Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

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Let me continue to make my position clear that it was the Fall of the Jewish Temple of God c 70 CE that triggered the Jesus story which eventually became the basis of a New Religion.

Based on the writings of Josephus, Tacitus and Suetonius the Jews expected Jewish Messianic rulers sometime around the Jewish War against the Romans c 66-70 CE which was supposedly predicted in Hebrew Scripture.

This suggests that the Predicted Jewish Messianic ruler/rulers had not been revealed up to c 66-70 CE. Essentially, there was no Messianic ruler known to the Jews up to c 66-70 CE.

Apologetic writers for hundreds of years and after Josephus, Tacitus and Suetonius would confirm that the Jews did NOT acknowledge any Jewish Messianic ruler in the 1st century or at the time of Pilate.

The Dead Sea Scrolls also show that Jewish writings did not acknowledge an actual advent of a PREDICTED Jewish Messianic ruler.

1. All Jewish writings which appear to mention the story of Jesus are no earlier than the 2nd century.

2. All non-Apologetic writings which appear to mention the story of Jesus are no earlier than the 2nd century.

3. All recovered and dated manuscripts which appear to mention the story of Jesus are no earlier than the 2nd century.

4. All the Gospels in the NT are forgeries with Fake 1st century writers.

5. No 2nd century manuscripts of the Jesus story has been found in the Hebrew language.

6. No 2nd century manuscripts of the Jesus story was found in Galilee or Jerusalem.

7. Arguments AGAINST the Jesus story and cult are no earlier than the 2nd century.

8. Arguments BY CHRISTIANS about the NATURE of Jesus are NO earlier then the 2nd century.

The picture is quite clear.

The abundance of evidence overwhelmingly suggest that the Jesus story did not originate among the Jews and was unknown in Galilee and Jerusalem and was most likely initiated in the 2nd century.

The pattern of forgeries in the NT Canon is easy to detect.

1. All the supposed authors of the NT were either relatives of the unknown Jesus, hand-picked followers of the unknown Jesus or their acquaintances.

2. None of the authors of the NT has ever been located outside the NT and Apologetics.

3. Up to 180 CE, some Apologetic and non-Apologetic writers do not mention, acknowledge or do not associate Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, Peter, James and Jude with the direct composition of any specific Gospel or Epistle.

The more we examine the evidence it is quite clear that the NT and Jesus story is a product of the 2nd century and later.
 
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No it is often not true. But Paul didn't worship a dead Jesus and he didn't tell other people to worship a dead Jesus. That's because he wrongly believed that Jesus had come alive again. What I'm saying here is precisely that Paul's belief was NOT true, because personally I don't believe that Jesus came back to life.



But Paul was worshipping what he believed to be a dead, or spirit, Jesus. Because Paul never knew any living Jesus. And afaik, nor does he give any details of knowing anyone else that had ever known a living Jesus.
 
Let me continue to make my position clear <snip clarification of position already produced millions of times>
The more we examine the evidence it is quite clear that the NT and Jesus story is a product of the 2nd century and later.
Glad you stated that again. And Paul and all the other Epistles and Revelation. And they are conscious fictional compositions intended to deceive readers, for some unknown but presumably nefarious purpose, by unknown persons, by unknown means in an unknown place. Moreover, the century is not known. Late second, or early fourth. Who knows? Let alone cares, eh? Evidence, eh? Oh wait, there's no earlier NT manuscripts! Well, we've been through the earliest extant manuscripts thing, haven't we?

You believe your Hardouinesque hypothesis to be vastly more probable than the proposition that there is a historical person underlying some aspects of the gospel Jesus accounts. I believe it to be much less probable. Such a complex multi-layer literary phenomenon as the NT simply cannot be a forgery performed by weird miscreants working 150 or 280 years after the indicated date of the events. It's absurd.
 
But Paul was worshipping what he believed to be a dead, or spirit, Jesus. Because Paul never knew any living Jesus. And afaik, nor does he give any details of knowing anyone else that had ever known a living Jesus.
James the Lord's brother. Peter. John.
 
Let me continue to make my position clear that it was the Fall of the Jewish Temple of God c 70 CE that triggered the Jesus story which eventually became the basis of a New Religion.

...

Your position has been known for some time. That isn't the problem.

The problem is that you are the only one who doesn't know that your position is idiotic.

It's a bit sad really.
 
James the Lord's brother. Peter. John.

How illogical to use Bible characters as the corroborative evidence for Bible characters?

If we use Bible characters as evidence then God must exist because he raised the brother of the Apostle James from the dead.

If we use Bible characters as evidence then God must exist because Paul claimed Jesus the brother of the Apostle James was God's Son.

If we use Bible characters as evidence then Angels exist because Paul mentioned them.

If we use Bible characters as evidence then the Devil existed because Paul mentioned Satan.
 
So Paul's audience had never heard of James the Lord's Brother? When Paul talked about him was the first they knew of him?

Josephus didn't write about him?
 
Your position has been known for some time. That isn't the problem.

The problem is that you are the only one who doesn't know that your position is idiotic.

It's a bit sad really.

Your position is known to be a problem for a long time.

It is really sad.

You have no evidence for your unknown dead HJ.

Your unknown dead HJ has no known history in or out of Apologetics.
 
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Your position is known to be a problem for a long time.

It is really sad.

You have no evidence for your unknown dead HJ.

Your unknown dead HJ has no known history in or out of Apologetics.

He was alive for about 30 years or so before he became the dead Jesus that Paul mentions.

You have to be alive first, in order to become dead later.

How can there have been a dead Jesus, if there was no living Jesus?
 
Based on the writings of Josephus, Tacitus and Suetonius the Jews expected Jewish Messianic rulers sometime around the Jewish War against the Romans c 66-70 CE which was supposedly predicted in Hebrew Scripture.
Please reference the relevant passages. Show us where they specifically state that no messiah was expected prior to 66 CE.

This suggests that the Predicted Jewish Messianic ruler/rulers had not been revealed up to c 66-70 CE. Essentially, there was no Messianic ruler known to the Jews up to c 66-70 CE.
Show us the passages.

Apologetic writers for hundreds of years and after Josephus, Tacitus and Suetonius would confirm that the Jews did NOT acknowledge any Jewish Messianic ruler in the 1st century or at the time of Pilate.
Show us the passages.

The Dead Sea Scrolls also show that Jewish writings did not acknowledge an actual advent of a PREDICTED Jewish Messianic ruler.
Show us the passages.

1. All Jewish writings which appear to mention the story of Jesus are no earlier than the 2nd century.
And no texts of Joesphus' works, which you have cited to support your argument, are any older than the 13th Century. Thus we can conclude, using your logic, that Josephus was a 13th Century invention.

2. All non-Apologetic writings which appear to mention the story of Jesus are no earlier than the 2nd century.
Yet Tacitus mentions Nero's persecution of Christians. Where do you suppose those Christians came from?

3. All recovered and dated manuscripts which appear to mention the story of Jesus are no earlier than the 2nd century.
We've already covered this. There are many factors that explain this, including the early obscurity and slow initial growth of Christianity, the destruction of virtually all 1st Century records in Jerusalem as a result of the First Jewish-Roman War, and the rarity of ancient texts of any kind, even those which were highly regarded among scholars and historians.

4. All the Gospels in the NT are forgeries with Fake 1st century writers.
No, they aren't. They were written anonymously, and then attributed to certain early Christian figures by tradition. How can you cite Ehrman on the gospels and not be aware of this point? And again, the historicity if Jesus is not dependent upon the canonical gospels having been written by the authors to whom they came to be attributed. It's well know by biblical scholars who support the historicity of Jesus that the gospel authors were people who'd never met Jesus, never claimed to have met him or witnessed the events they describe. They were simply writing down stories that had come to them via years of oral tradition.

5. No 2nd century manuscripts of the Jesus story has been found in the Hebrew language.
Why would it be? Even many educated Jews wrote in Greek during this period.

6. No 2nd century manuscripts of the Jesus story was found in Galilee or Jerusalem.

7. Arguments AGAINST the Jesus story and cult are no earlier than the 2nd century.

8. Arguments BY CHRISTIANS about the NATURE of Jesus are NO earlier then the 2nd century.
You only think that because you have such a simplistic concept of history. You seem to think that history is some sort of perfect record, and that anything that ever happened is preserved for us. You seem to think that all we have to do to determine what happened in the distant past is to go look up the records, and if no record exists from that time period, then it cannot have actually happened. Of course, you only apply this reasoning to Christianity, otherwise you'd be dismissing a great many non-Christian writers as Medieval inventions.
 
How illogical to use Bible characters as the corroborative evidence for Bible characters?
If we use Bible characters as evidence then God must exist because he raised the brother of the Apostle James from the dead.
If we use Bible characters as evidence then God must exist because Paul claimed Jesus the brother of the Apostle James was God's Son.
If we use Bible characters as evidence then Angels exist because Paul mentioned them.
If we use Bible characters as evidence then the Devil existed because Paul mentioned Satan.
IanS stated that
Paul never knew any living Jesus. And afaik, nor does he give any details of knowing anyone else that had ever known a living Jesus.
So IanS was looking for details that Paul gave! Right? I wrote down what IanS wanted. Details given by Paul of anyone who had known a living Jesus. If you think information like that is not valid, take it up with IanS. It's the information he asked for.
 
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How illogical to use Bible characters as the corroborative evidence for Bible characters?

If we use Bible characters as evidence then God must exist because he raised the brother of the Apostle James from the dead.

If we use Bible characters as evidence then God must exist because Paul claimed Jesus the brother of the Apostle James was God's Son.

If we use Bible characters as evidence then Angels exist because Paul mentioned them.

If we use Bible characters as evidence then the Devil existed because Paul mentioned Satan.

Yeah...and if we use Bible characters as evidence then that means Pontius Pilate existed because ... oh, wait ...
 
He was alive for about 30 years or so before he became the dead Jesus that Paul mentions.

You have to be alive first, in order to become dead later.

How can there have been a dead Jesus, if there was no living Jesus?

You got your information about your Unknown dead Jesus from gLuke.


Your 30 year old dead Jesus got his life from a Ghost in gLuke.

You forgot that we know that the 30 year old Jesus was born of a Ghost in gLuke.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus is really Myth Jesus in gLuke.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus had NO human father.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus was the Son of God born of a Ghost.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus was plucked from a book of Myths.

Luke 3:23 KJV
And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed ) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli...

This is how your 30 year old dead Jesus got his "Life" .


Luke 1
30 And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God.

31 And, behold , thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. 32 He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David............34 Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be , seeing I know not a man?

35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
 
You got your information about your Unknown dead Jesus from gLuke.


Your 30 year old dead Jesus got his life from a Ghost in gLuke.

You forgot that we know that the 30 year old Jesus was born of a Ghost in gLuke.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus is really Myth Jesus in gLuke.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus had NO human father.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus was the Son of God born of a Ghost.

Your 30 year old dead Jesus was plucked from a book of Myths.

Luke 3:23 KJV

This is how your 30 year old dead Jesus got his "Life" .


Luke 1

Why do you believe the Bible?

Why do you take this rubbish at face value?

Why can't you see that these later traditions that were added to the story tell us very little, if anything, about the HJ?

Are you really unable to understand this very simple and basic point?
 
Yeah...and if we use Bible characters as evidence then that means Pontius Pilate existed because ... oh, wait ...

Pontius Pilate is found in the writings of Philo and Josephus--Not Paul and Jesus.

Paul and Jesus are found in Mythology--the Bible.
 
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