Atheists being asked about the existence of Jesus

[EgoDeath]

Like creationist,  atheists generally making such arguments are all together clueless of history, in particular early history, it’s writing and contexts.

It’ll probably come as a surprise but people in the first century didn’t write that often, just like people didn’t really send email in the 1970s. Writing was a luxury, the primary method of convey things was through the oral tradition.

Such atheists also seem oblivious that writings we have of figures of early history, are almost exclusively written after these figures have died. The fact the we have writings about Jesus some 20-40 years after his death is pretty remarkable, in fact we have a first hand account on someone who met his disciples and brother. How many agreed up figures on ancient history, could we say that about, in comparison, let alone a religious figure?

On top of that the only historian writing of that entire period of Roman Palestine, that we still have is the works of Josephus.

Such atheists also seem incapable of reasoning, if the evidence for the historicity of Jesus was so lacklackuster, than you should be able to form a compelling ahistorical explanation, that’s close to as persuasive,  contains a parallel degree of explanatory power as a historical explanations. The fact is you can’t without stretching credibility, as bad as creationist and holocaust deniers do, speaks volumes.

But such atheists are incapable of contemplating this. The historical method is about the pursuit of the best explanation, the strength of evidence is matter of explanatory power. No ahistoricist conclusions come even remotely close to a historical explanation in this regard, that folks here have yet to even offer one.

Atheists have perhaps been deluded by the idea of a lack of belief, think the real argument is between Jesus existing, and a lack of belief in Jesus existing, requiring some sort of super proof to resolve, when it’s an argument between Jesus existing, and not existing, the viability of historical explanation, over non historical ones.

Yet it seems that many atheists seem unable to get their head around this idea, perhaps deluded by the idea that lack of belief is an actual position, other than laziness in thought.

Okay, you're getting bogged down in a lot of speculation and nonsense. Here are the facts.

-Recorded history, as far as we know, began around 4000 BCE.

-Though reliable, chronological records were not being kept back then as they are now, there are plenty of writings about events, people and things for thousands of years before the supposed existence of Jesus that give us good reason to believe that those events, people and things actually occurred or existed.

-For whatever reason, only a small handful of historical writings exist on Jesus, all of which were written long after his death by people who never met him or even met anyone that he knew, for that matter.

-Some of the historical writings used to back up the idea of Jesus as a real man don't even mention Jesus by name.

Now here's a compelling piece of speculation.

-It's entirely possible that the "historical" writings about Jesus were produced to promote the pro-Christianity narrative, which would've been very strong during the time in which these writings were created.

The FACT is, there is no good reason to assume with such confidence that Jesus was real. Your argument basically adds up to: Writing was rare and there weren't many historians back then, so the fact that anyone mentioned during that time must mean that he was real. That's very akin to the Christians who say, "We have no clue how the universe was created, and some people wrote about its supposed creation, therefore what they wrote be true!"

Sorry, that's not a very compelling argument. Once again, is it POSSIBLE? Sure. Probable? Not at all. Until further evidence is produced, I remain unconvinced.

A video I remember from a long time ago featuring Christopher Hitchens on the subject.

[Acrobat]

-It's entirely possible that the "historical" writings about Jesus were produced to promote the pro-Christianity narrative, which would've been very strong during the time in which these writings were created.

What does that even mean? That there was a plot where by some Romans or earlier followers of Jesus, who wanted to bolster the appearance that he was a historical figure, so they interpolated passages into Josephus, perhaps even convinced him of this fraud, by having him write of his supposed brothers death? Perhaps the same conspirators even influences Paul, or perhaps Paul was a part of them, telling him to write of meeting his brother and disciples, to bolster the appearance of historicity even more?

I mean I thought they had some balls selling some jew that died an embarrassing defeat at the hands of romans as the messiah, but he also didn’t exist apparently, and this detail was so embarrassing and not the other details that they had to fabricate an appearance of historicity to make it viable?

I think I heard less specious explanations coming out of Pizzagate, but please continue on, this is fun.

Sorry, that's not a very compelling argument. Once again, is it POSSIBLE? Sure. Probable? Not at all. Until further evidence is produced, I remain unconvinced.

If the evidence isn’t that compelling, than you should have no problem creating ahistorical explanations for the same pieces. The strength of evidence is only as good as its explanatory power, so please let see you expand on your alternative ahistorical argument, so we can test whether we shouldn’t be confident about the historical position.

If you can’t manage that, and still thinks we can’t hold confidently that Jesus existed, than you’re idiot.

If all the alternative explanations starts to sounds as ridiculous as the worst conspiracy theories, your claims that we shouldn’t be confident about historicity is false.

[EgoDeath]

-It's entirely possible that the "historical" writings about Jesus were produced to promote the pro-Christianity narrative, which would've been very strong during the time in which these writings were created.

What does that even mean? That there was a plot where by some Romans or earlier followers of Jesus, who wanted to bolster the appearance that he was a historical figure, so they interpolated passages into Josephus, perhaps even convinced him of this fraud, by having him write of his supposed brothers death? Perhaps the same conspirators even influences Paul, or perhaps Paul was a part of them, telling him to write of meeting his brother and disciples, to bolster the appearance of historicity even more?

I mean I thought they had some balls selling some jew that died an embarrassing defeat at the hands of romans as the messiah, but he also didn’t exist apparently, and this detail was so embarrassing and not the other details  that they had to fabricate an appearance of historicity to make it viable?

I think I heard less specious explanations coming out of Pizzagate, but please continue on, this is fun.

Nope. Simply that Josephus had read some of the writings of the Bible, or heard something passed down through oral tradition, was inspired by something that he read or head and simply wrote about Jesus assuming that he was a real person. I'm saying that it's possible, not even that I honestly believe that's what happened.

That, to you, is as reasonable as a pizza chain in the capital of the United States of America being behind a ring of political pedophiles hellbent on trading and using children as sex slaves, all while covering it up through vague and cryptic symbols on the walls of said pizzeria?

Wow. That's a reach I'm not even sure Stretch Armstrong could make.

However, the issue still remains, how did Josephus learn of Jesus? Are we to take it on faith that he learned that Jesus was a real person through oral tradition?

Sorry, that's not a very compelling argument. Once again, is it POSSIBLE? Sure. Probable? Not at all. Until further evidence is produced, I remain unconvinced.

If the evidence isn’t that compelling, than you should have no problem creating ahistorical explanations for the same pieces. The strength of evidence is only as good as its explanatory power, so please let see you expand on your alternative ahistorical argument, so we can test whether we shouldn’t be confident about the historical position.

If you can’t manage that, and still thinks we can’t hold confidently that Jesus existed, than you’re idiot.

If all the alternative explanations starts to sounds as ridiculous as the worst conspiracy theories, your claims that we shouldn’t be confident about historicity is false.

The thing is, I don't have to recreate some alternate explanation. I'm saying that yes, the writings exist, they're there in history. But so is the Bible. That doesn't mean that the words in the Bible are all historically accurate. Granted, Josephus was a historian! Great. However, we have to ask, how did Josephus learn of the existence of Jesus? After all, he was not alive when Jesus was alive and never met anyone that knew Jesus. And strangely enough, all of the "historical" writings about Jesus came to be after the Bible was written. Is the Bible the source that these historians are using to claim that they know Jesus was real? Okay, then once again, I'm simply not convinced. A historical writing based on a book that is anything but a record of history means very little to me.

Honestly, we don't even know if Socrates was a real person. Or Sun Tzu. But The Art of War is surely an actual book, I own a copy. Does it mean I have to accept that Sun Tzu was real? No. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. It doesn't really matter.

There is not enough evidence to compel me to say, with confidence, that I think Jesus was definitely a real man. At best, it's possible he was real. If you feel the need to insult me and call me an idiot based on that, then I'd suggest you probably need to grow the fuck up. I'm not the one making illogical leaps across vast gaps in historical knowledge. You are. I'm simply saying I'm not convinced by the evidence that is there. You're the one saying that because a couple posthumous writings about a (supposed) man based on fictional character (because certainly if Jesus was real he was not the miracle-making magic man from the Bible) in a book written thousands of years ago exist, that the man must be real and anyone who thinks otherwise is akin to a flat-earther or holocaust denier. That is fucking insane dude.

[Acrobat]

The thing is, I don't have to recreate some alternate explanation. I'm saying that yes, the writings exist, they're there in history. But so is the Bible. That doesn't mean that the words in the Bible are all historically accurate. Granted, Josephus was a historian! Great. However, we have to ask, how did Josephus learn of the existence of Jesus? After all, he was not alive when Jesus was alive and never met anyone that knew Jesus. And strangely enough, all of the "historical" writings about Jesus came to be after the Bible was written. Is the Bible the source that these historians are using to claim that they know Jesus was real? Okay, then once again, I'm simply not convinced. A historical writing based on a book that is anything but a record of history means very little to me.



Actually the passage regarding James death, wasn’t writen about in the Bible. But Josephus describe the death, the various political players involved, and indicates his relationship with Jesus. It’s a fairly detailed historical account, that’s pretty banal. Josephus was aware of variety of things happening locally, he was a historian chronicling a variety of things happening in that area.

Secondly we have a first hand account of someone who met his brother and his disciples. 

Now, you say you don’t have to recreate some alternative ahistorical explanation, but why? If you feel that these elements can just as easily be explained by ahistorical explanations as they can by historical explanations, than you should be able to prove it, by doing just that. I know that once you start going down that line you start to border on the ridiculous, unlike if I were to start explaining Hercules as ahistorical.

You can forms all sorts of reasonable historical explanations, but I bet you can’t form a reasonable ahistorical explanation, that doesn’t border on the credulous.

This is a testament of the strength of the historical arguments, that one can be as confident about Jesus exists, because the alternative borders on the mother of all conspiracy theories.

There’s a multitude of pieces here that make little to no sense in any conceivable ahistoricist conclusion, like the idea of non-historical person being considered the Jewish messiah, or even being crucified by the romans.

Is it more likely that this messiah claimant met his untimely death at the hands of the Romans, or that some early Jews would have invented a non historical a messiah that died at their hands in such a humiliating fashion?

If you think you can make a non-credulous ahistorical conclusion, by all means try, I bet you can’t.

The fact that you can’t, is a pretty good indication why we can be pretty confident that the data supports historicity not ahistoricity.

There is not enough evidence to compel me to say, with confidence, that I think Jesus was definitely a real man.


At best, it's possible he was real. If you feel the need to insult me and call me an idiot based on that, then I'd suggest you probably need to grow the fuck up.

It’s because folks like yourself operate on a very silly way to think of these questions. What you should be doing is looking at the various data and say what’s the best explanation that I can form based on them? Can I form a ahistorical explanation just as good as a historical one? What you should be doing is actually putting that brain of yours to work, and start drawing out reasonable conclusions here, in this process you’ll quickly see why historicity is held with a good deal of confidence, and a-historicity is seen as ridiculous. Instead you and other opts for a lazy mans agnosticism.

[EgoDeath]

The thing is, I don't have to recreate some alternate explanation. I'm saying that yes, the writings exist, they're there in history. But so is the Bible. That doesn't mean that the words in the Bible are all historically accurate. Granted, Josephus was a historian! Great. However, we have to ask, how did Josephus learn of the existence of Jesus? After all, he was not alive when Jesus was alive and never met anyone that knew Jesus. And strangely enough, all of the "historical" writings about Jesus came to be after the Bible was written. Is the Bible the source that these historians are using to claim that they know Jesus was real? Okay, then once again, I'm simply not convinced. A historical writing based on a book that is anything but a record of history means very little to me.



Actually the passage regarding James death, wasn’t writen about in the Bible. But Josephus describe the death, the various political players involved, and indicates his relationship with Jesus. It’s a fairly detailed historical account, that’s pretty banal. Josephus was aware of variety of things happening locally, he was a historian chronicling a variety of things happening in that area.

Secondly we have a first hand account of someone who met his brother and his disciples. 

Now, you say you don’t have to recreate some alternative ahistorical explanation, but why? If you feel that these elements can just as easily be explained by ahistorical explanations as they can by historical explanations, than you should be able to prove it, by doing just that. I know that once you start going down that line you start to border on the ridiculous, unlike if I were to start explaining Hercules as ahistorical.

You can forms all sorts of reasonable historical explanations, but I bet you can’t form a reasonable ahistorical explanation, that doesn’t border on the credulous.

This is a testament of the strength of the historical arguments, that one can be as confident about Jesus exists, because the alternative borders on the mother of all conspiracy theories.

There’s a multitude of pieces here that make little to no sense in any conceivable ahistoricist conclusion, like the idea of non-historical person being considered the Jewish messiah, or even being crucified by the romans.

Is it more likely that this messiah claimant met his untimely death at the hands of the Romans, or that some early Jews would have invented a non historical a messiah that died at their hands in such a humiliating fashion?

If you think you can make a non-credulous ahistorical conclusion, by all means try, I bet you can’t.

The fact that you can’t, is a pretty good indication why we can be pretty confident that the data supports historicity not ahistoricity.

There is not enough evidence to compel me to say, with confidence, that I think Jesus was definitely a real man.


At best, it's possible he was real. If you feel the need to insult me and call me an idiot based on that, then I'd suggest you probably need to grow the fuck up.

It’s because folks like yourself operate on a very silly way to think of these questions. What you should be doing is looking at the various data and say what’s the best explanation that I can form based on them? Can I form a ahistorical explanation just as good as a historical one? What you should be doing is actually putting that brain of yours to work, and start drawing out reasonable conclusions here, in this process you’ll quickly see why historicity is held with a good deal of confidence, and a-historicity is seen as ridiculous. Instead you and other opts for a lazy mans agnosticism.

Over and over you continue to straw man me by telling me to prove claims that I'm not making. I don't claim to have an explanation for why the writings exist (although I can speculate, it would be just that: speculation), all I'm saying is this: that the writings exist doesn't prove to me, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Jesus was real. That's it. It proves, at best, there may have been a guy named Jesus who roamed around during that time talking about god. Maybe. That's the most we truly have.

That Josephus talked about a guy named James that may or may not have been the brother of a guy who may or may not have existed does nothing more to prove your case.

The reality of it is, I'm not sitting here saying Jesus wasn't real. I'm saying I'm not buying into the fact that he was, and at best I'm at a maybe. At best.

I can repeat myself a number of times more if you'd like, but for some reason I don't feel like you're even reading what I'm typing, because no matter how much I say I'm not offering an alternate explanation, you seem to continue to push me to prove my alternate explanation, which doesn't even exist. You're arguing with a figment of your imagination.

A small handful of posthumous writings about a man previously written about in a book of magical fairy tales does very very little to actually prove this man was a genuine historical figure. Period. Is it possible he was real? Sure. Probable? Not so much. I'm not convinced.

I wonder how many more times you'll try to get me to repeat this? I'm growing weary of this non-conversation.

[Acrobat]



Actually the passage regarding James death, wasn’t writen about in the Bible. But Josephus describe the death, the various political players involved, and indicates his relationship with Jesus. It’s a fairly detailed historical account, that’s pretty banal. Josephus was aware of variety of things happening locally, he was a historian chronicling a variety of things happening in that area.

Secondly we have a first hand account of someone who met his brother and his disciples. 

Now, you say you don’t have to recreate some alternative ahistorical explanation, but why? If you feel that these elements can just as easily be explained by ahistorical explanations as they can by historical explanations, than you should be able to prove it, by doing just that. I know that once you start going down that line you start to border on the ridiculous, unlike if I were to start explaining Hercules as ahistorical.

You can forms all sorts of reasonable historical explanations, but I bet you can’t form a reasonable ahistorical explanation, that doesn’t border on the credulous.

This is a testament of the strength of the historical arguments, that one can be as confident about Jesus exists, because the alternative borders on the mother of all conspiracy theories.

There’s a multitude of pieces here that make little to no sense in any conceivable ahistoricist conclusion, like the idea of non-historical person being considered the Jewish messiah, or even being crucified by the romans.

Is it more likely that this messiah claimant met his untimely death at the hands of the Romans, or that some early Jews would have invented a non historical a messiah that died at their hands in such a humiliating fashion?

If you think you can make a non-credulous ahistorical conclusion, by all means try, I bet you can’t.

The fact that you can’t, is a pretty good indication why we can be pretty confident that the data supports historicity not ahistoricity.


It’s because folks like yourself operate on a very silly way to think of these questions. What you should be doing is looking at the various data and say what’s the best explanation that I can form based on them? Can I form a ahistorical explanation just as good as a historical one? What you should be doing is actually putting that brain of yours to work, and start drawing out reasonable conclusions here, in this process you’ll quickly see why historicity is held with a good deal of confidence, and a-historicity is seen as ridiculous. Instead you and other opts for a lazy mans agnosticism.

Over and over you continue to straw man me by telling me to prove claims that I'm not making. I don't claim to have an explanation for why the writings exist (although I can speculate, it would be just that: speculation), all I'm saying is this: that the writings exist doesn't prove to me, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Jesus was real. That's it. It proves, at best, there may have been a guy named Jesus who roamed around during that time talking about god. Maybe. That's the most we truly have.

That Josephus talked about a guy named James that may or may not have been the brother of a guy who may or may not have existed does nothing more to prove your case.

The reality of it is, I'm not sitting here saying Jesus wasn't real. I'm saying I'm not buying into the fact that he was, and at best I'm at a maybe. At best.

I can repeat myself a number of times more if you'd like, but for some reason I don't feel like you're even reading what I'm typing, because no matter how much I say I'm not offering an alternate explanation, you seem to continue to push me to prove my alternate explanation, which doesn't even exist. You're arguing with a figment of your imagination.

A small handful of posthumous writings about a man previously written about in a book of magical fairy tales does very very little to actually prove this man was a genuine historical figure. Period. Is it possible he was real? Sure. Probable? Not so much. I'm not convinced.

I wonder how many more times you'll try to get me to repeat this? I'm growing weary of this non-conversation.

One can hold that Jesus existed confidently, based on the fact that historical explanations make far better sense of the data, than ahistorical explanations, all which stretch credulity. If the evidence as you suggest is weak, this wouldn't be the case.

In order to prove that the evidence is lackluster, incapable of giving us such confidence, than you'd have to provide an ahistorical explanation with a comparable degree of explanatory power. Or else your claim that the evidence is lackluster, is just blustering on your part, and has no real substance.

The reason why you refuse to even contemplate an alternative, speculate for us on an alternative possibly, because you and I both know, that it's not long before it starts to border on the ridiculous. The fact that you can't see why this renders your statement about the evidence being lackluster, as meaningless, is more your problem than mine, says more about an incapacity to do the hard work of actually reasoning through your view, and your preference for a lazy agnosticism.

[The Grand Nudger]

One can hold that Jesus existed confidently, based on the fact that historical explanations make far better sense of the data, than ahistorical explanations, all which stretch credulity. If the evidence as you suggest is weak, this wouldn't be the case.

Says the man who promised goods he did not possess.  When you say this, are you suggesting that the "data" which establishes this is the imaginary data you offered from earlier? 

Or is it the consensus of scholars , equally imaginary, also from earlier?   

In reality, no one is confident about the historical status of some jesus, or even paul.  Each historicist is an ahistoricist with regards to every other competing hypothetically historical character.  Much like the analog between theism and atheism...in point of fact. Any time someone begins to talk about "the historical jesus" a necessarry question is "which one of them" - and lacking a solid answer to that, the whole enterprise of discussing this as settled fact is more than a little bit deceptive.

Personally, I'm giving you a mulligan..because I don't think that your silliness here has been intentional, I just don't think you know very much about this. Even though you swear to have debated the subjects luminaries (lol) - which I'm starting to think is a way of telling us that you read something online and then yelled at the internet.... is all. That...you're not going to get a mulligan for.

[Acrobat]

Says the man who promised goods he did not possess.  When you say this, are you suggesting that the "data" which establishes this is the imaginary data you offered from earlier? 

No the same data, that those who do try and make ahistorical explanations try and account for as well.

Or is it the consensus of scholars , equally imaginary, also from earlier?   
In reality, no one is confident about the historical status of some jesus, or even paul.  Each historicist is an ahistoricist with regards to every other competing hypothetically historical character.  Much like the analog between theism and atheism...in point of fact.  Any time someone begins to talk about "the historical jesus" a necessarry question is "which one of them" - and lacking a solid answer to that, the whole enterprise of discussing this as settled fact is more than a little bit deceptive.

Personally, I'm giving you a mulligan..because I don't think that your silliness here has been intentional, I just don't think you know very much about this.   Even though you swear to have debated the subjects luminaries (lol) - which I'm starting to think is a way of telling us that you read something online and then yelled at the internet.... is all.  That...you're not going to get a mulligan for.

No nearly all historians, and NT scholars are confident that Jesus existed.

Again read the wikipedia article:

"Virtually all New Testament scholars and Near East historians, applying the standard criteria of historical investigation, find that the historicity of Jesus is effectively certain[2][nb 1][nb 2][nb 3][nb 4][nb 5] although they differ about the beliefs and teachings of Jesus as well as the accuracy of the details of his life that have been described in the gospels.[nb 6][9][nb 7][11]:168–173 While scholars have criticized Jesus scholarship for religious bias and lack of methodological soundness,[nb 8] with very few exceptions such critics generally do support the historicity of Jesus and reject the Christ myth theory that Jesus never existed.[13][nb 9][15][16][17]"

Are you suggesting this is false?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

[The Grand Nudger]

Its not as if I haven't already commented on that, directly?  You literally just quoted me commenting on it..and then asked the question?

[Acrobat]

Its not as if I haven't already commented on that, directly?  You literally just quoted me commenting on it..and then asked the question?

I indicated that nearly all historians and NT scholars are confident that Jesus existed. You accused me of making this up(imaginary) and previously implied that this isn’t true.

I quoted you Wikipedia, confirming this as well.

You have yet to correct yourself, or even claim that the Wikipedia entry is false.