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

[abaris]

My own opinion on this (unlike O'Neill, I'm an actual historian, by education and training, if not by profession) is that the situation is pretty closely mirrored by the 'Arthur of Britain' problem.

Yes, I'm pretty much the same as you. Although I got my training at the university of Vienna and am in no way specialised in ancient history but made my degree writing about what's called contemporary history in my corner of the world. Meaning the 20th century.

One of my first lessons when starting to study history was to be presented with a text. No author, no time period and no geographical origin was offered. We were encouraged to come to our own conclusions based only on the actual text. In my case it was from the GDR, which was still existing at the time. Certain keywords in the narrative pointed in that direction. The lesson was to be critical of one's sources and that's something I think is missing when dealing with the likes of Bart Ehrman for example, who doesn't have any training as a historian and therefore misses out on critical text analysis. Starting with the definition of history through the ages, which was entirely different in ancient times than it is today. Hearsay was considered a valid source and the underlying meaning was to present an ideal, not actual events.

[Minimalist]

Well said, Brian.  Almost by statistics there had to be at least one fucker name Y'shua bar Yusef because both were common names.

It doesn't matter.  It is not the man that xtians follow but the magic tricks.  As H. L. Mencken noted:

There is no possibility whatsoever of reconciling science and theology, at least in Christendom. Either Jesus rose from the dead or he didn’t. If he did, then Christianity becomes plausible; if he did not, then it is sheer nonsense.

[Ravenshire]

There is only one reason anyone gives a fuck about the historicity of jeebus. So they can drag the myths into the story. If not for the religion, nobody would have a single fuck to give about whether a specific rogue Jewish Rabbi actually existed.

[abaris]

There is only one reason anyone gives a fuck about the historicity of jeebus. So they can drag the myths into the story. If not for the religion, nobody would have a single fuck to give about whether a specific rogue Jewish Rabbi actually existed.

There's one thing that makes the story remotely interesting. When they finally penned that tall tale, Jesus came fully equipped with most myths of the mediterranean region. An all inclusive package, so to speak. I'm going back to my first post in this thread: The major questions to ask is the why when it comes to the gospels. What was the agenda?

The Roman empire wasn't as illiterate as the christian Middle Ages, but books - or rather scrolls - were still rather expensive. So it's not as every wayward peasant could sit down to write at his leisure.

[Brakeman]

Why are historians ignoring the huge elephant in the room?????

ART

There is no contemporary art of any jesus, and nearly every household had pottery. If Jesus was so great of a man with such miracles, he would have been as well known as he claims in Jerusalem. First century art would have been alive with such depictions of the "son of god." But oxen and carts seem to be the more popular theme..

If you were an artist and wanted to paint something that told a story and would sell to people who had "experienced" a miracle of meeting jesus, why would you paint anything else?

[Cyberman]

First century Rule 34?

[Minimalist]

Why are historians ignoring the huge elephant in the room?????

ART

There is no contemporary art of any jesus, and nearly every household had pottery. If Jesus was so great of a man with such miracles, he would have been as well known as he claims in Jerusalem. First century art would have been alive with such depictions of the "son of god." But oxen and carts seem to be the more popular theme..

If you were an artist and wanted to paint something that told a story and would sell to people who had "experienced" a miracle of meeting jesus, why would you paint anything else?

And so they did...if not on pottery at least on wall art.  The earliest known depiction of the godboy is from the Eastern town of Doura Europus. 

This c 240 AD, shows "jesus" (beardless and wearing a toga!) healing the paralytic.

[Minimalist]

It had absolutely nothing to do with getting people to hate the Jews.

You're missing the point.  They didn't have to get anyone to hate the Jews.  The Jews had already accomplished that all by themselves. 

"You are fond of saying that in the old days this same most high god made these and greater promises to those who gave heed to his commandments and worshipped him. But at the risk of appearing unkind, I ask how much good has been done by those promises have done either the Jews before you or you in your present circumstances. And would you have us put out faith in such a god? Instead of being masters of the whole world, the jews today have no home of any kind."
Celsus c 180

But the point of the gospel accounts is to a) absolve the Roman officials and b) blame the jews for killing their "god" and for demanding that it be done in what was the most shameful and dishonorable way imaginable.

I'm sorry if you can't see that but it is plain as day.

[Pyrrho]

I didn't read the OP, nor do I intend to.  Tim O'Neill is an 'historian' in roughly the same sense that  Dr. Seuss is a surgeon. 

Boru

Does Dr. Seuss deserve this comparison?

[TheMessiah]

I think I see what may be the sticking point here.

When atheists make the claim, 'There is no evidence for an historical Jesus', they are manifestly not claiming that it is an utter impossibility that an itinerant preacher with a name very like 'Yeshua-bar-Yusef' got into some trouble with the authorities in 1st century Palestine.  By and large, what atheists are claiming is that there is no evidence for an historic Jesus who corresponds in large part to the figure depicted in the Gospel narratives and the Pauline epistles.

My own opinion on this (unlike O'Neill, I'm an actual historian, by education and training, if not by profession) is that the situation is pretty closely mirrored by the 'Arthur of Britain' problem.  In both cases, we have 'histories' of dubious reliability - and with a pretty clear bias -, penned long after the events they relate, in which the central figure is credited with remarkable/miraculous abilities.  In both cases, we have a central figure who seems tied to actual, historic events (the reign of Tiberius, the Battle of Mount Badon), but not even a scintilla of undisputed physical evidence.

So, could there have been a Romanized Briton warlord who went about bashing Saxons for fun and profit?  Maybe, but this person bears about as much resemblance to Arthur of the Round Table as an unwashed, illiterate rabbi bears to the Jesus of the Gospels.

Boru

That's some pretty lousy reasoning; and I'd expect that from a religious person, simply ''dismissing'' his claims as ''I don't care if he says he is a historian'' - because that is taking the assumption that he's one of the few who does believe Jesus existed, the consensus around Jesus existing is across most ancient historians. I expect skepticism in Atheism.

The evidence for Jesus; is backed up by two historical references - there's about as much historical evidence for Jesus, if not more than there is for the conqueror; hence the ''Jesus could be amalgamated'' ha been debunked.

3.  "Jesus began as an allegorical, symbolic figure of the Messiah who got 'historicised' into an actual person despite the fact he never really existed"

This idea has been presented in most detail by another amateur theorist in yet another self-published book: R.G. Price's Jesus - A Very Jewish Myth (2007).  Unlike "Acharya S" and, to a lesser extent Doherty, Price at least takes account of the fact that the Jesus stories and the first members of the Jesus sect are completely and fundamentally Jewish, so fantasies about Egyptian myths or Greek Middle Platonic philosophy are not going to work as points of origin for them.  According to this version of Jesus Mythicism, Jesus was an idealisation of what the Messiah was to be like who got turned into a historical figure largely by mistake and misunderstanding.

Several of the same objections to Doherty's thesis can be made about this one - if this was the case, why are there no remnants of debates with or condemnations of those who believed the earlier version and maintained there was no historical Jesus at all?  And why don't any of Christianity's enemies use the fact that the original Jesus sect didn't believe in a historical Jesus as an argument against the new version of the sect?  Did everyone just forget?

More tellingly, if the Jesus stories arose out of ideas about and expectations of the Messiah, it is very odd that Jesus doesn't fit those expectations better.  Despite Christian claims to the contrary, the first Christians had to work very hard to convince fellow Jews that Jesus was the Messiah precisely because he didn't conform to these expectations. Most importantly, there was absolutely no tradition or Messianic expectation that told of the Messiah being executed and then rising from the dead - this first appears with Christianity and has no Jewish precedent at all.  Far from evolving from established Messianic prophecies and known elements in the scripture, the first Christians had to scramble to find anything at all which looked vaguely like a "prophecy" of this unexpected and highly unMessianic event.

That the centre and climax of the story of Jesus would be based on his shameful execution and death makes no sense if it evolved out of Jewish expectations about the Messiah, since they contained nothing about any such idea.  This climax to the story only makes sense if it actually happened, and then his followers had to find totally new and largely strained and contrived "scriptures" which they then claimed "predicted" this outcome, against all previous expectation.  Price's thesis fails because Jesus' story doesn't conform to Jewish myths enough.

4. "Jesus was not a Jewish preacher at all but was someone else or an amalgam of people combined into one figure in the Christian tradition"

This is the least popular of the Jesus Myth hypotheses, but versions of it are argued by Italian amateur theorist Francesco Carotta (Jesus was Caesar: On the Julian Origin of Christianity. An Investigative Report - 2005)), computer programmer Joseph Atwill (Caesar's Messiah: The Roman Conspiracy to Invent Jesus - 2005) and accountant Daniel Unterbrink (Judas the Galilean: The Flesh and Blood Jesus - 2004).  Carotta claims Jesus was actually Julius Caesar and imposed on Jewish tradition as part of the cult of the Divius Julius.  Atwill claims Jesus was actually the deliberate creation of the Emperor Titus, imposed on Judaism in the same way.  Neither do a very good job of substantiating these claims or of explaining why the Romans then turned around, as early as 64 AD (fifteen years before Titus became emperor) and began persecuting the cult they supposedly created.  No scholar takes these theories or that of Unterbrink seriously.

No scholar also argues that Jesus was an amalgam of various Jewish preachers or other figures of the time.  That is because there is nothing in the evidence to indicate this.  This ideas has never been argued in any detailed form by anyone at all, scholar or Jesus myth amateur theorist, but it is something some who don't want to subscribe to the idea that "Jesus Christ" was based on a real person resorts to so that they can put some sceptical distance between the Christian claims and anything or anyone historical.  It seems to be a purely rhetorically-based idea, with no substance and no argument behind it.  

I honestly think one of the reasons Atheists deny the vast historical evidence for Jesus; and logic is not skepticism, but ideology.
There is an ideological desire to undermine Christianity - and it stems from anti-Theism.