2021-09-28

Jésus-Christ, sublime figure de papier / Nanine Charbonnel

I began to post about the contents of Jésus-Christ, sublime figure de papier by Nanine Charbonnel when I saw that it had something scholarly and original to contribute to the question of the historicity of Jesus but, because it was in French, would be sheltered from the English speaking world. Here in chronological sequence is the complete coverage of my reading.

1	New French Mythicist Book (Introductions pages 7-13)	23rd May 2019
	Part 1: The Hebrew Bible and How its Text Works (pages 17-109)
2	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 1. Hermeneutical Impasse	26th May 2019
3	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 1a . . . — Something Untouchable about the Bible	10th June 2019
4	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 2a. The Sacred and Creative Power of the Hebrew Text	5th August 2019
5	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 2b. A God Bound to the Mechanics of Language	6th August 2019
6	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 3a. Representing a Collective in a Single Individual	13th August 2019
7	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 3b. Creative Intertextuality	13th August 2019
8	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 3c. … Word Play Undermining Historicity	15th August 2019
9	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 3d … Metaphors of Exodus and Lion Dens Become History	16th August 2019
10	Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier. Chap 3e … A Different Kind of Literary Heritage	17th August 2019
	Part 2: The Gospels are Midrash (pages 113-447)
11	Jesus Christ as a sublime paper persona	6th March 2020
12	Jesus Christ, Sublime Literary Creation of the Human Spirit	8th March 2020
13	Inadequacy of the Tools in the Search for the Historical Jesus	9th March 2020
14	A Midrashic Hypothesis for the Gospels	10th March 2020
15	How Jewish Gospels Became Christian Gospels	18th March 2020
16	The Christian Revolution: The Threefold Fulfillment of Scripture	21st March 2020
17	How the Gospels Became History	23rd March 2020
18	To Ask if Bible Events Actually Happened Guarantees the Bible Will Be Misunderstood	6th April 2020
19	Further on a “Midrashic” View of the Gospels	8th April 2020
20	Gospel Parables and the “Birth” of the Messiah as a Personification of Israel	11th April 2020
21	The Symbolic Characters in the Gospels: Personifications of Jews and Gentiles	13th April 2020
22	The Symbolic Characters in the Gospels #2: John the Baptist and the Twelve Disciples	20th April 2020
23	Symbolic Characters #3: Mary, Personification of the Jewish People, “Re-Virgined”	24th April 2020
24	Gospels Cut From Jewish Scriptures, #1	12th May 2020
25	Gospels Cut From Jewish Scriptures, #2	16th May 2020
26	Gospels Cut from Jewish Scriptures, #3	23rd May 2020
27	Gospels Cut from Jewish Scriptures, #4	31st May 2020
28	Gospels Cut from Jewish Scriptures, #5	24th November 2020
29	Gospels Cut from Jewish Scriptures, #6	25th November 2020
30	Gospels Cut from Jewish Scriptures, #7 (conclusion)	5th December 2020
31	Pit Stop in the Nanine Charbonnel Posts on the Literary Construction of Jesus Christ	8th December 2020
32	Jesus Christ Created as an Epitome of Old Testament Figures (1) — Charbonnel and Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	11th December 2020
33	Jesus Christ Created as an Epitome of Old Testament Figures (2) — Charbonnel and Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	22nd December 2020
34	How Collective Messianic Figures Mutated into Jesus — continuing Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	26th December 2020
35	Jesus Created to Embody Two Peoples in One New Man — continuing Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	2nd January 2021
36	Jesus embodies all the Jewish Messiahs — continuing Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	3rd January 2021
37	The Mystery of the Incarnation Solved? — Continuing the series on Nanine Charbonnel’s Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	14th February 2021
38	The Jewish Origin of the Incarnation: continuing Nanine Charbonnel’s Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier	18th March 2021
39	Damascus, code name for the Temple? (Post Script to Jewish Origin… NC’s Jésus-Christ…)	19th March 2021
40	The Jewish Origins of the Word Becoming Flesh / 1 (Charbonnel: Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier)	9th April 2021
41	Jewish Origin of the “Word Became Flesh” / 2 … (Charbonnel: Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier)	12th April 2021
42	4 Jewish Word Plays behind the Word Becoming Flesh / 3 … (Charbonnel: Jésus-Christ, Sublime Figure de Papier)	14th April 2021
43	The Incarnation of The Name – Continuing Nanine Charbonnel’s Sublime Paper Figure Jesus Christ	22nd June 2021
44	Jesus: Incarnation of Written and Oral Torah. part 1 of 3 (Charbonnel contd)	2nd August 2021
45	Jesus: Incarnation of Written and Oral Torah. part 2 of 3 (Charbonnel contd)	3rd August 2021
46	Jesus: Incarnation of Written and Oral Torah. part 3 of 3 (Charbonnel contd)	4th August 2021
47	Climactic Advent of the Messiah (Charbonnel contd)	8th August 2021
48	Understanding the Sacrifice of Jesus (Charbonnel contd)	12th August 2021
49	The Sacrifices to be Fulfilled by the Messiah Jesus (Charbonnel continued)	14th August 2021
50	Jesus’ Death as the Death of the People of God: Communion and Passion	19th August 2021
51	Personification, redemption and substitution (Charbonnel continued)	22nd August 2021
52	The Crucifixion as a Victorious Elevation (Charbonnel continued)	27th August 2021
53	The Gospels as Figurative Narratives (Charbonnel continued)	7th September 2021
54	The Secret of the Power Behind the Gospel Narrative (Charbonnel Continued)	11th September 2021
55	Are There Really “Keys” to Understanding the New Testament? (Charbonnel continued)	26th September 2021
	Conclusion: pages 449-453
56	Conclusion: Nanine Charbonnel, Jésus-Christ, sublime figure de papier	28th September 2021

"Neil, in my mature judgement (I am now an old man), this fine 4-part study is a brilliant reworking, an instructive restatement of Hayden White’s Metahistory (and his subsequent writings). Your critique of certain historiographic representations as imbedded in the case study of the “scientistic”, “empirical” Richard Carrier provides a solid starting point for the more honest “fictive” reading of the New Testament that you encourage. Your last paragraph is a very intelligent call to sensitive readers of these texts. I suspect a whole generation of biblical students has been educated without the insights provided by the incomparable White. Bravo!"

-- Timothy Bagley, - November 2024
"Neil Godfrey and Tim Widowfield, who both write at Vridar . . . happen to be some of the most astute and well-read amateurs you can read on the internet on the subject of biblical historicity. I call them amateurs only for the reason that they don’t have, so far as I know, advanced degrees in the subject. But I have often been impressed with their grasp of logic and analysis of scholarship. I don’t always agree with them, but I respect their work."

— Richard Carrier, – March 2014
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-- Peter Kirby, - May 2023
This is superb work, Neil, and reminds me of Albert Schweitzer’s work from a century ago. . . . .

I commend you for being the first to even TRY to translate Bruno Bauer’s brilliant Kritik der Evangelien und Geschichte ihres Ursprungs, which is now more than 150 years old.

. . . . .Thank you for your historic effort.

-- Paul Trejo, M.A., - November 2022
Editor, An English Edition of Bruno Bauer’s 1843 Christianity Exposed
"By the way, my thanks to Neil for an ongoing superb job of exposing Jim’s review for what it is: a farcical and none too effective exercise in mythicism assassination, nothing to do with rational, let alone unbiased, scholarship. I’m also happy to see even Jim giving Neil credit where credit is due."

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-- Thomas L. Thompson, - April 2020
"Vridar is consistently thought-provoking, well-informed, and asking the right questions. There are intelligent, thoughtful comments and commenters regularly offering productive discussion. Books and publications are covered with a range of perspectives with attempts at fair and accurate representation of others’ arguments and content (where there are occasional and inevitable missteps on that I notice Neil making corrections and apologies where warranted, which wins points with me). Please carry on."

— Gregory Doudna, – January 2019
"Fantastic. I’m so glad you’re helping to spread these ideas!"

Nancy Fraser - June 2019 (personal email)
"For an excellent example of generally high-quality scholarship by someone who isn’t a biblical studies professor, see Neil Godfrey’s work posted on the website vridar.org."

— Tom Dykstra, – JOCABS 2015
"I have found your website really valuable as an interpretive filter for Biblical scholarship, especially the origins of Christianity and historicity of Jesus issue. Your clarity of expression, fair comments and personal insights are much valued. I refer to your site frequently as yet more names and publications pop up requiring an academic critique and helpful recommendations for book purchases. So, please continue to delve deeply and share this intellectual sustenance with your grateful readers."

— Mary Booker, – February 2020 (personal email)
"Very good. This post is going straight to the March 2016 Biblical Studies Carnival."

—N.T. Wrong, – March 2016
"These reviews of yours are so bloody weird!"

— James Crossley, – April 2010
"I’d like to thank you for this very nice representation of what I was trying to show in the book. It’s always gratifying when a reader zeroes in on exactly those aspects I thought were most interesting and most central to my argument. Thank you for this careful and engaged reading of my work – much appreciated!"

— Eva Mroczek, – June 2017
"Thanks much for this book review. I think it expands, and contributes to, the effort in honouring Thomas that we with Lukasz originally had in mind with this volume. Best, Emanuel"

-- Emanuel Pfoh - August 2020
https://earlywritings.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=145080#p145080
Neil made a good synthesis of the work without being an “expert” of the field.

-- Enrico Tuccinardi, - October 2022
"Neil, this is actually rather useful. Good job."

— R. Joseph Hoffmann, – June 2014
"I always enjoy reading Neil’s blog because I think that he is careful, thorough, intellectually fair, and honest."

— April DeConick, – November 2007
"I still wonder at all the material you turn out for Vridar. The more I read your stuff (and I still do, of course), the more I realize how much we all owe you. Your voice is unique."

— Earl Doherty, November 2013 (personal email)
Congratulations, Vridar, . . . I declare, Vridar, your own hard work translating Bruno Bauer will make a major difference in future studies of Bruno Bauer and the evolution of Hegel’s philosophy of religion.

-- Paul Trejo, - April 2023
"Neil, for what it is worth it is obvious to me that if you had earlier in life tracked into a graduate program at one of the world’s leading research universities you would be one of the world’s formidable ones. You are doing essentially the same quality now (apart from the philology and languages) except mostly sticking to commenting on others’ work as informed comment/discussion."

— Gregory Doudna, – January 2019
"I want to say here that this site is so resourceful and highly on top of the most modern scholarship in the areas discussed here. . . I know of no other site which offers a wide range of topics related to careful critical analysis of historically and scripturally related issues."

-- Martin Lewadny, - March 2009
"Note that I do not use the term ‘amateur’ pejoratively. . . . In fact, Godfrey is extremely well read and his librarian skills have brought many important academic works to my attention."

Raphael Lataster - August 2019
"Here I give an admittedly subjective short list, in random order, of useful, high level and regularly updated weblogs on the study of the Old Testament . . . ‘Vridar: Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science’ (http://vridar.org/) by Neil Godfrey"

-- Klaas Spronk, - Bibliotheca Orientalis LXXI, 3/4 (2014)
"Many thanks for this post, and for the quality of your blog."

— Philippe Wajdenbaum, – November 2018
"Neil, You’ve done a clean job in your posting on ‘Jesus the Healer’. It reflects well on you. Best, John"

— John Moles, September 2011 (personal email)
"Thanks for this detailed interaction! I’ll try to offer something more substantial than 'Thank you' in response at some point, but I didn’t want to wait . . . to express appreciation for your detailed interaction with what I’ve written!"

— James McGrath, – June 2009

Andrew Dabrowski on “Josephus and Jesus, New Evidence” – Review 3 – “received with pleasure”: “I agree with you the TF is probably fraudulent. But if so it reveals your reasoning here to be dubious:…” Jul 3, 01:47
Neil Godfrey on “Josephus and Jesus, New Evidence” – Review 3 – “received with pleasure”: “What Morton Smith wrote was: If we suppose the alterations to the text were minimal, the original was something like…” Jul 3, 01:28
Neil Godfrey on “Josephus and Jesus, New Evidence” – Review 3 – “received with pleasure”: “I have addressed Morton Smith’s methods several times now. Unfortunately he falls into the traps of circular reasoning and confirmation…” Jul 3, 00:26
Neil Godfrey on Speaking of Josephus . . . .: “There is nothing historical about Acts. It is second century fiction. The scenes are borrowed from the gospels and created…” Jul 3, 00:20
Thomas Worthington on Pitfalls in Seeking Authenticity in Ancient Texts: “This all reminds me of dealing with chatGPT and other LLMs which simply can not bring themselves to say “I…” Jul 2, 07:58
Mike on Pitfalls in Seeking Authenticity in Ancient Texts: “Was proved centuries ago, God of Abraham was completely invented Cephas (Peter) and Paul invented Jesus from their “visions” Even…” Jul 2, 01:37
Paul Trejo on “Josephus and Jesus, New Evidence” – Review 3 – “received with pleasure”: “In my reading, Morton Smith (“Jesus the Magician,” 1978) offers a more cogent explanation for the text on Jesus by…” Jul 1, 04:34
Neil Godfrey on Pitfalls in Seeking Authenticity in Ancient Texts: “Yes indeed. I had the same reaction when Lucy Worsley read the “trial transcript” of Alice Driver per Foxe’s Book…” Jul 1, 04:01
Gordon Rouse on Pitfalls in Seeking Authenticity in Ancient Texts: “It does remind me of Lucy Worsely’s episode about Queen Mary. (Still on iView I see at time of posting)…” Jul 1, 03:19