Elijah

Is it the one guy’s book you are citing or the article itself? What’s the evidence that convinced you that Confucius was mythical? Any reason to believe he’s not just trying to make a name with a theory that he knows that there isn’t significant evidence to dispute it? e.g. No evidence is my evidence, Constantine invented it.

Pretty obscure theory but it’s nice to know what level of evidence would be necessary to convince a myther.

avi

Yes, precisely.
Millions and hundreds of millions of people agree with you.
I do not.
We return then to evidence, subject of this thread.
Where is the evidence that the supposedly itinerant rabbi from Bethlehem existed, let alone performed various miracles?

There is nothing wrong with proclaiming to the world your belief, based upon faith, but that belief ought not be confounded with conclusions derived from evidence. The subject of this thread is not whether you personally accept Jesus as your savior, or whether or not Jesus was "the messiah". The subject of this thread is whether or not the FACT that there exists no evidence for Jesus' life, proves that he could not have existed.

I argue, simplistically, that, like the remote sans battery, we cannot conclude something definitive, absent data. Absence of human footprints in India, neither supports, nor refutes the hypothesis that Ganesha is a mythical creature. "Falsification" of that hypothesis would have occurred in writing, fraudulently, that Ganesha possesses hoofs, rather than human feet.

avi

How does one ascertain either one?

There is no data for Jesus. Second and third hand accounts of the man's life, as is also the scenario for KongZi, led Toto to propose that the latter's existence was similarly mythical. At least for KongZi, however, one has documents authored by people with names, accurate dates of authorship, and an unbroken historical record, with purported birth place, family history, and so on, i.e. without requirement to invoke supernatural prescriptions to explain KongZi's presence, his life's work, or his contribution to society.

aa5874

That is exactly what I thought. You think you know the truth, so you do not need any corroborative information to support your belief.

This makes no sense. You already know and can verify that there is a geographical area called America. America is on the map.

Your post is absurd.

I am not claiming that Judaea does not exist because Jesus was a myth.

Many writers of antiquity, including the NT, the church writers, Jews, and others wrote about a place called Judaea, however only so-called Jesus believers wrote about Jesus.

Jesus was just a belief, a myth.

aa5874

Why did you put me in the wrong time machine? Can you please put me in a 4th century time machine?

I just want to talk to Eusebius. He will tell me about Ignatius, Clement, Paul, Luke, Mark, John, Matthew, James, Jude, Philemon, Peter, and Timothy.

Elijah

I don’t claim that he performed miracles. The evidence is in the written and oral tradition surrounding Jesus. A skeptic can dismiss it as not credible because of xy and z but it’s still evidence of his existence.
Oh heaven forbid I mention anything out of the scope of the OP. I was just responding to your claim of no messiah.
Sure there is data in the NT but you’re going to have to understand the political and philosophical context of what’s going on so.

Elijah

No I know I’m never going to know the truth in regards to someone who lived 2000 years ago that so much has been written about so I choose the most likely scenario based on the evidence and my experience. You are choosing a much much less probable scenario that has no evidence supporting it because of wishful thinking on your part.
I even made a note explaining the difference and you still didn’t get it.
No you are saying Jesus doesn’t exist because people wrote things about him that couldn’t be possible which is an illogical conclusion.
Comparing the evidence of the existence of a man to a country without considering the temporal factor is nuts.

You should expect only the immediate followers to talk about a peasant who was executed. Why would there be anything written about him until his cult grew into something worth writing about?
That’s just your belief that you can’t support with evidence or probability.

Doug Shaver

Ever heard of ring species? I believe they disprove that assertion.

bacht

The written material seems to support your second point here, that Christian authors didn't have anything to say about Jesus' life until after the first apostles were gone, late in the 1st C.

Trying to judge "probability" in this case is challenging I think. We're talking about a person who was the incarnation of God, a radical and possibly unique claim in human history. But we can't restrict ourselves to the reports of believers, this would be one-sided in any examination of an ancient figure.

Elijah

How does ring species disprove species? As I've said the fuzziness of the term species doesn't disprove species or a first to a species.

The probability of him being God incarnate as in genie god stuff that is heard often today is zero, the probability that he is based on a historical core is pretty good since the alternative isn't common nor supported.