Sunday School FEB 7, 2010

Comment by Reggie on February 7, 2010 at 5:52pm

Holy crap, Nelson. You gave me enough links to occupy myself for a week.

Comment by Nelson on February 7, 2010 at 5:57pm

lol. exactly Reg! to occupy you until next Sunday when the next edition of Sunday School is posted. :D
let me know which is your favorite thing you read from among the links!

Comment by Gary Bergeron on February 7, 2010 at 7:34pm

Wow! The IST streaming feed is awesome!
Nelson, between Sunday School and Johnny's Sunday Service, my bookmark drop-down groans whenever I open it. LOL
Thanks for the this week's lesson and looking forward for next Sunday!
By the way, i do hope something is done in Turkey to stop people from burying their children alive...sheesh, that so awful!

Comment by Reggie on February 7, 2010 at 7:37pm

Will do, Nelson. This will help keep me busy in the hotel rooms I will be regulated to over the next couple of weeks.

Comment by Wonderist on February 8, 2010 at 1:40am

"James McGrath explains the basic misunderstanding that Jesus-mythicists have of the historian's endeavor. "

I'm curious as to why this post from a committed Christian scholar is linked so uncritically in an atheist bulletin. Especially when it's clear that several Jesus-mythicists *are* historians, namely Robert M. Price, Richard Carrier, Thomas L. Thompson, R. Joseph Hoffmann, and others. McGrath's blog amounts to little more than a straw man version of the mythicist position. Here's a brief overview of Jesus mythicism including many good links to more detailed articles/sources.

Comment by Nelson on February 8, 2010 at 3:09am

first of all Wonderist, Richard Carrier is not a mythicist. he has expressed some doubt about historicity but has never to my knowledge identified himself as being among the ahistoricists. in 2002 he was critical of Earl Doherty's arguments in Doherty's book The Jesus Puzzle. in Carrier's 2005 work Sense and Goodness Without God he never once invokes Jesus as myth even when, if he were a mythicist, it would have been reasonable to expect him to do so. once again, never does Carrier invoke Jesus as myth in any of his three articles appearing in The Empty Tomb, Bob Price and Jeffrey Jay Lowder eds., a book published in 2005. finally, in his 2009 book Not The Impossible Faith, he also never invokes Jesus as myth in his numerous refutations of J.P. Holding's book The Impossible Faith. to be clear, because those books aren't on Jesus historicity, i'm not saying that he doesn't come out and say that he is a mythicist, i'm saying that when he discusses Jesus he discusses him as if he believes there to have existed a historical person Jesus. if Carrier is a mythicist he seems content to keep it a secret from everyone. if you've seen him in print say that he's a mythicist i'd be interested to see a citation.

second, McGrath clearly didn't aim to encapsulate the mythicist position with his post and as such there is no straw-man. he was addressing a single often-made comment on the part of mythicists. do you deny that such a comment is a common one? do you deny that what McGrath says about the error inherent in the comment is true? in rejecting outright what McGrath says simply because he may be a Christian, you are guilty of the genetic fallacy. it is the value of what a person says and not who says it that is key. accordingly, who cares if he's a committed Christian or not? moreover, that some Jesus mythicists are historians themselves doesn't automatically rule out their misunderstanding the historical endeavor nor make them necessarily innocent of poor thinking on a given subject.

the fact of the matter is that the Jesus mythicists are a tiny minority- indeed, your list, excepting Carrier, represents pretty much all of them!- while almost every serious historian and scholar is convinced by the evidence that Jesus did exist. this is the scholarly consensus and as such it isn't enough to say that so-and-so is a Christian and so therefore their opinion doesn't count. and nor is it valid, and this was McGrath's point, to engage in special pleading when demanding abstract theoretical proof that Jesus existed prior to discussing what historical-critical methodology can tell us about what he said and did when it is the evidence of what he said and did that leads us to the conclusion that the man Jesus existed. this is the nature of the historical endeavor as applied to any historical personage.

as for your contention that i presented the link uncritically, the Sunday School series is rather more a way to get the links in the hands of the community. while i may occasionally make critical statements or express my opinion in brief on the contents of a link, this isn't the place for long discussions on the relative merits of the contents of a link. more often than not someone has already posted a thread on the subject of the link generally (sometimes even specifically) and i urge you to use the search function and add your thoughts to any of those discussions. failing that, you're of course welcome to post a thread yourself. just recently there took place a discussion on the historicity of Jesus in Gregory's group A Skeptic's Guide To History. you can find that thread here (you'll have to join the group to post to the thread).

Comment by Shine on February 8, 2010 at 7:53am

Yay, another great schoolday!

Comment by Wonderist on February 8, 2010 at 8:52pm

"i'm not saying that he doesn't come out and say that he is a mythicist, i'm saying that when he discusses Jesus he discusses him as if he believes there to have existed a historical person Jesus. if Carrier is a mythicist he seems content to keep it a secret from everyone. if you've seen him in print say that he's a mythicist i'd be interested to see a citation."

Actually, you're right, he doesn't come out and say it publicly, and he does not claim to be able to prove it. He is cautious on this point. He is working on a book, On the Historicity of Jesus Christ, which will take a methodological approach, and in that book he will make an argument (not proof) 'for' one particular side. (Insiders know which side; I do not.) I only mentioned him because he is a historian that takes the mythicist position seriously and does not discredit it, but presents it fairly and as a live option. You'll note in his analysis of Doherty, that in the end he supports Doherty's argument as stronger than the standard historical theory (though he does not fully agree with Doherty's argument; presumably he will state his full position in his upcoming book). I was wrong to lump him in with the mythicists. I should have instead said that there are many historians who are at least supportive of the mythicist argument as a live option, which is what I actually meant. My bad. The point being, McGrath's blog is still a straw man argument.

"second, McGrath clearly didn't aim to encapsulate the mythicist position with his post and as such there is no straw-man."

Here are the straw men I speak of, quoted from his blog. He paints mythicists with one broad brush:

I've long been perplexed by the frequent complaint from mythicists (i.e. those who claim that Jesus was a purely invented figure, not even based on a real historical human individual) that those working on the historical Jesus simply assume as a presupposition that Jesus existed, rather than addressing the question directly.

The blog he links to does not even make the 'complaint' that he refers to. The 'complaint' itself is a straw man; not all mythicists are so simplistic, and he makes no distinction (it's not 'from some/many mythicists' but simply 'from mythicists', and he goes on to define 'those who' he's referring to). The blog author he links to is not even a Jesus mythicist, but a biblical studies hobbyist, who does not even claim to be a mythicist:

Correct. I certainly don’t pretend to think that raising questions about this or that detail amounts to a positive case. This is hardly the place for that, and I don’t think I have ever attempted at any time to present “a positive case” for a mythical Jesus. My interest is in exploring and trying to make sense of the evidence as we have it, and I can do no more than point out places where it seems it imply a mythical or allegorical entity of some sort. I don’t pretend that is a solid case at all.

He uses the mythicist position as if it is dichotomous with historians:

And so I will state once again what is obvious to historians and New Testament scholars but apparently unclear to some who are not entirely familiar with how historical investigation works.

He states his opinion of a probability as if it were a fact ignored by mythicists. Clearly, any mythicist would disagree with his claim here (if they didn't, they wouldn't be mythicists):

And even in the case of the most plausible mythicist scenario ... we never get a scenario that is more probable than one that regards there as having been a real historical figure Jesus

He states that mythicists never provide any positive argument. McGrath has been called on this claim before, and yet here he is repeating this falsehood. (The overview link I gave earlier links to several positive arguments.):

not that they ever take the time to make a positive case for how the myth was invented and how it came to be misunderstood so quickly as being about a historical figure

These characterizations do not fit with what I've read of mythicist arguments from serious, modern historians. Hence my claim it's a straw man.

"do you deny that such a comment is a common one? do you deny that what McGrath says about the error inherent in the comment is true?"

I deny that he presents the mythicist side fairly and honestly, in this case in particular. I've also seen him several times make such straw men as this blog also does, so it seems to follow a pattern. In any case, my concern is not with McGrath (who's free to hold whatever position he chooses), but with the inclusion in an atheist-related bulletin of a link which appeared to endorse his position wholeheartedly, without considering its bias.

"in rejecting outright what McGrath says simply because he may be a Christian, you are guilty of the genetic fallacy."

Did I reject outright what McGrath says? No. Did I reject anything he said for the reason that he's a Christian? No. I reject *some* of what he says; actually, more so the way he says it. And I reject it because it seems clearly to misrepresent the mythicist arguments/analysis of real historians. My point about him being a committed Christian is that this would be a likely explanation for his apparent bias. So, you are also guilty of a straw man fallacy, it seems. Again, I'm not even concerned with McGrath's position, but with the way it was included in this bulletin (that it was being taken at face value).

I pointed out McGrath being a committed Christian not as an attack on him, but to identify why I thought the linking to him was uncritical. Namely, you appeared to buy into his blog post as if he were an unbiased commentator. He's not unbiased. He's a committed Christian. That doesn't mean I reject everything he says. It means we should take what he says with a grain of salt, especially if other people following the link don't realize his position, since you didn't mention it when you linked to him. Here's the context, again, of how you presented his blog:

"James McGrath explains the basic misunderstanding that Jesus-mythicists have of the historian's endeavor."

Certainly seems at first glance to me to say that you agree with him that a) all Jesus mythicists have a basic misunderstanding of the study of history, and b) there are no reputable historians who are also Jesus mythicists. Others who read this for the first time will draw similar conclusions, with no hint that there's a valid reason to be skeptical of his characterizations of mythicists.

"accordingly, who cares if he's a committed Christian or not?"

Seems obvious to me. There are legitimate reasons to cast doubt on a person's claims such as 'conflict of interest', for example. This does not mean to reject them outright, but even historians must be aware of an ancient author's bias and take note of where that bias influences the written text. Why should we act any differently when considering a contemporary author's likely biases? Besides, I'm not merely speculating on the bias. It's clear from reading his blog and comparing that to what Jesus-mythicist historians actually say (which is why I provided that summary with dozens of links/references). It shouldn't come as a surprise that people, even scholars such as McGrath, have biases. We all do, myself included, of course. IMO, part of critical thinking is to constantly double-check our own biases and the biases of the experts we cite as authoritative/trustworthy/etc. I don't think this is some sinister position to take.

"moreover, that some Jesus mythicists are historians themselves doesn't automatically rule out their misunderstanding the historical endeavor nor make them necessarily innocent of poor thinking on a given subject."

Unfortunately, his straw man does not support his position that that is the case. And again, I'm not concerned about McGrath per se, but about the presentation of the link.

"the fact of the matter is that the Jesus mythicists are a tiny minority"

I hardly see that as supporting the argument that they are actually wrong and that Jesus-historicists are actually right. Self-identified atheists are a tiny minority too.

"it isn't enough to say that so-and-so is a Christian and so therefore their opinion doesn't count"

Good thing I didn't say that then.

"nor is it valid, and this was McGrath's point, to engage in special pleading when demanding abstract theoretical proof that Jesus existed prior to discussing what historical-critical methodology can tell us about what he said and did when it is the evidence of what he said and did that leads us to the conclusion that the man Jesus existed."

That is the main straw man I'm talking about. The sources I've read do not make that kind of special pleading argument. Nevertheless, the claim McGrath (and now also you) is apparently making is that this is a basic, frequent complaint of all Jesus mythicists (and the text surrounding your link increased that appearance). That isn't the case, in my experience. Hence my claim it's a straw man. Again, my point is that it appears to me that you're just taking his word for it, or perhaps you've read some of the sillier claims of some mythicists (like Acharya S, Zeitgeist, etc.) and found it corroborated, but it's not actually a fair or honest characterization of the more serious arguments from historians who are mythicists. Having taken his position uncritically (IMO), you endorsed it with that link. That's what I was posting about. I'm trying to provide other readers (and possibly yourself) with information to the contrary of McGrath's characterization.

"this isn't the place for long discussions on the relative merits of the contents of a link"

First, my first post was only a paragraph long and included a single link. I wasn't intending a long discussion either, just to point people out the other side of the story. However, since you responded as you did, accusing me of genetic fallacy etc., I feel obliged to set the record straight. I don't intend to prolong this.

Second, when I see something that strikes me as odd as that link did, especially when it concerns a topic I consider important to critical/free thought, I'm probably going to make a reply if I can, and I don't feel it's inappropriate to do so. In fact, I would say that such critique is necessary and unfortunately lacking too often in our culture. My stance is that of unapologetic atheism: There's nothing wrong with voicing criticism, especially regarding religion-related topics such as this.

Comment by Wonderist on February 8, 2010 at 8:54pm

Sorry for the length of that. It didn't seem that long when I typed it. Again, I felt obliged to set the record straight.

Comment by Nelson on February 9, 2010 at 2:48am

i didn't tell you that you couldn't respond. i simply asked you respectfully not to do it here since this is not the place. hence my offering the link to a recent discussion on historicity.
but instead you ignored my request and posted here.
...sigh.

now, instead of discussing this in a place where others can read it after searching for discussions on Jesus historicity we're doing it here in a totally unrelated blog post. all the more problematic seeing as how the forums are a far easier venue when it comes to following discussions.

1. McGrath linked to Godfrey's post which includes this quote from Thompson: "Twentieth-century scholarship, with its faith in history, assumed a historical Jesus as its starting point.... But they always assumed there was a historical Jesus to describe." how are we to take Godfrey's use of this quote if not that Godfrey accepts Thompson's assertion as valid? contrary to your assertion that the post McGrath linked to does not even include the "complaint" McGrath refers to, there it is right there in Godfrey's quotation of Thompson. furthermore, the "complaint" appears yet again in the comments to the original post wherein Godfrey, in responding to McGrath's comments, says, in his own words this time, "Where is there any historicist analysis of the evidence to argue for the fact of the historical Jesus? Historical Jesus studies all assume there is an historical Jesus to uncover or explain."
and so, one need only read the post McGrath linked to to see that the "complaint" is resorted to, not once, but twice. once in Thompson's words and once in Godfrey's own words.
accordingly, your objection that McGrath was framing all mythicists as simplistic simply doesn't hold water. his post was prompted by Godfrey's invocation of the very "complaint" McGrath wrote to rebut. moreover, as to your objection that McGrath was generalizing, i simply don't think that an unbiased observer would read McGrath's opening line, "I've long been perplexed by the frequent complaint from mythicists," as meaning that McGrath was saying that all mythicists invoke this "complaint". he's simply saying that the "complaint" is frequently used by mythicists. my experience in reading mythicists and discussing the matter with them leaves me unable to think that anyone who has read the mythicists and discussed the matter with them would deny that this is true.
now, Godfrey may not self-identify as a mythicist but if you follow his blog, and i do, you'd see that he discusses mythicism seemingly every third post! a simple search of his blog for the keyword "myth" results in numerous results relating to Jesus as myth. strictly speaking, if Godfrey does not self-identify then, yes, by calling him a mythicist McGrath is mislabeling Godfrey's position. but, c'mon, under the "if it quacks like a duck" rubric, and Godfrey most certainly does quack like a duck when it comes to mythicism, McGrath's having labeled Godfrey a mythicist is not absolutely unreasonable.

2. "He uses the mythicist position as if it is dichotomous with historians"
does he indeed? you certainly won't deny that nearly every ancient historian and New Testament scholar finds the evidence that Jesus existed to be convincing, would you? it seems to me that McGrath was most likely using a simple rhetorical device- exaggerating in order to make a point- to make a comparison pointing up the extreme difference in numbers between the overwhelming majority of historians and NT scholars who are convinced by the evidence and the bare handful of those who are not.
and yet even allowing for the rhetorical comparison it's important to consider the next two sentences after the one you quoted: "Historians are confident Jesus existed, first and foremost, because we have sayings attributed to him and stories about him that are more likely authentic than inauthentic. We have enough such material to place the matter beyond reasonable doubt in the minds of most experts in the field." it's clear in these next two sentences that he's most certainly not saying that all historians and NT scholars are convinced by the evidence because he says MOST experts in the field! so even if he was mistakenly speaking literally by suggesting that all historians accept the evidence he corrects himself in the very next sentences!

3. this quote was taken from the parentheses that were filled in by the ellipsis in the quote you used in your point i responded to in 2). but it is best understood in the context of the larger quote: "even in the case of the most plausible mythicist scenario (not that they ever take the time to make a positive case for how the myth was invented and how it came to be misunderstood so quickly as being about a historical figure) we never get a scenario that is more probable than one that regards there as having been a real historical figure Jesus."
again, it's not as if this is one person's opinion, McGrath's, against a majority or approximately half and half of historians and scholars who are convinced and not convinced. we're talking about an overwhelming majority who are convinced that the probability that he existed is beyond serious doubt. it is therefore not enough for the mythicist to simply come up with alternative scenarios by which the Jesus tradition began and developed. they need to come up with a more probable scenario than the currently consensus scenario that he did exist as an historical person. such a mythicist scenario would also need to address why the historicist scenario appears more probable and parsimonious, prima facie. when historicists accuse mythicists of having failed to present a positive argument it is this failure that they refer to. after all, c'mon, you don't really think that every historicist that's ever made this accusation has never read Doherty, Price, Wells, Thompson, etc. do you? or do you think they've read them and have just absentmindedly forgotten the arguments they present? or do you think they've read them, remember the arguments, and are out and out lying? it's just that the mythicists' "positive arguments" are merely plausible alternative scenarios that fail to make a case for why their scenario is more probable than the historicists' while failing to explain why the historicists' scenario appears initially more probable and parsimonious. McGrath and other historians and NT scholars have been accused of having been "called on this before" but the mythicists continue to understand "positive argument" to mean, apparently, "plausible alternative scenario." and this is where the validity of a comparison with ID believers come in. Intelligent Designers also propose a superficially plausible alternative scenario but they do not offer a more probable scenario and nor do they offer any reason why darwinian evolution only appears more probable and parsimonious.
and lest i be accused of making an argument from authority let's be clear that i'm talking about the evidence that has convinced the majority. i'm not suggesting that simply because the majority of experts is convinced that so therefore should we be convinced. it is the evidence that is convincing not merely the number of scholars who are convinced.

4. "These characterizations do not fit with what I've read of mythicist arguments from serious, modern historians. Hence my claim it's a straw man."
please point to a mythicist historian of any time period who has produced the kind of scenario i describe above. maybe we should back up and define our terms. if your definition of a "positive argument" is merely a plausible alternative to the overwhelmingly held consensus then i certainly agree that several mythicist authors have produced such a scenario.
"I deny that he presents the mythicist side fairly and honestly, in this case in particular."
it's a blog post not a book length refutation, point by point, of the mythicist literature. he was simply addressing the commonly used objection that Jesus must be theoretically proved to have existed in the abstract before evidence of what he said and did can be used to establish his historicity.
whether or not McGrath has ever argued against a strawman, i can not say. i can't recall seeing him do so in print but that certainly doesn't mean he's never done so.

5. "Did I reject outright what McGrath says? No. Did I reject anything he said for the reason that he's a Christian? No."
you said in your first post here: "I'm curious as to why this post from a committed Christian scholar is linked so uncritically." you certainly appeared to be saying that just because McGrath is a Christian his post shouldn't be linked uncritically. if this is not a commission of the genetic fallacy it's as near as makes no difference.
you accuse McGrath of bias but it is not reasonable or logical to automatically accuse someone of bias simply because you disagree with them. you must address the evidence. this accusation is a red herring. if everyone who disagrees with the mythicists is biased then the evidence doesn't matter. the discussion is over before it begins. moreover, bias doesn't explain the overwhelming majority of atheist and agnostic historians and NT scholars who are convinced by the evidence (Burton Mack and Bart Ehrman respectively for instance). nor does it explain the numbers of Christian historical Jesus scholars who freely admit that they have faith in a theological Jesus while researching a historical Jesus and whose historical findings clash with their theological beliefs (J.D. Crossan, John Meier, or Dale Allison). if bias were truly at work with this last group we would find them defending the historicity of the theological Jesus of their faith as opposed to the historicity of the Galilean Jewish peasant. after all, it does no good to suggest that they are biased on historicity while apparently being perfectly fine with producing scholarship that completely refutes the Jesus of their faith as depicted in the gospels.
all that aside, if your problem is merely with the way i linked to McGrath's post, i've already explained that. i'm only too happy to explain again, expanding on my earlier explanation. i post the links here to inform and entertain. though i sometimes give a sentence in comment upon posting the link, and even more often, the gist of my opinion of the content of the link is, i imagine, often clear to the reader, my intention is never to comment on the content of a link. Sunday School is about recapping the week of interesting posts from around the internet. first of all, even if i wanted to give my opinion on the content of every link, the sheer number of links mean that these posts would run huge if i were to comment on each and every one. second, my comments are, again, simply not what Sunday School is about.

6. "I pointed out McGrath being a committed Christian not as an attack on him, but to identify why I thought the linking to him was uncritical."
so you'd have wanted me to post the link with a note saying "watch out, he's a Christian!"?
LOL. that's another fallacy: poisoning the well!
again, it is simply not reasonable to accuse someone of bias simply because they are a Christian. without a doubt everyone has some motivation to be biased. what matters is whether or not an individual is biased in practice, that they are abusing, or simply not applying, historical-critical methodology due to their bias. there is no evidence i'm aware of that McGrath has done so. i do not accept everything the man says uncritically and i will not but neither will i assume that he is biased in each and every instance simply because he may have some motivation to be so. it goes without saying that i would attack him, were he to do this, if he were to accuse you of being a mythicist simply by virtue of your being biased as an atheist. the irony of you accusing me of linking to McGrath uncritically on the alleged assumption that i was assuming that McGrath is unbiased while you yourself are apparently assuming that McGrath is necessarily biased due to his Christianity is not lost on me.

7. "Certainly seems at first glance to me to say that you agree with him that a) all Jesus mythicists have a basic misunderstanding of the study of history, and b) there are no reputable historians who are also Jesus mythicists. Others who read this for the first time will draw similar conclusions, with no hint that there's a valid reason to be skeptical of his characterizations of mythicists."
first, it depends on what you mean by "at first glance." if you mean upon reading the single sentence i wrote when linking to the post i think that's patently absurd. you can no more draw firm conclusions about my opinion on the matter by my single sentence, "James McGrath explains the basic misunderstanding that Jesus-mythicists have of the historian's endeavor.", than if i had simply posted a raw URL.
now, if you mean by "at a glance" my subsequent posts here then certainly i agree that it will be clear to all that my opinion is that many if not most mythicists have a basic misunderstanding of the historian's endeavor. this has been my experience without question. but no, i absolutely don't think all historians have that misunderstanding. Bob Price i believe understands the historian's endeavor quite well. it is this understanding that leads his writing on the subject to be much more nuanced; he tends to describe probabilities, possibilities, and plausibilities as opposed to making statements of fact. it is, furthermore, absurd to to take my statements here as indicating a belief on my part that no reputable historians are mythicists. frankly, this description of my statements here borders on simple dishonesty since i've said repeatedly that it is a majority of historians and NT scholars who accept the evidence, not that there are absolutely no historians who do not.
as for others reading McGrath's post and coming away thinking that there's no reason to be skeptical. first of all, once again, the vast majority of historians and scholars DOES think that there's no reason to be skeptical. second, someone who reads something on a internet blog post and accepts what it says without thought and without examination of the evidence underlying the author's statements isn't going to be helped by my refusing to link to the post or by my "watch out, he's a Christian!" warning. and then again there's the fact that Sunday School isn't as much about commentary as it is about the weekly recap from around the internet. there are hundreds of discussions on any number of topics around the community, to say nothing of the rest of the internet.

8. "There are legitimate reasons to cast doubt on a person's claims such as 'conflict of interest', for example. This does not mean to reject them outright, but even historians must be aware of an ancient author's bias and take note of where that bias influences the written text. Why should we act any differently when considering a contemporary author's likely biases?"
that a conflict of interest may exist is not enough to think that one's interest conflict in fact. unless you have reason to think that an individual has acted out of bias in the past then you are committing the genetic fallacy and/or poisoning the well. historians are of course careful to take into account the biases of ancient authors but these are biases in practice not biases merely suspected. but we would not be justified in refusing to admit an expert's writings into evidence simply because they may have a motive to be biased. such a possible motive must give us pause, to be sure, but if we can establish that the author is careful to keep his biases under the control of the methodology of their field of expertise then our continuing insistence on an assumption of bias is illogical.
you speak of legitimate reasons to be skeptical of McGrath's statements. what are they? you must establish a history of his having failed to keep his biases in check such that we are justified in finding his statements to be biased in fact.
and my same objections above apply again. if McGrath is biased then why do atheists and agnostics who do not share his bias agree with him? why, too, do Christian scholars so thoroughly dismantle the Jesus of orthodox Christianity in the process of historical-critical research? are they biased, just not when it comes to rendering the fundamental narratives of their religion without a foundation in history?

unapologetic atheism is fine. right up until it becomes denialism masquerading as skepticism.

sorry for the length of that... had to set the record straight. i'll urge you once again to go to this thread to continue the discussion. i'm very interested to hear which of the mythicists arguments you find so convincing, why you feel those arguments are more probable than the historicist position, and why it is that the historicist explanation seems more probable and parsimonious on its face. since the discussion in that thread is already well developed i'd urge you too to read through it before replying as it's a near certainty that some of what you may wish to address has already been addressed.

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