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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Arthur Pewtey)
Newsgroups: net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Evidence for Religion: possible excesses in some replies
Message-ID: <1074@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 12-Jun-85 16:53:03 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1074
Posted: Wed Jun 12 16:53:03 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 13-Jun-85 03:07:08 EDT
References: <387@uvm-cs.UUCP> <2214@topaz.ARPA> <1064@pyuxd.UUCP> <112@umcp-cs.UUCP>
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>>> Be careful about circular arguments.  There is no external evidence that
>>> Mark is the oldest Gospel.  Indeed many early Church tradition says
>>> Matthew
>>> is.  Scholars believe that Mark is earliest because his accounts appear to
>>> be more "primitive".  That is, in a number of cases he makes the least of
>>> Jesus' authority, and seems to have the least "mythological" versions of
>>> many of the stories.  If we assume that the stories gathered
>>> Christological
>>> elaborations over time, then the least elaborated gospel would be the
>>> earliest.  That argument is fine.  I think I even believe it.  But we
>>> can't run the argument backwards.  We can't use Mark's alleged age as an
>>> argument for the historicity of his accounts.  The apparent historicity
>>> of his accounts is what caused us to conclude that his gospel was the
>>> earliest one in the first place.  [CHUCK HEDRICK]

>>Relative age is an important but no an all-encompassing factor here.  The
>>fact alone that a "Gospel" exists that fails to mention Jesus' divinity and
>>resurrection at all says something.  After all, if those things DID happen,
>>who on earth would leave such truly remarkable and alluring aspects out of
>>their account? [ROSEN]

> Gad, the list of reasons one could give to account for the truncation of
> Mark is LONG.  The author could have died before finishing it, or the end
> was torn off, or ....  One can speculate endlessly, to little purpose.

Ah, but, Charles, it wasn't just stuff left off of the tail end, there was
stuff left off at all points!  Can you imagine writing the document and
later saying "WHOOPS!  I forgot all about the fact that Jesus' mother was
a virgin and the miracle of the virgin birth.  Let me go back and put that
in...  AAARRRGH!!!"  I tend to doubt that he just forgot.  I would tend to
think that he didn't put it in for a reason (didn't happen), and that later
authors of later works DID put it in for another reason (to spruce up the
story---the same way modern authors have to add a required amount of sex and
violence to get their books published, these guys had to add a little miracle
story to get people interested:  good words and deeds was NOT enough!).
-- 
"to be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best night and day
 to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle any human
 being can fight and never stop fighting."  - e. e. cummings
	Rich Rosen	ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr