In an attempt to put all of this behind me, I posted a message up for fans of my blog to not expect me to respond to John’s two additional sections on Jesus in his blog. I made it clear that John wished me to stop talking to him and leave him alone, and in a manner of respect I said I would, which included responses to additional material I promised I would get out to readers. But as if going against his own request, John came onto my blog and threw some pretty harsh accusations at me. John has accused me of acting like a Christian because I am “so sure” of being right. John then suggested that I had mischaracterized him and his reasons (here on my blog), which has forced my hand. In order to stall any more inescusable libel directed against me, I have decided to show my readers the conversation in which John claims I have mischaracterized his reasons (check comments). You, the reader, can decide the veracity of his claims.
My initial email:
John (& Richard),
To start, I want you to know John that I only contacted Richard to get an additional perspective. It was not my intention to bring him into our conversation (if I had an ulterior motive, it was only to bring his attention to a comment of yours, perhaps said in anger, where you suggested that mythicists were crackpots or something to that effect after listing Richard–a mythicist–as a friend). His comments were unbiased and worked as a means to help me understand some of your arguments because I don’t think you were making them clear initially. (Richard had equally exposed my bias in our conversation which forced me to reevaluate how I was going to respond; for that I am thankful)
I will leave your comments in red.
I was presuming the first step, that the source is trustworthy when merely claiming there was a charismatic doomsday prophet who was crucified by the Romans. And sources are neither compleltey trustworthy or completely non-trustworthy. We cannot throw the baby out with the bathwater. We must do the hard work of finding out what we can trust and what we can’t.
I do not feel you have adequately made the case (nor has any historical Jesus scholar) that it is acceptable to assume there was a charismatic doomsday prophet who was crucified by the Romans. You are welcome to believe that–but that does not make it a trustworthy claim. In antiquity, it was common for scholars like Apollonius of Rhodes to debate with other scholars over the historical Achilles; the Trojan War was even dateable. Would it be fair to say their claims concerning a historical Achilles were trustworthy? What about a historical Homer? More on this below.I don’t think I’m making a mistake here, since I agree with Richard. I was presuming that the work in question was a non-fictional one. And there are elements in the Gospels and the NT itself that indicate they are not indending their works to be complete fiction. One strong piece of textual evidence is the eschatological predictions in the NT itself, which were an embarrassment to the early Christians and were watered down and/or explained away as time went on, from Paul to Mark to Matthew to Luke to John to Revelation to II Peter. Therefore I conclude these writings are textual evidence. Once established as textual evidence then the burden of proof shifts to the person who denies this evidence. But I don’t disagree with this first step.
I will let Richard deal with the Argument from Embarrassment as he is currently working extensively on this issue (and even addressed it at Amherst in a paper which I unfortunately could not attend to listen to). However, just because a Christian in the second century was embarrassed by origin tradition of the first century does not imply–at all–that the escatological predictions in Mark are authentic. Further, our earliest source of Eschatological predictions come from Paul who never once suggests that Jesus will “come again” – simply that he will, eventually, come. Paul had no inclination, it seems, of an original coming.Just because the Gospels contain failed eschatological promises does not mean that the Gospels represent anything more than complete fiction. In Lucian’s True Stories, he makes the claim “for I will say one thing that is true…that I am a liar…My readers must not believe a word I say.” But as G.W. Bowerstock points out in his Fiction as History:Nero to Julian (1997) even that is a lie. Lucian does make historical claims in his True Stories that reflect locations, travel, dress, etc… But these historical truths (as the Gospel has some, such as the existence of Pilate and Jerusalem, for example) do not imply that authorial intent was to write anything but fiction.Additionally, escatological promises have been made since Isaiah 53 and probably before. The whole of the passion, crucifixion, and resurrection have roots in Isaiah 53, which I have written extensively on (and linked to you almost three times now) here in response to James McGrath’s argument of the same calibre while also abusing (in some form) the Argument from Embarrassment.
I have written extensively on this issue precisely because I was tired of repeating myself on it. I feel there is significabt reasons for Jewish authors of antiquity to write fictional stories (Just look at all the Pseudepigrapha and some of the Dead Sea Scrolls) concerning their Jesus Christ (eponymously named…”Anointed Savior”). And Mark had copies of Paul’s letters (or was at least strongly influenced by the same theology) enough where he created an origin story based off Paul’s vision-accounts including Jesus being crucified by “the powers” (archons) of the ages–which Paul speaks of elsewhere as heavenly bodies (Paul discusses the Archon’s elsewhere, although he also uses another term (stoicheia) in some places. See: Gal. 4:3, “elemental spirits of the cosmos” (stoicheia tou kosmou), 4:8-9, “However at that time, not knowing God, you were slaves to gods who by nature are not gods. But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, why do you turn back again to the weak and miserable elemental spirits, to which you desire to be slaves all over again?” (Alla tote men ouk eidotes theon edouleusate tois phusei mê ousi theois: nun de gnontes theon, mallon de gnôsthentes hupo theou, pôs epistrephete palin epi ta asthenê kai ptôcha stoicheia, hois palin anôthen douleusai thelete) and Col. 2:8, “Be careful that you don’t let anyone rob you through his philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the elemental spirits of the cosmos, and not after Christ.” (Blepete mê tis humas estai ho sulagôgôn dia tês philosophias kai kenês apatês kata tên paradosin tôn anthrôpôn, kata ta stoicheia tou kosmou kai ou kata Christon); also Rom. 8:38, “For I am persuaded, that neither…angels, nor Archons…nor powers…” (pepeismai gar hot…oute angeloi oute archai…oute dunameis) and 1 Corinthians 15:24, “Then the end comes, when he will deliver up the Kingdom to God, even the Father; when he will have abolished all rule and all authority and power.” (hotan paradidôi tên basileian tôi theôi kai patri, hotan katargêsêi pasan archên kai pasan exousian kai dunamin,). Additional first century evidence: Ephesians 2:2, “in which you once walked according to the course of the cosmos, according to the Archon of the powers of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience;” (en hais pote periepatêsate kata ton aiôna tou kosmou toutou, kata ton archonta tês exousias tou aeros, tou pneumatos tou nun energountos) See full article here: http://tomverenna.wordpress.com/2008/10/16/intertextuality-between-paul-and-the-hebrew-bible/).
It is interesting to note that your “trustworthy claim” (i.e. that there was a charismatic prophet named Jesus who was crucified by the Romans) is at every turn refuted by our earliest, most credible Christian source: Paul.
I make no such error at all. I ONLY talk in terms of probability. I was talking about textual evidence. If someone denies the textual evidence then what is left to establish that someone existed in the historical past?
Archaeological evidence, voids that are left in our historical timeline (as best we can put together), other nonbias attestation that is clear was not redacted (or, as Kurt Noll will put it in an up and coming SBL article…varying memes did not overtake earlier, existing ones at such a quick rate), to name a few. Although the very fact alone exists that I can make a compelling and persuasive case concerning the origins of Christianity without a need for a historical Jesus isn’t evidence for ahistoricity, it does suggest (by using the same data you do) to some degree the level of complete irrelevancy such a historical figure would have really had if such a figure existed. This, combined with hundreds of other collaborative interpretations lead to a lot more problems with historicity than ahistoricity. Try to take away Alexander the Great from history and your timeline just does not make any consecutive sense. Take out a historical Jesus and your timeline of Christian origins can still happen even when looking only at the available data we do have. Just because I do not count the Gospels asIf we have to depend on coins or busts then only a very tiny number of people could be shown to exist in the past because only a tiny number of people ever had coins or busts made of them.
I don’t think this is a fair statement. There is more to history than coins or busts, clearly. And at times (and I make this distinction for a reason) the textual evidence is helpful (often textual evidence should be taken with a pillar of salt). In this particular instance, the textual evidence can be very useful in supporting my interpretation of it. You seem to be implying that the textual evidence can only support your interpretation and that if I accept ahistoricity the textual evidence is useless. I disagree. The textual evidence is very important, not only in determining genre (I feel, as Michael Vines rightly points out in his The Problems of Markan Genre, that the Gospel of Mark–our earliest Gospel that we know of–was written intentionally as edifying Jewish fiction) but in determining the manner in which the Gospel authors employed their uniqueness to a common trope. (See my article here concerning this issue) This argument has been fleshed out in my blog to some degree, but will be made more completely in upcoming articles for collections of essays and for my monograph. I’m certain Richard’s book will deal with these issues more primarily being as his monograph will be allocated entirely to arguments against historicity. My monograph will deal primarily with Gospel exegesis (although another collection of essays I am working on with Bob Price will focus on Christian origins without a historical Jesus).
I hope these suffice as answers for now. I linked to additional material because I have come down with something recently (some bug or virus that has been passed around between my girlfriend and I for a week or two now despite our best efforts to get rid of it and as a consequence I have not been able to write much). If you or Richard need me to elaborate on an issue raised here let me know.
Warm regards,
Tom
Here is John Loftus’ reply:
I never called Richard a crackpot.I’m out of here.You have an agenda, an axe to grind. After reading that first sentence I haven’t bothered to read the rest of what you said.John
My reply to John:
John,
Do you read things all the way through? Where did I say you called Richard a crackpot? I said you called mythicists crackpots or something to that effect – and I said I contacted Richard as he is a mythicist. My exact sentence was: “(if I had an ulterior motive, it was only to bring his attention to a comment of yours, perhaps said in anger, where you suggested that mythicists were crackpots or something to that effect after listing Richard–a mythicist–as a friend)” (emphasis mine) and it wasn’t my first sentence, it was my second. Please do me the courtesy of reading everything I say and stop skimming.
I’m forwarding your comments below and mine above to Richard so he can get a gyst of where my frustration is with you and our current conversation – we cannot be productive in this dialogue if you insist on being stubborn and not reading my replies fully. If you wish to be intellectually lazy, just say so. Rather you be lazy than dealing with slander (by suggesting I have an agenda when clearly I do not).
Regards,
Tom
John’s reply:
I will no longer dialogue with you, Tom. Do not email me again.I’m done.John
As you can see for yourself, John not only did not read what I wrote, but he apparently forgot what it was that he said. Talk about being close-minded and having an axe to grind! He also likened me to a Holocaust Denier here (and he was exposed here for doing the same thing to others) which is not only insulting but ignorant. If John wants to apologize for his actions I will accept his apology and remove this post. Otherwise, he asked for it.
Posted by Tom Verenna 
Posted by Tom Verenna 
Posted by Tom Verenna 
