For People Who Think There Was No Historical Jesus

[DeistPaladin]

That's about the best we'll ever get where a real man is concerned. It's fun figuring out how Christianity could have got started with a purely mythic Jesus though.

Was there anything wrong with what I offered on page 1 or so of this thread?

Christianity is the bastard child of Judaism and Paganism. A nebulous and hypothetical "mortal Jesus" is neither necessary nor helpful to understand Christianity's origins.

Pagan paternity is found in certain core Christian beliefs that are completely alien or even blasphemous to the Jewish faith. The Jews had little or no concept of an afterlife, much less any detailed description of a salvation message essential to Christianity, and the idea of an intercessor to Yahweh, which Jesus requires, was/is completely unacceptable to a jealous god that explicitly forbade such an arrangement.

Still, religion, like art, casts its influence and gains inspiration from its neighbors, sometimes even from politically or socially hostile ones. Judea stands at a cross-roads of three continents and was occupied by foreign empires. Persia, Egypt, Greece and Rome all had their turn and each had their proto-Christian ideas to offer.

Even the modern concept of the Christian god seems closer to Zeus than to Yahweh. Yahweh never once smote anyone with lightning. That was Zeus' shtick. Yahweh preferred columns of fire or using the earth to swallow the sinners. Which punishment works its way into our culture?

Satan, meanwhile, seems like a cross between the Greek gods Pan and Hades.

Reading the NT in the order the books were written is also informative. One sees how the story got better with the telling. The first book, Revelation, depicts a Jesus most consistent with a messiah, a bloody warlord come to bring glory to Israel. Salvation was by works and keeping the laws, also consistent with Jewish theology.

The idea of a faith-based scheme of salvation complete with dumping Jewish laws came with Paul's epistles. These letters speak of a Jesus who was either celestial or lived a long time ago. Paul denies in 1Cor 15:8 that this Jesus had lived within his lifetime.

Mark, a non-witness allegedly a companion of Paul (assuming Mark even wrote the Book of Mark) brought this Jesus down to earth and placed him in recent history. Matthew later corrects Mark in his errors on Jewish theology (evidence that Christianity owes its existence to non-Jews or Pagans) and expands upon it. Luke wrote a book of his own, apparently ignorant of Matthew as evident by all the contradictions.

Search any Synoptic Gospel in vein for any reference that Jesus was part of any Trinity. This came with the Gospel of John that depicted the modern Jesus. This Jesus was one with his father and quite bombastic about his mission.

The tale developed over time in ways that we can look back and see. Christianity is best understood as a syncratic faith, a blending of all the nearby religions into one super-religion that was to unite the Roman Empire.

But to look for a mortal historical Jesus is like pealing away an onion for its center. First, you peal away the miracles and magic. There goes most of the story. Then you peal away the successful and highly controversial ministry, since it got no attention from contemporary sources. Then you peal away the teachings, since we have no clue what those might have been. Then you peal away any specific dates as to exactly when he lived, since Matt and Luke can't get that straight. So, other than all that, we still have... we still have... we still have...?