My blog

[robvalue]

Awesome! Thank you very much guys I really appreciate all the feedback. I will try and get on there soon and make some changes. Satanism is a good one, I forgot that. It is indeed a sad fact that propaganda can go so low as to say this.

Tim: welcome to the forum! My question about Historical Jesus is, can any action, event or quote be attributed to a real "jesus", beyond reasonable doubt?

My stance is this: I see no evidence that jesus is anything more than an entirely fictional character, and if it is "based" on someone, then this means as little as if Harry Potter is "based" on a Harry the writer knew. In other words, it's not a real character.

All the "evidence" about Jesus is hearsay. I do not know of any that isn't, if you know of some, please let me know! 1, 100 or 1,000,000 hearsay accounts are not sufficient evidence for anything, beyond reasonable doubt, in my opinion. And we have one book, the bible, with any real details. I consider the bible no more accurate of reality than any fictional book that happens to feature a few historical events, vaguely.

So yeah, I would say the burden of proof is to establish at least a handful of sayings, actions or events to the same "jesus". And I don't think it can be done. I'm happy to be proved wrong!

Otherwise, what does historical Jesus even mean? There were people back then called jesus? Well, sure. Pick any one and stick the story on him. It's still fiction.

---

To come back to the mythicist stance, watchamadoodle... I think I'm wondering what it actually is saying. I mean, my stance as above is the rejection of a HJ claim. But I'm not making a claim myself there, so far. So to be a mythicist, do I need to make the additional claim that jesus is mythical? And if so, what would be a suitable burden of proof for this? I don't know. Sounds like an impossible proving the negative; but a case can certainly be made for elements of jesus being nicked from earlier stuff, and Paul's jesus not being the same jesus but a different celestial myth. That's what I'm wondering... I mean... What would it mean to say I'm a Harry Potter mythicist? Do I have a burden of proof to demonstrate it's not real, but is based on "mythology" of sorts? If anyone has a decent answer to this, please let me know! But if you take the stance that mythicists are making a claim, then indeed, you comparing it to the jar of sweets analogy is a very perceptive one. Neither can meet their burden of proof, so we're left in the middle. But left with what? He's still not established to be anything other than fiction... Oh I'll just kick him in the nuts some more for now.

[GrandizerII]

But why assume, by default reasoning, that Jesus must (or is likely to) be just a myth? Isn't agnosticism about his historical existence the default position to take in the absence of sufficient evidence for either side?

I'd be agnostic about Harry Potter's existence as a real person did I not know that he is nothing more than a character made up by J. K. Rowling.

---

Tim: welcome to the forum! My question about Historical Jesus is, can any action, event or quote be attributed to a real "jesus", beyond reasonable doubt?

Well, not beyond reasonable doubt, but I think a case can be made. Being baptized by John the Baptist and dying on a cross. And being from Nazareth, etc.

My basis for my view is not based primarily on documents by the way, more on the fact that historical Jesus seems to answer relevant questions regarding Jesus' existence much better than mythical Jesus.

[robvalue]

What evidence is there about him being baptised by John, being from Nazareth and dying on a cross? Are there good enough external sources to confirm this? If so I'd be interested to take a look. And we have to be sure it's actually jesus and not just random people all being strung together.

What I don't understand is giving jesus and the bible special treatment. Why assume any of it is real and not just made up? That's my point. I see no evidence, well, nothing credible.

---

To me, the default position when handed a story is to assume it has no truth to it until I'm convinced otherwise. If there is truth, I should have no trouble being convinced. Especially one as old as this, and written after the death of the protagonist. We don't know who wrote it, or why. But just because he's famous, he is not more real to me than superman. I'm not claiming that it didn't happen, I have no need to any more than I need to prove there is no God. I believe only what there is good reason to believe. I don't have to make my own claims at all.

That's just my opinion though I think the bible has such myth and clout around it that idea there "must be something to it" kind of gets under people's scepticism at times.

---

I'm not trying to be a dick. Sorry if it comes across that way. Just engaging in debate It makes no difference to me whether he was real or not, it's just interesting.

[watchamadoodle]

What evidence is there about him being baptised by John, being from Nazareth and dying on a cross? Are there good enough external sources to confirm this? If so I'd be interested to take a look. And we have to be sure it's actually jesus and not just random people all being strung together.

I'm not aware of any non-Christian evidence for a baptism by John - even though that event is accepted by most historians. The non-Christian evidence is for a crucifixion and a brother named James who was stoned. You probably read about these quotes already but here they are:

Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judæa, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Christ

And now Caesar, upon hearing the death of Festus, sent Albinus into Judea, as procurator. But the king deprived Joseph of the high priesthood, and bestowed the succession to that dignity on the son of Ananus, who was also himself called Ananus. Now the report goes that this eldest Ananus proved a most fortunate man; for he had five sons who had all performed the office of a high priest to God, and who had himself enjoyed that dignity a long time formerly, which had never happened to any other of our high priests. But this younger Ananus, who, as we have told you already, took the high priesthood, was a bold man in his temper, and very insolent; he was also of the sect of the Sadducees, who are very rigid in judging offenders, above all the rest of the Jews, as we have already observed; when, therefore, Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done; they also sent to the king, desiring him to send to Ananus that he should act so no more, for that what he had already done was not to be justified; nay, some of them went also to meet Albinus, as he was upon his journey from Alexandria, and informed him that it was not lawful for Ananus to assemble a sanhedrin without his consent. Whereupon Albinus complied with what they said, and wrote in anger to Ananus, and threatened that he would bring him to punishment for what he had done; on which king Agrippa took the high priesthood from him, when he had ruled but three months, and made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus

[GrandizerII]

In my last statement in my last response, I said that I don't rely on documented evidence but more on parsimony in this case.

For example, if Jesus was a myth, why have him be Jesus of Nazareth rather than Jesus of Bethlehem?

[robvalue]

Who knows? I understand the desire to analyse motives, but really I find assuming something is possibly real because a fake would have been written differently isn't positive evidence. They may have had all kinds of quirky reasons for how they wrote it that are lost to us, and to me it makes it no less fictional.

I see, if you're not going by documents, what are you going by? What other evidence is there? A myth of Christ would have been just as good as a real story as far as people who believed it were concerned, they had no way to tell the difference after his death.

Watchamadoodle: Thanks very much for those passages, I'll check those out. I was wondering if the crucifixion was maybe the easiest to try and pin down. But say it's true, this gives us one event at best. And we have no way of knowing if this was the "same guy" the story was originally based on. Interesting though, I'll look into it cheers. Yeah, if there's a lack of non-christian evidence like for the baptism, I think that's safely ignored as BS. Or rather, there's no good reason to think it happened.

Carrier makes a lot of arguments about how the style of the text is mythical, as in, that was how people wrote myths rather than history.

[watchamadoodle]

The quote from Tacitus probably only indicates that Christians (or Chrestians) existed at the time of Nero. Tacitus probably only recorded the belief that Christians were followers of a Jew named Christus who was crucified under Pilate. Tacitus probably had no reason to question the existence of Christus, and he probably didn't care very much if Christus was mythical.

The Josephus quote is more important IMO. Probably if that quote didn't exist then the historians would not be so confident that Jesus probably existed.

(Also, Josephus was a politically well-connected Jew when James was stoned, so it's a very different situation than the Tacitus quote.)

[robvalue]

Sure. But whatever information Josephus had was hearsay, wouldn't you agree? Is there any reason to think it is more reliable than just what he had heard or been told about events? (Also Josephus' work contains at least one blatant forgery by Christians raising further suspicions).

I've finally got on my website and made improvements to the What is atheism/theism? page and the What atheism is not page, taking into account excellent feedback from Watchamadoodle and Dystopia. Thanks guys! Please let me know if you think it's an improvement Hopefully I've removed all confusion now, and I took into account your observation Watcha regarding the theist mindset.

---

Well... good point, I guess it's a question of definition.

I'm not claiming that I know jesus is mythical, I'm saying I believe it, and I find it the most likely thing. I don't know Harry Potter isn't real either, but I feel the same level of confidence.

Does that make me a mythicist? Or do I have to claim knowledge? Claiming knowledge seems indefensible.

Tell me if this answer makes some logical sense. If not, please let me what the issue with it is.

The difference between Jesus and Harry Potter is we have sufficient information to know how Harry Potter originated and we see that it is pretty much fiction (including the characters). We can even ask the author of the book series about whether or not Harry Potter is a real person if you really needed to be sure.

I can't be as confident regarding Jesus' non-existence.

Sorry, I missed this question.

Sure, we can talk to the author. But in the end, we only have the author's word, and they may not even know the truth. They may be lying and know it is true. It may "happen" to all be true anyway, or maybe its truth invaded the author's consciousness and caused them to write it, thinking it was fiction. Their "say so" does not decide whether or not the events are true or partly true. But an examination of the text alone, regardless of what the author says, should produce a valid result. Is there good reason to think any of these events are true? No. You say we "see it is fiction"... I know what you're saying here. By that line of reasoning though the gospels should also be considered fiction because (a) they are often written in a mythical rather than historical style and (b) they include obviously fictional factors like jesus fulfilling prophecies that aren't even prophecies, and doing impossible things. And doing contradictory things based on the telling and retelling of his story, which grows over time rather than diminishes, pointing to embellishment rather than fact.

We don't know who wrote the bible, or why exactly. But again, what the author says is largely irrelevant. The text should stand or fall on its own. And remember, this is really important: even if the authors of the gospels thought they were writing the truth, all they had to go on was hearsay. We have no reason to believe they had any other sources than this. So 100% belief in what they were writing has 0% effect on whether it was actually true. This is why I reject hearsay, it carries no weight as evidence.

---

What I mean is... To say jesus is mythical isn't making a claim as such, it's just saying HJ has not met its burden of proof.

What is its "burden of proof" here? How would it meet this, exactly? What evidence, of the kind that we could expect for an early first century Jewish preacher, would be sufficient to meet this burden of proof, in your opinion?

And I don't mean declaring that it definitely is mythical; just that if something isn't demonstrably real, we have no reason to assume it's anything but fiction.

See my questions above about what could be "demonstrable" here.

To address this again:

I'm not sure if this is your point but... If it is the case that there could not reasonably be expected to be enough evidence to establish the historicity of jesus, this should not give us extra leeway to promote the credibility of the evidence we do have to "fill this gap" or to just make assumptions based on people's motives. If the evidence is not there, then we cannot make a case. Making allowances is not honest practice, especially for such a badly documented series of events, such a long time ago.

But really, it comes down to this: Is there any credible evidence, not hearsay, that Jesus was a real person? The answer seems to be no.

[watchamadoodle]

Sure. But whatever information Josephus had was hearsay, wouldn't you agree? Is there any reason to think it is more reliable than just what he had heard or been told about events? (Also Josephus' work contains at least one blatant forgery by Christians raising further suspicions).

That's a good point that there is an obvious Christian forgery interpolated into another part of Josephus' work.

In some ways, most things we believe are based on hearsay. Even when a juror listens to an eye witness to an event, that evidence is still hearsay (for the juror). Rather than hearsay or not hearsay, we should consider the provenance of the evidence. Did the report travel through one person, or did it travel through 10 people? Do we know those people? Are they reliable witnesses?

In the quote from Josephus, his source was probably King Herod Agrippa II, because the wikipedia article says that Josephus used Agrippa as a source. Agrippa was the person who replaced the high priest over the unjustified stoning of James. Probably there was a formal government investigation of some kind. It was hearsay, but it was probably good quality hearsay.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herod_Agrippa_II

I've finally got on my website and made improvements to the What is atheism/theism? page and the What atheism is not page, taking into account excellent feedback from Watchamadoodle and Dystopia. Thanks guys! Please let me know if you think it's an improvement Hopefully I've removed all confusion now, and I took into account your observation Watcha regarding the theist mindset.

On the blog, the last line of the "what is atheism" page came out of the text box. I'm using Firefox on Linux mint (a few versions old too). Maybe it formats properly on other browsers.

Also, I wonder if you want to add anything about agnostics? Whenever I talk to Christians, they always insist that I'm actually an agnostic instead of an atheist. You explained that not all atheists are gnostic atheists, but maybe you want to go further and explain that most atheists are agnostic atheists? This seems to be a big hang-up for Christians when they talk to atheists. I know that should be obvious from what you said about gnostic atheists, but maybe it needs to be mentioned?

---

@robvalue, I read your page again and saw that you covered the agnostic issue, so never mind.

This is a typical description of someone who identified as "just an agnostic", preferring not to label themselves as an atheist, even though they are.

[robvalue]

OK thanks I'll check that out. I appreciate all feedback very much! I hope I satisified Dystopia, he had a good point, I could have been clearer about stuff.

Yeah it's amazing how much confusion these terms cause. I hope my site does a little bit in the battle against that!

Thanks for the info on Josephus. The fact that christians needed to stick their own stuff in there makes me think they barely believed their own story, or thought there wasn't good enough reason for others to believe it. But I'll check that out, as I said I don't like to worry about motive too much. But forgery is not good :p

You're right, we do deal a lot with hearsay, and it's up to us to evaluate it. I doubt a jury would ever convict merely on hearsay, only if evidence backs it up.