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9/18/2015 8:12 pm  #1


Historicity and Youtube Atheists

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UsFnWScv7w

"I am not here to debate hermeneutics with you, nor anyone else.  I am here to educate you on historical methods, and to apply that method to the Biblical gospels.  The Bible objectively fails all rules of historical reliability, without exception.  This is not a matter of debate among secular historians.  The only people who dispute this conclusion are Christian apologists with an a-priori commitment to Biblical reliability. "

There are few videos that really irk my blood, this is one of them. If anyone's familiar with history and the method of hermeneutics, would you even consider responding to this? Do respond, if you wish to. I wish there were people on YT that dealt with such arrogant drama.

 

9/20/2015 11:36 am  #2


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

Thanks for your reply Alexander, if you wish to add more, feel more than welcome to do so. This video really irked my blood. A few months ago I was involved in conversation with the leading mythicist D.M Murdock(otherwise known as Acharya S.) which really had me so consumed, and I wouldn't rest in peace till I managed to get in contact with Michael Heiser, who kindly clarified many things for me, anyways, please respond to this as well as you can(if you have time of course), and thanks a lot.

     Thread Starter
 

9/20/2015 6:20 pm  #3


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

I don't see why these Jesus Mythicists continue spreading their pseudo-history. Back in the 19th century, the Mythicist hypothesis was prevalent, but now the Mythicist hypothesis has been discredited from academic history. The historical evidence is clear that Jesus did existed and no, "christian apologists" are not the only ones saying this, rather academic history. Check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIdCRanZZyw. or Tim O'Neill's blog.

 

9/20/2015 6:38 pm  #4


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

I concur with Brony, Ben Yakov's aphorism about Jesus Mythicists being the atheist equivalent to Young Earth Creationists tends to ring true here.

Isn't Law a Mythicist?

 

9/20/2015 7:41 pm  #5


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

It's shit talking anyway. A mythical Jesus not only doesn't contradict theism but it doesn't even rule out *Christian* theism. Establishing that a present Christian heresy is God's revelation is not particularly helpful for the atheist.


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
 

9/20/2015 8:41 pm  #6


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

Mysterious Brony wrote:

I don't see why these Jesus Mythicists continue spreading their pseudo-history. Back in the 19th century, the Mythicist hypothesis was prevalent, but now the Mythicist hypothesis has been discredited from academic history. The historical evidence is clear that Jesus did existed and no, "christian apologists" are not the only ones saying this, rather academic history. Check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIdCRanZZyw. or Tim O'Neill's blog.

https://larryhurtado.wordpress.com/2012/07/23/the-did-jesus-exist-controversy-and-its-precedents/

One of the main reasons for it that I've learnt from Dr. Heiser and Dr. Hurtado is that, apparently, none of the historians in today will do the work required for the public in order to diminish this myth, with the few exceptions of Boyd and Eddy in their book, The Jesus Legend: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus and  Stanley E. Porter in, Unmasking the Pagan Christ: An Evangelical Response to the Cosmic Christ Idea. We also have Maurice Casey(an agnostic) who has written, Jesus: Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths? 


Thanks for referring Tim O'Neill's blog to me, I'll be going through it now.

Last edited by Dennis (9/20/2015 8:45 pm)

     Thread Starter
 

9/20/2015 8:47 pm  #7


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

Okay, I didn't watch the video and am not an expert in Biblical scholarship; however, the passage the OP quotes seems strange to me. Secular history, whether Biblical or not, almost always rules out supernatural or paranormal explanations as a matter of course. This is really what secular history is, so it is hardly surprising secuar historians tend to ignore such possibilities. But these historians rarely support their perspective. They just asume that it is obvious they should take a naturalist approach to historiography. With the exception of a few rigid and narrow fundamentaists, Christian historians are actually more likely to be alive to the need to take into account different worldviews and possible explanations in sifting the historical evidence. I would argue this makes them better historians.

 

9/20/2015 9:21 pm  #8


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

This does lead to an interesting question: I'm not a Christian but I'm not a naturalist in historical method any more than biblical scholars are, because I'm not a naturalist period. What are we supposed to do about claims of miraculous events in historical texts? Sometimes a mythical reading is clearly motivated because the texts in question will be literary or will have obvious context or motivations for exaggerating or poetasizing events, but I can think of, just off the top of my head, having read about well over a dozen cases of seemingly miraculous events in the history of Buddhism, and not even merely in the life of the Buddha, but in the life of what you might call Buddhist Saints. What kind of scholarly motivation could I possibly have for dismissing those kinds of accounts? Only a strict adherence to something like naturalism would seem to force me to constantly want to debunk those claims.

Socrates daimonion also comes to mind- there is nothing but a supposed naturalism that would push us to try and psychologize that phenomenon away.

Last edited by iwpoe (9/21/2015 9:09 am)


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
 

9/21/2015 8:57 am  #9


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

Hi, Jeremy Taylor and iwpoe, for the issues that've come up, literary critique would be of great intrigue. Is anyone here familiar or formally/informally trained in the art of literary critique?

     Thread Starter
 

9/21/2015 9:07 am  #10


Re: Historicity and Youtube Atheists

Dennis wrote:

Hi, Jeremy Taylor and iwpoe, for the issues that've come up, literary critique would be of great intrigue. Is anyone here familiar or formally/informally trained in the art of literary critique?

What do you mean? So called, literary criticism? I.e. bad interpretations of interesting philosophical texts you get in English departments? Or something else?


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
 

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