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

[Redbeard The Pink]

Like I said, it's a really a debate between rationale and conformity, or fact vs speculation.

The fact is, there is no solid evidence that Jesus ever existed. Therefore, the belief that he did is purely one of choice. Obviously historians have an invested motivation in choosing/speculating in favor of a historical Jesus because the alternative is to be ostracized. This dilemma is nothing new in human history. At one point you could be ostracized or worse for saying the earth was round or that the earth revolved around the sun. Undoubtedly the knowledge of the truth was known by many long before it was acceptable to profess that truth.

I have no doubt that many of today's historians that accept an historical Jesus either do so because they are lazy, weak minded, and prone to unquestioned conformity, or because they don't consider the cause worth the potential price of being ostracized.

Either way, historical Jesus advocates cannot offer solid proof of his existence. Many of these historians are Christians, but even the ones that aren't are exercising faith in Jesus Christ.

Being a "Christ-Myther" myself, I was going to contribute my own thoughts to this thread, but this guy pretty much nailed it. Just because something is the consensus belief, doesn't necessarily make it true. If the consensus is based on sloppy evidence or bad interpretations of that evidence, then a revisitation of the consensus claim is warranted and justified.


Some branches of the Christ Myth theory forward dubious historical claims and conspiracy theory crap; many of these can be easily dismissed by most historians. Even the stronger versions of the theory are subject to criticism and based on tricky evidence. Here's the thing, though...if you do turn it around and ask mainstream historians why they believe Jesus did exist, even the atheists start to sound like apologists. Their argument boils down to one thing: consensus. Aside from that, they have no legitimate claim to the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth.