Where did the Jesus myth come from?

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@Atom, when you've got a minute: Did you manage to "find a theistic argument, that is an argument made by theists in general or any one theist in particular, in the quote of Min's you just gave" in your post #388, as per my challenge to you?

Or are you perhaps ready to "retract your accusation of ad hominem" yet?

I have limited time and have to prioritize in choosing a threads and posts to respond to, so I look for posts that say something credible in argumentation. Lets agree to disagree on this. Lets just say it was ad hom to me, and not to you. I am sorry if I offended. That wasn't my intent.

Here is the case I am presenting:

1) I provided the testimony of Bart Ehrman, a hostile expert witness, to establish that a consensus of historical scholars agree that Jesus was a real person. This video clip showed that:
a) The critical scholar Bart Ehrman believed Jesus was a real person.
b) Bart Ehrman attests that all serious scholars believe Jesus was a real person.

2) I provided a quotation from a second skeptical scholar John Dominic Crossan “That he [Jesus] was crucified is as sure as anything historical can ever be.” “Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography” pg.145;
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/00606166...0060616628
to read, type in "crucified" in search box
This shows the following:
a) The second critical scholar John Crossan believed Jesus (was a real person) who was crucified.
b) John Crossan attests that the evidence for Jesus' crucifixion is as sure as anything historical can be. One can read his reasons at the link I provided.

3) Here is another critical scholar's testimony: Paula Fredrikson, PHD Boston University writes: "I know in their own terms what they saw was the raised Jesus. That what they say and then all the historical evidence we have afterwords attests to their convictions that that;s what they saw. I'm not saying that they really did see the raised Jesus. I wasn't there. I don't know what they saw. But I do know that as an historian that they must have seen something."
This shows the following:
a) A third critical scholar, Paula Fredriksen, believes that Jesus was a real person.
b) Paula Fredriksen, believes that after Jesus' death a number of people claimed to have seen the risen Jesus.
c) Paula Fredriksen, believes that these people saw something that caused them to attest to great conviction that they saw Jesus.
d) Paula Fredriksen, believes that they saw something (as in didn't just make it up).

4) I offered some extra biblical references by ancient non-christian historians and provided links to the documents so any of you could read what they said about this Jesus who was a real person:
a) Josephus, Jewish Historian Antiquities 18, chapter 3 http://www.ccel.org/j/josephus/works/ant-18.htm
b) Tacitus, Roman Historian Annals 15.44 http://www.chieftainsys.freeserve.co.uk/...nals15.htm
c) Lucian of Samsota, Greek Satirist The Works of Lucian, Vol. IV "The Death of Peregrin" http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/luc/wl4/wl420.htm (scroll down to 11)
d) Mara Bar-Serapion, Syrian prisoner A Letter of Mara, Son of Serapion (scroll down to just after footnote 19) http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/mara.html

Only two unsubstantiated assertions were offered in response this data saying:
i) "The quotes you listed post-date the life time of Christ." How is this meaningful in a field where almost all the ancient historical evidence about people was written after the person's death? Is Plato a myth too because the earliest evidence was from 200 years later?
ii) "The first two can be shown to be partial or full interpolations." I heard this argued as an assertion in a debate video once, but there was no justification offered. Can this claim be shown to follow from historical data, or is it just an assertion based on speculation. I'm asking because I genuinely would like to here what you've got. Respond with a message if you don't want to rat-hole this discussion.

5) I now offer two more skeptics as having the opinion the Jesus was a real person. These names were offered in opposition to my assertion that Jesus was a real person, but they both support my position:
a) Robert M. Price: According to the evidence offered to me (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_M._Price), Price is a Jesus Seminar fellow. He couldn't be casting votes with beads as an expert on what Jesus said and didn't say if he didn't believe Jesus was a real person.
b) Richard Carrier clearly expresses the opinion that Jesus was a real person while arguing against Jesus' resurrection in his debate with Mike Licona in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EGrzxkozVU (In this debate i also particularly liked that fact that Carrier attests to the reliability of 1 Corinthians by using a quote from it as a basic premise for his argument. Incidentally, if you listen carefully the quote Carrier read didn't actually say what Carrier claimed it said. Carrier also omits mention of the early Christian creed Paul states in 15:3:4 which soundly contradicts Carriers premise. This is a discussion for another thread). BTW, Carrier botched one argument in this debate so badly one Atheist reviewer said his head exploded. He provided the photo below.



Now as in my last summary I wish to point out that I am not arguing that we should believe Jesus was a real person because a majority of academic scholarship, including skeptical scholarship, supports the position. I will again rephrase my argument seeking to avoid prior misinterpretations of my position. I'm arguing the following:
1) Independent academic experts, that is scholars of ancient history, use well defined professional methodology in assessing historical data and drawing conclusions about what happened in ancient history.
2) That using these methods of assessment have resulted in a virtual unanimity in peer reviewed academic publications concluding that Jesus was a real person.
3) Therefore, there is very strong evidence supporting the conclusion that Jesus was a real person.

On the basis of what I've seen presented here (or anywhere else for that matter), because there are no good reasons to doubt the existence of the academic consensus, the validity of the methodology used by expert historians, or the conclusion that Jesus was a real person, the assertion that Jesus was not a real person is based almost entirely on faith and is antithetical to science.

On this thread I was asked for evidence to support my position, so I've been progressively providing more arguments, names, and testimony to support my position "Jesus was a real person". I'm pleased that the argument I'm presenting are not actually being challenged with arguments in refutation, but are instead being met almost exclusively with evasive rhetoric, diversionary tactics, and irrelevant assertions about burden of proof.

On the other hand, I now have a growing curiosity about the evidence supporting the "Jesus didn't exist" claim so I'll press the question. I assume that there must be some reasonable arguments and historical data to support this position or there wouldn't be obviously intelligent people here believing the claim. I'm seriously interested in hearing that case argued.