Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

[proudfootz]

As stated before, your criterion is your hostility to religion. This has nothing to do with whether Jesus existed as a person or not. "Relevance" to people's lives is neither here nor there in this discussion. There simply isn't anything more to be said about this. Your view is nonsense.

Of course, IanS hasn't stated this alleged 'criterion'.

Is it your position that historians who dismiss Jesus's miracles are 'hostile to religion' because they don't believe in magic?

Therefore the 'historical Jesus' hypothesis is nonsense?

 

[dejudge]

As stated before, your criterion is your hostility to religion. This has nothing to do with whether Jesus existed as a person or not. "Relevance" to people's lives is neither here nor there in this discussion. There simply isn't anything more to be said about this. Your view is nonsense.

Why are HJers who Believe the Bible is history hostile to Fundamentalist Bible Believers when they are on their side?

HJers and Fundamentalists don't seem to get along. Why?

 

[IanS]

The specifics are definitely in question.
The gross outline is generally accepted as plausible; that a war took place and that such a war or battle was between Troy and Greece, and as well, that Troy existed.

We will probably never know the actual details of these kinds of events, or the likes of figures like Buddha or Jesus (or several Japanese ancient heroes, Egyptian Kings, Babylonian rulers, etc...).

There are truly very large gaps of information, and the idea of writing for prosperity and in secular fashion was not remotely close to a developed concept during such ages.

This doesn't prove Jesus, or any other similar figure.
I only state that such conditions are hardly alien and unusual in the ancient record.

Jayson - just re. the final highlighted sentence, which is the summarised point of what you are saying -

- the fact that historians and history students may be interested in all sorts of ancient history, is not really the point here. And nor is it the point if parts of that ancient history can be turned into popular TV programs or popular-level books (as has been the fashion for a number of years now). That's all fine, but for most things in ancient history, whether or not claimed evidence is true or false, whether the strength of the claimed evidence has been wildly exaggerated or vice-versa, is really not of great importance to anyone except for a narrow group of academic historians. And nor is it going to have any real influence on anyones future now anyway.

But in the case of Jesus we are not actually talking about “historians” anyway. And we are not talking about a hobby interest in ancient history amongst the general public. We are talking about the claims and beliefs of bible scholars, theologians, Christian writers, the Church and Christians in general, who have been convinced there is very good evidence to show that Jesus did exist … most of them think the evidence is absolutely certain and that there could never be any doubt about it.

So in that sense, on a forum like this we do not, and should not, just take the word of bible scholars at face value, and say “oh well, they are academic authorities, so lets just appeal to their better knowledge and agree he must have existed”. The point is, you might do just that with say a TV program or a book about the Trojan Wars … you might simply accept the historians word there as an authority you should believe, because it really doesn’t matter to you or anyone else! But the case of Jesus is not remotely like that …

… in the Jesus case we are asked to take the word of bible scholars for something that is of very direct and worldwide importance in almost everyone’s lives today. But when you ask those bible scholars “what actually is this very persuasive evidence that makes you all so sure?”, the replies are simply terrible! All they can do is to lamely hand you the bible and say we should all believe some things in that book!

And that really just is not good enough in a case as important as Jesus.

 

[Brainache]

...
But in the case of Jesus we are not actually talking about “historians” anyway. And we are not talking about a hobby interest in ancient history amongst the general public. We are talking about the claims and beliefs of bible scholars, theologians, Christian writers, the Church and Christians in general, who have been convinced there is very good evidence to show that Jesus did exist … most of them think the evidence is absolutely certain and that there could never be any doubt about it.

So in that sense, on a forum like this we do not, and should not, just take the word of bible scholars at face value, and say “oh well, they are academic authorities, so lets just appeal to their better knowledge and agree he must have existed”. The point is, you might do just that with say a TV program or a book about the Trojan Wars … you might simply accept the historians word there as an authority you should believe, because it really doesn’t matter to you or anyone else! But the case of Jesus is not remotely like that …

… in the Jesus case we are asked to take the word of bible scholars for something that is of very direct and worldwide importance in almost everyone’s lives today. But when you ask those bible scholars “what actually is this very persuasive evidence that makes you all so sure?”, the replies are simply terrible! All they can do is to lamely hand you the bible and say we should all believe some things in that book!

And that really just is not good enough in a case as important as Jesus.

You really should try engaging with actual Historians on this subject. There are plenty of them who are not Christian.

Try talking to the Jewish ones for example.

You want them to use different criteria for assessing the writings about Jesus than they do for anyone else.

Seems to me you are putting far too much faith in Jesus the miracle working son of God, so much so that you can't understand that Secular Historians can be confident that there was a Jewish Rabbi upon whom the stories were based. That Rabbi was not magical or divine, just the man at the centre of a superstitious cult.

Why do you think that is so exceptional?

 

[IanS]

As stated before, your criterion is your hostility to religion. This has nothing to do with whether Jesus existed as a person or not. "Relevance" to people's lives is neither here nor there in this discussion. There simply isn't anything more to be said about this. Your view is nonsense.

That's the tenth time you have tried to make that claim, even though you know very well, and have been told in the clearest possible terms each time, that its completely untrue.

The reason I think the Jesus case is very shaky, is because the claimed evidence is poor to non-existent. Full stop.

However, the reason I think the subject is important is because I think Jesus is a vitally important figure in the current day Christian church as the basis of it's teaching, it's beliefs, and the beliefs of Christians in general.

And those are two quite separate considerations.

 

[JaysonR]

IanS;

To both of your responses, I have the following remark:

Historicity is not determined in value based on the want of modern-day relevance.

The historical record is not relaxed or tightened based on modern relevance.
There should be no difference in our viewing of any event, place or person - regardless of how much it might excite, offend, or otherwise provoke any given modern mind.

Bowing to fashion is not a means of approaching history; indeed, the opposite of this has a long relationship in the field.

So do we loosen our concern for Ananus ben Ananus and tighten our concern over Jesus?
No.
Both are to be subjected to the same examination and standards, else we have not examined anything and have instead just thrown our bias opinions into the matter negligent of method and standard.

 

[GDon]

Firstly - the Jesus case is unusual (if not actually unique), because in his case what is essential is evidence of him actually existing as an individual. Whereas in every other case that you might mention from ancient history, e.g. Caesar, or Pythagoras, or Alexander the Great (to name the usual suspects!) what matters is NOT whether the individual did any of the things claimed in their name, or even whether they lived at all, but instead what matters is the evidence establishing the events that are said to have happened in their name, e.g. famous wars, famous philosophical movements etc.

That is - it does not actually matter if Caesar was not a real figure. What matters to history is that there certainly was a Roman ruler at that time who did all the major things attributed to his reign. And the evidence for that is overwhelming. Not just in contemporary writing, but in the remains of numerous foreign battles, numerous physical monuments, written records of governing etc.

Historians do not really care if his name was actually “Caesar” or if he really had illegitimate children with various women., whether a sycophantic courtier told Caesar he was god, or that Caesar said “by Jove, do you know I think I am indeed now a god!” … history has no interest in trivial nonsense like that. What matters is that there is overwhelming independently corroborated evidence of what the emperor of Rome did in that period of Roman rule.

The same is true of ancient philosophers like Pythagoras. Apparently very little is known of Pythagoras himself. But no historians or anyone else really cares about that. What matters to history is the philosophical Pythagorean movement that began with his name and the mathematical discoveries etc. associated with the name … it’s the discoveries and the events that are historically important, not whether it was all due to anyone named Pythagoras, or whether somebody called Bill Smith was really responsible for it all.

However, that is not the case for Jesus. In the case of Jesus it’s the existence of the person himself that is vital. We all know Christianity began around that time, and that Christianity existed as a religion thereafter. Nobody here has ever disputed that. The dispute is about whether Jesus truly existed and whether bible scholars are right to say the evidence for the existence of Jesus is overwhelming (in fact, “certain”). So in the this case, unusually in ancient history, what is important is the existence of the figure himself.

That’s the first factor. The next thing is - nobody except a handful of historians care whether Pythagoras or Alexander the Great ever existed. They are totally irrelevant to the daily lives of everyone on earth today. But with Jesus as the very foundation and justification on which worldwide Christianity is built, with it’s very considerable influence on world affairs and direct influence in US and European governments, law making, taxation, education etc., Jesus is of very real & direct day-to-day importance in the lives of virtually every person on this planet.

So, unusually, in the Jesus case, it’s the persons existence which requires the evidence. And since a great deal hangs upon it, that evidence does need to be pretty solid and well confirmed.

I highlighted those parts I thought were interesting. To be honest, I can't understand how your comments relate to the validity or not of using "copies of copies". I'd like to keep the focus on that, as a broader question of how history can be investigated.

The main point (please correct me if I am wrong) is that we can use "copies of copies" if there is "overwhelming independently corroborated evidence" to support those "copies of copies". Otherwise they can't be used. Is that correct? If not, can you express what you mean, keeping the focus on "copies of copies" please?

 

[Craig B]

Of course, IanS hasn't stated this alleged 'criterion'. [of hostility to religion]

In effect he has. Look at this.

The point is that whatever the status of any Trojan wars, supernatural or not, if you asked people on street whether they thought the evidence was good enough to believe it, they would tell you they have no interest in it either way. It's simply not important to the daily lives of hardly anyone alive today. People don’t care if the evidence for that is good or bad. They are just not interested. And it makes zero difference to them.

That is very much not the point, of course.

But if you try asking the same question about Jesus, especially throughout much of the USA, asking if they think Jesus was real, then you'd find a vastly different response.

We are to imagine that IanS thinks this is a good thing?

But the Trojan wars and Jesus are things of the ancient past, which should have zero practical importance to anyone’s daily life today .... except of course that the Jesus case is completely different (probably unique), because belief in his existence does continue to have a very significant impact on the lives of almost everyone today.

See how Jesus "should have" no significance, but he does. That is a clear statement of aversion and hostility. I do not argue that this is or is not justified. I assert that it is not a valid argument against historicity.

 

[dejudge]

So do we loosen our concern for Ananus ben Ananus and tighten our concern over Jesus?
No.
Both are to be subjected to the same examination and standards, else we have not examined anything and have instead just thrown our bias opinions into the matter negligent of method and standard.

You seem to forget that there are hundreds upon hundreds of manuscripts and Codices about Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God.


In fact, there may be more existing writings about Jesus the Son of God than ALL the Deified Emperors of Roman plus all the Myth Gods of the Jews, Greek and Romans.

We probably would find very very little about your Ananus ben Ananus but we would find a vast amount of details about Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God.

Whether people today are biased the Conception, Birth, Death, Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus the Son of God are documented in hundreds of sources for hundreds of year.

We have a complete Documented Myth, a far more detailed Myth than any other Myth in the history of mankind.

The conception and Birth of the Jesus is established and documented until new evidence surfaces.

 

[IanS]

IanS;

To both of your responses, I have the following remark:

Historicity is not determined in value based on the want of modern-day relevance.

The historical record is not relaxed or tightened based on modern relevance.
There should be no difference in our viewing of any event, place or person - regardless of how much it might excite, offend, or otherwise provoke any given modern mind.

Bowing to fashion is not a means of approaching history; indeed, the opposite of this has a long relationship in the field.

So do we loosen our concern for Ananus ben Ananus and tighten our concern over Jesus?
No.
Both are to be subjected to the same examination and standards, else we have not examined anything and have instead just thrown our bias opinions into the matter negligent of method and standard.

No. You are talking about what matters to historians in non-religious issues of history.

But we are not talking here about historians and non-religious matters of history. We are talking about what bible scholars, theologians and Christian writers in general claim to be the evidence for Jesus.

And we are simply asking what that evidence actually is.

You yourself may be equally interested in what evidence is claimed for any Trojan Wars or whatever. But (a) that is not what we are discussing here, and (b) almost nobody cares what evidence exists for any Trojan Wars, because they are no longer of practical importance to anyone. So very few people are going to bother getting "exercised" about whether the claimed evidence is good or bad.

But just because historians, or indeed in this case bible scholars and theologians, may believe all sorts of other things on terrible evidence, even on supernatural evidence, certainly does not mean anyone here should also accept that terrible evidence simply on the basis that these people are supposed to be “scholars” who we should appeal to.

 

[JaysonR]

IanS,

The evidence is rather well known; especially after 170 some-odd pages.
If that evidence leads one to decide they do not think such a figure existed, then so be it; if the opposite is true, so be it.

The evidence is incapable of being infallible, as is being required, however.

Just as equally as it is impossible for Ananus ben Ananus to be accounted for by the same level of scrutiny.
By the caliber that has been discussed in here, such a figure is slotted as non-existent at a much earlier stage of examination than such a figure as Jesus.

And no, it does not matter what the popular need is in any direction in the examination of historicity.

At no point in determining the historicity of something does the question arise as to which caliber of interest the current public has in the subject and therefore determine some sliding scale of scrutiny.

If the evidence that is capable of being gained at this point is not good enough for you, then so be it; no one will reasonably be able to convince you otherwise of your position (just as I do not think anyone in this entire thread has really strongly changed their position in either direction).

We could arrive at the same issue regarding the likes of Ananus ben Ananus.

 

[dejudge]

....If the evidence that is capable of being gained at this point is not good enough for you, then so be it; no one will reasonably be able to convince you otherwise of your position (just as I do not think anyone in this entire thread has really strongly changed their position in either direction).

How can you know no one has changed their position?

 

[JaysonR]

I don't know that such has happened, but I do not think that such has occurred, as I have yet to see any post by anyone suggesting that their position has radically shifted from one side to the other in either direction.

What I have seen are a large amount of posts which have served to refine each side's arguments, which then spiral into heated discourses of varying quality between both sides, and then eventually a revived iteration of the previous points made by both sides, followed by another round of heated discourse of varying quality, and then eventually a revived iteration of the previous points made by both sides...

As far as I see, both sides reject the other side's essential premises, and thereby do not recognize the logical deductions which follow from those initial premises.

 

[proudfootz]

In effect he has. Look at this. That is very much not the point, of course. We are to imagine that IanS thinks this is a good thing? See how Jesus "should have" no significance, but he does. That is a clear statement of aversion and hostility. I do not argue that this is or is not justified. I assert that it is not a valid argument against historicity.

None of this adds up to an alleged 'criterion of hostility to religion'.

IanS explicitly explains this is not the case:

"The reason I think the Jesus case is very shaky, is because the claimed evidence is poor to non-existent. Full stop.

However, the reason I think the subject is important is because I think Jesus is a vitally important figure in the current day Christian church as the basis of it's teaching, it's beliefs, and the beliefs of Christians in general.

And those are two quite separate considerations."

 

[JaysonR]

However, that vested interest will never be capable of altering the evident material in any fashion, but instead will only allow any given individual the ability to become aware of just how scant 1st c CE Middle Eastern history really is.

For some, realizing just how terrible that historical record is will mean changing their mind over the acceptance of given figures, such as Jesus, as having existed.

What cannot be claimed, however, is that due to the value of Jesus for today, that the scrutiny of the material must therefore exceed the capacity available for the region and age.

No one can oblige that request; it is impossible at this time for any like figure of this region and time.

If sects rose following Ananus ben Ananus, we would be at roughly the same position as we are with the Jesus figure.

Any attempt to get very specific in this region and age results in a large amount of speculation, and that our culture found great value in this figure can somewhat bias the assumption of how notable any like figure would have been during this period or how well they would have been accounted for; even in-spite of the Roman wipe-out of all Hebrew records and government.

Case in point, the High Priests would easily have been of far more importance during their own time than any revolutionary (regardless how big any given revolutionary was), yet we have practically no records of their existence, and specifically far less regarding their actions.

It's not like folks claiming to be a messianic leader or prophet were in short supply during this time; any figure like Jesus would hardly stand apart as notable in fashion more than worth noting a High Priest to anyone aside from those who followed such an individual.

 

[IanS]

IanS,

The evidence is rather well known; especially after 170 some-odd pages.
If that evidence leads one to decide they do not think such a figure existed, then so be it; if the opposite is true, so be it.

Well so far no reliable evidence of Jesus has been produced anywhere in the 170 pages. If you think it has then by all means feel free to just list it.

What has been produced is nothing more than quotes from the bible. By that is not by any means reliable evidence of any it’s authors ever knowing Jesus and being in any position to provide any evidence known to them about Jesus.

That is evidence of peoples 1st (2nd) century beliefs about Jesus. But there is no evidence there to show their beliefs were true. If you think there is evidence there showing their beliefs were true, then go ahead and just list it.

The evidence is incapable of being infallible, as is being required, however..

Who ever asked for infallible evidence?

What has been asked for is anything remotely like we have for other well supported famous figures in history, e.g. Caesar, other Roman emperors, various Egyptian pharaohs, all sorts of kings and queens etc.

But if the best you can come up with is the late copyist writing of the bible describing Jesus as overtly supernatural on almost every page, and where not a single writer in the whole bible ever claimed to have met this person, then that is way short of what’s required even to be reliably called “evidence”.

Just as equally as it is impossible for Ananus ben Ananus to be accounted for by the same level of scrutiny...

We are not talking about Ananus or anyone else. We are talking about Jesus. So lets stick to the point please - where is the evidence that anyone ever wrote to make a credible claim of having met Jesus?

By the caliber that has been discussed in here, such a figure is slotted as non-existent at a much earlier stage of examination than such a figure as Jesus....

You mean Ananus has less supporting evidence than Jesus? OK, well how does that help the case for Jesus?

Is it supposed to be positive evidence for Jesus that we have even less known “evidence” for somebody else?

And no, it does not matter what the popular need is in any direction in the examination of historicity.....

It’s not a matter of “popular” need. What I have said is that the case of Jesus is of particular current day concern and importance to people now. And that’s why it requires good supporting evidence … and not merely the sort of evidence you seem to be suggesting as virtually non existent for someone called Ananus.

Just as a quite different example of needing particularly good evidence for especially important claims - there was actually plenty of good theoretical evidence for the Higgs Field before the LHC experiments and their final announcement of observing the effect. But the reason we went to all that trouble of trying to build the LHC and detect the field/"particle" directly, was that the proposed existence of the Higgs Field is especially important and has far reaching consequences … so the evidence for its existence needed to be much better than it was prior to the LHC experiments.

Important claims do require a much better standard of evidence.

At no point in determining the historicity of something does the question arise as to which caliber of interest the current public has in the subject and therefore determine some sliding scale of scrutiny......

I disagree about that. Though it’s not just public interest we are talking about in general. However in the Jesus case, the main interest is that of the public - Christians in general, Church leaders and theologians are really all members of the public when it comes to their religious belief in Jesus. But if that belief is to be true, then it does need very good supporting evidence. Because that belief has far reaching important consequences.

Historians may not care what the public thinks about the quality of their evidence in other non-religious matters, e.g. the existence of Caesar. And I’m not disputing that - public amateur opinion does not change the actual factual evidence. But to repeat - this is not case where “historians” are determining anything. The people you are talking about here are bible scholars, who have claimed that the evidence is overwhelming and who along with Church leaders and theologians have led the general public to believe that the evidence is overwhelming and determined so by expert academic authority, but where in fact when asked for that evidence, they can do no more than say they believe certain things in the bible … without any reasonable external corroboration at all.

And that is just not good enough. And nor is it a case of that position being beyond public scrutiny.

If the evidence that is capable of being gained at this point is not good enough for you, then so be it; no one will reasonably be able to convince you otherwise of your position (just as I do not think anyone in this entire thread has really strongly changed their position in either direction).

We could arrive at the same issue regarding the likes of Ananus ben Ananus.

People rarely change their minds on any issue just in the course of a single thread, and especially not on this subject, which is as you can see a mater which always draws a huge number of posts and often quite heated and bad tempered debate.

However that is not really the aim to change minds immediately in this thread.

What is not good enough for me as evidence of a human Jesus, is the total lack of any evidence of anyone ever writing to credibly claim they had ever met or known a living Jesus in anyway at all. Nor any physical or archaeological evidence of any genuine kind whatsoever.

But where instead the claimed evidence is supposed to be that in the 1st-2nd century, a number of highly religious people, hugely superstitious and barely educated by modern standards, wrote to say that although they themselves never knew Jesus, unnamed anonymous sources who also had never claimed to know Jesus, apparently believed that still earlier people were once disciples who would have known Jesus … and what they knew about him was that he walked on water, raised the dead and fed thousands of people with no food, plus 40 or so other impossible miracles.

That is not credible evidence of anyone ever knowing a living Jesus. And it should not be good enough for you as credible evidence either.

But if you think there is better evidence than that in the bible, then by all means tell us what it is. Because so far nobody here has been able to produce anything except the manifestly unreliable and incredible stories in the bible.

 

[JaysonR]

IanS,

There's a much easier approach than your comments require.
It's rather simple: Was there a Jesus who was the divine savior of humankind, who was part of God?

No. That is incredibly easy to answer.
Firstly, before we even get to Jesus, we can rule out the divinity by simply noting that the Hebrew god was the Canaanite deity El from that pantheon - the Father of the pantheon.
By consequence, we openly know that no such god as the Hebrew god even existed since it was lifted from the Canaanite pantheon and was of polytheistic following for quite some time by the Hebrew peoples until a unification movement (possibly the Maccabees movement) left only El standing.

So right away we can easily claim that the imperative aspect that you are concerned with regarding Jesus' stature in our culture is immediately answered: no such figure existed.


What we are left with is rather benign and unimpressive to our culture and of no interest to anyone alive today in regards to what you are outlining.
It matters none at all whether there was some outspoken revolutionary from Galilee who was killed and from whom some Hebrew unification philosophy was taken up by others for Hebraic following and transfigured through the diaspora into a legend of individualized and self-actualized authority to moral judgement beyond the control of centralized governance or theocratic rule by misconstrued outline of whatever aspects of those philosophies happened to have made it in some fashion from oral tradition of the Hebrew culture into textual literature tradition of the Roman empire.

This no longer is fascinating in any other respect other than to those who find interest in examining why this particular legend was attractive to the territories of the Roman empire, and in which manners this legend was leveraged for which cultural sociopolitical movements of their time.

In short, Jesus as an historical figure, and not a divine figure, is hardly valuable to anyone in this culture we live in today; which would have been about the same for any such figure during their own time.

 

[tsig]

It's amusing that when confronted with a mirror of your own behavior you suddenly recognize your tactics as dishonest efforts to score points.

You've condemned yourself.

Odd how people accuse you of trying to poison them when you feed them their own cooking.

 

[tsig]

IanS,

There's a much easier approach than your comments require.
It's rather simple: Was there a Jesus who was the divine savior of humankind, who was part of God?

No. That is incredibly easy to answer.
Firstly, before we even get to Jesus, we can rule out the divinity by simply noting that the Hebrew god was the Canaanite deity El from that pantheon - the Father of the pantheon.
By consequence, we openly know that no such god as the Hebrew god even existed since it was lifted from the Canaanite pantheon and was of polytheistic following for quite some time by the Hebrew peoples until a unification movement (possibly the Maccabees movement) left only El standing.

So right away we can easily claim that the imperative aspect that you are concerned with regarding Jesus' stature in our culture is immediately answered: no such figure existed.


What we are left with is rather benign and unimpressive to our culture and of no interest to anyone alive today in regards to what you are outlining.
It matters none at all whether there was some outspoken revolutionary from Galilee who was killed and from whom some Hebrew unification philosophy was taken up by others for Hebraic following and transfigured through the diaspora into a legend of individualized and self-actualized authority to moral judgement beyond the control of centralized governance or theocratic rule by misconstrued outline of whatever aspects of those philosophies happened to have made it in some fashion from oral tradition of the Hebrew culture into textual literature tradition of the Roman empire.

This no longer is fascinating in any other respect other than to those who find interest in examining why this particular legend was attractive to the territories of the Roman empire, and in which manners this legend was leveraged for which cultural sociopolitical movements of their time.

In short, Jesus as an historical figure, and not a divine figure, is hardly valuable to anyone in this culture we live in today; which would have been about the same for any such figure during their own time.

Seems an odd thing to say when this thread alone has 7000+ posts and there are many such threads.

 

[JaysonR]

Not odd at all.
The value of impact for that assessment to our culture is about as valuable as inquiring of a High Priest of the same age; actually less.

The value in our culture is on the divinity claim, and that is very easy to answer as not accurate and so the claim regarding the outstanding nature requiring some larger caliber of inquiry than normal for an historical version of this figure is not applicable as that call to value unto our culture causing a requirement for a larger caliber of inquiry is answered without the need of historicity arriving into question, for, as mentioned, it is only the divine figure in our culture which is of dramatic value - not the concept of a benign Hebrew revolutionary from the Northern region of Galilee.