Why are other civilizations ignored in the Bible?

[DeistPaladin]

I am glad I asked you what I did. I did not intend for you to go through the trouble of responding to the entire article though....

Very thorough you are!

You pulled my string.

We need to come to a consensus on this issue before we go any further. I maintain that Jesus was a man of history. He was born around 6BC-4BC. He was from Galilee and around 30AD He was crucified under Pontius Pilate.

Can we agree on these three things?

Sorry, I thought I already answered that but it may have been buried in the dump I did above.

Luke, not Matthew, seems the easiest to reconcile with history if we must.

That would mean born 6 CE, started ministry 34 CE, crucified 36 CE.

Then again, John suggests that Jesus started his ministry in 27 CE and was crucified in 29 CE. I base this on the chapter 2 conversation Jesus had with the Jewish priests at the temple.

John 2:20 Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days?

1. Temple construction started in 20 BCE (source: New Oxford Annotated Bible).
2. Add 46 years with no "year 0", this dates the conversation to Passover of 27 CE.
3. There were three Passover celebrations dated in the Gospel of John.
4. Count them. 27-28-29, Jesus was crucified before Passover of 29 CE.

...but of course, these dates would be too early for John the Baptist, who only got started in 28 CE. Sheesh, the poor guy doesn't have Holy Ghost powers. Give him at least a few years to build his famous ministry before you cut off his head!

I have no idea out of what source you pulled 6-4 BCE. The last Roman Census in the BCE era was 8-9 BCE. Qurinius during the 6-4 BCE era was governor of a province in the center of modern day Turkey, too distant to administer the Census.

30 CE as a crucifixion date is way too soon for John the Baptist, for reasons I already outlined. Jesus' ministry lasted for three (3) Passover Holidays according to the Gospel of John. JtB started his ministry at the earliest in 28 CE according to the Gospel of Luke. Even if the guy was an overnight success before having his head cut off, this doesn't allow for the three Passover Holidays we need to shoe-horn it all in before 30 CE.

[DeistPaladin]

Edit to add (I'm on a roll)

...OK, next we got to shoe-horn John the Baptist into our timeline. Here's what we know from the Bible:

1. Started his ministry in 28/29 CE.
2. Mouthed off about Herod Antipas' marriage to his brother's wife, Herodius.
3. Got his head cut off.
4. Jesus started his ministry afterwards.

Now Herod's brother died in 33-34 CE, which would be consistent with the dates in Luke and allow Jesus to be "about 30" if his birthdate was 6 CE.

This is also consistent with the political historical landmarks we have to work with. You see, Herod Antipas was already married before dumping his wife for Herodius, to the princess of a nearby Kingdom run by one Aratas IV. The princess got wind of Antipas' plans as Antipas was returning from Rome and she fled to her father's kingdom. Her father, none too pleased, made war with Antipas and beat up Antipas' army in 36/37 CE. Tiberius ordered the legions to save their client kingdom and come back with the head of Aratas IV but Tiberius died in 37 CE before the order could be carried out.

Now apologists like to shove the marriage which outraged John the Baptist to before 30 CE and subsequently allow JtB's early execution and JC's early start to his ministry. Not only does this savagely curtail just how much time JtB would have had to build a ministry (really, he did all that in one year) but it means that Aratas would have delayed his invasion by almost a decade.

It makes no sense.

So you can see the timeline is a big mess?

[Minimalist]

30 CE as a crucifixion date is way too soon for John the Baptist, for reasons I already outlined.

You forgot Lucius Vitellius (consul 34, Imp. Legate of Syria in 35) but since you're arguing with a troll facts don't matter.

[DeistPaladin]

After my cross-examination of the contradictory stories by four non-witnesses contrasted with the baloney of Christian "scholarship", I felt the need to post this reflection of how I feel about the Christian case for Jesus:

[DeistPaladin]

You forgot Lucius Vitellius (consul 34, Imp. Legate of Syria in 35) but since you're arguing with a troll facts don't matter.

Min, if you wouldn't mind schooling me again, please take the floor with that detail. I don't want to miss it next time someone pulls my string.

[Minimalist]

Lucius Vitellius consul in 34 AD and the father of Aulus Vitellius - who briefly ruled as emperor in 69, was appointed Imperial Legate of Syria in 35. While there he replaced Pontius Pilate as prefect in 36 and Caiaphas as Chief Priest. This seems to be while fulfilling the order of Tiberius to hunt down Aretas IV who had attacked Herod Antipas in the aftermath of Antipas' divorce of Aretas' daughter, Phasaelis. As you have already noted, this cannot have occurred until after Antipas sailed to Rome and back to obtain Tiberius' permission for the wedding. Given the sailing time, the time needed for Aretas to gather a force, the need to notify Tiberius of Aretas' attack by the Roman military post and the time then needed for Tiberius' order to return to Antioch, and then gather and provision a force to begin an expedition to Nabatea, Vitellius can not possibly have begun his pursuit until mid-36.

If the attack had happened earlier there is simply no way that Vitellius could have been given such an order as, under the system imposed by Augustus and Tiberius, he would not even have been eligible for such an important military command until he had completed the office of consul.

Try as they might, Roman history prevents the jesus freaks from moving their boy up in time to make it line up with the rest of their happy horseshit.

[max-greece]

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In a word: no.

Not according to the Gospels.

• Luke has Mary pregnant during the administration of Qurinius, which began in 6 CE.
  
• According to Luke, Jesus was "about 30" when he began his ministry.
  
• According to Luke, John the Baptist started his ministry during the 15th year of Tiberius, 28/29 CE.
  
• Matt, Mark and Luke agree that JC began his ministry after JtB was put in prison. Details are sketchy here but I will argue this couldn't have been much before 34 CE.
  
• If JC had been born before 4 BCE, he would have been too old by the time of JtB's arrest.
  
• There was no census in 4 BCE. The closest BC census was in 8/9 BC.
  
• In 4 BC, under Herod the Great, Judea was a ally of Rome, not subject to direct taxation and census.
  
• Luke's timeline is the best fit for JC, since "about 30" allows for a 6 CE birth and a 34 CE beginning of his ministry (28 = about 30) and it allows three Passover festivals outlined in John before Pilate is recalled to Rome in 36 CE.
  

If I WERE to speculate on a birthdate, 6 CE seems more likely.

The one glaring problem with Luke's timeline is the 10 year pregnancy of Mary. Mary's pregnancy began under the reign of Herod the Great (who died in 4 BCE). Then again, those sons of god may take longer to bake in the oven.

Falsifiability is a pretty important part of making assertions and claiming them to be proven. How might I disprove this assertion, were I inclined to argue against it? There were no detailed records of what peasants were born and raised where and Yeshua was a common name.

It may be so and what then?

Continuing with that linked article:

Certainly consistent with the "Synoptic Gospels" (Matt, Mark, Luke). Their Jesus was a holy man who was clearly separate from and subordinate to his father god. He had less knowledge than his father ("No man knows the day, not even the Son, but the Father alone"), he has a subordinate will ("Not my will by thine be done") and he speaks about his Father in third person and to him in second person.

Not so much with John.

• Jesus in John claims to be one with his father ("I and my Father are one"), wholly blasphemous to the Jewish faith.
  
• Jesus claims to be an intercessor to God ("no man commeth unto the Father but through me"), a role forbidden in strict Jewish monotheism (Isaiah 43:10-12, "I, even I am Lord. Beside me there is no savior. I have saved. I have Judged.")
  
• "The Jews", named as such, are a separate and hostile religious group in John.
  

In all Gospels, Jesus preaches a message about salvation and Hell, something unknown to the OT. However, by JC's day, Judaism had likely morphed and incorporated pagan concepts. Many Jews chaffing under Roman rule, wondering where the heck was Yahweh's promise to the seed of David, may have decided their kingdom was in a higher place.

The Jesus of the Gospel of John never baptizes Jesus. In the others, the vision is shared by all present. JtB supposedly bore witness and the booming voice should have been heard by everyone there.

That's the story though the itinerary is fuzzy. The Synoptics say that Jesus was "immediately" taken into the wilderness for 40 days. When he came back, JtB was put in prison. The Gospel of John says that JC spent the next three days gathering disciples and attending a wedding. JtB was not arrested right away and Jesus opens a rival baptism franchise and beats JtB at his own game. What a guy!

"Scholars" don't take these supernatural accounts seriously, do they?

This part we can gleen from Tacitus. However, the entry is oblique and 2nd century. It doesn't even mention Jesus by name. Clearly, this religious leader wasn't well known outside his cult following and insignificant to the authorities. I'm not saying he wasn't crucified and fanciful stories weren't told of his resurrection afterwards. People claimed to see Elvis long after his death. I am saying that notables didn't seem to take much notice of him until later centuries.

Such is the folklore of the supposed "early church". The only 1st century Christian persecution I'm aware of is the Neronian fire, and even this was more of a scapegoating of a small minority, who likely had neither warning nor opportunity to escape.

The letters of Pliny the Elder run contrary to the folklore established by Hollywood, with early Christians holding their heads high, refusing to renounce their savoir as they were horribly tortured and killed at the hands of pagan Romans as the background orchestra swells. In reality, Rome was apathetic to different religions and only turned on them when their proponents rebelled against Roman authority. More to the point, Pliny seems to have no idea who these Christians are or what to do with them. Putting them under the lash, these Christians renounce Jesus, contrary to the heroic folklore.

As if the picture weren't muddy enough, the very "early church" is a dubious organization. Actual history shows that there were a wild variety of early Christianities. They disagreed on how many gods there were, whether Jesus was a flesh-and-blood person, when Jesus lived, what Jesus was, what Jesus died for or even whether he died at all. The modern distinction between Christian and Muslim would look like petty hair-splitting in comparison.

Echoes of this early struggle within the Church can be read in the Bible itself. Read 1John 4:1-3 and 2John 1:7. These verses are supposedly written by "John the disciple" (in reality, pseudo-epigraphy and interpolation were serious problems and half the epistles of "Paul" are of dubious authorship). Yet this man who knew Jesus rails against the Docetic Christians as anti-Christs who denied that Jesus had come in the flesh. Rather than appeal to recent history, this "John" appeals to faith, imploring the reader to "believe" and "confess" that Jesus had come in the flesh. The fact that not one but two canonical letters deal with the Docetics helps to underscore that these heterodox Christians were not simply minor schismatics. Clearly, Jesus wrote nothing down and made nothing clear to his followers.

To me, "based on a true story" should have three components.
1. The miracles.
2. The ministry.
3. The message.

The miracles? Seriously?

The ministry? Clearly the stories of it being such a politically and religiously earth moving force that spread like wildfire are gross exaggerations. Nobody seemed to give a scribble on a parchment, not even the Jews, until later centuries. John the Baptist had a much bigger following and historical accounts outside Gospel propaganda indicate he wasn't a modest forerunner but a candidate for messiah. To this day, he has followers that reject Jesus in favor of JtB. If JtB had seriously knelt before Jesus, you'd think his followers would have gotten the message and Jesus would have made a bigger splash.

The message? What was it again? Canon wasn't established until the 4th century under the weight of imperial authority. Until that time, there was no one Christianity.

What's left?

• Some guy
  
• named Yeshua
  
• who was some kind of religious leader
  
• or something.
  

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I am glad I asked you what I did. I did not intend for you to go through the trouble of responding to the entire article though....

Very thorough you are!

We need to come to a consensus on this issue before we go any further. I maintain that Jesus was a man of history. He was born around 6BC-4BC. He was from Galilee and around 30AD He was crucified under Pontius Pilate.

Can we agree on these three things?

Honestly Discipulus,

Excellent approach. I suggest for your own sake you don't come to a consensus and then gently ease your ass out of the door.

You really picked the wrong guy to try this with. Probably an idea to school yourself in your opponent first - go to Youtube - find Deist's channel - watch some of the video's on the subject.

To make matters worse - he now has Min in his corner. Do not be fooled by Min's terse put-downs - he's another walking encyclopaedia on the subject.

If you are foolish enough to take this on you will get your ass handed to you on a plate.

Just my $0.02 of course.

[DeistPaladin]

Try as they might, Roman history prevents the jesus freaks from moving their boy up in time to make it line up with the rest of their happy horseshit.

It's not just the Jesus freaks but so-called "historists" as well.

I can understand why the apologists are desperate to move all the dates back a decade. They have to in order to preserve Matthew, who features a bullshit story about Herod's massacre of all the male infants around Jerusalem in a story lifted out of Exodus (which in turn was ripped off from Sargon). When it's "The Word of God", you're stuck with it.

Lies have a way of tripping up a larger fabrication and Matthew's whopper about "The Slaughter of The Innocents" means apologists are stuck with Herod the Great, who died in 4 BCE. Sucks to be them. What I don't understand is why "secular historists" are so reluctant to admit the obvious, that whoever wrote Matthew was a bald-faced liar and throw the whole Gospel out.

If I were to argue the "secular historist" stance, say in a high school debate team assignment, I'd use the dates provided by Luke. Jesus was born in 6 CE, started his ministry in 34 CE and died in 36 CE. It's a tight squeeze and you need to fudge what "about 30" means ("meh, 28, close enough") but it works for every historical landmark I can see. Just ditch the bullshit about Mary's virgin conception under Herod the Great and, AFIAK, you're good to go.

Feel free to rip me apart there. It's not what I actually believe but what I would argue in an assigned debate.

Now supposedly, the "secular historist" has the advantage of being selective about what parts of the Bible can be used. Bart Ehrman (a theologian, not a historian) himself has ripped apart the contaminations in scripture, so why not? Why not just toss out Matthew and the virgin conception in Luke? You're already tossing out all the miralces, divinity and woo, which is 90% of the story anyway.

Supposedly, the "secular historist" is arguing for some mortal guy who inspired the myths and legends. In practice, the lines between them and the very apologists they deride like McDowell, Habermas, et al, are fuzzy at best. They cling to the 4 BCE timeline and carry the water for the apologists on other issues of the picture they construct, when they construct anything coherent at all. They call themselves secular but howl with indignation when you take their precious Bible away from them.

It honestly makes me wonder about their motivation. Why are historical scholars so reluctant to admit what obviously can't be reconciled with a basic reading of scripture? Are they either Christians or former Christians who can't fully let go? Or are they terrified of reprisal, that their careers may suffer if they incur the wrath of Jesus Inc.?

[DeistPaladin]

Oh, and thank you Min, by the way.

[discipulus]

DeistPaladin, do you agree with historians when they say that there are two events subject to "almost universal assent"? These two events being the baptism of Jesus by John and Jesus' crucifixion by the order of Pontius Pilate.

That is what I was asking.

Do you agree with their conclusions regarding those two events? Yes or no? We need to come to a consensus on this.