# Did Jesus Exist? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 30, 2010, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889 "2010-04-30T18:19:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Abe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f1d935/32.png) [@Abe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abe)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/101 "2010-05-06T02:29:36Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > There is clear evidence that the early Christian movement existed. Given that, I find it far more likely that the person whom that movement proclaimed, revered, and presumed to follow actually existed, than that he was “constructed out of whole cloth” by someone within a relatively short time of the period he was supposed to have lived and taught. The problem with this thinking is that it is fallacious: it’s called arguing from personal incredulity (a relative of the argumentum ad ignorantiam). ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/102 "2010-05-06T02:30:29Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > What does Roman literacy have to do with Palestinian literacy at the time? It was \*part of Rome. \* :rolleyes: There are other examples from Ephesus, Egypt, and other locations all through the ancient world. There is no evidence that Judaea was any different than the other areas of the Empire, do you have any evidence that graffiti and low-level literacy magically vanished at the borders of Judaea? ---
**Author:** ![Abe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f1d935/32.png) [@Abe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abe)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/103 "2010-05-06T02:44:04Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Note that until 1961 we had no evidence (other than the Gospels and Josephus, and a couple of offhand mentions else where) of the existence of \*\*Pontius Pilate, \*\*a moderately important Roman politician. Nothing he wrote, _no first hand accounts,_ nothing. If there was nothing solid to show Pontius Pilate existed, why would we expect there to be any evidence of Jesus? Philo, a contemporary of Pontius Pilate (and presumably Jesus), is a [primary source](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontius_pilate#Primary_sources) that mentions the historical Pontius Pilate. Even without the discoveries made in the 1960s that you mention, this seems to be \*\*considerably \*\*better evidence than we have for Jesus. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/104 "2010-05-06T04:32:15Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > It was \*part of Rome. \* :rolleyes: There are other examples from Ephesus, Egypt, and other locations all through the ancient world. There is no evidence that Judaea was any different than the other areas of the Empire, do you have any evidence that graffiti and low-level literacy magically vanished at the borders of Judaea? This is a pretty weak reach. First of all, Galilee, where Jesus was from, was _not_ part of the Roman Empire, it was still a sovereign tetrarchy under Herod Antipas. Judea, which was where Jerusalem was located, was part of the Roma Empire, but only as a backwater province. It had no educational institutions, and Jesus wasn’t from Judea anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/105 "2010-05-06T13:42:48Z")
Judaism in medieval times had a tradition of literacy - it was considered a pre-requisite for religious education for all males that they be able to read the scriptures. This was a result of the rabbinical form of Judaism, a tradition from which Jesus (allegedly) also sprang. Though as to whether this tradition of literacy extended back in time to the era prior to the destruction of the second temple, I don’t know. There are certainly surviving documents from that time or earlier - such as the so-called Dead Sea Scrolls - but as to whether these were the property of a tiny scribal class of literates, or whether literacy was more wide-spread, again I don’t know. My suspicion is that Judea was in a transitional state. The hold of the Priestly class (no doubt backed by a cotrie of professional scribes) was being challenged by the Pharasees, scribes and scholars who after the diaspora were to become the rabbinical class: the latter were associated with the creation of “houses of study” outside of the actual Temple. > [@](#): > > In the first decades of Roman rule, the Temple remained the center of Jewish ritual life. According to the Torah, Jews were required to travel to Jerusalem and offer sacrifices at the Temple three times a year: Pesach (Passover), Shavuot (the Feast of Weeks), and Sukkot (the Feast of Tabernacles). Yet, the Temple was not the only institution for Jewish religious life. During the 70-year exile in Babylon, Jewish houses of assembly (known in Hebrew as a “beit knesset” or in Greek as a “synagogue”) were the primary meeting place for prayer. The house of study (in Hebrew: “beit midrash”) was the counterpart for the synagogue. After the building of the Second Temple in the time of Ezra, the beit knesset and the beit midrash remained important institutions in Jewish life, although secondary in importance to the Temple. Outside of Palestine, the synagogue was often called a house of prayer (in Greek: προσευχαί, proseuchai; in Hebrew Beit Tefilah). One such synagogue in Alexandria, the Diopeloston, was a basilica with a double roofed colonnade, was said to be large enough to house one million worshippers (see Succah 51b). While that number is an exaggeration, it demonstrates the importance and centrality of the synagogue at that time. While most Jews could not regularly attend the Temple service, they could meet at the synagogue for morning, afternoon and evening prayers. On Mondays, Thursdays and the Sabbath, a weekly Torah portion was read publicly in the synagogues, following the tradition of public Torah readings instituted by Ezra (see, Nehemiah 8:1-18). > **[Pharisees](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharisees#Religious_and_cultural_life_during_the_Roman_period)** > > The Pharisees (/ˈfærəsiːz/; Hebrew: פְּרוּשִׁים, romanized: Pərūšīm, lit. 'separated ones') were a Jewish social movement and school of thought in the Levant during the time of Second Temple Judaism. Following the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD, Pharisaic beliefs became the foundational, liturgical, and ritualistic basis for Rabbinic Judaism. Although the group no longer exists, their traditions are of great importance for the manifold Jewish religious movements. > Conflicts between Pha... These ‘houses of study’ formed what there was of a Jewish educational network, quite aside from the formal Temple - though again, how widespread actual literacy was is unknown; it is known that in later eras the same institutions were strongly associated with Jewish literacy. If a “historical” Jesus existed and was, as some believe, associated with the Pharasees, it is not inconceivable that he was educated in literacy in such an institution. That being noted, Palestine in the Roman era was a primarily agricultural, not urban, society; literacy rates overall would have been low, I imagine. What you would get would be certain individuals attracted to the teaching life, and for them, it would have been possible to become literate. ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/106 "2010-05-06T13:55:10Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Note that until 1961 we had no evidence (other than the Gospels and Josephus, and a couple of offhand mentions else where) of the existence of \*\*Pontius Pilate, \*\*a moderately important Roman politician. Nothing he wrote, _no first hand accounts,_ nothing. If there was nothing solid to show Pontius Pilate existed, why would we expect there to be any evidence of Jesus? Erm…because he was born to a virgin - a rather uncommon occurence, I gather - and his mom was supposedly impregnated by a Divine Creator - a rather less uncommon occurence, I’d wager - perhaps? Or was that all hushed up afterwards? ---
**Author:** ![moldybread](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@moldybread](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moldybread)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/107 "2010-05-06T15:18:17Z")
When was the first time Muslims mention Jesus? In the Koran? How much later was the Koran written after Jesus? ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/108 "2010-05-06T15:36:44Z")
> [@moldybread](#): > > When was the first time Muslims mention Jesus? > In the Koran? How much later was the Koran written after Jesus? About 600 years. (cf. the Muhammad thread for quibbles about “written”). By that time there was already some fairly extensive literature on the subject. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/109 "2010-05-06T15:49:46Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Judaism in medieval times had a tradition of literacy - it was considered a pre-requisite for religious education for all males that they be able to read the scriptures. This was a result of the rabbinical form of Judaism, a tradition from which Jesus (allegedly) also sprang. Rabbinic Judaism, and the concordant focus on literacy and Bible study, developed in the disapora after the destruction of the Temple. Rabbinic Judaism had roots in Pharisaic traditions, but the vast majority of Palestinian Jews were not literate during the 2nd Temple period (though the literacy rate among Hellenistic Jews was better). > [@](#): > > Though as to whether this tradition of literacy extended back in time to the era prior to the destruction of the second temple, I don’t know. In terms of universal or widespread popular literacy, it did not. > [@](#): > > There are certainly surviving documents from that time or earlier - such as the so-called Dead Sea Scrolls - but as to whether these were the property of a tiny scribal class of literates, or whether literacy was more wide-spread, again I don’t know. I know. It was a tiny scribal class. > [@](#): > > My suspicion is that Judea was in a transitional state. The hold of the Priestly class (no doubt backed by a cotrie of professional scribes) was being challenged by the Pharasees, scribes and scholars who after the diaspora were to become the rabbinical class: the latter were associated with the creation of “houses of study” outside of the actual Temple. > > [Pharisees - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharisees#Religious_and_cultural_life_during_the_Roman_period) > > These ‘houses of study’ formed what there was of a Jewish educational network, quite aside from the formal Temple - though again, how widespread actual literacy was is unknown; it is known that in later eras the same institutions were strongly associated with Jewish literacy. If a “historical” Jesus existed and was, as some believe, associated with the Pharasees, it is not inconceivable that he was educated in literacy in such an institution. > > That being noted, Palestine in the Roman era was a primarily agricultural, not urban, society; literacy rates overall would have been low, I imagine. What you would get would be certain individuals attracted to the teaching life, and for them, it would have been possible to become literate. It was unlikely, but possible. As I said upthread, Jesus might have learned to read as an adult if he’d studied with the Pharisees or the Essenes. Incidentally, the majority of Bible study in synagogues was done orally. Synagogues would typically employ a scribe (usually a Levite or a Priest) to read slected scripture to them, after which discussion would ensue. ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/110 "2010-05-06T15:59:53Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Synagogues would typically employ a scribe (usually a Levite or a Priest) to read slected scripture to them, after which discussion would ensue. “…And God saw that it was good. So sayeth the Lord… And, eh, the Lord commanded that the bounties of the land and the most beautiful daughters from each family be delivered unto the scribe, for he is surely blessed. But not the ugly fat daughters, for they are accursed in his eyes.” ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/111 "2010-05-06T16:15:13Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Rabbinic Judaism, and the concordant focus on literacy and Bible study, developed in the disapora after the destruction of the Temple. Rabbinic Judaism had roots in Pharisaic traditions, but the vast majority of Palestinian Jews were not literate during the 2nd Temple period (though the literacy rate among Hellenistic Jews was better). > > In terms of universal or widespread popular literacy, it did not. > > I know. It was a tiny scribal class. > > It was unlikely, but possible. As I said upthread, Jesus might have learned to read as an adult if he’d studied with the Pharisees or the Essenes. > > Incidentally, the majority of Bible study in synagogues was done orally. Synagogues would typically employ a scribe (usually a Levite or a Priest) to read slected scripture to them, after which discussion would ensue. We mostly agree. The issue, succinctly stated, is this: if a 'historical" Jesus was, as some suspect, himself a Pharisee (or Essene), or associated with them, his literacy isn’t surprising; if he was just your ordinary country yokel from Galilee, it is, because the vast majority of the rural population of Roman-era Palestine would have been illiterate. The Hellenized Jews, being more urban, were also more likely to have been literate. My point was that the Pharsees (and to a lesser extent, Essenes) represented an educational opportunity potentially open to outsiders quite apart from the (tiny) formal scribal caste centered on the Temple organization, not that they instituted some sort of widespread literacy among the population at large. I take it you don’t disagree with that. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/112 "2010-05-06T17:47:33Z")
No disagreement, no. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/113 "2010-05-06T20:51:38Z")
Weren’t Pharisees and Essenes associated with particular locations or cult centres, though? ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2010, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/114 "2010-05-06T21:01:43Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Weren’t Pharisees and Essenes associated with particular locations or cult centres, though? Essenes sometimes lived in seperate communities, famously at Qumran. Though Josephus I believe said that there were some Essenes in “every town”. The Pharisees did not form seperate communities, but rather competed with the Sadduces over leadership of the “mainstream” of Judaism - eventually winning a total victory as the importance of the Sadduces declined to nothing after the destruction of the Temple. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2010, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/115 "2010-05-07T02:39:42Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > This is a pretty weak reach. First of all, Galilee, where Jesus was from, was _not_ part of the Roman Empire, it was still a sovereign tetrarchy under Herod Antipas. Judea, which was where Jerusalem was located, was part of the Roma Empire, but only as a backwater province. It had no educational institutions, and Jesus wasn’t from Judea anyway. Well, yes, it was backwater, but not much than Ephesus (Modern Turkey), hardly known as a center of learning. Anyway the articles all say such graffiti was known _throughout the Empire._ Note that Egypt was recently independent. And the _sovereign_ tetrarchy under Herod Antipas?Hardly "_Judea lost its independence to the Romans in the 1st century BCE, by becoming first a tributary kingdom, then a province, of the Roman Empire. The Romans had allied themselves to the Maccabees and interfered again in 63 BCE, following the end of the Third Mithridatic War, when general Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus stayed behind to make the area secure for Rome. Queen Alexandra Salome had recently died, and a civil war broke out between her sons, Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II. Pompeius restored Hyrcanus but political rule passed to the Herodian family, first as procuratores and later as client kings. In 6 CE, Judea came under direct Roman rule as the province of Iudaea. . [4]"_ Thus it was part of Rome. Nor did Herod rule Judea (although he did rule Galilee where Jesus was likely raised as a young boy, and did quite a bit of his early preachings) _“Herod Antipas (short for Antipatros) (before 20 BC – after 39 AD) was a first century AD ruler of Galilee and Perea, who bore the title of tetrarch (“ruler of a quarter”). He is best known today for accounts in the New Testament of his role in events that led to the executions of John the Baptist and Jesus of Nazareth, and through their portrayal in modern media, such as film. After inheriting his territories when the kingdom of his father Herod the Great was divided upon his death in 4 BC, Antipas ruled them as a client state of the Roman Empire. He was responsible for building projects at Sepphoris and Betharamphtha, and more important for the construction of his capital Tiberias on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. Named in honor of his patron, the emperor Tiberius, the city later became a center of rabbinic learning.”_ Note that Tiberias was known as a great center of learning, around AD20, while Jesus was 20ish. What _you_ have to do is show that the level of graffiti and thus low level literacy was lower in Judea etc than in the entire rest of the Empire. There is no such evidence. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2010, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/116 "2010-05-07T09:25:57Z")
I’ve seen documentary evidence of semi-literate Judean graffiti - I think it was something along the lines of “People called Romanes, they go, the house”. Of course, it was overlaid with a lot more literate stuff. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2010, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/117 "2010-05-07T14:40:49Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > I’m not at all sure, however, that the evidence shows that this individual had “one hell of an impact on a bunch of people.” Instead, I’d offer that in the years after Jesus may have lived, certain other people used Jesus’s name and supposed life to have “one hell of an impact on a bunch of people.” OK, but that brings up the question of why Paul and the four Gospel writers, decades later, collectively or as individuals (however it might have worked) latch onto this obscure (or invented) character who didn’t have much of an impact on more than a small number of people as the basis of their stories. I mean, sure, men have frequently invented their gods, but what precedent was there at the time for people trying to build a religion around somebody else? Emperors set _themselves_ up as gods, but what precedent is there for some charismatic person (Paul) founding a religion around a fictional person, rather than himself? I suppose he could have been the one who first made the inductive leap that one’s life expectancy might be higher as the high priest to a messiah that had already been and gone, rather than as the messiah himself. But absent some precedent for this, this seems a good deal more unlikely than the idea that there might have been a pretty charismatic man named Jesus who preached in Galilee during the reign of Tiberius, gathered a goodly number of followers, and (however accurately or inaccurately) inspired Paul and the Gospel writers. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2010, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/118 "2010-05-07T14:46:50Z")
We have the Gospels & spotty questionable Roman & Jewish historical references to support the existence of Jesus. On the other hand, to support the existence of Paul, we have… the Book of Acts, his letters & those attributed to him, and some apocryphal Christian books & letters. No Roman or Jewish records at all. So why is Jesus thought to be mythical & not Paul? The Christian tales of Paul are nearly as fantastic. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2010, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/119 "2010-05-07T15:30:26Z")
Paul, at a minimum, can be defined as the author of the Pauline corpus. Seven of those letters are universally accepted as having been the work of a single individual. That individual had to have existed. We may call that individual “Paul” since that’s what he called himself. It is not necessary to accept anything else as historical about him other than that he was whoever wrote those letters. Having said that, I have seen fringe theories (fringe even by mythicists standards) that Paul was a fictional character too, and that his letters were contrived by Eusebius, or other similar harebrained scenarios. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2010, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889/120 "2010-05-07T15:38:44Z")
Here’s another clue for you all: The walrus was Paul. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-jesus-exist/537889.md?page=7)