Lineage of Jesus

Thank you for this information, although I would be skeptical as to the vericity of the Historical refrences, one thing seems obvious. Where is Jesus mentioned in history when he actualy lived?

Quote: "There is NO MENTION anywhere in the Nicean writings about the books of the Bible"

Ok I was wrong to say the Council wrote the bible, the church set up by Emperor Constintine had compiled the bible, but the Council set up by Constintine helped confirm it as a religion.
Quote:
"The New Testament and the Nicene Creed are deeply entangled with each other. The wording and the concepts in the Nicene Creed come from the New Testament—in fact, one of the most important debates at the Council of Nicea concerned whether it is proper to include a word in the Nicene Creed that does not occur in the New Testament. On the other hand, at the time that the Church issued the official canon of the New Testament, it customarily compared writings to the Nicene Creed to determine if they were orthodox. So you are correct if you say that the Nicene Creed proceeds from the New Testament, and you are correct if you say that the New Testament is certified by the Nicene Creed." (www.kencollins.com/bible-c1.htm)

If the Nicene creed is based off of the New Testament it would stand to reason they had the New Testament present at the Council. The fact that there is no refrence to the New Testament in the writings rasies a red flag to me. Again I would like to point out that The Emperor Constintine Set up Both the Council and the Church.
I am assuming then that the council was set up to justify the bible.
So the Nicene Council was set up to help "prove" to the Roman people that the New Testament was about the christian religion according to the Church and at the same time the Church came out with the bible That was confirmed by the Nicene Creed. The fact that both the Council and the Church were set up by the Emperor Constintine and that each reinforced each other still leaves me with the question of accuracy. Its a pattern with the church througout time, enforcing its self with its own works. I belive that one could reason that the Emperor set up both the Council and the Church to Insert into history the religion.

I appriciate your effort to enlighten me.

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--ignorance is humankind's worst enemy--

I can’t see any reason to say Jesus never existed and was created by the Nicene Council. On the other hand, the belief that He was one and the same as God I do believe dates to the 3rd or 4th century AD. I think the writings show a transformation of Jesus from originally being simply portrayed as a religious teacher – to being a someone aspiring to be King. And later he was portrayed as a prophet and eventually in the 3rd or 4th century the writings eventually said God and Jesus were the same. I don’t really believe the idea of a Holy Trinity. I believe God is omnipresent and this omnipresent quality could be called the Holy Ghost. But I don’t think God and Jesus are one and the same.
In the Gospels you will see Jesus himself never considered himself the same as God. He would pray to God (What God would need to pray to himself). He always spoke of God as separate from himself and Jesus never even claimed to know what God was thinking. For example when asked if the sons of Zebedee could sit at his right hand and his left when he ascends into heaven. He replied “That is not for me to decide but for God in heaven” Mathew 20:23
Also consider Jesus’ last words on the cross were “My God. My God. Why have you forsaken me?” This doesn’t make it sound like Jesus and God are the same. There are many more examples like these in the gospels.
It started off with Paul’s writings that portrayed Jesus as a messenger from God.
Sup32string, from your remarks I’m sure you’re already convinced Jesus and God aren’t the same but my point to you is if he was a complete fabrication then why wouldn’t these gospels be consistent with the idea of Jesus just being another manifestation of God?

Thanks

I think I read most of this string, but I apologize if I overlook something in my quick response. First of all, there are several references to Jesus by contemporary historians (mostly "pagan"). Josephus was a Jewish historian writing in the second half of the first century. Granted, it was 30 years after Jesus' death, but this seems to demonstrate how well known Jesus' movement was. Two of the Roman historian that I can mention offhand are Tacitus and Swetonius (sp?) who I believe both mentioned Jesus as a leader of a religious rebellion (which, to the Romans, that's all he was). Just as an aside, very few historians and scholars of the late second temple and early Roman imperial periods doubt the existence of a man named Jesus (and even fewer of them are Christians . They understand him as a man who founded a sect of Judaism and who offered a threat to both the Jewish aristocracy and the Romans. It's the idea that he was God that is obviously the brunt of discussion. As an additional aside, Roman catacomb inscriptions discovered in the 1940s contain Christian symbols and the text "Woe, Jesus!" They date to 40-45AD. There is the also the bone ossuary, which arguably refers to the historical Jesus. Of course, these last two are quite speculative, but are interesting in my mind.
Okay, well that's all that came to mind so far. I hope I haven't regurgitated too much . take care,
Jake

Jake22 writes: First of all, there are several references to Jesus by contemporary historians (mostly "pagan").

There were non-Biblical mentions of Jesus by three roughly 1st century historians or qualified writers: Josephus, Tacitus and Suetonius. For reference purposes I quote the relevant passages here.

This one from Josephus's Antiquities of the Jews 18:63-64, possibly written around the 80's AD, is widely believed to be a later Christian insertion:

About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who wrought surprising feats and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Messiah. When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of the highest standing amongst us, had condemned him to be crucified, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him. On the third day he appeared to them restored to life, for the prophets of God had prophesied these and countless other marvellous things about him. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared.

There is less agreement about this passing reference to Jesus in Antiquities 20:9.1. It seems impossible to establish its authenticity:

"So he [Ananus, son of Ananus the high priest] assembled the sanhedrin of judges, and brought before him the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others (or some of his companions) and when he had formed an accusation against them, he delivered them to be stoned.

Tacitus writing around 100 AD mentions Christians in Annals 15.44, but it is believed by some to be a later Christian insertion, and even if genuine he is clearly merely repeating what he has heard:

...derived their name and origin from Christ, who, in the reign of Tiberius, had suffered death by the sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate

Suetonius around 120 AD mentions a "Chrestus" in his The Lives of the Caesars 5.25.4, and while perhaps confirming the existence of Jews who followed Christ it provides no evidence of Jesus, and in fact errs in describing him as instigating disturbances long after he supposedly died:

Since the Jews constantly made disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus [Emperor Claudius in 49 CE] expelled them from Rome.

Moving on:

As an additional aside, Roman catacomb inscriptions discovered in the 1940s contain Christian symbols and the text "Woe, Jesus!" They date to 40-45AD.

I have never heard this before. Do you have a source for this information?

There is the also the bone ossuary, which arguably refers to the historical Jesus.

The ossuary has been ruled a forgery by Israel's Department of Antiquities and its owner has been arrested. It'll be interesting to see how this turns out, because the most recent issue of Biblical Archeology Review has a long article describing how the ossuary's authenticity has been firmly established, so clearly there is a difference of opinion.

--Percy

I went back to check that inscription and I was a bit mixed up on the details, namely that it was a suburb in Jerusalem, not the catacombs. It is documented in The American Journal of Archaeology, October-December, 1947, LI.4, pp. 351ff. It is a 1945 discovery in Talpioth, a Jerusalem suburb, by the Museum of Jewish Antiquities located at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. The find consisted of several burials. I searched and found a site with some details. It's a Christian website, but here goes:

"On ossuray #1 was the name “Simeon Barsaba.” Professor Sukenik (an excavator) believed the family name, “Barsaba,” might well be related to the New Testament references to “Joseph Barsabas” and “Judas Barsabas,” both of whom are mentioned in the book of Acts (1:23; 15:22) – these two men possibly having been brothers. It is thus known that members of this family became identified with the Christian movement in the days of the first-century church.

"On ossuary #7 there is this inscription, written in charcoal: Iesous iou, which Professor Sukenik suggested should be rendered “Jesus, woe!” – the latter term being interpreted as an expression of grief.

"On the flat cover of ossuary #8 was this carved inscription in Greek, Iesous aloth, which again reflects the name “Jesus,” along with a presumed exclamation of mourning (p. 363).

"This tomb has been dated in the first half of the first century A.D. (cir. A.D. 42/43), based on pottery fragments therein, as well as a coin belonging to the administration of Herod Agrippa I that was among the rubble."

So, take it as you will. As for your response...in all respect, I have heard that the references to Jesus in historical documents are probably additions by the early church. I think that this is a bit of a cop-out answer...it seems to me to deny plain evidence, oftentimes for no other reason than that it doesn't fit with the "trendy" scholarly arguments denying more traditional ways of thinking. If those documents were so heavily redacted by early Christians, a point which (to my understanding) is not supported by proof, then why were references to great pagan men kept in there, primarily when there were overtones of non-Christian divinity? Why would early Christians even keep copies of the histories in existence? It doesn't make sense to me, but I suspect someone will have a good answer. I do not believe that those are additions, but I am certainly interested to hear other points of view.
A quick additional reference to Christ is from Pliny, the governor of Bithynia (in Epist. X.96). In 112 AD he wrote emperor Trajan for advice about how he should deal with Christians who met on appointed days to sing a hymn "to Christ as if to God."
As for the ossuary, I have heard nothing of what you spoke (although I don't deny it). I took a New Testament class with a well-published scholar who was not a Christian. According to him (although this was 6 months ago now), nearly every scholar of the time period believed the box to be authentic. Perhaps things have changed since then. If you don't mind, what about the finding was determined to be a fake?
Jake

[This message has been edited by Jake22, 07-27-2003]

Well the validicity of the work of Josephus is contested but the consensus is that its is at least doctored.(unfortunately, the text as we have it in extant copies of Josephus' Antiquities appears to have been dramatically re-written from a Christian point of view." http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~humm/Topics/JewishJesus/josephus.html)
As for Tacitus, Percy said its thuoght to be a Chrisitan insertion as well.
For Suetonius
Quote:
"Slingerland proceeds to take on the notorious crux in Suet. Claud. 24.4: Iudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantis Roma [Claudius] expulit. His treatment, although unnecessarily prolix, argues quite powerfully against the widespread conviction that "Chrestus" is Christ. As Slingerland points out, more fully than any predecessor, the name appears with reasonable frequency in the epigraphic evidence, encompassing persons of freedman or free born status, some of lowly origin, some of relatively prominent station. Nothing suggests Jesus Christ here. The passage indeed implies that Chrestus the impulsor was in Rome when these events transpired. And it will not do to save the Christian hypothesis by postulating Suetonius' ignorance. Nor does Acts 18:1-3 help the cause, for its reference to Jews expelled from Rome who joined Paul in Corinth does not suggest that they were Christians when they left Rome. Orosius' interpretatio christiana rests on no evidence independent of Suetonius. Slingerland reaches a proper and salutary conclusion: the burden of proof rests with those who wish to identify Chrestus with Christ, not those who distinguish them (pp 169-217).
http://omega.cohums.ohio-state.edu:8080/hyper-lists/bmcr-l/1998/1998-07-02.html

So I don't know I still don't see the historical refrences here. thanks for the information

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--ignorance is humankind's worst enemy--

Hey sup. In regards to the Josephus link you provided, I think it's interesting to note that it's true that there has been a dramatic rewriting from a Christian point of view, as you mentioned. However, the bias is related to Jesus' resurrection and identifying Jesus with a messiah figure expected by the Jews. It seems that there is no dispute that the passage mentions a Jesus with Jewish and Greek followers who existed and was killed by Pilate (at least according to the webisite).
Furthermore, Percipient, you mentioned a second passage of Josephus. Although you said this passage is less agreed upon than the first, it is a "usually undisputed allusion" to Jesus according to the site provided by sup. I'd assume the information is rather accurate, seeing as it's presented by an Ivy League professor who seems to have a rather anti-Christian viewpoint (at least as far as Christianity being the revealed plan of God goes). I'm not sure if it's 100% reliable, but worth noting.
Regarding your Suetonius info, thanks. It may be good to note that, according to your site, "Slingerland's own proposal for the identity of Chrestus is imaginative and novel...ingenious but highly speculative, as Slingerland himself concedes." His point is certainly interesting, though. However, the fact that "Slingerland is a man with a mission, [and] he has a clear and consistent thesis to present" does not make me too confident in his conclusions. I have cynical doubts about the few scholars who deny the existence of Jesus...that they do so not out of a review of the evidence, but instead because of personal or professional biases. (I assume that there are other scholars who similarly believe "Chrestus" is not to be identified with "Christos," so I'm sure the argument has other points not mentioned.)
As a side note, there are some interesting links on the sup's page: http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~humm/Topics/JewishJesus/ about possible references to Jesus. They are speculative but pretty interesting.
I'm a little jumbled and rushed, but I hope this post makes sense. I always have a hard time disagreeing with people because I don't want my disagreement to be interpretted it as disrespect. I hope nothing came off that way.
Thanks,
Jake

Greetings,

quote:

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May I ask how you are sure that the historical refrences you speak of that mention Jesus are not ficticious themselves?

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Well, it is almost certain that the 2nd and 3rd century fathers were real people, as Percipiet mentions below (because we have many interlocking references).

But -
Ignatius is very doubtful - I consider him totally fictitious :
* the story is not plausible at all
* we have no evidence of Ignatius the person at all
* his writings are extremely corrupt (2 versions exist)
* the writings are very odd (e.g. drug references?)
See my page here:
http://members.iinet.net.au/~quentinj/Christianity/Ignatius.html

quote:

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Why did the church have to forcibly make people belive? In the inquisitions the church tortured any who would preach the old philosophies and kill those who would not recant their claims. It seems odd to me that a religion would have to do that if it indeed was true. Might you be able to explain to me then what the reason behind the Inquisition is please? Thanks for your information I'll will look into what you have said.

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Whoa - you skipped from the first few centuries, right up to the Inquisition which was a MILLENIUM later - you cannot mix these up, they are totally different situations, in the first case the church was young and often persecuted, the Inquisition was a thousand YEARS of growth later.

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With the invention of the printing press (which the church sought to stop) the bible could be massed produced. In mass producing the bible, it was no longer easy to change things in the bible. As far as you my claims of the bible being only roughly 400 years old in it present form being false I would have to disagree.

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You keep saying this without any foundation - do you have any evidence of the bible being "changed" after the 4th century?
We have actual manuscripts from the 4th century - most of the NT was settled by then.

Can you show evidence of any changes made to the Bible after the 4th century?

Iasion

Greetings Admin,

I am impressed with the moderation here - polite and useful and appopriate - keep up the good work :-)

Iasion

Greetings again,

quote:

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Thank you for this information, although I would be skeptical as to the vericity of the Historical refrences, one thing seems obvious.

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It is good to be sceptical, but the onus is then on you to check the information and form a view you can defend.

quote:

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Where is Jesus mentioned in history when he actualy lived?

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There are NO contemporary references.
I agree that Jesus ws NOT a historical figure.

quote:

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If the Nicene creed is based off of the New Testament it would stand to reason they had the New Testament present at the Council.

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Yes,
much of the NT was known and used by the Council - they argued about certain passages at length.
But,
they did NOT choose the "books of the Bible"
The church has NEVER as a whole, officially named the books of Bible (strange but true).

quote:

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Again I would like to point out that The Emperor Constintine Set up Both the Council and the Church.

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Again I would like to point out this is NOT true -
Constantine did NOT set up the Church -
* the term "ecclesia" was in use,
* the ranks of the church were established,
* the importance of various centres,
* the leadership of the church,
were all established well before Constantine.

quote:

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I am assuming then that the council was set up to justify the bible.

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You seem to have a fixation with this issue.

You are wrong - the Council had NOTHING to do with the Bible per se.
The council was set up to get the various dis-agreements (Arianism=the nature of Jesus, Easter) of the Christian religion sorted out so it would be an effective official religion.

Iasion

Greetings Dave901,

quote:

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I can’t see any reason to say Jesus never existed...

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There are many good reasons to think Jesus was not a historical person:
* no contemporary references, even where expected (Justus, Philo)
* Jesus' story mimics other common son-of-god stories (Attis, Adonis, Iasius, Osiris)
* early Christians make no historical references
* the alleged "evidence" occurs long after the alleged events
* the Gospels were unknown until early-mid 2nd century

quote:

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I think the writings show a transformation of Jesus from originally being simply portrayed as a religious teacher

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That is NOT what the evidence shows.
The earliest Christian writings are Paul's (who probably reallly existed) and make up about 1/4 of the NT.
Paul talks of Iesous Christos as a spiritual entity of some sort, with NO historial or earthly references.
But, Paul does NOT show ANY mention of teachings by Jesus, even when the context demands it :
* Paul says "we do not know how to pray" - no mention of the Lord's prayer,
* Paul discusses divorce - no mention of Jesus' teachings,
* Paul talks about food cleanliness - no mention of Jesus' teaching.
This amazing ommision is discussed at length by Earl Doherty (highly recommended) :
http://www.humanists.net/jesuspuzzle/silintro.htm

In fact, the entire first century of Christian writings, up to early-mid 2nd century, shows NO MENTION of:
* Mary, Joseph, Bethlehem, Nazareth
* Herod, Pilate, Lazarus, Nicodemus, Judas
* teachings of Jesus,
* miracles of Jesus,
* the birth stories,
* the cleansing of the Temple,
* the triumphal entry,
* the trial,
* the passion,
* Peter's denial,
* etc, etc, etc....
In short - the Gospel story of Jesus of Nazareth was totally unknown for the ENTIRE FIRST CENTURY of Christianity.
This astonishing fact is laid out in my table here:
http://members.iinet.net.au/~quentinj/Christianity/Table.html

You will not find any evidence of Jesus as a teacher until a century or so after he supposedly existed - it is simply false to claim the first strata of Jesus shows a religious teacher - it does not.

quote:

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In the Gospels you will see Jesus himself never considered himself the same as God.

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The Gospels were entirely unknown until early-mid 2nd century, and when they arose, pagans attacked them as "fiction" and "based on myth" - the Gospels were not even named until late 2nd century, originally being anonymous.
Actually, Aristides specifically dsecribes the "Gospel" singular, as having been "preached a SHORT time" in the 120s - clear evidence the Gospels only arose in early 2nd century.
A detailed chronology can be seen on my page here :
http://members.iinet.net.au/~quentinj/Christianity/Gospel-Timeline.html

quote:

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He would pray to God (What God would need to pray to himself). He always spoke of God as separate from himself and Jesus never even claimed to know what God was thinking.

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The Gospels are fiction, unknown until a century after the alleged events.

quote:

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It started off with Paul’s writings that portrayed Jesus as a messenger from God.

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There is NO evidence of teachings or a message from Jesus in the Pauline corpus.

quote:

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if he was a complete fabrication then why wouldn’t these gospels be consistent with the idea of Jesus just being another manifestation of God?

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The Gospels, and Jesus, were NOT a "complete fabrication" - the elements of the Gospel story can all be found in the OT and pagan writings of the time - there is nothing original in the Gospels.
Note that G.John DOES have Jesus equated with God - it is the odd one out (and the last Gospel to be accepted).

Iasion

Greetings Jake22,

I note Percipient has dealt with the issue of contemporary writers.

Let me just point out that Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, Pliny (and the ridiculous Phlegon and Thallus cites) are NOT contemporaries.

quote:

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It seems that there is no dispute that the passage mentions a Jesus with Jewish and Greek followers who existed and was killed by Pilate (at least according to the webisite).

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False.
There is MUCH dispute, the Josephus issue is one of the hottest debates in NT studies - Earl's page may be of interest:
http://www.humanists.net/jesuspuzzle/supp10.htm

quote:

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Furthermore, Percipient, you mentioned a second passage of Josephus. Although you said this passage is less agreed upon than the first, it is a "usually undisputed allusion" to Jesus according to the site provided by sup. I'd assume the information is rather accurate, seeing as it's presented by an Ivy League professor who seems to have a rather anti-Christian viewpoint (at least as far as Christianity being the revealed plan of God goes). I'm not sure if it's 100% reliable, but worth noting.

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No, this passage is also disputed.

quote:

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I have cynical doubts about the few scholars who deny the existence of Jesus...that they do so not out of a review of the evidence, but instead because of personal or professional biases.

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Oh?
Have you reviewed the evidence yourself ?

Have you evidence of bias of all these following authors? :
C.F. Dupuis, 1791, Abrege De L'Origine Des Cultes
Robert Taylor, 1829, Diegesis
Bruno Bauer, 1841, Criticism of the Gospel History of the Synoptics
Mitchell Logan, 1842, Christian Mythology Unveiled
David Friedrich Strauss, 1860, The Life of Jesus Critically Examined
Kersey Graves, 1875, The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviours
T.W. Doane, 1882, Bible Myths and their Parallels in Other Religions
Gerald Massey, 1886, Historical Jesus and Mythical Christ
Thomas Whittaker, 1904, The Origins of Christianity
William Benjamin Smith, 1906, Der vorchristliche Jesus
Albert Kalthoff, 1907, The Rise of Christianity
M.M. Mangasarian, 1909, The Truth About Jesus ? Is He a Myth?
Arthur Drews, 1910, The Christ Myth
John M. Robertson, 1917, The Jesus Problem
Georg Brandes, 1926, Jesus – A Myth
Joseph Wheless, 1930, Forgery in Christianity
L.Gordon Rylands, 1935, Did Jesus Ever Live?
Edouard Dujardin, 1938, Ancient History of the God Jesus
P.L. Couchoud, 1939, The Creation of Christ
Alvin Boyd Kuhn, 1944, Who is this King of Glory?
Karl Kautsky, 1953, The Foundations of Christianity
Herbert Cutner, 1950, Jesus: God, Man, or Myth?
Guy Fau, 1967, Le Fable de Jesus Christ
Earl Doherty, http://www.jesuspuzzle.org/
Profesor G.A. Wells, The Jesus Myth
Robert M. Price, http://www.depts.drew.edu/jhc/artread.html
Hermann Detering,
Freke and Gandy, The Jesus Mysteries
P. Alfrani,

(its true that some of these authors, particularly earlier ones, are of doubtful scholarship.)

In short,
despite the protestations of faithful believers, the historicity of Jesus has been increasingly doubted for centuries and quite a few authors argue the point to this day.

I expect that Jesus as myth will be the mainstream view within a century.

Iasion

Greetings again,

quote:

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I went back to check that inscription and I was a bit mixed up on the details, namely that it was a suburb in Jerusalem, not the catacombs.

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Correct.
The Talpoith ossuaries were found in a Jewish suburb, in a Jewish gravesite, with not the slightest connection to anything Christian.

quote:

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"This tomb has been dated in the first half of the first century A.D. (cir. A.D. 42/43), based on pottery fragments therein, as well as a coin belonging to the administration of Herod Agrippa I that was among the rubble."

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Dated by who?
It would be more accurate to say : it is the OPINION of a faithful Christian that it "has been dated in the first half of the first century A.D. (cir. A.D. 42/43),"
According to my reference (C.K. Barret, The New Testament Background, SPCK 1987), this tomb is dated 50BCE - 50CE, which is quite different. The meanings of the words "Iesous iou" and "Iesous aloth" is disputed.
Father Sukenik is a Christian believer - other scholars read these ossuaries as simply names - Jesus being a very common name in those times.

Note that one of the ossuaries from this period reads :
"Jesus, son of Joseph"
funny how Christians never bring that one up as proof :-)

quote:

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As for the ossuary, I have heard nothing of what you spoke (although I don't deny it). I took a New Testament class with a well-published scholar who was not a Christian. According to him (although this was 6 months ago now), nearly every scholar of the time period believed the box to be authentic. Perhaps things have changed since then. If you don't mind, what about the finding was determined to be a fake?

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This ossuary serves as a classic example of how so-called scholars support their biased view-points with any "evidence" they can get their hands on, no matter how dubious.
Several sceptics pointed out there were problems with this ossuary, but the majority were happy to jump on the bandwagon and declare it hard (literally) evidence for Jesus - now these so-called "experts" have egg on their faces as it has clearly been found a forgery and the maker is going to jail - I wonder how many other items came frm his hands?

I hope this example will give pause to those who claim there is good evidence for Jesus - there is NONE.
All the evidence is weak, late, or forged.

Let me finish with a thank you to all who have participated here :-)
And an apology if my tone seems sharp, I have just spent time on the TheologyWeb, which has very poor quality debate, mostly consisting of insults - this board is much better :-)

Iasion

An english teacher gives a class an assignment to write a story. Two students hand in a paper, that are simular in context, but the names and some basic details have changed. The teacher upon reading this knows that one or both of them have cheated. Its found that the one student had dramaticaly re-writtin some parts of his classmates story. Upon further review the teacher noticed he or she has done this in the past as well. From that point on anything and everything that that student writes will be highly suspicious. It would stand to reason that the student will try to do it again, has done it in the pass, and probably copied or cheated on almost everything he or she has did. This is way I feel about the christian historical documents that the Church and other christians claim as the big proof. Its known that many of the documents are pious frauds. Its is known many of the documents have been rewrittin or translated buy christians, who took poetic license to add in Jesus instead of ______ or just plain add what ever they wanted. If this is the case then I find all and any work that the christians present, highly suspicious at best and at worst utter works of fiction.
Translation is something I have a problem with. Lets say I have an acient greek scroll here. ITs about the life of scholar who lived around the 1st century ad. Lets say his greek name was Appolo. But lets say im a Jew so I change Apollo to Saul or if im a christian I chance it to Paul. Lets say Apollo one day came upon a man who has just been pulled from the water. Apollo sees the man is not breathing.
Apollo then hits him in the chest a few times and the man coughs up the water and gets up. Now word travels from there on the lips of all who saw it to a historian of the day. Like the game you played in school If you whisper a statement to one person and that person tells another and so on, by the time it gets back to you the sentence has changed. By the time this gets to the greek historian it might sound like 'Apollo made a dead man rise again'. So if I were a Jew I might translate that into "Saul came to a man who had died and made him rise again' or if I was a christian I might say 'Jesus came across a man who was dead and made him riseth again'. It would be too easy to interpret and translate what you think is true from the actual fact. I know this is not proof of anything at all, but one can draw some conclusions from it. We all know that diffrent sides of the story use diffrent ways of presenting the same facts in order to make their side look right. This is why there is so much debate on whether Jesus ever existed or if he was modeled after someone(s) else.

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--ignorance is humankind's worst enemy--