This is an archive of past discussions about Jesus. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

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Archive 37

Archive 38

Archive 39

Archive 40

Archive 41

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Archive 45

Reports

1st and 2nd Paragraph Documentation Report

Fellow editors:

Before the article was blocked, I finished documentation for all but two of the listed historians and Bible scholars who support the majority position. I was only able to verify one of the persons supporting the minority position. Left to do are: Geza Vermes; D. A. Carson; Bruno Bauer; Michael Martin; John Mackinnon Robertson.

From the vague discussions we've had during our ... vigorous ... debate, I recall one or two more we might want to add. Please help me by listing them here. If they are not in the talk:Jesus/Cited Authors Bios subpage, please add them. No matter how the vote comes out, please list only historians and Bible scholars for the majority (the way we have the position described, Voltaire and Bertrand Russell don't count). I'll check Will Durant to see if he has formal historian's credentials. For the second, anyone with scholarly credentials will do, as long as they support the nonexistence hypothesis.

In the spirit of collaboration I hope can prevail here, I am, of course, open to modification of the above, providing it takes into account that these notes are for providing evidence of the majority and minority views.

Also unfinished on the documentary front, are the subpages on Jesus and the Jewish Authorities and the date range for the life of Jesus. This is the hard work, folks. Help us establish what scholarship says. --CTSWyneken 12:41, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Archived a Bunch

I did some archiving in preparation for the run off vote. Will finish the rest in the AM. If I moved an active discussion, I apologize. Please feel free to move it back. --CTSWyneken 03:26, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The absurdist protest to the vote can be found here. Arch O. La 06:15, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I have 1) fixed the link to archives 36 & 37 2) performed a slight reorg on said archives, and 3) added said archives to the archive index. Good night, everybody! Arch O. La 06:40, 1 March 2006 (UTC) PS: Perhaps someone should index the active subpages as well. But, I'm going to bed. Arch O. La 06:44, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Moved to Archive 38: Judaism's view, Again with the Jesus-Myth (3 proposals by Raisinman), Question about Jesus, Pilate and Barrabas, Jesus in other languages. Arch O. La 02:24, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Final Avery vote

Run-Off for Final Vote

Okay. Our primary vote has left us with two candidates. Once again, we will take votes for 48 hours. At the end of that time, the item with majority will be placed on the main page and a moratorium will be called on editing that line for thirty days. During that time, further discussion can take place on its archive page and perhaps our editors can come up with a better solution. Please, however, let us wait the full time to post suggestion or discussion on the primary page, and let us not change it based on that discussion until it is opened back up to the main talk page. This is for simplicity's sake and to keep us from having to vote again on that stupid line! =P

Once again, I ask that you select only one option this time. If you have no major preference, please indicate it below the vote table in a comment but select one of the options (flip a coin if you have to). At this point, voting twice mathematically nullifies your own vote and renders it useless. And once again, although this wasn't paid hardly any attention to last time, please restrict your comments to outside the voting table so that it does not get cluttered. If you want to tell us why you voted the way you did, comment off the table. (Sorry, it's my OCD kicking in. I like a clean table.)

Agreement to Consensus and Honesty: By placing your signature on a suggested text line on this voting board, you agree to abide by the consensus of a selected line for the proposed thirty day term. There is no point in placing a vote which you later choose to disavow, or voting in a decision which you later choose to ignore. Our first round of voting provided an opportunity for those who believed more discussion was needed or those who rejected the concept of voting and no one marked there. Please do not move your vote after you have placed it (unless you placed it by mistake, at which point we would expect you to immediately move it. Ten hours later is unacceptable). Any editor caught moving or removing another editor's vote will be immediately referred to an admin and have his or her vote nullified.

Once again, please only place #~~~~ on the voting table. --Avery W. Krouse 04:16, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Averykrouse is being more than reasonable in saying to put comments elsewhere and maintain a clean table. If I were the mediator, I would state that comments that mess up the table are bad faith edits. Robert McClenon 12:36, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Voting will end at 04:00 3 March, 2006 (UTC).

Final Candidates

Please read above instructions before voting.

However, citing a lack of extant contemporaneous documents making reference to him, a small minority question the historicity of Jesus.^[1] (current form AND February 20th consensus agreed by vote)

Without objection, can the above read more simply as: A small minority question the historicity of Jesus, citing a lack of extant contemporary references to him. Haldrik 12:58, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik 05:11, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Robsteadman 07:29, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Paul B 11:07, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Alienus 17:26, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Mrcolj 18:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Jayjg ^(talk) 18:27, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
ems 18:45, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
--Victim of signature fascism | There is no cabal 20:38, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
--PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 21:11, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
--MPerel ^{( talk | contrib)} 21:21, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
--Rick Norwood 22:12, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Jon513 22:21, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
youngamerican (talk) 01:04, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Drogo Underburrow 07:16, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Jim62sch 01:15, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
JimWae 03:51, 2 March 2006 (UTC) this one was agreed to less than 10 days ago & unless it has problems, should not be revoted on 3 times in one week.
1. ~~Robeaston99 10:03, 2 March 2006 (UTC) agree with JimWae~~ Disqualified; Robsteadman sockpuppet. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:42, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
2. ~~Vhjh 11:05, 2 March 2006 (UTC)~~ Disqualified; Robsteadman sockpuppet. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:42, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Is it really just a small minority? Agree with Haldrik's simplification, too. Babajobu 15:02, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

A small minority of others question the historicity of Jesus.^[2] (Version proposed by User:CTSWyneken)

Run-Off Discussion and Comments on Votes

The first choice is not unacceptable. drboisclair 05:06, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Continuing to abstain. Georg Cantor helped me escape from a Hell of transfinite dimensions. Arch O. La 06:01, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
I am voting but maintain this whole vote is invalid because of a previous quorum/cabal call and the fact that votes do not prove consensus merely show the divide. Second choice is unencyclopedic - the l;ack of extant contemporaneous documents is significant and MUST be mentioned in the intro - it is fundamental to "faith" as well as to these scholars who state that "|jesus" is fiction. However, as I said, the vote is invalid due to vote rigging attempts previously. Robsteadman 07:31, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

One last time: Besides your opinion that inviting people to vote renders it invalid, do you have a wikipedia policy or guidline citation that even discourages the practice? --CTSWyneken 10:54, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

See this [3] Jim62sch 01:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

If there was vote rigging before by simply letting certain people know about the vote and not others, than it seems to have evened out, because I was never infomred of this vote and others were. Guess I got kicked out of the cabal. lol. This cabal needs to shape up if we're ever going to have a chance at effectively pushing our own "Christian" fundamentalist "faith" driven POV! Come on guys! Get with the program. I'm gonna call a secret meeting at 7PM tonight on this page....oops....Gator (talk) 13:45, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

You just beat me to the vote, Gator! 8-) --CTSWyneken 18:43, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

It may not be a policy guideline but I do think that operating in this way is contrary to the spirit of Wikipedia. I have seen it elsewhere with more clearly oraganised "factions" being used to vote. It's one reason why voting is not really the best approach, even though I understand that it may be unavoidable when confronted with intransigence and edit-warring that make consensus impossible. Paul B 11:01, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your view on this, Paul. I actually think of it as in the spirit of collaboration that we try to foster. There is the danger, of course, that voting blocks could be put into play. To avoid this, I made sure that I invited everyone who had voted on previous proposals, including those on all sides of the issue. --CTSWyneken 11:23, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm more concerned that we've had filibustering disguised as voting. Arch O. La 11:27, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm more concerned that the vote is entirely illegitimate. Worse, this is the complaint made by 3 out of 4 of the voters in the minority group. There is a block of voters who have been actively recruited to ram the historicity of Jesus down our throats. Clearly, there is no genuine consensus here and this vote is worthless. There is never going to be a consensus until there is some honesty here. Alienus 17:26, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the whole reason I'm doing this is to get us away from that stupid line. I believe that Jesus was a completely real, completely historical person, and I don't question at all his Historicity. The only motivation for this whole thing is to get us, as a whole, to move on. --Avery W. Krouse 20:54, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps you can produce the policy or guideline that says inviting everyone who has voted on an issue is out of bounds. I invited folks who have voted on all sides of all previous votes and those who have expressed an interest in the page. Indeed, some have been attracted by the NPOV flare placed on the page. If you can produce such a policy, I will comply to it. --CTSWyneken 18:37, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh clearly the voting is illegitimate...which is why you just voted. When you vote and then immediately complain that the vote is illegitmimate it just makes it look like your hedging your bets. If I win, great and if I lose then I will claim the election was invalid. Poor form. Either vote or argue the voting is illegimitate. Not both. As Rob would say: Shameful. When this is over, you will be expected to honor and enforce the consensus.Gator (talk) 17:59, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Unless we count the disposable accoutns with a small number of edits differently than long time wikipedias I wonder about this vote as well. In any case 50%+1 is not the standard. Dominick ^(TALK) 19:23, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

(ri) Hey, I just voted, too, and then posted this in response to someone else [4]. So what of it. Jim62sch 01:19, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

How cute. You want to force us to choose between either pretending that the vote is legitimate or not voting at all. I don't think so. This vote is a sham, but my disagreement is quite real. Alienus 18:23, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

That's one way of looking at it. I think you're cute too. ;)Gator (talk) 18:28, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Is it really necessary to go after each other? --CTSWyneken 18:37, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Hey it takes two to tango and I'm not dancing (unless he buys me dinner first :) )18:43, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

This latest round was necessary due to the block and the need to have as broad an agreement as possible before we reopen the page. I am hoping that all will respect the result this time, whichever way it goes. That way, we will have less recourse to constant reverts that can attract admin blocks. --CTSWyneken 11:34, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I hope so...but I've become skeptical. Arch O. La 11:38, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Also once more, in the light of the fact that most encyclopedias do not even mention the nonexistence hypothesis, I am still puzzled. What do you mean by encyclopedic? --CTSWyneken 10:56, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The issue is not the lack of contemporary sources. Even the Jesus-myth academics analyze the available sources historiographically to come to their conclusions. Lack of sources on the ancient world is common; painting this as some exception, where here in the case of Jesus all of a sudden the later sources is an issue, is incorrect and academically dishonest. pookster11 07:33, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I actually agree that the lack of contemporary sources is a red herring. The real issue is the reliability of the sources and the supposed connections to mystery religions and Judeo-gnosticism, but I still think it is better to give a reason rather than none. I don't think anyone is being "dishonest" here. Lack of contemporary sources is a legitimate argument, though at times I think the word "contemporary" is really being used by its advocates as shorthand for "neutral, non-Christian, archival, archaelogical etc" sources. Paul B 11:07, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

But, you see, the problem is that lack of contemporary sources is not a legitimate argument, at least when you are speaking of the academic field in regards to ancient history. Its not anything that we don't run into on numerous occassions. I'm actually right now researching the Imperial cult in the West under Augustus, and I have about 5 or 6 different secondary sources who all argue first "We have no idea where this comes from." There's no doubt that the cult existed, but there's a lack of contemporary evidence that allows us to trace its overall development. The fact of the matter is, even the academics in favor of the Jesus-myth hypothesis have no problem using the available sources in their research. Basically put, my question is, when we talk about citing a lack of contemporary evidence to discredit that Christ ever existed, who exactly are we talking about? Historians? Lay-persons? Or is it just Rob? pookster11 22:44, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

OK, let's imagine that some manuscripts were found referring to a cult of a miracle working figure in - say - Dacia. He communed with the ancestors of the Dacians. He raised people from the dead and prophecised concerning the future of Dacian people. What would modern scholars make of this? They might conclude that such a prophet existed, or they might take the view that he was a mythical figure. This latter view would be on the grounds that many such similar god-like figures are generally taken as mythical. However, if there were references in Roman writings to this prophet having inspired the Dacians, and there were portrayals of him preaching to Decabalus on Trajan's column, then the balance of opinion would be in favour of his existence as a real person. This is why independent and contemporary evidence is a factor. Without it we might say "maybe he's real, maybe he isn't". And that's all that the sentence states. I personally think that a much more important factor is the nature of the texts that describe Jesus' life. That's what produces the doubt in the first place. If the texts were like your records of a cult of Augustus, there wouldn't be a problem. None disputes that there was a cult of Jesus. But if the "Augustus" of the cult were described as a miracle working god - and there was no other evidence of this "Augustus" - then I suspect there might be some doubt. Then the absence of independent evidence becomes meaningful. Paul B 12:56, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Thats all well and good, but my question would then be who are you and why am I listening to your analysis of this make-believe event? This is an encyclopedia article, not a dorm room on Friday night. This is supposed to be based on research and standards set in the academic field, not on what we as individuals may believe (ie: no original research, NPOV, etc.). Some people may believe that the lack of contemporary documents discredits the existence of Jesus; to them I say fine, thats your opinion. As I work in the field of ancient history, I know that this is not anything new or shocking, and that this is in fact the case with a number of historical events and personalities. I also look at the issue of the historicity of Jesus, and I see the secondary materials avaiable, and all of them utilize the sources in regards to Jesus's life and draw their conclusions through historiographical analysis of the available sources, and not simply discounting the sources because we don't have a firm date or don't know if there is an original source or if they are themselves original works. This is how the field of historicity regarding Jesus works; there is no imaginary model or comparison that need be created, it is what it is. Analysis of texts and sources is far, far more complex than what you have outlined in you example above, and please don't take this the wrong way but it is not a process you are familiar with. The analysis of your example above would not be as cut and dried as you would have us believe; there would be a number of factors that go into the analysis of said imaginary documents, and not simply a question of "Well are there independent sources?" The fact remains that even the Jesus-myth group accepts the available sources on Christ's life and utilizes them in its research. My question remains: who are these people that cite the lack of contemporary documents as the reason why Christ is just a mythological figure? pookster11 21:37, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me Mr "pookster", but you know nothing about me or whether or not analysis of sources "not a process [I am] familiar with." Such comments are presumptuous and wholly unwarranted. Of course the process of analysis is more complex. My story was presented as a "parable" to illustrate a point about sources and at no point did I say that the example would be in any sense "cut and dried." And of course there would be a "number of factors that go into the analysis" of said documents. You are creating a straw man. And you are also asserting empty truisms and using equivocation when you say that "the Jesus-myth group accepts the available sources on Christ's life and utilizes them in its research." Well, blow me down with a feather! Of course they do. They can only use the documents that exist, can't they? But they use them to reach their conclusions. What they do not "accept" is the accuracy of the documents as records of events. And of course they are not alone, though their interpretations a rather extreme. You know as well as I do that the historical reliability of the Gospels is profoundly contested and that there is no clear consensus about what may be true and what may not be. I've already said that it's essentially the nature of the documents that's at issue. I think it would be more accurate to put "...considering the Gospels to be unreliable sources..." rather than "...citing the absence of extant contemporary documents...". But both points are mentioned by the mythers and other questioners of Jesus's historicity, so it is not false, nor is it dishonest. Paul B 14:39, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I reluctantly voted. I agree with Paul that a reason should be given; however, I can not support the first sentence. To explain this position of the nonexistence of Jesus can not be so easily summarized.

Can we actually refuse to allow changes to that paragraph for 30 days? Wikipedia always welcomes new people and invites them to be bold. We have a potential "man trap" waiting to spring on a unsuspecting newbie if we try to enforce this. I hate to say this but we all DO become part of a protectionist cabal in my view if we try. SOPHIA 19:43, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I have to partially agree here. We shouldn't impose some sort of arbitrary 30 day time period for changes. BUT, 'if there is clear consensus, then enforcing it is totally acceptable. Happens all the time. Edits without discussion and in contraditicon to consensus should be reverted. When I tried to open up a vote for AD/BC vs BCE/CE I was, eventually, shot down and referred to the previosu discussion and consensus. Stung a bit, but that was the right thing to do. I just didn't know. I agree.Gator (talk) 19:49, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Let me be very clear: given the irregularities involved in this vote, I do not consider it in any way binding. There does not seem to be a genuine consensus here, and I am most certainly not agreeing to leave that text alone for a month. No such agreement could be binding, anyhow. Alienus 19:53, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to ask again. What are the policies and guidelines you are using to determine this vote is irregular? --CTSWyneken 20:44, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Gee, I hate beig redundant, but, [5] —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jim62sch (talk • contribs) 01:22, 2 March 2006.

Please sign. --CTSWyneken 01:51, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Sophia, I, too, prefer to allow edits from new folk -- even new folk to this article. Yet I feel it is justified to ask, very nicely, that they read the archives before they comment on the talk page and that they comment on the talk page and try to achieve some sense of agreement before they edit. We can use very polite edit summaries when we revert them, go to their talk pages and explain what's happening and ask they follow this practice.

It is not unreasonable to ask people to do this when a lot of debate has gone into the words here. We also need time to attend to the remaining issue in the first paragraph -- documenting and setting the date range and deciding if it belongs there or in the second paragraph and attend to whether or not to keep Saducees and Pharisees in paragraph two. Both of these need to be done by having folk review more of the literature and report back. This can be accomplished if we have 30 days of peace to research and annotate the subpages. --CTSWyneken 20:44, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the definition of concensus (at least for RfA) is 80-100%, where as at the minute it is approximately 66%:33%... vastly short of concensus in either direction. Deskana (talk) 19:59, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

My reason for providing the thirty day moratorium is because all it will take is one single person to bring this whole talk page to a stand still all over again. I want to move the discussion off of this page and refer everyone to the archive so that this page can be used to move on and work further. In Wikipedian terms, no, we can't stop anyone from editing that line, I don't think there's code out there for it. But we can revert the edit and refer them to the subpage discussion. I do not understand how people don't see that this whole process has been horrible for us, bickering over three words for over thirty days. If this gets us past it, the better for it! --Avery W. Krouse 20:55, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

It was perfectly clear where you stood before, but thanks for saying it again. Oh and no one has declared any sort of consensus yet (see above). However, to "be very clear", if there is a consensus than your edits in contradiciton of it will be reverted. That's jsut how it is here. Please stop threatening an edit wars. We've had enough of them. I look forward to helpful edits and comments from you in the future. Thanks. Gator (talk) 20:00, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Was that comment aimed at Alienus? I thought it was aimed at me for a sec. Deskana (talk) 20:04, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The shorter sentence is much better...the longer the sentence, the more POV it becomes. The first part of the first choice is critiquing a group of people. Leave that to the article about those people, where their credibility can be properly explained in a more detailed manner.--ikiroid | (talk) 19:56, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I think this BBC link might be relevant. I found it last week: [6]. Its important because it shows that the issue of historicity is notable enough for the BBC to cover it with an entire documentary on the "serious channel". --Victim of signature fascism | There is no cabal 20:41, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Can we add a sentence that says that "most historians don't care one way or the other" since otherwise it gives a misleading impression that they all hold the opposite view to the minority? (That's "most" in the sense of "most ... in the world" not "most ... in the US bible-belt") --Victim of signature fascism | There is no cabal 20:46, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Welcome Ril! Do you know of a historian that doesn't care? After all, the phrase: "That's ancient history" is music to their ears! 8-) --CTSWyneken 21:00, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, of course they care in the professional sense. They just don't make it a matter of their own personal relgion. Which is why I had to LOL—I had the absurdist thought of historians going to war against the infidels and heretics. Arch O. La 21:07, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

"Most historians don't care..." LOL thanks for putting this all back into perspective. We've been needing a breath of fresh air. BTW, I use my Bible belt to hold up my Bible pants ;) Arch O. La 20:51, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Do you recommend Bible underpants? I hear they're quite uncomfortable.--shtove 22:50, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

That's why I go commando. It brings me closer to the Lord. Arch O. La 23:19, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The problem I see with disallowing votes of people who have been invited or informed about the vote, is that it makes it too easy to rig a vote the other way. All someone would have to do is invite all the people they disagree with about something to come vote on it, thereby rendering them ineligible to vote.

I'm curious whether the instructions to either "vote, or complain about the vote, but not both" will be enforced by disqualifying the complainers, or those instructions were just vain hoping. Wesley 21:06, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Since the wikipedia community does not enforce these votes either way, other than to block pages in constant edit war, the only way it will be enforced is by the cooperation of the editors here.

What I find kind of interesting is that yesterday and today there were complaints about people nrw to the article voting. Now that a number of folk have dropped by to vote, never having been here before, and have voted for the sentence they favor, all is quiet. It is no matter to me. As long as we have registered editors, they are welcome as far as I'm concerned. --CTSWyneken 01:49, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

So now the vote consists of the combination of two proposals' votes against one proposol's votes... OK. —Aiden 21:35, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Short of 80%?

I think we need to discuss, as a group, what we're going to do if this vote ends up with no 80% candidate. If we reopen the floor to this discussion, we're only going to cause more issues, more fighting, more wars. One way or the other, discussion of that line needs to be off of this main page for those that are sick and tired of dealing with it. Frankly, at the end of the day, my goal with this whole final vote process was just to stop the war, get this line out of the limelight, and leave it alone. If we can't do that, how will we ever get anything else done on this page? --Avery W. Krouse 20:58, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

As I can go with either option, I believe we should respect whichever position wins, put it on the main page and direct all discussion -- politely -- to the talk:Jesus/2nd Paragraph Debate subpage. I, for one, will revert to the winning position up to two times a day unless editors there agree to a change. --CTSWyneken 21:04, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I think Avery is asking what would we do if no concensus is reached and we can't decide which one is the winning one? Are you saying that we should just impliment the one with the majority? I'd support that, for lack of a better idea. Deskana (talk) 21:05, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

First, we need to not be so rigid. Anything above around 70% is fine by me. But, more importantly, if there is no consensus here, (majority is not good enough with the people we ahve opposing) the original sentence (option 1) will stand as it is the result of previous discussion, votes and consensus. No need to start talking about this for anotehr 30 days, just go with what we have already agreed upon as it has the most consensus. It wouldn't be so bad. Rob needs to win one once in a while to prove to him that there is no cabal. Gator (talk) 21:07, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Whatever happens, I'd like to avoid any hint of an edit war. Alienus 21:18, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Me too. It simply leads to page locking and halts edits, which is damaging for both sides of the argument. Deskana (talk) 21:21, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

But Gator, that sentence is no longer of consensus, we voted a clear majority in favor of adding "what they consider", if you look in the history, the only reason it is the way it is was because the minority in the edit war got the last edit. If we start going at it again over this, simply voting some more won't fix it. We need to be prepared to end this fight once and for all :/. Homestarmy 21:55, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

It's still the current version and is the product of the Feb 20th consensus that was much more involved than that last vote you referred to. We need to be prepared to simply allow that version in if there is no consensus for the second sentence. No wikilawyering, we just need to accept defeat and move on. That first sentence isn't much worse than the 2d, so we'll be OK.Gator (talk) 22:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Again to draw a comparison to RfA, if there is no concensus the candidate is left as s/he was before- not an admin. The same should apply here. Deskana (talk) 22:05, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that's what I am saying. Stop plagarizing! ;)Gator (talk) 22:07, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Since I am on record as to being fine with both of our current options and the one the Homes reminds us of, let me throw in a few thoughts, for what its worth.

I think that, unless we have an exact tie, we should go with the majority. This vote has more votes already than the winning factions of previous elections combined. We have a wider opinion on this one than we've ever had.

That doesn't mean we can't go on discussing on the subpage. What I'm suggesting is that we revert only changes of substance made without discussion and general agreement on that page. We can thus allow folks to go on to another subject and improve the rest of the page.

An alternative if we have a dead tie in the vote is to agree to leave the page as it was with the last vote and together file an RfC for this issue. --CTSWyneken 22:09, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The bigger problem is can anyone verify a secondary source that states that Christ did not exist because of the lack of contemporary historical documents? As stated several times now, even the Jesus-myth academics accept the sources that are available and draw their conclusions from them. The basis of the Jesus-myth is not a lack of contemporary historical documents, therefore the proposal that the article state "citing a lack of contemporary historical documents..." is flat wrong. Can anyone point to authors who effectively attack the sources themselves as being unreliable and thereby argue that because there are no contemporary sources Christ did not exist? Otherwise, like I said, even the consensus version from before, while everyone may agree on it, is still blatantly false in regards to the Jesus-myth hypothesis. pookster11 23:06, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I haven't read The Jesus Myth, and probably won't. But certainly, as a basic principle of historiography, one attempts to find contemporary documents. Therefore the lack of contemporary documents is a problem. There are a number of stories in the gospel accounts that one would expect to find contemporary documents of. For example, if Herrod slaughted large number of Jewish children, that is certainly something you would expect contemporary Jewish documents to mention. They don't.

It was probably a dozen or two children killed, see Slaughter of the innocents. ^ross ^nixon 00:50, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Once again, you're approaching the topic as someone unfamiliar with how history, especially ancient history, works. Please don't take this as a personal insult. Most of the time we don't have contemporary documentation for historical events or persons. What I'm arguing here is that, contrary to what some individuals have tried to argue here, the lack of contemporary documents relating to the life of Christ is not used by any historians to attempt to disprove the existence of the person of Jesus; to the contrary, most works that question the existence of Christ as a person base their research off of what documents do exist, in particular the Christian and Gnostic gospels. To my knowledge, no historian attempts to make the argument that Christ didn't exist because the documentation of his life comes from a later period. My question is, when we put into the article "Citing a lack of contemporary sources, some historians...", who exactly are we talking about? Can anyone name any historians that discount the very existence of Christ based on the fact that our sources come from some years after his supposed death? pookster11 02:04, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Say, Pookster, could I get your help on documenting paragraphs one and two? I need some help with the nonexistence hypothesis folk, since I do not have many of their works in my library. --CTSWyneken 02:27, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

What do you need? The list of academics listed as part of the Jesus-myth group is a piss-poor list. Bauer has almost no bearing on actual historical work. The main source for the Jesus-myth hypothesis is Arthur Drews from the turn of the 20th century. While some connection can be made from Bauer to Drews, Drews is the one who actually did all the research and developed the concept into an actual hypothesis; Bauer did little more than write "Hey maybe Jesus is a myth" and leave it at that. Martin is an athiest philosopher; I have never run into anything that even remotely quotes or credits him in regards to the development of Christianity or Christ, whether as a historical or mythological figure. He's largely a crusading athiest and is recognized as such. Robertson has no academic credentials whatsoever, either as a historian or philosopher. Wells is probably the most credible one on that list, but the basis of his research is comparing the later accounts of Christ with the gospels, not discounting them as being non-contemporary. In fact, the gospels serve as the basis for most of his work, which includes a lot about how Jesus devloped into this mythical figure different from how he is portrayed in the gospels, even going as far as analyzing the gospels and later accounts to decide at what point the virgin birth was integrated as a part of the mythos around the historical Jesus; once again however, he treats Jesus as a historical figure. The list I gave above is a good start; I'm not going to pretend that I'm an expert in this field by any means, but those are the works I'm aware of and have run into on numerous occasions. Once again, none of those authors discounts the validity of the historical person of Christ based on a lack of sources; the Jesus-myth hypothesis is highly complex and involves analysis of the available sources and not just simply discounting those sources as non-contemporary. Once again, if anyone knows of a historian who does so, please post it here. pookster11 04:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

As for the vote, I voted -- essentially I flipped a coin. But either version is fine by me, so I agree with CTSWyneken that the majority should rule. If I had given it a little more thought, I would have just voted with the majority. Rick Norwood 23:49, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

16-14 at the moment...that's a very slim majority. Pookster, I don't think anyone has mentioned an historian that supports the nonexistence hypothesis. I might be wrong though; I'm not one of the people working on the citations. Arch O. La 02:14, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Well for one who are these people voting whom most of us have never seen around before? —Aiden 03:01, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Doesn't look like there will be a majority; do we go with a plurality? Or just stick with the Feb 20 version (which looks the same as the version the plurality support)? Either way, we ought to leave it alone and not edit war our way through it...be graceful in defeat. KHM03 11:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

That would be my plea, along with a call for civility, lack of name calling and position characterizing, everyone politely reverting the page to the "winning" form, and keeping discussion on the remaining points to talk:Jesus/2nd Paragraph Debate and its inevitable (sigh) archives. --CTSWyneken 11:51, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I think it's pretty clear that this vote won't actutally settle anything. When it comes down to it all we are really arguing about is mention of the lack of documents. As Mr go commando said we have fallen into the binary thinking trap. There are quite a few different versions of the jesus myth around which range from stating that jesus is competely fictitious as a historical person, through the different degrees of existence (ie some NT stuff is credible), to the acceptance of most of the NT but rejecting the divinity and ressurection claims. All of these views question the historicity of jesus as presented by mainstream christianity. It then becomes a case of how you summarize these different views. The only common denominator they all have (and the major point in some cases) is "the lack of extant contemporaneous documents" (I hate typing that). That phrase can acutally mean lots of different missing documents depending on which group is refered to. For example outside the NT no record of the census, no mentions of the slaughter of the innocents no records of him feeding 5,000, the discrepecies with normal customs at the time (palm waving & passover and calling a trial after the passover meal etc) and so on.

If you look at the Evolution article (a featured article) the social debate is mentioned in a paragraph of it's own at the end of the introduction which contains a link to an article on the controversy. This despite the fact that there is no mainstream scientific backing at all for these differing ideas (the non existence theory has been compared to this but only by people with no real understanding of the scientific process). The controversy is in the news and readers may want to follow this up so it's mentioned clearly and linked. More importantly the reasons why the controversy has come about are mentioned - "because of it's implications for the origin of humankind" (even manages to be non sexist too!).

Basically what I'm driving at is that to have a sentence with any real meaning to it we must mention the point of difference with the mainstream view (the historicity of jesus) and also a brief mention of the reasons why this view arises (the lack of extant contemporaneous documents - that's twice I've had to type that now).

This should not be seen as a sneaky athiest plot to gradually expand this sentence to a thesis. No more is needed but to put less in is uniformative. To leave it our completely makes the article look out of date (or protectionist depending on your way of thinking). Most of the editors who appear to be non christian seem to support this type of sentence so hopefully no revert war would occur.

The only other point to take into consideration is whether we state the "lack of ...." as a fact (ie Due to the lack....some scholars question) or present that considering that lack imortant is a POV (ie Questioning the lack... some scholars question...).

This is why I haven't voted this time as after spending more time thinking I realised we weren't really moving forward whatever we decided. SOPHIA 12:23, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

SOPHIA, these are thoughtful comments - could you translate them into a specific proposal? Also, Aiden, I urge you not to throw stones. Many of the people who have voted, on either side, may not have been involved in this debate over the last month, yet I have "seen them around" quite a bit over the past several years; I know them to have made serious contributions to this article in the past. Without questioning the value of your contributions, I have to say I do not recall "seeing you around" until early this year. If you do not have much experience here, let me clue you in: Wikipedia is an on-line encyclopedia that anyone can edit. As you know, I do think people should be willing to explain their vote if asked. But there are no rules in this matter. Unless someone is clearly vandalizing a page, it is not up to anyone here to dismiss their edit or vote. Even someone who has been active at Wikipedia for less than a year has a right to edit and vote! No one "owns" an article, even those who basically wrote most of it (even if that was tweo or three or four years ago). Slrubenstein | Talk 12:35, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree with SL on the thoughtful comments, but, Sophia has already offered a version. IIt has got to be discouraging to hear "try again." Why not continue to talk it out on the talk:Jesus/2nd Paragraph Debate? But I will not be happy with anyone who in any way goes back to characterizing other users, their motives, etc. This must stop.

So intend to revert changes in the winning position unti we all or most all think the change acceptable. We must have a truce. There are at least two more issues on this paragraph alone that are open. Do we really want an edit war, a block and archives 55-60? On just this topic? --CTSWyneken 12:48, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

This has been a long debate so I have no problems reposting my suggestion (actually the improved suggestion by jpgordon)

The historicity of Jesus is questioned by a small minority of scholars, who cite the lack of extant contemporaneous documents.

The reason I prefer this sentence is that it clearly states that the importance of the lack of documents is a POV by the scholars concerned. However the debate on a shorter sentence has been valuable if only to get a view of how people feel on this and to clear the air.SOPHIA 13:04, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Um, that "go commando" thing was a joke, following comments of "Bible belt," "Bible pants," and "Bible underpants." I was just being absurdist again; I don't exactly want this to become my new nickname! On the other hand, I feel too many of us have gone commando in the military sense~there have been wars and rumors of war on this page for too long. If we're going to talk about evolution, then I need to find an evolutionary microbiologist, cellular biologist, or virologist to expand my Viral Eukaryogenesis stub. I just slapped an "expert needed" tag on it because I've been spending far more time on the Jesus article. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I like the way the issue of historicity is dealt with at Socrates, even if some may feel it violates NOR and NPOV. Similar issue: to what degree did Plato fictionalize Socrates?

It is important to compare how well the NT correlates to outside sources, while also remembering that two millenia is long enough that the available evidence is likely incomplete. I used to subscribe to Biblical Archaelogy Review until editor Herschel Shanks got caught up in that whole James Ossuary thing. But that also brings up a point that there is a gray market in Holy Land antiquites...which only adds more uncertainty. BTW the voting is now dead even at 18-18. What do we do if there's a tie? Finally, has anybody translated that German article yet?Arch O. La 14:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

SOPHIA, thank you for reposting your suggestion. I haven't voted because I find either of the two choices, and yours for that matter, acceptable; I would defer to any of them so we can move on. 14:54, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I think pookster made an important point, maybe more of a claim earlier that seems to be getting missed: that no historian cites a lack of extant contemporary documents. Instead, they evaluate, interpret and compare documents that are widely agreed to be both contemporary and extant. It would appear that the burden lies with the folks wanting to include this claim to provide a reference or two. Or, if what is really meant is that some elements of Christianity's history of Jesus aren't found in all contemporaneous documents, it should say something about the conflicts, discrepancies or contradictions among contemporary documents, not the complete lack of them. Plenty of people claim their are discrepancies and contradictions, and only disagree as to which ones are real discrepancies and how much they matter. But who really claims there aren't even any documents? (I guess that would be one way to eliminate all the discrepancies.) Wesley 17:26, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Another question is, contemporaneous to what? The three years of Jesus' ministry? His incarnation? Herod's temple? The first century A.D.? The Roman occupation of Judea? I think part of the problem is that those who argue "contemporaneous" are using different reference points. This is what I meant when I asserted "there are levels of contemporaneity" while debating Robsteadman. Arch O. La 17:35, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Vote Aftermath

Vote Count?

Will editors who do not have 100 edits or are banned count? Dominick ^(TALK) 20:29, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

You'll have to ask Avery Krause. I have 1237 edits [7] and have never been banned, so I guess I'm safe (of course, I also chose to abstain). Arch O. La 20:51, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

We have not disqualified any registered user at all from this vote and I would argue against it if someone suggested it. This matter is really not that important. I am hoping that having everyone's view out, we will not have an edit war while trying to move the article along. --CTSWyneken 21:24, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Check below for a comment from Jayjg. IMHO we may need outside help to settle this. Arch O. La 23:05, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

If necessary, we can open an RfM. Jim62sch 20:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Exhausted Editors

Frankly, I'm about sick and tired of this whole thing anyway. The editors complain that we're not getting anywhere, so someone suggests a vote. The editors complain about having to vote, so the vote fizzles out with little result. The editors complain that we've gotten no result, so we suggest another vote. The editors complain about one or two words in that vote, so the vote fizzles out. The editors get into an edit war over two freaking words, so I suggest a final vote. The editors complain that we're voting too much, then vote anyway, and threaten to ignore the results.

Here's the deal, people: Get your act together. Stop complaining if you are not willing to make an effort. Very few of you have done anything to actually forward discussion on this subject besides bicker about the semantical value of a handful of words. I am telling you right now, you are staring down the barrel of another edit war, and those of us who are actually trying to sort it all out are not going to stay for another one. I, for one, would love nothing more than to blank this whole Talk Page and start over. I have given you a solution, a feasible method to end this madness, and you've chosen to pick it apart and have a moan and groan session about it. A good number of you decided that you didn't even need to follow the groundrules because, well, you don't plan on abiding by the results if you don't get your way. Well fine, choose your own path. Have your revert war, have your edit conflict, enjoy it! And while you're sitting here arguing about "lack vs. shortage" and "historians vs. scholars," the rest of the page will sit and rot. You want a Featured Article? You want a Good Article? Then get to work and stop arguing!

Yes, I am angry. Yes, I am venting. If you only knew the level of frustration that I feel every time I see one of you lambast another. Every time one of you outright refuses to work together. Every time one of you chooses to focus on owning the page and proving a point as opposed to doing what is best. You know what, who cares if a minority of scholars gave a rat's fuzzy hind-end about the Historicity of Jesus? In a sixty paragraph page, two words are not going to destroy the rest of the material! But no, those of you that will be not satisfied until the page either reads "Jesus was a fake" or "Jesus is Lord" will never let us move on.

I thank those of you who are making an honest effort to improve this page. You are an asset to Wikipedia. And I condemn those of you who are making every effort to destroy that honest effort. I am not going to name any names, it is rarely unclear who these people are, in either case. --Avery W. Krouse 21:49, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Consensus Version: Who exactly are we talking about?

I understand that a version has previously been voted on and acheived consensus, and everyone agrees with this and is ahppy and blah blah blah. I have gone back through the archives as well as posting this question here several times, and have yet to receive a response. So, I'm giving it its own little section here at the bottom. When we say that some historians question the historicity of Jesus based on a lack of extant contemporary documents, who are we talking about? Can anyone name a source that argues for the non-existence of Jesus based on a discreditation of the sources regarding his life as being later and non-contemporary? I bring this up because this of course is exactly what the consensus line argues, something that I propose is patently false. Instead what has happened is a single user, who shall remain nameless, has insterted his own idea and his own original research into this whole debate and we have all been sucked in by his demand that we provide contemporaneous sources. No historian, to my knowledge (hence the call for sources), has ever made such a claim in any scholarly or academic work, in fact just the opposite. Drews, who developed the Jesus-myth into a historical hypothesis, based his research off the four cannonical gospels. Wells, who you include as a citation for one who disbelieves the historicity of Christ, does so not by discounting the sources as non-contemporary but actually uses the four gospels as a basic re-telling of Christ's life, and then compares them to later documents to show how Jesus evolved from the philosopher-carpenter in Mark to being God in Revelation. I've noted this several times already, so feel free to go back and look at past comments. But, the fact of the matter remains, the consensus line about "Citing a lack of contemporary sources..." does not apply to any historians, but in fact applies to a Wiki-user who has started this whole debate in the first place. If anyone can suggest any historians who actually do cite the lack of sources as a reason to discredit the possible existence of Christ, then by all means, list them. Otherwise, this whole debate about how the line should read is really beside the point; the line about "Citing a lack of contemporary sources..." is just plain untrue. The basis of the Jesus-myth in all of its myriad forms is not the lack of documentation but analysis of the documentation. The reality is we have all been sucked in by the personal beliefs of one Wiki-user and have attempted to placate this single user by placing his/her beliefs into the article. pookster11 21:10, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

See also above where I ask, contemporaneous to what? Also I brought up the oral history hypothesis to show that I consider the whole "extant contemporaneous documents" thing to be a red herring. The real issue is historical methodology, and the validity of arguments based on that methodology. Pookster is a PhD candidate in history, so his words should carry some weight. Arch O. La 21:25, 2 March 2006 (UTC) PS: I don't have the weight of the degrees that others have been throwing around, but the phrase raised epistomological and methodological alarm bells from my undergraduate sociology minor. Arch O. La 21:41, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Copied from above:

Another question is, contemporaneous to what? The three years of Jesus' ministry? His incarnation? Herod's temple? The first century A.D.? The Roman occupation of Judea? I think part of the problem is that those who argue "contemporaneous" are using different reference points. This is what I meant when I asserted "there are levels of contemporaneity" while debating Robsteadman. Arch O. La 17:35, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

To get some idea of what Jesus mythers are arguing, take a look at this page, and click on "Next" until all dozen points are made. Alienus 21:48, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

It might be easier in regular essay format, found here. I can tell you he definitely goes on and on about the lack of accounts written during the (supposed) lifetime of Jesus. Alienus 21:53, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Um... Doherty has a BA in ancient history and classical languages, and in his own words only has a working knowledge of those languages. He has a book yes, he's hardly part of the academic field, and in a cursory overview of some of the book-reviews the most common analyses are that he hasn't read all the sources and he's not equipped to write such a book. Any serious, accredited historians? pookster11 21:56, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

What, only a BA?! I'm going to rush out and burn his books immediately!!!! I just know that nobody without at least a PhD could possibly be counted as a scholar, much less be capable of putting together an argument that succeeds or fails on its own merits. 22:23, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Go find some reviews of his work. They are universal in stating that his analysis is unqualified and that he hasn't read all of the relevant sources, secondary and primary, and his language skills need improving, something that he would have had to have done in a PhD program. pookster11 22:55, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

And I thought I was spending too much time on Wikipedia.

Please note, gentlemen (and we are all gentlemen -- no woman would waste her time splitting hairs the way we have) that we have been debating for days and days about the question of whether or not the sentence that mentions that some doubt the historicity of Jesus include or not include the reason for that doubt! Talk about angels dancing on the head of a pin!

The whole thing is worth it, for me, thanks to Arch O. La's reference to the official Catholic position, which I never knew until now. The article he cites should be a major source for this article. Rick Norwood 22:35, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Let's not be misandric. Some men also see the waste in splitting hairs. Hence my abstension and absurdist protest. Arch O. La 22:59, 2 March 2006 (UTC) PS: Note that the website was a Jewish one, with a particular POV aligned against the Messianic Jew movement. Their citation of the Catholic position should be taken with a grain of salt. If we could find the original documents, that would be better. As a Lutheran I have no great love for Catholics, but I still want to be fair. Arch O. La 01:05, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Voting irregularity

The vote is close to a tie (it was a tie the last time I looked), and there have been accusations of irregularity on both sides. Americans will of course recall United States presidential election, 2000, the Florida runoff, and Bush v. Gore. The whole thing was eventually decided by the Supreme Court. If we cannot agree on a phrasing for the second paragraph, then it may be time to appeal to a neutral or higher power, be it a neutral admin, RFC, mediation or arbitration—whichever is appropriate. The issue is the vote itself and not any particular user. Now, do we agree or disagree with my statement? Arch O. La 22:49, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I've removed the votes of the two Robsteadman sockpuppets (though, I might add, they voted for the version I preferred). If there are any other serious suspicions of sockpuppetry, please let me know. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:57, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Be careful: at this point they are alleged sockpuppets, and Rob is pretty upset at the allegations. Also, Rob and Alienus (maybe others) have alleged other voting irregularities. Arch O. La 23:03, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

No, at this point they are confirmed sockpuppets. I have confirmed the sockpuppetry myself. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Can you confirm whether Raisinman is a sockpuppet? Alienus 23:28, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the vote is, at this point, worthless. Between allegations of sockpuppets and scabs, there's little chance of a consensus. Alienus 23:05, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

All sockpuppets have been identified; if there are any other editors seriously suspected of being sockpuppets please let me know, and I'll look into it. As far as "scabs" go, the term seems meaningless in this context. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, there were also the Raisinman allegations. At this point I feel that anybody who has posted to this page in the last five weeks is too close to the issue to be truly objective (myself included). Thus my desire that we seek outside help in settling this. Oh, and I know what a scab is: one side has been accused of trying to stuff the ballot box. Arch O. La 23:31, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I brought up the term, so I'll explain it. Scabs are people brought in from outside because the people you already have aren't cooperative. In this case, it refers to stacking the vote by inviting strange strangers based on their known biases. These people are not genuinely editors of this article, just an attempt to manipulte the democratic process. Alienus 23:27, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

It's a shame that those who have 9apparently) been confirmed of sockpuppetry, will get their way if we throw the vote out. However, for the sake of peace, i say we just use the first version (that was the result of consensus) and move on. At this point, I think that;s the best option. No more voting. No more procedures. Let's jsut edit.Gator (talk) 23:15, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Would that we could all be such pacifists. Otherwise, I don't think this approach is likely to work. Conflict will continue until we find a way to settle this. Arch O. La 23:33, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

So Robsteadman, the one throwing accusations around like mad about the voting being rigged is himself trying to rig the vote? How ironic. —Aiden 00:53, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Id seriously like to make a joke here and provide a hyperlink, but it might be too mean considering the irony :/. Homestarmy 00:56, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

And versa vice, to be honest. Also to be honest, I'm a little uncomfortable with how quickly Rob was punished. It seems to me to be a rush to judgement. Arch O. La 01:02, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Well using sockpuppetry to get extra votes or things like that I think qualifies as an immedietly bannable offense or something, the sockpuppetry alone doesn't do it as I remember the rules. Rob seems to be having some problems outside this article though, one of his sockpuppets got in some sort of argument it looks like over his own bio article, (Robert Steadman) looked like personal attacks by this one person against Rob, Rob's sockpuppet apparently was citing sources when Rob himself could apparently do nothing :/. We ought to help Rob out. Homestarmy 01:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll just say that I do not want to be fed to the lions, nor do I want to witness the Crusades. Arch O. La 02:02, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm confused. The latest action against Robsteadman happened far too quickly for my comfort, and both of Rob's alleged sockpuppets have been active since October. I still have to say "alleged" because Jayjig is sealing the records. I realize the need for privacy, but something smells fishy here, and I don't mean my tuna sandwhich. Am I being naive? Arch O. La 04:23, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Well judging by his sockpuppet's vast knowlege of Rob Steadman at his article, and lack of activity much elsewhere, I don't think it's hard to believe. Secondly, I've seen Jayjg mediate disputes (he's an Admin and member of the Arbitration Committee) in other articles and if he says they're sockpuppets, they're sockpuppets. —Aiden 04:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I guess, although there were those of us who thought they might have been friends or students of Rob. I'll have to take your word on Jayjg. I noticed that Gator also asked what the evidence was, I would have too but this was all over by the time I became aware of it. It smells funny when the accused is not allowed to confront the evidence. Arch O. La 05:00, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

The evidence isn't sealed; as I've made clear elsewhere, I'll gladly provide it to any editor with CheckUser access. Outside of that circle, however, privacy issues remain paramount. And I'm not sure what you consider to be "fishy"; the fact that I blocked and discounted the votes of two sockpuppets that voted the same way I did? Jayjg ^(talk) 17:29, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Alright who has such access so we cna just find out what the checkuser found out. Don;t you see the problem here Jay? If he can;t even know if the results found that the same IP address was beign used both all three names, then he can NEVER defend himself adn that's NOT fair. I know you can see this. Shouldn;t he afforded the same ability to defend himself as Deskana was? Deskana was given the basic info that the same IP address was being used and he was able to defend himseld and preserve his reputation. Please give Rob the same chance. Privacy issues ahve nothig to do with it. We don;t want IP addresses, jsut the basic reason why you came to your conclusions. I know you know what we mean, so if you're not willing to at elast do that, please refer us to another admin who is willing to accomodate (and I know they xist ebcause Deskana was lucky enough to have one). Thanks again for your tirless efforts here, they do not go without appreciation.Gator (talk) 17:39, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, really, Deskana knew it was because of his IP address because the vandalism came from an anon IP address that was linked to him through his college. It would be pretty hard for an admin to not say anything about an already known and linked IP address in that case, not because an admin was kind enough to offer extra info. --Oscillate 17:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Check out Rob's talk page. The question may be academic anyway, since Rob has decided not to pursue an apppeal. If you really want to know why I'm uncomfortable, I gave three reasons on Avery Krause's talkpage, and there has also been some discussion on SOPHIA's talkpage. Gator, Deskana and I have our reasons to be uncomfortable, but it's really in Rob's hands now anyway. Arch O. La 17:56, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

What To Do Upon Rob's Return

Alright, ladies and gentlemen, I am opening the floor to this discussion. We have clearly seen that the sole roadblock to the progress of this page comes in the form of one Robert Steadman. This cannot be more clear now that he has been convicted of sockpuppetry. Now, we've assumed good faith so many times that our assumes are sore. We've been civil to the point of sickness. Can any single one of you honestly say that Rob is going to behave now? Can any of you believe that with just an ounce of assurance? I hope not.

The deal is, Rob's block ends in less than 24 hours. I thank God that I noticed the peculiarity or we may have never caught him (though looking back it seems fairly obvious now). But when he comes back, he's going to be mad. He's going to be very, very mad. And he is not going to assume good faith. He is not going to be civil. So, the question is, what do we do? Obvious options include:

Head him off at the pass: Seek a request for comment.
Trial by jury: Take him before ArbCom.
Let him graze and hope for peace: allow him to come back to the talk page freely.
Corral him: ignore him entirely or give him an ultimatum (behave or be blocked).

Discussion? --Avery W. Krouse 05:01, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I still think it smells fishy, but I have to defer to Jayjg. Arch O. La 05:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC) Addendum My objections are listed on Avery's talk page. Perhaps it is time to put Rob on trial, if only to give him (and his advocate) a chance to defend himself. I have earlier today (yesterday WikiTime) suggested that we seek outside help to settle this; but doesn't mediation come before arbitration?Arch O. La 05:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Long before. There should be a full process (not that that's always followed). Also, having read through the archives, I don't think that Rob is the only roadblock -- there are a few other editors who I would consider to be roadblocks.

In any case, if he becomes problematic upon his return, we really need to let him go for a bit (unless he violates WP:VAND, WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, etc.) and then begin an RfC pointing out violations. Sed, caveat vos ipsi. Jim62sch 21:23, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Why does this discussion belong on this talk page? And, as a simple remedy, don't in the future get caught up in the idiosyncratic beliefs of a single belligerent Wiki userdemanding that the article conform to his version of events, epecially in the case of a musician attempting to argue history. pookster11 06:38, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, it's a metadiscussion: talking about the debate rather than debating the article. Avery's passing around "Christian Cabal" invitations, he claims it's parody but I fear he's just feeding the fire. Arch O. La 06:53, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

You are hereby invited by the Grand Poobah Avery W. Krouse to announce your membership in the Wikipedia Christian Cabal! Please add your name to the members list. If userboxes are your thing, you may add {{User:Averykrouse/Christian Cabal Box}} to your userpage to declare your allegiance! The Grand Poobah salutes you! --Grand Poobah Avery W. Krouse
If you believe this is in poor taste, I'll remove it. But I think we all need to take a moment and lighten up. After all, if this group is around, why not acknowledge the Christian Cabal? Come on, even Lithuanians need Jesus! --Avery W. Krouse 06:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

This user is a Christian, but refuses to join any cabal.

Arch O. La 07:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I like it! --Avery W. Krouse 07:09, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

My advice is to just let the whole thing drop. Reply only to the new things he says, ignore any old argument, any abuse (short of logging it), any tirades, etc. If he reverts or edits without discussing it first, revert it back. If he does it multiple times, count them. Report any 3RR violations. If he comments on the second paragraph at all, move it to the subpage for the second paragraph (same thing with any comment on the second paragraph, for the time being). By now, having slammed JayG, one of the most respected admins in the wiki, he will be watched.

Beyond this, let's drop it. Remember that your own behavior can come under examination if you bring an RfC. While not as bad as Rob's behavior, he's not by far the only one who has been out of line.

That is all we should say here. Below, sometime this morning, will be my "what's next" proposal. --CTSWyneken 10:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I hope this works, but what if we become deadlocked again? True concensus has been hard to come by. And I'll say again that this about more than just the one user, even if he seems to be the only one who gets into trouble. Arch O. La 11:49, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I will hope for better. And read up on the rules. --CTSWyneken 12:23, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Halt, Stop!

OK. That's enough all of you! Avery is right. The arguments here have had little or nothing to do with the words we wish to put on the page.

Both versions are accurate and NPOV. A small minority of others DO deny the historicity of Jesus. Nowhere does it deny that there are multiple reasons for this conclusion. Nowhere do we say this is the whole story. In fact, we provide a link to a page where its all laid out.

On the current version, it is also true. A small minority does deny the historicity of Jesus due to the lack of extant contemporaneous sources. Note that nowhere in this statement is the phrase "Jesus mythers." A subset of these folk do assert the claim in the paragraph. So it is true.

The latter version, if it passes, puts the paragraph only slightly out of balance, a matter we can discuss on the subpage. 0 So, I will repeat once more and will not say it again. I intend to revert the page two times a day if needed to reflect the vote results at the end of this day. I will not reply to any of the same old accusations, arguments, smears, etc. by those of you have made them countless times over the past few weeks. If the page is again frozen, I will put in an RfC myself.

Is anyone coming with me? --CTSWyneken 00:26, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I say we let Robsteadman and Raisinman duke it out in the alley after work. ;) KHM03 00:29, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I hope we can stop ramming heads together, but if not, see my suggestion above: outside help. Arch O. La 00:31, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

How's this. Since we have spent more than enough time discussing this, change my vote to a vote for whichever side has the most votes. If enough people agree to do the same, it should be a landslide for one side or the other, and I don't much care which. Rick Norwood 00:30, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Or just accept it the way it is. Its wrong in that is mis-portrays the basis of the Jesus-myth, but people don't want to discuss that; Rob's personal viewpoint has become the centerpiece for this line, so lets put it in there, make a note that this is what Rob believes and in no way relects the actual Jesus-myth hypothesis, and take the rest of the discussion to the historicity board. It really is a very simple matter, and just a brief reference to some people think otherwise is enough, not a qualification that its based on lack of sources which is patently not the case. pookster11 00:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I've gone record to say that there's got to be a better way to express the Jesus-Myth position. SOPHIA has said that she feels that the problem stems from separating the Historicity article (methodology and analysis) from the Historical Jesus article (conclusions based on that analysis). I've been told that the German version is much better than the English version, but I'm still waiting for a translation ;) Arch O. La 00:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the bickering needs to stop, or we shall never see anything positive from this article. As for the people who insist that Jesus never existed, well, a number of people say that the Holocaust never happened. I can form a group of people who will swear that the moon is made of Roquefort, but that does not make it so.

As for a mythical Jesus...yes that too is true. In some ways, Christianity could just as easily be called Paulism, as it was Paul and his disciples who defined the religion, turning it away from Judaism into something that would appeal to the Greeks (and to a lesser extent the Romans)

Bottom line is that the article needs to portray all relevant sides, and the folk arguing over this need to remember that only 30% of the people in the world are Christians.

As for the German, I'll start translating it tomorrow. Jim62sch 01:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I've started to looked at Pauline Christianity vs. Judaisers (Ebionites?), the Noahide interpretation of Acts 15, and the Jewish arguments over where Christianity went wrong (but may be OK for goys). Frankly, I've always found the Galations explanation to be incomplete, and have been looking for deeper answers. Arch O. La 01:12, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

There's actually three main offshoots of Christianity, and the Ebionites are probably the least of the three. You have the Pauline, which is mainly concerned with creating Christianity out of Judaism, the Gnostics, who blend Christian philosophy with Hellenistic philosohy (kind of a proto-neoPlatonism), and then the Ebionites, who are mainly concerned with keeping Christian philosophy and identity tied to Judaism. Keep in mind that this article is NOT about Christianity; this is an article about Jesus Christ. All relevant sides of Christianity, its three main branches and then the later branchings and heresies and what not, do not need to be covered here, nor do they even need to be mentioned here. pookster11 01:25, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Halt! I say! Stop! There. I feel better! None of this has anything to do specifically with the paragraph at hand. Can we please just let this one settle and move on to the rest of the article. Plenty battles await there.

For Pookster: this paragraph is not here to address more than the old-fashioned Jesus Myth crowd. There are a bunch of folk out there that believe that Jesus never existed, but do not buy into the myth arguments. There are newer proponents of the Jesus myth school that do believe Jesus existed (Wells, for example) but that he little resembled the Jesus proclaimed in the Gospels.

It is here because a number of internet sites push the nonexistence hypothesis. By the rules of wiki, this is kind, since the position is so small a minority we need not call attention to it. Yet in the spirit of collaboration, we have all agree it to be good to represent it. --CTSWyneken 01:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't know much about Gnosticism, but I do know that Neoplatonism influenced Augustine of Hippo and some of the other Church Fathers.

True, this is better handled at Christianity. The discussion here emerged from discussing the Jesus-Myth and what it implies. So, we went off on a tangent. Arch O. La 01:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Leave it and Move On?

I say, then, that we leave it as it stands and move on. It's six of one, half-dozen of the other at this point.

Does anyone vehemently disagree with that idea? --Avery W. Krouse 05:04, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

More like 17 of one, 19 of another. See proposals below. --CTSWyneken 11:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I've been ready to move on for weeks. See below. Arch O. La 05:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

If Jesus mythers are alllowed then conservative scholars who affirm the gospels historicity and Jesus's resurrection should be allowed

If Jesus mythers are allowed (who are in vast minority), then conservative scholars who affirm the gospels historicity and Jesus's resurrection should be likewise mentioned in the introduction.

I say this because scholars who affirm the resurrection and the historicity of the gospels are more plentiful than Jesus mythers.

I suggest this sentence: In addition, there are many scholars who affirm the resurrection of Jesus and the historicity of the gospel accounts such as Gary Habermas, F.F. Bruce, William Lane Craig, and Norman Geisler. Raisinman 21:40, 2 March 2006 (UTC)raisinman

The point behind this paragraph was to establish what very few things represent the view of the whole scholarly community. (we were putting the finishing touches on this before the current tempest blew in). If we EVER finish with this discussion, I want to turn to paragraph three, where we will talk about what scholars in the Christian community affirm. --CTSWyneken 02:21, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

An edit summary of "Raisinman is a sock" is pretty accusatory and uncivil. You BETTER have some SOLID evidence (i.e. a checkuser test) to back that up or you're just trolling. I don't blame Raisin for removing it. I would've done the same. This is not the palce for this anyway. Either respond to his arguments or don't. You're not allowed to do this here. unacceptable. Gator (talk) 21:57, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Or hey, how bout this? We stop including all this tertiary nonsense in the introduction and instead link people the the page about the historicity of Jesus? pookster11 21:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

What just happened? :/ Homestarmy 21:59, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

People who have a vested personal interest in the contents of this page have become frustrated and are going insane. pookster11 22:01, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't care particularly if User:Raisinman is a sockpuppet or not (unless we start seeing real violations of policy, such as using socks to evade WP:3RR). KHM03 22:04, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Didn't we already do the fake insanity thing, remember "Biblepants" or whatever it was? Homestarmy 22:06, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

It was part of my absurdist protest of this absurd voting process. No offense to Avery, I mean the whole process up to this point. Arch O. La

Anyway, if we could get off of this and back to identifying historians that discredit the historicity of Christ based on the lack of sources in order to validate the consensus version, it would be appreciated. Me? I've gotta go translate some 4-5 pages of Xenophon and get back to writing, so I'll be away for a while doing my own work. pookster11 22:10, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Wow, it's too bad a mere BA prevents Doherty from ever qualifying as a historian! Alienus 22:25, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Did I miss something? Who is this Doherty and what has (s)he written? --CTSWyneken 02:27, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Does he claim to be an historian? KHM03 00:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Does the scholarly community accept him as such? KHM03 00:07, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Heck, I have a BA in history. I'm not sure that makes me a top-notch, world-class, widely-accepted-by-the-academic-community expert. Also, Doherty would readily admit to a particular bias, which we have to recognize (he doesn't follow Wikipedia's NPOV policy! ;) ). KHM03 00:10, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't disqualify him, he can go and enter the field and become a PhD just like everyone else. Does it make him a reputable source? No. Does he have the training to make such assertions? No. Is he therefore taken seriously by the academic community? No. Him writing a book and making these assertions is tantamount to anyone here saying the same thing. Hell, if thats the standard we're going to use I'm going to just start citing myself in my works; I have a BA and probably a better grasp of Latin and Greek than this guy does. Of course no one will ever take me seriously and I sure as hell won't be getting a position teaching anywhere, but some guy on Wikipedia will take my research as serious, academic work. If the best source you can come up with is some guy who went to college and wrote a book, then my assertion stands. pookster11 22:52, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll look over the websites that Alienus provided later. It's enough for me that several have shown that the Jesus-Myth is wider than the nonexistence hypothesis, a point that I think not everybody has realized. Finally, there's got to be a better way to phrase their position than "extant contemporaneous documents." Arch O. La 22:52, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Viewpoint of a n00b

Before people begin to return fire, I have to admit that I am seriously new to Wikipedia, and I have no intention of upsetting anyone. It's just i've looked through some of the discussion on this page, and a question popped into my head.

Is it really possible to have a NPOV on certain subjects?

I think this particular subject might demonstrate that possiblity. Because where belief and scepticism meet to discuss an issue, both sides will bring strong emotions with them that would interfere with objectivity.

If I am a Christian, my belief in Christ comes before any thought that he never existed. If I am an atheist, my denial of him being any more than a mythological figure supersedes the notion he could have existed. I don't think there is any escaping that.

This article already holds various opinions of Jesus, from various points of view, and is that such a bad thing? Maybe that is the answer, make Multiple Point of View (MPOV) an acceptable alternative.

I'll be awaiting execution...

Dane Jude 21:59, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Just see WP:NPOV. I just think you have a slightly different defintion of what NPOV actually is here that's all. good to have you aboard. You chose a heck of apage to start your wiki-life though....maybe you should start with Guinea Pig. :)Gator (talk) 22:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Welcome, Dane! I was going to suggest writing about a small town near you! 8-) Seriously, NPOV on Wikipedia is slightly different that pure neutrality. We are to strive to represent what scholars in a given field have to say about an issue, and, where there's a significant minority, to represent what they say, too. All of this is supposed to be backed up with citations from reputable, published works. That's really what this particular tempest is about. How do we talk about the minority view? --CTSWyneken 22:14, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Welcome to Wiki, Dane Jude. NPOV does not mean you have a NPOV. It means you write for wiki from an NPOV. For example, I may think that Elvis was the greatest human being who ever lived, but I would never say that in Wiki. Instead, I would find some sourced info about the number of top singles Elvis had and include that information in the article on Elvis. Information, not opinion, is the key. I have some very strong opinions, and writing for Wiki has been good for me, because it forces me to examine those opinions and, if I want them in Wiki, to back them up with evidence. Rick Norwood 22:20, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the welcome everyone :) CTSWyneken, that is a really interesting question. At college I was introduced to this idea of a pyramid structure for writing articles and essays, at the top of the pyramid are the most central and important ideas, and as you go down the pyramid the views become more intense (and argued possibly in an essay) and highly focused. So I guess I'm saying that although I think that minority opinions should be explained in an article, it's a matter of position. And I don't mean the position that the contributors want, but what will be of most use to the reader. I'm a lazy student after all! If I was being entirely honest I would have the non existance of Jesus line in the 'other views' section, linking to its own article, because it would probably be an interesting topic. Gator, I had a look at the NPOV article, thanks for kicking me over there, I think I get it now, and thanks Rick for backing that up. Dane Jude 22:38, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Welcome Dane June - you make an interesting point about the importance of the historicity of jesus to each "side". For christians it is obviously crucial but for atheists it is actually not very important as just because a man named jesus existed (josephus mentions 19 I think) does not mean you have to accept he was the son of god. SOPHIA 00:15, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Welcome Dane,

I concurr with Sophia's comments on the importance of the existence of this man called Jesus (we are talking about a specific one, not about the other 18) to atheists (or other non-Christians). Because of this, the non-existence claim is only held by very few people, who defend it with great vigour against scholarly consensus. Why they do this is a matter of speculation I will not indulge here.

However, Dane, I must somewhat your statement: "If I am a Christian, my belief in Christ comes before any thought that he never existed." Belief in Christ indeed does depend on the existence of Christ, but that doesn't mean that faith preempts considering the claim of his non-existence. The Evidence for this claim would have to be considered and, if it were sufficient (or the evidence for his existence insufficent), a heart-wrenching acceptance and destruction of one's belief would be the result. What I am trying to say is that a believer must not be blind to the question but may answer it. Given the evidence situation this is a hypothetical situation.

Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 00:36, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for giving my comment more weight than intended, Dane. That is indeed what we have been proposing. Several of us have been arguing for a small introduction -- just outlining the article, really. We would then give more detail in a historicity section below, which in turn would be an outline for the detailed essay Historicity of Jesus.

All I was trying to say with my poor attempt at humor is that writing about a small town would be considerably quieter than coming to debate central, a.k.a. the article on Jesus. --CTSWyneken 02:01, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Atheism does not require the belief that Jesus did not exist, any more than it requires the belief that Mohammad didn'tr exist. It just requires the belief that he wasn't God, which is also a requirement of Islam and Judaism. I think there are some - a few - liberal Christians who take the view that Jesus' historical existence is not important for their faith. Paul B 14:33, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I've said that I'm agnostic about historicity, because I recognize that the available historical and archaelogical evidence is likely incomplete. Does this make me a liberal? Arch O. La 15:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I think what is being implied is that some people might just not care if Jesus really existed or not and are just thinking "Hmm, I was born again, semantics can wait, this is good enough". Though the semantics really are kind of important. Homestarmy 15:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

In researching my comments for this page, I've discovered a remarkable group of Christians who actually say out loud that Jesus is not that important to Christianity. Jesus, evidently, hadn't a clue about what was happening to him, and the most important thing about him was not anything he said, which we can safely ignore, especially when we diagree with it. He was just a sacrificial lamb, and it is his death, not his life, that is important. Very interesting. I had not run into these ideas before. The things an innocent google search can turn up! Rick Norwood 15:29, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Now, that sounds liberal to me. Which Christians are these? BTW the operators of that "Why Jews Don't Believe in Jesus" website I mentioned earlier sent a letter to a Catholic priest asking him to answer some of their objections. The priest's response was basically, "Well, we don't really believe in this stuff either." See for yourself. Now, I for one found this to be quite shocking. Arch O. La 15:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Rick, that Jesus "hadn't a clue about what was happening to him" might be your view but it's certainly not "evidently". "the most important thing about him was not anything he said, which we can safely ignore, especially when we diagree with it" sounds like liberal theology to me. For proper Christianity both life and death of Jesus are important - and yes, Archola, if Jesus didn't live at all, Christianity is pointless. Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 15:41, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Str1977, please read more carefully. Not only is that not my view, I say above that I had never even heard of it before. Rick Norwood 22:26, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Of course, I have yet to see any actual, verifiable, factual evidence that anybody made Jesus up. Of course He lives! But that's my faith talking. BTW we Christians have our own version of the Jesus-myth. The gospels of Peter, Thomas and Mary are held to be mythical compared to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Something to keep in mind. Arch O. La 15:51, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, Archola, my above post violated the principle I posted myself a while ago, that historicity (defined as the ability to recontruct him via the historical craft) is not the same as existence. Some one might have existed without being reconstructable by history (e.g. the Rhenish peasant John in the 15th century). In Jesus' case IMHO both existence and historicity are affirmed (and the historical community's opinion confirms the latter and thereby also the former), but as regards the Christian faith the existence is what matters, not the historicity (as defined above). Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 16:08, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Existence is binary; histroricity is not. Which is why I'm faithful to existence but agnostic to historicity. I don't consider this to be intellectual dishonesty either; IMHO historical evidence is incomplete (as with many ancient figures), and thus one can't, based on historicity alone, draw a definite conclusion. The most that can be said against either side is "insufficient evidence," and what we are left with is informed opinion. Arch O. La 17:55, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Well Archola, they aren't mythical, those gospels exist. The problem of course is that they don't look Christian, they supposedly don't claim that they are themselves important, and as I understand it, some of them often contradict the gospels we already use on very important points. Homestarmy 16:10, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant that to Christians the portrayal of Jesus in those non-cannonical Gospels is mythical compared to the NT. What you're saying is sort of like saying Hercules: The Legendary Journeys wasn't mythical because it was a real TV show--but Hercules himself is a myth. Arch O. La 16:16, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Rick's comment makes sense only if one cannot distinguish between people who believe Jesus existed, and Christians. But this has been a problem for a small groups of editors, more prominently Robsteadman: they cannot see past a false binary between believing Jesus existed which means there is a God which means Christianity is the truth versus there is no God so Christianity is a lie so there was no Jesus. Paul Barlow explained the illogical (and un-empirical) nature of this binary thinking quite well. The problem is, anyone who is dogmatic in their beliefs will never, ever be able to understand this. Slrubenstein | Talk 17:44, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Let's not pick on Rob. There have been others, most recently Raisinman with his "militant athiest plot" remark. I hope more people come to realize that there is a range of data and not just binarity. It will be difficult unless we move beyond what foundationalists call properly basic beliefs. This is a more neutral term than "dogmatic." BTW there are at least two of us who have agreed to allow each other our differing subjectivities and just work together anyway (see User Talk:Archola#Sophistry and the responses on User Talk:Sophia. Arch O. La 18:19, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. Slrubenstein | Talk 10:50, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, unfortunately when discussing anything related to religion, an artificial dichotomy tends to be assumed by those discussing the issue. Obviously, such a false dichotommy means that reaching a consensus from polar extremes becomes nigh on impossible. Thus, if the extremists who staked out these dichotomatic positions could moderate a little, perhaps we might be able to discuss this issue from a scholarly viewpoint. I know that fully subjugating one's beliefs to the concept of NPOV on such a subject is difficult, but let's all give it a shot. Jim62sch 20:58, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Archives and Live Subpages

Question re: Archives

I know I took a very broad brush stroke to the discussion page, but it was getting very long. Many current conversations are now found in Archive 35. It would help to have a table of contents for each archive, but the current format does not really allow for it and I am uncomfortable making such an edit. I would be more than happy to fill out the contents of A. 35, but doing one for all the old archives would be a job for several of us in order that it be done quickly. Any suggestions? Storm Rider 22:56, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

We do have a table of contents for each archive. See Talk:Jesus/Archive_details. If you could fill it out for the archive you created it would be appreciated. Thanks. Deskana (talk) 23:22, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

And CTSWynekan also archived a bunch--36, 37 and the first round of the Avery vote. Arch O. La 06:09, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

2nd Paragraph Debate Page Added

I've gotten a subpage started with some of the debate over the second paragraph in it. It is at: Talk:Jesus/2nd Paragraph Debate. It is very rough, may be missing material from yesterday evening and could use a touch up before continued conversation starts there. Perhaps links could be set there to previous discussions in the archives. I'm a bit occupied today, so won't be able to put a lot of time into it. Can someone else do the grunt work? --CTSWyneken 10:50, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Archived talk:Jesus/2nd Paragraph Debate

I've archived the subpage, as I proposed above, and copied two items from this page. Someone who has a better grasp of tables should pretty it up.

Anything that would be helpful to the next round of discussions could go there. I'd just ask we keep it to a minimum. --CTSWyneken 17:39, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Are we ready to request unprotection yet? Arch O. La 17:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I can't believe this page has been Protected for so long. Alienus 18:07, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I guess we are....Homestarmy 18:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Hearing no objections, go ahead. --CTSWyneken 18:09, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I have made the request. Arch O. La 18:18, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

This should be interesting. Jim62sch 00:05, 4 March 2006 (UTC)