Analytic Philosophy Divide

John MacDonald | October 19, 2024

As someone who focuses on the history of Philosophy in the Continental tradition, perhaps the main style of reasoning you see is phenomenology/phenomenalizing.

Hegel gives the example that a torn sock phenomenalizes the previously hidden invisible category of Unity belonging to the sock, precisely “as” a lost unity. This little word “as” is the key to phenomenology, which Aristotle thought of with the logos apophantikos, something “as” something else, e.g., The Dog “taken as” brown. And so, if I hear a living thing in the forest near my legs only to look down and see it was dead leaves rustling in the wind, this “mis-taking” phenomenalizes our basic stance toward the world is “taking-as,” taking something “as” something. Phenomenology in Continental philosophy is dis-closing / un-hiding the hidden. See for example HERE.

The important part of analytic philosophy I’ve been looking at recently is probability reasoning, and so for example in history William Lane Craig tries to establish the historicity of the resurrection through math, and Richard Carrier argues the probability that Jesus existed is at best 1/3, and probably much lower. Historical judgments involve probability, the likelihood that such and such happened.

We looked at a few facets of probability reasoning, such as when observations “only seem” to disqualify hypotheses. One example used is that 2 consecutive lottery wins doesn’t invalidate the hypothesis that the draw was fair. It may just be something really unlikely happened. Regarding probability, Nietzsche noted applied math shows the probability of rolling 3 with a dice throw is 1/6, though this tells us nothing about the result of the next toss because there is only a mental connection between a series of dice throws. There is no causal connection in reality between this coin toss and the previous series, and so we have no idea what the result of the next toss will be even if we know what the previous throws were. This is a problem with reasoning with fractions generally, and so in the 1760s, Johann Heinrich Lambert was the first to prove that the number π is irrational, meaning it cannot be expressed as a fraction. Likewise, Parmenides/Zeno showed long ago measuring movement in fractions is impossible, and so to travel from A to C, you must first cross half that distance to B. But, in order to get to that halfway B, you must first get halfway to B, and so on to infinity. Parmenides thus denied the possibility of motion because for him if thought didn’t apply to reality the error was with reality, not with thought (“Thinking and Being are the same”).

Historical Jesus studies shows itself to be a combination of phenomenological reasoning (in the Continental sense) and probability reasoning. We want to dis-cover (1) the likelihood that Jesus existed, just as to open our eyes to (2) the way the first Christians understood the world.

(1) DID JESUS EXIST?

One popular idea is Jesus started out as a vague dying/rising savior myth who was later placed in historical fictions/gospels (Euhemerized). But the key point is that the dying/rising salvation theme of the Jesus tale is a later development, and so is not at our earliest level of the Jesus salvation message. Against Christ-mythicism, Prof Bart Ehrman notes for Paul righteousness came through the cross/resurrection, that if it came through the law Chris died for nothing (Gal 2:21). Mark wrote a Paul-inspired propaganda document/gospel (euaggelion, as per the Augustus use of the term) selling Jesus’ cross and resurrection as the way to salvation like Paul argued, and yet contrarily Mark said salvation also came through repentance and the Kingdom (Mark 1:14-15), and following the law and giving everything to the poor (Mark 10:17-22). Mark unwittingly or deliberately (which would be my guess) incorporated material about the historical Jesus that contradicted his Pauline cross/resurrection bias.

Paul notes there were many different factions teaching variations on Jesus, “12 What I mean is that each of you says, “I belong to Paul,” or “I belong to Apollos,” or “I belong to Cephas,” or “I belong to Christ.” 13 Has Christ been divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? (1 Cor 1:12-13). Paul’s authority seemed to be receiving pushback because he never met Jesus but only knew him through visions: “9 Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord? 2 If I am not an apostle to others, at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord (1 Cor 9:1-2). Paul was not an apostle because he had a vision of Jesus, as is sometimes claimed, since he also says the 500 saw the risen Christ (1 Cor 15:6) without being apostles. Rather he was an apostle because of the brides (churches) he established for Christ.

As I said, there were many factions teaching varieties of Christ, most of which taught the saving death and resurrection of Jesus such as Peter/Cephas, James and John (per the Corinthian Creed/poetry Paul quoted), and also Paul who taught the cross/resurrection but innovated that gentiles didn’t need to become Jews to follow Christ. Without this innovation by Paul Christianity never would have taken over the world.

Now, there also seem to be some factions of Christ followers who Paul hated for their message of Jesus and their arrogance, who he says taught another gospel and another Jesus from Paul and Peter, which appears to be the message I noted above preserved in Mark of salvation through God’s kingdom/repentance/law/care for the poor that the historical Jesus taught while he was alive, not the later message of Peter, James, John and Paul of being saved by Jesus himself through his death/resurrection.

Paul sarcastically called these the Super Apostles / False Apostles:

“11 I wish you would put up with me in a little foolishness. Yes, do put up with me! ²I feel a divine jealousy for you, for I promised you in marriage to one husband, to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. ³But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by its cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. ⁴For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough. ⁵I think that I am not in the least inferior to these super-apostles.^..13 For such boasters are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. 14 And no wonder! Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. (2 Cor 11: 1-5; 13-15).”

For Paul there was the utmost urgency because the end was not only coming soon but underway (1 Cor 15:23), so he resolved to know nothing about the historical Jesus among his churches but Christ and him crucified (1 Cor 2:2). But he also noted, a point that commentators often miss, that “17 If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile, and you are still in your sins (1 Cor 15:17).” Paul basically nullifies everything he says about the cross with this sentence, and so Mark, heavily influenced by Paul, would later restore weight to the cross with Jesus’s death converting the soldier at the cross despite the irony that the resurrection hadn’t happened yet and in fact Mark deliberately has no resurrection appearances.

Phil Long notes:

“Paul describes a meeting in Jerusalem with the Pillars of the Church in Galatians 2:4-5. The language Paul uses is military and political. These false brothers are “undercover agents and conspirators” (Witherington, Galatians, 136). It seems most likely that the false brothers are similar to the “men from James” mentioned in Galatians, or the priests and Pharisees mentioned in Acts 15:1. They are Jewish believers who understand the church as a reform movement within Judaism. Whoever these people were, they found a way to sit in on the meeting between Paul and the Apostles with the intention of causing trouble for Paul. That they intend to “bring us into slavery” indicates that they will insist that Gentiles be circumcised if they are to be full members of the messianic community. (Phil Long)

It appears the meeting was to be a private meeting between Paul, Barnabas and Titus and the three leaders of the Jerusalem church, Peter, James the Lord’s brother, and John. But there is another party at the meeting described by Paul as “false brothers.” Could these be the super apostles or highly orthodox apostles who followed Jesus’s teaching from when he was alive but didn’t ascribe to the salvific cross and resurrection? They were important enough to be at this high-level meeting. If Paul respected Cephas and James and John, but hated the super apostles, they must have been more than just Judaizers as Peter, James, and John were. Interestingly, sources such as Q and the Didache don’t mention Jesus’ crucifixion, or the resurrection.

(2) EYES WIDE OPEN

Masaccio’s fresco (1424-28), in the Brancacci Chapel, Florence, emphasizes the nakedness and shame of the original sinners. Photo: Bridgeman Images (wiki)

4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die, 5 for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was a delight to the eyes and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves. (Genesis 3:4-7, NRSVUE)

Paul’s Conversion on the Way to Damascus, a 1601 portrait by Caravaggio (wiki)

¹⁷So Ananias went and entered the house. He laid his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” ¹⁸And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and his sight was restored. (Acts 9:17-18 NRSVUE)

“I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you to serve and testify to the things in which you have seen…. I will rescue you from your people and from the Gentiles—to whom I am sending you to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God” (Acts 26:15-18, NRSV)

“The Lord God, have called you in righteousness, and I will hold of your hand and strengthen you: and I have given you as the covenant to a race, as a light to the nations/gentiles: to open the eyes of the blind, to bring out from bonds those who are bound and them that sit in darkness, and from the prison house those that sit in darkness” (LXX Isaiah 42:6-7, NET)

For the next post in this 4-part series, Click HERE

For the Afterword in this series CLICK HERE

(Appendix) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper

(1/2) Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed?

Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed: The Trump Lens (2/2)?

The Next Quest For The Historical Jesus

MY ESSAYS