RE: Existence of Jesus
March 12, 2009 at 10:39 am
(This post was last modified: March 12, 2009 at 11:28 am by Mark.)
(March 12, 2009 at 10:13 am)chatpilot Wrote: Most of these arguments regarding the secular evidence of the existence of Jesus such as Josephus etc. Have been proven to be inserted at a later time and not by the original author.This argument is old and outdated and is not even worth my time debating it all over again it's a pretty tired and boring subject to go over it again.I suggest you do your own independent research and familiarize yourselves with the subject matter.I refuse to get into this same old tired argument of Jesus being mentioned in Josephus etc.
Although I am a longtime student of Roman life and history, and I have a moderately good command of classical Latin, I certainly do not claim to be expert on the question of the historicity of Jesus or on the arguments about Josephus. But I do understand that a majority of classical scholars do not doubt that Jesus the man existed. And I do find a level of sophistication and erudition in wikipedia, on these questions, that is entirely absent in any of your posts here -- and by now, yes, I have read those above.
So I must say that your sweeping dismissal of these points is not very interesting, still less persuasive. If you don't find it worth your time to debate these points, why bring them up?
(March 12, 2009 at 10:35 am)Kyuuketsuki Wrote:(March 12, 2009 at 10:13 am)chatpilot Wrote: Most of these arguments regarding the secular evidence of the existence of Jesus such as Josephus etc. Have been proven to be inserted at a later time and not by the original author.This argument is old and outdated and is not even worth my time debating it all over again it's a pretty tired and boring subject to go over it again.I suggest you do your own independent research and familiarize yourselves with the subject matter.I refuse to get into this same old tired argument of Jesus being mentioned in Josephus etc.
Dunno about "proven" but yeah a lot of historians seem to suspect that.
Also, aren't most of these theistic arguments a bit dated anyway?
Kyu
You really should read the wikipedia reference that I supplied above, before you accept chatpilot's sweeping dismissal of Josephus's account of Jesus.
In any case these are not theistic arguments, but historical and especially about Josephus and the Gospels, textual arguments.
Classical times are so remote that it really is quite remarkable if anyone not extremely distinguished is mentioned in the accounts of the day, still less a very ordinary (from the viewpoint of Rome) non-Roman-citizen and foreigner. Why should Jesus the man be supposed not to exist? Just because miracles are falsely attributed to him? Don't you think it rather more likely that some charismatic man did exist? The phenomenon of charismatic men starting religious or quasi-religious movements is hardly isolated in history. E.g. Joseph Smith. But you will search more recent history in vain for a religious movement centered on a supposed charismatic man who did not, in fact, exist.