Sheshbazzar

'say now 'Shibboleth'!" And he would say, "Sibboleth," for he would not pronounce it right. Then they would take him and kill him at the passages of the Jordan.
There fell at that time Forty-Two Thousand Ephraimites.'

mah' ha'bediel?

aa5874

Don't you see the inverted commas..."real words"? They were placed there to prevent your error.

By the way, People here have a good memory.

You have already ADMITTED that Nothing is certain so why bother post?

Are you trying to KILL TIME?

J-D

It is still the case that some of the statements in question cannot be literally accurate reports of events that actually occurred, while others might or might not be literally accurate reports of events that actually occurred.

Sheshbazzar

It would be very interesting to see a listing of those events that 'might be' literally accurate reports of events that actually occurred.
That is, a listing of events and persons reported within the NT texts that are verified historical facts well supported by non-Biblical contemporary sources.
Has anyone produced such a thing?

Just for fun.
For example, That there was an actual city of Jerusalem is obvious.
And Herod Antipas is historical personage well attested to outside of religious propaganda.
What else is there within these NT texts that couldn't be the product of religious fiction?

Take away all of the rest, and just what is it that would remain, free from any possible taint of being religiously motivated fabrications?

J-D

Your 'that is' is an error. The two descriptions you give of hypothetical listings are not equivalent.

aa5874

It can be shown that characters in the NT were mentioned by non-apologetic sources like King Herod the Great, Augustus the Emperor, Cyrenius the Governor, Pilate the Governor, Caiaphas the high Priest, John the Baptist, Tiberius the Emperor, Herod the tetrarch, Philip the tetrarch, Lysanias the tetrarch, King Aretas, Felix the Governor, Bernice, Drusilla, Herod Agrippa, Festus the Governor, and Marcus Agrippa.

Incidentally, virtually all the characters mentioned are found in the writings of Josephus but nothing can be found for a single disciple, Mary and her children, nor Jesus.

It would appear that we have virtually 100% corroboration for all Jewish and Romans officials but 0% for Jesus, his disciples and families.

But, there is another REMARKABLE fact.

Virtually All the places that are mentioned in the Gospels are corroborated EXCEPT the CITY of Nazareth.

The City of Nazareth where Jesus supposedly live for ALMOST all his Life on earth was NOT mentioned by any non-apologetic writer at all.

And, NO CITY called NAZARETH has ever been located. Josephus himself LIVED in Galilee.

HJ of Nazareth is NOT the most likely explanation.

HJ of NAZARETH cannot be recovered.

J-D

That depends on what you mean, in this context, by the terms 'HJ of Nazareth' and 'recovered'.

Doug Shaver

Unless it's a work of fiction. Every work of fiction purports to be a report about something.

I'm sure Paul sincerely believed in the reality of the Jesus he was writing about, but I see no reason to assume the gospel authors believed they were telling true stories about a historically real person.

archibald

There is no reason to assume anything.

But there are more reasons to think that these writers believed in an actual Jesus than that they didn't.

For starters, it seems very uncommon, if not unique, to write about a recent figure in that way (ie. with the writer not believing in his existence), particularly the writer's own supposed religious leader/founder. Can you think of another example?

gurugeorge

But I'm more interested in your initial statement that does touch on "aboutness":-

"Each of the four gospels makes some statements about Jesus which cannot possibly be historically true and some statements about Jesus which might or might not be historically true."

Which shows that you're already thinking of Jesus as historical (i.e. you've already gone beyond the logic of statements-in-general that you're trying to shift the grounds of discussion to), only you're thinking that some statements about him might or might not be historically true.