"Reliable eye witness accounts"
This is a phrase you're likely to read or hear whenever perusing Christian apologetic arguments for Christian theology. Christians like to believe that, unlike many competing religions, their god (or at least a third of their god, it's kind of complicated you see) walked the earth and within relatively recent history. This divine visit was further recorded in four different biographies which they regard as historical documentation proving who and what Jesus was.
This debate will be not over whether or not some guy named "Yeshua" existed, the Jesus-of-the-gaps that Bart Ehrman is welcome to pursue. "Yeshua" was a common name in 1st century Judea and doomcrier, messiah-wannabe (or "Christ" which means "anointed one") not an uncommon pursuit in a Roman province chaffing under imperial rule and wondering what happened to Yahweh's promise to King David that his seed would rule for all time. Doubtless many such persons existed if your definition of "the historical Jesus" is that vague (hold that thought for when we later review the "Jamesian Reference" in Josephus). No, this debate is over whether or not we can trust the Gospels as a source on that Yeshua. Are these Gospels based on a true story?
To answer that question, we need to first ask just what that story is.
The Gospel of Luke
Let's begin with Luke. We start here because his is relatively the easiest to reconcile with history, compared to the other accounts. Here are some of the milestones he provides in his Gospel account (please read these verses and you'll learn that...):
The annunciation of Mary and subsequent pregnancy was during the reign of King Herod (who died in 4 BCE)
Mary was pregnant was during the administration of Quirinius of Syria (who started his administration in 6 CE)
John the Baptist started his ministry in 27-28 CE.
Jesus started his ministry after JtB was put in prison.
Jesus was "about 30" when he started his ministry.
Luke 23:1 Jesus' three Passover ministry (according to the Gospel of John) ended with his crucifixion by Pilate (recalled to Rome in 36 CE).
So, OK, let's make that a 10 year pregnancy and we can make it all fit. Jesus is born in 6 CE, started his ministry in 33-34 CE (fudge what "about 30" means, say it means 27 or 28) and died in 36 CE. It's a tight fit but we can shoe-horn it all in... if you accept that Mary had a ten-year pregnancy. Maybe a curse went with the miracle of her virgin conception?
The Gospel of Mathew
Matthew has a different set of dates for the life of Jesus.
Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod, right before the "slaughter of the innocents" detailed in verse 16.
So Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod. That's quite a relief for Mary, but this places the date of his birth around 5 BCE. This is far too early for Luke's census. Judea was an independent tributary at that time and Quirinius was governor of a province in the middle of modern day Turkey, quite a distance from Syria.
The Gospel of John
John provides the most specific dates to work with. He tells us that Jesus started his ministry in 27 CE and was crucified in 29 CE. How do we know that?
Temple construction started in 20 BCE (New Oxford Annotated Bible, NT p152). Add 46 years and we arrive at the Passover of 27 CE. Add two more Passovers (the dates of Jesus' ministry given in John 2:13, 6:4 and 13:1) and we arrive at 29 CE as the date of the crucifixion, too early for JtB to be arrested and executed.
So much for "little debate". But then, John does sit oddly alongside the "synoptic" accounts, a point underscored by how Christian scholars use the very term "synoptic" (similar) to describe Matt, Mark and Luke (excluding John).
OK, so there's a lot of disagreement on which DECADE Jesus was born in and when exactly he was crucified. But is there agreement on what Jesus was?
Mark 13:32 (Jesus doesn't know what the father knows)
Matt 26:39 (Jesus has a separate will from his father and is clearly separate from and subordinate to his father.
Luke 3:22 (Jesus and his father speak to one another in second person and of one another inn 3rd person).
So Jesus had a separate and subordinate will, an inferior body of knowledge and interacted with his father as a separate being. In fact, read only the synoptic Gospels and you have a hard time coming up with any justification for the Trinity. That doesn't come along until John is written. John 10:30.
The theology becomes even more divided when you consider all the heterodox Christianities that existed in the first few centuries (Bart Ehrman provides a good overview in "Lost Christianities" on pp 2-3).
The Marcionite Christians believed that there were two separate gods, Jesus and the lesser god Yahweh. They rejected the OT and all things Jewish. Salvation was by faith in Jesus. Jesus' life on earth had no childhood. He appeared in the temple one day as all pagan gods might. The Ebionite Christians were at the opposite extreme. There was one god, Yahweh. Jesus was a mortal man, conceived by Mary and Joseph the same way all babies are made, and later adopted by Yahweh as a son at his baptism. Salvation was by keeping Jewish laws. The Docetic Christians rejected the idea of a flesh-and-blood Jesus. Jesus was an apparition. The material world was evil and so Yahweh could not ever debase himself by being part of it. The Arian Christians (no relation to Hitler's fictional race) believed Jesus was an angel sent by God. They were fierce rivals with the Trinitarian Christians up until Nicaea in 325.
Early struggles between Christian factions is codified in the Bible itself. See 1John 4:1-3 and 2John 1:7. John is condemning the Docetics for thinking Jesus had not come in the flesh. If we are to believe he was a disciple of Jesus, wasn't this within the lifetimes of those who would have remembered Jesus? Did Jesus not have relatives who could have testified as to the existence of their uncle or great uncle Yeshua? One wonders why followers of Jesus would make up such a fantastic notion that he was only an apparition at all but why would John condemn them with the language of faith ("believe" and "confess")? Why not appeal to recent history to prove them wrong? Surely he would have if he could have.
Finally, there's the ministry. It spread like wildfire throughout neighboring provinces, drawing great multitudes (Matt 4:23-25). It attracted the attention of notable rulers like Herod Antipas (Luke 9:7). He shook the religious foundations so profoundly that the priests were always trying to trick him with questions and finally met on Passover Eve in an elaborate conspiracy to kill him off (Mark 14:10-12).
Such a profoundly popular, powerful and controversial ministry should have gotten attention outside of Jesus' following, right?
The closest Christians come to a non-tampered source is the Annals of Tacitus (quoted by my opponent above). This passage is so brief and oblique it doesn't even mention Jesus by name (just "the anointed one" or "Christos") and even this doesn't surface until the second century. Evidently, Jesus was the leader of a minor cult following that got nobody's attention while he lived.
What about Josephus? The Testimonium Flavianum is a forgery so rank that even apologists confess it was tampered with (example Strobel's "The Case for Christ" p79) though they try to make the case for "partial authenticity" (the whole paragraph reads like the stuff of Christian propaganda, rattling off all the bullet points of their theology in rapid fire succession, in a paragraph that interrupts the flow as if inserted whole cloth, but I'll let the reader judge for yourself with the link provided). As for the Jamesian Reference, I will cite the part that my opponent did not quote, at the bottom of the paragraph:
So his followers were divided on his teachings, we don't have a coherent timeline as to when he lived and the reports of the success of his ministry are, at best, gross exaggerations. We have no idea what Jesus really said or taught, as we have no writings of his. The story, as related, is just not coherent or verifiable.
Further, the sources, even taking their authorship at face value, are unreliable as witnesses:
Mark: Hearsay upon hearsay from a non-witness and we know of at least one significant alteration in the version we now have (Mark originally ended at 16:8).
Matt: Liar (misrepresents the OT to manufacture "prophecies")
Luke: Not a witness by his admission (see Luke 1:1-3)
John: Theology too advanced to be contemporary (for more reasons than already provided).
But this post is already long so I'll reserve this subject for one of my followup posts.
This is a phrase you're likely to read or hear whenever perusing Christian apologetic arguments for Christian theology. Christians like to believe that, unlike many competing religions, their god (or at least a third of their god, it's kind of complicated you see) walked the earth and within relatively recent history. This divine visit was further recorded in four different biographies which they regard as historical documentation proving who and what Jesus was.
This debate will be not over whether or not some guy named "Yeshua" existed, the Jesus-of-the-gaps that Bart Ehrman is welcome to pursue. "Yeshua" was a common name in 1st century Judea and doomcrier, messiah-wannabe (or "Christ" which means "anointed one") not an uncommon pursuit in a Roman province chaffing under imperial rule and wondering what happened to Yahweh's promise to King David that his seed would rule for all time. Doubtless many such persons existed if your definition of "the historical Jesus" is that vague (hold that thought for when we later review the "Jamesian Reference" in Josephus). No, this debate is over whether or not we can trust the Gospels as a source on that Yeshua. Are these Gospels based on a true story?
To answer that question, we need to first ask just what that story is.
The Gospel of Luke
Let's begin with Luke. We start here because his is relatively the easiest to reconcile with history, compared to the other accounts. Here are some of the milestones he provides in his Gospel account (please read these verses and you'll learn that...):
The annunciation of Mary and subsequent pregnancy was during the reign of King Herod (who died in 4 BCE)
Mary was pregnant was during the administration of Quirinius of Syria (who started his administration in 6 CE)
John the Baptist started his ministry in 27-28 CE.
Jesus started his ministry after JtB was put in prison.
Jesus was "about 30" when he started his ministry.
Luke 23:1 Jesus' three Passover ministry (according to the Gospel of John) ended with his crucifixion by Pilate (recalled to Rome in 36 CE).
So, OK, let's make that a 10 year pregnancy and we can make it all fit. Jesus is born in 6 CE, started his ministry in 33-34 CE (fudge what "about 30" means, say it means 27 or 28) and died in 36 CE. It's a tight fit but we can shoe-horn it all in... if you accept that Mary had a ten-year pregnancy. Maybe a curse went with the miracle of her virgin conception?
The Gospel of Mathew
Matthew has a different set of dates for the life of Jesus.
Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod, right before the "slaughter of the innocents" detailed in verse 16.
So Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod. That's quite a relief for Mary, but this places the date of his birth around 5 BCE. This is far too early for Luke's census. Judea was an independent tributary at that time and Quirinius was governor of a province in the middle of modern day Turkey, quite a distance from Syria.
The Gospel of John
John provides the most specific dates to work with. He tells us that Jesus started his ministry in 27 CE and was crucified in 29 CE. How do we know that?
Quote:John 2:19-20 Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days?
Temple construction started in 20 BCE (New Oxford Annotated Bible, NT p152). Add 46 years and we arrive at the Passover of 27 CE. Add two more Passovers (the dates of Jesus' ministry given in John 2:13, 6:4 and 13:1) and we arrive at 29 CE as the date of the crucifixion, too early for JtB to be arrested and executed.
So much for "little debate". But then, John does sit oddly alongside the "synoptic" accounts, a point underscored by how Christian scholars use the very term "synoptic" (similar) to describe Matt, Mark and Luke (excluding John).
OK, so there's a lot of disagreement on which DECADE Jesus was born in and when exactly he was crucified. But is there agreement on what Jesus was?
Mark 13:32 (Jesus doesn't know what the father knows)
Matt 26:39 (Jesus has a separate will from his father and is clearly separate from and subordinate to his father.
Luke 3:22 (Jesus and his father speak to one another in second person and of one another inn 3rd person).
So Jesus had a separate and subordinate will, an inferior body of knowledge and interacted with his father as a separate being. In fact, read only the synoptic Gospels and you have a hard time coming up with any justification for the Trinity. That doesn't come along until John is written. John 10:30.
The theology becomes even more divided when you consider all the heterodox Christianities that existed in the first few centuries (Bart Ehrman provides a good overview in "Lost Christianities" on pp 2-3).
The Marcionite Christians believed that there were two separate gods, Jesus and the lesser god Yahweh. They rejected the OT and all things Jewish. Salvation was by faith in Jesus. Jesus' life on earth had no childhood. He appeared in the temple one day as all pagan gods might. The Ebionite Christians were at the opposite extreme. There was one god, Yahweh. Jesus was a mortal man, conceived by Mary and Joseph the same way all babies are made, and later adopted by Yahweh as a son at his baptism. Salvation was by keeping Jewish laws. The Docetic Christians rejected the idea of a flesh-and-blood Jesus. Jesus was an apparition. The material world was evil and so Yahweh could not ever debase himself by being part of it. The Arian Christians (no relation to Hitler's fictional race) believed Jesus was an angel sent by God. They were fierce rivals with the Trinitarian Christians up until Nicaea in 325.
Early struggles between Christian factions is codified in the Bible itself. See 1John 4:1-3 and 2John 1:7. John is condemning the Docetics for thinking Jesus had not come in the flesh. If we are to believe he was a disciple of Jesus, wasn't this within the lifetimes of those who would have remembered Jesus? Did Jesus not have relatives who could have testified as to the existence of their uncle or great uncle Yeshua? One wonders why followers of Jesus would make up such a fantastic notion that he was only an apparition at all but why would John condemn them with the language of faith ("believe" and "confess")? Why not appeal to recent history to prove them wrong? Surely he would have if he could have.
Finally, there's the ministry. It spread like wildfire throughout neighboring provinces, drawing great multitudes (Matt 4:23-25). It attracted the attention of notable rulers like Herod Antipas (Luke 9:7). He shook the religious foundations so profoundly that the priests were always trying to trick him with questions and finally met on Passover Eve in an elaborate conspiracy to kill him off (Mark 14:10-12).
Such a profoundly popular, powerful and controversial ministry should have gotten attention outside of Jesus' following, right?
The closest Christians come to a non-tampered source is the Annals of Tacitus (quoted by my opponent above). This passage is so brief and oblique it doesn't even mention Jesus by name (just "the anointed one" or "Christos") and even this doesn't surface until the second century. Evidently, Jesus was the leader of a minor cult following that got nobody's attention while he lived.
What about Josephus? The Testimonium Flavianum is a forgery so rank that even apologists confess it was tampered with (example Strobel's "The Case for Christ" p79) though they try to make the case for "partial authenticity" (the whole paragraph reads like the stuff of Christian propaganda, rattling off all the bullet points of their theology in rapid fire succession, in a paragraph that interrupts the flow as if inserted whole cloth, but I'll let the reader judge for yourself with the link provided). As for the Jamesian Reference, I will cite the part that my opponent did not quote, at the bottom of the paragraph:
Quote:...and made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest.Wrong Jesus.
So his followers were divided on his teachings, we don't have a coherent timeline as to when he lived and the reports of the success of his ministry are, at best, gross exaggerations. We have no idea what Jesus really said or taught, as we have no writings of his. The story, as related, is just not coherent or verifiable.
Further, the sources, even taking their authorship at face value, are unreliable as witnesses:
Mark: Hearsay upon hearsay from a non-witness and we know of at least one significant alteration in the version we now have (Mark originally ended at 16:8).
Matt: Liar (misrepresents the OT to manufacture "prophecies")
Luke: Not a witness by his admission (see Luke 1:1-3)
John: Theology too advanced to be contemporary (for more reasons than already provided).
But this post is already long so I'll reserve this subject for one of my followup posts.
Atheist Forums Hall of Shame:
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
