Toto

Then there probably are no 100% pure mythicists. Even Doherty thinks that there might have been a human source behind the Q sayings.

The essence of mythicism, as I understand it, is the claim that there was no human Jesus at the origins of Christianity, whether as founder or inspiration. The mythicist thinks that the first Christians (or proto-Christians) worshipped an explicitly spiritual Savior, and later Christians gradually historicized this savior.

S.C.Carlson

OK. How does the human source behind Q fit into the picture? Wells seems to date this Q person before Paul, so why cannot this person be considered the inspiration behind Christianity?

Stephen

jgibson000

Yes, I would. Saying, as Wells did, that Jesus never existed at all, historically or otherwise, and that Christians were wrong to think othewise, is quite different from saying, as Earl does, that Paul believed in the existence a being named Jesus who lived and died in a realm above the earth.

Have you actually read Wells?

Jeffrey Gibson

Amaleq13

Hidden so well it is irrelevant to my statement since I was only thinking of the earliest external evidence of Christian beliefs.

Josephus, Tacitus, & Pliny indicate that Christians referred to the central figure of their faith as "Christ" and that this was apparently understood by outsiders to have been the figure's name.

Are you aware of another figure who has been referred to simply as "Christ"?

jgibson000

Actually. Josephus uses the word as a title not a name, speaking of Jesus as "the" Christ. And if I were you, I wouldn't try to use Pliny or Tacitus to make the case that Christians referrred to the central figure of their faith only as "Christ". The lack of an article before Christos in the relevant texts of Pliny and Tacitus does not mean much since, as you surely know, Latin lacks words corresponding to "the" and "a", and what appears to be an anarthrous noun may actually be one.

Not off hand, but I don't know why I need to be.

Jeffrey Gibson

Amaleq13

More relevantly, Josephus uses it as a way to specifically identify the "Jesus" to whom he refers which, in turn, only makes sense if that is how he was best known. Pliny and Tacitus also indicate this was how the man was known.

"Jesus the Christ" is just as much a name as "Billy the Kid" if that is how an individual comes to be known and identified.

They support my earlier statement.

Paul uses an article every time he refers to Jesus as "Christ"?

Unless you aspire to provide a truly relevant comment on my point, I suppose you needn't.

Doug Shaver

Hard to say. Variations of that legend have been told about several religious conquerors, most of them Muslim.

Didymus

If the Q sayings tradition preceded Paul, it seems quite possible, even likely, that the crucified man named Jesus was confuted with the legendary wandering preacher named Jesus. Or to put it another way, over time the crucified Jesus came to be thought of as the same legendary figure as the Q preacher, and thus the crucifixion was believed to be the fulfillment of apocalpytic expectations.

Or at least a step in that direction.

Didymus

Solo

I have actually read Wells.....

and it looks to me Doherty's thesis on Paul's "silence" is a wholesale import from Wells who first introduced it and elaborated on it, as argument for HJ non-existence. Moreover, with time Wells' position on Paul shifted somewhat. While in the 80's (Historical Evidence for Jesus) he claimed that Paul believed Jesus lived on Earth long before his time, he later placed himself even closer to the view of Doherty. In "The Jesus Myth" (1999) he states that "for Paul Jesus was fundamentally a supernatural personage who sojourned only briefly on Earth" without being specific when. If there is a gap between Doherty and Wells, it is certainly miniscule. Wells' Paul would have had a pre-existent and supernatural Christ killed by demonic archons in some unspecified and irrelevant time-space on Earth, Doherty's Paul at some higher elevation. I don't see substantial difference. Both vehemently deny that Paul's Christ has anything to do with the Jesus of the gospels.

In his latest lectures, Wells apparently repudiated his former position saying he now believes Jesus most likely existed. (He probably ended up on Schmithal's picture of a wandering apocalyptic preacher of whom we really know nothing for certain. I don't know; I haven't seen anything in print).


Jiri Severa

aa5874

But if 'Christ' means the 'Annointed One' or the 'Messiah', isn't it possible that others also believed they were the 'Christ' and also had followers, even though their first name was not Jesus?

These are the words of Jesus according to Luke 21:8 KJV, 'Take heed that ye be not deceived, for many shall come in my name saying , I am Christ; and the time draweth near: go ye not after them'.

Jesus, the Christ, expects others to be called the 'Christ. I wonder how many were called the 'Christ' before hIm?