Historian explains why Jesus ''mythers'' aren't taken seriously by most Historians

[Mudhammam]

Thanks for the reply. That's some excellent analysis. Have you read Cicero's On Divination by any chance? It's a pretty incredible exposé of the types of ideas and trains of thought that were popular with the herd in the first-century BC. After having read that and Philo's complete works recently, along with some other Greek and Roman writers (currently on Seneca's letters), it's really easy to see how Jesus the wise man who courageously shed his mortal flesh evolved into Jesus the resurrected Word of God. This is just one example of the mindset that pervades the elite class and simply by observing the modern-day situation of religion in less affluent environments, it's kind of all too obvious to me how the Christian superstitions came to be as they appear in the surviving texts:

"If you see a man who is unterrified in the midst of dangers, untouched by desires, happy in adversity, peaceful amid the storm, who looks down upon men from a higher plane, and views the gods on a footing of equality, will not a feeling of reverence for him steal over you? Will you not say: 'This quality is too great and too lofty to be regarded as resembling this petty body in which it dwells? A divine power has descended upon that man.' When a soul rises superior to other souls, when it is under control, when it passes through every experience as if it were of small account, when it smiles at our fears and at our prayers, it is stirred by a force from heaven. A thing like this cannot stand upright unless it be propped by the divine. Therefore, a greater part of it abides in that place from whence it came down to earth. Just as the rays of the sun do indeed touch the earth, but still abide at the source from which they are sent, even so the great and hallowed soul, which has come down in order that we may have a nearer knowledge of divinity, does indeed associate with us, but still cleaves to its origin; on that source it depends, thither it turns its gaze and strives to go, and it concerns itself with our doings only as a being superior to ourselves." (Seneca, epistle XLI, popularly entitled "On the God Within Us")

What texts would you say were particularly eye-opening for you in understanding how Christianity grew out of the Hellenistic Judaism that was splintering off from the more traditional sects of Hebrew faith at the time? (There were a number of instances when I was reading Philo where it was just like, "Oh wow... That's remarkably similar in thought.")