Who was the first person to claim Jesus never exsisted?

[Kunigunde Kreuzerin]

Maybe the "many deceivers" in 2 John 7?

For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh.

But this is usually interpreted to refer to Docetists, who believed that there was a real Christ, just not a fleshy one.

DCH

Agreed, but I understand not your "but".

[DCHindley]

Maybe the "many deceivers" in 2 John 7?

For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh

But this is usually interpreted to refer to Docetists, who believed that there was a real Christ, just not a fleshy one.

Agreed, but I understand not your "but".

You may delete the "but" if you wish. I'm just saying it does not have to indicate that the persons referred to in 2 John 7 did not believe a "Jesus" had appeared and done his thing in the past. A phantom Jesus (lacking a physical body yet appearing to physical human beings to have one) is not a non-existant Jesus.

DCH

[arnoldo]

Forgive me for belaboring this point. However, I think it is pertinent to determining if there was a historical Jesus.

Can anyone provide a clear-cut example of an ancient author that asserted that Jesus never, ever existed?

Not to be confused with someone who wrote they did not believe in the miracles or resurrection of Jesus but a statement that emphatically claims that a man named Jesus who Christians claimed was crucified by the Romans around 30 A.D. never, ever existed.

Thanks in advance.
Sincerely,

John T

As the censors employed by the Christian hegemony spent well over a thousand years in banning and in diligently seeking out such heretics, and confiscating and burning their heretical texts (and their authors along with them when they could lay hands on them)
99+% of the literature of those first 3 centuries did not survive the ages of Christian book burnings. Why would you even expect to be able to locate any such text or author?

Even today, If a genuine ancient text whose content clearly indicated that jesus of Nazareth is a myth , were to be discovered by a Christian dominated 'research' institution with a vested interest in the maintenance of their myth, the 'faith', it would never be allowed to come to the knowledge of the general public. . .

Sheshbazzar
.

If only works like Celsus's "On the True Doctrine" had been preserved we would have greater knowledge on the origin of christianity. Instead we have to look at fragments of Celsus's writings such as the following;

It is clear to me that the writings of the christians are a lie, and that your fables are not well-enough constructed to conceal this monstrous fiction: I have heard that some of your interpreters...are on to the inconsistencies and, pen in hand, alter the originals writings, three, four and several more times over in order to be able to deny the contradictions in the face of criticism.
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/celsus3.html

Still, it's possible that Celsus's extant writings may one day be discovered in the Vatican's Secret Library.

[DCHindley]

Julian, AKA, The Apostate.

It is, I think, expedient to set forth to all mankind the reasons by which I was convinced that the fabrication of the Galilaeans is a fiction of men composed by wickedness. Though it has in it nothing divine, by making full use of that part of the soul which loves fable and is childish and foolish, it has induced men to believe that the monstrous tale is truth.
http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/julia ... 1_text.htm

Now we're getting somewhere. However, a little further we read:

Yet Jesus, who won over the least worthy of you, has been known by name for but little more than three hundred years: and during his lifetime he accomplished nothing worth hearing of, unless anyone thinks that to heal crooked and blind men and to exorcise those who were possessed by evil demons in the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany can be classed as a mighty achievement. As for purity of life you do not know whether he so much as mentioned it; but you emulate the rages and the bitterness of the Jews, overturning temples and altars, and you slaughtered not only those of us who remained true to the teachings of their fathers, but also men who were as much astray as yourselves, heretics, because they did not wail over the corpse [of Jesus] in the same fashion as yourselves.

There is a certain amount of rhetorical effect at play here. It seems that Julian is not questioning so much the existence of the kind of Jesus that I have bolded for emphasis, but he does not believe the things said about him (being the son of God, and teaching dogma that Julian felt was bitter and hurtful to others who do not believe that dogma), which he considers mythical embellishment.

DCH

[ficino]

In Justin's letters to Typhro--- Typhro stated that there was no Jesus. Supposedly, this was written in early 135ad

I thought that Trypho (the correct spelling) rejected the possibility that Jesus was the predicted messiah, but his rationale was that the Jesus of Christians did not fulfill the predictions of Judean scripture as Judeans interpreted them, not because Jesus did not exist.

I agree with David. I posted a long spiel about this very topic here:

memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=157

[ficino]

Still, it's possible that Celsus's extant writings may one day be discovered in the Vatican's Secret Library.

I sort of think I remember that Celsus reported that some people doubted that Jesus existed, but that Celsus also attributed his miracles to sorcery, as if Celsus thought he existed. I may be misremembering.

[Kunigunde Kreuzerin]

You may delete the "but" if you wish. I'm just saying it does not have to indicate that the persons referred to in 2 John 7 did not believe a "Jesus" had appeared and done his thing in the past. A phantom Jesus (lacking a physical body yet appearing to physical human beings to have one) is not a non-existant Jesus. DCH

Agreed. I would just say that the persons in 2 John 7 reject the idea of a historical Jesus and argued for a not human Jesus Christ. His appearance was in a similar form of other ancient gods (as Zeus, Apollo ...). Clearly, this Jesus Christ existed, but not in the form of a "historical" existence.

[John T]

Julian, AKA, The Apostate.

It is, I think, expedient to set forth to all mankind the reasons by which I was convinced that the fabrication of the Galilaeans is a fiction of men composed by wickedness. Though it has in it nothing divine, by making full use of that part of the soul which loves fable and is childish and foolish, it has induced men to believe that the monstrous tale is truth.
http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/julia ... 1_text.htm

Thanks for the link, I gave it a cursory look but I couldn't place my finger on the part that Julian claims Jesus never existed.

Can you cut and paste it for me?

Once again I not looking for someone that challenges the miracles or deeds of Jesus but someone that denies that he ever existed.

Sincerely,
John T

[John T]

Peter would like me to move on. So, I assume he concedes there is no such documentation.

Now, logic would say, if the Romans were trying to put down a revolt 70 A.D. and one of the charges for the unrest was that they executed Jesus (30 A.D.), as well as the death of James the Just (62 A.D.) by the Sanhedrin, wouldn't Josephus make note that this cult was a hoax, that Jesus never, ever existed? That James the Just was a madman who had no such brother named Jesus?

Sincerely,

John T

[Peter Kirby]

Maybe the "many deceivers" in 2 John 7?

For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh.

But this is usually interpreted to refer to Docetists, who believed that there was a real Christ, just not a fleshy one.

While in many cases there are clear references to docetism in the early Christian writings, this could also mean exactly what Kunigunde suggests. It only does not meet the rigid "clear cut" criterion of the OP.