People say all sorts of things. In the colloquial sense saying ‘the law’ or ‘scientists’ can be dogmatic holds some weight.

Science and law both lay no claim to absolute truth, and both change and develop over time. Just because they stagnate doesn’t mean they are based on dogmatic principles. For example, the way ‘justice’ was dished out centuries ago is nothing like it is today, and science today is utterly different to what to was centuries ago too.

Religion is based on doctrines, from scriptures most of the time. The ‘truth’ of the scriptures is never held to be questionable yet the interpretation, due to the nature of language, is varied. This is mostly, as far as I can see, due to the institutions of religion rather than a true reflection of ‘being religious’. A religious person needn’t be dogmatic, but at the root the institutionalized doctrine of a religious organisation is heavy embedded in dogma - the writ, unquestionable truth.

Of course, this is just a brief overview. I don’t parcel off my views as being black and white. I think some views, be they religious, scientific or legal, are prone to stagnation and that cultural trends push and pull different views and categories of thought in different directions.

Science and law both lay no claim to absolute truth, — I like sushi

Well I know what you are saying, lol, but there are people in both fields who claim otherwise.

A religious person needn’t be dogmatic, but at the root the institutionalized doctrine of a religious organisation is heavy embedded in dogma - the writ, unquestionable truth. — I like sushi

That's VERT well said.

I think some views, be they religious, scientific or legal, are prone to stagnation — I like sushi

Ah. Well that's why I started talking in the first place. If you see my revisions on this chapter, one of four in my book now provisionally titled "THE NEWER TESTAMENT for RATIONAL HUMANS (fresh perspectives on the most powerful story ever told) contains a rather astonishing number of new thoughts, as far as I can determine after talking with people across many religions, churches, and other disciplines over the last few decades.

Given the way the current church has kind of walled itself in with dogma to its own continuing detriment, it seems to me well worth trying to expand the domain of people who can find comfort in the life and teachings of Jesus within a framework that does not conflict with the laws of science, while neither denying existing doctrinaires, nor atheism, as possibililties. My own interpretation finds a path through that mess based on St. Thomas, as now described in the second and third paragraph.

I have work to do moving that into its own context, within my book, and also on finishing the chapter 'from ALPHA TO OMEGA' which is now being reviewed by book publishers on linkedIn, and also on formatting my translation of the Gospel of Thomas, and last not but not least, updating my various fiction accounts.

So I really enjoy this discussion, but given the amount of actual writing work I have ahead of me already, I really need to constrain further discussion to adjustments of my revised post at the beginning of this thread, that is, to quotes and criticisms of it. I hope you will not find my limited time and abilities dissuade you from doing so, because we did get past a rather difficult hurdle in our dialog, and I would value your continued ctriticisms of my actual revised first post very much

I’m absolutely certain I’m not your target audience so it’s VERY difficult to offer decent constructive criticism.

What immediately sticks out is your personality. If that is what you want, great. If you wanted your work to sound more distanced then you have some heavy editing to do.

Again, I’ve said this previously to someone else - very recently. Generally speaking people read not to get to know who you are, and what you know/think. They read for their own purposes - be this entertainment, to explore and attach their views to what is written, or to merely absorb information (the later is where personally distanced scholarly work comes to the fore).

It appears, correct me if I’m wrong, that you’re aiming this work at Christians and/or people with a specific scholarly interest in the gospels. That isn’t me sadly, so my comments are flavoured by that fact.

Often enough it is better to get your general ideas down on paper before you then decide on who you are speaking to and what you would like them to get from your words - probably one of the most difficult and confusing things to sort out imo!

GL

As I did try to say, its all on linkedIn now while I look for a publisher, if you have no objections to my first post remaining.

Jesus is obviously a myth. Come on now.

(this is literally my answer).

What? Objections? I don’t understand.

lol, I just wrote a very detailed explanation that you didnt read. So obviously you dont know you cant believe that Aklexander the Great existed either. Among other people. Really I dont have much more time for this kind of silliness however amusing it is, sorry, its too childish.

It - doesn't - matter - how - detailed - your - explanation - is. It's bollocks. There is no man who resembles the Son of the creator and as I suggested before you don't even agree on a metaphor. Christ was written by a human and it's entirely stupid to have that sort of faith in Christ.

I don't care what this author seen. What are his credentials? If he says he was with Christ, it's on his head to provide evidence too, or, it's bollocks.

Some blue blood for testing would be nice, I mean, I'm losing actual faith in complete, boring religious style. Let's pray to God - or not - because as a civilization that has moved forward and lot's of us learned that's doing nothing.

You're holding us back (with specifically your hot headedness).

Do you deserve to get angry at me?
Do you deserve to have your writing, read?

Just get hot headed about it... That will work.

(you could come up now with near enough exactly the same frame of mind, free of God - why don't you? Look I'll show you. I believe I was created, and I have full faith in it and it's work. Did I say God? No.)

Im not angry at you. Youre just showing you dont care about the quality of historical evidence youre denying. I described it very carefully. Logically, you cannot believe Alexander the Great existed either. Why don't you start another thread to discuss that? It seems a far more fundamental problem you have there, lol

Sorry if I offended you, you stay believing in what you want.

Logically, you cannot believe Alexander the Great existed either. — ernestm

I don't think it's reasonable to maintain that the quality (or quantity) of historical evidence supporting the existence of Jesus is comparable to that supporting the existence of Alexander the Great. Quite the contrary.

There's a great deal of contemporary evidence of the existence of Alexander, from many different sources. He's mentioned in 1 Maccabees Chapter 1 for example. Those who accompanied him on his conquests, like Ptolemy, Callisthenes and Nearchus, wrote accounts of him. There are contemporary Babylonian accounts of him inscribed on clay tablets. There's an inscription memorializing his dedication of a temple to Athena. His name and figure appear in contemporary Egyptian hieroglyphics. Coins were minted while he was alive with his name and likeness.

There is no comparable evidence of Jesus.

There is no comparable evidence of Jesus. — Ciceronianus the White

That's true, but Paul wrote as if Jesus was a real person in the 50s AD, and he mentions meeting with Peter and James, Jesus's brother. Mythicists argue that Paul was referring to a divine being, not an earthly human, and that James was only Jesus's brother in the faith. But there was the Jurasalem sect who survived for centuries, known as the Ebionites. They considered Jesus to be a regular human being who was also chosen by God to be the Jewish messiah, and taught his followers to obey all of the Torah. And that is traced back to James and Peter.

We know from Paul's legitimate letters in the NT (seven of them), and the writer of Acts, that Paul had disputes with the Jurasalem Church over whether Gentile converts had to be circumcised and some other issues related to following the law.

Josephus also wrote about John the Baptist, and there's evidence from the Gospels that Jesus was probably a disciple of his at one point.

I think the existence of the Ebionites makes it harder to believe the mythicist account, where Jesus starts off as an archangel crucified in the firmament by demons, since it's pretty clear they didn't believe that. My guess is that there was a real Jesus of which a little bit can be known from Paul and the Gospels, but there was also Son of Man myth that he was combined with dating back to the Qumran writings, like the Book of Enoch. Or Paul imported Philo's Platonic teachings into his revealed gospel, since he didn't know Jesus while he was alive. Or a combination of all three and maybe more elements. Religion is syncretic and it evolves over time. There are usually different sects fighting over the true faith.

It's also important to note that the Ebionites considered Paul to be a first rank heretic.

What you are pointing to are all secondary or tertiary sources, and almost all compiled from documents thought to be written 300 years after Alexander died, personally I think he did exist, so please excuse me for not qualifying it. I am not going to put much time into proving that statement myself, but it is an interesting debate and I would encourage you to have it indepdently.

If you are to COMPARE the evidence for the two, it really is not unreasonable to postulate that the Macedonians ENTIRELY MADE HIM UP, based on some minor deity popular at the time, for much the same reasons the Christians would have made up that Jesus existed, except for political rather than religious power. He could have just been a God, I say, for the strength of the evidence we have.

I think it's likely there was a real person, Jesus, as well. We can add to the sources you note the brief mention made by Tacitus to someone like him; also Suetonius. But the evidence regarding the existence of Alexander is so extensive it simply makes no sense to me to maintain that there is no more reason to believe Alexander existed than there is to believe Jesus existed.

Hi folks, this contains the completion of the hermeneutic argument started in the first post, that the pre-Christian Romans and Greeks did not feel bad because they had taken personal responsibility for what they did wrong. It is within an explanation of the history of the gospel of St. Thomas. I would extract the portions specifically peritnent to the original hermeneutic argument and put it in the first post, but it has reached the maximum lenght supportd on this forum of ~5,000 words. I highlight the portions pertinent to our discussion in bold.

Why was the Thomas' Gospel lost, and how was it found?

When the Church Fathers first selected texts for the canonical version of the New Testament, they had hundreds of documents to consider, and ten times as many copies. The Old Testament scrolls were already enough to fill a truck. Each document they selected would have to be meticulously copied by hand many times, and re-transcribed after a few generations, because parchment started to decay after that long.

Among the documents they considered were a crate of shorter texts written in 'Coptic,' which is vaguely similar to Greek, but with a different alphabet. Coptic was mostly written in Egypt. By the time the first Christian Emperor, Constantine, hired historians and theologians to formalize the New Testament and the Nicene creed ca. 350 AD, Egypt had become part of Byzantium, with the capitol of Constantinople (now Istanbul). In Byzantium, bizarre combinations of Egyptian traditions and the new Christian ideas were rife, because the earliest and most powerful early church of the era was founded in Alexandria by the apostle St Mark, about 30 years after Christ's life.

Not many people could read Coptic elsewhere. It's possible none of the Church Fathers who lay the foundations of the canonical New Testament could read Coptic. Also, there were far more texts than they needed. And Greek was rather like English is today, whereas not many other people spoke Coptic outside Egypt anyway. So it's possible they just lumped the low lot together as not being usable and put them aside.

Moreover, it was already rather well known what OTHER weird things the Egyptians were already doing. As illustration, one of the Church Fathers who selected texts for the bible, Orizen, castrated himself so that he would not be distracted by sexual desire, and even that was relatively normal compared to some of the weird things happening in Egypt. I draw a polite curtain over other self mutilations converts were doing to themselves, to abase themselves and prove their admission of guilt before God.

To curb the castrations and other forms of self mutilation that were exploding all over the Roman territories, the Nicene Council decided to formulate an extremely precise, clearly bounded, and exclusive creed, which states that personal redemption only requires asking of forgiveness in prayers to Jesus to fulfill the Holy Covenant and guarantee eternal life. For that purpose, they felt the letters of St Paul, previously Saul the Slayer, were particularly important. Also, they decided to assure better transmission of historical records by maintaining four accounts of the life of Jesus separately, not conflating them into one account as everyone else did at the time. This left little space for much more than a few disciple letters and St. John the Divine's vision of the End of Days, which included also corrective messages to many churches.

Thus there are many reasons why the Gospel of Thomas was put aside, Even though it says nothing contrary to the Nicene creed, it does not add further to the message of personal redemption, as stated in the selected gospels and letters.. It was in Coptic. They might not even have been able to read Coptic. Coptic was from Egypt, and there was weird stuff going on there. They had to put emphasis on stopping the weird stuff, really, right away.

Not long after that, St. Augustine wrote his pivotal CITY OF GOD, which took the Nicene Creed one step further, denying even secular law should be honored over the need for personal redemption, and resulting in 1,200 years now infamously known as the Dark Ages. During the Dark Ages, Ecclesiastical authorities destroyed huge numbers of texts as heretical. Whether the destruction was to protect their own power, or to ensure absence of distraction from the need of personal redemption, remains a matter of opinion.

Whatever the case, the Coptic texts were almost entirely lost. There were fragments found of the Gosepl of St; Thomas in Oxyrhynchus. Then an amazing discovery in 1945 of 'the Nag Hammadi Library' in Egypt contained the complete Gospel of St. Thomas, thus surviving all the way through the Dark Ages and the upheavals of Church splits after the printing press was invented, to the current day.

Well, no. Ptolemy (who may have been his half-brother), Callisthenes and Nearchus were all there with him when Darius was defeated, Tyre besieged, Jerusalem entered, Egypt taken, Alexandria(s) founded, and so on. They didn't write their accounts 300 years later--there's no evidence they lived over 300 years. His generals, friends and relatives like Ptolemy and Seleucus, the Diadochi, ruled portions of his empire just after his death. Why would they pretend there was someone who led them in the conquest of the known world? Then they'd have to make up his father, Phillip, as well, whose conquest of Greece is well-attested to. Athens and Corinth revolted against Alexander's rule while he was alive. We may as well say Aristotle was made up while we're at it, since he was hired by Phillip as Alexander's teacher. The coinage, the dedication to Athena, the Egyptian hieroglyphics, the Babylonian tablets, have all been dated to around 330 BCE, when he lived.

What I have been told by others is that we don't have particular evidence that any of the texts said to be by Ptolemy are genuine either. All that does is extend the debate in a parallel way to the debate about the genuine nature of the synoptic gospels. I think it is a fruitless rabbit hole, personally, and as you already accept the existence of both of them, lol, not something worth spending our time on.

Instead, as you are obviously very knowledgeable of ancient history, please could you tell me of any texts you know about on the huge amount of self mutiliation that was going on before the Nicene council formalized the creed of personal redemption based only on asking for forgiveness from Jesus?

On self mutilation at the time, the easy topic to find references on is castration. But the other self mutilations are not so easy to find. I did find one rather extensive Egyptian document stated to be from the era, lauding self mutilation so much I felt nauseous reading it and didn't keep the link. Most other people have probably had the same reaction. Castration however has been a subject of fascination due to Castrati singers, the last of whom was still alive when I was born.

While there has been extensive debate with Christians finding the notion that a church father castrated himself repugnant, there really doesn't seem any reason why the assertions about it in classical literature could possible make something like that up, for much the same argument as about Alexander the Great.

The most commonly stated biblical justification is Matthew 19:12: "For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it." Origen himself points to a pre-Christian document, 1st century BC, praising the virtue of self castration, the Sentences of Sextus https://www.sbl-site.org/assets/pdfs/pubs/065501P.front.pdf . The practice of self castration was even older, traced back to a Phrygian cult worshipping Atys in the 4th Century BC. As in many other cases, those seeking to migrate more ancient religions into christianity as part of their spiritual journey simply pointed to the above Matthew verse and similar ones to justify it.

Beyond that on self mutilation in general, on quick search I immediately find the following, as I remember from earlier research. The biblical justification is Matthew 5:30 "And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell." (KJV).

In his Apology from the second century, Justin martyr tells how a young Christian in Alexandria petitioned the Roman prefect for permission to be castrated. Permission was denied, but Justin’s apologetical use and evident approval of the effort itself are striking. For much more, see “The Practice and Prohibition of Self-Castration in Early Christianity.” Vigiliae Christianae, vol. 51, no. 4, 1997. Caher remarks “Though evidence of castration is fairly scanty, sources from the fourth century indicate by then self castration had become a real problem in the nascent church.” Caher cites Basil, and specific rules against self castration in both the Nicaean Canons and Apostolic Consitutions.

Philo of Alexandria, in a lost work, allegedly asserted, “It is better to eunuchize yourself than to rage madly for unlawful sexual intercourse.” (Taylor, G. (2002). Castration: An Abbreviated History of Western Manhood. NY, New York: Routledge.) (https://apostleswarning.wordpress.com/tag/gnosticism/_ )

It appears, correct me if I’m wrong, that you’re aiming this work at Christians and/or people with a specific scholarly interest in the gospels. That isn’t me sadly, so my comments are flavoured by that fact. — I like sushi

So the discussion of the hermeneutic change, on absence of personal guilt for pre-Christian Romans and Christians, has reached my conclusion from it: the huge wave of new guilt resulted in so much castration, and other self mutilation, than the Nicene council had to write a creed defining personal redemption as only possible through asking forgiveness in prayer....

So to me, religious authority did result in an improvement, although of course, speculating on different historical outcomes from postulated changes in prior events, such as, what would have happened had the Nicene council done something different, can only ever be speculation.

Regardless, I TOTALLY UNDERSTAND you not wanting to continue discussion on motivation for religious authority in the church, lol. I don't even want to think too much about self mutilation either. You have a safe day there )

You know I thought about it, and frankly saying the first law of the Nicene canon prohibits castration really is enough.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Council_of_Nicaea#Promulgation_of_canon_law

Sorry to ask you to do such a horrid thing, lol.

I was going to suggest that what took place regarding self-mutilation took place at or around the same time as the Church began to abandon its glorification of martyrdom, and for much the same reason. To put it very simply, the Church had begun to take over the Roman state. As it did so, self-mutilation like seeking a martyr's death--like living on top of pillars and other extravagances--became something of a nuisance and embarrassment, and may have threatened the status quo. My guess would be this kind of extremism was discouraged more and more after the reign of Diocletian. It no longer served a purpose. From the time of Constantine, Christians became more concerned with oppressing pagans and other Christians.

Well, I am sad to hear you have so negative a view, but I do understand it has become very popular to be cynical of the history of the church, a favorite pastime of many, and quite a fad. It used to not be like that very much at all until the 1960s, so maybe its part of an ongoing correction that hasnt leveled out.

It seems to me, the single fact that the very first rule in the Nicene canon makes castration wrong is enough evidence that the council really did have a specoific reason to write the Nicene creed, at the time they did, with a specific goal to stop even more spread of the self mutilation. I dont see how castration could ever be a particular 'nuisance' to people in power, nor why it should be.

However, since the creed was formalized, it has been grossly abused by a large number of people as cynical as yourself but on the other side of the religious divide, which is frequently used to dismiss the entire idea of Jesus actually having anything valid to say too, because if people in power abused their power by whatever means they could, in this case the distortion of a divine message, then it means the divine message is also wrongfully labeled as evil.

Part of the problem I have personally with this problem is that I can't tell the difference between the people at each extreme, besides where both sides stand on their beliefs, the attitudes just seem to be exactly the same, except pointed in the other direction at each other. Both sides, and you too, use vast generalizations that lump everything and everybody into a religious or anti-religious weapon, to the complete exclusion of any other motivation that does not fall in line with a rigid, one-size-fits-all condemnation.

I think the Nicene council had very good reason to want to do something good, and tried to do good. Not everything they did was perfect, but one thing's for sure. They stopped the castration. Later on, various weird monks would masochize themselves as described with disgusted relish in William James 'variety of religous experience,' but I also do not generalize that to be the overall state of how Christians want to treat themselves, despite many times being told that real Christians are always masochists, I just dont find that to be true.

I think it's pretty well established that the (first) Council of Nicea was called by Constatine at the urging of a synod of bishops primarily in an effort to address, and condemn, the claims of Arius and his followers and establish a set of rules and doctrine to govern the Church. The Arian claims were renounced at the Council, and other points of doctrine approved (e.g. the date on which Easter was to be celebrated), and so there was formulated what's called the Nicean Creed, we we fortunate Catholics dutifully recited at mass, first in Latin (Credo in unum Deum, etc.) and then after Vatican II in the local language that applied. The renunciation of Arianism had the result that the Creed states that Jesus is begotten, not made, and is one in being (consubstantial) with the Father.

Nonetheless, Constantine's successor emperors Constantius and Valens were Arians, and Arianism thrived for a time, so other Councils were held at which other controversies were also addressed. It took some time for orthodoxy to be established and to a certain extent there remain in play controversies regarding, for example, the role and status of the Bishop of Rome.

I doubt very much that the Council of Nicea was held primarily to address self-mutilation or castration, certainly one of the less enchanting aspects of ecstatic Christianity and of the worship of Attis, consort of the Great Mother, and Dionysus, which preceded it.

Call me cynical if you like, but I think the Councils and the eventual establishment of an orthodoxy were to be expected as a religion which sought to regulate so extensively the lives and beliefs of all persons and forbid any contrary thought and conduct took hold of the apparatus of the Empire.

Call me cynical if you like, but I think the Councils and the eventual establishment of an orthodoxy were to be expected as a religion which sought to regulate so extensively the lives and beliefs of all persons and forbid any contrary thought and conduct took hold of the apparatus of the Empire. — Ciceronianus the White

Call me cynical, but the Nicene council had little to do with the power of religious authority. They were a minor set of clerks on the edge of things, not considered to be that important at the time. In fact, at the time, not even Constantie took them that seriously and continued to do his Sun God thing,

Call me cycnical, but I think it rather irrefutable the domination of thought and conduct arose from Augustine, not the Nicence council. As a side point, his Apologetics is the first major attack on Arianism. But far more importantly one can find the first major atttack on denial of secular law in Augustine;s City of God, which states secuar law (and therefore secular authority) is insignificant compared to the needs of personal salvation. That was siezed upon by those thirsting for power as a legitimate excuse to depose the Roman empire and place religious authority in its stead.

Nothing the Nicene council said directly challenged secular authority. the council only chalenged the divinity of secular authority, which was ignored by both the Romans AND the Christian church. Call me cynical, but the Byzantine empire and even the catholic church for large portions of its history, continued to claim divinity in the head of state--Just as the Egyptians did, for thousands of years previously. Their claim to Godhead for a human being totally ignored the creed's statement of there being only three Gods and one at the same time.

I think it's pretty well established that the (first) Council of Nicea was called by Constatine at the urging of a synod of bishops primarily in an effort to address, and condemn, the claims of Arius and his followers and establish a set of rules and doctrine to govern the Church. — Ciceronianus the White

And it is clear, given the above, that their primary concern, in establishing a set of rules. was to stop castration Instead the council mandated salvation as possible ONLY through personal prayer. That was the central point of the Nicene creed, and the first law in the Nicene canon. FIRST RULE. The first rule was not about authority or doctine on the number of Gods. The first ruel in the canon was to stop castration.

Nonetheless, Constantine's successor emperors Constantius and Valens were Arians, and Arianism thrived for a time, so other Councils were held at which other controversies were also addressed. — Ciceronianus the White

Because, whatever an academic thinks, the control of power deemed by most people as the only reason for religious authority was actually still not important to Christian academics, all of whom were at the time more concerned with the dismaying behavior of people abusing their bodies than with who should run the world how. They couldn't even really have an opinion on it. They were hired by Constantine.

I doubt very much that the Council of Nicea was held primarily to address self-mutilation or castration, certainly one of the less enchanting aspects of ecstatic Christianity and of the worship of Attis, consort of the Great Mother, and Dionysus, which preceded it. — Ciceronianus the White

A minor finge sect from Phrygia that had little to do with it. There are about a dozen vierses in the NT cited as supporting self mutiliation. My thesis, that the Romans had no prior experience of an emotion arising from taking personal responsibility for one's own faults, would be much more likely given the epicenter of the problem was Egypt, not Turkey. I would account that to [1] the dilution of the original message in Mark's gospel which was written there by conflation with new notions on the Holy Covenant from the Old Testament, which was previously rather unknown there due to political conflict between Egypt and Judaea, and [2] to some extent ideas from the Atis cult but not very much, as it had never been particularly dominant, and [3] Egyptian myth, which had many forms beyond reckoning during the start and evolution of the Byzantine empire, and not one single interpretation as popularly held in modern culture.

revisions complete for the day, may 8, 10.30 am pst.

Sorry, not had time to look yet. Looks like you’re getting feedback anyway.
Maybe I’ll see if I have anything to offer later next week (probably not if I’m totally honest).

This thing about the desire of the Nicence council to assert religious authority over the state has gone on long enough, and is almost entirely OT. I'm starting a new thread on it here:

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/8256/of-christianity-dominating-the-secular-world