Question For Christians About Biblical Inerrancy

[Antlerman]

Yes, I saw that earlier but didn't jump on that. It's impossible to claim to know it is inherently true, since the means to which we arrive at that conclusion are limited and flawed. I could equally say they are inherently false, and it would have as much meaning. It's ironic that he acknowledges bias, then in the next breath claims the beliefs are without bias, viz., "inherently true".

 

BTW, I had to edit out my brief post from last night as it was lacking substance, merely expressing personal frustration at the end of the day. I would prefer to argue substance whenever possible. It now says what I think needs to be said.

What amazes me is that in my other thread, he accuses the Jesus Seminar people of being quacks without backing his claims up with any proof. So much for judge not lest ye be judged. Then in this thread he cites Paul Johnson as his evidence, but according to the Wikipedia article about him, Paul Johnson got his education from conservative Christians over an actual education simply because he preferred it over those ebil secularists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Johnson_(writer) Perhaps he should try reading Marcus Borg's book The Search for Jesus: Modern Scholarship Looks at the Gospels? Which is a book I need to read sometime but it's hard to find books by liberal Christians around here.

I hadn't caught that other thread since I'm only following a couple with my available time. That he calls them "quacks" again says something about how he uses ad hominem arguments versus substance in his disagreements with others' scholarship. Every time he does this, it lessens any credibility that he can offer to his position. It says, "I have to call them insulting names, because I have no actual criticism of any real specifics". Calling them "quacks", "their ilk", etc betrays a weak position.

 

Regarding the Jesus seminar, I've been reading a book from a Christian scholar that actually does offer a real, and well explained criticism of those involved with the Jesus seminar. You may wish to pick up The Christian Myth, by Burton Mack. The criticism has to do with their method, their approach. He essentially sees them falling into the same trap as conservative scholars in that they start with a certain conclusion at the outset, much like our friend Ray here with his list of 8 premises decided prior to study that all research must square up with (see my above post).

 

What essentially you wind up with in the Jesus Seminar becomes more pious meditations, reimagining Jesus as the founder of the Christian religion, while taking into account the mythmaking that occurred after the fact by his followers. They essentially see that Jesus was notable and powerful enough as to have inspired all this creation of myth surrounding his personage. The problem with this is that they start with the traditional view that narrative Gospel's account of Jesus calling disciples to follow him and was the initiator of a church in his name, is little more than starting with a later myth that became what we see as traditional Christianity. They don't go far enough and remove Jesus' personality from the equation to evaluate it. They start with him on some central role. Why? Is it because they feel beholden to have him there due to their Christianity themselves? Are they unwilling to put it all on the table? What they end up with is a failure in their search for the "historical Jesus", because they have him tied to the myth.

 

When it's all evaluated on equal footing with all other religions in the light of social theory, examining its texts and their compositions, a consistent picture emerges of a peoples engaged in very active social experiments, taking the teachings of a cynic-sage like figure, forming a community around those teachings in his name, adding their own rules of community to it attributing them to "Jesus" (a common practice in the day), later layers showing shifts in the community in response to its environment, spin off groups emerging in other areas with their own layers such as miracles, mystical Christ cults in the Asia Minor areas, gnostic variations, etc all in response to their social environments and needs. Mythmaking, until you have many groups in contention with each other in their need to map out territories for themselves.

 

Then emerges the layers citing authority by assigning names of "disciples" who "knew" Jesus to offer validation to their views, adding layers an apostolic myth into the stories, Thomas, Peter, Matthew, etc. Then you finally have the myth layer created of the Epic Bible, as telling a consistent story emerging in the 2nd Century, stealing the Hebrew Bible from the Jews, making its story about the emergence of Christianity, and compiling Christian writings which supported the "centrist" views of the Christianities in existence which was later called "orthodox" and all other Christianities "heretical".

 

From Jesus to Christ to the Church. Jesus didn't create this. Very active social experimentation and it's intellectual enterprise of supporting mythologies did. Imagining Jesus in ways to validate their experiments.

[freeday]

antlerman,

 

I heard a very interesting lecture on the Jesus Seminars once. If I remember right, only about 20% of what Jesus said was considered probably or certainly authentic. For example, in the lords prayer, "Our Father" are the only two words that were labeled Certain; the rest of the prayer was probable or maybe.

 

Now, if we take what "they" claim to be certain authentic phrases such as "love your enemies," "turn the other cheek," or "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's" into account; why would anyone want to execute Jesus. Why would the Romans or Pharisees, oppose him so much if this is all he was declaiming. There is no reason to execute someone unless they are effrontery and caustic to the society. How could these meek sayings lead to an execution that changed the religion of the world.

 

This is another reason to discount the Jesus Seminar as someone trying to sale their koolaid.

[Deva]

Why would the Romans or Pharisees, oppose him so much if this is all he was declaiming. There is no reason to execute someone unless they are effrontery and caustic to the society. How could these meek sayings lead to an execution that changed the religion of the world.

 

 

Can't help but interject here -- I have read (I think Crossan) said that the incident at the temple with the money changers in and of itself would have been enough for the Romans to have executed Jesus.

[Ouroboros]

I heard a very interesting lecture on the Jesus Seminars once. If I remember right, only about 20% of what Jesus said was considered probably or certainly authentic. For example, in the lords prayer, "Our Father" are the only two words that were labeled Certain; the rest of the prayer was probable or maybe.

Is your qualm with the Jesus seminars mostly about that it's a subjective and arbitrary view on the Bible? Is your problem with it that they voted and it's based on consensus rather than complete and unadulterated acceptance of all the text?

[Neon Genesis]

antlerman,

 

I heard a very interesting lecture on the Jesus Seminars once. If I remember right, only about 20% of what Jesus said was considered probably or certainly authentic. For example, in the lords prayer, "Our Father" are the only two words that were labeled Certain; the rest of the prayer was probable or maybe.

 

Now, if we take what "they" claim to be certain authentic phrases such as "love your enemies," "turn the other cheek," or "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's" into account; why would anyone want to execute Jesus. Why would the Romans or Pharisees, oppose him so much if this is all he was declaiming. There is no reason to execute someone unless they are effrontery and caustic to the society. How could these meek sayings lead to an execution that changed the religion of the world.

 

This is another reason to discount the Jesus Seminar as someone trying to sale their koolaid.

You're presuming that Jesus was actually crucified or that he even existed as a real historical figure. I don't know whether or not Jesus really existed, but all we can say for certain is that the bible most certainly is not historically accurate. Why is there no non-biblical evidence of Jesus' crucifixion or resurrection? What if Jesus' sacrifice was metaphorical and not a literal historical event? Wasn't it the ancient Gnostics who didn't believe Jesus was literally resurrected because they didn't believe Jesus had a physical body? You have yet to give us any reason why we should trust the bible's account of Jesus' life to be historically accurate and reliable. In 1 Corinathian 14:42-43 Paul says that the physical body is corrupt.

So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption. 43 It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power.

If the physical body is corrupt, then if Jesus' resurrection was a physical one, then is Paul saying Jesus was corrupt? You're not forming conclusions based on evidence. What you're doing is trying to make "evidence" fit your preconceived conclusions, when you really have no evidence of your claims. The truth is there's no reason to believe that Jesus' sacrifice literally happened anymore than there's reason to believe Greek mythology is real or to believe in Mithras. Also, I don't have the link on me, but I remember reading once a theory that Jesus and Barabbas were the same person but I don't know how reliable it is.

[mwc]

Also, I don't have the link on me, but I remember reading once a theory that Jesus and Barabbas were the same person but I don't know how reliable it is.

As I recall they aren't the same person but they have the same name (jesus) in some (one?) manuscript. This would then make "Jesus bar abbas" (son of the father) and "jesus christ" (the christ). The people then choose between an earthly jesus and a heavenly jesus. I suppose you could see it as choosing between two aspects of the same character so one jesus. Either way (I'd have to re-read it to give a really definitive answer).

 

mwc

[mwc]

Now, if we take what "they" claim to be certain authentic phrases such as "love your enemies," "turn the other cheek," or "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's" into account; why would anyone want to execute Jesus.

Let me take all this at face value. So then why would anyone do such a thing? Are you trying to say that this jesus was never executed? He died a ripe old age having never upset anyone?

 

Why would the Romans or Pharisees, oppose him so much if this is all he was declaiming. There is no reason to execute someone unless they are effrontery and caustic to the society. How could these meek sayings lead to an execution that changed the religion of the world.

This is something different entirely.

 

mwc

[freeday]

I heard a very interesting lecture on the Jesus Seminars once. If I remember right, only about 20% of what Jesus said was considered probably or certainly authentic. For example, in the lords prayer, "Our Father" are the only two words that were labeled Certain; the rest of the prayer was probable or maybe.

Is your qualm with the Jesus seminars mostly about that it's a subjective and arbitrary view on the Bible? Is your problem with it that they voted and it's based on consensus rather than complete and unadulterated acceptance of all the text?

 

It is nothing more than a couple of people deciding for themselves what they feel Jesus said. There is no way of proving or disproving what happened two millenniums ago.

[Ouroboros]

It is nothing more than a couple of people deciding for themselves what they feel Jesus said. There is no way of proving or disproving what happened two millenniums ago.

So what is the difference between the Jesus seminars and when they established the canon of the books in the Council of Nicaea? And why did Luther later remove some of the books from the canon? Would 300 years after Jesus in a time of low tech, no internet, no printing press, and very flaky reports and testimonies of people seeing miracles both left and right be any more accurate than 2,000 years later with people educated in text criticism?

 

Basically, are you telling me that educated text critics, with PhD, and years, and years of studies and even competence in Greek and Latin, have less clue than you?

 

If you don't agree with the scholars of the Jesus seminars, and the Jesus seminars don't agree with other scholars, and other scholars can't agree with you... then how can anyone trust the "proper" interpretation of anything in the Bible? You are discrediting the people who supposedly know what they're doing, and I'm supposed to believe there is one single, proper, absolute interpretation of the Bible made by other scholars--the ones you like, but not the ones you don't like.

 

How is YOUR view NOT subjective?

[freeday]

It is nothing more than a couple of people deciding for themselves what they feel Jesus said. There is no way of proving or disproving what happened two millenniums ago.

So what is the difference between the Jesus seminars and when they established the canon of the books in the Council of Nicaea? And why did Luther later remove some of the books from the canon? Would 300 years after Jesus in a time of low tech, no internet, no printing press, and very flaky reports and testimonies of people seeing miracles both left and right be any more accurate than 2,000 years later with people educated in text criticism?

 

Basically, are you telling me that educated text critics, with PhD, and years, and years of studies and even competence in Greek and Latin, have less clue than you?

 

If you don't agree with the scholars of the Jesus seminars, and the Jesus seminars don't agree with other scholars, and other scholars can't agree with you... then how can anyone trust the "proper" interpretation of anything in the Bible? You are discrediting the people who supposedly know what they're doing, and I'm supposed to believe there is one single, proper, absolute interpretation of the Bible made by other scholars--the ones you like, but not the ones you don't like.

 

How is YOUR view NOT subjective?

 

I knew when I responded you were going to bait me into this. This is not a matter of interpretation, but a question of what Jesus really said. How can they know what he said any better 1700 years later? I think the Canon is compiled out of the best congruent books available. The books chosen flow the best whereas the non-canonical books have contradictions and inconsistencies in them.

 

"Very flaky" Come on now, that is just hearsay. With no forms of mass production, they would have had great oral tradition that would lend itself to better accuracy.

[Ouroboros]

Freeday,

 

The books you have in your canon (your Bible) was voted in, by humans. You seriously consider educated theologians to be wrong, when they use their brains to figure things out, while casting votes somehow is the magic hand of God?

[Antlerman]

This is not a matter of interpretation, but a question of what Jesus really said. How can they know what he said any better 1700 years later? I think the Canon is compiled out of the best congruent books available. The books chosen flow the best whereas the non-canonical books have contradictions and inconsistencies in them.

 

"Very flaky" Come on now, that is just hearsay. With no forms of mass production, they would have had great oral tradition that would lend itself to better accuracy.

I wish I weren't so tired right now otherwise I would lay this bare for you. Perhaps as time permits sometime this weekend? Busy right now.

[freeday]

Freeday,

 

The books you have in your canon (your Bible) was voted in, by humans. You seriously consider educated theologians to be wrong, when they use their brains to figure things out, while casting votes somehow is the magic hand of God?

 

After reading most of them (non-canonical) and all canonical, wouldn't you agree with the decisions they made? This isn't rocket science, they fit together the best.

[freeday]

This is not a matter of interpretation, but a question of what Jesus really said. How can they know what he said any better 1700 years later? I think the Canon is compiled out of the best congruent books available. The books chosen flow the best whereas the non-canonical books have contradictions and inconsistencies in them.

 

"Very flaky" Come on now, that is just hearsay. With no forms of mass production, they would have had great oral tradition that would lend itself to better accuracy.

I wish I weren't so tired right now otherwise I would lay this bare for you. Perhaps as time permits sometime this weekend? Busy right now.

 

That is cool, hope your vacation went well. Nothing better than fried seafood, you know this is how we cook in the deep south.

[Ouroboros]

After reading most of them (non-canonical) and all canonical, wouldn't you agree with the decisions they made? This isn't rocket science, they fit together the best.

No, why? They don't fit together perfectly, and other Gospel were taken as "The Word of God" by other Christians in that time. Do you seriously think they ran around like, "Oh, I got this false Gospel, and I know it's wrong, but I believe it anyway," and then the council comes and say, "Look, we will remove those books we all know is wrong anyway." And would Christians actually have false Gospels at that time? So close in time? Really? In other words, the possibility of having false Gospel at that time is a fact, and something you agree to. Does that mean we can trust a bunch of old guys in cape and political interests to pick the "true" ones? Do you even know the names of the bishops who picked your holy book? And if it was God's hand that led them to pick the books, then why did Luther change it?

 

Besides, this is what the Jesus seminars did. They picked what fitted best too! But since it was done by the scholars you don't like, then it must be wrong. When done by the ones you like (and you don't even know the names of), then it's okay. Because Allah is great! (Sorry, I meant Jesus is great... I get all your religions mixed up, because you all sound so similar in your rhetoric defending your particular book and faith.)

 

(And I should change my statement, it wasn't the Council of Nicaean, but the Council of Carthage--I think, right? Anyway, it was humans who agreed on books, not a supernatural hand from God writing on the wall. Humans then, humans now.)

 

Here is a quote from Bart D Ehrman (another scholar and expert in the early history of Christianity)

Early Christianity was extremely diverse. It was not the unified monolith that modern people sometimes assume. This diversity was manifest in a wide range of writings, only some of which have come down to us in the New Testament. The New Testament canon was formed by proto-orthodox Christians who wanted to show that their views were grounded in the writings of Jesus' own apostles. Whether these writings actually represent the views of Jesus' own apostles, however, was in some instances debated for decades, even centuries.

[Ouroboros]

Also, I don't have the link on me, but I remember reading once a theory that Jesus and Barabbas were the same person but I don't know how reliable it is.

Interesting. I've heard the same thing, and I think I know where it comes from, but I can't remember the author. The basic symbolism is that Jesus (the spiritual) broke apart from Jesus (the flesh) to become the sacrifice... something like that.

[freeday]

After reading most of them (non-canonical) and all canonical, wouldn't you agree with the decisions they made? This isn't rocket science, they fit together the best.

No, why? They don't fit together perfectly, and other Gospel were taken as "The Word of God" by other Christians in that time. Do you seriously think they ran around like, "Oh, I got this false Gospel, and I know it's wrong, but I believe it anyway," and then the council comes and say, "Look, we will remove those books we all know is wrong anyway." And would Christians actually have false Gospels at that time? So close in time? Really? In other words, the possibility of having false Gospel at that time is a fact, and something you agree to. Does that mean we can trust a bunch of old guys in cape and political interests to pick the "true" ones? Do you even know the names of the bishops to picked your holy book? And if it was God's hand that led them to pick the books, then why did Luther change it?

 

Besides, this is what the Jesus seminars did. They picked what fitted best too! But done by the ones you don't like, then it must be wrong. When done by the ones you like (and you don't even know the names of), then it's okay. Because Allah is great! (Sorry, I meant Jesus is great... I get your religion mixed up, because you all sound so similar in your rhetoric defending your particular book and faith.)

 

I am not the one being pleonastic here, I only stated an opinion of why I felt you couldn't just pick out phrases he might or might not have said which led to the conclusion of why would Jesus be executed for just saying "Our Father." This just doesn't make sense to me. Is it you that is picking what fits you best? You sound just as convinced as the great doctorate degree persons, of which I bet you could name, that they are correct that Jesus could have only just said "Our Father."

 

Fun fact of the day, Allah was originally the Moon god, of which a person of political power made into the supreme god. It offends me when you compare the God of the universe to the moon god.

[Ouroboros]

I am not the one being pleonastic here, I only stated an opinion of why I felt you couldn't just pick out phrases he might or might not have said which led to the conclusion of why would Jesus be executed for just saying "Our Father." This just doesn't make sense to me. Is it you that is picking what fits you best? You sound just as convinced as the great doctorate degree persons, of which I bet you could name, that they are correct that Jesus could have only just said "Our Father."

Hell no. I don't trust them either. I don't trust the way the Bible was made into the Bible, nor do I trust Jesus seminars to get a "correct" book of what Jesus supposedly said. I see your point now. And right, who can know what Jesus really said or not. We're in agreement there.

 

Fun fact of the day, Allah was originally the Moon god, of which a person of political power made into the supreme god. It offends me when you compare the God of the universe to the moon god.

Get used to it. Jesus was the same name as Joshua, and Messiah (Christ) was used as an epithet for some kings in the OT. So what was so special about "JC"? A name is just a name. Besides, the Muslims would deny Allah to be the moon-God, just as much as you would deny and fight against the idea that Jesus was the Sun, and the apostles were the 12 zodiac signs, and the Gospel is really about paganism and astrology. So, they get offended when you make that reference about Allah, and you get offended when your God is compared to the zodiac and the Sun (or the moon), or whatever you do. The thing is, Christians and Muslims use the same tactics to prove their points.

 

And since you consider me to blabber too much, I will now shut up and let you be.

[freeday]

I am not the one being pleonastic here, I only stated an opinion of why I felt you couldn't just pick out phrases he might or might not have said which led to the conclusion of why would Jesus be executed for just saying "Our Father." This just doesn't make sense to me. Is it you that is picking what fits you best? You sound just as convinced as the great doctorate degree persons, of which I bet you could name, that they are correct that Jesus could have only just said "Our Father."

Hell no. I don't trust them either. I don't trust the way the Bible was made into the Bible, nor do I trust Jesus seminars to get a "correct" book of what Jesus supposedly said. I see your point now. And right, who can know what Jesus really said or not. We're in agreement there.

 

Fun fact of the day, Allah was originally the Moon god, of which a person of political power made into the supreme god. It offends me when you compare the God of the universe to the moon god.

Get used to it. Jesus was the same name as Joshua, and Messiah (Christ) was used as an epithet for some kings in the OT. So what was so special about "JC"? A name is just a name. Besides, the Muslims would deny Allah to be the moon-God, just as much as you would deny and fight against the idea that Jesus was the Sun, and the apostles were the 12 zodiac signs, and the Gospel is really about paganism and astrology. So, they get offended when you make that reference about Allah, and you get offended when your God is compared to the zodiac and the Sun (or the moon), or whatever you do. The thing is, Christians and Muslims use the same tactics to prove their points.

 

And since you consider me to blabber too much, I will now shut up and let you be.

 

I didn't say you were blabbering too much, just being redundant. I see your point of how you don't like the compilation of the bible; but how would you have preffered the canon to be compilated. I think they did the best job, with the best resources they had, that could be done.

 

In conclusion with the Jesus Seminars, I have no problem looking for evidence, good or bad, of Jesus' life through archeology; however, this was just picking out what he could have said. I don't feel this added any extra knowledge for us whatsoever.

[Antlerman]

antlerman,

 

I heard a very interesting lecture on the Jesus Seminars once. If I remember right, only about 20% of what Jesus said was considered probably or certainly authentic. For example, in the lords prayer, "Our Father" are the only two words that were labeled Certain; the rest of the prayer was probable or maybe.

 

Now, if we take what "they" claim to be certain authentic phrases such as "love your enemies," "turn the other cheek," or "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's" into account; why would anyone want to execute Jesus. Why would the Romans or Pharisees, oppose him so much if this is all he was declaiming. There is no reason to execute someone unless they are effrontery and caustic to the society. How could these meek sayings lead to an execution that changed the religion of the world.

 

This is another reason to discount the Jesus Seminar as someone trying to sale their koolaid.

Actually I'm not on vacation in the South. That was me referencing Ray saying he had been there, and saying I wish I could be. I'm busier with work right now because we're moving the company down 5 floors in the same building. Not quite what I'd call a vacation. However, since I'm up early and enjoying a nice Ethiopian dark roast coffee while listening to some Beethoven cello sonata's before the onslaught of the day....

 

Regarding the Jesus Seminar's votes, of about 500 sayings of Jesus: 13 were considered authentic; 77 that he could have possibly said it; and the rest that he was either unlikely to have said it or could not have said it. So yes, the total of maybes come in at just under 20 percent, with certain being much less. Now the problem with them was their criteria, as I touched on a bit above (Crossan's "triple attestation"). But don't fool yourself, the faults in their approach are no worse than the conservative scholar. So this should offer no consolation.

 

Regarding your criticism of his sayings not being enough to get him crucified, you are certainly correct. This is one of the faults of seminar I referenced earlier. They start with the narrative story as being historically factual without support, which of course is a premise that leads to skewed understanding. From Mack I referred to above, pg. 33,

"Sanders argues that, if it was not what Jesus said that mattered, it must have been something Jesus did. He finds it in the story of Jesus in the temple, the episode of provocation in the narrative of the crucifixion. Taking this narrative incident as historically factual,

a story others have shown to be a fiction required by the logic of a mythic martyrdom

, Sanders works out the reasons that all of the actors must have had for playing the roles they did in Jesus's crucifixion. Thus the "passion narrative" turns out to be historical."

 

So you can see what happens when you want a thing to be true? Starting with accepting that the story of the crucifixion was factual, creates a difficulty in reconciling the Jesus teachings with the martyrdom story both for those of the quest for the historical Jesus, and for the traditional picture of Christianity which accepts the narrative gospels as historical accounts. However, once you lay it on the table along side the ideals of the Greek martyr where it first appears in the Christ cults in regards to Jesus, the later narrative tale of Mark becomes a fiction supporting this genre seen in the earlier letters of Paul.

 

The whole passion narrative itself has difficulties, and the historical Jesus quest has been unable to set the traditional image far enough aside to look at it as entirely a product of early Christian mythmaking. It would seem that would be for no other reason than personal comfort. And that sort of transforms scholarship into something just under that - for both them and the conservative.

 

So take no comfort in finding fault with the Jesus seminar. To quote Mack again, pg 40,

 

"This means that we need to start over with the quest for Christian origins. And the place to start is with the observation that the New Testament texts are not only inadequate for a Jesus quest,

they are data for an entirely different phenomenon

. They are not the mistaken and embellished memories of the historical person, but the myths of origin imagined by early Christians seriously engaged in their social experiments. They are data for early Christian mythmaking. The questions appropriate to these texts should be about the many Christian groups and movements in evidence, their particular social circumstances and histories, and the various social reasons they had for imagining a teacher in so many different ways. To read these texts only in the interest of the quest to know the historical Jesus has been to misread them, to misuse them.

They simply do not contain the secrets of the historical Jesus for which scholars have been searching. Early Christians were not interested in the

historical

Jesus. They were interested in something else.

"

 

The same thing applies to the conservative for the same reasons. My coffee is finished and I'm off to work....

[Ouroboros]

I didn't say you were blabbering too much, just being redundant. I see your point of how you don't like the compilation of the bible; but how would you have preffered the canon to be compilated. I think they did the best job, with the best resources they had, that could be done.

What I'm saying is that the same apply to the Jesus seminars. They didn't know any better what Jesus said or didn't, or which Gospel was the true one or which one wasn't, or which part of the Gospels were truly the words of Jesus in year 300, or 400, or even 100. And the reason is that, why would there be 10, 20, or whatever, number of Gospels, if everyone truly knew all the way to 400 CE what Jesus actually did say? Think about it.

 

I will be redundant and say it again, but in a different way: If a group of politically interested bishops in year 390 knew what Jesus said, then they would have known what Jesus said year 150, and people would not have put their trust in several different and contradictory Gospels. Basically, the need to vote and the fact there were plenty of variations of what Jesus said, shows they didn't know what Jesus said.

 

So would anyone know better now than then? No, probably now, it would be guesswork. But did they know when they compiled the books? No, they didn't, they pretty much did the same thing with the same lack of knowledge back then. So the Bible, is a book that changes with times, just like it did back then, and if you're Christian today, you should allow it to do today.

 

 

In conclusion with the Jesus Seminars, I have no problem looking for evidence, good or bad, of Jesus' life through archeology; however, this was just picking out what he could have said. I don't feel this added any extra knowledge for us whatsoever.

Think about how you read the Bible. You perhaps read a verse where Jesus say something that doesn't make sense literally. Like "let the dead bury the dead," and you make an excuse that Jesus didn't mean that literally. Then you read another passage which you read literally, like "pray and it will be given to you." You are making distinctions to what and how Jesus said things, just like the scholars do. They pick and choose depending on their education, knowledge, and their studies in the text. But believe me, I'm not defending what the Jesus seminar did, but I don't think there is a difference between them, the construction of the canon, or how Christians in general handle their Bible all the time. It is personal opinions deciding the "truth."

[Antlerman]

Think about how you read the Bible. You perhaps read a verse where Jesus say something that doesn't make sense literally. Like "let the dead bury the dead," and you make an excuse that Jesus didn't mean that literally. Then you read another passage which you read literally, like "pray and it will be given to you." You are making distinctions to what and how Jesus said things, just like the scholars do. They pick and choose depending on their education, knowledge, and their studies in the text. But believe me, I'm not defending what the Jesus seminar did, but I don't think there is a difference between them, the construction of the canon, or how Christians in general handle their Bible all the time. It is personal opinions deciding the "truth."

To give some credit to the Jesus seminar, they do go further than the conservative in accepting and considering textual criticism, archeology, etc in weighing what may or may not have been likely to have been said. So it wasn't just blind faith or "cherry picking". It did have some criteria beyond just purely subjective interpretation. However, as I just cited above it itself ran into barriers it seemed unwilling to broach, and that of being beholden to the basic narrative account once you've stripped away the obvious elaborations of miracle traditions and whatnot. But ultimately it fails to offer a good working model on which to fit the data we have today. All this contrasted with the conservative who is essentially about defending the Protestant tradition, dug in even further back down the line of willingness to consider explanations that go outside traditional orthodoxy.

[Ouroboros]

To give some credit to the Jesus seminar, they do go further than the conservative in accepting and considering textual criticism, archeology, etc in weighing what may or may not have been likely to have been said. So it wasn't just blind faith or "cherry picking". It did have some criteria beyond just purely subjective interpretation. However, as I cited above it itself ran into barriers it seemed unwilling to broach, and that of being beholden to the basic narrative account once you've stripped away the obvious elaborations of miracle traditions and whatnot. But ultimately it fails to offer a good working model on which to fit the data we have today. All this contrasted with the conservative who is essentially about defending the Protestant tradition, dug in even further back down the line of willingness to consider explanations that go outside traditional orthodoxy.

Well, the criteria used is man-made as well. Just because someone set up a guideline for how to cherry-pick, it doesn't mean it's not another form of elaborate cherry-picking. The same with the canon, they had a guideline too. The question is rather, is the guideline correct? Who made the guideline? Since they decided to remove miracle stories from it, it's obvious they profess to an underlying idea that miracles are not part of the original story, etc. My critique is not against the Jesus seminar, or against the when they made the canon, but rather against the idea that one or the other is better than the other as a process, since they both pretty much are based on the same thing, human decisions and opinions. When it comes down to it, the Jesus seminars could be wrong, it could be that the real, historical, human Jesus said a whole bunch of stuff which wasn't recorded, and Q totally misrepresented all of it. It's like freeday said, we don't know, and my point is, neither did the bishops 300 CE. I think that the Jesus seminars is just an attempt to "modernize" the Bible and trying to fit it into modern culture. By removing the offending or questionable parts, its made more palatable to the public, especially the 'non-magical-Jesus' group (what we call the liberal Christians here). Maybe a better word is secular Christians? I don't know if that made sense or not, FWIW.

[Neon Genesis]

My critique is not against the Jesus seminar, or against the when they made the canon, but rather against the idea that one or the other is better than the other as a process, since they both pretty much are based on the same thing, human decisions and opinions. When it comes down to it, the Jesus seminars could be wrong, it could be that the real, historical, human Jesus said a whole bunch of stuff which wasn't recorded, and Q totally misrepresented all of it. It's like freeday said, we don't know, and my point is, neither did the bishops 300 CE. I think that the Jesus seminars is just an attempt to "modernize" the Bible and trying to fit it into modern culture. By removing the offending or questionable parts, its made more palatable to the public, especially the 'non-magical-Jesus' group (what we call the liberal Christians here). Maybe a better word is secular Christians? I don't know if that made sense or not, FWIW.

This is one of my criticisms too. That I think Christians on both sides of the debate whether liberal or conservative are starting with presumptions about the nature of Jesus and the NT when neither side has any non-biblical evidence Jesus existed or what his life was like, though I think the liberals are handling it more rationally than the fundies are. This is not to say Jesus could have never existed but I still do find it suspicious after all this time we still don't have evidence for Jesus's existence or non-biblical evidence of what his life was. I think if there's one thing the Jesus Seminar does prove is that contrary to the claims of fundies, there's no such thing as a one true way in Christianity and I think it's foolish for xtians to proclaim there's a one true way to interpret the bible or a one true way to be a Christian until more evidence is found as to what the life of Jesus was really like.

[Antlerman]

To give some credit to the Jesus seminar, they do go further than the conservative in accepting and considering textual criticism, archeology, etc in weighing what may or may not have been likely to have been said. So it wasn't just blind faith or "cherry picking". It did have some criteria beyond just purely subjective interpretation. However, as I cited above it itself ran into barriers it seemed unwilling to broach, and that of being beholden to the basic narrative account once you've stripped away the obvious elaborations of miracle traditions and whatnot. But ultimately it fails to offer a good working model on which to fit the data we have today. All this contrasted with the conservative who is essentially about defending the Protestant tradition, dug in even further back down the line of willingness to consider explanations that go outside traditional orthodoxy.

Well, the criteria used is man-made as well. Just because someone set up a guideline for how to cherry-pick, it doesn't mean it's not another form of elaborate cherry-picking. The same with the canon, they had a guideline too. The question is rather, is the guideline correct? Who made the guideline? Since they decided to remove miracle stories from it, it's obvious they profess to an underlying idea that miracles are not part of the original story, etc. My critique is not against the Jesus seminar, or against the when they made the canon, but rather against the idea that one or the other is better than the other as a process, since they both pretty much are based on the same thing, human decisions and opinions. When it comes down to it, the Jesus seminars could be wrong, it could be that the real, historical, human Jesus said a whole bunch of stuff which wasn't recorded, and Q totally misrepresented all of it. It's like freeday said, we don't know, and my point is, neither did the bishops 300 CE. I think that the Jesus seminars is just an attempt to "modernize" the Bible and trying to fit it into modern culture. By removing the offending or questionable parts, its made more palatable to the public, especially the 'non-magical-Jesus' group (what we call the liberal Christians here). Maybe a better word is secular Christians? I don't know if that made sense or not, FWIW.

In part I agree with this, as I have said. But again, the liberal scholarship that chooses to de-mythologize it is not doing so entirely on faith. It's very difficult to be intellectually honest when you apply textual criticism and accept that it reveals, for one example, that books which claim to be written by one author in fact are not. That's looking at evidence, not just faith. All I'm saying is that even though they still took a myth and tried to update it, they did so by attempting to use methods that acknowledged discoveries gleaned through critical scholarship. Critical scholarship is one that attempts to set aside biases.

 

Jesus seminar aside, what of the social interest theory that I've been referencing? To me this is not about supporting a faith at all. It's about trying to create a model of explain based on what we know from anthropology, ethnology, archeology, etc that answers what data we have. Like anything within the sciences, the model of explaination that works most consistently is generally seen as the most likely scenario. Considering when we apply what we've learned from other cultures regarding the role of religion to the West's own Christian religion, it seems the puzzle pieces fit quite nicely and make a whole lot more sense in the light of human creations. It's all a matter of setting aside the Gospels to treat them on a social level. This is quite different than updating the myth, IMO. Far more informative.