Did Jesus Christ Actually Exist?

[Enai de a lukal]

Exactly, and that's what I'm not seeing here in evidence for the existence of Jesus. I think that there might be some confusion between historians agreeing that something is true, and agreeing on the evidence for it. It looks to me like most historians who write about Jesus agree that he existed, but don't see any need to try to prove it. They use the Bible to write stories about his aims and purposes and what he said and did, as if they are talking about a real person. but there isn't anything that all of them accept as evidence for any of that. They all pick and choose what to believe and not to believe in the stories, and there are wide divergences between them in their selections. When they do try to prove that he was a real person, they don't use any arguments from the Bible. They only use a handful of mentions from outside of the writings of Christians, that could possibly have simply been reporting what Christians thought about it. That looks very underwhelming to me, as evidence for his existence.

(later) They all agree that some of what the gospels say about Jesus is not true, but what is not true is different for different ones. If historians can just pick and choose what to believe and not to believe in those stories, based on their own unqualified personal theories about human psychology and sociology and unexamined bandwagon opinions about what is possible and what isn't,, then how are those stories evidence that he really existed?

To put it another way, most Biblical historians don't consider something being said in the gospel stories as a reason at all for thinking that it's true. If they did, it wouldn't be so easy for them to use the lame excuses that they do for discounting anything that doesn't agree with the story they want to tell. So I don't think that the reason for most of them agreeing that he existed is because of overwhelming evidence in the Bible. If they do really believe that he existed, it might be for some of the same reasons as mine, even if they aren't aware of it.

Then I'm I'm wondering if this is a matter of lack of familiarity with history as a discipline, because if the evidence of a historical Jesus is not overwhelming then nothing is. If you're primarily used to, say, chemistry or physics or even sociology or anthropology, you're used to a different methodology, different types and levels of evidence. But evidence of persons of antiquity is like fossil evidence; it takes very precise conditions to preserve, and so we don't have a ton. Usually all we have is evidence for high-level political, military and religious figures, and sometimes not even that. Which makes the evidence for Jesus so striking; he is one of the most well-attested figures of antiquity, and he was a peasant from rural Galilee. Not only is he attested from within a reasonable timeframe, he is multiply-attested; all of the Gospels use sources that are provably independent from one another. And they are remarkably consistent on the large-print details- name was Jesus, born of Mary, came from Galilee/Nazareth, preached an apocalyptic message, went to Jerusalem, was crucified. And the overall episode is a familiar one, since Jesus was not the only peasant-preacher during that time and in that place.

Moreover, the alternative, that someone would invent this figure, does not pass the relevant historical principles. It is a widely used principle in history that when people invent things, they invent things that help their own interests. They tend not to invent things that harm their interests. And for 1st century Jews, the messiah was a glorious military and political figure who would expel the Romans and re-establish Israel under the Davidic covenant. Under those circumstances, no one one invent the notion of a crucified messiah. And yet that's just what Jesus was- a criminal who not only failed to expel the Romans, he got crushed like a bug and killed and tortured in a way explicitly vilified by the Jewish Bible. And the patent absurdity of a crucified messiah is why Christians struggled to covert Jews (it was, as Paul described it, a "stumbling block" for the Jews, but not for the Gentiles). Far more plausible is the notion that some Jews thought Jesus was the messiah, Jesus got killed, and his followers had to re-invent the concept of being the messiah.

Here's a couple other things. Christianity had many opponents, including from the very beginning. Christians were widely blamed for drawing the ire of the gods, because Christians refused to participate in pagan rites and one thing pagan gods did when not enough people worshipped them was smite the people with lightning and famines and so forth. Christians were accused of all sorts of infamy... save one charge that was curiously not leveled against them. That charge was of believing or inventing a false religion. Now if there was any truth to the notion of CHristians inventing Christ, surely there would have been some accusations of such, especially from the period where people would have been in a position to know?

On each of these points, mythicisism has only bad answers. Its simply no contest: the evidence for the historical Jesus is overwhelming.

 

[Niatero]

Then I'm I'm wondering if this is a matter of lack of familiarity with history as a discipline, because if the evidence of a historical Jesus is not overwhelming then nothing is. If you're primarily used to, say, chemistry or physics or even sociology or anthropology, you're used to a different methodology, different types and levels of evidence. But evidence of persons of antiquity is like fossil evidence; it takes very precise conditions to preserve, and so we don't have a ton. Usually all we have is evidence for high-level political, military and religious figures, and sometimes not even that. Which makes the evidence for Jesus so striking; he is one of the most well-attested figures of antiquity, and he was a peasant from rural Galilee. Not only is he attested from within a reasonable timeframe, he is multiply-attested; all of the Gospels use sources that are provably independent from one another. And they are remarkably consistent on the large-print details- name was Jesus, born of Mary, came from Galilee/Nazareth, preached an apocalyptic message, went to Jerusalem, was crucified. And the overall episode is a familiar one, since Jesus was not the only peasant-preacher during that time and in that place.

Moreover, the alternative, that someone would invent this figure, does not pass the relevant historical principles. It is a widely used principle in history that when people invent things, they invent things that help their own interests. They tend not to invent things that harm their interests. And for 1st century Jews, the messiah was a glorious military and political figure who would expel the Romans and re-establish Israel under the Davidic covenant. Under those circumstances, no one one invent the notion of a crucified messiah. And yet that's just what Jesus was- a criminal who not only failed to expel the Romans, he got crushed like a bug and killed and tortured in a way explicitly vilified by the Jewish Bible. And the patent absurdity of a crucified messiah is why Christians struggled to covert Jews (it was, as Paul described it, a "stumbling block" for the Jews, but not for the Gentiles). Far more plausible is the notion that some Jews thought Jesus was the messiah, Jesus got killed, and his followers had to re-invent the concept of being the messiah.

Here's a couple other things. Christianity had many opponents, including from the very beginning. Christians were widely blamed for drawing the ire of the gods, because Christians refused to participate in pagan rites and one thing pagan gods did when not enough people worshipped them was smite the people with lightning and famines and so forth. Christians were accused of all sorts of infamy... save one charge that was curiously not leveled against them. That charge was of believing or inventing a false religion. Now if there was any truth to the notion of CHristians inventing Christ, surely there would have been some accusations of such, especially from the period where people would have been in a position to know?

On each of these points, mythicisism has only bad answers. Its simply no contest: the evidence for the historical Jesus is overwhelming.

Okay, it's like I said, I misunderstood what you meant by "overwhelming." Thank you.

(later) My first thought is that you mean that it's overwhelming in relation to mythicism, but that's only because all the mythicism arguments are so weak. They aren't designed to convince anyone who isn't looking for validation for their opposition to Christianity.

On another topic, from my research it looks to me like there isn't any agreement on a methodology for history that doesn't allow historians to make up any story that they want to and call it "history," and/or isn't contested by multitudes of historians.

... all of the Gospels use sources that are provably independent from one another.

Provable only by people using their own personal theories about human psychology and sociology, without any training or qualifications in those fields and without any input from professionals in those field. The argument about people not inventing things that would harm their interests is another example of that, and doesn't stand up under half a minute of examination.

And for 1st century Jews, the messiah was a glorious military and political figure who would expel the Romans and re-establish Israel under the Davidic covenant.

Not for all Jews of that time.

And the patent absurdity of a crucified messiah is why Christians struggled to covert Jews (it was, as Paul described it, a "stumbling block" for the Jews, but not for the Gentiles).

"... but not for the gentiles," which invalidates that as a reason for thinking that the story could not have been invented by anyone in that time.

Christians were accused of all sorts of infamy... save one charge that was curiously not leveled against them. That charge was of believing or inventing a false religion. Now if there was any truth to the notion of CHristians inventing Christ, surely there would have been some accusations of such, especially from the period where people would have been in a position to know?

Agreed.

I'm wondering why I never see anyone in these debates talking more about the allusions to Old Testament passages in the gospels, and the wisdom in the sayings of Jesus that reveals itself in practice, and the fallacy in thinking that the gospels couldn't have been written before the destruction of the temple, and Paul's meetings with the apostles, and other observations that seem much more convincing to me than the most popular arguments for his existence.

 

[Heyo]

Neanderthals and hominids are now shown to have co existed in history and are contemporaries with humans and likely even inbred...so that supporting evidence claim is "out the window "!

Technically, that would have been pre-history. History is defined as the study of the past via written records. I.e., history began about 5,000 years ago in Mesopotamia. Neanderthals died out about 40,000 years ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal
Also, Neanderthals are hominids, just as humans, chimps and gorillas. Hominidae - Wikipedia

 

[Augustus]

On another topic, from my research it looks to me like there isn't any agreement on a methodology for history that doesn't allow historians to make up any story that they want to and call it "history," and/or isn't contested by multitudes of historians.

To some extent that is true.

Saying scholarly historians can "make up any story they want" might be going a bit far, but it is significantly about constructing narratives to link various bits of often ambiguous evidence.

Even if people are trying to be neutral and objective, their interpretation of the evidence will be dependent on their academic background, their culture and the era they live in which leads to emphasis on the fads and fashions of their generation (so now for example, there are lots of works focusing on gender and race in history).

The explanation of the past is always connected to the political and ideological needs and wants of people in the present.

 

[RestlessSoul]

Sure, and fairies wear boots and you gotta believe me

I believe Ozzy. Not sure I believe you.

 

[Mock Turtle]

If any eyewitness writings outside of the bible are ever found that describe the raising of dead people who then wander back into the city and live among the people at the time of Christ's crucifixion and resurrection, then this would be almost irrefutable evidence that Christ was indeed raised from the dead as well! We have writings outside of the bible that are close to being eyewitness, but not directly...they recite claims by others who were eyewitness.

In my view this is a low bar for evidence, given that many people even these days are classified as dead but who apparently come back to life - because they were not actually dead. Besides the notion that individual testimony necessarily has weight.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Provable only by people using their own personal theories about human psychology and sociology, without any training or qualifications in those fields and without any input from professionals in those field. The argument about people not inventing things that would harm their interests is another example of that, and doesn't stand up under half a minute of examination.

Ok I can't help but point out that this is comedic gold. The linguistic analysis of the NT documents I'm referring to is only learned in grad/post-grad, so it requires training and relevant qualifications and so is only performed by professionals or under the guidance thereof.

And obviously when people are untruthful, they tend to do so in ways that help rather than harm the). And so as here:

On another topic, from my research it looks to me like there isn't any agreement on a methodology for history that doesn't allow historians to make up any story that they want to and call it "history," and/or isn't contested by multitudes of historians.

These comments just indict your "research". I have to ask- what on Earth were you reading for this "research" to reach these crankish conclusions?

 

[joelr]

(I don't know what I find more irritating, Carrieritis or reliance on quotes from Revelations.)

Yeah, surprise, a historian is outspoken about the belief in Biblical historicity and apologists invent buzz words against him. Anything to hide from truth.
why don't you take on thing Carrier said regarding the Bible and demonstrate it's wrong?

In this case it was a mention of the difference from MA to PhD in historical studies. Which he would know.
I don't care about irritating, I care about truth.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Yeah, surprise, a historian is outspoken about the belief in Biblical historicity and apologists invent buzz words against him.

I have no problem with outspoken historians in general or with Carrier in specific. I do, however, have a problem with selection bias. My guess (and it is only a guess) is that many of those who fixate on Carrier have never read a single book by any of those respected scholars who accept the historicity of a sect leader now called Jesus.

Your reference to "belief is Biblical historicity" is sloppy at best. I'll leave it to you to figure out why.

Finally, your whining about apologists is more than a little ironic, given that many amateur mythicists manage to demonstrate apologetics at its worst.

 

[joelr]

I have no problem with outspoken historians in general or with Carrier in specific. I do, however, have a problem with selection bias. My guess (and it is only a guess) is that many of those who fixate on Carrier have never read a single book by any of those respected scholars who accept the historicity of a sect leader now called Jesus.

That isn't me.

Your reference to "belief is Biblical historicity" is sloppy at best. I'll leave it to you to figure out why.

No thanks. Carrier is outspoken about the consensus and it bugs apologists. I'm fine with how I said it.

So What About Hannibal, Then? • Richard Carrier Blogs

This kind of argument has been tried again and again and again. I’ve discussed every one. (See Okay, So What about the Historicity of Spartacus?) It’s always of this form: P1. We should not doubt [x] existed. P2. The evidence for Jesus is better than for [x]. P3. The same standards of evidence...

www.richardcarrier.info

All mainstream scholars agree Jesus as demigod is a mythical savior deity. They all agree the Gospels are myths about him. They simply conclude that those myths contain some kernels of fact, and that Jesus was originally not a flying, magic-wielding supergod. But they agree the super-Jesus, the only Jesus about whom we have any accounts at all, didn’t exist. They think some mundane Jesus did, who was dressed up with those legends and beliefs later. But that still admits he belongs to a reference class that the Hannibals of the world do not: that of mythically-attested savior gods who speak to their followers in dreams and visions. So we actually need more evidence for Jesus than we have for Hannibal, to be sure Jesus isn’t just like all other mythical savior gods, who also had amazing stories about them set on earth history, and who also appeared to people in dreams and visions—yet never plausibly existed.

Notice, Carrier is granting historicity.

Finally, your whining about apologists is more than a little ironic, given that many amateur mythicists manage to demonstrate apologetics at its worst.

That's funny, so you are going to critique my mention of apologetics by comparing it it amateur...... anything? Yes amateur work is , uh, amateur? No kidding? So what? So is apologetics.
Excellent comparison because apologetics isn't scholarship, it starts with a conclusion and then tries to make it true or it just lies.

Right from the first apologist Justin Martyr (Jesus looks like a Greek demigod because the devil.....uh huh) to C.S. Lewis and his garbage (he was either completely crazy or the Son of God! Uh, sorry Mr Lewis but like all other savior sons/daughters of a supreme god he is a myth. Whoops, forgot to mention that one C.S.). Or Lee Strobel and his "Case" for Christ where he somehow did "research" but never came across the dozens of internal and external reasons why we know the Gospels are anonymous and non-eyewitness? Like the Greek manuscript SAYS IT'S NOT EYEWITNESS????

Why Scholars Doubt the Traditional Authors of the Gospels » Internet Infidels

The traditional authors of the canonical Gospels—Matthew the tax collector, Mark the attendant of Peter, Luke the attendant of Paul, and John the son of Zebedee—are not held to be the Gospels' actual authors by the majority of mainstream New Testament scholars. Christian apologists nevertheless...

infidels.org

I'm stating facts about apologetics from reading actual apologetics from Habermas, Licona and others. As well as most historians started out fundamentalists and now can say how ridiculous most apologetics are.
Kipp Davis, Richard Miller, Josh Bowden, Ehrman, I can get you many quotes.

Please give me one good Christian apologetic that holds to good standards of evidence the way you would expect of any other work?
So again, I'm just saying what the scholars are saying and will back everything up.



Christian Apologists Are Wrong About The Gospels | Dr. Richard C Miller

10:00 the Gospels are cult performant, not biographies. Thomas Hagg, The Art Of Biography in Antiquity, goes into this. The NT has biographic like qualities. If the early Christians wanted to call them that they knew how to write them and wrote in the genre.


They had people who wrote in the genre, produced weti, (lies), later writings we know of.


The readers of the gospels were meant to be favorably bias and were willfully indulging in the world of marvel the text creates. Not written at all like a history.
No authentication of the stories is included like in all histories. Translation tropes are written just like this. Eyewitness are included in Translation fables, Romulus, Herecles, …


18:20 90 known gospels or Christian writings, even the others had people martyring themself in front of Caesar.


20:45 Mainstream secular historical studies, Litwa, McDonald, Miller, Carrier, are smack dab in the middle of mainstream work, methodologies, approaches, understanding the ancient world.



29:54 The idea of writing inventive fictive literature that has peripatetic (traveling from place to place) structure, supervision by what feels like a divine perspective, is common and normal in that time period.


Everything WRONG With Christian Apologetics

Dr's Kipp Davis and Joshua Bowen





"The Oxford Annotated Bible (a compilation of multiple scholars summarizing dominant scholarly trends for the last 150 years) states (p. 1744):


Neither the evangelists nor their first readers engaged in historical analysis. Their aim was to confirm Christian faith (Lk. 1.4; Jn. 20.31). Scholars generally agree that the Gospels were written forty to sixty years after the death of Jesus. They thus do not present eyewitness or contemporary accounts of Jesus’ life and teachings.


Unfortunately, much of the general public is not familiar with scholarly resources like the one quoted above; instead, Christian apologists often put out a lot of material, such as The Case For Christ, targeted toward lay audiences, who are not familiar with scholarly methods, in order to argue that the Gospels are the eyewitness testimonies of either Jesus’ disciples or their attendants. The mainstream scholarly view is that the Gospels are anonymous works, written in a different language than that of Jesus, in distant lands, after a substantial gap of time, by unknown persons, compiling, redacting, and inventing various traditions, in order to provide a narrative of Christianity’s central figure—Jesus Christ—to confirm the faith of their communities."

Why Scholars Doubt the Traditional Authors of the Gospels » Internet Infidels

The traditional authors of the canonical Gospels—Matthew the tax collector, Mark the attendant of Peter, Luke the attendant of Paul, and John the son of Zebedee—are not held to be the Gospels' actual authors by the majority of mainstream New Testament scholars. Christian apologists nevertheless...

infidels.org

 

[Ebionite]

History of religion can include beliefs of people but supernatural events themselves are not considered history.

How is this not academic bias?

 

[Subduction Zone]

How is this not academic bias?

It is done because if you included all mythical beliefs as part of history it would be impossibly contradicting. It is not a bias if they treat all religions the same.

How would you decide which myths to include and which ones to disregard?

 

[joelr]

Then I'm I'm wondering if this is a matter of lack of familiarity with history as a discipline, because if the evidence of a historical Jesus is not overwhelming then nothing is. If you're primarily used to, say, chemistry or physics or even sociology or anthropology, you're used to a different methodology, different types and levels of evidence. But evidence of persons of antiquity is like fossil evidence; it takes very precise conditions to preserve, and so we don't have a ton. Usually all we have is evidence for high-level political, military and religious figures, and sometimes not even that. Which makes the evidence for Jesus so striking; he is one of the most well-attested figures of antiquity, and he was a peasant from rural Galilee. Not only is he attested from within a reasonable timeframe, he is multiply-attested; all of the Gospels use sources that are provably independent from one another. And they are remarkably consistent on the large-print details- name was Jesus, born of Mary, came from Galilee/Nazareth, preached an apocalyptic message, went to Jerusalem, was crucified. And the overall episode is a familiar one, since Jesus was not the only peasant-preacher during that time and in that place.

Jesus is not well attested. The Gospels all copy Mark and Paul only knows of a vision of Jesus.
This article gives some of the evidence that Mark is rewriting OT narratives for Jesus, using fictive writing only used in myth and shows the author was very familiar with OT stories because he reworked them and quoted them.

The Gospels as Allegorical Myth, Part I of 4: Mark

Previously, I’ve written about the historicity of Jesus, and mentioned how the most recent analysis, in Richard Carrier’s On the Historicity of Jesus (the first comprehensive, academica…

lagevondissen.wordpress.com

Mark 15.24: “They part his garments among them, casting lots upon them.”

Psalm 22:18: “They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon them.”

Mark 15.29-31: “And those who passed by blasphemed him, shaking their heads and saying, ‘…Save yourself…’ and mocked him, saying ‘He who saved others cannot save himself!’ ”

Psalm 22.7-8: “All those who see me mock me and give me lip, shaking their head, saying ‘He expected the lord to protect him, so let the lord save him if he likes.’ ”

Mark 15.34: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

Psalm 22.1: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

On top of these links, Mark also appears to have used Psalm 69, Amos 8.9, and some elements of Isaiah 53, Zechariah 9-14, and Wisdom 2 as sources for his narratives. So we can see yet a few more elements of myth in the latter part of this Gospel, with Mark using other scriptural sources as needed for his story, whether to “fulfill” what he believed to be prophecy or for some other reason.

He is not well attested because the other Gospels can be shown to be sourcing Mark as the Synoptic Problem demonstrates from Robert H. Stein’s The Synoptic Problem: An Introduction:

The Synoptic Problem | Bible.org

Any serious discussion of the Synoptic Gospels must, sooner or later, involve a discussion of the literary interrelationships among Matthew, Mark, and Luke. This is essential in order to see how an author used his sources (both for reliability’s sake as well as for redactional criticism), as...

bible.org

(1) The argument from length. Although Mark’s Gospel is shorter, it is not an abridgment, nor a gospel built exclusively on Matthew-Luke agreement. In fact, where its pericopae parallel Matthew and/or Luke, Mark’s story is usually the longest. The rich material left out of his gospel is inexplicable on the Griesbach hypothesis.

(2) The argument from grammar. Matthew and especially Luke use better grammar and literary style than Mark, suggesting that they used Mark, but improved on it.

(3) The argument from harder readings. On the analogy of early scribal habits, Luke and Matthew apparently removed difficulties from Mark’s Gospel in making their own. If Matthean priority is assumed, then what is inexplicable is why Mark would have introduced such difficulties.

(4) The argument from verbal agreement. There are fewer Matthew-Luke verbal agreements than any other two-gospel verbal agreements. This is difficult to explain on the Griesbach hypothesis, much easier on the Lachmann/Streeter hypothesis.

(5) The argument from agreement in order. Not only do Luke and Matthew never agree with each other when they depart from Mark’s order, but the reasons for this on the assumption of Markan priority are readily available while on Matthean priority they are not.

(6) The argument from literary agreements. Very close to the redactional argument, this point stresses that on literary analysis, it is easier to see Matthew’s use of Mark than vice versa.

(7) The argument from redaction. The redactional emphases in Mark, especially in his stylistic minutiae, are only inconsistently found in Matthew and Luke, while the opposite is not true. In other words, Mark’s style is quite consistent, while Luke and Matthew are inconsistent—when they parallel Mark, there is consistency; when they diverge, they depart from such. This suggests that Mark was the source for both Matthew and Luke.

(8) The argument from Mark’s more primitive theology. On many fronts Mark seems to display a more primitive theology than either Luke or Matthew. This suggests that Matthew and Luke used Mark, altering the text to suit their purposes.

Moreover, the alternative, that someone would invent this figure, does not pass the relevant historical principles. It is a widely used principle in history that when people invent things, they invent things that help their own interests. They tend not to invent things that harm their interests. And for 1st century Jews, the messiah was a glorious military and political figure who would expel the Romans and re-establish Israel under the Davidic covenant. Under those circumstances, no one one invent the notion of a crucified messiah. And yet that's just what Jesus was- a criminal who not only failed to expel the Romans, he got crushed like a bug and killed and tortured in a way explicitly vilified by the Jewish Bible. And the patent absurdity of a crucified messiah is why Christians struggled to covert Jews (it was, as Paul described it, a "stumbling block" for the Jews, but not for the Gentiles). Far more plausible is the notion that some Jews thought Jesus was the messiah, Jesus got killed, and his followers had to re-invent the concept of being the messiah.

He could be made up the same way all other savior demigods in mystery religions were made up. Could be based on a Rabbi as well, either way the Gospel narrative is fiction.
This goes into Dr Tabor and the scholars who study savior cults, the basic idea is :

All Mystery religions have personal savior deities


- All saviors


- all son/daughter, never the supreme God (including Mithriasm)


- all undergo a passion (struggle) patheon


- all obtain victory over death which they share with followers


- all have stories set on earth


- none actually existed


- Is Jesus the exception and based on a real Jewish teacher or is it all made up?

Here's a couple other things. Christianity had many opponents, including from the very beginning. Christians were widely blamed for drawing the ire of the gods, because Christians refused to participate in pagan rites and one thing pagan gods did when not enough people worshipped them was smite the people with lightning and famines and so forth. Christians were accused of all sorts of infamy... save one charge that was curiously not leveled against them. That charge was of believing or inventing a false religion. Now if there was any truth to the notion of CHristians inventing Christ, surely there would have been some accusations of such, especially from the period where people would have been in a position to know?

On each of these points, mythicisism has only bad answers. Its simply no contest: the evidence for the historical Jesus is overwhelming.

First there was, For we did not follow cleverly devised myths 2 Peter. An argument against people saying it was made up.

But anti-Christian propaganda didn't survive so we don't know what detractors were saying.

Justin Martyr says the same, he argues all the Greek demigods similar to Jesus were made up but not Jesus. His bad apologetics shows there was an argument.

Justin Martyr, The Dialogue with Trypho,
Chapter 69. The devil, since he emulates the truth, has invented fables about Bacchus, Hercules, and Æsculapius


His followers didn't have to re-invent anything, Jesus is a savior in a mystery religion. A Jewish version of a mystery cult.



The Religious Context of Early Christianity


A Guide to Graeco-Roman Religions





HANS-JOSEF KLAUCK


Professor of New Testament Exegesis, University of Munich, Germany


Summary

The Hellenistic mystery cults play a decisive role in the argumentation of the representatives of the school of the history of religions (see the Introduction, above), in two ways. First, they postulate a genetic derivation of the Christian sacraments from the quasi-sacramental rites of the mystery cults (initiation, washings, anointings, sacred meals); they see the Chrisrian sacraments as having no basis in the message of Jesus and in Palestinian biblical Judaism, but rather as the outcome of a process of Hellenisation which is evaluated as a lapse from the original purity of the gospel, whether this is dated (with Heitmuller) already before Paul, or (with Harnack: see p. 148, n. 49) only outside the New Testament itself in the second century. Secondly, it is further argued (see Bruckner) that the myth of the dying and rising again of a divinity, which lies at the centre of each cult, was a significant influence on earliest Christianity's image of Christ, which drifted off into myth.



Petra Pakkanen, Interpreting Early Hellenistic Religion (1996), showed 4 trends all mystery cults shared, Christianity has all 4
- Syncretism: combining a foreign cult deity with Hellenistic elements. Christianity is a Jewish mystery religion.

- Henotheism: transforming / reinterpreting polytheism into monotheism. Judaism introduced monolatric concepts.

- Individualism: agricultural salvation cults retooled as personal salvation cults. Salvation of community changed into personal individual salvation in afterlife. All original agricultural salvation cults were retooled by the time Christianity arose.

- Cosmopolitianism: all races, cultures, classes admitted as equals, with fictive kinship (members are all brothers) you now “join” a religion rather than being born into it

 

[blü 2]

if the evidence of a historical Jesus is not overwhelming then nothing is.

I used to think the chances of a real historical Jesus were 50-50. Certainly there's no clincher either way, Two points in particular have changed my view to make it more likely, but by no means certain, that Jesus existed in history. The first is Ehrman's point that in the records we have, none of the early enemies of Christianity dismissed Jesus as non-existent. The second, which is based on the so-called criterion of embarrassment, is the way Jesus is recorded in all four gospels as demonstrating unrelieved aggro towards his mother in particular and his family in general (Mark 3:31-35, Mark 6:4-5, Matthew 10:35-37, Luke 11:27. John 2:3, contrast John 19:26).

One problem that remains is that the writers of the gospels, starting with Mark, had never met an historical Jesus. And that the first gospel, Mark, can be read as constructed solely from materials in the Tanakh and other writings then extant, so that arguments along these lines are available ─

The author of Matthew declared Mary to have been a virgin because the LXX in translating Isaiah 7:14 had rendered Hebrew 'almah, young woman, as parthenos, virgin (which indeed it had);​

​

He invented the unhistoric 'Taxation Census' story to get Jesus to be born in Bethlehem to “fulfill” Micah 5:2.​

​

He invented the unhistoric 'Massacre of the Innocents' story to get Jesus into Egypt to “fulfill” Hosea 11.1. (If there had been an authentic Massacre of the Innocents, it seems unlikely we'd have no other mention of it.)​

​

He absurdly sat Jesus across a foal and a donkey to ride into Jerusalem "to fulfill prophecy" (Matthew 21:2-5) in Zechariah 9.9; (and that one's otherwise inexplicable).​

Arguments have also been made that the whole design of Mark is based on narrative schemes from the Tanakh. (I've just browsed my library in vain looking for a noted book to that effect, but (a) it's from last century and I can't remember its name and (b) I'd know it if I saw it but I can't find it on my shelves. Apologies.)

the alternative, that someone would invent this figure, does not pass the relevant historical principles.

The first gospel, Mark, was written, certainly after 70 CE (Mark 13:3) and most probably after 75 CE, since its author appears to have used Josephus' report of the trial of Jesus son of Ananias / Ananus aka Jesus of Jerusalem Wars, VI 5.3, which was not available before then, as his template for his trial of Jesus scene. This is some 40-45 years after the traditional date of the crucifixion, and like all the gospels, entirely hearsay. Clearly there was a Christian group in Jerusalem, much as Paul mentions (though Paul emphasizes that he got no information from them, and that ALL he tells you is from his vision, Galatians 1:11-12).

Anyone wishing to read a somewhat triumphalist view of the No Historical Jesus argument may enjoy David FitzGerald's Nailed.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I used to think the chances of a real historical Jesus were 50-50. Certainly there's no clincher either way, Two points in particular have changed my view to make it more likely, but by no means certain, that Jesus existed in history. The first is Ehrman's point that in the records we have, none of the early enemies of Christianity dismissed Jesus as non-existent. The second, which is based on the so-called criterion of embarrassment, is the way Jesus is recorded in all four gospels as demonstrating unrelieved aggro towards his mother in particular and his family in general (Mark 3:31-35, Mark 6:4-5, Matthew 10:35-37, Luke 11:27. John 2:3, contrast John 19:26).

One problem that remains is that the writers of the gospels, starting with Mark, had never met an historical Jesus. And that the first gospel, Mark, can be read as constructed solely from materials in the Tanakh and other writings then extant, so that arguments along these lines are available ─

The author of Matthew declared Mary to have been a virgin because the LXX in translating Isaiah 7:14 had rendered Hebrew 'almah, young woman, as parthenos, virgin (which indeed it had);​

​

He invented the unhistoric 'Taxation Census' story to get Jesus to be born in Bethlehem to “fulfill” Micah 5:2.​

​

He invented the unhistoric 'Massacre of the Innocents' story to get Jesus into Egypt to “fulfill” Hosea 11.1. (If there had been an authentic Massacre of the Innocents, it seems unlikely we'd have no other mention of it.)​

​

He absurdly sat Jesus across a foal and a donkey to ride into Jerusalem "to fulfill prophecy" (Matthew 21:2-5) in Zechariah 9.9; (and that one's otherwise inexplicable).​

Arguments have also been made that the whole design of Mark is based on narrative schemes from the Tanakh. (I've just browsed my library in vain looking for a noted book to that effect, but (a) it's from last century and I can't remember its name and (b) I'd know it if I saw it but I can't find it on my shelves. Apologies.)


The first gospel, Mark, was written, certainly after 70 CE (Mark 13:3) and most probably after 75 CE, since its author appears to have used Josephus' report of the trial of Jesus son of Ananias / Ananus aka Jesus of Jerusalem Wars, VI 5.3, which was not available before then. That's some 40-45 years after the traditional date of the crucifixion, and like all the gospels, entirely hearsay. Clearly there was a Christian group in Jerusalem, much as Paul mentions (though Paul emphasizes that he got no information from them, and that ALL he tells you is from his vision, Galatians 1:11-12).

Anyone wishing to read a somewhat triumphalist view of the No Historical Jesus argument may enjoy David FitzGerald's Nailed.

I think that Matthew already had Jesus in Bethlehem. It was Luke that invented the bogus tax story and thus made his birth date later than that of the one in Matthew. In Matthew Herod was still alive and leader of Judea. That ended in 4 BCE. Luke has his specifically name Quirinius and his census and that occurred in 6 CE. At least ten years later.

 

[blü 2]

How is this not academic bias?

Because we have precisely zero authenticated examples of supernatural beings and events.

Alternatively, if Christian theology is in, so is Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Shinto, Buddhist, Satanism, the Nordic gods, the Great Spirit, the Rainbow Serpent, Zeus, Apollo, Athena, Aphrodite ... and so on for many pages.

 

[PearlSeeker]

How is this not academic bias?

It's not bias. It's the natural limitation of reconstructing the past. What is past is gone. You can't repeat it - you can't make experiments. All you can do is to find the most probable explanation. It doesn't mean that miracles and supernatural is impossible. It's just highly improbable.

 

[Augustus]

All Mystery religions have personal savior deities


- All saviors


- all son/daughter, never the supreme God (including Mithriasm)


- all undergo a passion (struggle) patheon


- all obtain victory over death which they share with followers


- all have stories set on earth


- none actually existed


- Is Jesus the exception and based on a real Jewish teacher or is it all made up?

That's not correct, and some of their “gods” actually did exist.


‘the variety of mystery cults makes them exceptionally difficult to summarise both briefly and accurately’.28 Consequently, the most recent attempts to define the Greek Mysteries are much more cautious and abstain from a catch- all definition.29 They usually agree that important characteristics shared by all these cults are secrecy and an emotionally impressive initiatory ritual.30 To this I would add their voluntary character (passim),31 nocturnal performance (Ch. I n. 57), preliminary purification (passim), the obligation to pay for participation (passim), rewards promised for this life and that of the next (passim), and the fact that the older Mysteries were all situated at varying distances from the nearest city (passim). With the exception of the Mithras cult (Ch. V.2), they also seem to have been open to male and female, slave and free, young and old (passim)...

In later antiquity, the Mithras cult developed a specific cosmology and soteriology, which was not a feature of the earlier Mysteries (Ch. V). This variety means that we should probably be content to stress the Wittgensteinian family resemblances of the various Mysteries rather than attempt to offer an all-encompassing definition...


when the emperor Hadrian’s much younger boyfriend Antinoos drowned in the Nile before the emperor’s very eyes in AD 130, several Mystery cults were instituted in memory of him, such as in Antinoopolis, the city that Hadrian founded on the site of the accident, in Klaudiopolis, Antinoos’ birthplace in Asia Minor, but also in Mantineia on the Greek mainland, presumably in order to gain privileges from the emperor.54 We know virtually nothing about how this new cult was organised, but it is striking that his memory was celebrated through a Mystery cult.

We are somewhat better informed about our second example: Mysteries created as part of the cult of the emperor. Not surprisingly, these new Mysteries were modelled on the most prestigious Mysteries of the ancient world, the Eleusinian Mysteries. In these imperial Mysteries, which we know only through a few inscriptions, there were singers of hymns, as in Eleusis, as well as a hiero- phant and a sebastophant, in other words, functionaries who displayed holy objects and the image of the emperor, respectively, perhaps instead of the display of a statue of Demeter as probably happened in Eleusis (Ch. I.3). There was also heavy eating and drinking, and initiation into these Mysteries was clearly not for free.55

JN Bremner - Initiation into the mystery cults of the ancient world

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

All mainstream scholars agree Jesus as demigod is a mythical savior deity. ...

Notice, Carrier is granting historicity.

<yawn>

If true, given that the historicity question focuses on historicity rather than divinity, there is nothing more to discuss. See, for example, Wikipedia>Historical Jesus which begins:​

​

The term "historical Jesus" refers to the life and teachings of Jesus as interpreted through critical historical methods, in contrast to what are traditionally religious interpretations.[1][2] It also considers the historical and cultural contexts in which Jesus lived.[3][4][5][6] Virtually all scholars of antiquity accept that Jesus was a historical figure, and the idea that Jesus was a mythical figure has been consistently rejected by the scholarly consensus as a fringe theory.[7][8][9][10][11] Scholars differ about the beliefs and teachings of Jesus as well as the accuracy of the biblical accounts, with only two events being supported by nearly universal scholarly consensus: Jesus was baptized and Jesus was crucified.[12][13][14][15]​

​

Moving on: this is interesting ...​

<yawn>

 

[Enai de a lukal]

I used to think the chances of a real historical Jesus were 50-50. Certainly there's no clincher either way, Two points in particular have changed my view to make it more likely, but by no means certain, that Jesus existed in history. The first is Ehrman's point that in the records we have, none of the early enemies of Christianity dismissed Jesus as non-existent. The second, which is based on the so-called criterion of embarrassment, is the way Jesus is recorded in all four gospels as demonstrating unrelieved aggro towards his mother in particular and his family in general (Mark 3:31-35, Mark 6:4-5, Matthew 10:35-37, Luke 11:27. John 2:3, contrast John 19:26).

One problem that remains is that the writers of the gospels, starting with Mark, had never met an historical Jesus. And that the first gospel, Mark, can be read as constructed solely from materials in the Tanakh and other writings then extant, so that arguments along these lines are available ─

The author of Matthew declared Mary to have been a virgin because the LXX in translating Isaiah 7:14 had rendered Hebrew 'almah, young woman, as parthenos, virgin (which indeed it had);​

​

He invented the unhistoric 'Taxation Census' story to get Jesus to be born in Bethlehem to “fulfill” Micah 5:2.​

​

He invented the unhistoric 'Massacre of the Innocents' story to get Jesus into Egypt to “fulfill” Hosea 11.1. (If there had been an authentic Massacre of the Innocents, it seems unlikely we'd have no other mention of it.)​

​

He absurdly sat Jesus across a foal and a donkey to ride into Jerusalem "to fulfill prophecy" (Matthew 21:2-5) in Zechariah 9.9; (and that one's otherwise inexplicable).​

Arguments have also been made that the whole design of Mark is based on narrative schemes from the Tanakh. (I've just browsed my library in vain looking for a noted book to that effect, but (a) it's from last century and I can't remember its name and (b) I'd know it if I saw it but I can't find it on my shelves. Apologies.)


The first gospel, Mark, was written, certainly after 70 CE (Mark 13:3) and most probably after 75 CE, since its author appears to have used Josephus' report of the trial of Jesus son of Ananias / Ananus aka Jesus of Jerusalem Wars, VI 5.3, which was not available before then, as his template for his trial of Jesus scene. This is some 40-45 years after the traditional date of the crucifixion, and like all the gospels, entirely hearsay. Clearly there was a Christian group in Jerusalem, much as Paul mentions (though Paul emphasizes that he got no information from them, and that ALL he tells you is from his vision, Galatians 1:11-12).

Anyone wishing to read a somewhat triumphalist view of the No Historical Jesus argument may enjoy David FitzGerald's Nailed.

Yeah certainly not a 50-50, but in my earlier days as an atheist I would have probably been more sympathetic to mythicism as an ideologically driven polemic against Christianity. Nowadays, I just view it as a distraction from more interesting questions (like who Jesus of Nazareth was, what he was really like). And I think Ehrman's point about the non-existence of early critics of Christianity arguing that Jesus didn't really exist is a good point- if there was any genuine question on this point, surely someone would have raised it- as is his point about the fact that no 1st century Jew is going to invent a story about the purported messiah having been crucified by the Romans, as I've argued here.

Obviously there are not genuine certainties when dealing with ancient history, but I do think that for the most part we can reasonably take it for granted that there was some historical counterpart to the Jesus of the Gospels; we've heard the arguments, the case for mythicism is ****-poor, and what few valid arguments have been sufficiently answered in my mind.

Now never say never, but I do think it likely that we never have any credible firsthand reports about Jesus. I think that's just something we'll have to accept, given that his associates were, apparently, illiterate peasants. But its worth noting in this connection- and in relation to mythicists bizarre claims about Paul not believing in an "Earthly Jesus"- that Paul knew Jesus's brother James. I'll take a look at David FitzGerald's argument, I would love to have a not-pitiful version of the mythicist position to work with, if you go with e.g. Carrier's version there's just nothing there to even work with.