{"id":2820,"date":"2010-10-11T22:23:00","date_gmt":"2010-10-11T22:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/10\/battling-mythicism-in-the-heavenly-places\/"},"modified":"2010-10-11T22:23:00","modified_gmt":"2010-10-11T22:23:00","slug":"battling-mythicism-in-the-heavenly-places","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/10\/battling-mythicism-in-the-heavenly-places.html","title":{"rendered":"Battling Mythicism in the Heavenly Places"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Earl Doherty and some other mythicists<\/a> try to argue that Paul thought that the story of Christ, whatever that story may have involved, was set in a mythical heavenly realm \u2013 typically, a realm viewed as having been \u201cin the realm of flesh\u201d and yet \u201cabove the firmament.\u201d <\/p>\n

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Such\u00a0claims apparently seem not merely plausible but persuasive to some\u00a0\u2013 but certainly not to those who have\u00a0actually read the New Testament extensively, rather than atomistically looking for prooftexts to support for a preconceived theory. <\/p>\n

It is all well and good to mention those texts that refer to Christ being victorious over powers or crucified by the rulers of this age. But not in isolation from other evidence. Take for instance Ephesians 6:12<\/a>, which\u00a0refers to its author and readers also being involved in a struggle \u201cnot against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.\u201d<\/p>\n

So can someone please explain to me again why the events involving Jesus are supposed to have been thought of as occurring elsewhere than on earth, when a Christian\u00a0author writing on earth to recipients on earth used the same language to refer to a conflict he believed they were currently involved in? If, as Earl Doherty claims<\/a>, \u201cColossians 2:15 can hardly refer to any historical event on Calvary\u201d then surely Ephesians 6:12 cannot have been written by or to people who believed they were historical human beings living on earth, right?<\/p>\n

[I also happened across an extensive discussion of Doherty and mythicism by Bernard Muller<\/a>, which I\u2019ve only had a chance to glance at, but looks like it is worth exploring further.]<\/p>\n

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Earl Doherty and some other mythicists try to argue that Paul thought that the story of Christ, whatever that story may have involved, was set in a mythical heavenly realm \u2013 typically, a realm viewed as having been \u201cin the realm of flesh\u201d and yet \u201cabove the firmament.\u201d Such\u00a0claims apparently seem not merely plausible but […]<\/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-2820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nBattling Mythicism in the Heavenly Places<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Earl Doherty and some other mythicists try to argue that Paul thought that the story of Christ, whatever that story may have involved, was set in a\" \/>\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\/10\/battling-mythicism-in-the-heavenly-places.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Battling Mythicism in the Heavenly Places\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Earl Doherty and some other mythicists try to argue that Paul thought that the story of Christ, whatever that story may have involved, was set in a\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/10\/battling-mythicism-in-the-heavenly-places.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Religion Prof: The Blog of James F. 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