Rick Van Vliet

The historical Jesus (Gospel of Thomas) never claimed to be the Messiah. And in Mark, it was supposed to be a big secret.

Yeah, the entire country was seething with revolt. Anyone that drew a crowd, much less claimed to be the king, was quickly killed by the Romans and the Roman appointed, Roman flunkie, High Priest and Sanhedrin. After all, first thing Herod did after the Romans appointed him, was kill 2/3 of the Sanhedrin. They got the message.

show_no_mercy

No, it does not. It's no more evidence that a Spiderman comic alone demonstrates there was a historical Peter Parker. In both cases it's an author writing about a character putting some sayings in his mouth.


We have primary evidence for the existence of Josephus - we have writings written by him. We have no writings from the main character of the Christian religion. So your assertion that we have more evidence for Jesus than we have of Josephus is false.

bacht

So the most paper wins? You're gonna get a lot of challenges on this one :eating_popcorn:

Rick Van Vliet

Ok, what do you consider evidence someone like Socrates or Josephus existed?

Rick Van Vliet

Comic relief.

The oldest copy we have of Josephus was written down 1000 years after he lived. And every version we have of Josephus passed through the hands of the Christian Church.

We have a wealth of things 1000 year older about Jesus, that never passed through the hands of the Christians.

Other than the Christians and Christian versions of Jospehus, your "writings" confirming the existance of Josephus are?

Doug Shaver

Well, it seems to work for Christian apologists.

bacht

Wasn't Josephus a client of the Flavians Vespasian and Titus? I don't know the references but I thought he was mentioned by other writers, either Roman or Jewish (?)

Were all his writings fabricated later by Christians? If so, why wouldn't they have added more than one reference to Jesus and one reference to his "brother" James? Jewish War has none at all, and nothing about John the Baptist, Peter, Paul or any other NT characters.

Surely the pro-Roman stance of Josephus would be a natural fit with the pro-Roman New Testament writers? Yet both camps seemingly ignored each other.

Rick Van Vliet

Jews and Samaritans often quoted the Torah and Jews the Jewish Bible. It does not indicate that they didn't say it.

But yes, not likely the historical Jesus believed in turning the other cheek. The followers of Paul/Christians of course said Paul should be forgiven.

Rick Van Vliet

The militant atheists, wallowing in ignorance, were claiming the lack of existing paper from the time and place of Jesus meant he didn't exist.

Just pointing out their blind ignorance of the elementary historical fact that no paper exists for virtually anyone from that far back.

Hope that helps sort it out.

Rick Van Vliet

He was definitely mentioned by the early Christians, but they believed in the existance of Jesus a lot more than they believed in the existance of Josephus.

No, there really was a Josephus, and he did write several things. The Christians probably removed more about Jesus than they added. It's not just Jesus and James that's mentioned in Antiquities, and not mentioned in The Jewish War. Josephus also doesn't mention John the Baptist, and the Fourth Way. In Antiquities, Jospehus blames the Fourth Way for the entire Jewish War, says it's all their fault, but in The Jewish War, he never mentions them. All of the writings of Josephus are Roman propaganda, but The Jewish War was right after the Jewish war and it was pure propaganda. Leaving Jesus out tends to support Eisenman's opinion that the followers of Jesus were heavily involved in the Jewish War.

One can argue, that Mark got most of his narrative, starting with Jesus' appearance in Jerusalem, including the trial, up to the cross, from Josephus. There is an almost identical story of the trial of Jesus about another Jesus, another prophet marshalling his forces on the Mt. of Olives, only to be surprised by a Roman night attack, a leader of the Jewish people, buried in a cave for 3 days, thought to be dead, only to arise when the women came to do the last rites, etc.