# Jesus: Man or Myth? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 28, 2004, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501 "2004-09-28T15:51:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**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:** [October 2, 2004, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/81 "2004-10-02T04:25:51Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > It’s cleaner because it is grossly inadequate to explain all the facts. Any theory will be cleaner when you cut out those nasty ol’ facts that just don’t fit. > > Your theory is incomplete because, in part, the sayings are too inconsistent to be from the same person What’s inconsistent about them? Be specific. Do you have an understanding of what constitutes the accepted Common Sayings Tradition? Give me two examples from Q[sup]1[/sup] which you believe to be inconsistent. > [@](#): > > and worse, it fails to explain the glaring lack of biographical detail in the earlier strata. Are you telling me it does’t kick off your bullshit meter to see that, contrary to the order in real life, the biograpical material of “Jesus” doesn’t come in to the picture AT ALL for many decades and decades, whereupon it suddenly acquires exactly those attributes?? Not a loud buzzer, not even a little whistle? > > You need to have your bullshit meter worked on, my friend. I already listed some historical material which emerges as early as Paul. A few other pericopes also include framing narratives and anecdotes. We’re arguing the same stuff over and over again. The Jesus movement in its earliest form was not a religion and Jesus was not an object of worship. He was a _teacher_ and his _teachings_ were what was preserved. The mythicized figure came later. It’s like you’re trying to find mythical precursors to Santa Claus in order to disprove a historical Saint Nickolaus. One has very little to do with the other. ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/82 "2004-10-02T04:33:20Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > It’s like you’re trying to find mythical precursors to Santa Claus in order to disprove a historical Saint Nickolaus. One has very little to do with the other. Good analogy. ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/83 "2004-10-02T04:33:44Z")
> [@rfgdxm](#): > > How do you know Paul didn’t? If he had, all he would have seen is a place that some claimed Jesus was crucified at, and an empty tomb where Jesus was said to have arisen from, etc. What he would have seen is nothing remarkable enough to have mandated writing about. **Hilarious!!** :smack: I sure as hell hope you’re just blithering around! Although if so, it would be nice if you stopped wasting my time… Can you imagine? SomeGuy (to Paul): Oh, great teacher Paul! Tell us of your dangerous, sacred pilgrimage to see the holiest of holy sites! Paul, master of words, replies: Peh. SomeGuy: Tell us about the glorious Mount of Olives, the favortite place of our Lord! What was it like? Paul, master of words, replies: Just dirt. SomeGuy: Oh, but Paul, surely you felt a sacred moment of transcendence when you went to stand in the very spot where they crucified our Lord! Paul, master of words, replies: ech. Someguy: Then tell us of the tomb, the glorious tomb with its sacred stone set aside! Paul, master of words, replies: heh. Yep, ya got a real genuine scenario there, sport. Real nice. Me? Well, I would have probably found a thing or two to say about 'em. Not much. Just a few score thousand words, I figger. But then I’m not nearly as prolific as that Paul guy wuz… ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/84 "2004-10-02T04:35:44Z")
> [@rfgdxm](#): > > Yep. **Ambush** claims to KNOW more than he possibly can about this matter. Anyone who claims NOT to know after seeing the evidence and finding that it cannot be fit into any theory but ahistoricity can justifiably claim to be ignorant of logic, ignorant of reason, ignorant of the facts… Hell, just plain ignorant. ---
**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:** [October 2, 2004, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/85 "2004-10-02T05:05:25Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > **Hilarious!!** :smack: > > I sure as hell hope you’re just blithering around! Although if so, it would be nice if you stopped wasting my time… > Can you imagine? > > SomeGuy (to Paul): Oh, great teacher Paul! Tell us of your dangerous, sacred pilgrimage to see the holiest of holy sites! > > Paul, master of words, replies: Peh. > > SomeGuy: Tell us about the glorious Mount of Olives, the favortite place of our Lord! What was it like? > > Paul, master of words, replies: Just dirt. > > SomeGuy: Oh, but Paul, surely you felt a sacred moment of transcendence when you went to stand in the very spot where they crucified our Lord! > > Paul, master of words, replies: ech. > > Someguy: Then tell us of the tomb, the glorious tomb with its sacred stone set aside! > > Paul, master of words, replies: heh. > Yep, ya got a real genuine scenario there, sport. Real nice. Me? Well, I would have probably found a thing or two to say about 'em. Not much. Just a few score thousand words, I figger. But then I’m not nearly as prolific as that Paul guy wuz… Two things. I’ve said them both already but I’ll say them again. 1. The letters of Paul do not contain the sum total of all that Paul said, did or knew. So not finding testimony that Paul visited or venerated any sites associared with Jesus is nothing more than a rather weak argument from silence. We have seven Pauline letters which are indisputedly authentic. Seven is not very many and can hardly be taken as a catalogue of Paul’s entire life experience. I have over ten thousand posts on this message board and and there are all kinds of things I’ve seen, done and heard about that I’ve never posted here. It would not be possible to download my entire life experience onto a message board and it’s simply not scientifically defensible to conclude that if Paul did not write something in his letters that he had no knowledge of it. If you read the letters carefully, I believe you will find that Paul never once mentions his own mother or father. Does that mean he didn’t have parents? 1. (and this is probably more on point), the tomb was in all probability a literary creation. The site of the crucifixion was likely unknown. There was really nothing else for Paul to visit in Jerusalem. Jesus was not _from_ Jerusalem, after all and the only known site strongly connected with him was the Temple. ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/86 "2004-10-02T05:08:14Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > BTW, **Ambush** , if there’s one thing I’ve learned in over a decade of trying to research Historical Jesus… In which, with respect, you appear to have failed, based on the serious mistatements and logical errors you’ve made here (in my opinion). In any event, your posts show an surprising innocence of the works of Price, Doherty, and Wells for someone who has claimed to have read them. You’re actually debating this issue in a vaccum. > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > … and try to form solid conclusions, it’s that _nothing_ about HJ can be stated as “FACT.” Quite true. There’s nothing about the historical Jesus position that’s factual. But the absence of evidence where it MUST be there for the historicist position to hold up completely and utterly **damns** the historicist view as **impossible.** And since the historicist position is untenable, the ahistoricist position wins by default. > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > I got my ass handed to me in a bucket more than once by Religion professors and Catholic priests who taught me just how much I didn’t know. Me, too. Until I read some 20+ works on the ahistoricist position, studied them carefully, then _ **I** _ was the one handing people their asses. Yes, I know how arrogant I sound, but I’m really not. It’s just that the ahistoricists have blown such huge, gaping holes in the traditionalist and modern “skeptic” views that after all these years I’ve seen through all the bullshit. No one here has even come _close_ to revealing a flaw in the position I hold, which truthfully I expected to have far more difficulty defending here at the Straight Dope. But none of my challengers have even sufficiently recognized what utterly untenable positions they hold, let alone how solid and, thus far at least, undamaged my position is! I might have had a difficult time if my fellow debaters had read Doherty and actually found a flaw there. But that hasn’t happened yet. > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > That’s not even to say that you’re necessarily wrong, but don’t get the idea that you’ve got this all figured out. _Nobody_ does. First, no one’s yet laid a hand on the position I’m defending. Second – and this is the point that I think you’ve been hammering me about – I know damned well that **100% certainty** is unavailable to me on this. But 100% certainty is unavailable to anyone when it comes to synthetic knowledge. However, we can be as certain as we are about any logical chain of reasoning that the ahistoricist position is the **ONLY** one that can explain **ALL** the evidence and therefore must be the correct one. That’s what I’m saying and that’s all I’m saying. p.s.: Have you surrendered on the questions I asked of you earlier in this thread? ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/87 "2004-10-02T05:15:49Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > Two things. I’ve said them both already but I’ll say them again. > > 1. The letters of Paul do not contain the sum total of all that Paul said, did or knew. So not finding testimony that Paul visited or venerated any sites associared with Jesus is nothing more than a rather weak argument from silence. That’s a rather weak counter-argument from appalling ignorance. I want to cut and paste this in the hope that you’ll actually read it, but instead I’ll just ask you to **carefully READ** : [THE SOUND OF SILENCE: 200 Missing References to the Gospel Jesus in the New Testament Epistles](http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/silintro.htm) Thank you. Take a few days and read it, please. ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/88 "2004-10-02T05:33:38Z")
> [@FriendRob](#): > > **Polycarp** and **Diogenes** have tackled your challenges pretty well, **ambushed** , so I’ll take on the other side of the argument. > > If there never was a historical Jesus, tell me EXACTLY how the Jesus Myth developed. What was the theology of the inventor(s) of the myth? How did that theology become Pauline theology, or Markan theology, or Thomas theology? I’ve read Wells and Price and Doherty, and this is where they all seem to fall down. If there was no actual person, what do you put in its place? Where do these myths come from? With what purpose were they invented? It’s not enough to say “myths happen”. You have to provide some sort of logical development of the tradition to replace the standard one. No, I don’t. This debate is over the question of whether there was a historical Jesus or not. It is NOT about explaining the rise of Christian theology, whether historicist or not. But I will tell you something of extreme importance: Burton Mack, in his 2001 book _ **The Christian Myth** _ writes as follows: I want now to offer four criticisms of the quest for the historical Jesus, especially as it has been pursued in recent American scholarship, and then suggest a better approach to the examination of Christian beginnings. (1) A first criticism is that the quest has not produced any agreement about a textual data base from which to work. … (2) A second criticism is that **none** of the profiles proposed for the historical Jesus can account for all of the movements, ideologies, and mythic figures of Jesus that dot the early Christian social-scape. We now have the Jesuses of Q1 (a Cynic-like sage), Q2 (a prophet of apocalyptic judgment), Thomas (a gnostic spirit), the parables (a spinner of tales), the pre-Markan sets of pronouncement stories (a lawyer for the defense), the pre-Markan miracles stories (an exorcist and healer), Paul (a martyred messiah and cosmic lord), Mark (the son of God who appeared as messiah, was crucified, and will return as the son of man), John (the reflection of God in creation and history), Matthew (a legislator of divine law), Hebrews (a cosmic high priest presiding over his own death as a sacrifice for sins), Luke (a perfect example of the righteous man), and many more. Not only are these ways of imagining Jesus **incompatible** with one another, **they cannot be accounted for as the embellishments of the memories of a single historical person no matter how influential**. Thus the link is missing between the historical Jesus as reconstructed by scholars and the many figures of Jesus imagined and produced by early Christians. Since the quest for the historical Jesus has been pursued in the interest of explaining Christian origins, this missing link is a very serious consideration. **It means, in fact, that the quest has failed.** The object of the quest has purportedly been to remove the fantastic and miraculous features of the Christ myth and gospels from the “real Jesus of history,” but the more important problem for explaining Christian origins is to account for the diversity of mythic claims about him. _ **No reconstruction of the historical Jesus has done or can do that.** _ (3) A third criticism is that the link between the teachings of Jesus on the one hand and the story of his crucifixion on the other is missing. None of the scholars that start with the sayings of Jesus has ever been able to account for the crucifixion of Jesus on the basis of those teachings. This means that something is wrong. The teachings and the crucifixion should make sense when put together, but they do not. This is a very serious criticism of the quest. It is also a very serious criticism of the narrative logic of the gospels where the teachings and the crucifixion are in fact interwoven. … 1. A fourth criticism is that the publication of books about the historical Jesus as well as the public discussion of them has assumed a purpose for the quest that is unreasonable and ill-conceived. … **Changing the Focus** This means that we need to **start over** with the quest for Christian origins. And the place to start is with the observation that **the New Testament texts are not only inadequate for a Jesus quest, they are data for an entirely different phenomenon. They are not the mistaken and embellished memories of the historical person, but the myths of origin imagined by early Christians seriously engaged in their social experiments. They are data for early Christian mythmaking.** The questions appropriate to these texts should be about the many Christian groups and movements in evidence, their particular social circumstances and histories, and the various social reasons they had for imagining a teacher in so many different ways. To read these texts only in the interest of the quest to know the historical Jesus has been to misread them, to misuse them. **They simply do not contain the secrets of the historical Jesus for which scholars have been searching.** The historical Jesus is dead. Long live the myth! ---
**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:** [October 2, 2004, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/89 "2004-10-02T06:03:54Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > Oh, what happy nonsense! Jesus as a person doesn’t matter “yet”? His life and deeds don’t matter “yet”? You’re kidding, right? Kidding?? PLEASE tell me you’re kidding? Man, you’re easily one of the smartest, most educated people I know, but do you even _read_ what you write? That’s… that’s… well, it’s bullshit. I mean no personal insult, but that argument is the weakest, wateriest, most transparent bullshit I’ve seen peddled in quite some time. That’s exactly the kind of bullshit the historicists have routinely clung to because they have no rational defense of their rationally indefensible position. They can’t explain it, so they just come right out and say “it doesn’t matter”. Sheesh! He’s God on Earth, sure, but the details of his life just don’t matter!?! I don’t know whether to laugh or cry… More ludicrous BS. Look: First google result for Mark Twain: **Mark Twain in His Times** homepage First google result for Benjamin Franklin: **The World of Benjamin Franklin** What were you saying again? 😃 Plato speaks considerably about Socrates’ worldly milieu. No biographical details at all? None at all? That must be another dose of “God on Earth doesn’t matter” absurdity. [/quote] And after all that, we’re still left with an authentic sayings tradition from a man who was not a figure of worship while he was alive. No, his biographical details didn’t matter. _He was not a figure of worship_. Do you get that yet? > [@](#): > > Well, ladies and gentlemen, there you have it: either a truly “dumbth” comment, or a desperate debater’s desperate choice: denying the established facts! > > Should I assume you’re kidding again? Honestly, you must start being serious. There are many pre-Gospel NT epistles, only a portion of which are actually Pauline. How could you not know this? Didn’t you, er…, _claim_ to have read Doherty, Price and Wells? How _could_ you have? Now I _know_ you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. Please…entertain me…name a single non-Pauline book in the New Testament which dates from before the gospels. I’ll give you a hint. There _aren’t_ any. > [@](#): > > Characterized by the desperate or those unfamiliar with the facts, I suppose, but not by well-informed, knowledgeable persons. You are really just flaunting you ignorance now. The items I named are _objectively historical claims_ made by Paul about Jesus. You said Paul made no such claims. You’re wrong. He did. Not very many, not very useful, but historical claims they be, nonetheless. So please enlighten me. Is it your position that Paul did _not_ make those claims? If so, please present your thesis for why his letters are wrong. > [@](#): > > Yes, there were many earthly followers of the supernatural Christ. You’re missing the point. Paul claims that Jesus appeared to “the Twelve.” That is a historical claim. The authenticity of the claim is irrelevant. I’m starting to think you don’t quite grasp how scholars use this terminology. > [@](#): > > If you mean he was a direct disciple, that’s flat out wrong and reveals an astonishing lack of knowledge on your part. If you mean he was a peer of Paul’s, then big deal. Paul said he was a disciple. We are only discussing what Paul _claims_, not about whether his claims are true. > [@](#): > > What’s to stop an ordinary guy who never knew Jesus from having a brother? Nothing, but Paul says that Jesus had a brother named James. One agin, we are only discussing whether Paul makes historical _claims_, not about whether his claims are true. > [@](#): > > Only extreme fundamentalists believe Cephas was the Peter of the much later Gospels! Now this is just completely false and asinine unless you believe that virtually the entirety of mainstream Christianity are “extreme fundamentalists.” > [@](#): > > Are you kidding us again?! In any case, you’re cheating: the list of attendants of the last supper comes from the Gospel stories, not from Paul or any of the other pre-Markan writers. Who said anything about a list of attendants? I just said Paul claimed a last supper, and he did. I actually think that Paul was the _origin_ of the Eucharist stories. Once again, Paul made a _historical claim_. It is false to say that he didn’t. Whether the claim was true is not relevant. > [@](#): > > Who was crucified? If you mean Cephas, who didn’t know Jesus, then big deal. If you meant Jesus, he was crucified in the angelic sphere of heaven, not on Earth. You’re kidding me right? You’re seriously denying that Paul claimed Jesus was crucified? > [@](#): > > So? It seems you understand even less than I’d imagined about the NT and modern scholarship. Cephas and James never knew Jesus! The only ones who believe that, as I said, are fundamentalists. Modern, believing Christian scholars know that there is no legitimate, contemporary knowledge at all of the people the Gospels report were Jesus’ alleged direct disciples. **Polycarp** , could you please fill him in on this matter? You have no idea what you’re talking about. We are only discussing historical claims made by Paul. Paul claims that James was the brother of Jesus and that Cephas was his disciple. Josephus claims that Jesus had a brother named James. Your claim that “believing Christian scholars” don’t believe that Cephas and James knew Jesus is complete horseshit. [quote] That’s slightly more subtle. Did you know that Paul includes himself on the list of people who have seen the Risen Christ, just like – he asserts – the rest of the apostles and the mysterious “500”? Do you know what that means? What it means for a man who never could have seen Jesus on Earth nevertheless claims to have seen him? No? Well, it means that Paul, like all these others, **only saw Christ in mystical visions!** It doesn’t matter what you think it means. All that matters is that it is a historical claim by Paul. > [@](#): > > Yee haw! Silly, evasionary nonsense, Texas style! I knew it was coming; I knew it, I tells ya! > > Christ on a hovercraft, man, didn’t you ever read Galatians? > > I have an appointment coming up in just a few minutes, so I’ll have to make this very brief: Here is Galatians 1:12 For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel preached by me **is not the product of men**. For I did not receive _(parelabon_, from _paralambano_) it **from any man, nor was I taught it** , but (I received it) through a revelation of/about Jesus Christ. I have no idea what you think your point is with this but genre is quite relevant and you have not made any sort of response o my point about that. Your quotation from Galatians has nothing to do with my point > [@](#): > > Yee haw, this is fun! Paul visited Jerusalem and spoke with the so-called “pillars of Jerusalem”, including Cephas and James, who as Paul just told us told him NOTHING of any historical Jesus at all! Why not? Well, because they didn’t KNOW anything of any historical Jesus! How do you know what they did or did not tell him? This is absurdly reductionist crap. > [@](#): > > I don’t think you were being honest when you said you’d read Doherty, Price, and Wells, because all of this is just the most rudimentary stuff. You should at least read [Doherty’s web site](http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/home.htm) thoroughly before coming back for more of a drubbing, my friend. I have read it. I have even linked to it on this board. Search the forum for “Jesus Puzzle” and you will find me talking about it. Like I said, I was not convinced. Why don’t you read [Bernard Mueller’s](http://www.christianorigins.com/doherty-muller.html) critique of Doherty and let me know if still so damn confident about his conclusions. (FYI, Mueller is a borderline mythicist himself. He actually agrees with Doherty on a number of points- as do I- but he debunks a few points too. Doherty tends to be somewhat selective and _ad hoc_ in his presentation of evidence. I’m sure you will agree after reading Mueller’s piece) ---
**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:** [October 2, 2004, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/90 "2004-10-02T06:19:16Z")
> [@](#): > > For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel preached by me is not the product of men. For I did not receive (parelabon, from paralambano) it from any man, nor was I taught it, but (I received it) through a revelation of/about Jesus Christ. I just figured out that this was your cite for Paul claiming not to have known James or Peter (and never mind that he claimed that he DID know them). You have attached entirely too broad a meaning upon the word “gospel.” ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 9:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/91 "2004-10-02T09:13:25Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > Josephus also refers to execution of one "James, the brother of Jesus, who was called ‘Christ.’"Quote: > Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned. > > This reference is more accepted and may be the strongest extra-Biblical evidence we have for the historicity of Jesus. This second Jesus/Josephus mention is pretty rock solid as it is accepted that the reason why James was stoned is because he was one of the leaders of the Early Church. In other words, it’s not just a co-incidence of names. Next there is something missing in the Historical record- soemthing that shoudl be there if Jesus was a complete myth- the Romans, during the persecution, did not use that as an argument. And the Romans should have had access to Pilates records. They certainly could have said “There _was_ no Jesus, and we have proof”. But they didn’t. Why not if they had good evidence that the records showed no Jesus ever was executed? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/92 "2004-10-02T09:34:09Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > A vague paraphrase is all that’s needed for my questions. I’m not going to fall for a rhetorical gambit that requires I spell out each and every one of Paul’s and all the other pre-Gospelic writers’ words just to show that: > > - they don’t quote Jesus’s sayings, which they **would** have had he been a historical figure; > > - they don’t cite Jesus’ teachings, which they **would** have had he been a historical figure; > > - they don’t tell any anecdotes about Jesus’ life, which they **would** have had he been a historical figure; > > - they don’t place Jesus in a full historical setting, which they **would** have had he been a historical figure; > > - they don’t try to solve any doctrinal disputes with Jesus’ own words, which they **would** have had he been a historical figure! > How much more proof can reasonably be demanded than to simply present those otherwise totally inexplicable facts? > > My dear Polycarp, please cite even a single instance where Paul or any other pre-Gospelic writer ever says they went to visit, say on some kind of holy pilgrimage, any of the holy sites where you historicists assert were so critical to the Jesus story. Say, the location of the Last Supper? No? Can’t do it? How about holy Gethsemane? No? Okay, well, then, surely you can find a cite for one of them visiting the Mount of Olives? Not even the burial vault, to see with one own’s eyes the location of the Resurrection? What? You can’t do even that? **Astounding!** Why, it’s just as if a historical Jesus never existed! > > Seriously, my friend, there’s not the slightest suggestion that any pre-Gospelic writer(s) – **the ones who would likely have known of the alleged historical Jesus the best** , since they were much closer to him in time – _ever taking an interest in any of what the Gospels show are the holiest sites in the entire world!_ Sure, visiting a few of these sites might have been dangerous, but wild horses or demons couldn’t keep me from visiting the holiest sites of Our Lord! If he existed, that is. > > If you tell me they simply weren’t interested in these holies of holies, I’ll be forced to call you a fool, and we wouldn’t want that. These early Christians’ utter dismissal of these sites has one and only **one** explanation: **There was no historical Jesus!** 1. Why _would_ the Pre-gospelic writings say any of these things? There were more or less private letters, written from Paul to various Church leaders, all of whom shoudl have known this stuff. It’s not suprising that such details are missing- what would be suprising is if they were included. The fact that Augustus didn’t mention a lot of personal detail about Julius Caesar in his letters doesn’t prove that Julius didn’t exist. By the way- can you prove that Julius Caesar existed as a Man? 2. Why _should_ they be interested? That whole thing about visiting “holy sites” was a later invention, and so were the sites themselves. We have no idea of where Ceasar “crossed the Rubicon”- in fact we really aren’t sure where the Rubicon was/is. Why didn’t Augustus or the later Ceasars visit this “holy place” and erect a shrine? Or Julius’s birthplace? There is no shrine where Alexander died- although he did have a very fancy tomb- hundreds of miles away. The whole idea of a “place that was holy because xxxx did this here” is mostly a later creation of the Christian Emperors, etc. The Early Fathers simply weren’t interested- like it or not. ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/93 "2004-10-04T09:28:20Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > You may be right, but Doherty hurts himself by trying to claim that no one believed this before Ignatius in CE 107. Overreaching is a sign of mania. I have no idea what you’re saying, and I doubt you do, either. Ranting, one-sentence dismissals are a sign of not truly grasping the argument. > [@foolsguinea](#): > > I’m not aware of any extant copies of Q. So these “strata” would seem to be in someone’s imagination. Good grief. You don’t know anything about Q either, do you. > [@foolsguinea](#): > > Or he took a historical Jesus’s life & made it Homeric, which is just as plausible. No, it’s not. Where are you getting this nonsense? If Mark didn’t have to invent Jesus’ “life”, he wouldn’t have had to secretly rely on Homer to do it for him, now would he. Where was this Jesus’ “life” you’re going on about? Why did no one else merely publish it? Why didn’t Mark just publish it? You don’t appear to have any idea what you’re talking about. > [@foolsguinea](#): > > This is on your side. Holy Bob save me from misguided people who clearly don’t understand the issues being on my side!! ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/94 "2004-10-04T09:32:43Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > Well, Daugherty has been demolished. Well, Mr. Fool’s, you seem to be talking out your guinea again. You’ve demonstrated that you’ve never read him – hell, you can’t even spell his name! > [@foolsguinea](#): > > I had a sort of argument with my mother the other night, where she was saying that I don’t believe in Jesus because I never studied the historical evidence. She’s a Josh McDowell disciple. Well, I never bothered to really read any of McDowell’s books, but the argument seems to be based on, “This stuff was written down within 50 years of its purportedly happening,” which would make most fiction “historical.” > > But it got me to thinking. I’d assumed for years there was a real Yeshua, who was believed to be resurrected, & this mutated in time into deification. But maybe Cephas & James made him up. Thoughts? That’s highly unlikely. ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/95 "2004-10-04T09:45:51Z")
> [@rfgdxm](#): > > Hardly. I just think tha Jesus was a real man who preached a message, and after his death his followers grafted on ahistorical details of his life borrowed from other sources. Possibly some of those you mentioned. That doesn’t make any sense at all! It’s ridiculous. What you’re so bizzarely claiming, when we include the actual evidence, is that the early decades’ worth of followers of Jesus had some kind of weird writers’ block that somehow, magically, prevented them from writing down any of the biographical stuff that anyone would have written down for decades and decades. Then, all of a sudden, many decades later, some guys who never knew Jesus invented all those historical, biographical details, but even though you know that’s all fiction, you claim through some kind of supernatural gift that there were _real_ biographical details for a _real_ guy. That’s just nuts. On what basis can you even _begin_ to claim such nonsense as fact? ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/96 "2004-10-04T09:48:10Z")
> [@rfgdxm](#): > > Yep. **Ambush** claims to KNOW more than he possibly can about this matter. You were saying, in your last post? You know, where you were implicitly claiming supernatural knowledge that a historical Jesus existed even though you admit that his biography is fiction? :smack: ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 10:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/97 "2004-10-04T10:16:05Z")
I reported that Dio’s (and others’) simplistic, evidence-ignoring historicist position fails utterly because doesn’t addresss a large number of facts, one of which is the utterly inconsistent “Jesus” personas wandering aimlessly in the NT and elsewhere. He replied: > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > What’s inconsistent about them? Be specific. I quote again now from a source who is _vastly_ more knowledgeable and informed than either of us: Dr. Burton Mack (from _The Christian Myth_): > [@Burton Mack](#): > > (2) A second criticism is that none of the profiles proposed for the historical Jesus can account for all of the movements, ideologies, and mythic figures of Jesus that dot the early Christian social-scape. We now have the Jesuses of Q1 (a Cynic-like sage), Q2 (a prophet of apocalyptic judgment), Thomas (a gnostic spirit), the parables (a spinner of tales), the pre-Markan sets of pronouncement stories (a lawyer for the defense), the pre-Markan miracles stories (an exorcist and healer), Paul (a martyred messiah and cosmic lord), Mark (the son of God who appeared as messiah, was crucified, and will return as the son of man), John (the reflection of God in creation and history), Matthew (a legislator of divine law), Hebrews (a cosmic high priest presiding over his own death as a sacrifice for sins), Luke (a perfect example of the righteous man), and many more. So, as we see, Mack acknowledges the vast inconsistencies I referred to. I wasn’t talking about inconsistencies within the same persona or reference (such as within Q[sup]1[/sup]), but large, inexplicable inconsistencies between the Jesus of Q[sup]1[/sup] and the Jesus of Q[sup]2[/sup], and between the pre-Markan non-Pauline NT Jesus and the Pauline Jesus, etc, etc, etc > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > We’re arguing the same stuff over and over again. Only because you’re mostly refusing to respond to what I actually wrote in all these posts. You’re ignoring what you can’t provide an answer to, while providing either bull-headed denials or evasive pseudo-replies to the rest. > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > The Jesus movement in its earliest form was not a religion and Jesus was not an object of worship. He was a _teacher_ and his _teachings_ were what was preserved. The mythicized figure came later. Sigh… See what I mean? You haven’t come anywhere _close_ to directly explaining why this alleged man’s students and followers were utterly unable or unwilling to write _word one_ of any of even the slightest biographical or historical _hint_ that this alleged guy ever existed! There’s no _teacher_ there, only the teachings. I tell you that no such phenomenon – a guy who teaches inconsistent things but never touched the ground, never ate, never rested, never disagreed, was never used as an exemplar, never used to win a doctrinal dispute – ever existed! Your thesis is laughable! As laughable as a historical Santa Claus! ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/98 "2004-10-04T10:20:02Z")
MODS: Post #88 was posted by **ambushed**. The header isn’t right. Would you look into that, please? ---
**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:** [October 4, 2004, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/99 "2004-10-04T17:08:32Z")
#88 was posted by me, I just bollocksed the quote tags. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/100 "2004-10-04T17:34:47Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > At that point, Porphyry begins scuruplously researching the historical claims – spurious and otherwise – of the newly arrived Gospels. It wasn’t particularly difficult with the evidence available at the time to learn that Jesus and Christianity were pure inventions. Have you actually read any of Porphyry? Or are you just going off of some quote taken out of context on some website? We also have this one from Porphyry: > [@Porphyry](#): > > To counter the reports of Jesus’ illegitimacy more than to secure his divine stature, his mother was declared the recipient of a singular divine honor: Jesus was the son of Mary - a virgin - “through the holy spirit” (Matthew 1:20). As is typical of his writing, Matthew comes closest to revealing the argumentative purpose of his birth story and its links to Jewish polemic against Christian belief in his reference to Joseph’s suspicion of Mary’s pregnancy (Matthew 1:19). He is also careful in the birth story and elsewhere to provide evidence and proofs from the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew bible - as a running narrative. There doesn’t seem to be any question from Porphyry that Jesus as a man actually existed and that he helped found a religion. In fact, there also doesn’t seem to be any question that Jesus died on the cross. Instead, he objects to the myths that have become assigned to him by his followers in the years following his death. From Hoffman’s analysis of Porphyry’s _Against the Christians_: > [@](#): > > Furthermore, we know from Augustine (City of God) that Porphyry complained of the influx of educated women into the church; in his Philosophy from Oracles, written around 263, he laments (en masque as Apollo, the god of enlightenment) that it is almost impossible to win back anyone who has converted to Christianity: it is easier, he says, to write words on water than try to use argument on a Christian. They simply cannot understand the folly of worshipping as a god a man who had died as a criminal > [@](#): > > The truth seems to be that Porphyry regarded Jesus as a criminal, justly punished for his crimes by the power of the Roman state, and hence undeserving of the status of hero or of the divinity conferred upon him by his misguided followers. Looks to me like Porphyry accepts a historical Jesus, but rejects the mythical tales that have sprung up around him - thus his attack on the evangelists historical abilities. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501.md?page=6)