CX

Hmmm...I ahve to agree with Polycarp. You present yourself as rather biased by saying no theists should respond, regardless of the fact that a theist may believe that Jesus is the son of god, that is a matter of faith not evidence whereas some of the things you mention above are matters of evidence. There are plenty of intelligent theists out floating around and there are some here. So a priori dismissing arguments from a theist isn't terribly intellectually honest.

Anyway I don't have a dog in this fight, but I am inclined to think Jesus really existed and not all the mythos of Xianity is derivative from sources outside Judaism. And some of it originates with Xian sources. The problem with relating Xian theology to pagan sources is manifold. Firstly where the mystery cults are concerned we have very little information owing to the exclusive nature of such cults. Secondly it is often very difficult to tell the direction of dependence (i.e. is Xianity dependent on paganism or is paganism dependent on Xianity). Lastly, very often dilletante authors with a particular agenda (both theistic and nontheistic) have a strong propensity for overstating the case and for confirmation bias. If you strongly believe that Xianity is derived entirely from pagan sources that is the evidence you'll find. Regarding the overstating, a lot of the stuff I've read draws very strong parallels where they are really quite tenuous and could be coincidental. For example I regularly see claims that the Jesus myth was derived entirely from mithraism. This is just plain silly since the difference in the two are far more dramatic than the similarities. Also sometimes people conflate different pagan theologies like taking bits from Krishna and Mithras and the Sol Invicti cult etc. and weaving them together into Xian theology. This strikes me as very post hoc.

Were Jews and later Xians influenced by the cultures around them? Certainly, that much is obvious and not terribly astonsihing or controversial. Are Judaism and Xianity derived entirely from other sources? This claim is extraordinary and would require extraordinary evidence which I frankly have not seen. I do note that noone makes this claim for any dead religions (i.e. Norse mythology is so obviously a complete rip-off of indo-aryan practices.) That people do it with Xianity to me points to some ridiculous desire to undermine Xianity as a religion. I see no need for that. That Xianity is a human invention seems clear to me. Why waste time trying to make it something it isn't unless one is insecure in one's position?

Undercurrent

Having read the entire book, I can say I find the conclusions interesting, but not so compelling that I would accept them completely without further research. I do believe the authors claim, however, that Jesus probably never really existed and is merely the Jewish version of a mythos that existed before the alledged events of the bible, and had been transcribed onto the deities of other regions as well.

Roughly speaking, the idea is that there were mystery religions which had their own stories which they didn't regard as really literally true, so much as useful teaching tools. When they established branches of their "church" in other lands, they'd attribute the actions of the hero of their legend to a minor local god. In the case of the Jews, who didn't have at that time any minor local gods, to the hero Joshua.

Later, through some creative numerology, the name was changed to the Greek IESOUS, the allegory was forgotten, and one sect of the Jewish version of the mystery cult decided that all their story was literally true and that all of the other sects were infidels. Then they took over and wiped the other sects out.

One thing the book does make clear is that the early christian church was much, much more diverse in both its aceptence of scriptures and interpretation of scripture than today's churches are, and that the ``official'' history of christianity as one god-man who started a faith that slowly grew despite persecution until, by persuasion, it was accepted across the Roman Empire, is wishful thinking at best, and at worst blatant historical revisionism for purposes of poilitical gain.

One would think that if the christian religion had died out in the third century, rather than being a major relion today, finding a sigle icon of a crucified man with a name other than "Jesus" on it would lead most people to accept that the religion had non-christian roots.

m.

Vorkosigan

Are Judaism and Xianity derived entirely from other sources? This claim is extraordinary and would require extraordinary evidence which I frankly have not seen. I do note that noone makes this claim for any dead religions (i.e. Norse mythology is so obviously a complete rip-off of indo-aryan practices.)

I ran aground on the grammar here. Did you leave out a negative somewhere? Or by "this claim" do you mean that nobody claims their religion is free from foreign influences.

I thought Dumezil had written extensively on the Indo-Aryan roots of the Norse religions....

Michael

Pantera

What makes you think that only theists regard the Josephus references as being genuine? Have a read of <a href="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/testimonium.html" target="_blank">Peter Kirby's examination of the issue</a> for instance - he regards at least the shorter of the two references as confirmation of the historicity of Jesus. Lest you regard him as biased, the II hosts his <a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/peter_kirby/tomb/index.shtml" target="_blank">argument against the historicity of the empty tomb story</a>.

CX

I'm not inclined to comment on the rest, but this part here is absolute crap. No offense. Having studied Koine Greek it is trivially obvious that IHSOUS (not the way you spelled it incidentally) is a straight transliteration of the Hebrew name Yeshu'a (transliterated directly to English as Joshua), No numerology needed. For me this casts serious doubt on the rest of your post. The statement above is just silly, do you have a reference for it? (I haven't been following all the posts in this thread that closely).

CX

Obviously I used a very poor example. I have no knowledge of Norse mythology aside from some of the main deities. My point is people don't go to such incredible lengths to say that something like Zoroastrianism, for example, is completely derivative and that no such person as Zoroaster ever existed. It might be hypothesized I don't know, but people sometimes seem hell bent on showing that there is no original theology in Xianity and that Jesus must have been a fictional person. Of further note, though technically a backhanded argument from authority, is the fact that no real biblical scholar who publishes in peer reviewed journal supports the mythical Jesus hypothesis.

lpetrich

What Dumezil had written about was their shared ancestral-Indo-European origins.

It's been concluded that many of the languages of Europe and India are descended from some ancestral language, in the fashion of the Romance languages being descended from Latin.

It's been possible to reconstruct a fair amount of Proto-Indo-European, as it's been called, but the easiest-to-reconstruct features are relatively dull features like basic vocabulary and grammar, and not the more culturally-interesting sort of vocabulary.

Even so, some interesting progress has been made over the decades. The ancestral IE speakers had been acquainted with dogs, cows, pigs, sheep, and horses, though not cats. They were also acquainted with wheels, axles, yokes, yoke poles, and they had a word for conveying by vehicle. They had been acquainted with some sort of metal, but they were unaware of iron. Likewise, they were unaware of writing; as with iron, words for it were invented several times and sometimes borrowed.

From these and other clues, a plausible IE homeland and time has been deduced: 4500-3500 BCE just north of the Black Sea. Which makes their religion some very old-time religion. What can be deduces about it?

One difficulty is that they show no evidence of exclusivism; their descendants often adopted the religions of those they conquered in addition to theirs. However, there's been a limited amount of progress at guessing what their religion was like.

Though they very likely worshipped several deities, the only big deity name that survives is one which may be translated as "Father Sky". But there are hints of others, such as a god of thunder and war who rides a chariot pulled by goats, who wields an ax, and who fights a snake monster of drought. His name varies, however, being Thor among Germanic speakers and Indra in India. Thor is likely derived from a word for "thunder" ("The Thunderer") and Indra is likely derived from a word for "man" ("The Man").

Dumezil's great contribution to IE studies is his proposal of a three-function ideology:

• Command
• Force
• Nourishment

A good literary rendition of it is the Judgment of Paris, in which the three goddesses offer various gifts:

• Rule of much of the known world
• Superior military prowess
• The love of the most beautiful woman in the world

Father Sky is doubtless in the Command function; that function is sometimes split between two deities, a guardian of law and agreements, and a more cosmic, mysterious one who is associated with sorcery.

I wonder if you people might be interested in a Kiosk article describing this really old-time religion; it would be an interesting illustration of the longevity of a religion now almost universally considered to be false.

Pantera

Disclaimer: I have not read the book - my (extensive) university library does not appear to think it is worth stocking, and I do not intend to shell out money for it at this time. However, the summaries I have read indicate that it does indeed make the glaring omission which I am about to criticise. Please correct me if it does actually offer an extensive treatment of the issue.

I would be a lot more inclined to take this sort of book seriously if they did not normally completely ignore what is by far the most obvious source of borrowing for the tales about Jesus - the Jewish scripture. Consider...

Isaac, Samson and Samuel were all born to old or infertile women. John the Baptist was born to an old and infertile woman. Jesus was born to a virgin. (Gen 17, Judges 13, 1Sam 1, cf Matt 1, Luke 1)

Ismael's mother was visited by an angel, who predicted the child's future and told her what name to give him, as was Jesus' mother.. (Gen 16, cf Luke 1)

The birth of Isaac is announced by God to Abraham. God predicts the child's future and tells Abraham what name to give the child. The birth of Jesus was announced to Joseph by an angel, who predicted the child's future and told him what name to give the child. (Gen 17, cf Matt 1)

Samson's mother was visited by an angel who announced the birth of her son and predicted the child's future, as was Jesus' mother. (Judges 13, cf Luke 1)

Moses escaped from a mass extermination of children, as did Jesus (Exodus 1-2, cf Matt 2)

Elijah fed a family for a long time with a small jar of flour. Elisha fed a hundred men with twenty barley loaves, with food left over. Jesus fed five thousand with five barley loaves and two fish, with food left over. (1Kings 17, 2Kings 4, cf John 6 etc.)

Elijah raised a widow's son from the dead, as did Jesus. (1Kings 17, cf Luke 7)

Elijah ascended into heaven, as did Jesus. (2Kings 2, cf Luke 24 etc.)

Jesus cried "My god, my god, why have you forsaken me, as did one of the characters in the Psalms. (Psalm 22, cf Mark 15)

These are just a few of the obvious ones which spring to mind. I'm sure a thorough search would turn up many more.

Now, since Christianity grew out of Judaism, simple parsimony suggests that the first place to look for the Gospel writers' influences should be the Jewish scripture. And indeed, many (most?) of the more obviously mythical additions to the life of Jesus have strong parallels in Hebrew mythology. There is no obvious need to scour obscure Roman cults (or, ridiculously, Indian mythology like Buddha and Krishna) for possible signs of borrowing - there is a much more obvious source staring us right in the face. What do the authors make of these parallels? Do they think they are greater or lesser than the parallels between the stories of Jesus and those of Mithras and Horus? What criteria do they use to answer these questions? Or do they, as it appears to me they do, simply ignore these issues completely?

This is not, of course, to deny the possibility, or even the probability, that there was some flow of ideas between Christianity and Roman mystery cults. However, to look for the Gospel writer's influences solely in the mystery cults while completely ignoring much more obvious sources for mythical tales is not the action of people who are genuinely interested in uncovering truth, and more the actions of people who are interested in finding support for their own pre-concieved ideas.

The claim that Jesus was an entirely mythical person created whole cloth from Roman mystery cults is a pretty extraordinary one - any good skeptic should exercise a healthy degree of skepticism when evaluating it.

Pantera

I suppose Anunnaki may well dismiss anything Bede has to say out of hand, but in his review <a href="http://www.tektonics.org/TF.JM_060960581X.html" target="_blank">here</a> Bede does make some accusations which should be very easy to check, and which if true would be serious indeed. Perhaps Anunnaki could indulge my curiosity and check whether they are correct or not.

Do Gandy and Freke really assert that "no serious scholar" believes that Josephus wrote any of the Testimonium? If so, I'm afraid this is an outright lie, and by making such an assertion they would more or less give up their claim to be taken seriously on the spot. Unless they are really suggesting that Crossan, Meier, Brown, Ehrman and many others (many of them no friends of orthodox Christianity) are not serious scholars, which would be pretty rich coming from two people without a peer-reviewed paper between them.

Kirby survys views on Josephus <a href="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/testimonium.html" target="_blank">here</a>

Are we to assume that the ten books mentioned from the last 20 years were written by scholars less serious than Freke and Gandy?

Do they really quote from Collosians and Ephesians to establish what Paul thought of Jesus, while elsewhere accepting the modern, liberal view that these letters are probably not genuine Pauline epistles? If so, this would have to be either serious incompetence or downright dishonesty.

Do they really support many of their parallels with references only to hundred year old works? Scholarship has moved on a lot since then - were they unable to find any modern works (or better still, primary sources) to support the same point? If so, the point should at the very least be treated with skepticism. If they relied on 100 year old scholarship extensively to the exclusion of modern works, their whole thesis would start to look very shaky indeed.

Undercurrent

Well let's see. The title of the thread is "The Jesus Mysteries", and my post discusses the thesis of "The Jesus Mysteries", therefore it only stands to reason that the source of the material is, "The Jesus Mysteries."

To wit, from page 116 of said book:

The book itself is heavily footnoted and makes reference at the end to a 1993 work of D. Fidler (although at present I am at a loss to dig through the many pages of end notes to find the approprate title) and R. Eisler's study of the gematria of the Jesus story (1920), 119. I haven't read either of these, but if you have an issue with the scholarship (that is, above and beyond the assertion that it is "silly") of the statement, you ought to look there.

Additionally, I doubt that the author's decision to transliterate the greek eta by sound as "e" rather than by glyph as "H" is a terribly damning difference.

m.

[ December 23, 2001: Message edited by: Michael ]</p>