Even if theism is a failure, it's still superior to atheism

[Jehanne]

Of course, they do!  But, none of them are written by anyone who knew Jesus personally; nowhere do they even claim that.

Dawn

Which has nothing to do with whether Jesus was literate.

Boru

As I said, it's an inference. If Jesus was literate, he would have been able to write things down; even if he knew someone else who was literate, that person could have written something down either for Jesus or about Jesus. Of the many thousands of literate individuals who were at least aware of Jesus' existence, no one even mentioned his name. Flavius Josephus, writing about the Roman & Jewish wars in the mid-70s, mentions Pontius Pilate but nowhere mentions Jesus; twenty years would pass before Josephus would, finally, make the first extra Biblical reference to Jesus, and even there, he was discussing James, Jesus' brother, finally mentioning, almost in passing, that "some believe him (Jesus) to be the Messiah". Clearly, Josephus was unimpressed by Jesus.

Again, if Jesus were literate, it is more probable that he, like Paul, would have written something down, and as with Paul's letters, it would have been likely that one of Jesus' followers would have preserved that document.

And, so, I do not believe that Jesus was literate, nor were any of those who were close to him.

Dawn