Did Jesus exist?

[Existentialist]

The word 'atheist' indicates a lack of belief in deities. That is all the word, by itself, indicates. Which sort of atheist (gnostic, agnostic, hard, soft, what have you) is not implied by the word itself. For example, if someone says, "I am an atheist", all we know about that person is that he or she lacks belief in deities, because that's all the word actually means. It will take more information, usually in the form of qualifiers, to determine if the person considers him or herself gnostic or agnostic, etc.

See what I mean? You can't assume anything about a person's views from that single word beyond it's most basic meaning.

I totally agree with you. But this discussion is at a different stage from the level of asserting a lack of belief in gods.

It has been boldly asserted in this thread that there is no atheist position on any matter other than the existence of gods. That assertion only stands if atheism is taken to mean a lack of belief in god. If atheism is taken to mean the position that god does not exist, then everything in the universe becomes conceptually free of an idea that would claim it. Therefore the atheist may take an atheist position on the existence or not of Jesus. Because the way I express my atheism is to say that god does not exist, I take the atheist position that the existence or not of Jesus is of little or no importance to me as an atheist.

I think the problem has arisen, and repeatedly arises, because the correct statement that atheism is the lack of belief in gods, which at rudimentary level covers both the main definitions of the word atheist, is being used to prevent the statement that atheism is the belief that there is no god from having any consequential meaning. Essentially, an effort is being made to say that the idea that atheism is the belief that there is no god is the same as the idea that atheism is the lack of belief in god. I don't see how this can be described as anything other than a logical fallacy.