So if he WASN'T the Son of God....

cournioni

He was the David Blaine of his time.

King Mob

Peregrinus wrote: »

So this doesn't help you. You're looking for someone like John Frum, except that his fictionality is not pointed out.

Now you're moving the goalposts.
You frequently caveat that it needs to be his contemporaries. In this case, it needs to be both someone from his time as well as someone specifically from that culture.
John Frum is fictional. Presumably someone on these islands knew this, yet his legend grew and persisted.

Now it's your turn. Please point to an example of what happens when someone fictional is called out by his contemporaries.

Peregrinus wrote: »

Well, we do have records of opponents of Christianity contradicting the virgin birth claim. Specifically, we have a record of story which alleges that Jesus was the product of an illicit liason between his mother Mary and a Roman soldier named Pantera.

Again, you are moving the goalposts.
You have been specifically talking about events that can be attested to by various known witnesses (ie the people in the stories about Jesus).

Not all of these stories are true. So where are the examples you believe should exist of people refuting untrue stories of Jesus?
Are there people saying that he didn't perform X miracle or never visited Y place?

Also, the claim about Pantera comes from the 2nd Century, which is not contemporary.

Peregrinus wrote: »

Which, again, raises the issue; if the opponents of the Jesus movement thought that Jesus was, or even might be, fictional, then the story that he was born illegitimate would itself be false. Why circulate a false story to refute Christianity, when you could circulate a true one that would be an even more effective refutation?

Again, I've given several other possibilities for this. The idea that Jesus must therefore exist is not the only explanation. And again, not contemporary.

Peregrinus

King Mob wrote: »

Now you're moving the goalposts.
You frequently caveat that it needs to be his contemporaries. In this case, it needs to be both someone from his time as well as someone specifically from that culture.
John Frum is fictional. Presumably someone on these islands knew this, yet his legend grew and persisted.

Now it's your turn. Please point to an example of what happens when someone fictional is called out by his contemporaries.

John Frum was called out by his contemporaries. The movement arises in the late 1930s, and immediately comes to the attention of the colonial administrators, who by the early 1940s are identifying “John Frum” as a local man Manehevi who poses as a supernatural being, appearing before men under the influence of kava, clothed in western costume and adopting a shrill speaking voice.

As the movement gained traction and caused increasing problems for the authorities, Manehevi was arrested, tried and was publicly punished.

A second man, Neloiag, then proclaimed himself as John Frum. He loses the support of other leaders of the movement, however, who are alienated by his militancy. He too is then arrested, imprisoned and eventually sent to New Caledonia, from where he does not return.

So, pretty comprehensively called out, then.

(Why does the John Frum movement not collapse at this point? It does, to some extent; it loses a lot of adherents. But it survives because it’s a focus for protest against what they see as the injustice/oppression of colonial rule. Ultimately John Frummists aren’t concerned with whether Frum is a historical character, a real but supernatural being or a useful embodiment of their objections to colonial and cultural oppression, which is the main driver of Frummism.)

King Mob wrote: »

Again, you are moving the goalposts.
You have been specifically talking about events that can be attested to by various known witnesses (ie the people in the stories about Jesus).

Not all of these stories are true. So where are the examples you believe should exist of people refuting untrue stories of Jesus?
Are there people saying that he didn't perform X miracle or never visited Y place?

Also, the claim about Pantera comes from the 2nd Century, which is not contemporary.

The only fact-claims about Jesus which we positively know to have been in circulation in the 25 or so years after his death are those made by Paul, already mentioned. We believe that many of the fact claims that first appear in later texts (e.g. the gospels) were not invented by the authors of those texts but simply recorded by them, but as we have no earlier evidence of them we cannot say when they arose.

From the fact claims that we know to have circulated about Jesus before the gospels, the commonplace ones - his mother, his brother, his teaching against divorce, his death - do not seem to have been refuted by anyone that we know of. This is easy to explain if Jesus is historical and the claims are true; less easy if Jesus is completely fictional. The only claim that seems to have been refuted is the claim that he rose from the dead. Matthew’s gospel refers to an assertion that Jesus’s body was missing from the tomb because it was stolen or removed by his followers, and includes details intended to refute that assertion. Matthew would hardly invent an objection to the resurrection, so presumably he addresses it because it’s already in circulation and he can’t ignore it. Mark’s (earlier) gospel doesn’t explicitly mention the same objection, but includes details that seem intended to refute it, so we infer that the “stolen body” hypothesis may already have been in circulation even when Mark was writing.

(But, of course, the stolen body hypothesis does imply that the critics accepted that Jesus’s body had been put in the tomb in the first place. Which they wouldn’t accept, if they had any reason to think that Jesus was wholly fictional.)

King Mob wrote: »

Again, I've given several other possibilities for this. The idea that Jesus must therefore exist is not the only explanation.

I’ve never said it was the only explanation; just that it’s the most plausible and likely one. (And I note that at no time have you ever contradicted that view. You have argued for the possiblity of other explanations, which I have never denied, but you haven’t suggested any reason for preferring the other explanations.)

King Mob

Peregrinus wrote: »

The only fact-claims about Jesus which we positively know to have been in circulation in the 25 or so years after his death are those made by Paul, already mentioned. We believe that many of the fact claims that first appear in later texts (e.g. the gospels) were not invented by the authors of those texts but simply recorded by them, but as we have no earlier evidence of them we cannot say when they arose.

So short answer: You cannot point to any refutations of falsified events from the time or that are "recorded" later.

Peregrinus wrote: »

From the fact claims that we know to have circulated about Jesus before the gospels, the commonplace ones - his mother, his brother, his teaching against divorce, his death - do not seem to have been refuted by anyone that we know of. This is easy to explain if Jesus is historical and the claims are true; less easy if Jesus is completely fictional.

Why would it be less easy? It would be equally as easy if there was just one cohesive story or one set story that the movement wanted to sell.
Again this is ignoring all of the various claims that were made that were false.
Again, there should be claims of fakery about them, according to you, yet they do not seem to exist...

Peregrinus wrote: »

The only claim that seems to have been refuted is the claim that he rose from the dead. Matthew’s gospel refers to an assertion that Jesus’s body was missing from the tomb because it was stolen or removed by his followers, and includes details intended to refute that assertion. Matthew would hardly invent an objection to the resurrection, so presumably he addresses it because it’s already in circulation and he can’t ignore it. Mark’s (earlier) gospel doesn’t explicitly mention the same objection, but includes details that seem intended to refute it, so we infer that the “stolen body” hypothesis may already have been in circulation even when Mark was writing.

They'd also hardly record any refutations they couldn't counter or hand wave away. And seeing as how you have to rely on early Christian writers wrote about themselves, it's not really surprising that there would be no record of people calling Jesus fake.

Remember, there is no contemporary accounts of Jesus's existence external to Christian writing in the first place.

Peregrinus wrote: »

I’ve never said it was the only explanation; just that it’s the most plausible and likely one. (And I note that at no time have you ever contradicted that view. You have argued for the possiblity of other explanations, which I have never denied, but you haven’t suggested any reason for preferring the other explanations.)

Great. So the idea that there's no claims of Jesus being fake doesn't really amount to anything meaningful.

Peregrinus

King Mob wrote: »

So short answer: You cannot point to any refutations of falsified events from the time or that are "recorded" later.

Honestly, King Mob, you have the attention span of a gnat. In the very post to which you are replying I point to evidence of attempt to falsify the resurrection claim.

King Mob wrote: »

Why would it be less easy? It would be equally as easy if there was just one cohesive story or one set story that the movement wanted to sell.

No. Even a cohesive false story is more easily refuted than a true one.

And this particular story is not all that cohesive, since it involves a significant number of people who were still living when Paul was writing. I have already pointed out that Paul mentions both Mary and James, who would know if his Jesus story was a fabrication. He also mentions Jesus's other brothers, who would also know, and Peter, who would also know. So for Paul's story to be a fabrication, we have to hypothesise quite a large conspiracy to sustain it. And we know both from Paul's own letters and from the Act of the Apostles that he was very much at odds with both Peter and James, so they don't look like people who Paul would choose as dependable co-conspirators.

So, yeah. Fact-claims about Jesus not being refuted when first put about are easily explained if Jesus was a historical figure and the fact claims are either (a)true, or (b) plausible and uncontroversial. But if Jesus is fictional and all fact claims about him are complete fabrications, there not being refuted at the time does require some explanation, and involves hypothesising extensive and improbable conspiracies. Which, fine, you can hypothesise. But you make no attempt to offer any reason for taking the hypothesis seriously.

King Mob wrote: »

Again this is ignoring all of the various claims that were made that were false.
Again, there should be claims of fakery about them, according to you, yet they do not seem to exist...

I've already addressed this. From the period you are talking about, if Jesus is real then the only claim made about him that is controversial is that he rose from the dead, and people do seek to refute this.

King Mob wrote: »

They'd also hardly record any refutations they couldn't counter or hand wave away.

They do record claims that they cannot counter or hand-wave away. The "stolen body hypothesis" still circulates because Mark and Matthew recorded it, and their refutations of it are unconvincing.

King Mob wrote: »

And seeing as how you have to rely on early Christian writers wrote about themselves, it's not really surprising that there would be no record of people calling Jesus fake.

And yet there is a record of people calling specific claims about Jesus fake. You cannot assume that the Christians succeeded in suppressing the one when they clearly did not suppress the other.

King Mob wrote: »

Remember, there is no contemporary accounts of Jesus's existence external to Christian writing in the first place.

So? Why would there be? There are no contemporary accounts at all of Alexander the Great, a figure of rather more prominence in his own time that Jesus of Nazareth. Zero contemporary accounts of Jesus is exactly what we would expect if he is a historical figure.

King Mob wrote: »

Great. So the idea that there's no claims of Jesus being fake doesn't really amount to anything meaningful.

Sorry, what? How are you getting that out of anything I have written?

recedite

Peregrinus wrote: »

John Frum may not in fact be wholly fictional. As in, the foundation of the John Frum stories may well be an actual person..

The similarity with Jesus is that John Frum was invisible to serious scholars and contemporary reporters at the time.
It was only later that the cult of John Frum drew attention as a curiosity.
By which time it was hard to know if the man himself had ever existed.

The default assumption should be that if these men ever existed, they were simply small time con-men and opportunists. Probably with no idea themselves that they would leave behind a lasting impression.

King Mob

Peregrinus wrote: »

No. Even a cohesive false story is more easily refuted than a true one.

A false story is very easy to write down.

Peregrinus wrote: »

And this particular story is not all that cohesive, since it involves a significant number of people who were still living when Paul was writing. I have already pointed out that Paul mentions both Mary and James, who would know if his Jesus story was a fabrication. He also mentions Jesus's other brothers, who would also know, and Peter, who would also know. So for Paul's story to be a fabrication, we have to hypothesise quite a large conspiracy to sustain it. And we know both from Paul's own letters and from the Act of the Apostles that he was very much at odds with both Peter and James, so they don't look like people who Paul would choose as dependable co-conspirators.

Sure, that all of those people also existed, could read and knew what was written about them. And that assuming keeping 10 people quiet in an age before widespread information and education was somehow impossible?
It's not really an elaborate conspiracy...

Peregrinus wrote: »

So, yeah. Fact-claims about Jesus not being refuted when first put about are easily explained if Jesus was a historical figure and the fact claims are either (a)true, or (b) plausible and uncontroversial. But if Jesus is fictional and all fact claims about him are complete fabrications, there not being refuted at the time does require some explanation, and involves hypothesising extensive and improbable conspiracies. Which, fine, you can hypothesise. But you make no attempt to offer any reason for taking the hypothesis seriously.

So assuming for a moment Jesus was ficitional and that people were actively trying to disprove he existed. Where would these claims be found?

Peregrinus wrote: »

I've already addressed this. From the period you are talking about, if Jesus is real then the only claim made about him that is controversial is that he rose from the dead, and people do seek to refute this.

So if there were instances of people involved directly calling the followers of a fictional Jesus out, the followers would write it down?

Peregrinus wrote: »

They do record claims that they cannot counter or hand-wave away. The "stolen body hypothesis" still circulates because Mark and Matthew recorded it, and their refutations of it are unconvincing.

Sure, unconvincing to us.
But not unconvincing to the authors perhaps. Or not unconvincing to the people they were addressing.
I've seen people believe stupider things for stupider reasons.
Do you think that the author's believed that their refutation is unconvincing? If so, why did they write their refutation in the first place?

What it seems to be case of is a common tactic of believers in psuedoscience: presenting an argument from doubters you believe you've got a killer response to so it seems like you've got more answers than you do.

If for example, Mary herself started disagreeing with some of the claims, where would her arguments be recorded, who by and why?

Peregrinus wrote: »

And yet there is a record of people calling specific claims about Jesus fake. You cannot assume that the Christians succeeded in suppressing the one when they clearly did not suppress the other.

It's not even really suppressing. It's just not recording them. The Scientologists don't write down and include the foibles of their founders or the real criticisms of their claims either.

Peregrinus wrote: »

So? Why would there be? There are no contemporary accounts at all of Alexander the Great, a figure of rather more prominence in his own time that Jesus of Nazareth. Zero contemporary accounts of Jesus is exactly what we would expect if he is a historical figure.

It's also what we'd expect if he was a fake figure.
Likewise, it doesn't follow that there must be contemporary claims he was fake if he was fake.

If he were fictional, then we would see the exact same thing.

If this is not the case, where would we find these contemporary claims?

Peregrinus wrote: »

Sorry, what? How are you getting that out of anything I have written?

Your argument hinges on the idea that a lack of claims of fakery somehow bolster his existence.
A lack of claims of fakery does not imply that he was real.
Hence the argument doesn't really stand up.

Peregrinus

recedite wrote: »

The similarity with Jesus is that John Frum was invisible to serious scholars and contemporary reporters at the time.
It was only later that the cult of John Frum drew attention as a curiosity.
By which time it was hard to know if the man himself had ever existed.

Frum was visible to colonial adminstrators at the time, and their actions with respect to him are documented. And the Frum movement was certainly the subject of academic scrutiny from the early 1950s, perhaps 10 to 15 years after it first arose, and much less time than that after the last reported sightings of [someone claiming to be] Frum.

recedite wrote: »

The default assumption should be that if these men ever existed, they were simply small time con-men and opportunists. Probably with no idea themselves that they would leave behind a lasting impression.

Well, an analogous hypothesis about Jesus is that he was a small-time itinerant preacher from Galilee who came to the big smoke, got himself into trouble with the authorities and came to a sticky end. And that's a much easier hypothesis to accept, and requires far less in the way of unevidenced and apparently unlikely hypotheses and conspiracy theorising to support.

recedite

Peregrinus wrote: »

Frum was visible to colonial adminstrators at the time, and their actions with respect to him are documented.

Have you a link to anything on this? I thought it was the cult that came to their attention, not the man. I think one or two impersonators or copycat John Frums might have made brief appearances afterwards. Much like Elvis Presleys keep cropping up.

A couple of decades on from the foundation seems to be an optimal time for the spread of a cult. As with Paul's conversion, the adherents are almost contemporary, but not quite direct witnesses to the actual events they preach about.

oldrnwisr

Peregrinus wrote: »

Paul was likely born at around the time of Jesus's birth, not his death. He and Jesus would have been contemporaries, though they never met. (If they had, Paul would certainly have mentioned it in his writings.) Paul's letters start from a time about 20-25 years after the crucifixion, and it's evident that by this time there are already organised Christian communities in many places (Who else is Paul writing to?) who already have a considerable body of tradition/belief/memory of who Jesus was, what he said, what he did.

Well, no. This isn't true and I've already pointed this out to you. Paul is writing to communities of gentile converts that he himself founded. This is explicitly and repeatedly mentioned. Of the 7 authentic Pauline epistles (Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, 1 Thessalonians, Philippians, Philemon):

• Galatians was a church probably somewhere around Antalya in Turkey about 440 miles from Jerusalem directly but about 880 miles for travellers of the time. It is likely from internal evidence in the letter and surrounding evidence in Acts 16:6 that it was Paul himself who founded the communities in Galatia and that they were not pre-existing communities. Moreover, Galatians 4:8 demonstrates that the churches were composed of primarily pagan converts.
• Thessalonians was a church founded by Paul during his travels with Timothy and Silas. In Acts 17, it mentions that Paul goes into a Jewish synagogue in Thessalonica and preaches, "proving" that Jesus was the Messiah. We are told in 17:4 that: "Some of the Jews were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a large number of God-fearing Greeks and quite a few prominent women."
• Corinthians was again founded by Paul. The story of Paul's preaching and conversion of gentiles in Corinth is documented in Acts 18.
• Philippians was also founded through the actions of Paul, particularly Paul's preaching in Philippi beginning with the conversion of Lydia in Acts 16.
• Philemon was the leader of the church in Colossae (as in epistle to the Colossians). This church was founded by Epaphras a man from Colossae who helped Paul in his ministry and was sent by Paul back to his hometown to preach Paul's gospel. So again, not a pre-existing community.
• The evidence for the founding of the Roman church is a little more vague. The 2nd century church leader Irenaeus states that this church too was founded by Paul, this time in partnership with Peter. However, a later 4th century writer Ambrosiaster states that there was a Christian community already in Rome by the time Paul got there. However, internal evidence from Romans itself suggests that there were several groups of believers.

So, in all of the authentic Pauline epistles the only one with any direct evidence of a Christian community prior to Paul is Romans. The rest of the churches are communities founded by Paul, in most cases from pagan converts and the epistles represent Paul checking up on the churches he has already founded.


Similarly, there's no evidence that any of the people in places like Galatia were eyewitnesses or had any contact with them. Even in places where Paul's communities did come into contact with other apostles, this seems to have caused major disagreements. See, for example, 1 Corinthians 1:11-12

"My brothers and sisters, some from Chloe’s household have informed me that there are quarrels among you. What I mean is this: One of you says, “I follow Paul”; another, “I follow Apollos”; another, “I follow Cephas”; still another, “I follow Christ.”

Peregrinus wrote: »

So the problem with the idea of Jesus as a complete fiction is this; it's a fiction that must have been created and propagated well within the lifetime of large numbers of people who would be well positioned to know, first-hand, that it was a complete fiction. And yet not only is it widely accepted, but we have no evidence at all that anybody at the time ever suggested that it was a fiction.

The thing is, as Richard Carrier points out in On the Historicity of Jesus, euhmerization (taking originally mythical figures and pretending that they were real) can take hold in a short space of time. Even in modern times, John Frum, Tom Navy and Ned Ludd in particular were all suggested as real people within the lifetime of people who would have been positioned to know.

Peregrinus wrote: »

No writings from the period attacking Jesus as a fiction survive. No writings survive which refer to any writings from the period attacking Jesus as a fiction. In all the defensive writings we have from Christian source which attempt to vindicate Christianity against various attacks, none at all seem to be defending against an attack based on the fictitiousness of Jesus.

Well, there's two problems here.
Firstly, no writings which are hostile to Christianity survive at all except as scattered quotes in Christian writings. So we don't have Celsus' The True Logos, we don't have Fronto's Discourse against the Christians and we don't have Hierocles' The Lover of Truth.

Secondly, there doesn't seem to be any non-Christian early sources at all. The early non-Christian writers seem unaware of Jesus or Christianity. I've already pointed out the suspicious silence of Seneca the Younger but there's also Philo of Alexandria, Justus Tiberius and Nicolaus of Damascus. Then there are the mysterious gaps in later histories which should mention Jesus. For example Cassius Dio's 80-volume history of Rome chronicles 983 years of Roman history. The first 34 and last 20 volumes are partially extant surviving in fragmentary copies and compiled works. However, the middle section (35-60) is fully extant, with one glaring omission, book 55 is completely absent with not even a scrap of it surviving. This is the period from 12BCE to 9CE which would have covered Jesus' birth, Herod's massacre of the innocents, the Star of Bethlehem etc. I have also previously mentioned Tacitus' history of Tiberius which again has a mysterious gap between the years 29 and 31CE around one of the possible years of crucifixion. There are other similar mysterious gaps in the works of Plutarch and of course, your namesake Peregrinus Proteus

The idea that we would have writings attacking the Jesus story as fictional is ludicrous for two reasons. Firstly it seems that anything which either attacked Christianity or didn't mention Jesus or Christianity was wiped out by later Christians such that it is no longer extant today. Secondly, it seems that nobody knew who Jesus was in the early days and early writers both Jewish and Roman were not aware of any such person or movement.

Peregrinus wrote: »

All of this is rather hard to explain if, in fact, Jesus is completely fictional. In fact, those who suggest that he was fictional seem to be embracing a theory for which there is considerably less evidence than the rival theory, that he was historical.

Not really. The gospels which lead on from Paul's writings are works of deliberate fiction and so are necessarily discarded as far as historicity is concerned. The real question here is Paul and who Paul was writing about, whether or not he believed Jesus to be real. The problem for both sides of the Jesus myth argument is that there is so little biographical information about Jesus in Paul's writings that there's little evidence to build a case either way. On the one hand, Paul describes Jesus as being born of a woman and dying but on the other hand all of Paul's information comes from visions and he could have, if he wanted to included biographical information about Jesus. He could have met Jesus' mother and family if he chose to but his interactions with Jesus' family and apostles is limited in the extreme.

FWIW, here's what I think happened. I think that there probably was a "Jesus", not an actual person called Jesus but someone who roughly fit the type of apocalyptic preacher that we get vague hints about in the NT. In fact, I think from real historians like Josephus that there probably a great many Jesus characters circulating at the time, motivated by the Roman occupation and being brought up on stories of the messiah. All of these characters would in all likelihood have remained in relative obscurity had it not been for Paul. Paul's "conversion" is in reality, likely to have been an attack of temporal lobe epilepsy, stroke or TIA, given the symptoms of temporary blindness, auditory and visual hallucinations and sudden hyperreligiosity. Paul's rabid proselytising about this "vision" of Jesus (which probably formed as a mish-mash of the various Jesus types floating around at the time) seems to have been effective and resulted in the conversion of a great number of pagans in Galatia, Colossae, Philippi and Corinth, to name but a few. These communities inevitably spread further and further and towards the late 1st century had grown to the point that doctrinal teachings could no longer sustain the faithful. They wanted to know more about this Jesus. That's where the gospels come in. The gospel writers, Mark in particular invent a backstory for Jesus to satiate the faithful and attract even more new followers. However, it's not until the 2nd century that the movement actually gets big enough for the outside world to notice and we get mentions from Pliny and Tacitus. And the rest as they say is history.

OK, so here's the TLDR. The most reasonable explanation for Jesus is the minimal historical Jesus, there was probably some guy or guys called Jesus upon whom the gospels are based but we don't have any actual facts about Jesus because of the fictitious nature of the gospels and the silence of contemporary writers. Anyone making a case beyond this, on either side has some major obstacles to overcome.

oldrnwisr

Peregrinus wrote: »

The contemporary opponents of Christianity, remember, included the Temple authorities, who were supposed to have hunted him down and handed him over to the Romans to be crucified. If he had been fictional, they would know that none of this had ever happened. They would hardly have been behind about pointing this out. Similarly, the Pharisee movement would have had a strong interest in pointing to the fictionality of Christ, if indeed he had been fictional.

There always seems to be an element of the Mandela effect in play when discussing this topic.

Firstly, the depiction of the Temple Authorities in the gospels is not likely to be true. From what we know of Pilate from other writers like Philo and Josephus, Pilate was a ruthless, murderous governor who liked to troll the Jews for ****s and giggles. If the temple authorities had deigned to bring Jesus to Pilate and demand his crucifixion, they would have found themselves nailed to a neighbouring cross for their impudence. Pilate's depiction in the gospels as a weak-willed nice guy, too cowardly to speak up to his Jewish masters is pure fantasy.

Secondly, the story of the Temple Authorities plotting against Jesus and handing him over to be crucified arrives with the gospels. Those same temple authorities were all dead by then and in no position to argue against a fictional Jesus.

recedite

oldrnwisr wrote: »

but on the other hand all of Paul's information comes from visions...

Are you suggesting that visions are not an acceptable source of material evidence :pac:

Franz Von Peppercorn

robindch wrote: »

I can't speak for oldrnwisr, but for myself, it's got nothing to do with certain types of anybody trying to disprove the existence of one figure or another.

On the contrary, it has everything to do with what I suppose you could call the semi-voyeuristic spectacle of religious people - and I'm not including you here - who declaim or imply the perfection of their religion while unfamiliar with the imperfection of the blocks which hold it up in the air.

The historicity of Jesus has nothing got to do with the religious aspects, so that won’t wash.

I could continue my argument on the historicity of Jesus, the belief of most scholars, here but I think it’s fairly pointless to do so.

Theres a type of atheist - generally a convert - who is searching for another priesthood. I believe atheist Ireland is like that and this forum has its own cult of personalities.

Franz Von Peppercorn

oldrnwisr wrote: »

There always seems to be an element of the Mandela effect in play when discussing this topic.

Firstly, the depiction of the Temple Authorities in the gospels is not likely to be true. From what we know of Pilate from other writers like Philo and Josephus, Pilate was a ruthless, murderous governor who liked to troll the Jews for ****s and giggles. If the temple authorities had deigned to bring Jesus to Pilate and demand his crucifixion, they would have found themselves nailed to a neighbouring cross for their impudence. Pilate's depiction in the gospels as a weak-willed nice guy, too cowardly to speak up to his Jewish masters is pure fantasy.

He had of course been rebuked by the emperor previously for antagonising Jewish belief systems.

The washing of hands is probably a later addition. Christianity was trying to spread through the empire at the time and preferred to blame the Jews rather than the empire.

Nevertheless as with most inconsistencies it proves the opposite of what you think it does. A fictional Jesus could just have been killed by the Sanhedrin outright. There is no need for Pilate and no need for crucifixion - which was used for common criminals or revolutionaries against the state.

If the ever mysterious inventors of Christianity wanted to blame the Jews with an invented Jesus he would have been stoned.

Secondly, the story of the Temple Authorities plotting against Jesus and handing him over to be crucified arrives with the gospels. Those same temple authorities were all dead by then and in no position to argue against a fictional Jesus.

Lots of people were dead by the time they were written about. Not much of an argument.

the_syco

Everlong1 wrote: »

....who exactly was this Jesus Christ bloke? And why are millions still worshipping him 2,000 plus years later?

Saw a documentary about him. Seems there was plenty of messiahs around that time. The bible was written based on 3rd hand info long after he was dead.

People are still worshipping him, because if you were a priest you;
didn't have to fight
got paid for it
your word was the word of god

and the HQ have a fcuk load of money to ensure the money still pours in.

oldrnwisr

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

He had of course been rebuked by the emperor previously for antagonising Jewish belief systems.

Yes, exactly. Philo of Alexandria documents Pilate deliberately antagonising the Jews. And Josephus, in the passage immediately prior to the testimonium goads the Jews into a precipitous act (using sacred money to build an aqueduct) and then violently suppresses the consequent uprising. This isn't the Pilate that we see in the Gospels.

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

The washing of hands is probably a later addition. Christianity was trying to spread through the empire at the time and preferred to blame the Jews rather than the empire.

You're making an assumption that there was a core crucifixion story involving Pilate which was built upon by the Gospels. But there's no evidence for that. There's also evidence of deliberately fabricated elements like the story of Barabbas. Then there's the problem of the portrayal of Pilate's character. Then there's the contradiction between Mark and John over every significant element of the crucifixion. Mark's gospel, the earliest and the basis for all of the other passion narratives gets almost everything wrong. He has the trial happen in the home of a member of the Sanhedrin, which wouldn't happen, he has the trial happen at night, which wouldn't happen, he has the trial happen during Passover, which wouldn't happen, he has the sentenced passed immediately, which wouldn't happen, he has Jesus beaten in custody, which wouldn't happen, he has Jesus buried in a single cloth, which wouldn't happen.

At the time when Mark's gospel was written, Rome had no idea what Christianity was. It would take Roman writers another 40 years to even begin mentioning Christianity. You can even see the Roman response to early Christians in Acts 18 when a group of Jews bring Paul before the proconsul Gallio (brother of Seneca). The Jews bring Paul to Gallio for "worshipping God contrary to law" to which Gallio responds, meh come back when he commits an actual crime. As I've already pointed out, if the Christians were spreading so rapidly then people like Seneca who was in the mix along with his brother, would have mentioned it, and yet didn't.

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Nevertheless as with most inconsistencies it proves the opposite of what you think it does. A fictional Jesus could just have been killed by the Sanhedrin outright. There is no need for Pilate and no need for crucifixion - which was used for common criminals or revolutionaries against the state.

Well, here's the thing. Firstly, there are suggestions in various NT books that Jesus was stoned and not crucified:

"He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed."
1 Peter 2:24

"Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.""
Galatians 3:13

"The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead - whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree."
Act 5:30

"We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a tree."
Acts 10:39

"When they had carried out all that they had written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb."
Acts 13:29

After all, why would the Jews even bring Jesus to be crucified. The recurring theme in the gospels is that Jesus admonishes the Pharisees for adhering too closely, to the letter rather than the spirit of the law. The Sanhedrin certainly had the authority to stone people, or at the very least, the Roman authorities didn't give a crap whether the Jews stoned someone or not. They stone Stephen to death in Acts 7:54-8:2 and were it not for Jesus' intervention they would have stoned that woman to death in John 8:1-11. So the usual Christian excuse that the Sanhedrin wouldn't have been allowed to stone somebody just doesn't wash.
Again and again in the gospels the Sanhedrin are seen to blindly follow the commandments. So when Jesus is accused of blasphemy in Mark 14, the punishment is clearly mandated as stoning in Leviticus 24:16. The references to Jesus being hung on a tree above and Joseph's request for Jesus' body (despite having voted him guilty) becomes clear when you read Deuteronomy 21:23

"his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance."

OK, so what does all this have to do with mythicism. Mark's gospel is heavily influenced by Pauline Christianity and has a strong anti-Judaic element, so it would make sense for the original story to have the Jews as the aggressors. However, there is also in Mark an undercurrent of political foreshadowing like the symbolism contained in Jesus' exorcism of the demon possessed man in Chapter 5. Mark's gospel was written during or soon after the Jewish War and destruction of the Temple in 70CE and even bears some evidence of borrowing from Josephus' Jewish war. It's entirely possible that the first draft of Mark blamed the Jews but that this was changed to the Romans in the changing political climate around 70CE. This would go a long way to explain certain inconsistencies in the passion narrative. We should also bear in mind that the gospel was copied and copied and copied for 130 years before we get to the first extant manuscript. The idea that we can be sure we have the original story is laughable.

As I've said before, the mythicists have two major stumbling blocks to overcome, the writings of Paul and any direct positive evidence for the Jesus story being entirely mythical. However, the historicists have equally big stumbling blocks including the fictitious nature of the gospels, the fact that Paul only experienced Jesus in visions, the fact that we have no writings from any non-Christian sources before the 2nd century and the fact that we have no writings from any other named person in the NT. The writings of Peter, Paul, James and John are all pseudoepigraphal. Right now, the truth state of Jesus' existence is indeterminate and what it should really do is prompt the question of where the default position should be, existence or nonexistence.

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Lots of people were dead by the time they were written about. Not much of an argument.

Peregrinus' point was that if a story of Jesus being crucified by the Romans at the behest of the Jews was going around, and if Jesus was fictional, then the Temple Authorities could have and would have written a rebuttal of this fact. However, there are two flaws in this argument. Firstly, there is the extremely low possibility of any anti-Christian writing surviving to the present.
Secondly, Peregrinus' assumes that the passion narrative as told in Mark had been circulating since the time of Paul's ministry or before. However, there's no evidence of that. The first time we see the passion narrative is in Mark by which time the Temple Authorities from 30CE would all be dead.

Hotblack Desiato

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Theres a type of atheist - generally a convert - who is searching for another priesthood. I believe atheist Ireland is like that and this forum has its own cult of personalities.

This is a strange place to be making up new unevidenced beliefs

recedite

oldrnwisr wrote: »

Galatians was a church probably somewhere around Antalya in Turkey about 440 miles from Jerusalem directly but about 880 miles for travellers of the time. It is likely from internal evidence in the letter and surrounding evidence in Acts 16:6 that it was Paul himself who founded the communities in Galatia and that they were not pre-existing communities. Moreover, Galatians 4:8 demonstrates that the churches were composed of primarily pagan converts.

I agree but also interesting to note that "the Galatians" were not so much a church, but a people. Celts who had migrated from central europe, and speaking a language similar to Welsh. In the early years of BCE the pioneers had been mercenaries, but later whole tribes migrated into northern Italy, sacking Rome. Also getting as far east as Anatolia. The name Galatians is a version of Gauls. Also related to the Gaels V Galls in Ireland and the later Scottish Gallowglasses.
But by the time of Paul the various Celtic tribes known collectively as the "Gauls" had been conquered throughout most of the continent, so the Galatians would have been a Romanised subject people. But still quite different in terms of religion and culture to either Romans, Greeks or Jews.

At this time, the Turks had not yet arrived in Turkey; that was much later.

Everlong1

Hi folks.

I haven't had a chance to follow up on my OP since I posted it, so am pleasantly surprised to discover the robust debate which seems to have ensued !

I'm not a scholar myself so was really looking for "an idiot's guide" to Christianity and I've certainly got that!

Big thanks and respect to all who posted. I look forward to studying the above and doing some further homework myself.

Everlong1

Fourier

Bart Ehrman's books on the topic are quite good, although they repeat themselves heavily as robindch said, I'd suggest "How Jesus became God". It's one of the latter ones and has some good info on both Judaic and Greco-Roman religion at the time.

New Testament History and Literature by Dale Martin probably has the best info on the whole topic of early Christian writings (did you know there were romantic thrillers about Paul?).

He also summarises the current thoughts on Jesus's existence quite well. Similar to oldrnwsr above, though he extends it using places where the gospels disagree or contradict their message as additional points of evidence.

Zubeneschamali

Adamocovic wrote: »

I had always assumed there was enough historical writings that suggested a person (Named Jesus or not) claiming to be the son of God existed.

The Gospels are historical writings, but they are obviously extremely unreliable as history, being written down 1-2 generations after the events described based on stories in circulation, and then, much later, whittled down to four to make a somewhat more consistent story.

And at least to my eye, the Gospels say that Jesus did not claim to be the Son of God.

magicbastarder

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

The Gospels are historical writings, but they are obviously extremely unreliable as history, being written down 1-2 generations after the events described based on stories in circulation, and then, much later, whittled down to four to make a somewhat more consistent story.

can you imagine gerry adams writing the history of the IRA in his retirement? maybe the comparison is a stretch, but not that big of a stretch.

Zubeneschamali

magicbastarder wrote: »

can you imagine gerry adams writing the history of the IRA in his retirement? maybe the comparison is a stretch, but not that big of a stretch.

I think it is more as if someone today were to write a life of Elvis based entirely on stories they heard with no written references at all.

Elvis, too, is rumoured to have appeared to his followers after his death, and lo, there are shrines to him in many homes, uh-huh-huh.

pauldla

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

I think it is more as if someone today were to write a life of Elvis based entirely on stories they heard with no written references at all.

Elvis, too, is rumoured to have appeared to his followers after his death, and lo, there are shrines to him in many homes, uh-huh-huh.