RE: A strange but curious question: if you had a time machine...
February 10, 2015 at 9:41 am
(This post was last modified: February 10, 2015 at 9:58 am by TheMessiah.)
(February 9, 2015 at 10:53 pm)Pyrrho Wrote: What we have here is a kind of fallacy involving overwhelming one's opponents in an argument with excessive verbiage and not bothering with clearly stating the relevant bits.
Apologies, but this Christ myth theory is simply laughable. It would not be taken seriously in any scholarly debate; I expect better citation of evidence from your post rather than analyzing the New Testament and Gospels and saying ''He didn't exist!'' --- clearly, the Biblical Jesus was mostly fictional in what he did, but you seem to either ignore or simply neglect to mention or evaluate the Historical evidence which points to the existence of the Historical Jesus Christ. It is because most legitimate respected scholars and historians agree, via a consensus based upon evidence that Jesus existed. This ''myth theory'' is simply idiotic Internet nonsense proposed by amateurish arguments which have been rejected by the vast majority of Historians. You could prop up the argument ''Think for yourself!'' but this is idiotic, the Historians are the ones who have cited and evaluated Historical evidence; thus we cite their work. You need to cite scholarly work to lend some credibility to your view. There is no evidence today that the existence of Jesus was ever denied in antiquity by those who opposed Christianity.
The mentions of Jesus outside Christian sources have been used for analysis of the existence of Jesus. Yet you falsely prop up ''There is no evidence!''. --- there is more evidence for the existence of Jesus than there are other Historical figures, who are suspectly accepted Twice in the works of 1st-century Roman historian Josephus; a source who has been used for justification for the existence of other Historical figures, yet somehow Jesus does not get the same pass? And then again, once in the works of the 2nd-century Roman historian Tacitus.
Antiquities of the Jews, written in 93–94 AD cites two references to the biblical Jesus Christ. The general scholarly view is that while the longer passage, known as the Testimonium Flavianum, is not authentic in its entirety, it is agreed upon that it originally consisted of an authentic nucleus, which was then subject to Christian interpolation or forgery.
Josephus scholar Louis H. Feldman stated that "few have doubted the genuineness" of Josephus' reference to Jesus in Antiquities, Tacitus referred to 'Christus' and his execution by Pilate in the Annals (AD 116), book 15. The Crucifixion most certainly occurred.
The negative tone of Tacitus' comments on Christians heavily suggests that the passage was very unlikely to have been forged by a Christian scribe. The Tacitus reference is now widely accepted as an independent confirmation of Christ's crucifixion.
I'd encourage anyone who wants to take a rational and unbiased look at who "Jesus" (ie Yeshua ben Yosef) was to begin with Ehrman's Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium, then Paula Frederiksen's From Jesus to Christ: The Origins of the New Testament Images of Christ and then Geza Vermes' Jesus the Jew. All are top class academic studies by leading scholars and all happen to be by non-Christians. Read those books and you'll get a superb understanding of who Yeshua was and why both fundie Christians and the moronic "Jesus never existed" clowns can be given equal measures of scorn.
