Was there a historical Jesus at all?

[I Ratant]

Would it be expected the Hebrews would take up a Roman (oppressor) figure as something of value?
A loony-tune cult though, protesting against the man... the ruling elite in Israel.. might.
Hmm.. mayhap.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

The hebrews in Judaea never too Jesus too seriously either. And I doubt that Mark was writing for their benefit anyway, since he was writing in Greek. And obviously wasn't from Judaea anyway, seeing how he mangles its geography. Likely (IMHO) the whole midrash is written by a Greek christian for the benefit of a Greek christian community. If there were any Hebrews among them, obviously they were helenized ones in exile which were equally out of touch with the actual place, or they wouldn't have swallowed the story.

 

[bluskool]

We know that at least part of it is made up.
We don't know what and to what extent.

It's not reliable (on that particular subject) and, even if it was, it does not bring any new information (Jesus preached, was a nice guy, got executed, we know that already).

It doesn't matter if it tells anything about Jesus. It only matters if it is a reliable testimony to his existence which is the question at hand. You say it is not reliable and I am asking why. It is obvious that some of the one passage was made up, but I don't think there is any reason to think the whole passage was made up. I just can't imagine a Xtian scribe saying "hmmm, Josephus never mentions Jesus, so I think I'll go ahead and add a passage here so that future historians will have a non-xtian source for Jesus's existence." It seems more plausible to me that a scribe was copying
Josephus, got to the passage on Jesus and decided to alter it to reflect a Xtian message.

So, there is not much reason to keep it outside of apologetists wanting an non-Christian source to bolster their belief in Jesus' historicity...

I don't think it bodes well for the apologist that Xtian scribes were altering Josephus. An apologist might mention it when rattling off a list non-Xtian sources, but like you said, this source tells us nothing accept that Jesus existed and was killed. The apologist is going to be hard pressed to turn that into support for his faith.

Yeah, as I said, it's not about Jesus, it's about Christian with a short reference to their belief.
It's also a mistake, Pilate was prefect. It is sometime considered doubtful that Tacitus would make such an error. That, and the fact that nobody refers to this passage until a few centuries also suggests that it might be a later addition...

Making a mistake seems more plausible considering the fact that, at the time, procurators were in control of Judea and the fact that the rest of the passage doesn't speak favorably of Xtians.

It also comes from the Christian tradition, Tacitus did not go there and investigate, his source has to be Christian traditions.

How can that be certain? It could be the case that Tacitus just knew that the Xtians worshiped some guy that Pilot executed. There is no a priori reason for saying that Tacitus must have gotten that information from Xtians.

 

[Trent Wray]

.
Do NOT go into your bathroom, close the door, look in the mirror, and say "Bloody Mary" three times!
You have been warned!

Bloody Mary! Bloody Mary! Bloody Mar ....

 

[Darat]

It doesn't matter if it tells anything about Jesus. It only matters if it is a reliable testimony to his existence which is the question at hand. You say it is not reliable and I am asking why. It is obvious that some of the one passage was made up, but I don't think there is any reason to think the whole passage was made up. I just can't imagine a Xtian scribe saying "hmmm, Josephus never mentions Jesus, so I think I'll go ahead and add a passage here so that future historians will have a non-xtian source for Jesus's existence." It seems more plausible to me that a scribe was copying Josephus, got to the passage on Jesus and decided to alter it to reflect a Xtian message....snip...

Or got to something he interpreted as being about Jesus and "clarified" it, we know many religious folks do that today. (Not singling out religious folk for doing this it's just they are the group we are talking about.)

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I just don't see the Caesar analogy so much, but the movie, "The God Who Wasn't There," which lays out a good case for no historical Jesus included an hypothesis that Jesus has all the standard hero qualities as many 'gods' that came before him.

The Jesus of the Gospels bears a striking resemblance to other ancient heroes and the figureheads of pagan savior cults

They list about 20 such qualities in the movie.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Or got to something he interpreted as being about Jesus and "clarified" it, we know many religious folks do that today. (Not singling out religious folk for doing this it's just they are the group we are talking about.)

The almost total lack of anything which supports the Jesus story in other historical records is pretty damning. Taken together with the fact the Josephus passage in question is awkward and seems out of place, supports that this passage was faked.

 

[D'rok]

That said, as I was saying, I'm not saying that Julius Caesar _is_ Jesus Christ. While the authors seem to go for basically "it was just distortions in an oral story" slant, I'm not particularly buying that. But it seems to me very possible that someone constructed their Jesus midrash starting from the structure of Caesar's story. It's a powerful story of the hero coming against all odds as the saviour, being betrayed and apparently defeated, then ultimately winning even from beyond the grave. It's not the worst starting point, if you want to do a quick job of inventing the biography of another messiah who won even from beyond the grave.

Well, personally I think it was fiction to begin with, but perhaps it was inspired by the story of Julius Ceasar. I would also put forth the story of Socrates as a possible source of inspiration, as well as some stories from Greek and Egyptian mythology -- if similarity is a method of showing influence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces

The similarities are neither surprising nor indicative of influence. One size really does fit all.

 

[Darth Rotor]

If there were any Hebrews among them, obviously they were helenized ones in exile which were equally out of touch with the actual place, or they wouldn't have swallowed the story.

Right.

No true Jew ... is that the argument here?

If I recall correctly, the Jews were pretty good about quarreling with one another, from older accounts to roughly time of Jesus, so I find allusions to "Hellenized Jews" being "not real Jews" difficult to buy.

One of the wonderful things that the Christians had passed down to them from their Jewish theological and social ancestors was the joy of arguing with one another, over pretty much everything. Early Church, Constantine's era, Greek/Roman church, Roman/Lutheran, Roman/England, Avignon/Rome, down to the present time.

Whatever Jesus the wandering rabbi may have taught, the argumentative character of his early followers has become immortal: it lives to this day.

DR

 

[Madalch]

.
Do NOT go into your bathroom, close the door, look in the mirror, and say "Bloody Mary" three times!
You have been warned!

DO NOT go into a bar, look at the bartender, and say, "Bloody Mary" three times!

You will get some alcohol that has been contaminated with some revolting tomato-based liquid.

 

[Darth Rotor]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces

The similarities are neither surprising nor indicative of influence. One size really does fit all.

Which segues nicely into a condom brand advertising campaign ...

Ceasar Condoms: One size fits all, trimmed or untrimmed

 

[Foster Zygote]

Caesar was a general; Jesus mostly preached peace.
Caesar was well-born; Jesus came from humble origins.
Caesar was the most powerful man in his time; Jesus was poor.
Caesar had mad booty; Jesus is not remembered to get lucky even a single time...
Caesar rules alone and share his power with no one; Jesus had a bunch of followers and lived in communism with them.
Caesar died old and sick; Jesus was 33.
Caesar's death tore the empire into a civil war; Nobody seemed to notice Jesus' death until the 2nd century CE.


If you have two narratives big and detailed enough to include enough details, it almost is a given that some of these details will coincide by sheer accident.
Cherry picking these details can often lead to a mistaken impression... that's where conspiracy theries come from.


ETA: I only wrote about the theory presented in the OP here, I don't know if the OP wants to get into the more general question of "Did Jesus exists?".

Spot on post.

 

[D'rok]

Which segues nicely into a condom brand advertising campaign ...

Ceasar Condoms: One size fits all, trimmed or untrimmed

Speak for yourself pal. It's only Magnums around here.

 

[Bikewer]

Most all the early-Christianity authorities, even the skeptical ones like Ehrman, seem to think that Jesus was a real person; likely an apocalyptic rabbi.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Right.

No true Jew ... is that the argument here?

Nope. Just saying that

A) if your target audience is the Jews in Judaea, you'd write in Hebrew not Greek. Same, as, you know, if you want to preach a story to the Americans you'd do it in English not in Russian.

B) someone from the actual province of Judaea would be more likely to know that their province isn't bordered by that river. Basically same as if I told someone a story as true where someone crosses the Mississippi from Iowa directly to Washington DC, I might have a harder time convincing an actual inhabitant of Washington DC that that story is true.

Basically spare me the knee-jerk No True Scottsman reference, I'm not talking about habits or practices, I'm talking about objective stuff like language and the geography of the place.

 

[Darth Rotor]

Nope. Just saying that

A) if your target audience is the Jews in Judaea, you'd write in Hebrew not Greek. Same, as, you know, if you want to preach a story to the Americans you'd do it in English not in Russian.

B) someone from the actual province of Judaea would be more likely to know that their province isn't bordered by that river. Basically same as if I told someone a story as true where someone crosses the Mississippi from Iowa directly to Washington DC, I might have a harder time convincing an actual inhabitant of Washington DC that that story is true.

Thank you.

Regarding your title, I, like Bikewer, I find Ehrman more credible than you.

DR

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

So, an appeal to authority? Not sure what the point was either, since I wasn't going for a popularity contest vs Ehrman.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces

The similarities are neither surprising nor indicative of influence. One size really does fit all.

Yes, I'm very familiar with the monomyth actually. But what is claimed on that site goes a bit beyond that. There are a ton of similar names, of events that happen in the same order, use of verbs and phrasings that suggest something very different from the standard image of the passion, etc.

Basically, let's put it like this. Let's say I write a novel about a guy called Fridi Sackins who got a neclace from his uncle Cilco Sackins and has to take it to Mount Murder to destroy it. And incidentally his friends Jollyadoc and Samsmart accompany him. And they fight their way through a mine, and whatnot on their way.

I'm guessing at some point you'd say I plagiarized LOTR, rather than merely "it's just the same monomyth structure."

That, in essence, is the take of that book. The similarities are way past the point of being merely the same monomyth.

Mind you, I'm not necessarily saying they're right. It's just an interesting hypothesis, as far as I'm concerned. And it's not like we have a shortage of hypotheses on the topic that proved to be dubious or outright loony, so, who knows, we might just have another Dan Brown on our hands. But, just saying, it's a bit more complex than that.

 

[aggle-rithm]

But if enough elements are confused, embelished, or outright invented starting from another myth, is it still a "historical Jesus" or is it on par with "historical Dorothy from The Wizard Of Oz", as Rasmus so aptly puts it?

And, really, that is in fact the more important question: are there _any_ elements in there which are actually true? Which of them? And how would you know, much less get so sure that you have no reason to doubt?

For the same reason I don't doubt when someone tells me they own a dog. The Gospels tell the story of a rabbi named Jesus who came from Nazareth and had some followers. This is in no way an extraordinary claim given the fact that "Yeshua" was a common name in Palestine and there were lots of rabbis with lots of followers.

The fact that he came from Nazareth raises some difficulty for Gospel writers, since the Messiah was supposed to come from Judeah. They fixed this by inventing two Nativity stories that explained away this inconsistency (although they are unfortunately not consistent with each other).

If someone just made up the whole thing, then why would they bother creating this difficulty? Why not just say he was from Bethlehem to begin with?

 

[Minarvia]

.
Do NOT go into your bathroom, close the door, look in the mirror, and say "Bloody Mary" three times!
You have been warned!

No, no, no! It's "I don't believe in Mary Worth!" I'll be proven correct when TrentWray posts again later...

Now, "Candyman" five times...that may be true.