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Post by fortigurn on Jan 15, 2015 5:41:18 GMT
Sure, Richard Carrier is dead wrong on mythicism, but he is well enough qualified to comment on the issue and his field is ancient history, which is quite close enough. In any case, I think questions on the historical Jesus are better dealt with by the products of history faculties rather than theology faculties. The fact Carrier subscribes to a fringe position is irrelevant. That might place him outside the scholarly mainstream, but it hardly means he is not a scholar. Academics have believed all sorts of dumb things over the years. As someone once said of a deceased professor, "He had an exemplary career: wrong about everything but always in an interesting way." I agree with this. Carrier is sufficiently qualified to comment. It's just that he typically comments without substantive evidence to support him, and often transgresses his skill boundaries.
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Post by ignorantianescia on Jan 22, 2015 11:52:02 GMT
He regularly speaks with presumed authority outside his field of expertise, he subscribes to a fringe position rejected by the academic consensus, and he has yet to obtain a professional academic position. I agree with Sankari. Carrier is qualified as a classical historian to comment on some aspects of early Christianity related to Greco-Roman culture. But he doesn't have sufficient skills to deal with the Jewish influence on early Christianity. We all agree his main bone to pick is Mythicism, as he operates from an anti-Christian bias. The key issue for him is Jesus' existence, a huge subject that relies on all kinds of input from various sub-disciplines. Carrier simply lacks the expertise to evaluate all those issues. He knows no Hebrew of the relevant periods, no Aramaic of the relevant period. Whenever he dabbles in textual criticism, his output is lazy. Then there are the usual tell-tale signs. He readily adopts minority views without addressing the arguments of the majority. He aims for the nitpick in 'discussions' with actual experts. His tendency to dress up arguments with Bayesian fluff without any evident need of that resembles a smokescreen tactic. Carrier could be a qualified independent scholar if he kept himself to questions of NT Greek linguistics, the participation of early Christianity in Greco-Roman society or similar subjects. He could be a respectable amateur scholar if he went outside that domain, found himself a mentor and slowly built up his skills and reputation by contributing to smaller questions. But right now he overreaches way beyond that, so he is neither. And he is definitely not a regular scholar.
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