Amaleq13

Since you seem to have missed it when it was provided earlier:

Paul and his older contemporary, Jesus.

jackal5096

Jesus needed a reason not to exist?

Some of my reasons: (many coming form Earl Doherty)

Paul's ignorarnce of a corporeal Jesus walking around just a generation earlier.

Paul's claim in Colossians 1:25-26 of receiving his ministry from God to complete the word of God, which, according to Paul, was a mystery for ages and past generations.

Many of the sayings or teachings of Jesus found in the gospels appearing to be equivalent to statements of Paul, yet Paul never attributes his statement to any Jesus.

The fact that GMatthew and GLuke had to plagarize Mark and Q.

That GMark appears more like a literary work (a play by or in the style of Seneca?) than a narrative, including the appearance of an underlying chiastic structure

That Bishop Ignatius, in his letter to the Smrynians, praises them for being "persuaded" to remain faithful, and cites as evidence for a fleshy Jesus the prophets, the law of Moses, the Gospel (singular) and the martyrdom of the church leaders. He doesn't plea to any eyewitness testimony, even though he was associated with Polycarp, who was allegedly a disciple of the Apostle John.

The fact that it quickly became a fad to write a "gospel" about Jesus, such as the infancy gospels, the gnostic gospels, etc.

That's just a few, off the top of my head.

spamandham

Possibly, but it also means Paul's Jesus could have walked the earth in Paul's distant past rather than his recent past (in reality or simply in Paul's mind).

I reviewed the link Amalaq provided above, and the only point I see that I think is significant is this one:

(originally by Ben C.)
5. Paul writes that God sent forth his son to redeem those under the law in the fullness of time (Galatians 4.4). It is easier to suppose that, for Paul, the fullness of time had some direct correspondence to the end of the ages (1 Corinthians 10.11) than to imagine that the fullness of time came, Jesus died, and then everybody had to wait another long expanse of time for the death to actually apply to humanity.

The 'fullness of time' might be a reference to the beginning of the new age of Pisces, and if so, then Ben might be right. It might also be a reference to some expectation of when the Jewish messiah would return based on Daniel's 70 weeks (I seem to recall Carrier suggesting that there was an expectation of the return during the reign of Pilate due to calculations based on Daniel). If that's what it means, then Ben may also has a point.

However, I'm not convinced the point is strong, because both of these scenarios would also be satisfied by the mere appearance of Jesus (in vision form as Paul admits to), and need not involve a recent earthly existence. Paul refers to Jesus as existing at the beginning of time (in spirit), as well as Paul's present (in spirit), and Paul refers to Jesus appearing to Paul in vision form and revealing secrets to him (Paul). Paul also makes statements that place Jesus on earth ('born of a woman', etc). Paul's Jesus is a complex entity, so that has to be considered.

I can imagine Paul's position as (A):
1. Jesus lived on earth in the foggy distant past like all the other mythical heros running around, and...
2. Jesus appeared recently to Paul and his contemporaries in vision form to fulfill Daniel's 70 weeks, and/or the new age of Pisces.

I see this as more likely than (B):
1. Paul viewed Jesus as a recent historical figure, yet...
2. never says anything explicitly about that in his abundant writings, and...
3. Paul's Jesus has a striking similarity to Isaiah's suffering servant

Point 2 here requires more guesswork as to what is going on in Paul's mind than A does, IMHO. The various MJ ideas are not going to go away until this anomaly in Paul's writings can be explained inductively rather than with apologetics or anachronisms.

Why are the striking similarities between Isaiah 53 and the very few things Paul has to say about Jesus ignored so in this discussion? If there were no modern Christians, I think this point alone might be a slam dunk for concluding that Jesus either never existed at all, or if he did, any memory of it was long since lost to the ravages of time even by Paul, such that Paul saw fit to reconstruct the foggy memory from the Jewish scriptures to fill in details.

DBT

It's nothing definite, and it's not even about what Paul wrote, only that he was living at the earliest period in the formation of Christianity - as 'Saul' he was persecuting Christians- as it was virtually in the time of 'Christ' it suggests to me that there may have been a historical figure around whom the myth grew.
You can see much the same process at work now (perhaps to a lesser degree) in relation to certain religious leaders, charismatic preachers, guru's, etc. Occasionally one may get lucky...and a new religion is born.

spamandham

To me, this merely implies that Paul does not directly contradict the idea of a recent historical Jesus. I agree with that, but neither does he directly affirm it. That's what's puzzling. He writes a few tidbits that may indicate a vague historical figure, intermigled among a vast quantity of spiritual ideas that overshadow.

DBT

Who knows what the truth is.
But a historical figure as the basis for the Christ myth seems likely. We do have examples of this odd deification process of charismatic individuals even in modern times...

Stephen T-B

"Sorry but the burden of proof is always on the accuser, not the accused." (Knupfer).
This needs clarification: is Jesus being accused of being the son a god? Or accused on not being the son of a god?

Generally, people are accused of being something rather than of not being something: thieves are accused of being thieves, murderers of being murderers, cheats of being cheats. Would one expect to see a card player stand up suddenly, sweep the cards and bets to the floor and, pointing at another player, shout "I ACCUSE YOU OF NOT CHEATING!"?

Jesus can, perhaps be accused of fibbing: I mean, all that stuff about being tempted in the desert by Satan is pretty unbelievable, especially as no tower - regardless of how high - could give a vew of all the kingdoms on Earth.
When he refers to "my father in heaven" is he, in fact, claiming a special relationship; did he not teach that all are the children of his god?


"Jesus has made his case. (Knupfer)
He did?
Or was it made by others - specifically Paul - on his behalf?

"...atheists always try to avoid the fact that they have absolutely no evidence for their beliefs so they are imaginary beliefs. And that, my friend, is a fact" (Knupfer).

Wrong.

The evidence for my belief that god doesn't exist is that when I asked said god for some pretty basic guidance, it wasn't provided. I thought, at the time, that that was because
a) this god wasn't interested in me
or
b) that it doesn't exist outside the human imagination.

Then, when I considered the great range of Christians - all of them supposed to be worshipping the same god and following that god's admonitions - and how they differed in what they thought was important and how they should behave, it was quite clear to me that they were, in fact, worshipping a multitute of gods - each fashioned to suit its particular devotees.
This would be explained if the gods were fashioned by human beings in their own image.
If the gods are, indeed, figments of the imagination.

spamandham

Of course it's possible that there was a historical figure of some kind who could reasonably be called the historical Jesus. And we are all open to gauge the liklihoods of such positions as we see fit.

But, if the deification of historical figures factors into such odds, it seems that the deification of fictional characters should as well. Of greatest significance, are period similarities.

Doug Shaver

Did any of those examples occur in a Jewish mileu?

At any time in history, has any Jewish group ever deified any charismatic individual who lived contemporaneously with them?

TomboyMom

Apparently you don't mind assuming what you're trying to prove. Are you by chance a Christian apologist?