Reply to Quake reveals day of Jesus' crucifixion, researchers believe

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Let’s consider a few people who never to have their existence or historicity doubted by atheists and other anti-Christian skeptics.

Plato. Unlike Jesus, he wrote some things. None of these works are strictly autobiographical. The best biographical source for Plato comes from Diogenes Laërtius, in his Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, a work written over five hundred years after Plato’s death. The oldest extant copy of this dates from the late eleventh century.

Julius Caesar. Two of the most important historical documents telling us about his life come from Suetonius and Plutarch, both of which were written more than one hundred years after his death. But the extant copies possessed today are even farther—much farther—removed from Caesar’s death in 44 B.C.

The great Macedonian conqueror, Alexander the Great (356-323 B.C.). Historians get all their information about Alexander beginning in the first century B.C. The most valuable of these is (once again) Plutarch’s Lives. The bulk of our information on Alexander comes from Plutarch. But this work was written in the first century, almost four centuries after Alexander. Thus, the earliest source for Alexander used by modern historians is more than 260 years after his death and the most reliable source is more than 370 years removed.

It’s also agreed that the four Gospels were written within one hundred years of Christ’s death. The Gospel of St. Mark is generally dated to within forty years of the Crucifixion, with St. Matthew and St. Luke not long after. The Gospel of St. John is usually dated to around A.D. 100. Several of St. Paul’s letters—even more impressively—are often dated earlier than St. Mark’s gospel; and within these, at least one recorded creed of the early Christians has been traced back to within five years of Christ’s death (see 1 Cor. 15:3-4). The extremely early dating of this creed is incredibly significant because it is, first, recorded well within the lifetimes of eyewitnesses who could correct and critique the creed if necessary (written as a credal formula, it was apparently already a core profession of Christian doctrine), and second, because it provides direct evidence of early belief in the resurrection of Jesus:

For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures . . .

In comparison with the other major figures of antiquity, the historical reliability of the New Testament based on the “fact-to-record” criterion—and in comparison to other important historical works of the ancient world—holds up as impressive and well supported. (Nor is the New Testament the only historical evidence of Jesus’ existence—not by a long shot.)[/quote]
I think that most people, atheist or not, Jesus the man existed. It’s the son of god bit that has some doubters.[/quote]

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