aa5874

It is illogical to think that there cannot be fictional characters in antiquity and that Jesus cannot be fictional.

Achilles the son of a sea-goddess was fictional just like Jesus, the offspring of the Holy Ghost.

Well, the offspring of the Holy Ghost does not have an historical core, he has a fictional core. Virtually everything about Jesus is fiction from his Holy Ghost conception witnessed by his mother to his fantastic ascension through the clouds witnessed by the disciples as presented by the written statements of the authors of the NT and the church writers.

Zaphod

Elijah

Your basic premise - that Jesus was a very minor character during his day and would not be expected to generate a historical record, but whose example of self-sacrifice engendered slow but steady veneration does not jive with the available evidence - including the Bible accounts. This is a large problem for the Historical Jesus model.

To wit: (From http://nobeliefs.com/exist.htm - A good essay which you will find interesting)

"WHAT ABOUT WRITINGS DURING THE LIFE OF JESUS?

What appears most revealing of all, comes not from what people later wrote about Jesus but what people did not write about him. Consider that not a single historian, philosopher, scribe or follower who lived before or during the alleged time of Jesus ever mentions him!

If, indeed, the Gospels portray a historical look at the life of Jesus, then the one feature that stands out prominently within the stories shows that people claimed to know Jesus far and wide, not only by a great multitude of followers but by the great priests, the Roman governor Pilate, and Herod who claims that he had heard "of the fame of Jesus" (Matt 14:1)". One need only read Matt: 4:25 where it claims that "there followed him [Jesus] great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jersulaem, and from Judaea, and from beyond Jordon." The gospels mention, countless times, the great multitude that followed Jesus and crowds of people who congregated to hear him. So crowded had some of these gatherings grown, that Luke 12:1 alleges that an "innumberable multitude of people... trode one upon another." Luke 5:15 says that there grew "a fame abroad of him: and great multitudes came together to hear..." The persecution of Jesus in Jerusalem drew so much attention that all the chief priests and scribes, including the high priest Caiaphas, not only knew about him but helped in his alleged crucifixion. (see Matt 21:15-23, 26:3, Luke 19:47, 23:13). The multitude of people thought of Jesus, not only as a teacher and a miracle healer, but a prophet (see Matt:14:5).

So here we have the gospels portraying Jesus as famous far and wide, a prophet and healer, with great multitudes of people who knew about him, including the greatest Jewish high priests and the Roman authorities of the area, and not one person records his existence during his lifetime? If the poor, the rich, the rulers, the highest priests, and the scribes knew about Jesus, who would not have heard of him?"

The historians of the day wrote about the smallest details of life in the area of the world where Jesus is said to have lived. They would NOT be expected to to not have mentioned him.

And this is the crux of the Argument from Silence. Jesus SHOULD have been written about by MANY historians. The expected record is not to be found ANYWHERE. There was a thread here not too long ago that listed 200 occasions when ancients should have mentioned Jesus but did not when they were writing about his contemporaries.

This satisfies the two legs of the Absence of Evidence tenet. Here we have very good evidence indeed (not proof) that the absence of evidence does in fact indicate the evidence of absence.

Compound this Argument from Silence with the fact that the earliest writings about Jesus describe not a man but a God and perhaps now you can see why the Mythical Jesus approach makes sense.

If you would actually bother to READ the Doherty essay which Toto was kind enough to provide you, you will find that Doherty provides a wealth of information which helps corroborate the MJ position.

Elijah

Hello.

Please find a comparable figure from the time and show the evidence they left as a comparison of what you think we should expect.
I’ve asked this before, maybe you can help. What does the list of historians from the time and area look like? How many works survived that should mention Jesus but don’t?
What kind of evidence are you expecting here? Newspaper clippings? Diaries from town folk who saw him? Letters to someone’s aunt that they saw a preacher talking crazy? Maybe a book written by a fisherman retelling the account?

What text do we have that you think should mention him that doesn’t?
Do we have the writings of any of the people in discussion to see if they did write about him?
What historians do you have in mind?
Could I get a link to that thread please?
Absence of evidence is only evidence of absence if you have a complete sample which you obviously don’t when speaking of events in the past.
The son of God. It’s a title for the messiah. To understand their ideology as simple pagan mythology is missing the sophistication of the conversation. Cartoon understandings will not get the job done… sorry.
Sure it does. That’s why I’m told to read it a thousand times instead of just providing the information that helps the myther position.

Does a dollar go to IIDB every time his site gets plugged on here or something?

Petergdi

So what's your take on the lack of contemporary and near contemporary mention of Hillel?

Peter.

Toto

The original list of historians who should have mentioned Jesus but didn't was compiled by Remsberg.

There is a thread here from 2005 and if you search for "Remsberg" in this forum you should find more discussion.

Remsberg's original list is here

Elijah

Thanks for being helpful Toto. I'll go though em and check the works that they left to see if it's rational to think that Jesus should be mentioned there.

Curious as to which of those do you think should have mentioned him? The post starts out with Philo being the one who "surely should" have and I don't know the work that it would have fit into of his.

But I will look around. Thanks again.

Toto

The list is cumulative. You can decide that any given writer had no reason to mention Jesus, but when you see the number of writers who discuss equally insignifcant people, and none of them mention Jesus or any other Christian from the first century, the likelihood of Jesus being an actual historical person from that era goes down.

Elijah

Yea I was just curious to your opinion on what you thought was rational to expect Jesus to be mentioned in. No reason to expect some of those people to mention him. If you don't want to express your opinion or don't have one, NM.

Where are all the Jewish historians from that time?

aa5874

So, it is your view that Jesus of the NT is more likely to have existed if no-one mentioned him?

When you see figurative statements, fiction and implausible events with respect to Jesus from the authors of the NT and complete silence from external sources, then you think Jesus is most likely to have existed.

I think the opposite. Jesus is not likely to have existed when I see fiction, implausibilities, and figurative statements in the NT and complete silence from external sourcers.

Elijah

Who do you think should have mentioned him that didn't? What ancient text from the period and area do you think is missing a Jesus reference?

From my POV you don't have a lack of evidence of Jesus from ancient texts you just have a lack of ancient texts from the time of Jesus. It's strange that Roman poets and philosophers are used as examples for the case of silence when there is no reason for him to be mentioned there at all. Its not rational thinking.

Do you really have silence from external sources or just lack relative external sources to check?