Nailed: Ten Christian Myths that show Jesus never existed

[tsig]

I know I pulled my 60% out of my ass, since it was simply a way to illustrate my leaning towards one side more than the other. I never claimed otherwise.

Pulling numbers of out one's behind to prove something is rather pathetic.

Hummm....

 

[Brainache]

Let me first extend a very heartfelt thank you. This is what I feel to be a substantive reply on your part and I do very much appreciate it.


No, I do not just read answers to me alone; I tend to pay a bit more attention to people with whom I'm having a direct conversation with. Not always, though, but I do try. I did watch those videos that you posted and that pakeha thoughtfully re-posted upon my request (not implying that you wouldn't have, upon my polite request).

I didn't find them persuasive either, I'm afraid.

OK. No worries really, but it definitely isn't the first time I've said all that.

Like I said, different people find different things persuasive on this subject, I'm not trying to force my views on anyone.

 

[Brainache]

Hummm....

What was Belz trying to "prove" with his 60%?

Was it just an indicator of his personal opinion, or was it supposed to be a rigorous statistical proof?

 

[davefoc]

What was Belz trying to "prove" with his 60%?

Was it just an indicator of his personal opinion, or was it supposed to be a rigorous statistical proof?

Exactly, what tsig seems to have seen as a contradiction isn't. Belz did not offer the 60% figure as more than an estimate of the strength of his personal belief. He didn't use it as part of a proof of anything.

 

[dejudge]

I used the method of agreeing with the Academy.

I am not an expert and I don't consider myself qualified to dismiss an entire academic discipline just because its conclusions are inconvenient for my Atheist world-view.

Why do you feel qualified to do that?

That is strange. I asked you how you got your 90% figure and now you tell me it is based on THE APPEAL TO AUTHORITY.

But, you dismiss Richard Carrier, Earl Doherty, Robert Price and others who argue for a mythological Jesus.

How come you are conveniently qualified to dismiss the entire academic discipline that argue for a mythological Jesus?

Now, how did you come up with your 90% figure? What method did you use?

 

[dejudge]

Exactly, what tsig seems to have seen as a contradiction isn't. Belz did not offer the 60% figure as more than an estimate of the strength of his personal belief. He didn't use it as part of a proof of anything.

He got IT from the air?

Belz has already screamed out in rather bold writing that HE NEVER CLAIMED TO HAVE EVIDENCE FOR HJ.

Belz have also admitted that everyone agrees the evidence is TERRIBLE and that it is very weak.

Nothing has changed---The HJ argument is essentially dead--no supporting evidence.

 

[Brainache]

That is strange. I asked you how you got your 90% figure and now you tell me it is based on THE APPEAL TO AUTHORITY.

But, you dismiss Richard Carrier, Earl Doherty, Robert Price and others who argue for a mythological Jesus.

How come you are conveniently qualified to dismiss the entire academic discipline that argue for a mythological Jesus?

Now, how did you come up with your 90% figure? What method did you use?

Richard Carrier, Earl Doherty, Robert Price are three people. That is not an Academic Consensus.

Why don't you know this?

 

[dejudge]

Richard Carrier, Earl Doherty, Robert Price are three people. That is not an Academic Consensus.

Why don't you know this?

The guy who claimed HJ was a Zealot is NOT an Academic Consensus.

The Guy who claimed Jesus was an Apocalyptic is NOT an Academic Consensus.

The guy who claimed Jesus was a Rabble Rouser is NOT an Academic Consensus.

This is the Academic Consensus--there is little or no evidence for an historical Jesus and accounts of Jesus in the NT are riddled with discrepancies, historical problems and events that could NOT have happened.

An Academic Consensus is where virtually all parties for and against an HJ agree on any matter.

See Bart Ehrman's Did Jesus Exist?" page 182 to see the Academic Consensus on the accounts of Jesus in the NT.

 

[Brainache]

The guy who claimed HJ was a Zealot is NOT an Academic Consensus.

The Guy who claimed Jesus was an Apocalyptic is NOT an Academic Consensus.

The guy who claimed Jesus was a Rabble Rouser is NOT an Academic Consensus.

This is the Academic Consensus--there is little or no evidence for an historical Jesus and accounts of Jesus in the NT are riddled with discrepancies, historical problems and events that could NOT have happened.

An Academic Consensus is where virtually all parties for and against an HJ agree on any matter.

See Bart Ehrman's Did Jesus Exist?" page 182 to see the Academic Consensus on the accounts of Jesus in the NT.

Yes. We have all been aware of this for decades now. that is why nobody except you accepts the NT writings at face-value.

 

[dejudge]

Yes. We have all been aware of this for decades now. that is why nobody except you accepts the NT writings at face-value.

You are the one who took the NT at face value giving the impression that James the Lord's brother was James in Josephus AJ 20,9.1

It turned out that your face value reading of the NT was completely destroyed by Christian writers themselves.

1. James the Lord's brother was alive c67-68 CE according to the Rufinus Recognitions.

2. James the Lord's brother was NOT the brother of Jesus by birth according to Chrysostom.

3. James the Lord's brother was NOT the brother of Jesus according to Jerome's De Viris Illustribus.

Let me warn you again--do not take the NT at face value--it is riddled with historical problems, discrepancies and events that could not have happened.

Now, again, how did you come up with your 90% minimum HJ??

 

[David Mo]

None of that is in any way actual evidence of a living Jesus though is it.
(…)And the fact that Paul may have said something about women in the church, is again no sort of evidence at all that Paul knew anything about anyone called Jesus. Is it!

Of course, for I hadn’t put those examples in order to show any evidence about Jesus’ existence, but about the method of extracting some valid points from suspicious testimonies. Neither had I spoke of the "messianic secret" because I believe in it. Nor do I believe in resurrections or talks from the cross. Reassurance: I do not believe in angels, miracles, prophecies or that Jesus was the smartest and the very holy son of God. I had mentioned here the "messianic secret" because it is an indirect way to understand some trend of early Christianity. You continue confusing to believe in what says someone and infer something from what someone says. And they are very different things.

That is completely different from figures like Caesar or Pythagoras whose existence is relatively unimportant, and where the importance lies entirely in the philosophical ideas, the buildings and the legal systems etc. which they left behind.

That’s why I said many times earlier in these threads - Jesus is not at all like Caesar or Pythagoras (or Kim Jong il or whoever), but far more like all the other gods and deity’s who are the foundation of every religion ever known.

You are right; the case of Jesus is not like Caesar or Pythagoras… in some aspects. But it is also different from Zeus or Quetzalcoatl... in some aspects. I would say it is more similar to Zarathustra or Buddha. But I'm not interested now in analyze one by one these differences and similarities. I am trying to determine the debate on Jesus' death as indication of his existence. If you want dismiss all the other evangelic accounts this is not my problem here.

But where I do think you are most definitely wrong in your above quote is where you appear to be saying that so-called "mythicists" must produce an alternative theory to convince you that Jesus was myth, otherwise you do not accept that idea of Jesus as myth. (…) I mean this is known to be a dishonest demand from years of legal experience in courts) to insist that so-called “mythers” must produce a specific myth theory to counter any claims of a historical Jesus.

On the contrary, anyone who is sceptical about claims of a HJ, has no obligation at all beyond pointing out that the claimed evidence for Jesus is weak to the point of being non-existent.

We are not in a courtroom so I'm not concerned by your accusation of intellectual dishonesty.
Jesus' existence is a case of tertium non datur, that is to say either Jesus is an historical character mythologized or he never existed and was invented (a total myth) by early Christians. We must decide A or B. There is no alternative. I find more unlikely B, so I am inclined to think A. It is logical.


NOTA BENE:
I asked you a question and I am very interested in your answer. Really!

What is a 'genuine' historian? Is a Marxist historian a 'genuine' historian?

Thank you.

 

[Belz...]

Hummm....

And once again you prove that you do not read the posts that are made in the thread. Go back to the two posts that you quoted, and read them carefully this time.

Sheesh, when I made the second one I thought "Oh, maybe someone could think the 60% figure falls into that category.... bah, of course not. Nobody could be that obtuse."

No, I'll make it easy for you:

Pulling numbers of out one's behind to prove something is rather pathetic.

That's what I wasn't doing.

Maybe in the future you'd like to actually engage people in discussion rather than lamely attempt to score imaginary points in a game only you are playing.

 

[Belz...]

What was Belz trying to "prove" with his 60%?

Was it just an indicator of his personal opinion, or was it supposed to be a rigorous statistical proof?

Exactly, what tsig seems to have seen as a contradiction isn't. Belz did not offer the 60% figure as more than an estimate of the strength of his personal belief. He didn't use it as part of a proof of anything.

Thank you. At least some people are making an effort to read and interpret posts correctly.

 

[maximara]

Well I was asking Ian but... can I understand that your stance is that the bare minimum level of evidence to consider a historical character is real is contemporary confirmation ?

In this case yes as we know from Josephus that there were a lot of would be messiahs and we would need to show that this story is not simply an elaboration on one of those.

But we don't even have derivative evidence ie evidence that is known to use contemporary record-evidence that has since been lost. All we have are alleged eyewitness accounts written down sometime between 70 - 130 CE and an guy 20 years after the supposed events rambling about the Jesus in his head.

Even at the lowest level of comparative evidence (Evidence that gives details that can be checked against known factors of the time) the Jesus story is a total bust. You either have events that are NOT verified by any other source (even the other Gospels) such as Herod's slaughter of innocents or the events are at odds with how we know things have worked -- such the two trials, Pontius Pilate's behavior regarding Jesus, how the body of Jesus was handled, and the supposed aftermath.

 

[Belz...]

In this case yes as we know from Josephus that there were a lot of would be messiahs and we would need to show that this story is not simply an elaboration on one of those.

Isn't that the whole scenario of HJ, namely that the story is an elaboration on one of those ?

But we don't even have derivative evidence ie evidence that is known to use contemporary record-evidence that has since been lost. All we have are alleged eyewitness accounts written down sometime between 70 - 130 CE and an guy 20 years after the supposed events rambling about the Jesus in his head.

Yes, and those are definitely not eyewitness accounts. Even Luke begins by admitting as much.

Even at the lowest level of comparative evidence (Evidence that gives details that can be checked against known factors of the time) the Jesus story is a total bust. You either have events that are NOT verified by any other source (even the other Gospels) such as Herod's slaughter of innocents or the events are at odds with how we know things have worked -- such the two trials, Pontius Pilate's behavior regarding Jesus, how the body of Jesus was handled, and the supposed aftermath.

Ok. Could you confirm or deny that this line of reasoning also applies to many other historical figures (no contemporary or first-hand literature) ?

 

[dejudge]

Can anyone confirm or deny that Romulus the myth founder of Rome had no contemporary or first-hand literature?

 

[Brainache]

Can anyone confirm or deny that Romulus the myth founder of Rome had no contemporary or first-hand literature?

I can confirm that is irrelevant to this question.

 

[dejudge]

I can confirm that is irrelevant to this question.

You can do no such thing.

You confirm that you have very little knowledge that mythological figures have far less written about them than Jesus, the Son of God born of a Ghost and God Creator without a human father.

You cannot ignore the abundance of evidence of mythology for Jesus of Nazareth in hundreds of manuscripts, Codices and Apologetic writings.

 

[Brainache]

You can do no such thing.

You confirm that you have very little knowledge that mythological figures have far less written about them than Jesus, the Son of God born of a Ghost and God Creator without a human father.

You cannot ignore the abundance of evidence of mythology for Jesus of Nazareth in hundreds of manuscripts, Codices and Apologetic writings.

Why not?

Who says?

 

[IanS]

NOTA BENE:
I asked you a question and I am very interested in your answer. Really!

Thank you.

By "genuine historian" I mean any university lecturer and researcher, with a least a doctorate in mainstream history, and who works in a mainstream history department studying and researching in mainstream history. Not someone who's qualifications are in bible-studies and similar religious issues, who teaches in a bible-studies department or similar religiously oriented department of a university or religious institute or theological seminary.

And by "mainstream history" I mean any academic areas of history, ancient or modern, which are of interest to non-biblical non-religiously interested historians, such that the work is typically published in journals and as papers that are not specifically or mainly of interest to religion and religiously interested people (whether academics such as bible studies teachers and theologians, religious hierarchy such as senior bishops, the Pope, and other church officials, and religious people in general such as devout Christians interested in what bible-studies teachers write and say about the historicity of Jesus and veracity or otherwise of the bible).

IOW - the sort of academics who are employed in university history departments. And not the sort of people employed in bible-studies departments or religious wings of history departments or theological institutes.

Example - people like Bart Ehrman, who calls himself a historian, is actually a bible studies scholar, because all his qualifications are in bible studies, theology and other religious issues, and he teaches bible studies in a university bible studies department (not in any mainstream history department). In contrast, university lecturers who teach and research, for example, the history of Roman emperors and their lives, conquests & politics etc., in the history departments at Oxford, Cambridge and London universities, are “genuine mainstream historians” … afaik there is nothing to stop any of those "genuine historians" researching and publishing papers about any aspects of Jesus historicity or historical research on biblical writing or related writing from that period, though afaik they rarely stray into those religious areas.