This post is merely a bulletin, a progress report and a reminder, for myself, and my followers patiently expecting the last installments of two blog-series I have yet to finish. They are:
Conclusion: A New U.S. Constitution
Paul, Acts, Forgeries & Marcion – Part III (the Marcion part)
There are several other drafts pending and waiting to be finished, but it seems they will have to wait longer to be completed and published.
As many of you know I am the full-time/overtime caretaker of my mom 7-days and nights a week. She suffers from severe dementia which has now progressed into Early Alzheimer’s Disease. Her condition has been noticeably progressing since at least 2017, but has really advanced the last 18-months. She now requires more than one person (me) to care for her. I am no longer able to care for her as one person. I’ve been a one-man show since August of 2021 with very few and limited breaks so this is not only required for her, but more so myself.
Come this June or July—that’s the time-frame we are shooting for—Mom will be admitted into an Assisted Living Memory Care facility. You might imagine what all has to be done to 1) find the best Assisted Living Memory Care facility, 2) move out of her current Senior Living apartment and lots of furniture moved into storage, 3) getting all the legal paperwork sorted out to move her into an Assisted Living Memory Care facility, 4) the Long-term Care insurance policy claim initiated, which has been done, 5) her late husband’s Veteran’s Benefits Assistance initiated, 6) get Durable Power of Attorney completed, and 7) finally get myself completely moved back up (again) to Dallas, Texas after all tasks for Mom have been completed. Then 8) find employment in the Dallas metroplex that pays enough to live on and hopefully (fingers crossed 🤞) with a little safety net rainy day fund. The latter is not as easy as it once was 25-35 years ago. Wages in Texas have not kept up with “inflation” or the cost of living per zip code.
In other words, my next 10 or 12 weeks are going to be quite busy, to say the least. I will do what I can for my blogging, but I can make no promises. I do appreciate all of your patience and understanding. At some point in late July or early August I will be back into Dwain’s full-swing and living his own life once more. It is so needed and cannot come soon enough for me. 🙂
Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always
In this part two I want to examine (reexamine?) the reliability or unreliability of Paul’s epistles and facts hidden in the Greek New Testament as well as other contemporary sources of the time about Paul. I will also examine Paul’s thirdepistle to the Corinthians and the forgeries within it done in his name by later Greek Church Fathers and their copyists.
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The Eccentric Yet Dubious Apostle Paul
Labelling Paul as dubious is quite the understatement if one knows the various extant accounts of him available outside the popular Greek New Testament. From what we know, however, in his epistles and the book of Acts is that he was loved and hated, welcomed and shunned, provocative and a pestilence. There is even the chance he never existed as one man, but was a reference class as Dr. Richard Carrier places him. Carrier states that Paul’s six authentic letters are “far more probable hypothesis (for more on this point see How Do We Know the Apostle Paul Wrote His Epistles in the 50s A.D.?). And that makes Paul far better attested than Jesus: because we have some things written by Paul himself! That’s a serious issue of reliability of whether Paul actually understood and knew Jesus simply from an epileptic vision on the road to Damascus or from resurrection appearances after Jesus’ execution and burial.
Epilepsy and Paul
Another problematic account of Paul was his medical health issues of ectasia and exstatic seizures and its form(s) of disease classified as the “Sacred Disease” or focal epilepsy. This disease disrupts one’s daily life in many significant ways from learning, to bodily dysfunctions, to hyper-sensations such as hallucinations (visual, hearing, and taste), mood swings, to communication, speaking and cognitive functions. It isn’t hard to conclude that with all those “disruptions” in a person’s life causes all sorts of positive and negative social interactions and relationships, especially around ancient people who have little to no understanding of the disease and its manifestations, privately or publicly. And as mentioned earlier, this disease in the 1st century CE most surely caused eccentricity and dubious behavior and speech in the eyes of other Jews and Gentiles. There’s another reliability issue.
Unfounded Claims of Jewish Lineage
In the Greek New Testament Paul claims he was born of Jewish parents in the Roman Province of Cilicia in its capital Tarsus. During his life there Cilicia was heavily Hellenized going as far back as 333 BCE when Alexander conquered Anatolia. As I covered in my 2018 series Saul the Apostate, this claim of Jewish heritage from the tribe of Benjamin is a major snag and mess.
The Gate of Cleopatra, or the Sea Gate and Roman road in modern day Tarsus, Turkey.
First, nowhere in Jewish Rabbinical history is there a tribal list or ancestry of Benjamin in existence in Cilicia or Tarsus at that time, not even rumors of it. Second, it is claimed in Acts 22:3 that Paul’s rabbinic studies were under Gamaliel in Jerusalem. Yet, none of his ascribed writings and arguments in the Greek New Testament are Gamaliel or rabbinic in nature. Most historical scholars of Late Second Temple Judaism and Zugot-Tannaitic Rabbinical literature agree with this falsehood. Yet another problem of Paul’s reliability.
Paul’s Hellenic Studies and Education
On a positive inference of Paul’s eccentric exuberance for public or church preaching, his infatuation with mysteries and the Spirit of God through tongues, supernatural powers, sacraments, and fatalism (mood symptom) can be directly traced to the Gnostic lore of Alexandria and the Corpus Hermeticum, specifically the Poimandres, heavy in Greek mythology and later Hellenism. Probably not so coincidental was his education and exposure in the Hillel school. There Paul would have learned classic Hellenistic literature, ethics, and philosophy (Stoicism) and these influences do indeed reveal themselves in all his ascribed letters, especially from the Hellenistic Book of Wisdom and other Apocrypha, as well as Philo of Alexandria who is the father of harmonizing Greek philosophy with the Jewish Torah; both are transparent in Paul’s writings.
Paul’s Roman Citizenship & Anti-Semitism
Interesting enough, Paul’s background and study of Hellenistic philosophy, literature, and ethics would have suited him well to becoming a Roman citizen, later saved by a Roman centurion at the Temple amongst a serious dispute and angry Jewish mob (Acts 21:27-36), and as a result becomes a hunter-prosecutor of early annoying Christians to the Roman Empire (Acts 22:22–23:11) all while despised by Homeland Jews for his attacks on them and apostacy of Judaism.
Evidence of Paul’s Herodian Lineage & Unions
This is the most intriguing inferences and connections of Paul’s dubious reliability from the Greek canonical New Testament that is veiled, hidden inside his Epistles and Acts. There is also internal and extraneous sources of him belonging to Herodian-Jews, not Pharisaic-Jews and these sources combined and understood as a whole picture reveal a plausible conclusion he was likely/probably a Hellenic “Herodian Christos” evangelist not a Jesus evangelist. Where do we find these sources?
Alluding to and probably referencing terminology in the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSSs) of Qumran we find almost identical terms used in Paul’s letters to the Galatian, Corinthian, and Roman Herodian-Christians. The DSSs frequently use terms like the Enemy, the Liar or Spouter of Lies, Man of Lying, Comedian of Lying (i.e. epileptic?), and some others. They strongly pointed to the adversary of “The Righteous Teacher” within the Judean “The Way” Movement of Jesus’ disciples and followers. Paul refers to them repeatedly in his letters in Gal. 1:20, 2 Corinthians 11:31, and Romans 9:1 (to name just three) that he was not “a Liar” or he “does not lie.” This explicitly implies that his groups/churches in those three cities had been told that Saul of Tarsus deceives and maligns the truth and the faith.
Dead Sea Scrolls today and the Pesher Habakkuk scroll written c. 2,000 years ago about the “Wicked Priest” and “the Spouter of Lies” as well as “the Enemy.”
Furthermore, “The Enemy” terminology is also strong and prevalent in the Pseudo-Clementines. For example, in Homilies the apparent Epistle of Peter to James the brother in Jerusalem, it states:
For some from among the Gentiles have rejected my legal preaching, attaching themselves to certain lawless and trifling preaching of the man who is my enemy. […]
[The Gentile Enemies]transform my words by certain various interpretations, in order to the dissolution of the law. […]
…the law of God which was spoken by Moses, and was borne witness to by our Lord… for thus he spoke: “The heavens and the earth shall pass away, but one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law.” (quoting Matt. 5:18)
Dr. Bart Ehrman describes the significance of this Epistle of Peter to James as a Palestinian counter-balance against the Hellenic canonical NT and Acts of the Apostles. He writes:
This book provides the counter-view to that found in the New Testament book of Acts, where Paul and Peter are thought to be completely on the same side and simpatico on every major issue. Not according to this short letter. Here Peter and James are the heroes of the faith, and Paul is the great enemy.
— Bart Ehrman Blog, “Another Forgery in the Name of Peter, April 2013, accessed Oct. 11, 2018
I cover more extensively the overall, hateful opinions of Paul by 1st century Homeland Jews and in their DSSs in my fourth part of Saul the Apostate. And by the way, Herodian Jews did indeed receive Roman citizenry. Ironically, Paul himself openly supports this method of Roman-Herodian citizenship:
Greet Apelles, the approved in Christ. Greet those who are of the household of Aristobulus. Greet Herodion, my kinsman.
— Romans 16:10-11
Be sure to read closely Dr. Robert Eisenman’s extensive work on Paul’s Herodian bloodline and unions in my Part IV. They are quite compelling. With these sources it is no stretch to conclude that Paul’s Christ-cult and theology Christology was easily embraced by Hellenic Pagans/Gentiles because it represented very little of what Jesus’ Tannaitic, Torah-loving teachings and Sectarian reforms.
On a final note about Paul’s probable Herodian connections, the question must be asked, What would be the best alternative approach—centuries-later in the eyes and minds of the Hellenic Patristic Fathers—to a failed Messiah, who never returns, and the related Messianic OT prophecies hence also failed? Be sure to read Dr. James Tabor’s answers to this question.
Reliability & the Author(s) of Acts
The book of Acts is generally regarded by scholars to be a two-part compilation sometimes labelled Luke–Acts. Both works were addressed to a man named Theophilus, an obscure friend of Luke and by unsubstantiated conjecture, Paul’s lawyer. Nevertheless, the name Theophilus as the recipient, appears in both Luke’s Gospel and in Acts which implies Luke would be the author. That’s the traditional Greek-church theory.
But the timespan of 5–35 years (possibly 40-yrs) between writings of the two volumes—Luke in c. 80-110 CE and Acts in c. 90-120 CE—suggests that Acts was probably written well after Luke. And since both works’ authorship are anonymous, i.e. no explicit signature of the author, opens the debate that Acts had more than one author. The latter would also explain nicely the many contradictions between Luke and Acts, as well as those between Paul’s epistles and Acts. In my opinion and research, the wide differences of composition time-frames and author anonymity of Luke–Acts makes a good case that Acts had more than one author, or source, resulting in many inconsistencies and irreconcilable blunders.
What are the most glaring, damaging fallacies and inconsistencies of the book of Acts portrayal of Paul and Paul’s description of himself in his letters?
Apostles performing Acts of miracles and evangelizing Gentiles and Jews alike — Image from pereprava.org
Many biblical scholars like John Crossan, Clare Rothschild, Gregory Sterling, Thomas Brodie, perhaps Richard Carrier, and Bart Ehrman are all in agreement that in specific historical details Acts is unreliable. But as far as general portrayals of Paul the book of Acts is more accurate. But does that make Acts a historical narrative? No. However, it does make Acts a theological drama and sensationalized story. In that arena I am in the same boat or posture as Richard Carrier: if a narrative isn’t completely factual, then it must be classified as an inspired-by-actual-events legend, but not an irrefutable factual transcript. Big difference.
If one needs Acts to be a reliable history, and not revisionist history (a.k.a. “bullshit”), one needs to “leave out” all the evidence that it repeatedly contradicts the eyewitness testimony of Paul, and in precisely the ways that suit its author’s agendas, and that it mimics known tropes and features distinctive of fiction and propaganda, and conspicuously omits all the actual markers of reliable histories.
Carrier goes on with his sharp criticism of the author(s) of Acts stating, “That people [of the 1st and 2nd century CE] routinely tried to pass off lies as genuine history was a major problem regularly complained of at the time.” He cites three different sources of these complaints, T.J. Luce, “Ancient Views on the Causes of Bias in Historical Writing,” Lucian’s “How to Write History,” and Plutarch’s “On the Malice of Herodotus.” Then Carrier lays it on thick by stating there are over 20 other “Acts” that even most all Orthodox Christians agree are bogus.
Then Carrier goes even further stating that Christians and their self-proclaimed, self-perceived impunity to bend laws of nature as God-initiated “miracles” and rewriting, re-visioning actual historical events for believers afforded Christians and their scribes the license to freely doctor up stories/Acts that suited their own agenda and lure, recruit Gentiles into the new Pauline Christology.
Additionally, Acts contains some serious historical fallacies, four that are glaring. The first fallacy is the Roman Cohorts/troops stationed supposedly in Caesarea c. 37 CE. In Acts 10:1 the “Italian regiment” would be the Cohors II Italica Civium Romanorum, or an Italian Auxiliary Unit based out of Syria. The problem with this specific unit and Acts’ account of it is that its presence in Caesarea or Judea is confirmed to be no earlier than 69 CE, thirty-two years later.
A second fallacy (of many) is the event of the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 put next to Galatians 2. Examine the following image table:
Paul and Barnabas are appointed by Antioch church (v. 2). Meeting involves the church, the apostles, and the elders (v.4, 6). No report. Includes the Apostolic Decree (v , 29). Gal. 2. Paul goes up (with Barnabas and Titus) by revelation (v. 2). Meeting is private, before those of repute (v.2). Includes an agreement on division of labor (v. 9). Mentions a request and agreement to remember the poor (v. 10). Those of repute added nothing to me (v.6).
Once again this shows compellingly, in my knowledgeable opinion, that Acts was written noticeably later by more than one author and authors who naïvely did not have the Gospel of Luke in front of them, making their work in Acts highly unreliable.
A third fallacy or problem is James’, the brother of Jesus, speech in Jerusalem (Acts 15:16-18) where he quotes literally from the GreekSeptuagint speaking Greek. But James’ audience would’ve only been the Council members who spoke Aramaic or Mishnaic Hebrew amongst each other. Why on Earth would James speak to them in Greek? Because he would not; that would’ve been completely unnecessary, unless Acts 15 is a later retro-report than the actual speech the Acts’ author(s) haphazardly and naïvely penned.
Finally, the fourth fallacy or problem of Acts’ reliability is the Egyptian and the assassins/terrorists called Sicarii of 1st century Judea (prior to 70 CE) and the narrative in Acts 21:38. By confusing this Egyptian with Paul the author(s) of Acts demonstrates that they used Josephus’ as a prior source and completely mistook that “The Egyptian” led them… which is wholly false.
To conclude this portion, I am in agreement with biblical scholars like Bart Ehrman and critics like Richard Carrier that as a whole the book of Acts is mostly unreliable, if not completely unreliable. It does easily give convenient historical facts about events of 1st century CE to lend itself as valid, reliable to readers about events in Judea, Jerusalem, and its Roman rule, however, it cannot be trusted on the specific details and verifiable, confirmed external facts of the time that we do possess today.
Paul’s “Third” Epistle & Letter to the Laodiceans? What?
There are two letters (falsely) attributed to Paul called 3rd Corinthians and another called Laodiceans. They are noted in Acts 8: 9-24 and in the Acts of Paul, a pseudepigraphal apocryphal work neither of which are in the present day NT canon.
Third Corinthians is a forgery written by Orthodox Christian Fathers to oppose circulating forgeries during the 3rd century CE to support their own seven separate Nicene Councils’ final theologies. Marcion of Sinope became the very first major heretic of the Greco-Roman Catholic Church and our present Orthodox Christian Churches, Protestant ones included.
There were apparently Pauline letters about Marcion of Sinope circulating around c. 135 CE in Rome. Sadly, none of them exist today because extreme 2nd–4th century orthodox Christians destroyed and burned them. However, as luck would have it we do have letters forged in Paul’s name by Greek Church Fathers which seem to oppose Marcion. And they wrote forgeries to oppose him and his “heretical” theology in the name of Paul. Yes, the second and third generation Church Fathers fabricated and invented their own Pauline forgeries to fight Marcion. Bart Ehrman explains:
It was quite common for “orthodox” Christians (that is, Christians who accepted the theological views that eventually became widely accepted throughout Christianity) to charge “heretics” (those who taught “false teachings”) with forging documents in the names of the apostles in order to support their views. […]
The Gospel of Peter, for example, was charged with being heretical, as teaching a docetic view of Jesus. But orthodox Christians forged documents of their own. We have far more of this kind of forgery, since orthodox writings were more likely to be preserved for posterity, even if they were not actually written by their alleged authors.
Two different theologians had gone to Corinth during Paul’s missions, one named Simon (the Magician) and the other Cleobius. Both were preaching a very different gospel than Paul’s. The Corinthian Christians wanted Paul to come in person to whip the ones who had gone astray from Simon’s and Cleobius’ teachings. Their teachings were essentially:
Do not petition the Old Testament prophets
God is “not Almighty,” not omnipotent
No resurrection of the flesh/dead will happen
Earth was not created by God, but by angels
Christos did not come here in the flesh as a man
Christos was not born from Mary
Much of these theological doctrines sound like Marcion’s teachings. Consequently, followers of Marcion rejected an afterlife “in the flesh” at the end of time. This also meant that Christos could not have been born and had human flesh. Since the Old Testament did not belong in the canonical New Testament, disregarding the OT prophets was fine, they were no longer needed. Imagine the impact of these teachings to traditional Judeo-Christians, even Paul’s Corinthians.
But there are discrepancies above with the followers—in the forged 3rd Corinthians that is—to what Maricon actually taught. Marcion in fact did teach that Earth was created by the OT God. Hence, it was an apparent wayward group of Corinthians that deviated from traditional Judeo-Christian creationism, not Marcion, as the Greco-Roman Church Fathers purported in their forged letter of 3rd Corinthians. However, this group of Corinthians had similar theological ideas with Marcion, but they were not identical. It seems the 2nd century Church Fathers like Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Justin Martyr, got it wrong in making their forged epistle in the name of Paul.
The phony 3rd letter to the Corinthians was a denunciation aimed at the rising movement of Gnostic Christianity and docetism in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE. In this “response letter” the early Church Fathers, not Paul, underscored several doctrines about the real nature of Christos as opposed to Marcion’s and the Gnostics’ version. One particular doctrine that 3rd Corinthians addresses is the importance of the flesh. No, not pornography—although that would be a nice respite from this crazy religion—they mean (the early Greek Church Fathers) actual flesh and bone and blood in order to make Christos’ Incarnation theologically workable.
Assaulting the Gnostics’ beliefs, the forger(s) chastise any who proclaim that heaven, Earth, and all within them was not God’s creation are labelled heretics. In attempting to mimic Paul the forger(s) slip up and show their papyrus caper. Making the flesh one of the primary focal points caught Bart Ehrman’s attention:
This emphasis on the “flesh” is very interesting, but also a bit ironic. One recent study of 3 Corinthians has shown that the forger[s], who was intent on opposing the false teachings of the heretics, does so by teaching ideas about the flesh that are contrary to what the real, historical Paul taught.[2] Paul himself certainly believed that God had created this world, and that at the end of time he would redeem it. Paul, like most Jews and Christians in his day, thought that at the end of this age there would be a bodily resurrection. That is to say, that humans would face judgment, either reward or punishment, in their own bodies that had been raised from the dead (see for example 1 Corinthians 15). But Paul did not call the body “the flesh.” On the contrary “the flesh” meant something completely different for Paul. It meant that part of human nature that is controlled by sin and that is alienated from God (see for example Romans 8:1-9). For Paul, the “flesh” needed to be overcome, since it was controlled by sin. The human body would be raised from the dead, but the flesh had to die.
This somewhat technical understanding of the term flesh came to be lost in later orthodox Christianity, when theologians began thinking that flesh and body were the same thing. And that has happened here in 3 Corinthians. Unlike Paul, this [forgery] emphasizes the importance of flesh as a creation of God that will be raised. In other words, this is an instance in which a forger claiming to be Paul represents a point of view that is contrary to Paul’s, even though he is trying to correct, in Paul’s name, teachings that he thinks are false.
Another forged “letter” by early Hellenic Church Fathers done in the name of Paul is the one to the Laodiceans. According to many biblical scholars this fake letter is the epitome of stale and lacking in theme and intent. In fact, nine-tenths of the letter is just a repeat of Philippians. The opening line is from Galatians 1:1 so it shows no substance and no pop, no inspiration. Adolf von Harnack says, “[The letter,] it is with regard to content and form the most worthless document that has come down to us from Christian antiquity.“
Ruins of ancient Laodicea, a city 10.5 miles northwest of Colossae, Asia Minor or modern day Turkey
The mystery about a letter or letters to the Laodiceans is that only one exists. It is the letter found in the Latin Vulgate, but it is remarkably short and claims to be written by Paul. Any letter to the Laodiceans from Marcion does not exist, only Tertullian writes about it attacking the Marcionites for using a revised version of Ephesians. The 4th–5th century Epiphanius of Salamis also references a Laodicean letter, but he merely quotes straight from Ephesians 4:5. Nonetheless, the quagmire of confusion was only made much worse by the early Greco-Roman Orthodox Church Fathers. At the very least, this paints a dubious picture on their reputation and integrity.
But here’s the rub. Forgeries were rampant during the Latin Middle Ages both in the Orthodox Roman Church—the ancestor of today’s Protestant Churches—and possibly too, we can’t know with certainty, from the Marcionites, all trying to plagiarize and imponerePaul’s letters. And whether it comes down to an age of coincidental loss of history or to an age of ruthless hunter-eradicators, it is not coincidence that the only surviving records of papyrus and manuscripts somehow all belong to the victorious Greco-Roman Orthodox Church and its 2nd–4th century Hellenic Fathers. Think about it.
In my last and final Part III of Paul, Acts, Forgeries & Marcion, I will explore and examine a bit further the very first major heretic and threat of the early 1st century Roman Orthodox Church, Marcion, and why he was such a danger.
Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always
My good friend Ark (Egyptian Akhenaten) over at A Tale Unfolds has recently gotten into a lengthy discussion/debate with an American(?) pastor about the tale of the Christian resurrection and the reliability or unreliability of the Greek New Testament. He, myself, and many other secularists, atheists, and humanists of our WordPress community have been in these debates with evangelicals, fundamentalists, or otherwise hyper-conservative religious faith-followers an untold amount of times over many years, or at least over a decade, probably more. We are all very experienced, well-informed, well-educated, and quite reasonable in our non-religious views and/or secularism. All of us pop holes in their weak apologetics everywhere and with lethal precision.
The oldest extant New Testament, Codex Sinaiticus that ends at Mark 16:8, with no resurrection story whatsoever. It was written by four different Greek scribes.
When we indulge these Faith-followersTM almost all those times the ending is boringly predictable: They believe merely because their own personal, imagined, paranormal construct makes them feel good inside. Period. They fail miserably every time they try to defend their individual fabricated mental construct because they can never produce any degree of convincing evidence that their “God,” their “Savior,” or their “Holy Scriptures” existed or are universally reliable and unanimous. Yet they keep coming around like a never-ending three-ring circus.
But enough rambling, let’s get on with the subject at hand.
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The Resurrection: Fact or Fiction?
We immediately run into a major problem asking this question before even reaching the starting-line or into the starting stalls. What is it? The severe lack of any independent sources for the resurrection tale. Or to say it another way sources that are not strictly Hellenic-Greco-Roman manuscripts, i.e. the earliest extant 4th-century CE Greek-based New Testament called the Codex Sinaiticus (above image). But this surviving vellum parchment is a manuscript copy of over 292–322 some years later than the events, persons, and concepts they purport to convey and narrate. How much personal bias, editing, changing, and omitting could take place by ancient copyists and scribes overseen and supervised by early archbishops and church fathers over a span of two centuries? A lot. That was a rhetorical question.
Major Problem #2:Confusion among all Christian apologists concerning whether the resurrection story was a non-material event, i.e. a different body, an immaterial body, and thus not in history or time and space. Or if the resurrection was material, the same body, a material body, i.e. in history as a chronological time and space event. The latter belief is held by virtually all Christian apologists and faith-followers today.
These two Christian postures are important because a non-material body does not require an empty tomb nor a body in the flesh, a tactic that avoids all the problematic Gospel and New Testament contradictions and confusion. In other words, the resurrection was an act by God within His dimensions, power, and omnipresence. With a material body it does require an empty tomb and a literal body in the flesh, a far, far harder defense of the resurrection.
Late Second Temple Jewish Ossuaries with bones of two noblemen – photo Gali Tibbon / AFP / Getty Images
Major Problem #3.0 and #3.1:Miracles. Did they exist then? Do they exist today? With a material body defense Christians must debate whether or not miracles, or a creator God, events, and people can bend or subvert the commonly accepted laws of nature, physics, chemistry, Quantum Mechanics, et al, to explain the testimony of very biased sources: the Greek Gospels. However, this debate then presents another subproblem of this major problem:background probability. What is meant by background probability of a claim or testimony?
Jeffrey J. Lowder, co-founder of Internet Infidels and researcher in Philosophy of Religion, Metaethics, and Inductive Logic, is one great scholar to explain “background probability of testimony”:
Suppose someone that was presumably reliable and trustworthy claimed they had just flown over a lake by flapping their arms. Surely no rational person would take such a claim seriously (at least initially; although we might change our minds if this event could be repeated). We would reject such a claim because it goes against everything which we know about the powers of the human mind, modern physics, etc. Apart from the testimony of such an event, we would rate the prior probability of such a claim so infinitesimally low that it would invalidate the testimony and make the claim unbelievable.
What is “background probability” (B-P) to a resurrection believer and what is it to a secularist, atheist, or agnostic?
B-P to a Non-Believer: Lets suppose God does exist. If God does exist, then to a believer’s or theist’s world-view and perception, at least to themselves, they can plausibly argue that the “background probability” is improved, if not greatly improved. An all-powerful Creator who designed the laws of nature and the universe could certainly intervene and awestruck us with abnormalities of which we are unfamiliar. And if a God could do that, then it follows that a mere resurrection and levitation of a man is completely within His powers.
Furthermore, a believer and other theists have the doctrine of Special Revelation. From my extensive blog-page Why Christianity Will Always Fail:
Special Revelation is direct revelation to an individual or a group. This sort of revelation includes dreams, visions, religious miracles, experience of extraordinary events, and prophecy like manifestations of “tongues.” It also includes holy scriptures like the Old and New Testaments or the Bible.
Humans can believe to themselves and make-believe to themselves anything they want with very few limits, including the existence of a God. However, not all humans align with this train of thought. Hence, because of widespread disbelief in a deity or deities, it makes sense that this God or gods would intervene in human history revealing His plan, His nature, and His purpose for life on Earth. Richard Swinburne of Oxford University England argues “miracles might be especially useful for the purpose of authenticating a divine messenger or prophet.”
The two reasons above—the existence of God/Gods and Special Revelation—believers can conceivably argue that if God/Gods exist, then the probability of the resurrection improves despite the severe lack of independent sources. Another point to consider in this miracles-paradigm is should a theist/believer reject the resurrection, they must seek out the historical sources and context to do so. A very intriguing position for the believer.
For a non-believer, or secularist, or atheist, “background probability” for the resurrection is as ludicrous as pigs flying and cows on the Moon. Thus, for an event of teleportation of a man executed and dead for supposedly three days and nights, i.e. beyond resuscitation, is simply unrealistic given the known constraints of the human brain and vital organs after 5-minutes and up to 35-minutes for Myocardial ischemia. Plus, such an event would go against all laws of nature. Scottish philosopher, historian, and empiricist David Hume, states “for an atheist to be justified in believing a miracle on the basis of testimony, the possibility that the testimony is false would have to be a greater miracle than if the alleged event actually occurred.” Therefore, the B-P makes a resurrection infinitesimal or impossible to accept for non-believers.
Popular Defenses for the Resurrection
Most lay Christians use the works of two or three apologists to defend the resurrection of Yeshua bar Yosef, or Iēsous Christós in the Greek. The late Norman Geisler, William Lane Craig, and J. Warner Wallace are three of many that faith-followers trust to do their legwork. Of these three apologists I will focus on Dr. Craig because he is generally regarded as one of the best. Also, one of his academic advisors and fellow alum was Norman Geisler.
From his website “Reasonable Faith,” Craig’s defense of the resurrection has three premises: 1) the empty tomb, 2) “appearances” after his execution, and 3) the supposed origin(s) of the Christian faith. Let’s examine these while remembering the severe lack of independent sources about Jesus, i.e. non-Greco-Christian sources.
The Empty Tomb Premise — What diverse evidence is there for the empty tomb? Craig addresses this question with 10-lines of evidence in one of his books. Here, I will only quote two of those lines, what he thinks are most important:
Craig purports “One of the most important facts, I think, undergirding the empty tomb is oddly enough the burial story of Jesus. […] In any case, the Jewish authorities certainly could have made an end to the whole affair by simply pointing to the closed tomb of Jesus and said, “Look! The grave is occupied, he is not risen from the dead” and that would have been the end of it. Therefore, the accuracy of the burial story, I think, provides powerful grounds for affirming the historicity of the empty tomb account.”
“Another aspect of the empty tomb narrative itself, as it is found in the Gospel of Mark, is that this portion of the narrative was probably part of Mark’s early source material that he used for describing the passion and the death of Jesus – the last week of Jesus’ life and his crucifixion. […] Also, the empty tomb story is connected to the burial account by syntactical and linguistic ties. For example, the pronouns used in the empty tomb story have their antecedents in the burial story so it is really one smooth account. When you remember that Mark is the earliest of our Gospels, that means that his source material was even older and this passion narrative that included the empty tomb story could have gone back to within the AD 30s even. Remember Jesus was crucified about AD 30 so we are talking about a source that is extremely old and is therefore a valuable source of historical information.”
Craig goes on to explain two or three other lines of resurrection evidence on his website, but nowhere at all does he go outside of the Synoptic Gospels other than a peculiar, very brief mention of the early 2nd century CE Apocryphal Gospel of Peter story, again strictly Greco-Christian sources only. Craig attempts, albeit poorly, to garner pseudo-Judaic sources from Talmudic literature (70–640 CE) and Middle Age polemic Jewish “propaganda,” as he describes it:
One final piece of evidence that might be mentioned would be the fact that the earliest Jewish polemic, or anti-Christian propaganda, itself presupposes the empty tomb. [6] The earliest Jewish polemic that was launched against the Christian proclamation “He is risen from the dead” was to state that the disciples came by night and stole away his body; then the Christians responded to that that there was a guard at the tomb and they would have prevented the theft and so on and so forth. [7] The interesting thing in this dispute is not the historicity of the presence of the guard. Rather the interesting thing is what the Jewish polemic was saying in response to the Christian proclamation “He is risen from the dead.” Were they saying these men are drunk with new wine or his tomb is still out there on the hillside? No, they were saying the disciples came and stole away his body. Think about that for a minute. What that implies is that the body was missing. The earliest Jewish polemic was itself an attempt to explain away the empty tomb. Thus, we have evidence for the empty tomb which comes not from the Christians but from the very enemies of the earliest Christians themselves which is historical evidence of first rate quality because it comes not from the sources which believed in the resurrection but from those which disputed it.
So on the basis of reasons like this and many others the majority of New Testament critics today affirm the historicity of the empty tomb story.
— William lane craig, from “Resurrection,” Veritas Forum interviews, the reasonable faith website
I am baffled how Craig came up with this feeble Polemical Jewish conclusion. In the 5th and 6th centuries CE Jews were not the least bit concerned with Greco-Christian myths and tales spread around the Mediterranean. From the JewishEncyclopedia.com:
In a book entitled “Contra Judæos,” the Archbishop of Seville grouped all the Biblical passages that had been employed by the Fathers to demonstrate the truth of Christianity. Whether learned Spanish Jews took up the controversy and replied to Isidorus’ arguments by counter-treatises in Latin, as Grätz believes (“Gesch.” v. 75 et seq.), is doubtful. In Spain, as everywhere else in that period, the Jews paid little attention to attacks written in Latin or Greek, which languages were not understood by the masses. Moreover, the Christian dogmas of the Trinity, the Incarnation, etc., seemed to them to stand in such direct contradiction to both the letter and the spirit of the Old Testament that they deemed it superfluous to refute them.
More aggressive was Saadia’s contemporary, the Karaite Al-Ḳirḳisani. In the third treatise of his “Kitab al-Anwar wal-Marakib” (ch. xvi.) he says that “the religion of the Christians, as practised at present, has nothing in common with the teachings of Jesus. It originated with Paul, who ascribed divinity to Jesus and prophetic inspiration to himself. It was Paul that denied the necessity of obeying the commandments and taught that religion consisted in humility; and it was the Nicene Council which adopted precepts that occur neither in the Law nor in the Gospels nor in the Acts of Peter and Paul.”
It’s safe to say that Craig’s argument for “the empty tomb” is at the most wishful for Christians, and in the least, wholly unconvincing for non-Christians. He actually offers no important pagan evidence as he claims he does.
Jesus’ Appearances Premise — What diverse evidence exists for Jesus’ appearances days after his execution? Craig’s answer from his website:
“The primary evidence that we have for Jesus’ post-mortem appearances would come first of all from Paul’s list of witnesses in 1 Corinthians 15. There he says that when Christ rose from the dead he appeared to Cephas (or Peter), then to the twelve disciples, then to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom were still alive at the time of his writing though some had died, then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and then last of all, says Paul, “he appeared also to me.” ”
The implication Craig makes here are six (6) counts of attestation to Jesus being alive days after his execution and burial. They are Peter, the twelve disciples (including Peter again), “500 brethren,” James his brother, all of the apostles, and Paul. None of these six counts of attestation are independent sources or testimony. They are all Judeo-Christians and even Paul, or Saul of Tarsus, is a highly unreliable source as I covered in my five part blog-series Saul the Apostate. And Craig’s final comment about Jesus’ appearances goes:
So we have in Paul’s information very good grounds for believing that various individuals and groups of people under various circumstances saw appearances of Jesus alive from the dead. The Gospel accounts, I think, provide confirmation and attestation that goes to confirm and fill out the details of these appearance stories. [16]
Notice Craig’s vague and veiled descriptions of “various individuals and groups of people.” It is certainly reasonable to suppose that all these individuals and groups were Judeo-Christians, again barring Paul, who had vested interests or skin in the game that Jesus was notthe dead, failed Messiah as thousands of Homeland Jews and Gentiles were asserting at the time according to the Greco-Roman New Testament and later writings of early generation Hellenistic Church Fathers.
Another fact that must be remembered with these above counts of attestation and Craig’s framing of them is that the Gospels were written over 40–110 years after Jesus’ execution, burial, and purported resurrection (see image below). It is quite plausible in a range of degrees that the much later testimonies recorded in the Gospels and Acts were retrofitted by those Greco-Roman scribes and copyists to corroborate Paul’s letters regarding the resurrection. This would also explain the many internal contradictions or inaccuracies of the resurrection in the Greek canon of the New Testament.
Chronological Order of the Greek New Testament Canon
As noted earlier in the first image above, the oldest surviving Gospel copy, the Gospel of Mark, does not have any resurrection story after Jesus’ execution and burial. It ends at Mark 16:8, nothing more, nothing less until later retrojections were made into Mark c. 70-75 CE or later. This is a lethal blow to Christianity’s core doctrine and its apologists.
Hence, Craig’s argument is not proof Jesus rose from the dead. Moreover, there are still no non-Christian sources or pagan sources of the resurrection. In fact, the Jewish doctrine of a resurrection of the dead is not only quite different than Paul’s, the Gospels, and Acts, but is barely even a mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, Isaiah and Daniel to be precise. This fact weakens or undermines early Judeo-Christian testimonies as unrelated.
Therefore, Craig’s argument for the validity of appearance stories is not only his biased six sources cited, but worse, an implied kangaroo court of “witness testimonies.” I think this argument is one of Craig’s weakest and is near laughable.
Origin(s) of the Christian Faith Premise — How did “The Way” Movement, a reforming Jewish sect in 1st century CE Roman-ruled Judaea and Galilee arise? Craig answers this in a long, sporadic rabbit-trail way:
All scholars agree that the Christian faith, or the Christian movement, – “The Way” as it was called at the first – came into existence because the original disciples firmly and sincerely believed that God had raised Jesus from the dead. They proclaimed this message everywhere that they went. Indeed, Christianity could not have come into existence without this prior belief. […]
The resurrection of Jesus is what enabled them to believe that Jesus was Messiah after all; that God had vindicated Jesus by raising him from the dead despite the fact that the Jewish leaders had crucified him for blasphemy. It showed that his claims were true after all.
So without this prior belief in the resurrection of Jesus the Christian movement could never have sprung into being; it could never have come to exist. The question then becomes: where in the world did the disciples come up with this outlandish belief that God had raised Jesus from the dead? If you deny that Jesus really did rise from the dead, then you have got to explain the origin of the disciples’ beliefs in terms of either Christian influences, pagan influences, or Jewish influences on them. Obviously, it could not have been the result of Christian influences for the simple reason that there wasn’t any Christianity yet. Since the belief in Jesus’ resurrection was foundational for Christianity, it cannot be explained as the later retrojection of the Christian church back into the records because there would not have been any Christian church had they not believed in the resurrection to begin with. […]
None of these factors serve to account for the origin of the disciples’ belief that God had raised Jesus from the dead. We have here a belief which nothing in terms of antecedent historical influences can account for. Therefore, it seems to me that the best explanation for the origin of this belief and the origin of the Christian movement itself is that the belief was true – Jesus did rise from the dead. That explains the origin of the Christian faith.
Unfortunately for Craig, by delving into 1st century CE Jewish customs, doctrines, and traditions he shows his amateur knowledge and understanding of Talmudic literature of post-Second Temple Judaism (70–640 CE).
The resurrection doctrine is fleshed out in a variety of rabbinic sources. Among the ideas associated with it is the belief that during the messianic age the dead will be brought back to life in Israel. According to the Talmud , all bodies not already in Israel will be rolled through underground tunnels to the holy land. Avoiding this process, which is said to be spiritually painful, is one reason some Jews choose to be buried in Israel.
At least two talmudic sources note that the righteous will be brought back from the dead wearing the clothing in which they were buried. .
According to the Jewish mystical tradition, souls can be reincarnated in different bodies if those souls have not completed their missions on earth. At the time of the resurrection, the individual soul will be split among the various bodies it once inhabited, and the portion of the soul whose mission was completed in a particular body will return to that body.
Thus, from the above elaboration Craig has misrepresented Talmudic traditions and literature as well as wrongly connect them with the Greek New Testament canon. In Peter Schäfer’s book, Jesus in the Talmud, Princeton University Press, 2007, Schäfer argues:
The references of Yeshu (Aramaic) were not from the early Tannaitic period (1st and 2nd centuries) but rather from the 3rd and 4th centuries, during the Amoraic period. The references of Yeshu in the Babylonian Talmud were “polemical counter-narratives that parody the New Testament stories, most notably the story of Jesus’ birth and death” and that the rabbinical authors were familiar with the Gospels (particularly the Gospel of John) in their form as the Diatessaron and the Peshitta, the New Testament of the Syrian Church. The message conveyed in the Talmud was a “bold and self-confident” assertion of correctness of Judaism, maintaining that “there is no reason to feel ashamed because we rightfully executed a blasphemer and idolater.”
— Jesus in the talmud, wikipedia
Obviously William Lane Craig is not Jewish nor is he a scholar in Second Temple Judaism and Messianism. One must look elsewhere to understand the large chasm between his faith and theology and that of Jesus’ reform movement and his sectarian Judaism. He is way off.
Debunking the Resurrection
One of the most renown atheists and critics of Christianity—or as I like to call it, Pauline Christology—is Dan Barker, Co-President of the Freedom From Religion Foundation and minister turned atheist. From his book Losing Faith in Faith, in his chapter Jesus: History or Myth?, he explains in four simple reasons why the resurrection and Jesus are not an actual event or a historical person. I often argue this as well for very similar reasons citing some of the same sources:
There is no external historical confirmation of the New Testament stories. [i.e. non-Greco-Christian sources]
The New Testament stories are internally contradictory.
There are natural explanations for the origin of the Jesus legend.
The miracle reports make the story unhistorical.
Myself, like Barker, always ask Christian faith-followers and apologists, Where is the contemporary pagan, unbiased non-Christian testimonies of Jesus’ life and resurrection? They are silent on this because there is none. As I thoroughly cover on my page entitled Why Christianity Will Always Fail, there is no independent historical sources for Yeshua’s/Jesus’ life or resurrection:
There are at least 41 known Pagan and Jewish authors/historians during Jesus’ lifetime or within less-than 100 years of his life that aside from two forged passages in the works of a Jewish author (Josephus), and two disputed passages in the works of Roman writers (Pliny the Younger & Suetonius), there is no mention of a Jesus Christ. Nor within a century of Jesus’ life do any of these authors/historians make any mention of the later disciples or apostles. They are:
Dan Barker also makes this overwhelming fact. Barker points out this:
…the Roman historian Philo-Judaeus, who lived before, during, and after the time of Jesus, does not even mention Jesus, much less his resurrection. With respect to Book 18, Chapter 3 of Josephus’ Antiquities of the Jews, he argues that it is a Christian interpolation, and he gives six reasons why (Ibid., p. 362). Likewise, he argues that the passage in Book 20, Chapter 9 is also unreliable (Ibid., p. 363-64). Moreover, he claims that alleged references to Jesus in the books of Suetonius, Pliny the Younger, Tacitus, the letter of Mara Bar-Serapion, Lucian, Tertullian, Phlegon, and Justin Martyr are equally unconvincing.
For some event like a human being coming back from days of being dead would certainly interest non-believers, Gentile Romans and anyone inside the Roman-ruled Syro-Palestine and beyond to write about the Jewish sectarian Jesus’/Yeshua’s extraordinary defiance of death. But that never happened. There are no extant records testifying to this miraculous resurrection event. Christians then in the 1st century CE and Christians in the 21st century have no answer. They fabricated them. All one needs to ask these blinded faith-followers,TM “What exactly, in comprehensive detail, happened over Easter and the day their most crucial theological doctrine was born?” Aside from the many problematic contradictions in Paul’s letters, the four Gospels, and the Book of Acts, once again, they cannot produce any independent pagan evidence to corroborate, even a whole century after purported claims by 1st and 2nd generation Greek Church Fathers. Nothing. Zip. We have a kangaroo court once again.
…prudent history demands that until all explanations for the origin of an outrageous tale are completely ruled out, it is irresponsible to hold to the literal, historical truth of what appears to be just another myth
Dr. Michael Martin formerly of Boston University and alum of Arizona State University (B.S.), University of Arizona (M.A.), and Harvard University (PhD), another acclaimed atheist notes these five serious problems for Christianity’s claim of a historical factual resurrection:
the extent to which the author’s purpose may have influenced his reliability
the consistency or inconsistency of the NT accounts
whether the accounts are based on eyewitness testimony
the known reliability (or unreliability) of the eyewitnesses
the extent to which the event is confirmed by independent testimony
Martin’s five above points blow the Greco-Roman Christian tales of resurrection into mere fanciful myth, not reliable eyewitness testimonies.
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In the next part of Paul, Acts, Forgeries & Marcion I will briefly go into the reliability of and facts hidden in sources about Paul’s/Saul’s letters, then Paul’s third letter to the Corinthians and the forgeries of it in Paul’s name. Some if not much of what I cover with Paul/Saul is previously covered in my 5-part series mentioned earlier, Saul the Apostate if you care to review it as well. Hope all of you can read and join in. Ark/Doug, I hope this series benefits your debate with the Christian pastor. 🙂
Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always
There is another streaming series I have become a fan of along with Season 2 of Halo on Paramount+. It is Alexander: The Making of a God. I am a fan of time-period pieces, especially about Antiquity through the post-Classical Age and fall of the Roman Empire.
Released on January 31st, 2024, the docudrama series explores a segment of Alexander the Great’s sudden rise to Macedonian power at the ripe age of 20-years old after the assassination of his father Philip II in 336 BCE, followed by his military victories and conquests of the Persian Empire ruled by Darius III. This was all the Netflix directors and producers wanted to cover. Doing more, like his childhood or going into his Western India campaign and his mysterious death back in Babylon, would’ve simply been far too cost prohibitive. Yet, critics blast the series for not covering every single hour of Alexander’s life. Pffft. 🙄🤦♂️ And many—surely of the ultra-Conservative persuasion—slam the docudrama series for hinting, or showing that Alexander the Great was not strictly heterosexual. Ridiculous non-sense in my opinion and irrelevant to the important historical context and facts.
Alexander with his closest friend Hephaestion – Netflix
These strictly gender-binary critics, however, demonstrate very, very little knowledge of ancient Greek-Macedonian socio-culture. Ancient Greek-Macedonian society never had any written or verbal differentiation between heterosexual and homosexual persons. What they did have was six (6) different definitions of love. Notice their Athenian context versus our modern Puritan American, binary and restrictive definitions or ‘social boundaries’ today.
Eros — The first kind of love was eros, named after the Greek god of fertility, and represented the idea of sexual passion and desire. But the Greeks didn’t always think of it as something positive, as we tend to today. In fact, eros was viewed as a dangerous, fiery and irrational form of love that could take hold of you and possess you — an attitude shared by many later spiritual thinkers, such as the Christian writer C.S. Lewis. Eros involved a loss of control that frightened the Greeks. Which is odd, because losing control is precisely what many people now seek in a relationship. Don’t we all hope to fall “madly” in love?
Philia — The second variety of love was philia or friendship, which the Greeks valued far more than the base sexuality of eros. Philia concerned the deep comradely friendship that developed between brothers in arms who had fought side by side on the battlefield. It was about showing loyalty to your friends, sacrificing for them, as well as sharing your emotions with them. (Another kind of philia, sometimes called storge, embodied the love between parents and their children.) We can all ask ourselves how much of this comradely philia love we have in our lives. It’s an important question in an age when we attempt to amass “friends” on Facebook or ‘followers’ on Twitter (now X) — achievements that would have hardly impressed the Greeks.
Ludus — This was the Greek’s idea of playful love, which referred to the playful affection between children or young lovers. We’ve all had a taste of it in the flirting and teasing in the early stages of a relationship. But we also live out our ludus when we sit around in a bar bantering and laughing with friends, or when we go out dancing. Dancing with strangers may be the ultimate ludic activity, almost a playful substitute for sex itself. Social norms frown on this kind of adult playful frivolity, but a little more ludus might be just what we need to spice up our love lives.
Agape — The fourth love, and perhaps the most radical, was agape or selfless love. This was a love that you extended to all people, whether family members or distant strangers. Agape was later translated into Latin as caritas, which is the origin of our word charity. Lewis referred to it as “gift love,” the highest form of Christian love. But it also appears in other religious traditions, such as the idea of mettā or “universal loving kindness” in Theravāda Buddhism. There is growing evidence that agape is in a dangerous decline in many countries. Empathy levels in the U.S. have dropped nearly 50 percent over the past 40 years, with the steepest fall occurring in the past decade. We urgently need to revive our capacity to care about strangers.
Praga — Another Greek love was pragma or mature love. This was the deep understanding that developed between long-married couples. It was about making compromises to help the relationship work over time, and showing patience and tolerance. The psychoanalyst Erich Fromm said that we expend too much energy on “falling in love” and need to learn more how to “stand in love.” Pragma is precisely about standing in love — making an effort to give love rather than just receive it. With divorce rates currently running at 50+ percent, the Greeks would surely think we should bring a serious dose of pragma into our relationships today.
Philautia — The final variety of love was philautia or self-love. The clever Greeks realized there were two types. One was an unhealthy variety associated with narcissism, where you became self-obsessed, and focused on gaining personal fame and fortune. A healthier version of philautia enhanced your wider capacity to love. The idea was that if you like yourself and feel secure in yourself, you will have plenty of love to give others (today this is reflected in the Buddhist-inspired concept of “self-compassion”). Or as Aristotle put it, “All friendly feelings for others are an extension of man’s feelings for himself.”
These fluid socio-sexual norms in ancient Greece-Macedonia are very well recorded and reflect just how open-minded Alexander’s compatriots were. It is wholly unfair for modern Puritan America, that often is oppressively rigid, gender-binary only, and impose their own personal antichronistic beliefs upon ancient Greece and Macedonia, especially upon an iconic figure as Alexander the Great. That position is completely unfounded and severely lacks any supporting evidence.
Nevertheless, the legends of Alexander the Great are held very dear and close to the heart of traditional, conservative, gender-binary populous. They are easily offended by any suggestion that Alexander was not strictly heterosexual.
Alexander the Great is often glorified in “manosphere” circles as a hyper-masculine figure to aspire to, the semi-legendary conqueror famous for his ambition and military accomplishments. […]
Alexander’s sexuality has been the subject of debate among historians, but it is largely accepted that the great conqueror wasn’t strictly heterosexual.
Is this unnecessary, ridiculous homophobia and paranoia? I think so. What does it matter today, that 3rd-century BCE culture and social norms some how effects our sexuality today?
Ironically, many “anti-woke” influencers have a shallow understanding of history, and tend to fetishize time periods they don’t fully understand — they often refuse to acknowledge clashing cultural norms and assume that anything outside of heterosexual monogamy is some kind of modern deviation.
So… what say you? Do you think it makes any difference whatsoever that Alexander the Great might have been or probably was at least bisexual, like many great men of the Greek-Macedonian empire? If so, why? Explain in detail how his intimate personal life would change anything about his military and phenomenal cultural advancements for the entire world.
Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always
Earlier this week I took one of our Toyota vehicles to be inspected for an eventual auto registration renewal. While there at the auto shop I had a rumor heard days earlier which turned out to be confirmed as fact.
On June 13, 2023 the Texas Legislature has given final approval to House Bill 3297.
Supporters of the bill [Republicans] called the safety inspections time consuming and inconvenient. Opponents of the bill [Democrats and Independents] say it could set Texas drivers, and future Texans, on a dangerous path. […]
Texas highways are notoriously dangerous. At least one person dies on a Texas highway each day. According to the most recent state data, 4,489 people were killed in auto crashes in Texas during 2021, or about 1.56 deaths per 100,000 miles traveled by drivers. That’s up from 1.36 deaths per 100,000 in 2017.
Starting in 2025 Texas will not require (by law) any of its 23+ million vehicles to be annually inspected as “safe and environmentally friendly” except in just 17 Texas counties. Yes, you read that correctly. I kid you not! If I want to drive a vehicle that spews out a shitload of black smoke carbon monoxide, in 2025 Texas, I will be allowed to do that unimpeded and with no serious consequences unless pulled over by law-enforcement and given a small citation, a slap on the hand.
Downtown Kerrville, TX at Sidney Baker St. (Hwy 16) and Main St. (Hwy 27) looking SW
Yes, over the last 20+ years it has become glaringly obvious that this 21st-century Lone Star State, Texas government, very sadly, very shamefully craves to be in national and global news limelight and headlines weekly. If it is negative, especially ugly, and the news tarnishes the state’s already suffering and declining reputation, they bask in the attention. Texas’ craving for worse keeps increasing as the state turns more and more radical MAGA with more out-of-state MAGA radicals moving here every month. And I haven’t mentioned yet what two elderly white Kerrville men openly discussed with the entire lobby waiting area and the part-owner of the shop, boldly and out loud to everyone there.
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Fair warning. This is going to be a lengthy rant, fed-up, irritated blog-post about rural Texans. If you’d rather not read about my high-level of frustration, then I politely suggest skipping this read and move on. No harm taken. 🙂 The reality, however, is that this gripe must be made known if for no other reason than to recalibrate the mass mental delusions of specific ruralTexans that audaciously boast abusively of this state’s “many perfections.” The attitude is certainly laughable, but also quite disturbing that they believe it, wholeheartedly.
The 2022 — 2024 Texas Congress
Once the white lady, who’s part-owner of the auto shop, explained the change in vehicle inspections for January 2025, one of the aforementioned white cowboys said aloud, “That shows you how stupid those legislatures are in Austin.” It was a peculiar thing to say and surprised me a little. I kept listening in order to better ascertain what he meant. Why? Because most all of the current Texas Congress, both the Senate and the House, are totally dominated by Republicans (see above diagram)! Over the last 15-20 years about 85% to 99% of Conservative Republican laws get easily passed. Was he calling our Republican dominated legislatures stupid?
The other white cowboy chimed in as he was the more vocal of everyone talking and almost agonizingly long-winded. Then before I knew it, they were quickly onto open-carry, pro-guns, and pro-Second Amendment. They moved so quick to this subject/debate I totally missed the segue from vehicle inspections to “the right to bear arms!” White Cowboy #2 sitting near me proclaimed that “every gun-owner should be combat trained.” What? I thought to myself with a bewildered expression, you mean like trained in military combat? Special Forces Black Ops? What the hell!? I wanted to speak up and say to him, Sir, isn’t that a closer step to a Police State? But I refrained, i.e. choose your battles on your terms.
A little disturbed that the open lobby discussion took a bad turn, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut. I said sternly to white Cowboy #2, “that is exactly what our school teachers are now required to be.” He responded with a simple, sort of dismissive yes. He turned his attention back to white Cowboy #1 and the part-owner lady behind the counter who was sharing a frightening story she had recently in Austin with her daughter inside the vehicle with her. It was a case of road rage by a man up on her door window and windshield cussing her up, down, left, and right while giving her the middle finger. She put her purse—with a pistol inside—on her dashboard. The man slacked off his tantrum she said, but the red-light in which they were stopped was turning green.
Yes my readers/Followers, this is a common occurrence in rural Kerrville, Texas, or Austin. I am not embellishing in the least.
Finally, our Toyota Avalon’s state inspection was finished, but not before the white part-owner lady and white Cowboy #2 spouted off that “they,“ meaning our federal government and anti-violence, pro-gun-reforms, liberal Americans, “will never take our guns in Texas.” Because I was leaving, I painfully held my tongue. I wanted to say while walking out, That’s an all too common misnomer people. All of you can have as many 18th-century flint-lock muskets and pistols as your gun-worshipping hearts desire! But I was polite and wished the two white ladies behind the counter a good day and departed.
2600 block of Junction Hwy (27), just about 0.5 mile from our home. In this portion of the highway there are a minimum of 12 access & egress points inside just 240 ft of highway along with a middle suicide lane.
These sorts of road hazards and mentally unstable, poor white drivers in rages have become a frequent event and dangerous problem here. Just for me, since moving back to Kerrville in August 2021 for my Mom’s severe Dementia/Early-Alzheimer’s, driving around Kerrville’s four main highways—Hwy 27, Hwy 16, CR 783, and Spur 98; see slideshow below—I have been in almost five (5) auto accidents! Of those five, two of them came within 1-2 feet of each other’s cars/trucks, both cases were at red-light intersections where I had a green-light right-of-way in the left lane, and they only had a flashing yellow arrow to turn left in front of me.
Other near accidents were once again, my green-light right-of-ways, in the right lane this instance, and a big monster-wheeled dually diesel truck with cow-bars and flatbed trailer hitched to the rear… was to my right at the intersection. As I was moving into the intersection, speed limit is 45mph, I was doing about 43-44, this white redneck pulls into my lane in front of me going perhaps 10-12mph… because he had paused in his right-turn lane with a “Yield” sign in front of him (slide #3 below), he impatiently chose to pull out in front of me anyway. I had to slam on my brakes, again. I sat on my horn for a good 10-15 seconds. Are there THAT many blind or nearly blind drivers everywhere? How do they obtain driver’s licenses, much less afford auto insurance? Following are some of my other near accidents in this very dangerous, white redneck town.
Main St & Francisco Lemos, Kerrville
Junction Hwy (27) & Spur 98, Kerrville
Junction Hwy (27) & Spur 98, Kerrville
Junction Hwy (27) & Harper Rd (783), Kerrville
Holdsworth & Paschal, Kerrville
We use the State Farm Drive Safe & Save app in order to save as much money as possible each month in these hard inflationary times. We’ve been on it now for over a year. Of the five different driving categories State Farm tracks via Bluetooth beacon and satellite, two of the categories—Hard Braking and Quick Accelerating—I get flagged or punished for my sudden reactive defensive driving so I won’t slam into these many idiotic bad drivers. Every time I slam on my brakes, we must pay more on our monthly premium. It is beyond infuriating that I am having to pay more for so many crazy bad drivers here! 😡 However, based on a 6-month to 6-month average of scores, we do still pay a lot less than we did without the app.
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I decided to do a little research on this motor vehicle nightmare in Texas and rural Texas counties. I found some depressing statistics, e.g. image left. Texas also led the nation in 2020, 2021, and 2022. We lost the number one spot to Mississippi in 2023, but fell only one slot: #2.
What are the primary causes of fatal deaths or maiming of drivers and passengers on Texas roads and highways? According to multiple Texas law firms specializing in vehicular damages, the top four causes of fatalities are 1) running off the road crashes, 2) stop-light intersections, 3) distracted driving (cell phones), and 4) DUI crashes, or Driving Under the Influence of drugs or alcohol.
It is also worthy to note that #5 is motorcycle accidents where 45% of all “chopper riders” are not wearing helmets. This is also a very frequent occurrence on Kerrville roads and highways. The rebel biker-chopper culture is huge here! There seem to be biker rallies here every other month, but mostly from May to September. The noise that 15, 20, or 30 bikers together make on our highways sounds like a freight-train on your porch. Your windows are literally vibrating. And NO! I am not exaggerating. Here are more statistical facts from vehicular damage law-firms of how deadly Texas roads and highways truly are:
Kerrville man killed on Hwy 16 just outside of Kerrville from speeding motorist head-on collision
Therefore, what’s the moral of this ranting story? What’s the takeaway? It is exactly this:
Absolutely do NOT believe what most white Texans brag or arrogantly boast how great or incredible Texas-living is about. They are lying or not telling the entire picture or truth. Remember, I am an 8th-generation Texan. My ancestors have lived here a long, long time, and I have lived most of my life here and watched how downhill and deteriorating this state has gone. It is not pretty. There’s not much hope it will reverse, or change anytime soon.
Every other time or third-time you drive on Texas roads or highways, you are literally risking your life or bodily harm and vehicular damages. In my last 20-years here I have noticed how horribly dangerous our streets and roads have become. It is a STARK difference from 1994.
And this is only about two aspects of living in rural white redneck Texas where too many radical MAGA Republicans reside and freely, rudely express their rage and anger with either vehicles and/or guns/weapons at anyone and everyone.
If someone you know is considering moving their family to Texas, rural Texas in particular, share this post and information with them quickly along with my many other blog-posts about the reality of rural Texas living. As a matter of fact, share not only these motor vehicle dangers, but also these seven (7) reasons NOT to live in Kerrville, TX or most all rural towns in Texas spoken from a residing Texan. They’re all the same problems statewide:
Lack of urban amenities – little to do except eat or eat or eat, and drink alcohol. Boring.
Very limited diverse Job Opportunities – mostly ranching, construction, or retail.
Very limited diverse Education & Institutions – only one high school and one tiny private Christian college.
Extreme Climate swings & Allergies: Cedar in winter, pollen in spring, and ongoing developmental pollution! Also, drinking water contamination due to these conditions.
Lack of diverse Scenery – essentially just one type: predictable Hill Country.
Decaying Community and Family Values – simply drive on Main St/Junction Hwy for 12-36 months and you will risk vehicular and/or bodily harm 1-out-of-2 times on the roads/highways. Some of the RUDEST or UNSAFE drivers anywhere else in a Texas small town!
High Cost Housing & Real Estate Market – and it’s still rising. This negatively expands the economic inequality gap in Fair Housing. And Property Taxes are high as well!
Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always – Avoid Texas!
I have zero expectation that anything I ever say will end someone’s belief in their God. Not my goal or purpose. That alone belongs to the individual. ~ Zoe
Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels, it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it
The Professor's Convatorium 