Jesus Existed

Positive Case My case is rather simple, that Jesus, in name and person, is a euhemerised from existing oral traditions and myths at the time. This isn't a far fetched proposal, especially when we consider so much of the NT is known to be fabricated. We only need to consider the non-canonical Gospels, and non-authentic Pauline epistles that have made the canon.[1] Richard Carrier asserts: "In Jewish and pagan antiquity, in matters of religious persuasion, fabricating stories was the norm, not the exception, even in the production of narratives purporting to be true"[2] Therefore, I argue, it is but a minor extension to take the enormous body of mythology already associated with Jesus in even it's earliest writings (Markan Gospel & Pauline Epistles) and extend the myths about Jesus, to Jesus himself. I do not even make the claim that Paul was dishonest in his writings, only that his preachings catalysed the euhemerisation of the idea of a crucified & resurrected saviour. Carrier continues: "The epistles written during the first generation of Christians (from the 30s to the 60s CE) reveal a highly fragmented church already from the earliest recorded time, rife with fabricated new gospels and teachings effectively beyond the control of any central authority"[2] This we already have multiple working mechanisms (oral traditions, euhemerisation, errors, outright fabrications) by which Jesus would have emerged. There is already significant evidence that these mechanisms are more than substantial, and it can be argued it was only a matter if time before a figure like Jesus emerged. The position is greatly favoured by Occam's Razor as a result as it simply uses existing principles to yield an explanation. Q Source The Q Source is hypothetical. We do not have any copies or versions of this manuscript, and it isn't even apparent if it's a singular document or several documents. Moreover, there are numerous hypotheses for the synoptic problem which do not involve the Q document. Hence, to state it is a witness to Jesus is dubious, since we know nothing of it's composition, or if it even originally claimed anything about Jesus. The Markan Gospel The author of Mark almost certainly could not have been a witness to Jesus even if Jesus did exist, because of both the language barrier, socio-economic barriers, geographical barriers as well as the fact it was written 35 years after the facts it purports to describe. The sources are at best secondary, and derived from oral tradition, hence from sources that are demonstrably full of myth, and fabrication. Pro argues that the embarrassment factor is significant here. However, IF it was, then we have good reason to believe Mark would have excluded it from his Gospel, considering the level of euhemerisation evident within the Gospel, which meant Mark was at least comfortable with changing and distorting the facts from oral tradition (assuming that these embarrassment stories actually existed in the oral traditions, and were not just a synthesis of Mark). "Even the earliest gospel (Mark) invents a worldwide darkness, the Sea of Galilee (he got away with inventing a Sea!), the tearing of the temple veil, the Barabbas narrative, and the empty tomb, among other things"[3] Clearly Mark was comfortable with inventing mundane facts when required. Pro makes the claim that the embarrassment factor increases the likelihood of the passages authenticity, however the criterion at best can only establish a "sincerity of belief" needs to be assessed in balance with other factors. Moreover virtually all supernatural entities have some element of embarrassment, so for any fictional claim we can expect at least some embarrassing references, which is unsurprising in the Mark's theology, for example: "People invented the Romulus story, and Romulus murdered his own brother. People invented Attis, and he is said to have castrated himself. People invented scientology, and look what a crock that religion is!! The Old Testament reports the sins and follies of David, Moses (who was prideful) Adam (eating the forbidden fruit under the guidance of his wife! Imagine a patriarchal society inventing that!) and Noah (his son "saw his nakedness" when he was drunk) among others, and yet scholars are in agreement that all of these stories are probably myths."[3] Lastly, both examples Pro cites are of Jesus attempting miracles (!), which runs into contamination considerations. Josephus Pro concedes that significant forgery occurred in the verses pertaining to Jesus. Hence the fact it has an "authentic nucleus" is speculative. This by itself significantly discredits the verse as reliable evidence. What is worse however is the date of composition for this was ~93AD, over 60 years after the events it purposes to describe. [5] Moreover Josephus was not born until 37 AD. The nucleus is thought to only consist of Jesus' execution under the Pontiac Pilate. However this is essentially what was already being preached at the time. Christianity was already widespread in the region by the time of the composition of the Pauline epistles, and 40 years have since passed. We clearly know that Josephus could not have witnessed Jesus even assuming he existed, so at best Josephus is a second source. It seems the most reasonable explanation for this nucleus is that Josephus was just documenting what he was hearing the Jews were saying at the time. The reference to Jesus in Josephus does nothing to differentiate between a mythical Jesus and a historical one. Since we would expect there to be some mention of Jesus as he was preached at some later point. Tacitus First, this passage dates to 116AD, 80 years after the facts it purports to describe, which runs into even more severe problems than Josephus' references. Secondly, even assuming this passage is authentic, it only gives evidence if the Christian movement's existence, and what they were saying at the time. This much is not in dispute, we already know this existed from Paul's epistles. Thus it does nothing to advance the case of a historical Jesus. Furthermore Carrier argues that the passage itself is evidently an interpolation: "The first clue it might not be is that our one manuscript containing this passage had originally spelled the persecuted group as the "Chrestians," not the Christians, and this was subsequently corrected by erasure... And if that"s the case, it"s not believable that Tacitus would have explained the name "Chrestians" using the name "Christus." Instead, obviously, he would use "Chrestus." His reasons for such were: "But fifth, and most convincingly, there is no evidence that this event happened. The burning of Rome itself is well attested, by both literary and physical evidence. But no one seems to have ever known Christians were in any way connected with it, until late in the 4th century."[6] The Apostle Paul: James: Note that Paul only uses "brother of The Lord" twice in his letters. The second instance is a generic use: (1 Cor 9:5) " 5 Don"t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord"s brothers and Cephas?" Given this to be the case, does this mean there were a multitude of brothers of Jesus? Of course not, 'Brother' in this instance is clearly a Celtic title, which remains the cleanest explanation. IF it was true James was Jesus' brother, then we would expect there to be some policing over the use of this phrase, which is clearly absent from Paul's writings. Moreover, IF policing is done, then we have no reason to believe it was for biological kinship over "rank" within the clergy at the time. In John's view, all baptised Christians were effectively sons of God in the same way Jesus was (Romans 1:3-4). Paul affirms the former hypothesis of there being many sons when he states: (Romans 8:29) "For whom he foreknew, he also foreordained to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren" Thus Jesus was the first of many Sons of God, who would have all been brothers, and he affirms this several times in his letters conceptions; there are numerous passages in Paul that confirm this (Romans 8:15-29, Romans 9:26 Gal 3:26-29, Gal 4:4-7). I do not have space to go over Pro's Gish Gallop of Pauline claims to a physical Jesus. Nor do I have to assert Paul was lying in any of the quotes (some are known interpolations however, such as 1 Thess. 2:14-16). Since Paul never claims to have known or met a physical Jesus, and we have strong evidence that a large fraction of his claims about Jesus came via. revelation (be it genuine hallucinations, or fabricated so, is irrelevant). So, if we assume there really was a Jesus, then how did Paul come to know about him? The only possible explanation is from second witnesses, which is quite simply, oral tradition. Oral Traditions: Pro attempts to affirm oral traditions by affirming Jewish written traditions (wtf?!?!), needless to say he has *spectacularly failed* to affirm it. The Dead Sea scrolls are only evidence of accurate transmission of the Jewish manuscripts. Pro has given no reason to believe that the manuscripts of the New Testament were transmitted anywhere near as carefully as these were. Pro skips over/ignores abundant evidence last round this was not the case. Contamination: Pro has not challenged this argument outside of an attempted reducio with Alexander the Great & Caesar. However this ignores the fact that they would be excluded via. P6, there this is clearly false for either of the former 2, since we have a plethora of contemporary sources from both supporters & enemies of both, as well as physical evidence of their existence (coins, Alexander's existence, etc.) unlike for Jesus. References 1. http://en.m.wikipedia.org... 2. http://www.nobeliefs.com... 3. http://www.skepticink.com... 4. http://www.hypotyposeis.org... 5. http://www.earlychristianwritings.com... 6. ibid 7. http://freethoughtblogs.com...