Hundreds of people.

Is there anyone else whose review of the matter will hold weight in a consensus?

I am especially interested in hearing about point 4 in your conclusion in this article: [4] biased disagreement.

Since we all are subject to confirmation bias, I find it difficult to even reason about objectivity giving consideration to your explanation on how to best handle it in the conclusion. 🙂 I’ll be watching. Thank you.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1448687315371416/?ref_newsfeed_story_type=regular

Mendeley is a free reference manager similar to Endnote. I use it and find it useful

I’ve evolved in my thinking now that I understand what Mark is doing literarily. I wasn’t convinced then that Mark could possibly be doing something else. But for my evolved view and it’s basis, you’ll have to await my new book On the Historicity of Jesus. Expected June or July.

My own hypothesis is that Mark ended the Gospel thus in order to set up a pretext for why little of his particular story had been heard in the Christian community until he wrote it down.

1) Then Mark is selling deliberately his story has Recorded History?

2) your hypothesis is still valid and possible if I assume that the young man at tomb exhorts the woman to command a by now degraded Peter (a Judeo-Christian icon and then rival for the pauline Mark) to go in Galilea of Gentiles because the Risen Jesus is allegory of new Temple and/or Novus Israel (the true church) now present not more in Judaea but into the Diaspora?

If so, then MacDonald is partially correct when he argues wrongly that the exhortation of young man to escape in Galilea is a kind of apologetical ”defensive military tactic” ex evento post-70, because it may be another clue that for Mark the Risen Christ is allegory of Israel that survives to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70.

Thanks for the replies,
Giuseppe

Merely that “well-established facts” can wobble and fail at times.

Examples range from the reputation of Columbus to scientific claims such as Mercury orbiting in tidal lock with the sun, dinosaurs having sub-brains in their lower spines, Martian canals, and other phlogistons of your choice.

By “hot ‘n’ sweaty” I meant to allude to high degrees of passion in certain controversies, and the proportionate need for applied skepticism.

Unfortunately I’m about to embark on a long period of travel, so I won’t get to blog about that video for awhile. I’ll do so as soon as I can find time (amidst all the other dozens of things that need blogging). I plan to write up a commentary on it.

Yes, Crook didn’t answer the arguments that took him most by surprise (they wouldn’t have if he’d chosen a different order of presenting, or if it hadn’t just been finals so he would have had time to read my book before the debate, instead of administering and grading tests and papers, the latter limitation quite beyond his control, and the former had pluses and minuses no matter which way he went).

As to whether his model makes more sense than mine, I quite disagree. The evidence goes the other way, as I showed in the debate. Crook was mistaken in claiming it went from Mark’s earthly Jesus to John’s pre-existent Jesus. Paul’s Jesus is already pre-existent and even more supernatural than John’s. And Paul predates Mark by decades. Meanwhile, Mark is demonstrably fiction (I even showed that with Crook’s own examples).

But certainly, to be sure, one needs to weigh and compare a lot more evidence and models than we had time to cover. Such is the case with any debate (something Christians often don’t understand in their love of debates; there were some Christians in the audience, but I think they were as annoyed by Crook’s destruction of their faith as mine, so that was win-win for both of us).

And as you note, we need to see lots of examples and analysis of the structure and content of the Gospels (esp. Mark) to see how they are creating their fictions and why. That I do accomplish in chapter 10 of my book.

It would be a reversal of the Ascension story (where the demons don’t know who he is). But I can see what you have in mind, placing the earthlings in the position of the demons (as one would expect someone to do who terrestrialized the original Ascension narrative) could be such a nod. Although the parallel breaks down when Jesus doesn’t reveal himself and shame and subjugate his executors (as he does in the original Ascension). One would also have to suppose making the demons then aware is a literary device. Which it certainly is. But how does it fit the Ascension model?

There may be closer parallels with the Enoch literature than the Ascension. And that may have been a factor in any case.

Still, I think a better fit is MacDonald’s explanation, which I summarize in OHJ:

Mark’s strange theme of the ‘messianic secret’ (which Jesus always insists upon, even though almost no one ever complies) makes no sense as history, or really even as theology or apologetic, yet makes perfect sense as reflecting the theme of Odysseus in disguise among the suitors in his palace who were maliciously courting his wife. Like Jesus, Odysseus endeavors, even when occasionally recognized, to maintain that disguise until he can get his revenge on those suitors (the sinners who would usurp his place to slake their greed) who have inhabited his house–analogous to the priests and Pharisees inhabiting the temple (God’s house), who are likewise corrupt sinners mired in hypocrisy and greed, and likewise courting the same woman: the church.