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Did I Quote Mine Marcus Borg?

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  • #91
    Originally posted by Punkish View Post
    Quick question to Tassman before I decide about the quote mining: Do you accept or reject that Jesus did the first type of wondrous works, healings / exorcism that Borg distinguishes from nature miracles (which you called 'magic' in the post that Adrift was responding to)? Thanks.
    I’ve already stated that, what were believed to be miracles of healing and exorcism by a credulous populace, are best explained by the power of suggestion of a charismatic figure. We see similar today with the likes of Benny Hinn, and many others, producing what are claimed to be miracles. If Benny can produce "miracles" then Jesus could certainly have done it, especially given that the descriptions of them are embellished accounts written 50+ years after the events by non-eyewitnesses.
    “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

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    • #92
      Originally posted by Punkish View Post
      Quick question to Tassman before I decide about the quote mining: Do you accept or reject that Jesus did the first type of wondrous works, healings / exorcism that Borg distinguishes from nature miracles (which you called 'magic' in the post that Adrift was responding to)? Thanks.
      Tassman is an atheist, and I suspect that like me he thinks that people who think Jesus really did miracles are naive and gullible and on par with people who think The Lord of the Rings is non-fiction or who think Trump is the best president ever.

      If your question is did Jesus's followers believe he did miracles, in the same sort of way as Joseph Smith's followers or Sathya Sai Baba's followers believe they did miracles, then the obvious answer is that certainly 30-100 years or so later at least some of his followers believed he did because they wrote the gospels, and Josephus seems to corroborate the idea that his followers believed in his miracles. If the question is, to what extent does Tass think we can look behind the gospels, to the "historical Jesus" and claim with any reasonable level of probability that the man called Jesus actually existed and really claimed to do miracles in the same sort of way Joseph Smith or Sathya Sai Baba did, then I would personally comment that I think the balance of probability leans fairly heavily toward a "probably yes" on that, but if that is your question to Tass I would be interested to see him comment.

      I think it's always worth bearing in mind that any claims about history tend to be on a bit of an epistolomologically poor footing to begin with because they essentially involve playing a giant game of detective with surviving artifacts and documents and attempting to reconstruct the past by guesswork and deduction - claims about the past are inherently a matter of sorting through circumstantial evidence. Historical events are not repeatable the way any modern scientific field of inquiry is, nor are they able to be personally experienced by anyone living, so we can't 'know' about them the way we can 'know' about things like lights or cars or people we've met, we can just make guesses on balances of probability and attempt to reconstruct the past as best we can. We can guess that Jesus probably existed, and we can guess that he was probably seen by his immediate followers as a miracle worker. But those are, ultimately, guesses.

      Edit: LOL, cross-posted. Oh well.
      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

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      • #93
        OK, then Adrift's response with the 'quote mine' might still be valid, even without the supposed fatal omission. And Tassman, despite all these credulous people who apparently shouldn't be believed, Celsus still thought Jesus practiced magic he learned from Egypt. (! - who himself had issues with credulous people)

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        • #94
          Originally posted by Punkish View Post
          And Tassman, despite all these credulous people who apparently shouldn't be believed, Celsus still thought Jesus practiced magic he learned from Egypt. (! - who himself had issues with credulous people)
          Oh, goody, let's make the views of some guy named Celsus who lived a couple of millennia ago the upper limit on our own critical thinking ability. What could go wrong?
          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

          Comment


          • #95
            I'm starting to suspect that Tassman isn't a Christian.
            Actually YOU put Trump in the White House. He wouldn't have gotten 1% of the vote if it wasn't for the widespread spiritual and cultural devastation caused by progressive policies. There's no "this country" left with your immigration policies, your "allies" are worthless and even more suicidal than you are and democracy is a sick joke that I hope nobody ever thinks about repeating when the current order collapses. - Darth_Executor striking a conciliatory note in Civics 101

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            • #96
              Originally posted by psstein View Post
              I'm coming in late, but here's my view (as someone with published NT work and a lot of work on the NT):

              1. Jesus was definitely known as a healer who performed miraculous healings/exorcisms/etc. So did a lot of other Jews, by the way. Whether or not Jesus acted outside of natural causes is a theological issue.
              Borg seems to be stating something more than that his skeptical and liberal peers believe that Jesus was known as a miracle worker who performed healings and exorcisms, but that he actually was a healer and exorcist. He then suggests that these healings were more than simply faith healings like something Benny Hinn might perform, but were actually paranormal in nature. The full article is in the second post, in case you didn't see it.

              As I point out elsewhere, even John Dominic Crossan believes that Jesus performed actual historical miracles,

              Source: The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant by John Dominic Crossan

              Jesus was both an exorcist and a healer: I take 121 Beelzebul Controversy [1/2], 110 A Leper Cured [1/2], 127 Sickness and Sin [1/2], and 129 Blind Man Healed [1/2] as not only typically but actually historical. His vision of the Kingdom was but an ecstatic dream without immediate social repercussions, were it not for those exorcisms and healings. Those latter were what the Kingdom looked like at the level of political reality.

              © Copyright Original Source



              Whether Crossan believes these miraculous acts to be simply psychosomatic or something paranormal like Borg, I have no idea, and he doesn't go into it.

              Originally posted by psstein View Post
              2. I am agnostic to the nature miracles (professionally). The stories are difficult to parse and follow many of the same constructions as Elisha's miracles in 2 Kings.
              What some people here seem to be tripping over is the word "miracle" in the phrase "nature miracle" as though Borg is referring to them as uniquely miraculous, and exorcisms/healings not so much, but that's not what he's doing. As I mention in post #18 the literature suggests that these are simply distinctions between types of miracles made by scholars studying the Gospels. So, for instance, John Meier breaks up the miracles in the Gospels into exorcism, healings, raising the dead, and "nature miracles". Meier isn't saying that "nature miracles" are the only miracles mentioned in the Gospels, but that they are simply a type of miracle that are distinct from exorcisms, healings, and raising the dead. He then goes on to further break down "nature miracles" into sub-categories, which include "gift miracles," "epiphany miracles," "rescue miracles," and "curse miracles". Some of the confusion probably lies in the fact that Borg doesn't like to use the word miracle at all,

              Source: http://www.beliefnet.com/faiths/christianity/2004/04/the-mighty-deeds-of-jesus.aspx

              My shift in terms from "miracles" to "the spectacular" is deliberate. The most common modern understanding of miracles, accepted by both those who affirm and deny them, takes into consideration the modern worldview: The universe is a closed system of cause and effect operating under natural laws. Within this framework, miracles are understood as God's intervening supernaturally into an otherwise predictable system of natural cause and effect.

              Because I do not accept this way of thinking about the world and God's relation to the world, I avoid the term "miracles."

              © Copyright Original Source

              Last edited by Adrift; 04-06-2017, 08:31 AM.

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              • #97
                Originally posted by Roy View Post
                If some-one who's judgment I trust thought |I was committing a fallacy, I'd look again. I often have. But I'd take a single respected individual's view over a numerical poll that includes people who fall for argumentum ad populum any time.
                Well, it also depends on whom you're asking what questions to. If you go to the average Christian forum and create a poll on evolution, most would probably vote in favor of creationism - secular forums it would be reversed. But both polls have far less value than any poll conducted by those that are professional biologists, that have actual actual expertise.

                This is why I suggested for him to go over to a philosophy forum and ask the opinion of the members there regarding this - as most likely have a background in the subject. It's perfectly reasonable to do such a thing, as that's what those forums are for in the first place. People come to PhysicsForums all the time to settle an issue. But he dodged the challenge precisely because he knew how they would likely judge his choice use of quote brackets.

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                • #98
                  Originally posted by Punkish View Post
                  OK, then Adrift's response with the 'quote mine' might still be valid, even without the supposed fatal omission.
                  Adrift quoted Borg, whom I hadn’t referenced, to support his argument but omitted the “miracles” Borg did not accept. This is quote mining at its most dishonest.

                  And Tassman, despite all these credulous people who apparently shouldn't be believed,
                  Stories of healings, exorcism, and divination are commonplace in ancient literature and if you don’t accept them then there’s no reason why we would believe the miraculous stories about Jesus either...especially given that that the descriptions of them are embellished accounts written 50+ years after the events by non-eyewitnesses.

                  Originally posted by Meh Gerbil View Post
                  I'm starting to suspect that Tassman isn't a Christian.
                  There's no fooling you.
                  “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

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