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by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 7:52 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

The problem is that almost any ancient text treated sufficiently critically will become ambiguous/undecipherable. Just a postscript for the record, I argue very much against postmodernist views that reduce texts to endless ambiguities etc. I reject those methods and their assumptions. My methods ar...
by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 5:18 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

The problem is that almost any ancient text treated sufficiently critically will become ambiguous/undecipherable. Just a postscript for the record, I argue very much against postmodernist views that reduce texts to endless ambiguities etc. I reject those methods and their assumptions. My methods ar...
by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 5:13 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

to Neil, Tim is a real devil, isn't he. He takes a passage that makes perfectly clear sense to everyone and that fits entirely within the Acts-Eusebian paradigm and doesn't need to go beyond any nice simple, clear-cut assumptions that the text we read is a translation of just what Paul wrote back i...
by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 5:02 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

to Neil, I have called Bernard's method "proof-texted" historical reconstruction. It is not Bernard's method, of course, but the method that is generally used by much of the academy of biblical scholars who write about Christian origins. It does involve a real critical evaluation of the d...
by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 4:30 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

The problem is that almost any ancient text treated sufficiently critically will become ambiguous/undecipherable. No, not so at all. One would only achieve such an outcome if one were not being critical by nihilistic, stupid, hostile to what one was reading. That's not genuine criticism. Criticism ...
by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 12:28 am
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

I have called Bernard's method "proof-texted" historical reconstruction. It is not Bernard's method, of course, but the method that is generally used by much of the academy of biblical scholars who write about Christian origins. It does involve a real critical evaluation of the data -- no ...
by neilgodfrey
Thu Sep 07, 2017 12:09 am
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig
Replies: 473
Views: 231871

Re: The best case for Jesus's historicity: Mark Craig

Bernard, you especially -- you regularly ask us to read your long web pages. How about seriously doing the same with another's page? I read the whole page but I found it convenient to quote the conclusion & comment on it. Tim is trying to confuse the issue when it is very clear when James, the ...
by neilgodfrey
Wed Sep 06, 2017 2:52 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: Evidence that Marcion existed
Replies: 47
Views: 46246

Re: Evidence that Marcion existed

to Neil, It does not look you have anything specific to say about my argument, just accusing me of proof-texting because I go against your conclusion for a very late Acts. Cordially, Bernard Bernard, I have tried over and over to explain that I disagree with your methods of argument and assumptions...
by neilgodfrey
Wed Sep 06, 2017 2:48 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: Evidence that Marcion existed
Replies: 47
Views: 46246

Re: Evidence that Marcion existed

to Neil, all of this suggests that this document was composed in the mid- to late second century." If the author was aware of the gospels, how could he have written that: 16-17 Coptic version "... The wings of the clouds shall bear me in brightness, and the sign of the cross shall go befo...
by neilgodfrey
Wed Sep 06, 2017 2:45 pm
Forum: Christian Texts and History
Topic: Evidence that Marcion existed
Replies: 47
Views: 46246

Re: Evidence that Marcion existed

"[The creed's] close parallels with the creed found in the writings of Justin (.... lived in the middle of the second century) suggest that the Epistula Apostolorum may be indicative of the state of affairs at the time of Justin ... "The Epistula Apostolorum was composed sometime after th...