JonA

While I don't think all historicists will agree on the importance of these points (and may even include others in their own lists), these characteristics do not simply describe 'some guy called Jesus'.

So I am still at a loss trying to figure out who these historicists are that reduce their argument to 'some guy called Jesus'.

Are there any such people at all?

Jon

Toto

I think Wells might qualify. He has decided that there was a historical Jesus based on the figure in Q, but doesn't even think that this Jesus was crucified.

But I think that the "some guy called Jesus" is just the outsider's view of what the historicists claim can be established.

fatpie42

Ah, so you were being faecetious from the outset. Nice to know...

It's common sense that if we can't tie any of the events in the gospels to a historical figure then the historical Jesus argument is left with "some guy called Jesus". Naturally no historical Jesus proponent argues for that, but it's something they are going to have to try to avoid.

And yes, I do think that in the end E.P. Sanders isn't left with much more than "some guy called Jesus".

He was born in 4 C.E.. - Yeah, there were undoubtedly people called Jesus who were born during that period.

He was baptised by John the Baptist. - Yeah, with Jesus being such a common name, inevitably some of the people John baptised were called Jesus.

That all stories about Jesus are confined to Israel does not mean that there was a historical figure there. Though naturally there were many historical people in that area called Jesus.

As far as these two points are concerned, they probably form the strongest part of E.P. Sanders' argument (to my mind):
Jesus engaged in a controversy about the temple.
Jesus was crucified outside Jerusalem by the Roman authorities.

I mentioned these two points in another comment and I'll quote what I said again here:

That he had followers is true whether he was historical or not, because many followers (such as Paul) saw no need to have actually met the guy.

Same goes for the idea that after his (supposed) death Jesus' followers continued as an identifiable movement.

We know from Paul that at least some Jews persecuted at least parts of the new movement, but once again this does not mean there was a historical figure.


As Toto implies, the risk of simply affirming the existence of "some guy called Jesus" may be an oversimplification of the problem. However, if you want to clarify exactly how that misses the point, I'd be really interested. The whole point of starting this new thread wasn't to pretend to be an expert, but to allow for clarification on the issues.

fatpie42

Is this the same Wells?
http://www.skeptically.org/newtestament/id25.html

Naturally that letter is now over a decade old, but I'm intrigued all the same.

I fully admit that I may be over-simplifying things. My intention is to make the issues clear. If you or anyone else thinks certain clarifications are important, I am very interested to hear what they have to say.

Stringbean

Concur AA good posts dude.

mountainman

The historicists (who may be atheists) and the Biblical Historians certainly present themselves as the INSIDERS.

My current opinion on this OP is that the HJ is a hidden postulate with respect to the insiders, and that the MJ is a not so-hidden postulate used by the outsiders. Although both parties may strenuously argue that the HJ and the MJ are the respective conclusions of the respective theories concerning the history of christian origins, their arguments are weakened by the dismal nature of the entire set of evidence (and in many cases its suspicious provenance) relevant to this question.

fatpie42

I think I agree that the problem is that the evidence is so dismally poor that it is difficult to come out on either side of the argument. Naturally I have mostly posed this as problems with the HJ rather than arguments for the MJ. Though I still think MJ is the stronger position if only because the Jesus in the NT is blatantly mythical. (Though the problem is that this doesn't rule out an HJ which inspired the writings about MJ.)

I'd be interested to know which points (particular of those 7 listed in part two) you thought were strongest, which you thought were weakest and what you thought was important yet had been left out.


Little side note: While a lot of people will try to compare Jesus with other figures of the time like Caesar (*groan*), Socrates (*meh*) and I doubt I'm the first to bring up more recent figures like King Arthur or Robin Hood. Still, I'd be very interested to hear what there is to be said about Sikh founder Guru Nanak. Guru Nanak certainly is meant to have performed many things which are impossible, but unlike in the case of Muhammad where the historical and the impossible are clearly separate, stories about Guru Nanak seem to be much more of a collection of incredible tales (as with Jesus). Guru Nanak seems to be more likely to be historical because of the lineage of Sikh Gurus that followed after him (since Guru Nanak is quite late on anyway). However, I'd be interested to know what evidence there was of his existence and how we might explain the appearance of all the fantastical stories surrounding him. I'm not certain that you would need an actual person in order for amazing stories to arise.

archibald

Guru Nanak. Good one. Another to add to the list of possibly analogous figures. Previously my 'favourite' was Sai Baba (of Shirdi). Others might have included Muhammad the Mahdi, and Guatama Buddha.

Plus, it's interesting to have one from at least 5 different extant religions (Sikh, Hindu, Islam, Buddhism and Christianity).

We might even (for comparitive purposes) mention Moroni, from mormonism.

Not that comparing them will necessarily yield anything conclusive, of course.

Something which influences my preferred guess is that when stories are based on a recent religious leader (recent at time of writing I mean), it seems they are normally more likely to have an historical core figure than not. But even this is not by any means conclusive. Far from it.

DCHindley

Mr pie,

I remember this being a point of discussion on Crosstalk2 (aka XTalk) a good while back. I believe that there are the core 8 of Sanders and members conjured up the other two from either Sander's other writings or from other critics of equal weight. Their archives are open to public view, so head over there and search on the words |sanders historical jesus| and see what you get. Chances are it was discussed to death there.
http://www.yahoogroups.com/messages/crosstalk2

My personal opinion after dabbling in this kind of stuff since the early 80s is somewhat like yours. Most of what are claimed to be established facts are rather tenuous if you think about them seriously. What makes any particular data element a "fact" is when the interpretation of the data element is generally agreed upon by critics. You have to start somewhere, I guess. I think Sanders offered these 8 generally agreed upon "facts" as starting points for serious discussion by critics engaged in the "3rd quest", fully aware that some of them may be falsified at some point, and new "facts" established.

DCH

Solo

You should be aware that Sanders revised his list. In The Historical Figure of Jesus (or via: amazon.co.uk) (published in 1991) Sanders generously added to the list and modified the things of which he was certain everyone could be certain.

· Jesus was born c. 4 BC, near the time of the death of Herod the Great
· He spent his childhood and early adult years in Nazareth, a Galilean village
· Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist
· He called disciples (omitting “and spoke of there being twelve”)
· He taught in the towns, villages and countryside of Galilee
· He preached “the kingdom of God” [but “healed” is omitted]
· He created disturbance in the temple area
· He had a final meal with his disciples
· He was arrested and interrogated by Jewish authorities, specifically the high priest
· He was executed on the orders of the Roman prefect, Pontius Pilate
· His disciples at first fled
· They saw him (in what sense is uncertain) after his death
· As a consequence, they believed they believed he would return to found the kingdom
· After his death, his believers formed a community to await his return and sought to win others to faith in him as God’s Messiah
· [The statement that parts of the new movement were persecuted by at least some Jews is omitted].

Best,
Jiri