Jesus Existed: Argument From Pattern of Cults

[ApostateAbe]

My preferred argument that Jesus existed is the pattern of cults. In short:

ARGUMENT FROM PATTERN OF CULTS
(1) There is an actual human being corresponding to the reputed founder of every cult in history and the modern world that reveres such a reputed human founder, in absolutely every case where the information is available.
(2) Jesus was reputed to be the human founder of the cult of Christianity that revered him.
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

The flaw in this line of reasoning is that it is grounded in the assumption that the narrative we have about the origins of Christianity -- Luke-Acts -- reflects historical reality.

There is no independent confirmation that this narrative has historical foundations.

The existence of that narrative is not independently attested until the second century. (The same narrative consists of anachronisms from the late first/early second centuries.)

The same narrative appears to be inconsistent with other documents associated with early Christianity that several scholars date prior to or contemporary with the gospels (e.g. letters, Odes, Hebrews, Ascension).

The narrative leads one to have certain expectations of what late-first and early-second century Christianity would look like that are not met in the current evidence.

The practice of historiography in the ancient world (Greek, Roman, Jewish) was closely related to rhetoric and epic and poetic literature. "Historians" tended to write what they believed would have been the most most plausible happenings given human nature, and they frequently resorted to adapting narratives from other literature to fill in these gaps in their knowledge.

Narratives explaining the origins of cultic or ritualistic practices and groups tend to arise post hoc to explain or give some etiological/historical explanation for a practice or group.

So it is not implausible that a second century historian wrote what he had reason to believe would be the most plausible explanation for the founding of proto-orthodox Christianity.

It is the whole body of early Christian literature, not just Luke and Acts, that contributes to premise #2. Maybe your perspective is that Christianity started out as something other than a cult and became a cult? My argument is about plausibility, so how is your model plausible? What is the closest historical or modern analogy to Christianity, in your opinion?

[neilgodfrey]

It is the whole body of early Christian literature, not just Luke and Acts, that contributes to premise #2. Maybe your perspective is that Christianity started out as something other than a cult and became a cult? My argument is about plausibility, so how is your model plausible? What is the closest historical or modern analogy to Christianity, in your opinion?

When you say "the whole body of early Christian literature" informs us that Jesus founded the cult, what titles in particular are you referring to?

As far as I am aware "the whole body of early Christian literature" does not narrate or explain how "the cult/church" began. We have Acts. Do we have anything else from that corpus of the first century/early second?

I don't see anything implausible about Christianity emerging or coming to coalesce from divergent social and intellectual forces that eventually led to the creation of mythical narratives to explain their rituals. A respectable body of scholars argue that's how Judaism started and it's even how a few scholars of Islam argue that religion started.

We also have historical examples of mythical persons emerging very quickly to be widely embraced as historical ones.

If such things are possible and on the record then they are plausible.

But I suspect this is going to come down to pointless a "I don't think that's plausible/You do think it's plausible" debate.

[pakeha]

My preferred argument that Jesus existed is the pattern of cults. In short:

ARGUMENT FROM PATTERN OF CULTS
(1) There is an actual human being corresponding to the reputed founder of every cult in history and the modern world that reveres such a reputed human founder, in absolutely every case where the information is available.
(2) Jesus was reputed to be the human founder of the cult of Christianity that revered him.
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

I think the pattern follows from the sociological pattern of cults: a human being takes advantage of natural authoritarian human psychology to create in other people an excessive obedience to his self or her self. When the cult founder dies, most often the cult dies, but sometimes the cult lives on and evolves to become an ideology, and this is one of the two main types of religions, such as Islam, Christianity, Buddhism and Zoroastrianism. The other type is a religion that evolves out of clan mythology, such as Judaism or Hinduism.

Steven Carr gave a counterexample: Benjamin Creme's Maitreya. However, Maitreya seems to be neither a reputed human being nor the reputed founder of the cult. The reputed human founder of the cult was Benjamin Creme, and of course he existed.

Stephen Huller gave another counterexample: Moses, being the reputed human founder of Judaism. My first objection is that I don't actually take Moses to be the reputed founder of Judaism. There are many characters who reputedly contributed to the founding of Judaism, and most prominent among them is Abraham. But, my more relevant objection is that Judaism is not and was never a "cult," as far as we are aware, as in a group of people who excessively revere a single leader in conflict with the larger society. Instead, Judaism seems to have evolved from clan mythology.

To be clear, a "cult" isn't just any group of people we disagree with. When speaking usefully, it is a sociological phenomenon that follows objective patterns. See this list to get an idea of what cults tend to have in common:

Characteristics Associated with Cultic Groups - Revised
Janja Lalich, Ph.D.
Michael D. Langone, Ph.D.

Would you consider Asclepius to human, or Ebion?
How about Roman Isis?

[ApostateAbe]

Would you consider Asclepius to human, or Ebion?
How about Roman Isis?

Asclepius is a reputed god and Isis is a reputed goddess, but Ebion is a reputed human and may be a good counterexample.

[bcedaifu]

Would you consider Asclepius to human, or Ebion?
How about Roman Isis?

Ἀσκληπιός, born of "Caesarean section", from a human mother, and a Greek god, Apollo, was of the same heritage as both Jesus and Herakles, i.e. Greek demigods, possessing divine powers.
Ebion, (meaning impecunious), was a purely fictional human, without divine origin or pretensions.
Ἶσις, Egyptian goddess, known as a protector of children and the dead, was the mother of Horus, another Egyptian god. Her name means "throne" in English.

[spin]

Ebion, (meaning impecunious), was a purely fictional human...

This use of "fictional" should be avoided here. Normally in English, "fictional" indicates "deliberately made up", as a novelist might have done. It indicates a certain intentionality on the part of someone choosing to invent a character or story. Ebion was given literary existence apparently through a poor assumption, ie that the group called Ebionites were named after their founder, hence Ebion, and not based on a descriptive term from Hebrew (being needy). Poor assumptions are a different source of information—from fiction—that doesn't reflect reality. By describing Ebion as a "fictional human" one confuses more than qualifies. People might also use the term "invented human", which merely perpetuates the lack of clarity.

Then I went looking for a more functional adjective, but it was not easy to find. Starting with "unreal", where an "unreal human" doesn't quite convince, on to "spurious", which has the slightly clearer "spurious human", or the analytically functional, but unwieldy, "non-historical", and "non-existent" seems to suggest now (perhaps "never-existent"?). If anyone has a suggestion for an accurate adjective to replace the inappropriate "fictional" that's better than "spurious", I'd be happy to hear it.

[bcedaifu]

Would you consider Asclepius to human, or Ebion?
How about Roman Isis?

Ἀσκληπιός, born of "Caesarean section", from a human mother, and a Greek god, Apollo, was of the same heritage as both Jesus and Herakles, i.e. Greek demigods, possessing divine powers.
Ebion, (meaning impecunious), was a purely fictional human, without divine origin or pretensions.
Ἶσις, Egyptian goddess, known as a protector of children and the dead, was the mother of Horus, another Egyptian god. Her name means "throne" in English.

Ebion, (meaning impecunious), was a purely fictional human...

This use of "fictional" should be avoided here. Normally in English, "fictional" indicates "deliberately made up", as a novelist might have done. It indicates a certain intentionality on the part of someone choosing to invent a character or story. Ebion was given literary existence apparently through a poor assumption, ie that the group called Ebionites were named after their founder, hence Ebion, and not based on a descriptive term from Hebrew (being needy). Poor assumptions are a different source of information—from fiction—that doesn't reflect reality. By describing Ebion as a "fictional human" one confuses more than qualifies. People might also use the term "invented human", which merely perpetuates the lack of clarity.

I sought to distinguish a character, Ebion, of unknown human heritage, from three Greek demigods, and an Egyptian goddess. As a "fictional human", Ebion's leadership had been constrained by the limits of human capacity, whereas, the other four characters had not been.

pakeha's point though, I believe, was simply aimed at refuting Apostate Abe's notion, that an argument from pattern of cults, demonstrated the existence of the Greek demigod, Jesus of Nazareth, by highlighting "persons", other than Jesus, who also had cult followings, but are acknowledged to have had no paternal DNA. Ebion may, or may not, have actually existed, but, no one argues, so far as I am aware, that this person, Ebion, whether genuine human or fictional human, possessed supernatural abilities, like Asklepios, Herakles, Isis, and Jesus of Capernaum.

[pakeha]

...pakeha's point though, I believe, was simply aimed at refuting Apostate Abe's notion, that an argument from pattern of cults, demonstrated the existence of the Greek demigod, Jesus of Nazareth, by highlighting "persons", other than Jesus, who also had cult followings, but are acknowledged to have had no paternal DNA. Ebion may, or may not, have actually existed, but, no one argues, so far as I am aware, that this person, Ebion, whether genuine human or fictional human, possessed supernatural abilities, like Asklepios, Herakles, Isis, and Jesus of Capernaum.

Thanks, bcedaifu. Perhaps Isis wasn't the best choice of a cult, although what we know of the Roman Isis cult, it's certainly in the running for a Roman treatment of a divine figure.
Certainly Jesus shares much in common with both Asklepios and Herakles, especially in a death brought on by betrayal and semi-divine parentage.
And lack of historicity.

[spin]

Would you consider Asclepius to human, or Ebion?
How about Roman Isis?

Ἀσκληπιός, born of "Caesarean section", from a human mother, and a Greek god, Apollo, was of the same heritage as both Jesus and Herakles, i.e. Greek demigods, possessing divine powers.
Ebion, (meaning impecunious), was a purely fictional human, without divine origin or pretensions.
Ἶσις, Egyptian goddess, known as a protector of children and the dead, was the mother of Horus, another Egyptian god. Her name means "throne" in English.

Ebion, (meaning impecunious), was a purely fictional human...

This use of "fictional" should be avoided here. Normally in English, "fictional" indicates "deliberately made up", as a novelist might have done. It indicates a certain intentionality on the part of someone choosing to invent a character or story. Ebion was given literary existence apparently through a poor assumption, ie that the group called Ebionites were named after their founder, hence Ebion, and not based on a descriptive term from Hebrew (being needy). Poor assumptions are a different source of information—from fiction—that doesn't reflect reality. By describing Ebion as a "fictional human" one confuses more than qualifies. People might also use the term "invented human", which merely perpetuates the lack of clarity.

I sought to distinguish a character, Ebion, of unknown human heritage, from three Greek demigods, and an Egyptian goddess. As a "fictional human", Ebion's leadership had been constrained by the limits of human capacity, whereas, the other four characters had not been.

pakeha's point though, I believe, was simply aimed at refuting Apostate Abe's notion, that an argument from pattern of cults, demonstrated the existence of the Greek demigod, Jesus of Nazareth, by highlighting "persons", other than Jesus, who also had cult followings, but are acknowledged to have had no paternal DNA. Ebion may, or may not, have actually existed, but, no one argues, so far as I am aware, that this person, Ebion, whether genuine human or fictional human, possessed supernatural abilities, like Asklepios, Herakles, Isis, and Jesus of Capernaum.

You need to read what I said. It is clear that you didn't understand it at all.

I understood what you were trying to say (ie Ebion is a different category from deities) and did not comment on it generally—just on the misapplication of the term "fictional", which is a problem for many commentators here.

People fall over their terminology.

[ghost]

Mohammed never existed.