To claim Jesus the strictly human rabbi more likely did not exist remains a longer stretch than to claim he more likely did exist -- given the more plausible scenario that emerges from the slim data we have.
I wonder if anyone here who's trying to be "objective", but still feverishly maintaining this normal rabbi never existed, will ever answer the simple question "What does the available data indicate is the MORE LIKELY scenario?" And NO, I'm not asking for an answer with some sort of proof -- nothing like that is possible for about 50% of ancient history -- Get real! -- I'm asking for an honest reply as to which scenario seems the MORE LIKELY given the slim data we have.
Philological, stylistic, linguistic and stylometric******* analysis has yielded a high degree of likelihood (certainty is not found in the modern analysis of ancient history, since such up-to-date historiography deals responsibly in degrees of likelihood instead) that the earliest textual layer is comprised of the very few Jesus quotes in 1 Corinthians, the narrative references in 1 Corinthians and the other six authentic Paulines*, a lot but not all of the narrative material in the shorter Vaticanus/Sinaiticus version of GMark******** and the parallel sayings in GMatthew/GLuke (sometimes called "Q" for "Quelle" = source) -- plus maybe the Gospel of Thomas (although serious scholars are split on that). This earliest textual layer not only shows distinct earmarks of oral transmission, but is the layer on which the consensus of modern professional scholarship bases its historical Jesus model. Amplifying these earliest layers are key non-apologetic pieces of data in Josephus's Antiquities XX (not Antiqs. XVIII) and Tacitus's Annals.
The seven authentic Paulines do indeed make several references to Jesus as a real person, including direct references to areas where dishonest mythers claim complete silence: parentage**, life events***, ministry****, apostles***** and betrayal******.
Mythers also conflate the miracle man of the later textual layers in the New Testament with the strictly human rabbi found in its earliest textual layers -- and also in non-apologetics like Tacitus and in Josephus's "Antiquities", Chapter XX. Mythers evidently need an elementary primer on where the most up-to-date textual scholarship stands today among the professional peer-vetted academic researchers. That's not hard to find out. Go to any academic library, or go to the web sites of any secular institutions of higher learning.
What emerges from these earliest textual layers is a perfectly mundane biography. Jesus was a Jewish kid from Nazareth, whose family's livelihood was largely dependent on his father's wood-working business. Jesus learned the family craft but left home relatively young and joined John the Baptist's group, where he was baptized and adopted an outlook that was initially largely apocalyptic. But when John was executed, Jesus changed the focus of the group somewhat, becoming an itinerant rabbi himself and teaching by sayings and parables. His teaching folded in certain notions like the last shall be first and giving up one's life for others as part of the message. He was also a folk healer who was perhaps a bit luckier than most, possibly because he was a bit better read than most, although still an autodidact, more likely.
The followers he accrued were probably attracted to him because his notions of no one deserving ostracism of any kind seemed pretty genuine. He was not impeccable in this respect; it took a while for him to accept those outside what passed for Israel at the time. But there seem to be glimmerings of a more pluralist approach as we move toward his execution. In fact, in many respects, the gulf between the outlook of society around him versus his own increasingly egalitarian one grew so wide by the time he was arrested that it is arguable that that gulf may be among the very largest for any cultural/social reformer throughout human history. Purely in terms of such a gulf with one's contemporaries, only the experiences of Gotama and Socrates seem comparable. Hence the strong retrospective notoriety that has developed for all three.
Jesus does seem to have been a party man, unlike John the Baptist. I have a feeling he would probably have been very accessible and affable, but his immediate disciples always worried (not without cause) about his spreading himself too thin. They were probably very protective of him, and even though one might have found him easy to talk to at a party, one or two of his handlers would probably have whisked him away after a few minutes. He frequently over-extended himself, and sometimes a whole day would go by with him totally alone to compensate.
He internalized strongly a distinct strain of antipathy in Hebrew culture and various founding texts in Judaica toward much in the credit/debt world. On the one hand, we have certain notions in those founding texts such as the Jubilee and forgiveness of debt, etc., while on the other, Jesus seems to have internalized these themes in the founding texts in his confronting this whole moneyed class at the Temple.
After the confrontation, he realized that his days were now numbered, and he arranged a commemorative meal with his disciples -- perhaps choosing a meal as a way to remember him by because he himself had been so active in feeding and healing the poor?
The brouhaha that resulted from the ruckus in the Temple got the implacable Pilate's attention, not because he had any concern about the functioning of the Temple as such but because any disturbance at all didn't fit the rigid decorum he ruthlessly maintained throughout the region. While the makers and shakers in upper-class Jewish society did not lift a finger to prevent Jesus's execution (many were simply terrified of Pilate and his record number of crucifixions), the execution was still conceived, initiated, pursued, carried out (right outside Jerusalem) and concluded entirely by the Roman occupation under Tiberius.
Jesus was not the strongest guy physically, and a few hours on the cross was all it took to kill him. His body disappeared, as did most of those who were crucified.
End of story.
Intrusive magic accounts of stuff like the virgin birth, or most of the miracles*********, or the physical post-resurrection appearances, etc., all show later stylistic earmarks and don't appear to come at all from the same early textual layers used for the professional historical model outlined above. However -- typically -- it is the later layers that Jesus mythers, in their ignorance of the latest textual analysis, always latch on to show that "Jesus never existed". Well, duh. The magic man who turns water into wine, or is born of a virgin(!), etc., etc., probably never existed, yeah. And that has diddly-squat to do with the itinerant rabbi who was a vulnerable human being and got nailed up by the Romans and has ended up being studied in greater depth by serious secular researchers today. Such a social outcast would naturally show up in relatively few non-apologetic accounts. That's no surprise. And if he started a following, it's completely typical of such a figure that we might find more material on him from his followers than from non-apologetic writers. Still, there remain those few non-apologetic references to this guy cited above, sometimes distinctly unsympathetic, and they in fact confirm the powerless human rabbi duly found in the earliest textual layering deduced by modern textual analysis. So that's why Jesus is so obscure. Again, duh.
The miracle claims made for Jesus in the later textual layers are extravagant, yes, and their probable a-historicity are indeed confirmed by the paucity of any such claims in the non-apologetic materials. But there's nothing extravagant or out of the ordinary in a mundane human troublemaker who was nailed up by a militaristic occupation. Nor are such mundane details missing in the non-apologetics. Different strands of modern historical inquiry all converge on the likelihood of such a mundane figure. It's not just one line of research that does this. They also put any kind of miracle worker in considerable doubt.
What does all that data suggest is the MORE LIKELY less implausible scenario? Don't fixate on this document or that document. Assess the documentary field as a whole. That's what the professionals do. And they have painstakingly developed an historical model despite a lot of strenuous unhelpful pushback from fundies: Jesus was strictly human, a clearly historical figure -- and without a whiff of magic about him. Duh.
Thoughts?
Stone
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* First Thessalonians (ca. 51 AD)
Philippians (ca. 52–54 AD)
Philemon (ca. 52–54 AD)
First Corinthians (ca. 53–54 AD)
Galatians (ca. 55 AD)
Second Corinthians (ca. 55–56 AD)
Romans (ca. 55–58 AD)
** Galatians 4:4
born of a woman, born under law
Romans 1:3
who as to his human nature was a descendant of David
Galatians 1:19
I saw none of the other apostles—only James, the Lord's brother.
1 Corinthians 9:5
Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?
*** Phillipians 2:7
but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death — even death on a cross!
1 Corinthians 2:8
None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
1 Thessalonians 2:15
who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out.
1 Corinthians 15:3
that he was buried
**** 1 Corinthians 7:10
To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord): A wife must not separate from her husband.
1 Corinthians 9:14
In the same way, the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel.
***** Galatians 1:18
Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to get acquainted with Peter and stayed with him fifteen days.
1 Corinthians 9:5
Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?
****** 1 Corinthians 11:23
The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread,
24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me."
25
In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the
new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in
remembrance of me."
******* the sort of analysis that outed Joe Klein as the author of a politics book some years back
******** The Gospel of Mark is in several versions: the most reliable are the Sinaiticus and Vaticanus mss.
********* Most of the miracles are in the later layers, but a handful are in the earlier ones, and those earlier ones are exclusively healings, suggesting that Jesus the human rabbi was actually a pretty good healer whose prowess simply got exaggerated
