Historical Jesus

[abaddon]

Once writings of antiquity are examined it will be easily seen that Jesus, the disciples and Paul were completely fabricated and that all of them are found in works of fiction, forgery, false attribution and without historical corroboration.

False. You have presented no convincing argument. Your argument is dismissed

Examine the very NT.

Did that. Next.

All the NT stories of Jesus, the disciples and Paul are utter fiction.

Unevidenced assertions.

All the authors are unknown but falsely attributed to Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, James, Peter, Jude and John.

So what? Quibbling about the names gets you nowhere.

Now, examine all the apocryphal writings which mention Jesus, the disciples and Paul.

Did that too and fond them historically interesting and that is about it. Now what?

The apocryphal writings about Jesus, the disciples and Paul are total ridiculous fiction just like the NT.

Baseless assertion.

Examine writings from the 1st century by supposed well-known writers it will be noticed that there is no mention of Jesus, the disciples and Paul except in forgeries.

You have the full set of first century writings? Or just the ones you are aware of? Or including the ones not yet discovered?

It is argued that it is not likely 1st century writers would mention NT characters like Jesus, the disciples and Paul but such an argument is contradicted by the very writings which were forged in an attempt to historicise Jesus.

Bare assertion.

The NT contains stories about a character called John the Baptist who after having met Jesus baptised him in the river Jordan.

So what?

John the Baptist is mentioned in the writings of Josephus' "Antiquities of the Jews" and the passage is not considered a forgery.

Oooo, was he? JtB must therefore be real according to your argument and baptised some bloke in the river jordan. How earthshakingly MUNDANE.

Josephus' "Antiquities of the Jews" 18. appears to corroborate that John the Baptist was a figure of history in the time of Herod even though the NT stories about John the Baptist were made up.

Cherry picking. That account is true but this other one is not? How old are you?

In gMark, John the Baptist, is mentioned a few times in the 1st chapter and chapter 8 but the rest of the story is about Jesus and the disciples. For example, Jesus is mentioned at least 93 times, and the disciples no less than 90 times.

Popularity contest now, is it? That called the argumentum ad populun. Go look it up.

In the NT John the Baptist, later slain by Herod, supposedly baptised Jesus, a miracle worker, who had thousands of followers in Judea and was put on trial before the Sanhedrin and Pilate after which he was crucified.

It's vaguely possible, that happened in some form. But I really couldn't care less whether it did or didn't.

The fact that Josephus mentioned John the Baptist means that he could have mention Jesus, his disciples and Paul if they were really figures of history.

Interesting. You think JtB WAS a historical figure. How do you know that? You already know part of joe baby was forged. Why not that bit? Cherry picking again.

Josephus mentioned characters by name who claimed to have or attempted to perform miracles similar to the supposed miracles of Jesus.

Joe baby mentioned Jesus by name. Pick which bits of Joe baby you want.

Why didn't Josephus write about the supposed magician called Jesus who was crucified under Pilate in Jerusalem?

Or Sauron, or Eru, or Vishnu. Or whatever. That is such a pointless and useless line of argument.

Jesus never existed.

Unevidenced assertion.

Jesus, the disciples and Paul never had any history so writings of well-known writers had to be corrupted or fabricated in an attempt to historicise them.

Unevidenced assertion.


In the end, your post was a stream of unevidenced claims, baseless assertions, pointless diversions and logical fallacies. It's all an intellectual dead end. Yet, somehow, you have your panties in a wad over it. I want to know why that is and you refuse to say.

Do you really think your abject nonsense will convince any christian of "the error of their ways"?

Of course not and you know it.

The only possibility is that you are trying to convince yourself.

As an atheist, it doesn't much matter to me.

But it is awfully funny to watch you stamping your feet with such vigour,

 

[Reformed Offlian]

Examine the very NT.

Now, examine all the apocryphal writings which mention Jesus, the disciples and Paul.

Examine writings from the 1st century by supposed well-known writers

I have a better idea: construct an actual argument for your conclusions that doesn’t commit obvious fallacies such as affirming the consequent or hasty generalization.

As I’ve already alluded to twice before, your conclusions are only as good as the inferences you used to reach them. If the inferences are weak -as yours are -then the observations don’t matter. Simply piling more exhibits onto the evidence table won’t strengthen your case.

Outlining a plausible theory of the crime wouldn’t hurt, either. Why fake Paul?

 

[smartcooky]

I have a better idea: construct an actual argument for your conclusions that doesn’t commit obvious fallacies such as affirming the consequent or hasty generalization.

As I’ve already alluded to twice before, your conclusions are only as good as the inferences you used to reach them. If the inferences are weak -as yours are -then the observations don’t matter. Simply piling more exhibits onto the evidence table won’t strengthen your case.

I've been saying something like this for a while. The response so far has been that dejudge talked down to me like an overbearing 1920s British Public School master. I don't expect the response to you will be very much different.

Outlining a plausible theory of the crime wouldn’t hurt, either. Why fake Paul?

I wish you good luck getting any kind of worthwhile answer to that!
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[DevilsAdvocate]

A great nany historians date many of the New Testament Books to the second century.

Here is a video that suggests just that. I personally don't believe this...not sure what I believe as to when it was created. Although I do believe that Jesus was either totally made up or highly exaggerated.

That's tinfoil hat conspiracy nonsense. So the Romans had Josephus create the Jesus myth to pacify the Jews. And somehow they bought it. But then the Romans persecuted the Christians that they had created.

And Josephus made subtle connections between Jesus and Titus so that...um...the Jews would think that Titus was a good guy like Jesus? They would think that the terror of the Jews was actually sort of holy because he was like the Jesus fiction they had been tricked into believing? Somehow.

And they were tricked into this belief that Titus is just like Jesus by these extremely subtle and tenuous connections that nobody mentioned or even "discovered" for about 2000 years?

Except they didn't, because there are no records (that I am aware of) of early Christians linking Jesus to Titus or saying Titus was an alright dude.

If you look at my smudges and squint and tilt your head and forget everything you know, you just might see Jesus!

 

[HansMustermann]

At least the argument about whether Acts should have mentioned Paul writing letters is whimsical, but at least it wouldn't be absurd if the author had decided to include such padding. It wouldn't be outside the scope.

However the objection that the GOSPELS mention the other disciples but not Paul is getting into the realm of the downright absurd. The gospels are focused on Jesus, and pretty much end with Jesus's death and resurrection. Save for a bit of epilogue that gets increasingly inflated over time, maybe, but even that is about meeting Jesus and fairly close in time to the crucifixion anyway.

Paul never meets Jesus before crucifixion, doesn't travel with him, doesn't personally interact with Jesus, etc. He doesn't even meet any of the supposed 12 disciples until YEARS after his conversion. Remember, he says he first goes to Arabia, then to Damascus, has to escape from there, then 3 more years pass before he meets Peter. That's YEARS after the end of the gospels.

Even in the fiction that is Acts, he doesn't actually interact with any other followers of Jesus (such as Stephen) until well after Jesus lived, died, came back, spent some more time with his followers, left again, and more time passed until anyone even starts taking notice and getting annoyed at these guys preaching in his name.

Basically the objection is as absurd as saying that Stalin must be made up, because some book about WW1 doesn't mention him. Why would it? It's still YEARS before he is of any importance.

Expecting, nay, DEMANDING, that a book includes stuff that's well outside its scope is really silly.

 

[HansMustermann]

ADDITIONALLY, if you had actually read the Gospels instead of just repeating someone else's word counts, you'd know that they are really hyper-focused on Jesus's supposed sayings and symbolic deeds. Nothing else matters there.

As I keep saying, the gospel Jesus is the worst kind of Mary Sue. He's a Black Hole Sue. He enters the scene, sucks up all attention, then leaves. There is no room even for the apostles to do anything in that scene other than set up the scene by asking whatever needs to be asked, for Jesus to deliver his amazing answer.

Hell, even Jesus himself, out of a ministry of anything between 1 year (according to Mark, Matthew and Luke) or 3 years (John), you get at most about two dozen pages documenting his parables. Unless he's actually making a symbolic point, they don't even mention ANYTHING about what Jesus is doing all that time.

It's in fact why you can't really use them to reconstruct a historical Jesus. There are no paragraphs in there that aren't tailored to tell you a very specific religious message. You get no neutral filler anecdotes, like, say, "And Jesus went to the pub with Peter and Barnabas, and they joked about him riding Mary Magdalene's ass into Jerusalem."

Literally, when he's not actively making a religious point, even JESUS isn't important enough to be mentioned in the gospels.

So expecting them to take a detour to mention PAUL is kinda absurd.

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

However the objection that the GOSPELS mention the other disciples but not Paul is getting into the realm of the downright absurd. The gospels are focused on Jesus, and pretty much end with Jesus's death and resurrection.

And if we posit that the same author wrote Luke and Acts, then of course some apostles are in Luke but Paul isn't. Paul is in the sequel. He's not a part of the Jesus film. He's in the next summer blockbuster Apostle film.

 

[Tassman]

Jesus and Paul had no history. They are only and always products of fiction, forgeries and apocryphal sources,

Examine the Acts of Paul

Acts of Paul

Jesus and Paul are no different. They were fabricated.

Well yes, so you keep saying. But I haven't quite grasped WHY Paul and Jesus were "fabricated". By whom and to what end?

 

[smartcooky]

Well yes, so you keep saying. But I haven't quite grasped WHY Paul and Jesus were "fabricated". By whom and to what end?

Told ya! No meaningful answer!

dejudge just gainsays any argument, and repeats his beliefs ad nauseam thinking that they equal evidence.

 

[HansMustermann]

Well, Jesus I can sorta get. There was this amazing dude that Paul was talking to in his visions, and your salvation depended on totally being his biggest fanboy, and stuff, and people wanted to know more about him.

And we know they really did, because for example Papias puts everything on hold and pretty much does a tour of the middle east to learn all the stories about Jesus he can. He obviously really really really wanted to know more about his idol, and he can't have been the only one.

So, sure, someone will sell them a fake biography of Jesus that, incidentally, gives them his religious views as supposed hard historical fact.

But the key in there is that a bunch of people were already Jesus fanboys, before someone came and sold them some Jesus fanfic.

It's not very clear why or how that would work the same for Paul though, especially if the thesis is that those churches were already founded by other people like Peter and James and such.

I mean, people did occasionally (albeit very rarely) invent some mythical common ancestor (e.g., Hercules) or common deity (e.g., Zeus) or common founder (e.g., POSSIBLY Pythagoras). But in this specific scenario, all those three roles are already filled. It's basically Adam, Jesus and respectively Peter, then. It seems far easier to just pile up your stuff on Peter if that's the common founder that people already know, than to have a literal conspiracy to convince everyone that 'no, see, Peter was actually just some unimportant schmuck. It's this Paul guy you've never heard of before that is the real deal. You should listen to what HE has to say.'

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

It seems far easier to just pile up your stuff on Peter if that's the common founder that people already know, than to have a literal conspiracy to convince everyone that 'no, see, Peter was actually just some unimportant schmuck. It's this Paul guy you've never heard of before that is the real deal. You should listen to what HE has to say.'

Yeah. Or James the Just. Or other apostle who knew Jesus. Peter knew Jesus, but here's a letter from Paul who didn't know Jesus, so it is better than anything you hear from the people that knew Jesus.

Is this fiction being written by someone with brain damage? And people believed it?

 

[HansMustermann]

Well, you know I'm not excluding brain damage, especially for Paul, but yeah, it seems somewhat unlikely that everyone would go, "oh, ok, let's just forget Peter and read the letters of this Paul guy who never met Jesus" just because some guy showed up with a letter from some guy nobody's heard of before.

 

[dejudge]

Well, Jesus I can sorta get. There was this amazing dude that Paul was talking to in his visions, and your salvation depended on totally being his biggest fanboy, and stuff, and people wanted to know more about him.

And we know they really did, because for example Papias puts everything on hold and pretty much does a tour of the middle east to learn all the stories about Jesus he can. He obviously really really really wanted to know more about his idol, and he can't have been the only one.

So, sure, someone will sell them a fake biography of Jesus that, incidentally, gives them his religious views as supposed hard historical fact.

But the key in there is that a bunch of people were already Jesus fanboys, before someone came and sold them some Jesus fanfic.

It's not very clear why or how that would work the same for Paul though, especially if the thesis is that those churches were already founded by other people like Peter and James and such.

I mean, people did occasionally (albeit very rarely) invent some mythical common ancestor (e.g., Hercules) or common deity (e.g., Zeus) or common founder (e.g., POSSIBLY Pythagoras). But in this specific scenario, all those three roles are already filled. It's basically Adam, Jesus and respectively Peter, then. It seems far easier to just pile up your stuff on Peter if that's the common founder that people already know, than to have a literal conspiracy to convince everyone that 'no, see, Peter was actually just some unimportant schmuck. It's this Paul guy you've never heard of before that is the real deal. You should listen to what HE has to say.'

Your post is just baseless speculation derived from your imagination. You have done what the NT authors did.

You make up your own imaginative stories about Jesus and Paul without a shred of historical evidence hoping people would believe you.

Your stories of Jesus and Paul are really uncorroborated imaginative fiction.

 

[Tassman]

Well, Jesus I can sorta get. There was this amazing dude that Paul was talking to in his visions, and your salvation depended on totally being his biggest fanboy, and stuff, and people wanted to know more about him.

And we know they really did, because for example Papias puts everything on hold and pretty much does a tour of the middle east to learn all the stories about Jesus he can. He obviously really really really wanted to know more about his idol, and he can't have been the only one.

Papias is the star of Bauckham’s book about “eyewitnesses” much quoted by Evangelicals. But even here, the best Papias can do is quote gossip from travelers who had met someone who knew a former disciple (allegedly) of Jesus. Hardly reliable stuff, especially from people who wanted to believe anyway.

So, sure, someone will sell them a fake biography of Jesus that, incidentally, gives them his religious views as supposed hard historical fact.

He got it straight from the horse's mouth. "Not from men nor by a man, but from Jesus Christ". Why would you not believe him?

It's this Paul guy you've never heard of before that is the real deal. You should listen to what HE has to say.'

Well he was saying what people wanted to hear. And Paul was (apparently) well educated and authoritative, unlike the illiterate peasants that Jesus surrounded himself with according to the story. And, in such a gullible era, Paul being personally singled out by god in a vision was quite acceptable, surely - that sort of thing happened all the time.

 

[HansMustermann]

Papias is the star of Bauckham’s book about “eyewitnesses” much quoted by Evangelicals. But even here, the best Papias can do is quote gossip from travelers who had met someone who knew a former disciple (allegedly) of Jesus. Hardly reliable stuff, especially from people who wanted to believe anyway.

Well, I never said that he actually found any eyewitnesses. And I'll be the first to laugh at his criterion that he knew he found the right guys if they confirmed what he wanted to hear.

I'm just using him as an example of a Jesus fanboy who put a lot of time and effort into finding more stories about his idol. So, you know, I can see other fanboys just buy a book about their idol if someone came and said, "hey, I have a biography of Jesus!"

He got it straight from the horse's mouth. "Not from men nor by a man, but from Jesus Christ". Why would you not believe him?

Well, yes, but my point is that that works better when you're starting a cult, than as some kind of conspiracy to replace Peter with a made up Paul as your founding father. Because that seems to be literally what dejudge proposes: that actual disciples like Peter or James founded those churches, so those would be the guys that those congregation know. And then there was some kind of literal conspiracy to make up some Paul guy and forge some letters from this Paul guy that nobody had heard of before, and convince everyone that no, see, THIS is the real source.

I mean, in THAT setup, at this point they're replacing some guys who must have been claiming to somehow know it from Jesus, with another guy who also had such a claim, except much weaker and nobody had heard of him. What's even the point? I mean, even if they want want a founder with a stronger claim of knowing it directly from Jesus, why not just make it up for the guy that people already knew about?

Well he was saying what people wanted to hear. And Paul was (apparently) well educated and authoritative, unlike the illiterate peasants that Jesus surrounded himself with according to the story. And, in such a gullible era, Paul being personally singled out by god in a vision was quite acceptable, surely - that sort of thing happened all the time.

Again, if he's the one founding those churches, or even becoming the superstar speaker of some existing churches, I can see that working. A bit of charisma and being educated in sophistry go a long way. I'm just not sure why they'd invent him retroactively, if they have some other founding guys. I mean, if they want visions, can't they just give Peter some?

 

[HansMustermann]

Your post is just baseless speculation derived from your imagination. You have done what the NT authors did.

You make up your own imaginative stories about Jesus and Paul without a shred of historical evidence hoping people would believe you.

Your stories of Jesus and Paul are really uncorroborated imaginative fiction.

Says the guy proposing a literal ancient conspiracy theory, without even being able to write a coherent story of how or why that happened, even when asked repeatedly. At this point I'm not even using the term as an expletive or anything. What you're proposing is literally that some guys from churches founded by someone else, invented a guy named Paul, sat down and wrote a bunch of letters in his name, and then somehow convinced everyone that, no, see, we were founded by this completely different guy named Paul that none of you remember about. I.e., a literal conspiracy. For no obvious reason.

That's replacing a "lemme tell you something about this guy that lived 3000km away 50 years ago, and that's why you never heard of him" (actual distance between Corinth and Jerusalem in a straight line) narrative, with a later narrative that literally is a variant of "lemme tell you about this guy who founded our church 50 years ago RIGHT HERE, baptized people, did speeches, was a pen pal of the local church leaders, so, err, that's why none of you even remember even hearing about him ever before." And not only that, but apparently you think this happened in churches numbering thousands of people, so even with the ancient life expectancy being what it was, there would still be a thousand witnesses around. If you apparently find it too unbelievable that people would be gullible enough to fall for the former, I'm rather baffled as to why you find the latter much more believable.

But really, even having a coherent story would be a step forward at this point. What you have presented at this point is more like some disparate claims that don't even connect in any logically valid way, and then just went barking at anyone who isn't immediately convinced anyway. Which, really, isn't an argument.

 

[Tassman]

Again, if he's the one founding those churches, or even becoming the superstar speaker of some existing churches, I can see that working. A bit of charisma and being educated in sophistry go a long way.

Historically, the “existing church” of Peter and James was the Jerusalem Church, which was basically a continuation of Judaism with Jesus tacked on. Paul, saw big. He saw the church as universal - for (shock/horror) gentiles as well.

I'm just not sure why they'd invent him retroactively, if they have some other founding guys. I mean, if they want visions, can't they just give Peter some?

I don’t think they did invent Paul retroactively. He just took over and made the Jesus church universal instead of essentially remaining a part of Judaism. Pity. If it hadn’t been for him Christianity would have gone the way of the Jerusalem Church when the Roman army destroyed Jerusalem and its Temple – and the Jerusalem Church, such as it was.

As for visions, they were commonplace back then – didn’t Peter have a vision of unclean foods. Thanks to him we can enjoy our bacon.

 

[HansMustermann]

IIRC, wasn't Peter's vision from Acts? Paul seems to rather claim that he was the one who talked some sense into Pete.

 

[dejudge]

Historically, the “existing church” of Peter and James was the Jerusalem Church, which was basically a continuation of Judaism with Jesus tacked on. Paul, saw big. He saw the church as universal - for (shock/horror) gentiles as well.

Please, Acts of the Apostles is useless fiction. There is no actual history of Peter and James associated with any church anywhere. There is no historical evidence anywhere that Peter and James lived anywhere and was associated with Judaism in any century. Saul/Paul was a fabricated converted in an attempt to historicise the fables of Jesus and the disciples.

There is no historical reference to any Jew who was an actual member of an actual Jerusalem church.

I don’t think they did invent Paul retroactively. He just took over and made the Jesus church universal instead of essentially remaining a part of Judaism. Pity. If it hadn’t been for him Christianity would have gone the way of the Jerusalem Church when the Roman army destroyed Jerusalem and its Temple – and the Jerusalem Church, such as it was.

As for visions, they were commonplace back then – didn’t Peter have a vision of unclean foods. Thanks to him we can enjoy our bacon.

[/quote]

Visions are not and have never been accepted as historical accounts. In addition, the claims in the Epistles about the so-called Paul not receiving his Gospel from man but from a resurrected being are total lies.

There is no historical corroboration of any Pauline Church at anytime. There is no historical corroboration of a single convert of any Pauline Church. There is no historical corroboration that any Church anywhere actually received the so-called Pauline Epistles.

No Jewish writing of antiquity mentioned a supposed Pharisee who asked Jews and people of the Roman Empire to worship a resurrected being as a God for their salvation and to abolish the sacrifice of animals.

NT Paul, his letters and churches were fabricated no earlier than the 2nd century in an attempt to deceive believers he was a witness to the fables called the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles.

 

[David Mo]

NT Paul, his letters and churches were fabricated no earlier than the 2nd century in an attempt to deceive believers he was a witness to the fables called the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles.

You have no evidence that the stories in the Gospels were invented in the second century or after.
You have no evidence that they were invented to deceive anyone.
To make a claim you have to have evidence, according to you.
Where is your evidence?