aa5874

I may not be able to answer your questions right now, but I find it a bit odd that, if your hypothesis is true, Eusebius and Constantine would write four Jesus stories with different chronologies of events and even have different versions of Jesus, himself.

GMark's Jesus is fundamentally different to gJohn's Jesus and gMatthew and gLuke do not agree on the time of birth, where Jesus lived as a child, genealogy or even the words of Jesus during crucifixion.

These major discrepancies in the four Jesus stories of the NT tend to indicate to me that it was likely that each Jesus story was already known, written and used seperately by different sect of Jesus believers, and then sometime later, the Church took control of four Jesus stories and made them official documents that were made to appear to originate from the Church since the 1st century.

aa5874

But what about "Historical scholarship" who are committed Christians and already are committed to the notion that Jesus MUST have existed?

How many of "Historical scholarship" pray to Jesus and/or His Father on a daily basis?

It is unlikely that a Christian would claim Jesus did not exist and still remain a Christian, and maybe many of "Historical scholarship" are Christians, perhaps the majority.

It is a concensus among Christians that Jesus existed.

cogitans

That must be it. Historians are just Christians in disguise!

Toto

I don't know anyone who is committed to the notion that Jesus never existed. I know people who have reached that conclusion based on their view of the evidence, but most would be willing to change their mind given new evidence.

cogitans

People are entitled to their view of the evidence. The question is whether others should grant their view of the evidence as a valid one.

But by all means, if someone can in fact fulfill the burden of proof at hand, it would be a most welcome feat!

mountainman

My take is that Jesus was invented in the fourth century. I have assembled every single archaeological citation mentioned in the literature available to me at present that has been used in the discussion of the ancient historical origins of christianity prior to the rise of Constantine. It is a page called The Early Christian Epigraphic Habit.

If you are looking for the evidence listed citation by citation have a read of that list and ask me a question. As far as I can determine, there is no evidence to be examined before its explosion c.312 CE.

Best wishes,


Pete

aa5874

It would seem that you want Jesus to exist by default.

Let me ask you a question. If an entity does not exist, what evidence would you expect to prove its non-existence?

If it is truly a fact that Unicorns did not exist, what evidence or information would you provide to prove Unicorns did not exist?

Would the evidence, by any chance, be Nothing, that is no-one, so far, has been able to come up with any credible information from any source. There are no genuine photographs of Unicorns, there are no Unicorns in any Zoo, there is NOTHING at all on real Unicorns.

You have proven your case beyond any reasonable doubt. Unicorns do not exist.

Now, if it is true that Unicorns do in fact exist, what evidence or information would you provide to show that there are real Unicorns?

Would you just use the description of Unicorns as evidence? I don't think so. The description of a Unicorn is not evidence of its existence, the description only allows us to identify a Unicorn when it can be found.

Now, this is the fatal flaw of those who propagate that Jesus of the NT did exist, they ERRONEOUSLY have been using the description of Jesus as evidence.

Consider the following: I am looking for evidence of the existence of Jesus of Nazareth, his mother was called Mary, his father was believed to be Joseph. He was thought to have carried out miracles and it is claimed he was crucified and his body has not been found or it is said he resurrected, sometime in the 1st century during the reign of Tiberius. This Jesus is described at lenght in the NT.

Do you have any credible evidence or information about this person I described to prove he existed?

cogitans

:rolling::rolling::rolling::rolling::rolling:

What a rambling, inane diatribe. You have more of a talent for producing drivel than you have for pretending to be a historian.

I really, really hope this stuff isn't representative for the level of "scholarship" in this forum.

mountainman

Until that time arrives Toto to my mind we are dealing with a fourth century fiction and as such - from the perspective of the field of ancient history - I am quite committed to the notion that Jesus never existed as such before the rise of Constantine who published Him Lavishly far and wide.

Clerk Jesus Kent Toto is my euphemistic way of saying that IMHO Toto, although Apollonius of Tyana was an historic personage, the character of Jesus never existed, and never assumed a human form prior to the appearance of the new testament literature, and its anti-particles - the non-conanical NT literature. At that stage (C14 = 4th century) Jesus became a politically real historical character, and my comments about the words of Arius stand.


Best wishes,


Pete

Ben C Smith

Thankfully, it is not.

Ben.