Historicity of Jesus - the Talking Points
Posted: Sat Oct 05, 2013 4:46 pm
Many of us approach this subject with the interest, among other things, towards finding what we can to answer our curiosity regarding the subject of the historicity of Jesus - whether any such man existed, whether we have evidence of anything regarding it. Some others also approach it looking for their talking points, whether they've decided for or against the historicity of Jesus. All in all, it's a fairly contentious subject with a wide audience.
It has a lot of analogy with the debate over the existence of God, despite drawing on entirely different disciplines (history instead of philosophy), and this might partly be due to the fact that membership of these two debates has some overlap (even if a person isn't interested in both at the same time, there's a good chance they were interested in one or the other in the past). And with that analogy, I would point out that the arguments have been pretty well-rehearsed in all directions by the philosophers. And the analogy kind of breaks down because there hasn't been as extensive a literature just covering the arguments, their strengths, and their flaws when it comes to the historicity of Jesus.
These arguments might seem trite to long-time participants to the debate, but it is a danger to become inured to a line of thought through over-exposure. We should be careful of confirmation bias, whereby we shape our evaluation of the evidence subconsciously by elevating that which agrees with us and reflexively putting down that which does not.
And so, without further ado, let's get into some of the basic talking points, trying to go over as many as possible briefly.
Against the Historicity of Jesus
(1) I don't think you can talk about this, at least not at this point of the debate, without mentioning Earl Doherty's review of the emphasis and language he finds in several documents to speak of Jesus Christ in such a way as not to place him on earth. I can't really summarize that here, so I'll just use a hyperlink to his online presentation of the case.
(2) While he doesn't get as much attention as Doherty, Detering has been publishing in an attempt to revive the Dutch Radical hypothesis. Essentially, he puts the letters of Paul into the second century, and the Gospel material even later, towards the mid-second century. This kind of opinion, especially with the motives attributed to the creators of this literature, has the effect of making it doubtful that the subject of the texts is historical.
(3) Ken Olson, among others, has been sustaining the argument that the original text of Josephus didn't have anything written about Jesus. To me, this is the only argument from silence (outside of Christian writings) that could be really probative. Nobody expects anything more than evidence leading to a probability, and an omission by Josephus is simply that.
(4) While Doherty approaches the subject from an examination primarily of the New Testament epistles, supplementing with a few non-canonical texts, it is still available for someone to approach the subject primarily from an examination of non-canonical texts, such as the Nag Hammadi Library. I assume Doherty doesn't primarily because he wants his case to be palatable to a fairly mainstream organization of the documentary history of early Christianity. But there is a goldmine of information in these gnostic texts that is still being extracted and which, possibly, might allow for a really different interpretation of the development of things than normally assumed.
(5) Some have much to say about the parallels of Jesus to other gods, so there is a category of argument that appeals to this and places Jesus as an archetypal "dying and rising savior god" like other mystery cults. Freke and Gandy as well as Acharya S take this route, among many others.
(6) Edited to add the argument of G. A. Wells, going back to G.R.S. Mead, that the original Jesus was a figure of the murky or more ancient past. There is some evidence for such an account in the rabbinic stories about a Yeshua. Almost forgot it because this doesn't seem to find as many champions nowadays.
(7) Edited to add the idea that the New Testament and the rest was a deliberate fabrication by Romans, for completeness.
(8) Edited also to add any number of more extreme schemes that push the start of the Christian literature into the third century or beyond.
And what more? (I'm sure Richard Carrier will have more to add when his book is out, but that's not for some months.)
For the Historicity of Jesus
(1) There are two arguments that are most frequently mentioned. The first is regarding the external evidence. To flip the third argument above, many make the argument that there was a reference to Jesus in Josephus originally, and this could indeed form real evidence. They also catalogue the other references in pagan authors, although the usual reply is that this is evidence for Christian belief primarily.
(2) The second is regarding James, the brother of the Lord in Paul, also known as a brother of Jesus in other references. These references include Hegesippus and Julius Africanus, who, although at late date, do attest to people who were claiming to be related to Jesus by birth. The sources point to this group of people having leadership roles in Jerusalem. While some have, as April DeConick says, "deconstructed" this evidence to remove its impact, it is still worth mulling over.
Here most writers kind of consider it fait accompli, which I don't believe shows a lot of good faith in their approach to the discussion. Let me attempt to improvise some further points.
(3) In the synoptics (Mark 9:1 etc.) and John (the 21st chapter), as well as in similar more-developed echoes in 2 Peter, there is reference to whether Jesus announced that the end of the world would come within the lifetimes of some of the people in earshot. If we understand the situation in life of these references as belonging to communities where people were dying off who had heard the words of Jesus, prompting such concern, this would be easily accounted for if there were some Jesus to have been heard.
(4) Papias, in words quoted later by Eusebius, from his five-book Exposition of the Oracles of the Lord, said that he would inquire from people who had listened to the apostles about what the deeds and sayings of Jesus were. It is difficult to understand Papias as meaning this as anything other than literally. When we also compare a similar statement in the preface of Luke, there's some evidence that people were walking around saying that they had heard or seen what Jesus said or did. This is some measure of evidence for his existence.
(5) There is some evidence that in the late first or even early second century there was still living somebody in Asia Minor who claimed to know Jesus. This comes from the internal evidence of the Gospel of John (19:35, the 21st chapter) and from the reference also to the apostle John, both from Papias and from Polycarp, as claimed by Irenaeus. While it may be tenuous or invented, it still is another point to note. (Our evidence isn't exactly "airtight" in either direction.)
(6) In the Gospel of Mark 15:21, the man named Simon of Cyrene is said to be "the father of Alexander and Rufus," an otherwise unexplained detail not picked up by the writers of Matthew and Luke. One very simple explanation for this is that Alexander and Rufus were known to the audience and that they were actual men who were the sons of Simon. This would then imply the existence of Simon as someone who was present during the crucifixion, and, thus, a historical crucifixion of Jesus.
(7) Some have argued that the Acts of the Apostles were written by a companion to Paul. If so, this would suggest that Paul knew men who knew Jesus.
(8) Some have argued against the interpretation of the epistles of Paul in any case, or for the authenticity of the passage of 1 Thessalonians that Doherty rejects (overstating how mainstream his own opinion is), which would make Paul in his epistles contradict any theory very similar to Doherty's.
And what more? Let's see if we can do better in being complete and forward about the extent of the evidence such as it is.
It has a lot of analogy with the debate over the existence of God, despite drawing on entirely different disciplines (history instead of philosophy), and this might partly be due to the fact that membership of these two debates has some overlap (even if a person isn't interested in both at the same time, there's a good chance they were interested in one or the other in the past). And with that analogy, I would point out that the arguments have been pretty well-rehearsed in all directions by the philosophers. And the analogy kind of breaks down because there hasn't been as extensive a literature just covering the arguments, their strengths, and their flaws when it comes to the historicity of Jesus.
These arguments might seem trite to long-time participants to the debate, but it is a danger to become inured to a line of thought through over-exposure. We should be careful of confirmation bias, whereby we shape our evaluation of the evidence subconsciously by elevating that which agrees with us and reflexively putting down that which does not.
And so, without further ado, let's get into some of the basic talking points, trying to go over as many as possible briefly.
Against the Historicity of Jesus
(1) I don't think you can talk about this, at least not at this point of the debate, without mentioning Earl Doherty's review of the emphasis and language he finds in several documents to speak of Jesus Christ in such a way as not to place him on earth. I can't really summarize that here, so I'll just use a hyperlink to his online presentation of the case.
(2) While he doesn't get as much attention as Doherty, Detering has been publishing in an attempt to revive the Dutch Radical hypothesis. Essentially, he puts the letters of Paul into the second century, and the Gospel material even later, towards the mid-second century. This kind of opinion, especially with the motives attributed to the creators of this literature, has the effect of making it doubtful that the subject of the texts is historical.
(3) Ken Olson, among others, has been sustaining the argument that the original text of Josephus didn't have anything written about Jesus. To me, this is the only argument from silence (outside of Christian writings) that could be really probative. Nobody expects anything more than evidence leading to a probability, and an omission by Josephus is simply that.
(4) While Doherty approaches the subject from an examination primarily of the New Testament epistles, supplementing with a few non-canonical texts, it is still available for someone to approach the subject primarily from an examination of non-canonical texts, such as the Nag Hammadi Library. I assume Doherty doesn't primarily because he wants his case to be palatable to a fairly mainstream organization of the documentary history of early Christianity. But there is a goldmine of information in these gnostic texts that is still being extracted and which, possibly, might allow for a really different interpretation of the development of things than normally assumed.
(5) Some have much to say about the parallels of Jesus to other gods, so there is a category of argument that appeals to this and places Jesus as an archetypal "dying and rising savior god" like other mystery cults. Freke and Gandy as well as Acharya S take this route, among many others.
(6) Edited to add the argument of G. A. Wells, going back to G.R.S. Mead, that the original Jesus was a figure of the murky or more ancient past. There is some evidence for such an account in the rabbinic stories about a Yeshua. Almost forgot it because this doesn't seem to find as many champions nowadays.
(7) Edited to add the idea that the New Testament and the rest was a deliberate fabrication by Romans, for completeness.
(8) Edited also to add any number of more extreme schemes that push the start of the Christian literature into the third century or beyond.
And what more? (I'm sure Richard Carrier will have more to add when his book is out, but that's not for some months.)
For the Historicity of Jesus
(1) There are two arguments that are most frequently mentioned. The first is regarding the external evidence. To flip the third argument above, many make the argument that there was a reference to Jesus in Josephus originally, and this could indeed form real evidence. They also catalogue the other references in pagan authors, although the usual reply is that this is evidence for Christian belief primarily.
(2) The second is regarding James, the brother of the Lord in Paul, also known as a brother of Jesus in other references. These references include Hegesippus and Julius Africanus, who, although at late date, do attest to people who were claiming to be related to Jesus by birth. The sources point to this group of people having leadership roles in Jerusalem. While some have, as April DeConick says, "deconstructed" this evidence to remove its impact, it is still worth mulling over.
Here most writers kind of consider it fait accompli, which I don't believe shows a lot of good faith in their approach to the discussion. Let me attempt to improvise some further points.
(3) In the synoptics (Mark 9:1 etc.) and John (the 21st chapter), as well as in similar more-developed echoes in 2 Peter, there is reference to whether Jesus announced that the end of the world would come within the lifetimes of some of the people in earshot. If we understand the situation in life of these references as belonging to communities where people were dying off who had heard the words of Jesus, prompting such concern, this would be easily accounted for if there were some Jesus to have been heard.
(4) Papias, in words quoted later by Eusebius, from his five-book Exposition of the Oracles of the Lord, said that he would inquire from people who had listened to the apostles about what the deeds and sayings of Jesus were. It is difficult to understand Papias as meaning this as anything other than literally. When we also compare a similar statement in the preface of Luke, there's some evidence that people were walking around saying that they had heard or seen what Jesus said or did. This is some measure of evidence for his existence.
(5) There is some evidence that in the late first or even early second century there was still living somebody in Asia Minor who claimed to know Jesus. This comes from the internal evidence of the Gospel of John (19:35, the 21st chapter) and from the reference also to the apostle John, both from Papias and from Polycarp, as claimed by Irenaeus. While it may be tenuous or invented, it still is another point to note. (Our evidence isn't exactly "airtight" in either direction.)
(6) In the Gospel of Mark 15:21, the man named Simon of Cyrene is said to be "the father of Alexander and Rufus," an otherwise unexplained detail not picked up by the writers of Matthew and Luke. One very simple explanation for this is that Alexander and Rufus were known to the audience and that they were actual men who were the sons of Simon. This would then imply the existence of Simon as someone who was present during the crucifixion, and, thus, a historical crucifixion of Jesus.
(7) Some have argued that the Acts of the Apostles were written by a companion to Paul. If so, this would suggest that Paul knew men who knew Jesus.
(8) Some have argued against the interpretation of the epistles of Paul in any case, or for the authenticity of the passage of 1 Thessalonians that Doherty rejects (overstating how mainstream his own opinion is), which would make Paul in his epistles contradict any theory very similar to Doherty's.
And what more? Let's see if we can do better in being complete and forward about the extent of the evidence such as it is.