Talk:Lewis's trilemma

Mental health issues

I am troubled by the words "lunatic" and "madman". In the 19th century, and possibly still for Lewis, it was possible to say that someone who wrongly believed himself to be god was "mad", with madness as a broadly understood cliché of raving insanity. In fact, what we now know about mental illness and religious delusion would suggest that it would be perfectly possible for a person to have a belief in themselves as a divine messiah without being psychopathic. Look at Vissarion, for example; he doesn't seem like either a liar or a lunatic, but most of us would not agree that he is what he claims to be. He doesn't sound like a conman, so I would tip that he believes what he says, but his delusion is way short of "lunacy". I am not competent in mental illness, so I can't add this to the article, but perhaps somebody else can? --Doric Loon (talk) 22:10, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

Vissarion behaves like this? ---> Mark 9:19, Mark 11:15–16, Matthew 11:13–36 ? --Wikipek (talk) 05:22, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

R. A. Knox

The argument is developed at length by Monsignor Ronald Knox in his 1927 book The Belief of Catholics, an important work of Catholic apologetics in its time. It's only speculation on my part, but I wouldn't be surprised if Lewis was familiar with this and influenced by it. Metamagician3000 (talk) 01:37, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

Looking at the Wikipedia article on Knox, I see that there is actually a book of the two of them (Knox and Lewis) in conversation, with a title that suggests they were friends, so perhaps it would be useful to track this down and see whether it sheds any light. Metamagician3000 (talk) 01:44, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

I do not know ...

I do not know how to use a talk page or why I need to, but the descendant of the text being discussed here as currently written in July, 2023 seems mostly there to service someone's anti-Christian agenda. IF the text is somehow necessary it still does not belong in the intro. I in my attempt at removing the text said the following: There is no reason for this line at all in the intro of an article discussing Lewis' trilemma, it is 1) Irrelevant insofar as the article claims to be about Lewis' position 2) Only there because someone wants to sell their take on the question of whether or not Jesus Christ is God. 3) If needful in some strange world still positioned in the wrong place by being located in the intro of the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Uglylayout (talk • contribs) 02:40, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

@Uglylayout: thanks for bringing this discussion to the talk page. This is the place to discuss changes to the article.

The intro is supposed to be a summary of the rest of the article. The sentence you are objecting to is, I presume, an attempt to summarize the content in the sections titled "Cristian" and "Jesus' claims to divinity". If you would like to propose different text to do this job please do so here, where other editors can discuss it. Paul August ☎ 19:50, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

We don't have an anti-Christian agenda. We don't have a pro-Christian agenda, either. We do call a spade a spade, when WP:RS do it. Religious neutrality isn't persecution. tgeorgescu (talk) 05:10, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

If that's the case, then you should actually call a spade a spade. 2603:8081:7700:56D:F9ED:F779:E3F7:7D55 (talk) 03:27, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Did Jesus call himself God?

I know that most Christians believers believe that Jesus did claim he was God. But it is the mark of modern Bible scholarship that he didn't. If one is a mainstream Bible scholar, highly likely they will claim that. tgeorgescu (talk) 05:12, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

@Tgeorgescu: This source disagrees (see also here). Potatín5 (talk) 13:59, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

@Potatín5: Consensus isn't unanimity. See WP:RS/AC. E.g. Stevenson, Austin (2024). The Consciousness of the Historical Jesus: Historiography, Theology, and Metaphysics. T&T Clark Studies in Systematic Theology. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 26. ISBN 978-0-567-71440-4. Retrieved 23 February 2024. tgeorgescu (talk) 14:09, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

@Potatín5: Can you provide an appropriate quote from Bird's book supporting the point of view that Jesus claimed that he was god? If so then we might consider adding such as an example of a dissenting view. Paul August ☎ 15:12, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

@Paul August: E.g. Bird, Michael F. (2022). Jesus Among the Gods: Early Christology in the Greco-Roman World. Baylor University Press. p. 408. ISBN 978-1-4813-1675-0. Hence my overall thesis: Jesus is a Jewish deity of the Greco-Roman world. Jesus sits among the gods of antiquity, and he can sometimes be mistaken for a Hermes or a Serapis; but his likeness to more than any other is to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, at least as he was believed upon and worshipped by Christians in the Roman east in the first two centuries. Jesus is a Jewish Mediterranean deity, or Jesus is identifiable with the Jewish God as expressed in the forms and tropes of eastern Mediterranean religion. Jewish literature and religion are the primary coordinates for mapping the origins of Christology...

Note also that Austin Stevenson is a systematic theologian, not a biblical scholar, and many of the quotes there are from works that are now several decades old (e.g. Dunn's Christology in the Making dates to 1980). Other recent scholars who have reached the same conclusion as Michael Bird include Richard Bauckham[1], Ruben A. Bühner[2] and Brant Pitre[3]. Potatín5 (talk) 11:27, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

@Potatín5:: But this quote doesn't say anything about Jesus claiming to be God. What Bird is saying what Jesus was but nothing about what Jesus said. Paul August ☎ 12:58, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Bird's thesis is that Jesus was considered to be a pre-existent, divine figure alongside the Father within Jewish monotheism (high Christology) already during his own lifetime, and that this perception was in direct continuation with its Second Temple Jewish and Eastern Mediterranean religious and theological contexts. His point is not so much about arguing that Jesus claimed to be God as it is to argue that Jesus was already considered to be God during his own lifetime. Potatín5 (talk) 13:46, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Ok that's fine, but the question we are discussing here is whether he claimed to be God. Paul August ☎ 15:04, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Well, if Jesus and his disciples considered him to be God, that is not much different from the original question. Potatín5 (talk) 16:44, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Having a BA and MA in Theology in Germany, I have never perceived the kind of consensus you seem to perceive when you call denying Jesus' claims to divinity a hallmark of modern biblical scholarship. Maybe one can say that there is some controvery around the extent of the claims of the historical Jesus. As the text stands right now, it reads like muslim apologetics. 2003:F0:CF04:903D:5CF4:B731:151F:E825 (talk) 21:02, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Sources Unrelated to Lewis's Trilemma

There have been more than a few edits arguing the merits of Lewis's Trilemma with sources being added to back up those arguments, but the sources are not about the trilemma itself amount to original research. See WP:OR This article is not a place to debate Lewis's Trilemma, and content for or against it should reflect sources discussing Lewis's Trilemma directly. PeRshGo (talk) 13:53, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I agree that the article is not the place for Wikipedia to debate the soundness of the Trilemma. But it is, of course, the place to present—in a neutral way— the debate to be found in scholarly sources. Can you be specific as to where exactly you think we are doing the former rather than the latter? Paul August ☎ 14:44, 31 March 2024 (UTC)