I continue, from part 1, part 2, considering the latest, of a never ending, round of pop-research on the issue of the historical Jesus and Jesus mythicism, namely Michael Paulkovich and Raphael Lataster.
I personally chronicled 205 texts that reference Jesus written pre 70 AD to 200-250 AD, see Historical Jesus – two centuries worth of citations
An example of his bias is his claim that “a supernatural miraculous explanation is actually, inherently implausible.” I would imagine that the way that he knows that “a supernatural miraculous explanation is actually, inherently implausible” is either by examining all, each and every, “supernatural miraculous explanation” and determining that they are all “inherently implausible” or by presupposing that “a supernatural miraculous explanation is actually, inherently implausible” which would be unreasonable circular reasoning.
An example of his bias is that he seeks to dismiss Josephus because he mentions miracles. Of course, this is not historical research, this is censorship. He also dismisses Josephus because he mentions Hercules but whereabouts did he do so?
In Against Apion 1.18 he notes “Hercules’s temple” not Hercules. In War of the Jews 2.16.4 he notes “the pillars of Hercules” not Hercules. In Antiquities of the Jews 1.15 he is quoting Alexander Polyhistor who is the one that references Hercules. In Antiquities 8.5.3 he notes “the temple of Hercules…the temple of Hercules” not Hercules. In Antiquities 10.11.1 he is quoting Megasthenes who is the one who writes that Nebuchadnezzar exceeds Hercules.
So, as a historian Josephus references landmarks of note and authors who wrote on this or that figure, in this case Hercules.
I am unsure if this means that he and his reviewing peers simply did not bother checking the citations. In fact, from what I understand, it seems that Lataster simply repackaged what other people have said before him: other Jesus mythicists who made a media splash, were discredited by historians and quietly went away only to have someone else do the same a few years later and on and on it goes.
He merely seems to be reiterating only those researchers with whom he already agrees and merely disregards those whom he finds inconvenient.
In fact, he considers “real” research only to be that which is premised upon his secular worldview philosophy.
Hector Avalos, Robert Price and Richard Carrier, John Dominic Crossan, Earl Doherty, Randel Helms, et al. appear to be his go-to guys yet, Ben Witherington, Gary Habermas, Mike Licona, N.T. Wright, Richard Bauckham, et al. are simply ignored.At least he references Craig Blomberg (although in what Blomberg has stated is a misrepresenting manner) even though he, essentially, allows Richard Carrier to do the arguing for him, meaning that it is a form of a copy and paste job from Carrier.
Sadly, with all regard and discretion, he speaks much like you: in generic terms such as claiming that well, who knows who, some or another Christian scholar or some historian or something or someone applies this or that faulty criteria.
The next segment will consider Raphael Lataster on Paul and the celestial Jesus.