{"id":1616,"date":"2010-02-19T08:46:00","date_gmt":"2010-02-19T08:46:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/02\/is-there-evidence-for-mythicism\/"},"modified":"2010-02-19T08:46:00","modified_gmt":"2010-02-19T08:46:00","slug":"is-there-evidence-for-mythicism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/02\/is-there-evidence-for-mythicism.html","title":{"rendered":"Is There Evidence For Mythicism?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

The ongoing conversation has shown yet another parallel between mythicism and creationism.<\/p>\n

On the one hand, it seems increasingly clear that there is strictly speaking no \u201cevidence\u201d for mythicism. Positive evidence for mythicism would presumably involve some actual indication that someone somewhere invented the story of Jesus, not merely as the novelistic historical fiction that is common in the ancient world, but as\u00a0pure fiction.<\/p>\n

The discussion keeps returning to the \u201ccompatibility\u201d of evidence with mythicism. But evidence is often compatible with more than one conclusion \u2013 what makes for an academically rigorous investigation is an attempt to deal as efficiently and persuasively as possible with as much of the relevant evidence as possible. <\/p>\n

The evidence from biology is \u201ccompatible\u201d with young-earth creationism \u2013 as long as you are willing to posit a creator who arbitrarily makes organisms created independently appear as though they are related, and creates rocks with\u00a0ratios of radioactive isotopes to decay products that \u201cmislead\u201d scientists into thinking the Earth is much older than 6,000 years. Likewise, no evidence is incompatible with mythicism \u2013 as long as one is willing to posit an arbitrary mythmaker who invents things for no\u00a0obvious reason, and who often expresses himself so poorly that one often gets the \u201cwrong impression\u201d that he is talking about a historical figure.<\/p>\n

But as it turns out, neither mythicism nor young-earth creationism is about the evidence at all, but is a presupposition which is brought to the evidence and which no evidence can ever counter. In the case of mythicism, it is a presupposition that no details in a narrative such as the Gospels can ever lead a historian to conclude that he or she is dealing with a story based on historical events. And if that is one\u2019s presupposition, then unless different sorts of evidence are found, or unless mythicists show some willingness to deal more plausibly with Paul\u2019s references to Jesus being \u201cborn of a woman,\u201d \u201cdescended from David according to the flesh,\u201d and crucified, then it seems that time spent discussing the New Testament with mythicists would be better spent discussing the nature of historical inquiry when archaeological evidence and first-hand eyewitness accounts are lacking. That seems to be where the real disagreements lie.<\/p>\n

But mythicists have been emphasizing that they are a diverse group, and so I wonder whether there are any mythicists reading this who would in theory<\/em> accept a textual account as evidence (not providing certainty, of course, but providing a high degree of probability) of something or someone historical. If you could provide an example or illustration, it would be greatly appreciated.<\/p>\n

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The ongoing conversation has shown yet another parallel between mythicism and creationism. On the one hand, it seems increasingly clear that there is strictly speaking no \u201cevidence\u201d for mythicism. Positive evidence for mythicism would presumably involve some actual indication that someone somewhere invented the story of Jesus, not merely as the novelistic historical fiction that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nIs There Evidence For Mythicism?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The ongoing conversation has shown yet another parallel between mythicism and creationism.On the one hand, it seems increasingly clear that there is\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/02\/is-there-evidence-for-mythicism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Is There Evidence For Mythicism?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The ongoing conversation has shown yet another parallel between mythicism and creationism.On the one hand, it seems increasingly clear that there is\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/02\/is-there-evidence-for-mythicism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Religion Prof: The Blog of James F. 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