Pants-of-dog wrote:This does not show that Jews persecuted Christians. It shows that Saul did. And he seems to have various reasons to have done so.
At the time, not all Jews were antipathetic to Christians. While the Pharisees (like Saul) and others may have had differences with Christians, this does not mean all Jews did.
i. It verifies that St. Paul was among the Jews who regularly persecuted Christians and apparently even took them prisoner to high priests in different areas, and sought the permission of priests to do this. People literally in charge of synagogues were a part of this scheme, according to the passage.
This would be rather grave and unacceptable if it was a story about Bishops hunting gay Christians, wouldn't it?
Would you say... this would be an example of generalized persecution of Christians?
ii. Of course not all Jews. Many Jews became Christians -- but, technically, by modern Jewish law as I understand it, they then cease to be Jews. But I am sure it is more complex than that.
No. Read more carefully.
He asked for letters, or papers, so that he could travel to Damascus. He needed these because it was not under Roman rule at the time and so he could not just walk in.
This seems like it's letters to get over to the synagogue in Damascus and be allowed to conduct an inquisition. Hence, he asked for letters to the synagogues, not permission to Roman authorities.
How would you read it if it said...
"9 Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who are gay, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem.
"Something tells me that you would read it quite differently.
I know he persecuted Christians. I was questioning your claim that he did it because he was a Jew, which is not supported by your texts so far.
And since we are discussing whether or not the Bible myths were modified for political reasons, you cannot claim that one of your premises is that it has not changed.
So St. Paul had a team of other Jewish men and letters from the high priest to the synagogue of Damascus to go enforce a Roman persecution?
This was clearly a fight between the Jews and the Christians.
As far as whether or not these myths were modified, I still insist that the recordings of these were way too early to envision some "long game" con on the Romans to ingratiate themselves to them. I also do not think the texts themselves are designed to ingratiate themselves to Romans.
I would entertain any claims that they really were designed to that end, if you want to bring them up. I feel like I should have asked for a more concrete backing up of this point earlier and now regret that I did not.
The fact that these words were not written until decades after it supposedly happened.
The fact that each gospel tells it slightly differently.
The fact that each gospel progressively makes Pilate looks less culpable and the Jews look worse.
The fact that shortly after these gospels came out, Christianity became the ruling religion of the empire.
ia. The words likely were written down before that point. We know that St. Paul came over to the church something like three years after Christs' death, though some put it later into around 5+ years after his death. His epistles survive and were written, copied, etc., so it would make sense that the Gospels were recorded very recently after the death of Christ.
ib. I also believe it was completely normal for these to then be memorized and carried on, as was the practice of anyone. This provides sort of a doubel insurance on the quality of the text.
ii. The Gospels record different aspects of the same events, and sometimes similar events. But this is something that is best discussed on an example by example basis.
iii. So you would say that
there is a known order of the Gospels, and that the Gospels
were, in fact, fixed and remained unchanged when you suggest that each Gospel makes Pontius Pilate look less culpable?
iva. I believe the Gospels were widely circulated and known in the 1st century, and that there is evidence of a canon being establsihed in the late 2nd century because it had become necessary. In the 4th century, tolerance of Christianity became normalized and Christian ascendance really did begin. In the 5th century, there were also plenty of Pagans around. Paganism died slowly, and was tolerated.
ivb. I am curious... How would the Christians ingratiate themselves to Rome?
What is a Roman? Who were the Romans? Who were they appealing to?
Did Roman identity exist in some broad way like some powerful national or cultural ID?
Weren't Jews also Romans, as you pointed out?
No. I never claimed it was wrong because it was a myth.
You were initially arguing that Pilate was indifferent, while simultaneously arguing that Romans were persecuting Christians. I replied by pointing out that the indifference portrayed in the Bible was also used as a theological justification for pogroms and other discrimination against Jews.
You seem to have confirmed this with your firm belief that Jews persecuted Christians instead.
There weould be crimes against Jews centuries & centuries & centuries after the ascendance of Christianity to political power. That is completely irrelevant here.
No.
They were saying things like “oh crap these romans are here to rape and torture us again. We need to get some political power to stop this. Oh Jeez, that hurts. I have no faith that god will get us out of this. Tell then what they want to hear. Tell them we think they are the good guys and this is all the fault of the Jews. Oh hod, why do they always sodomise us?”
Et cetera.
What does the timeline on this look like? I do not understand how 1st century Christians could be excited to let themselves face gross persecution and change their holy texts knowing that it would pay off in the early 4th century.
Yes, and Christians are still just as greedy and just as good as hoarding up treasures as the rest of us.
And it is still going on. You do not see those television evangelists giving away their money, do you? No. Quite the opposite. Quite the opposite.
I do not imagine many greedy people throwing in their lot with the early Christians.
Did she never play “telephone” in school
It is actually very easy to change the record once you have given yourself the power to decide which version is the right one.
What do you think about her actual argument, though?
It's obvious that the "Telephone" rebuttal doesn't actually apply. We know that people in dramatically different places all memorized the Rg Veda and could recite it back to us by heart, reciting exactly the same thing, usually even using the exact same tones...
How do you respond to Doniger's position in a way that accounts for the facts on the ground?
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