If Jesus wasn’t a real historical figure, where did Christian theology come from?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
“The historical evidence for Jesus himself is extraordinarily good. …. From time to time people try to suggest that Jesus of Nazareth never existed, but virtually all historians of whatever background now agree that he did.”
━━ NT Wright, Oxford & St Andrews Universities, in the Guardian.

What evidence?

The arguments behind the vast scholarly consensus that Jesus certainly existed (2,000 to 3,000 scholars agree according to Ehrman) include but are not limited to the following. The parens cite posts on this thread that give more detail.

1. Applying historians' logic to the gospels (9:57 and 11:05). No, this doesn't mean that Bart Ehrman or anybody using this method is taking the gospels on faith (funny thought). Instead, Bart wrote, "But how can you make a convincing case if we’re talking about thirty or so independent sources that know there was a man Jesus? These sources are not all living in the same village someplace so they are egging each other on. They didn’t compare notes. They are independent of one another and are scattered throughout the Mediterranean. They each have heard about the man Jesus from their own sources of information, which heard about him from their own sources of information. That must mean that there were hundreds of people at the least who were talking about the man Jesus.”

2. Contemporary and near-contemporary external sources at 10:31, 11:03 and 11:06. Tacitus and Josephus among others. Notably, no contemporary Jewish sources who opposed Christianity actually disputed Jesus' existence or even questioned it. Contemporary Jewish sources criticized what Jesus did, but not whether he existed.

3. Linguistic sources (10:57). Short version quoting Bart: "The fact that some gospel stories based on Aramaic are scattered throughout our sources suggests that they were in circulation relatively early in the tradition. Most of these are thought to go back to the early decade or two (probably the earliest decade) of transmission."

4. Paul (11:17 and elsewhere, and not part of the gospels, despite what some of you apparently think). Short version: Paul, who wrote starting in 33AD, knew Jesus' brother James and Jesus' disciples John and Peter. You'd think that if Jesus never existed, James would have said something. Ehrman writes that this is "the death knell" for mythicism.

4. Arguments from logic (11:03 and 10:51). Short version: why would Christians make up a hero who was humiliated and crucified?

The following scholars have made careers disputing parts of the gospels and Christian theology, and writing books like "Misquoting Jesus." You'd think they'd want to cap their careers and win international renown by finding Jesus didn't exist. And yet they are certain Jesus existed.
- Bart Ehrman, an atheist who also describes himself as a historian
- Amy Jill Levine, Jewish
- Paula Fredickson, a Jewish historian

And, of course these cites on Wikipedia think Jesus definitely existed: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus.

And the many, many other scholars (e g., atheist Michael Martin and so many others) provided by a helpful poster here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
“Historical reconstruction is never absolutely certain, and in the case of Jesus it is sometimes highly uncertain. Despite this, we have a good idea of the main lines of his ministry and his message. We know who he was, what he did, what he taught, and why he died. ….. the dominant view [among scholars] today seems to be that we can know pretty well what Jesus was out to accomplish, that we can know a lot about what he said, and that those two things make sense within the world of first-century Judaism.”
━━ EP Sanders, Oxford & Duke Universities, in The Historical Figure of Jesus.

Another point for “most likely”.

Nope. This quote doesn't actually address whether Jesus existed. It takes that for granted. Instead it addresses his message, what he did, and why he died.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“An ancient historian has no problem seeing the phenomenon of Jesus as an historical one. His many surprising aspects only help anchor him in history. Myth and legend would have created a more predictable figure. The writings that sprang up about Jesus also reveal to us a movement of thought and an experience of life so unusual that something much more substantial than the imagination is needed to explain it.”
━━ Emeritus Professor Edwin Judge, Ancient History Research Centre, Macquarie University, Sydney, in the Foreword to the truth about Jesus by P Barnett.

He is referring to the “phenomenon of” and “writings about” Jesus.

Not direct evidence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“So in one sense I think I’m not alone in feeling that to show the ill-informed and illogical nature of the current wave of “mythicist” proponents is a bit like having to demonstrate that the earth isn’t flat, or that the sun doesn’t revolve around the earth, or that the moon-landings weren’t done on a movie lot.”
━━ Larry Hurtado, Emeritus Professor, Edinburgh University, on Larry Hurtado’s Blog.

No one here is denying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“Research in the historical Jesus has taken several positive steps in recent years. …. the persistent trend in recent years is to see the Gospels as essentially reliable, especially when properly understood, and to view the historical Jesus in terms much closer to Christianity’s traditional understanding.”
━━ Prof Craig Evans, Arcadia Divinity College, Arcadia University, in What are They Saying about the Historical Jesus?

Completely biased.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“So in one sense I think I’m not alone in feeling that to show the ill-informed and illogical nature of the current wave of “mythicist” proponents is a bit like having to demonstrate that the earth isn’t flat, or that the sun doesn’t revolve around the earth, or that the moon-landings weren’t done on a movie lot.”
━━ Larry Hurtado, Emeritus Professor, Edinburgh University, on Larry Hurtado’s Blog.

No one here is denying.

You're just disagreeing with the vast scholarly consensus that there's 100% certainty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“I think that the New Testament does provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus. It is clear, then, that if we are going to apply to the New Testament the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material, we should not require independent confirmation of the New Testament’s claim that Jesus existed.”
━━ Jeffery Jay Lowder, writing on the Secular Web.

This supports “most likely” existed.

“Prima facie”, which means gives the impression.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/prima-facie

Your play on words alludes to something nonexistent - a final arbitrer as to Jesus's existence, like a tribunal. There is not one. This logic is a road to nowhere. No arbitrer decides with finality for all of humanity whether Jesus existed. Rather, each of us decides for ourselves.

So "most likely" is how YOU might feel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“The information about Jesus which can be gleaned from sources other than the gospels – a few references in Josephus, one in Tacitus, and the information implicit in Paul’s letters, for example – does little more than confirm the historical reality of Jesus and the general time and place of his activity. …. He was a Galilean, and it is likely that his principal teaching and healing activity was in Galilee, but he was executed in Jerusalem. …. There are other facts about Jesus which are equally certain ….”
━━ WD Davies & EP Sanders, Jesus: from the Jewish Point of View, in The Cambridge History of Judaism Vol 3, 621-626

Josephus and Tacitus are unbiased but also not direct.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“some judgments are so probable as to be certain; for example, Jesus really existed, and he really was crucified, just as Julius Caesar really existed and was assassinated. …. We can in fact know as much about Jesus as we can about any figure in the ancient world.”
━━ Marcus Borg, Professor of Religion and Culture at Oregon State University, in The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions

What are his sources?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“I think that the New Testament does provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus. It is clear, then, that if we are going to apply to the New Testament the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material, we should not require independent confirmation of the New Testament’s claim that Jesus existed.”
━━ Jeffery Jay Lowder, writing on the Secular Web.

This supports “most likely” existed.

“Prima facie”, which means gives the impression.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/prima-facie

Your play on words alludes to something nonexistent - a final arbitrer as to Jesus's existence, like a tribunal. There is not one. This logic is a road to nowhere. No arbitrer decides with finality for all of humanity whether Jesus existed. Rather, each of us decides for ourselves.

So "most likely" is how YOU might feel.

Well put. And pp is in a tiny minority, along with Holocaust deniers and flat earthers.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:^^^ PS. I made this to be eminently bumpable. The next time somebody whines, "but the evidence is all based on the gospels" or "likely and certainly mean the same thing," feel free to bump away!

Also, I forgot to include insults in what atheists have brought to the table.

Again, the best “evidence” is Tacitus and Josephus. They were almost contemporary. But again they only had indirect knowledge. And there is question about the authenticity of the translations.

The other points are irrelevant towards definitive proof.

Likely and certainly don’t mean the same thing. Do we need to recap the definitions again?

"The best evidence...." So you just want to ignore the historical/internal, logical and linguistic evidence and call them "irrelevant."

Remind us about your scholarly credentials again....

If you need to “infer” anything then you don’t have direct evidence.

The other sources aren’t independent/unbiased.

^^^ Exhibit A for deniers posting on DCUM.

Do we need definitions again? That’s not denying.

You're opening up room for deniers and denying. If you don't understand that, you need to blame your high school English teacher.

Acknowledging that there isn’t direct evidence isn’t denying.

So why don't you back up and tell us your larger point. Make your point explicit. Spending days on DCUM trying (despite your own lack of credentials) to discredit thousands of scholars by calling their work irrelevant, biased, or not direct seems evidence that you're desperately trying to open up space for denying and denials.

Choose one.
1. Jesus "likely" or "probably" existed--but there's room for doubt and the deniers, even if it's small.
2. Jesus definitely existed (the "vast scholarly consensus" per Ehrman).

A guy named Jesus most likely lived. We don’t have any direct evidence of it though.

So you're in the camp of, I dunno, 1-10% possibility of denial. Shake hands with the skinhead Holocaust deniers.

1) not denying - just saying we don’t have evidence

2) we have hard evidence and eyewitnesses to the Holocaust so your comparison doesn’t even make sense if there was a denier

Parse this for us, please. Saying "we don't have evidence"
1. Flies in the face of the evidence above, which you cavalierly dismiss as biased or irrelevant.
2. Opens the door wide to denial.

Denying means that you think someone made it up. Realistically, I don’t think someone made it up.

We just don’t have hard evidence.

Who is we?

Nobody in 2022 has hard evidence. Maybe some will be discovered in the future but we just don’t have it today.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“An ancient historian has no problem seeing the phenomenon of Jesus as an historical one. His many surprising aspects only help anchor him in history. Myth and legend would have created a more predictable figure. The writings that sprang up about Jesus also reveal to us a movement of thought and an experience of life so unusual that something much more substantial than the imagination is needed to explain it.”
━━ Emeritus Professor Edwin Judge, Ancient History Research Centre, Macquarie University, Sydney, in the Foreword to the truth about Jesus by P Barnett.

He is referring to the “phenomenon of” and “writings about” Jesus.

Not direct evidence.

John, his disciple, wrote a biography. The Book of John.

But but but you don't believe the direct evidence is direct evidence. 🤔

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^^^ PS. I made this to be eminently bumpable. The next time somebody whines, "but the evidence is all based on the gospels" or "likely and certainly mean the same thing," feel free to bump away!

Also, I forgot to include insults in what atheists have brought to the table.

Again, the best “evidence” is Tacitus and Josephus. They were almost contemporary. But again they only had indirect knowledge. And there is question about the authenticity of the translations.

The other points are irrelevant towards definitive proof.

Likely and certainly don’t mean the same thing. Do we need to recap the definitions again?

"The best evidence...." So you just want to ignore the historical/internal, logical and linguistic evidence and call them "irrelevant."

Remind us about your scholarly credentials again....

If you need to “infer” anything then you don’t have direct evidence.

The other sources aren’t independent/unbiased.

^^^ Exhibit A for deniers posting on DCUM.

Do we need definitions again? That’s not denying.

You're opening up room for deniers and denying. If you don't understand that, you need to blame your high school English teacher.

Acknowledging that there isn’t direct evidence isn’t denying.

So why don't you back up and tell us your larger point. Make your point explicit. Spending days on DCUM trying (despite your own lack of credentials) to discredit thousands of scholars by calling their work irrelevant, biased, or not direct seems evidence that you're desperately trying to open up space for denying and denials.

Choose one.
1. Jesus "likely" or "probably" existed--but there's room for doubt and the deniers, even if it's small.
2. Jesus definitely existed (the "vast scholarly consensus" per Ehrman).

A guy named Jesus most likely lived. We don’t have any direct evidence of it though.

So you're in the camp of, I dunno, 1-10% possibility of denial. Shake hands with the skinhead Holocaust deniers.

1) not denying - just saying we don’t have evidence

2) we have hard evidence and eyewitnesses to the Holocaust so your comparison doesn’t even make sense if there was a denier

Parse this for us, please. Saying "we don't have evidence"
1. Flies in the face of the evidence above, which you cavalierly dismiss as biased or irrelevant.
2. Opens the door wide to denial.

Denying means that you think someone made it up. Realistically, I don’t think someone made it up.

We just don’t have hard evidence.

Then your positions are contradictory. Nobody made it up, but you still aren't 100% sure Jesus existed. Care to explain that?

Seems very likely that he lived. Seems unlikely (unrealistic) that someone made it up.

Still no hard evidence to know 100%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“An ancient historian has no problem seeing the phenomenon of Jesus as an historical one. His many surprising aspects only help anchor him in history. Myth and legend would have created a more predictable figure. The writings that sprang up about Jesus also reveal to us a movement of thought and an experience of life so unusual that something much more substantial than the imagination is needed to explain it.”
━━ Emeritus Professor Edwin Judge, Ancient History Research Centre, Macquarie University, Sydney, in the Foreword to the truth about Jesus by P Barnett.

He is referring to the “phenomenon of” and “writings about” Jesus.

Not direct evidence.

John, his disciple, wrote a biography. The Book of John.

But but but you don't believe the direct evidence is direct evidence. 🤔

follow up rhetorical question:

If a publisher edits a biography, does that render the biography fake/not true?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Deniers' positions going forward:

(1) Bart Ehrman and Jewish historians all have a vested interest in finding Jesus existed.
(2) Ignoring all the other evidence

Having biases doesn’t mean “invested interest”.

Do we need to define bias now?

Maybe, since you’re confusing “vested” and “invested.”

Yes. Typing quickly on my phone.

Having biases doesn’t mean “vested interest”.

Do we need to define bias now?

Don't bother. Your claim that atheist and Jewish scholars Ehrman, Levine and Fredricksen are biased in favor of finding Jesus' existence is laughable however you define it.

For decades they have studied the NT. They went to theological/seminary schools. Yeah, they are biased.

Keep making us laugh.

We all studied World War II in high school. That doesn't make us Nazis.

You probably deeply believe what you were taught about WWII to be true. More so if you had spent decades of your life hearing and repeating the same stories.

It’s easy for you to verify what is true or not for much of WWII because of physical evidence or unbiased eye witnesses. That is not the case here.

Ehrman, Levine and Fredericksen have spent decades trying to disprove much of Christianity. They have nothing to lose. Proving Jesus didn't exist would make them go down in history.

They are trying to disprove supernatural elements by identifying inconsistencies in texts.