But then in order to qualify what "normal mythologizing" is you then have to qualify that it
- Never refers to someone who supposedly lived within 4 decades of when the myth became popular
No, that's not "what 'normal mythologizing' is." Nothing about normal mythologizing excludes someone who lived within 4 decades of when the myth became popular -- or even within 4 DAYS of when the myth became popular.
Rather, it is simply an empirical fact that miracle myths did not develop this early after the alleged events occurred. The alleged Jesus events occurred around 30 AD. The written reports about them that we know of are dated 40 or 50 years later, or 30 years later for the resurrection event.
On the other hand, for ALL other miracle myth legends, the time span between the alleged event and the earliest report was several generations, and usually several centuries. Nothing says a normal myth could not have developed earlier than this -- rather, it's just an empirical fact that none did develop earlier than this.
This is an empirical fact, not part of the definition of "normal mythologizing." It's not based on "what 'normal mythologizing' is" but on the empirical facts which were always the case in all the examples of mythologizing that you can cite.
Miracle legends proliferate faster in modern times.
In fact, let's say that perhaps today, in the 21st century, there are myths which develop sooner than this after the alleged miracle event, because of the advantage of the modern Internet. Perhaps you could argue that there are some such cases. Or maybe in the 20th century when we had widespread publishing and broadcast media to help propagate a new cult, we might have some cases. Perhaps it has been possible to win 1 or 2 thousand disciples within a year or 2, whereas in the period before 1500 AD this surely was not possible.
So, such a case is still a miracle myth or a case of mythologizing, which occurred (if there are any cases) in a shorter time. So the short time does not disqualify it as a legitimate case of mythologizing. As an empirical fact there are no such cases prior to 1500 (or 1600 or 1700?) AD.
So the long time length is not part of the meaning of "mythologizing," which conceivably could happen within only a few days. Also, that the myth hero had to be a famous celebrity also is not part of the meaning of "mythologizing." Theoretically the myth hero could be an unknown obscure person who did absolutely nothing of any significance. But it's an empirical fact that there are no such cases.
I.e., "mythologizing" (i.e., miracle event mythologizing) just means that a miracle claim is made, i.e., that a miracle event happened, but the truth is that no such event really happened. So, how did the fiction originate and become believed widely by people? To pose this question it doesn't matter what the time length is between the alleged event and the later claim or report that is believed.
It could be only 40 DAYS, or even 40 hours or minutes from the time of the reported event and the time of the report about it. Don't insert a DEFINITION of "normal mythologizing" that it had to be a long period of time between the event and the later report of it. That's only an EMPIRICAL FACT about all the miracle claims that were made, i.e., that there was a long time span.
The long period that always transpired is not part of the meaning of "mythologizing" or "normal mythologizing." Rather, it's just an empirical fact that this is normally what happened with mythologizing. It usually occurred over many generations or centuries, not just 30 or 40 or 50 years. You can't give any example of a miracle myth that emerged in only a few years or only one generation.
Now, you might cite an example like the
Vespasian miracle story, which appeared in a shorter time than normal. But this obviously was due to this person's wide celebrity status as a person of wide repute and power. So this one miracle story about him appears in the record only about 50 years later. His high status and power is the obvious explanation.
So, it's an empirical fact that "mythologizing" occurred in the case of a famous celebrity, or a person of wide repute, someone of great distinction, and usually many generations or centuries later, though in some cases the miracle legend could occur within a few decades, or less than 100 years. But even in this Vespasian case, we have only this one miracle story and no others.
The "normal mythologizing" process just means that which we see as an empirical fact which took place in all the miracle legends. It happened as a result of the wide reputation of the miracle hero figure, who got mythologized, and also it generally required a long period of time, usually several generations. It required CENTURIES in the case of the pagan figures like
Asclepius or
Perseus or
Apollo etc. This is just an empirical fact, not part of the definition of "normal mythologizing."
What you have to explain, and have still not explained, is how such mythologizing took place in the case of Jesus, who did not have the advantage of the long career and widespread recognition or status (which was the case with all the other miracle heroes) and also whose miracles reportedly took place only 30 or 40 or 50 years prior to the earliest reports of them.
Why were there
NO OTHER CASES of such mythologizing? The wide reputation is not incidental but was always a necessary component of the mythologizing. It's because of the wide recognition or status of the miracle figure that he became mythologized. In all cases he was a famous figure, or someone of widely recognized status in his time, which is why he became mythologized.
The case of Jesus appears to be the only exception to this pattern. He was not a famous person or a person of recognized status. What is another exception?
This is NOT about "what 'normal mythologizing' is" -- it's about the empirical fact that mythologizing did not happen in such a short time, but required much longer, and also it was always a famous celebrity or popular hero figure who was mythologized, or someone with a long distinguished career, etc. Not someone like Jesus who was an unknown during his lifetime (assuming he did no miracle acts).
Nothing rules out the possibility of someone being mythologized in a short time, or someone obscure becoming a myth hero, but the empirical fact is that this did not ever happen. Or you might find 1 or 2 cases of a shorter time span, which is the exception, but even so it was always a famous celebrity. So there were no exceptions to these facts about how mythologizing took place. These facts were necessary as something that caused the mythologizing to take place. I.e., these facts EXPLAIN HOW the mythologizing happened. We look for cases where these facts were not so and we can't find any. Theoretically there could be such cases, but empirically there are no such cases.
So, you have still not explained how we have this ONE CASE ONLY of a figure who was mythologized and where these empirical facts are missing, and thus we are left without any way to explain how the mythologizing could have happened in his case, as we can explain it in all the other cases. Like Perseus, Apollo, Zeus, Horus, etc. Or Apollonius of Tyana and Simon Magus.
Why is it that we can explain how the mythologizing took place in all these other cases, but we cannot explain this in the case of Jesus? this being the ONLY case where we cannot explain it?
- Only refers to myths about miracle workers
The mythologizing is much more difficult to explain in the case of miracle claims, because the truth is that people generally do NOT believe miracle claims unless they see some convincing evidence.
Our whole topic begins with the retort: "But there were others who also did miracles, or allegedly did them." So this is what we're talking about. I.e., miracle legends. In the case of Jesus we have evidence that they happened, but in the other cases we do not (or we have virtually none).
NON-miracle legends can also emerge, but their spread is more easily explained, because people have less difficulty believing something that is normal, or which are normal events rather than superhuman or miracle events. So we're not talking about NON-miracle legends. We're talking about how miracle stories became popular legends. And about the CREDIBILITY of the stories, which is questioned precisely because it's about miracle claims, because these are inherently less credible and require extra evidence.
"Mythologizing" doesn't necessarily mean miracle stories only, but it's the miracle stories that we need to explain, because it's these that we don't believe generally, and yet the stories got transmitted and recorded and believed, so we need to explain how that happened. And to just say "people made up shit" and other slogans does not explain anything. Why did so many people believe it and spread it and eventually record it in writing? You haven't answered this, except for your emotional outburst that "People made up shit!"
But the calm rational non-outburst answer is that the hero figure was a famous celebrity, or had something that distinguished him. And it was common for stories or legends to evolve over many generations or centuries. This answers how it happened in ALL the cases you can name.
- Only refers to myths that were actually written down
We know NOTHING of what happened 1000 or 2000 years ago
except what was written down. Of course we're talking about what was written down or recorded for us. If you don't want to talk about what was written down, then you don't want to talk about what happened 2000 years ago.
Do you understand that we're talking about history here? Do you understand what "1000 years ago" or "2000 years ago" means? Of course we have to limit this to what was recorded in writing. We can add to this anything discovered that does NOT come from the written record, but hardly any such thing exists. 99% of our historical knowledge is based on what was "written down."
We can't put away the difficult questions by demanding that all reference to what was "written down" be expunged from the discussion. We must rely on the written record in order to be able to deal with any question about what happened 2000 years ago. All the "reasons to reject Christianity" are based on the historical record that is written down. If all reference to what is "written down" has to be disqualified, then there are no "reasons to reject Christianity" left. All those reasons are based on what was written down.
And one of the unique features of the Jesus miracle legend is that it's the only one which cannot be explained as a product of mythologizing, since it developed too soon after the historical person lived
A baseless assertion you argue using circular reasoning and have yet to produce any evidence for.
You mean it's a baseless assertion that Jesus lived 30 or 40 or 50 years before the first reports about him? Do you deny this? And the time distance for the other miracle legends, the pagan gods, is many centuries. Right? You need additional evidence for this? When do you claim those original pagan heroes lived, and when do you claim the reports about them are dated?
This has been pointed out numerous times in this thread.
No, everyone agrees that the earliest reports about Jesus are 30 or 40 or 50 years after the events reportedly happened, and that the earliest reports about the pagan gods occur at least 500 or 1000 years after the events happened (if those pagan heroes were real historical persons).
References by Josephus are obvious forgeries and . . .
Let's not get into that -- it's not necessary here. It's the gospel accounts which first report on the miracles of Jesus, or Paul writing in the 50s AD who first reports on the resurrection event.
All other references in the historical record were separated from the allegations by nearly a century and . . .
Save Tacitus for a different topic. That's not about mythologizing or the miracle events.
You've never dealt with the fact that this myth appeared in Rome first, not in or around Jerusalem where it supposedly happened.
You mean the first gospel account. We don't really know where it first appeared. However, even if Mark was written in Rome, that doesn't tell us where the first sources came from. The Mark writer had sources, and we don't know where they came from. Almost surely much of his sources originated from Galilee or Judea. He got this from what he had heard, and from written sources available at that time.
This is very obvious from the "Rejection at Nazareth" story which it would be impossible for a later Christian writer to fabricate. Mark obviously had this story in some form as an earlier source, not as something he concocted. And many other elements in Mark had to have originated from a source near to the events.
Distance measured in thousands of miles would have been every bit as effective as time measured in centuries to separate the myth from any vestigial facts that may have formed an historical nugget.
Again, we don't know that Mark was written in Rome. It might have been, but you can't keep repeating this as dogma. It's only one possibility.
And anyway, it is based on several sources, and some of these were surely near to the events reported.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Mark
The author used a variety of sources derived from accounts predating the gospel's composition, such as conflict stories (Mark 2:1-3:6), apocalyptic discourse (4:1-35), and collections of sayings (although not the Gospel of Thomas and probably not the Q source). . . .
Rome (Mark uses a number of Latin terms),Galilee, Antioch (third-largest city in the Roman Empire, located in northern Syria), and southern Syria have all been offered as alternative places of authorship.
Further, even if there was some geographical distance from the events, this does not distort the accuracy of the account. If the travel time was much less, then this could help improve the reliability, but it's really only the TIME factor that is relevant, not the geographical distance. If the reports arrived early to the author/editor, then it doesn't matter that it might have been a long distance that the reports traveled.
So your obsession with a possible long traveling distance from the original location to that of the author/editor is artificial. There is much in Mark that is clearly of local origin even if it traveled far to the eventual point of the final composition.
Actually, it isn't that we have none at all. We've talked about some possible other cults. We have one document about the Apollonius of Tyana reputed miracles. And there's mention of the Simon Magus cult. Along with these, who must have been unusual characters in some way, there must have been hundreds more, mostly less important than these two, which also drew limited attention and were dismissed.
Ahhh, so another qualifier:
You have now combined the logical fallacy of appeal to popularity with your already established sharpshooter fallacy. Multiplying fallacies doesn't increase the validity of the argument.
But "popular" just means that someone believed it, which is all we have for ANY historical events. We believe the reported events because someone believed it or claimed it was true and reported it. The more reports there are, the more certain we can be that the claims are true. I.e., the more "popular" the belief that it happened, the more credible is the claim that it happened.
So once again, you are just disqualifying the gospel accounts for reasons which would also disqualify ALL our sources for history. The only reason some history reports are believed more than others is that they are more "popular" -- i.e., there are more reports for them and more indication that they were generally believed.
We believe Julius Caesar was assassinated because there were many who believed it and reported it, i.e., because this was
popularly believed. If you throw out every report saying it happened and every claim that people believed it, we'd have no evidence that Caesar was assassinated. It's the POPULARITY of this belief that makes it more credible. If the report of the Caesar assassination was not
popular or widely believed, then it would be less credible for us as part of the true historical record.
Finally, let's go back and revisit this:
It's simply not true that anyone can just "make up shit" and spread it around and thousands are soon believing it. It has never happened and you cannot name one case. And if it could happen, we'd have many examples of it, not ONE ONLY.
So I provided you a list of people who "made up shit" and spread it around and thousands (millions) were soon believing it.
No, we were talking about miracle claims. It's about the miracle events in the gospels that was our topic. Your answer to those claims is that "People make up shit," and so I used your phrase, but this was about making up miracle stories. Now you're trying to change it to making up ANY "shit" -- which is not what this is about.
It's not true that anyone could make up miracle stories, or claims about something highly improbable, and that everyone just started believing it. No, the reason some such claims were believed is that there was some evidence that it was true. Or in some cases it was a claim about a popular celebrity figure who had a wide reputation, and because of this people were more likely to believe it.
Whatever the explanation, it's true
only in some cases that the claims were believed. Most miracle stories were NOT believed by people, because the claims were not credible. When the claims were believed, we need to look for the reason why. You cannot simply dismiss it with your "People make up shit" outburst. This does not explain it. Usually when someone did "make up shit" it was not believed if it was something weird or highly improbable or contrary to common experience.
Not only has it happened often in the annals of history it has happened thousands upon thousands of times in your own lifetime (provided you are more than 10 years old).
We're talking about events several centuries ago, not today when anyone can post something nutty on the Internet and maybe someone appears to "believe" it.
Why can't you give one other example of a miracle legend, from 1000 or 2000 or 3000 years ago, where we have evidence in the form of multiple documents appearing soon after the miracle event reportedly happened? Why won't you offer an example instead of trying to dismiss this legitimate question? Answer: there are no other examples. This is the only case which cannot be explained by the mythologizing process which we see at work in all the other cases, where it's obvious what factors took place that caused the mythologizing to happen.
Your response was:
You're off topic. We're talking about instant miracle legends, not just ANY "bullshit." None of the above started an instant miracle hero myth that spread and got published in multiple sources.
So we can add goalpost shifting to your list of crimes against logic just on a single page.
No, nothing has shifted. From the beginning, 130 pages ago, the point was that Jesus performed miracle acts, and these appeared suddenly in the record, in written documents, in only 1-2 generations from the reputed events, whereas for all other miracle legends it required much longer than this, i.e., the pagan miracle heroes like Horus and Perseus and Asclepius, etc. For these it required CENTURIES for the stories to appear in written documents, and this long time gap is evidence that mythologizing must have happened during that time, so that the stories are less credible.
From the beginning you have been asked to explain why the only exception to this is the Jesus miracle legend, and why this is not therefore more credible than those pagan legends. Also, how could this Jesus legend evolve into a myth when the historical figure himself was not a famous or well-reputed celebrity of high status, as was the case for all other reputed miracle myth heroes, i.e., all the ones we can identify as real historical persons.
So there has been no shifting of the goalpost. You could not answer this question from the very beginning, and you still cannot answer it.
You made a statement and were demonstrated to be false on it. At least own up to that. Or are you going to argue somehow that when it comes to miracle workers people use better critical thinking skills than when it comes to these other scams I mentioned?
You and others have said this yourself. If someone says, "It's raining outside," you believe it, but if they say, "A flying saucer just landed," or "Zombies just rose out of their graves," etc., we don't believe it, or we demand evidence first. So yes, it's obvious that we are more skeptical when miracle or paranormal claims are made as opposed to claims about normal events.
A scam artist might lie to you about whether it's raining, or about whether a certain investment is risky. Scamming is not necessarily about miracle claims. But in the case of miracle claims, we are always MORE skeptical, and people do not believe it as easily. They might often choose to believe what they hope is true, including something miraculous, but in comparing a miracle claim with a NON-miracle claim, it is always the miracle claim that is more difficult to believe, all else being equal. And so when people do believe such a claim, we need to ask why they believe it, and we can determine what the reasons are.
And mythologizing happens easier if certain conditions are met -- such as a high celebrity status of the one making the miracle claim, including his long tradition or long career or longstanding reputation -- or especially if the miracle hero is a longstanding "god" or deity who has been worshiped for centuries. These and other factors explain how the target audience might be persuaded and choose to believe.
So yes, it is true that people are more skeptical, or more critical in their thinking, if the promoters make miracle claims to them, in contrast to NON-miracle claims.
And the more strange or weird the claim is, the less we believe it. It's in degrees that we become more skeptical. We are more skeptical about advertising claims that are too extreme or "too good to be true" than we are about the more moderate claims.
So it was not false to say that people are more skeptical when you make a miracle claim to them than if you make a claim about something normal.
And the Jesus myth was far from "instant." 40 years is not instant
Which is a shorter time period -- the time gap of 150 years between the reported Apollonius of Tyana miracles and the one source we have for this, or the time gap of 30 or 40 or 50 years between the reported Jesus miracles and the 4 (5) sources we have for these miracles?
Or the 1000+ years time gap between the reported Perseus miracles and the first written reports we have of these miracles?
Are you still having difficulty figuring out that several centuries is a longer time period than 30 or 40 or 50 years? Don't you understand that one century is 100 years? and that 100 years is much longer than 30 or 40 or 50 years? Why must you get hung up on the word "instant" -- don't you understand that the ancient history documents were typically much later than only 50 years after the events they reported? Are you having trouble registering this?
Haven't you yet figured out that it was not unusual for the later document reporting the event to be dated even 100 years later? that even "primary sources" were sometimes 100 years after the reported events, such as Tacitus who is a "primary source" for the life of Caesar Augustus?
This 30 or 40 or 50 years was a relatively SHORT
SHORT time space from the date of the Jesus events to the first written reports about those events. Our information about Jesus is just as reliable as the sources for most of our historical record for that period. And by comparison to any other miracle hero legends, this time gap between the alleged events and the first reports of them is far less for the Jesus events. It's in this sense that he is the only "instant miracle myth."
Instead of pretending you don't understand this point, which is not really so difficult to grasp, why don't you get serious and give us an example of another such "instant miracle myth" from before 1500 AD. Or, since there isn't any example, why don't you give us a reason why it is that we have ONLY THIS ONE example of such an "instant miracle myth" and no others.
