Very nice overview of Bayes Theorem and Historical Jesus

[_Jersey Girl]

Because ALL of our background knowledge shows us that these things simply have never happened and so the probability is extremely low it happened in this case. The claim then is people believed because they thought it happened historically. Or, people believed because it was invented as a religious worldview in light of what they themselves already had as part of their world knowledge view of dying and resurrecting mythological figures. This never happened to an actual historical person. The probability that it did in this oe case because it's our Jesus is extremely low on that consideration alone. And THAT is one reason why they hate doing the probability.

Sucked me right back in.

Do you think that the above cancels out the historical Jesus?


Y/N Pick one.

[_mikwut]

Hello Philo,

I must ask you if your familiar with the late Maurice Casey's Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths? In it Casey explains this really American phenomena of mythicism being decimated via the internet and predominantly self published books. I think he adroitly smashes to pieces your idea of the academy not having freedom in this research area. That is a myth if there is one in this whole discussion. You and Carrier might have a point worth giving some agreement towards when it comes to American institutions that include statements of faith even though they have tenured professors but it doesn't address the massive and plural secular institutions particularly in other countries that are not infected in any way with American fundamentalism.

Just think this through without a feeling of having to defend Carrier for a second. Me and you are both former Mormons. Let's juxtapose the Jesus mythicism with a hypothetical Joseph Smith mythicism. Let's suppose we are still members holding onto liberal ideas of the church and don't want to leave our faith roots. Let's suppose Mormonism has the kind of cultural cache Christianity does. Let's suppose In universities across the world the following historical constructions are taught, Joseph as con man, Joseph as cult leader, Joseph as sex crazed power lunatic, Joseph as magician, Joseph as misogynist, Joseph as liar, thief, homosexual etc.... Why would their exist this vast spectrum of very unfriendly constructions toward Joseph Smith but when the Joseph Smith mythicists state their position it is rejected because even in the secular universities stubborn headedness, unwillingness to weigh all the evidence etc. and a lack of or willingness to engage all positions and evidence exist? That would just be silly. Why would you and I perfectly stomach he is a con man and criminal but if he was a mythic figure well that would be just going to far and you and I would just plug our ears and shout I'm not listening, I'm not listening? Absurd.

That is exactly what we see in the academy respecting Jesus. Among scholars who work on the historical Jesus almost every conceivable and possible construction of who Jesus was has been freely allowed by tenured and non-tenured academics alike and put in the mix of peer review. Many of these are sensational and impious. He is depicted as a gay hermaphrodite mamzer, conceived by the rape of a roman soldier, failed messiah figure, con artist, magician and lousy expositor of Stoicism. To me mythicism would be easier to stomach (he's divine in mythicism for heaven's sake) and wouldn't even undermine traditional Christian ideas and claims as deeply.

Really Philo, how is Jesus being protected from the disturbing aspects of mythicism but everyone can stomach just fine the other even more damning constructions? I really think you need to understand and respect the hard diligent objective work of scholars without the immature even teen age exploits of Carrier, who likes calling them "dicks", "hacks" and "douches" persuading you.

I have to be honest with myself everyday Philo. I was born and raised Mormon. I have left that belief. But those roots don't clean easily and without real consistent struggle. There is an appeal to the new atheist zeal and fad for us former Mormons just like former fundamentalists. Someone like Carrier has a Charisma that can appeal to our fight against the machine we were born into mentality. But it is often just substituting one fundamentalism for another because we haven't swam in the non-fundamentalist waters. But, that has to be balanced Philo. Years of non fundamentalist reading and studying and being is necessary. Nothing personal because it comes from inside myself and our shared experience - fundamentalism is a curse, it's like diabetes you have to eat right, exercise and take your insulin diligently and check your levels (I'm diabetic) - it never leaves you - so our disease that we can only manage but not completely cure - as former Mormons yah, it sucks, but fundamentalism has to be managed all the time by us types. Part of that management I'm afraid to break it to you - is accepting mythicism is fundamentalism. It takes one to know one.

mikwut

[_Jersey Girl]

mikwut,

You couldn't know how much I appreciate your above post.

Thank you.

[_huckelberry]

Philo Sofee , thank you for providing an example to consider, Ascension of Isaiah . I went hunting. Perhaps there are more versions. The one I found was pretty Catholic (it could possibly be read as Docetic as Mikwut noted)
///
". For Beliar was in great wrath against Isaiah by reason of the vision, and because of the exposure wherewith he had exposed Sammael, and because through him the going forth of the Beloved from the seventh heaven had been made known, and His transformation and His descent and the likeness into which He should be transformed (that is) the likeness of man, and the persecution wherewith he should be persecuted, and the torturers wherewith the children of Israel should torture Him, and the coming of His twelve disciples, and the teaching, and that He should before the sabbath be crucified upon the tree, and should be crucified together with wicked men, and that He should be buried in the sepulchre,"

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/t ... nsion.html

Yes, and none of this happened on earth. That is what makes it so fascinating.

Philo, I just finished reading the whole thing not just the clip. It is a vision of Isaiah which happens in the seven heavens. the incarnation ministry crucifixion burial are all pictured as happening on earth after Jesus makes his descent to earth from the seventh heaven and is born of Mary as a baby.

If you are reading one where the crucifixion and burial happen in the heavens you are reading one completely different than the one I found. Now I just choose the first one to come up by Google.

[Guest]

Philo:
Because ALL of our background knowledge shows us that these things simply have never happened and so the probability is extremely low it happened in this case. The claim then is people believed because they thought it happened historically. Or, people believed because it was invented as a religious worldview in light of what they themselves already had as part of their world knowledge view of dying and resurrecting mythological figures. This never happened to an actual historical person. The probability that it did in this oe case because it's our Jesus is extremely low on that consideration alone. And THAT is one reason why they hate doing the probability.

Jersey Girl:
Sucked me right back in.

Do you think that the above cancels out the historical Jesus?


Y/N Pick one.

I wish it was that easy. In historical investigations, it is never so black and white. There are always more probably true or more probably questionable thinking going on. It's never either fully 100% one way or another. This evidence and background would lower the probability, but that doesn't mean it falsifies it. It means we continue looking at all other parameters and see what their probabilities are, and weigh them against this one. This is one reason why apologetics fails. They do not seriously consider the other claims with equal weight and analysis of all available evidence and background knowledge. I have strong doubts that anything we find can simply cancel out a historical Jesus. It just doesn't work that way. What it does do, on my take is make me more cautious about overly energetic claims about a historical Jesus as we have received the tradition through questionable means and documents and evidences. In other words, I become a bit more skeptical is all. Does that make sense?
For instance, since Roswell in Carrier was brought up earlier, let me say one thing. We have simply not ever seen any spaceship of aliens, nor do we possess one that has been authenticated as "out of this world" That one factor alone cannot cancel out the idea that it was aliens, but it weighs against the claim. We can't just use one thing and not address all the other evidences, background knowledges (have there *ever* been any alien spaceships found? No. That *must* be taken seriously in our background knowledge on literally *any* and *all* claims of UFO's from here on out) and comparisons of it all. This is why historical process takes time.

Hope that helps. Lets say I am more guarded now concerning the historical Jesus. It's what evidence is supposed to do as well as background. If there is something there positive, then a little more optimism is called for in saying "perhaps so." If it is negative, there is a little more caution saying, "lets keep checking and weighing."

[_Philo Sofee]

Huckleberry:
Philo Sofee , thank you for providing an example to consider, Ascension of Isaiah . I went hunting. Perhaps there are more versions. The one I found was pretty Catholic (it could possibly be read as Docetic as Mikwut noted)
///
". For Beliar was in great wrath against Isaiah by reason of the vision, and because of the exposure wherewith he had exposed Sammael, and because through him the going forth of the Beloved from the seventh heaven had been made known, and His transformation and His descent and the likeness into which He should be transformed (that is) the likeness of man, and the persecution wherewith he should be persecuted, and the torturers wherewith the children of Israel should torture Him, and the coming of His twelve disciples, and the teaching, and that He should before the sabbath be crucified upon the tree, and should be crucified together with wicked men, and that He should be buried in the sepulchre,"

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/t ... nsion.html

Yes, and none of this happened on earth. That is what makes it so fascinating.

Philo, I just finished reading the whole thing not just the clip. It is a vision of Isaiah which happens in the seven heavens. the incarnation ministry crucifixion burial are all pictured as happening on earth after Jesus makes his descent to earth from the seventh heaven and is born of Mary as a baby.

If you are reading one where the crucifixion and burial happen in the heavens you are reading one completely different than the one I found. Now I just choose the first one to come up by Google.

Yes, as Carrier has noted in "On the Historicity of Jesus," the Ascension is a combination of two or more manuscripts dating from different times, and the earthly aspects were the invented later "pocket Gospel" of a different historical non-original to the early story, spliced into the earlier version of only a heavenly redeemer figure. In other words, it's been meddled with by later Christian historicists stamping their later interpretation onto it, as the scholar Carrier used, Knight, demonstrated. I don't have Knight's books and analysis. At some point I will have to get them. I am simply accepting Carrier is being truthful on this for now.

[_Jersey Girl]

Philo:
Because ALL of our background knowledge shows us that these things simply have never happened and so the probability is extremely low it happened in this case. The claim then is people believed because they thought it happened historically. Or, people believed because it was invented as a religious worldview in light of what they themselves already had as part of their world knowledge view of dying and resurrecting mythological figures. This never happened to an actual historical person. The probability that it did in this oe case because it's our Jesus is extremely low on that consideration alone. And THAT is one reason why they hate doing the probability.

Jersey Girl:
Sucked me right back in.

Do you think that the above cancels out the historical Jesus?


Y/N Pick one.

I wish it was that easy. In historical investigations, it is never so black and white. There are always more probably true or more probably questionable thinking going on. It's never either fully 100% one way or another. This evidence and background would lower the probability, but that doesn't mean it falsifies it. It means we continue looking at all other parameters and see what their probabilities are, and weigh them against this one. This is one reason why apologetics fails. They do not seriously consider the other claims with equal weight and analysis of all available evidence and background knowledge. I have strong doubts that anything we find can simply cancel out a historical Jesus. It just doesn't work that way. What it does do, on my take is make me more cautious about overly energetic claims about a historical Jesus as we have received the tradition through questionable means and documents and evidences. In other words, I become a bit more skeptical is all. Does that make sense?
For instance, since Roswell in Carrier was brought up earlier, let me say one thing. We have simply not ever seen any spaceship of aliens, nor do we possess one that has been authenticated as "out of this world" That one factor alone cannot cancel out the idea that it was aliens, but it weighs against the claim. We can't just use one thing and not address all the other evidences, background knowledges (have there *ever* been any alien spaceships found? No. That *must* be taken seriously in our background knowledge on literally *any* and *all* claims of UFO's from here on out) and comparisons of it all. This is why historical process takes time.

Hope that helps. Lets say I am more guarded now concerning the historical Jesus. It's what evidence is supposed to do as well as background. If there is something there positive, then a little more optimism is called for in saying "perhaps so." If it is negative, there is a little more caution saying, "lets keep checking and weighing."

Oh, Philo Sofee, but it IS that simple. Please know and be sure that I am not trying to talk you into anything or out of anything. I hope you remember me as someone who doesn't do that to you and who will give you honest feedback. (Whether you like it or not). I'm not doing anything more than trying to get you to think, reflect, and sort.

You aren't reading my question for what it says and asks you.
You're over thinking it.

Since I departed this thread, I continued to read it. The problem as I see it right this very second is that you have so much stuff stuffed into your head right now that you are unable to answer a simple question.

I mean that as an observation, not a criticism. And, it's okay to be there in your head. It's understandable and the truth is, it's probably damn necessary.

I'll return here eventually to take this up with you or perhaps someone else will be able to clarify just exactly what I am asking you, for the question requires a yes or no answer. I gotta go have Easter now...

[_Kishkumen]

I would disagree in a friendly way. I find it vastly more informative than what you are implying. All the way around Carrier has held his own with every reviewer so far of his books. I suspect bias plays more of a role in your statement than actually having read his blog. No biggie to me.

Um, yes, Philo Sofeee, I have read his blog. Probably a dozen or so entries. I have read his nauseatingly boastful style. His polemics. His putdowns. His oversharing about his polyamorous lifestyle choices.

Trainwreck.

[_huckelberry]

Huckleberry:
Philo Sofee , thank you for providing an example to consider, Ascension of Isaiah . I went hunting. Perhaps there are more versions. The one I found was pretty Catholic (it could possibly be read as Docetic as Mikwut noted)
///
". For Beliar was in great wrath against Isaiah by reason of the vision, and because of the exposure wherewith he had exposed Sammael, and because through him the going forth of the Beloved from the seventh heaven had been made known, and His transformation and His descent and the likeness into which He should be transformed (that is) the likeness of man, and the persecution wherewith he should be persecuted, and the torturers wherewith the children of Israel should torture Him, and the coming of His twelve disciples, and the teaching, and that He should before the sabbath be crucified upon the tree, and should be crucified together with wicked men, and that He should be buried in the sepulchre,"

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/t ... nsion.html

Yes, and none of this happened on earth. That is what makes it so fascinating.

Philo, I just finished reading the whole thing not just the clip. It is a vision of Isaiah which happens in the seven heavens. the incarnation ministry crucifixion burial are all pictured as happening on earth after Jesus makes his descent to earth from the seventh heaven and is born of Mary as a baby.

If you are reading one where the crucifixion and burial happen in the heavens you are reading one completely different than the one I found. Now I just choose the first one to come up by Google.

Yes, as Carrier has noted in "On the Historicity of Jesus," the Ascension is a combination of two or more manuscripts dating from different times, and the earthly aspects were the invented later "pocket Gospel" of a different historical non-original to the early story, spliced into the earlier version of only a heavenly redeemer figure. In other words, it's been meddled with by later Christian historicists stamping their later interpretation onto it, as the scholar Carrier used, Knight, demonstrated. I don't have Knight's books and analysis. At some point I will have to get them. I am simply accepting Carrier is being truthful on this for now.

Philo, the introduction noted the spliced together quality. There is an extended vision , ascent into heaven by seven degrees. It is similar to a number of visionary tracts of the time. If you take out the explicitly christian material you are left with a vision of the "Angels",
....
31. And thereupon the angel who conducted me said to me: "Worship this One," and I worshipped and praised.

32. And the angel said unto me: "This is the Lord of all the praise-givings which thou hast seen."

33. And whilst he was still speaking, I saw another Glorious One who was like Him, and the righteous drew nigh and worshipped and praised, and I praised together with them. But my glory was not transformed into accordance with their form.

34. And thereupon the angels drew near and worshipped Him.

35. And I saw the Lord and the second angel, and they were standing.

36. And the second whom I saw was on he left of my Lord. And I asked: "Who is this?" and he said unto me: "Worship Him, for He is the angel of the Holy Spirit, who speaketh in thee and the rest of the righteous."

37. And I saw the great glory, the eyes of my spirit being open, and I could not thereupon see, nor yet could the angel who was with me, nor all the angels whom I had seen worshipping my Lord.

38. But I saw the righteous beholding with great power the glory of that One.

39. And my Lord drew nigh to me and the angel of the Spirit and He said: "See how it is given to thee to see God, and on thy account power is given to the angel who is with thee."

40. And I saw how my Lord and the angel of the Spirit worshipped, and they both together praised God.

41. And thereupon all the righteous drew near and worshipped.

42. And the angels drew near and worshipped and all the angels praised.
.......
following this vision there is a six repeating stage descent.

Please note, the Jesus myth hypothesis is not just that some Jews believed in a Great Angel and that might or might not connect with a Messiah. The Jesus myth hypothesis is that a group of people believed the Great angel suffered crucifixion, death and rebirth in the celestial regions and connection by way of knowledge connected believers to that rebirth.

If you remove the events that are part of the incarnational physical Jesus pattern from this writing you have nothing that would connect it with a Jesus myth at all. It might be possible for a reader to wonder why the journey to the vision is so elaborate if nothing more than a meet and greet happens. Perhaps somebody might speculate that something seen in heaven was cut out. At that point someone might imagine a celestial crucifixion was once described there. (or one could imagine a journey to America, or variety of other things.)


Or one might note that certain mystic Jewish traditions use this type of repetitive imaginative journey as a chariot for ones own journey. I think it is entirely possible for a Jewing ascent to involve the meeting and worship with no link to Christian myth or story.

[_Kishkumen]

As abstractly interesting as the mythicist position is to me, I don't find it very convincing. Are the gospels laden with fantastical material? Yes. But so too were the feats of historical persons pre-dating Jesus by decades and centuries. So, I can agree with the mythologization of Jesus as practically a given, but not the idea that the earthly Jesus was slapped together from a central myth of a heavenly being and various bits of historical information.