James Hannam's website

[noons]

I just wanted to let James know that at least one of the articles on his site, the seeker's guide to the bible, is pulling a 404.

[Deleted]

I, too, noticed this.

[ignorantianescia]

Not only the Seeker's Guide to the Bible, these links in the table of contents all give a 404.

History of Religion: essays and articles about the growth and effect of Christianity
The Foundation and Loss of the Royal and Serapeum Libraries of Alexandria: a more detailed treatment (academic): www.bede.org.uk/Library2.htm
The Decline of Witch Trials in Europe: why and how witch trials came to an end (academic): www.bede.org.uk/decline.htm
Christianity and Pagan Literature: Christians are no more likely to burn books than anyone else (general): www.bede.org.uk/literature.htm

Historical Jesus and the Bible
The Seeker's Guide to the Bible: what is in it? who wrote it? how historical is it? Covers Old and New testaments (general): www.bede.org.uk/seekers1.html

Philosophy of Science and Religion
A Dialogue on Natural Religion: a discussion between a theist and an agnostic on why we should believe in God (popular): www.bede.org.uk/dialogue1.htm

[contraxt]

Hi James,
I have contributed to your site previously but cannot see where or how to start a new thread. I’d like to post a reaction to Prof Bart Ehrman’s new book “Did Jesus Exist?” and will do so here but if this is inappropriate simply remove it or advise me how to start a thread.
Regards
Did Jesus Exist?
With The Titanic much in our minds, the metaphor is just too tempting. The largest moving man-made object in history fatally holed below the waterline; And now 100 years later, “the world’s most powerful and influential social, political, economic, cultural and religious institution” is also about to plunge into the dark icy depths of history! The institution in question is The Christian Church and the dramatic description of its importance comes from the internationally renowned American theologian Prof. Bart Ehrman. The dire prediction of its imminent fate is mine!
Ehrman is widely regarded as an energetic defender of Christianity but ironically, and no doubt unintentionally, he has just set Christianity on a collision course with a massive iceberg which it cannot now avoid!
For years, Ehrman has received a steady trickle of enquiries asking him that most fundamental Christian question: Did Jesus ever actually exist? Obviously irritated by these nagging questions he has now decided to dispose of the issue once and for all with an eagerly awaited book entitled, “Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth”. He clearly expects this to be an easy pushover because he describes “the mythicists” who question Jesus’ existence as weird and whacky “deniers” with mostly none of the academic training or credentials needed to debate “real experts” like himself. Be that as it may, his grave strategic error has been to bring this question into the open at all for whilst ever it was only loopy “internet junkies” raising the question they could safely be ridiculed or ignored. But now he has staked his formidable international reputation on refuting this nonsense the question has suddenly become mainstream and the actual evidence must be examined on its own merits.
Well, what evidence does Ehrman muster and how does he approach the problem? Before we read a word of his text the very title of his book suggests he has not really understood the difficulties and we’ll return to this. First though, we are rather surprised to find a theologian of his stature making the elementary error of saying we have no evidence for Pilate! Our confidence is further shaken when he immediately admits “our best sources” of information about Jesus, the gospels, “are riddled with problems”! Apart from that little understatement of the “problems”, the very fact he starts with the gospels at all sounds a loud warning klaxon that he is on the wrong track!
And this is the crux of the problem that he doesn’t appear to appreciate: Although everyone naturally and unthinkingly turns first to the gospels for information on Jesus, they are NOT the earliest Christian literature but merely anonymous copies of copies of dubious provenance from late first century. When we properly start at the beginning with the writings of Paul and several others we are astonished to find that they know nothing whatever of Jesus’ supposed gospel adventures. This is so important it must be restated: The earliest Christians closest in time and place to Jesus’ supposed gospel career know nothing whatever about it! No Mary (virgin or otherwise); no Bethlehem or Galilee; no disciples or earthly enemies; no parables, healings or miracles of any kind; no temptations, transfiguration or triumphal entry to Jerusalem; no betrayal by a Judas, denial by a Peter or trial and crucifixion by Pilate in Jerusalem: In fact no pre-gospel Christian writer ever has cause to even mention Pilate and Paul went so far as to say that Roman governors only punish wrongdoers so could not possibly have believed Jesus fell foul of Pilate! And this where even the title of Ehrman’s book alerts us that he’s misunderstood the whole problem because nowhere in the earliest Christian writings is Nazareth ever even mentioned let alone connected with Jesus. This is a common error and the celebrated British theologian N.T. Wright has glibly stated that Paul repeatedly refers to “Jesus of Nazareth”. To restate the problem a third time: There is absolutely nothing in the writings of the pre gospel Christians that requires us to believe their Jesus lived in Pilate’s Palestine per the gospels. Ehrman tries to avoid this conclusion by saying that Paul knew the disciple Peter but ironically, no scholar has done more than he has (in earlier works) to show that Paul’s associate Cephas cannot be equated with the supposed Peter of the gospels. Ehrman has in fact shown just a glimmering of this whole problem in an earlier book when he asked perplexedly if “Paul and the gospel writers even shared the same religion”?
The answer appears to be a resounding NO and if the very first Christians like Paul knew nothing of the Jesus we conceive from the gospels we can surely have very little confidence that he ever really existed!

[humphreyclarke]

I did enjoy the Titanic references in your post - very topical. I should point out however that Bart Ehrman is not a theologian; he is a New Testament Scholar (and an Atheist at that). I didn't see you mention that Paul said that he spent two weeks in Jerusalem lodging with the apostle Peter, and that he also met Jesus's brother, James. That would be a bit weird if there were no historical Jesus.

[unkleE]

Apr 11, 2012 23:20:47 GMT contraxt said:

I have contributed to your site previously but cannot see where or how to start a new thread.

Go to the home page and click on one of the sections (History, Science, etc) and you'll find a new thread 'button' at top right.

Ehrman is widely regarded as an energetic defender of Christianity

That would be news to the bulk of christians who think he is destructive of christianity!

Our confidence is further shaken when he immediately admits “our best sources” of information about Jesus, the gospels, “are riddled with problems”!

A problem doesn't mean a source is worthless, just that there are many issues to deal with. If historians discarded sources that had problems, I imagine we'd know very little history!

[sankari]

contraxt, please learn something about genre. When you've done this, you'll understand why apostolic letters to established Christian churches have no need to recount the biography of Jesus.

The Gospels belong to a completely different genre with a very different purpose. We expect biographical details in the Gospels. We do not expect them in the epistles.

The fact that certain biographical details do not appear in the epistles is no evidence that the authors were unaware of them.