Ongoing Skeptic Thread

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Cheese

no...I disagree. There is a lot more info on Constantine etc than Jesus himself.
Whether that info is to believed or not is another story.
Even IF there was a man named Jesus it is not the same person as depicted in the bible, that is a total fabrication, or fable if you prefer.

I have not been arguing that the gospels are unassailable documents, so the accuracy of their depictions of Jesus is not at all at issue here. I do take issue with your assertion that their presentation is a total fabrication. It is quite reasonably not, and in fact there is much within the gospels that is based on the actual life of the actual man Jesus. Multiple attestations in multiple sources, and the criterion of dissimilarity make a robust case for the historical Jesus.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Cheese

no...I disagree. There is a lot more info on Constantine etc than Jesus himself.
Whether that info is to believed or not is another story.
Even IF there was a man named Jesus it is not the same person as depicted in the bible, that is a total fabrication, or fable if you prefer.

OK, Constantine was a hyperbole, but my point stands. No one here including myself it's arguing about complete accuracy of the gospels. Simply the existence of a man named Jesus in the early first century

[afc wimbledon]

We know Constantine and Nero were real as they left bloody great ruins with their names on.
The logical balance of probability is that the early church grew out of a very small group of followers/dissidents and one of them was called Jesus, that said it proves nothing in a spiritual sense, there was also a Mohammed and a Buddah,

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

with the exception of some very strong Emperors or outright ruthless or crazy, the leadership was always on a very loose setting.

Especially when the Empire split

The fascinating is based around the powers behind the throne. In terms of rule, for the most part a lot of these guys stayed on the gilded throne for decades

Some of my favorites

Tiberius - Absolutely ruthless and sadistic, he lasted for 22 years and was possibly poisoned by his grand nephew Caligula

Caligula only lasted 3 years but after a brief illness went insane and declared himself a god, turned his palace into a brothel to raise funds and named his horse as a high priest. Assasinated by his guard and the senate

Nero - lasted about 13 years, the theory is that he caused the great fire, his tax policies caused a great uprising and he fled and was declared as an enemy of the Senate and the people. He couldn't kill himself, and made his assistant murder him

Marcus Aurelius - 15 years died of natural causes, one of the more sane and uncorruptable Emperors who was dubbed the philosopher kings.

Commodus - Back to batsh%t insane he was the son of Marcus and lasted about 15 years, he was another god king who claimed that he was the son of the god Jupiter, One of the only Emperors to actually take part in the Gladiator games entering the arena himself. However most of the slaves would simply submit to him rather then fight him.

I would point out though that Constatine gained power after a particularly unsettled time when there had been years of multiple emporers most of whom lasted a year at most before being killed.

[Cheese]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

I have not been arguing that the gospels are unassailable documents, so the accuracy of their depictions of Jesus is not at all at issue here. I do take issue with your assertion that their presentation is a total fabrication. It is quite reasonably not, and in fact there is much within the gospels that is based on the actual life of the actual man Jesus. Multiple attestations in multiple sources, and the criterion of dissimilarity make a robust case for the historical Jesus.

Boy you simply have a way with words that most couldn't dream of attaining in a lifetime....maybe you should stand up and let the world know your story?
Again, we are at a standstill when we have to use the Gospels as a historical reference for the man named Jesus.

• Was there any first hand knowledge of the man or simply references based on hearsay?
• When did the first reference to Jesus get recorded?

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

...No one here including myself it's arguing about complete accuracy of the gospels. Simply the existence of a man named Jesus in the early first century

I am actually arguing for a little more than that. I contend that:
· a real man named Jesus of Nazareth existed in Palestine in the first century CE
· he was an apocalyptic reformer who gained a following
· he was executed by crucifixion for sedition in accordance with Roman law
· his followers believed he had risen from the dead, and had appeared posthumously to several of them.

Originally Posted by Cheese

Again, we are at a standstill when we have to use the Gospels as a historical reference for the man named Jesus.

Are you suggesting in this then that because the Gospels are historically dubious then it follows that they are historically worthless? In my opinion, this is an extreme and unreasonable form of scepticism that is analogous to denying the occurrence of the Trojan War because of the exceptional historical problems with Homer.

* I will procede to happily answer your questions, but I also expect that you follow suit and answer some of my own. I am still waiting for your response to my queries about your confidence in the existence of the last high priest in the Jerusalem Temple, Phineas ben Samuel...

Originally Posted by Cheese

• Was there any first hand knowledge of the man or simply references based on hearsay?

No document or record of Jesus survives from an eyewitness. However, I have already qualified precisely why that is the case, and furthermore have shown why this is actually to be expected. The absence of eye-witness testimony in no way invalidates the historical probability that there was a real man, Jesus of Nazereth. I have already agreed that my evidence is circumstantial, but have argued at length why this is not terribly problematic for my own case. The point being, At least my historical reconstruction depends upon SOME evidence, unlike mythicists' theories which consistently suffer from an utter dearth of any corroboration.

What I am curious about is the alternative. What evidence do you depend upon to presume that Jesus was a myth? Do you have any "first hand knowledge" of a Jewish "Christ-myth" in the first century? What historical criteria have you employed in assessing the mythicists' theories, and by what methods do you determine their superiority to my own claims?

Originally Posted by Cheese

• When did the first reference to Jesus get recorded?

In the Pauline Epistles. Scholars are practically unanimous in assigning all of the undisputed Paulines to a 20-year period between 45–65 CE. These letters include Romans, Galatians, 1-2 Corinthians, Philippians, 1-2 Thessalonians and Philemon. The earliest of these is 1 Thessalonians, which is commonly dated between 45–50, but it is safe to assume that most would set it closer to 50. Bear in mind that while Paul's letters present the earliest documented evidence for Jesus, they contain traditions that are also virtually universally regarded as pre-Pauline. That is, while Paul was writing these things down in the 50's and 60's, he was also citing sources (likely oral but perhaps also written) that testify to the existence of Jesus, and which he clearly did not invent. Examples of these are in the Corinthian confession in 1 Corinthians 15 (written b. 57 CE), and the Christological hymn in Phil 2:6–11 (written ca. 56 CE), and a citation of one of Jesus's teachings in 1 Thes 4:13–18 (c.a. 50–51 CE).

So, if we accept that traditions about Jesus were in circulation prior to their documentation in 50, this would indicate their existence within 12–20 years of his death, and almost certainly within the lifetime of followers and companions who would have witnessed his death. If you are determined to deny the existence of the man Jesus, then you must produce a plausible and historically legitimate counter theory—that is, one which depends upon geographical, cultural, religious, and political certainties and receives support from even a modicum of circumstantial evidence—which contains the invention of a Christ myth within Palestine and within the lifetime of the same people who were witnesses to the mythologized period and events in question.

...So where is your evidence?

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Cheese

Boy you simply have a way with words that most couldn't dream of attaining in a lifetime....maybe you should stand up and let the world know your story?...

This doesn't seem to me to be germane to the topic at hand, but what do you want to know?

[Thor]

Just got Richard's response to TC's last reply. Really enjoying this whole debate, learning so much from you all its crazy fun.

______________________________________________

(1) "In other words, it is much more historically plausible that an actual man existed from Nazareth than it is that he was invented by eager followers." -- But not a plausible deified messiah deserving of worship. Thus, the historical Jesus was as hard a sell in Judea as a mythic one would have been. Thus, its being a hard sell cannot argue for Jesus being either historical or mythical. (See items 4 and 11 below.)

(2) The argument advanced in this response, however, is a slightly different one than previously formulated. This new argument is more familiarly called the Argument from Embarrassment. Basically, the "Why Would They Make That Up" argument. Many scholars have exposed the logical and factual invalidity of it. I document that fact and discuss the AfE extensively and why it doesn't work (especially in defense of a Nazareth origin, but not just that) in my book Proving History (pp. 124-69).

(3) "practically EVERY Jew—whether in Jerusalem, Samaria, or in Alexandria—agreed about several fundamental principles."-- This is debatable. There were at least ten and as many as thirty Jewish sects, which were widely divergent from the so-called "mainstream" sect of the Pharisees (which most directly became the Rabbinical sect post-war), and we know little about most of them, and thus cannot say "what they agreed about." This is a logically invalid argument from silence.

I document this diversity and the scholarship and sources on it in the anthology by Lowder and Price, The Empty Tomb: Jesus beyond the Grave ("The Heady Days of Jewish Diversity," pp. 107-10, with endnotes). We cannot claim to know what fringe Jewish sects believed when we have no information about what they believed. Moreover, what we do know of the fringe sects is that they diverged in a lot of unexpected ways from what was supposedly mainstream. Thus, the many more sects we don't have information on can have diverged in many more ways still than even we know. I took Ehrman to task for the same fallacy (and he even contradicts himself on it, as I also point out):
http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/1794#20

(4) This is a good example of what I mean: "All Jews agreed about the characteristic singularity of God: the god of Judaism was the only God for every Jew."-- This is technically false depending on how you define the word "god." Jews were in fact henotheistic, i.e. they regarded one God as supreme but allowed other divinities subordinate to him (Satan, demons, archangels, angels), and usually just shielded this cultically (worship was denied them) or semantically (as with Jesus until much later, the word "god" would not be used for them, even though they were identical to what pagans called gods in attributes and so on, and some terms are even identical when translated, e.g. the word used by Jews for demon in Greek is actually the word "divinity," and archangels were often called "Lord" just as Jesus was, even though that word was interchangeable with God), but sometimes not even that held, e.g. the messiah Melchizedek and his council are called "gods" [elohim] in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Paul calls Satan "the god of this world," and so on, while the notion of worshipping archangels and/or other divine subordinates of God is attested for some Jewish sects.

This gets us back to item (1) above. If introducing Jesus as an object of worship was anathema to all Jews, it would be anathema whether Jesus was historical or not. Thus proposing that Jews would never countenance worshipping a second power in heaven can never be an argument for historicity. To the contrary, as I alluded to in my first reply, worship of a *celestial archangelic* being would be an easier sell than worship of *an ordinary historical man*. We know this from the Dead Sea Scrolls and their presentation of the superbeing Melchizedek, and from Rabbinical Talmudic discussions of heretical Jewish sects.

See Alan Segal's book Two Powers in Heaven:
http://astore.amazon.com/supportcarr...ail/039104172X

And Margaret Barker's The Great Angel:
http://astore.amazon.com/supportcarr...ail/0664253954

And Larry Hurtado, “Monotheism, Principal Angels, and Christology,” in Timothy Lim and John Collins, ed., The Oxford handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 546-64:
http://astore.amazon.com/supportcarr...ail/0199663084

(5) None of the other "all agreed upon" claims made in this latest reply are relevant to the Jesus myth debate. So I set them aside as of no importance.

(6) I never said anything about Christianity not being a Jewish sect or not starting among Jews. Indeed, I was quite repeatedly clear in saying the opposite. Being a fringe Jewish sect that attacked mainstream Judaism does not make them non-Jewish. Any more than it made the Essenes or the Qumran sect non-Jewish. Or indeed even the Samaritans, who are actually a Jewish sect (only declared heretical by Pharisees). And so on.

(7) The Mormon analogy holds in this context: Just as Mormonism fit fringe American culture, so did Christianity. Christianity shares even a lot with mainstream Judaism (just as Mormonism did with mainstream American culture), but I assumed we were discussing those attributes of it that were non-mainstream. When we focus only on those in the case of Mormonism, too, we get my analogy with Christianity.

(8) My argument does not depend on the "possibility" that Christianity was a radical fringe group of Jews, but on the demonstrable fact of it. I direct you back to item (1). I am here being argued against like this: the Christian teachings were too radical for Jesus to be mythical, because such radical teachings would never succeed among Jews; oh, and by the way, there was nothing radical about Christianity and Carrier is just inventing a teapot in space by saying so. What? Besides those two arguments contradicting each other, the first argument is illogical (remember: point (1)).

(9) A possibiliter fallacy is saying (A) "it's possible that x, therefore probably x." But I am arguing (B) "x makes the evidence more probable than ~x; therefore, probably x." The teapot argument in this reply suggests this is not understood. It would seem I am being mistaken for arguing (A), when in fact I am arguing (B). And indeed I extensively explain in my book Proving History that the only valid way to argue is (B) and I even elaborately explain why we can't use arguments like (A). So it's perverse to have me accused of doing the opposite.

(10) "Unfortunately, outside of the odd mythicist interpretation of the early Christian writings, there is not one shred of documented evidence for such a movement or doctrine." -- This is multiply false. There are not only documents that contain evidence of minimal Doherty mythicism (e.g., the Ascension of Isaiah, 1 Peter, Ignatian anti-Docetism, Irenaeus on the heresies of Jesus being born in heaven, etc.) but there are documents whose contents make much less sense on any other theory (e.g., Hebrews, 1 Clement). The whole array of evidence I shall present in my next book, so there is no need to debate it now. We should just wait for that. Certainly, the merits of mythicism do hinge on whether it makes the contents of documents like these more probable than historicity does. So that is actually where the debate lies. But insisting there is nothing to debate is just inserting one's head in the sand.

(11) "My whole point in citing 11QMelchizedek from the Qumran Scrolls was precisely to illustrate how badly Jesus fit this model, to the point that it strains credulity to imagine how the subject of the Corinthian creed could ever be confused with Daniel’s Son of Man" -- It fits the Christian expectation of Jesus' future return on clouds of heaven exactly. So I don't see why it is being deemed incongruous. Indeed, there is evidence 11Q13 even imagined Melchizedek would die before doing the same. But that is at least debatable. Though I have an article on this in peer review at an academic journal, I have a current summary online here:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/1440

I can only assume what is being claimed here is that the "dying first" part (if we assume it wasn't already in 11Q13) is a novel addition that would be a hard sell to Jews who liked 11Q13. But again, go back to item (1): if that was a hard sell, it would have been as hard a sell for a historical Jesus as for a mythical one. It therefore can argue against neither. One might then try to gin this up into an Argument from Embarrassment, but then see item (2). Many religions come up with weird hard sells. That doesn't make those religions true. I give examples in my book. Mormonism is another.

Moreover, an AfE in this case defeats historicity as well (my point (1) again), since the same fact that ginning up an ordinary failed messiah into a worship-worthy Melchizedek figure would be just as foolish if Christians wanted their religion to sell--so if people don't make up foolish things, they would not have made that up, whether Jesus existed or not. They would have made up something easier to sell. Therefore, even an AfE here cannot argue for historicity. Christianity is as much a hard sell either way; and indeed, harder if Jesus really was just an ordinary guy executed (item (4) again).

Moreover, that a messiah would "die first" is (a) already in Daniel 9 and thus not anathema to Jewish thinking and (b) already embraced in Talmudic Judaism and thus was in fact mainstream (see my article link above for the references). So even the "hard sell" part is a hard sell.

(12) "They must somehow ignore or alegorise his humanness" -- This betrays a lack of understanding of minimal Doherty mythicism. On that theory, Jesus did indeed put on, as a garment, a human body made of flesh, one even fashioned from the sperm of David. Not allegorically. Actually. The only difference with standard historicity is that in Doherty mythicism this body is killed and buried in the sky, not on earth. As appears to have been the case in the earliest redaction of the Ascension of Isaiah, for example.

(13) "The earliest Christian creeds and teachings are universally binding on this point: Jesus was a man who died. He was NOT a celestial being." -- This is refuted by Paul, who has no knowledge of any other Jesus except the celestial being (try as you might, you'll never find in Paul any clear reference to Jesus ever residing on earth; but even apart from that, Paul talks about the celestial Jesus constantly, whether he was ever on earth or not). Phil. 2 even explicitly says Jesus was a preexistent being who descended from heaven to incarnate and die, then reascend to live again celestially, where he now sits (as is said many other places) "at the right hand of God." And Colossians and Hebrews are even more explicit on this (Heb. 1:1-4 and Col. 1:12-20 and Heb. 2:10 and 9:1ff. etc.). Likewise 1 Cor. 8:6 identifies Jesus as God's agent of creation (thus a preexistent being). Paul thus identifies Jesus as (a) a preexistent celestial being (in Phil. 2), (b) God's agent of creation (in 1 Cor 8:6), (c) the Image of God, and (d) the Wisdom of God; Hebrews adds (e) that he is the High Priest of God's celestial temple; and John adds (f) that he is the Logos who was the first being created. We know a Jewish being who fits the description of (a)-(f), being called all those things, as that being is repeatedly discussed by Philo, and even identified by Philo with a figure in Zechariah named Jesus. A celestial being. This is not teapots in space. This is documented fact.

(14) "he did NOT in any way conform to any imagined messianic prediction from Jewish scriptures" -- except Daniel 9 and Isaiah 53 and Wisdom 2 and 5 and...do I really need to continue? One might try to argue these were not yet understood to be messianic (except Daniel 9, which explicitly predicts a messiah will die), but that begs the question: at what point were they deemed messianic and by whom and why? We actually have no evidence that Is. 53 *wasn't* long deemed messianic (it is accepted as such in the Talmud) and Wisd. 2 and 5 are easily adaptable to messianism (appearing even to reference the same figure as in Is. 53) and when one accepts Daniel 9 as messianic (as it indisputably is; the Mechizedek scroll is thoroughly based on that fact), Is. 53 and Wisd. 2 and 5 become more obviously messianic (as they appear to reference the same figure: a dying chosen one of God who will be resurrected and exalted and whose death is associated with an atonement for sin [in Is.] and who is identified as the son of God [in Wisd.]). This looks a lot less like a teapot in space and a lot more like a testable hypothesis.
Ehrman on Historicity Recap
freethoughtblogs.com

[Yasa]

Not to break up the discussion here, and maybe this is the wrong place for this question, but do any of you think that we'll see the formation of new major religions in the future? I don't mean spin offs with Abrahamic roots, but entirely new beliefs, gods, origins, etc.. Be it monotheistic or polytheistic. Obviously we can only speculate unless we live for thousands of years. Or do you figure the current model will stick around forever?

[CaramonLS]

Text, let's assume you are correct and that Jesus really did exist as a person.

Do you believe that if proper historical records (similar to how they were in Islam) were maintained, that his documented life would look a lot like Mohammed's?

Should clarify: In the respect that he was a great figure, but performed no miracles other than "talking to God".

[Cheese]

^^^ Caramon...Mohammed flew on a winged horse to heaven accompanied by the angel Gabriel.

In the year 621, at the age of 51 years old, He flew on the magical Winged-Horse of Fire which he called Burak, which literally means White Horse but seen as "Thunder-Lightning".

The story of the Ascension of Mohammed, known as "Miraj", or "Stairway to Heaven" began when Mohammed fell asleep on a carpet at his cousin's place and became the inspirational source of different "Stories of the 1001 Nights of Arabia" involving "Magic Carpet Rides".

[CaramonLS]

IIRC, but that was Mohammed's claim to take that Journey, I don't believe there were any actual witnesses to the event (he entered a temple alone and took the Journey). Aka just another vision.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Yasa

Not to break up the discussion here, and maybe this is the wrong place for this question, but do any of you think that we'll see the formation of new major religions in the future? I don't mean spin offs with Abrahamic roots, but entirely new beliefs, gods, origins, etc.. Be it monotheistic or polytheistic. Obviously we can only speculate unless we live for thousands of years. Or do you figure the current model will stick around forever?

We have scientology right now.

Personally I think in general psuedo-science will be the predominant philosophy for the why question and personal philosophy take over for moral code issues.

[missdpuck]

Originally Posted by Cheese

^^^ Caramon...Mohammed flew on a winged horse to heaven accompanied by the angel Gabriel.

In the year 621, at the age of 51 years old, He flew on the magical Winged-Horse of Fire which he called Burak, which literally means White Horse but seen as "Thunder-Lightning".

The story of the Ascension of Mohammed, known as "Miraj", or "Stairway to Heaven" began when Mohammed fell asleep on a carpet at his cousin's place and became the inspirational source of different "Stories of the 1001 Nights of Arabia" involving "Magic Carpet Rides".

And these begat Led Zeppelin and Steppenwolf....

[Cheese]

Originally Posted by CaramonLS

IIRC, but that was Mohammed's claim to take that Journey, I don't believe there were any actual witnesses to the event (he entered a temple alone and took the Journey). Aka just another vision.

Yep I understand...Just reminding that these are attributed to him same as Jesus has miracles attributed to his life, after all who would follow a God that can't perform miracles!

[flamesfever]

Originally Posted by GGG

We have scientology right now.

Personally I think in general psuedo-science will be the predominant philosophy for the why question and personal philosophy take over for moral code issues.

Based on the fundamental basic human rights of freedom, justice and equality, I believe the morals and ethics of western civilization will continue to influenced by:

1. the Holy Books

2. Science, reason and logic

3. Philosophical considerations

4. Experience

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by CaramonLS

Text, let's assume you are correct and that Jesus really did exist as a person.

Do you believe that if proper historical records (similar to how they were in Islam) were maintained, that his documented life would look a lot like Mohammed's?

Should clarify: In the respect that he was a great figure, but performed no miracles other than "talking to God".

I will get to Carrier's response in due course, but it will take more time to address his points properly.

As to the question at hand, I don't know much about Mohammed, but from what I do know, the socio-economic circumstances of Jesus's life were considerably different, which in turn made for a very different sort of life.

I think his "greatness" is speculative and highly debatable. We should bear in mind that there was almost certainly nothing altogether unique or exceptional about Jesus, nor his message. There were many apocalyptic movements, and many purported Jewish messiahs within 100 years of Jesus life, and they all bore fairly similar traits. It should also be noted that there were a not insignificant number of would be miracle workers in Greco-Roman Palestine, so even these claims about Jesus cannot be considered all that unusual or exceptional.

The success of Christianity is in many ways a matter of timeliness and good fortune (or bad, depending upon your own stakes in this discussion). As a Christian, I continue to hold a certain faith commitment regarding the exceptional claims made about Jesus, but as a historian, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that he was anything but a rather pedestrian apocalyptic prophet; one how was in no way out of place or of extraordinary note in his own time or place.

[jammies]

My theory is that if there wasn't a historical Jesus, there was another guy with the same name who did exist.

[T@T]

Originally Posted by jammies

My theory is that if there wasn't a historical Jesus, there was another guy with the same name who did exist.

If Jesus existed it is kind of strange it took so long for writings to show up about him, others have said the name Jesus was added later for someone else and the roman church took extraordinary steps to destroy some really old Jewish books said to have contained the true name of Jesus Christ and that he had a twin brother. And of course it may have contained the story that he wasn't crucified on a cross but rather stoned to death for theft.

For me it doesn't matter if he existed or not, people around the world need to realize if he did live he was just a man,he wasn't born from a virgin,he didn't perform miracles(no such thing),he died like people do,didn't come back and never will.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by T@T

If Jesus existed it is kind of strange it took so long for writings to show up about him...

I have explained precisely why the written sort of evidence you might expect for Jesus is non-existent here, here, here and especially in my response to Carrier in post #176.

In short, it is not at all strange that a peasant Jewish apocalypticist who was executed by the Romans for sedition during the Jewish celebration of passover was overlooked by outside sources. It is not strange that his primarily illiterate band of followers never managed to provide any written record of his existence or teachings.

Originally Posted by T@T

...others have said the name Jesus was added later for someone else and the roman church took extraordinary steps to destroy some really old Jewish books said to have contained the true name of Jesus Christ and that he had a twin brother. And of course it may have contained the story that he wasn't crucified on a cross but rather stoned to death for theft...

What "others" have said this? These assertions are little more than tinfoil-hat inspired conspiracy theories. What are your sources, and where is the evidence?