Richard Cevantis Carrier (ur. 1 grudnia 1969) – amerykański historyk, działacz ateistyczny, autor, mówca i bloger; posiada doktorat z historii starożytnej (Columbia University)[1]. W 2008 obronił pracę doktorską pt. Attitudes Towards the Natural Philosopher in the Early Roman Empire (100 B.C. to 313 A.D.).

Richard Carrier
Richard Cevantis Carrier
Ilustracja
Państwo działania

 Stany Zjednoczone

dr. nauk historycznych
Specjalność: historia starożytna, historia nauki
Alma Mater

Uniwersytet Kalifornii w Berkeley

Doktorat

2008 – Historia
Uniwersytet w Columbii

Jego ostatnie książki na temat historyczności Jezusa sytuują go jako jednego z adwokatów teorii mitu Jezusa[2], według której w rzeczywistości nie istniał ani Jezus historyczny ani Jezus biblijny[3][4][5]. Jest to mniejszościowy pogląd[6][7][8]. Carrier początkowo nie był zainteresowany kwestią historyczności Jezusa[9]. Początkowo myślał, że to marginalna teoria spiskowa niewarta akademickich dociekań; jednakże kilka różnych osób poprosiło go o zbadanie tej kwestii i znaleźli fundatorów dla takich badań. Od tamtego czasu, stał się wiodącym ekspertem w zakresie teorii ahistoryczności Jezusa[3][4][b]. Do innych badaczy, którzy stoją na stanowisku „Jezusowego agnostycyzmu” lub „Jezusowego ateizmu”,[10] należą: Arthur Droge, Kurt Noll(inne języki), Thomas L. Brodie(inne języki), Earl Doherty(inne języki), Robert M. Price(inne języki), Thomas L. Thompson(inne języki), Raphael Lataster, Hector Avalos(inne języki) jeszcze inni, tacy jak Philip R. Davies(inne języki), wyrazili opinię, że perspektywa Carriera i innych jest wystarczająco rozsądna, aby zasługiwać na rozważenie[11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19].

W 2004 roku, Carrier w telewizji debatował z Williamem Lane Craigiem(inne języki)[20]; pojawił się również w filmie dokumentalnym The Nature of Existence[21], znajduje się na liście w Who's Who in Hell[22]; wystąpił w filmie dokumentalnym The God Who Wasn't There, w którym znajduje się z nim wywiad nt. historyczności Jezusa[23], jak również w innych produkcjach.

Życie osobiste edytuj

W 2015 roku Carrier poinformował o zakończeniu swojego 20-letniego małżeństwa. Ujawnił, że po 17 latach małżeństwa miał kilka krótkich romansów ze względu na pewne nietypowe okoliczności w małżeństwie, z którymi sobie nie radził. Opowiedział o tym żonie i przez ostatnie dwa lata małżeństwa byli za wzajemnym porozumieniem w otwartym związku. Obecnie jest otwarcie poliamoryczny, gdyż uznał, że nie będzie szczęśliwy w związku monogamicznym[24].

Publikacje edytuj

Wybrane teksty i artykuły naukowe edytuj

  • "Flash! Fox News Reports that Aliens May Have Built the Pyramids of Egypt!". Skeptical Inquirer 23.5 (wrzesień-październik 1999)
  • "The Guarded Tomb of Jesus and Daniel in the Lion's Den: An Argument for the Plausibility of Theft". Journal of Higher Criticism 8.2 (jesień 2001).
  • "Pseudohistory in Jerry Vardaman's Magic Coins: The Nonsense of Micrographic Letters". Skeptical Inquirer 26.2 (marzec-kwiecień 2002) and 26.4 (lipiec-sierpień 2002).
  • "The Function of the Historian in Society". The History Teacher 35.4 (sierpień 2002).
  • "Hitler's Table Talk: Troubling Finds". German Studies Review 26.3 (październik 2003).
  • "The Argument from Biogenesis: Probabilities Against a Natural Origin of Life". Biology & Philosophy 19.5 (listopad 2004).
  • "Whence Christianity? A Meta-Theory for the Origins of Christianity". Journal of Higher Criticism 11.1 (wiosna 2005).
  • "Fatal Flaws in Michael Almeida's Alleged 'Defeat' of Rowe's New Evidential Argument from Evil". Philo 10.1 (wiosna-lato 2007).
  • "On Defining Naturalism as a Worldview". Free Inquiry 30.3 (kwiecień/maj 2010).
  • "Thallus and the Darkness at Christ’s Death". Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism 8 (2011-2012).
  • "Origen, Eusebius, and the Accidental Interpolation in Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 20.200". Journal of Early Christian Studies 20.4 (zima 2012).
  • "The Prospect of a Christian Interpolation in Tacitus, Annals 15.44". Vigiliae Christianae 68 (2014).

Książki i rozdziały edytuj

Zobacz też edytuj

Uwagi edytuj

  1. (ang.) Jesus ahistoricity theory is the antithesis of a given Jesus historicity thesis. Thus for the sake of argument (via Bayesian analysis), Carrier posits three criteria for his minimal historical Jesus:
    1. "An actual man at some point named Jesus acquired followers in life who continued as an identifiable movement after his death." (Carrier, On the Historicity of Jesus, p. 34.)
    2. "This is the same Jesus who was claimed by some of his followers to have been executed by the Jewish or Roman authorities." (Ibid.)
    3. "This is the same Jesus some of whose followers soon began worshiping as a living god (or demigod)." (Ibid.)
    "If any one of these premises is false, it can fairly be said there was no historical Jesus in any pertinent sense." (Ibid.)
  2. Teoria ahistoryczności jest antytezą danej tezy historyczności Jezusa. Zatem, na potrzeby argumentacji (poprzez analizę Bayesa), Carrier postuluje trzy kryteria dla minimalnego historycznego Jezusa.[a]

Przypisy edytuj

  1. About Dr. Carrier. [dostęp 2017-04-06].
  2. Maurice Casey: Jesus: Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths?. Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014, s. 14–16. ISBN 978-0-567-44762-3. (ang.).
  3. a b Richard Carrier: On the Historicity of Jesus: Why We Might Have Reason for Doubt. Sheffield Phoenix Press Limited, 2014, s. 52. ISBN 978-1-909697-49-2. Cytat: [T]he basic thesis of every competent mythologist, then and now, has always been that Jesus was originally a god just like any other god (properly speaking, a demigod in pagan terms; an archangel in Jewish terms; in either sense, a deity), who was later historicized..
  4. a b Raphael Lataster. Questioning the Plausibility of Jesus Ahistoricity Theories — A Brief Pseudo-Bayesian Metacritique of the Sources. „The Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies”. 6:1, s. 91, 2015. Cytat: Given the problematic sources that historical Jesus scholars have access to, and the failings of many of their methods, it seems appropriate to call for a thorough, and Bayesian, analysis of the evidence in order to determine if Jesus’ historicity or ahistoricity is more probable. Indeed, just such a task has been completed by independent historian Richard Carrier. 
  5. Richard Carrier: On the Historicity of Jesus: Why We Might Have Reason for Doubt. Wyd. kindle. Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2014-06-30. (ang.).
  6. Bart Ehrman: Forged:Writing in the name of God. HarperCollins, 2011, s. 285. ISBN 978-0-06-207863-6.
  7. Did Jesus Exist? Dr. Robert M Price, Dr. Richard Carrier, David Fitzgerald Interview Part 1.
  8. Richard A. Burridge, Graham Gould: Jesus Now and Then. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2004, s. 34. ISBN 978-0-8028-0977-3.
  9. Did Jesus Exist? Dr. Robert M Price, Dr. Richard Carrier, David Fitzgerald Interview Part 1.
  10. Robert M. Price: Deconstructing Jesus. Prometheus Books, Publishers, s. 17. ISBN 978-1-61592-120-1. Cytat: Generations of Rationalists and freethinkers have held that Jesus Christ corresponds to no historical character: There never was a Jesus of Nazareth. We might call this categorical denial “Jesus atheism.” What I am describing is something different, a “Jesus agnosticism.” There may have been a Jesus on earth in the past, but the state of the evidence is so ambiguous that we can never be sure what this figure was like or, indeed, whether there was such a person.
  11. Richard Carrier: Ehrman on Historicity Recap - Richard Carrier. richardcarrier.info, 2012-07-12. [dostęp 2016-10-13].
  12. Dr. Richard Carrier. Questioning the Historicity of Jesus. „Strange Notions”. Brandon Vogt. [dostęp 2016-04-06]. Cytat: The hypothesis that Jesus never really existed has started to gain more credibility in the expert community. Some now agree historicity agnosticism is warranted, including Arthur Droge (professor of early Christianity at UCSD), Kurt Noll (associate professor of religion at Brandon University), and Thomas L. Thompson (renowned professor of theology, emeritus, at the University of Copenhagen). Others are even more certain historicity is doubtful, including Thomas Brodie (director emeritus of the Dominican Biblical Centre at the University of Limerick, Ireland), Robert Price (who has two Ph.D.’s from Drew University, in theology and New Testament studies), and myself (I have a Ph.D. in ancient history from Columbia University and have several peer reviewed articles on the subject). Still others, like Philip Davies (professor of biblical studies, emeritus, at the University of Sheffield), disagree with the hypothesis but admit it is respectable enough to deserve consideration.. 
  13. Raphael Lataster. IT'S OFFICIAL: WE CAN NOW DOUBT JESUS' HISTORICAL EXISTENCE. „Think”. 15 (43). s. 65–79. DOI: 10.1017/s1477175616000117. 
  14. Hector Avalos: Who was the historical Jesus?. „Ames Tribune”, Mar 2, 2013. GateHouse Media. [dostęp 2016-08-28]. Cytat: [Hector Avalos, professor of Religious Studies at Iowa State University] My own opinion, as an academic biblical scholar, is that there is not enough evidence to settle the question one way or the other. I am an agnostic about the existence of the historical Jesus. A main problem continues to be the lack of documentation from the time of Jesus to establish his existence definitively. Jesus is supposed to have lived around the year 30. But there is no mention of him anywhere in any actual document from his own time or from the entire first century.. 
  15. Tom Dykstra. Ehrman and Brodie on Whether Jesus Existed: A Cautionary Tale about the State of Biblical Scholarship. „The Journal of the Orthodox Center for the Advancement of Biblical Studies (JOCABS)”. 8 (1), s. 29, 2015. Cytat: As for the question of whether Jesus existed, the best answer is that any attempt to find a historical Jesus is a waste of time. It can’t be done, it explains nothing, and it proves nothing. [Vol. 8, No. 1 (2015)]. 
  16. Tom Dykstra: Jerome Murphy-O’Connor versus Thomas Brodie. Mandatory for Decent Human Life, 2014-07-20. [dostęp 2016-11-18]. Cytat: [Thomas L.] Brodie’s book doesn’t have to convince everyone. What it does accomplish is help establish that a serious scholar can indeed take a mythicist position. It helps show that mythicism is an intellectually viable position even if not universally convincing.
  17. Stevan L. Davies: Spirit Possession and the Origins of Chr. BARDIC Press, 2014-11-1, s. 4. ISBN 978-1-906834-19-7. Cytat: Mythicists have discovered problems in the supposed common-sense of historical Jesus theories that deserve to be taken seriously..
  18. Stephen Law: Stephen Law: EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS. Stephen Law, 2012-04-20. [dostęp 2016-11-18]. Cytat: [Published in Faith and Philosophy 2011. Volume 28, Issue 2, April 2011. Stephen Law. Pages 129-151] The vast majority of Biblical historians believe there is evidence sufficient to place Jesus’ existence beyond reasonable doubt. Many believe the New Testament documents alone suffice firmly to establish Jesus as an actual, historical figure. I question these views. In particular, I argue (i) that the three most popular criteria by which various non-miraculous New Testament claims made about Jesus are supposedly corroborated are not sufficient, either singly or jointly, to place his existence beyond reasonable doubt, and (ii) that a prima facie plausible principle concerning how evidence should be assessed – a principle I call the contamination principle – entails that, given the large proportion of uncorroborated miracle claims made about Jesus in the New Testament documents, we should, in the absence of independent evidence for an historical Jesus, remain sceptical about his existence.
  19. Richard Dawkins: The God Delusion. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008-01-16, s. 122. ISBN 0-547-34866-5. Cytat: It is even possible to mount a serious, though not widely supported, historical case that Jesus never lived at all, as has been done by, among others, Professor G. A. Wells of the University of London..
  20. "The End of Faith" (Faith Under Fire episode 1, season 1, aired October 2, 2004). Reported by WorldNetDaily.com ("Faith Under Fire hits TV screens: PAX series looks at religion, spirituality, morality"), EvangelicalNews.org (Randall Murphree, "Is God Republican Or Democrat? New PAX Series with Lee Strobel Debates Issues"), and IIDB.org (Richard Carrier debates William Lane Craig on "Faith Under Fire")
  21. Imdb cast listing
  22. Warren Allen Smith: Who's Who in Hell. Barricade Books, 2000, s. 186. ISBN 1-56980-158-4.
  23. Patricia Ward Biederman: Documentary Questions the Existence of Jesus. Los Angeles Times, 2005-08-20. [dostęp 2015-03-19].
  24. Richard Carrier: Coming Out Poly + A Change of Life Venue. Richard Carrier Blogs, 2015-02-18. [dostęp 2015-03-19].

Bibliografia edytuj