medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Richard Landes wrote:

now let me ask you this, since it's been in the back of my mind as i read
your recommendations.  i have what i think is clear evidence that
ecclesiastical leaders (theologians, bishops, computists) engaged in a
systematic effort to "cook the books" on when the year 6000 was coming.
http://www.mille.org/people/rlpages/cchart.html
this is a multi-generational affair (goes on for over 600 years) and shows
an extraordinary consistency.  as long as 6000 is far away, everyone is
happy to invoke it as a way to tell people to be patient.  when it gets
close, however, an extraordinay consensus arises to switch dating systems
and make no mention of the earlier chronology when it hits its year
6000.  this happens twice (500 CE and 801 CE).  as paul freedman once said,
my devise should be: "6000: coincidence? i think not."

the standard response of my colleagues is to say, "nonsense, such
conspiracies of silence don't exist" and "are you saying that these good
people espoused a chronology because they were trying to manipulate popular
opinion and dampen apocalyptic excitation?"  yes i am.  and i have a
millennium-long pattern of evidence that no one has explained
otherwise.  but for some reason, medievalists seem virtually incapable of
imagining that there might be this kind of broad, self-interested, and
(certainly by the standards of those whom they were misleading) dishonest
consensus.  now i know these good clerics had all sorts of good and
responsible reasons for changing these chronologies as they approached the
year 6000, and that those who espoused them in earlier ages probably
believed them with a whole heart.  but that wholeheartedness was largely
because they wdn't have to deal with the consequences (much like computer
programers in the 1960s who created the y2k problem because it was easier
and they wdn't be around to deal with it when it happened).  i'm not
condemning them or accusing them of being inhuman.  but i'm also not ready
to say (as i've heard from numerous scholars), "they were probably changing
the dating systems out of a concern for accuracy."

is this case relevant to our discussion?

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Yes, it's relevant, but its an evidence question and you are much better informed on the evidence than I am on this issue.  So I can't be of much help.  My posts simply intended to make the point that one cannot prejudge out of suspicion and be fair to the people one is judging (nor can one pre-judge out of affinity and be fair).  Beyond that, one has to get one's hands dirty with the evidence.  But that's why it's so important that experts on this evidence like Richard Landes can be trusted by all the rest of us to be fair and not prejudge and not overinterpret evidence out of suspicion or affinity, since I and everyone else depend on his expertise on this body of evidence because we can't all examine all the evidence minutely.

So, I guess we have to trust each other to play fair with people from the past.