Quote:why would the gospel writers invent a Messiah
There is some evidence that they did not "invent" him. He had been invented some time earlier.
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0...85,00.html
Quote:A 3-ft.-high tablet romantically dubbed "Gabriel's Revelation" could challenge the uniqueness of the idea of the Christian Resurrection. The tablet appears to date authentically to the years just before the birth of Jesus and yet — at least according to one Israeli scholar — it announces the raising of a messiah after three days in the grave. If true, this could mean that Jesus' followers had access to a well-established paradigm when they decreed that Christ himself rose on the third day — and it might even hint that they they could have applied it in their grief after their master was crucified. However, such a contentious reading of the 87-line tablet depends on creative interpretation of a smudged passage, making it the latest entry in the woulda/coulda/shoulda category of possible New Testament artifacts; they are useful to prove less-spectacular points and to stir discussion on the big ones, but probably not to settle them nor shake anyone's faith.
Scholars have since determined that the word in question means "live."
http://www.bib-arch.org/bar/extra.asp?Ar...ticleID=14
Quote:after reviewing the document, I came to the conclusion that the reading suggested by Professor Knohl for the third word of line 80—HAYE “live”—seems to be the only plausible reading of that word. Thus, the first five words of this line should be translated as: “In three days live, I Gabriel.”
As this refers to a revolt which broke out in 4 BC upon the death of Herod the Great we can see that there was at least a sub-set of Judaism which had concocted the basic story. The revolt was ruthlessly suppressed by Publius Quinctillius Varus and the leaders crucified. So it would seem that all the gospel writers had to do was dust off what must have been an underground myth and write their boy into it.
