Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

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Jagella
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Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #1

Post by Jagella »

According to the Huffington Post article, Did Jesus Exist?, New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman has the following to say:
In a society in which people still claim the Holocaust did not happen, and in which there are resounding claims that the American president is, in fact, a Muslim born on foreign soil, is it any surprise to learn that the greatest figure in the history of Western civilization, the man on whom the most powerful and influential social, political, economic, cultural and religious institution in the world — the Christian church — was built, the man worshipped, literally, by billions of people today — is it any surprise to hear that Jesus never even existed?
What's so important about Ehrman's position on the historicity of Jesus to Christian apologists is that not only does Ehrman insist that Jesus did exist, but Ehrman is an atheist! Since he's an atheist, he cannot be biased toward a real Jesus or so apologists seem to believe. So here we have a distinguished professor of New Testament who believes in a historical Jesus and without a Christian bias, or so we are told.

Question for Debate: But how unbiased is Ehrman really?

Of course, we all have biases that can skew our thinking, but there are many different kinds of bias and different degrees of bias. Some biases can be overcome with sufficient evidence, and other kinds of bias will remain regardless of the evidence. I think it's safe to say that an atheist can indeed have a pro-historical-Jesus bias. After all, depending on your theology, a real Jesus doesn't necessitate a real God. So Ehrman might well have a real-Jesus bias, and his being an atheist does not preclude his having such a bias.

There's plenty more I can say about Ehrman's article, but I will save that for later in the discussion.

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Re: Re:

Post #101

Post by Bust Nak »

The Nice Centurion wrote: Fri Aug 05, 2022 9:33 am Bart Errorman, here once again falsely referred to as Bart Ehrman...
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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #102

Post by neverknewyou »

[Replying to Jagella in post #1]

Ehrman, an atheist that believes the Son of God is an historical figure. Really?

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #103

Post by The Nice Centurion »

neverknewyou wrote: Fri Aug 05, 2022 10:21 pm [Replying to Jagella in post #1]

Ehrman, an atheist that believes the Son of God is an historical figure. Really?
An agnostic that believes in a historical Jesus!

But the way he goes for it to prove that is more than questionable.
He was called out by Carrier and other peers for giving false evidence misinfomating the public.
Reacted only with either Arrogance or not at all, proving that the lies are intended.

The bad thing about it is that the broad public still doesnt want to know that or simply is easy hoaxed on.
And people who "want" a historical Jesus do want to know about the lies in "Did Jesus Exist?" even less.
https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/1794

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #104

Post by neverknewyou »

[Replying to The Nice Centurion in post #103]

He claims to be agnostic about something, he certainly isn't agnostic when it comes to historical Jesus. Either that or he simply knows which side his bread is buttered on.

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #105

Post by The Nice Centurion »

neverknewyou wrote: Sat Aug 06, 2022 1:22 am [Replying to The Nice Centurion in post #103]

He claims to be agnostic about something, he certainly isn't agnostic when it comes to historical Jesus. Either that or he simply knows which side his bread is buttered on.
And he knows how to get hold of his tasty bread also!

All his short storys on his Website are behind Paywall!

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #106

Post by TRANSPONDER »

:D I was going to stay out of this one, but I thought I'd comment with a couple of things that occurred to me, and really say more about me that about Ermann, Carrier or any other commentator.

Objectivity is not impossible. The idea of whating to know (as credibly as possible) the truth, never mind whether it is what one likes or not, is a real thing. That said, it isn't easy to eliminate bias. But then, some implicit bias is valid, such as the bias towards a natural explanation. Because that is the way things work, the physical processes that science has shown and is the basis of the materialist default, which is logically valid, no matter how much the believers in the supernatural might prefer to pretend that supernatural explanations (never mind their own preferred supernatural explanation, dismissing all the others out of hand) are equally valid.

We've all seen it:- 'Agree to differ', 'My opinion is as valid as yours' and similar ploys to allow the Believer to escape with their Faith intact.

Sorry - not wishing to be impolite, but Bias is inbuilt in the Faithbased apologetics, and the scientific/Materialist basis is valid and proven and is the logical default putting the burden of proof on the claimant. Which is why atheism (as it is and not the strawman definition of Theism) is logically valid and the default of 'agnosticism').

This is intended to explain the sort of bias that is justified whereas faithbased bias is not.

So, Bart Ehrmann, and indeed Richard Carrier. I have read little of the views of either. I am rather going my own way and I might be surprised. But really, I reckon if there was any apologetic to make me sit up and rethink - on either side, I've have heard it by now.

So I won't rehash my own Pet Theory but will just touch on the case for and against an historical Jesus.

First off, an Historical Jesus doesn't have to be Gospel Jesus. If..if there was a real Jesus as the basis of the gospel figure, The Christian Jesus is not who it was. It has to be (going by the evidence under the cover -up) a Pharisee - zealot failed messiah and good reason for all the cancel culture the early Christian writers engaged in. And that's my story and I ain't changing it for nobody :P )

On the not real and totally mythical side, there is a total lack of historical validation. Philo is totally silent. An (evident) spurious potted bio. of Jesus had to be written into Josephus as he originally said nothing. Tacitus is the ONLY extra - Biblical writer whom I trust did mention Jesus, but the fact that he said that Pilate was a Procurator rather than Prefect shows that he is commenting on the claims of the Christians rather than historical sources he could trust.

So Carrier or Ehrmann, I tend to credit a real Jesus too, but not one that Christians liked, so they changed what they could - but couldn't change that he was not born in Bethlehem but in Galilee, nor that he wasn't killed by the Sanhedrin but by the Romans. But what they could do was write some crummy excuses to wangle Jesus into Bethlehem and blame the Jews for forcing Rome to kill Jesus. And nobody ain't going to change my views on that either.

Bias? Nope - evidence. 'What would make you change your mind?' they say. It is too late. Water under the bridge. Just as no evidence is likely to pop up proving that the earth is flat and the sun revolves around it, I see no evidence that will validate Genesis (1) make the sun stand still or make OT god credible or indeed make the flawed and incredible or Uncredible Gospels or Acts believable. There is no point in this question any more.

So my bottom line - you can opt for your own bottoms - is that real Jesus or Mythological Jesus, is irrelevant and whichever, the Gospel Jesus is not a credible one. And that I assert is quite apart from Bias, justified or not. It is based on the evidence, not preference. And I don't doubt that other commentators can do it as well, even if they do have books to sell.

Apologies (well, slightly ;) ) for the long post, thank you for your patience, hit the like button or subscribe. And consider leaving a tip in the jar beside the like button.

(1) I have to recall the debate with otseng than with whom no better case for the Flood has been made in my recollection, but it wasn't good enough even to make the case for the selected points (ignoring for instance fossil sequences) and using the limited table top hydroplate model that (as seen in a later exchange with another poster) does not work when applied ocean - size to a round earth.

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #107

Post by neverknewyou »

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #106]

The earliest Christians, the epistle writers, worshipped a Christ figure that had never been on earth before but were promised by the likes of Paul that he would come soon.

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #108

Post by TRANSPONDER »

neverknewyou wrote: Sat Aug 06, 2022 11:02 am [Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #106]

The earliest Christians, the epistle writers, worshipped a Christ figure that had never been on earth before but were promised by the likes of Paul that he would come soon.
I sorta get that. I reckon that Paul (having got the basics of the resurrection -belief from the disciples) developed his own idea that in fact spilled over into the gospels, though they hardly understood it when presented in the current form. It goes like this:

Adam disobeyed and brought sin into the world. This meant sin - death (whatever that is taken to mean). In order to break through that imposed law of sin -death (the Mosaic law wouldn't do it, Paul says) this spirit of Adam inhabited Jesus and was the 'saving' Messiah that by sacrifice of himself, or rather the human the spirit occupied, the spirit going back to heaven, would allow people to escape sin -death. I think this explain why Jesus is called 'Son of man'. It means son of Adam. I suspect that this Messianic Adam - spirit was also the one that (supposedly) inhabited David the king, so this Jesus also became Son of David, though this is arguable as Paul seems to think that Jesus was born into the house of David.

Now, much of this is carried over into the Gospels which is where we get the question about David's son, which is not explained as I'm not sure the writers really understood it. The idea is that David says that the Lord (God) said to David's Lord (the messianic spirit) sit at my right hand. So how can the messiah be David's son? The answer is that the messiah is incarnated into the body of a human descended from David.

That's how I see it, anyway.

But you may have a point in suggesting that the early Christian writers had forgotten the messianic spirit and had thought that it was the spirit of God that descended on Jesus at the baptism (aside that Matthew and Luke tried to say that Jesus was born divine) and thus - as you say - the worshipped a Christ (Holy Spirit) that had never been incarnated before. But I think that was a Greek Gentile Christian idea moved on from the Man-Messiah of Paul and (thus) of the disciples.

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #109

Post by neverknewyou »

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #108]

Paul did not get the resurrection belief from the disciples. There were no disciples of Jesus in Paul's time. The Jerusalem groups experience of a risen Christ was the same as Paul's and they were all waiting for Christ to come to earth for the first time. The Jerusalem group worshipped a heavenly mythical Christ just as Paul and the other epistle writers did. The dispute between Paul and the Jerusalem group was over preaching to the gentiles, the Jerusalem group wanted to preach exclusively within the Jewish community.

The concept of an earthly Jesus and disciples came later from Mark writing in 70 CE or so. According to Paul, Peter was ordained by God to be an apostle just as Paul claimed for himself, there is no Jesus in all of this. We can't continue to read Marks gospel into the epistle writings.

Perhaps you are conflating disciples with apostles, they are not the same.

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Re: Bart Ehrman defends belief in a historical Jesus.

Post #110

Post by AquinasForGod »

[Replying to Jagella in post #1]

If anything, he is biased against Jesus.

What is interesting is every historian that holds a position at university believes Jesus existed and was crucified. Ther are only a few that think Jesus is a myth, but even in that myth he was crucified. Also, they don't hold positions.

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