Nailed: Ten Christian Myths that show Jesus never existed

[Elagabalus]

Oh wait!

 

[Elagabalus]

R U sure U fixed the link?

 

[Foster Zygote]

You are free to, and have been asked to and consistently failed to deliver ANY non biblical evidence for an HJ. I'm just going with the null hypothesis here

Why would an entirely mythical Jesus be the default position?

 

[Elagabalus]

Sorry, I see you've made an update...thanks again!

 

[maximara]

As you know, I'm having doubts about the Roman involvement in Jesus' death. Possibly unfounded and leaning to crankdom, but there you are.

As I have pointed out there are many problems with the Gospel account from what has survived.

1) Matthew describes Herod going on a child killing rampage about 2 years after Jesus parents have gone to Egypt while Luke expressly states they went to temple every year. No one else talks about Herod going on a child killing rampage.

2) The scope of Luke's census is anachronistic...the closest census of that scope was in 74 CE. The moving around of people of a census makes little sense from a logistic matter.

3) The Sanhedrin trial account is totally at odds with the records on how that court actually operated in the 1st century.

4) Pontius Pilate is totally out of character based on other accounts. In on account his solution to a group causing problems was to send Roman soldiers in disguise amongst the mob and on a prearranged signal start killing them

Moreover it is never really explained in the Bible why if Jesus' only crime was blasphemy why Pilate would need to be involved. If Jesus crime has been sedition then there would be no reason for Pilate to involve Herod Antipas or for the Sanhedrin to be involved for that matter.

5) Jesus preaches in the open so there is no need for the whole Judus betrayal. Send a modest group of soldiers and get the guy.

6) The crucified were left to rot as a warning to others unless there was intervention on the behalf of an important person per The Life Of Flavius Josephus (75)

7) Given Jesus short time on the cross and reports of him being out an about after word certainly the Roman might have wondered if they had been tricked yet there is nothing in the reports of the Romans acting in this matter. Carrier describe how the Romans would have handled the situation and it is totally at odds with the account in Acts.

8) the Roman Empire was the most literate in the ancient world ("no one, either free or slave, could afford to be illiterate" (Di Renzo, A (2000) “His master's voice: Tiro and the rise of the roman secretarial class,” Journal of technical writing and communication, vol. 30, (2) 155-168) and yet not one known contemporary of Jesus writes anything about him. In fact, no Churchman even mentioned anything regarding the actual account in the Gospels until c130 CE. Paul who supposedly met Jesus' brother give us no real details in the seven letters agreed to be his-rather they are the same vague broad outlines we see for John Frum who likely started out as an idea rather then a person.

On every point where we can check what the Gospels tell us against History they fail miserably. None of the key events in Jesus life (his birth, trials, crucifixion, reaction of the Romans regarding his supposed resurrection, etc) fit what we do know of the period.

The ballads of Robin Hood better fit the history of the time(s) they supposedly took place then those of Jesus and the earliest written account is some 200 years after Robin Hood's supposed exploits. Jesus accounts at worst were some 100 years after the events and they so totally hose history to the point they might have been written by Baron Münchhausen.

 

[Brainache]

Again, you present another example of "history" from imagination.

You should be aware that the author of gJohn utterly dismantles your imagination story and places the Temple Incident at almost the start of his story.

John's Temple Incident happens in the first of THREE other Passover visits to the Temple or at least two years before gJohn's Jesus was crucified.

Please, get familiar with the stories of Jesus in the NT instead of inventing your own version by imagination.

This is another example of reading the Gospels at face-value. That is not how to do History.

Please tell me what evidence you have read that supports these two statements. No, this isn't a 'gotcha' question.

Josephus:

Now some of the Jews thought that the destruction of Herod's army came from God, and that very justly, as a punishment of what he did against John, that was called the Baptist: for Herod slew him, who was a good man, and commanded the Jews to exercise virtue, both as to righteousness towards one another, and piety towards God, and so to come to baptism; for that the washing [with water] would be acceptable to him, if they made use of it, not in order to the putting away [or the remission] of some sins [only], but for the purification of the body; supposing still that the soul was thoroughly purified beforehand by righteousness. Now when [many] others came in crowds about him, for they were very greatly moved [or pleased] by hearing his words, Herod, who feared lest the great influence John had over the people might put it into his power and inclination to raise a rebellion, (for they seemed ready to do any thing he should advise,) thought it best, by putting him to death, to prevent any mischief he might cause, and not bring himself into difficulties, by sparing a man who might make him repent of it when it would be too late. Accordingly he was sent a prisoner, out of Herod's suspicious temper, to Macherus, the castle I before mentioned, and was there put to death. Now the Jews had an opinion that the destruction of this army was sent as a punishment upon Herod, and a mark of God's displeasure to him.

http://www.biblestudytools.com/history/flavius-josephus/antiquities-jews/book-18/chapter-5.html

JTB was famous for "Preparing The Way In The Wilderness", he wasn't hanging around that corrupt nasty big Temple.

And this statement as well. I appreciate it.

Well I don't know if that definitely happened, but I was just trying to explain the differences in the story. Why Jesus got crucified as opposed to beheaded like JTB, just going by what the stories say. This is of course just my opinion.

Where is it written what Jesus' family thought or said?

Well we have Paul's talk of James and the other "Brothers of The Lord". We have the epistles of James and Jude in the Bible. We have Hegesippus' testimony about the grandchildren of Judas being taken to Diocletian.(ETA: Domitian? I just woke up... sorry not sure.)

And IMO we have the DSS.

 

[Elagabalus]

On points 2,4,5 and 6 Dominic Crossan agrees with you. Or at least he did. On point 7 he also believes that Jesus' body was never taken down by anyone.

 

[pipelineaudio]

Why would an entirely mythical Jesus be the default position?

why would an entirely mythical Vishnu be the default position?

 

[davefoc]

You are free to, and have been asked to and consistently failed to deliver ANY non biblical evidence for an HJ. I'm just going with the null hypothesis here

People have been fairly open about listing what the non biblical evidence for an HJ is. There seems to be a semantic issue about what constitutes evidence. The word evidence, as I use it, means this: Information that is not known to be false and that if true supports a proposition. Based on that definition of the word, evidence, the list of non-biblical evidence for an HJ is as follows:

1. Testimonium Flavium - My guess is that it an interpolation in total and even it is not an interpolation in total it only provides indirect support for the existence of an HJ since Josephus was not born when the HJ is hypothesized to have lived.

2. Josephus James reference - My guess is that it is an interpolation but if it isn't an interpolation in total it might not refer to the HJ.

3. Tacitus - If true suggests that Christians were in Rome as early as 64 CE. My guess is that there weren't enough Christians in Rome to make the claim that Nero tried to blame the Rome fires on them plausible, but maybe I'm wrong. And Christians in Rome as early as 64 CE provides support for the idea that the origin of Christianity might have dated from the death of the hypothetical HJ in about 33 CE.

4. The fact that people were writing about an HJ by about 100 CE is some evidence that he might have existed in 30 CE.

5. Early existence of Jewish Christians. There is pretty good evidence that Jewish Christians existed. There is a story that they were kicked out of the synagogs in 90CE. However, tying the existence of the Jewish Christians that are very likely to have existed to an early circa 30 CE Jesus Palestinian sect doesn't seem to be possible.

6. Josephus mentions John the Baptist. This is generally believed (but not universally) not to have been an interpolation and as such provides a small amount of corroboration for a Gospel story.

7. Talmud and dead sea scroll stuff. I don't see anything here that even qualifies for the highly inclusive davefoc definition of evidence, but there are many things in this world that davefoc doesn't know, so maybe.

There might be some other stuff that some people in this thread would put forth, but this is the list as I understand it. I guess I might have included Suetonius but I didn't feel it.

 

[Foster Zygote]

why would an entirely mythical Vishnu be the default position?

Because Vishnu is a magical personification. That's why there's no "historical Vishnu". An historical Jesus is proposed as a 1st Century apocalyptic rabbi who was arrested and promptly executed as a trouble-maker. There's nothing supernatural about that.

 

[pipelineaudio]

Here's a primer which you should probably read before you feel compelled to rip into the HJ Hypothesis.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/exploringourmatrix/2011/04/a-menu-of-answers-to-mythicists.html

In these threads I always have to ask "what would even COUNT for an HJ?" I mean, I agree there could have been many guys named jesus running around back then, maybe even could have done something similar to the more mundane acts in the gospels.

For me an HJ has to be a guy who we could go back there and identify as THAT jesus. I don't even know where to start for defining characteristics as all we really have are descriptions among miracle stories and contradictory claims.....so from there;

#1. Agreed, so what? No evidence for HJ

#2. Which writings are those? I have ZERO problem imagining that the gospels are a euhemerization of Paul's work

#3. Not sure exactly what he's getting at, but the "brother of the lord" thing could mean anything. If it really meant "the brother of the actual guy I saw talking to me from the clouds, but I didn't really make a big deal about it", I'm not going to buy it

#4. Agreed, so what? No evidence for an HJ

#5. Do I think some evidence would be left behind that the sun blackened and zombies walked the streets, thousands witnessed miracle events and a bunch of thugs sacked the temple complex? Yes. Sorry, no evidence for an HJ

#6. Agreed, so what? No evidence for an HJ

#7. Agreed, so what? No evidence for an HJ

#8. Agreed, so what? No evidence for an HJ

#9. Agreed, so what? No evidence for an HJ. Further, I wonder just how long there had been a "christ" before any Jesus. There seem to have been a lot of "christ-type" groups running around before any mention of a name Jesus

#10. This is a tricky one for me, and one of the tidbits that maybe Paul believed this was a guy who walked the earth. Of course when he says he received it all from scripture it kind of nixes the whole deal. Because of the blatant contradiction I'm going to have to say this is no evidence for an HJ

#11. Argument from authority, no evidence for an HJ

#12. Total non sequitor and no evidence for an HJ

#13. We could go on about this one in some length, but it contains no evidence for an HJ

#14. OK, but no evidence for an HJ

Ok, I'm just going to stop here because, I'm sorry, this site is kind of lame and no evidence that I see

 

[pipelineaudio]

An historical Jesus is proposed as a 1st Century apocalyptic rabbi who was arrested and promptly executed as a trouble-maker. There's nothing supernatural about that.

If thats all an HJ is, then sure, I believe there could have been plenty of them. What does that have to do with the jesus of the bible?

I actually knew a lot of HJ's in arizona in that case, but they weren't so much rabbi's as soccer players, which gives them about the same relationship to the jesus of the bible

 

[Belz...]

You are free to, and have been asked to and consistently failed to deliver ANY non biblical evidence for an HJ.

Then right now you have proven that you haven't read the thread, and that your conclusions about it and the proponents of either side in this debate is pure fabrication on your part: I have never claimed to have evidence for Jesus.

What I DID say is that the HJ hypothesis fits known history, that Christianity (the real-life religion) requires an explanation (a cause), and that HJ provies a simpler and less question-begging solution.

I'm just going with the null hypothesis here

The null hypothesis is "I don't know", not "yo wrong !!1!"

 

[pakeha]

Not sure why you think "strata" is a dirty word. There are layers. Defining the boundaries is where it gets tricky.

I don't.
I do find it interesting that using the strata criteria we get such divergent views of Jesus. One being Crossan's social reformer, the other being a zealot.
Sorry if my use of ''s was confusing.

Well I don't really see the problem. JTB was arrested out in the "Wilderness" somewhere and delivered to Herod's Castle where he was beheaded. He wasn't guilty of any immediate sedition, Herod just feared his popularity and that he might do something one day.

I'm not familiar with the story JtB was arrested out in the wilderness.

Jesus, on the other hand, was in the Temple on the biggest day of the Jewish Religious year causing a disturbance with a major source of Roman Revenue: The Temple Tax from the "Money Changers".

Are you quite sure about that ruckus occurring on the biggest day of the Jewish Religious year?
I thought the gospels tell us Jesus was crucified just before the biggest day.

So he was most likely picked up straight away, or very soon afterwards (apparently Mr Ehrman still favours the Judas betrayal scenario, Who knows?). They then make an example of him by crucifying him and calling him "King Of The Jews".

Big laughs all round for the Romans. Jesus' family were less impressed.

Wasn't he picked up by temple servants, not Romans?
It's definitely a confusing story.

 

[davefoc]

If thats all an HJ is, then sure, I believe there could have been plenty of them. What does that have to do with the jesus of the bible?

I actually knew a lot of HJ's in arizona in that case, but they weren't so much rabbi's as soccer players, which gives them about the same relationship to the jesus of the bible

I think that amongst the minimum requirements for an HJ is that he played a significant role in an early first century religious sect that included at least some of the characters mentioned by Paul. With this requirement, an HJ could probably be identified as either having existed or not if one had complete knowledge of all the people that lived in early first century Palestine

 

[Brainache]

I don't.
I do find it interesting that using the strata criteria we get such divergent views of Jesus. One being Crossan's social reformer, the other being a zealot.
Sorry if my use of ''s was confusing.



I'm not familiar with the story JtB was arrested out in the wilderness.

That was where he was famous for doing his thing. I'm just assuming if there was something remarkable about how Herod got him, Josephus would have mentioned it. I just assume that they came for him where he was dunking people as usual. It would have made him easy to spot.

Are you quite sure about that ruckus occurring on the biggest day of the Jewish Religious year?
I thought the gospels tell us Jesus was crucified just before the biggest day.

Well during the festival, which I believe lasted a few days. But it was a time when everyone was in town for the celebrations. They came from all over the place to be in Jerusalem on Passover. So I'm not sure it makes a lot of difference.

Wasn't he picked up by temple servants, not Romans?
It's definitely a confusing story.

Well it would be impossible to be certain about any of these details. I'm just trying to make sense of the traditions as we have received them.

 

[davefoc]

Then right now you have proven that you haven't read the thread, and that your conclusions about it and the proponents of either side in this debate is pure fabrication on your part:...

...

Not having read the thread entirely might be a good thing. I think the about a third of the thread can be duplicated with a few simple programs:

Program 1
10 The HJ didn't exist because people made up impossible stuff about him.
20 Lots of people have had impossible stuff made up about them and they still exist.
30 Generate posts with random facts about how unreliable the NT is
40 goto 10

Program 2
10 The HJ didn't exist because the oldest copies of writings known to exist today date to late second century at the earliest.
20 The oldest copy of a document doesn't mean that the document couldn't have existed at an earlier date
30 Generate posts with random facts about how unreliable the NT is
40 goto 10


In addition to a lot of repetitive posts there was an interesting theory mentioned in this thread that I haven't seen a response to:

Paul's writings post date the Gospels.
​

I do not recall ever seeing this theory put forth by any author/specialist that writes about this stuff. I assume that it is false, but what is the basis for the claim that Paul's writings predate the Gospels? I went looking for the evidence that Paul's wrote his works before any of the Gospels were written and I didn't find much. Perhaps the assumption is based on the fact that Paul doesn't mention the Gospels and if his work post dated the Gospels then he would have? Perhaps it is based on the idea that the Gospels seem to be derivative and present a more detailed view of Christianity than Paul did? Perhaps the idea is that the author of Luke is presumed to have written Acts after he wrote Luke and Acts seems to have required Paul to have existed and written his stuff before Acts could have been written?

Anyway, I'd be interested in what people have to say about the theory.

 

[edge]

Ten Christian Myths that show Jesus never existed.
How ridicules this thread is, the most remembered person throughout all of history never existed? You would think that right off if he didn’t exist they would have put a stop to it and they tried just as you are, ever wonder why? I never seen so many people try to prove something they can't? But you'll convice yourselves you have, funny that too, LOL.

 

[Craig B]

Paul's writings post date the Gospels.
​

I do not recall ever seeing this theory put forth by any author/specialist that writes about this stuff. I assume that it is false, but what is the basis for the claim that Paul's writings predate the Gospels? I went looking for the evidence that Paul's wrote his works before any of the Gospels were written and I didn't find much ... Anyway, I'd be interested in what people have to say about the theory.

The evidence has been discussed in these threads. Points that have been raised include Paul's notice of King Aretas as ruler of Damascus. (2 Corinthians 11.) This monarch is known to have died c 40 AD. Paul also visited Jerusalem prior to the destruction of the Temple, and evidently prior to the outbreak of the rebellion in 66 AD. (Galatians 2.) The generally accepted dates for the canonical gospels are all post-70 AD.

 

[dejudge]

In addition to a lot of repetitive posts there was an interesting theory mentioned in this thread that I haven't seen a response to:

Paul's writings post date the Gospels.
​

I do not recall ever seeing this theory put forth by any author/specialist that writes about this stuff. I assume that it is false, but what is the basis for the claim that Paul's writings predate the Gospels? I went looking for the evidence that Paul's wrote his works before any of the Gospels were written and I didn't find much. Perhaps the assumption is based on the fact that Paul doesn't mention the Gospels and if his work post dated the Gospels then he would have? Perhaps it is based on the idea that the Gospels seem to be derivative and present a more detailed view of Christianity than Paul did? Perhaps the idea is that the author of Luke is presumed to have written Acts after he wrote Luke and Acts seems to have required Paul to have existed and written his stuff before Acts could have been written?

Anyway, I'd be interested in what people have to say about the theory.

Can you recall when it was first claimed that many of the Pauline letters were in fact not authentic? Do you recall the names of those who argued that the Pauline Corpus is riddled with multiple authors?

Well, it is some of those very people who successfully argued that the Pauline Corpus were composed some time in the 2nd century.

You could have gone to Wikipedia.

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

No actual corroborative evidence has EVER been presented at any time to show that an actual character named Paul did live, did preach and did write letters to Churches.--None.

Incredibly, some so-called Scholars have assumed that Paul did live, did preach and wrote letters to Churches which has been spread by Chinese Whispers.

The un-evidence assumptions about Paul is believed by many as fact when it was NEVER ever successfully argued.

It is virtually impossible for an argument to be successful without evidence.

The claim that Pauline writings were composed before the Fall of the Temple is inherently a total failure because no evidence will ever be presented.

Not even the author of Acts, the supposed close companion of Paul, ever claimed Paul wrote Epistles to Churches and Pastorals in Acts of the Apostles up to at least c 62 CE.

And further, it has already been DEBUNKED that there were Pauline writings which predated the Gospels because there is hardly anything about the life of Jesus.

Such a claim is highly illogical because the supposed forgeries written AFTER the Gospels also have little or nothing about the life of Jesus

These forgeries or falsely attributed writings have little or nothing about the life of Jesus---Ephesians, 2 Thessalonians, Colossians, 1&2 Timothy and Titus.