Why didn't Yeshua write anything?

[hope_for_things]

17 minutes ago, Pete Ahlstrom said:

Thanks for devoting a post to my unbelief.  Bart Ehrman points out a lot of the contradictions in the New Testament in his books.  His website is here: http://www.bartdehrman.com/

His position is that if God wanted us to have his words, why didn't he preserve them?  I wonder about this myself.  The earliest fragment of any of the gospels dates from 2nd century, not contemporaneous to Jesus' life, and there are a lot of important contradictions like where Jesus was born, when did he die, when did he rid the temple of the money changers, etc.  I also have a hard time believing that God could not forgive sins unless Jesus came.  It seems strange to me that we as mortals can forgive one another but God could not without sacrificing his son. 

These are all good questions that I'd like to see religious leaders wrestle with.  The theology of Christianity has some valuable traditions that are inspirational, the substitutionary atonement idea or others that you mention are morally problematic.  I find value in Christianity, but not in many of the dogmas that have developed over the course of the movement.  

[USU78]

1 hour ago, hope_for_things said:

Actually there are reasons that scholars believe Jesus was likely not literate and why the Luke narrative should be questioned.  I'm not an expert and I couldn't find anything concrete in a quick google search, but I have read some about this in a book or two and I'll try to look them up sometime.  Scholarship has been done on this topic, I'm just not representing it well at this point, sorry about that.  

Just a thought:  you're arguing from authority, and I'm arguing the evidentiary value of what is the best available evidence:  the gospels.  Naturally, I must bring up unknown/unknowable Q* in doing this.  Anthropology/archaeology, very soft sciences both, can only tell us so much, and I understand that you must, from your perspective, ignore or downplay the "historical novels" that are the gospels, but by the same argument that you ignore or downplay Luke, I can, for the same reasons, ignore or downplay the Assyrian Royal Library, http://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-asia/ashurbanipal-oldest-surviving-royal-library-world-over-30000-clay-tablets-007127.

The Assyrians, no less than the Jews, aggrandized their guys, their victories, their achievements, and downplayed their enemies, their defeats, their foibles.

Accordingly, from an evidentiary point of view, Ashurbanipal's clay tablets are no more or less valuable than 1 Kings or Luke:  Just because you disapprove of the Judeo-Christian G-d, you don't get to ignore His followers' writings while accepting whole cloth Ashurbanipal's.  Not if you want to be honest.

[Bobbieaware]

5 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

I dunno if ya unnastan what I'm sayin.

 

You made me laugh, Mark!

 

[Pete Ahlstrom]

58 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

These are all good questions that I'd like to see religious leaders wrestle with.  The theology of Christianity has some valuable traditions that are inspirational, the substitutionary atonement idea or others that you mention are morally problematic.  I find value in Christianity, but not in many of the dogmas that have developed over the course of the movement.  

I think there is some value there but is it inherent to christianity or could there be a substitute? I tend to think it is people that make the organization and not the other way around. 

[Gray]

On 6/25/2017 at 4:25 PM, Honorentheos said:

When I read the title of the thread and the OP, I was going to offer up my thoughts but in scrolling through the replies already posted saw you had very tactfully posed a similar explanation. So I just offered a rep point in support and thought I'd see how the discussion progressed.

If one separates out what is most probably true of the historic person we know as Jesus of Nazareth from the beliefs, it doesn't leave a lot that we can be certain of to a high degree. But one area that the sources and context seem to support is that the historical Jesus was prophesying of a very near term overthrow of the occupying Romans and a purification of Israel in part through God's agent the Son of Man. One can debate both sides of if Jesus saw himself as the Son of Man or was referring to another to come. But given this understand of Jesus as a historic figure, it is more the case his concern was with the writings that the people of Palestine already had but needed to be more faithful to than someone looking to document new teachings meant to endure for centuries. One might compare it to President Benson admonishing the Church to return to the Book of Mormon in an age that really hasn't seen scripture production in a meaningful way in a couple of generations no matter how much one says that each issue of the Ensign is modern scripture.

Put simply, the historical Jesus didn't write teachings down because the historical Jesus was admonishing the people of the covenant to remember the covenant, and that God would reveal His arm to the world very, very soon.

His direct disciples who know him in life would have held similar views. His post-execution apostle, Paul, has the distinction of being a Roman citizen and pursuing something completely different from the historical Jesus as he communicated with bodies of these newly minted Christians over a broad geography. Hence, he wrote, others wrote in his name, others debated what he wrote, and those who read what he wrote would write in response. His first chronological epistle, 1 Thessalonians contains the same vision of a wrathful God purging the world in the time to come, but it has a non-Jewish focus and a different time-table. For example -

In Paul we see some of the key shifts occurring. These new adherents to the God of the Jewish people of former pagan beliefs are waiting for Jesus, who Paul teaches was raised from the dead and who will have a primary role in delivering them from the impending destruction. The role of Jesus is now that of the Son of Man, which is consistent in the post-execution writings. The destruction to come is also expected to occur in the time of those being written to, which is consistent if one of the very first examples of what every generation of Christians seems to believe - the end times are near. But this never-Jewish audience needs taught. Hence, writing and calls to remember what they were taught.

I don't think the historic Jesus would have intended anything he taught to be considered different from what was in the sacred scripture of his time. And he certainly wouldn't have seen reason to waste the effort on putting it to paper for future generations given that God's arm was to be unmistakably revealed to the world very soon and there'd be no need. The urgency of preparing for the coming kingdom was all important.

 

Thank you for your thoughts! To add to that, I think this is a great introduction to the concept of the historical Jesus and the theological Jesus, what history is and isn't, and why historians think that some accounts in the gospels have some basis in history and others do not:

 

 

[mfbukowski]

2 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

It could be my lack of understanding your argument, I'm thinking I don't fully grasp what you're trying to tell me, because I think I agree with you on the essence of these ideas, but you are telling me I don't understand them.  Ultimately, I agree that religion is a subjective experience, and truth for religious propositions is just saying "I agree".  

Where I disagree is that I think scholars of history or the bible or other sciences have things to tell us that are very useful and can help inform our religious paradigms as they always have throughout the history of the world.  Nobody today believes in the OT view of 3 heavens anymore (the air where the birds fly, a hard dome with windows in it to let out rain, and the top part where the rain and water are at).  Science has explained the nature of our planet and its relationship in the universe and religion has largely incorporated these ideas into religious paradigms and evolved along with the findings.  

Sometimes it sounds to me like you're trying to say that arguments on both sides of a debate are equally viable and equally true.  I just don't believe that.  The three heavens model is not equally true to as our understanding of the universe today.  If there is evidence that biblical scholars find that leads them to believe that Jesus was likely not literate, I need to take that evidence seriously and not just dismiss it because it conflicts with the traditions of my religion's theology.  

Why not take the scientific methods seriously?  It seems you believe we should take philosophy seriously and you let that philosophy inform your religious paradigm.  I see myself doing the same, so I'm not sure what you're trying to teach me with respect to how my beliefs that the sciences can tell us many important things about our world is in conflict with some higher philosophical position.  

Oh well, I have done about as much as I can, and you still don't read the links I post. "Snow is white" is not a religious proposition. I wish you well. Positivism is dead, and you don't get it. Good luck. Read up on that til you get it.

Edited June 28, 2017 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

5 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

It could be my lack of understanding your argument, I'm thinking I don't fully grasp what you're trying to tell me, because I think I agree with you on the essence of these ideas, but you are telling me I don't understand them.  Ultimately, I agree that religion is a subjective experience, and truth for religious propositions is just saying "I agree".  

Where I disagree is that I think scholars of history or the bible or other sciences have things to tell us that are very useful and can help inform our religious paradigms as they always have throughout the history of the world.  Nobody today believes in the OT view of 3 heavens anymore (the air where the birds fly, a hard dome with windows in it to let out rain, and the top part where the rain and water are at).  Science has explained the nature of our planet and its relationship in the universe and religion has largely incorporated these ideas into religious paradigms and evolved along with the findings.  

Sometimes it sounds to me like you're trying to say that arguments on both sides of a debate are equally viable and equally true.  I just don't believe that.  The three heavens model is not equally true to as our understanding of the universe today.  If there is evidence that biblical scholars find that leads them to believe that Jesus was likely not literate, I need to take that evidence seriously and not just dismiss it because it conflicts with the traditions of my religion's theology.  

Why not take the scientific methods seriously?  It seems you believe we should take philosophy seriously and you let that philosophy inform your religious paradigm.  I see myself doing the same, so I'm not sure what you're trying to teach me with respect to how my beliefs that the sciences can tell us many important things about our world is in conflict with some higher philosophical position.  

Ok one more try.

Someday you will die.

What do you want your legacy to be to mankind? Looking back, what will have been your purpose for being here?

THAT IS YOUR RELIGION 

Science cannot tell you what you want to become in your life, nor how to achieve it.

[RevTestament]

3 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Ok one more try.

Someday you will die.

What do you want your legacy to be to mankind? Looking back, what will have been your purpose for being here?

THAT IS YOUR RELIGION 

Bravo, MFB, Bravo! Very succinct.

P.S. Except he may not die. 

[hope_for_things]

15 hours ago, USU78 said:

Just a thought:  you're arguing from authority, and I'm arguing the evidentiary value of what is the best available evidence:  the gospels.  Naturally, I must bring up unknown/unknowable Q* in doing this.  Anthropology/archaeology, very soft sciences both, can only tell us so much, and I understand that you must, from your perspective, ignore or downplay the "historical novels" that are the gospels, but by the same argument that you ignore or downplay Luke, I can, for the same reasons, ignore or downplay the Assyrian Royal Library, http://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-asia/ashurbanipal-oldest-surviving-royal-library-world-over-30000-clay-tablets-007127.

The Assyrians, no less than the Jews, aggrandized their guys, their victories, their achievements, and downplayed their enemies, their defeats, their foibles.

Accordingly, from an evidentiary point of view, Ashurbanipal's clay tablets are no more or less valuable than 1 Kings or Luke:  Just because you disapprove of the Judeo-Christian G-d, you don't get to ignore His followers' writings while accepting whole cloth Ashurbanipal's.  Not if you want to be honest.

I'm not an expert on biblical scholarship, anthropology or archaeology, but I'm certainly not willing to put my personal observations up against those who have spent years training on a subject.  I also am not an expert in physics, environmental sciences, or anatomy.  I see people every day who are willing to dismiss medical or environmental sciences because they read some blog on the internet that questions the validity of climate change, or another article about the risks of GMOs.  

Personally, I try to stay with the mainstream when it comes to experts in these fields because I trust the process of the scientific method and how over time it weeds out the errors more effectively than some rogue idiots that think they know better but haven't invested the time and effort to learn the science and truly understand it.  

The Luke narrative tells us something and should be considered along side other evidence.  

[hope_for_things]

14 hours ago, Pete Ahlstrom said:

I think there is some value there but is it inherent to christianity or could there be a substitute? I tend to think it is people that make the organization and not the other way around. 

I agree with you completely about the people being the point of these organizations.  Is there inherent value in Christianity?  I personally think so, and I know many people who believe so as well.  Its a unique and widely influential religious movement, that has had significant influence on the rise of the western world and the modern advances of society.  I don't think we should dismiss its value.

Personally, I don't believe Christianity has exclusive truth or authority for God though.  

[hope_for_things]

13 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Oh well, I have done about as much as I can, and you still don't read the links I post. "Snow is white" is not a religious proposition. I wish you well. Positivism is dead, and you don't get it. Good luck. Read up on that til you get it.

I'm trying, and I read some of your links, but I get confused.  It feels like you can't give me a straight answer and instead are trying to change the question.  The OP of this thread is talking about one subject and I'm discussing that, and then you jump in and tell me that my entire world view is upside down, and it kind of makes my head spin.    

Logical Positivism is Dead link, one of the people said this: 

Quote

In philosophy, death occurs when there is nothing more to talk about. 

In the case of logical positivism, modern physics is pretty much all logical positivism. It is the raw extraction of data from experiments, followed by mathematical formulation, followed by validation through application of results.

Positivism is the intuition that everything we see, before it is true or false or 1 or 0 is at least something. It is the acknowledgement of existence at the exact time and place where it is born: Sensory experience. This is the closest we get to reality. It is the raw interface that generates raw data yet to be tampered with. Next, this input is formulated logically, and mathematically. It is at this stage we distinguish measurability and falsifiability of the elements, and map their relationships. Hence the term Logical Positivism.

Positivism says all evidence and direct observations can only be non-null (or full as the opposite of null). An observation is an existence in itself that cannot be undone. This is not to be confused with true. True is already a value with meaning. The same distinction is required with zero, false, empty, and null. Intuitively these are all false to most people, but if that were so, computers would be unable to compute. Zero is not false. False is not null. Zero equals null is false. This is the essence of computability and mathematics.

What failed was not the lasting intuition of Positivism or Logic, but rather the attempt these philosophers made at creating a new language of pure Logic to predicate all Positivist experiences.

To this day, the leap from experience to mathematics is made manually and often painfully, through trial and error, through falsification, and through brute force. Scientists rely on their imagination, philosophic intuition, and their training in mathematics, logical formulation, experimentation, and their overall integrity as a scientist. But to this day, physics is the logical predication of observations.  And every physicist is evidence of this.

Unfortunately for philosophers, Logical Positivism ran its course, and there is really not much to talk about. This means that it made progress and graduated the realm of philosophy, contributing the fruit of its labor into mainstream science. Physics students may not even be aware of the notion, but what they are doing is precisely Logical Positivism put to practice. But what is ubiquitous is not worth mentioning because there is not much to talk about. Physicists are busy talking about physics -- as it should be. For that, they have all the philosophers that preceded them to thank.

This  topic, along with most philosophy, is confusing for beginners because  whenever you try to read about it you cannot distinguish the objective  philosophic intuitions from its subjective philosophic history.

When  you are reading about philosophy, you are often reading what all these  different people thought and argued about. The intuitions get buried in  the controversies, and even more so when the author makes an attempt to  be fair and balanced among all the subjectivity. To learn the intuitions  these philosophers were chasing, it is best to stick to one philosopher  and understand what it is they were getting at before reading what it is they were arguing about.

I don't get the point of what he's saying.  I've read it three times very slowly and I'm still lost.  It sounds to me like he's saying that physicists are using the principles of Positivism in their methodology, but that they are unaware that according to philosophers Logical Positivism is a dead end way of thinking, so these physicists continue to do their experiments using a broken way of thinking.  Is this an attempt to dismiss physics?  Surely everyone can see the value of modern physics and the advances this has given to society.  I just don't get it.  What is this author trying to critique about physics, is he/she trying to dismiss everything physics has accomplished and call it a dead science?  

So please try and help me understand what point you are attempting to make to me, because I'm just not getting it.  When I say that I find value in the sciences, are you responding to me by saying that the sciences aren't valuable because philosophers have debunked the scientific method, or that philosophy is so far advanced past these other disciplines that we should dismiss and ignore the work of the scholars in these disciplines?  Please clarify your position because I want to understand what you're telling me and you seem hesitant to just come right out and say it.  

Dumb it down for me please, I want to get your point.  

 

[hope_for_things]

10 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Ok one more try.

Someday you will die.

What do you want your legacy to be to mankind? Looking back, what will have been your purpose for being here?

THAT IS YOUR RELIGION 

Science cannot tell you what you want to become in your life, nor how to achieve it.

Ok, just reading your second try here and maybe I'm getting what you're saying better now.  

I would agree with you about science not being able to tell me what to become in life.  What I want to become and my deep inner aspirations are more emotionally driven, but I can't disconnect these feelings and aspirations from the experiences of my mind and how I view the mechanisms that I observe through my senses and through my intellect.  

Bringing this full circle to the OP, I was talking about scholars of history, archaeology and anthropology helping to inform our views about the literacy of individuals that lived 2000 years ago.  I can't think of a better method for trying to determine what life was like 2000 years ago.  What other method could possibly tell us about these individuals besides the sciences?  

[mfbukowski]

7 hours ago, RevTestament said:

Bravo, MFB, Bravo! Very succinct.

P.S. Except he may not die. 

I should have mentioned also the assumptions behind the beliefs that ground what we see our purpose in life

One secular religious motive might go something like this:

Assumption/ Belief:

I want to become the best human I can become and dedicate my life to the most important cause which exists

The most important issue facing mankind today is saving the planet for future generations

My purpose in life will be to dedicate myself to the broad category of saving the planet

This belief leads to these concrete actions:  Supporting Greenpeace plus xyz

Therefore

I will become active in Greenpeace and dedicate my life to organizing, spreading the word, and, as possible, go on their missions to stop whalers etc

In this structure you actually parallel "church"

You have an unprovable belief that "saving the planet" is the "most important" issue facing mankind

You have a person who wants to "be good"

You have a person willing to effectively "be a missionary" for the cause, in organizing, spreading the word, and putting their lives and bodies on the line on a ship at sea etc.

"Saving the planet" becomes a secular religion which creates a purpose for life, a cause larger than oneself, which is assumed to be "correct" on faith, and actions are taken on faith, including possibly getting on a boat and confronting whalers, which action, it is believed,  will make this world a better place.  It provides fellowship and purpose and a goal for a future which is beyond the lifetime of the believer, and it has nothing to do with God. 

 

[mfbukowski]

15 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

I'm trying, and I read some of your links, but I get confused.  It feels like you can't give me a straight answer and instead are trying to change the question.  The OP of this thread is talking about one subject and I'm discussing that, and then you jump in and tell me that my entire world view is upside down, and it kind of makes my head spin.    

Logical Positivism is Dead link, one of the people said this: 

I don't get the point of what he's saying.  I've read it three times very slowly and I'm still lost.  It sounds to me like he's saying that physicists are using the principles of Positivism in their methodology, but that they are unaware that according to philosophers Logical Positivism is a dead end way of thinking, so these physicists continue to do their experiments using a broken way of thinking.  Is this an attempt to dismiss physics?  Surely everyone can see the value of modern physics and the advances this has given to society.  I just don't get it.  What is this author trying to critique about physics, is he/she trying to dismiss everything physics has accomplished and call it a dead science?  

So please try and help me understand what point you are attempting to make to me, because I'm just not getting it.  When I say that I find value in the sciences, are you responding to me by saying that the sciences aren't valuable because philosophers have debunked the scientific method, or that philosophy is so far advanced past these other disciplines that we should dismiss and ignore the work of the scholars in these disciplines?  Please clarify your position because I want to understand what you're telling me and you seem hesitant to just come right out and say it.  

Dumb it down for me please, I want to get your point.  

 

Yep that's what he is saying and what I am saying and what everyone else who knows anything about philosophy is saying.

Physics and science tells you nothing about what is important in life or how you should spend your life

That is the realm of religion.  See the posts before and after, hereabouts.   Physicists make things go.  They don't tell you anything about your life.

 Scientists are mechanics who make your car go, but you decide where to drive to work and why you should work there.

[mfbukowski]

9 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

Ok, just reading your second try here and maybe I'm getting what you're saying better now.  

I would agree with you about science not being able to tell me what to become in life.  What I want to become and my deep inner aspirations are more emotionally driven, but I can't disconnect these feelings and aspirations from the experiences of my mind and how I view the mechanisms that I observe through my senses and through my intellect.   

You were doing fine until that "but":

Quote

 

but I can't disconnect these feelings and aspirations from the experiences of my mind and how I view the mechanisms that I observe through my senses and through my intellect.   

 

I don't have a clue what that means

Quote

Bringing this full circle to the OP, I was talking about scholars of history, archaeology and anthropology helping to inform our views about the literacy of individuals that lived 2000 years ago.  I can't think of a better method for trying to determine what life was like 2000 years ago.  What other method could possibly tell us about these individuals besides the sciences?  

THAT was the derail.

How people lived 2000 years ago is not the subject of the thread, the subject of the thread was how a particular individual named Jesus lived 2000 years ago when we have direct evidence in at least TWO PLACES in the story that show that he was literate.  The question was not ABOUT how people lived 2000 years ago, it was about what is in the scriptures.

You are mixing up how people lived with the story.

Pretend this is star trek ok?   The story says Mr Spock did thus and so in two places.  The question IS- "Did Mr Spock do thus and so"?  In the story YES Mr. Spock did thus and so, and it is shown in two places in the story

YOUR point is -  no MR spock did not do thus and so because he lived in the future and people did not do that in future - and that point is irrelevant to the story.

You seem to have trouble compartmentalizing the exact question and directly answering it which seems related to 

Quote

but I can't disconnect these feelings and aspirations from the experiences of my mind and how I view the mechanisms that I observe through my senses and through my intellect.   

You have to learn to disconnect one point from another.   Each point is a discrete brick in the wall, if one fails, the wall fails.

You have to learn how to isolate each brick and examine it closely before you put it in your wall.

[hope_for_things]

4 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Yep that's what he is saying and what I am saying and what everyone else who knows anything about philosophy is saying.

Physics and science tells you nothing about what is important in life or how you should spend your life

That is the realm of religion.  See the posts before and after, hereabouts.   Physicists make things go.  They don't tell you anything about your life.

 Scientists are mechanics who make your car go, but you decide where to drive to work and why you should work there.

Ok, but lets backup to my earlier post, because I don't think you understand the argument I was making.  Maybe you didn't read my post very well this time.    I said that science has influenced religious thinking throughout the history of the world.  I gave an example of the 3 heavens OT belief or the structure of our solar system, and how scientific understanding has influenced prevailing religious perspectives on these topics.  This has happened countless times throughout history, and is continuing to happen today with evolution or other paradigm changing discoveries by the sciences that inform our view of the world and our relationship to it.  

How else do you explain these changes in the history of religion other than they were influenced by discoveries of science?  

[hope_for_things]

40 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

I don't have a clue what that means

We live in a post enlightenment, modern technological society and are swimming in this milieu.  I'm essentially saying that I can't divorce my thinking from the environment that has shaped my life's experience.  I'm typing on a keyboard and sending a message to you through the internet.  The advances of the sciences are intertwined into my worldview, I can't separate my relationship to these things and try to look at religious experience through a lens that isn't built by the knowledge that surrounds me.

46 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

How people lived 2000 years ago is not the subject of the thread, the subject of the thread was how a particular individual named Jesus lived 2000 years ago when we have direct evidence in at least TWO PLACES in the story that show that he was literate.  The question was not ABOUT how people lived 2000 years ago, it was about what is in the scriptures.

 I disagree, the question was why didn't Jesus write anything down during his lifetime.  The OP didn't limit this discussion to what's found in the canon.  But even if the canon was the limit, we can learn a lot through biblical criticism, and one thing that we learn is about the authors and their writing style and intent.  The author of Luke was not recording history as I explained earlier.  

50 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Pretend this is star trek ok?   The story says Mr Spock did thus and so in two places.  The question IS- "Did Mr Spock do thus and so"?  In the story YES Mr. Spock did thus and so, and it is shown in two places in the story

YOUR point is -  no MR spock did not do thus and so because he lived in the future and people did not do that in future - and that point is irrelevant to the story.

You seem to have trouble compartmentalizing the exact question and directly answering it which seems related to 

Quote

but I can't disconnect these feelings and aspirations from the experiences of my mind and how I view the mechanisms that I observe through my senses and through my intellect.   

You have to learn to disconnect one point from another.   Each point is a discrete brick in the wall, if one fails, the wall fails.

You have to learn how to isolate each brick and examine it closely before you put it in your wall.

Ahh.. Ok, I think what you're essentially telling me here is I'm breaking the rules of engagement with respect to dialogue about a topic. You're calling a foul on me for taking the author's question in a different direction than you think is appropriate.  To carry your analogy further, I essentially brought some Star Wars discussion into a Star Trek party, and for some Trekkie fans that's a violation of the rules.  

But let me ask about these bricks in the wall.  Do you see yourself as responsible for keeping the wall from falling, or a defender of the wall?  Why shouldn't we let the wall fall, and then rebuild it again.  I see value in that process, but I can also see value in dissecting the wall one brick at a time as you suggest.  Both approaches are valid in my mind.  

[USU78]

2 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

The Luke narrative tells us something and should be considered along side other evidence.  

No argument here.  As for the substance, it tells us that He could be quite provocative when He chose to be.  That's the main focus of the story, which to me appears to differ from, say, Mark hardly at all.  The difference in detail of how He provoked the congregants at the Synagogue isn't particularly interesting, except that you make in this thread the claim that He could not have been literate because  ...  appeal to authority.

The experts you appeal to are secondary sources.  Yes, I agree it's important to listen to what they have to say.

But in my lifetime they've gone from "there was no such place as Nazareth and nobody named Yeshua ever lived or taught there" to a grudging acceptance of both the place's existence and the man's existence.  Why did they reject both?  Precisely because of the Judeo-Christian G-d.  Because His followers wrote stuff down, what they wrote down must necessarily be entirely fictional.  But these experts, and you seem to take the minimalist position as exclusively authoritative, are not the only ones.  We can look at the primary sources and decide for themselves whether a tendentious bigotry against the believers' writings informs their scholarship.

To me the errors made by the gospel writers are, at worst, the errors of Vidal in writing about Aaron Burr or Abraham Lincoln.  The overall tale told is accurate, but because of the gap of time between the life lived and the writing writ, some howlers necessarily occur.  And storytelling requires a certain creative jumbling of people and events in furtherance of the narrative.  And figuring out which is a howler and which is a remembered TRVTH about the life lived is what's fun.

[USU78]

1 hour ago, hope_for_things said:

 What other method could possibly tell us about these individuals besides the sciences?  

What the sciences can tell us about are entirely about the material culture: diet, pottery, jewelry, art, architecture, and the like.

Sciences cannot tell us much if anything about whey they didn't eat port, what informed their aesthetics in architecture and the plastic arts, and the like.

What they and their descendants wrote about what they believed about themselves and their world can tell us this.  Science, to the extent it can divine such things, is useful in answering those questions.  For example, if no humans or animals appear in frescoes or on pottery or incised into stone, science can divine a probable religious motive.  If the divined religious motive happens to correlate with the writings, we have a perfect wedding of human intellectual/spiritual endeavor.

We have arrived at a TRVTH.

[hope_for_things]

13 minutes ago, USU78 said:

To me the errors made by the gospel writers are, at worst, the errors of Vidal in writing about Aaron Burr or Abraham Lincoln.  The overall tale told is accurate, but because of the gap of time between the life lived and the writing writ, some howlers necessarily occur.  And storytelling requires a certain creative jumbling of people and events in furtherance of the narrative.  And figuring out which is a howler and which is a remembered TRVTH about the life lived is what's fun.

I don't have much to add because you're just mischaracterizing and misunderstanding my points.  Best of luck, I would recommend studying the scholarship instead of dismissing it, you might learn something.  

[USU78]

Just now, hope_for_things said:

I don't have much to add because you're just mischaracterizing and misunderstanding my points.  Best of luck, I would recommend studying the scholarship instead of dismissing it, you might learn something.  

So  ...  class is over, teach'?

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, hope_for_things said:

Ok, but lets backup to my earlier post, because I don't think you understand the argument I was making.  Maybe you didn't read my post very well this time.    I said that science has influenced religious thinking throughout the history of the world.  I gave an example of the 3 heavens OT belief or the structure of our solar system, and how scientific understanding has influenced prevailing religious perspectives on these topics.  This has happened countless times throughout history, and is continuing to happen today with evolution or other paradigm changing discoveries by the sciences that inform our view of the world and our relationship to it.  

How else do you explain these changes in the history of religion other than they were influenced by discoveries of science?  

I know what you said, I was ignoring it because it was irrelevant.  We have been over it a hundred times.

You see the influence of the 3 heavens in the kingdoms of glory, so within the realm of religion it was a perfectly good idea, it was just misapplied to science which is exactly what you do in every post!

Of course they were influenced by the history of science which was an ERROR- they should NOT have been influenced by discoveries of science!   THAT IS THE WHOLE POINT THAT MIXING SCIENCE AND RELIGION IS IRRATIONAL and is in fact your error as well.  THAT is what you do not understand one iota.

THAT is what you cannot see I guess.

Cheesh- why do you think ALL THESE PHILOSOPHERS OF SCIENCE ARE SAYING THAT??  

Remember the quote YOU got from the death of positivism site?

2 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

It sounds to me like he's saying that physicists are using the principles of Positivism in their methodology, but that they are unaware that according to philosophers Logical Positivism is a dead end way of thinking, so these physicists continue to do their experiments using a broken way of thinking.

That is what YOU said and yes you got it right!!  I told you that?

The history of psychology was influenced by phrenology too, and medicine was influenced by leaches.  This is pretty frustrating, frankly.

[mfbukowski]

30 minutes ago, USU78 said:

So  ...  class is over, teach'?

He hasn't got a clue

[mfbukowski]

33 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

I don't have much to add because you're just mischaracterizing and misunderstanding my points.  Best of luck, I would recommend studying the scholarship instead of dismissing it, you might learn something.  

You cannot possibly understand the stupidity of this comment and who USU is.

This is one of the most hilarious things I have ever read on this board.

I can't stop shaking my head and laughing out loud.  Get some humility kid.

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, hope_for_things said:

We live in a post enlightenment, modern technological society and are swimming in this milieu.  I'm essentially saying that I can't divorce my thinking from the environment that has shaped my life's experience.  I'm typing on a keyboard and sending a message to you through the internet.  The advances of the sciences are intertwined into my worldview, I can't separate my relationship to these things and try to look at religious experience through a lens that isn't built by the knowledge that surrounds me.

 I disagree, the question was why didn't Jesus write anything down during his lifetime.  The OP didn't limit this discussion to what's found in the canon.  But even if the canon was the limit, we can learn a lot through biblical criticism, and one thing that we learn is about the authors and their writing style and intent.  The author of Luke was not recording history as I explained earlier.  

Ahh.. Ok, I think what you're essentially telling me here is I'm breaking the rules of engagement with respect to dialogue about a topic. You're calling a foul on me for taking the author's question in a different direction than you think is appropriate.  To carry your analogy further, I essentially brought some Star Wars discussion into a Star Trek party, and for some Trekkie fans that's a violation of the rules.  

But let me ask about these bricks in the wall.  Do you see yourself as responsible for keeping the wall from falling, or a defender of the wall?  Why shouldn't we let the wall fall, and then rebuild it again.  I see value in that process, but I can also see value in dissecting the wall one brick at a time as you suggest.  Both approaches are valid in my mind.  

You have no clue your brilliance in this philosophy stuff is a hundred years old.

I think you need to stop listening to the idiots on the boards and get some education.  Read some Kuhn and Polanyi but I doubt you will even read this wacko-pedia version https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Kuhn

Figure out what Wittgenstein meant by Language Games

I am blinded by your hubris.  A defender of the wall?  Do you have eyes?  Half the people here think I am a relativistic atheist.  The wall has already fallen- I am building the new one brick by brick.  You are just a hundred years behind and don't even see it.

Edited June 28, 2017 by mfbukowski