Your religion is nothing more than luck and geography

[Homercles82]

i actually believe that just because god knows all does not mean he predetermines all. in other words, there is free will. without it, there is no true 'love'.

Of course there is free will but how is free will of fallen man congruent with the teachings of the Bible? the Israelites chose their own pathways many times but God's plan involved righting their ship. There was nothing they did under their own power that resulted in good.

Romans 8:28-32 (New International Version, ©2010)

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who[a] have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

Free Will believers teach us that yes, God calls us but we have the choice to reject or accept. Why would God call someone whom he knows will reject? That simply takes away from the sovereignty of God. If you are called by God you have no choice but to accept the Holy Spirit to come into your body and overtake you. There is no rejection of the Holy Spirit.

[HokieSkinsFan]

Sure it is. You don't think there is historical evidence for the claims of Christianity?

Jesus was just a composite of various pagan gods. There is no evidence of his existence outside of the bible (don't even mention Josephus, because it's a noted forgery). If there were really a man who walked on water, healed the blind, raised the dead, and conquered death himself don't you think at least one secular scribe would be compelled to jot it down for the record? Also, none of the four gospels were first-hand accounts. They were written anywhere from 60-100 years after the events in question took place.

[Metalhead]

Techboy, I have a question for you about the New Testament Gospels and the Gnostic Gospels in relation to the date of christ from post #165. Do you find it awkward that people follow beliefs from gospels as fact from 2000 years ago but not 1800 years ago (Gnostics)? Removing gospels may have had a good intention at the time, but I would imagine you want as much information as possible, from every source known. Can we utilize revisionist history now if necessary or is it silently forbidden?

[Homercles82]

Jesus was just a composite of various pagan gods. There is no evidence of his existence outside of the bible (don't even mention Josephus, because it's a noted forgery). If there were really a man who walked on water, healed the blind, raised the dead, and conquered death himself don't you think at least one secular scribe would be compelled to jot it down for the record? Also, none of the four gospels were first-hand accounts. They were written anywhere from 60-100 years after the events in question took place.

Tacitus, Suetonius and Pliny the Younger good enough for you? Or will you shoot them down with a 9 word sentence as well?

[elkabong82]

In point of fact, the evidence for Jesus of Nazareth as an historical personage is much stronger than that for Buddha, or really, many figures of ancient history. I'll go into that in a minute.

That being said, I'm pretty sure Buddha existed too, and I'm also pretty sure that this is not the kind of evidence he's talking about.

Both are based on second-hand accounts written many years after the fact, that was my point in regards to one having more historical merit than the other, as Trippster asserted.

I've studied the New Testament from an historical/analytical perspective. The Gospels, for example, all are written many years after the fact, based on second-hand accounts, and have some conflicts with one another. Doesn't mean there isn't merit within, but it does mean the same types of conflicts with the historical sources of Buddhism exist with Christianity as well.

[Homercles82]

Both are based on second-hand accounts written many years after the fact, that was my point in regards to one having more historical merit than the other, as Trippster asserted.

I've studied the New Testament from an historical/analytical perspective. The Gospels, for example, all are written many years after the fact, based on second-hand accounts, and have some conflicts with one another. Doesn't mean there isn't merit within, but it does mean the same types of conflicts with the historical sources of Buddhism exist with Christianity as well.

How are they secondhand accounts when they are written by the actual disciples who walked with Jesus? Speaking strictly of the Synoptic Gospels and the book of John which were written by apostles who were disciples of Jesus.

[chipwhich]

How are they secondhand accounts when they are written by the actual disciples who walked with Jesus? Speaking strictly of the Synoptic Gospels and the book of John which were written by apostles who were disciples of Jesus.

Just as an FYI, there are historians that consider the above to be false.

[Homercles82]

Just as an FYI, there are historians that consider the above to be false.

Good for them? You can always find someone who will disagree with something that someone says regardless of what it is.

Example: There were people at the time who thought Jesus was a blasphemer and people who thought he was the savior.

[techboy]

Wow, so many errors in so few words.

Jesus was just a composite of various pagan gods.

False. You're in "the moon landing was faked"or "the earth is flat" territory here.

The "Jesus Myth" Hypothesis: What do the experts have to say?

The simple fact is that pretty much anyone who has done any reading at all in the field of Jesus history knows that virtually no serious scholar in the field argues that Jesus was not an historical person. No one. Not the atheists, not the skeptics, not the Christians. No one.

It's not even an area of dispute, in a field where virtually everything is disputed by somebody.

For some of the reasons for this, try this log of a academic listserv discussing the historical Jesus. Consider, for instance, this answer by John Dominic Crossan (his Wiki page)

If I understand what Earl Doherty is arguing, Neil, it is that Jesus of Nazareth never existed as an historical person, or, at least that historians, like myself, presume that he did and act on that fatally flawed presumption.

I am not sure, as I said earlier, that one can persuade people that Jesus did exist as long as they are ready to explain the entire phenomenon of historical Jesus and earliest Christianity either as an evil trick or a holy parable. I had a friend in Ireland who did not believe that Americans had landed on the moon but that they had created the entire thing to bolster their cold-war image against the communists. I got nowhere with him. So I am not at all certain that I can prove that the historical Jesus existed against such an hypothesis and probably, to be honest, I am not even interested in trying.

It was, however, that hypothesis taken not as a settled conclusion, but as a simple question that was behind the first pages of BofC when I mentioned Josephus and Tacitus. I do not think that either of them checked out Jewish or Roman archival materials about Jesus. I think they were expressing the general public knowledge that "everyone" had about this weird group called Christians and their weird founder called Christ. The existence, not just of Christian materials, but of those other non-Christian sources, is enough to convince me that we are dealing with an historical individual. Furthermore, in all the many ways that opponents criticized earliest Christianity, nobody ever suggested that it was all made up. That in general, is quite enough for me.

There was one other point where I think Earl Doherty simply misstated what I did. In BofC, after the initial sections on materials and methods (1-235), I spent about equal time in Galilee (237-406) , or at least to the north, and in Jerusalem with pre-Pauline materials (407-573). I agree that if we had a totally different and irreconcilable vision/program between Paul and Q (just to take an example), it would require some very good explaining. Part of what I was doing, for example, in talking about the Common Meal Tradition was showing how even such utterly distinct eucharistic scenarios as Didache 9-10 and I Cor 11-12 have rather fascinating common elements behind and between them. It is a very different thing, in summary, for Paul to say that he is not interested in the historical Jesus (Jesus in the flesh) than to say that "no Galilee and no historical Jesus lie behind Paul."

Paragraph 3 is especially telling, I think.

One more passage by Crossan:

I am not certain, Neil, that I have much to add to my previous post. I do not claim "ideological immunity" against the possibility that the historical Jesus never existed. That such a person existed is an historical conclusion for me, and neither a dogmatic postulate nor a theological presupposition. My very general arguments are: (1) that existence is given in Christian, pagan, and Jewish sources; (2) it is never negated by even the most hostile critics of early Christianity (Jesus is a **** and a fool but never a myth or a fiction!); (3) there are no historical parallels that I know of from that time and period that help me understand such a total creation. There is, however, a fourth point that I touched on in BofC 403-406. It is crucially important for me that Jesus sent out companions and told them to do exactly what he was doing (not in his name, but as part of the Kingdom of God). The most basic continuity that I see between Jesus and those companions was, as I put it, not in mnemonics, but in mimetics. In other words, they were imitating his lifestyle and not just remembering his words. I find that emphasized in the Q Gospel’s indictment of those who talk, but do not do, and in the Didache’s emphasis on the ways (tropoi) of the Lord (not just words/logoi). When, therefore, I look at a phrase such as "blessed are the destitute," and am quite willing to argue that it comes from the historical Jesus, I am always at least as sure that it represents the accurate summary of an attitude as the accurate recall of a saying. For analogy: If Gandhi had developed a large movement after his death of people who are living in non-violent resistance to oppression, and one of them cited an aphorism of Gandhi, namely "if you do not stand on a small bug, why would you stand on a Big Bug," I would be more secure on the continuity in lifestyle than in memory and could work on that as basis.

That about sums it up, and again, this not seriously disputed by just about anybody. Michael Grant (here's his Wikipedia page) was an eminent classical historian, and in his Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels writes on page 199-200:

"...if we apply to the New Testament, as we should, the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material, we can no more reject Jesus' existence than we can reject the existence of a mass of pagan personages whose reality as historical figures is never questioned...To sum up, modern critical methods fail to support the Christ-myth theory. It has 'again and again been answered and annihilated by first-rank scholars'. In recent years 'no serious scholar has ventured to postulate the non-historicity of Jesus' -- or at any rate very few, and they have not succeeded in disposing of the much stronger, indeed very abundant, evidence to the contrary.

The "Jesus Myth" Hypothesis: What do the experts have to say about mythological development of Jesus in general?

Jesus is a popular target for "parallelism" on Mr. Internet. The ones I hear most commonly are Mithras and Horus, so let's look at those. Then we'll cover Osiris and others, and then parallelism in general.

Just a preface here... most of this stuff floating around the internet is based on work by Francis Cumont (or nobody at all), and has been since discarded by more modern research, which has determined that most of the parallels are bogus, and where they do exist, generally they would have to be the other way around (Mithraism borrowing from Christianity) due to the dating. The following quotes are from an interview Lee Strobel does with Dr. Edwin Yamuachi, a foremost expert in this field, who among his extensive qualifications, was a participant at the Second Mythraic Mysteries Congress in Tehran in 1975. Quotes are from Strobel's The Case for the Real Jesus. All quote Dr. Yamauchi directly.

Here's what happened at the Congress:

The Congress produced two volumes of papers. A scholar named Richard Gordon from England and others concluded that Cumont's theory was not supported by the evidence and, in fact, Cumont's interpretations have now been analyzed and rejected on all major points. Contrary to what Cumont believed. even though Mithras was a Persian god who was attested to as early as the fourteenth century B.C., we have almost no evidence of Mithraism in the sense of a mystery religion in the West until very late-too late to have influenced the beginnings of Christianity. (page 168)

More quotes from Dr. Yamauchi on the problems with the idea that Mithraism influenced Christianity:

The first public recognition of Mithras in Rome was the state visit of Tiridates, the king of Armenia, in AD 66.. It's said that he addressed Nero by saying, 'And I have come to thee, my god, to worship thee as I do Mithras.' There is also a reference earlier to some pirates in Cilicia who were worshipers of Mithras, but, this is NOT the same as Mithraism as a mystery religion. (page 169)

Mithraism as a mystery religion cannot be attested before anout AD 90, which is about the time we seee a Mithraic motif in a poem by Statius. No mithraea [or Mithraic temples] have been found at Pompeii, which was destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. The earliest Mithraic inscription in the West is a statue of a prefect under the emperor Trajan in AD 101. It's now in the British Museum. (page 169)

The earliest mithraea are dated to the early second century. There are a handful of inscriptions that date to the early second century, but the vast majority of texts are dated to AD 140. Most of what we have as evidence of Mithraism comes in the second, third, and fourth centuries AD. That's basically what's wrong with the theories about Mithraism influencing the beginnings of Christianity (page 169)

Gordon dates the estanblishment of the Mithraic mysteries to the reign of Hadrian, which was AD 117-138, or Antoninus Pius, which would be from 138 to 161. (page 169)

Specifically, Gordon said, 'It is therefore reasonable to argue that Western Mithraism did not exist until the mid-second century, at least in a developed sense (page 169)

Editor's note: Dr. Gordon is a senior fellow at the University of East Anglia.

Further, most of the parallels aren't even true! For example, Mithras was not born of a virgin. He sprang out of solid rock! Dr. Yamauchi again:

He [Mithras] was born out of a rock. Yes, the rock birth is commonly depicted in Mithraic beliefs. Mithras emerges fully grown and naked except for a Phrygian cap, and he's holding a dagger and torch. In some variations, flames shoot out from the rock, or he's holding a globe in his hands. (page 171)

Also, Mithras wasn't ressurected (more on the uniqueness of this story later, by the way, and not just about Mithras). Actually, there's no record of Mithras dying at all!

We don't know anything about the death of Mithras. We have a lot of monuments, but we have almost no textual evidence, because this was a secret religion. But I know of no supposed references to a death and resurrection. Indeed, Richard Gordon declared in his book "Image and Value in the Greco-Roman World" that there is "no death of Mithras"-and thus, there cannot be a resurrection. (page 172)

The December 25 parallel is often claimed, but the Christian church didn't adopt that date until the 4th century, so that's not a parallel with the Bible either.

I'll stop the detail here, because I have a lot to still cover, but I think that's sufficient to demonstrate that there is absolutely no evidence that Christianity borrowed from Mithraism, and if anything, Mithraism may well have borrowed from Christianity!

Now, though, I'd like to bump up a level, and talk about how and why scholars have rejected the notion that there is any pagan mythological "copycat" influence on the Christian story (hopefully, this will also put to rest whatever "parallels" I skipped).

The following is from T.N.D. Mettinger's book, The Riddle of Ressurection: "Dying and Rising Gods" in the Ancient Near East.

First, Mettinger's assessment of the current state of scholarship, from Chapter 1.2.1: Where Do We Stand? The Task of the Present Work (This quote is from page 40):

As a result of the many decades of research since de Vaux (1933), "it has become commonplace to assume that the category of Mediterranean 'dying and rising' gods has been exploded... (I)t is now held that the majority of the gods so denoted appear to have died but not returned; there is death but no rebirth or ressurection." These words of J.Z. Smith aptly summarise the present state of research. (56)

Mettinger spends a lot of time in this chapter discussing this: the current consensus of scholars is that there are no "dying and rising" gods that predate Christ, and that, in fact, many of the references came after Christ, and are in fact more likely either cases of pagans borrowing from Christians, and not the other way around, or, as in the case of the Church moving Jesus' birthday to Dec. 25, an attempt by early Christians to attract followers of various pagan beliefs.

Now, I want to be totally fair here: although Mettinger shows the current state of scholarship, he then goes on to say that he is one of the few that disagree, and the book is an attempt to make his case that there are in fact a few "dying and rising" gods that pre-date Christianity. He makes a fairly good argument, too, for the gods Melqart, Adonis, Osiris, and Dumuzi. Most scholars disagree with him, but it's a fair argument. Note please, that nowhere in this list is Mithras, by the way.

Before the "Christ mythers" declare victory, though, along with the fact that he is in the extreme minority on this issue, there is also this quote from page 221, in the Epilogue (the bold emphasis is mine, the italics are his):

(1)The figures we have studied are deities. In the case of Jesus, we are confronted with a human (for whom divinity was claimed by himself and by his followers). For the disciples and for Paul, the resurrection of Jesus was a one-time, historical event that took place at one specific point in the earth's topography. The empty tomb was seen as a historical datum. (4)

(2) The dying and rising gods were closely related to the seasonal cycle. Their death and return were seen as reflected in the changes of plant life. The death and ressurection of Jesus is a one-time event, not repeated, and unrelated to seasonal changes.

(3) The death of Jesus is presented in the sources as vicarious suffering, as an act of atonement for sins. The myth of Dumuzi has an arrangement with bilocation and substitution, but there is no evidence for the death of the dying and rising gods as vicarious suffering for sins.

There is, as far as I am aware, no prima facie evidence that the death and resurrection of Jesus is a mythological construct, drawing on the myths and rites of the dying and rising gods of the surrounding world. While studied with profit against the background of Jewish resurrection belief, the faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus retains its unique character in the history of religions. The riddle remains.

So, to sum up:

1) The vast majority of scholars reject the idea of pre-Christian "dying and rising gods" at all.

2) Mettinger, who while in the minority, makes a pretty good case that there are a few, also firmly concludes that there is no evidence that the Jewish Jesus was a myth based on other stories. Jesus is unique.

The point about Jesus' essential Judaism is key to the current scholarly rejection of the myth hypothesis. As Dr. William Lane Craig writes in Reply to Evan Fales: On the Empty Tomb of Jesus:

Now from D. F. Strauss through Rudolf Bultmann the role of myth in the shaping of the gospels was a question of lively debate in New Testament scholarship. But with the advent of the so–called "Third Quest" of the historical Jesus and what one author has called "the Jewish reclamation of Jesus,"{1} that is, the rediscovery of the Jewishness of Jesus, scholars have come to appreciate that the proper context for understanding Jesus and the gospels is first–century Palestinian Judaism, not pagan mythology. A most informative article on the demise of myth as a useful interpretive category for the gospels is Craig Evans's "Life–of–Jesus Research and the Eclipse of Mythology," in which he chronicles and accounts for the "major shift" away from mythology as a relevant factor in gospel interpretation.{2}

Given that Jesus and the gospels find their natural home in first century, Palestinian Judaism, recourse to pagan mythology to explain them has become otiose. Hence, we find James Dunn, called upon to write the article on "Myth" for the Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, questioning even the need for such an entry in the dictionary: "Myth is a term of at best doubtful relevance to the study of Jesus and the Gospels…The fact that 'myth' even appears here as a subject related to the study of Jesus and the Gospels can be attributed almost entirely to the use of the term by two NT scholars"–Strauss and Bultmann.{3} In lamenting that most commentators have no "knowledge of–or at least, they certainly ignore–the tools that modern anthropology has provided for the analysis of myths and myth construction," Fales tacitly recognizes that his views in gospel interpretation would be rejected by the vast majority of NT critics (and not, therefore, simply by "fundamentalists!"). What he does not appreciate is that the construal of the gospels in terms of myth has been tried and found wanting by NT scholarship.

(Editor's note: I had to look it up. "Otiose" means useless. )

Further, there just isn't enough time between the events and the writings for the kind of legendary development necessary for a myth-based story.

From Contemporary Scholarship and the Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ by Dr. William Lane Craig:

First, the resurrection appearances. Undoubtedly the major impetus for the reassessment of the appearance tradition was the demonstration by Joachim Jeremias that in 1 Corinthians 15: 3-5 Paul is quoting an old Christian formula which he received and in turn passed on to his converts According to Galatians 1:18 Paul was in Jerusalem three years after his conversion on a fact-finding mission, during which he conferred with Peter and James over a two week period, and he probably received the formula at this time, if not before. Since Paul was converted in AD 33, this means that the list of witnesses goes back to within the first five years after Jesus' death. Thus, it is idle to dismiss these appearances as legendary. We can try to explain them away as hallucinations if we wish, but we cannot deny they occurred. Paul's information makes it certain that on separate occasions various individuals and groups saw Jesus alive from the dead. According to Norman Perrin, the late NT critic of the University of Chicago: "The more we study the tradition with regard to the appearances, the firmer the rock begins to appear upon which they are based." This conclusion is virtually indisputable.

At the same time that biblical scholarship has come to a new appreciation of the historical credibility of Paul's information, however, it must be admitted that skepticism concerning the appearance traditions in the gospels persists. This lingering skepticism seems to me to be entirely unjustified. It is based on a presuppositional antipathy toward the physicalism of the gospel appearance stories. But the traditions underlying those appearance stories may well be as reliable as Paul's. For in order for these stories to be in the main legendary, a very considerable length of time must be available for the evolution and development of the traditions until the historical elements have been supplanted by unhistorical. This factor is typically neglected in New Testament scholarship, as A. N. Sherwin-White points out in Roman Law and Roman Society tn the New Testament. Professor Sherwin-White is not a theologian; he is an eminent historian of Roman and Greek times, roughly contemporaneous with the NT. According to Professor Sherwin-White, the sources for Roman history are usually biased and removed at least one or two generations or even centuries from the events they record. Yet, he says, historians reconstruct with confidence what really happened. He chastises NT critics for not realizing what invaluable sources they have in the gospels. The writings of Herodotus furnish a test case for the rate of legendary accumulation, and the tests show that even two generations is too short a time span to allow legendary tendencies to wipe out the hard core of historical facts. When Professor Sherwin-White turns to the gospels, he states for these to be legends, the rate of legendary accumulation would have to be 'unbelievable'; more generations are needed. All NT scholars agree that the gospels were written down and circulated within the first generation, during the lifetime of the eyewitnesses. Indeed, a significant new movement of biblical scholarship argues persuasively that some of the gospels were written by the AD 50's. This places them as early as Paul's letter to the Corinthians and, given their equal reliance upon prior tradition, they ought therefore to be accorded the same weight of historical credibility accorded Paul. It is instructive to note in this connection that no apocryphal gospel appeared during the first century. These did not arise until after the generation of eyewitnesses had died off. These are better candidates for the office of 'legendary fiction' than the canonical gospels. There simply was insufficient time for significant accrual of legend by the time of the gospels' composition. Thus, I find current criticism's skepticism with regard to the appearance traditions in the gospels to be unwarranted. The new appreciation of the historical value of Paul's information needs to be accompanied by a reassessment of the gospel traditions as well.

Ultimately, though, I think the biggest stumbling block to the idea that the stories of Jesus were "borrowed" from anywhere is that it is a historical fact that the disciples and early Christians really believed that they had encountered the risen Jesus.

Consider this passage from Resurrection Research from 1975 to the Present: What are Critical Scholars Saying, by Dr. Gary Habermas. Keep in mind that this is a survey of critical scholars.

I like to quote this section:

Bart Ehrman explains that, “Historians, of course, have no difficulty whatsoever speaking about the belief in Jesus’ resurrection, since this is a matter of public record. For it is a historical fact that some of Jesus’ followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead soon after his execution.” This early belief in the resurrection is the historical origination of Christianity.[91]

As we have mentioned throughout, there are certainly disagreements about the nature of the experiences. But it is still crucial that the nearly unanimous consent[92] of critical scholars is that, in some sense, the early followers of Jesus thought that they had seen the risen Jesus.

This conclusion does not rest on the critical consensus itself, but on the reasons for the consensus, such as those pointed out above. A variety of paths converge here, including Paul's eyewitness comments regarding his own experience (1 Cor. 9:1; 15:8), the pre-Pauline appearance report in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7, probably dating from the 30s, Paul's second Jerusalem meeting with the major apostles to ascertain the nature of the Gospel (Gal. 2:1-10), and Paul's knowledge of the other apostles' teachings about Jesus' appearances (1 Cor. 15:9-15, especially 15:11). Further, the early Acts confessions, the conversion of James, the brother of Jesus, the transformed lives that centered on the resurrection, the later Gospel accounts, and, most scholars would agree, the empty tomb. This case is built entirely on critically-ascertained texts, and confirmed by many critical principles such as eyewitness testimony, early reports, multiple attestation, discontinuity, embarrassment, enemy declarations, and coherence.[93]

Please keep in mind that Dr. Ehrman is not a Christian. He is a skeptic.

Not only is it an historical certainty (insofar that we can be certain of anything, historically) that Jesus existed, it is also an historical fact that the earliest Christians really believed that they had encountered the risen Jesus, which makes the myth theory ridiculous on its face.

It doesn't matter how many apparent parallels there are, if the early Christians were reporting what they thought actualy happened.

There was a thread a while back talking about all the "eerie similarities" between Kennedy and Lincoln. Did anyone come away with the conclusion that Kennedy must have been a myth, based on the stories of Lincoln?

No? That's why the community of scholars has roundly rejected parallelism. No "wholesale cribbing" here.

There is no evidence of his existence outside of the bible (don't even mention Josephus, because it's a noted forgery).

Wrong again.

First, part of Josephus is considered to have been an insertion, but the vast majority of Josephus scholars believe that he wrote about Jesus in that passage.

Of course, even if you reject that particular passage completely for some reason, Josephus also talks elsewhere about James the brother of Jesus, and that passage is not in dispute.

As Dr. Crossan notes above, there are Jewish, Christian, and pagan sources (such as Tacitus and Pliny the Younger) that talk about Jesus. Extrabiblical, Non-Christian Witnesses to Jesus before 200 a.d. is a decent start. Non-biblical accounts of New Testament events and/or people is another partial list.

Finally, I'd note that as Grant and Sherwin-White attest, the texts of the New Testament are excellent historical sources, and to reject them because they are written by Christians is simply to engage in incredibly bad history.

Again, On page 186 he writes (emphasis is the author's):

So much for the detailed study of the Graeco-Roman setting of Acts and Gospels. But it is fitting for a professional historian to consider the whole topic of historicity briefly and very generally, and boldly to state a case. Though for two short periods of our history we are lucky enough to have two major contemporary historians of remarkably objective character in Thucydides and Polybius, we are generally dealing with derivative sources of marked bias and prejudice composed at least one or two generations after the events which they describe, but much more often, as with the Lives of Plutarch or the central decades of Livy, from two to five centuries later. Though connecting links are provided backwards in time by series of lost intermediate sources, we are seldom in the happy position of dealing at only one remove with a contemporary source. Yet not for that do we despair of reconstructing the story of the tyranny of Pisistratus or of the tribunates of the Gracchi.

This is a terribly important point that people too often miss. Most of ancient history is composed from third hand sources, centuries after the fact, with perhaps one (if really lucky, two), still very biased, source of the information. The texts of the New Testament (and outside writings from people like Josephus, Tacitus, and Pliny the Younger) provide us with an historical treasure trove of information, more or less unparalleled in the ancient sources. In the New Testament we have upwards of 7 independent sources (depending on how one counts) attesting to certain events in the life of Jesus, all within the 1st century at the latest, but some of which is as early as 18 months to 5 years after the events in question. (I'll come back to this later and back it up with citations... I don't want to sidetrack this point any more).

Sherwin-White continues on page 186...

Subtle techniques of source-criticism have been evolved for the detection and elimination of various types of bias and anachronism, whether of the intermediate or of the original source, or of the writer who actually survives and transmits his work to us. To judge by what is so freely published, we are satisfied with our methods, and believe that a hard core or basic layer of historical truth can be recovered from even the most deplorable of our tertiary sources- be it Diodorus or Florus or even the Epitome de Caesaribus. The basic reason for this confidence is, if put summarily, the existence of external confirmations, and the working of the synoptic principle. From time to time external contemporary evidence of a sort less warped by the bias of personalities- e.g. the texts of laws and public accounts- confirms the conclusions drawn from the critical study of literary sources. Hence we are bold to trust our results in the larger fields where there is no such confirmation. Equally, the criticism of sources tends to reveal the existence of a basic unitary tradition beneath the manifold divergences of detail in rival narratives, which is often the product of their particular bias.

Did you pick that up? You can blithely dismiss all of the New Testament texts as "Christian", but historians have the tools to get valuable information (like the six facts) out of much worse sources, and do so. Where they can externally verify things, they can check out their methods.

Incidentally, there is the kind of external confirmation Sherwin-White mentions as backing up textual criticism for the texts of the New Testament.

He continues on page 188:

The objection will be raised to this line of argument that the Roman historical writers and the Gospels belong to different kinds of literature. Whatever the defects of our sources, their authors were trying to write history, but the authors of the Gospels had a different aim. Yet however one accepts form-criticism, its principles do not inevitably contradict the the notion of the basic historicity of the particular stories of which the Gospel narratives are composed, even if these were not shored up and confirmed by the external guarantee of their fabric and setting. That the degree of confirmation in Graeco-Roman terms is less for the Gospels than for Acts is due, as these lectures have tried to show, to the differences in their regional setting. As soon as Christ enters the Roman orbit at Jerusalem, the confirmation begins. For Acts the confirmation of historicity is overwhelming. Yet Acts is, in simple terms and judged externally, no less of a propoganda narrative than the Gospels, liable to similar distortions. But any attempt to reject its basic historicity even in matters of detail must now appear absurd. Roman historians have long taken it for granted.

So, where they can check it, it checks out. Pretty good for totally being made up, huh?

This is a conclusion elaborated upon in mind-numbing detail by Colin J Hemer, a classical scholar, in The Book of Acts in the Setting of Hellenistic History. It really is detailed, so I'll spare everyone muliple citations and cite a summary by Dr. William Lane Craig in The Evidence for Jesus (great article on this topic, by the way):

The book of Acts overlaps significantly with secular history of the ancient world, and the historical accuracy of Acts is indisputable. This has recently been demonstrated anew by Colin Hemer, a classical scholar who turned to New Testament studies, in his book The Book of Acts in the Setting of Hellenistic History. {5}Hemer goes through the book of Acts with a fine-toothed comb, pulling out a wealth of historical knowledge, ranging from what would have been common knowledge down to details which only a local person would know. Again and again Luke’s accuracy is demonstrated: from the sailings of the Alexandrian corn fleet to the coastal terrain of the Mediterranean islands to the peculiar titles of local officials, Luke gets it right.

Okay, just one example from Dr. Hemer's book to give you an idea of the "fine-tooth comb" Dr. Craig is talking about. On page 228 we find:

14:6 The implication is that the crossing from Iconium to Lystra involved a passage across a linguistic and administrative boundary from Phrygia to Lycaonia, a fact reflected in onomastics of the district. Thus, to take a rare example of a Phrygian name in the New Testament, Apphia of Colossae, in Phrygia (Phlm. 2). This name, in variant spellings, is common in inscriptions of Phrygia and rare elsewhere, even allowing for possible confusions with feminines of the nomen 'Appius' of Rome. (26)

And so on (I left out the Greek names because of a lack of a font for them here, and laziness)... Hemer lays out dozens of detailed comparisons to the external historical data just like this, and as Dr. Craig notes, they all match up.

Quoting again from Dr. Craig's article:

The judgement of Sir William Ramsay, the world-famous archaeologist, still stands: "Luke is a historian of the first rank . . . . This author should be placed along with the very greatest of historians."{7} Given Luke’s care and demonstrated reliability as well as his contact with eyewitnesses within the first generation after the events, this author is trustworthy.

So, to make a long story short (too late!), the best practice of historians tell us that you'd be wrong to dismiss evidence from the time of Jesus because of bias, and where we can compare (like in Acts), we see that our trust in these methods is confirmed. Despite being a biased source, Acts holds up as an historical document.

If there were really a man who walked on water, healed the blind, raised the dead, and conquered death himself don't you think at least one secular scribe would be compelled to jot it down for the record?

Do you think anybody that saw it and believed it would have remained secular?

There were witnesses. They shared their stories. Their stories were recorded.

Besides, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Also, none of the four gospels were first-hand accounts. They were written anywhere from 60-100 years after the events in question took place.

Wrong once more. The latest dating accepted for John is in the 90s AD, which is about 60 years. Most of the texts are much closer than that. For example, the early Christian formula Paul cites in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 has been dated to within 5 years of the event, as Dr. Craig notes in Contemporary Scholarship and the Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ (another great article on the topic):

First, the resurrection appearances. Undoubtedly the major impetus for the reassessment of the appearance tradition was the demonstration by Joachim Jeremias that in 1 Corinthians 15: 3-5 Paul is quoting an old Christian formula which he received and in turn passed on to his converts According to Galatians 1:18 Paul was in Jerusalem three years after his conversion on a fact-finding mission, during which he conferred with Peter and James over a two week period, and he probably received the formula at this time, if not before. Since Paul was converted in AD 33, this means that the list of witnesses goes back to within the first five years after Jesus' death. Thus, it is idle to dismiss these appearances as legendary. We can try to explain them away as hallucinations if we wish, but we cannot deny they occurred. Paul's information makes it certain that on separate occasions various individuals and groups saw Jesus alive from the dead. According to Norman Perrin, the late NT critic of the University of Chicago: "The more we study the tradition with regard to the appearances, the firmer the rock begins to appear upon which they are based." This conclusion is virtually indisputable.

It is my understanding from a conversation I had recently with Gary Habermas that just this year, two giants of the field (neither of them evangelical Christians) independently published studies that found this kerygma dates to within a year of the crucifixion. When I find them, I will share.

As another example, many scholars argue that the Passion Narrative in Mark dates to within 7 years of the event. From the same article:

(3) The empty tomb story is part of the pre-Markan passion story and is therefore very old. The empty tomb story was probably the end of Mark's passion source. As Mark is the earliest of our gospels, this source is therefore itself quite old. In fact the commentator R. Pesch contends that it is an incredibly early source. He produces two lines of evidence for this conclusion:

(a) Paul's account of the Last Supper in 1 Cor. 11:23-5 presupposes the Markan account. Since Paul's own traditions are themselves very old, the Markan source must be yet older.

( The pre-Markan passion story never refers to the high priest by name. It is as when I say "The President is hosting a dinner at the White House" and everyone knows whom I am speaking of because it is the man currently in office. Similarly the pre-Markan passion story refers to the "high priest" as if he were still in power. Since Caiaphas held office from AD 18-37, this means at the latest the pre-Markan source must come from within seven years after Jesus' death. This source thus goes back to within the first few years of the Jerusalem fellowship and is therefore an ancient and reliable source of historical information.

Now, I am not saying that this is without some controversy in the scholarly community, but there is no controversy that all of the texts of the New Testament are written in the 1st century, within 2 generations, and some much earlier (Mark and the letters of Paul are generally dated in the 50s).

And I'd repeat, again, that whatever problems the New Testament texts might have, they're still enough to establish the six historical facts I cited (and a lot more, as you can see from the quotes about the utility of the New Testament texts for history).

Techboy, I have a question for you about the New Testament Gospels and the Gnostic Gospels in relation to the date of christ from post #165. Do you find it awkward that people follow beliefs from gospels as fact from 2000 years ago but not 1800 years ago (Gnostics)? Removing gospels may have had a good intention at the time, but I would imagine you want as much information as possible, from every source known. Can we utilize revisionist history now if necessary or is it silently forbidden?

What possible historical value is there in a text written 300 years after the events in question? What insight would such an author have that Jesus' contemporaries, as early as 5 years (or fewer) from the actual events, would not?

You try to cast doubt on texts a decade or two after the fact, while contemporaries and witnesses are still alive and in the community, but want to take those seriously?

Really?

[elkabong82]

How are they secondhand accounts when they are written by the actual disciples who walked with Jesus? Speaking strictly of the Synoptic Gospels and the book of John which were written by apostles who were disciples of Jesus.

Because they talk of aspects of Jesus' life that they were not around for, but heard from Jesus or another one of his followers. There are no surviving texts written directly by Jesus, which seems in and of itself suspicious. But that's all I mean by second-hand, that there is no evidence from Jesus himself. I think this is why, for example, there are discrepancies among Matthew and Luke I believe, over the nativity story.

[techboy]

How are they secondhand accounts when they are written by the actual disciples who walked with Jesus? Speaking strictly of the Synoptic Gospels and the book of John which were written by apostles who were disciples of Jesus.

Actually, to be fair, most scholars argue that the Gospels weren't actually written by the apostles, given that the names we attach to them are traditional, but not in the original texts. On the other hand, these books might have be such:

The Gospel of Matthew, who was thought to be written by the tax collector, and one of the Apostles (and as a side note, one very strong argument for the traditional attribution here is why Matthew? Why pick a rather obscure Apostle, instead of Peter or John, if you're going to make it up?)

The Gospel of John, who is thought to be written by the Apostle John

1st Peter (and 2nd Peter), thought to be written by the Apostle Peter

James, thought to be written by James, the brother of Jesus, and the leader of the early Jerusalem Church

Jude, thought to be written by Jude, brother of Jesus and James

1 John (and 2 and 3 John), thought to be written by John the Apostle

Revelation, thought to be written by John the Apostle

Click the links for evidence and arguments supporting the traditional authorship of each book, as well as a discussion of evidence and aguments against, by Dr. Daniel B. Wallace.

What's more, Luke and Acts are written in the genre of the great Greek histories, and we saw how accurate they are earlier, and Luke says that he interviewed eyewitnesses. Paul also passes on information that probably came from direct eyewitnesses, such as the kerygma in 1 Corinthians I discussed in a previous post (he probably got it from Peter, who was an eyewitness).

Further, even the most skeptical of critics places the latest of the texts of the New Testament at no later than AD 90s (and many much earlier), when the witnesses were still alive, and could act as checks against false stories. Paul, in fact, practically dares readers to check his story out in 1 Corinthians 15.

In fact, in his book Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony Dr. Richard Bauckham makes a very powerful argument that the Gospels contain the eyewitness testimony of many people, who then acted as controls and checks on the traditions associated with them.

Ultimately, though, as I noted, the case I made doesn't rely on the more controversial evidence, like Dr. Bauckham's book. Using only minimal facts agreed upon by even critical (i.e. non-Christian) scholars, using such historical analysis methods as the Criterion of Embarrassment, the Criterion of Dissimilarity, Multiple Attestation, and the like, I believe it is possible to make the case that the best explanation of all the available data is that Jesus rose from the dead.

[chipwhich]

Actually, to be fair, most scholars argue that the Gospels weren't actually written by the apostles, given that the names we attach to them are traditional

So you quote bible.org as your evidence? Isn't that like quoting foxnews.com

[elkabong82]

Ultimately, though, as I noted, the case I made doesn't rely on the more controversial evidence, like Dr. Bauckham's book. Using only minimal facts agreed upon by even critical (i.e. non-Christian) scholars, using such historical analysis methods as the Criterion of Embarrassment, the Criterion of Dissimilarity, Multiple Attestation, and the like, I believe it is possible to make the case that the best explanation of all the available data is that Jesus rose from the dead.

Martyrdom and resurrection are not exclusive to Christianity, so are those other religions with such stories correct as well?

Other than those in the religion, there is very little mention of Jesus by others at or around the time, and those few that do don't even mention any miracles or resurection.

The possibility that Jesus was the leader of Christians and was executed for his beliefs is real. But the possibility that his Apostles, many years after the fact, attributed God-like powers to Jesus to enhance him and their religion's legitimacy in a time where they are spreading the word and trying to gain new members in an unpopular religion, also seems possible. That would explain the discrepancies in the Gospels, IMO, as well. However, the possibility Jesus was indeed the son of God also exists, largely because it cannot be disproven, but also because of the religion's ability to survive and become a major religion in the world all this time later. However, that same line of thinking can be applied to Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and other surviving ancient religions.

[RansomthePasserby]

(don't even mention Josephus, because it's a noted forgery). .

Only a small portion of Josephus' writings are alleged forgeries. Also, the parts that are considered authentic include descriptions of both Jesus and his brother James.

[techboy]

There are no surviving texts written directly by Jesus, which seems in and of itself suspicious.

I don't see why it's suspicious, really. The dude was kinda busy.

I think this is why, for example, there are discrepancies among Matthew and Luke I believe, over the nativity story.

The discepancies between the Gospels are largely overblown, and while it's possible to reconcile them, we don't really have to.

What the reader needs to consider when looking at these texts is that, as scholars are coming to conclude recently, they were written in the style of the Greek Biographies. They are history, but not in the way we think of. In those days, the "objective" historian didn't exist, and details (or even chronological order) were not considered that important.

Further, each text tells the story of Jesus, but each text has at least some different sources (though it is thought that they also share some, for instance Luke and Matthew are thought to make use of Mark to some degree), and any time you have different people telling the story, the details emphasized are going to be slightly different, especially in the case of the Gospels, where each was written for a different audience. Matthew, for instance, was written to a Jewish audience, and so includes more focus on Old Testament prophecy and other things that would be of concern to Jews.

And really, think about this. Just imagine the outcry if all four Gospels and the other texts of the New Testament precisely agreed on even the most minute of details, and told each story exactly the same way. People would cry collusion!

In point of fact, I think the discrepancies add to the veracity of the New Testament texts, not take away from them.

I'd finally note that focusing on the discrepancies is to ignore the much larger harmony in the story that is told. It's not like any of the sources disagree on anything significant.

I'd just like to quote Craig, who put it pretty well (as usual). First, from What Price Biblical Errancy?:

Such a conclusion is unnecessary for two reasons. First, we may need instead to revise our understanding of what constitutes an error. Nobody thinks that when Jesus says that the mustard seed is the smallest of all seeds (Mark 4.31) this is an error, even though there are smaller seeds than mustard seeds. Why? Because Jesus is not teaching botany; he is trying to teach a lesson about the Kingdom of God, and the illustration is incidental to this lesson. Defenders of inerrancy claim that the Bible is authoritative and inerrant in all that it teaches or all that it means to affirm. This raises the huge question as to what the authors of Scripture intend to affirm or teach. Questions of genre will have a significant bearing on our answer to that question. Poetry obviously is not intended to be taken literally, for example. But then what about the Gospels? What is their genre? Scholars have come to see that the genre to which the Gospels most closely conform is ancient biography. This is important for our question because ancient biography does not have the intention of providing a chronological account of the hero’s life from the cradle to the grave. Rather ancient biography relates anecdotes that serve to illustrate the hero’s character qualities. What one might consider an error in a modern biography need not at all count as an error in an ancient biography. To illustrate, at one time in my Christian life I believed that Jesus actually cleansed the Temple in Jerusalem twice, once near the beginning of his ministry as John relates, and once near the end of his life, as we read in the Synoptic Gospels. But an understanding of the Gospels as ancient biographies relieves us of such a supposition, for an ancient biographer can relate incidents in a non-chronological way. Only an unsympathetic (and uncomprehending) reader would take John’s moving the Temple cleansing to earlier in Jesus’ life as an error on John’s part.

We can extend the point by considering the proposal that the Gospels should be understood as different performances, as it were, of orally transmitted tradition. The prominent New Testament scholar Jimmy Dunn, prompted by the work of Ken Bailey on the transmission of oral tradition in Middle Eastern cultures, has sharply criticized what he calls the “stratigraphic model” of the Gospels, which views them as composed of different layers laid one upon another on top of a primitive tradition. (See James D. G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered [Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 2003].) On the stratigraphic model each tiny deviation from the previous layer occasions speculations about the reasons for the change, sometimes leading to quite fanciful hypotheses about the theology of some redactor. But Dunn insists that oral tradition works quite differently. What matters is that the central idea is conveyed, often in some key words and climaxing in some saying which is repeated verbatim; but the surrounding details are fluid and incidental to the story.

Probably the closest example to this in our non-oral, Western culture is the telling of a joke. It’s important that you get the structure and punch line right, but the rest is incidental. For example, many years ago I heard the following joke:

“What did the Calvinist say when he fell down the elevator shaft?”

“I don’t know.”

“He got up, dusted himself off, and said, ‘Whew! I’m glad that’s over!’”

Now just recently someone else told me what was clearly the same joke. Only she told it as follows:

“Do you know what the Calvinist said when he fell down the stairs?”

“No.”

“‘Whew! I’m glad that’s over!’”

Notice the differences in the telling of this joke; but observe how the central idea and especially the punch line are the same. Well, when you compare many of the stories told about Jesus in the Gospels and identify the words they have in common, you find a pattern like this. There is variation in the secondary details, but very often the central saying is almost verbatim the same. And remember, this is in a culture where they didn’t even have the device of quotation marks! (Those are added in translation to indicate direct speech; to get an idea of how difficult it can be to determine exactly where direct speech ends, just read Paul’s account of his argument with Peter in Galatians 2 or of Jesus’ interview with Nicodemus in John 3.) So the stories in the Gospels should not be understood as evolutions of some prior primitive tradition but as different performances of the same oral story.

Now if Dunn is right, this has enormous implications for one’s doctrine of biblical inerrancy, for it means that the Evangelists had no intention that their stories should be taken like police reports, accurate in every detail. What we in a non-oral culture might regard as an error would not be taken by them to be erroneous at all.

and on the subject of disagreements in the Gospels, though about the Passion story from Inerrancy and the Resurrection:

So some of these alleged discrepancies are easy to answer and are what we should expect from independent accounts of the same event. Others are more difficult but are in the end not of great consequence. Historians expect to find inconsistencies like these even in the most reliable sources. No historian simply throws out a source because it has inconsistencies. Moreover, the inconsistencies Ehrman is talking about aren’t within a single source; they’re between independent sources. But obviously, it doesn’t follow from an inconsistency between two independent sources that both sources are wrong. At worst, one is wrong if they can’t be harmonized.

The problem with focusing on discrepancies is that we tend to lose the forest for the trees. The overriding fact is that the Gospels are remarkably harmonious in what they relate. The discrepancies between them are in the secondary details. All four Gospels agree:

Jesus of Nazareth was crucified in Jerusalem by Roman authority during the Passover Feast, having been arrested and convicted on charges of blasphemy by the Jewish Sanhedrin and then slandered before the governor Pilate on charges of treason. He died within several hours and was buried Friday afternoon by Joseph of Arimathea in a tomb, which was sealed with a stone. Certain women followers of Jesus, including Mary Magdalene, having observed his interment, visited His tomb early on Sunday morning, only to find it empty. Thereafter, Jesus appeared alive from the dead to the disciples, including Peter, who then became proclaimers of the message of His resurrection.

All four Gospels attest to these facts. Many more details can be supplied by adding facts which are attested by three out of four. So don’t be misled by the minor discrepancies. Otherwise you’re going to have to be sceptical about all secular historical narratives which also contain such inconsistencies, which is quite unreasonable.

[techboy]

So you quote bible.org as your evidence? Isn't that like quoting foxnews.com

The articles I cited are written by Dr. Daniel Wallace (his Wikipedia page), a noted textual critic and historian, and include careful citation of the research used.

So, no.

Martyrdom and resurrection are not exclusive to Christianity, so are those other religions with such stories correct as well?

The case I construct shows that Jesus claimed to be God, and demonstrated it by rising from the dead. This case uses only facts accepted by the vast majority of scholars regardless of theological persuasion.

I am unaware of any other religion that has such an event backed by this kind of evidence. Christianity is unique in this regard.

[techboy]

The possibility that Jesus was the leader of Christians and was executed for his beliefs is real. But the possibility that his Apostles, many years after the fact, attributed God-like powers to Jesus to enhance him and their religion's legitimacy in a time where they are spreading the word and trying to gain new members in an unpopular religion, also seems possible.

First, no fair editing this in after I've responded.

Second, no way. As I noted in my previous post just above, this doesn't work for a number of reasons. Most importantly, it is a rock solid historical fact, accepted by scholars of all theological persuasions (my quote is of Bart Ehrman, a famous atheist/agnostic, depending on his mood apparently), that the earlist Christians really believed that they had encountered the risen Jesus. They didn't make it up later. They really believed it.

[elkabong82]

I don't see why it's suspicious, really. The dude was kinda busy.

The discepancies between the Gospels are largely overblown, and while it's possible to reconcile them, we don't really have to.

I say it's suspicious because a man in Christ's position had to have written some things to his Apostles and followers, and you'd think his followers would want preserve at least someposessions and writings from the man they believed to be the legitimate son of God. I never said it was unreasonable or impossible, just merely suspicious, or peculiar.

The discrepancies in the Gospels ideally should not exist. Largely overblown? Accoding to you maybe, but not to others, you shouldn't be so dismissive of them. The discrepancies are only resolved when the credibility of each Apostle is lessened, specifically John.

[techboy]

I say it's suspicious because a man in Christ's position had to have written some things to his Apostles and followers, and you'd think his followers would want preserve at least someposessions and writings from the man they believed to be the legitimate son of God. I never said it was unreasonable or impossible, just merely suspicious, or peculiar.

It might be suspicious to you, but then you're not a 1st century Palestinian Jew.

Jesus and his followers lived in a culture of oral transmission. Most people of the day couldn't read or write, so information was passed by telling stories and singing songs. The kerygma I keep referencing is probably originally a hymn.

If this topic is of interest to you, I'd suggest Dr. Bauckham's book. He talks about oral transmission cultures, and their surprisingly good reliability (witnesses acted as checks on each other... it's not like the telephone game). He also talks about how the cultures of the day placed an emphasis on the story of a living person as being preferred over other sources. It's very interesting, and he cites some of the great Greek writers like Galen on this subject, so it's not just a Palestinian thing.

The discrepancies in the Gospels ideally should not exist.

That's unrealistic, and does not take into account the way people wrote histories in those days, as I said, nor does it acknowledge the simple fact that when a group of people witness something, they will all tell the story slightly differently.

Again, if things were perfectly matched, people would cry collusion/fraud, and likely they'd be right.

[elkabong82]

First, no fair editing this in after I've responded.

Second, no way. As I noted in my previous post just above, this doesn't work for a number of reasons. Most importantly, it is a rock solid historical fact, accepted by scholars of all theological persuasions (my quote is of Bart Ehrman, a famous atheist/agnostic, depending on his mood apparently), that the earlist Christians really believed that they had encountered the risen Jesus. They didn't make it up later. They really believed it.

yeah, sorry, I was editing while you were replying.

to be fair, belief in the surreal/supersticious, was common back then. Those people believed in monster's, in the world being flat, etc. There are people even today, for example, that believe fantastical things, such as those who believe they were abducted by aliens or saw a UFO. The mind sees what it wants, in a sense.

Nonetheless, much as the possibility Jesus was the son of God cannot be disproven, nor can it be disproven that his disciples manufactured events to enhance their religion's attractiveness/legitimacy to newcomers.

As for the other post, the facts accepted by "most scholars" make a lot of assumptions. Such as, "they would have been ashamed to mention certain things, like crucifiction," so it hadto have been true. They are assumptions based on assigned characteristics of honesty and humility. Even with such analysis, the possibility of fabrication of miraculous acts and resurrection still exists. Many scholars are, afterall, Christians, so they inherently will seek to defend their faith and attempt to reconcile faith with their field, some scientists do this as well.

[Mickalino]

There are no surviving texts written directly by Jesus, which seems in and of itself suspicious.

I don't see why it's suspicious, really. The dude was kinda busy.

Well of course, there are no surviving texts written by Jesus, because the wind blew away the sand in which he wrote.

He didn't write like man wrote. He's the Son of God, and this is how he writes.....

http://net.bible.org/passage.php?passage=Joh%208:6-8

Now they were asking this in an attempt to trap him, so that they could bring charges against him. Jesus bent down and wrote on the ground with his finger

[RansomthePasserby]

yeah, sorry, I was editing while you were replying.

to be fair, belief in the surreal/supersticious, was common back then. Those people believed in monster's, in the world being flat...

This is kind of a tangent, but considering Jesus' disciples were fishermen (the curvature of the earth is clearly evident in large bodies of water), and the circumference of the earth was measured fairly accurately a couple hundred years before Jesus' time, I doubt they believed the world was flat. It was pretty widely accepted the world was round by then.

[elkabong82]

It might be suspicious to you, but then you're not a 1st century Palestinian Jew.

Jesus and his followers lived in a culture of oral transmission. Most people of the day couldn't read or write, so information was passed by telling stories and singing songs. The kerygma I keep referencing is probably originally a hymn.

If this topic is of interest to you, I'd suggest Dr. Bauckham's book. He talks about oral transmission cultures, and their surprisingly good reliability (witnesses acted as checks on each other... it's not like the telephone game). He also talks about how the cultures of the day placed an emphasis on the story of a living person as being preferred over other sources. It's very interesting, and he cites some of the great Greek writers like Galen on this subject, so it's not just a Palestinian thing.

That's unrealistic, and does not take into account the way people wrote histories in those days, as I said, nor does it acknowledge the simple fact that when a group of people witness something, they will all tell the story slightly differently.

Again, if things were perfectly matched, people would cry collusion/fraud, and likely they'd be right.

So Jesus couldn't read or write? And he had no possessions that disciples may have wished to keep and/or pass on? Again, not saying it's impossible, just odd.

I said "ideally" in terms of the discrepancies not existing, especially when they are supposedly coming directly from Jesus' disciples. Like I said to homercles, I think the oral tradition and Jesus' life being second-hand accounts as they were delivered not by him but by his disciples in the Gospels, explains the discrepancies. It seems we actually agree in that regard. However, that only accounts for some discrepancy. One would think there wouldn't be so many discrepancies over such an important person, perhaps THE most important person.

If things were perfectly matched people would cry collusion? So you are saying that the stories, over the same things, shouldn't be perfectly matched? That seems counterproductive, and more like the defense of someone trying to turn a flaw into a necessity.

Again though, do you not see a problem with the fact that the discrepancies are only resolved when the credibility of the Apostles is called into question? Like I sad, a lot of John is just outright dismissed.

[elkabong82]

This is kind of a tangent, but considering Jesus' disciples were fishermen (the curvature of the earth is clearly evident in large bodies of water), and the circumference of the earth was measured fairly accurately a couple hundred years before Jesus' time, I doubt they believed the world was flat. It was pretty widely accepted the world was round by then.

Ok, they believed the Earth revolved arnd the sun. And I may be mistaken, but part of the criticism of Colmbus' voyage in 1492 was that the Earth was flat and he'd fall of the edge. But I will retract the flat Earth part, and replace it with the myriad of other fantastical beliefs, such as monsters, plagues being caused by God, etc.

[elkabong82]

Well of course, there are no surviving texts written by Jesus, because the wind blew away the sand in which he wrote.

He didn't write like man wrote. He's the Son of God, and this is how he writes.....

http://net.bible.org/passage.php?passage=Joh%208:6-8

Now they were asking this in an attempt to trap him, so that they could bring charges against him. Jesus bent down and wrote on the ground with his finger

So one brief passage now proves that Jesus only wrote in the ground, never on any paper/papyrus?