Wiploc

Moving to BC&H.

aa5874

Sherlock Holmes:
1. Sherlock Holmes was described as an historical character.

2. Sherlock Holmes may have began with an historical character.

Popeye:

1.Popeye was described as an historical character

2. Popeye may have began with an historical character.

Achilles:

1. Homer described Achilles in a mythological manner.

2.Homer's Achilles have been considered a MYTH.

Jesus:

1.The authors of the NT and Church writers have described Jesus in a mythological manner.

2.The Jesus of the NT Canon and Church writers can be considered a MYTH.

ALL the parameters to consider that Jesus was a MYTH are in place.

1. Jesus was described in a non-historical manner and even witnessed in non-historical events.

2. The accomplishment of Jesus, SALVATION through the RESURRECTION, was the result of a non-historical event.

3. No non-apologetic source cannot account for a Messiah named Jesus BEFORE the Fall of the Temple who Jews worshiped as a God and REMITTED their sins.

4. If Jesus did exist as a man then it was virtually unlikely that Jews would have worshiped a man as a God.

5. If Jesus was just a man his crucifixion would have had NO ability to REMIT sins. Thousands of Jews were crucified and some MUST have crucified innocently.

6. The words and actions of Jesus can be found in Hebrew Scripture or the Septuagint. His birth, betrayal, crucifixion, death and resurrection can be found in Hebrew Scripture


The theory that Jesus was a MYTH is FAR superior to the belief that the Jesus was based on a SINGLE man.

HJers cannot show that the Jesus story was even based on a SINGLE character. And further, the Historical Jesus is based on the premise that the Jesus story in the NT Canon and Church writings were fundamentally NON-HISTORICAL.

The belief that Jesus was historical is NOT really a theory it is just a BELIEF since there are NO written DATA, and no artifacts of antiquity to support the historicity of Jesus BEFORE the Fall of the Temple.

The HJ theory cannot be developed beyond BELIEF since it is NOT established or how to establish whether Jesus was based on a single or multiple characters.

The MYTH theory is FAR SUPERIOR to HJ.

Styrofoam

But the claim that David or Samson existed is different than the claim that Jesus existed. As someone phrased it in the peanut gallery thread for your debate with David Henson, improbable claims require more evidence than probable claims. Claiming that there was a king of Israel named David is reasonable. Claiming that God had a son named Jesus who died and was resurrected is not. And the thing is, it's one claim. There's not a claim that Jesus existed, and a claim that he was the son of God. It's all the same claim. There's no historical attestation of Jesus outside of the Gospels, and one reference in Josephus that was probably added by the church. If you don't think Jesus was the son of God, I don't see any reason to think he existed at all.

mountainman

The way to answer number two is to state it in this way:

2. Christianity began with a fictional character

And start asking common sense questions such as ....

Who first published the story in what language?
What did they have to gain?
What was the story used for?
Who could have authored the story?
When could the story have been authored?
Was the story published during war or peace?

Was there any massive reaction or controversy against the story?
Do we have any witnesses who state that the story was a fiction?



I object to the idea that there is an often perceived limit of only two types of respondents to this 2nd question (ie: either 'mythicists' or 'historicists') on the basis that neither of these classes of respondents are necessary qualified in the field of ancient history - in which field the question arises and needs to be addressed.


The above questions are valid questions in the field of ancient history to the question did Christianity begin with a fictional character. They need to be addressed, examined and answered. If the historical truth is in fact that Christianity did begin with a fictional character, then Christian origins is a perpetuated fraud -- and most likely imperial.

The answers to these above questions - the evidence - is out there.

My opinion

I personally find that the ancient historical truth is better explained by the evidence that Christianity began with a fictional character. Jesus and his Church history were invented in imperial scriptoria between 312 and 324 CE and then was promoted above Apollo, Asclepius, Zeus, Hercules, Diana and their priesthoods and their temples 324/ 325 CE. Christianity was thrust upon the empire from this time 324/325 CE by a warlord and oppressor who ruled by military strength and coercion and who personally saw to it that the "Fabrication of the Christians" (ie: the Bible) was published lavishly far and wide.

Chaucer

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/ch...esus-t267.html

Doug Shaver

This is the first I've ever heard anything about a historical Popeye.

As for Sherlock, it depends on how loosely you want to construe "historical" or "based on." As far as I'm concerned, a fictional character, if purely fictional, is by definition a character without any historical counterpart, and the purity is not compromised by the character's having merely been "inspired by" a real person. At the very least, there has to be some correlation of biographical data between the real person and the fictional character.

By the same reasoning, I say there was no historical King Arthur. I don't care how many famous early Medieval warlords or warriors there might have been whose names just happened to be, or to sort of sound like, Arthur. There is a difference between winning battles and ruling kingdoms, and that difference matters a lot when we start asking, "Is this story, in any sensible way, about a real person?"

aa5874

Those claims are BOGUS.

1. Pliny the younger did NOT write a single about Jesus. The word "JESUS" cannot be found in the Pliny letters to Trajan.

And what is most devastating is that in the letters to Trajan is that Pliny did NOT appear to know about Christians and what they believed. And even AFTER TORTURE NO Christian mentioned the name of Jesus.

2. Tacitus did NOTmention the name Jesus in Annals. And NO known CHURCH writer used Tacitus "Annals" to claim Jesus did exist.

3. Suetonius did NOT mention Jesus in his writings. Again no known church writer used the writings of Suetonius to show that Jesus did exist.

4. ALL claims of an ECLIPSE on the 14th day of Nissan is completely bogus. There can be NO eclipse of the Sun on the 14th day of Nissan as long as the 14th day of Nissan has been in existence.

On the 14th day of Nissan the Sun and the moon are on the opposite sides of the earth. For an ECLIPSE to occur both the sun and moon MUST be on the same side of the earth. And further NO TOTAL ECLIPSE can LAST for even 10 minutes in the same location.

5. Jerome did not propagate that Jesus was a man. Jerome was of the view that Jesus was DIVINE and became a man. Jerome propagated a MYTH.

6. It is also known from apologetic sources that there were Christians since the 1st century, since the time of the Emperor Claudius, who did NOT worship Jesus.


It would appear that HJers are propagating BOGUS information about Jesus.

There is only ONE external source where the name JESUS Christ can be found and they are "Antiquities of the Jews" 18.3.3 and 20.9.1 and even though the passages are forgeries, Jesus was STILL described as a MYTH.

Jesus was RAISED from the dead.

"Antiquities of the Jews" 18.3.3 Surely Jesus was a MYTH or non-historical.

PhilosopherJay

Hi Davka,

I like the phrase "made out of whole cloth". The Jesus stories do not come from whole cloth, but from many bits and pieces of cloth which has been torn and cut from other cloths. For example, the claim that Jesus went to Egypt as a child is ripped from the cloth of Moses being raised in Egypt as a child.

There is always the possibility that a bit here and there of cloth actually does come from an historical character. For example, it is quite plausible that Pilate did execute a man who claimed to be a son of god (a holy man), but that would still make Jesus only a trivially historical figure. In the same way that Santa Claus may in a trivial sense be an historical figure, because he is based on Saint Nick or Saint Nicholas, who may have been based on a real historical person.

In the same way, it is quite conceivable that there was a newspaper reporter in New York in the 1930's who wore glasses and would take them off when he went to visit his mistress after work. We could say that this makes Clark Kent an historical character, but it would only make him so in a trivial sense. He was not made out of whole cloth, but only a bit of cloth.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

show_no_mercy

This is another good point. Is Santa Clause mythical or historical? He's another good comparison to the Jesus story. Most people would say that there's no Santa Clause giving people presents. But if there was a person who originally gave out presents that the current Santa myth is based on, would we say that this was the historical Santa?

spamandham

Probably every mythical concept that exists has some origin in reality. People are just not creative enough to invent ideas from whole cloth. One our ancestors looked up at the night sky, and while fantasizing about one of the king's virgins, noticed that some of the stars had a similar shape if you connected them in your mind (it helps to be high when you try this). ...and so we could say that particular virgin is the historical Virgo. But surely this is an absurd stretch of what is meant by "the historical X".

Could I analyze all the Popeye cartoons and develop a nontrivial picture of the historical person that inspired the character? No. Any attempt to do that is simply going to create another fictional character, albeit one that more closely resembles a real person.

The same with Jesus. If Julius Caesar or King Tut could both just as easily be the historical Jesus, then the Jesus we have is a myth regardless of how that myth originated. The only hope for salvaging a historical Jesus would be if a good argument could be made that the stories we have really are biographies in the modern sense, but with some magic tacked on just to puff up the memory of the man. IMHO, that approach has been thoroughly discredited.