indeed arguing against the legend theory, because normally folks don’t simply toss a position at an author and criticize them for not dealing with it when the author didn’t aim to in the first place. I also assumed when you accused professional philosophers of question begging and lying, that perhaps I shouldn’t judge until I could have a look at the source.<BR/><BR/>Dawson said:<BR/><I>”But if the Jesus story were a legend in the first place – <B>the very premise which our authors are trying to defeat</B>, then appealing to what might have happened or could have happened to Jesus’ body simply begs the question, for it assumes precisely what they are called to prove: namely that the story we have of Jesus in the New Testament is not legend. If the story about Jesus is merely a legend, then there was no body to crucify and seal in a tomb or parade through the streets of Jerusalem.”<BR/><BR/>“Geisler and Turek's book is admittedly aimed more at a popular audience, but it's fair game so far as I see it, and it's typical in regard to how blatantly many Christians beg the question when it comes to how they argue against the legend theory.”</I><BR/><BR/>Simply put, I think you’ve built a straw man and forced it to beg the question. Does G/T present Habermas’ resurrection argument to conclude that the legend theory is false? No. Besides the fact that there are all sorts of “legend theories” and Wells is the most extreme, you are missing out on what is actually being argued. Generally when New Testament scholars speak of “embellishments” or “legend development” they are not necessarily asserting that the narratives are not without any historical seed at all; specifically, G/K are not defending against the supposition that Paul took some pagan mythology to wash down his hallucinations, and then regurgitated some no-less-than maniacal letters with which later writers found much accord and fabricated more complex Jesus tales. Indeed, if G/K is arguing for the historicity of the resurrection and not the historicity of the whole “Jesus story”, this is a sound argument. <BR/><BR/>On that note I contend that if the legend theory you suppose is true, then Paul is completely insane (after all his statements are incoherent without the Gospels being read back into them or assuming his audience had any idea of what he meant), and the Gospel writers are some of the most outrageous fraudsters fiction has ever seen. Now back to this corny book (actually I agree with your analysis there). <BR/><BR/>G/T is specifically arguing for the historicity of the resurrection, which, as you’ve pointed out, rests on other premises (the historicity of specific statements made in the Gospels) to support it. It is perfectly valid argumentation to have a series of linked premises (with sub-arguments) that support a larger conclusion. One need not reject or accept the entire New Testament as legend; indeed many critical scholars reject the miracle stories and resurrection as legendary yet find no good reason to reject the descriptions of political events, geography, etc. Regardless, you are misrepresenting G/T and introducing a false dichotomy.<BR/><BR/>Craig Blomberg discusses this dichotomy:<BR/>“It certainly seems fair to say its no more appropriate to take the hardest and most fantastic part of a piece of literature and write all the rest of it off as a result, than it is to take the most sober, corroborated piece of literature and use that as a reason for believing everything else in the document.” (<I>Difficult Questions about the New Testament</I>, mp3 online).<BR/><BR/><BR/>2. Dawson said: <I> There’s a persistent and annoying perhapsical nature to all this, and puts a great burden on the memories of those whom Paul personally missionized, persons who may or may not have been the recipients of Paul’s letters, which – like I Corinthians – was addressed to the church as a whole, not to a specific individual.</I><BR/><BR/>You complain that there is a "perhapsical" nature to this whole idea that Paul’s letters were not written in a contextual vacuum. Yet haven’t answered my question: is it really more probable that Paul was writing nonsense? I think the legend theory per Wells has much more perhapsing to account for then any theory of New Testament origins. Perhaps the earlier letter to the Corinthians we no longer have (1 Cor 5:9) contains everything that you find lacking in Paul. :)<BR/><BR/><BR/>3. On several counts, you project your modern understanding back into ancient context:<BR/><BR/>3a. Dawson said: <I>"They obviously do not have a physical person in mind when they make these kinds of declarations, so why suppose the early Christians were speaking about a physical Jesus when they claimed to have "witnessed" him?"</I><BR/><I> If the word “witness” enjoys a very loose meaning for many of today’s Christians (and it very often does), why suppose it didn’t enjoy similar flexibility among the early Christians?</I><BR/><BR/>A word’s current usage cannot be transferred anachronistically “backwords” (get it?). The error is counted doubly when you attempt the feat with two different languages. (Carson, <I>Exegetical Fallacies</I> pg 33)<BR/><BR/>3b. Dawson:<I>"If I had seen a man who was actually resurrected from the grave, whom I thought was "the Son of God," I would waste no time in writing down exactly what I had seen, where I had seen it and when I had seen it. If I knew of others who had the same experience, I would not hesitate to get their testimony down in writing, or at least to have them endorse such statements of witness. But that's me."</I><BR/><BR/>Do you live in the oral culture of first century Palestine? If you did chances are you’d be illiterate, and if you could read and write could you afford it? How could you assure the transmission of your document?<BR/><BR/>Even granting your position for the sake of internal critique, how many average people in our modern society have ever written a historical account of some life changing event they experienced? How about the Virginia Tech mass homicide? This was a major event to witness. I was going to school at James Madison University at the time (2 hours down the road), and saw no written accounts circulating amongst my close friends who were only several feet away from the killer that day. Indeed not even blogging about their experiences? No, but they told me plenty about it. Even if they did write some of it down, would it still be around in a couple of millennia? Maybe so with today’s standards, but I don’t think that even close to a reasonable expectation for 30 AD. Geisler (same book) points out it may very well be the case that Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, and James were among the 500 as well as nine who are elsewhere named Apostles (Geisler/Turek, pg 248); if he’s right then there are written accounts.<BR/><BR/>At any rate you recognize transmission problems elsewhere:<BR/><I>On Paul's view, I don't see why any of the anonymous 500 or so brethren that he mentions in I Cor. 15 could not also claim to be apostles. Maybe some of them did and are simply lost in history.</I><BR/><BR/>3c. Dawson: <I> Paul nowhere suggests that Jesus had taught these things during his life on earth. But that’s what we find when we get to the gospels: Jesus marching a squad of disciples through the ancient countryside between various towns in Palestine performing miracles, healing the blind, the lame and the infirm, giving moral instruction and teaching in the form of parables. We never learn any of this from Paul. </I><BR/><BR/>It’s as if you are surprised by the fact that Paul was writing letters on the road and not historical narrative. Was Paul’s purpose in writing those letters to give exhaustive account of Jesus’ earthly ministry? No. Would these references have made his arguments more compelling? Perhaps to you, but where has it been argued that the original intended audience shares your worldview? So why blame Paul for not fulfilling your requirements when they are incompatible with Paul’s authorial intent?<BR/><BR/>1 Corinthians 9:10 “To the married I give this charge (not I, but the Lord): the wife should not separate from her husband”<BR/><BR/>Now why does Paul put this moral teaching in Jesus’ mouth, and then immediately afterwards clarify something that he is saying instead of Jesus? Indeed this teaching was nothing new (Gen 2:24; Mal 2:16).<BR/><BR/><BR/>4. Now to the issue of Gospel dating and how Wells handles external sources:<BR/><BR/>Wells:<BR/>“Before 90 AD, Jesus remained an undated, mysterious figure about whom virtually nothing was known or reported (<I>Did Jesus Exist? </I> pgs. 47, 65; HEJ, 217-220).”<BR/><BR/>"Jesus is not linked with a recognizable historical situation in any document (Christian, Jewish or pagan) that can be proved to have originated before about AD 100" (<I>Did Jesus Exist?</I>, pg. 215)<BR/><BR/>Now those are some big statements, and you would immediately wonder what he does about all the external attestation (Josephus, Tacitus, and later Papias, Thallus, Lucian, Pliny, etc…) Easy, he rejects them. What degree of specialization does he possess relevant to the subject area? None. <BR/>Now given I don’t think you have to be a New Testament historian or textual critic to be critical, but when you’re going to swim upstream and insist on largely abandoned styles of form criticism you’re making a tall order. Price proudly admits that he stands in an older tradition of criticism in his debate with William Lane Craig on the resurrection, but I have yet to find Wells acknowledge his heritage.<BR/><BR/>Wells more recently questions the seriousness of the Jesus quests :<BR/><BR/>“The theological world is now in the midst of what is known as "The Third Quest for the Historical Jesus". J. P. Meier allows that "all too often the first and second quests were theological projects masquerading as historical projects" (art. cit., p. 463). We shall see whether their successor fares any better.” (<I> G. A. Wells Replies to Criticisms of his Books on Jesus</I>, 2000)<BR/><BR/>I would like to interact with Wells personally someday, but I think he’s a bit old for such affairs and admittedly gets on the Internet infrequently. J.P. Holding did have some interaction with him: <A HREF="”" REL="nofollow">Tektonics</A><BR/><BR/>Dawson: <I> Similarly with the events described in the gospels themselves: how can we know which year, according to the event sequences given in the gospels, when Jesus was crucified</I><BR/><BR/>Luke 3:1<BR/><I>“1In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene”</I><BR/><BR/>Tiberius became emperor in August, AD 14 which places John’s ministry at October, AD 27. Given the 3 Passover feasts described in John, this would place the crucifixion at AD 30. External sources corroborate that Pilate was Roman governor of Judea, Herod Antipas was tetrarch of Galilee, and Caiaphas was Jewish high priest. Specifically one of these sources would have no reason to acknowledge or accredit Christianity: the Jewish Mishnah and Talmuds. Five of Christ’s disciples are named therein (see Klausner, <I>The Jesus of Nazareth</I>, pg. 18)<BR/><BR/>Ok, nice but big deal right? Well, if multiple methods of computation bring us to the same date this strengthens the conclusion (and also cast doubt on collaborative effort among the authors). As you know source criticism plays a large role in this, which is why the question of Q-source and Markan priority are important. Nevertheless, if multiple independent attestations can be sufficiently demonstrated, then the historicity of an event is very probable even to the most skeptical historians (Ehrman, Borg, etc…). <BR/><BR/>In Acts there are two significant events with external attestation for their timeline:<BR/>1. The expulsion of the Jews to Rome in AD 49 by Emperor Claudius (Acts 18:2, date referenced in Suetonius, <I>Claudius</I> 25.4)<BR/>2. The appointment of Gallio as governor of the province of Achaia in mid AD 51 (based on the Gallio inscription found at Delphi, mentioned in Acts 18:12 in relation to Paul’s visit to Corinth)<BR/><BR/>There is much more to cover about dating the Gospels, but without being lengthy there isn’t much more I can say about them (Temple destruction in 70 AD, War of 66AD, death of Paul and Peter from Josephus, Nero in 64 AD etc…).<BR/><BR/>A good essay on dating Luke/Acts (generally historians prefer these two books because of the amount of historical data mentioned therein): <BR/>http://leonardooh.wordpress.com/2008/04/17/on-dating-luke-acts-and-it%E2%80%99s-synoptic-consequence/<BR/><BR/>Mark has external attestation from Papias in 110 AD:<BR/>Mark indeed, since he was the interpreter of Peter, wrote accurately, but not in order, the things either said or done by the Lord as much as he remembered. For he neither heard the Lord nor followed Him, but afterwards, as I have said, [heard and followed] Peter, who fitted his discourses to the needs [of his hearers] but not as if making a narrative of the Lord's sayings'; consequently, Mark, writing down some things just as he remembered, erred in nothing; for he was careful of one thing - not to omit anything of the things he heard or to falsify anything in them.<BR/><BR/>As I have pointed out to Robert, if the early Christian community was pumping out lies left and right to build their case for Christ, why not put Peter at the pen on this document instead of Mark who was not an eyewitness? Especially at the time Papias was writing, when the apostolic pedestal found its high point.<BR/><BR/><BR/>5. Dawson: <I>I'm not talking linguistic philosophy either. You had mentioned "the building blocks of thought," and those are concepts, not words. This is basic epistemology, not linguistic philosophy. You can't have language without concepts. The ability to form concepts comes first, but language helps us retain and organize the concepts we've formed.</I><BR/><BR/> This is a silly quibble, but just so you don’t think I’m being dishonest in what I stated:<BR/> “Words are the unit of thought in most of our thinking and writing; they are the bricks of our conceptual formulation.” (Ramm, <I>Protestant Biblical Interpretation 3 ed.</I>, page 128)<BR/><BR/><BR/>6. Regarding the word study fallacy you keep insisting is proper exegesis:<BR/><BR/>Straight out of a hermeneutics textbook, under the heading of “word-count fallacy”:<BR/>“We make this mistake when we insist that a word must have the same meaning every time it occurs. For example, if we are confident that a word carries a certain meaning in seven of its eight occurrences in Scripture, we might be tempted to conclude that it must have the same meaning in its eighth occurrence. Yet as Darrel Bock maintains, “word meanings are determined by context, not word counts.” (Bock, “New Testament Word Analysis pg. 111, <I>A Hands on Approach To Reading, Interpreting, and Applying the Bible, Duvall pg 130</I>)<BR/><BR/><BR/>7. You deem my inquiries about James as trifling, but even Wells himself says that his theory stands or falls on this. Indeed the reason I have pressed this point is because your original statement about a recent resurrection in Paul demand such evidence be discussed. <BR/><BR/>Wells:<BR/>“If Paul means blood brother of a historical Jesus, then it would suffice to establish--against my view--that Jesus had really lived in the first half of the first century. Furthermore, I must admit that this interpretation of Paul's words does seem the immediate and obvious one. Here, then, is a case where what seems to be the plain sense of a text . . . would weigh very heavily indeed against my view of Christian origins.” (HEJ, 167)<BR/><BR/>Similarly regarding “the twelve”:<BR/>"If these words were really written by Paul, then it looks as though he was aware that Jesus chose twelve disciples; and if Paul in this respect corroborates what the gospels say, then it would be reasonable to infer that he also knows the principle facts of Jesus' life . . . ." (DJE, 124) <BR/><BR/>In order to get himself out of the quagmire he’s created ;) , Wells must argue that the Corinthian passage is an interpolation (<I>DJE</I>, pg 124) even though every single shred of manuscript evidence includes the full passage. That means there is zero textual warrant for his claim. This constitutes special pleading. You said you were ok with the creed being authentic though right?<BR/><BR/>In addition, Wells must reject both references to Jesus in Josephus to hold up his theory. Written around 93-94 AD, Josephus’ writings clearly link Jesus to his disciples and connect his crucifixion to Pilate. Now I grant that many register concern about the authenticity <I>Antiquities 18:3</I>, but who else is rejecting all references to Jesus? Wells of course.<BR/><BR/>Princeton Seminary's James Charlesworth: "We can now be as certain as historical research will presently allow that Josephus did refer to Jesus." (<I>Jesus Within Judaism </I>,pg. 96) <BR/><BR/>In addition, Wells <B>must </B>also twist the reference in Josephus about James to be consistent. According to the passage "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James" met his death after the death of the procurator Porcius Festus, yet before Lucceius Albinus took office (<I>Antiquities 20.9</I>)…which is also where we derive the traditional date of 62 AD for his death. <BR/><BR/>At any rate Wells has since changed his mind about the existence of Jesus, so now his earlier critiques of Paul need to be re-assessed and I seriously doubt they will maintain consistency. Apparently Q has persuaded him that Jesus may have been a real person.<BR/><BR/>'A final argument against the nonexistence hypothesis comes from Wells himself. In his most recent book, The Jesus Myth (1999), Wells has moved away from this hypothesis. He now accepts that there is some historical basis for the existence of Jesus, derived from the lost early "gospel" "Q" (the hypothetical source used by Matthew and Luke). Wells believes that it is early and reliable enough to show that Jesus probably did exist, although this Jesus was not the Christ that the later canonical Gospels portray. It remains to be seen what impact Wells's about-face will have on debate over the nonexistence hypothesis in popular circles.', Van Voorst, Robert E, 'NonExistence Hypothesis', in Houlden, James Leslie (editor), 'Jesus in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia', page 660 (Santa Barbara: 2003)<BR/><BR/>In a lecture given in 2003, he admits that Paul probably did believe that Jesus was an actual Jewish man who was crucified. (http://www.bede.org.uk/gawells.htm)<BR/><BR/>How do you square this with your statement given your relied on Wells for nearly all citations made during our interection?<BR/><BR/>Dawson:<I> Now, surely even you must admit, David, this is pretty flimsy. In all his letters, had Paul believed that people he had personally met had walked and talked with the earthly, pre-resurrection Jesus, we’re supposed to believe he never found an opportunity to mention this, except to refer to this person James as Jesus’ brother?</I><BR/><BR/>Perhaps like Antony Flew we should assume his old age has withered his critical faculties :) But enough about Wells, I just didn’t want you to think I was swatting him away so quickly. I will continue to read his works and possibly if I ever start a blog address more fully the issues with the legend theory. <BR/><BR/>Dawson said: <I>For here we have the example of G.A. Wells, whose books are chock full of quotes from and references to the scholarly literature, and he is dismissed with the wave of his hand as if he were simply a pesky fly. So in spite of your complaint, it probably wouldn't matter if I had used 5 or 10 or 50 different sources to inform my points - I'm sure you're inventive enough to find a way to dismiss them anyway.</I><BR/><BR/>I think there is a lot of inventive dismissal going on when you build a theory on the absence of evidence.<BR/><BR/><BR/>8. Dawson :<I>As for whether or not the gospel writers used Paul as a source, this is unclear. However, as I have shown, many of the teachings which Paul gives as his own or as inspired by his interpretation of "the scriptures" are put into Jesus' mouth in the gospels. This suggests that later writers were using sources that were influenced by Paul, even if they did not mention or credit Paul.</I><BR/><BR/>I haven’t been shown any examples of this, but I have heard about lots of things Paul doesn’t mention. What about some things he does tell us about Jesus?<BR/>• Jesus was born in human fashion, as a Jew, and had a ministry to the Jews. (Galations 4:4) <BR/>• Jesus was referred to as "Son of God". (1 Cor. 1:9) <BR/>• Jesus was a direct descendent of King David. (Romans 1:3) <BR/>• Jesus prayed to God using the term "abba". (Galations 4:6) <BR/>• Jesus expressly forbid divorce. (1 Cor. 7:10) <BR/>• Jesus taught that "preachers" should be paid for their preaching. (1 Cor. 9:14) <BR/>• Jesus taught about the end-time. (1 Thess. 4:15) <BR/>• Paul refers to Peter by the name Cephas (rock), which was the name Jesus gave to him. (1 Cor. 3:22) <BR/>• Jesus had a brother named James. (Galations 1:19) <BR/>• Jesus initiated the Lord's supper and referred to the bread and the cup. (1 Cor. 11:23-25) <BR/>• Jesus was betrayed on the night of the Lord's Supper. (1 Cor. 11:23-25) <BR/>• Jesus' death was related to the Passover Celebration. (1 Cor. 5:7) <BR/>• The death of Jesus was at the hands of earthly rulers. (1 Cor. 2:8) <BR/>• Jesus underwent abuse and humiliation. (Romans 15:3) <BR/>• Jewish authorities were involved with Jesus' death. (1 Thess. 2:14-16) <BR/>• Jesus died by crucifixion. (2 Cor. 13:4 et al) <BR/>• Jesus was physically buried. (1 Cor. 15:4) <BR/><BR/>(from http://www.bede.org.uk/jesusmyth.htm)<BR/><BR/>9. <I>Yes, you adhere to supernaturalism on the one hand (which defies explanation), and yet demand more and more and more explanation when it comes to hypotheses involving embellishment, fabrication, misunderstandings that beget further misunderstandings, manipulation of sources (such as OT "prophecies" of Jesus), etc., all couched in a worldview which condemns human beings as depraved liars. Got it. </I><BR/><BR/>Not even close Dawson, and I’m surprised you would hurl such insults if you are really laboring in love as you claim. It only makes the discussion less productive.<BR/><BR/><BR/>10. <I> David: "3. Your interpretation provides little explanatory power, since if ‘brother of the Lord’ simply means James was a Christian, this is nothing unique and honorific at all."</I><BR/><BR/>Dawson: <I>Did you read what I had written? Paul clearly thought that James was a "pillar" of the church at the time (I referred you to Gal. 2:9). He was not just another convert in Paul’s view. </I><BR/><BR/>This doesn’t at all lend credence to your argument about the meaning of the phrase in Galatians 1. Paul could say James was purple in chapter 2, but why assume that has any bearing on the meaning of a phrase in chapter 1?<BR/><BR/><BR/>11. <I>Specifically what evidence "points to the historicity of the Gospels"? What exactly do you mean by this? What evidence is there that a deity incarnated itself, was born as a human being to a virgin mother, performed miracles and cured congenital blindness, rebuked demons and devils, raised dead people back to life, and was himself raised back to life after being crucified? We have stories, and stories can be made up. Tell me what evidence supports these stories? </I><BR/><BR/>It seems like you have only supernatural events in mind for the historicity of the Gospels. There are voluminous works out there on the historical Jesus from all spectrums of the issue which give evidence for this. Need I summarize them all here? <BR/><BR/><BR/>12. Dawson: <I>As for the legend theory, I’ve already pointed to things which Paul says that conflicts with the later record, such as his view of rulers. </I><BR/>I already asked how Paul’s general description of rulers is relevant to a specific description in the Gospels. <BR/><BR/> 13.Dawson: <I>You believe the literalist Christian propaganda because you’ve invested yourself so deeply into its program, and admitting that your leg has been pulled is just too much to bear, especially when the messenger is someone so “loathsome” as a confessed atheist. I realize this, David, I was in your shoes at one point in my life. Only I woke up.</I><BR/><BR/>It’s rather unfortunate that my beliefs be relegated to mere “devotion to a system.” It’s not as if you have any particular insistence on the negation of my beliefs, or hold stock in the legend theory for any reasons relevant to your own Christianity experience. No not at all! I am completely biased and blind because of my worldview and you are the wise old atheist waking me up with the somber light of disbelief. I find that rather silly, but amusing nonetheless. :) <BR/>I’m 24 years old and grew up in a Christian home in the deep Southern Bible belt. I wildly abandoned my parents’ faith in college and eagerly followed the natural sciences as the sole means of attaining truth. I did things I never dreamed of (and will have nightmares about later in life), having been freed from the morality of my youth. Then, through events in my life, God took hold of me. I picked up the Bible and actually read its claims about God, mankind, and the world as well as the relationship between them. It makes perfect sense to me, and everything in the Bible meshes with what I’ve experienced personally in my “walk”, or whatever the popular Christian word is these days. In addition, I find the 4 facts about the resurrection very compelling. So you see, from my perspective I too woke up, and I was also in your shoes. Actually I know a limited amount about your shoes, but I think you have a great deal of confidence in your dismissal of Christianity. I'm sure you've thought this, but I'm always one to say doubt everything even your skepticism.<BR/><BR/>14. <I>David: "4. No sources have been presented in which ‘brother of the Lord’ does not reference a sibling relationship;" </I><BR/><BR/>Dawson:<I> Here you’re just begging the question. If the earliest source (Paul) does not mean a sibling relationship, then what you say here is patently false. </I><BR/><BR/>I intended to exclude the verse in question from that statement and should have done so explicitly. I guess given how quickly you accuse people of begging the question; I should be clearer. :)<BR/><BR/>15. <I>David: "indeed all other sources examined use the phrase specifically to identify Jesus’ siblings."</I><BR/><BR/><I>Dawson: And I’ve addressed this several times now: had later Christians not known that ‘brother of the Lord’ was a church title not at all denoting a sibling relationship, it could easily have been mistaken by them as meaning a sibling relationship, or opportunistically seized on in order to contrive such a view. Using ‘brother’ to denote others as believers was common parlance; it still is today. When I was a Christian, everyone in my church was so eager to call me his brother. Also, it is doubtful that Paul would have put stock in a relationship of the flesh. Nowhere does Paul say that Jesus had any siblings. </I><BR/><BR/>Are you basing your assertions about later Christians on what is probable or what is possible? If all your probability assessments rely on the legend theory, I think you’re in big trouble.<BR/><BR/>16. Dawson: <I>I’ve spoken to this already. The phrase "brother of the Lord" as used by Paul most likely indicates that James had some very high position in the Jerusalem church; for Paul, James is one of the “pillars” of the church (Gal. 2:9). </I><BR/><BR/>You’ve given no evidence that “brother of the Lord” indicates this, and neither have the quotes you provided. Speculating about unnamed “extant texts” doesn’t do much for me.<BR/><BR/>17. Dawson:<I>Especially because it references "the Lord" as opposed to "Jesus," the phrase strikes me very much to be a title rather than a reference to a biological sibling. I don’t think a reference to a sibling here would at all make sense.</I><BR/><BR/>Actually when the alleged ossuary of James was found, one of the reasons some critical scholars rejected it as authentic was precisely because it named him “brother of Jesus.” <BR/><BR/>18. Dawson: <I> I see that you resist answering my question. At any rate, I will answer yours:</I><BR/><BR/>On the contrary, I clearly stated that I didn’t think James’ sibling status had much to do with it. <BR/><BR/>At any rate I was pointing out in that response that the apostles had their own disciples too. We have those disciples putting John at the side of Jesus::<BR/>Irenaeus in 180 AD quotes the disciple of John (Polycarp):<BR/><I>John, the disciple of the Lord, who leaned back on his breast, published the Gospel while he was resident at Ephesus in Asia.</I><BR/><BR/>Are all these ancient historians spewing legend material uncritically? External sources seem to be the biggest problem for the legend theory. Do you really intend to reject every piece of evidence simply because it came later and “could have” been embellished? The cumulative case is rather devastating; indeed, not even Christian apologists explaining away apparent Bible contradictions have attempted the maneuvers of proponents of the extreme legend theory.<BR/><BR/><BR/>19. <I>David: "Douglas J. Moo (The Letter of James,pg 13) points out that ‘…physical ties to Jesus became important only after the time of James’ death.’" </I><BR/><BR/><I>Dawson: “David, this statement right here undermines the view that "brother of the Lord" indicates a sibling relationship.” </I><BR/><BR/>Absolutely not, because I clearly said that I reject the position that Paul is honoring James with the phrase.<BR/><BR/><I>Paul met with James while he was alive, according to what he writes in Galatians. Also, while most sources date James' death to 62 CE, Paul's composition of his letter to the Galatians is usually dated to the early 50s (I've seen no source dating it after 60 CE). So Paul was most likely writing before James met his doom. So if "physical ties to Jesus became important only after the time of James' death," then the situation we have here - where Paul is referring to James as "the brother of the Lord" (mind you, not "of Jesus") before James is even dead - demands some explanation. </I><BR/><BR/>It only demands explanation given a position I do not hold. <BR/><BR/>Why is any scholar that disagrees with your position a “Christian apologist?” <BR/><BR/>Dawson:<I>Moo is welcome to his opinion, but essentially he’s just poo-pooing the objection without really raising any good counter-objection to it. So I can just poo-poo Moo myself: it is precarious in the extreme to ignore the implications of the failure of the author of the epistle of James to identify himself as the brother of Jesus (as opposed to "of the Lord") when doing so would have greatly strengthened any claim to authority he wants for what he writes in that letter. Meanwhile, if the early communities did not have the tradition</I><BR/><BR/>Given Paul’s situation when he penned many of his letters, it is surprising he wrote anything at all. Its not just Moo’s opinion either - its sound exegesis. Ignore the literary genre and cultural context, and you’ve guaranteed the text can say whatever you’d like to support your theory. On top of that, how much easier to work from what the text doesn’t say!<BR/><BR/>20. David: <I>"Come on Dawson, not in my courtroom anyway."</I><BR/>Dawson: <I> But David, you’ve to my courtroom, remember?</I><BR/><BR/>I think each of us can judge for ourselves. <BR/><BR/>21. David: <I>"The very nature of Paul’s claims about his writings demanded either one accept them as authoritative or reject them as blasphemy."</I><BR/><BR/>Dawson: <I>I certainly don’t accept either horn of this dichotomy, nor would I expect anyone else to, even those sympathetic to Christianity. </I><BR/><BR/>So someone can claim to be giving direct orders from God and believers would be passé about judging the authority of his statements? <BR/><BR/>22. Dawson: <I>Actually we can say more than this. There are clear signs of tampering of common sources throughout the synoptics to taylor them to the specific preferences of the writer. It’s clear that Matthew and Luke were drawing upon Mark’s model, for they follow the same general course. But between Matthew and Luke, who (as many scholars – you like those – have pointed out) were both also drawing on a non-Markan source (referred to in the literature as Q), show differences in rendering the same sayings attributed to Jesus. </I><BR/><BR/>In general about the whole Luke/Matthew issue:<BR/>I think a lot of the alleged “tampering” is simply each author demonstrating a purpose and an intended audience. Is a modern Bible translation doing this when it utilizes common imagery and syntax that an English speaking audience can better understand? <BR/><BR/>Specific points about these passages:<BR/><BR/>22a. Some manuscripts for Luke 11:13 read πνευμα αγαθον, or “the good spirit.” <BR/><BR/>22b. There is the issue of the authors placement of this narrative within the theme he is developing for his audience:<BR/><BR/>“The Lukan parallel in 11:9-13 comes in a context where prayer is the issue. The point is fundamentally the same, but Luke narrows the focus. Rather than speaking of good gifts, he notes that the Holy Spirit is given. Since the Spirit is the consummate gift of God and also is a source of enablement and wisdom, the different is not that great.” (Darrell Bock, <I> Jesus according to Scripture</I>, pg 146 sect. 63)<BR/><BR/>22c. Also, this is arguably usage of a common figure of speech called synecdoche. (see Blomberg, <I>The Historic Reliability of the Gospels</I>, pg 165)<BR/><BR/>One need not conclude that the Gospel authors were inventing their entire stories simply because they tried to speak to their audiences. <BR/><BR/>23.Dawson:<I> "If a variety of religions which preceded Christianity incorporated worship practices that involved, for instance, the consumption of bread and wine as symbols for the flesh and blood of a resurrected deity."</I><BR/><BR/>David: <I>"Has someone provided an example of this?"</I><BR/><BR/>Dawson: <I>Yes, see for instance Freke and Gandy, The Jesus Mysteries, Robert Price's many articles and several books on the matter, Wells, Doherty, and numerous other sources. I certainly don’t have time to spoonfeed you here. But here’s a little taste, from Price’s review of NT Wright’s The Resurrection of the Son of God (which I have, but have not fully read):</I><BR/><BR/>The quote you provided does not address my question. Honestly I can stand Doherty but Price (in his debates) uses so much rhetorical bluster that I rarely want to sit and read him. <BR/><BR/><BR/>24. Dawson: <I> Okay, so long as it’s understood that borrowing from pre-Christian religious models was taking place in the molding of the Christian product. There were many sources, including various Jewish sectarian sources, the Wisdom literature, mystery religions, etc.</I><BR/><BR/>If you wish to assert borrowing from the mystery religions, go for it but give me an argument, not just assertions from Price.<BR/><BR/>25.Dawson: <I> The evidence is clearly the opposite as you have it, but by deeming the mystery cults as "irrelevant to [your] analysis" as you have, you cut yourself off from a vast area of knowledge and source of evidence. I suspect there’s an apologetic reason why you have chosen to do this.</I><BR/><BR/>The evidence has yet to be presented. I see no reason to accept mystery cult allegations on the grounds that we have no historical evidence of it. There is plenty of explanatory power within Judaism for Christian practices, why need I go seek explanations in places where evidence doesn’t exist? <BR/><BR/>26. Dawson: <I>Now David, I did pose some questions on how revelation is supposed to work, but I do not see that you’ve addressed them. Instead, you seem to prefer trifling over a passing reference to James as “the brother of the Lord,” which seems to be a very small matter in comparison to the claim to have received a revelation from a deity.</I><BR/><BR/>As I recall you asked two questions:<BR/>1. How does Paul know he has received information from a supernatural source?<BR/>2. How do we know that Paul has received information from a supernatural source?<BR/><BR/>Doug Geivett delivered an excellent paper at the same Greer-Heard conference that I referenced earlier (Dom Crossan vs NT Wright) on the “Espistemology of Resurrection Belief.” He also has a blog and is very responsive and polite, so I won’t hesitate to refer you to him for a thoroughly more educated opinion. His <A HREF="”" REL="nofollow">blog</A> here.<BR/><BR/>A few points:<BR/><BR/>1. As you’ve already pointed out, you will likely believe a personal experience or account if it comports with your expectations for that situation. I think you may have gone further and said you only believe reports that comport with the laws of nature, but a minor difference given the frequency of miracles.<BR/><BR/>2. If someone has an experience, and finds no reason to believe things aren’t as they perceived, then they have good grounds for believing their experience to be authentic. <BR/><BR/>3. Reporting such an experience to others would follow similar criteria; namely, they would deem such testimony valid given they had no reason to believe the person was crazy, dishonest, or mistaken. <BR/><BR/>Conclusion: A person claiming to have experienced something miraculous is generally not going to convince me; especially if I haven’t had personal experiences or reports from other, or most certainly not if I presuppose the impossibility of said events (which I do not). I do think in combination with other types of revelation (such as the Old Testament for those Paul was writing to, remember how much he liked to argue using it?) and with examination: experiences and testimonies lend support to warranted belief. At minimum such things may press a person to further explore something.<BR/><BR/>Dawson: <I>Also, I do have another question, which I’ve asked other Christians, but for which I have not received any satisfying responses. My question is this: Why doesn’t Jesus just appear before all of us, as he allegedly did before Paul on the road to Damascus (according to Acts anyway), and settle all these conflicts which have raged for 2000 years? I asked a Christian this question once, and his response was “Jesus wants us to have faith” (which only confirms the disjunction between faith and reason). To which I asked another question in response: Are you then saying that Paul, the most prolific writer of the NT, did not have faith?</I><BR/><BR/>If you’re heading where I think you are, I don’t want to get into the problem of evil this weekend, maybe another time. :)davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08071763988772047093noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-6955473243342508842008-08-14T11:06:00.000-04:002008-08-14T11:06:00.000-04:00David: "I agree with you, but I’m talking literary...David: "I agree with you, but I’m talking literary analysis here, not linguistic philosophy."<BR/><BR/>I'm not talking linguistic philosophy either. You had mentioned "the building blocks of thought," and those are concepts, not words. This is basic epistemology, not linguistic philosophy. You can't have language without concepts. The ability to form concepts comes first, but language helps us retain and organize the concepts we've formed.<BR/><BR/>I wrote:"There is nothing wrong with this procedure, especially since Paul is not clear in what he means by "brother of the Lord" when applied to James. Nowhere else does Paul use the word ‘brother’ to denote a biological relationship; should we look to other people’s use of the same word to interpret Paul? Other people have in fact used the word ‘brother’ to indicate a blood relation. Should we isolate Paul’s word ‘brother’, remove it from the overall context of his use of that word, and assign it the meaning which other users of that word mean by it? Why?"<BR/><BR/>David: "Again, it is the phrase, 'brother of the Lord', that finds usage in the later Gospels. To concentrate on the word alone is to limit the explanatory scope of your conclusion. Examining the usage of the phrase in light of the later Gospel writers is valid especially given your view that Paul was a source."<BR/><BR/>If later writers misunderstood Paul's reference to James as "the brother of the Lord" to mean something other than what Paul understood by it (just as today’s Christians have done), then obviously the writings of those later authors are not a good key for interpreting Paul. As for whether or not the gospel writers used Paul as a source, this is unclear. However, as I have shown, many of the teachings which Paul gives as his own or as inspired by his interpretation of "the scriptures" are put into Jesus' mouth in the gospels. This suggests that later writers were using sources that were influenced by Paul, even if they did not mention or credit Paul.<BR/><BR/>David: "This is not context robbery because the phrase is in exactly the same place: amid reference to the disciples, apostles, or Cephas. If in fact the later Gospel writers were not recording eyewitness testimony, but expanding legends, then a better explanation need be given aside from speculating about Docetism. This idea that early authors were willing to fabricate information in order to preserve and progress what they knew to be false is not probable to me; however, since you judge individuals with strongly held beliefs in the supernatural to be especially susceptible to delusions, I understand your position."<BR/><BR/>Yes, you adhere to supernaturalism on the one hand (which defies explanation), and yet demand more and more and more explanation when it comes to hypotheses involving embellishment, fabrication, misunderstandings that beget further misunderstandings, manipulation of sources (such as OT "prophecies" of Jesus), etc., all couched in a worldview which condemns human beings as depraved liars. Got it.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "I’ve seen no argument presented to conclude that Paul really meant that James was a biological sibling of the earthly Jesus in I Cor. 15. Do you have one?"<BR/><BR/>In response to your view of James :<BR/><BR/>David: "1. Assuming the legendary hypothesis, the later Gospel writers present James as the literal brother. No sufficient alternative explanation has been given for the Gospel writers choosing to fabricate the entire family of Jesus. Arguing apologetic motives requires giving some Gospel dates, which you have declined to discuss."<BR/><BR/>As I mentioned before, they need not have fabricated this from whole cloth. I’ll repeat myself: "If Christians of Paul’s time and later did not understand that ‘brother of the Lord’ was a title indicating membership in some core fraternity of leaders or zealots, it could easily have been interpreted as suggesting a sibling relationship." But maybe they did fabricate it from whole cloth, as for instance to combat docetism (which was a view held by the Gnostics of the day). I don’t see why this is so difficult to fathom. Doesn’t it strike you as a little off to say, on the one hand, that the best explanation is the supernaturalism of Christianity, but the possibility that someone has concocted a fiction is just too difficult to accept for some reason? As for dating the gospels, I would, as have numerous scholars, put the gospels post-70 CE.<BR/><BR/>David: "2. Paul’s use of the word adelphos fails to support your interpretation because it necessarily precludes the phrase from possessing more meaning than the word alone."<BR/><BR/>I’m not sure what this is supposed to mean. How does Paul’s use of the word adelphos "necessarily preclude the phrase from possessing more meaning than the word alone"? If you are thinking that to be my position, how did you get that? As I pointed out before, Paul’s use of adelphos in the phrase in question is conspicuous in that he says "brother of the *Lord*" rather than "brother of *Jesus*." For Paul, lordship is clearly post-resurrection, since while in the flesh Jesus was lowly and humble, "emptied" of his powers, and upon his ascension he sat at the right hand of God. Calling James "the brother of the Lord" has much different connotations than saying he is "the brother of Jesus."<BR/><BR/>David: "3. Your interpretation provides little explanatory power, since if ‘brother of the Lord’ simply means James was a Christian, this is nothing unique and honorific at all."<BR/><BR/>Did you read what I had written? Paul clearly thought that James was a "pillar" of the church at the time (I referred you to Gal. 2:9). He was not just another convert in Paul’s view.<BR/><BR/>David: "1. Evidence points to the historicity of the Gospels. In contrast, the legendary theory starts with no evidence, and utilizes arguments from silence in Paul."<BR/><BR/>Specifically what evidence "points to the historicity of the Gospels"? What exactly do you mean by this? What evidence is there that a deity incarnated itself, was born as a human being to a virgin mother, performed miracles and cured congenital blindness, rebuked demons and devils, raised dead people back to life, and was himself raised back to life after being crucified? We have stories, and stories can be made up. Tell me what evidence supports these stories?<BR/><BR/>As for the legend theory, I’ve already pointed to things which Paul says that conflicts with the later record, such as his view of rulers. For Paul, the earthly Jesus was lowly and humbled, "emptied" of his powers, living in obscurity. By the time we get to the gospels, he was famous throughout the land, a performer of miracles, a healer, a teacher, a rabble-rouser, a menace both to the Jewish priests and the Roman government, things we never learn from Paul, and opposite to what he does indicate of the earthly Jesus. The list goes on. The record we have in Paul and other early epistles is exactly how we would expect to find it if the gospels, which we know were written later, were the product of legend-mongering. There are clear lines of embellishment and fabrication. But if you’re guided by faith, I doubt I’m going to convince you of this. You believe the literalist Christian propaganda because you’ve invested yourself so deeply into its program, and admitting that your leg has been pulled is just too much to bear, especially when the messenger is someone so “loathsome” as a confessed atheist. I realize this, David, I was in your shoes at one point in my life. Only I woke up.<BR/><BR/>David: "2. Assuming non-legendary Gospel narratives, the later Gospel writers confirm that James was indeed the brother of Jesus."<BR/><BR/>Assuming that the gospels are true, one could say all kinds of things and get away with it, since he’s granting validity to supernaturalism, which is a playground for the mind. Assuming the supernaturalism of the bible, how could I contest Joseph Smith’s discovery of the golden plates of Mormonism? We have his own testimony of what he experienced, just as we have Paul’s testimony of the resurrected Jesus appearing to him.<BR/><BR/>David: "3. Early patristic sources and church historians affirm James as the literal brother of Jesus. (multiple independent attestation)"<BR/><BR/>By which time legends were well in circulation. You already cited the example of Hegesippus. So that’s not impressive at all.<BR/><BR/>David: "4. No sources have been presented in which ‘brother of the Lord’ does not reference a sibling relationship;"<BR/><BR/>Here you’re just begging the question. If the earliest source (Paul) does not mean a sibling relationship, then what you say here is patently false.<BR/><BR/>David: "indeed all other sources examined use the phrase specifically to identify Jesus’ siblings."<BR/><BR/>And I’ve addressed this several times now: had later Christians not known that ‘brother of the Lord’ was a church title not at all denoting a sibling relationship, it could easily have been mistaken by them as meaning a sibling relationship, or opportunistically seized on in order to contrive such a view. Using ‘brother’ to denote others as believers was common parlance; it still is today. When I was a Christian, everyone in my church was so eager to call me his brother. Also, it is doubtful that Paul would have put stock in a relationship of the flesh. Nowhere does Paul say that Jesus had any siblings.<BR/><BR/>David: "I’m curious as to whether you think James even existed?"<BR/><BR/>For all we know, there may have been several Jameses, or perhaps great confusion over the same James. In his <A HREF="http://www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com/rev_eisenm.htm" REL="nofollow">review of Robert Eisenman's <I>James the Brother of Jesus</I></A>, Robert Price points out:<BR/><BR/><B>Eisenman has developed a keen sense for the "name game" played in the sources. Most of us have sometime scratched our heads over the tantalizing confusions latent in the strange redundancy of similar names in the New Testament accounts. How can Mary have had a sister named Mary? Is there a difference between Joseph Barsabbas Justus, Judas Barsabbas Justus, and James the Just? Whence all the Jameses and Judases? Who are Simon the Zealot and Judas the Zealot (who appears in some NT manuscripts and other early Christian documents)? Is Clopas the same as Cleophas? What's going on with Jesus ben-Ananias, Jesus Barabbas, Elymas bar-Jesus, and Jesus Justus? What does Boanerges really mean? Is Nathaniel a nickname for someone else we know of? And so on, and so on. Most of us puzzle over these oddities for a moment--and then move on. After all, how important can they be, anyway? Eisenman does not move on till he has figured it out.... The gospels give prominence to an inner circle of three: Peter, John son of Zebedee and John's brother James. And Galatians has the Three Pillars in Jerusalem: Peter, John son of Zebedee, and Jesus' brother James. What happened here? Surely the inner group of three is intended as preparatory for the Pillars, to provide a life-of-Jesus pedigree for the Pillars. But then why are there two different Jameses? Mustn't they originally have been the same? Eisenman says they were, but certain factions who wanted to play up the authority of the shadowy college of the Twelve against the earlier authority of the Heirs found it politic to drive a wedge between James the brother of Jesus and the Twelve, so James becomes James the Just on the one hand and James the brother of John on the other.</B><BR/><BR/>Even when I was a believer, I always found this jumble of names to be quite messy.<BR/><BR/>David: "I’m also curious as to exactly when you date the Gospels?"<BR/><BR/>I don’t have exact dates. (Does anyone?)<BR/><BR/>David: "On your view, was James alive when these legends about him being Jesus’ brother were being circulated?"<BR/><BR/>I have no opinion on this. Do we have the birthdates and death dates for anyone mentioned in the New Testament? If Christians don’t, why expect me to? Tradition typically puts James’ death ca. 62, and as I have stated, I would, along with many others vastly more knowledgeable on the topic than I, put the gospels post-70. However, I don’t think the fact that someone is alive is sufficient to preclude legends developing about that individual. I remember back in the early 1980’s how many legends were circulating about Eddie Van Halen and his ability as a guitarist. That was 25 or more years ago. The guy is still alive to this day. Legends have a way of developing and persisting among devotees and enthusiasts, regardless of the facts. People who are easily enchanted by fantasy are prime suckers for what may be outright lies. I’ve seen it in my own day. I have no reason to suspect this was not possible 2000 years ago.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "In Christianity, fellowship in Christ clearly supersedes relation by the flesh."<BR/><BR/>David: "Is it your position that ‘brother of the Lord’ merely means James was a Christian?"<BR/><BR/>I’ve spoken to this already. The phrase "brother of the Lord" as used by Paul most likely indicates that James had some very high position in the Jerusalem church; for Paul, James is one of the “pillars” of the church (Gal. 2:9). Especially because it references "the Lord" as opposed to "Jesus," the phrase strikes me very much to be a title rather than a reference to a biological sibling. I don’t think a reference to a sibling here would at all make sense.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "Do you think that merely by being a biological sibling, James acquired status as an early leader? Again, what record in the early epistles even remotely suggests this?"<BR/><BR/>David: "Let’s not get things turned around here. I asked you ‘How did James acquire his status as early leader given we have no record of him following Christ during his lifetime?’"<BR/><BR/>I see that you resist answering my question. At any rate, I will answer yours: I don’t know, as there is no contemporary record for this. But it could have been any number of things. He may have been one of the initial ringleaders in Jerusalem, maybe for decades by the time Paul hit the gentile scene. A literal biological relationship is surely not the only (nor the best) explanation for James’ rank in the hierarchy of the church at the time. He probably was a teacher, a sage in his own right, someone probably forgotten by history save for some legends that grew around scant references to him that survived in the literature.<BR/><BR/>David: "We have a source (Eusebius) indicating Peter gave James leadership of the church when he had to leave Jerusalem, but why? I don’t know. I don’t think the sibling relationship had much to do with it."<BR/><BR/>Nor do I. As I have pointed out, with references to what Christians were actually teaching (and putting into Jesus’ mouth in the gospels) about family, I don’t think a sibling relationship would have meant a hill of beans to the early Christians. It was probably a misinterpretation of a title that Paul (and/or others) had used of James, one that was seized upon by later Christians who sought to combat docetism, which very much threatened the literalist view that gained currency in some influential circles.<BR/><BR/>David: "Douglas J. Moo (The Letter of James,pg 13) points out that ‘…physical ties to Jesus became important only after the time of James’ death.’"<BR/><BR/>David, this statement right here undermines the view that "brother of the Lord" indicates a sibling relationship. Paul met with James while he was alive, according to what he writes in Galatians. Also, while most sources date James' death to 62 CE, Paul's composition of his letter to the Galatians is usually dated to the early 50s (I've seen no source dating it after 60 CE). So Paul was most likely writing before James met his doom. So if "physical ties to Jesus became important only after the time of James' death," then the situation we have here - where Paul is referring to James as "the brother of the Lord" (mind you, not "of Jesus") before James is even dead - demands some explanation.<BR/><BR/>Moo: " If anything, therefore, the author’s [James epistle] failure to mention the relationship is an argument against the pseudepigraphal view…"<BR/><BR/>This is almost humorous. So argument from silence carries weight after all, at least when Christian apologists use it, right?<BR/><BR/>Moo: "So many factors- the author’s circumstances, his relationship to his readers, the purpose of the letter, the issues in the community – affect the content of the letter that it is precarious in the extreme to draw wide-ranging conclusions from the failure to mention a particular topic."<BR/><BR/>Moo is welcome to his opinion, but essentially he’s just poo-pooing the objection without really raising any good counter-objection to it. So I can just poo-poo Moo myself: it is precarious in the extreme to ignore the implications of the failure of the author of the epistle of James to identify himself as the brother of Jesus (as opposed to "of the Lord") when doing so would have greatly strengthened any claim to authority he wants for what he writes in that letter. Meanwhile, if the early communities did not have the tradition<BR/><BR/>David: "If Paul intends to bestow honor on James in his letter to the Galatians, why?Just because James is the head honcho in Jerusalem? These aren’t leading questions; I’m just curious what you think."<BR/><BR/>I think it’s quite possible that Paul’s motivations were political.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: “I would hope so. But one’s purpose may be to distract, deflect or confuse. If Paul is vague, given his purposefulness (as you claim), it must be because he was being vague on purpose. No?”<BR/><BR/>David: "Perhaps we haven’t taken enough time to understand the original Greek. I’m certainly not ready to render any verdict given the little time I have studied this passage."<BR/><BR/>Come now, David, you’ve definitely "rendered a verdict" on this passage, haven’t you? You didn’t need to parse the "original Greek" in order to suppose that Paul meant that James is Jesus’ sibling, did you?<BR/><BR/>David: "I also don’t aim at solving or proving any of this, but this is a useful way for me to learn more about your position and motivate my future studies. I do hope you’re gaining something from this as well."<BR/><BR/>I blog on the symptomatology of Christianity because I enjoy it, David. It’s a work of love for me.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: “Since you do not quote Doherty, or even cite him, I will:”<BR/><BR/>David: "I was referring to what Robert has already posted, which you said would suffice to support your position."<BR/><BR/>If you’re going to attack a source, you might want to be familiar with what it says.<BR/><BR/>Dawson: So Doherty does, after all, provide an explanation for this distinction.<BR/><BR/>David: “Where can we find this early community in Jerusalem identifying themselves as ‘brethren of/in the Lord’?"<BR/><BR/>Apparently only in inferences that we can make from the scant references in extant texts.<BR/><BR/>David: “It doesn’t look to me like he covered the definite/indefinite article distinction in the quote you provided.”<BR/><BR/>As he makes clear (he even put the word ‘the’ in italics), Doherty attributes the exclusivity of this title to James’ apparent preeminence of James’ position. I don’t think he needs to spend pages and pages on this.<BR/><BR/>David: “He thinks ‘brothers in the Lord’ is a ‘strong indicator of what the phrase applied to James must have meant’, but doesn’t give reasons why.”<BR/><BR/>It’s pretty self-explanatory at this point, at least it seems so to me. What else are you looking for?<BR/><BR/>David: “I’m sure he has them, but are they mentioned in his popular writings? At any rate, he admits some speculation that the phrase ‘could have resulted in a special designation’."<BR/><BR/>Since there’s so little to go on, any inference one draws from what little there is, will probably always be subject to the charge of “speculation,” as if this in itself were sufficient to write the epitaph over the inference. If you are interested in knowing more of Doherty’s views on this, I suggest you do some research – he’s got a website with dozens and dozens of articles. If you don’t find it there, maybe you could e-mail him and pose your questions directly to him. I’m not a Doherty scholar, so I don’t think I am best suited to answering all the wonderful questions you raise.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "Clearly by Hegsippus’ time (some 100+ years after Paul), the legend of who James was had grown significantly."<BR/><BR/>David: "Gerd Ludeman (in his debate with William Lane Craig on the resurrection, mp3 available online) has argued that legends can radically expand within a single year, so perhaps we should be skeptical of sources even if one year after the fact? How far does this kind of skepticism extend and is it applicable only to the Bible or all historical analysis?"<BR/><BR/>Of course, it depends on the content, which can give it away right off (such as if supernatural abilities or feats are attributed to someone). Similarly, if you were a member of a jury in a murder trial, and when the defendant took the stand to testify on his own behalf he claims that the reason why he was found with the murder weapon in his hand in the same room as the murder victim, is because a bat flew into the room, turned into a man, stabbed the victim to death with the murder weapon, then put the murder weapon into his hand and turned back into a bat and flew out of the room right before the police stormed the room, would you believe him, or suspect that he was making this up?<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "This is misleading. In his letters, Paul, the earliest NT writer, never refers to [James] as 'the brother of Jesus'. To say that 'James has historically been understood to be the brother of Jesus' is agenda-driven revisionism."<BR/><BR/>David: "Kurios is Paul’s explicit name for Jesus. I don’t think I made an unfair or inaccurate statement."<BR/><BR/>Paul's explicit name for Jesus is *Jesus*. Paul also refers to Jesus with the *title* 'Lord'.<BR/><BR/>Here's <A HREF="http://www.searchgodsword.org/lex/grk/view.cgi?number=2962" REL="nofollow">one source</A> which settles the matter:<BR/><BR/><B>he to whom a person or thing belongs, about which he has power of deciding; master, lord<BR/>the possessor and disposer of a thing<BR/>the owner; one who has control of the person, the master<BR/>in the state: the sovereign, prince, chief, the Roman emperor<BR/>is a title of honour expressive of respect and reverence, with which servants greet their master this title is given to: God, the Messiah</B><BR/><BR/>This is explicit in designating ‘Lord’ as a *title*. Saying that Paul refers to James as "Jesus' brother" or "the brother of Jesus," is misleading, for he never does say this. He refers to James as "brother of the *Lord*" which is significant.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "I don’t think so. At no point does Paul explicitly indicate that Jesus had any siblings, and a survey of his use of 'brother' demonstrates that this was a religious title, not a sibling relationship. I don’t need any evidence beyond this."<BR/><BR/>David: "Arguments from silence and a fallacious word study – that evidence is going to mount an argument that refutes 17 centuries of unquestioned literal brotherhood?"<BR/><BR/>I’ve given more than mere argument from silence, and my word study is not fallacious, David (and you haven't shown it to be either, so there! ;). What we have for 17+ centuries is uncritical acceptance of the Christian party line, David. That’s the "unquestioned" part of the "literal brotherhood" here which Paul’s passing reference to "brother of the Lord" in no way necessitates. Meanwhile, you have nothing but "tradition" and question-begging gospel-colored goggles going for the sibling relationship interpretation.<BR/><BR/>David: "Come on Dawson, not in my courtroom anyway."<BR/><BR/>But David, you’ve to my courtroom, remember?<BR/><BR/>David: "Do you contend that the 500 brethren are given just as much honor as James?"<BR/><BR/>No, I don’t, and I don’t have to. The "brother of the Lord" station was a high-ranking position. But like James, they were brothers in Christ, religious fellow-worshipers.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "Both the motive and the opportunity were present by the time the gospels were set to paper."<BR/><BR/>David: "Do you agree with Wells’ dating of the Gospels, if not what dates are you assuming here?"<BR/><BR/>I think Wells makes a very good case for the timeline of the writing of the NT documents.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "Since, even if they were using Paul as a source, the gospel writers probably would not have considered his writings as divinely ordained or canonical, they most likely would not have taken it as inviolable anyway. As Robert has, I believe correctly, pointed out, that the authors of Matthew and Luke made their own revisions to the narrative found in the gospel of Mark, the evangelists performatively demonstrated that they did not think they were documenting actual history. If they did, then they obviously did not have a very good understanding of what history is."<BR/><BR/>David: "The very nature of Paul’s claims about his writings demanded either one accept them as authoritative or reject them as blasphemy."<BR/><BR/>I certainly don’t accept either horn of this dichotomy, nor would I expect anyone else to, even those sympathetic to Christianity.<BR/><BR/>David: "Assuming Markan priority is the correct view, the most we can say is that Matthew and Luke did exactly what their contemporaries did when developing a historical narrative."<BR/><BR/>Actually we can say more than this. There are clear signs of tampering of common sources throughout the synoptics to taylor them to the specific preferences of the writer. It’s clear that Matthew and Luke were drawing upon Mark’s model, for they follow the same general course. But between Matthew and Luke, who (as many scholars – you like those – have pointed out) were both also drawing on a non-Markan source (referred to in the literature as Q), show differences in rendering the same sayings attributed to Jesus. For instance, consider the following:<BR/><BR/>Mt. 7:11: "If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!"<BR/><BR/>Lk. 11:13: "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?"<BR/><BR/>Notice how Luke pushes the promise further into the imaginative realm of the supernatural. Where on Matthew’s version, the reader believing the promise could reasonably expect tangible goodies in response to asking the "Father" for them, Luke preempts such expectation by altering the text to say "the Holy Spirit" instead of simply "good things," which is, even on the Christian view, a broader generality. There are many similar examples of such loose handling of source material in the gospels. Clearly these folks were *creating* narratives, not *recording* history.<BR/><BR/>David: "The statement that they didn’t ‘have a very good understanding of what history is’ both demands an explanation for what such a standard would be, and on the surface seems to push modern historical standards on ancient historians."<BR/><BR/>Your demand here seems to invite the accusation you pack into the latter half of your statement here, which seems openly baiting to me (and thus raises my suspicion that you’re seeking to entrap). But examples like the above clearly show that what we’re dealing with in the end is not history, but the development of theological portraits intended to inculcate emotional reactions in readers and at times answer rival theologies, etc.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "If a variety of religions which preceded Christianity incorporated worship practices that involved, for instance, the consumption of bread and wine as symbols for the flesh and blood of a resurrected deity."<BR/><BR/>David: "Has someone provided an example of this?"<BR/><BR/>Yes, see for instance Freke and Gandy, <I>The Jesus Mysteries</I>, Robert Price's many articles and several books on the matter, Wells, Doherty, and numerous other sources. I certainly don’t have time to spoonfeed you here. But here’s a little taste, from <A HREF="http://www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com/rev_ntwrong.htm" REL="nofollow">Price’s review of NT Wright’s <I>The Resurrection of the Son of God</I></A> (which I have, but have not fully read):<BR/><BR/><B>There are three fundamental, vitiating errors running like fault lines through the unstable continent of this book. The first is a complete unwillingness to engage a number of specific questions or bodies of evidence that threaten to shatter Wright’s over-optimistically orthodox assessment of the evidence. The most striking of these blustering evasions has to do with the dying-and-rising redeemer cults that permeated the environment of early Christianity and had for many, many centuries. Ezekiel 8:14 bemoans the ancient Jerusalemite women’s lamentation for Tammuz, derived from the Dumuzi cult of ancient Mesopotamia. Ugaritic texts make it plain that Baal’s death and resurrection and subsequent enthronement at the side of his Father El went back centuries before Christianity and were widespread in Israel. Pyramid texts tell us that Osiris’ devotees expected to share in his resurrection. Marduk, too, rose from the dead. And then there is the Phrygian Attis, the Syrian Adonis. The harmonistic efforts of Bruce Metzger, Edwin Yamauchi, Ron Sider, Jonathan Z. Smith and others have been completely futile, utterly failing either to deconstruct the dying-and–rising god mytheme (as Smith vainly tries to do) or to claim that the Mysteries borrowed their resurrected savior myths and rituals from Christianity. If that were so, why on earth did early apologists admit that the pagan versions were earlier, invented as counterfeits before the fact by Satan? Such myths and rites were well known to Jews and Galileans, not to mention Ephesians, Corinthians, etc., for many centuries. But all this Wright merely brushes off, as if it has long been discredited. He merely refers us to other books. It is all part of his bluff: “Oh, no one takes that seriously anymore! Really, it’s so <I>passé</I>!”</B><BR/><BR/>I wrote: "Is your concern to dispel the notion that Christianity borrowed from specifically a pagan mystery cult, or that it borrowed from any prior religious model?"<BR/><BR/>David: "Specifically the Hellenistic mystery cults. Of course Christianity borrowed from a prior religious model."<BR/><BR/>Okay, so long as it’s understood that borrowing from pre-Christian religious models was taking place in the molding of the Christian product. There were many sources, including various Jewish sectarian sources, the Wisdom literature, mystery religions, etc.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: "You seem to be wanting it both ways here, David. Above you quoted Grant, who says that "Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths of mythical god seems so entirely foreign...," but then you quote Nash and Metzger here, who claim that the Christian Eucharist, which has the believer thinking he is actually eating the flesh and drinking the blood of his god, is fully in keeping with Jewish practices."<BR/><BR/>David: "Only transubstantiation posits the view you expressed, and this is not the Biblical view of the Eucharist..."<BR/><BR/>I know a lot of Christians who would vehemently disagree with your claim here (specifically the latter part). If Christians are guided by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, this is most puzzling to me. Doesn’t the Holy Spirit help protect believers from doctrinal errors, or does it protect believers only on things that are not important? Or, is doctrine not important?<BR/><BR/>David: "that is a can of worms best left on the shelf."<BR/><BR/>Just as long as it is understood that this is a can of worms that Christians have opened and poured all over themselves. It’s certainly not my problem.<BR/><BR/>David: "Regardless, the quotes I presented are not contradictory, and the only way "I want it" is to look at the Eucharist in light of Judaism and its own sacred meals, and also look at what Christ said in the Gospels to institute this practice. The mystery cults are irrelevant to my analysis, and I’ve given some reasons why I think it’s just as likely that mystery cults would have borrowed from Christianity to gain popularity in Rome."<BR/><BR/>The evidence is clearly the opposite as you have it, but by deeming the mystery cults as "irrelevant to [your] analysis" as you have, you cut yourself off from a vast area of knowledge and source of evidence. I suspect there’s an apologetic reason why you have chosen to do this.<BR/><BR/>Now David, I did pose some questions on how revelation is supposed to work, but I do not see that you’ve addressed them. Instead, you seem to prefer trifling over a passing reference to James as “the brother of the Lord,” which seems to be a very small matter in comparison to the claim to have received a revelation from a deity.<BR/><BR/>Also, I do have another question, which I’ve asked other Christians, but for which I have not received any satisfying responses. My question is this: Why doesn’t Jesus just appear before all of us, as he allegedly did before Paul on the road to Damascus (according to Acts anyway), and settle all these conflicts which have raged for 2000 years? I asked a Christian this question once, and his response was “Jesus wants us to have faith” (which only confirms the disjunction between faith and reason). To which I asked another question in response: Are you then saying that Paul, the most prolific writer of the NT, did not have faith?<BR/><BR/>You may want to consult my blog <A HREF="http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/2007/06/problem-of-saul.html" REL="nofollow">The Problem of Saul</A> for some more spicy thoughts on the matter.<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-85416190756879922892008-08-12T21:14:00.000-04:002008-08-12T21:14:00.000-04:00Dawson, I'll try to be brief though you've given m...Dawson, I'll try to be brief though you've given me much to respond to :)<BR/><BR/>1. Dawson:<I>On the contrary, concepts are the building block units of thought, while words are symbols for concepts. </I> <BR/>I agree with you, but I’m talking literary analysis here, not linguistic philosophy.<BR/><BR/>2. Dawson:<I>”There is nothing wrong with this procedure, especially since Paul is not clear in what he means by “brother of the Lord” when applied to James. Nowhere else does Paul use the word ‘brother’ to denote a biological relationship; should we look to other people’s use of the same word to interpret Paul? Other people have in fact used the word ‘brother’ to indicate a blood relation. Should we isolate Paul’s word ‘brother’, remove it from the overall context of his use of that word, and assign it the meaning which other users of that word mean by it? Why?” </I><BR/><BR/>Again, it is the phrase, “brother of the Lord,” that finds usage in the later Gospels. To concentrate on the word alone is to limit the explanatory scope of your conclusion. Examining the usage of the phrase in light of the later Gospel writers is valid especially given your view that Paul was a source. This is not context robbery because the phrase is in exactly the same place: amid reference to the disciples, apostles, or Cephas. If in fact the later Gospel writers were not recording eyewitness testimony, but expanding legends, then a better explanation need be given aside from speculating about Docetism. This idea that early authors were willing to fabricate information in order to preserve and progress what they knew to be false is not probable to me; however, since you judge individuals with strongly held beliefs in the supernatural to be especially susceptible to delusions, I understand your position.<BR/><BR/>3. Dawson: <I> I’ve seen no argument presented to conclude that Paul really meant that James was a biological sibling of the earthly Jesus in I Cor. 15. Do you have one? </I><BR/><BR/><B>-In response to your view of James :</B><BR/>1. Assuming the legendary hypothesis, the later Gospel writers present James as the literal brother. No sufficient alternative explanation has been given for the Gospel writers choosing to fabricate the entire family of Jesus. Arguing apologetic motives requires giving some Gospel dates, which you have declined to discuss.<BR/>2. Paul’s use of the word adelphos fails to support your interpretation because it necessarily precludes the phrase from possessing more meaning than the word alone.<BR/>3. Your interpretation provides little explanatory power, since if "brother of the Lord" simply means James was a Christian, this is nothing unique and honorific at all.<BR/><BR/><B>-In support of the traditional view of James :</B><BR/>1. Evidence points to the historicity of the Gospels. In contrast, the legendary theory starts with no evidence, and utilizes arguments from silence in Paul. <BR/>2. Assuming non-legendary Gospel narratives, the later Gospel writers confirm that James was indeed the brother of Jesus.<BR/>3. Early patristic sources and church historians affirm James as the literal brother of Jesus. (multiple independent attestation)<BR/>4. No sources have been presented in which “brother of the Lord” does not reference a sibling relationship; indeed all other sources examined use the phrase specifically to identify Jesus’ siblings.<BR/> <BR/>I’m curious as to whether you think James even existed? I’m also curious as to exactly when you date the Gospels? On your view, was James alive when these legends about him being Jesus’ brother were being circulated?<BR/><BR/>4. In response to Matthew 28:10 on which you quoted Wells:<BR/>From Fausset Brown Bible commentary:<BR/>“go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me—The brethren here meant must have been His brethren after the flesh (compare Mt 13:55); for His brethren in the higher sense (see on Joh2 0:17) had several meetings with Him at Jerusalem before He went to Galilee, which they would have missed if they had been the persons ordered to Galilee to meet Him.”<BR/><BR/>5. Dawson:<I>In Christianity, fellowship in Christ clearly supersedes relation by the flesh. </I><BR/>Is it your position that “brother of the Lord” merely means James was a Christian?<BR/><BR/>6. Dawson: <I>Do you think that merely by being a biological sibling, James acquired status as an early leader? Again, what record in the early epistles even remotely suggests this?</I><BR/><BR/>Let’s not get things turned around here. I asked you “How did James acquire his status as early leader given we have no record of him following Christ during his lifetime?” We have a source (Eusebius) indicating Peter gave James leadership of the church when he had to leave Jerusalem, but why? I don’t know. I don’t think the sibling relationship had much to do with it. The early apostolic period was characterized by those who knew Christ orally passing on their knowledge to others (the Apostle John disciples Polycarp, who disciples Irenaeus etc.). I think James may have had some elevated insights into the life of Christ with which to illuminate the traditions and teachings in the early church. Regardless, I simply want to know how you think James became a leader. <BR/><BR/>The argument you quoted from Doherty <B>assumes </B>that James would have used his brotherly title for honor. How does that support your position? <BR/><BR/>Douglas J. Moo (<I>The Letter of James</I>,pg 13) points out that <BR/><I>“…physical ties to Jesus became important only after the time of James’ death. If anything, therefore, the author’s [James epistle] failure to mention the relationship is an argument against the pseudepigraphal view…So many factors- the author’s circumstances, his relationship to his readers, the purpose of the letter, the issues in the community – affect the content of the letter that<B> it is precarious in the extreme to draw wide-ranging conclusions from the failure to mention a particular topic</B>.”</I><BR/><BR/>While I grant Robert’s position is possible, I actually don’t buy into the honor bit at all. I think James “the brother of the Lord” was used to <B>identify </B>him in Galatians 2. James is very similar to Paul yet very different. They were both anti-Christian Jews who converted after post-resurrection appearances, yet the Biblical picture of James shows him to be closer to his Jewish roots than Paul the Apostle to the Gentiles. In fact they seem to have some conflict in Acts. If Paul intends to bestow honor on James in his letter to the Galatians, why? Just because James is the head honcho in Jerusalem? These aren’t leading questions; I’m just curious what you think.<BR/><BR/>7. <I>I would hope so. But one’s purpose may be to distract, deflect or confuse. If Paul is vague, given his purposefulness (as you claim), it must be because he was being vague on purpose. No?</I><BR/>Perhaps we haven’t taken enough time to understand the original Greek. I’m certainly not ready to render any verdict given the little time I have studied this passage. I also don’t aim at solving or proving any of this, but this is a useful way for me to learn more about your position and motivate my future studies. I do hope you’re gaining something from this as well.<BR/><BR/>8. Dawson: <I>Since you do not quote Doherty, or even cite him, I will:</I><BR/>I was referring to what Robert has already posted, which you said would suffice to support your position.<BR/><BR/>Dawson:<I> So Doherty does, after all, provide an explanation for this distinction.</I><BR/>Where can we find this early community in Jerusalem identifying themselves as “brethren of/in the Lord?” It doesn’t look to me like he covered the definite/indefinite article distinction in the quote you provided. He thinks “brothers in the Lord” is a “strong indicator of what the phrase applied to James must have meant”, but doesn’t give reasons why. I’m sure he has them, but are they mentioned in his popular writings? At any rate, he admits some speculation that the phrase “could have resulted in a special designation.” <BR/><BR/>9. Dawson: <I> Clearly by Hegsippus’ time (some 100+ years after Paul), the legend of who James was had grown significantly.</I><BR/>Gerd Ludeman (in his debate with William Lane Craig on the resurrection, mp3 available online) has argued that legends can radically expand within a single year, so perhaps we should be skeptical of sources even if one year after the fact? How far does this kind of skepticism extend and is it applicable only to the Bible or all historical analysis?<BR/><BR/>10. Dawson:<I>This is misleading. In his letters, Paul, the earliest NT writer, never refers to Paul as “the brother of Jesus. To say that “James has historically been understood to be the brother of Jesus” is agenda-driven revisionism.</I> Kurios is Paul’s explicit name for Jesus. I don’t think I made an unfair or inaccurate statement.<BR/><BR/>11. <I>I don’t think so. At no point does Paul explicitly indicate that Jesus had any siblings, and a survey of his use of “brother” demonstrates that this was a religious title, not a sibling relationship. I don’t need any evidence beyond this.</I><BR/>Arguments from silence and a fallacious word study – that evidence is going to mount an argument that refutes 17 centuries of unquestioned literal brotherhood? Come on Dawson, not in my courtroom anyway. Do you contend that the 500 brethren are given just as much honor as James? <BR/><BR/>12. Dawson: <I>“Both the motive and the opportunity were present by the time the gospels were set to paper.”</I> <BR/>Do you agree with Wells’ dating of the Gospels, if not what dates are you assuming here? <BR/><BR/>13. Dawson:<I> Since, even if they were using Paul as a source, the gospel writers probably would not have considered his writings as divinely ordained or canonical, they most likely would not have taken it as inviolable anyway. As Robert has, I believe correctly, pointed out, that the authors of Matthew and Luke made their own revisions to the narrative found in the gospel of Mark, the evangelists performatively demonstrated that they did not think they were documenting actual history. If they did, then they obviously did not have a very good understanding of what history is.</I><BR/>The very nature of Paul’s claims about his writings demanded either one accept them as authoritative or reject them as blasphemy. Assuming Markan priority is the correct view, the most we can say is that Matthew and Luke did exactly what their contemporaries did when developing a historical narrative. The statement that they didn’t “have a very good understanding of what history is” both demands an explanation for what such a standard would be, and on the surface seems to push modern historical standards on ancient historians.<BR/><BR/>14. Dawson:<I> If a variety of religions which preceded Christianity incorporated worship practices that involved, for instance, the consumption of bread and wine as symbols for the flesh and blood of a resurrected deity</I> Has someone provided an example of this?<BR/><BR/>15. Dawson: <I>Is your concern to dispel the notion that Christianity borrowed from specifically a pagan mystery cult, or that it borrowed from any prior religious model?</I><BR/>Specifically the Hellenistic mystery cults. Of course Christianity borrowed from a prior religious model. <BR/><BR/>16. Dawson: <I>You seem to be wanting it both ways here, David. Above you quoted Grant, who says that “Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths of mythical god seems so entirely foreign...,” but then you quote Nash and Metzger here, who claim that the Christian Eucharist, which has the believer thinking he is actually eating the flesh and drinking the blood of his god, is fully in keeping with Jewish practices. </I><BR/>Only transubstantiation posits the view you expressed, and this is not the Biblical view of the Eucharist...that is a can of worms best left on the shelf. Regardless, the quotes I presented are not contradictory, and the only way “I want it” is to look at the Eucharist in light of Judaism and its own sacred meals, and also look at what Christ said in the Gospels to institute this practice. The mystery cults are irrelevant to my analysis, and I’ve given some reasons why I think it’s just as likely that mystery cults would have borrowed from Christianity to gain popularity in Rome. <BR/><BR/>17. Dawson:<I>In his cross-examination of Gregory Boyd’s attempts to discount the possibility that non-Jewish religious cults of the day, such as the Mithra cult, had influenced the development of the Christian version of a sacred meal practice, Doherty points out:</I><BR/>The Gospels themselves give the negative reaction Jesus received from the Jews when he preached about his body and blood. Doherty’s concerns are valid, and NT Wright has written a book (<I>The Resurrection of the Son of God</I>) to examine precisely why such significant mutations in Judaism would happen. Neither Doherty nor Price addresses the dating of sources to the alleged cult parallels. Indeed no one making these arguments does, because they know there is nothing in the first century to speak of. The practice of taurobolium is hardly relevant to the Eucharist supper, and again Doherty is assuming transubstantiation. <BR/><BR/>18. <I>If a person writes a letter and includes in it all this “doctrine” and claims to have received it via revelation from some supernatural being, would you really take that seriously? Apparently so, for you are doing just that in the case of Paul, for this is what Paul claims.</I><BR/>I take it unless something can be empirically demonstrated or logically derived, then it doesn’t count as evidence? The Christian Worldview does not limit itself this way. The historicity of the Gospels is central to Christian epistemology, as well as the existence of God and the inspiration of the Bible.<BR/><BR/>19. Dawson:<I>Indeed, if Paul had conferred with Peter and learned from him that Jesus was put to death as a result of a trial before Pilate, do you think Paul would tell us that “rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil” (Rom. 13:3)? How could Paul have this view of rulers, a view which is echoed in I Peter 2:14, if he believed Jesus had been crucified under Pilate?</I><BR/>I don’t see what you’re getting at here. Would knowledge of Pilate crucifying Jesus have necessarily changed Paul’s opinion of rulers in general, especially given that Paul viewed Jesus’ death as a sacrifice willingly taken on for redemptive purposes?<BR/><BR/>20. I agree with you Paul’s reason for going on the trip isn’t specifically to validate his experience. I was speculating about Paul’s psychological state given the affairs with the Judaizers. Acts doesn’t describe this as direct revelation in the same manner Paul had on the road to Damascus. The revelation sent them to preach the gospel, not talk with Cephas and James. The underlying issue at stake was Paul’s defense of his gospel message against the Judaizers. <BR/>Acts 13<BR/><I>1Now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen a member of the court of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. 2While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” 3Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off. </I><BR/><BR/><BR/>Cheers,<BR/>Daviddavidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08071763988772047093noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-76174131764785746602008-08-10T16:53:00.000-04:002008-08-10T16:53:00.000-04:00I wrote: “not one of the other 33 references using...I wrote: “not one of the other 33 references using the word ‘brother’ seems to denote a blood relation.” ... “So the more we look at this, the more compelling it becomes that Paul used the word ‘brother’ in his letters, pretty much without exception, to indicate a relation within the election, not a biological relation.”<BR/><BR/>David: “1) There are exegetical problems with this, namely the dreaded word study fallacy:<BR/>Removing a word from its immediate context robs the intended meaning. Words are the building blocks for units of thought; thus, they should not be isolated when bringing out the author's meaning. Specifically words are used in a relationship with other words. If you've studied hermeneutics you already know about the widening contextual units that one must examine when doing exegesis (the sentence, the thought, the parts of an argument, entire argument, the whole letter or narrative, etc...) Tallying up instances of adelphos does not provide support for a meaning. The examples you provide are not evidence for or against any interpretation. It just shows how often Paul used a word. The object of the preposition, kurios, must be considered when making comparison, not to mention kurios itself (one of the most loaded words in the New Testament).”<BR/><BR/>I have a few points in reaction to all this:<BR/><BR/>1) None of this provides an argument for a blood relation for James being intended in I Cor. 15. <BR/><BR/>2) For one we’re told that “words are the building blocks for units of thought,” but we’re also told that “word study” is a fallacy when it comes to trying to understand what someone means when he does not explicitly clarify what he means in what he says. If “words are the building blocks for units of thought” and words are all we have to go by, what else is there in determining what someone means?<BR/><BR/>3) I take issue with the claim that “words are the building blocks for units of thought.” On the contrary, <I>concepts</I> are the building block units of thought, while words are symbols for concepts. This is why different languages can exist; different languages have different symbols for very similar concepts. In English I say ‘dog’, in French I say ‘chien’, in Russian I say ‘sobaka’ and in Thai I say ‘mah’. The concept is essentially the same between all speakers, but the symbol for that concept varies.<BR/><BR/>4) I have not attempted to isolate the word “brother” in order to divine Paul’s meaning of this word in I Cor. 15; rather, since Paul does not explicitly state what he means, I look to his other uses of this word as a helpful guide. There is nothing wrong with this procedure, especially since Paul is not clear in what he means by “brother of the Lord” when applied to James. Nowhere else does Paul use the word ‘brother’ to denote a biological relationship; should we look to other people’s use of the same word to interpret Paul? Other people have in fact used the word ‘brother’ to indicate a blood relation. Should we isolate Paul’s word ‘brother’, remove it from the overall context of his use of that word, and assign it the meaning which other users of that word mean by it? Why?<BR/><BR/>5) Yes, “words are used <B>in a relationship</B> with other words,” but if you think Paul means <I>blood</I> brother in this context, you need to argue for it, especially since Paul uses the other word quite habitually to refer to a spiritual rather than biological relationship. I’ve seen no argument presented to conclude that Paul really meant that James was a biological sibling of the earthly Jesus in I Cor. 15. Do you have one?<BR/><BR/>6) If Paul is not explicit in what he means by “brother of the Lord” when he uses this phrase, why isn’t it the case that “tallying up instances of adelphos does not provide support for a meaning”? Besides, I’ve done more than merely “tally up” Paul’s use of ‘brother’; I’ve looked at his habitual use of the term to discover what he means when he uses it. Why is this invalid, especially if he is not explicit in what he means by it in one specific instance?<BR/><BR/>David: “Where else does Paul present “ton adelphon tou kuriou”? 1 Corinthians 9:5 ‘Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?’ My contention is that this group, ‘the brothers of the Lord’, is the same group mentioned throughout the Gospels.”<BR/><BR/>In Matthew 28:10, we find Jesus speaking as follows: “Then said Jesus unto them, Be not afraid: go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me.” Here he is referring to unspecified persons as his “brethren.” On this Wells points out, “That the disciples (and not Jesus’ family) is meant is clear from the sequel. ‘The eleven disciples went to Galilee,’ where they saw and worshipped the risen one (vss.16-7).” (<I>The Historical Evidence For Jesus</I>, p. 169) So if Paul is meaning the disciples here, as you seem to be saying with your statement here, then he is not referring to people related to Jesus by blood, but by a relation of faith.<BR/><BR/>David: “2) I'll grant Robert that James is given an honorific title, but why does the designation as Jesus' sibling not give honor to James?”<BR/><BR/>In Christianity, fellowship in Christ clearly supersedes relation by the flesh. We find this in the gospels as well, where Jesus tells his hearers about conditions of discipleship: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26). (I do not hate my father, my mother, my wife, my child, my brother and sisters, or my own life, nor will I do so, so I cannot follow Jesus, per his own terms.)<BR/><BR/><BR/>David: “How did James acquire his status as early leader given we have no record of him following Christ during his lifetime.”<BR/><BR/>Do you think that merely by being a biological sibling, James acquired status as an early leader? Again, what record in the early epistles even remotely suggests this?<BR/><BR/>David: “How is honor implied by some ‘brotherhood’ with Jesus that is not physical?” <BR/><BR/>The early Christians obviously thought that “doing the will of God” was of chief importance. This is why the gospel of Mark, which does give Jesus biological brothers (most likely to provide fodder for opposing docetism, a theological rather than chronicling purpose), has Jesus say in their midst, “For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother and my sister, and mother” (3:35). So even when we get to the gospels, biological relation is readily eclipsed by one’s status as a faithful believer. Indeed, how would honor be implied by a mere biological relationship? If biological relationship were of such importance as to bestow honor upon a sibling, why doesn’t Paul honor Jesus’ mother Mary, who was, according to the gospels, with child while yet a virgin?<BR/><BR/>For Paul, James was clearly someone important in the early hierarchy of the church in his day (in Gal. 2:9 he refers to James as one of the "pillars" of the church). He does not explain the credentials belonging to such a position, but given Paul’s abhorrence for things of the flesh, it is quite doubtful that a relationship according to the flesh is what gives James the privilege of the honorific title he gives him.<BR/><BR/>David: “3) Paul uses prepositions very purposely in his preaching”<BR/><BR/>I would hope so. But one’s purpose may be to distract, deflect or confuse. If Paul is vague, given his purposefulness (as you claim), it must be because he was being vague on purpose. No?<BR/><BR/>David: “(just read that aloud and should go wipe off my monitor).”<BR/><BR/>Yes, I note your gift for alliteration.<BR/><BR/>David: “Paul calls his fellow believers in Christ (Col 1:7; 4:7).”<BR/><BR/>Yes, a relationship that seems quite vague to me, since “Christ” is not a place. Or is it? Perhaps it’s a place that is accessible only by means of imagination?<BR/><BR/>David: “This distinct preposition demands some explanation.”<BR/><BR/>Yes, I agree. And what is Paul’s explanation? Or should I ask: Does he give one?<BR/><BR/>David: “Doherty asserts that we should use “brothers in the Lord” as a clue to to interpret the phrase, and offers no explanation why. He contends that the early church of James may have been called the “brethren of the Lord” (no evidence given). Ok, but James is the brother of the Lord, not a brother of the Lord. Unless definite and indefinite articles are irrelevant in Greek (they're not), then this distinction must be addressed by Doherty as well.”<BR/><BR/>Since you do not quote Doherty, or even cite him, I will:<BR/><BR/><B>The term “brother” (<I>adelphos</I>) appears throughout Paul’s letters, and was a common designation Christians gave to each other. In I Corinthians 1:1 Sosthenes is called <I>adelphos</I>, as is Timothy in Colossians 1:1. Neither of them, nor the more than 500 “brothers” who received a vision of the spiritual Christ in [I] Corinthians 15:6, are to be considered siblings of Jesus. “Brothers in the Lord” (<I>adelphōn en kuriō</I>) appears in Philippians 1:14 (the NEB translates it “our fellow-Christians”). This is a strong indicator of what the phrase applied to James must have meant. James was the head of a community in Jerusalem which bore witness to the spiritual Christ, and this group seems to have called itself “brethren of/in the Lord.” The pre-eminent position of James as head of this group could have resulted in a special designation for him as <I>the</I> brother of the Lord. Note, too, that such designations are always “of the lord,” never “of Jesus.” We might also note that the term <I>adelphos</I> was common in Greek circles to refer to initiates who belonged to the mystery cults.</B> (Doherty, <I>The Jesus Puzzle</I>, pp. 57-58)<BR/><BR/>So Doherty does, after all, provide an explanation for this distinction.<BR/><BR/>David: “4) Just as a reference, the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology outlines a wide semantic domain for adelphos, which could mean the following: brother, close family member, fellow member of society or religious group, or even the Greek philosophical concept of universal brotherhood. NIDNTT also notes that Paul does not use adelphos when speaking to a gentile audience (for example: Acts 17:22). No honorific titles even mentioned, where is the evidence of such usage for ‘brother of the Lord’?”<BR/><BR/>Are we to suppose that Paul <I>never</I> used “adelphos” when speaking to a gentile audience? Isn’t this an argument from silence? Regardless, if you want “brother of the Lord” to indicate a biological sibling, you are invited to present your best case for this. <BR/><BR/>David: “Did the Gospel author(s) use this unique phrase in Galatians to fabricate a family for Jesus? If so does that suggest they understood it to be a literal brother? There have been 3 historic positions on the Jesus' brothers: a )Orthodox church - they were children from a previous marriage b) Catholic church - they were cousins c) Protestants - they were Joseph and Mary’s later children. <I>The Brother of Jesus</I> by Bruce Chilton and Jacob Neusner presents a very good critical analysis of all the contemporary theories. I also ran across a shorter summary article here: http://www.bibleinterp.com/articles/Chilton_James.htm”<BR/><BR/>Because it’s pertinent, I’ll continue with Doherty where I left off:<BR/><BR/><B>But there is further indication that early Christians knew of no sibling relationship between James and Jesus. The New Testament epistle of James opens this way: “James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ...” ... Few believe that James the Just actually wrote this letter, but if a later Christian is writing in his name, or even if only adding this ascription, commone sense suggests that he would have identified James as the <I>brother</I> of the Lord Jesus if he had in fact been so, not siply as his servant. A similar void is left by the writer of the epistle of Jude. (Few likewise ascribe this letter to the actual Jude, whoever he was.) It opens: Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ, and a brother of James...” ... Now if James had been Jesus’ sibling, and Jude is James’ brother, this would make Jude the brother of Jesus, and he appears as such in Mark 6. So now we have two Christian letters ascribed to supposed blood brothers of Jesus, yet neither one of them makes such an identification. Attempted explanations for this silence are unconvincing. They ignore the overriding fact that in the highly contentious atmosphere of most Christian correspondence, the advantage of drawing on a kinship to Jesus to make the letter’s position and the writer’s authority more forceful would hardly be passed up.</B> (<I>The Jesus Puzzle</I>, p. 58)<BR/><BR/>David: “Jerome quotes Hegesippus' account of James from the fifth book of his lost Commentaries (165-175 AD):” <BR/><BR/><I>"After the apostles, James the brother of the Lord surnamed the Just was made head of the Church at Jerusalem. Many indeed are called James. This one was holy from his mother's womb. He drank neither wine nor strong drink, ate no flesh, never shaved or anointed himself with ointment or bathed. He alone had the privilege of entering the Holy of Holies, since indeed he did not use woolen vestments but linen and went alone into the temple and prayed in behalf of the people, insomuch that his knees were reputed to have acquired the hardness of camels' knees."</I> <BR/><BR/>Clearly by Hegsippus’ time (some 100+ years after Paul), the legend of who James was had grown significantly.<BR/><BR/>David: “In conclusion, James has historically been understood to be the brother of Jesus.”<BR/><BR/>This is misleading. In his letters, Paul, the earliest NT writer, never refers to Paul as “the brother of <I>Jesus</I>. To say that “James has historically been understood to be the brother of Jesus” is agenda-driven revisionism.<BR/><BR/>David: “No positive evidence has been provided for your claim.. A unique reading of “brother of the Lord” as found in Galatians (over and against the Gospels which present the sibling) requires more evidence to defend itself against readings that comport across the New Testament.”<BR/><BR/>I don’t think so. At no point does Paul explicitly indicate that Jesus had any siblings, and a survey of his use of “brother” demonstrates that this was a religious title, not a sibling relationship. I don’t need any evidence beyond this. In fact, going just by what Paul says, a sibling relationship would be quite extraordinary for an otherwise ordinary term for Paul. If Paul meant sibling relationship, why doesn’t he say “brother of Jesus” instead of “brother of the Lord”? Are the “more than 500 brethren” that Paul mentions in I Cor. 15:3-8 also siblings of Jesus? Why not?<BR/><BR/>David: “Regardless of the historicity of the Gospels, they support this reading of Galatians.”<BR/><BR/>Actually, the gospels <I>provide</I> this reading of Galatians, a reading that is not suggested in the letter itself. We get the notion that a sibling relationship is intended in Galatians only by reading the gospels back into Paul. But if the gospels are legendary, and were developed for theological purposes rather than for purposes of chronicling actual events (which I’m convinced they were), then this is an invalid approach to interpreting Galatians. I realize that Christians won’t like this, but they have a very, very difficult time overcoming this.<BR/><BR/>David: “If Paul is the only source prior to the Gospels mentioning James, then one is left wondering why the later writers would use this alleged ‘spiritual brother’ to fabricate an entire family for Jesus.” <BR/><BR/>Opposition to the heresy of docetism would provide sufficient motivation for giving Jesus blood relatives. Besides, this need not have been fabrication from whole cloth. If Christians of Paul’s time and later did not understand that “brother of the Lord” was a title indicating membership in some core fraternity of leaders or zealots, it could easily have been interpreted as suggesting a sibling relationship. Both the motive and the opportunity were present by the time the gospels were set to paper.<BR/><BR/>David: “Also a quick note that ‘the twelve’ in 1 Cor 15 is equivalent to ‘the twelve disciples’. This is a semantic change due to innovation that normally only grammarians concern themselves with; however, I think its worth mentioning. The innovation is specifically called an ellipsis, which is basically when a headword (disciples) is closely associated with a qualifier (twelve). The headword is often omitted due to frequency of use.”<BR/><BR/>This may be true, but this explanation seems to be speculation driven by the desire to conform the epistles with the gospels. Regardless, you seem to agree that, if the gospels are true, it would be more accurate to say, in agreement with them, that Jesus appeared to “the eleven,” which is what the gospels explicitly state. Moreover, if the tradition that a member of the twelve defected and betrayed Jesus after Paul’s time, or independent of his mission circles, the record is just as we would expect it to look in such a case. Paul would have Jesus appear to “the twelve” because he would not have know about a later tradition that has one of them defect from the group.<BR/><BR/>David: “This lends support to the passage being an oral creed, but my real point here is that if Paul is saying Jesus appeared to the twelve disciples, then how far back could Jesus' death/resurrection be?”<BR/><BR/>Again, Paul nowhere indicates that any of his contemporaries were fellow travelers with the earthly Jesus. This is a later tradition that has been read back into Paul. Besides, if I Cor. 15:3-8 is a post-Pauline interpolation, as Price has argued, then pointing to this passage as an early creed would be moot. Regardless, Paul never does put any time or place to Jesus’ death and resurrection, and speaks of these very vaguely, never indicating the circumstances under which he believed any of this happened, never indicating that any of his contemporaries knew the earthly, pre-crucifixion Jesus, never suggesting that any of the members of leadership whom he mentions were witnesses to Jesus’ execution, etc. When he does claim that the post-resurrection Jesus appeared to people living in his own day, Paul gives no details on what they saw, or how they would know it was really Jesus. These read like religious experiences, much like what numerous Christians I have known personally have claimed to have had.<BR/> <BR/>David: “I think ‘the twelve’ had become a regular expression for ‘the group of disciples’.” <BR/><BR/>For all we know, it could have been, but maybe not. It’s certainly not an expression that Paul used regularly. I could not find it in any other passage by Paul. So if we want to affirm that it was in regular usage during Paul’s day, I’d think we’d need something more than Paul’s solitary passing mention of it.<BR/><BR/>If “the twelve” was an expression that was standardized because it was part of a creed, as many seem to think, how did this creed come to use “the twelve” here if the gospel stories are true, according to which Jesus appeared to “the eleven”? I personally tend to think that “the twelve” had symbolic meaning (so much in the NT is symbolism anyway), corresponding to the twelve tribes, given the early Christians’ dependence on OT themes. <BR/><BR/>David: “The eleven could have been purposely tweaked by the later Gospel writers in an attempt to be more accurate about what happened for narrative purposes (as opposed to reciting a creed).”<BR/><BR/>What appears to have happened was that the notion of “the twelve” was adopted by certain communities and incorporated into their concocted narratives about an earthly Jesus. It would have been easy for later writers to take such references them and give them a significance they did not originally have by making “the twelve” a group of disciples who banded around Jesus during the earthly life they sought to portray in their narratives, where for Paul it had no such meaning (for it is hard to see how Paul could have failed to refer to them as such had he known about them). The reduction to “the eleven” was a natural result, then, of the gospel story which made a member of the original twelve defect and betray Jesus. By this point, the narrative had taken on a life of its own as the primary vehicle for containing doctrine and providing the desired portrait of Jesus. Remember that Paul’s letters, even if any of the evangelists were aware of them, were not considered canonical at this point, so there probably would not have been much concern for “contradicting” Paul, especially if the evangelists did not originally intend their narratives to be documenting actual history but rather convey spiritual truths by means of allegory (as many scholars today suggest).<BR/><BR/>David: “If legendary expansion is true, then we have Gospel writers contradicting one of their sources which itself requires explanation.”<BR/><BR/>I don’t think the gospel writers would have considered it a contradiction per se, especially if they didn’t think of their own narratives as recording actual historical events. Since, even if they were using Paul as a source, the gospel writers probably would not have considered his writings as divinely ordained or canonical, they most likely would not have taken it as inviolable anyway. As Robert has, I believe correctly, pointed out, that the authors of Matthew and Luke made their own revisions to the narrative found in the gospel of Mark, the evangelists performatively demonstrated that they did not think they were documenting actual history. If they did, then they obviously did not have a very good understanding of what history is.<BR/><BR/>David: “In accord with Chris here, on what grounds do you assume only one appearance to the apostles?”<BR/><BR/>I don’t. I’m only going by what is stated in Paul’s letter, and what Christians want to interpret Paul’s reference to “the twelve” to mean. If it means the twelve apostles in the gospels, then it seems there’s a problem, since according to the gospel accounts, by the time Jesus started making his post-resurrection appearances, Judas had already eliminated himself from the scene. <BR/><BR/>David: “I acknowledge that other religions have traditions, and food is to be among the most commonly selected means of expressing religious concepts and having communal time.”<BR/><BR/>In other words, Christianity is not unique in this regard.<BR/><BR/>David: “Two things in common at the same time does not imply strong dependence, and at best posits weak influence.”<BR/><BR/>We’re not talking about flowers or hair growth here, but religious practices which involve symbolism as well as what practitioners value and seek to achieve. If a variety of religions which preceded Christianity incorporated worship practices that involved, for instance, the consumption of bread and wine as symbols for the flesh and blood of a resurrected deity, it’s very reasonably doubtful that Christianity’s own use of such symbolism would arise independent of such traditions coincidentally. The ANE during Paul’s day was swarming with various cultures intermingling and influencing each other. It was in this setting that Christianity first developed. Are we to suppose that traditions from other religions could not have been recast and adopted by adherents who converted to Christianity, very probably from some of these other religions?<BR/><BR/>David: “Paul uses the Old Testament example of Baal worship to discourage the Corinthians from pagan idolatry.”<BR/><BR/>And he wouldn’t have done so in the way that he does in I Cor. if those worship practices did not in a significant way mirror a similar practice in Christianity. <BR/><BR/>David: “This is not explicitly a mystery cult reference and most likely isn't one since they were very exclusive and secretive in bringing new members into their midst.”<BR/><BR/>Is your concern to dispel the notion that Christianity borrowed from specifically a pagan mystery cult, or that it borrowed from any prior religious model?<BR/><BR/>David: “Albert Schweitzer said, ‘If we posses so few typical statements about Mystery-feasts, is it not partly because they had no very remarkable features and did not take a very exalted position in the hierarchy of the cultus acts?’ (<I>Paul and His Interpreters</I> pg 195)”<BR/><BR/>I don’t think we can assume what Schweitzer wants us to assume here. The assessment of whether or not something is “remarkable” depends on a variety of value-informed contexts, which not everyone shares, and criteria which vary according to purpose. I might find remarkable something that Schweitzer might have passed over, and vice versa. Then again, if many or all religions of the time incorporated sacred feast practices (as you seem to acknowledge), then against this relief one religion’s sacred feast practices might not seem so remarkable. It’s probably the case that a religion was expected to have a feast sacrament. So there was probably little imperative to document them. Besides, the practices of secretive cults would probably not have been prone to being written in the public journals of the time. These cults may have existed for decades or more before anyone took any serious notice of them.<BR/><BR/>Also, one reason why so few “typical statements about Mystery-feasts” survive may be because they were stamped out by religious rivals. Suppression of anti-Christian works has been well documented. Porphyry’s <I>Adversus Christianos</I>, for instance, was institutionally put to the torch, and under Constantine possession of it was made a capital offence.<BR/><BR/>David: “Also with respect to Paul himself borrowing doctrines from mystery cults I stand with Grant: Also “Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths of mythical gods seems so entirely foreign that the emergence of such a fabrication from its midst is very hard to credit.” Michael Grant, Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels, p. 199”<BR/><BR/>This seems to ascribe a monolithic uniformity to the Judaism of the day which would be very difficult to defend. Within Judaism were many different sects. The Jewish Wisdom literature itself was clearly a profound influence on Paul and people like Philo. In I Cor. 1:24, Paul says that “Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God.” This association of Christ with “the wisdom of God” confirms Wells’ point that “statements made about Wisdom in [the Wisdom] literature are made of Jesus in the Pauline letters” (<I>The Jesus Legend</I>, p. xxvi).<BR/><BR/>David: “And as Ronald Nash notes: ‘Any question for the historical antecedents of the Lord's Supper is more likely to succeed if it stays closer to the Jewish foundations of the Christian faith than if it wanders off into the practices of the pagan cults.’ (<I>The Gospel and the Greeks</I> pg 149). What about the Jewish passover feast!? Bruce Metzger notes, ‘the Jewishness of the setting, character, and piety expressed in the [Christian] rite is overwhelmingly pervasive in all the accounts of the origin of the supper.’ (<I>Methodology</I> p 17)”<BR/><BR/>You seem to be wanting it both ways here, David. Above you quoted Grant, who says that “Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths of mythical god seems so entirely foreign...,” but then you quote Nash and Metzger here, who claim that the Christian Eucharist, which has the believer thinking he is actually eating the flesh and drinking the blood of his god, is fully in keeping with Jewish practices. In his cross-examination of Gregory Boyd’s attempts to discount the possibility that non-Jewish religious cults of the day, such as the Mithra cult, had influenced the development of the Christian version of a sacred meal practice, Doherty points out:<BR/><BR/><B>You claim that Jews would have been horrified by the bull’s blood ritual, and no doubt they were. But would they have been any more enamored with the Christian Eucharist, a rite which represented itself as eating and drinking the flesh and blood of their god? This was something fully in keeping with the mystery religion sacramentalism, especially the ancient cult of Dionysos which also ate and drank the god’s flesh and blood. But did it have anything to do with being Jewish? I hardly think so. The traditional Jewish thanksgiving meal had nothing like it, and the idea would have been blasphemy to most Jews, certainly those of the ‘mainstream’ type you allude to. To represent a man’s body and blood as being divine and the source of salvation would have constituted idolatry. By your own argument, Dr. Boyd, how then do we possibly explain a supposed widespread acceptance of this new faith among Jewish circles when it would have involved such abhorrent doctrines and rites?</B> (<I>Challenging the Verdict</I>, p. 89)<BR/><BR/>David: “Justin Martyr was writing to the emperor of Rome to defend against charges of impiety and wickedness leveled against Christians.. His point was that in some respects Christianity was similar to religions that found approval in Rome, and yet Christianity often demanded an even higher morality.” <BR/><BR/>Indeed, here Justin Martyr sought to take advantage of those similarities, similarities which today’s Christians try to downplay or even deny. Justin Martyr simply confirms that some features of Christianity were already enjoyed by earlier religions, and he is trying to use this fact in order to garner toleration. He’s essentially telling us that Christianity was nothing really new.<BR/><BR/>I wrote: “Now, I’m still curious about Paul’s claim to have received his information via revelation. How exactly does that work?”<BR/><BR/>David: “Perhaps Paul did doubt his revelation experience and sought to have it confirmed by those who claimed to know Jesus.”<BR/><BR/>You’re not addressing my question here. Back up a bit, and let’s focus on Paul and his claim to have received his information via revelation directly from Christ. How does this work? How does one “receive” a revelation? How does he know once he’s received it that it is in fact a “revelation”? How does he distinguish it from his imagination, a fantasy, a daydream, or just a bright idea? If a person writes a letter and includes in it all this “doctrine” and claims to have received it via revelation from some supernatural being, would you really take that seriously? Apparently so, for you are doing just that in the case of Paul, for this is what Paul claims.<BR/><BR/>David: “Again this is the whole rub about recent resurrection because you assume that those he went to see only knew a ‘heavenly risen’ Jesus.”<BR/><BR/>Again, as I pointed out above, Paul nowhere suggests that the people he confers with in Jerusalem were companions of Jesus during his earthly existence. Had Paul known or believed this of Peter and James, it is an understatement to call his silence on this baffling. Moreover, as many commentators have noted, Paul never distinguishes the appearances of Jesus that he claims others experienced from his own experience. He never mentions, for instance, a doubting Thomas who was invited to touch or examine a physical resurrected body’s wounds. These are later traditions that were built up to answer the docetists. Furthermore, Paul does not record what specifically he discussed with the individuals he met with in Jerusalem. He is as vague as can be on this, mentioning it only in passing (and even goes on to explain how he rebuked Peter in Antioch – Gal. 2:11-14). Christians typically insert what they read in the gospels into the cracks at this point, even though what Paul gives us in no way indicates the stories we read in the gospels.<BR/><BR/>Indeed, if Paul had conferred with Peter and learned from him that Jesus was put to death as a result of a trial before Pilate, do you think Paul would tell us that “rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil” (Rom. 13:3)? How could Paul have this view of rulers, a view which is echoed in I Peter 2:14, if he believed Jesus had been crucified under Pilate?<BR/><BR/>Again, I have known numerous Christians myself who have claimed that Jesus appeared to them. And yet Jesus is supposed to have died nearly 2000 years ago, going by the gospel accounts. Accordingly, Jesus is still appearing to people, thousands of years after he was purportedly put to death and resurrected. So I’m not positing anything that is out of the ordinary for Christian believers.<BR/><BR/>David: “That is possible, but since Paul’s reason for going on the trip was to confirm his experience then I believe that supports that Paul believed Cephas/James really hung out with Jesus and thus has were qualified to verify his experience....”<BR/><BR/>Actually, Paul appeals to a revelation as his reason for going to Jerusalem. The NLT translates it this way:<BR/><BR/>“I went there because God revealed to me that I should go. While I was there I met privately with those considered to be leaders of the church and shared with them the message I had been preaching to the Gentiles. I wanted to make sure that we were in agreement, for fear that all my efforts had been wasted and I was running the race for nothing.” (Gal. 2:2)<BR/><BR/>According to what he says of his own journey to Jerusalem, he just says that a revelation told him to. So it’s not clear that his “reason for going on the trip” was so that others could “verify his experience.” But let’s suppose that it was revealed to Paul that this is what he should do. That seems quite superfluous to me. He got his original gospel via revelation (Gal. 1:11-12), and then he gets another revelation telling him to go see some people who will confirm his initial revelation experience, an experience that Paul had when he was not even in the presence of these other people. <BR/><BR/>David: “otherwise we’re left with a delusional Paul going to visit other delusional people to validate his experience...and that is a hard nugget for me to swallow.”<BR/><BR/>That a person might be delusional when it comes to his strongly held beliefs in the supernatural, is no hard nugget to swallow, not for me at any rate. <BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-3139217587611087832008-08-10T16:46:00.000-04:002008-08-10T16:46:00.000-04:00Chris: “My comment merely refers to the error your...Chris: “My comment merely refers to the error your assumption makes in foreclosing against the possibility that Jesus did appear to all 12 as Paul writes.” <BR/><BR/>Actually, I’ve made no error, since I’m assessing possibility on the basis of the evidence positively given in the record. And in my view, going by the evidence does not constitute erroneous procedure. <BR/><BR/>The problem is produced by what is stated: one tradition (Paul’s) says that Jesus appeared to “the twelve,” while the other (found in the gospels) claims that Jesus appeared to “the eleven.” Neither tradition – either the one found in I Cor. 15:3-8 or that of the gospels – gives even a remote suggestion that Jesus appeared to Judas in some afterlife experience. Nowhere in his letters does Paul even mention Judas Iscariot, or that one of “the twelve” defected and committed suicide. It is because Paul offers no details that proposals like the one you give can be imagined and inserted into the record as if Paul may actually have had something like this in mind. <BR/><BR/>Chris: “Paul is providing new information, not conflicting information.”<BR/><BR/>To be consistent with your own proposal, you would need to refrain from the overtly indicative mood in which you couch this assertion. By affirming it positively, as you do here, you have ventured well beyond the evidence and into the realm of the ad hoc. Besides, we must remember that Paul was the earlier writer here. So he would not have been providing information which the gospel writer overlooked or failed to supply.<BR/><BR/>Now, if I am in error here, it is because I do not grant to the imagination the power which theists implicitly grant to it. Only they don’t want to call it imagination. They have other names for imagination, like “spiritual truth” or “revelation.” <BR/><BR/>But what you offer, Chris, is actually valuable for illustration of one way legends begin to take shape in the minds of the faithful. As I have argued elsewhere, belief in the supernatural invites the believer to retreat deeper and deeper into his imagination. Without doing so, “the fear of God” which is supposed to be the beginning of knowledge (Prov. 1:7) will never take root. (Van Til’s autobiographical account of his own conversion experience is illustrative of this point; see <A HREF="http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/2007/07/role-of-imagination-in-christian-god.html" REL="nofollow">here</A> for example.) Here you have imagined a scenario specifically geared toward resolving a problem in the record, and because you take the supernatural seriously, you bestow what you have imagined with the validity of a legitimate “possibility” that even I am expected to take seriously. What we have in the end, however, is the legend-building process aptly modeled before us as it takes shape. The legend has now grown: after Jesus appears to “the eleven,” he descends into hell and appears before Judas Iscariot, who is roasting in tormenting flames licking his entire body throughout, and scolded for his historic offense. This completes “the twelve” that we have in Paul, so now there’s no problem. What evidence is there for such an event? None is needed, belief in the supernatural overcomes any need for evidence. As Christian David Slayer wrote on <A HREF="http://www.graceforums.com/showthread.php?tid=222&pid=1680#pid1680" REL="nofollow">Grace Forums</A> recently, “If non-believers need proof God exists, then they have no faith.” Faith simply eliminates any need for evidence or proof, since it grants primacy to the imaginary.<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-1309407662543506682008-08-09T17:42:00.000-04:002008-08-09T17:42:00.000-04:00Perhaps Paul did doubt his revelation experience a...<I>Perhaps Paul did doubt his revelation experience and sought to have it confirmed by those who claimed to know Jesus.</I><BR/><BR/>I cannot see any evidence in Galatians that Paul ever doubted that he was preaching the gospel correctly. It seems more likely to me that he was concerned that the apostles in Jerusalem had things wrong. Perhaps his fear that he was running his race in vain was the fear that the apostles in Jerusalem were undoing his work by teaching false doctrines.Vinnyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08955726889682177434noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-19571391266243735232008-08-09T17:22:00.000-04:002008-08-09T17:22:00.000-04:00Robert,Yes, while most Christians would probably h...Robert,<BR/><BR/>Yes, while most Christians would probably have not clue what the Tübingen School is, I think the traditional Christian position would reject this.<BR/><BR/>As for Clementine I'm not sure. How do you conclude that if a Christian rejects the Tübingen School they necessarily accept the psuedo-Clementine literature? <BR/><BR/><I>On the one side, is the "Tübingen School" view that the canonical gospels and Acts were products of the mid to late 2-nd century. </I><BR/><BR/>“The demonstration, mainly by English scholars, of the impossibility of the late dates ascribed to the New Testament documents...and the proofs of the authenticity of the Apostolic Fathers and of the use of St. John's Gospel by Justin, Papias, and Ignatius gradually brought Baur's theories into discredit.” (from the Wikipedia article which is curiously thorough and shows some unusual marks of scholarship).<BR/><BR/>The Germans create it, the British correct it, and the Americans corrupt it! :)davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08071763988772047093noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-51520802936375205772008-08-09T16:54:00.000-04:002008-08-09T16:54:00.000-04:00Dawson said:“not one of the other 33 references us...Dawson said:<BR/><I>“not one of the other 33 references using the word ‘brother’ seems to denote a blood relation.”<BR/>“So the more we look at this, the more compelling it becomes that Paul used the word ‘brother’ in his letters, pretty much without exception, to indicate a relation within the election, not a biological relation.”</I><BR/><BR/>1) There are exegetical problems with this, namely the dreaded word study fallacy:<BR/>Removing a word from its immediate context robs the intended meaning. Words are the building blocks for units of thought; thus, they should not be isolated when bringing out the author's meaning. Specifically words are used <B>in a relationship</B> with other words. If you've studied hermeneutics you already know about the widening contextual units that one must examine when doing exegesis (the sentence, the thought, the parts of an argument, entire argument, the whole letter or narrative, etc...) Tallying up instances of adelphos does not provide support for a meaning. The examples you provide are not evidence for or against any interpretation. It just shows how often Paul used a word. The object of the preposition, kurios, must be considered when making comparison, not to mention kurios itself (one of the most loaded words in the New Testament).<BR/><BR/>Where else does Paul present “ton adelphon tou kuriou”?<BR/>1 Corinthians 9:5 <BR/><I>Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas? </I><BR/><BR/>My contention is that this group, “the brothers of the Lord”, is the same group mentioned throughout the Gospels.<BR/><BR/>2) I'll grant Robert that James is given an honorific title, but why does the designation as Jesus' sibling not give honor to James? How did James acquire his status as early leader given we have no record of him following Christ during his lifetime. How is honor implied by some “brotherhood” with Jesus that is not physical? <BR/><BR/>3) Paul uses prepositions very purposely in his preaching (just read that aloud and should go wipe off my monitor). Paul calls his fellow believers <B>in</B> Christ (Col 1:7; 4:7). This distinct preposition demands some explanation. Doherty asserts that we should use “brothers in the Lord” as a clue to to interpret the phrase, and offers no explanation why. He contends that the early church of James may have been called the “brethren of the Lord” (no evidence given). Ok, but James is <B>the</B> brother of the Lord, not <B>a</B> brother of the Lord. Unless definite and indefinite articles are irrelevant in Greek (they're not), then this distinction must be addressed by Doherty as well. <BR/><BR/>4) Just as a reference, the <I>New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology</I> outlines a wide semantic domain for adelphos, which could mean the following: brother, close family member, fellow member of society or religious group, or even the Greek philosophical concept of universal brotherhood. NIDNTT also notes that Paul does not use adelphos when speaking to a gentile audience (for example: Acts 17:22). No honorific titles even mentioned, where is the evidence of such usage for “brother of the Lord?”<BR/><BR/>5) A mere honorific title fails to explain the “brother of the Lord” as used by later authors who you claim used Paul's material as a source. <BR/><BR/>6)The early church had no problems with this (Doherty readily concedes this point) until perpetual virginity became an apologetic concern (the Ebionites used Jesus' family to argue against perpetual virginity, see Ireneus <I>Against Heresies</I>). Did the Gospel author(s) use this unique phrase in Galatians to fabricate a family for Jesus? If so does that suggest they understood it to be a literal brother? There have been 3 historic positions on the Jesus' brothers:<BR/><BR/>a )Orthodox church - they were children from a previous marriage<BR/>b) Catholic church - they were cousins <BR/>c) Protestants - they were Joseph and Mary’s later children<BR/><BR/><I>The Brother of Jesus</I> by Bruce Chilton and Jacob Neusner presents a very good critical analysis of all the contemporary theories. I also ran across a shorter summary article here: http://www.bibleinterp.com/articles/Chilton_James.htm<BR/><BR/>Jerome quotes Hegesippus' account of James from the fifth book of his lost Commentaries (165-175 AD): <BR/><BR/><I>"After the apostles, James the brother of the Lord surnamed the Just was made head of the Church at Jerusalem. Many indeed are called James. This one was holy from his mother's womb. He drank neither wine nor strong drink, ate no flesh, never shaved or anointed himself with ointment or bathed. He alone had the privilege of entering the Holy of Holies, since indeed he did not use woolen vestments but linen and went alone into the temple and prayed in behalf of the people, insomuch that his knees were reputed to have acquired the hardness of camels' knees." </I><BR/><BR/>In conclusion, James has historically been understood to be the brother of Jesus. No positive evidence has been provided for your claim.. A unique reading of “brother of the Lord” as found in Galatians (over and against the Gospels which present the sibling) requires more evidence to defend itself against readings that comport across the New Testament. Regardless of the historicity of the Gospels, they support this reading of Galatians. If Paul is the only source prior to the Gospels mentioning James, then one is left wondering why the later writers would use this alleged “spiritual brother” to fabricate an entire family for Jesus. <BR/><BR/><BR/>Also a quick note that “the twelve” in 1 Cor 15 is equivalent to “the twelve disciples”. This is a semantic change due to innovation that normally only grammarians concern themselves with; however, I think its worth mentioning. The innovation is specifically called an ellipsis, which is basically when a headword (disciples) is closely associated with a qualifier (twelve). The headword is often omitted due to frequency of use. This lends support to the passage being an oral creed, but my real point here is that if Paul is saying Jesus appeared to the twelve disciples, then how far back could Jesus' death/resurrection be? <BR/><BR/><BR/>Dawson said:<BR/><I>“The “sun came up this morning” as opposed to what?”</I><BR/><BR/>Oops, sorry about that. I meant to say “do you correct people” and missed that on the edit. <BR/><BR/>I’m saying that the “sun came up” is a phenomenological description (from the point of view of the observer) and need not be literally and objectively true in order to be true in the sense the author intended. This would probably be a more liberal view of “the twelve” so I’m not even sure how far I would take that since I haven’t studied the literary genres (Gospel narratives vs Paul’s letters) closely enough to really argue for an interpretation. I think “the twelve” had become a regular expression for “the group of disciples.” The eleven could have been purposely tweaked by the later Gospel writers in an attempt to be more accurate about what happened for narrative purposes (as opposed to reciting a creed). If legendary expansion is true, then we have Gospel writers contradicting one of their sources which itself requires explanation. <BR/><BR/>I don't see any contradiction for post-resurrection appearances if they happened in this order:<BR/><I><BR/>Peter (1 Cor 15:5)<BR/>Ten Apostles (Luke 24, John 20:19)<BR/>Eleven Apostles (John 20:24<BR/>All Apostles (Matt 28, Mark 16)<BR/>James (1 Cor 15:7)<BR/>Paul (1 Cor 15:8)</I><BR/>Using your hermeneutic, Paul doesn’t tell us which appearance he is talking about so he is only aware of the appearance to the twelve. In accord with Chris here, on what grounds do you assume only one appearance to the apostles?<BR/><BR/><BR/>In response to the mystery cult stuff: <BR/><BR/>We know next to nothing about Hellenistic mystery cults in the 1st century. What we do know of mystery cults mainly comes from the 3rd-4th centuries and implies there was a period of syncretism and eclecticism during which the cults became more widespread in Rome. This period is most likely when a) they borrowed from Christianity to be popular b)vice versa c)both d)neither.<BR/><BR/>As for 1 Cor 15 and the worship of Baal of Peor, I don't see the significance. I acknowledge that other religions have traditions, and food is to be among the most commonly selected means of expressing religious concepts and having communal time. Two things in common at the same time does not imply strong dependence, and at best posits weak influence. Paul uses the Old Testament example of Baal worship to discourage the Corinthians from pagan idolatry. This is not explicitly a mystery cult reference and most likely isn't one since they were very exclusive and secretive in bringing new members into their midst. Albert Schweitzer said, “If we posses so few typical statements about Mystery-feasts, is it not partly because they had no very remarkable features and did not take a very exalted position in the hierarchy of the cultus acts?” (<I>Paul and His Interpreters</I> pg 195)<BR/><BR/>Also with respect to Paul himself borrowing doctrines from mystery cults I stand with Grant:<BR/>Also “Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths of mythical gods seems so entirely foreign that the emergence of such a fabrication from its midst is very hard to credit.”<BR/>Michael Grant, Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels, p. 199<BR/><BR/>And as Ronald Nash notes:<BR/>“Any question for the historical antecedents of the Lord's Supper is more likely to succeed if it stays closer to the Jewish foundations of the Christian faith than if it wanders off into the practices of the pagan cults.” (<I>The Gospel and the Greeks</I> pg 149). What about the Jewish passover feast!? Bruce Metzger notes, “the Jewishness of the setting, character, and piety expressed in the [Christian] rite is overwhelmingly pervasive in all the accounts of the origin of the supper. (<I>Methodology</I> p 17)<BR/><BR/>J. Gresham Machen’s <I>The Origin of Paul’s Religion</I> has shaped my thinking on the matter considerably.<BR/><BR/>Justin Martyr was writing to the emperor of Rome to defend against charges of impiety and wickedness leveled against Christians.. His point was that in some respects Christianity was similar to religions that found approval in Rome, and yet Christianity often demanded an even higher morality. Using your own hermeneutic: we don’t know which specific elements Martyr was referring to therefore we should conclude that he didn’t know about the ones he doesn’t mention. :) Comparative religion is not the point here, the point is Martyr is not evidence of mystery cult sacred meals..only of sacred meals which I openly will acknowledge (even from the Old Testament) has been around since religion.<BR/><BR/>Dawson said:<BR/><I>Now, I’m still curious about Paul’s claim to have received his information via revelation. How exactly does that work?</I><BR/>Perhaps Paul did doubt his revelation experience and sought to have it confirmed by those who claimed to know Jesus. Again this is the whole rub about recent resurrection because you assume that those he went to see only knew a “heavenly risen” Jesus. That is possible, but since Paul’s reason for going on the trip was to confirm his experience then I believe that supports that Paul believed Cephas/James really hung out with Jesus and thus has were qualified to verify his experience....otherwise we’re left with a delusional Paul going to visit other delusional people to validate his experience...and that is a hard nugget for me to swallow.<BR/><BR/>Cheers,<BR/>Daviddavidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08071763988772047093noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-60907650517302923582008-08-09T13:12:00.000-04:002008-08-09T13:12:00.000-04:00Chris: “My comment merely refers to the error your...Chris: “My comment merely refers to the error your assumption makes in foreclosing against the possibility that Jesus did appear to all 12 as Paul writes. Paul is providing new information, not conflicting information. “<BR/><BR/>Chis begs the question on multiple levels. By asserting Dawson is in error in “ foreclosing against the possibility that Jesus did appear”, he without justification assumes the supernatural is real. However, the supernatural is simply the negation of all that is natural. All that exists is the natural. Existence exists. It is impossible for other than existence to exist, for all that exists is existence. Assuming the supernatural is to assume the metaphysical primacy of non-existence and consciousness. This is absurd.<BR/><BR/>By assuming that Paul wrote I Cor. 15:3-8, Chris ignores the very plausible alternative that the passage in question is a post-Pauline interpolation. This is gross question begging. <A HREF="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/robert_price/apocrypha.html" REL="nofollow">See Robert M. Price's Apocryphal Apparitions 1 Corinthians 15:3-11 As a Post-Pauline Interpolation</A><BR/><BR/>Asserting “ Paul is providing new information,” is to presume the gospel fairy tales are historically true; that is a fine example of Petitio principii, for that is the issue at question.<BR/><BR/>Chris wirtes that Paul's story was “not conflicting information.” Again he reasons in a circle. Steven Carr's comments demonstrate against the idea that Paul believed in a historical Jesus who rose from the grave like a zombie in a George Romero movie. <BR/><BR/>The analysis I posted of the ancient hymn fragment found at Philippians 2:6-11 coupled with the implications of the letter of Claudius Lysias renders the notion that Paul believed a corpse rose from its grave and walked about talking and eating fish absurd.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03469718358131331499noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-72649904368778655932008-08-09T12:36:00.000-04:002008-08-09T12:36:00.000-04:00chadzwo: "I believe Dawson's point is that Judas w...chadzwo: "I believe Dawson's point is that Judas was dead prior to Jesus resurrection and he therefore could not have appeared to him."<BR/><BR/>Mark is widely and generally thought to be the first of the canonical gospels. Mark ends at 16:8. The spurious long ending, 16:9-20, is not authentic to Mark. In 16:8 we read:<BR/><BR/>"They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid."<BR/><BR/>There are no post resurrection appearances in canonical Mark. The literary device of the women fleeing in fear and remaining silent was used to explain why the story of a physical resurrection had been unknown up till then. Matthew and Luke both used Mark as a source document and radically changed the story in different ways to suit their doctrinal agendas. That they did so indicates that they did not think of Mark as history. By freely changing the Jesus story, the other gospel evangelists implicitly assert that Mark and their own writings are pious fiction. This is fatal to Christianity.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03469718358131331499noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-86949782772897487812008-08-09T02:19:00.000-04:002008-08-09T02:19:00.000-04:00Chris - I believe Dawson's point is that Judas was...Chris - I believe Dawson's point is that Judas was dead prior to Jesus resurrection and he therefore could not have appeared to him. Matthew 27:5 - And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself. From the most natural way to read this portion of Matthew, it appears Judas was dead well before Jesus death, burial, and resurrection. For the record, I do not agree with Dawson's conclusions but neither do I see Judas as a possible solution to the eleven/twelve issue.<BR/><BR/>Dawson - sorry to have not posted in response to your questions. Usually by the time I am finished reading all that is written here (or at least the parts I find interesting) I haven't any time left to post. Will try to do so at some point.chadzwohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05829082015713400364noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-39350079284307284722008-08-08T15:41:00.000-04:002008-08-08T15:41:00.000-04:00Hi Dawson,Long time reader, third time commenter.M...Hi Dawson,<BR/><BR/>Long time reader, third time commenter.<BR/><BR/>My comment merely refers to the error your assumption makes in foreclosing against the possibility that Jesus did appear to all 12 as Paul writes. Paul is providing new information, not conflicting information.<BR/><BR/>Enjoy your blog immensely.Chris Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13134785155889204025noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-68589123527632602492008-08-08T08:44:00.000-04:002008-08-08T08:44:00.000-04:00Chris wrote: “In regards the 12 vs 11 discussion p...Chris wrote: “In regards the 12 vs 11 discussion point; Just because Judas betrayed Christ doesn't mean that Christ then did not appear to him.”<BR/><BR/>You need to tell this to the authors of the gospels, for as I have quoted, they have the risen Jesus appearing to “the eleven” after Judas defected and killed himself. <BR/><BR/>Chris: “If anything I would think it more important that Christ appear to Judas if for no other reason than to show him his error.”<BR/><BR/>Apparently the authors of the gospels did not share your opinion on what is important, otherwise I would expect them to have included something to this effect in their gospel narratives. It would be easy for them to do, since what we’re dealing with here is ultimately imaginary: one can imagine a resurrected Jesus doing virtually anything he invents in the fantasies of his imagination. But clearly this would be fiction at this point, like medieval tales the still-virgin Mary descending into hell to visit the sinners being tormented there.<BR/><BR/>But none of this bodes well for Christianity. No matter how you slice it, Paul is in conflict with the gospels here, and the explanations Christians come up with are unsatisfying. The problem is in fact created by Christianity, for Christianity wants us to accept what both Paul and the gospels say as inspired truth. On my view, which in no way partakes in such nonsense, the explanation is simple: Paul (assuming he wrote I Cor. 15:3-8 in the first place) was unaware of the tradition that one of “the twelve” defected and betrayed Jesus, because that tradition was not developed until a later time, when narratives depicting Jesus’ earthly existence began to be compiled and put into story form. This is just one of the many strands of evidence demonstrating that what we have in the New Testament is a series of snapshots documenting the growth of an ancient legend, from its more primitive beginnings to a full-fledged “histories” which cast fictional characters in fictional stories set in otherwise historical settings, much like today’s historical novels.<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-35311317135618517532008-08-07T23:45:00.000-04:002008-08-07T23:45:00.000-04:00Dawson,Thank you for responding and I'm glad your ...Dawson,<BR/><BR/>Thank you for responding and I'm glad your experiences with Cohen match mine; Cohen does offer nuggets of gold and his own world-view is frightful as you say. He accepts Kant's noumenal / phenomenal split and thinks objectivity is getting in touch with the nomenal realm or as he calls it "non-fantasy" or "ultimate truth" (which is Jung's term). It drives me crazy when he goes on for length with that but its worth it when he finally focuses on the mind control aspects of the Bible. <BR/><BR/>If you ever post on the subject of either Cohen's book or Christian mind-control I will share some more observations with you. I've taken about 10 pages of notes on the book. <BR/><BR/>Regards,madmaxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14375140131881725965noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-5169354825295527042008-08-07T15:02:00.000-04:002008-08-07T15:02:00.000-04:00In regards the 12 vs 11 discussion point; Just bec...In regards the 12 vs 11 discussion point; Just because Judas betrayed Christ doesn't mean that Christ then did not appear to him. If anything I would think it more important that Christ appear to Judas if for no other reason than to show him his error.Chris Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13134785155889204025noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-11720099228507116712008-08-07T14:27:00.000-04:002008-08-07T14:27:00.000-04:00David: I hope you are well. I found answers to you...David: I hope you are well. I found answers to your questions and posted them. Now its my turn to ask you a question.<BR/><BR/>If a "traditional" Christian believer accepts the notion of a historical Jesus, James, and Peter, then it would be the case that such a person would reject the "Tübingen School" of New Testament criticism. Consequently, it would follow that a "traditional" Christian believer would accept the Clementine Homilies as having historical worth by portrayal of historical factual information.<BR/><BR/>In light of such acceptance of the Clementine Homilies, what do you make of the <A HREF="http://www.compassionatespirit.com/Homilies/Epistle-Peter-to-James.htm" REL="nofollow">Epistle of Peter to James ?</A><BR/><BR/>In this document, Peter allegedly complains to James about Paul: "For some from among the Gentiles have rejected my legal preaching, attaching themselves to certain lawless and trifling preaching of the man who is my enemy" - Apostle Peter in "Epistle of Peter to James"<BR/><BR/>If the Epistle of Peter to James is genuine, then it would falsify Pauline Christianity. The amazing fact that Pauline Christianity dominates the landscape of Christian belief, however, would be fatal to Christianity in general if the Epistle of Peter to James were genuine. If there were to be a Holy Spirit leading and guiding Christians to "truth", then it is inexplicable that Pauline Christianity could be the dominate view if the Epistle of Peter to James were genuine. But if the Clementine Homilies describe a set of historical circumstances, then the Epistle of Peter to James probably is authentic. This creates a dilemma.<BR/><BR/>On the one side, is the "Tübingen School" view that the canonical gospels and Acts were products of the mid to late 2-nd century. If so, then Catholic Christianity was and is a purely human created institution. Protestantism is likewise merely a set of dearly beloved delusions. On the other side of the dilemma rests the realization that the early Jewish Christians held the prior and prime beliefs. <BR/><BR/>Both horns are fatal to Christianity. In John 14:26 Jesus is alleged to have spoken "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you." If the "Tübingen School" view is correct, then Christianity is a product of the late 2-nd century and the Clementine Homilies are fiction. If the Clementine Homilies are true, then Paul was delusional and Jewish Christianity had priority and primacy to claims of correct doctrine. However, since both of these alternatives are contrary to Pauline Christianity and since the Holy spirit was supposed to do the John 14:26 things, then Pauline Christianity could only be triumphant if there was no Holy Spirit it do the John 14:26 things. If there is no Holy Spirit, then there is no Christian God irregardless of whether there was actually a historical Jesus of some sort.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03469718358131331499noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-28674735818050065472008-08-06T22:48:00.000-04:002008-08-06T22:48:00.000-04:00Hi Madmax,Yes, I have read Cohen's book. In fact, ...Hi Madmax,<BR/><BR/>Yes, I have read Cohen's book. In fact, I've savoured much of it (particularly the second half where he analyzes the mind-game of Christianity), and have done so in spite of your spot-on criticisms of his work. He makes some amazing observations, but you're right - they're nestled in a frightful worldview of his own, and they have to be picked out from some very over-burdened language. Not an easy read, and I've always wished he could have contained himself in many passages where he just seems to ramble. But it's like panning for gold: there's a lot of dirt and grime and dust, but there are nuggets in there, no doubt about it.<BR/><BR/>Very good catch, Madmax! I'm glad there's someone out there paying attention.<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-22528194135641729592008-08-06T22:44:00.000-04:002008-08-06T22:44:00.000-04:00Hello David,These last two days have been very bus...Hello David,<BR/><BR/>These last two days have been very busy for me, and I don’t think tomorrow or Friday will be much different. So I had to be very selective in my response.<BR/><BR/>David: “Also with respect to ‘brother of the Lord’, it would be unusual for Paul not to call Jesus kurios in this passage. No arguments from me there. How adelphos is commonly used does not settle the issue. I actually think there is some evidence that adelphos could also imply “cousin” but suffice it to say that no small amount of evidence such as presented here will support or refute this.”<BR/><BR/>I went to biblegateway.com and did a search on keyword ‘brother’ in the Pauline epistles, and it fetched me 34 results (see <A HREF="http://www.biblegateway.com/keyword/?search=brother&version1=9&searchtype=all&bookset=10" REL="nofollow">here</A>). Setting aside for a moment Gal. 1:19, where Paul refers to James as “the Lord’s brother,” not one of the other 33 references using the word ‘brother’ seems to denote a blood relation. In Phil. 2:25 Paul writes: <BR/><BR/>“Yet I supposed it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother, and companion in labour, and fellowsoldier, but your messenger, and he that ministered to my wants.”<BR/><BR/>Now, I don’t know anyone who takes this reference here to mean that Epaphoditus was Paul’s biological sibling. A <A HREF="http://www.biblegateway.com/resources/commentaries/index.php?action=getCommentaryText&cid=8&source=1&seq=i.57.2.6" REL="nofollow">commentary about Epaphroditus</A> on biblegateway.com says this about Paul’s reference to him as ‘brother’:<BR/><BR/>“First, he is my brother, the fundamental term of relationship within the believing community; he is to Paul what the rest of the Philippian Christians are as well.”<BR/><BR/>So the more we look at this, the more compelling it becomes that Paul used the word ‘brother’ in his letters, pretty much without exception, to indicate a relation within the election, not a biological relation.<BR/><BR/>I asked: “If Paul convened with Peter to get his facts straight, how could he have repeated this error?” <BR/><BR/>David: “Do you correct your people when they say the ‘sun came up this morning’?”<BR/><BR/>The “sun came up this morning” as opposed to what? (And who do you think are “my people”? I just have my wife and daughter, and my wife’s native language is not English, so on occasion I do correct her.)<BR/><BR/>David: “To me, that would be the equivalent of “the twelve” vs “the eleven” in the ancient mind.”<BR/><BR/>I don’t think I see what you’re taking as analogous between “the sun came up this morning” and “the twelve” vs. “the eleven.” I suppose if one of “my people” (whoever they may be) said “the sun came up this morning” and another said “the sun came up this afternoon,” that would cause me to question them. Similarly, if Paul is supposed to have gone over with Peter all the details of his gospel, which he claims to have received via revelation directly from the risen Jesus, I would expect that Peter would have made it clear that the post-resurrection Jesus appeared to “the eleven,” as the gospels explicitly state, if in fact the gospel story were true. But if the stories we find in the gospels are later concoctions, stories that had developed for theological purposes and were not recording actual history, then I can see why Paul would not have thought to say that the post-resurrection Jesus had appeared to “the eleven,” since he would not have known about one of the members of “the twelve” defecting prior to Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances. <BR/><BR/>Either way you slice it, there’s a discrepancy here whose implications for the discussion are sufficient to call itself to our attention. You had accused me earlier of special pleading. <BR/><BR/>I wrote: “I tend to see Paul’s version of the sacred meal as something he or others before him have imported into the new religion from the surrounding pagan culture, whose many mystery religions involved sacred meals.” <BR/><BR/>David asked: “When is the earliest evidence we have of mystery religions using sacred meals, like 2nd or 3rd century?”<BR/><BR/>Scholars have long noted various parallels, some closer than others, between Christianity and pre-Christian religions and religious practices in the ANE. Back in 1899, Wallis Budge in his <I>Egyptian Religion</I> noted (p. 172) that "The ancient Egyptians believed that the deceased must eat the gods and so be imbued with their powers." The mystery religions, whose roots stretch back to the ancient Egyptians, had dominating influence over the pagan world. These religions had various rites of initiation and worship, and they shared certain essentials which are also found in Christianity, such as baptism and sacred meals. Justin Martyr, in defending Christianity against the criticism of his day, wrote, "In saying that the Word was born for us without sexual union as Jesus Christ our teacher, we introduce nothing beyond what is said of those called the Sons of Zeus" (<I>Apology</I>, 3). Paul himself, in I Cor., makes it clear that sacred meal rites very similar to Christianity’s Eucharist were practiced by other religions in his own day when he writes “Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils” (10:21). So in fact, we don’t have to look very far for evidence of rival religions using sacred meals before the 2nd century. It’s right there in Paul!<BR/><BR/>Now, I’m still curious about Paul’s claim to have received his information via revelation. How exactly does that work? How can one person be sure that another person has received information from a supernatural source, especially if we cannot interview that person about this claim? How could Paul distinguish what he called “revelation” from what he was imagining? You mention Gal. 2:2 where Paul is apparently saying that he went to Jerusalem to confirm what he learned by revelation. This itself would strike me as odd: if someone learns something by revelation, why would he need other human beings to validate it? When Abraham was told to prepare his son Isaac for sacrifice (Gen. 22), the story does not indicate that he had to go to anyone else to confirm whether or not he got it right. So it’s always been very curious to me a) how one supposedly learns something by revelation, b) how that person distinguishes what he claims to have learned by revelation from something he may merely be imagining; and c) why others might be expected to accept such a claim especially when a) and b) are stubbornly difficult if not impossible to explain.<BR/><BR/>Many Christians have gotten sore at me just for raising these questions, which itself tells me there’s something wrong. But you at least seem open to considering them, which is why I’m glad you’re sticking around for this discussion.<BR/><BR/>Regards,<BR/>DawsonBahnsen Burnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11030029491768748360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11714522.post-30516290884176458042008-08-06T17:27:00.000-04:002008-08-06T17:27:00.000-04:00David: "you should wonder why the early chur...David: "you should wonder why the early church leadership chose to attribute Marcan authorship when they knew he was writing down Peter's words. Why not put Peter at the wheel, if you know that this will guarantee the story gets in the stack?"<BR/><BR/>David's query begs the question in several ways. By asserting that I should be concerned about (presumably) the Jesus myth case because of Christian apologetical assertions that canonical Mark was authored by the legendary secretary John Markus to Simon Peter the Apostle, is to assume that the Gospel story is historical. The historicity of the Gospel story is, however, the issue at question. <BR/><BR/>It is Petitio principii to think there was "leadership" in early Christianity because doing so assumes a "big bang" origin of Christianity with a legendary founder, Jesus of Nazareth. In fact, Christianity was always a schizophrenic diversity of cultic expression characterized by many sects each with a writhing, squirming, wad of competitive would be prophets and apostles. Christianity was never a single organization prior to the darkness of total Catholic control. Asserting there was 2-nd century consensus or unity begs the question.<BR/><BR/>Its circular reasoning to think that putting Peter at the wheel will guarantee the story gets in the stack because that is to assume the gospel stories are historical. That, however, is the question at issue? <BR/><BR/>To suggest Irenaeus' agenda of establishing his four gospels as authoritative was contested is to ignore the Sitz im Leben of late second century Catholicism and to assume that the other types of Christianity then extant would be in any way influenced by what they considered gross error or that thier complaints might be considers by Irenaeus. Would the Gnostics or Jewish-Christian sectarians have been influenced by Irenaeus? Of course not. Would Irenaeus deliberate over the concerns of opposing sectarians? Perposterous nonsense. Who was there in the 2-nd century to say what was scripture and what was not? David is projecting his conception of mondern intellectual discussion back onto the ancients. The religious landscape of 2-nd century Rome was a free-for-all. There were Holy Ghost's, Prophets-Of-The-Real-Gods, Apostles-O-Christ-du jure on every street corner. Vast numbers of phony preachers and cult leaders competed for followers and their loot, and there was no end to the fools and loons who willingly followed and coughed up all they had. The much later Church Councils and Synods of the fourth century were 150 to 200 years yet to come relative to Irenaeus. However, his writings were influential with third and fourth century Catholics in establishing preferred dogma. The later churchmen then accepted Irenaeus' recommendations (an reliance on Papias) because his gospels told the story in a manner compliant with their desire to create an authoritative institution issuing command catechism. Irenaeus' claim regarding authorship of Mark stem from Papias. However, the zany notion that the canonical Gospel of Mark was authored by the legendary secretary John Markus to Simon Peter the Apostle as per Papias cannot be substantiated from what historical data we have. <BR/><BR/>Since the four canonical gospels do not show up in the literary record prior to Irenaeus naming them in "Against Heresies," <BR/><BR/>"After their departure (death of Peter & Paul), Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter." - <A HREF="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/irenaeus-book3.html" REL="nofollow">Against Heresies 3:1:1</A><BR/><BR/>we can reasonably accept a strong prior probability that were canonical Mark and Matthew in circulation prior to Irenaeus, that Quadratus of Athens, Aristides, Marcion, Polycarp, Justin Martyr and other early 2-nd century apologists would have used them. But the early 2-nd century Christian churchmen do not cite or quote canonical Mark and Matthew. <BR/><BR/>It is likely that Irenaeus ascribed authorship of what we think of as the canonical Gospel According to MarK to Presbyter John's Mark based on data from Papias about a quite different document. <A HREF="http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/guess.html" REL="nofollow">Paul Tobin's case thoroughly refutes evangelical assertions that canonical Mark was the docuement thought to be known to Papias. He explains:</A><BR/><BR/>"The first explicit references to the supposed authors of the gospels were from Irenaeus (c130-200). Thus we see him making references to the gospels according to Mark, Matthew, Luke and John in <A HREF="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/irenaeus-book3.html" REL="nofollow">Against Heresies (c 180):</A><BR/><BR/>Against Heresies 3:10:5 Wherefore also Mark, the interpreter and follower of Peter, does thus commence his Gospel narrative: "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God..." [Mark 1:1]"<BR/><BR/>The earliest attempt to give the names of the authors of some of the gospels came just before the middle of the second century. This is the witness of an early Christian named Papias, bishop of Heirapolis. He wrote a now lost work entitled The Five Books of Interpretations of the Oracles of the Lord. The actual time of his writing is unknown, and is now available only in fragments quoted by later Christians. Most scholars place it around 130 CE, but it could well be as late as 150 CE. In any case, this is what Papias wrote - as quoted in Eusebius's (c275-339) <BR/><A HREF="http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/250103.htm" REL="nofollow"> History of the Church:(Book III, Chpt.39, Art.1) </A> <BR/> <BR/>Quoted in History of the Church 3:39:15<BR/>And the presbyter said this: Mark the interpreter of Peter, wrote down exactly, but not in order, what he remembered of the acts and sayings of the Lord, for he neither heard the Lord himself nor accompanied him, but, as I said, Peter later on. Peter adapted his teachings to the needs [of his hearers], but made no attempt to provide a connected narrative of things related to our Lord. So Mark made no mistake in setting down some things as he remembered them, for he took care not to omit anything he heard nor to include anything false. As for Matthew, he made a collection in Hebrew of the sayings and each translated them as best they could. <BR/><BR/>His source for this information is one Presbyter John. Who is this mysterious person whom Papias quoted? We do not know. We do know that he was not one of the apostles, as earlier in the same work Papias wrote this:<BR/><BR/> Quoted in History of the Church 3:39:3-4<BR/>And whenever anyone came who had been a follower of the presbyters, I inquired into the words of the presbyters, what Andrew or Peter had said, or Philip or Thomas or James or John or Matthew, or any other disciple of the Lord, and what Aristion and the presbyter John, disciples of the Lord, were still saying. <BR/><BR/><B>Note that the presbyter John is not included in the list of the apostles and is not to be confused with the apostle John who was mentioned earlier in the sentence and in the past tense. There is a further point we should note about the witness of Papias. According to Eusebius (History of the Church 3:39:13-14), Papias was a man "of very limited understanding" who "misunderstood apostolic accounts." In other words he must have been, even for his age, quite credulous. We do not foresee such a person counterchecking the reliability of the information given to him by the presbyter. He probably just accepted what was told to him verbatim.</B><BR/><BR/><I>[Robert_B: Presbyter John's story is that his Mark took notes from speeches delivered by Apostle Peter. Our canonical Mark is a narrative story, not a collection of logia sayings.]</I><BR/><BR/>Whatever the case may be as to the reliability of this tradition (which we will consider below), Papias' testimony tells us that the name Mark was attached to the gospel around 130-150 CE. Prior to this the document we call the Gospel According to Mark circulated anonymously. It is unlikely that our Gospel According to Mark was the same document Papias referred to. Richard Bauckham in "Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony" (Eerdmans 2006) admits that modern scholars have regarded Papias testimony on Mark as "historically worthless." (Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: p203) - Paul Tobin's web article <BR/><A HREF="http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/papias.html" REL="nofollow">Was Papias a Reliable Witness?</A> <BR/><BR/><BR/><I>[Robert_B: We know about Papias from Irenaeus through Eusebius. Both Irenaeus and Eusebius are known to have exaggerated and must be approached skeptically<BR/><BR/>It is quite certain that the Christian landscape of the 2-nd century was saturated with itinerate, vagabond, preachers-teachers-prophets-apostles who traveled about swindling credulous Christian believers. Even Paul warned about such in 2 Cor 11:4. The Didache warns against such itinerate apostles..</I><BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/didache-roberts.html" REL="nofollow">Let every apostle who comes to you be received as the Lord. But he shall not remain more than one day; or two days, if there's a need. But if he remains three days, he is a false prophet.</A> <BR/><BR/><I>[Robert_B: We cannot, therefore, rule out that presbyter John was not a swindling con-man who targeted Papias as a mark.</I> <BR/><BR/>Richard Packham in "Critique of John Warwick Montgomery's Arguments for the Legal Evidence for Christianity" notes regarding Papias that: "The testimony of Papias is the earliest authority for the authorship of the Apostles, but it is scarcely "solid." We do not even have Papias' direct testimony, since his writings are lost. Our information about Papias' testimony comes only by way of Eusebius, who wrote in the fourth century, and who portrays Papias as being somewhat gullible. The "John" of whom Papias was a student was more likely John Presbyter than John the Evangelist (or John the Apostle, if they can be proven identical). In short, the "solid" evidence is not as solid as Montgomery would like us to believe."<BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://books.google.com/books?id=lWwPAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22Supernatural+Religion%22#PPA276,M1" REL="nofollow">In "Supernatural Religion: An Inquiry Into the Reality of Divine Revelation", (full view available on Google Books) Walter Richard Cassels presents a thoroughly convincing case that canonical Mark is not the same document as that spoken of by Papias. The argument starts on page 276 and runs through 286.</A><BR/><BR/>Cassels concluded that: "It is not necessary for us to account for the manner in which the work referred to by the Presbyter John disappeared, and the present Gospel according to Mark became substituted for it. The merely negative evidence that our actual Gospel is not the work described by Papias is sufficient for our purpose. Any one acquainted with the thoroughly uncritical character of the Fathers, and with the literary history of the early Christian Church, will readily conceive the facility with which this can have been accomplished. The great mass of intelligent critics are agreed that our Synoptic Gospels have assumed their present form only after repeated modifications by various editors of earlier evangelical works. These changes have not been effected without traces being left by which the various materials may be separated and distinguished ; but the more primitive Gospels have entirely disappeared, naturally supplanted by the later and amplified versions. The critic, however, who distinguishes between the earlier and later matter is not bound to perform the now impossible feat of producing the originals, or accounting in any but a general way for the disappearance of the primitive Gospel.<BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tischendorf" REL="nofollow">Tischendorf</A> asks : "How then has neither Eusebius nor any other theologian of Christian antiquity thought that the expressions of Papias were in contradiction with the two Gospels (Mt. And Mk.)?"<BR/><BR/>The absolute credulity with which those theologians ccepted any fiction, however childish, which had a pious tendency, and the frivolous character of the only criticism in which they indulged, render their unquestioning application of the tradition of Papias to our Gospels anything but singular, and it is only surprising to find their silent acquiescence elevated into an argument. We have already, in the course of these pages, seen something of the singularly credulous and uncritical character of the Fathers, and we cannot afford space to give instances of the absurdities with which their writings abound. No fable could be too gross, no invention too transparent, for their unsuspicious acceptance, if it assumed a pious form or tended to edification. No period in the history of the world ever produced so many spurious works as the first two or three centuries of our era. The name of every Apostle, or Christian teacher, not excepting that of the great Master himself, was freely attached to every description of religious forgery. False gospels, epistles, acts, martyrologies, were unscrupulously circulated, and such pious falsification was not even intended, or regarded, as a crime, but perpetrated for the sake of edification. It was only slowly and after some centuries that many of these works, once, as we have seen, regarded with pious veneration, were excluded from the canon; and that genuine works shared this fate, while spurious ones usurped their places, is one of the surest results of criticism that the Fathers omitted to inquire critically when such investigation might have been of value, and mere tradition credulously accepted and transmitted is of no critical value. In an age when the multiplication of copies of any work was a slow process, and their dissemination a matter of difficulty and even danger, it is easy to understand with what facility the more complete and artistic Gospel could take the place of the original notes as the work of Mark." - Cassels, "Supernatural Religion" p.285-286 <BR/><BR/>Charles B. Waite in his definitive - <A HREF="http://books.google.com/books?id=JFwAAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=History+of+the+Christian+Religion:+To+the+Year+Two+Hundred#PPA237,M1" REL="nofollow">History of the Christian Religion: To the Year Two Hundred</A> wrote the following about Papias' alleged witness to the Gospels According to Mark and Matthew.<BR/><BR/>*Such is this far famed testimony (Eusebius, Ecc. Hist. bk. 3, ch. 89.)<BR/>That portion relating to the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, may be stated as follows: Eusebius says, that Papias said, that John the presbyter said, in what manner certain writings of Mark and Matthew had been constructed. The value to be attached to any statements of Eusebius, will be considered hereafter. One important circumstance will be noted, in the evidence, as it stands: Notwithstanding this explanation of the apostolic origin of the books, it appears that Papias considered them, as evidence, inferior to oral tradition. That, too, a hundred years after the time, when, as is claimed, they were written. Again, it is contended by able critics, that the language here attributed to Papias, concerning the book written by Mark, cannot be applied to the gospel which bears his name. ' They insist that it must be referred to the Preaching of Peter, or some other document more ancient then the Gospel of Mark. So also of the logia, oracles or sayings of Christ, by Matthew, which were not the same as the Gospel of Matthew.* - "History of the Christian Religion: To the Year Two Hundred", By Charles Burlingame Waite, p.237 (full view on Google books)<BR/><BR/>Papias' credulity did not escape Eusebius who wrote of him that: <A HREF="http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/250103.htm" REL="nofollow">13. For he appears to have been of very limited understanding, as one can see from his discourses. Church History (Book III, Chpt.39, Art.13) </A><BR/><BR/> That Papias would accept anything is evident by the surviving *fragment of Papias' writing, preserved by Apollinarius of Laodicea, a fourth century Christian bishop, tells of the fate of Judas. It is important to read this passage in full:<BR/><BR/> Judas did not die by hanging, but lived on, having been cut down before choking. And this the Acts of the Apostles makes clear, that falling headlong his middle burst and his bowels poured forth. And Papias the disciple of John records this most clearly, saying thus in the fourth of the Exegeses of the Words of the Lord:<BR/><BR/> Judas walked about as an example of godlessness in this world, having been bloated so much in the flesh that he could not go through where a chariot goes easily, indeed not even his swollen head by itself. For the lids of his eyes, they say, were so puffed up that he could not see the light, and his own eyes could not be seen, not even by a physician with optics, such depth had they from the outer apparent surface. And his genitalia appeared more disgusting and greater than all formlessness, and he bore through them from his whole body flowing pus and worms, and to his shame these things alone were forced [out]. And after many tortures and torments, they say, when he had come to his end in his own place, from the place became deserted and uninhabited until now from the stench, but not even to this day can anyone go by that place unless they pinch their nostrils with their hands, so great did the outflow from his body spread out upon the earth. [Fragment 3, from The Apostolic Fathers Translated By J. B. Lightfoot & J. R. Harmer]<BR/> <BR/>Anyone who reads this will immediately notice a few things. Firstly this is a harmonization of the contradictory readings from Matthew 27:3-5 and Acts 1:18-19. [b] Secondly the additional details, like his swollen head, sunken eyes, bloated genitalia, body flowing with pus, emanation of worms and terrible stench are typical motifs used by ancient authors to describe the deserved sufferings of evil men before their deaths. Josephus in Antiquities 17:6:5 described Herod the Great's suffering before his death to include putrefied genitals, emanation of pus and worms and bad stench. Acts 12:23 describes the death of Herod's grandson, Herod Agrippa I by stating that he was struck by an angel and was "eaten by worms." In other words the story about Judas suffering is an expected folkloric expansion of the brief accounts given in the Matthew and Acts. [Maccoby, Judas Iscariot and the Myth of Jewish Evil: p82-84]<BR/><BR/>Obviously this fable recounted by Papias certainly did not come from eyewitness accounts. Yet he presented it quite matter-of-factly as though he was recounting real history!<BR/><BR/>There are further examples from available fragments of Papias' writing of the basic unreliability of his writings. He was a teller of tall tales. In the fragment preserved by Philip of Side (c. 380 - c. 439), we hear of the daughters of Philip who would drank snake venom with no ill effects, of a woman resurrected and of those who were raised by Jesus surviving until the early second century!<BR/><BR/> The aforesaid Papias reported as having received it from the daughters of Philip that Barsabas who is Justus, tested by the unbelievers, drank the venom of a viper in the name of the Christ and was protected unharmed. He also reports other wonders and especially that about the mother of Manaemus, her resurrection from the dead. Concerning those resurrected by Christ from the dead, that they lived until Hadrian. [Fragment 5, from The Apostolic Fathers Translated By J. B. Lightfoot & J. R. Harmer] <BR/><BR/>We can now see why Eusebius noted that Papias writes of "strange parables" and "mythical tales." The latter's credulousness is strong evidence that Papias was as Eusebius described him: someone of "limited understanding." As for his claim of diligent collection and remembering of the Jesus tradition from the elders, we have an example of this in Irenaeus. Irenaeus cited Papias as his source for this saying of Jesus about the millennium:<BR/><BR/> Against Heresies 5:33:3-4<BR/>As the elders who saw John, the disciple of the Lord, related that they had heard from him how the Lord used to teach in regard to these times, and say: The days will come, in which vines shall grow, each having ten thousand branches, and in each branch ten thousand twigs, and in each true twig ten thousand shoots, and in each one of the shoots ten thousand clusters, and on every one of the clusters ten thousand grapes, and every grape when pressed will give five and twenty metretes of wine...And these things are borne witness to in writing by Papias, the hearer of John, and a companion of Polycarp, in his fourth book; for there were five books compiled by him <BR/><BR/>The source of this saying attributed to Jesus is not from any extant Christian writing or oral tradition - but Jewish apocrypha! Compare the passage below from 2 Baruch, a late first century or early second century Jewish pseudepigraphical text.<BR/><BR/> 2 Baruch 29:3-6<BR/>And it shall come to pass when all is accomplished that was to come to pass in those parts, that the Messiah shall then begin to be revealed. ...The earth also shall yield its fruit ten thousandfold and on each (?) vine there shall be a thousand branches, and each branch shall produce a thousand clusters, and each cluster produce a thousand grapes, and each grape produce a cor of wine. <BR/><BR/>The above evidence tells us that Papias was not a careful historian but a credulous second century Christian who seemed eager to believe anything that confirms his faith in Jesus.* - Paul Tobin <A HREF="http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/papias.html" REL="nofollow"> Was Papias a Reliable Witness?</A><BR/><BR/><B>In light of this stuff, the question of Peter-Mark-Papias is viscously circular, for Papias was an unreliable witness. His testimony cannot be taken seriously by any honest exegetical investigator.</B>Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03469718358131331499noreply@blogger.com