Jesus Christ Was A Real Person, Though Saul's Writings And The Gospels Are Mostly Mythical.

Thank you Nathan for your insights and research!Though Saul definitely wrote on Jesus long before Josephus, as the writings of Josephus on Jesus were written in mid 90sCE or around 60 years after the death of Jesus.From Wikipedia: "Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews, written around 93–94 AD" Source: http://en.wikipedia.org...Whereas Saul's writings on Jesus arrived only 20 years after the death of Jesus Christ.From that same source: Not all of Josephus's writings are Authentic, Historians and Biblical scholars agree that some of his writings were interpolated (altered) by later Christians to make them more convincingg."Scholarly opinion on the total or partial authenticity of the reference in Book 18, Chapter 3, 3 of the Antiquities, a passage that states that Jesus the Messiah was a wise teacher who was crucified by Pilate, usually called the Testimonium Flavianum, varies.[4][5][1] The general scholarly view is that while the Testimonium Flavianum is most likely not authentic in its entirety, it is broadly agreed upon that it originally consisted of an authentic nucleus, which was then subject to Christian interpolation or forgery [5][6][7][8][9][10] by fourth-century apologistEusebius or by others.[11] Although the exact nature and extent of the Christian redaction remains unclear,[12] there is broad consensus as to what the original text of the Testimonium by Josephus would have looked like.[9] Modern scholarship has largely acknowledged the authenticity of the reference in Book 20, Chapter 9, 1 of the Antiquities to "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James"[13] and considers it as having the highest level of authenticity among the references of Josephus to Christianity.[14][1][2][15][16][17] However, critics point out that Josephus wrote about a number of people who went by the name Jesus, Yeshua or Joshua,[18] and also speculate that Josephus may have considered James a fraternal brother rather than a sibling.[19] Almost all modern scholars consider the reference in Book 18, Chapter 5, 2 of the Antiquities to the imprisonment and death of John the Baptist also to be authentic.[20][21][22]" Here is a chronological list of the Books of the New Testament from a Bible Study Group:"James - 50 A.D.First Thessalonians - 52-53.Second Thessalonians - 52-53.Galatians - 55.First Corinthians - 57.Second Corinthians - 57.Romans - 57-58.Philippians - 62-63.Colossians - 62-63.Philemon - 62-63.Ephesians - 62-63.Luke - 63.Acts - 64.First Timothy - 65.Titus - 65.Second Timothy - 66.Mark - 66.Matthew - 67.Hebrews - 67.First Peter - 67-68.Second Peter - 68.Jude - 68.Apocalypse - 68.John - c. 85.Epistles of John - 90-95."Source: http://www.biblestudytools.com...So you can easily see that the writings of Josephus arrived around the same time as the Epistles of John which had absolutely no input from any of the Apostles, since they were all long dead.So Josephus gained all his knowledge from Hearsay and Legend.Some scholars argue that the Epistles of James came before Saul's though this has been disputed as they appear to have been fraudulent, as the language used is unlikely to be that of a disciple of Jesus in that era. So they appear to have been added later. So much of the Bible is like this, interpolations added afterwards to make it appear more authentic, such as the interpolations in Josephus's writings. Christian apologists are so fond of forgery, though it appears that this is the only tool they have to assert that Jesus was authentic and in my books, if they have to be fraudulent to make their hero appear real, this lends credence to the case that Jesus may not have existed after all.Here is a taste of this argument concerning the epistles of James:"1. The cultured language of James is not that of a simple Palestinian. Sevenster's evidence that the Greek language was much used in Palestine at that time and could be learned does not prove that a Jew whose mother tongue was Aramaic could normally write in literary Greek. Most of those who defend the thesis that James was written by the Lord's brother must assume that it achieved its linguistic form through the help of a Hellenistic Jew, but there is no evidence in the text that the assistance of a secretary gave shape to the present linguistic state of the document, and even if this were the case the question would still remain completely unanswered which part of the whole comes from the real author and which part from the "secretary."Source: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com...So far, I've also shown that Ehrman is correct as well.As both Ehrman and Jewish Clerics agree that Messiahs were common at the time of Jesus, practically a Messiah in every Jewish village, as Messiah only means anointed one, or somebody who has had their head anointed with oil into the service of God by a Rabbi. Jews do not accept Jesus as the messiah because: Jesus did not fulfill the messianic prophecies. Jesus did not embody the personal qualifications of the Messiah. Biblical verses "referring" to Jesus are mistranslations. Jewish belief is based on national revelation. But first, some background: What exactly is the Messiah? The word "Messiah" is an English rendering of the Hebrew word Mashiach, which means "anointed." It usually refers to a person initiated into God's service by being anointed with oil. (Exodus 29:7, 1-Kings 1:39, 2-Kings 9:3) Source: http://www.aish.com..."Jews do not believe that Jesus was the mashiach. Assuming that he existed, and assuming that the Christian scriptures are accurate in describing him (both matters that are debatable), he simply did not fulfill the mission of the mashiach as it is described in the biblical passages cited above. Jesus did not do any of the things that the scriptures said the messiah would do."Source: http://www.jewfaq.org...and: http://www.simpletoremember.com...So, Jewish Historians cannot consider Jesus as fulfilling the Prophecies as was expected of their National Leader, new King of Israel, and there were many messiahs like Jesus dotting the Judaic region. The lineage of Jesus proposed after his death was another deception from Apologists. Who was Jesus's actual father, well, most likely a Roman Soldier, but certainly not an heir to the Throne of Israel. Joseph's heir would have been his first true son (blood son) which was James, as stepsons only get to be heirs if there are no blood sons to take the position, so if Joseph was heir to King David, then James would be next in line after Joseph. Mary's lineage does not count in Judaism, as only the Husband is considered as ruler of the house and can produce heirs to his inheritance.Again we have Christian apologists trying to put Jesus onto a false pedestal.These apologists likely wrote the Gospels to convince others that Jesus was divine, thus Luke proclaiming Jesus as Son Of David. No Disciples were alive at the time of the writing of Luke, (63CE) and he did not get this from the previously writings of Saul who would have mentioned such a lineage if one existed, so the author of Luke made this lie up from his own head.So: So far I have established that Saul is still known by the majority of Historians including Bart Ehrman as the first written record of the existence of Jesus Christ.Thus part of my BOP.And that Jesus was not the Messiah that the Jews were waiting for in the Old Testament/Torah prophecies.Another Mark on my BOP commitment.Historically, if there were no Contemporary accounts from Eye Witnesses of the life of Jesus Christ, we cannot take Hearsay accounts as Absolute Fact as even rote learning has Errors.Rote recollections are never accurate for historical events, as events happen only once and rote relies on memory from repetition. Thus such things as What Jesus said as his last words, who was at his tomb, if he even had a tomb. Most probably he was tossed into a mass grave along with the other criminals he was executed with or left on the cross to rot away, as an example to others, which was common Roman practice at the time.Such things that relied on inaccurate rote recollections are inaccurate if they only occurred once, the only accurate knowledge passed on historically by rote are traditions, where learners are given the same story, repeated over and over until they remember every word.Thus the Sermon on the Mount of Jesus Christ, would be entirely inaccurate as it only occurred once, and likely the teachings were altered and added by the Gospel Author(s) 30+ years later, when most rote recall would be errant."Threlfall and Frobisher (1999: 65) point out, ‘rote learning does not in the long term achieve the desired aim of accuracy of recall and response’."Source: http://knowledge.sagepub.com..."The system is widely practiced in schools across India, Pakistan, China, Singapore, Japan, Romania and Greece. In the United Nations Arab human development report for 2004 the (Arabic) researchers claim that rote learning is a major contributing factor to the lack of progress in science and research & development in the Arab countries."Source: http://www.k12academics.com...As can be seen, rote learning is great for learning language and things that can be repeated and remembered easily, but for once off events and individual, subtle concepts, it fails completely. Thus nothing in the Gospels regarding events, such as the Sermon on the Mount and The Resurrection or Ascension can be regarded as Factual.Because they were passed on by rote, they get altered with every passing like the Telephone Game or as we used to call it Chinese Whispers.That is all I have time for.So Thanks Nathan, the ball is now in your court!