The 'resurrection' (again)

[Zzyzx]

.
In a current thread someone said:

Would you like to have a debate on the deluge or Jesus' resurrection?

As people join the Forum they maybe unaware that some topics have been debated many, many times. Perhaps they think they have 'killer arguments' that are compelling.

Question for debate: Did long-dead bodies came back to life as claimed in Gospels?

[Difflugia]

But are sceptics consistent with this methodology? Let's take this methodology and apply it to, say, the book of Acts.

"After these days we got ready and started on our way up to Jerusalem. Some of the disciples from Caesarea also came with us, taking us to Mnason of Cyprus, a disciple of long standing with whom we were to lodge. After we arrived in Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly. And the following day Paul went in with us to James, and all the elders were present." – Acts 21:15-18

Elsewhere you argued the author of Acts used "we" as rhetorical device when it seems quite clear the most straightforward meaning within the context of Acts is that the author was implying he was with Paul.

I disagree. The context of those parts of Acts is of a sea voyage narrated in early Mediterranean literature. In that context, first-person plural narration is known to be a common rhetorical device. While it is "quite clear" that the author uses "we" constructions in certain parts of the narrative, it is equally clear that the author does not in others and that there is a particular pattern. The concluding paragraph to the paper I linked is as follows:

If the author felt such a close relation to all of the events he wrote about, why did he not use first person plural all the way through? Why did he use it only in the we-sections? He did not use first person plural only in the we-sections. He used it in the two settings where it is eminently appropriate if the author construes his work in the genre of historical biography in the Hellenistic milieu toward the end of the first century A.D. These two settings are prefaces and sea voyages.

I make that particular claim because there is, in fact, a strong contextual reason for suggesting that the author is using language in a particular way. It would read as the same kind of rhetorical device whether tradition identified the author as a companion of Paul or not. If you still think I'm being unfair, then perhaps you can take one of the examples I gave earlier and explain why it should be read in the traditional way apologists do, but independently of its contradiction by another author. Whether Acts was actually written by a companion of Paul or not, the "we passages" fit a rhetorical pattern found in extant literature, which can be consistently applied to the work as a whole. Can you likewise supply a consistent pattern, for example, that would tell us why "Joseph of Heli" might be read differently than "Nathan of David" or "Shem of Noah" within the context of Luke's genealogy?

[1213]

...
Do you doubt that it can be proved that WW1 occurred over a hundred years ago?

I believe it occurred, but you can’t prove it. Now it is maybe easy to believe for many, but if humans still exist after 2000 years, it will also probably become similar myth as other over 2000 years old history.

[Zzyzx]

Do you doubt that it can be proved that WW1 occurred over a hundred years ago?

I believe it occurred, but you can’t prove it.

“Prove” is a slippery term. I can provide evidence to convince all but those who prefer willful ignorance.

Now it is maybe easy to believe for many, but if humans still exist after 2000 years, it will also probably become similar myth as other over 2000 years old history.

After 2000 years it may be difficult to distinguish between what was myth and what was reality – just as we now have difficulty making that distinction now about tales from the past. Some prefer to believe that myths about supernatural entities creating the universe and visiting from time to time. Many such myths abound and many supernatural entities are proposed.

How can a rational person decide which myths to believe and which to disbelieve? It appears as though in the present time most people choose to believe myths that are popular in their culture and to dismiss myths of other cultures – and/or to believe myths that were instilled in them during childhood (before discernment and judgment developed).

Others choose to NOT believe myths unless verifiable evidence is presented to show that claims and stories are a truthful representation of events that actually / literally / really occurred in the real world.

[JehovahsWitness]

While it is "quite clear" that the author uses "we" constructions in certain parts of the narrative, it is equally clear that the author does not in others and that there is a particular pattern. The concluding paragraph to the paper I linked is as follows:

If the author felt such a close relation to all of the events he wrote about, why did he not use first person plural all the way through? Why did he use it only in the we-sections? He did not use first person plural only in the we-sections. He used it in the two settings where it is eminently appropriate if the author construes his work in the genre of historical biography in the Hellenistic milieu toward the end of the first century A.D. These two settings are prefaces and sea voyages.

If we take the plain meaning of the words, it is obvious that the writer employed "we" when he himself was present and included in the action and they /he etc when describing events of which he was not a participant. What specifically from the text renders the above impossible or even unlikely?

To illustrate: If I say "We went to to central park in New York " what reason is there not to conclude I was not physically there and participating in the action. If later I write Paul and his friends left New York and flew to Memphis where we met up with him in March. What would one naturally conclude about the flight from New York to Memphis, if not that I was not on the flight that group?

CONCLUSION While it isn't unheard of for the gospel writers to present events of which they are assumed to have personally witnessed in the third person, they tend to do this consistently throughout the narrative. Luke, the presumed writer of the book of Acts, deviates from this consistency. There is no good reason not to conclude that was because the writer wasnt present for the events described.



JW

[JehovahsWitness]

If the author felt such a close relation to all of the events he wrote about: the very act of not employing first person plural for "all the event he wrote about" linguistically distances himself, evidently then he did not feel a close relation to "ALL" the events he wrote about

why did he not use first person plural all the way through? : following the plain meaning of the word we, because he wasnt physically present or a participant of events.

Why did he use it only in the we-sections? (see above )

JW

[Difflugia]

If we take the plain meaning of the words, it is obvious that the writer employed "we" when he himself was present and included in the action and they /he etc when describing events of which he was not a participant. What specifically from the text renders the above impossible...

Nothing, but since nobody except you has raised a question of mere possibility, that seems to be a straw man.

...or even unlikely?

Though there is at least some argument about exactly how much and how directly the structure of Luke/Acts was influenced by Homeric epic, Luke was at the very least trying to mirror certain aspects of the well-known Greek and Roman histories, which themselves showed the influence of Homer and Virgil. In what is considered a brilliant literary innovation, Homer's Odysseus recounts the shipwreck that took the life of his entire crew in first-person plural. Homer ends book 11 with Odyssus switching his narration from first-person singular (and speaking of his crew in the third person) to first-person plural in the final sentence of the book, which sets the tone for the exciting sea-borne bits of the story that follows:

‘Straightway then I went to the ship, and bade my men mount the vessel, and loose the hawsers. So speedily they went on board, and sat upon the benches. And the wave of the flood bore the barque down the stream of Oceanus, we rowing first, and afterwards the fair wind was our convoy.

This initial part in the first-person plural only lasts a few paragraphs, but I want to draw attention to it to point out a Homeric convention that Luke follows: when Odysseus switches back to the first-person singular after landing, there is a narrative transition that separates the narrator from the rest of the crew to (presumably) keep the literary transition from "we" to "I" from being jarring to the listener:

‘So spake she, and our lordly souls consented thereto. Thus for that time we sat the livelong day, until the going down of the sun, feasting on abundant flesh and on sweet wine. Now when the sun sank and darkness came on, my company laid them to rest by the hawsers of the ship. Then she took me by the hand and led me apart from my dear company, and made me to sit down and laid herself at my feet, and asked all my tale. And I told her all in order duly. Then at the last the lady Circe spake unto me, saying...

Luke does this in Acts in a way that looks to me like it's formulaic, something like "if you switch to first-person plural, make sure there's something to allow you to switch back." Luke's narrative of the sea voyage begins in Acts 13, but doesn't switch to "we" for the initial legs about which little can be said and where it would be awkward to include such a transition (13:4, 13:13-14, 14:25-26). When Luke does have a fitting place for the transitions, though, he uses it. Acts 16:11 begins a short voyage with, "Setting sail therefore from Troas, we made a straight course to Samothrace...." He maintains "we" as the subject until verse 19, when "they laid hold of Paul and Silas, and dragged them to the marketplace." From that point, Paul and his party (at that point, only Silas) are referred to as "they." The next "we" (aside from those in direct quotations of the characters themselves) is the beginning of another sea journey at 20:5. Interestingly, though most of the following chapter occurs on land, Luke avoids the necessity of a transition by not mentioning anyone from the "travelling party" except Paul until the next leg of the sea journey in 21:1 ("And after we parted from them and had set sail..."). At 21:7, the sea leg is completed. Luke maintains the "we" until 21:26 when, once again, he has a reason for a separation from the narrator. Paul "took the men," thus almost ritually excluding the narrator, as one would expect that were the narrator an actual companion, he would be included in "the men."

Now, I'll return to Homer, Odysseus, and the Odyssey. Once Circe has finished explaining the dangers of Scylla and Charybdis, Odysseus speaks of his departure, switching from first-person singular to plural in a way that becomes familiar and formulaic:

But I departed to my ship and roused my men themselves to mount the vessel and loose the hawsers. And speedily they went aboard and sat upon the benches, and sitting orderly smote the grey sea water with their oars. And in the wake of our dark-prowed ship she sent a favouring wind that filled the sails...

This then continues until the captain of the ship is slain by a falling mast and the entire crew is swept out to sea when the ship reels from a lightning strike. Odysseus becomes "I" once again.

The climax of Luke's story is also the shipwreck. In terms of the previous discussion, the shipwreck and final journey begin with 27:1 ("And when it was determined that we should set sail for Italy...") and ends, as before, with the separation of the narrator from Paul in 28:16 ("...Paul had to live by himself with the soldier that guarded him.").

There are a few other points that I think bear on Luke's use of Homeric literary techniques. It's worth noting that the wreck of Odysseus' ship came about after the crew ignored a prophetic warning by Circe, because wreck of Paul's ship also followed an ignored prophetic warning, this time from Paul himself (27:9-11). Both wrecks are described with similar details, including a protracted storm lasting many days, an exhausted food supply, and loss of sailing tackle. The main difference in the two tales is that at the end, the centurion in charge of the Paul's vessel finally heeded the prophetic message delivered to Paul by an angel of God. Thus rather than all hands lost to the anger of the gods, all hands were saved by God's providence. Finally, both Odysseus alone and the survivors of Paul's ship were received kindly by the inhabitants of an island. Compare the end of Book 12 of the Odyssey with the beginning of Acts 28:

Thence for nine days was I borne, and on the tenth night the gods brought me nigh to the isle of Ogygia, where dwells Calypso of the braided tresses, an awful goddess of mortal speech, who took me in and entreated me kindly.

And when we were escaped, then we knew that the island was called Melita. And the barbarians showed us no common kindness: for they kindled a fire, and received us all, because of the present rain, and because of the cold.

So, this establishes that a first century Greek author is at least arguably writing in a style (Greek historiography) that is known to have been influenced by Homer. There are also parallels within Luke's text itself to the Odyssey specifically. This doesn't mean that the author of Acts wasn't a companion of Paul, but it does mean that there is an identifiable reason for "Luke" to write certain passages using first-person plural that is independent of whether or not he, himself was present. The "we" passages are therefore very weak evidence for concluding that he was, bordering on no evidence at all.

To illustrate: If I say "We went to to central park in New York " what reason is there not to conclude I was not physically there and participating in the action. If later I write Paul and his friends left New York and flew to Memphis where we met up with him in March. What would one naturally conclude about the flight from New York to Memphis, if not that I was not on the flight that group?

This is the same sort of thing I've talked about elsewhere. To imply that an illustration as obvious as this has somehow not been considered is less an argument than it is a simple insult. Unless you are genuinely so mistaken as to think that a contemporary, conversational statement you might make can somehow shed light on whether first century Greek literature shows Homeric influence, then this is less than even a straw man or even a red herring. It's the same thing as your assertion elsewhere that the differences between the genuine Pauline epistles and the Pastorals can be compared to someone calling his wife "my cuddle bunny." By making the argument yourself and implying that you think I could somehow find it compelling, you demean us both.

[JehovahsWitness]

If we take the plain meaning of the words, it is obvious that the writer employed "we" when he himself was present and included in the action and they /he etc when describing events of which he was not a participant. What specifically from the text renders the above impossible...

Nothing {snip}

Ok well then my work here is done..

I am entirely uninterested in any attempt to draw parallels between Homer and the book of Acts but I'm sure with a popularion of 7 and a half billion people there is at least one person on earth that is. If your only point is you do not believe that the writer is was in fact present for the events that the word "we" might indicate he was , my response is ...so? So what?! Not a rhetorical question...what would be the significance of that even if that could be reasonably supported? So the writer wasn't there, it seems he wasn't there more the majority of the events in the book of Acts anyway... So. What?!


JW

[Zzyzx]

So the writer wasn't there, it seems he wasn't there more the majority of the events in the book of Acts anyway... So. What?!

If / since the writer of "Luke" evidently did not personally witness events and conversations that occurred decades earlier, WHAT is the source of his information and how reliable is that source (and how can any of that be known)?

Was he recording hearsay, rumors, folklore, legends?

[1213]

… Some prefer to believe that myths about supernatural entities creating the universe and visiting from time to time. … …How can a rational person decide which myths to believe and which to disbelieve? …

If one is rational, he obviously looks what is the most rational explanation. I think Bible God creating earth is the most rational explanation for everything to exist. And I think only rational explanation for the Bible to exist, is that things really went as it tells.

[Difflugia]

Ok well then my work here is done.

You smugly dismiss an honest and detailed answer to your question and you think your work is done?

I am entirely uninterested in any attempt to draw parallels between Homer and the book of Acts but I'm sure with a popularion of 7 and a half billion people there is at least one person on earth that is. If your only point is you do not believe that the writer is was in fact present for the events that the word "we" might indicate he was , my response is ...so? So what?! Not a rhetorical question...what would be the significance of that even if that could be reasonably supported?

I'd think that a Christian would find it important to understand exactly what each author of his or her holy book was intending to convey to the reader. In the same way you didn't mean that question as a rhetorical, I don't mean that answer as snark. That's literally what I ask myself whenever I read the Bible, both now and when I was a Christian.

So the writer wasn't there, it seems he wasn't there more the majority of the events in the book of Acts anyway... So. What?!

The primary question for me isn't whether Luke (or whoever) was actually there, but what did he expect his readers to understand from his writing? Christian apologetics tries to paint him as an eyewitness, at least to certain parts, because there are doctrinal reasons for believing that every bit of the Gospels and Acts happened precisely as described such that every word is true in a historical sense. Since I don't think that's true for any of the Gospels or Acts, reading any of them as though it is won't allow me (or anyone else) to get out of it what the author put into it. It'd be like reading The Metamorphosis with the misunderstanding that Kafka was presenting it as a real event rather than metaphorical fiction with a moral. It would be treated as either garbage ("People can't turn into giant insects!") or evidence of something wondrous, but that misses the entire point ("People can turn into giant insects!"). Either way, it's not what Kafka intended. It gets worse if someone starts trying to reinterpret the vocabulary or grammar into something that is more plausible, but further yet from what the author intended. "Maybe 'verwandeln' doesn't always mean to change in a physical sense, right? I mean, nobody would lie there and worry about his job if he had physically and literally turned into armor plated vermin, right?" Even if one manages to construct a literary monstrosity that is nonetheless technically plausible, that still won't bring anyone closer to the message placed there by the author.

The only reason I care (and whether I should or not, I do) about how others read the Bible is because I find the Bible fascinating and I want others to find it as fascinating as I do. I know from past experience, though, that it was much harder to be actually interested when I also worried about whether it might be true. Just like a literalist Kafka reader suddenly finding out that people can't turn into bugs, I went from being a true believer to thinking that the Bible was just made-up crap. Since then, I've realized that there's so much more to the Bible both as a document and as a process over thousands of years and I now find it more interesting than I ever did as a Christian.

Someone caring only if the Bible is literally true strikes me the same way as someone that watches football, but only cares about the final score or that thinks the only interesting part of a 500-mile race is the final lap. There are people like that and they're free to enjoy football or racing however they want, but it would be a bit cheeky for them to tell a football or racing fan that they shouldn't enjoy a contest when their favorite doesn't win. In the same way, you're welcome to discount every attempt to actually understand the Bible as irrelevant if it doesn't impact your favorite reductionist doctrine. I'd be lying, however, if I said that I wasn't offended that you asked a question in way intended to seem serious, while completely discounting the documented and thought-out answer that I gave you because it doesn't change the score of the simplified, derivative game that you're playing. It's like asking a soccer player to explain her strategy from a close game, only to then tell her that the strategy was dumb because she could have just picked the ball up and thrown it.