Chris Weimer

"Gospel Jesus" never existed.

dongiovanni1976x

Paul is a contemporary of Jesus, though he never met him in person he claims that he knows of Jesus' brother (Gal 1:19) and for us to have a written testimony of such a claim is an historical source. To have Josephus, an independent Jewish source corroborate this by recounting that, “so he (Ananus) assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called the Christ, whose name was James, and some others, and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned.” (Antiquities 20.9.1)

Since, Mr. Doherty, has said in this forum that “Paul had nothing to do with the Galilean scene that produced Q...I’m quite prepared to suggest that, although he didn’t regard his story as historical per se, Mark may have regarded (mistakenly) his Jesus figure as representing someone who had been” then we can assume that GMark, who allegedly used Q, should be considered an independent source from Paul (GMatthew and GLuke/Acts not withstanding) This admission means that Mr. Doherty agrees that GMark is likely independent of Paul, which further means that in chapter 6 verse 3, when James is mentioned by Mark we can tie this to Paul and Josephus for a total of three independent sources Mark 6:3, Galatians 1:19 and Antiquities 20.9.1 supporting the HJ position.
This is demonstratable without even making the appeal to Tacitus (and supported archaeological evidence of the Plaque of Pontius Pilate and Alexamenos Graffiti) Seutonius’ Chrestus or the almost universally recognized interpolation of TF by Josephus.

Therefore, for all intents and purposes with regard to how historians approach figures from antiquity, it is quite obvious why there is a near universal consensus that Jesus was an actual figure in history who was: born of a woman (Gal 4:4, Rom 1:3); was born as a Jew (Gal 4:4); that he had brothers (1 Cor 9:5), one of whom was named James (Gal 1:19, Mark 6:3, plus in Josephus Antiquities 20.9.1, he was thought by some people to be the messiah); that he ministered among the Jews (Rom 15:7); that he had twelve disciples (1 Cor 15:5); that he instituted the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor 11:23-25); possibly that he was betrayed (1 Cor 11:23, assuming that the Greek term here means “betrayed” rather than “handed over” to death by God); and that he was crucified (1 Cor 2:2, “executed by Pontius Pilate under Tiberius" in the Annals 15.44; Alexamenos Graffiti(? perhaps))

You cannot get much more evidence for this in antiquity from someone who was reportedly a criminal, who never wrote anything himself and was not wealthy enough to have momuments built in his honor or held any public position.