spamandham

...whoever has the simpler (least implausibilities, not merely simplistic) argument, of course.

spin

Neither. If it's merely a matter of belief then there is no need to decide. You're not forced to. I mean, will it matter which Jesus was, real or non-real? Surely it only matters for someone who believes in Jesus: you don't want to believe something that you know is not real. To a non-believer it won't change anything. If there's not enough evidence on which to base a choice, it's better not to choose. You won't be worse off.


spin

Toto

Robert M. Price is a scholar - an evangelical turned atheist-who-still-loves-church-ritual. He is close to being a mythicist.

Richard Carrier is a scholar - a Taoist turned atheist. He is a mythicist.

If you need an authority to believe in one theory or the other, you can take your pick.

aa5874

And, don't forget the Jesus believer called Marcion. About 1800 years ago, he was one of the first Jesus believer to claim Jesus was NOT human at all, Jesus only appeared to be human.

GakuseiDon

How can you pick either of them? As far as I know, neither Price nor Carrier have ever proposed their own hypothesis for the non-historicity of Jesus, nor approved any one particular mythicist position. If this has changed, I'd be interested to hear it. They haven't published a case on-line or off-line that can be examined or questioned. All we can say is that they are mythicists. Can we ask mythicists to encourage them to make a case, so the matter can be discussed?

Toto

GDon:

Price has deconstructed the evidence that is usually proposed for the historicity of Jesus. He has only said that if there was a historical Jesus, there is no more. That's why I only described him as close to mythicism.

Carrier is writing a book as we type.

Both Carrier and Price will be at the first meeting of the Jesus Project next week.

This Project may actually advance the discussion on the issue. We will know more in about 10 days or so.

Clivedurdle

Is Jesus as the Teacher of Righteousness on their agenda? If not, why not?

GakuseiDon

I am SO looking forward to this. The intention of the Project is to "acknowledge the question [of the Jesus story] and examine it impartially--without theological or apologetic constraints". Topics include "legitimate use of non-canonical sources in reconstructing the Jesus story, the Christ-myth theories, historical, theological and value-driven approaches to the gospels".

I hope they hid the knives during the buffets. It will be a blood-bath.

Toto

I don't think it will be a blood bath. The participants mostly seem to be friends, and there are no evangelicals or adherents of the "jesus so obviously existed you must be nuts to question him" school of thought.

GakuseiDon

For those interested in what will be discussed, I found the agenda here:
http://www.centerforinquiry.net/amhe...on_an_inquiry/