Malachi151

From what I understand of this case basically, here we have the favorite lover of an emperor, hundreds of statues of whom were erected by the emperor after he died.

He likely because worshiped as a god because there were so many statues of him, and at that time these types of statues are how gods were depicted.

It seems that because he was the favorite lover the emperor, he was depicted as a god in statues, and was accepted as one because of the memorials built to him.

Malachi151

gstafleu: What you are saying now is different from the OP.

I agree that depicting these deities as "real" or even earthly did happen in many cases, what I don't agree to is that there was any need for Jesus son of Ananias to be integrated in order to make the story more acceptable, or that ben Ananias forms any kind of HJ "core".

Solo

Oh, so do I, Gerard, so do I.

Jiri

Ted Hoffman

There is no reliable or irrefutable evidence supporting the existence of a historical Jesus.

Chris Weimer

Please define your terms.

Ted Hoffman

Reliable extra-Biblical Evidence that indicates that there was a man known as Jesus in the early first century Judea, who walked around with a gang of 12 men, who claimed he was the messiah and threw moneychangers out of the temple and who was crucified under the procuratorship of Pontius Pilate.
The keyword here is "reliable" - that means a source whose author was writing history (as best as he/she could) and not suspected of being interpolated and all.
Plain and simple.

Chris Weimer

First case of shifting goalposts.

Why does he have to do all these things? What if everything else could be verified except the throwing of the moneychangers out of the temple?

There are plenty of historians who have written about Jesus Christ whose works are without interpolations. Michael Grant, for one.

A bit too simple. Perhaps you'd like to tweak it a bit?

gstafleu

Aren't we back here at the question of how much "gospel stuff" one should attribute to an HJ before he counts? Let's say, for argument's sake, that Mark did use JbA as a source for some story elements, but then added the gang of twelve, for example because he wanted something to relate to the twelve tribes of Israel (or for some other reason, pick your choice). Would JbA then count as an HJ? I suggest the only way in which he then would not count as an HJ would be to come up, as you did, with some set of gospel stuff that any valid HJ must have. But what are the criteria that establish that set?

Or perhaps there is a criterion that there can only be only one HJ? The scenario above leaves open the possibility of multiple HJs. Anything wrong with that?

Gerard Stafleu