I agree with this (if "Mark" were the first gospel).For example, Matthew has to invent a new apologetic for the empty tomb because no one had ever heard of such a thing before Mark invented it; otherwise, Mark would have had to have done what Matthew did, as the empty tomb story would have been spread across three continents for four decades by then. But only after Mark publishes the notion do we hear an obvious rebuttal arising to it (“they just stole the body!”) that Matthew then has to answer.
I tend to agree with this.The same goes for the Baptism story and Nativity
It's clear, to me at least, that sayings attributed to Jesus sometimes come from scripture.Collections of sayings perhaps; but whenever a source of them is mentioned, we find they come from scripture or visions.
Did you not notice that Carrier claims that the sayings of Jesus sometimes come from "visions" (seemingly key for Carrier to claim in order to defend his theory) and that Carrier implicitly acknowledges that sometimes no "source" gets mentioned? Even if Carrier is correct about the way that he describes the texts, his conclusion that the sayings always come from visions or scripture (or invention) has a weak basis at best here.
And why would you trust Carrier to be correct here? It's the core of his theory that he's talking about, a theory that very few others accept. It doesn't show a critical spirit to take his claims at face value.
No I am not interested in personally proving Carrier wrong (or something) on the forum today. But I would encourage you to use critical thinking with your sources and to seek out different points of view from different research.
Statistics: Posted by Peter Kirby — Fri Jan 31, 2025 1:58 pm