Originally Posted by rlogan

You just need to organize your thinking about this.

Logically, if Jesus did not exist then nothing that depends on that existence did either.

So therefore there were no direct disciples. There was no virgin Mary or Joseph.

But to leap to nonexistence of John the Baptist isn't warranted. His existence does not depend at all upon Jesus existing and we have Josephus mentioning him.

It is furthermore pretty unremarkable to have a "Baptizer". There just isn't anything extraordinary to question.

Pilate, or for that matter cities and geographic settings are requirements for any fable that is attempting to situate itself in "reality". You don't question the existence of a city simply because it is mentioned in a novel.

Originally Posted by bacht

Doesn't this depend on whether we define Jesus as an earthly prophet or as a heavenly Christ? Couldn't there have been early believers without a "real" teacher on the scene? It's not a great leap from believing in a messiah or two like the DSS.

Originally Posted by Chili

Jesus was not a teacher but just a guy trying to get his ass out of purgatory (there called Galilee) and he showed us exactly how to do it in the NT. The reason for the NT was that too many Jews got lost there and died nonetheless. Matthew shows us how and why this happens, which then is the reason and purpose for Matthew to be part of the NT.

It was written a couple hundred years later so the reader could not trace the real life existence of this particular Jesus to a certain Jew in history, and further, it is important to let all skeletons die because much goes on in the life of a wily carpenter who's life was scarlet with the stain of sin or he would not have a cross to be crucified on.

Originally Posted by bacht

I agree that dating the NT materials is tricky, but I don't agree that there was a real carpenter at the root of it all. If Jesus was just a clever guy, why did he become equal to God? Why not just a prophet, as the Muslims would have it?

I don't know where the cross idea came from. I don't read Greek, is the word for "cross" similar to the word "christ"? In other words, did the symbol precede the name?

Originally Posted by Chili

Joseph was not a carpenter either but since carpenters are known to make many things with their own hands the idea of being a carpenter is a good metaphor to identify the great sinner called to display this event.

It is based on "all is created in sin" wherefore creators of things must be sinners and this is only true because the primary premiss of the idea to create something is always inspired to make us co-creator at best and therefore guilty of sin as usurper of the creator by whom, in whom, and with whom we actually created the thing.

Originally Posted by bacht

Uh, okay. God is the ultimate creator yes? Are you saying that when men imitate God they are sinning? I don't quite follow your point (is Satan lurking in this picture somewhere?)