mountainman

So who is the chief suspect chief?

And what's the current pricing for nine 3 meter
cylindrical drums of porphyry, separated by ornate
brass leaves, etc, etc

Minimalist

You've just met another one. BTW, if you believe that shit, I have a bridge in Brooklyn that you can buy. Cheap.

Wiploc

Minimalist, how did you decide that he never existed? There could have been a real person named Jesus, and the Jesus myth could have been seeded by stories of this real person. Or the myth could have grown up without being originally based on a real person. How did you decide that the latter is so much more likely than the former as to warrant your belief?

crc

OLDMAN

One only has to look at the modern Mormon church to see how religion grows out of pure fiction. Today they have millions of followers

Minimalist

Oh, simple mathematics means there probably were 50 people (at least) with the name, Jesus, son of Joseph. Both were exceedingly common names at the time. So it isn't the name that matters. You need to identify one who did all the magic tricks, was born at two separate times, (pre-4 BC and post 6 AD) who died in 30 or 33 or 36 AD, etc and who was so famous and dangerous that the powers that be had him killed but who was at the same time so insignificant that no one living at the time paid any attention to him.

Let me know when you find that guy. The "Jesus" you are looking for only seems to exist in the fertile imaginations of his followers....just like Zeus and Odin and Jupiter and Baal and Marduk.

jjramsey

Evidence?

AFAIK, you are completely wrong about Tacitus and mostly wrong about Josephus. The Testimonium Flavianum in the extent copies of Josephus' work is considered by nearly all scholars to be at least partially interpolated, with a respectable minority believing it to be an interpolation altogether. The briefer passage in his work, mentioning the "brother of Jesus called Christ, James his name," is almost universally considered genuine, though there are still arguments on this board about it.

FinnHawk

It doesn't even matter if Jesus did indeed exist. The key is whether or not he was divine, which I highly doubt.

ApostateAbe

Jenny, if the arguments have good arguments mixed in with the bad, then the good arguments will be glazed over. I found the assertion that the 11 disciples of Jesus were killed to be especially bad. The video doesn't give sources, but you can look it up yourself: the sources are late catholic church myth.

aa5874

You want to know whether or not he was the Holy Phantom?

mountainman

TESTIMONIUM FLAVIANUM

Logically the TF has only three possible "states":

1) TF: is completely authentic
2) TF: is partially authentic
3) TF: is completely inauthentic

The following subscribe to 3):

Lardner,
Harnack,
Schurer,
Gordon Stein.
Author of CMU,
Arthur Drews,
David Taylor,
Wells, JM
Bishop Warburton "a rank forgery, and a very stupid one, too",
Remsburg,
Rev. Dr. Giles,
Rev. S. Baring-Gould,
Cannon Farrar,
Theodor Keim,
Rev. Dr. Hooykaas ,
Dr. Alexander Campbell,
Dr. Chalmers,
Lee Strobel (NOTE: See comments),
Charles Templeton,
Freke and Gandy,
Earl Doherty,
Marshall Gauvin ("[the TF] .. did not exist." ),
Edwin Johnson,
Jakob Burckhardt ??
Jay Raskin
Joseph Wheless, Forgery in Christianity



This is also a misrepresentation.

Firstly, it is my understanding that for example all
the writers listed above in reference to the TF being
a completely fabricated interpolation, additionally
consider the minor reference (the James ref) in Josephus
the minor interpolation. ie: It is also fabricated from
a margin gloss by a later hand.

The defining post in your thread above
belongs to spin.

Best wishes,


Pete Brown