The Historical Validity of Jesus

[RobertJ64]

I searched all the topics and did not find any that dealt directly with this issue.
It is generally agreed that there are no sources from within the time of Jesus that corroberates any of the details in the Gospels. Two historians that were writing at that time Philo of Alexandria and Justus of Tiberias make no mention of Jesus at all.
I would be interested in discussing the issues with apologetics and atheists alike.
Can Jesus in fact be proven to have existed in our history?

[Lotan]

Hi Dan,

To me, this suggests the collision of two separate stories. Like Robin Hood absorbing Maid Marian.

Except that the Baptist was a real person. From Wikipedia…

"It is significant in the question of the historicity of Jesus that Josephus makes much greater mention of John than he does of Jesus, and that the genuineness of the brief passages about Jesus are heavily disputed by scholars, while those of John are not."

So the Jesus story absorbed the Baptist story, but why?

As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, "Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way; the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight" Mark 1:2-3

Including the story of John the Baptist required some apologetic modification, like this spew from Matthew …"I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?", but is the inclusion of John the Baptist in the gospels (including the extended tradition in Luke) only to fulfil Isaiah’s prophecy, or is there some reality behind it? After all, in gMark Jesus receives the Holy Spirit after his baptism.

Yes, but do they contribute to the historicity of Jesus, or are they equally unknown?

They are known, with the exception of the Magdalene, from Paul’s epistles, where they are presented as actual historical persons with whom Paul interacts, and not as mythological characters.

We can set aside all of Paul's writings because he wasn't in a position to know whether Jesus was real or not.

I agree to a point, but not entirely. Paul wrote real letters to real people, and sometimes about real people, and most importantly, unlike the other NT authors he actually lived during Jesus' (alleged) generation.
I finally broke down and read Earl Doherty’s The Jesus Puzzle. It was better than I expected. In some areas Doherty skips over the evidence too lightly for me to take his arguments seriously, but his deconstruction of Paul’s theology was an eye-opener. It really doesn’t require a human model. All the same, secular historian Donald Harman Akenson makes a good case for a historical Jesus based on Paul’s letters, even if it is only a bare bones sketch. We shouldn’t necessarily "set aside" Paul’s theology either, because at least it suggests the possible apologetic motivations of later writers.

Fine, but you are arguing for a person named Jesus, which falsifies christianity.

I have no argument on that point whatsoever.

Even in terms of a person, the historicity of Jesus is still zero. You can only argue that the stories about Jesus are more or less realistic. That's no quite the same as arguing that they happened.

Actually, I find most of the stories about Jesus to be more or less unrealistic, but I don’t think that their purpose was to relate a historical narrative so much as a theological one. The story doesn't always go smoothly though; there are bumps. It is at these points especially where I think we can get a glimpse of a real human life behind the apologetic accretion. For example, Jesus 'brother' James continued to worship at the Temple even after Jesus supposed 'resurrection'. Why?
So much of the gospels (and Acts) has been shown to be the reworking of previous material...

"...Eisenman brings to bear on the narratives of Acts the model of a "mix and match" redactional technique whereby Luke is seen to have composed his stories by recombining the salient features of very different stories from his sources. When Luke finishes, only bits of either the paradigmatic or syntagmic composition of the originals are left, but there is enough to recognize the one as the mutation of the other. This is the procedure used recently to great effect by a number of scholars, not least John Dominic Crossan (who shows the Passion Narrative to be built up from various Old Testament proof texts), Randel Helms (who in Gospel Fictions shows case after case of a gospel story's derivation from a similar Septuagint story), and Thomas L. Brodie (who unscrambles numerous Lukan tales into their original Deuteronomic components). Eisenman's originality at this point lies not in the technique but rather in his willingness to take seriously Luke's use of Josephus as a source. (Again, this is something no one who wants an early date for Luke or a historical basis for Acts is likely to consider seriously, but then we have a case of apologetics masquerading as criticism.) And Eisenman's redactional analyses of Luke on Josephus is unly one of the major advances of James the Brother of Jesus. It seems not too much to say that the book ushers in a new era in the study of Acts." A review of Eisenman's "James the Brother of Jesus" by Robert M. Price

...that I am left to believe that the remainder might have an historical source of some sort; either the life of an individual, or an idealized character representing a religious (pre-Christian) community. This is where I thought you (or maybe trencaclosas?) might be able to help, as I know that you are more skeptical on the matter of an historical Jesus than I am. Specifically, have the "broad points" that I mentioned earlier be explained away satisfactorily by anyone that you are aware of?

At this point I need to mention one further bit of evidence in favor of Jesus' historicity, and that is the logia themselves. That 18% that the Jesus Seminar agreed upon had to come from somewhere, and there are hints that at least some of them might have originated at Qumran. Whether the Jesus Seminar is correct or not, there is still a substantial body of sayings to account for. Jesus connection with John the Baptist, as well as the absence of any mention of the Essenes in the gospels (even though the Pharisees and Sadduccees are constantly polemicized) also point to Qumran.
Just to complicate things, there are those who believe that an even older, separate tradition originated in Galilee due to the pastoral nature of many of Jesus' parables.
So I'm not asking for much. Just a plausible explanation for those aspects of Jesus' story that haven't already been revealed as midrash, apologetic, etc.
Seriously, if anyone can shed light on even one of these specific points that would be helpful.

[Lotan]

Their Jesus couldn't save a gnat from a puddle of spit.

Correct. So what?

[Cathar1950]

Historical Evidence for the Gospel Accounts of Jesus Christ
I don't find the arguments or sources compelling. I tend to think there was a historical Jesus but he is impossible to find with out reflecting our own images or other traditions. The Jerusalem church under the leadership of James Peter and the other disciples were at odds with Pauline thought and visions. The information that Paul does give are either in the form of proclamations or visions Paul received. Even the traditions in the gospels are more apologetic then historical.

[Easyrider]

Their Jesus couldn't save a gnat from a puddle of spit.

Correct. So what?

So, they left the rest of the accounts of Jesus and who he really was (divine God, Jewish Messiah, and resurrected Savior) on their cutting room floors.

[RobertJ64]

Easyrider,

You are supposed to contribute to the discussion not merely put links up on the board.
The link you did post, I read and it did not offer any substantiating proof for the historical Jesus. Josephus is NOT a contemporary of Jesus and his works have been completely tampered with by Christian scribes. Josephus a Jew, would simply not subscribe to the Christian belief.
Just because the bible writers mention places and real historical characters in the world does not validate their stories to be true. All writers of the Gospels were writing well after the alleged incidents. What they were writing could not be challenged nor supported simply because there were no survivors from the time of Jesus to the time the earliest Gospel was written.
The earliest gospel manuscripts we have from Mark (written in Greek) does not have a resurrection story.
You will have to do a lot better than that my friend if you wish to strengthen your own case as it is very weak indeed.

[Lotan]

So, they left the rest of the accounts of Jesus and who he really was (divine God, Jewish Messiah, and resurrected Savior) on their cutting room floors.

I think that they have a different idea about "who he really was" than you do. Do you have any special evidence or academic credentials that they lack on which to base your claim that Jesus was more than human, or do you rely on faith and 'logical' arguments based on faulty assumptions?

[Easyrider]

Easyrider,

You are supposed to contribute to the discussion not merely put links up on the board.

You must be a novice here. Otherwise you'd see my postings are not just "links."

The link you did post, I read and it did not offer any substantiating proof for the historical Jesus. Josephus is NOT a contemporary of Jesus and his works have been completely tampered with by Christian scribes. Josephus a Jew, would simply not subscribe to the Christian belief.

You present two fallacies here: 1. That "his works have been completely tampered with by Christian scribes." Completely? Even when an apparent Christian interpolation in the Testimonium is reduced to what scholars believe Josephus originally wrote, Josephus' still referenced Jesus, as did the Talmud, and many other authors in the link provided. Josephus also talks about John the Baptist and James, and neither accounts are considered Christian interpolations. 2. No one ever said Josephus subscribed to the Christian belief. That's your Strawman that you conjured up.

Just because the bible writers mention places and real historical characters in the world does not validate their stories to be true.

No, but it doesn't invalidate them either like I think you would have it.

All writers of the Gospels were writing well after the alleged incidents. What they were writing could not be challenged nor supported simply because there were no survivors from the time of Jesus to the time the earliest Gospel was written.

Another foible on your part. Many scholars date the Gospels and Epistles within the probably lifetimes of the disciples, etc.

http://www.errantskeptics.org/Dating_the_NT.htm

The earliest gospel manuscripts we have from Mark (written in Greek) does not have a resurrection story.

Sure it does. Mark 16:1-8 are considered from the earliest manuscripts. All four Gospels provide the resurrection.

You will have to do a lot better than that my friend if you wish to strengthen your own case as it is very weak indeed.

Back to the drawing board for you, Robert!

Cheers...

[Lotan]

You must be a novice here. Otherwise you'd see my postings are not just "links."

I'm not a novice here.

Another foible on your part. Many scholars date the Gospels and Epistles within the probably lifetimes of the disciples, etc.

http://www.errantskeptics.org/Dating_the_NT.htm

And your own personal foible is that you ignore the fact that the scholars listed on that apologetics site are almost entirely zealous conservatives whose opinions are outside of the mainstream of NT historical scholarship.

[Easyrider]

You must be a novice here. Otherwise you'd see my postings are not just "links."

I'm not a novice here.

Another foible on your part. Many scholars date the Gospels and Epistles within the probably lifetimes of the disciples, etc.

http://www.errantskeptics.org/Dating_the_NT.htm

And your own personal foible is that you ignore the fact that the scholars listed on that apologetics site are almost entirely zealous conservatives whose opinions are outside of the mainstream of NT historical scholarship.

I wouldn't consider most liberal scholars "mainstream," Lotan. A great many of those turkeys don't even have a clue who Jesus really is.

[McCulloch]

Easyrider has produced a list of scholars who argue for an early date for the writing of the Gospels and Epistles. Lotan claims that these scholars are biased by their conservative Christian viewpoint.

Lotan claims that the scholars in the mainstream of New Testament research differ from the conservative scholars cited by Easyrider.

It appears to me that both Lotan and Easyrider have some work to do.

Lotan, your argument would be much stronger if you could identify some of those mainstream scholars with some of their credentials. It would be helpful if it could be shown that there is little likelihood of them having an a priori bias.

Easyrider, your argument would be much stronger if you could identify NT scholars who are not conservative Christians who hold to the earlier dates. It is premature to criticize Lotan's list of scholars when he has yet to specify them. However, once he has specified them, if you could show that they exhibit a bias, it would also help your argument.

A great many of those turkeys don't even have a clue who Jesus really is.

In one statement you have committed two fallacies. In stating that they haven't a clue who Jesus is, you are begging the question. In calling them turkeys, you commit an ad hominem.