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Geologist Suggests Aboriginal Oral Tradition Is the World's Oldest Story

2/14/2020

83 Comments

 
This past week geologist Erin Matchan, writing with colleagues in Geology, claimed that the Gunditjmara people of southern Australia preserve the world’s oldest oral tradition, dating back 37,000 years. Being conservative on such things, I find it difficult to accept that claim, since preservation over such long periods occurs nowhere else in the world, and the evidence is suggestive without being conclusive. Matchan alleges—while admitting that she does not have proof—that the Gunditjmara origin story for the Budj Bim (Mount Eccles) volcano records its catastrophic formation over a period of months tens of thousands of years ago. She bases this date on her dating of the volcano’s rocks, which, so far as I can tell, has nothing to do with the oral story since the oral tradition does not describe the formation of a volcano. Previous estimates placed the volcano’s origins around 25,000 BCE.
The best-known version of the Gunditjmara tale, and the one used by most scholars in discussing it, was recorded in the far-away time of 2010 in a book the Gunditjmara wrote with G. Wettenhall, The People of Budj Bim: Engineers of Aquaculture, Builders of Stone House Settlements and Warriors Defending Country:
At the dawn of time, it was the Ancestral Beings – part human, part beast – who brought what was previously barren land to life. At the end of the Dreaming journeys, the Ancestral Being left aspects of themselves behind transformed into part of the landscape. To the Gunditjmara people, Budj Bim’s domed hill represents the forehead of one such Being, with the lava that spat out as the head burst through the earth forming his teeth. In the Dhauwurd wurrung language, budj bim means “high head,” and tung att means “teeth belonging to it”, referring to the scattered red scoria.
This account is a bit of a hybrid. The second half is derived from a word list in a nineteenth century book, and the first half comes from more recent accounts.
 
The problem is that the use of “lava that spat out,” which does not appear in nineteenth century sources, seems to imply that the story refers to an active lava flow. But the story as we have it today has been influenced by more than a century of geological work on the mountain and the 2004 Australian government heritage designation that tied the mountain as an erupting volcano to the Gunditjmara’s sacred landscape. The government asserted that “the link between the eruption of the volcano and Budj Bim is of outstanding heritage value as a designation of the process through which ancestral beings reveal themselves in the landscape.”
 
Before 2004, that wasn’t quite what was described. Earlier references merely describe the “scoria cones”—the conical hills leftover from spouting lava—as the “teeth” of the supernatural creature whose head is the mountain. This is what was given by James Dawson in his glossary of terms in his 1881 Australian Aborigines, the ultimate source for the quoted paragraph. This is not very different from other Aboriginal legends explaining the origin of mountains as petrified beings, giants’ ovens, and such. Accounts of local Aboriginal peoples possessing stories of their ancestors witnessing volcanism were not necessarily associated with the giant’s head popping out of the ground.
 
Geologically speaking, the Budj Bim volcano last erupted 8,000 years ago, so if we assume that the story refers to an actual eruption (as the Australian government and most Australian scholars do), there is no specific reason to associate it with the first formative eruption of 37,000 years ago. It is possible, but definitely unproven. We might just as well claim that the Phoenician story that the Anti-Lebanon mountains were formed from petrified giants preserves a memory of their formation.
 
As Patrick Nunn discussed in his overstated but not necessarily wrong book The Edge of Memory (2017), there are stories across Australia associating former volcanoes with fire, so it would seem that the more likely explanation is that the stories have an Ice Age provenance, but not one going so far back in time. The Australian government agrees, writing that “There are two areas in Australia where Aboriginal people witnessed volcanism: the area of the younger volcanics of the Atherton Tablelands; and, the younger volcanics in Victoria, which includes Mt Eccles.” This seems confirmed by nineteenth century sources, which quote Gunditjmara informants to the effect that their ancestors had witnessed various eruptions and a tsunami. Dawson recorded an Aboriginal informant telling him that his grandfather had personally witnessed a volcanic eruption in Victoria. Neither of these stories, though, implies witnessing the formation of a volcano sui generis. In 1938, geologist Edmund Gill described the volcano at neighboring Tower Hill as having thrown ash over fossilized human footprints, confirming that humans lived in the area before at least one of the volcano’s eruptions.
 
There is no archaeological evidence of a human occupation at Budj Bim before about 13,000 BCE, but Matchan wishes to challenge this, citing a report from the 1940s that a stone axe had been found nine feet beneath a volcanic ash layer at Tower Hill. The National Museum of Victoria studied the axe and concluded in a 1944 report that it was between 4,000 and 6,000 years old, based on estimates of the age of the ancient postglacial flood plain on which it sat, estimates derived from studying the geology of the site and the fossil shell remains in the layer. Matchan re-dated the volcanic layer to 37,000 years ago using argon-argon dating. H. F. Wickham offers confirmation of the younger date in his early research from the turn of the twentieth century. He reported the discovery of a dingo skeleton beneath the same volcanic layer. Since dingoes entered Australia around 3,500 years ago, it strongly suggests that the human occupation beneath the volcanic layer cannot be 37,000 years old.
 
I honestly don’t know what to make of the conflicting lines of evidence, but it seems odd that the argon-argon dating would be 30,000 years different from all of the other lines of evidence previously used to construct a timeline of human activity in the region. But even if we accept all of the evidence in the Geology article at face value, there still is nothing in the oral tradition that demands it refer to the formation of the volcano rather than representing a fairly logical set of conclusions (within the Dreaming framework) about Budj Bim from observable facts.
83 Comments
Crazy
2/14/2020 09:51:17 am

Even if correct, it's unprovable because reading and writing was non-existent for hundreds and thousands of years after the origin of language.

Reply
Crash55
2/14/2020 01:09:21 pm

Argon-argon dating is a relative method so maybe their reference standard was no valid?

Reply
Dale Simpson
2/14/2020 01:45:51 pm

“Lava that spat out” could describe my bathroom experience this morning after eating a sriracha burrito bowl for dinner last night.

Reply
Julia Child
2/14/2020 03:37:30 pm

“Lava that spat out” could describe my bathroom experience this morning after eating a sriracha burrito bowl..."

First mistake: Burritos don't belong in a bowl.

Second mistake: Sriracha doesn't belong anywhere near a burrito. If you have to go to Thailand to spice up your burrito? You aren't doing it right.

Reply
Jr. Anthony Warren
2/14/2020 05:00:13 pm

First mistake: Burrito bowls are actually a thing.

Second mistake: If you're talking about the brand the poster is likely referencing, it's made in Los Angeles County California by a Vietnamese.

So lonely.

Julia Child
2/14/2020 05:52:28 pm

@JR. ANTHONY WARREN

"First mistake: Burrito bowls are actually a thing."

Yes, I understand that they would be a "thing" to a cretin such as yourself.

"Second mistake: If you're talking about the brand the poster is likely referencing, it's made in Los Angeles County California by a Vietnamese."

No, I'm not. Thanks for confirming your cretinism.

So lonely.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fXcbDEczwwc

Not Kent
2/15/2020 12:36:16 am

Also: I'm never alone as long as I am NOT KENT.

❤️

David Childress
2/14/2020 02:14:24 pm

I really like the smell of my own poopie.

Reply
Stuart
2/16/2020 07:36:59 pm

Yes Childress, obviously. You have to. You have to live with the smell of your shit everyday.

Reply
Jr. Time Lord
2/14/2020 03:40:24 pm

What's the deal with all the geologists and their crazy theories? There is a trend within pseudoscience of phds publishing their pet theories from outside of their area of expertise. Why are so many geologists playing this game? Are they just hard up for work?

Reply
Doc Rock
2/17/2020 02:48:06 pm

Time Lord

At first glance is does appear that pro geologists have a relatively speaking higher tendency to really twist off and suddenly decide that they are experts in using archaeology, folklore, historical linguistics, etc. when it comes to pursuing uber fringy stuff. O

Reply
Kent
2/17/2020 04:27:14 pm

There's a reason they call it "rocks for jocks".

Anthony Warren plays the same game with his psychologypoetry degree.

Jr. Time Lord
2/17/2020 06:51:03 pm

Doc,

What does geology have to do with ufology? I have witnessed several geologists spouting off about aliens.

Rockhound
2/19/2020 11:32:13 am

Lower division geology classes can be easy but there are other easier majors. At my school we called the Modern Languages department "Easy B's for the Braindead." Some of my friends got decent jobs right out of college with geology degrees. The people I know with BA degrees in language had to go to graduate school or get jobs that had nothing to do with knowing another language.

No ONe Cares
2/19/2020 12:09:02 pm

When a B is your goal... you've already failed.

In college I had two friends, one with a BA in math, the other with a BS in EE and an MS in EE. The MS worked as a systems programmer for the university, but the BA math, working for the same employer, made twice as much money. His job? Buying PCs.

State school so I was able to look up their salaries on-line.

T. Franke link
2/14/2020 04:50:11 pm

The assumption of a non-written, oral historical tradition over a longer period of time is always nonsense. We only have to look for well-studied examples where we have written (!) sources:

Homer's Iliad.
The events happened around 1200 BC, and where written down e.g. round 700 BC. But what do we really know about the Trojan war? The story is so distorted and enriched with later information that we can read something from it only with highly sophisticated historical criticism.

Nibelungenlied:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nibelungenlied
A very distorted story with mythical parts although historical core events are there.

Jesus Christ:
Although we have written sources which date back to the very first century after the events, what do we really know about the historical Jesus?

Muhammad:
The same story. Muslims claim that his life is written down in detail, but there is a huge gap between Muhammad's lifetime and the first written sources. Not so for the Quran, but this is a very cryptic book (and points rather to Petra as the birthplace of Islam, than to Mecca in Saudi-Arabia, which makes perfect sense).

Herodotus:
He wrote that Egypt is 11,000 years old and older. But is it? No. And Herodotus was a thorough man.

Plato's Atlantis:
The same as with Herodotus. No magic. No wonders. No analogy, no morality tale, and no parable. Even not the biggest buildings known then, but anyway clearly distorted.

And after these examples imagine a purely oral tradition .... it is so ridiculous to claim that it can preserve something over thousands of years.

As far as I know, these claims concerning the Australian oral tradition is not new, see here:

Patrick D. Nunn, Geohazards and myths: ancient memories of rapid coastal change in the Asia-Pacific region and their value to future adaptation, in: Geoscience Letters, Official Journal of the Asia Oceania Geosciences Society (AOGS), Article No. 3 / Vol. 1 (2014).

Patrick D. Nunn / Nicholas J. Reid, Aboriginal Memories of Inundation of the Australian Coast Dating from More than 7000 Years Ago, in: Australian Geographer Issue 1, Vol. 47 (2016); pp. 11-47.

Reply
The Historical Jesus (T. Franke)
2/14/2020 05:35:46 pm

There are no references to a historical Jesus in the first century. The name Pilate is never mentioned by any first century Christians in relation to the crucifixion and it is not given a historical setting - the crucifixion in first century Christianity depicts Jesus Christ as an atoning sacrifice devoid of historical context. It is entirely a spiritual concept, When the gospels were contrived during the second century these spiritual concepts of the first century were turned into a mythic historical narrative. Note that the Pilate in the Gospels is depicted as a pliable softie whilst according to the accounts by Josephus and Philo (and others) he was a brutal tyrant.

Reply
Of course
2/14/2020 05:40:57 pm

Jesus Christ was not crucified on any old day. Jesus Christ was crucified during a specific religious festival and the Last Supper preceding that event was only a variation of the Jewish Passover Meal.

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 06:47:09 pm

@TheHistoricalJesus(T.Franke)

I am not a Christian. But IMHO your depiction is a fringe minority view among historians.

The gospels were not contrived in the 2nd century, they were complete by 100 AD. And the gospels provide at least some historical context though they cannot be read as history books, of course (this was my point! Although it's even a written tradition, you can hardly rely on it in the most points, and now think what you could expect from an oral tradition ....)

Reply
Jr. Anthony Warren
2/14/2020 06:50:14 pm

Who are these 1st century Christians whose accounts you're reading?

So lonely.

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:15:05 pm

@Jr. Anthony Warren

x) Why "accounts"? I talked of a tradition which is notoriously unreliable (though not fully invented), although it is a written tradition. My point was: How much more then does a non-written tradition have to be unreliable?!

x) Who where the authors of the gospels and the other parts of the New Testament? May I point you to the relevant Wikipedia page? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Testament

x) I have the feeling that there is some aggressive anti-Christian attitude lurking among readers of this board which I, myself not a Christian, unvoluntarily stirred up, and so my argument is absurdly misunderstood. Please note that you do not have to believe in Jesus as your saviour only because it turns out that he most probably was not a mere myth but a non-supernatural historical figure.

@ T. Franke
2/14/2020 07:27:13 pm

Nobody knows who wrote the gospels, where the gospels were written, or when the gospels were written.

That's quoting Ann Loades - Ann Loades is Professor Emerita in Divinity, University of Durham; Honorary Professor of Divinity, University of St Andrews; and Lay Canon Emerita, Durham Cathedral

Herodotus was a thorough man (T. Franke)
2/14/2020 05:44:35 pm

Herodotus is not taken seriously by historians, and you need to do your homework in relation to your other points in your post.

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 06:41:35 pm

I am very very sorry, but to say that "Herodotus is not taken seriously by historians" is simply wrong, if not ridiculous. You obviously have no idea about the real discussions in academia. Herodotus is taken absolutely seriously, the discussion is more about how to interpret Herodotus' histories. Only pseudoscientists do confuse the two things: Taking an author seriously, and taking his writings literally.

I am so sorry, but your statement is dead wrong. It is you who has to do homework.

Reply
10 Historical Facts That Herodotus Got Hilariously Wrong
2/14/2020 07:03:08 pm

10 Historical Facts That Herodotus Got Hilariously Wrong

https://listverse.com/2015/04/08/10-historical-facts-that-herodotus-got-hilariously-wrong/

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:26:20 pm

@10HistoricalFacts.....

I hope you understand that your presented Web site does not reflect the state of the art in academia? This is only a simplistic presentation driven by sensationalism, not by science. And funny enough, even this page uses the word "thorough" when it comes to Herodotus!

Let me point you to the following book and the chapter about Herodotus' methods which will give you a better understanding. It is "A Guide to Reading Herodotus' Histories" by Sean Sheehan, introducing you to the Fehling debate and other discussions.

Let me tell you that by pointing to this Web site you revealed that you are far from having a deeper understanding of Herodotus. Let me tell you again:

Only pseudoscientists do confuse the two things: Taking an author seriously, and taking his writings literally.

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:28:06 pm

I have forgotten to add the Web link:

"A Guide to Reading Herodotus' Histories" by Sean Sheehan:
https://books.google.de/books?id=Ab5KDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA1&hl=de&pg=PT28

@ T. Franke again
2/14/2020 07:29:52 pm

Sean Sheehan is a freelance writer and independent scholar

T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:39:07 pm

"Sean Sheehan is a freelance writer and independent scholar"

So what? She describes the academic debate, so that even YOU have a chance to understand it.

Furthermore, the Bloomsbury bio says that she taught in UK and abroad.
https://www.bloomsbury.com/author/sean-sheehan

... but you prefer to reliy on arguments ad hominem.

fringe minority view among historians
2/14/2020 07:09:36 pm

I don't care less about the historians - I only look and analyse the evidence and here the [fringe] atheists and rationalists - who get their facts about Christianity from German Protestant Bible Encyclopedias of the 19th century present the facts as they exist and are disregarded by your historians.

Yes, it's a fringe belief that Jesus Christ did not exist, but it's the correct fact of the matter. You need to account for the fact that no Christian from the first century mentions a historical Christ (the crucifixion is depicted as a spiritual event, without historical context) and the first Christian to mention written gospels was Justin Martyr circa 130AD - a fact that is disregarded by your historians. And the earliest extant papyrus gospel fragment dates from the approximate same period of time.

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:42:15 pm

You: "Yes, it's a fringe belief that Jesus Christ did not exist, but it's the correct fact of the matter."

That is what you believe. I respect this, but disagree.

Reply
I do not believe anything
2/14/2020 07:46:48 pm

That's why I don't believe in the historical Christ - because it's not a fact - but a belief

T. Franke link
2/14/2020 08:15:02 pm

"That's why I don't believe in the historical Christ - because it's not a fact - but a belief"

This is a good example for a pseudoscientific attitude. Pseudoscienists believe that you know something for sure, with facts, or you can only believe.

But this is not science.

Science knows another category of knowledge, and it is the most important one, the scientific way of generating knowledge, so to say: You may not know what is exactly true but you can approach the truth with a certain likelihood. You have arguments which make X much more likely than Y. Then, X is the scientific point of view. This is true even for natural sciences. Take e.g. the new Higgs particle: Did they really find it as a fact? No, they did not! They just made experiments which make it very likely that the particle exists!

And so it is with Jesus: Academia has put forward arguments which make it likely that Jesus existed. Not more. Not less. It is not a belief.

Rationalists & Jesus Christ mythology
2/14/2020 08:24:59 pm

Are you seriously suggesting that rationalists and critical thinkers take the rubbish of the Bible seriously ?

I have given up arguing with you, T. Franke

Nativity of Jesus Christ
2/14/2020 08:27:32 pm

I wonder if you will ever find out the real nativity of Jesus Christ, T. Franke.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 08:43:17 am

Look, in the first place, a rationalist and critical thinker would never call the Bible "rubbish". The Bible is an important part of humankind's cultural heritage, whether you like it or not. Rationalist thinkers know this. It is of importance even for non-Christians like me. In the second place, a rationalist and critical thinker is not so silly to dismiss the Bible as a whole, from a historian's point of view. It is exactly this anti-rational buy-it-all-or-dismiss-it-all attitude which is a striking feature of pseudoscience. But I am repeating myself. It is time for you to stop your irrational Bible-hating and start to surrender to rationality.

By the way, how do you read any ancient book? With this attitude you show in case of the Bible, you can almost dismiss all and everything. What about e.g. the Roman historian Tacitus? Everybody knows that he has a clear bias in his works. But are his works just "rubbish"? And to be dismissed entirely? And oh ..... yes: There occur Roman gods and priests in Tacitus' histories! All "rubbish" only because of this?

To T, Franke
2/15/2020 10:30:17 am

To be blunt, T. Franke, you don't know what you are talking about. 19th century Protestant Scholars concluded that the Gospels were totally unhistorical and rested entirely on Faith. Christianity was founded on Faith, not upon History.

When Channel Four UK TV showed "Jesus: The Evidence" documentary series in 1980s it repeated the conclusions about the Gospels made by 19th century Protestant historians. There followed a "serious debate" in the Houses Parliament expressing outrage with one Member of Parliament hilariously demanding the resignation of Rudolf Bultmann, who died in 1976.

The entire Gospels are built upon Old Testament models and this has been known about for centuries. You can even buy annotated Bibles wherein the Gospels contain parallel passages from the Old Testament. Of course, to fundamentalist Christians such passages are regarded as verification whilst to critics they are regarded as debunkable evidence.

To T.Franke - Tacitus
2/15/2020 10:34:30 am

The passages in Tacitus about the crucifixion were unknown before the 15th century. Certainly not mentioned by Eusebius, who would have lapped up that reference in his Ecclesiastical History - had it existed during his lifetime. Bear in mind that the "Histories" by Tacitus only exist in fragments and that is a great method by a forger to deploy. Much more harder to counterfeit a whole book (or series of books) imitating the author's style.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 11:36:52 am

You make me laugh.

I did not mention Tacitus because of his passages about the Christians. I even was not aware that there are such passages in Tacitus. I mentioned Tacitus as just another example where the question arises: How to handle it? And where your approach of dismissing it all if parts of it are not credible is very harmful (again).

Concerning your authorities: You rely on the 19th century protestant fringe theologians (they were always fringe), and on Rudolf Bultmann (famous, but fringe, too). If I were you I would not buy in completely in what they said, really not. But you may do as you please, but please realize that this is fringe.

Concerning the question of how to interpret the Old Testament references in the New Testament: Either as an attempt of Christians to interpret the Jesus events, or either as the basis of an invention of Jesus. Well ...... this is almost (not fully) the same question as with Atlantis: Are realistic details in the Atlantis story a hint to the realism of the story, or are they a hint from where the inventor of the story took his inspirations?

In both cases I clearly tend to say that it is not an invention. I find it rather obvious that Christians tried to find references to the Old Testament, and I find it rather obvious that a real place shares some features with other real places of his time. It is especially making me wonder that an inventor should have taken inspirations in literally hundreds of various places to piece his invention together. (And all this for a story which wanted to be recognized allegedly as a morality tale? Why the effort?) ((And then there are those who consider Atlantis a Noble Lie, so no recognition is wanted as invention, but then you come into other troubles ...)) (((...))) ((((...)))) etc. etc.

Atlantis & Christianity
2/15/2020 12:01:54 pm

Atlantis & Christianity go pretty well together - both being products of not so fertile imaginations. Although Christianity took far longer to develop - its embryo found in the Book of Daniel Son of Man theology when Judea was occupied by the Seleucid kings and with whom the High Priests of Jerusalem Temple collaborated.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 01:07:55 pm

I like to see the idea of Atlantis as a mere invention paralleled to fringe ideas such as that Jesus, too, is merely an invention. Because this underlines how fringe the idea of Atlantis being an invention should (!) be.

Jr. Anthony Warren
2/15/2020 01:28:57 pm

Neither the Benedictines nor the state university instructors I studied under considered Bultmann 'fringe" rather mainstream.

So lonely.

Atlantis & Christianity
2/15/2020 02:00:10 pm

Some people read far too many coffee table books
Try telling the Founders of American Independence that Christianity was a serious subject matter.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 02:06:48 pm

Your teachers were dishonest to you? Bultmann contradicts many Christian and especially Catholic doctrines. He may be mainstream among a Western liberal elite who used Bultmann to silently abandon Christian faith without saying so. Maybe your teachers had an agenda and did not inform you correctly? And no, Benedictines have not extra credit only because they are monks.

Christian Faith ?
2/15/2020 02:29:32 pm

Christian faith does not add up to anything at all.
Christianity merged with Rome and consequently distanced itself from both its geographic and cultural origins in Judea.

Are any of the Popes that are buried in the Vatican in the afterlife? I don't think so.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 02:56:53 pm

Christian faith ....

...... and yet another one who misunderstands this discussion as a discussion about Christian faith.

Let me remind you: My initial argument is that the Christian written tradition is not very reliable, and therefore we may conclude from this and other examples that non-written traditions are even more unreliable.

It is about the question of Jason's posting whether oral traditions can go back thousands of years. They can not.

written tradition is not very reliable
2/15/2020 03:02:25 pm

Christianity chopped and changed its pedigree very quickly for a specific reason that is not being examined simply because of scholarly dogma that muscles in certain rubbish that it regards should remain static and motionless for all eternity.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 05:02:13 pm

Whether true or not: The question under the perspective of Jason Colavito's blog post is whether this can happen with an oral tradition, too? The answer is: Yes, it can, and even more easily than with a written tradition.

Oral Tradition in Christianity
2/15/2020 05:32:11 pm

Non-existent. That's what I can see. Witness the difference in Church history between Acts and Paul's Epistles. Not allowed to know about that in Roman Catholicism - banned.

The church history in Acts was contrived to fit in with the claims in the Gospel (at complete odds with Paul's letters) and it's author is not Luke but pseudo-Luke according to scholars.

So there you have it as far as so-called oral tradition within Christianity goes.

Jr. Anthony Warren
2/15/2020 07:51:02 pm

I think Mr. Franke is confusing "Christian or Catholic doctrines" with "stuff I've heard some people believe." The operative word being "doctrine".

As always "the answer is above".

So lonely.

LArry storch
2/16/2020 12:55:38 am

“It is about the question of Jason's posting whether oral traditions can go back thousands of years. They can not.”

That’s a weak justification for twisting a comment section attached to a post about Australian aborigines into yet another boring and interminable argument about the historicity of early Christianity — the exact same damn discussion that I’ve read about 150 times in the last six months! We get the freaking point!

T. Franke link
2/16/2020 09:11:11 am

Larry Storch ..... errrr, WHO twisted this comment section into an argument about the historicity of early Christianity? I did not (laughter), I presented SIX (!) examples of written traditions to point out the problems even with written traditions, and then some OTHERS came along and picked exactly ONE of the six examples, Christianity, in order to present their extreme fringe theories about early Christianity.

Jr. Anthony Warren
2/14/2020 07:57:36 pm

Again, who are these 1st century Christians whose accounts you are relying on?

I've given up on keeping straight who is who in this discussion.

So lonely.

Reply
T. Franke link
2/15/2020 08:44:45 am

Jr. Anthony Warren

Your repeated question will stay alone, here, since I will not repeat my answer which you can find above.

Jr. Anthony Warren
2/15/2020 09:33:13 am

"x) Why 'accounts'? I talked of a tradition which is notoriously unreliable (though not fully invented), although it is a written tradition."

What written accounts are you relying on? Name names.

"The name Pilate is never mentioned by any first century Christians in relation to the crucifixion and it is not given a historical setting - "

What first century Christians never mention Pilate? Name names.

"the crucifixion in first century Christianity depicts Jesus Christ as an atoning sacrifice devoid of historical context."

WHAT in "first century Christianity depicts Jesus Christ"? Name names.

So lonely.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 09:43:30 am

This last posting of Jr Anthony Warren confuses quotes from me with quotes from others. I repeat: The answer is given above.

JR. Anthony Warren
2/15/2020 10:38:23 am

Okay I understand that you need a post that SOLELY DEALS WITH YOU, like a personalized invitation.

So Lonely.

"x) Why 'accounts'? I talked of a tradition which is notoriously unreliable (though not fully invented), although it is a written tradition."

What written accounts are you relying on? Name names.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 11:23:43 am

Answer see above.

Jr. Anthony Warren
2/15/2020 01:25:54 pm

"x) Why 'accounts'? I talked of a tradition which is notoriously unreliable (though not fully invented), although it is a written tradition."

You only cite written accounts from OUTSIDE the tradition, so clearly the answer is "I will not answer."

So lonely.

T. Franke link
2/15/2020 02:51:58 pm

Jr Anthony Warren

Your misunderstandings grow and grow. And let me repeat: Find the answer above. Find the answer above. Find the answer above.

Jr. Anthony Warren
2/15/2020 07:46:20 pm

So lonely.

Joe Scales
2/16/2020 12:20:32 am

I always play the starring role...

Herodotus' Histories
2/14/2020 07:20:50 pm

Donald Lateiner, Deceptions and Delusions in Herodotus. Classical Antiquity Volume 9, Number 2 (October, 1990), pages 230-246 (University of California Press)

Snip

"Herodotus certainly plays to his Greek audiences pleasure in descriptions of deception and delusion, allowing the listener's or reader's amused perception of a different reality. The responsible historian tried to separate fact from fiction, sham from truth, charlatan from dupe and clearheaded exposer of deceit."

Reply
T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:33:54 pm

Donald Lateiner:

Yes! Read your quoted passage by Donald Lateiner again! What does he say? Does he say that Herodotus has fallen for deception and delusion? Or commits deception and delusion? Or does this passage by Donald Lateiner say that Herodotus DESCRIBED deception and delusion?

It is exactly the latter ..... and yes, Herodotus describes a lot of cases where deception and delusion played a role in history.

And then, Donald Lateiner calls Herodotus a "responsible historian". Wow!

THANK YOU!

Reply
Yes
2/14/2020 07:36:55 pm

Herodotus was repeating deception and delusion but without discrediting the accounts the way they should have been discredited.

T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:46:58 pm

@YES

My dear, Herodotus qualified these stories exactly as deceptions and delusions. Because Herodotus was a skeptic.

This is exactly what Donald Lateiner says: "The responsible historian (=Herodotus) tried to separate fact from fiction, sham from truth, charlatan from dupe and clearheaded exposer of deceit."

Is it so difficult to accept the obvious? Herodotus was a thorough man but not perfect. He made mistakes. But he did not intentionally deceive his audience.

Quoting Aristotle
2/14/2020 07:48:10 pm

"Herodotus is wrong to maintain that the semen of Ethiopians is black (Histories 3. 101, where he says the same also of some Indians), as if every part of a person with black skin should be black; he said this even though he could see that a black-skinned person's teeth are white" (Aristotle, On The Generation of Animals, 736a).

T. Franke link
2/14/2020 07:59:22 pm

Quoting Aristotle:

And what do you want to show with this statement by Aristotle? Herodotus made mistakes (as did Aristotle, and what funny mistakes Aristotle made!), but a mistake is not an intentional deception.

Now it is my turn to point to a superficial page and show you what sensational mistakes Aristotle made:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/6-things-aristotle-got-wr_b_5920840

Ohhh, looooook: Aristotle says that women have fewer teeth than men! Funny! Especially funny because he critizies Herodotus by pointing to the teeth but he himself did get it wrong, too, with teeth. :-)

Conclusion: Neither Herodotus nor Aristotle put forward intentional deceptions.

An Anonymous Nerd
2/15/2020 08:03:39 pm

The Fringe has gotten pretty good at marring this site with inane and semi-related comments.

Herodotus is indeed taken seriously by modern historians, because "right about everything" (no) and "taken seriously" (yes) are two separate concepts.

The history of the Gospels as literary works is way, way more complex than the comments here would suggest.

Did Jesus exist as an historical person? My understanding is that there is a lively academic debate but the consensus is yes. Even if so of course there is considerable disagreement over what he actually said versus what was attributed to him later.

Finally and most-importantly, none of this really has anything to do with the topic of Mr. Colavito's article. It does, however, have the effect of dragging down the intellectual level of the site. Which I guess is the likely intent anyway. So congratulations on that much,

-An Anonymous Nerd

Reply
To Anonymous Nerd
2/16/2020 02:05:29 am

The consensus about the historicity of Jesus will always be yes for the simple reason that the edifice of Biblical Scholarship will always never say no to maintain its existence to say yes.

Was there really a miracle-worker in Judea not mentioned anywhere during the first century by Christians and non-Christians. Where are the first-century accounts to justify the statements in the Gospels that Jesus was followed in public by multitudes - where are these first century accounts ??

The letters of Paul, 2 Peter and the literature of the Early Church Fathers are very silent about the life of Jesus Christ if he indeed existed, All that glittering and exciting stuff about early Christianity is completely missing from the earliest Christian literature.


Reply
Only Robert M. Price
2/16/2020 02:19:14 am

I can only think of ex-Baptist Minister and New Testament scholar Robert M. Price who disputes the historicity of Jesus from inside the Biblical Establishment. Elaine Pagels can also be added as a sceptic of the historicity of Christianity, (Professor of Religion at Princeton University).

The consensus is unable to verify its position and let's face it, there will never be a live public debate on television about the (non)historicity oi Jesus Christ. It will never happen.

Old Testament scholars reject the historicity of Exodus and claim that Moses and David never existed - but those very same Old Testament scholars will never treat the New Testament the very same way. I think this last point illustrates the situation very well.

Kent
2/16/2020 07:33:26 am

"Was there really a miracle-worker in Judea not mentioned anywhere during the first century by Christians and non-Christians."

Antiquities of the Jews (Flavius Josephus) is a 1st century work and mentions both Jesus and John the Baptist.

I can't help you with references to anyone who was "not mentioned anywhere."

Josephus Again
2/16/2020 08:51:48 am

How many times has it got to be repeated that no Christian before Eusebius mentioned the references to Jesus Christ in Josephus, and the earliest extant fragments of Josephus date from the 10th century. Note the existence of the Slavonic Josephus that is overflowing with fake references to Christianity. There are scholars who have claimed the reference to Jesus in Josephus was faked by Eusebius. The parallel paragraph found in another work by Josephus is missing while the preceding and following paragraphs are identical in the other work by Josephus. Also, the reference to John the Baptist is not entirely trustworthy, bearing in mind the disputed reference to Jesus Christ in Josephus.

Josephus and Vespasian
2/16/2020 09:18:26 am

This passage by Josephus, renegade Jew and supporter of Roman occupation of Judea, shows the passage about Jesus to have been inserted by the Christians.

"But now, what did most elevate them (the Jews) in undertaking this war (AD66-70), was an ambiguous oracle that was also found in their sacred writings, how ‘about that time one from their country should become governor of the habitable earth’. The Jews took this prediction to belong to themselves in particular: and many of the wise men were thereby deceived in their determination. Now this oracle certainly denoted the government of Vespasian, who was appointed emperor in Judaea." (Flavius Josephus, Wars of the Jews, Book 6).

T. Franke link
2/16/2020 09:18:09 am

An Anonymous Nerd ....

..... agreed! :-)

PS: I would like to avoid the word "consensus" in science, because there are indeed dissenters, and so I would rather prefer to speak of "overwhelming majority" or similar.

Reply
Anthony Watten The ex-Benedictine
2/16/2020 01:58:58 am

Anthony Warren the ex-Benedictine has never heard of the Early Church Fathers. Poor Anthony Warren the ex-Benedictine.

He should read the books by G. A. Wells. G. A. Wells utilised much of his information from German Protestant Encyclopedias of the early 20th century (he was Professor of German at Birkbeck college).

Reply
Apostolic Fathers
2/16/2020 06:35:47 am

The Early Church Fathers are now commonly called the Apostolic Fathers. It is plain from their writings that they were unacquainted with the existence of the Gospels.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostolic_Fathers

Reply
Kent
2/16/2020 07:56:46 am

Based on the link you posted, what you said is not correct.

"The Apostolic Fathers were core Christian theologians among the Church Fathers who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD, who are believed to have personally known some of the Twelve Apostles, or to have been significantly influenced by them."

Might as well say "American Indians are now commonly called Eskimos."

READ THIS ANTHONY WARREN
2/16/2020 08:45:18 am

Church Fathers who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD
WERE NOT AWARE OF THE GOSPELS UNTIL JUSTIN ,MARTYR CIRCA AD130

American Indians are now commonly called Eskimos
2/16/2020 08:59:57 am

You can throw that at the barmy New Testament scholars in relation to their theories and conjectures that merely represent their wishful thinking

Christine Erikson
2/17/2020 09:10:57 pm

the differing radiometric dating systems for rocks don't agree with each other on the same specimen so the systems are wrong.

Reply
Böckström
2/20/2020 08:58:58 am

There is a oral saga out there that goes far way back than this one, and that's the Bock Saga. Have a look at Welcome to Hell and Welcome to Altlantis on YouTube, very interesting stuff that can be easily proven/disproven if the Church and the Finnish Government would allow a few minor digs.

Reply
Kent
2/20/2020 12:05:46 pm

Even ancient-origins.net doesn't buy that nonsense.

"A rather provocative example of this would be the ideas of the now deceased eccentric Swedish-speaking Finnish tour guide Ior Bock, born as Bror Holger Svedlin, who, among other things, claimed that humans existed on Earth 50 million years ago and originated in what is now Finland. Although it is always possible that the mainstream is mistaken, the Ior Bock saga does not stand up very well to scrutiny."

"He claimed that humans were the result of some sort of combination of goats and monkeys."

You're in 5150 territory here. As Anthony Warren can tell you it's no fun.

https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/ior-bock-saga-everything-we-know-about-history-wrong-008599

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        • The Faith of Ancient Egypt
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    • Classic Fiction >
      • Lucian's True History
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      • H. P. Lovecraft >
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        • Lovecraft's Library in 1932
      • The Skeptical Poltergeist
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    • Miscellaneous Documents >
      • The Balloon-Hoax
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      • De Profundis
      • The Life and Death of Crown Prince Rudolf
      • The Bathtub Hoax
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      • Position of Viking Women
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      • James Dean's Scrapbook
      • James Dean's Love Letters
      • The Amazing James Dean Hoax!
    • Free Classic Pseudohistory eBooks
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