R. G. Price - On the Mythic Jesus

[coffeeveritas]

Yes, we are missing the vast majority of ancient texts because in the 4th century xtian thugs burned the libraries. That argument is like the definition of “chutzpah” where a man who murders his parents asks for mercy because he is an orphan.

Are you blaming the lack of ancient texts solely on Christians? The only books I recall Christians burning are gnostic ones, and some pagan religion stuff (in historical accounts, sadly not in modern day). I have to confess, I am actually not very up-to-date on my book burning accounts, so if you have any good ones I would like to see them. Are you talking about the destruction of the Serapeum? Because there were no books destroyed in that fire.

As far as Josephus, it is a forgery...in full.

Admittedly this is a topic of debate, but there are a large number of scholars on both sides. It's not like someone checked the answer book and told us who was right.

“I don’t think anyone in the Christian community thinks that passage is a reference to Christ actually causing the trouble in person.”
Sorry. There are a lot of nuts out there. Not that I think you are one of them but be careful when you speak in absolutes.

I stand corrected. What I should have said was, "I don't think any SANE person in the Christian community . . ." Haha! oh my fellow Christians.

Hmmm....you edited my comment to delete the part where I said we have no evidence one way or the other. I’ll let that pass.....once.

Oh, that's my bad! I was trying for word economy, but you totally weren't being dogmatic there. Thanks for pointing that out, I do want to try to be fair to everyone.

Now you have crossed into outright falsehood. Suetonius does not mention a date and he does not in any way equate those xtians with the fire.

I should have stated that more clearly. What I was saying there was that the scholars I use as my source have the persecutions that he is talking about dated to 64 AD, and that quite separately, he goes on to mention the fire. I was just saying that both elements are there.

Pliny was a lawyer in Rome...if there were trials in Rome he would have known about them.

He clearly indicates that he did know about the trials, he just says he never bothered to go to one.

If it was there it would have played right into their hands when they were trying to concoct this vast persecution history which they came up with later.

That just sounds like such a conspiracy theory. To be fair, the victor does write the history, but when people talking about changing history it just sounds like DaVinci code or a time travel movie to me.

This is big long debate about the historical validity of Tacitus’s account, but I do believe most historians accept Tacitus.

There's a good reason for debate. (See below*) I hate that “most historians” argument. One wonders how many simply do not wish to get into it as it seems unprofitable.

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I was just commenting on the consensus of modern scholarship as it stands right now, but you're right, sometimes people just use that term by way of saying, "I'm right because these people said so," and then chalk it up as a victory. The fact is, sometimes the consensus is wrong, and sometimes the person saying that doesn't even really know what the consensus is. I just don't want to spend 2 hours looking up all the sources to do the textual criticism on this thing, and the fact that I know of some scholars who would back me up here sounds good enough to me. I used it as a lazy phrase. I'm tired.

Speaking of tired, I have to get up early. I love a good discussion though. You're bringing your A-game Min, this is good stuff.