AthenaAwakened

Now when you say historical core, are you saying a single person or many people?

aa5874

Did you NOT just say you were NOT qualified to delve into the texts.....?

Now, you are CERTAIN that it is NOT "A".

You have BECOME qualified or developed an opinion at a RAPID rate.

I can't wait to see your second posts on the poll.

Now, I DELVED in some of the TEXTS and "A" and "B" are NOT likely.

The so-called "historical Jesus" PLAYED ZERO ROLE in the ADVANCEMENT of Christianity and NO author of the NT wrote about or claimed that they personally TRAVELED, TALKED TO, or INTERACTED with Jesus Christ anywhere on EARTH.

Incredibly NO author of the NT personally BOASTED that they were WITH JESUS. Only the Pauline writer BOASTED that he SAW Jesus AFTER he was RAISED from dead which is EXACTLY the wrong thing to BOAST about.

mountainman

Say we consider an historical core composed of many people. We would need to examine the history of these "many people". If even one of those "many people" was actually the Jesus we are looking for, then we can move all the others outside the central core, and retain an historical Jesus, no matter how fragmentary, at the "Historical Core".

In this model, for example, the histories of other historical figures such as Apollonius of Tyana, or Socrates, or Mani (depending on how much chronological leeway is being granted by the exercise) were used to embellish the history of a far lesser known historical person Jesus.

However if none of those "many people" was actually the Jesus we are looking for, then we are not dealing with a Jesus who has any sort of an historical core, but rather, the core itself is not historical.

mountainman

Hi Revolutionary,

Good questions man!

Personally I am wary of answers, and I am wary of readers and contributors carrying away answers from this poll and this forum. My personal preference is for readers and contributors to carry away questions.

Best wishes,


Pete

AthenaAwakened

Here's what I think

I think that at the supposed time of the Christ, there were street prophets, and mystery cults, and all kinds of people who "knew the truth" and were looking for followers.

So, Jesus could be the bits and pieces of any where from one to 43,856 different people.

MOST LIKELY there was not a Jesus, but there were popular movements that share certain beliefs and ideas and over time those beliefs and ideas personified into a Christ. And it's equally likely many probably professed to be this Christ but after the Christ was already invented.

That's the great thing about Jesus, you can suppose anything you like. Any then tomorrow suppose something totally different.

rizdek

So, are you saying that IF every gospel author was clearly identified and each claimed in no uncertain terms that they personally traveled with, talked to amd interacted with JC on earth and further that there were other contemporary NON gospel writers that claimed to corroborate the events of the gospels that you might start believing Jesus lived and actually is the Christ, the son of God? Would you vote A?

aa5874

I can ONLY deal with the present EXTANT evidence from antiquity. Based on the evidence from antiquity or the writings of antiquity Jesus was just a story like any of the COMPETING Myth Fables of Antiquity.

The Greeks and Romans had very many MYTH fables, Gods and Sons of Gods, born of virgins, and it was the very same Greeks and Romans who later BELIEVED Jesus was the offspring of some kind of Ghost.

Marcion showed without reasonable doubt that people of antiquity did believe PHANTOMS exist and that they WORSHIPED the PHANTOM as the Son of God although he had NO birth and came directly from heaven to Capernaum.

aa5874

A 43,856 PIECE MAN is a MYTH.

You have it upside down or back to front.

If you claim the Gospels were late then you have a problem. Jesus of the Gospels is NOT a person. That is PRECISELY why we have the HJ/MJ arguments.

Jesus of the Gospels was the OFFSPRING of some kind of GHOST. See Matthew 1.18-20.

Based on evidence from Antiquity, the Jews FIRST EXPECTED an actual physical human CHRIST or Messiah BEFORE the Gospels and the Pauline writings.

It was a PHYSICAL Messiah BEFORE the Spiritual Messiah. The Jews expected a PHYSICAL Messiah during the 1st century.

It was most likely the authors of the NT who by taking verses out-of-context fabricated Jesus

But, we really don't have anything about Jesus as a man and we don't have anything credible about Christ in the 1st century. History is NOT about invention and speculation.

Who would DARE claim Robin Hood was a fisherman in Judea without any credible evidence?

Who would DARE claim Jesus was NOT the offspring of some kind of Ghost?

There is NO need to speculate. We ALREADY have the stories about Jesus and in them Jesus was NOT a man.

mountainman

Hi AthenaAwakened,

Thanks for your thoughts on this subject.

That's alot of different people. I guess the question becomes were any of them the Jesus of the NT. If this is the case, then that one in the 43,856 gets moved to the core, and the other 43,855 get moved outside the core, and represent the bits and pieces of myth and history peripheral to it, cocooned in a scribal soup. (See the above diagram)

If none of the 43,856 can be so identified, in this instance, Jesus does not have an historical core, and is mythical all the way down.


Best wishes,


Pete

mountainman

Historians?