Sheshbazzar

As I attempted to get across in previous posts, the distinction is of -when- one chooses to place the beginnings of "Christ-ianity".
The Greek term "christos" had been in use by the Greek speaking JEWS even before 300BC, and was used in The LXX for "anointed" and in Daniel for "THE Anointed"
("Ho' CHRISTOS") "The CHRIST".
They ( the JEWS) then believed that "Ho' CHRISTOS" = "THE CHRIST", was the one whom YHWH would send to defeat all of Israel's enemies, and that "The CHRIST" would rule over all the nations.
This was hundreds of years before the official establishment of the separatist religion of "Christ-ianity" in the 1st century.

To do the subject justice, it is necessary to understand that the terms "CHRIST" and "THE CHRIST" did not just pop up out of nowhere sometime early in the 1st century.
JEWISH and Gentile believers in "The CHRIST" had already been around for hundreds of years and for generations, long, long before those "birth stories" that claim the "birth" of The "Christ" as having taken place in the Days of Herod..
The distinction is that most Jewish believers in "The Christ" did not accept or "buy into" all of the outlandish tales and urban legends that were being circulated without any regard for truth or evidence.
Jewish believers in the doctrine of the (future) coming of "The Christ", then dropped the Greek term, and returned to using the Hebrew Scriptural term "The MESSIAH" ('Ha' Mo'she'kah)
Jewish renegades and their gentile followers however retained the "Christ" appellation, (certainly it was convenient to Greek speakers, and to the writers where a simple X could be used as both a name and an icon for their deity) continued to fabricate ever more elaborately contrived propaganda stories carefully aimed to vilify the Jewish nation and its ancient customs in the eyes of The (Hellenic) World.
Christianity -as it now exists- is NOT Jewish, although it did originate in Judaism, It is NOT "Roman", its ideas and stories being a mixture of Jewish midrash on the Tanaka (it "borrows" heavily from the OT for its plot lines) and the popular ideas caged from various Gentile (principally Greek, some Egyptian, and Hindu philosophies and mythologies.
That is one of the things that made it so popular so quickly, it was and still is an "everyman's" religion, incorporating something that would 'ring a bell' or appeal to almost anyone.
And it proved to be very flexible and adaptable. Anyone not satisfied with what was set before them could quite simply cook up a new interpretation, invent a new story, and thereby both please themselves, and perhaps gather a hundred, or a thousand, or a million followers. (ex. Marcion, Constantine, Luther, Wesley, Smith, Russel, Moon....)

dog-on

Ok. I see no issue with all this and a Roman origin of Christianity being compatible, as I said earlier, I believe.

No Robots

What about this bit:

dog-on

The operative part being, "Christianity - as it now exists".

No Robots

Yeah, but the thread is about origins, not about subsequent distortions.

dog-on

True, but I could simply point out that Roman readers of the LXX during the first or second century AD could have come to the same conclusions as some Jews may have in the 3rd Century BC.

No Robots

However, Sheshbazzar attributes the origins of Christianity "as we know it" to "Jewish renegades and their gentile followers," and not to Romans.

No Robots

Please explain what you mean here. While certainly most Jews do not see Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah (Christ), none have, to my knowledge, expressed disbelief in the the historical existence of Jesus of Nazareth. What "outlandish tales and urban legends" are you referring to, and where do you find Jewish responses to them?

Sheshbazzar

Perhaps it might best be explained by encouraging you to arrive at answers that are reasonable to you. To do this I'll simply propose a set of scenarios that you can place yourself in. I'll try to keep details and elaborations to a bare minimum.
All that I ask is that you work from the premise that the terms "christ" and "The christ" are terms that are already known in the centuries preceding the "birth of christ".

Imagine now that you are in Jerusalem, it is the year 20 CE (an anachronism, I know, but bare with me)
OK, you are properly dressed so that you will blend right into the crowd, and you are a traveler, fluent in the Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic languages.

It is around 4 in the afternoon on warm mid-summer day, and it is The Sabbath Day, so all of the people are relaxing and visiting, being a stranger here you wish to make some inquiries regarding "The Christ".
Overhearing a lively conversation amongst a group of Greek speaking Jews, you amble on over and are warmly greeted, pleasantries are exchanged, and you are welcomed into their midst. You ask of them, "What about The Christ"?

What kind of replies would you expect to hear?

No Robots

C'mon. Just answer the question. What "outlandish tales and urban legends" are you talking about, and how do they relate to Jesus of Nazareth?