Gospel Authors Intelligent?

Tim Robbins

Apologies for putting this in the Atheist forum, but I would afraid it would offend the Christians. I was just wondering has anyone ever come across evidence that any of the Gospel authors (or any of the Biblical authors for that matter) were actually intelligent?

For example, plenty of evidence Russell is intelligent. Even if you don't agree with his atheist viewpoints, he was a superb mathematician.

Is there any evidence of the Gospel others even knowing Pythagoras' theorem?

Fanny Cradock

Yes, because knowledge of Pythagoras' theorem is a sure fire sign of intelligence.

Tell me, what type of intelligence are you referring to? Is it merely intellect or are you including other proposed forms of intelligence - linguistic, physical, logical/mathematical, musical, spacial interpersonal or intrapersonal?

brianthebard

If they could write then that would probably mark them out as intelligent for the time?

Fanny Cradock

Are you proposing that humans living 2000 years ago can be considered less intelligent than humans toady?

brianthebard

Who me? No I'm suggesting they would've measured intelligence differently.

AtomicHorror

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Is there any evidence of the Gospel others even knowing Pythagoras' theorem?

Knowledge is not the same thing as intelligence.

lostexpectation

great fiction writers?

Dades

I see no purpose in this thread - the question is ridiculous.
The only reason I'm not closing it is because I'm mildly drunk.

2Scoops

Fanny Cradock wrote: »

Are you proposing that humans living 2000 years ago can be considered less intelligent than humans toady?

Certainly they had less knowledge and were not as well-educated as the average person of today. That's a big deal, even if they had the same innate intelligence.

I think you could also make a strong case that differences in lifestyle and nutrition would have negatively influenced their intelligence also.

Asiaprod

Dades wrote: »

I see no purpose in this thread - the question is ridiculous.
The only reason I'm not closing it is because I'm mildly drunk.

I'm just too lazy to bother tbh. I see no point in the question.

@TR I know you better, where do you intend for this question to go, because right now as it stands this one straddles a very thin line. I would just hate for you to be the cause of others getting infractions.

Affectionatly yours
The Karma Police:D

PDN

I am struggling to understand the mental processes of someone who assesses intelligence based on the criteria of knowing Pythagoras' theorem - particularly when discussing literary works that have absolutely nothing to do with mathematics. I mean, we don't come across any mention of Pythagoras' theorem in Shakespeare's sonnets or in Ulysses - do we? Why would any rational person expect to find a reference to Pythagoras' theorem in a work of religious literature?

I am also struggling to understand why such a person would consider themselves qualified to judge anyone else as intelligent or not.

Rev Hellfire

I suspect dades was not the only one under the influence of the demon drink when posting eh eh tim...


There you go kids, don't drink and type.

ChocolateSauce

I'm a little bit confused how someone who thinks "militant" atheists are immature can turn around post such a clearly inflammatory question like this.

Zombrex

Dades wrote: »

The only reason I'm not closing it is because I'm mildly drunk.

That's what yer ma said!! :pac::D;):P:eek:








... I'll get my coat

Húrin

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Apologies for putting this in the Atheist forum, but I would afraid it would offend the Christians. I was just wondering has anyone ever come across evidence that any of the Gospel authors (or any of the Biblical authors for that matter) were actually intelligent?

For example, plenty of evidence Russell is intelligent. Even if you don't agree with his atheist viewpoints, he was a superb mathematician.

Is there any evidence of the Gospel others even knowing Pythagoras' theorem?

I'm not offended by this so much as baffled. Why should they not have the benefit of the doubt as regards their intelligence?

I would credit them with their discernment and good use of sources to form coherent narratives of the ministry of Jesus.

ChocolateSauce

Húrin wrote: »

I'm not offended by this so much as baffled. Why should they not have the benefit of the doubt as regards their intelligence?

I would credit them with their discernment and good use of sources to form coherent narratives of the ministry of Jesus.

Coherent? I see....:rolleyes:

kiffer

Tim Robbins wrote: »

... I was just wondering has anyone ever come across evidence that any of the Gospel authors (or any of the Biblical authors for that matter) were actually intelligent?
...
Is there any evidence of the Gospel others even knowing Pythagoras' theorem?

This is a silly question... to which the answer is... no.
There is no evidence that the Gospel authors knew Pythagoras' theorem.
There is also no evidence that they were idiots either.

Matthew was some sort of tax collector so I imagine he was literate and numerate...
I'm sure the Gospel authors were of at least average intelligence.

Are you making the mistake of thinking that religious people are stupid?
Irrational maybe but assuming stupidity can be a dangerous mistake.

Tim Robbins

kiffer wrote: »

This is a silly question... to which the answer is...

I don't think it's that stupid a question. Poorly put - yes I accept that.
Apologies, I had other things on my mind. And in fairness it's not the easiest point / question to put.

Obviously logic would say, the arguer is irrelevant, it's the argument they put forward. We all know that.

But we're not exactly dealing with logic when it comes to the Bible.

At best we are dealing with historical narratives, written by men who may or may have not got their facts right.

Some people tend to confabulate more than others. I suspect, if the Gospels have not been dramatically changed and what we have now is close to the original versions, well then they were confabulating.

I don't think it's an unreasonable assumption that intelligent people don't tend to confabulate as much.

I also don't think it's an unreasonable assumption that people who are well read in logic or skepticism don't tend to make the as many mistakes with their thinking.

At the time of the Gospels, Aristotle had already layed down the basis of deductive logic which is still used today.

Surely people, who were aware of it, may have been slightly better at critical thinking?

So, I was interested in was what were the intellectual standards of the Gospel authors? Do we have any evidence that any of them had read the Greeks, Plato, Aristotle etc?

Dades

It sounds to me like what you are asking is whether they were educated.

But I still don't really think we can draw any conclusions on the people that wrote the first accounts 2000 years ago. Like any footballers autobiography I'd imagine the first draft and final edition are very different.

PDN

Tim Robbins wrote: »

I also don't think it's an unreasonable assumption that people who are well read in logic or skepticism don't tend to make the as many mistakes with their thinking.

Priceless.

Tim Robbins

PDN wrote: »

Priceless.

Typos yes. Thinking no :-)

robindch

Tim Robbins wrote: »

I was interested in was what were the intellectual standards of the Gospel authors? Do we have any evidence that any of them had read the Greeks, Plato, Aristotle etc?

That's a better question

Firstly, nobody's really all that sure who wrote the gospels, so it's rather difficult to figure out at the distance of 2,000 years who knew what. It is clear from the texts that we have (the current gospels) that at least John was familiar with Platonic philosophy and possibly with the work of Philo of Alexandria who had tried quite hard to merge contemporary jewish theology with greek philosophical ideas.

Quite a few ideas from Plato appear in the gospels for the first time as religious truth -- notions such as the existence of the soul, the idea of perfection in a parallel universe derived from Plato's Theory of Forms, the idea that your place in the afterlife is dictated by your performance in this one (thought that's not an original idea of Plato), the notion of Logos as it applied to god, as well as the framework notion than one can believe one's way to truth, rather than examine it, discuss it and change it in response to what one learns. The synoptic gospels are far lesser works than John's gospel is and the influence of greek thought is less evident in them.

And to add to what Dades said, not only do we not know what edits were made after the texts were first written, we also don't know who wrote them in the first plae, nor what influences they were subject to, so attempting to figure out anything about the personality of the authors is a fruitless exercise.

Pompey Magnus

Tim Robbins wrote: »

At best we are dealing with historical narratives, written by men who may or may have not got their facts right.

Some people tend to confabulate more than others. I suspect, if the Gospels have not been dramatically changed and what we have now is close to the original versions, well then they were confabulating.

I don't think it's an unreasonable assumption that intelligent people don't tend to confabulate as much.

I also don't think it's an unreasonable assumption that people who are well read in logic or skepticism don't tend to make the as many mistakes with their thinking.

At the time of the Gospels, Aristotle had already layed down the basis of deductive logic which is still used today.

Surely people, who were aware of it, may have been slightly better at critical thinking?

I would reckon the authors of the Gospels would have been well educated, the fact that they could write in the first place puts them in the 10-15% minority of the Roman world who were literate. The Gospel authors were to varying degrees aware of the Hebrew Bible, they make the odd mistake here and there but more or less they got things right.

The fact that they believed the stories of Jesus' resurrection shouldn't mean we dismiss their intelligence, after all there were very few people back then who didn't hold similar beliefs. Off the top of my head a similar example could be the Roman historian Seutonius who I think recorded that the soul of Caesar Augustus ascended visibly into the Heavens during his funeral, does this mean we should dismiss the respected Seutonius for his lack of critical thinking?

There is no reason to suspect that the Gospel authors themselves put much padding on the story of Jesus, it could well be the case that they recorded the stories close to how they themselves got it.

So, I was interested in was what were the intellectual standards of the Gospel authors? Do we have any evidence that any of them had read the Greeks, Plato, Aristotle etc?

I would say the author of the Gospel of John must have been well aware of at least some aspects of Greek philosophy, he identifies Jesus as the Logos, this being a feature of Greek philosophical thinking since Heraclitus of Ephesus which gradually developed from being abstract principal to become a more mystical personified entity, the latter being a concept which Philo the Jew helped develop in the early 1st Century and latter adopted by the author of John who was traditionally located also in Ephesus.

I would have to conclude that the authors of the Gospels were indeed quite intelligent. They were well educated and produced accounts which are still widely read 2,000 years later, that is pretty impressive no matter whether you believe the accounts or not.

Tim Robbins

robindch wrote: »

And to add to what Dades said, not only do we not know what edits were made after the texts were first written, we also don't know who wrote them in the first plae, nor what influences they were subject to, so attempting to figure out anything about the personality of the authors is a fruitless exercise.

My understand was that we can reasonably guess on who wrote them.

Pompey Magnus

Tim Robbins wrote: »

My understand was that we can reasonably guess on who wrote them.

We haven't a clue who wrote them, the accounts are anonymous and make no claim as to being in any way involved in any of the stories they record. It could have been anyone.

ChocolateSauce

Apart from the difference between education and intelligence, I'd add that intelligence isn't soley what you were born with, it's also what you do with it.

robindch

Charco wrote: »

I would have to conclude that the authors of the Gospels were indeed quite intelligent. They were well educated and produced accounts which are still widely read 2,000 years later, that is pretty impressive no matter whether you believe the accounts or not.

Impressive indeed, but perhaps less so when one considers that there were other, similar, accounts of miraculous events around at the same time (and before, and subsequently) that never made it as far as a world religion. I suspect that its survival is at least as much an accident of historical circumstance as than any specific wisdom on the part of the authors.

Or indeed, that Jesus thought that he was founding a world religion anyway -- I don't think that there's a whole lot evidence that he did, since much of the justification for the distinction between judaism and early christianity was Paul's work and Paul never met Jesus.

But going back to your first point, while the authors might have been well-educated by Roman standards and even more so -- presumably -- by Palestinian (or whatever) standards, the gospels themselves, with the debatable exception of John, are not impressive works of literature. Plodding, humorless, diaphanous accounts of one-dimensional characters and events of which the authors seemed to understand little, and were clearly at a loss as to how to communicate. The Romans, to say nothing of the Greeks, really did produce better stuff than that.

Weidii

Considering how many minds they managed to convince to believe in rather silly things, I'm sure they were intelligent men indeed.

CDfm

Thats like saying was Genghis Khan inteligient or Alexander the Great or did they do math.

Did Julius Caesar write everything atributed to him? Or did he have a PR scribe ?

Personally Im with the feminists on Pythagarus- he was down in the local brothel winebar with the lads. His wife or daughter wrote the thoerem as women are more logical then men and better at maths.He just took the credit.

As far as I know - it is not described in either the Synoptic Gospels or John that Jesus gave maths grinds.

The Gospels -not being about the Apostles but Jesus is silent on this. The closest you get on division is the loaves and fishes. Even that can be interpreted that people when the shared what they had had more than enough.

So the real question probably should be -could the grasp the philosophical concepts of what they taught as Christian leaders and did they do so successfully. They were successful judging by the numbers of Christians.

The Mad Hatter

CDfm wrote: »

Thats like saying was Genghis Khan inteligient or Alexander the Great or did they do math.

Inteligient?

Did Julius Caesar write everything atributed to him? Or did he have a PR scribe ?

Much of it was written by Shakespeare, actually.

Personally Im with the feminists on Pythagarus- he was down in the local brothel winebar with the lads. His wife or daughter wrote the thoerem as women are more logical then men and better at maths.He just took the credit.

Fair enough, but...evidence?

CDfm

robindch wrote: »

But going back to your first point, while the authors might have been well-educated by Roman standards and even more so -- presumably -- by Palestinian (or whatever) standards, the gospels themselves, with the debatable exception of John, are not impressive works of literature. Plodding, humorless, diaphanous accounts of one-dimensional characters and events of which the authors seemed to understand little, and were clearly at a loss as to how to communicate. The Romans, to say nothing of the Greeks, really did produce better stuff than that.

the romans had scribes to do it for them - by comparison the gospels were more like a blog

Nice choice John -I would go with Matthew.

I think the hypothesis about the Q document is over analytical.

If Jesus had wanted everything written down by scribes it would have read

..... and he turned to his scribe Robinch and said use the goatskin parchment and tortoiseshell nib. Robinch did and sealed and buried his earhenware jars for posterity .....

CDfm

The Mad Hatter wrote: »

Much of it was written by Shakespeare, actually.

Commentarii de Bello Galico and Commentarii de Bello Civili have authorship attributed to one Gaius Julius Caesar .

The Mad Hatter

CDfm wrote: »

Commentarii de Bello Galico and Commentarii de Bello Civili have authorship attributed to one Gaius Julius Caesar .

Spokey-doke. I've never really looked into Ancient Rome in any detail (beyond the TV series Rome, I mean), so all the famous lines I know are Shakespeare.

Tim Robbins

robindch wrote: »

Impressive indeed, but perhaps less so when one considers that there were other, similar, accounts of miraculous events around at the same time (and before, and subsequently) that never made it as far as a world religion. I suspect that its survival is at least as much an accident of historical circumstance as than any specific wisdom on the part of the authors.

Or indeed, that Jesus thought that he was founding a world religion anyway -- I don't think that there's a whole lot evidence that he did, since much of the justification for the distinction between judaism and early christianity was Paul's work and Paul never met Jesus.

But going back to your first point, while the authors might have been well-educated by Roman standards and even more so -- presumably -- by Palestinian (or whatever) standards, the gospels themselves, with the debatable exception of John, are not impressive works of literature. Plodding, humorless, diaphanous accounts of one-dimensional characters and events of which the authors seemed to understand little, and were clearly at a loss as to how to communicate. The Romans, to say nothing of the Greeks, really did produce better stuff than that.

How about we all read the Gospel of John and discuss online?

Pompey Magnus

robindch wrote: »

But going back to your first point, while the authors might have been well-educated by Roman standards and even more so -- presumably -- by Palestinian (or whatever) standards, the gospels themselves, with the debatable exception of John, are not impressive works of literature. Plodding, humorless, diaphanous accounts of one-dimensional characters and events of which the authors seemed to understand little, and were clearly at a loss as to how to communicate. The Romans, to say nothing of the Greeks, really did produce better stuff than that.

I have to say that perhaps the Gospel writers are in a no-win situation.

Mark is our oldest Gospel and is also the least developed Gospel, it is very bare when compared to the others and is indeed not up to the standards of other works from antiquity. But it is quite possible that Mark's intention was to faithfully relay the story as he recieved it without embellishment on his part. His characters are one-dimensional but then he most likely didn't know them personally and so if he were to make his characters more interesting he would probably have had to resort to literary invention, which is never good in a historical account.

On the other hand I think it is generally accepted that the Gospel of John is the most impressive Gospel on theological and philosophical grounds, but I think it is also the least credible when it comes to believability. In this Gospel Jesus engages in long discussions and philosophical discourses, it is very unlikely that these could be accurately remembered and recorded ~65 years after his death so it seems quite likely that much of the sayings of Jesus as recorded in John were later inventions from members of the Johannine community.

If we had four relatively impressive Gospels along the lines of John then we could say that the Gospel writers were indeed impressive authors who knew their Greek philosophy and had a detailed understanding of theological issues, however we would also be critical of them because they are providing statements that just couldn't be accurate recollections of what Jesus said.

If we wanted to know what the real Jesus actually said and did we would like to have more Gospels along the lines of Mark and less like John.

Dades

Tim Robbins wrote: »

How about we all read the Gospel of John and discuss online?

I'd rather gnaw off my own leg.

But knock yourselves out!

CDfm

Charco wrote: »

If we had four relatively impressive Gospels along the lines of John then we could say that the Gospel writers were indeed impressive authors who knew their Greek philosophy and had a detailed understanding of theological issues, however we would also be critical of them because they are providing statements that just couldn't be accurate recollections of what Jesus said.

But then again maybe it was composed with the Gentile in mind. Jews would already have been familiar with a Platoist view already popular -whereas non jews may not have been so inclined.

robindch

Charco wrote: »

Mark is our oldest Gospel and is also the least developed Gospel, it is very bare when compared to the others [...] the Gospel of John is the most impressive Gospel on theological and philosophical grounds, but I think it is also the least credible when it comes to believability.

Yes, that's roughly what I believe.

It's generally accepted that ancient authors regularly had people deliver speeches according to what the author thought they would say in a given situation, rather than a precise record of what they did say (look at what Plato had Socrates saying in comparison to Xenophon). The idea we have these days of a properly-researched biography with precise quotations from the main players seems to have been pretty much unknown then.

Charco wrote: »

If we wanted to know what the real Jesus actually said and did we would like to have more Gospels along the lines of Mark and less like John.

Agreed. But then again, the first three gospels are pretty dull stuff and I can't help but wonder if christianity could ever have taken off if John had not written his flightly and esoteric gospel. I rather suspect not.

rockbeer

robindch wrote: »

It's generally accepted that ancient authors regularly had people deliver speeches according to what the author thought they would say in a given situation, rather than a precise record of what they did say (look at what Plato had Socrates saying in comparison to Xenophon). The idea we have these days of a properly-researched biography with precise quotations from the main players seems to have been pretty much unknown then.

If only Jesus had taught his followers something useful, like the principles of voice recording technology :pac:

UU

No I think otherwise that they were in fact very intelligent and witty people whoever they were. After all, it wasn't even Matthew, Mark, Luke and John who wrote the Gospels. They were names put on each of the books. The New Testament was written over 100 years after Jesus' death and the authors didn't even know Jesus. The reason I said they were intelligent is because at that time in Palestine there was a whole issue of people proclaiming to be the Messiah. The Old Testament had predicted that a Messiah would come for the Israelites. The fact that they managed to take a that story and attribute to somebody who may have not been a Messiah let alone a god is baffling. Furthermore, they managed to use a load of local ancient Pagan stories and add that onto this. Their writings were then translated into one of the linguas francas of that time, Greek. Can you say that people capable of establishing the foundations of a major world religion which worked then (and still does to a large extent) as a major political drive and convert the masses to a bunch of crazy ideas?

CDfm

UU wrote: »

No I think otherwise that they were in fact very intelligent and witty people whoever they were. After all, it wasn't even Matthew, Mark, Luke and John who wrote the Gospels. They were names put on each of the books. The New Testament was written over 100 years after Jesus' death and the authors didn't even know Jesus. The reason I said they were intelligent is because at that time in Palestine there was a whole issue of people proclaiming to be the Messiah. The Old Testament had predicted that a Messiah would come for the Israelites. The fact that they managed to take a that story and attribute to somebody who may have not been a Messiah let alone a god is baffling. Furthermore, they managed to use a load of local ancient Pagan stories and add that onto this. Their writings were then translated into one of the linguas francas of that time, Greek. Can you say that people capable of establishing the foundations of a major world religion which worked then (and still does to a large extent) as a major political drive and convert the masses to a bunch of crazy ideas?

UU -you make it sound like a bunch of guys intent on world domination which it wasnt.How can you be so certain on authorship-we dont know very much of thr beliefs of the druids because they operated an oral tradition.So Christianity was written down when convenient -it was an underground belief and believers were persecuted and leaders executed.

Popular belief among the Israelites was for a king not someone who said accept what you have etc. So the books were translated to the Greek only shows that they had been written down and were a force. They shouldnt have suceeded and did.

I am interested in what pagan stories were assimilated?

robindch

rockbeer wrote: »

If only Jesus had taught his followers something useful, like the principles of voice recording technology :pac:

Good idea, but go with fancy tech? Why didn't Jesus just pick up and pen and write something?

Unless of course, he did, but whatever he wrote was subsequently destroyed.

Must tell run_to_da_hills about this.

2Scoops

robindch wrote: »

Why didn't Jesus just pick up and pen and write something?

Hi, Jesus! How you uh, how you coming on that novel you're working on? Huh? Gotta a big, uh, big stack of papers there? Gotta, gotta nice little story you're working on, there? Your big novel you've been working on for 3 years? Huh? Gotta, gotta compelling protagonist? Yeah? Gotta obstacle for him to overcome? Huh? Gotta story brewing there? Working on, working on that for quite some time? Huh? (voice getting higher pitched) Yeah, talking about that 3 years ago. Been working on that the whole time? Nice little narrative? Beginning, middle, and end? Some friends become enemies, some enemies become friends? At the end your main character is richer from the experience? Yeah? Yeah? (voice returns to normal) Oh, I look forward to reading it.

Dades

AtomicHorror

2Scoops wrote: »

Hi, Jesus! How you uh, how you coming on that novel you're working on? Huh? Gotta a big, uh, big stack of papers there? Gotta, gotta nice little story you're working on, there? Your big novel you've been working on for 3 years? Huh? Gotta, gotta compelling protagonist? Yeah? Gotta obstacle for him to overcome? Huh? Gotta story brewing there? Working on, working on that for quite some time? Huh? (voice getting higher pitched) Yeah, talking about that 3 years ago. Been working on that the whole time? Nice little narrative? Beginning, middle, and end? Some friends become enemies, some enemies become friends? At the end your main character is richer from the experience? Yeah? Yeah? (voice returns to normal) Oh, I look forward to reading it.

My friend keeps doing this routine about my PhD. thesis. Former friend, that is.

CDfm

Well Christians do a good line in talking books - they are called Masses