... nothing matters, and what if it did?

...who are intent on using the Jesus mythology to impose faith-based political power.

While many of the teaching of the world's religions are valuable parables, much of the ritualistic nonsense has long ago worn out it's welcome. The tribal nature of these belief systems (not just Christians) have been used by authoritarians to kill billions of people over the course of human history.

for the Father and the Holy Spirit.

believe that Jesus was likely a real but obscure figure amongst a number of messianic preachers during the Roman occupation in the first century. Rabbi Shmuley Boteach's hypothesis is that Jesus was a Torah observant rabbi with some good ideas and bad publicists.

Edited to add: the fact that there is little contemporaneous validation (Josephus is close...) doesn't mean much as the Roman bureaucracy routinely condemned and executed subversives willy-nilly and scant documentation is to be had for that period in ancient Judea, mostly because between 66 CE and 70 CE, the Romans pretty much tore the place up..

There likely was some boy who was into wizards and stuff that Harry Potter was based on. Therefore there was an historical Harry Potter.

my dog isn't in this fight.

He was not a contemporary and there are no known manuscripts of his work. There are several translations but none before 300 A.D and the most prominent ones referenced by Christians come from Christian monks who certainly had a bias in showing that the few "miracles" were real - one of the foundations of the King James version of Christianity.

acknowledged as a simple forgery by a monk/scribe. The other is also somewhat suspect. And as you note, Josephus is simply repeating the stories he heard, he is not a witness to any of it.

The Jesus of the Bible and at the core of the Christian faith is certainly mythical. There is evidence that ties Paul (Saul of Tarsus), Josephus, and the writers of the Gospels to Rome and a Roman agenda.

A "liberal Christian" who believes Jesus might have been Yeshua, a rabbi or bishop as his brother was, does not believe the mythical stories of miracles and resurrection. How could that be considered 'Christian'?

Wouldn't that be Atheist unless one still believes in a god?

almost all of whom are devout christians, say the evidence is overwhelming that there was a historical jesus.

The other shitty argument is that ‘there likely was some person in the region preaching messianic Judaism who was the basis for Bible Jesus’.

Does it matter?

Buddhism doesn’t really depend on the existence of an historical Buddha. The teachings of Buddhism can be evaluated and followed independently of that.

The standard christian theology requires an historical jesus to perform his ritual sacrifice. It is essential to the religion.

There are christians who don’t care about that nonsense and just follow the teachings, some of which are basic ‘be a good human’ stuff. And for them it doesn’t matter.

In ancient Egypt, there were attempts to completely erase the history of some of the pharaohs. Remember the old saying, "History is written by the victors." Christianity was hidden for a long time, due to the persecution of Christians. Much information has been lost or has been changed by the different offshoots of the faith over the years. However, as in many cultures throughout the world, history is preserved through oral tradition, not written, and it would be reasonable to rely on some of this tradition to substantiate that Jesus did exist.

In any event, it doesn't matter. Jesus is quoted to have said, and I paraphrase, "If you don't believe in me, believe in what I teach."

of all religions. There were fairly brief periods of Christian persecution, but mostly not during the formative years of the religion.

Most of the text destruction was done by christians after the Roman Empire adopted one faction in the theological civil war between christians that spanned the 3rd and 4th centuries. The ‘canonical gospels’ of the victorious faction, the official religion of the empire by the late 300s, survived, the rest generally didn’t.

Some of the non-canonical gospels have been recovered, they don’t change anything. None of them are contemporaneous, just like the official texts.

Yes, the Romans definitely tolerated different religions, as they took their own with a large "grain of salt!" Tolerating religions made governing the conquered territories much easier - and religious leaders easier to bribe.

...didn't the Roman government put together a propaganda book using a 300 year old myth and a collection of other cult myths, dates, and practices, in order to combine all those other various other cults into one big one for taxation purposes?

...considering what facts we DO know about the course of history on the subject.

But I definitely agree with your paraphase from a post above:

"In any event, it doesn't matter. Jesus is quoted to have said, and I paraphrase, "If you don't believe in me, believe in what I teach."

I firmly follow the teachings of goodness that are attributed to the Jesus of Christianity and others. Honest goodness among and for all fellow people is important to me, it's why the Humanist way of life is so appealing to me.

that they made up many years after he is said to have lived. They blended good charcter traits from a number of actual people to create a figure worthy of admiration and worship who they could found a religion on.

Being an Atheist, I of course do not believe he or anyone else is the son of a god of any sorts, but a mythical being in human form who they could use to direct people's behavior. Over the centuries this has been used as a source of mostly good, but sometimes evil.

And for those of you who devoutly believe in him, don't press me for any proof of what I say. It's just my opinion, and those who believe in him are a little short on proof themselves.

Love thy neighbor as thyself
Welcome the stranger
Help the poor and heal the sick.
Blessed are the meek
Blessed on the merciful
Blessed are the peacemakers
Blessed are the pure in heart

We accept these ideas as good things whether or not the man existed.

Most of what we'd call good is actually good social engineering. Something societies have to have evidently in order to be civilized. Most of the Bible is created from religious and mythical stories of other religions... put ithem together and blend for a new religion of the time.

Frankly, at some point I expect to see Star Wars and Star Trek blended into a religion. We already have one with characteristics from stranger on a strange land. And what is Dune but one hell of a mythic god story.

I guess count me in that group of those wondering why the emphasis on physicality. One can be worshipped without ever being real... as long as something is done to positively impact society.

The gods need us as we need the gods... because, as the gods supposedly created us, we created the gods. My belief system ain't for everyone and that's ok. I've just been a seeker after truth for 68 years.

But likely an blending of multiple ideas as well as hybrid ideals that were aspirational at the time.
Almost all the NT writings are years, most decades, after the time Jesus was believed to have lived.

most of which predate Christianity. There's an interesting book, "The Great Transformation" by the British theologian Karen Armstrong, that discusses the origin of altruistic philosophies/religions before Christianity:

from Fred Rogers?

From the perspective of a religion for a slave economy, the 'blessed be's' are a near perfect ideology for slaves. Be good now, you go to heaven.

The other ethics are common to many religions and are essentially 'try to not be an utter asshole'.

Christian texts present these ideas as if Jesus thought of them for the first time, or at least independently. But these mostly humanist notions were around long before Jesus. That doesn't mean Jesus stole or plagiarized. He probably just preached generally recognized social values to his followers.

the idolatry of the ancient mythologists accommodated to the purposes of power and revenue." --- Thomas Paine

But damn.. Paine does is it so much more succinctly and plainly than I ever could!

Did exist. Which actually is irrelevant. Christianity was/is derived from the letters allegedly written by Paul and the theology created by the so-called Church Fathers. Yeshua may or may not have said what it is alleged he said. Furthermore, imo, said person did not create a new religion.

The Gospels are not history just as Genesis is not history. There is much that the Gospel assemblers borrowed from Hebrew writings including the so-called prophets to fill in a picture that was necessary during the extended time frame which the creation of Christianity required.

There is also the problem of errors which gets ignored. One example is the confusion between “young girl” and “virgin” in Isaiah. Another is the Ark story. We all know that the animals were chosen male and female. Reading a little more and we see Noah was to take 7 pairs of clean animals yet the dietary laws do not appear in Genesis nor does God tell Noah which ones are clean.

A nominal catholic, why the religion was called Christianity since it seemed to be all about Paul and his hangup. He could even be called a usurper, since didn't Christ say to Peter... you are my rock (foundation) upon you do I build my church. Seen this way, all of Christianity is fake, as it goes against the very foundation Christ set and politically buckled under Paul... who seemed to have a real problem with sex and women, for two points.

Priest goes to heaven, and finds out the word was celebrate... not celibate! /gryn

The repetition of ancient themes in christian myth makes me doubt the historical factuality. The central image of Christianity is the cross or crucifix, the symbol of sacrifice by torture, used in an act of sacrificial atonement. Such sacrifices date to extreme antiquity.

Human sacrifice is an essential, founding myth of the Abrahamic religions. Abraham's son Isaac being spared by an angel at the last second sounds like a fictional device, softening the story. This act has obvious parallels to "God" (Jehovah, Yahweh) offering his son as sacrifice.

Atonement through sacrifice was a common ancient practice, often using animals (scapegoat), but sometimes people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scapegoat

The new testament message of love and kindness, rebooting the violence and bloodiness of the old testament, has been interpreted by some as a rumor of Gautama Buddha's teachings (ca 500 BC) reaching the Mediterranean world.

Another ancient theme repeated in the bible is The Flood, which is also described in the Epic of Gilgamesh, dating to 2100 BC.

To my thinking, the only original contribution of Abrahamic mythology is monopatriarchy. I don't say monotheism. In the Abrahamics, only the male divine principle is worshipped; the female principle is denied or sublimated into Mary-worship. Christianity has a divine Father and Son. The mother is a human vessel used only to incarnate the male Divine.

I think that Jesus, like The Flood, may have had some actual historical inspiration, maybe some minor local celebrity not notable enough to make it into the written record. Robert Graves, in King Jesus, theorized that Jesus was a political revolutionary who wanted to establish a thousand-year reign of him and his disciples, the Millenium.

An interesting speculative fiction read is "Behold The Man" by Michael Moorcock, an sf novella which won the 1967 Nebula Award and was later expanded to novel form. I won't give spoilers, except that it involves time travel.

What REALLY disturbs me is the bloody theocracy of Christianized Rome as it fell. This set the tone for centuries of oppression and conflict.

Thanks for the very educational link.

*cross-commented from https://www.democraticunderground.com/1016372881

Jesus is an archetype for an innocent person of truth, integrity, and power. Jesus dies and is reborn every single day. There’s nothing difficult about this — it’s Jung 101. Navalny’s cause remains and will be reborn.

You beat me to this.

The Romans and the church keep pretty good records. History or an opinion?

I found this thread offensive. That is all.

for all opinions on all religions or lack of religions. It is not a protected forum for the devout. There are other forums for that.

My opinion stands, or am I not allowed to express my opinion?

Sometimes people in this forum have a misunderstanding about the forum rules and express their anger about what they view as inappropriate or hurtful comments on their religion.

Julius Caesar introduced the Julian calendar in 46 BC, which was much better than the Roman calendar. He added an extra day to February every four years to keep it on schedule with the seasons. Pope Gregory XIII invented the Gregorian calendar in 1582; most countries use it today.

JESUS, A MYTH by the Danish philosopher Georg Brandes (1926). https://archive.org/details/jesusmyth0000bran/page/n5/mode/2up

Brandes noted the absolute silence of contemporaries about Jesus and likened him to the Swiss legends of Wilhelm Tell, an imaginary figure told in a background of invented history.

Jesus was so completely without contemporary witnesses that the Talmud, treating him some centuries later as an enemy of Judaism, generated its own gossip about him - but casting him a full century earlier than the New Testament does. See: https://archive.org/details/didjesuslive100b00meaduoft/page/n5/mode/2up

I am so shocked!

is the lengths the Gospel writers went through to square the person they were writing about with Hebrew prophecies about the Messiah.

One example being the whole "born in Bethlehem because Augustus wanted to tax the world" nonsense.

If the whole character of Jesus was made from whole cloth, why not just say the dude was born in Bethlehem and leave it at that? Why the whole song and dance about his parents having to leave Nazareth and having to find a cowshed in Bethlehem for his birth?

I suspect the reason was that too many people still alive when the oral tradition started--the accounts that were eventually written down--remembered he was called "Jesus of Nazareth" or whatever the Aramaic would have been. And if he was truly "of Nazareth" then he couldn't be the Messiah because that's not what the prophecy said.

So--the whole story about taxation. In an era before newspapers or public archives it would have been easier to fake this story than to convince people that the religious texts they had been taught all their lives didn't say what they said.

One other point: it keeps being said that the Romans kept "voluminous records" and such. This is hardly true. By comparison to our post printing press world Roman record keeping was sketchy at best, and almost entirely utilitarian, meaning accounts of finances, military pay and such. Then too, the vast if not overwhelming majority of Classical records have been lost over time. Even famous manuscripts have disappeared. Aristophanes--who definitely did exist--wrote some forty plays--all famous in their day and the equivalent to our best sellers--but less than a dozen survive. Sappho was famous among her contemporaries and generations afterwards, considered the greatest lyric poet of antiquity. Almost none of her work survives, and most that we do have is in fragments.

To expect then that various contemporary accounts of an obscure and probably illiterate country preacher--one among hundreds--preaching to a predominantly illiterate audience would somehow inevitably survive is hardly credible.

We'll probably never know one way or the other if there was or wasn't an "historical Jesus." But lack of a contemporary account is in no way conclusive evidence that he didn't.

Yes, I know who said that, but the principle is not wrong.

The article is interesting, but the headline is a stretch.

If something is postulated to exist, there must eventually be evidence for it. The Ether, N-Rays, Cold Fusion. The absence of evidence was evidence of absence. Same with Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster and Saint Christopher.
It doesn't mean there is not a opening for evidence to be presented. But without evidence the default should be what is in question did not exist.

and most likely local records were destroyed. There would be no records in Rome, the matter was too unimportant.

IOW, we can't know whether or not an itinerant preacher called Yeshua pissed off both the Jews and the Romans and got crucified.

What we do know is that the early Jesus cult spread rapidly and widely. Archaeology has turned up ROTAS squares in both Pompeii and Herculaneum, so we know they'd gotten that far by 79CE.

Last edited Sun Feb 18, 2024, 08:12 PM - Edit history (1)

was just one interpretation of the squares.
But yes, by this period there were enough followers for Mark to write the first Gospel.

More likely, someone who had been following him around since childhood wrote down what he remembered, that someone else edited, that someone else embellished.

Factural reoorting is extremely recent.

But the Gospel of Mark, written in Greek by someone not really named Mark. It was the first Gospel of the ones we still know of, probably written around 70AD.

is how many in this country though Q was real.
But I think we can clearly state that the Jesus portrayed in the Bible did not exist, even if there was a man, or men he was loosely based on.

Not the baseball player, but former megachurch pastor. He writes some very refreshing articles on this very subject.

https://www.jimpalmerauthor.com/

YouTube channel and MythVision. I stumbled in those because I was watching a lot of ancient history. It's all connected.

To me, the clusterfuck we have is people of the Abrahamic religions not being able to agree on what Jesus was. If any of it was true, I doubt that's what he would have had in mind.