I have posted the introduction to what is going to be a glossary of the Dying-and-Rising Gods. It takes a serious look at the Talmud, the Toledot Yeshu, and the history of the Onias dynasty as legitimate sources for the construction of the historical Jesus.
Any comments for the article would be greatly appreciated.
The writing seems clear and easy to read. I think I am going to have a lot of questions though.
hello, gee you have a really fantastic website and i can only be grateful you have set it up. wondering … im researching serapis from 3oo bc and on your site you have a great article, the article ends with a magnificent sculpture of ” Antinous as Serapis ” . Do you have any information on where i may research that sculpture?
thanks anyway if you dont or if you do…. great work must have its own reward…
I’m about 40 percent with you and 60 percent against on this pro-mythicist piece: http://www.lost-history.com/against-the-mythicists.php
Few notes
1. Hoffmann, in a book about it, appears to take the Toledoth chronology, and other things, more seriously than the gospels. Of course, it was not too long after his thesis, Marcion, etc.
2. I don’t think Ehrman is as bad as you, or other mythicists, crack him up to be.
3. You TOTALLY lost me with the idea of Freud, Jung, Frazier and Campbell as “experts.” First, depth psychology in general is a crock of shit. Second, Freud stopped researching hysteria in women the moment he realized child sexual abuse was behind a fair chunk of it. Third, on Jung, you must read “The Aryan Christ” biography of him. The title says a fair chunk of it all right there. Fourth, Frazier, and myth-and-ritual comparative religion, have long been partially if not totally rejected. Fifth, Campbell not only came from myth-and-ritual, he was also a New Agey blissmeister.
Other pieces on your whole site, the 40 percent agree, 60 percent disagree would apply in general, with a note, speaking of science, that correlation does not mean causation, especially when the degree of correlation is being stretched.
It seems to me that Hoffmann used to be far more reasonable in the past but then he had a very bad experience with the Jesus Project that has made him very bitter towards mythicists. I have a sneaking suspicion that his current opinions are overly influenced by a personal grudge against Richard Carrier.
Ehrman as a whole may not be that bad, but his book “Did Jesus Exist?” is probably the worst attempt at historical Jesus scholarship I have ever read.
http://www.lost-history.com/ehrman1.php
I am not talking about depth psychology or hysteria in women and I don’t think they are relevant to the current discussion. I think the current hatred of Freud is really strange in the same way that I would find people hating on Newton for not understanding relativity strange. His book “Moses and Monotheism” is still one of my favorite reads.
I think “Frazier has been rejected” has become the line for people who do not want to read him. I’m sure you can find some errors but I have not seen anything like a complete refutation of his primary arguments.
I have read several Campbell books and have not run into any New Age bliss but plenty of archaeological evidence for Christian/pagan syncretism.
You mentioned those four people, the first two of which are the high priests of depth psychology, on the post I linked, so, you were talking about depth psychologists.
My comments were all part of showing how pseudoscientific they are. If you don’t want to accept that, it goes to your credibility.
And “follow your bliss” isn’t New Agey?
“My comments were all part of showing how pseudoscientific they are. If
you don’t want to accept that, it goes to your credibility.”
Genetic fallacy.
“Follow your bliss” comes from an interview with Bill Moyers and I’m not even sure it made it into the documentary. It maybe has a “New Agey” flavor but he fully admits its a “superstition”.
I welcome any criticisms about what is pseudoscientific about MY arguments but you failed to provide anything substantive. “Hoffman used to take the Toledot seriously” hardly points to that conclusion. “Ehrman is as bad as you” is completely uninformative, and then you go off on a completely unrelated topic. What am I supposed to take from that?
The lettering on the bowl pictured reads “DIA [CH]RESTOU”. It is a CHREST, not a “CHRIST”. Obviously, the writer COULD have written “CHRIST” if s/he had wanted to; there is an “I” clearly written in the “DIA” part at the beginning. I can’t understand why so many writers leave out the “E” – it’s RIGHT THERE and anyone can see it. The sheer dishonesty of deliberately excising one of the letters for the sake of making it appear that it *could* somehow be “CHRIST”, if we squint just right – why doesn’t that bother people more??
David never danced naked before YHWH.
1 Chronicles 15:25-28
(25) And it was David, and the elders of Israel, and the commanders of the thousands, who were going to bring up the ark of the covenant of YAHWEH from the house of Obed-Edom with joy.
(26) And it happened, as The Elohim helped the Levites carrying the ark of the covenant of YAHWEH, they sacrificed seven bulls and seven rams.
(27) And David was clothed with a robe of fine linen, and all the Levites that carried the ark, and the singers, and Chenaniah, the master of the song with the singers. David also had an ephod of linen on him.
(28) And all Israel was bringing up the ark of the covenant of YAHWEH with shouting, and with the sound of a horn, and with trumpets, and cymbals, sounding aloud with lyres and harps.
Hi Jeff,
I found your article well-informed and very well presented. I was wondering if you would give me permission to use some of your content from this article on my site? I would give proper credit, of course. If not, that’s fine as well.
Sure, go right ahead.