J-D

People said that Alexander the Great was the son of a god. Does that make him indisputably fictitious?

French Prometheus

Jesus is not on any coin that dates back to the first century. Actually, AFAIK, the first coins with clear unambiguous Christian symbols were minted in the 4th century but still had no depiction of Jesus.

I also have quite a few coins with various deities. However, if you can find any Greek coin with the name of a legendary king followed by the title BASILEWS, I'd love to see it.

Of course, the nonexistence of Alexander would make it hard to explain how Persian sigloi were suddenly replaced by tetradrachms with ALEXANDROY BASILEWS written on them. It'll also be difficult to explain why those coins were suddenly minted in Egypt (until 305 when Ptolemy took the title of king and put his own name on the coins) and Babylon where coins had previously been rarely used.

And keep in mind that even though Alexander's coins were still minted for a long time after his death, there's little doubt on the dating of those minted before 323 BCE or very shortly afterwards (though these usually bore the name and title PHILIPPOY BASILEWS).

I'm not a MJer but I think that comparing the respective historicity of Alexander the Great (a king and major military leader of his time) and Jesus (one of many obscure preachers in Roman Judaea) is preposterous. The former completely changed the face of the mediterranean world during his lifetime. Before 336 BCE, there was a huge and powerful Persian empire. After 323 BCE, this empire was replaced by a Macedonian empire that quickly broke into several hellenistic kingdoms. And Alexander was the son (and a general in the army) of a famous king who vassalized all of continental Greece (we still have contemporary testimonies). Erase Alexander and you have A LOT to explain away.

On the other hand, Jesus had close to zero impact on his neck of the wood, let alone the ancient mediterranean world, during his lifetime.

Steven Carr

Perhaps that bit was fictitious.

I'm reminded of what JP Holding wrote about Alexander the Great - 'Meier notes that what we know about Alexander the Great could fit on only a few sheets of paper; yet no one doubts that Alexander existed. '

http://www.tektonics.org/jesusexist/jesusexisthub.html

I guess that is the way of apologists.

One minute they claim there are few facts about Alexander.

The next moment apologists will claim that many , many details about Alexander are historically verified, and can be used as analogies to writings about Jesus (to show that they are equally historically verified)

It is simply a case of saying whatever suits at any one time.

French Prometheus

Again, comparing the historicity of a king who completely changed the organization of the ancient world in his lifetime with that of an obscure preacher is ridiculous.

If you erase Alexander, you have to explain what happened between the death of Philipp II and the appearance of the hellenistic kingdoms on the ashes of the Achemenid Empire.

Steven Carr

So little impact that when one of his greatest followers wanted to teach other followers of Christ about the birth of a child, which ushered in a new covenant, he never thought about using the birth of Jesus. (Galatians 4)

And when the writer of Hebrews wanted a good example of a valuable thing being betrayed for a small reward, he did not think the betrayal of Jesus was the example he wanted - he preferred the story of Esau.

Layman writes in his article 'According to Plutarch, Aristotle personally annotated a copy of the Iliad for Alexander, who kept it with him throughout his later travels, even keeping it under his pillow as he slept.'

Just as Layman claimed Alexander the Great was inspired by Homer, so very early Christians writers drew little inspiration from the life of Jesus, preferring to draw their examples from the Old Testament.

Of course, that changed once Gospels were written which pointed out just how much the Old Testament and Jesus had in common.

aa5874

The historians recognised Philip, king of Macedon, as the father of Alexander the great, not a god, as it was rumored.

The conquests of Alexander the great are written by historians. Flavius Josephus wrote about Alexander the great, son of Philip, King of Macedon on his visit to Jerusalem and about wars conducted by him.

Antiquities of the Jews book 11.8, "About this time it was that Philip, King of Macedon, was treacherously assaulted and slain at Egae by Pausanias, the son of Cerastes, who was derived from the family of Oreste, and his son Alexander succeeded him in the kingdom.........

I cannot find any historian of antiquity that wrote anything about Achilles, the son of the goddess, with respect to the wars he fought and of his victories or defeat.

And Alexander the great was born July 20, 356 and died June 10 323 BCE, I cannot find any information about the date of birth or death of the son of the goddess, Achilles.

Mythra

What about contemporary inscriptions concerning Alexander, such as this one in the British Museum?

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore...er_the_gr.aspx

Comparing the evidence of Alexander's historicity to Jesus' is kind of a no-brainer.

aa5874

After reading your link, I see a match between Jesus, the son of the Ghost and Achilles, the son of the goddess, we have a tomb without a body.

"He is not here, for he is risen, as he said. Come see where the place where the Lord lay."(Matthew 28.6) Another empty tomb, the hallmark of mythology.

Gamera

The narrative is used to make the plaque refer to Alexander The Great "of history". Without the narrative the inscription could refer to some other Alexander. But where did the narrative come from? If you trace it back you'll find it derives from MSS written 1000 years after the fact.

So, a perverse historican might claim that the narrative (which was subject to a millennia of mythmaking and emendation and redaction) was drafted in a way to incorporate the preexisting inscription, which refered to some unidentified Alexander now lost to history.

See, it's easy to be a mythicist.

aa5874

It's so easy to see that Achilles is a myth and even easier to see that Jesus, the son of a ghost is the same.