Why do atheists even bother about debating Jesus?

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Christianity was a combination a numerous influences in that area of the time. You have the pagan Mysteries which were at the height of their popularity around that time and you have the apocalptic mystic Essene Jews who were knocking about. You also have numerous wandering wizards, spirtual healers, exorcists and so on. All of that would have collected together in the first Christian communities. If there was a real Jesus somewhere he may not have been that remarkable by the standards of the time. If he had been put to death then perhaps his followers experienced dreams or visions of him and that's not too uncommon. As for the empty tomb and all that business St Paul makes no reference to any tomb in his letters and the impression is that the resurrection was a spiritual kind of thing. The earliest gospels of Mark lack the resurrection narrative, though it ends with the empty tomb. Alternatively it all just happened for real though it does seem a far fetched to me.