Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

[Brainache]

After reading the hilited bit, Father Christmas takes on an entirely different aspect.

I wonder what he would have made of Santa Claus?

 

[dejudge]

I've seen enough evidence to conclude that the HJ is a plausible explanation for the origins of Xtianity. That is the bottom line.

All the rest is speculation.

You could not have seen any evidence for your Itinerant preacher who was NOT from Nazareth and was NOT the Christ.

You have NOT seen anything.

1. Your Jesus is NOT in the OT.

2. Your Jesus is NOT in the NT.

3. Your Jesus is NOT in Philo.

4. Your Jesus is NOT in Josephus.

5. Your Jesus is NOT in Tacitus.

6. Your Jesus is NOT in Suetonius.

7. Your Jesus is NOT in Pliny the elder.

8. Your Jesus is NOT IN Pliny the younger.

9. Your Jesus is NOT in Apologetics.

10. Your Jesus is NOT in the History of the Church.

Please, please, please!!! We are aware of the existing evidence and there is NOTHING about your Itinerant preacher.

You saw nothing. Your HJ explanation is NOT Plausible that is precisely why nothing is seen of him in all antiquity.

 

[Brainache]

You could not have seen any evidence for your Itinerant preacher who was NOT from Nazareth and was NOT the Christ.

You have NOT seen anything.

1. Your Jesus is NOT in the OT.

2. Your Jesus is NOT in the NT.

3. Your Jesus is NOT in Philo.

4. Your Jesus is NOT in Josephus.

5. Your Jesus is NOT in Tacitus.

6. Your Jesus is NOT in Suetonius.

7. Your Jesus is NOT in Pliny the elder.

8. Your Jesus is NOT IN Pliny the younger.

9. Your Jesus is NOT in Apologetics.

10. Your Jesus is NOT in the History of the Church.

Please, please, please!!! We are aware of the existing evidence and there is NOTHING about your Itinerant preacher.

You saw nothing. Your HJ explanation is NOT Plausible that is precisely why nothing is seen of him in all antiquity.

Still waiting for the name of one Scholar who agrees with you. I'm even taking away the qualifier; I don't care if he is reputable. Just one will do.

Anyone?

Buehler?

 

[dejudge]

You could not have seen any evidence for your Itinerant preacher who was NOT from Nazareth and was NOT the Christ.

You have NOT seen anything.

1. Your Jesus is NOT in the OT.

2. Your Jesus is NOT in the NT.

3. Your Jesus is NOT in Philo.

4. Your Jesus is NOT in Josephus.

5. Your Jesus is NOT in Tacitus.

6. Your Jesus is NOT in Suetonius.

7. Your Jesus is NOT in Pliny the elder.

8. Your Jesus is NOT IN Pliny the younger.

9. Your Jesus is NOT in Apologetics.

10. Your Jesus is NOT in the History of the Church.

Still waiting for the name of one Scholar who agrees with you. I'm even taking away the qualifier; I don't care if he is reputable. Just one will do.

Anyone?

Buehler?

I am still waiting for the EVIDENCE for your Jesus the obscure itinerant preacher who was NOT from Nazareth and was NOT the Christ.

Just one source from antiquity will do.

You have had years to come up with evidence but have nothing but empty hands.

 

[Craig B]

You have NOT seen anything

1. Your Jesus is NOT in the OT.
2. Your Jesus is NOT in the NT.

3. Your Jesus is NOT in Philo.
4. Your Jesus is NOT in Josephus.

5. Your Jesus is NOT in Tacitus.
6. Your Jesus is NOT in Suetonius.

7. Your Jesus is NOT in Pliny the elder.
8. Your Jesus is NOT IN Pliny the younger.

9. Your Jesus is NOT in Apologetics.
10. Your Jesus is NOT in the History of the Church.

That's almost like a Hymn. The "Negative Confession", perhaps.

 

[pakeha]

^
I knew that list reminded me of something.
Good catch!

I wonder what he would have made of Santa Claus?

And of Zwarte Piet^WP.

 

[Belz...]

On the contrary, I think most HJ people here have tried to show that Jesus existed.

 

[Foster Zygote]

You have offered a baseless speculative imaginative invention--not an explanation. You have no evidence from antiquity for what you say.

Origen, an Apologetic writer of antiquity claimed Jesus was born in Bethlehem and that the CAVE in Bethlehem was found and known by non-Christians.

Origen's Against Celsus 1

You didn't answer the question.

Can you offer a better explanation for the actions of the authors of Matthew and Luke than that Jesus was already popularly regarded as having come from the town of Nazareth?

Maybe this popular conception was wrong, and Jesus was actually a Nazirite, this becoming corrupted through successive generations of oral recounting until it was thought that he came from the town of Nazareth. But at any rate, I'd still like to know what competing explanation can be offered.

 

[Foster Zygote]

On the contrary, I think most HJ people here have tried to show that Jesus existed.

You are entitled to your opinion, but it is still wrong. Advancing an hypothesis as plausible is not the same as claiming that it is true. People participating in this thread have pointed to various threads of evidence as indicative that an historical Jesus may be the cause of what we can observe. We haven't enough evidence to epistemologically confirm the existence of Jesus. We do have enough to say the it is plausible that an historical Jesus lived and that his life and death led to the foundation of a movement that eventually evolved into Christianity.

 

[Foster Zygote]

On the contrary, I think most HJ people here have tried to show that Jesus What on earth is all this utter nonsense about repeatedly accusing people of lying?

It may have something to do with your persistent habit of misrepresenting the positions of others so that you can construct a strawman representing arguments that you'd prefer to address, rather than the arguments actually being made.

There is no word of a lie in anything I have said.

When you insist that others have claimed that Jesus must have existed, when they have done no such thing, it is a false statement. You are either aware that this is false, and therefor lying, or you are unaware that this is false, and unable to comprehend that arguments that you are addressing.

What I said above is that Stone and other HJ believers here are assuming Jesus was real, rather than actually using the evidence to reach a conclusion. They are assuming that the evidence must be convincing enough to form their stated belief that Jesus was probably real...

Let me stop you right there. In the first sentence, you claim that Stone and other believers assume that Jesus was real, then, in the second sentence, you attribute to them a position that Jesus was probably real. So which is it? Are they certain that Jesus did exist, or do they think that there is a degree of probability that Jesus may have existed?

Again, please point to a single post in which anyone in this thread, or any of the related concurrent threads, has claimed that Jesus must have existed.

 

[dejudge]

You are entitled to your opinion, but it is still wrong. Advancing an hypothesis as plausible is not the same as claiming that it is true. People participating in this thread have pointed to various threads of evidence as indicative that an historical Jesus may be the cause of what we can observe. We haven't enough evidence to epistemologically confirm the existence of Jesus. We do have enough to say the it is plausible that an historical Jesus lived and that his life and death led to the foundation of a movement that eventually evolved into Christianity.

Actually you do not have any evidence from antiquity for your obscure itinerant HJ so it is virtually impossible to claim your imagined Jesus is plausible.

You PIGGY-BACK on the very same unreliable Ass Talking Bible with the evidence for Myth Jesus ---the Jesus of Faith--Jesus Christ, the Son of God born of a Ghost and God Creator who Walked on the sea, Transfigured, Resurrected and Ascended.

The same Ass Talking DENY that Jesus Christ was on earth when the Jesus cult started.

The Ass Talking Bible that you rely on for history actually states that it a Ghost trhat came down from heaven on the Day of Pentecost gave the disciple the POIWER to start the Jesus cult--NOT Jesus.,

I repeat, in the NT itself, Jesus, the Son of God, was already dead before a Ghost came a Ghost came down from heaven to give the disciples POWER to start the Cult.

See Acts 2.

The Jesus cult NEVER NEEDED an existing Jesus.

In the very Ass Talking Bible Jesus had NO power to start the cult.

There was NO Jesus on earth when the Jesus cult began.

Acts 2

1 And when the day of Pentecost was fully come , they were all with one accord in one place.

2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting . 3 And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them.

4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost...

Even if Jesus did live it was a Ghost [the Holy One] that gave the disciples the POWER to preach the Good NEWS.

The Jesus Christian cult is a product of Plausible Holy Ghost stories.

 

[IanS]

Originally Posted by IanS
... You cannot keep saying untrue things like that about other people without them eventually getting cheesed off with it. OK ... What has happened is that after hundreds of pages of people claiming there is sufficient evidence from bible historians to believe that Jesus was indeed real, and many hundreds of requests for any such evidence, the only thing that has been offered is belief in the holy bible.

As to me, you have just said an "untrue thing"; I hope because you have simply not read what I have written, as in fact you have refused to do in the past.

Where do I promote "belief in the holy bible"? Must I go through my posts to dig out the various occasions on which I have pointed out that a critical study of gospel sources entails no "belief in the holy bible"? In return you may show me the lies you claim I have said about your views.

Jesus wept Craig! What the hell are you doing? You are presenting a quote from me, but it’s not a quote is it? What you have done above is to run together completely different parts of different paragraphs!

Here is what I actually wrote! -

You cannot keep saying untrue things like that about other people without them eventually getting cheesed off with it. OK?
OK, enough of that then. And on to your question above -

- you ask "What is there that so exercises the MJ side about the question of the evidential value of the gospels? It really is strange. Can you explain that?"


Well, firstly - it is not an “MJ” side here. As has repeatedly been explained to you, the vast majority of sceptics here are not proposing any specific myth theory of Jesus (and nor do they need to), but simply noting how vanishingly weak the claimed evidence is.

Secondly - it most certainly is a matter of evidence. And it has been repeatedly demonstrated here beyond all doubt, that neither you nor anyone else has come even close to producing the most microscopic spec of any reliable credible evidence of Jesus.

And thirdly - the sceptics here are not “greatly exercised” about the claimed evidential value of the gospels. What has happened is that after hundreds of pages of people claiming there is sufficient evidence from bible historians to believe that Jesus was indeed real, and many hundreds of requests for any such evidence, the only thing that has been offered is belief in the holy bible. And that’s a bible only known to us as fanatical religious preaching of constant untrue claims, from an age of appalling superstitious ignorance, and written by a chain of completely anonymous people, none of whom ever met Jesus, and all of whom were quite definitely getting their Jesus stories from the OT.

And as for your complaint - we just had chapter and verse from you agreeing that you most certainly are trusting the holy bible as your source of reliable credible evidence from which you draw your belief in Jesus.

 

[Craig B]

In the very Ass Talking Bible Jesus had NO power to start the cult.

Sometimes you produce quite wonderful expressions, hitherto unknown to the world of biblical scholarship.

 

[Brainache]

Sometimes you produce quite wonderful expressions, hitherto unknown to the world of biblical scholarship.

A "Talking Ass Bible" sounds like one of those tacky novelties you'd buy at an Atheist Joke Shop...

 

[dejudge]

I suspect most sceptics here have long since arrived at the conclusion that pro-HJ posters in all these threads and on all these forums are really obtaining their belief as a mater of incredulity. Meaning they just cannot (or will not) understand how Christianity could have arisen without a real messianic figure being behind it all, and although they do not know and can never cite any credible evidence from their so-called “expert historians”, they nevertheless take the same approach of incredulity towards those “scholars” too, and take it on trust that such people could never claim there was overwhelming evidence unless there really is overwhelming evidence (even though none of them can ever produce any such evidence at all).

People who argue for an historical Jesus actually know that the HJ argument is extremely weak and illogical.

Belz claimed everyone has agreed the evidence for HJ is TERRIBLE.

HJers know the HJ argument is hopelessly flawed.

 

[Foster Zygote]

Actually you do not have any evidence from antiquity for your obscure itinerant HJ so it is virtually impossible to claim your imagined Jesus is plausible.

Actually, we do. You see, there's this religion that came to be called "Christianity". It started during the mid 1st Century around stories about a religious teacher named Jesus. Given that we have no recordings of Jesus' existence from his actual lifetime, we can ask ourselves, "Did he exist?". The truth is, we can't say with epistemological certainty that he existed or not. That is, we can't prove either his existence or nonexistence. But it is plausible that there was a real Jesus who died and was then mythologized.

You PIGGY-BACK on the very same unreliable Ass Talking Bible with the evidence for Myth Jesus ---the Jesus of Faith--Jesus Christ, the Son of God born of a Ghost and God Creator who Walked on the sea, Transfigured, Resurrected and Ascended.

The same Ass Talking DENY that Jesus Christ was on earth when the Jesus cult started.

The Ass Talking Bible that you rely on for history actually states that it a Ghost trhat came down from heaven on the Day of Pentecost gave the disciple the POIWER to start the Jesus cult--NOT Jesus.,

I repeat, in the NT itself, Jesus, the Son of God, was already dead before a Ghost came a Ghost came down from heaven to give the disciples POWER to start the Cult.

See Acts 2.

The Jesus cult NEVER NEEDED an existing Jesus.

In the very Ass Talking Bible Jesus had NO power to start the cult.

There was NO Jesus on earth when the Jesus cult began.

Acts 2

Even if Jesus did live it was a Ghost [the Holy One] that gave the disciples the POWER to preach the Good NEWS.

The Jesus Christian cult is a product of Plausible Holy Ghost stories.

The rest of your post amounts to more complaints that the stories told by those who spread the Jesus cult aren't logically sound. Do you know of any religions, started by people who's existence you do not doubt, who's mythologies make logical sense?

 

[Foster Zygote]

Jesus wept Craig! What the hell are you doing? You are presenting a quote from me, but it’s not a quote is it? What you have done above is to run together completely different parts of different paragraphs!

Here is what I actually wrote! -

Ellipsis (plural ellipses; from the Ancient Greek: ἔλλειψις, élleipsis, "omission" or "falling short") is a series of dots that usually indicates an intentional omission of a word, sentence, or whole section from a text without altering its original meaning.

 

[dejudge]

Actually, we do. You see, there's this religion that came to be called "Christianity". It started during the mid 1st Century around stories about a religious teacher named Jesus. Given that we have no recordings of Jesus' existence from his actual lifetime, we can ask ourselves, "Did he exist?". The truth is, we can't say with epistemological certainty that he existed or not. That is, we can't prove either his existence or nonexistence. But it is plausible that there was a real Jesus who died and was then mythologized.

The truth is that it is illogical to say your HJ is plausible without supporting evidence the very same way it is illogical to say that the God of the Jews is plausible because there is a Jewish religion.

It is the very same for Romulus. It is illogical to claim Romulus is plausible because there is a city called Rome.

The rest of your post amounts to more complaints that the stories told by those who spread the Jesus cult aren't logically sound. Do you know of any religions, started by people who's existence you do not doubt, who's mythologies make logical sense?

You are complaining because you have no evidence which makes your argument for an HJ logically unsound.

 

[Brainache]

The truth is that it is illogical to say your HJ is plausible without supporting evidence the very same way it is illogical to say that the God of the Jews is plausible because there is a Jewish religion.

It is the very same for Romulus. It is illogical to claim Romulus is plausible because there is a city called Rome.




You are complaining because you have no evidence which makes your argument for an HJ logically unsound.

Buehler?

 

[dejudge]

The HJ argument is shown be a fishing expedition--after hundreds of years the Quest for an Historical Jesus still continues with Multiple versions of HJ based on guessing.

HJers have only managed to show that the NT is not a reliable historical source and that their HJ is NOT accounted for in the history of mankind as soon as it was admitted that their HJ was NOT born in Bethlehem and was NOT the Christ.