(July 24, 2012 at 1:39 am)cratehorus Wrote:(July 23, 2012 at 1:25 am)Minimalist Wrote: One thing xtians love to harp about is that the mythical jesus theory was unknown in antiquity
They do?
http://vridar.wordpress.com/2012/05/11/1...f-silence/
Quote:Silence: Why did no-one until modern times deny the existence of Jesus?
Ehrman spends a few pages at the beginning of his Chapter Four on the old canard which too many historicists seem to think is a knockout blow against the mythicist theory: that no one in all the documents we possess from the earliest period right up to the 18th century ever suggests, or deals with an accusation, that Jesus never existed. A moment’s reflection ought to reveal why this might be the case. (There are in fact a handful of notable exceptions to this silence that I will go into shortly, which puts the lie to Ehrman’s sweeping statement.)
Yep.
I had one asshole claim that the fact that there were no Greco-Roman writings against xtianity was proof that even the Romans knew it was all true. I pointed out to him that xtian thugs burned down the libraries of antiquity so his statement was the height of chutzpah...equivalent to the old definition of a man murdering his parents and then asking for mercy because he was an orphan.
Oddly, a couple of xtian writers did salvage a couple of Greco-Roman blasts at xtianity in the hope of "refuting" them. They failed to refute much of anything but they did demonstrate that Greco-Roman writers were out there pointing out that their cult was a pile of shit.