rob117

Something I never understood about the mythicist position is that it makes many, many more assumptions than the much more reasonable theory that Jesus was a street preacher who got deified by his followers. The authentic letters of Paul date to within 30 years of Jesus' death. Paul claims to know people who, according to the later gospels, knew Jesus personally. And then we have Q, the earliest layer of which dates to around the same time as Paul's letters. These two sources are, IMO, the best evidence that Jesus existed as a historical figure. The mythicist argument that Paul is talking about a mythical figure from long ago has no precedent in either Q1 or the letters. Q1 is filled with references to the Kingdom of God, and generally its tone is of a cult preacher preparing his followers for something that is supposed to happen soon- in this case, the apocolypse. The letters of Paul reinforce this; references in the letters to how the churchgoers all expect Jesus to come back very soon do not fit with them worshipping a mythical figure from long ago; they fit with him being a recently-deceased religious leader who proclaimed a coming apocalypse. There is also no reason why Paul's references to "The brothers of the Lord" should not be taken at face value.

jjramsey

I'd say it is a stretch to say that Jesus' purported resurrection would tend to exclude Jesus' teaching as a reason for Paul's apocalypticism. If anything, the experiences of Jesus' disciples in the aftermath of his death, whatever they were, would be colored by what he taught, and if he taught apocalyptic, then these experiences, including the ones that led to reports of Jesus' resurrection, would likely be interpreted in those terms. In other words, Paul would be more likely to see Jesus' purported resurrection as a sign of the coming apocalypse if Jesus had himself been apocalyptic.

I disagree. HJ research gets taken in a lot of different directions, but that doesn't mean that these directions are all equally bad. Jesus as apocalyptic prophet gets a fair bit of scholarly support, and I suspect that the reason it doesn't get even more support is that Jesus the apocalyptic prophet is embarassing. Jesus as a sage is a much more pleasant Jesus. Even a Jesus as violent revolutionary has some appeal, as he can be drawn as a fighter against injustice. An apocalyptic Jesus is arguably pathetic, and so not too worthy of worship even by liberal Christians, and he is scary, because he looks too close to a religious nut for comfort.

Amaleq13

Paul never claims those people knew the living Jesus but it is assumed by "historicists".

Mythicists do not make that assumption.

The earliest layer consists of sayings attributed to Jesus and that connection is assumed by "historicists" to be reliable.

Mythicists assume the attribution to Jesus is a later development.

IMO, that depends on which assumptions you prefer.

That you do not accept the reasons does not mean they do not exist.

youngalexander

Does it? Paul is at great pains to convince his 'converts' of the truth of his message. This is particularly so after he becomes aware of rival Apostles laying claim to Jesus name and teaching another Christ. He pulls out all stops to win the case. What are they? Scripture - OT. Jesus' teachings - NO! Examples of Jesus' life - NO! Definitive and crushing Christology from the SOURCE - no?
Paul knows zip about an Historical Jesus.
Where does Paul say 'who they knew'?
Do we?
Rather a contemporary mythical figure.
I quite agree. How many brothers was that again? Did Mary produce 'the 500' or are we being more realistic in speaking of 'a brotherhood'?

manfer

It seems dear jjramsey that the smell test is like that: " everything that dont like me, then go out, dont pass the exam..." (!?)

First non smell. Jesus making a prediction that failed. What was that prediction ? , please specify at least one prediction.

Second, Eusebius not only knew to write at several styles, as counselor of Constantinus emperor, but he had a numerous writers at his orders to counterfeit the books of Flavius Josefus like " Antiquitate ebraiche" or " Giudaics wars ", and others historicians contemporary of Jesus, like Tacito, Plinius the Young, Suetonius. He also had the time to invent "rescriptus" of Trajano and Adrianus, to wrote "Martyrs acts", and "Ecclesiastic History" , and at least , althought you dont like it, sure, and dont pass the smell test, he wrote the Paul epistles ...

Eusebius was a great... counterfeiter after a man of great culture. And to not finish whithout one important explication: he, Eusebius, did it again his own will, obeing Constantinus emperor, but he left to the posteriority the chance to discover the falses on his books thanks to the acrostics knowledge.

Thanks then to Eusebius to make possible to discover that cristian religion is an entire falsification.

I cant explain more, but if you like how to Eusebius did it, all its explained on Conde book's, " Simón, opera magna".

http://www.sofiaoriginals.com/

jjramsey

Historicists aren't assuming that Paul claimed that "those people knew the living Jesus." If you are saying that historicists shouldn't believe that the people that Paul mentioned knew the HJ unless Paul says it explicitly, or that we shouldn't conclude that we see some of the same personages (such as Peter, James, etc.) in both the Gospels and Paul, then I'd say that you seem remarkably phobic of making straightforward observations.

Actually, it seems to me that you have an understandable reluctance of taking things at face value (which is not entirely a bad thing when dealing with the NT), but you take this reluctance so far that you favor tenuous and speculative connections, such as that between the Therapeutae and Christians, over straightforward ones, such the ones that indicate that James really was the biological brother of James. It is one thing to realize that things aren't always what they seem. It is another to throw out Occam's Razor.

jjramsey

Mark 9.1: "Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come with power."

Mark 13:24-27:

CaliNORML

Thanks for that info, I shall remember that.

The original story I was looking for was the source I first read of accounts other than Jesus was from Dr. Joseph Campbell's work "Mythos" where he speaks of the pre-Jesus beliefs, however due to copyrights it is unpublished online. I did not find any evidence that IIDB disowns Dr. Campbell's work, but perhaps I missed that when searching.

From Dr. Campbells teachings I also discovered the reasons for myth, tales, and stories is not the actors of them, so much as the message they contain. The theme of sacrifice is woven through out human history of spiritual teachings.

Was there a myth of sacrifice before Jesus? Yes. So thus the essence of what this particular event is meant to be for, is the understanding of that concept, despite the names, places, and time any of them take place.

This core belief in the sacrifice is what the story is trying to establish and is true no matter the main character or the setting of the event. Even the American Indians had such stories of a person who sacrifices themselves for the good of all, and as such is held up as an example of the greatest good personified.

That Jesus and Christanity came to be the most recognized of these examples does not take away from the fact that many cultures had such tales to emphasize this core element that is supposed to be the main point for the betterment of one's understanding reguarding spiritual matters.

Sacrifice and self-preservation seem to conflict, life is aggresive and seeks to survive, to do an act willingly such as sacrifice seems un-natural. These matters are addressed in stories such as Jesus' and others they only differ in the players and costumes, never in the elemental spiritual ideas that they try to convey.

KMS

TedM

This assumes that the "another Christ" is referring to another person. IMO the passage CAN BE interpreted that way, but the most reasonable interpretation is against it. Rather it is about another gospel, one referring specifically to the role of Gentiles as it pertains to the Jewish law and salvation. Since THAT is something that arguably Jesus spoke little about even in the gospels, any expectation for Paul to appeal to a historical Jesus to bolster his case (which is based on the OT) is misguided.

Regarding Q, Paul's letters have a number of general ideas that match, and some specific ideas that are close enough to indicate that Paul was aware of and agreed with certain teachings in Q. At the least I think we can conclude that the PHILOSOPHY of Paul matches the PHILOSOPHY of Q. What's missing is Paul's ATTRIBUTION of teachings to Jesus or anyone else. Not all came from the OT. Where did they come from?

This group believes that a contemporary mythical figure recently died and will come back soon. How contemporary was this mythical figure?

"Brothers of the Lord" is a unique phrase in the NT. It isn't the same as "brothers IN the Lord" or "my brother" or "brother John", or "the brothers", which is how we see metaphorical references to fellow Christians. The separate designation of James as one of these, in contrast to John and Peter in Galations seems odd. Why would James belong, but not John or Peter, also pillars? And, if this were a title, it is an extremely important one, yet Paul provides no discussion of this title or group anywhere in his writings, and nothing has remained in the early Church traditions of this very important group. What happened to them? How did the "brothers of the Lord" die out without any mention or attempt to carry on such an important title? And, why is the earliest tradition only SUPPORTIVE of the most natural way to interpret the phrase--as a biological brother, especially when to do so was highly embarrasing to the establishment since it created a difficult scenario in which the perpetual virginity of Jesus' mother was called into question? Why wouldn't the establishment have simply changed the phrase or put in the "title" explanation in the documents? A simple change would have eliminated a very big problem. All of these IMO argue more stronly for the phrase as being read at face value than those against.

ted

Doug Shaver

It would help if you were more specific. I don't know which Christians you're referring to. They certainly were not all thinking alike during the early centuries.

The earliest known Christian writings are Paul's, and he gives no hint as to how long the religion had been around before he joined it. It was at least a generation later, if not two or three, before any Christian writer put Jesus into an unambiguous first-century historical context. And when they did that, they portrayed him as an embodiment of Jewish ideals. Of course it was a Christian reinterpretation of Judaism, but one objective probably was to establish a basis for claiming antiquity.