Virtually all scholars of antiquity agree that a historical human Jesus existed. Historian Michael Grant asserts that if conventional standards of historical textual criticism are applied to the New Testament, “we can no more reject Jesus’ existence than we can reject the existence of a mass of pagan personages whose reality as historical figures is never questioned.”
Virtually all scholars of antiquity dismiss theories of Jesus’s non-existence or regard them as refuted. In modern scholarship, the Christ myth theory is a fringe theory and finds virtually no support from scholars.
It does matter. Because it is near impossible to find a Christian who is fine with the Jesus story being a complete myth. Some of them will admit that not all of the contradiction-filled stories are correct but doubting he existed at all? Paul, the real founder, was at least honest about this and said all of their faith would be in vain if the resurrection had not happened.
The evidence points to a con that got out of control.
Michael Grant doesn’t know that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Saying that we know that there was some king in a certain place and time isn’t a big claim. Most places had kings. Saying that if even a quarter of the claims of the Gospels were true is a massive claim. Also whataboutism is kinda boring. I really don’t feel giving “historians” slack because they cut themselves slack.
In modern scholarship, the Christ myth theory is a fringe theory and finds virtually no support from scholars
Not going to have a job selling book and teaching the story of some old con. You sell books by advancing dozens of different contradictory models of the events all of them equally impossible to test.
Claiming that Jesus of Nazareth existed is not extraordinary at all though. It’s hardly far-fetched to claim that he was real.
Claiming that he was the son of God and could perform miracles however, is - as someone else pointed out.
Right so you are trying to make the claim so small it can be snuck in. Theists try this trick with God all the time.
Does making a claim small make it true or is that a rhetorical device to try to manipulate the argument? If I told you I was Obama and you called me out on it so I said well really I did met him once in a bar when he was in Congress, would my altered claim become true by virtue of being ordinary?
Jesus existence has nothing to do with the religion in and of itself. He can be reall without Christianity being true. You’re getting so caught up in wanting to argue against the theists that you’re focusing on something completely irrelevant just to chalk up a victory.
I have no evidence one way or another for our against his existence, the point is that it doesn’t matter. Jesus’ potential existence has nothing to do with the truthiness of religion unless you believe that his existence can only be a validation of the new testament - which would be akin to your Obama comparison and would be patently ridiculous.
I have no proof that billions of specific people existed, doesn’t change that they did.
Jesus existence has nothing to do with the religion in and of itself. He can be reall without Christianity being true. You’re getting so caught up in wanting to argue against the theists that you’re focusing on something completely irrelevant just to chalk up a victory.
We got a mind reader over here.
I have no evidence one way or another for our against his existence, the point is that it doesn’t matter. Jesus’ potential existence has nothing to do with the truthiness of religion unless you believe that his existence can only be a validation of the new testament - which would be akin to your Obama comparison and would be patently ridiculous.
First off you do have evidence of his non-existentence. Which I gave you. No one can keep their story straight about him. Secondly even if you didn’t have that you can say the same thing about unicorns.
I have no proof that billions of specific people existed, doesn’t change that they did.
First off you do have evidence of his non-existentence. Which I gave you. No one can keep their story straight about him. Secondly even if you didn’t have that you can say the same thing about unicorns.
You’ve given no such thing. You have made a statement that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, but you fail to grasp that the existence of Jeaus would not be extraordinary. Billions of people have existed and will exist. The extraordinary part is the sin of God thing, which we don’t disagree on.
Unicorns , much like “The Messiah”, are certainly extraordinary claims that would require proof. We have seen nothing to support the existence of anything even resembling unicorns. We have forever seen plenty to prove that humans exist. A specific human some thousands of years ago, is not unlikely.
And?
And so, the claim that he exists is hardly extraordinary.
Regardless, most historians agree that there was a human historical Jesus. Whether you think it’s all a conspiracy or scam or whatever is another matter I don’t care to get into.
And you repeat your argument from authority. Maybe if you do it another time it will convince me? Why not just address the total lack of evidence for this massive claim instead?
He didn’t exist. The reason why the James-Peter fraud stuck was because Paul was a preaching machine and they lucked out with getting at least two good writers. Proto-Mark and M. If Paul had died on that shipwreck or Syrian scribe had found a better job there would be no Christianity today.
And what’s more is the very closest written account we have shows problems. Paul never mentions the tomb and thinks Jesus was buried in the ground. Besides for the Eucharist he doesn’t seem to know much of anything about the ministry. Which is really freaken odd because by his own admission he was hunting and interrogating Christians before his conversion.
I haven’t dug into this what-so-ever, but how would it even be possible to identify whether a specific person with that name existed 2000 years ago? It’s not like you could just Google the guys Facebook profile or social security number back in 200AD
Why is it whenever this brought up an appeal to authority is invoked to people who weren’t there? Why not just use evidence to prove your position instead of telling me what some random priest in the 2nd century thought about zombie-skydaddy?
There is no evidence he existed and the narratives disagree with each other. Easily could have been a fraud by James and Peter.
Tell that to the scholars of antiquity. I’m just reporting what the prevailing thought is by people who study such matters because it was falsely claimed that most of them believe that Jesus was a myth.
Sure. Hey guys hate to be a buzzkill and I know you have a sweet gig inventing one crazy way after another to make this myth be true but there really isn’t anything here. It is a superstructure with no substructure. Until someone digs up some old letter or something you got nothing.
because it was falsely claimed that most of them believe that Jesus was a myth.
I don’t think anyone in this thread did that. I know what they believe, I just don’t care. Again
There is no evidence Jesus was a historical person
A fraud by the leading apostles could easily fit the data that we have.
Humans lie.
The narratives disagree with each other to an extent that it sounds very much like liars trying to remember their stories
There are things missing in the narratives that should be there.
In a way I sorta get it. There are like these Sherlock Holmes appreciation groups that have spent all this effort trying to find the historical 221B baker street. It is fun to pretend that a fictional character exists in the real world.
If you ask Mormon historians whether the particular figures in the Book of Mormon exist, they mostly all agree too. Perhaps a better metric is the number of secular historians who consider Jesus to be a historical figure. Or suppose that he is a historical figure, how many things can you say about him that are definitely true?
Historians generally agree that Jesus existed. But regardless, the Christ of Christianity exists as an ideal they’re supposed to follow. They do not.
What historians are you talking to?
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Evidence_for_the_historical_existence_of_Jesus_Christ#Non-Biblical_evidence
Outside the bible there is very little or no evidence for the existence of a Jesus.
It doesn’t really matter if a “historical human Jesus existed” because the Jesus that Christians worship, the Jesus of the Bible, is a fiction.
Absolutely, but that’s not the claim I was refuting.
It does matter. Because it is near impossible to find a Christian who is fine with the Jesus story being a complete myth. Some of them will admit that not all of the contradiction-filled stories are correct but doubting he existed at all? Paul, the real founder, was at least honest about this and said all of their faith would be in vain if the resurrection had not happened.
The evidence points to a con that got out of control.
Michael Grant doesn’t know that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Saying that we know that there was some king in a certain place and time isn’t a big claim. Most places had kings. Saying that if even a quarter of the claims of the Gospels were true is a massive claim. Also whataboutism is kinda boring. I really don’t feel giving “historians” slack because they cut themselves slack.
Not going to have a job selling book and teaching the story of some old con. You sell books by advancing dozens of different contradictory models of the events all of them equally impossible to test.
Claiming that Jesus of Nazareth existed is not extraordinary at all though. It’s hardly far-fetched to claim that he was real. Claiming that he was the son of God and could perform miracles however, is - as someone else pointed out.
Right so you are trying to make the claim so small it can be snuck in. Theists try this trick with God all the time.
Does making a claim small make it true or is that a rhetorical device to try to manipulate the argument? If I told you I was Obama and you called me out on it so I said well really I did met him once in a bar when he was in Congress, would my altered claim become true by virtue of being ordinary?
Do you have evidence he existed yes or no?
Jesus existence has nothing to do with the religion in and of itself. He can be reall without Christianity being true. You’re getting so caught up in wanting to argue against the theists that you’re focusing on something completely irrelevant just to chalk up a victory.
I have no evidence one way or another for our against his existence, the point is that it doesn’t matter. Jesus’ potential existence has nothing to do with the truthiness of religion unless you believe that his existence can only be a validation of the new testament - which would be akin to your Obama comparison and would be patently ridiculous.
I have no proof that billions of specific people existed, doesn’t change that they did.
We got a mind reader over here.
First off you do have evidence of his non-existentence. Which I gave you. No one can keep their story straight about him. Secondly even if you didn’t have that you can say the same thing about unicorns.
And?
You’ve got a comment-reader, no magic required.
You’ve given no such thing. You have made a statement that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, but you fail to grasp that the existence of Jeaus would not be extraordinary. Billions of people have existed and will exist. The extraordinary part is the sin of God thing, which we don’t disagree on. Unicorns , much like “The Messiah”, are certainly extraordinary claims that would require proof. We have seen nothing to support the existence of anything even resembling unicorns. We have forever seen plenty to prove that humans exist. A specific human some thousands of years ago, is not unlikely.
Regardless, most historians agree that there was a human historical Jesus. Whether you think it’s all a conspiracy or scam or whatever is another matter I don’t care to get into.
And you repeat your argument from authority. Maybe if you do it another time it will convince me? Why not just address the total lack of evidence for this massive claim instead?
Some dude who started a personality cult around himself that grew out of control once he died. Like the warlord paedophile Muhammed after him.
I’m sure there was no shortage of “sons of god”, but for some reason, this guy’s claim stuck.
He didn’t exist. The reason why the James-Peter fraud stuck was because Paul was a preaching machine and they lucked out with getting at least two good writers. Proto-Mark and M. If Paul had died on that shipwreck or Syrian scribe had found a better job there would be no Christianity today.
And what’s more is the very closest written account we have shows problems. Paul never mentions the tomb and thinks Jesus was buried in the ground. Besides for the Eucharist he doesn’t seem to know much of anything about the ministry. Which is really freaken odd because by his own admission he was hunting and interrogating Christians before his conversion.
I haven’t dug into this what-so-ever, but how would it even be possible to identify whether a specific person with that name existed 2000 years ago? It’s not like you could just Google the guys Facebook profile or social security number back in 200AD
That’s the thing. Anyone who knows how history works, knows that it’s extremely hard to prove someone existed that long ago.
Most things we have to prove if someone existed is if other people talk about them or mention them in their writings.
Other than the bible, no one really talked about a Jesus existing at that time. Which makes sense, since if a Jesus did exist he would be a nobody.
Why is it whenever this brought up an appeal to authority is invoked to people who weren’t there? Why not just use evidence to prove your position instead of telling me what some random priest in the 2nd century thought about zombie-skydaddy?
There is no evidence he existed and the narratives disagree with each other. Easily could have been a fraud by James and Peter.
Tell that to the scholars of antiquity. I’m just reporting what the prevailing thought is by people who study such matters because it was falsely claimed that most of them believe that Jesus was a myth.
Sure. Hey guys hate to be a buzzkill and I know you have a sweet gig inventing one crazy way after another to make this myth be true but there really isn’t anything here. It is a superstructure with no substructure. Until someone digs up some old letter or something you got nothing.
I don’t think anyone in this thread did that. I know what they believe, I just don’t care. Again
In a way I sorta get it. There are like these Sherlock Holmes appreciation groups that have spent all this effort trying to find the historical 221B baker street. It is fun to pretend that a fictional character exists in the real world.
Preach!
If you ask Mormon historians whether the particular figures in the Book of Mormon exist, they mostly all agree too. Perhaps a better metric is the number of secular historians who consider Jesus to be a historical figure. Or suppose that he is a historical figure, how many things can you say about him that are definitely true?
These ARE secular historians the Wikipedia article is referring to. As you say, any Christian ones would be too biased to be reliable.