Yes, definitely agree. Historians do not like to admit this, but their field is not terribly rigorous, at least not when compared to physics or chemistry. The same can be said of Psychology, though it is improving as a field.
Bible Studies is clearly a relatively non-rigorous field by its very nature. But there are Bible Studies and there are Bible Studies. Not everyone approaches the subject from the same perspective, so it is not really fair to lump them together and treat all the same.
A 'scholar' at Liberty University does not approach this material the same way that Crossan and Ehrman do. When it comes to Crossan I don't think I can reliably state if he is a believer or not. He does not think that Jesus was put in a tomb and resurrected from the dead in the way related in the gospels. But he still seems to be a believer. Ehrman is not.
I object to anyone who says that Jesus definitely, no question about it, existed too. I don't see any way to make such an absolute statement.
On the basis of the above (and all of your post), you and I are barely disagreeing at all beyond the level of "angels on a pin head". So the following are just some quite general personal comments -
When you say “But he (Crossan) still seems to be a believer. Ehrman is not” , can we be clear that you are talking there about belief in God? Because if we are talking about Jesus (as we were/are), then both Ehrman & Crossan do say they believe Jesus is a matter of known “certainty“.
When you say that you “object to anyone who says that Jesus definitely, no question about it, existed too. I don't see any way to make such an absolute statement.”, I have to point out that you will in that case definitely need to object to Bart Ehrman and Dominic Crossan, and afaik almost all bible scholars, e.g. where Ehrman says in his book that “almost every properly trained scholar on the planet” agrees with his views and where he (Ehrman) repeatedly said in that book that Jesus “certainly” “definitely” “did exist”.
And on that particular point of such well known and supposedly most academically expert and agnostically sceptic scholars as Bart Ehrman being incautious enough to write repeatedly declaring “certainty” , people really ought to ask themselves what sort of level of academic prowess it is that has it’s most celebrated practitioners writing so incautiously as that in a commercial book which they must have known would be seen by millions of people?
It’s really inconceivable that even the most lightweight research scientist would write anything as incautious and unprofessional as that unless he/she really did mean to express such certainty and felt very confident indeed of defending his/her words.
IOW - that sort of repeated lack of care should tell people a great deal about the difference in academic rigor and expertise that exists within a field like Bible Studies compared to any properly objective field such as theoretical/mathematical physics where, as some here know, I spent most of my academic past. And I only chuck in that piece of personal info because several HJ people here, and one in particular, have repeatedly told myself and others that we are not academically qualified to criticise bible scholars like Bart Ehrman, and that any such remarks I may make about apparent lack of care and objectivity in their work is an “ad hominem” etc. Well some of us have spent decades in far more careful, precise and objective academic research where “evidence” of the kind reportedly relied upon by bible scholars would be rejected as so hopelessly flawed as to be inadmissible from the start.
Regarding the reliability of the gospels and Paul's letters as historical documents, I think it depends entirely what one wants to glean from them. Most academic HJ research does not concern itself with Jesus as messiah -- that is a matter of faith. HJ 'research' concerns if he existed and what he might have actually done if he existed. I think it best to leave the messiah talk to the side when discussing HJ endeavors -- unless you particularly want to refer to the faith community or what the authors seemed to believe.
Even in purely fictional works one can glean historical facts. That should not be controversial. We could use the Harry Potter series, for example as evidence that automobiles exist. We should be skeptical about their ability to fly and suffer damage from a tree whomping them, however..
When you say “Most academic HJ research does not concern itself with Jesus as messiah -- that is a matter of faith. HJ 'research' concerns if he existed and what he might have actually done if he existed” … afaik, there is actually no Jesus originally described except for the biblical Jesus of peoples faith. The idea of a HJ is something relatively modern. But the only evidence for any Jesus, is that biblical writing which does not describe belief in a so-called “HJ” at all. The evidence (such as it is in the bible) is evidence of a miraculous supernatural Jesus … or rather, to be precise, it’s only evidence of peoples beliefs in a supernatural messiah that none of them had ever known except through generations of belief in OT prophecy drawn from centuries before Paul and the others were even born.
I think I must object to two things in the above statement. First, I think it is possible to use the gospels and Paul's letters if one applies strict criteria to them and arrive at historical probability -- just as one can glean the existence of cars from Harry Potter. We could not do that if the gospels and Paul's letters were all that we have, but that is not the case -- which is my second objection. There is extra-biblical material that informs the discussion, and historical analysis of first century CE Judaism also informs the conclusions one can draw from this material.
I fully agree that what Crossan and Ehrman claim about an historical Jesus falls short of good argument. But the fact that they stretch too far does not diminish the argument that there may have been a person behind the stories.
If by “extra biblical material” you mean the usual sources such as Tacitus and Josephus, then I’m afraid that is of absolutely no credibility at all in respect of it‘s ultra brief mention of “Jesus“. We have been through this before very many times, but very briefly - the fact is (apparently) that none of that extra-biblical writing is known in extant form (i.e. actually existing) except from copies made around 1000 years and more after the original writers had all died. And that vast discrepancy in the dates alone, makes any such extra biblical sources inadmissible as reliable writing about a messiah that none of those non-biblical writers could possibly have ever themselves known anyway.
Really, the bible scholars (and everyone else) is stuck just with the bible. And that is quite obviously neither reliable as a source (only anonymous copies available from long after the events), and not remotely credible in what is says (impossible miracles on almost every page).
No one caught the Roxanne reference