# 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:** 18\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2004, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/121 "2004-10-06T21:53:06Z")
Damn- he’s running away with his tail between his legs. 🆒 Not very often we get a victory like that. High Five to DtC and Polycarp, not to mention others. ---
**Author:** ![Gaudere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e495f1/32.png) [@Gaudere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gaudere)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2004, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/122 "2004-10-06T22:06:35Z")
> [@](#): > > Look, this is nothing but a gangbang by cretinous yahoos. No one here, save Polycarp, is worth my time. I don’t have the time or desire to debate in a ignoramus-run 15-to-1 pile-on. [Moderator Hat ON] ambushed, take that sort of comments to the Pit. Do NOT call people “cretinous yahoos” or “ignoramus[es]” here. [Moderator Hat OFF] ---
**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 7, 2004, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/123 "2004-10-07T00:48:28Z")
Mark is generally dated at approximately 70 AD (or later by some critical scholars). > [@](#): > > Most Christians contend that Hebrews was written in 65 AD by an anonymous author OTHER THAN PAUL (That’s ONE, which already demonstrates that you have no knowledge whereof you speak). Critics also hold that Hebrews was not written by Paul, but while they’re not sure who did write it, a significant percentage thinks it was Priscilla. > > Traditional Christians think that the epistle James was written in 45 AD by James, not Paul (That’s TWO!) Critical scholars place the date significantly later, but my point stands. > > Traditional Christians hold that 1 Peter was written around 65 AD by Peter. Some critical scholars agree with the date, others don’t, but they all agree the author was NOT Paul (That’s THREE!) > > Most Christians believe that 2 Peter was written in 67 AD, also by Peter. (That’s FOUR!) Critics disagree with both the dating and the author, but they agree it wasn’t Paul. This is really about the only thing in all of **Ambush’s** post that’s worth responding to since it’s the only thing that represents a falsifiable claim rather than an assertion that a pet theory is the indisputable truth. Hebrews is the only one of the books listed above which has any plausible claim to a first century dating. The rest of them are dated well into the second century and the very scholars that Ambush keeps citing (Doherty, Mack and Price) are among those who say so. Ambush keeps talking about what “only fundies” believe but he then cites fundy dates for Peter and James. Almost nobody other than the most dug in conservative traditionalists still argues for any early dating for those books and they certainly don’t believe in any genuine apostolic authorship. Hebrews has to date from at least the 60’s, as Ambushed said, but almost everyone (including all of Ambush’s mythicists) puts it in the 80’s or 90’s. I repeat for anyone who cares that the _only_ NT books which can be reliably dated before the Gospels are the seven letters of Paul which are known to be authentic. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/124 "2004-10-07T05:04:27Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > This is really about the only thing in all of **Ambush’s** post that’s worth responding to since it’s the only thing that represents a falsifiable claim rather than an assertion that a pet theory is the indisputable truth. Yeah, I’m hearing the sounds of table pounding from certain directions. Which is a shame: I think they’re some issues here that are getting buried. At any rate, I can think of 2-3 falsifiable claims made by Mr. ambushed that have been, um, falsified: > [@](#): > > - 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 try to solve any doctrinal disputes with Jesus’ own words, which they **would** have had he been a historical figure! Breathless bolding in original. Again, it didn’t take long for me to find the following quote (even though I’ve misplaced my annotated Bible). 1 Corinthians 23-25 “For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed took bread; 11:24and when he had given thanks, he brake it, **and said** , This is my body, which is for you: this do in remembrance of me. 11:25In like manner also the cup, after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood: this do, as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.” ## Emphasis added. Following those quotes, Paul continues with his theologic argument. Now I suppose it could be argued that Paul is quoting the mythic Jesus rather than the historical one. But that would be circular thinking. ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/125 "2004-10-07T11:15:39Z")
Please accept my sincere apologies, one and all. I shouldn’t have said those things, and I regret losing my temper like that. The stress of being at the bottom of a n-to-1 pile-on finally got to me, and I snapped a bit – understandably, perhaps, but nevertheless inappropriate. I ask for your forgiveness. It now strikes me as an unwise act to try to debate this extremely thorny and extraordinarily subtle issue in a forum such as this. It was unlikely in the extreme that I would have run across fertile minds in this debate, since, as all the mythicists and even general critics have sadly reported, the historicity of Jesus is such a profoundly prejudiced assumption in Western society that it’s not even mentioned as the unfounded assumption it is. Like nearly all of the posts in this thread, it was simply a given: What was to be proved was constantly taken as a given. No, this topic is too complex, too nuanced to be debated among the general public. More calmly this time, I exit the thread again. ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/126 "2004-10-07T14:13:28Z")
> [@t-keela](#): > > **ambushed** read the OP > > Now according to **your own cite**. There were a lot of men named Jesus who had knowledge of Eastern Philosopy living in Galilee at the time. If any of these men were Hindu then they would have claimed to have been God’s son. > > That is all the OP was asking. > > You are still arguing because the myth originated in the East there is no way Jesus ever lived. Can you not see that your own cites provide the evidence of Jesus’ existence? And any of this lot of men named Jesus who had knowledge of Eastern Philosopy living in Galilee at the time need not have been Hindu. They merely needed to know something about Eastern religions. The Jewish expectation of the Messiah wasn’t that he would be god incarnate. If a mere mortal named Jesus living in Galilee at the time wanted to sell the idea he was the Messiah in the form of son of God to the locals, he’d have either had to import this idea from the East, or have independently created it. ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/127 "2004-10-07T14:20:46Z")
Exactly right **rfgdxm**. I was simply trying to answer your question using ambushed own sources as evidence of the liklihood SOME Jesus probably did actually exist. I mean his own cites say there were a lot of men named Jesus there and that there was a lot of influence from the East. Why this big damned knock down dragout namecalling BS had to happen. So I guess you can thank him for making your case. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/128 "2004-10-07T14:42:31Z")
> [@t-keela](#): > > Exactly right **rfgdxm**. I was simply trying to answer your question using ambushed own sources as evidence of the liklihood SOME Jesus probably did actually exist. I mean his own cites say there were a lot of men named Jesus there and that there was a lot of influence from the East. Why this big damned knock down dragout namecalling BS had to happen. > So I guess you can thank him for making your case. 😉 I am not a Christian. As such, I have no need or desire to try and stretch the evidence to argue that there really was a historic Jesus when the evidence doesn’t support it. My best guess is from the evidence there really was a historic Jesus who around 2,000 years ago was a charismatic preacher who managed to inspire a core group of devoted followers. This Jesus either early in his ministry had the bad luck to get himself executed; or perhaps was actually seeking to get himself executed. The extant writings seem to suggest more the latter. Causing a disturbance in the Temple at the time of year he did doesn’t suggest he had much interest in self-preservation. Jesus himself may well have believed he would rise from the dead. When he didn’t, his followers had to do some spin control. Hence a myth being created around his life. ---
**Author:** ![Find\_Friends](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@Find\_Friends](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Find_Friends)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/129 "2004-10-07T22:14:56Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > Please accept my sincere apologies, one and all. I shouldn’t have said those things, and I regret losing my temper like that. The stress of being at the bottom of a n-to-1 pile-on finally got to me, and I snapped a bit – understandably, perhaps, but nevertheless inappropriate. I ask for your forgiveness. > > It now strikes me as an unwise act to try to debate this extremely thorny and extraordinarily subtle issue in a forum such as this. It was unlikely in the extreme that I would have run across fertile minds in this debate, since, as all the mythicists and even general critics have sadly reported, the historicity of Jesus is such a profoundly prejudiced assumption in Western society that it’s not even mentioned as the unfounded assumption it is. Like nearly all of the posts in this thread, it was simply a given: What was to be proved was constantly taken as a given. No, this topic is too complex, too nuanced to be debated among the general public. > > More calmly this time, I exit the thread again. I’d like to know to what sort of forums you _can_ take this kind of discussion. I have an idea, but don’t know whether naming specific forums is appreciated here. I support you for contributing your view in this matter, especially with no one to offer agreement. You have the right to express yourself without compromise or equivocation, as long as you do not abuse your opponents (as you have of course apolpgized for). This is a very new idea for many. Although I first encountered it more than a decade ago I never came across such a spirited exposition. It may take a ton of patience for you to promote it anywhere. You may be right about the difficulty in countering “such a profoundly prejudiced assumption in Western Socitety”. But I think it is also very important to note that Christianity, unlike _some_ other dogmatic systems, doen’t seem amenable to separabion from its founder. Persomally I think that there is much to study here. But I also feel that for me personally it is no longer as relevant as it once was. A truly existing Jesus-of-history would not have much in common with the Jesus-of-faith _anyway_! Hope to see you around on other threads. (Meanwhile I’ll pray constantly for your unworthy soul.) * * * True Blue Jack * * * “Why the theological implications alone are staggering” - (“Linus” upon being told by his sister that she wishes he had never been born.) ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/130 "2004-10-07T22:27:16Z")
Now think about it for a minute. What if Jesus actually had a twin brother? Could we have fun or what? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2004, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/131 "2004-10-08T01:14:46Z")
(Hey, I wouldn’t rule out the twin hypothesis.) > [@Meatros](#): > > Was a whole myth created and elaborated on? In my mind it’s a possibility. My in box is choked with urban legends about people who never existed, so I’d have to say that it’s a distinct possibility that back 2,000 years ago the case would have been similar. I disagree, but I wonder whether I am wrong. Here we can reference a huge dataset: [snopes.com](http://snopes.com) . My impression is that there are a lot of bogus stories that attach themselves to actual people. And there are even more bogus stories that refer to unnamed people. ## Yet I am unaware of folkloric stories -believed to be true- that refer to nonexistent (but named) people who supposedly died 20 years ago. Furthermore, I doubt whether there are **a set** of stories that refer to a specific named individual who never existed but is believed to have lived or died within the past 20 years. No, I don’t actually: here’s a counter example. I present the the case of one [Lester Green](http://www.articleshead.com/show_article/Lester-Green/), a nonexistant farmer invented by newspaperman C. Louis Mortison in the 1930s. Lester was a highly inventive farmer. Lester put 2 hens on his motor on cold nights to help it start in the morning -since 1 hen’s temperature was 102 degrees, 2 hens must make it 204 - enough cold start his auto. More ignorance is available at the link above. I’m not sure when that particular hoax was uncovered. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2004, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/132 "2004-10-08T01:20:19Z")
_Ahem_ For the sake of anyone who tunes in late, I think a huge problem with **ambushed** ’s argument is simply this: He claims that any writing about a teacher of ideas (like, say, Mark Twain, or Socrates, or Jesus) necessarily starts with biography. This is not only untrue for being a generalization, & verifiably not always the case, it’s deeply counter-intuitive (or even, _obviously wrong_). Socrates isn’t important because of his biography, but because of his arguments. Mark Twain’s biography wouldn’t mean jack without his writing & wit. And the Jesus of Q is a teacher, a rabbi, who says nothing about his personal history & background. Q is assumed to be an early Gospel, before all the contradictory life-story embellishments of Matthew & Luke. And for most students of NT criticism, this is easy to understand. The teaching comes first. For that matter, I looked at Earl Doherty’s website: No mention of his mother, his boyhood home, or even the university he was studying at when he formulated the amazing idea of an inhuman mythic Christ. Why not? And where is **ambushed** ’s autobiographical note, if he expects us to take him seriously? Could it be that people who write about noteworthy ideas introduce their ideas, not themselves? That the veneration of the ground Jesus walked on was a later superstitous addition to Christianity? Not according to **ambushed** , apparently. For him, the veneration of a god, a prophet, even a writer, comes before the teachings, the prophecy, even the writing. (Except, perhaps, for Doherty.) But that’s not what a study of writing in general tells us, or the story the study of the New Testament tells us. Q is there **before** the fabulous details of Jesus’s life. Paul’s letters, which are church-conduct theory, are the oldest known texts. The myth is written down in its entirety much later. Now, Paul does reference the resurrection. This much idea existed. Maybe Mark was written or being written even then, or an early form of Q/Luke. But, possibly, the oldest stuff the churches saved was doctrine, teaching from their teacher Paul (who doesn’t tell his life story in those letters either). That shouldn’t be a shock. Where does Q come from in Doherty’s scheme? It’s a bunch of sayings of a rabbi, after all. Does this mythic otherworldly Christ speak proverbs as well? Who wrote them down? If Christ were this otherworldly critter, how did he turn into the rabbi of Q? ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2004, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/133 "2004-10-08T01:25:52Z")
**Measure for Measure** , your set could include Philip Nolan, the titular character of Edward Everett Hale’s _The Man Without a Country_. While this is clearly anti-secession propaganda, I have a dim memory of reading some book for children when I was a kid (years before I read _The Man Without a Country_ itself) that may have implied poor Mr Nolan actually existed. I suppose some people were taken in. But then, who’s praying to Philip Nolan for the remission of sins? ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2004, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/134 "2004-10-08T13:03:34Z")
I have a question: according to his own writings, paul journeyed widely around the eastern Mediterranean…he was in Greece, Smyrna, Syria, Cyropus, Rome…howver, he seems never to have spent much time in Judea…any explanation for this? ---
**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 8, 2004, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/135 "2004-10-08T14:45:53Z")
> [@t-keela](#): > > Now think about it for a minute. What if Jesus actually had a twin brother? > Could we have fun or what? 😃 You jest but we actually do have a suggestion that such a tradiion may have existed. The apocryphal [Gospel of Thomas](http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/thomas.html) is an early sayings gospel much like Q. Thomas begins with the following statement: > [@](#): > > These are the secret sayings that the living Jesus spoke and Didymos Judas Thomas recorded. As I’m sure you remember from your Aramaic and Greek, Didymos and Thomas both mean “twin” (Didymos in Greek, Thomas in Aramaic). So these sayings are allegedly compiled by someone reduntantly called “The Twin, Judas the Twin.” I think we can safely assume that the redundancy is an accidental artifact of translation and assume that somebody called “Judas the Twin” was alleged to be an apostle of Jesus by at least one community of early Christians. It doesn’t explicitly say _whose_ twin Judas is supposed to be, but Mark’s gospel claims that one of Jesus’ brothers was named Judas (or Jude). Intriguing, isn’t it? I think a literal twin brother is unlikely because I just don’t see how something like that could have gone unremarked upon by Mark or Q (or Paul, for that matter) and also because GThom has Jesus pass authority for the Jerusalem cult to James which (I think) implies that Judas the Twin must not have been a biological twin of Jesus (why would a twin brother be bypassed for a younger, non-twin brother? It wouldn’t accord with Jewish rules of succession). A religion prof once told me that the word “twin” sometimes had a figurative meaning in Aramaic for people who looked alike, so Judas the Twin could have simply been a brother who _looked_ like Jesus but was not a literal twin. Or it may have had some symbolic religious meaning which has been lost, or he could have been someone else’s twin. No one really knows. ---
**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 8, 2004, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/136 "2004-10-08T14:56:42Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > I have a question: according to his own writings, paul journeyed widely around the eastern Mediterranean…he was in Greece, Smyrna, Syria, Cyropus, Rome…howver, he seems never to have spent much time in Judea…any explanation for this? He supposedly did visit Jerusalem a couple of times but it seems he did not get along too well with the Jerusalem cult and preferred to take his mission to the gentiles. Since Paul was not _from_ Judea, since he apparently had some friction with Jerusalem Christians, and since Judea was a smoldering powder keg with the Jewish-Roman War looming in the near future. Paul probably just did not feel any reason to hang around there. He was probably more comfortable in the Hellenistic world with a Hellensitic audience and he obviously didn’t want to be encumbered by the debates over circumcision and kosher diets while evangelizing gentiles. ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2004, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/137 "2004-10-08T18:13:18Z")
I did say it with a grin on my face, Because of all we’ve been through just trying to prove that Jesus existed, much less his twin. I have heard the speculation that there may have been a twin involved. His name wasn’t Arron was it… thankyou, thankyou very much. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2004, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501/138 "2004-10-08T18:17:21Z")
Jessie=Jesus? Elvis=Aaron? The King? We might ought to think about it some more huh? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jesus-man-or-myth/266501.md?page=6)