How late might the gospels be?

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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neilgodfrey
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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archibald
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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neilgodfrey wrote: Tue Jan 16, 2018 3:39 pm I think there's a big difference between expecting an event in one's lifetime on the one hand (Paul) and expecting it to happen within a very few months or a year or two at the most on the other hand (the common/literalist interpretation of Mark 13).
Maybe, but that's not got anything much to do with anything I've been saying. Quite the opposite.

Besides, if you make duff woo predictions, but you don't want to get caught out straight away, you might want to give yourself a bit of time to manoevure. :)
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neilgodfrey
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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archibald
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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neilgodfrey wrote: Tue Jan 16, 2018 3:47 pm Mostly I thought you were just having a go at me for expressing another perspective.
You're right. I apologise, and I take back the calling you being silly (twice I think) and dogmatic (twice I think), presumptious (just the once) and that you were only tossing out flippant gotchas.
hakeem
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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Charles Wilson wrote: Tue Jan 16, 2018 10:30 am

hakeem --

With all due respect to you, I believe you are making major Category Errors in your analysis. Your statement concerning "...stories of Jesus..." is false on the face of it to many believers. This implies that, in order to find Truth Value in what you state, a "deeper" analysis is required. Yet, that is not what your assert: "Anyone who has read gMark...". That is false as well. I will even meet you halfway and agree that, as statements of fact, (many) "stories of Jesus" are implausible. That, however, reduces to the ideas of "I like chocolate but don't like vanilla". This is countered by, "No, the more correct statement should be that one should like vanilla and not chocolate...".

This gets us nowhere.
Well, with all due respect to you your statement is false. The stories about Jesus in gMark are nothing like the choice between chocolate and vanilla

It is a fact that the claims about Jesus in gMark are non-historical.

The claim that there was a voice from heaven when Jesus was baptized must be non-historical .
The claim that Jesus was tempted by Satan in a wilderness must be non-historical.
The claims that Jesus instantly healed people by speaking to them must be non-historical.
The claim that Jesus walked on the sea must be non-historical.
The claim that Jesus fed thousands of people with a few bread and fish must be non-historical.
The claim that Jesus instantly transfigured must be non-historical.
The claim that Jesus raised people from the dead must be non-historical.
The claim that Jesus was crucified even though the witnesses gave false evidence must be non-historical.
The claim that Jesus resurrected after he was dead for days must be non-historical.

The Jesus story in gMark is nothing but manufactured non-historical events.


The claim that Jesus said things will happen before they die is really no different to the story that Jesus claimed a fig tree would die because it had no fruits.
Charles Wilson wrote: Tue Jan 16, 2018 10:30 am In order to find meaning in this, another step needs to be taken (to get all Hegelian about it...). If this is "simply" a record of someone recording the actions of a "Jesus" character, not much more can be said. "Ahhh, but Jesus is saying something much deeper here!" What? Once you open the stories up for analysis, you begin to find more and more plausibility - HISTORICAL plausibility, by way of Symbolic Assignment.

Jesus actually said what?? When did the author of gMark live?? When was gMark actually written? All you have done is presumed some deeper meaning to non-historical events by an unknown author.

Charles Wilson wrote: Tue Jan 16, 2018 10:30 amThere is something else going on here, hakeem. Yes, the "Jesus" stories are implausible. That, however, is a request for an examination of those stories, not a dismissal
What you say does not make much sense. I have examined the Jesus stories in gMark and have found them to be non-historical which means that the events never ever happened .

In effect, gMark must be post 70 CE propaganda to explain the fall of the Jewish Temple.
pavurcn
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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Two points:

1. Hakeem seems to rule out the possibility of the miraculous. That is not scientifically tenable. We cannot say that we know all the "laws of nature." How can one possibly know that the miraculous or extraordinary cannot occur? Life out of dead matter is a miracle; consciousness is a miracle.

And there is the existence of the universe itself.
This primordial singularity is itself sometimes called "the Big Bang", but the term can also refer to a more generic early hot, dense phase of the universe. In either case, "the Big Bang" as an event is also colloquially referred to as the "birth" of our universe since it represents the point in history where the universe can be verified to have entered into a regime where the laws of physics as we understand them (specifically general relativity and the standard model of particle physics) work.
People attest to "miraculous" cures and events all the time. (See, for example, Eben Alexander III. It is not scientific to disregard experience even if the event is beyond our current capacity for explanation. Science constantly points us towards the limitations of our knowledge and towards mystery.

2. A better thread-topic is "How early might the gospels be?" We should not fall into the fallacy of dating a text by the last item that might have been inserted into it. Scholars think the kernel of Mark is the passion account and may go back at least to the 40's. (Why not even earlier? The events would have been remembered and ritually celebrated in the 30's I would assume.) Like the Didache, gMark may have aggregated other sections over time and it may not be susceptible to a simplistic singular dating. Even some of those ("later") sections may have included very early material that had been remembered. If Jesus was the brilliant religious thinker and sermonizer and prophetic figure (and even more) that he could have been, it is much more likely to believe that people remembered carefully what he said and did. There was concern for authenticity and witness from very early on. People were not just entertaining themselves with myths. I assume that many were looking for the truth. What else would justify a whole new "Way"?
archibald
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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pavurcn wrote: Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:50 am A better thread-topic is "How early might the gospels be?" We should not fall into the fallacy of dating a text by the last item that might have been inserted into it. Scholars think the kernel of Mark is the passion account and may go back at least to the 40's. (Why not even earlier? The events would have been remembered and ritually celebrated in the 30's I would assume.) Like the Didache, gMark may have aggregated other sections over time and it may not be susceptible to a simplistic singular dating. Even some of those ("later") sections may have included very early material that had been remembered. If Jesus was the brilliant religious thinker and sermonizer and prophetic figure (and even more) that he could have been, it is much more likely to believe that people remembered carefully what he said and did. There was concern for authenticity and witness from very early on. People were not just entertaining themselves with myths. I assume that many were looking for the truth. What else would justify a whole new "Way"?
Hi.

You may be in the wrong place to be taking such a line, no matter how appealing it is (and it surely is). Unfortunately, this is the internet. On the internet, we mostly want something alternative, or edgy. Even a Jesus who is as you believe, but who was gay, or at a pinch, quite naughty, might do the trick. Even just married or not a virgin maybe.
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archibald
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

Post by archibald »

pavurcn wrote: Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:50 am People attest to "miraculous" cures and events all the time. (See, for example, Eben Alexander III. It is not scientific to disregard experience even if the event is beyond our current capacity for explanation. Science constantly points us towards the limitations of our knowledge and towards mystery.
In all seriousness, the reports wouldn't even have to have been accurate regarding the outcomes. What is and was common is/was people claiming to do miracles, particularly faith healing, and being believed. I grew up in Rural 1960's Ireland. There was a reputation-by-word-of-mouth faith-healer around nearly every bend in the road and no shortage of pilgrims (aka customers). An actual 1st C CE Judean 'faith-healer-preacher' therefore isn't really a problem in principle, albeit making such healing claims might have been considered a dodgy practice by some mainstream Jews.

As for raising people from the dead, I give you:

Image

No it's not a wedding stag party wearing their morning-after-the-night-before t-shirts. It's people who claim to be able to raise the dead. Americans, obviously (who else?)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film ... -dead.html
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Jax
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Re: How late might the gospels be?

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archibald wrote: Wed Jan 17, 2018 8:15 am
pavurcn wrote: Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:50 am A better thread-topic is "How early might the gospels be?" We should not fall into the fallacy of dating a text by the last item that might have been inserted into it. Scholars think the kernel of Mark is the passion account and may go back at least to the 40's. (Why not even earlier? The events would have been remembered and ritually celebrated in the 30's I would assume.) Like the Didache, gMark may have aggregated other sections over time and it may not be susceptible to a simplistic singular dating. Even some of those ("later") sections may have included very early material that had been remembered. If Jesus was the brilliant religious thinker and sermonizer and prophetic figure (and even more) that he could have been, it is much more likely to believe that people remembered carefully what he said and did. There was concern for authenticity and witness from very early on. People were not just entertaining themselves with myths. I assume that many were looking for the truth. What else would justify a whole new "Way"?
Hi.

You may be in the wrong place to be taking such a line, no matter how appealing it is (and it surely is). Unfortunately, this is the internet. On the internet, we mostly want something alternative, or edgy. Even a Jesus who is as you believe, but who was gay, or at a pinch, quite naughty, might do the trick. Even just married or not a virgin maybe.
Wait! Jesus wasn't gay? :wtf:

OK Mr. Wizard, then why was he snuggling with the disciple that he loved in 'John'? And the naked youth? And the fact that Jesus is "around 30" and apparently not married?

;)
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