Weighing up the evidence for the ‘Historical Jesus’

[Leucius Charinus]

'One funeral at a time' is quite descriptive of the academic problem and its most likely long term solution.

Most likely according to the historical trend. But PC's and the internet has exponentially reduced the academic analysis and response time. The usual GIGO aside, another possibility could be a critical manuscript discovery in another jar somewhere in Egypt. Who knows what information still lies buried? New information. Another breakthrough might arrive with a very simple non-destructive DATING TECHNOLOGY with an app for a mobile phone. Take a pic and get a date plus or minus 28 days. Wouldn't that be fun in the British Museum, Library, the Vatican and within the Oxford Papyrii Dept?

'Consensus' academia has now spent over two hundred years in the task of painting itself into its present corner.
At this late date, with a hundred thousand academics having supported and written their various theses cleaving to the popular status quo assertion of the existence of a 'historical' Jesus ...in an academic CULT-ure that demanded it, to now reverse, or to admit; 'We have long erred by the assuming of the unevidenced', would cause such a loss public confidence in pronouncements of religious history professors that religious 'scholarship' would become a public laughingstock and embarrassment that no sane collage applicant would dare touch it with a ten foot pole.
Not that it won't eventually happen anyway, but no one presently involved in that back scratching CULT-ural status quo wants it to happen while they are still around, and have to be the ones to deal with the ensuing academic embarrassment themselves.

Well it will be quite an admission if good solid evidence is found to underpin a simple theory of a Fictional Jesus which fits all the known evidence.

Future academics, consistently employing concise standards and criteria of evidence, will likely chortle in mirth over the bass-ackwards and primitive 'scholarship' methods of appeal to popular 'consensus' that is presently de rigueur. One that is notably founded and grounded in roots that lead right back to the writings and pro-Jesus theological assumptions of the 'academic' theologians of previous centuries.

There was a time when the only degree greater than a Doctor of Philosophy was a Doctor of [Christian] Theology. The reason for this was that critical thinking and sceptical exploration and enquiry had been savagely suppressed by the pathological reverence for the third rate writings inside a supposedly "Sacred Book".

IMO the greatest evidence AGAINST an historical Jesus is the utter corruption of the church organisation which preserved (and/or forged) the propaganda FOR.



LC

[MrMacSon]

The main point is that such an alleged important existence was not documented.

Oh you mean the most documented man on the planet, a legend that has lasted for over 2000 years and going strong?

Exactly: Legend. The most documented character on the planet. In the most documented Legend.

[Leucius Charinus]

Was it common in Hellenistic societies to question or challenge the existence of, or the mythology other cults gods?

There was IMO a tolerance and non-persecutory attitude associated with the Graeco-Roman-Egypto Hellenists to the general mixing pot of "Other Gods". With the Romans bringing in millions of slaves, so entered hundreds of cults, myths, traditions and deities. Those cults who had gold and wealth could probably afford to get their chief priests into the "Sacred Assembly of [pagan pontifices] Priests" in the major cities. One step closer to the ear of the Pontifex Maximus - the Roman Emperor.

Sure there were momentary flare ups of intolerance and persecution. The expulsion of Jews, the eradication of Manichaeans.

From what I have read, that would have been a quick way to get yourself quickly arrested and executed for blaspheming the gods.
NO gods were to be blasphemed under Greek or Roman rule, to do so was regarded as an act of Treason endangering the entire people.

The Roman Priesthood consulted the gods about everything. After the Republic collapsed and Augustus settled the bloodshed his architecture shows nothing had really changed. The gods were everywhere.

Anyone could worship and serve whatever god or gods they wished, but could not get away with denouncing or questioning the existence or mythology of the god(s) of others.ALL of the gods and their stories were to be respected. Or else.

The atmosphere might be described as "collegiate". The priests of all the various myriad gods were often educated and could often write (Greek, Latin, etc). This was a service to those who could not, but required some official document of some form.

Any such literature calling a god or his (her) existence or mythology into question would have been sought out and destroyed along with the person or sect stupid enough to publish it.
Exactly why Christians were hunted down and executed as a menace and a danger to civilized society.

I have major reservations about the church's propaganda relating to the so-called early persecutions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Myth_of_Persecution

• The Myth of Persecution: How Early Christians Invented a Story of Martyrdom is a 2013 book by Candida Moss, a professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of Notre Dame. Moss's thesis is that the traditional idea of the "Age of Martyrdom", when Christians suffered persecution from the Roman authorities and lived in fear of being thrown to the lions, is largely fictional. There was never sustained, targeted persecution of Christians by Imperial Roman authorities. Official persecution of Christians by order of the Roman Emperor lasted for at most twelve years of the first three hundred of the Church's history. Most of the stories of individual martyrs are pure invention, and even the oldest and most historically accurate stories of martyrs and their sufferings have been altered and re-written by later editors, so that it is impossible to know for sure what any of the martyrs actually thought, did or said.

LC

[Leucius Charinus]

Oh you mean the most documented man on the planet, a legend that has lasted for over 2000 years and going strong?

You said it; "a legend that has lasted for over 2000 years"

It's not 2000 years yet according to the relaxation of the palaeographical dating to cover the 4th century. There is no other physical evidence older than this. Next year will represent only 1,680 years (not 2000 years) from the Council of Nicaea.

A totally horse shit made up legend that appeals to the Alexamenos' like yourself.

Isn't the Alexamenos a donkey?




LC

[Leucius Charinus]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlTi95hun34&app=desktop
TTA Podcast 198: The Question of Christ

• • Published on Dec 22, 2014
    
    Is there any evidence for a real Jesus? Was Jesus' story borrowed from earlier religions and cultures? Is Jesus really the reason for the Christmas season, which is being celebrated globally this week?
    
    In this podcast, Seth Andrews speaks to three historians who have dedicated much of their lives and writings to the subject of Christ and Christianity:
    Dr. Richard Carrier, David Fitzgerald and Dr. Robert M. Price.
    
    Join us for a compelling panel and an enlightening show.
    
    RICHARD CARRIER: http://www.richardcarrier.info
    
    DAVID FITZGERALD: http://www.amazon.com/David-Fitzgeral...
    
    ROBERT M. PRICE: http://www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com

LC

[Sheshbazzar]

Isn't the Alexamenos a donkey?

Thank you for asking.

Alexamenos is a person that believes in, admires, or worships an Equine god.

Interestingly, the Greek pronunciation of 'EaSooce' (Jesus) is virtually indistinguishable to the ear from the Hebrew 'HaSooce' meaning 'the HORSE'.

Consider then for example Psalm 33:16 or Prov 21:31, and ...if you had skill in Hebrew, you could pursue the idioms used in conjunction much further, (a 'chariot' is NOT always specifically a wheeled device, but a general idiomatic term meaning 'that which follows' or a 'retinue' or 'troop', the texts speaking in metaphors on more than one level.)
Much prophecy and 'dark sayings of old' about 'the horse and its rider' and the 'horse and chariot', and little of it favorable.


But back to Alexamenos and the graffiti illustration. Look at what is described by Christianity 'scholars' as allegedly being the head of a donkey (ass).

The most notable distinguishing feature between an ass and a horse is the much larger ears of the ass over those of a horse.
Proportionally, the ears of the Equine illustrated in the Alexamenos graffiti are actually smaller than what is common to an average horse;

If the artist had intended a donkey (ass), mule, or jackass, the ears would normally be exaggerated and proportionally double or tripled the size of those appearing in the graffiti illustration. Thus I do not believe that the artist intended to illustrate a donkey (ass) but rather a horse.
Need I say, the conception, and the ridicule called up by the image is ancient, how ancient open to question; (Gen 49:17, Ex 15:1. Isa 43:17)

In my view all 'Jesus' /EaSooce historicists 'believers' are members of Alexamenos' cult.
Nothing new here, I have held that perception for over 30 years, and time and further learning have only reinforced it.
Consider the famous tale of the 'Trojan Horse'. The writers of the Bible lived contemporary with that tale, and if you can conceive of it, it found subtle expression within the developing Hebrew texts.
There is a Jewish fabricated 'Trojan Horse' even now present within the gates of the glorious Hellenistic religion called Christianity, Just like that tale of old Troy the Greeks fell for the ruse, and dragged this crudely fabricated ha'Sooce inside their gates. The Judaism inside will come out, and will bring down both walls and halls of the Christers horse religion and all goyim pride and pretentions with it.
No, the ancient Judean text writers did not foresee 'Christianity' per se, but the behemouth of Hellenism was visible on every side, and quite naturally they employed their pens (the mightiest weapon in their arsenal) to set up defenses and a ploy to defeat the mightiest culture on earth. Will they prevail?
Only Time will tell.



As seen through the eyes of Sheshbazzar

[cienfuegos]

to cienfuegos,

Even by minimalist historicism, actual Jesus doesn't matter. Actual Jesus was unknown to most people who accepted Christianity. Those people did not know if there was an actual Jesus or not and had no way to confirm what they were told.

I do not think an actual Jesus doesn't matter for minimalist historicism. His last year of his life, more so his last days, is was triggered Christianity, slowly first, then faster in the time of Paul (not only in numbers of Christians, but also for the ever expanding Christian beliefs).

You are asserting this. The fact remains that most new converts to Christianity did not witness any of the events related to the life of Jesus. They had to take the word of those who claimed they did. So it comes back to the eyewitness testimony. Who were they? Did they tell the truth? The appeal of Christianity is in the resurrection (see Paul, for example). So the key element of the religion: that Christ had conquered death and offers salvation to all was made up (by our knowledge of natural laws). If that was false, there is no reason to conclude that the rest was not false, too. People two degrees away from the events have no way to judge whether or not those events occurred. We know, beyond doubt, that some people will believe false claims on little or no evidence.

I believe that early Christians were not trying to pass off something they knew to be false. I believe they really did believe that a celestial being, Jesus, pre-existent with God, descended to earth (or the lower heavens), took on the appearance of a man (a Jewish man, it had to be for the new covenant to be established) and was killed by demons under the control of the ruler of the ages. They discovered this truth in the ancient writings of the Jews, translated into Greek. They meditated on it and believed they had received messages from God. When I read Paul talking about "another Jesus" or presenting his gospel to the pillars, it reminds me of how Joseph Smith had to limit revelation during the first years of Mormonism because things were getting out of control (mostly related to men having revelations about which young filly should be added to his stable). I believe this is compatible with what Paul talks about in his letters related to Jesus.

If Peter went to Corinth (as strongly suggested in 1 Cor 1-4: he had followers there), they would have known at least a bit about Jesus (and Jesus was so small historically there was little of significance to know about him). Also, the Church of Antioch was visited by Peter. Info about Jesus could be gleaned from non eyewitness apostles, including Paul (I'll come back to that later).

The followers in Corinth would only have second hand, or even third hand, knowledge of Jesus and not be able to assess the veracity of the story. It would not matter to them whether or not there had been an actual Jesus.

Quite a few times, Paul dropped down to earth attributes about a human Jesus (Jew, poor, ministering to Jews --& not Gentiles, which goes against Paul' gospel--, etc.) in order to make points, as if these attributes were already known & accepted by his audience.

I covered that. See comments about Isaiah.

The same goes for "Hebrews", which I am certain was written at the same time than the Pauline epistles.

I tend to lean toward an early dating of Hebrews as well.

Paul's epistles are not about telling all of what he knew about the human/earthly Jesus. And I already demonstrated that "Mark" was reacting to eyewitness' accounts which were not in his favor, that is about Christian beliefs, more so that the like of Peter and James, and likely the whole church of Jerusalem, were not Christians (because the eyewitnesses had no reason to be such).

When you say "I demonstrated" what you mean is "I have presented an argument that satisfies me." I would very much like it if you would embed your arguments and evidence here in your posts. I realize you have layers and layers of explanation and "demonstration" but often following your links is like a wild goose chase. Just state it here. I have already said that I believe the early Jesus belief was based on Isaiah 52/53. You are not dealing with that at all, but only re-asserting your position.

I already explained why I think "King of the Jews" and the disturbance in the temple were real facts:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1178&p=25822#p25822

ok, let's look at it:

a) "Mark" described very quickly the four elements of this incident in general terms (NO "some", "few", "many", "most " or "all " in his narration):
Mk 11:15-16 "And they come to Jerusalem, and Jesus having gone into the temple, began to cast forth those selling and buying in the temple, and the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those selling the doves, he overthrew, and he did not suffer that any might bear a vessel through the temple,"

Maybe this suited Mark's purpose. It is already known that Mark is usually more concise in his descriptions than other gospel writers. It's just his style.

b) "Mark" forced some damage control about Jesus' actions in the temple:
Mk 11:17 "... he said, "Is it not written: "`My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations,'? But you have made it a `den of robbers.'""
The quote comes from the combination of two different sources (therefore very unlikely to have been spoken by Jesus):

I don't see how this at all is "damage control." The fact that the quote comes from sources in the LXX should once again provide you with a hint that you fail to see: this is an allegory.

Soon after the narration of the ruckus, "Mark" wrote "And the scribes and chief priests heard it and sought how they might destroy Him; for they feared Him, because all the people were astonished at His teaching." (11:18).
"Mark" avoided to say these scribes and chief priests began to look for way to have Jesus killed because of the "disturbance".

How do you know that they began to look at a way to have Jesus killed because of the Temple disturbance? Our earliest Gospel doesn't say that, he says for blasphemy:

14:55 The chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking for evidence against Jesus so that they could put him to death, but they did not find any. 56 Many testified falsely against him, but their statements did not agree.

14:63 The high priest tore his clothes. “Why do we need any more witnesses?” he asked. 64 “You have heard the blasphemy. What do you think?”

They all condemned him as worthy of death.

Mark 14:55 says clearly that they were looking for a reason to kill him. They knew about the Temple disturbance and that seems to not have been a reason to kill him. (I think, by the way, that Mark has followed Jewish Wars 6.5.3 here for his plot, and in that story Jesus was brought before the priests and the Roman governor for his Temple disturbances but not found to have committed any offense worthy of killing, but they did flog him.)

Furthermore I used very little of gMark for my backbone reconstruction of Jesus' last year, and nothing above what Paul said about Jesus (poor, with brothers, of no reputation, humble, not giving sign he was the Son of God, dealing with Jews only, crucified as "Christ", etc).
And gMark, despite the embellishments, explains very well how Jesus became an accidental (credited) healer. Also the relationship between the time of John the Baptist and Jesus' last year, etc, etc.
Of course everything is explained on my website, more so on:
http://historical-jesus.info/hjes2.html & http://historical-jesus.info/hjes1x.html
As far as source criticism, if you read my website, you'll find I practiced that a lot, which led me to reject a lot of stuff (with stated series of reasons) from the gospels, including gMark (such as Jesus not a teacher, not speaking in parables, not an itinerant preacher, etc.)

This is all more of the same. You have explained it all so that it is convincing to you. You are fitting the evidence into your theory and not allowing consideration for other explanations.

I already explained myself about "Mark". Of course Josephus would not mention a flash in the pan uneducated Galilean in his proper chronological niche. And even if nothing is known about the author, that does not mean all he wrote is not true. And the author had many reasons to be anonymous, in view his gospel was packed with fiction and embellishments. However that does not mean his gospel did not contain authentic items (as already accepted by his audience), meant to give an air of authenticity to his work. Even anonymous writings can provide truth among lies, I don't see why not.

You are very assiduously avoiding source criticism here. "even if nothing is known...doesn't mean...not true." No, it means we have no way to evaluate him as a reliable source. Therefore, conclusions based on this source can only be at best tenuous if they are not attested elsewhere. "truth among lies," how do you know what's true and what's not? If Mark wrote an elaborate allegory, how do you filter "truth" from that? The author has the ultimate artistic license to fashion his story however he wants.

Oh yes, that would matter a lot to have this man known to have existed. Since so much depended on the crucifixion (at first shameful, then glorious), the earliest Christians could not accept that crucified man was unknown.

How would anyone beyond a handful of followers know that he existed?

Who is that Paul? do you consider what he wrote as evidence?

No, that particular Paul is a fictional character from a novel. (this relates to my quote of Paul from the Last Temptation of Christ). What he says, though, is quite embarrassing, so it must be true.

I'll answer the rest tomorrow.

Cordially, Bernard

Ok, but I think it is pointless. You are offering as evidence your hunches, interpretations, assumptions, and arguments. You have the two confused and intertwined. Where you did a good job of presenting actual evidence was your list of Paul's references to an earthly Jesus. That's evidence. Evidence is not your "explanation" of why a passage fits the theory you have constructed.

[cienfuegos]

https://theconversation.com/weighing-up ... esus-35319
Raphael Lataster Tutor in Religious Studies at University of Sydney

• Did a man called Jesus of Nazareth walk the earth? Discussions over whether the figure known as the “Historical Jesus” actually existed primarily reflect disagreements among atheists. Believers, who uphold the implausible and more easily-dismissed “Christ of Faith” (the divine Jesus who walked on water), ought not to get involved.
  
  Numerous secular scholars have presented their own versions of the so-called “Historical Jesus” – and most of them are, as biblical scholar J.D. Crossan puts it, “an academic embarrassment”.
  
  From Crossan’s view of Jesus as the wise sage, to Robert Eisenman’s Jesus the revolutionary, and Bart Ehrman’s apocalyptic prophet, about the only thing New Testament scholars seem to agree on is Jesus’ historical existence. But can even that be questioned?
  
  The first problem we encounter when trying to discover more about the Historical Jesus is the lack of early sources. The earliest sources only reference the clearly fictional Christ of Faith.
  
  
  ////
  
  
  
  The methods traditionally used to tease out rare nuggets of truth from the Gospels are dubious.
  
  The criterion of embarrassment says that if a section would be embarrassing for the author, it is more likely authentic. Unfortunately, given the diverse nature of Christianity and Judaism back then (things have not changed all that much), and the anonymity of the authors, it is impossible to determine what truly would be embarrassing or counter-intuitive, let alone if that might not serve some evangelistic purpose.
  
  The criterion of Aramaic context is similarly unhelpful. Jesus and his closest followers were surely not the only Aramaic-speakers in first-century Judea.
  
  The criterion of multiple independent attestation can also hardly be used properly here, given that the sources clearly are not independent.
  
  
  ////
  
  [CONCLUDING REMARKS]
  
  So what do the mainstream (and non-Christian) scholars say about all this? Surprisingly very little; of substance anyway. Only Bart Ehrman and Maurice Casey have thoroughly attempted to prove Jesus’ historical existence in recent times.
  
  Their most decisive point? The Gospels can generally be trusted – after we ignore the many, many bits that are untrustworthy – because of the hypothetical (i.e. non-existent) sources behind them.
  
  Who produced these hypothetical sources? When? What did they say? Were they reliable? Were they intended to be accurate historical portrayals, enlightening allegories, or entertaining fictions?
  
  Ehrman and Casey can’t tell you – and neither can any New Testament scholar.
  
  Given the poor state of the existing sources, and the atrocious methods used by mainstream Biblical historians, the matter will likely never be resolved. In sum, there are clearly good reasons to doubt Jesus’ historical existence – if not to think it outright improbable.

LC

Just reminding everybody about the OP. Nothing so far diminishes these observations. So far, I only see exactly what RL criticizes.

[cienfuegos]

"could have witnessed"; or may not have witnessed

.

Following what is currently known, its is "did witness".

Like it or not, the man has historicity at this point in time.

What man? From where? Witness what? Where? When? How do you know?

[outhouse]

What man?

If you don't know, your in the wrong forum.