Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

[Elagabalus]

Why would you even bother to quote something as weak, vague and inconsequential as that? And I think you have quoted that same passage several times here now.

What do you think that writer of the Wikipedia description actually says about what Wells had said in his 2003 book? That’s not Wells “own biography” is it! That’s what the writer of that Wikipedia article says about Wells and his book of 2003.

What did you think any of my posts ever said about Wells view of Jesus?

Do you think anyone, Wells or anyone else, ever denied that there were probably hundreds of human preachers around Palestine in the early first century? Any one of whom (or any number of whom) may have later become mythologized as a very different figure described in the bible?

What do you think counts as a real Jesus? Anybody at all who preached anything in Palestine before about 100AD?

How 'bout this?

G.A. Wells as “mythicist”

"Ehrman is well aware that I have come to modify my originally mythicist position, and he states correctly that I now think that there really was a man Jesus but that we can know very little about him (19, 241). In fact I agree with his view that 'Jesus really existed' but 'was not the person most Christians today believe in' (143). That he nevertheless continues to label me a mythicst is confusing."


link:
ww.radikalkritik.de/Wells_Ehrman.htm

 

[Craig B]

This is a really good point. In fact an extremely good point that has been overlooked.

Now I know you're kidding. It has been discussed in enormous detail in these threads, because if it is fatal to the historicity of Jesus it is even more fatal to the authors on your interminably repeated lists, since although most of them are known only from medieval manuscripts, we have the complete gospels from much earlier, the fourth century.

Anyway I don't know what to say. This has been discussed exhaustively.

 

[IanS]

Define "similar historical figures" because as has been pointed out before many of the ancient figures and events compared to Jesus are in better shape or fail to measure up:

Leukippos (shadowy nearly legendary figure of early 5th century BCE): very existence doubted by Epicurus (341 – 270 BCE).

Socrates (c469 – 399 BCE): written about by contemporaries Plato, Xenophon (430 – 354 BCE), and Aristophanes (c446 – 386 BCE).

Hippocrates (c460 – c370 BCE): written about by contemporary Plato.

Plato (428 – 347 BCE): written about by contemporaries Aristotle (384 – 322 BC), Xenophon, and Aristophanes.

Alexander the Great (July 20, 356 – June 11, 323 BCE): official historian Callisthenes of Olynthus, generals Ptolemy, Nearchus, and Aristobulus and helmsman Onesicritus where all contemporaries who wrote about Alexander. While their works were eventually lost, later works that used them as source material were not. Then you have mosaics and coins also contemporaneous with Alexander.

Hannibal (247 – 182 BCE): Written about by Silenus, a paid Greek historian who Hannibal brought with him on his journeys to write an account of what took place, and Sosylus of Lacedaemon who wrote seven volumes on the war itself. Never mind the contemporary Carthaginian coins and engraved bronze tablets.

Julies Caesar (July 100 – 15 March 44 BCE): Not only do we have the writing of contemporaries Cato the Younger and Cicero but Julies Caesar' own writings as well (Commentarii de Bello Gallico aka The Gallic Wars and Commentarii de Bello Civili aka The Civil War). Then you have the contemporary coins, statues and monuments.

Boadicea (d. 60 CE): Tacitus himself would have been a 5-year old boy when she poisoned herself c. 60 CE making him contemporary to her. Furthermore, his father-in-law Gnaeus Julius Agricola served under Gaius Suetonius Paulinus during the revolt. So Tacitus was not only an actual contemporary, but he had access to Gaius Suetonius Paulinus' records and an actual eyewitness.

Muhammad (570 – c. June 8, 632 CE): Unlike the New Testament, the Quran was written during Muhammad's lifetime and there are some that say it was compiled shortly before his death. Moreover there are non-Muslim references by people who would have been contemporary to Muhammad.


Now compare those to Jesus:

1) The only known possible known contemporary is Paul (Romans, 1st Corinthians, 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1st Thessalonians and Philemon) who not only writes some 20 years after the events but seems more intent on the Jesus in his own head than any Jesus who actually preached in Galilee. In fact, even though in his own account Paul meets "James, brother of the Lord" we get no details of Jesus' life, not even references to the famous sermons or miracles.

2) The Gospels are anonymous documents written sometime between 70 CE to 140 CE and there are no references to any of them until the early 2nd century.

Contrary to your claims many of the go to apologists us are in better shape then Jesus...which just shows how weak their argument really is.

Yes, it's a completely bogus argument from the HJ apologists to keep claming that there are numerous figures in history who are believed real on such weak evidence as Jesus (no actual evidence at all in fact), and that if we ruled out Jesus on that basis then all ancient history would disappear.

Most of those ancient figures are in fact known (or known about) from a great deal of perfectly credible and believable evidence describing all sorts of entirely normal human actions … writing various documents, developing various philosophical theories, leading armies into proven battles, etc. etc.

Of course it’s true that the further we go back, eg to say 500BC, there are famous figures such as Pythagoras who we know little or nothing about except for what has been attributed to their name and made known through latter schools of philosophical ideas that were said to originate with a particular individual name such as Pythagoras.

Whether or not those ideas really did come from a single person named Pythagoras, we do not actually know, and afaik a lot of historians doubt that all the ideas were produced Pythagoras himself.

But we don’t bother to argue about whether Pythagoras was a real person who did indeed develop all (or any) of those ideas. Because what matters to history is not really whether this person Pythagoras was actually responsible for any of it , or even whether he was a real person of that name. What matters to history is that a group of philosophers around that time did quite definitely produce those particular philosophical ideas. And afaik, that is well known and indisputable from all sorts of early writing about the philosophical beliefs of the group known under the name Pythagoreans.

So it’s the historical legacy of the ideas which is important in the case of very ancient shadowy figures such as Pythagoras. Not whether there really was a person named Pythagoras.

But that is not at all the case for Jesus. In his case it is specifically his existence which matters. That’s why we are arguing about whether Jesus existed (where we do not bother to argue the virtual irrelevance of whether figures like Pythagoras existed).

If Jesus did not exist then Christianity and the Christian Church loses the only basis for it's validity.

 

[dejudge]

Now I know you're kidding. It has been discussed in enormous detail in these threads, because if it is fatal to the historicity of Jesus it is even more fatal to the authors on your interminably repeated lists, since although most of them are known only from medieval manuscripts, we have the complete gospels from much earlier, the fourth century.

Anyway I don't know what to say. This has been discussed exhaustively.

It has not been discussed in ernormous details that all the supposed evidence for an HJ are really of no use because they are no earlier than one thousand years or more after they were composed.

Essentially, this means that when one makes references to Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius and Pliny they are really ONLY stating what they contained one thousand or more years after they were composed.

The HJ argument is dead--without a resurrection.

The very earliest stories of Jesus are manuscripts of Pauline Corpus and the Gospels dated to the 2nd century or later.

There is NO extant dated evidence at all that can show a Jesus character or cult earlier than the 2nd century.

The ONLY existing dated evidence show Jesus as a Myth in NT manuscripts.

 

[IanS]

How 'bout this?

G.A. Wells as “mythicist”

"Ehrman is well aware that I have come to modify my originally mythicist position, and he states correctly that I now think that there really was a man Jesus but that we can know very little about him (19, 241). In fact I agree with his view that 'Jesus really existed' but 'was not the person most Christians today believe in' (143). That he nevertheless continues to label me a mythicst is confusing."


link:
ww.radikalkritik.de/Wells_Ehrman.htm

OK, so Wells has changed his view where he previously did not think there ever was a person actually named Jesus, and for some reason now thinks there was a preacher named Jesus, but where he still thinks this person "Jesus" was not the person most Christians today believe in, and presumably he can only mean that he does not think this person Jesus was anything like the person described in the bible.

But I had not said anything at all about Wells believing or not believing that Jesus existed.

All I said about Wells was that in his book The Jesus Legend, he listed various standard attacks which he frequently encounters as quite clearly abusive attempts at derision and scorn.

An abusive approach which seems all too common from HJ believers in these threads too.

I did not say a single word there, or anywhere else, about what Wells thought about Jesus as a myth or otherwise.

So what had it to do with my post for Craig to tell me that Wells seems to have shifted his original beliefs somewhat?

This seems to be what people call a Strawman argument from you and Craig - you are arguing against me by saying that Wells has changed his opinion, even though I never said a single word either way on any opinion that Wells may or may not ever have held.

 

[Craig B]

It has not been discussed in ernormous details that all the supposed evidence for an HJ are really of no use because they are no earlier than one thousand years or more after they were composed.

Essentially, this means that when one makes references to Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius and Pliny they are really ONLY stating what they contained one thousand or more years after they were composed ...

It has been discussed, my friend. I have listed the dates of earliest extant manuscripts, and you know it. You are quick to accuse others of double standards, so don't make yourself a target for the same accusations. Your second bit, if it means that the entirety of extant ancient writings is telling us nothing about the ancient world, is mad. As I've pointed out the most noteworthy person who ever suggested this was Jean Hardouin, who was generally considered to be crackers. See www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/archive/permalink/jean_hardouins_theory_of_universal_forgery

 

[eight bits]

Belz

Yes but I still don't get it. The main point is the evidence for Jesus, which is admittedly weak and limited to a few literary works filled with exaggerated claims. A lot of figures of history have this level of evidence, so by the same logic we should exclude them all. I submit that this would leave much of history a great blank.

Yes, that is a fair motivation of avoiding "single factor" classification as a heuristic guide to truth in this domain, the one factor being the presence of supernatural material in all known sources of information about the person. BTW, Jason's favored heuristic (accept the reality of any person mentioned in an ancient text) is also a single-factor heuristic.

There is nothing in a Bayesian approach that recommends single-factor heuristics. Their principal advocate, Gerd Gigerenzer, emphasizes their low computational and investigative cost and (implicitly) that people learn good single-factors as they go along (sometimes but not always).

Neither of those "advantages" applies here. We have all the time in the world to examine the historicity of people who interest us; only somebody who didn't much care to get it right would worry much about minimizing their computational and other investigative cost. Presumably professionals would, at least to some extent, prefer to get the factually correct answer and be willing to expend effort to find out what that answer is.

And, as your argument points out, hardly any recognizable figure, whether real or fictive, does not eventually show up as a character in factually false stories. Tales of the supernatural are a perennially popular form of factually false story. So, the proposed single factor is utterly unsuitable to this task.

I conclude, then, that eliminating historical figures because all known sources about them contain supernatural material is a non-starter. However, neither I personally nor Bayesians generally recommended that policy in the first place.

Also, there is no "admission" that the evidence is weak. Sixty-four is a weak conclusion, in eiher direction. So is Ninety-ten for that matter. Bayes recommends that the strength of the conclusion be commensurate with the strength of the evidence and argument which supports that conclusion. For many posters here, that is so. No "admission" need be made, just assertion.

zugzwang

I don't follow your post # 2889 at all. History isn't science, and it is isn't law. OK, That is not an argument that there cannot be domain independent norms for uncertain reasoning that are applicable in all three fields (and many others besides).

Trotting out the law can be surrebutted by observing that the rules of evidence in legal proceedings explicitly serve goals besides the formation of correct opinions about uncertainties.As we have seen, so does professional history (assuming that its local advocates have accurately depicted its deliberative methods), but to serve different goals than the law.

Two things follow. If all I'm interested in is forming correct opinions about specific uncertainties, then there is a limit to how much I can or ought to rely on advice from lawyers or historians. Second, I might be able to make some headway by scraping away those fetaures of legal and historical inference that are conflated with pursuit of values besides prospects for being correct.

I propose as a working hypothesis that if I did that, then I would end up with something resembling qualitative subjective probability, to a useful extent. Coincidentally, I would recognize what I had scraped away as some variety of a qualitative decision theory. I would thus end up in nearly the same place as if I had simply applied Bayesian norms in the first place.

If so, then it is not obvious why I wouldn't save myself a step, and simply do at the outset what I have high confidence that I will end up doing anyway.

( edited to correct post number )

 

[zugzwang]

eight bits

I think you mean #2889?

I was only making the point that saying that because history isn't scientific, and doesn't use terms such as 'evidence' in the way in which the law does, that therefore it is rubbish, is an opinion, which might tend to demolish history as an academic discipline; but on the other hand, that such an opinion tends to be found mainly amongst internet amateurs, and so I think Stone is being a bit gloomy about the 'history is bunk' school, if there is one, indeed.

 

[IanS]

Not what Wells is reported to have said.

You will have to explain that remark to me. I do not know what you are referring to there at all.

He is referring to an individual responsible for the contents of the hypothetical Q document.

Of course Wells may be wrong, but he can't now properly be cited in support of the "all myth" hypothesis.

You mean Wells is "referring to an individual responsible for the contents of the hypothetical Q document"? is that what you mean?

I don't suppose Wells has any better idea than anyone else whether or not any document called Q ever existed. Does he?

Of course Wells may be wrong, but he can't now properly be cited in support of the "all myth" hypothesis.

I don't recall citing Wells, or indeed anyone at all as being "in support of the "all myth" hypothesis". Where did you think I ever said that?

I'm not even sure that a single sceptic anywhere in this entire thread has ever said that Jesus could only have been mythical in the sense of no possibility of any preacher actually named Jesus (or thought to be named Jesus) ever existing.

Has anyone said that?

Even dejudge has only said that the biblical Jesus must by mythical. He has only ever talked about the figure of Jesus described in the bible as a supernatural miracle worker. Because that is indeed what it does say all throughout the bible. And as he stresses - that is ONLY known description of Jesus.

But I have not said that a preacher could never have existed in the 1st century, where any such preacher was preaching something like Paul preached. I have never said that. And I don't recall anyone else here claiming an entire "all myth" Jesus like that, where no preacher could ever have existed (and nobody could have been named "Jesus"). Who here said anything like that?

I don't suppose Wells even said anything like that in his earlier books either, did he?

As far as I gather from Wells 1996 book The Jesus Legend, which is mainly a response to various critics where Wells discusses the nature of how various religious individuals and also a group from the British Law society, have criticised what he had written - what Wells seemed to think there about Jesus, was only that the claimed evidence for Jesus was too weak to establish much if any degree of confidence that he was a real figure who did any of the things claimed in the bible.

That’s more-or-less the position that I have repeated throughout all these HJ threads - what has been offered as evidence of Jesus, seems to be only that which was written in the bible. But for all the reasons I have explained here so many times, I do not believe that the biblical writing is reliable as any form of credible evidence of anything other than peoples 1st century religious beliefs. I do not see anything there which is actually evidence of a living Jesus who did any of the things claimed in the bible.

Going back to Wells for a moment, and in respect of his changed opinion on whether anyone named “Jesus” actually existed - I have no idea why Wells thinks that specific name has evidence in respect of any particular known preacher of that time. That is - I’d be interested to know if Wells claims evidence showing that a preacher actually named Jesus did indeed once exist. As far as I know, there is no evidence for that.

But that appears to be the only sense in which Wells has modified his “mythicist” view. Ie, he now agrees that someone named Jesus did indeed exist (how does he know that? What is the evidence for that??), and he therefore concedes that the earliest writers such as Paul may have based their beliefs on a real figure who Wells now says was called Jesus (or so he believes).

Though afaik, and also from what Wells actually says in that link given above, Wells does of course continue to criticise Ehrman saying his claimed evidence from such as the writing of Paul and other people, is not at all the evidence that Ehrman and other biblical scholars claim it to be. So Wells position does not seem to have changed much at all except that he now thinks for some unexplained reason (perhaps it’s in his 2003 book) that a preacher actually named Jesus did once exist.

But scholars like Ehrman and Wells are not scientists and they are not involved in any similarly truly objective profession of studies and research. That is not a total criticism. But what I mean by that is - their view of what constitutes credible and reliable evidence sufficient for them to state things confidently, is probably quite different to what I would accept as genuinely (ie honestly and sensibly), really credible and reliable evidence for any of these things in the Jesus story.

So whatever it is that has led Wells to decide that a preacher named Jesus once existed, it does not sound to me as if it’s something that I would find very convincing. It might be convincing, because I do not yet know what that evidence is supposed to be. But we have been through enough of these discussions about what has ever been claimed by anyone to be the evidence of Jesus, and I have read enough books from both sides on what the evidence is supposed to be, such that so far I have to conclude that no such evidence of any kind has ever been produced. And worse - people like Bart Ehrman, and indeed all the so-called “historians” that I have ever seen writing to express belief in Jesus, really do not seem to know what “evidence” of anything actually is. And that of course has also been the case in every single pro-HJ post in all of these threads … where no such evidence at all has ever been produced, but where instead numerous people here keep insisting that the biblical writing is evidence of the truth of what it itself claims … so that for example, the description of the Last Supper is claimed to be real evidence that Jesus probably existed.

I don’t know if Jesus ever existed. What I would like to see is some genuine evidence for it. But the bible cannot be genuine evidence of it’s own manifestly religious belief stories.

 

[Belz...]

Josephus also tells of how Pontius Pilate dealt with an angry, but not necessarily violent, mob that was protesting his use of temple funds to build an aqueduct to bring water to Jerusalem. He told them to disperse and, when they didn't, he gave pre-arranged signal. He had soldiers, dressed as civilians but with weapons hidden under their clothes, mix with the crowd. At the signal, they pulled out their weapons and began slaughtering the protestors.

Pfft... do we have any credible reliable awesome evidence that this even happened ? MYTH !!!

 

[Belz...]

Also, you will have to forgive me because it isn't as clear to me as it has been for you. You can choose not to answer it for the third time, but I will ask politely for you to explain why it's so obvious what a problem it would be for it to be said that "it's highly improbable that Socrates existed, mainly because there isn't any other data to support his existence, which will be revised upon further non-fantastic data being discovered."

I've already said that you'd end up with a mostly blank history. And if you don't understand why that's a problem, it's because we kinda don't want a blank history. That's it.

 

[Craig B]

... So whatever it is that has led Wells to decide that a preacher named Jesus once existed, it does not sound to me as if it’s something that I would find very convincing.

I'm sure you wouldn't, because you disagree with his current position on the historicity of Jesus.

 

[pakeha]

...My point is this: why would the creation of a mythical Jesus require such complex and detailed discussions of Jewish law? I suppose you might say that it gives credibility, for a Jewish audience - this mythical character really knows his Torah! Or if the mythical figure grew spontaneously (i.e. not forged), then the idea of a mythical preacher who could hammer those Pharisees in debate, would be appealing.

On the other hand, the discussions about Peah strike me as eminently non-supernatural and credible, since presumably various Jewish sects were arguing with each other about such details of law.

...I forgot another point about the laws on Peah, which seem to be quite complex, is that it wasn't forbidden to glean on the sabbath (as far as I can make out), but the Pharisees wanted to bring in a super-orthodox rule to forbid it. So Jesus rebuffs this, possibly to defend ordinary poor Jews, who after all, get hungry on the sabbath. Of course, he is given the famous maxim about the sabbath being made for man, but that in itself is not particularly supernatural. ... It's what you would expect a Jewish preacher/teacher to rabbit on about.

If that's the intention it fails lamentably anyway. Jesus' knowledge of, in this case, Samuel, is defective. he makes a mistake. ...

I wonder if the passage is in fact about Peah. In the David story he and his men need food because they're on the run from Saul, and David thereafter defects to the King of Gath, then other places; and Saul goes to the priest and kills him for having given David the bread. What can this have to do with Peah, whether grain may be gleaned on the Sabbath or not? It is about some kind of messianic activity, engaged in while on the run, and so holy that it justifies not merely casual taking of grain but would even warrant consumption of the holy bread. Maccoby uses this incident to further his view of Jesus and his men as Theudas-style rebels. But it is very confusing, and the error in the priest's name is exceedingly odd. Why was it not "corrected" by an alert redactor in subsequent centuries? ...

Now that's interesting.
Could the gospels have been badly cribbed by people who hadn't a clue? Something along the lines of the mix-up with the "Son of Man" title.

I essentially agree with this position. I think Jesus was historical - but barely. ... most of those of us posting on this thread who accept an HJ, only accept a Jesus who was barely historical. I see little difference between the barely HJ position and the the MJ position. Yet look at all the rancor - at least on the part of dejudge - this has provoked. This will likely be my last post on this thread, since I see most of what has any substance in this issue as having long been mulled - an mauled - over.

I'd be sorry if my posting has driven you from the thread.
Your posts have been very helpful in my efforts to understand the nature of the origins of the church.

I am.

I, by happenstance, saw a post signed "stein" which later had been edited to read "stone" in this poster's normal style.

Wow, what a freaking confident assertion. You just know that, do you? Pray tell us just where you picked up that infallible intelligence? Impress us all by this great discovery. Do you time travel, by any chance?

Stone

No, I don't just know that. Try using the search function on the monster thread at RatSkep and you'll quickly find my sources.

 

[IanS]

I'm sure you wouldn't, because you disagree with his current position on the historicity of Jesus.

Well that brief remark seems in no way to explain your last couple of critical replies to me. So I don't think that was a very constructive contribution at all, was it (and probably not intended to be constructive?).

But I just explained to you that afaik the only thing that I would disagree with Wells about is that he seems to be saying that he knows of good evidence to think a real person named Jesus was the origin of what Paul later wrote about as Jesus mythology. I doubt that what he thinks is evidence can be very convincing, otherwise the whole world would know about it by now,

Are you thinking that means that Wells has completely changed his mind and now agrees with Ehrman’s view of the evidence confirming things said about Jesus in the bible (as Ehrman and other bible scholars claim)? Because I don’t think that’s what Wells has said at all. And if, for example, you read you even those few quotes picked out in the link which someone gave earlier, you can very clearly see that Wells is disagreeing with Ehrman on all of Ehrman’s claims of evidential details of Jesus as described in the bible.

 

[The Norseman]

I've already said that you'd end up with a mostly blank history. And if you don't understand why that's a problem, it's because we kinda don't want a blank history. That's it.

Ah. Thank you again for the clarification. I appreciate it.

I still don't see how we could end up with a mostly blank history by using Bayes' method, though. I gave two examples which could possibly be written after using Bayes' method regarding the existence of other figures in history. If you don't care to pursue this line of thought with me in this thread, that's fine. What I would like, however, is for you to respond to my examples of why I think that there would not be a blank history.

 

[zugzwang]

I wonder if the passage is in fact about Peah. In the David story he and his men need food because they're on the run from Saul, and David thereafter defects to the King of Gath, then other places; and Saul goes to the priest and kills him for having given David the bread. What can this have to do with Peah, whether grain may be gleaned on the Sabbath or not? It is about some kind of messianic activity, engaged in while on the run, and so holy that it justifies not merely casual taking of grain but would even warrant consumption of the holy bread. Maccoby uses this incident to further his view of Jesus and his men as Theudas-style rebels. But it is very confusing, and the error in the priest's name is exceedingly odd. Why was it not "corrected" by an alert redactor in subsequent centuries?

However all that may be, Jesus does not come across as a virgin born divinity in these passages, as you observe.

Maurice Casey has a complicated argument about it being caused by the translation from the Aramaic; I will have to find a nice quiet time, in order to try to understand what he is saying.

There are a series of confrontations with the Pharisees, with high stakes, since they threaten death to anyone infringing their super-orthodox rules.

I think from the mythic point of view, you could see this as comparable to the series of tests which the hero traditionally has to go through in order to get to the goal; on the other hand, you could see these arguments as realistic and authentic. It's an interesting question as to why the minutiae of Jewish law are being raised here, concerning eating food, hand washing, doing things on the sabbath, fasting, and so on. I think Casey suggests that these incidents indicate the extreme hostility between various Jewish groups at the time - something I know very little about - maybe others here do. But at any rate, they are not supernatural wonders, but details of Jewish life.

 

[Belz...]

Ah. Thank you again for the clarification. I appreciate it.

I still don't see how we could end up with a mostly blank history by using Bayes' method, though. I gave two examples which could possibly be written after using Bayes' method regarding the existence of other figures in history. If you don't care to pursue this line of thought with me in this thread, that's fine. What I would like, however, is for you to respond to my examples of why I think that there would not be a blank history.

Well it's my understanding that most people in history have less evidence in favour of their existence than even Jesus. I'm sure many people far better versed than me on this topic can confirm or deny this.

 

[tsig]

Well it's my understanding that most people in history have less evidence in favour of their existence than even Jesus. I'm sure many people far better versed than me on this topic can confirm or deny this.

You must have been reading Christian apologetic sites. This was a favorite argument of DOC's.

 

[maximara]

How 'bout this?

G.A. Wells as “mythicist”

"Ehrman is well aware that I have come to modify my originally mythicist position, and he states correctly that I now think that there really was a man Jesus but that we can know very little about him (19, 241). In fact I agree with his view that 'Jesus really existed' but 'was not the person most Christians today believe in' (143). That he nevertheless continues to label me a mythicst is confusing."


link:
ww.radikalkritik.de/Wells_Ehrman.htm

Given the many definitions for "mythicst" there is nothing confusing about it.

Look at how John Roberton's "mythicst" position of 1900 was explained in 1946:

"(John) Robertson is prepared to concede the possibility of an historical Jesus, perhaps more than one, having contributed something to the Gospel story. "A teacher or teachers named Jesus, or several differently named teachers called Messiahs " (of whom many are on record) may have uttered some of the sayings in the Gospels.
1 The Jesus of the Talmud, who was stoned and hanged over a century before the traditional date of the crucifixion, may really have existed and have contributed something to the tradition.

2 An historical Jesus may have "preached a political doctrine subversive of the Roman rule, and . . . thereby met his death "; and Christian writers concerned to conciliate the Romans may have suppressed the facts.
3 Or a Galilean faith-healer with a local reputation may have been slain as a human sacrifice at some time of social tumult; and his story may have got mixed up with the myth.

4 The myth theory is not concerned to deny such a possibility. What the myth theory denies is that Christianity can be traced to a personal founder who taught as reported in the Gospels and was put to death in the circumstances there recorded" (Robertson, Archibald. (1946) Jesus: Myth or History?)

Wells should do better research on range of the "mythicst" position because his current argument agrees with "the myth theory denies is that Christianity can be traced to a personal founder who taught as reported in the Gospels and was put to death in the circumstances there recorded" because Wells' states the historical Jesus behind the Gospels was not crucified.

The "mythicst" position of 113 years ago and Wells fits it to a T.

It's really sad when somebody with internet access can do better research then the experts and show they don't know what they are talking about.

 

[dejudge]

How 'bout this?

G.A. Wells as “mythicist”

"Ehrman is well aware that I have come to modify my originally mythicist position, and he states correctly that I now think that there really was a man Jesus but that we can know very little about him (19, 241). In fact I agree with his view that 'Jesus really existed' but 'was not the person most Christians today believe in' (143). That he nevertheless continues to label me a mythicst is confusing."


link:
ww.radikalkritik.de/Wells_Ehrman.htm

Are you implying that we should not look at the evidence from antiquity but just follow Wells?

What will you do if Wells becomes a Christian?

You are promoting an absurd notion.

That is the reason why BILLIONS of people believe Jesus existed WITHOUT a shred of evidence. They follow what the authorities of the Church tell them.

Authorities of the Church have succeeded in making billions of people worship as a God a non-existing or dead man for Salvation and healing.

I have no intention at all of accepting anything in the Bible without supporting non-apologetic corroboration.

How did a dead or non-existent man end up in the Bible as a God WITHOUT a shred of evidence?

If Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and God Creator in the NT was really a KNOWN ITINERANT preacher the Bible is obviously a Pack of Lies.

Essentially, the Bible MUST be a PACK of Lies because Jesus was either just a Man OR NEVER DID EXIST

It is impossible for me to accept KNOWN lies, the Bible, as a credible source of history and especially without corroborative evidence from antiquity.

I have rejected the existence of the God of the Jews, Satan the Devil, the angel Gabriel, the Holy Ghost, and Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God because of NO supporting evidence from antiquity of their existence.

Why do people still accept a source of KNOWN LIES for history WITHOUT corroboration?