Eyewitness To Jesus? The Gospel Authors

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Justus of Tiberias wrote a history of Galillee and made NO mention of Jesus.

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Gotta watch those second-hand references. Where did you get the idea that he wrote a history of Galilee? As far as I can tell, Justus wrote a history of Jewish kings. Not exactly the circles that Jesus was supposed to have moved in.

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Nor did Philo Judaeus, Musonius Rufus, nor Seneca, nor did dozens of other early writers make any mention of Jesus.

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Why on earth should any of these writers, none of whom lived in Palestine, even have heard of a minor religious figure with a small following in Palestine, much less mentioned him?

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The early Christian documents (e.g. Paul, Clement, Hebrews, Jude, James etc) contain no hard evidence for a historical Jesus of Nazareth - merely mention of a spiritual Iesous Christos derived from scripture.

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Paul's letters and Hebrews both contain clear references to a physical Jesus; only the most desperate, twisted readings of them would suggest otherwise. That doesn't guarantee that Jesus actually existed of course, but Paul at least was in close enough contact with Jesus' milieu that he provides quite good evidence that there was such a person. (What he doesn't do is provide much information about Jesus' life or teachings.)

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The Gospels themselves are traditionally dated to late 1st century, yet the evidence shows that they were UNKNOWN, even to Christians until early-mid 2nd century - and that the Gospels were UN-NAMED until late 2nd century. The actual manuscripts of the Gospels date no earlier than 2nd century.

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No, that's quite wrong. The gospels are tradionally dated to mid to late 1st century. They are dated by virtually all contemporary scholars (of whatever religous persuasion) to late first century, or possibly (in the case of John) very early 2nd century. The earliest surviving evidence for one of the gospels is clearly the use of Mark by Matthew and Luke, both late 1st cent. The earliest non-Biblical Christian writings that can be roughly dated (I Clement and the letters of Ignatius, the first around 100 and the second ten or twenty years later) both contain repeated references to the gospels (or possibly, in the case of Clement, to similar traditions to those that were included by the gospel writers).

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All of which goes to show that Paul's original Iesous Christos was a spiritual being, not historical - then, a century afterward (after the total destruction of Jerusalem), the Gospels stories arise and are repeated ad nauseum.

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In sum, the Gospels are stories, written a century later - Jesus of Nazareth is a myth.

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This bears about as much resemblence to real New Testament scholarship as creationism does to science. Any claim that the gospels weren't written until 100 years after the death of Jesus is simply crackpottery.

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No, s/he was suggesting that there exists no 'EMPTY TOMB' narrative firmly dated to the 1st century CE. Do you have evidence to the contrary?

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Yes. Mark's gospel includes an empty tomb, and is firmly dated to the first century.

Greetings Brian,Thanks for your informative and supportive reply :-)
(and pardon me for glossing over your main point.)Yes,
I agree its obvious that the Jesus story is suspect - yet I notice that more and more people and web sites are looking into the issue - 5 years ago, the Jesus Myth theory was wild fringe thinking, now I'd say its merely a minority view (and growing.)Iasion

Udo Schnelle, for example, dates Mark to 70 CE, Matthew and Luke to 90 CE, and John to between 100 and 110 CE.

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We can't find any indication that he even existed at the time. Nobody seemed to notice his passing. We can't even find any records in the Roman tabulation, despite the evidence of the existence of Pilate.

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What Roman tabulation? Pilate, a Roman official, barely registers in Roman histories. Minor foreign religous figures are highly unlikely to have gotten that much attention.

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Do you honestly believe that if word came round about a man who was capable of raising people from the dead, it wouldn't get documented everywhere and spread so far and wide that it would be impossible to cover it up?

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A bit tendentious there, aren't you? Recast that as, "Do you honestly believe that if word came around about a man whose followers would later claim was capable of raising people from the dead, it wouldn't get documented everywhere?", and see how unimpressive it becomes. Even substitute "whose followers claimed was capable", and it's still remarkably unremarkable that people elsewhere didn't pay any attention. Miracle workers were not exactly a novelty, you know.

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And yet, nobody contemporaneous to Jesus seems to have noticed.

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As best as we can tell, Josephus noticed. Most (but not all) Josephus scholars consider the reference to "James, the brother of Jesus, who is called 'Messiah'" to be genuine. It's a probabilistic judgment, but it's the best that can be done. It's hard to think of anyone else who would be likely to have either noticed or mentioned Jesus.

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Udo Schnelle, for example, dates Mark to 70 CE, Matthew and Luke to 90 CE, and John to between 100 and 110 CE.

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Right. The dating isn't entirely guesswork. Ignatius, who died no later than 117, quoted Matthew, who in turn reworked material from Mark. Allowing time for both gospels to propagate before they'd likely be used by others, Mark pretty clearly had to be written in the first century. The suggestion that it was written ca. 130, on the other hand, would seem to require time travel.

Greetings sfs,Thanks for your reply :-)

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The support for Jesus' existence is much better than anything we have for Homer, for whom we have nothing even remotely contemporaneous,

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False analogy -
Homer is not promoted by a religion as historical proof of unbelievable supernatural events.Furthermore,
the reliablity of MANUSCRIPTS has nothing to do with the reliability of the CONTENTS -
e.g. we have copies of the Book of Mormon from merely a few years after it was written - would you argue that the Book of Mormon is therefore true?

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while for Jesus the earliest evidence comes from Paul, writing about 20 years after his death.

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But Paul contains no hard evidence for a historical Jesus - merely a few vague phrases in spiritual terms which may just as easily apply to a spiritual being who operates on the planes above the physical.Paul's total failure to mention :
* the Gospel events
* the Gospel actors
* teachings of Jesus
* miracles by Jesus
even in hundreds of places where the context calls for it
(see LIGAUBO - Daftar Situs Judi Slot Online Gacor Deposit Pulsa Jackpot Terbesar )
argues that Paul had never even heard of a historical Jesus of Nazareth.So, the evidence for Jesus in Paul is essentially zero.

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Not an eyewitness, but someone who did meet Jesus' brothers.

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* Paul makes it very clear he got his teachings "from no man",
* he makes it clear he is "just as much" an apostle as the pillars,
* he openly criticises the teachings of the pillars,
* he lists his visions among the appearances to the others.This argues strongly against a historical Jesus - it shows that Paul's type of visions were all any Christian ever saw of Jesus.Iasion

Greetings again,

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You're suggesting the gospels were written by non-Christians?

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No, as CA pointed out, I simply meant no Christian author for the first CENTURY or so after the alleged events (which covers about 20 early Christian documents) shows any knowledge of the empty tomb story.(Oddly enough, the empty tomb motif does show up in a popular Roman novel of the time (Chariton's "Chaereas and Callirhoe".) - i.e. the empty tomb theme was a known fictional story-telling device of the day.)Indeed, the vast bulk of the Gospel stories and actors are totally UNKNOWN to any early Christian till early-mid 2nd century.Please DO check out my analysis here:
iiNet | naked dsl - broadband - adsl - phone - voip
which clearly lays out my argument.Yet,
AFTER the Gospels arise (mid 2nd century),
the empty tomb, and all the other Gospel stories are repeated at length, ad nauseum, over and over, again and agian, on and on...This is clear evidence that the Gospel and their contents were totally unknown until early-mid 2nd century.This is supported by a fragment from the Apology of Aristides :
"... the gospel, as it is called, which a short time was preached among them"
which shows that the Gospel (singular) was new in Aristides time (which was probably in the 120-130s or perhaps later) - and that the formal term "Gospel" was new then (c.f. Justin who says the "memoirs of the apostles" are "called Gospels".)Then, just after the Gospels come to prominence, Celsus attacks them as "fiction based on myth" - an attack so damaging, the Christians attempted to destroy all evidence of it.Furthermore, in this very same period (late 2nd C.) we have Christian fathers describing Christian beliefs at length without a SINGLE MENTION of Jesus (Athenagoras), and even one who specifically denies Christians believe in a crucifixion or an incarnation (Minucius Felix.)Which all goes to show the Gospels were a spurious and late addition to a Christianity originally based on a spiritual being.Iasion

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False analogy -
Homer is not promoted by a religion as historical proof of unbelievable supernatural events.

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What bearing does that have on the quality of the historical evidence available?

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Furthermore,
the reliablity of MANUSCRIPTS has nothing to do with the reliability of the CONTENTS -
e.g. we have copies of the Book of Mormon from merely a few years after it was written - would you argue that the Book of Mormon is therefore true?

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Say what? Who said anything about the reliability of manuscripts? Is Josh McDowell whispering in your ear? We have no records from any near contemporary of Homer, while we do have such records from near contemporaries of Jesus. That is a fact, and it has nothing to do with the date of manuscripts.

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But Paul contains no hard evidence for a historical Jesus - merely a few vague phrases in spiritual terms which may just as easily apply to a spiritual being who operates on the planes above the physical.

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Paul says Jesus was physically ("according to the flesh") a descendant of David. That is not a phrase that can be applied easily to a spiritual being (especially when he describes himself as being Jewish with the same phrase).

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Paul's total failure to mention :
* the Gospel events
* the Gospel actors
* teachings of Jesus
* miracles by Jesus

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Have you actually read Paul? He frequently mentions the death and resurrection of Jesus, both of which are kind of prominent in the gospels. He doesn't seem to be very interested in most of the events of Jesus' life, but he does mention Cephas (Peter), James, John, the brothers of Jesus and "the twelve". Who else should he have mentioned? He mentions the teachings of Jesus -- not very often, but he does mention them. (The most obvious reference is when he quotes Jesus about divorce.) Of your list, the only one he actually doesn't mention is the miracles. Given Paul's interests, it's not clear why he would want to, but it's certainly reasonable to state that Paul provides no evidence that Jesus was known to him as a miracle worker.

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* Paul makes it very clear he got his teachings "from no man",
* he makes it clear he is "just as much" an apostle as the pillars,
* he openly criticises the teachings of the pillars,
* he lists his visions among the appearances to the others.

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None of which has any bearing on the fact that Paul includes the brothers of Jesus among those pillars (i.e. those already recognized as leaders by the followers of Jesus), and that he says he met them. The fact that Paul didn't like Jesus' brothers is hardly evidence that they didn't exist. No one is arguing that Paul's visions of Jesus constitute historical evidence. What's important is that both Paul and those he was writing to (including some who had been followers of Jesus longer then he had) thought of Jesus as someone who had brothers, and that those brothers really existed. Trying to turn this Jesus into a purely spiritual figure requires considerable contortion.

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No, as CA pointed out, I simply meant no Christian author for the first CENTURY or so after the alleged events (which covers about 20 early Christian documents) shows any knowledge of the empty tomb story.

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And I pointed out that you're wrong. Your attempted redating of the gospels is simply implausible. (Heck, we've got a manuscript of John's gospel that's probably earlier than the supposed writing of the gospels.)

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Please DO check out my analysis here:
iiNet | naked dsl - broadband - adsl - phone - voip
which clearly lays out my argument.

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I looked at it. What's Ignatius doing in the 130s? Why are Paul's references to the crucifixion and the Last Supper "uncertain" or "informal"? What happened to Paul's citation of Jesus' teaching? What happened to Ignatius and Clement's quotations from the gospels?

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This is supported by a fragment from the Apology of Aristides :
"... the gospel, as it is called, which a short time was preached among them"
which shows that the Gospel (singular) was new in Aristides time (which was probably in the 120-130s or perhaps later) - and that the formal term "Gospel" was new then ...

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Oh my goodness. An apology is a work addressed to someone outside the faith -- you know, someone you'd have to define terms for. And of course "gospel" is singular. "Gospel" has always had the primary meaning of the message about Jesus; the designation of the four Gospels as such is secondary.What text are you using, anyway? This is the only reference I can find to "gospel" in a translation of the Greek text:

Greetings again,Whoops,
that was "a history IN Galillee" :-)If the Gospel events had transpired, I think Justus would have mentioned Jesus - Photius thought it a "fault" that he didn't.Philo wote at length about Jewish beliefs and history (and he was the first to use the concept of the "Logos") - I think he would have mentioned a religious teacher such as Jesus.Seneca's times and thoughts were so similar to Paul, that a forged correspondence sprung up - if Seneca had heard of Jesus's teachings, it is fairly natural he would have mentioned him.The point is, there are quite a few writers from the period, see my list :
iiNet | naked dsl - broadband - adsl - phone - voip
Some of these writers, could, or even should, have mentioned Jesus -
none did.

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Paul's letters and Hebrews both contain clear references to a physical Jesus;

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I disagree - please backup your claim with evidence.

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They are dated by virtually all contemporary scholars (of whatever religous persuasion) to late first century, or possibly (in the case of John) very early 2nd century.

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Please pay attention.
That may be so, I make no specific claim to exactly when the (various layers of the) Gospels were WRITTEN.
I do however, make specific claims, backed with evidence, about the rise of knowledge about the Gospels' and contents.
I repeat my claim :
No Christian author shows knowledge of the Gospels or their contents, until early-mid 2nd century

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The earliest surviving evidence for one of the gospels is clearly the use of Mark by Matthew and Luke, both late 1st cent.

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Pardon?
An un-attested document dates another unattested document?
What are you smoking? :-)
There is NO EVIDENCE for any of the Gospels existing before early-mid 2nd century.
How on earth can you claim a document for which we have no evidence as proof of another document for which we have no evidence?
Claims and assertions and opinions about dates are worthless.
Please produce some actual evidence.

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The earliest non-Biblical Christian writings that can be roughly dated (I Clement and the letters of Ignatius, the first around 100 and the second ten or twenty years later) both contain repeated references to the gospels (or possibly, in the case of Clement, to similar traditions to those that were included by the gospel writers).

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The Ignatiana was forged in the 130s (exactly the period the Gospels arose) - the letters are notoriusly corrupt and it is doubtful if the person even existed. Doubts about the letters arose even in early times. (There is NO clear reference to any of the four Gospels by name - in this time, it was still "the Gospel", just like in Aristides.)Clement however, clearly IS an early document,
and I note you allow there may be no clear refereences to the Gospels therein.
Indeed so -
Clement has about 100 references to the OT, often named, and called "scripture",
Clement has about 100 references to Paul, often named, and called "wise writings",
but
Clement has merely 2 sayings similar (not exact) to Gospel sayings, introduced with "remember the words of the Lord Jesus" - i.e. oral tradition about a founder figure, not necessarily historical.

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This bears about as much resemblence to real New Testament scholarship as creationism does to science. Any claim that the gospels weren't written until 100 years after the death of Jesus is simply crackpottery.

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Well,
I never once claimed "the gospels weren't written until 100 years after the death of Jesus" - please do me the courtesy of actually following my argument properly.
I claimed there is no evidence of any knowledge of the Gospels until early-mid 2nd century.So far, you have responded with :
* numerous assertions and opinions,
* no evidence for your claims,
* a claim about Ignatius - that fails, as his writings are late,
* a non-claim about Clement - that supports my case,
and finally
* an insult ("crackpottery"), the last refuge for those with no argument.
In short, whilst long on opinions, you've given nothing to disprove my case.So, my claim stands :
There is no evidence that any Christian knew anything about the Gospels until early-mid 2nd century.Iasion

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If the Gospel events had transpired, I think Justus would have mentioned Jesus - Photius thought it a "fault" that he didn't.

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Here's Photius's description: Photius is obviously miffed that Jesus wasn't mentioned, but it isn't likely that he had a reliable perspective on how Jesus would have been viewed by his contemporaries, is it? If you can conclude that a chronology of the Kings of Judah from Moses to Agrippa should have mentioned someone who wasn't a king (or a political figure at all) and who didn't live in Judah, you practice an unusual form of inference.

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Philo wote at length about Jewish beliefs and history (and he was the first to use the concept of the "Logos") - I think he would have mentioned a religious teacher such as Jesus.

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What did Philo write at length about Jewish history? Which work do you think should have mentioned Jesus? Judging from Josephus, John the Baptist was a more significant public figure than Jesus. How many times does Philo mention John? (The answer is zero.)

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Seneca's times and thoughts were so similar to Paul, that a forged correspondence sprung up - if Seneca had heard of Jesus's teachings, it is fairly natural he would have mentioned him.

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You didn't answer my question. Why would Seneca, living in Rome when he wasn't in exile, have heard of Jesus' teachings? What other aspects of Jewish culture does he show an awareness of?

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The point is, there are quite a few writers from the period, see my list :
iiNet | naked dsl - broadband - adsl - phone - voip
Some of these writers, could, or even should, have mentioned Jesus -
none did.

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Exactly one of those writes should have mentioned Jesus: Josephus. And most Josephus scholars (including most non-Christian ones) have concluded that he did mention him. The others have zero evidentiary value. Apply the same test I suggested earlier: how many of these authors mention John the Baptist? Josephus, and that's it. (By the way, how do you know that Philo spent time in Jerusalem?)

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I disagree - please backup your claim with evidence.

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I've already provided one for Paul. For Hebrews:5:7 "During the days of Jesus' flesh, he offered up prayers and petitions."2:14 "Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity [Gr: he likewise participated/shared in them]."12:3 "Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men..."

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Please pay attention.
That may be so, I make no specific claim to exactly when the (various layers of the) Gospels were WRITTEN.
I do however, make specific claims, backed with evidence, about the rise of knowledge about the Gospels' and contents.
I repeat my claim :
No Christian author shows knowledge of the Gospels or their contents, until early-mid 2nd century

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And your claim is wrong, since the author of Matthew was a Christian author, wrote before the early 2nd century, and showed detailed knowledge of the content of the gospels. What authors are there who could have displayed a knowledge of the Gospels before the early 2nd century? Paul (and probably the author of Hebrews) wrote before the Gospels were written. Other NT writers (not counting the Gospel writers) wrote at unknown dates. The next writing we have is right around the beginning of the 2nd century.

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Pardon?
An un-attested document dates another unattested document?
What are you smoking? :-)
There is NO EVIDENCE for any of the Gospels existing before early-mid 2nd century.
How on earth can you claim a document for which we have no evidence as proof of another document for which we have no evidence?
Claims and assertions and opinions about dates are worthless.
Please produce some actual evidence.

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There are a number of lines of evidence that indicate that Matthew was written well before 130. Ignatius (whose letters, despite your rejection of them, are nearly universally accepted by the relevant experts) is one. Polycarp's clear quotation of Matthew is another. The date of Polycarp's letter was probably around 110-120. Personally, I find it pretty implausible that Polycarp, who was 60 years old in 130, wouldn't have noticed new writings suddenly appeared that didn't mesh with existing stories about Jesus. There's also Papias, who wrote sometime in the period 120-140; he reports traditions about the origin of written gospels, placing them in the generation of the apostles. Whether the traditions are accurate or not is unimportant; what matters is that by the time of Papias, there were already written gospels (attributed to Mark and Matthew) that were old, old enough to have accumulated traditions.

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Clement however, clearly IS an early document,
and I note you allow there may be no clear refereences to the Gospels therein.
Indeed so -
Clement has about 100 references to the OT, often named, and called "scripture",
Clement has about 100 references to Paul, often named, and called "wise writings",
but
Clement has merely 2 sayings similar (not exact) to Gospel sayings, introduced with "remember the words of the Lord Jesus" - i.e. oral tradition about a founder figure, not necessarily historical.

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Where did you get these numbers? I just went through Clement's letter to the Corinthians, and I find one explicit reference to Paul's writings (specifically to one of his letters to the Corinthians) and two explicit references to the words of Jesus (both quite similar to material in the Gospels); in addition there is one string of quotations from Hebrews and a reference to the parable of the sower, plus a number of phrases echoing gospel and Pauline material. The reference to Paul's epistle is, "Take up the epistle of the blessed Paul the apostle. What did he first write to you in the 'beginning of the gospel'? Truly he wrote to you in the Spirit about himself and Cephan and Apollos."The two references to gospel material are introduced by "Let us remember the words of the Lord Jesus, which he spoke as he taught gentleness and patience", and "Remember the words of Jesus our Lord, for he said . . .". None of the references in Clement are particularly useful as historical evidence for Jesus, but the phrasing of the first strongly suggests that Clement is thinking of a physical Jesus teaching in the flesh. Is your position that everyone forgot about the spiritual Jesus in the 35 or 40 years between Paul and Clement's letter, even though some individuals almost certainly lived through the entire period? That a spirit being in the heavenly realms was converted into a physical person living in Palestine in less than a single lifetime, that this happened in the minds of Christians spread throughout the Mediterranean, and that no one noticed or commented on the change? I find that a tad implausible. I also note that your claim was that there was no evidence that any of the Gospel stories or events were known earlier than the 2nd century. Since Clement is late 1st century, and knows stories of Jesus teaching, your claim would seem to be wrong.

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The Ignatiana was forged in the 130s (exactly the period the Gospels arose) - the letters are notoriusly corrupt and it is doubtful if the person even existed. Doubts about the letters arose even in early times.

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That the letters are authentic is the consensus of current scholarship, or at least that was the situation in 1992, judging from Holmes's edition of The Apostolic Fathers. The consesus can always be wrong, of course, but you have given no justification for overthrowing it in this case. (The existence of Ignatius is established by the letter of Polycarp, which refers to him.)

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I never once claimed "the gospels weren't written until 100 years after the death of Jesus" - please do me the courtesy of actually following my argument properly.

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My mistake. I thought that when you wrote you were saying that the Gospels were stories, written a century later. What exactly have I misunderstood about that sentence?

I only want to correct you on one thing.The Shroud of Turin IS NOT a fake.Research has proven that carbon 14 dating does not accurately date linen.The latest and best research has determined that the image on the Shroud was scorched on to it - no paints and no dyes. It is a three dimensional image on one side only with the scorchings to be more intense in areas that actually touched the Shroud (as opposed to an area like eye sockets.)The scorched image is the result of a micro-burst of heat and light. The source of that micro-burst was the power of God raising His Son from the dead which was recorded incidentially upon the Shroud.

Hi sfs,I didn't come over here to gang up on you, but this seems to be the thread the mythicist hang out in and the discussion is more detailed than I could do.What I'd like to know is what you consider to be the irreducible core of information we have at present about a historical Jesus. Doherty reads Paul's meeting with the brothers of the Lord not as literally blood kin of Jesus, but in a generic sense of a title for members of that Christian group, and indeed some modern sects speak of one another in a similiar way.There are a few who doubt that Paul existed and regard his letters as being created by later church fathers such as Eusubius who seems to come in for a great deal of suspicion by a few contributors at JesusMysteries@yahoogroups.com.It seems that you hold that there was a teacher whose followers spread the word and some of those who talked with them wrote accounts. Paul would be one, and would the authors of the gospels be others? Or did they rely on testimony from those who knew the historical Jesus?You are contributing to so many threads it's hard for me to keep up with you!lfen

I'm not sfs but I'll offer my views in case you're interested.Firstly I don't think we can rely on Paul's lack of interest in the historical Jesus as a solid argument that there was no such person. I beleive that the lack of information in Paul's Epistles is probably partly due to there being less to the historical Jesus than there is in the Gospels and partly Paul's own focus on his visionary experience (the only way he can claim parity with the disciples).What I think we can say about Jeus is :1) He came from Galilee2) He was, for a time, a follower of John the Baptist
(This is a point worth considering - although there is considerable "spin" in the Gospels they clearly state that Jesus submitted to John's Baptism - and the need for "spin" indicates it is something that is not likely to have been invented).3) He either claimed to be the Messiah or many people - including his leading followers came to believe that he was.4) He was executed by the Romans - crucified.5) After his death, some of his followers had experiences that they interpreted as indicating that he was still alive.
In my opinion, this was enough for them to hold to their belief in Jesus as Messiah and the concept of "the Second Coming" was invented to explain away Jesus' failure as Messiah.