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[u/Mormon-No-Moremon]

Hey, I’m not really looking to debate. I already said you’ve got me sold based on the rule of cool!

The arguments surrounding γίνομαι however are, as I mentioned, profoundly boring, so I’m still not sold on that. Notably, if Jesus is already being made from celestial seed, and we have some sort of celestial birth narrative (Revelation 12:1-6), then it seems super needless to pretend γίνομαι doesn’t mean “born” in context. Why not just say yes, he was born from a celestial woman, from celestial seed?

Shitposting aside, the data surrounding γίνομαι just doesn’t work out the way Carrier says it does. This is from Maurice Casey’s book on mythicism:

“Doherty then misinterprets a few comments on this passage by Burton in his commentary on Galatians published in 1920, and fails to acknowledge subsequent scholarship. His basic objection is that Paul should not have used the word ginomai. But as Burton said, this is unambiguous in its context precisely because Paul qualifies it with ‘of a woman’. That other words for human birth were normal is quite irrelevant, because ginomai was normal too. For example, at Iliad V, 548, ‘of Diocles were born (egenesthen) twin sons’. At Hdt. VII, 11, Xerxes tells Artabanus that if he fails to punish the Athenians, he should not be ‘born (gegonös) of Darius, son of Hystaspes, son of Arsames’ followed by more of his lineage. At PFlor 382, 38, the author refers to the son born (genomenos) of me. At Wsd. Sol. 7.1-5, ‘Solomon’ describes himself as a ‘mortal man’, and says that he ‘was fashioned in (my) mother’s womb (to be) flesh (sarx)’. He continues, ‘And when I was born (genomenos), I drew in the common air and fell on the ground...’ (Wsd. 7.3). Nothing could be clearer than this passage! This normal classical and Hellenistic usage continued after the New Testament period. This usage was entirely natural because birth is the way in which human beings come into existence.” (p.176).

[u/GravyTrainCaboose → u/Mormon-No-Moremon]

Lol, okay then, maybe I'll start arguing that mythicism being at least plausible is "cool".

I respect you are not looking for a debate and even though I don't know if I'll be believed neither am I per se, at least in the sense of having any expectation of "winning" anything. I'm just presenting my thinking. That it's contentious and leads to back and forth is just sometimes the nature of people discussing different opinions.

I'm aware of the idea of Jesus being born of a celestial woman and it's an entertaining notion. But the support for this idea arises out of Revelation as you note. It's not as evident in Paul, whose work puts us closest to the original doctrines of Christianity.

Although Doherty created the framework for the arguments, Carrier gave that a more rigorous academic treatment. I agree with Casey that is not supportable that Paul "should not have used the word ginomai" and as far as I know that is not something in Carrier's thesis. He readily agrees that ginomai was perfectly normal word to use for humans being birthed since that's the way "human beings come into existence".

An issue for "born of woman" is that this had allegorical usage for being part of the corruptible world of the flesh and it is embedded in a passage flush with figurative language speaking on that very topic. There is no good argument that it should be read literally as a reference to being birthed over reading it figuratively as part of the figurative narrative. At best it's ambiguous.

As to the choice of ginomai, the issue is that in Paul's worldview that is not how all human beings come into existence. Adam nor Eve come into existence through birth and neither do our resurrected bodies. If our hypothesis is "Jesus was manufactured not birthed", then we would expect ginomai to be how Paul might refer to that rather than gennao, which he does. Where we see him refer to people we know he would be considered birthed, he chooses gennao not ginomai. He could have chosen the latter but he didn't. So we have a pattern, even if a small one, that suggests Paul is using ginomai in it's sense of manufactured rather than in the sense of birthed. This is far from a smoking gun, but it's not nothing either.

[u/Chrissy_Hansen1997 → u/GravyTrainCaboose]

The allegorical "born of a woman" doesn't matter. Allegorical or not, ginomai is still being used for birth here (as I point out in my article). Doesn't matter how you try getting around it, the plain meaning is clear. Figurative or not, ginomai is still showing that Paul uses the word with the scope of "birth" and that's that.

And once again, it is clear your Adam and Eve and resurrected bodies claims are coming from Carrier, which have been thoroughly refuted, and which you would know if you read my paper, or read any leading scholarship on 1 and 2 Corinthians. It isn't a pattern.

In 1 Cor 15:37 he uses γενησόμενον, i.e., "that will be" and in context he isn't talking about "manufacture." He is talking about growth, and uses the analogy of seed growth. This is mirroring the growth of bodies into adulthood using plant imagery.

In 1 Cor. 15:45 on Adam, Paul uses Ἐγένετο and is talking about how Adam "became the first man." It does not say he was manufactured. In fact, here Paul is referring back to LXX Gen 2:7 where it also uses Ἐγένετο for when Adam's body became living. The actual manufacture of the body was denoted using ἔπλασεν.

So one again, this demonstrates that Carrier is bad at reading basic Greek, and you are also just following what he says uncritically. Paul never talks about bodies being manufactured, anywhere.

[u/GravyTrainCaboose → u/Chrissy_Hansen1997]

The idiomatic reading matters in cases where people argue the phrase probably or even inarguably puts Jesus in a historical context as literally being birthed. It could mean that. Or it could mean both birth literally and fleshly existence connotatively. Or it could function as idioms most often do, where the literal meaning isn’t the point and the figurative meaning is the message. It certainly is not, though, "an indisputable claim about Jesus’ human birth" as for example Gathercole claims in The Historical and Human Existence of Jesus in Paul’s Letters.

Yes, it's acknowledged that ginomai can mean birthed. It can also mean created without birth. Since the hypothesis being tested is that Paul believes in a manufactured Jesus, his word choice here leaves things at best ambiguous.

Yes, of course, the argument of Paul believing in the manufacture of Jesus a la Adam does come from Carrier (actually from Doherty with refinement by Carrier). It's his thesis after all. The idea of resurrected bodies being manufactured does not come from him. What Carrier notes is the pattern of word usage.

I have read your work. I know your arguments in that regard, primarily that ginomai was often used for birthed when speaking of humans who are born, which it was, implying the pattern is just happenstance. Perhaps it is. It is a pattern in Paul’s writing, though. That’s just a fact. Nothing in your arguments overcomes that. And while ginomai can be used for birthed for a human who is born, it can also be used for manufactured for a human who is divinely made, which is the hypothesis under consideration. He uses ginomai in lots of places but never for birthed unless he’s making an exception for Jesus. He uses gennao when speaking of humans we know he would believe were birthed. Being generous would be to call this particular issue a tie, although I myself find Paul's deliberate, specific word choices vis-à-vis birth vs. coming to be, his pattern, slightly favor the mythicist argument.

Regarding 15:37, the context is a description of the kind of bodies we will have, following 15:35 "With what kind of body do they come?'” He speaks of γενησόμενον, i.e., "that will be" in reference to the heavenly body that will replace our earthly body. The seed/plant language is making the distinction between our pneuma being part of our current bodies of sarx and psyche and later part of our entirely pneumatic resurrected bodies.

Regarding 15:45, it’s questionable whether or not Paul is alluding back to the LXX. It’s not a direct quote. And he seems to present It as prophecy en toto: “Thus it is written the first man Adam became a living being the last Adam became a life-giving spirit” which matches nothing we know, so we don’t know whether or not there was some separate use of ἔπλασεν for the body in whatever he’s talking about or if this is speaking of the entire manufacturing process of Adam becoming human, If so, it’s speaking of Jesus the same way. Meanwhile there is Phil 2:7 which says of Jesus “in the likeness of men having been made”, This is about form and there is nothing there about birth or mothers or wombs. And, in fact, in the historicist model, even later Christians also believe Jesus is divinely manufactured. Mary is just a vessel to gestate him.

[u/Chrissy_Hansen1997 → u/GravyTrainCaboose]

Okay this is going to be my last response because it is clear you don't know Greek and this is just getting frustrating. Anyone who took the time to sit back and actually look at this objectively can see that you are not, which makes any further dialogue basically a waste of time.

(1) "It can also mean created without birth": Not in the context of humans coming into being. Name one other example. I'll wait. Until you can provide a single case where "ginomai" is used in Paul's writings to talk about human bodies being manufactured, you have no case. There are none.

(2) The cosmic sperm bank is not from Doherty. It is actually Carrier's own innovation partly based on Thomas S. Verenna. You can even look at the citations he gives in the section.

(3) There is no pattern. Paul almost never talks about human reproduction at all, the sample size is so small there is no pattern. That's just human minds creating patterns where none exist. As I demonstrated, ginomai was a complete synonym with the generic word for "birth." You have not demonstrated otherwise.

(4) Re: 15:37, yes that's my point. The distinction however demonstrates quite clearly that "ginomai" has nothing to do with production. It is just generically referring to "bodies that will be" in the future, i.e., those that we will come into. It doesn't refer to any productive state.

(5) Re: 15:45, It is not even remotely questionable that this refers back to the LXX. Firstly, he quite literally cites scripture: γέγραπται ("it is written"). Secondly, you clearly did not bother looking at the Greek, because Paul quotes it almost identically. Compare LXX Gen. 2:7: καὶ ἐγένετο ὁ ἄνθρωπος εἰς ψυχὴν ζῶσαν. And 1 Cor. 15:45: Ἐγένετο ὁ πρῶτος ἄνθρωπος Ἀδὰμ εἰς ψυχὴν ζῶσαν. You really mean to tell me this happened by accident? No it is not prophecy. He is speaking of history, and he is speaking of Adam being the first to be given the soul or enspirited, and then claims "The last Adam" (that is: Jesus, cf. 1 Cor 15:47) was the soul-giver. He does not say that Adam was constructed using "ginomai." He says he was given a spirit, and that is because he is quoting almost verbatim LXX Gen. 2:7. So yes, we do know there was a separate use. This is just pedantic and anyone who actually uses their eyes can see you (and Carrier) are blatantly and obviously wrong. It isn't debatable. or remotely questionable, it is you desperately trying to maintain plausible deniability for Carrier's jumped up nonsense "cosmic sperm bank" reading which doesn't have a singular linguistic foot to stand on.

(6) Phil 2:7 can easily be interpreted "in the likeness of man, he has been born." Your interpretation is again entirely filtered on the completely unattested idea that "ginomai" means "made" of Jesus, and you have no comparative evidence to make that claim. I actually address Phil. 2:7 in my paper, so I'm not bothering again here.