You would think someone as intelligent as he is would be intelligent enough to recognize this was his opportunity to shine. A mainstream scholar had elevated him and many other eyes, apart from his usual fans, would be watching. This was his chance to show everyone he does deserve a place in academia. Yet he failed miserably. Instead of adopting the approach he used to write his PhD, he adopted the approach of an internet bully. What a glorious flame out.
Well put. Carrier could have concentrated on the objections Ehrman raised to his views and given an intelligent response as to why he thought Ehrman missed the mark. Instead, he went on about things that had nothing to do with his work (i.e., the nonsense about the bronze statue of a priapus) when both he and Ehrman agreed Acharya S is a quack. Given that I thought Ehrman's book was, by the nature of the genre of popular books, not as thorough as it could have been. Thus Carrier could have made some decent points and given some general appeal for scholars to check his work out for themselves and judge his hypothesis accordingly. If he had done that, he would have earned the respect of scholars as someone taking the academic process seriously and might have persuaded a few on the fringes to try entertaining some of his ideas.
Instead, he went the typical route of pseudoscholar: aggressive personal attacks on those with real accomplishments in the field where he is trying to make a mark, persecution complex, stunts that could only be called "an appeal to the yahoos" wherein he rallies the ignorant in a populist revolt against what scholars in the field take as quite obvious, and general all-around boorish behavior to anyone who might challenge the wisdom of the world renowned (just ask him!) Richard Carrier.
I am pretty sure the scholarly community will read his blog, decide he is the sort of nut case who occasionally send them 50 page screeds in all caps explaning in detail why America was discovered by ancient Basques and complaining the recipient of the screed and all of academia were conspiring to hide this fact from the public. In the last few weeks, Richard Carrier has done more to set back the cause of Jesus Mythicism in academia than anyone since Albert Schweitzer. The difference is this is what Schweitzer was trying to accomplish!
I hope Carrier has a plan B for supporting himself. Jesus mythicism has a habit of going in and out of style rather quickly. If it fades, he might end up like the late Walter Siegmeister (aka Dr. Raymond W. Bernard aka Dr Robert Raymond aka Dr Uriel Adriana) who, after earning his Ph.D from NYU was drawn into various crackpot theories and never found his way back to reality. He ended up traveling from place to place writing quack books for hire under a series of various pseudonymns. Either that or Carrier may have to get a day job.
Re: Ehrman's new book "Did Jesus Exist?" « Reply #271 on May 4, 2012, 1:17pm »
Re Carrier's accusation of insanity directed at professor Hoffmann, the specialists at The New Oxonian have done a very good job at demolishing that silly claim and much more in the comments: http://rjosephhoffmann.wordpress.com/201....thought-ghetto/
Very odd that Carrier insisted he had evidence that prof Hoffmann is insane, though. At which point you can do nothing but agree with the above posts...
Re: Ehrman's new book "Did Jesus Exist?" « Reply #272 on May 4, 2012, 2:36pm »
I've just posted this at Carrier's blog:
Quote:
OK, so what we have here is more than 6,000 words from Carrier on the following subjects:
* Ehrman's writing style * The exact qualifications of Thomas L. Thompson * The priapic statue touted by Dorothy Murdock * R.J. Hoffmann's alleged insanity * Ehrman's writing style (again) * Murdock's mistakes about the NT canon
I came here expecting some engagement with Ehrman's argument for the historicity of Jesus. Instead Carrier gives us 33 pages of tit-for-tat quibbling over irrelevant peripherals, with a few molehills inflated into mountains for good measure.
Disappointing.
As an aside, Ehrman is absolutely right to say that Murdock is wrong when she claims there were 'many councils' held to determine the Biblical canon.
Of the 19 church councils held between the 1st and 11th Centuries, only 4 of them mention the canon. One of them (Laodicea AD 363) alludes to the canon without defining it. The remaining three (Hippo AD 393, Carthage AD 397, Carthage AD 419) affirm the list proposed by Athanasius in his festal letter of AD 367.
There is no suggestion that these councils were convened to repudiate a competing canon.
Carrier opines:
>> the fact that they had to keep meeting to do that means there were repeated attempts to change it >>
No. It was common practice for local councils to ratify the decisions of earlier councils (particularly those held in other areas). As consensus grew, orthodoxy was established.
OK, so what we have here is more than 6,000 words from Carrier on the following subjects:
* Ehrman's writing style * The exact qualifications of Thomas L. Thompson * The priapic statue touted by Dorothy Murdock * R.J. Hoffmann's alleged insanity * Ehrman's writing style (again) * Murdock's mistakes about the NT canon
I came here expecting some engagement with Ehrman's argument for the historicity of Jesus. Instead Carrier gives us 33 pages of tit-for-tat quibbling over irrelevant peripherals, with a few molehills inflated into mountains for good measure.
Disappointing.
As an aside, Ehrman is absolutely right to say that Murdock is wrong when she claims there were 'many councils' held to determine the Biblical canon.
Of the 19 church councils held between the 1st and 11th Centuries, only 4 of them mention the canon. One of them (Laodicea AD 363) alludes to the canon without defining it. The remaining three (Hippo AD 393, Carthage AD 397, Carthage AD 419) affirm the list proposed by Athanasius in his festal letter of AD 367.
There is no suggestion that these councils were convened to repudiate a competing canon.
Carrier opines:
>> the fact that they had to keep meeting to do that means there were repeated attempts to change it >>
No. It was common practice for local councils to ratify the decisions of earlier councils (particularly those held in other areas). As consensus grew, orthodoxy was established.
I wonder if it will get through?
Very nice. Did you post it in round 2 or round 1? It's not in round 2. But someone asked him why he just doesn't debate Ehrman. He replied:
Quote:
Debates are lame. – Richard Carrier, May 2, 2012
But then.....
Quote:
Later this month I will be debating the existence of God with Lenny Esposito of Come Reason Ministries, on Wednesday May 23rd – Richard Carrier, May 3, 2012
Very nice. Did you post it in round 2 or round 1? It's not in round 2. But someone asked him why he just doesn't debate Ehrman. He replied:
But then.....
Quote:
Later this month I will be debating the existence of God with Lenny Esposito of Come Reason Ministries, on Wednesday May 23rd – Richard Carrier, May 3, 2012
Clearly you don't understand; debate are only lame when Carrier says they are. Meanwhile this post of mine is still on moderation at Carrier's blog.
Quote:
If you read what I wrote you will find I did not cite Diodorus Siculus as an example of the ‘X, the brother of Y’ formula, or claiming his usage was analogous to the passage in Galatians, or that his usage was a context in which we would expect to find the construction ‘X, the brother of Y’. I simply cited him (along with all the others), as examples of ‘literature that would use fictive kinship address’, in contrast to your claim that ‘we have almost no literature that would use fictive kinship address’.
Am I to understand that you now agree we do have ‘literature that would use fictive kinship address’, and we do have examples of ‘the formulas used’?
You make these statements:
* “one would not necessarily have occasion to say “x is brother of y” in fictive contexts unless y was a deity”
* “Because one does not become a fictive brother because one is the brother of some random member of a fraternal society. One becomes a fictive brother because one is a brother of the Lord in whom the fictive kinship is established”
Could you provide evidence for these statements please?
The fact is that we do have similar contexts to compare; we have the contexts of other religious associations. The evidence from the first century religious associations is that individuals were in fact fictive kin specifically because they were members of the association; they were not fictive kin on the basis of being individually kin of a deity “in whom the fictive kinship is established”.
Here’s an oft cited example:
“If any brother [adelfos] should wish to sell his share, the remaining brothers should buy it. If the brothers [oi adelfoi] do not wish to buy the share, then let them take the aforementioned cash, and let them withdraw from the association.” (IKilikiaBM 2 201, cited by Ascough, ‘Voluntary Associations and the Formation of Pauline Christian Communities’, in Gutsfeld & Koch, ‘Vereine, Synagogen und Gemeinden im kaiserzeitlichen Kleinasien’, Studien und Texte zu Antike und Christentum, number 25, p. 161 (2006).
This issue aside, I note you didn’t address my points 5-8. So once again, we have a phrase for which two meanings are proposed. One of these meanings is attested strongly throughout the relevant literature, the other is not attested at all (that you have found). It is an extraordinary claim that the meaning for which there is no evidence is the correct meaning, and that the meaning for which there is copious evidence is not the correct meaning.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and you are now saying that you don’t have any. It’s that simple.
Re: Ehrman's new book "Did Jesus Exist?" « Reply #276 on May 5, 2012, 4:41am »
Quote:
Meanwhile this post of mine is still on moderation at Carrier's blog.
He's claiming he is so busy with all his traveling and speaking that he can't get to all his comments. My guess is that he is trying to figure out how to reply before posting the comments. I think he did that before with you. He can't afford to look bad in front of all those adoring fans. As the good book says, pride comes before the fall. It's just a matter of time.
I hope Carrier has a plan B for supporting himself. Jesus mythicism has a habit of going in and out of style rather quickly. If it fades, he might end up like the late Walter Siegmeister (aka Dr. Raymond W. Bernard aka Dr Robert Raymond aka Dr Uriel Adriana) who, after earning his Ph.D from NYU was drawn into various crackpot theories and never found his way back to reality. He ended up traveling from place to place writing quack books for hire under a series of various pseudonymns. Either that or Carrier may have to get a day job.
It's funny, because I was thinking pretty much the same thing. I mean, where does he actually see himself 20 years from now? Does he really believe that he is going to completely overturn the entire field of NT scholarship and be vindicated in the end? He, Richard Carrier, the first one in history to figure out NT scholarship is a sham and is going to show the world?
This is the danger of having more expertise than your fans on the internet. With them cheer-leading him and stroking his ego, they've steered him away from a shot at securing a position in academia. Because with his attacks on Ehrman, and Academia in general, I think he's pretty much burned his bridges.
Re: Ehrman's new book "Did Jesus Exist?" « Reply #279 on May 5, 2012, 2:51pm »
Below is my third blog post on the Carrier/Ehrman dispute ________________________________
One of the strangest areas of the exchange between Bart Ehrman and Richard Carrier revolves around Ehrman’s curt dismissal of figures such as D. M. Murdock (aka “Acharya S”) and the duo of Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy. In his initial review, Carrier seems agitated that Ehrman did not spend more time on their type and instead dealt primarily with Carrier, Doherty, and Price:
Almost none of this 361 page book is a critique of the “bad” mythicists. He barely even mentions most of them. Indeed, if he mentioned Atwill even once it was in passing at best, and for the few authors he spends any time discussing (mainly Murdock and Freke & Gandy), he is largely dismissive and careless (indeed, his only real refutation of them amounts to little more than nine pages, pp. 21-30). I was hoping for a well-researched refutation of these authors so I could recommend this book to students, so they could see what sound scholarship looks like and to correct the errors in their heads after reading authors like these. But this book simply doesn’t do that.
Why it is that Carrier thinks Ehrman should waste his time refuting in detail the most bizarre ends of Jesus mythicism is a mystery. Ehrman obviously looked at a number of Jesus mythicist authors, dismissed those he considered completely outside anything resembling an attempt at real scholarship with a few examples of their incompetence, and concentrated on those who attempted sober arguments against Jesus’ existence. I suppose he could have gone over every one of their errors but then it would be a 1000 page book of endless minutiae that merely beats the theme of overall incompetence home until the whole thing becomes a great bore.
It seems as though Carrier thought Ehrman should waste his time cleaning up Jesus mythicism from its most cranky adherents. Sorry, but that is not the job of a scholar who is not part of the movement. If Carrier wants them dealt with, let him write that book. As Ehrman put it himself in his reply:
One of the things Carrier laments is that I don’t deal with the various mythicists all at length – even (this is a special point he presses) those who cannot be taken seriously (he names Freke and Gandy). My view is that there is no reason to take seriously people who cannot be taken seriously: a few indications of general incompetence is good enough.
There is little motivation for Ehrman to concentrate his efforts on the “bad mythicists.” His book is aimed at making the case for a popular audience that Jesus mythicism is a dead end. He pointed out that certain authors should never be taken seriously, gives a few examples why, and moves on to more serious proponents.
Even stranger is Carrier’s assertion that he had hoped Ehrman’s book could have been recommended to students to demonstrate the poor quality of the arguments of the “bad mythicists.” This turns reality on its head as if Ehrman were the young scholar who should be dealing with lesser lights with Carrier the established expert. By combining this with his disappointment that this was not “a book I could recommend as the best case for historicity”, Carrier seems to have lost touch with reality. It is Jesus mythicism that is the fringe movement in need of an academic defense. Ehrman is not writing this book to make a scholarly case as Carrier’s position is not taken seriously among scholars; his is a popular book designed to explain to an uninformed audience why it is not taken seriously. In this sense, it occupies a similar position to his earlier Truth and Fiction in The Da Vinci Code which similarly explained at a popular level why the assertions made by Dan Brown were complete nonsense.
I think it is perhaps more the case that Carrier is upset because, in the end, he suspects Ehrman does not take his ideas seriously. He is probably right on that point but, as I have pointed out in previous posts, Ehrman often doesn’t take ideas seriously that do not coincide with those of Bart Ehrman. More to the point, however, is that lots of other scholars also do not take Carrier’s ideas seriously. In fact, almost no one outside the New Atheist tour circuit takes his ideas seriously. The simple fact is the Jesus mythicist position reached its height in the late nineteenth century and has had little traction with scholars since Albert Schweitzer bulldozed it a century ago.
Now that I have given some indication of the general features of the exchange, I will begin turning to the specific cases discussed in their exchanges next time.
Why it is that Carrier thinks Ehrman should waste his time refuting in detail the most bizarre ends of Jesus mythicism is a mystery.
Exactly. Ehrman even explains why he won't be spending much time on the fringedwellers. Carrier should be pleased that Ehrman places him in a higher category. But apparently even this is not good enough.
It seems to me that what Carrier really craves is Ehrman's respect. That's why he can't tolerate Erhman's critique: because he takes it personally.
Meanwhile this post of mine is still on moderation at Carrier's blog.
He's claiming he is so busy with all his traveling and speaking that he can't get to all his comments. My guess is that he is trying to figure out how to reply before posting the comments. I think he did that before with you.
Yes there's no question he's doing that; my posts only appear once he has written a reply.
Re: Ehrman's new book "Did Jesus Exist?" « Reply #282 on May 5, 2012, 4:19pm »
A fourth blog post with this one on the whole "priapus" affair ____________________________________________________
If there is one thing that Bart Ehrman and Richard Carrier agree upon, it is that The Christ Conspiracy by Acharya S is an absolutely awful book. In fact, a bone of contention, as mentioned in the last post in this series, is that Ehrman said it was awful, gave a few examples of why it was awful, and then moved on while Carrier thought he should have dwelt upon its awfulness through many pages until every last ounce of its putridness had been exposed to sunlight and dissolved into the morning mist. Of course, the problem for Carrier is that some people confuse his position with that of Acharya S; the problem for Ehrman is that some people confuse his position for that of Carrier. Both are false but the latter is more false than the former.
Carrier, in attempting to demonstrate Ehrman is “incompetent” and “a hack” (nothing personal, mind you), latched onto something Ehrman wrote about D. M. Murdock (aka Acharya S) to demonstrate he understands the writings of the queen of Jesus mythicist conspiracy theorists better than Ehrman. On that I would agree; but then so do I but I don’t consider it a badge of honor. Carrier has had battles in the past with Murdock and has spent much time and verbiage trying to demonstrate why Murdock’s version of Jesus mythicism is garbage while his is brilliant. I have had to study Murdock’s books in order to summarize her charges, evaluate her evidence, and respond to her books for other Christians. Ehrman probably read her first book in preparation for Did Jesus Exist?, came to the conclusion she was nuts within three pages, and lightly read the rest for the lulz.
The dispute about Murdock in the Carrier/Ehrman exchange centers on what Murdock wrote concerning a certain statue of a penis-nosed rooster allegedly housed in the Vatican. The conversation begins with Murdock stating some fascinating things about the name “Peter”:
“Peter” is not only “the rock” but also “the cock,” or penis, as the word is used as slang to this day.
Fascinating because every reference work on English slang mentions the use of “peter” for a penis developed in the mid to late nineteenth century with the earliest confirmed reference from 1902. If the Greek word for rock (petra) were used for a penis, it would be an odd choice since the gender of the term is feminine. This is why it was changed to a masculine ending (Petros) when applied to the Apostle. It is even more confusing since Paul refers to Peter as Cephas, a transliteration of the Aramaic word for rock (keypha) and there the connection falls apart even further. If any of these were used as slang words for a penis in the ancient world, such evidence is not provided by Murdock but merely assumed because of a slang that first appears within the last two centuries in modern English.
Murdock then adds to the fun by citing a series of nineteenth century quacks (Godfrey Higgins, T. W. Doane, Madame Blavatsky) along with a contemporary one (Barbara G. Walker) for support for her claims of Peter’s mythological status. My personal favorite is when she cites Blavatsky to show Peter was unknown to Justin Martyr in the second century:
In addition to the canonical gospels, the Christianized Peter tales were not in existence at the time of Justin Martyr (100-165), who, as Blavatsky relates, “writing in the early part of the second century in Rome, where he fixed his abode, eager to get hold of the least proof in favor of the truth for which he suffered, seems perfectly unconscious of St. Peter’s existence!! Neither does any other writer of any consequence mention him in connection with the Church of Rome, earlier than the days of Irenaeus, when the latter set himself to invent a new religion, drawn from the depth of his imagination.”
Never mind that Peter was mentioned by Clement of Rome and Ignatius of Antioch prior to Justin and that Peter was mentioned by Justin (twice) in the Dialogue with Trypho. When crackpots get on a roll, they can’t be bothered with little niceties like fact-checking.
At some point Murdock then infers something about Peter and homoeroticism within patriarchal cults and quotes Walker as follows:
The cock was another totemic “peter” sometimes viewed as the god’s alter ego. Vatican authorities preserved a bronze image of a cock with an oversize penis on a man’s body, the pedestal inscribed “The Savior of the World.” The cock was also a solar symbol.
At this point Murdock goes off to chase other tangents and the reader is left to make what they can of the mess she left behind.
So what was she trying to infer here? The argument seems to be … Peter is an Apostle … Peter is associated with a rooster crowing … peter is a slang word for penis … there is a statue of a rooster-man with a penis for a nose … therefore … what??? In fact, her whole book is a series of often dubious claims pulled from frequently questionable sources and thrown up to form an impenetrable wall of ignorance that the light of common sense cannot breech. The segment described above on Peter is a perfect example as by the end we have a jumbled sequence of non sequiturs with her audience left to decipher the tea leaves and figure out her intent. In fact, the pattern is repeated throughout the whole book: does she really think the pyramids were not built by Egyptians as tombs but were celestial computers for refugees from Atlantis? Does she really believe academia is controlled by a secret Freemasonic brotherhood led by the pope? It does seem that way but your guess is as good as mine.
It is such “deep-from-within-the-recesses-of-a-padded-room” outbursts that make any alleged misunderstanding on Ehrman’s part quite understandable. Ehrman, having read the sequence outlined above (almost certainly for the first time) probably became glassy-eyed and began mentally recalling the theme from The Twilight Zone before parenthetically quipping:
There is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican or anywhere else except in books like this, which love to make things up.
It turns out a statue of a penis nosed rooster does exist although it certainly has no relation to either Peter or Christianity. It is an example of a Priapus, a minor but popular god related to fertility often connected to various figures with oversized penises in various forms. D. M. Murdock, atop her perch at her website, complained that she never said the statue was of Peter and Carrier agreed (the enemy of my enemy is my friend?) and seized upon the fact that a bronze apparently does exist even though Ehrman technically was correct stated no such bronze statue of Peter existed.
Although if one isolates Murdock’s sentence from its context, it does not overtly state a connection between Peter and the statue, certainly such a connection is implied by the overall context of the discussion. She has already inferred Peter was mythical, that he corresponded to pagan figures, that his name was associated with the penis, that he was associated with the rooster, and then she brings up a penis-nosed rooster headed bronze sculpture. If indeed she was not attempting to connect Peter to that bronze, then why did she bring it up in the first place? Without some alleged connection to Peter, it has no part in the discussion and sticks out like a sore thumb … or at least a sore penis. Indeed the statue was being connected to Peter the apostle, however incompetently and, given the discussion above, insanely, and Ehrman was right for considering the whole thing rather much of a “howler.”
Another point should also be made here. It certainly was not necessary for Ehrman to track down whether such a bronze figure of a penis-nosed statue existed. Anyone who has read The Christ Conspiracy knows it is full of the most incredible nonsense. How is someone like Ehrman to react when he reads Murdock’s explanation of why her ideas are not better accepted among scholars:
It is clear that scholars have known about the mythological nature of the Bible, yet they have gone to immense lengths to hide it, including using sophisticated language, like the priestly counterparts who have utilized the dead language Latin to go over the heads of the uneducated masses. It is possible that any number of these scholars are also Masons or members of some such secret brotherhood who are under the blood oath. Or they may merely be products of their occupation, in that many universities and colleges are under the dominion of the fraternities and the grand master, the Pope, i.e., the Catholic Church.
Just in case you missed the “wooo” factor of the above statement concerning the pope and secret Masonic blood oaths, Murdock stated earlier in the book that “unbeknownst to the masses, the pope is the Grand Master-Mason of the Masonic branches of the world.” Such nonsense as this or her infatuation with the penis nosed rooster is worthy of nothing but scorn and that is exactly what Ehrman supplied. Yet, for some unknown reason, Carrier decided to fight this particular battle even though it had absolutely nothing to do with anything Ehrman objected to in his own work.
With this rather silly topic out of the way, the discussion will move next time to one that at least is somewhat interesting: dying and rising gods.
Joined: May 2011 Gender: Male Posts: 490 Karma: 15
Re: Ehrman's new book "Did Jesus Exist?" « Reply #283 on May 7, 2012, 5:30am »
A correction for Tom Verenna.
Quote:
1. When you say 'let us not beat around the bush here, there is either dishonesty at work or Ehrman just isn’t doing his due diligence', and 'Those are the patently FALSE claims made by Ehrman', those are your claims so I respond to you. I don't go to Carrier saying 'Thomas Verenna said...'. I'm responding to Carrier's claims on his blog, to your claims on yours.
2. Pilate, procurator: The fact is that you can consult several experts in this area, in books written as recently as 2008, and they say the same; either Tacitus made a mistake, or he was speaking proleptically.[1] [2] [3] [4] This is not a matter of only one source. If you had read Carrier's paper (to which he linked), you will have found that the section to which he refers actually discusses whether procurators could be appointed prefects simultaneously, whereas the issue in question is whether or not Pilate was a prefect who was also appointed procurator. Carrier makes the argument that Tactius didn't make a mistake, but that Pilate was a procurator as well as a Prefect. In support, he cites Philo and Josephus referring to Pilate as a procurator.
But the fact is that standard scholarship on the subject understands Philo, Josephus, and Tacitus as adopting the new terminology established during the reign of Claudius after 41 CE, since all of them were writing after this date and since the only epigraphical evidence for Pilate (dated no later than 36 CE, before Claudius), identifies him as a prefect, but not as a procurator.[5] [6] Carrier does not mention any of this. Do you know how many scholars he cites as saying that Tacitus didn't make a mistake and wasn't writing proleptically? None. See for yourself; pages 33-36 of his own article.
3. Osiris: Carrier's original claim was made with regard to the GOSPEL accounts of Jesus' resurrection, claiming that the Osiris myth was a counterpart of the GOSPEL resurrection accounts. His claim was 'Plutarch attests that Osiris was believed to have died AND BEEN RETURNED TO EARTH', specifically 'he did indeed return to earth IN HIS RESURRECTED BODY'. Yes I am very aware of the various resurrection beliefs during the era in question, but you have missed the point that Carrier was originally addressing the GOSPEL accounts of Jesus' resurrection, which describe one specific form of resurrection belief; that the body which DIED was the same body which was RAISED, and that the person returned to life IN THEIR ORIGINAL BODY. The gospels reinforce this repeatedly, referring to an EMPTY TOMB, referring to Jesus proving he had been raised in the SAME BODY which had died, and referring to Jesus DENYING he was a disembodied spirit.
That is precisely why Carrier appealed to the Osiris myth in Plutarch, claiming that 'Osiris was believed to have died AND BEEN RETURNED TO EARTH', specifically 'he did indeed return to earth IN HIS RESURRECTED BODY'. Ehrman has disproved this; Osiris did not return to earth IN HIS RESURRECTED BODY. Osiris' body was dismembered and REMAINED IN PIECES, while his DISEMBODIED SOUL sometimes came to earth. Now that Ehrman has proved this, Carrier is retreating to more vague language, saying that Osiris still died and returned in some form. But his original point has been completely abandoned; he is no longer claiming that 'Osiris was believed to have died AND BEEN RETURNED TO EARTH', or that 'he did indeed return to earth IN HIS RESURRECTED BODY'. He is now saying that Osiris died and his soul came back to visit occasionally as a ghost, which is nothing like what he said previously. Of course this fails to support his original claims about Osiris being a parallel to the gospel resurrection story.
4. Carrier's claim ‘Ehrman says his views are the standard in the field, but in defense of the claim he still only names one advocate (Smith)’: You previously claimed this was an error on Ehrman's part, and now you're saying you don't know if Carrier is right about this. Clearly you didn't stop to check Carrier's claims, and clearly you didn't even read Ehrman's reply on this very point, in which he replies to Carrier in detail. Whatever happened to fact checking? You seem to just accept what Carrier says without even attempting to verify it.
5. Carrier's claim ‘he was “only” referring to the sources he had previously enumerated’: Again, although previously you dogmatically asserted that Ehrman was completely in error on this point and Carrier was right, but now you acknowledge 'You may be right'. Once again it's clear you didn't check the facts. It seems you haven't even read Ehrman's book yourself. What were you saying before about due diligence?
6. Just a typo: If you believe that Ehrman said it was just a typo, please quote him directly. On the contrary, Ehrman said it was simply a careless laps on his part. Of course it does not remotely diminish the argument he made; the fact that he said 'letter 10' and not 'book 10, letter 96' is completely inconsequential, and does not remotely prove that he hadn't read the letter or wasn't familiar with its contents. That Ehrman linked the letters is not in dispute, but as Carrier himself noted, standard scholarship on this subject also links these letters, so this is not an error on Ehrman's part.
7. Doherty quoting other scholars: Yet again, this was a point on which you stated dogmatically that Ehrman was wrong. But when faced with the evidence Ehrman is right, you say 'I haven’t read Doherty’s new book, so I’m not sure I can comment with any significant input'. That's interesting, because you were certainly sure you could comment dogmatically on it previously. You claimed explicitly and dogmatically that Ehrman was in error on this point. Now we discover you haven't even read the book Ehrman was criticzing, and nor have you even checked Carrier's claims concerning this point. What was it you were saying about due diligence?
8. Interpolation in Tactus: Again you miss the point. Carrier claimed that ‘many classical scholars’ and ‘a lot of established scholarship’ believe that the text in question was interpolated by a third party and that TACITUS NEVER WROTE IT. But leaving aside the fact that six scholars from 40 years ago is not ‘many classical scholars’ or ‘a lot of established scholarship’, two of the scholars he cited did not even believe this. They believed that Tacitus HAD WRITTEN IT, and that a third party had simply transferred the text from one of Tacitus' books into another book. There is a difference between saying that a third party made an interpolation by FABRICATING A STATEMENT BY TACITUS (Carrier's original claim), and saying a third party made an interpolation by TRANSPOSING A STATEMENT BY TACITUS. Carrier misrepresented two of his sources as saying the first, when they said the second.
9. Thom Stark: I look forward to reading your reply.
___________________________ [1] 'Certain minor imperial provinces had equestrian governors, who were known first as prefects but from the time of Claudius as procurators (e.g., Pontius Pilate in Judaea; 15.44.3). Claudius evidently assigned certain judicial functions too to procurators, but T.'s report is unclear (12.60).', Woodman, 'The Annals', pp. 359-360 (2004).
[2] 'Pilate was appointed under Tiberius, and an inscription from Caesarea mentions his activities in regard to a Tiberieion (or imperial cult sanctuary to Tiberius). The text also gives his correct title as praefectus rather than procurator.', Galinsky, 'The Cambridge Companion To The Age Of Augustus', p. 378 (2005).
[3] 'Since Coponius was apparently dispatched as a prefect (praefectus, eparxos), Josephus' nomenclature here seems incorrect, though the same problem is found in Tacitus (e.g. Ann. 15.44 on Pilate.', Mason & Chapman, 'Flavius Josephus: Translation and Commentary. Judean war', p. 80 (2008).
[4] 'Pilate actually held the lesser rank of prefect in Judea, something that Tacitus, who had access to the official records at Rome's Tabularium and frequently quoted from them in his Annals, should have known.', Dando-Collins, 'The Great Fire of Rome: The Fall of the Emperor Nero and His City', p. 8 ()2010.
[5] 'However, a fragment of a Latin inscription found in Caesarea gives Pilate the title "prefect". This supports the deduction made from other evidence, most of it epigraphic, that up to the reign of Claudius, though the terminology was still fluid, the normal title for an equestrian provincial governor was "prefect", and "procurator" must now ber reserved for the governors of Judaea after 44.', Smallwood, 'The Jews Under Roman Rule: From Pompey to Diocletian : A Study in Political Relations', p. 145 (2001).
[6] 'This change in title under Claudius goes a long way in explaining the confusion of the principal literary texts here. Philo, Josephus, the NT and Tacitus refer to various governors as eparxos (praefectus), epitropos (procurator), and hegemwn (governor), apparently indiscriminately.', Bond, 'Pontius Pilate In History And Interpretation', p. 12 (2004).
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