Does Batman or Jesus seem more real to you?

Maybe the better comparison would be between Ra’s al Ghul, the grandfather of Batman’s son, and Jesus. Jesus was only 33 when he was crucified and buried inside a tomb. Ra’s al Ghul was over 600 years old when came back to life after being cremated. Which story seems more credible?

Wait, Jesus never claimed supernatural powers? In the Gospels, he performs miracles everywhere he goes. For example, resurrecting Lazarus from the dead:

[QUOTE=John 11, New Living Translation]

11 Then he said, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but now I will go and wake him up.”

12 The disciples said, “Lord, if he is sleeping, he will soon get better!”

13 They thought Jesus meant Lazarus was simply sleeping, but Jesus meant Lazarus had died.

14 So he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead.

15 And for your sakes, I’m glad I wasn’t there, for now you will really believe.

[/quote]

Do you mean there are no extra-biblical sources where Jesus claimed supernatural powers?

Correct.

The parables. The example stories that work like fairy tales or metaphors to represent ideas. Though I didn’t mention anything about the New Testament. I said “The Bible”.

I know people who have been cremated. Not so much with the crucifixion thing though.

Yet they do.

Though to be fair it was his fanclub once they got organized who got to make it so.

I picked Jesus, for two reasons: First, it’s absolutely certain, to the extent that anything in history can ever be absolutely certain, that Jesus really existed, while it’s likewise absolutely certain that Batman does not and has not.

Second, Batman has been written by so many authors that the character is a muddled, inconsistent mess, which hinders his “reality” even as a literary character. Jesus has a similar problem (he’s depicted very differently by John than by the other three gospel writers, for instance), but not nearly to the same degree.

The same is true of Al Capone.

Yeah, but did any of them cheat death by transferring their mind into another person’s body?

I think it is fair to say Jesus also had a lot of writers when you consider that what got written down was initially an oral history and then went through x-number of translations on the way to your particular edition of the Bible.