ApostateAbe

If you believe that Jesus never existed as a human being, I would like to know what you take to be the best evidence for that position. I won't argue with it unless you really want me to.

If you think the position is based on there being insufficient evidence for a historical Jesus, then go ahead and say so, that is good too, thanks.

gurugeorge

To me, the evidence is basically threefold:

1) There is nothing in the letters of Paul (which I accept, for the sake of the argument, as being the earliest texts we have) which suggests any of the people he is talking about (the Jerusalem people) ever knew a human being called "Jesus". As an example of the kind of thing I mean, suppose there was something like "Cephas told me that Jesus had said this was not so", then that would be the kind of evidence that would suggest a link between Paul, a human being Paul knew, and a human being that person knew. There's nothing of that kind there.

2) There is positive evidence in the letters of Paul that the Jesus he (at least) is talking about is a visionary entity. This is a common type of religious experience, the other kind being mystical experience, strictly so-called, which Paul also seems to be familiar with (unio mystica).

3) While it has been claimed that the mini-credo in 1Corinthians 15 may be an interpolation, if it isn't, or even if it's only partly an interpolation (e.g. the dubious "500"), it's a plain enough "smoking gun" to the effect that the "appearance" was a "self-revelation of the divine", and that "according to Scripture" means, quite literally, the same as "according to the BBC" would today. IOW, Jesus "appeared" to them, made himself manifest to them, in Scripture, and (it looks like) in the same kind of visionary experience that Paul had (since he comes at the end of a list, and there's no hint that the "appearance" to him is of any different quality). IOW, scripture and visionary experience are the source of their belief that some entity had been on the earth in recent-ish times, been crucified, etc., and was the Messiah.

In the absence of any evidence like 1), the positive evidence of 2) and 3) just squeaks through to win the day.

aa5874

First of all, there could have been no debate whether Jesus was a myth or did exist as human unless there was some source of ANTIQUITY that mentioned Jesus of Nazareth.

It would have been virtually impossible to guess the names of characters that may have been crucified or believed to have been crucified under Pilate.

The notion that Jesus was a myth is directly based on the information found in the sources of ANTIQUITY, just as Homer's Achilles is considered a myth directly based on the information by Homer.

The description of the entity under scrutiny is utterly important when its nature is questioned.

How was Jesus described in the NT? It is without doubt in a mythological way. The offspring of the Holy Ghost of God, the Creator.

How was Jesus described by his supposed contemporaries? Jesus walked on water, transfigured with the resurrected Moses and Elijah, rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. These are all mythological descriptions.

Why was Jesus deified? Because Jesus rose from the dead. Over 500 people saw Jesus in a resurrected state.

Are there any witnesses for his mythological conception? Yes,the supposed Mary his mother and her husband Joseph.

Are there witnesses for Jesus walking on water? Yes, Peter the first bishop of Rome.

What about the transfiguration? Yes, Peter was there.

The resurrection? Yes, lots of witnesses. Peter, and the eleven, Paul with over 500 people.

And what about the ascension, surely there were no witnesses? Wrong, the disciples witnessed Jesus go through the clouds.

So, not only are the events surrounding Jesus mythological, but supposedly real people, his disciples, are witnesses for events that did not happen. The disciples are participants with Jesus in mythological non-events.

Jesus and his disciples are operating in the same realm, the realm of mythology.

Now, the Church writers agree [for hundreds of years that the events in the NT with respect to Jesus and his disciples were true even though they appeared mythological. The disciples witnessed events that did happen, Jesus was SUPERNATURAL, according to the Church.

The Jesus story can only make sense if Jesus was SUPERNATURAL.

If Jesus was just human, the entire NT and the Church writings will have to be dumped.

The disciples did not witness Jesus walking on water, did not witness the transfiguration, did not witness the resurrected state of Jesus or his ascension.

The NT and the Church writings cannot tolerate an human only Jesus.

Next, just to be secure, writings from external sources are perused to try and locate Jesus and his disciples. Nothing can be found as expected. The name Jesus and his disciples are completely absent except for forgeries in Josephus.

Jesus and his disciples were placed in Judea, the most unlikely place on the face of the earth in the 1st century to be dieified. Jews are not known to worship even deified Emperors, much less, a blasphemer.

It is inexplicable how Peter who denied any association with Jesus was able to claim that Jesus resurrected in Jerusalem, the same place where he lied about knowing Jesus, and was able to preach freely when Stephen was stoned to death and Jesus was crucified.

If Jesus was just human, how was he able to be deified in Judea when he was crucified being considered a blasphemer and probably did not do anything SUPERNATURAL as recorded in the NT?

There is no evidence for an human only Jesus, just for the Myth.

dog-on

Jesus Christ, as portrayed in the gospels is a mythical being. So, as far as the gospel Jesus is concerned, there is no question.

Whether or not there is some individual who this myth is based upon, the individual himself was completely irrelevant to the earliest believers as shown by the earliest Christian apologists. Indeed, all the writings we have from the early centuries regarding Jesus Christ refer specifically to some form of the mythical being.

If you would like to present some evidence to contradict this, I would be interested to see it.

Steven Carr

The historical Jesus first appears in a novel surrounded by people nobody has ever heard of.

Paul has a Jesus who founds the cultic meal, by way of which the cult has access to the body of its founder.

Of course, Jesus could have existed as a human being on earth.

Doug Shaver

I think the best evidence is all Christian writings of the first century and most Christian writings of the first half of the second century.

I don't include the canonical gospels in the first category. I think they could belong to the second, but I believe few Christians ever heard of any of them before the late second second century.

show_no_mercy

I think this explains why there were so many "Acts of..." type literature in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. It was the first time these people had heard of people like Philip, Judas, Andrew, Thomas, etc. who are first presented in the gospel narratives.

It's kinda like how we got the movie "The Scorpion King" due to the popularity of the "The Mummy" movies.

Minimalist

The best evidence for a mythical jesus is the stunning lack of evidence for a historical one.

Was there a Yeshua bar Yosef? There were probably a hundred of them in first century Judaea as both were exceedingly common names. It is not the name that xtians worship it is the miracles.

Clivedurdle

Some archaeology help?

http://www.archaeology.org.il/newsticker.asp?id=24

Very fishy!

storytime

Only the cult and its elements could have evolved. Why such a cultish story was seen as necessary is the question I pose. Was it political, much like we see in the Right Wing division of Christianity that has purposed itself in the takeover of the Republican party, thus drawing all men (the other Christians) to itself? It seems that the same reasoning applies now as then.