The Jesus Myth: An unrelenting case for history

[Philo Sofee]

So, I assume it would be pointless to refer you to the many accounts of modern prophete and apostles
who testify they 've seen the Savior (thus proving His Resurrection)?

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/danpeters ... phets.html

Dan’s got some real live ones in his blog comment section. When backed into a corner, he appealed to the witness of Mormon prophets:

I know that God lives. I know that Jesus Christ lives,” said John Taylor, my predecessor[sic], “for I have seen him.” I bear this testimony to you brethren in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

George Q. Cannon, a counselor in the First Presidency to Brigham Young, John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, and Lorenzo Snow, claimed on several occasions to have seen Christ and to have conversed with him face to face.

https://latterdaysaintmag.com/when-geor ... he-savior/


I don’t know how any Mormon can take the prophets’ words literally after so many decades of false promise, failures to discern, failed prophesy, outright lies, and racist doctrine.

Easy, they ignore all that... that's their modus operandi. Just go with what we say when it tickles yer ears folks, if ears are ticklin, truth is tricklin...

[Philo Sofee]

I don’t disagree.

I would submit, however, that the message/proposition of life after death/eternal progression, and the means/miracle to make it so, are not “nonsense”.

It may be the most important message in the world.

But it is a matter of faith at the end of the day.

Regards,
MG

You don't need Jesus or christianity for that idea anyway, MG. And it turns out, after some depth of inspection there is little hope found in that message. Faith is simply belief, MG. Don't hide your guesswork behind a mysterious notion that means very little. You think it? you feel it? great. I think you're just belieivng nonsense.

It's the Mormon way, they always HAVE to punt to faith since the evidence for their interpretation of Jesus just isn't there, and what they say they have doesn't have the coherence they wish it did. But then again, Jesus has never been coherent either. It's what makes him so fascinating to us all.

[Philo Sofee]

It's probably been three weeks ago now and I've read too many other things to remember exactly. As I read it, I recall how vividly different it was from the gospel accounts. It felt more alive, if you will, to me. But< i'd have to get back to it when I get a chance to provide any details as per my reaction. Also I just go MacDonald's newest work. I'm eager to get into it. He details all or most of his mimesis examples. I want to read more of the source materials there--hope to get my hands on them. I'll see what I can provide though in the coming days.

That's cool. Stylistically, it is quite different from the gospels. Where this discussion gets hung up, in my opinion, is in the implicit demand people like Carrier make that ancient texts conform to modern ideas about fact and truth. Such ideas come out of certain developments in intellectual history that really do not pertain to ancient literature. Everything written in the ancient world must be judged according to the thought world of its time and culture, as best we can understand them.

Tiberius lived on Capri, and many Romans resented his absence because the emperor was expected to be present in the city for Romans. His absence resulted in chaos in the Senate and his unavailability to the People of the city at entertainments, etc. His neglect was attributed to his excessive desire for personal pleasures, which are blown up to mythological proportions. Petronius' Satyricon gives us a sense of where this kind of satirical fantasy comes from. It is a fictional novel, but the spirit of it is not unlike the grotesque scenes in Suetonius' account of Tiberius on Capri. If the rumors about Tiberius were made up or fashioned to conform to models local to the Bay of Naples or Campania, it may be that they were not even real rumors, or the rumors themselves were consciously formed to meet certain tastes and expectations. For these reasons, although it is true that Tiberius lived on Capri for much of the final decade of his life, we cannot be certain that the outlandish descriptions of his actions are true.

Edward Champlin has written about the twisting of folklore about the wise king of the island to make Tiberius look bad in Suetonius' account. Champlin has thus shown why it is we have to be extremely careful when we read Suetonius on this topic. You may want to believe a story was factual--that Tiberius really did have a fisherman's face rubbed raw because he stepped onto a part of Capri he was forbidden to visit--but then the knowledge that the presentation of a fish to the tyrant or king was a commonplace raises important questions about the actual facts. So the line between fact and fiction is not exactly where one might expect. Tiberius lived, but how people felt about his memory profoundly shaped his historical image.

I read this in Suetonius "The Twelve Caesars" and Tiberius was a real piece of work wasn't he?!? Er, that is, if the stories are true. Fascinating, but it does make one glad to be alive today in our civilization!
Edited to add: https://historum.com/t/tiberius-on-capr ... re.189891/
this discussion of this entire issue of Suetonius on Tiberius at Capri is UTTERLY FASCINATING READING! Thanks, as always Kish, for the fascinating hints!

[yellowstone123]

The Tiberius I’m thinking about lived about 200 years before Christ. He also wanted to some how get the rich to help the poor which included giving up some land. It could be a different Tiberius.

[Philo Sofee]

The Tiberius I’m thinking about lived about 200 years before Christ. He also wanted to some how get the rich to help the poor which included giving up some land. It could be a different Tiberius.

Oh, O.K., the Tiberius Kish is talking about is definitely the one who went to Capri. I read it this morning in Suetonius then found a fantastically interesting discussion of it all here: https://historum.com/t/tiberius-on-capr ... re.189891/ The stories of him there are quite lurid, and sensationalized, and realistically mythologized, but Kish's point that adding those kinds of details have nothing to do with the actual existence of the person are irrelevant. Kish appears to me to be entirely correct in that assessment. Tiberius was real. Applying the same to stories of Jesus make perfect sense to me as Kish has been noting.

[yellowstone123]

Thank you for pointing that out.

[Bret Ripley]

The Tiberius I’m thinking about lived about 200 years before Christ. He also wanted to some how get the rich to help the poor which included giving up some land. It could be a different Tiberius.

I was curious about this, so I did a little looking. I believe you may be thinking of Tiberius Gracchus: "Tiberius Gracchus passed legislation which established a commission to survey Roman public land, reassert state claims to it, and redistribute it to poor rural farmers. These reforms were a reaction to a perceived decline in Italy's rural population."

[Kishkumen]

Apollonius of Tyana’s name stems from where he was born — Tyana in Cappadocia. That is in modern-day Turkey. It is said that he also traveled to Greece and Syria. Jesus Christ traveled the Middle East. There are also claims that Christ went to India during the years of his life for which the Bible does not account. Therefore, there is a chance that the two crossed paths and competed with one another for followers.

The article starts with two pictures one of Jesus and the other Apollonius. It is surprising how much they resemble each other. Though I might note that the style of painting appears to be a thousand years after Jesus and Apollonius lived. It is possible they are not accurate images.

The Apollonius example is a fruitful choice. To it I would add Alexander of Abonuteichos. Lucian wrote about Alexander before Philostratus wrote his Apollonius, although Apollonius was alive in the late first century and early second century BC. I think the earliest biography of Apollonius, which Philostratus relied upon, was an early second century biography. In other words, the stories of Apollonius and Alexander were written in the era when Christianity was really taking shape. The "heretics" (to use the term loosely) of the Alexander story are Epicureans and Christians. Both groups pose a threat to traditional Hellenic "paganism," Epicureans because they deny the involvement of the divine in our world, and Christians because they identify the traditional gods as evil demons.

The latter teaching is a particular sore point to me. What does it say about a religion that it literally demonizes the traditional practices and beliefs of the society in which it grows up? Surely here is a monstrous form of intolerance.

At any rate, both Apollonius and Alexander are examples of the high imperial holy man, characters in the tradition of Epimenides and Pythagoras, whom Jesus eventually supersedes. I don't think that there is a lot of space between them and Jesus, including the way in which they are talked about. What makes Jesus distinctive is that he comes out of a predominantly (not exclusively) Jewish environment, and so he cannot interact extensively with the gods and structures of Hellenism. And yet he still manages to come very close, which is not surprising given the extent to which the Palestine of his era was very well Hellenized.

[huckelberry]

The article starts with two pictures one of Jesus and the other Apollonius. It is surprising how much they resemble each other. Though I might note that the style of painting appears to be a thousand years after Jesus and Apollonius lived. It is possible they are not accurate images.

The Apollonius example is a fruitful choice. To it I would add Alexander of Abonuteichos. Lucian wrote about Alexander before Philostratus wrote his Apollonius, although Apollonius was alive in the late first century and early second century BC. I think the earliest biography of Apollonius, which Philostratus relied upon, was an early second century biography. In other words, the stories of Apollonius and Alexander were written in the era when Christianity was really taking shape. The "heretics" (to use the term loosely) of the Alexander story are Epicureans and Christians. Both groups pose a threat to traditional Hellenic "paganism," Epicureans because they deny the involvement of the divine in our world, and Christians because they identify the traditional gods as evil demons.

The latter teaching is a particular sore point to me. What does it say about a religion that it literally demonizes the traditional practices and beliefs of the society in which it grows up? Surely here is a monstrous form of intolerance.

At any rate, both Apollonius and Alexander are examples of the high imperial holy man, characters in the tradition of Epimenides and Pythagoras, whom Jesus eventually supersedes. I don't think that there is a lot of space between them and Jesus, including the way in which they are talked about. What makes Jesus distinctive is that he comes out of a predominantly (not exclusively) Jewish environment, and so he cannot interact extensively with the gods and structures of Hellenism. And yet he still manages to come very close, which is not surprising given the extent to which the Palestine of his era was very well Hellenized.

Kishkumen, I certainly respect your complaint.I was not familiar with this Alexander so I read a little in Wikipedia insuring I am not an expert. I did find myself thinking perhaps Ron DeSantis could try the snake with human head trick so he could access the Trumpian charisma he lacks. I am skeptical about demons but I think there are narcissistic human manipulations which function like what people fear of demons.

It is tragic, tragic to the tune of countless deaths, that Christians chowed down on that theory of demons running the pagan religions. I see no necessity for such a view taking a hold in terms of fundamental christian principals but take a hold it certainly did. Demonizing the ruling principals in the society one grows up in is reminiscent of at least a couple of historical revolutionary events. Communist revolution and French revolution come to mind.It would be possible that Christianity grew amongst people unhappy with the social order and who took a dark view of authorities who used the old gods as justification for their power. There could be a social mechanism taking place like Ajax seeing Trump as a middle finger to all those authoritarian leftists(who I gather are the reason for American unhappiness these days) The out group sees as demon like the people they fear are causing their unhappiness. Trump takes advantage of the social force and uses , bit like Roman Emperors taking over the Christian religion and claiming the demons must be some other guys. The resentment people being socially, monetarily squeezed have is real and unstable.

I have some impression that fear of or concern for demons influencing the world was a growing Hellenistic concern . It was part of the culture Christianity absorbed and changed(repurposed?) Of course you have a better view as to the accuracy or inaccuracy of this impression.

[Moksha]

BYP mentioned the posters on this thread so many times in his podcast and he is only up to page six...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luNgyV9OO6Q