Did William Shakespeare exist?

[ApeNotKillApe]

It's that his historicity is "unquestionable doctrine" that raises issues.

[Aegon]

It's that his historicity is "unquestionable doctrine" that raises issues.

...and that's irrelevant. Historians aren't theologians. The people researching this, for the most part, aren't out to prove Christianity. They research to find out whether or not a guy named Jesus existed at that time and was known as some sort of prophet figure. That's it. His historicity. If people want to say "He existed and if you don't think so you're a blasphemer and you should die at the stake" that's a separate problem and, again, irrelevant to whether he really existed or not.

[Minimalist]

Oh look, another historical figure with little evidence of their existence that everyone just accepts as existing. But just replace the name with "Jesus"...

Oh look....documentary evidence of Shakespeare.

http://www.pbs.org/shakespeare/evidence/evidence28.html

If only we had anything like it for fucking jesus.

[Edwardo Piet]

Socrates probably never existed, maybe old Shakey didn't either.... who cares it's what they're known for that demonstrates what they're worth, whether they existed or not.

Sample applies to fucking cunts like Yahweh. Sure 'he' never existed but that cretin's words splattered all over the Bible fucked history up.

[Minimalist]

Not even a close comparison:

http://www.freethoughtpedia.com/wiki/Socrates_vs_Jesus

Socrates is mentioned in documents written by three people who were alive during his purported lifetime. Whether the three writers worked independently of one another cannot be known with certainty. On the face of things, it is not obvious that any of them influenced the others, but it is hardly inconceivable that they could have. Socrates appears as a character in at least two of Aristophanes' plays. He appears as an interlocutor in a substantial portion of Plato's writings, and he plays a similar role in some of Xenophon's work.[2] Xenophon's material is similar to some of Plato's but not entirely consistent.
Aristophanes' work is clearly satirical, not biographical. From the play itself, we cannot know whether he was making fun of a real philosopher known to his audience or ridiculing certain ideas that were much discussed at the time and using a fictional character to embody them. The former does seem prima facie more likely, but the latter cannot yet be ruled out.
Aristophanes produced his plays while Socrates (if he existed) was still alive. Plato and Xenophon did their work after his purported death, both of them including Socrates' defense against the charges that led to his execution. Both writers give the impression that they had known Socrates and studied under his tutelage.

Fucking jesus has nothing to match that.

[Mudhammam]

Right. Nor should we, as amateur historians, expect Jesus to have anything that matches that of a person like Socrates, which makes what we do have about Jesus all the more impressive.

[Mudhammam]

Oh look, another historical figure with little evidence of their existence that everyone just accepts as existing. But just replace the name with "Jesus"...

Oh look....documentary evidence of Shakespeare.

http://www.pbs.org/shakespeare/evidence/evidence28.html

If only we had anything like it for fucking jesus.

Yes, then you could glibly call it a forgery.

In 1598 these early registers were replaced by more durable ones and all entries since 1558 were copied into them. This occurred in Stratford and the entry of Shakespeare’s baptism was therefore copied in 1600 by a clerk from a lost original

http://findingshakespeare.co.uk/going-di...hakespeare

[Minimalist]

Right. Nor should we, as amateur historians, expect Jesus to have anything that matches that of a person like Socrates, which makes what we do have about Jesus all the more impressive.

All we have about "jesus" is the pious blather of the later writers who invented him and put whatever words they wanted him to say in his mouth.  But I wouldn't expect you to know that.

[robvalue]

I have no idea. Never looked into it.

[rexbeccarox]

Like I say to the Jesus question: I can't know for sure, and, IMO, it's irrelevant except that people aren't threatened with burning into eternity for not believing Shakespeare existed.