tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8637125351921336084.post2734691050735379635..comments2024-03-19T00:26:30.753-07:00Comments on The Jesus Blog: Perceiving the Past in the Present - Le DonneAnthony Le Donnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01282792648606976883noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8637125351921336084.post-43863127727149565622013-09-10T07:52:28.112-07:002013-09-10T07:52:28.112-07:00indeed!indeed!Anthony Le Donnehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01282792648606976883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8637125351921336084.post-61151231773026720882013-09-09T04:50:48.474-07:002013-09-09T04:50:48.474-07:00Your correction is incorrect. Instead of "eit...Your correction is incorrect. Instead of "either that or", you can safely substitute "and"!Larryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08976868079076669453noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8637125351921336084.post-65015250161310979142013-09-09T00:19:36.927-07:002013-09-09T00:19:36.927-07:00*either that**either that*Anthony Le Donnehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01282792648606976883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8637125351921336084.post-37771849837036911152013-09-09T00:18:53.578-07:002013-09-09T00:18:53.578-07:00Larry, this topic obviously deserves a better venu...Larry, this topic obviously deserves a better venue than a blog post. Perhaps a full-length book would be a better place to provide a more detailed answer... As luck would have it, I have written such a book:<br /><br />The Historiographical Jesus: Memory, Typology, and the Son of David<br /><br />All kidding aside, I think you might enjoy it. Either than or it'll drive you crazy.<br /><br />-anthonyAnthony Le Donnehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01282792648606976883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8637125351921336084.post-32992568488996349912013-09-08T23:29:59.230-07:002013-09-08T23:29:59.230-07:00Anthony, you are saying two things. It is hard to ...Anthony, you are saying two things. It is hard to respond, because the response turns radically on which of these two things I respond to.<br /><br />You balked when I suggested that “there is no actual past”. You suggested instead that the problem is access to the actual past, that we cannot access the actual past because it only “existed” in its moment of being present and that moment is gone when its presence is past. So, you might have accepted it if I’d said instead that “the actual past is no more”. If the only problem with the actual past is the lack of direct access to it, then arguably we’re dealing with a limited problem, and a problem I think that every decent historian would acknowledge. The actual past is “out there”, and we strive to achieve the closest convergence we can imagine between the history we construct and that actual past.<br /><br />But you also said that “what actually happened” was a memory event from the start. That’s VERY much like saying that “there is no actual past” and never was. That’s a more radical statement, and FWIW, this statement is closer to the way I see it. The goal of the historian is then to understand the stories we tell about the past … or to find ways to tell the story better (what you called “a more compelling story”). <br /><br />A problem with this second construction is that it becomes difficult to imagine history as separate from memory – and here, I don’t mean that history begins as a memory event, but instead that there’s no seeming conceptual difference between history as practiced and history as it should be practiced, or between “good” or “accurate” history and history as most commonly accepted. This follows from what you said about what is forgotten not being history. Following this logic, what is remembered by very few is shaky history, and what is remembered en masse is solid history. Following this logic, there is no history (or “good” or “accurate” history) that is separable from the time or cultural context in which it is created. There are implications to this, not all of which I’m willing to accept, one of which is the radical relative subjectivity of historical truth.<br /><br />But back to basics. I cannot follow this conversation if both “the past existed” and “what actually happened” was a memory event from the start.Larryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08976868079076669453noreply@blogger.com