The Jesus of History Probably Existed - D

Thanks to InquireTruth for agreeing to this debate and setting it up. Hopefully we will both learn from it. As an Agnostic I don't claim to know for a fact whether Jesus existed or not, so to a certain extent I am playing devil's advocate here, with much of the material I intend to use being the result of recent research. I do however believe I can provide enough evidence to cast a reasonable amount of doubt about the likelihood of Jesus existing, thereby fulfilling my burden in this debate. I'll respond to my opponent's first round points before presenting some arguments of my own. --- 1. Tacitus. There are several problems with the validity of this extract as evidence for Jesus but first I'd like to challenge an assertion my opponent makes. PRO: "much of Tacitus' work has been lost, including portions from 29-32 AD an area which would have included Jesus' trial had he recorded it" My opponent provides a link to this page: http://en.wikipedia.org... to prove this point but according to this, the missing portions describe the period after the death of Tiberius, whereas the extract claims that 'Christus' was put to death "in the reign of Tiberius". In response to the suggestion that Tacitus is reliable on these issues, I must point out a clear inaccuracy within this same extract. Pilate is described as a "procurator" although his actual role in Judea was as a prefect. http://en.wikipedia.org... This suggests one of two things: either Tacitus is not so reliable after all, or this extract has been added by another, less knowledgeable, or perhaps even deceitful individual. The word "Christus" is a title rather than a proper name and means Messiah or 'anointed one'. Many individuals in Jewish culture including all High Priests could have used this title. "The term moshiach is used in the Hebrew Bible to describe Israelite priests, prophets, and kings who were anointed with oil in consecration to their respective offices. For example, Cyrus the Great, the king of Persia, is referred to as "God's anointed" (Messiah) in the Bible." http://en.wikipedia.org... The oldest manuscript for this extract has been corrupted and tampered with, the word for 'Christians' is a mistranslation. This pic shows the gap in the word where an erased e is still visible under IR light. http://en.wikipedia.org... Christianos means Christians, chrestianos means 'good people'. Lastly, many scholarly Christian believers have disputed the notion that this extract proves the existence of Jesus Christ. "Tacitus and Pliny the Younger reflect instead what they have heard Christians of their own day say. Despite various claims, no early rabbinic text ... contains information about Jesus". http://www.bsw.org... ---- 2. Josephus. My opponent acknowledges the fraudulence of the Jesus passage in the Testimonium Flavianum, is it not plausible that the passing reference in Antiquity of the Jews is not also an "interpolation"? The fact is this passage makes much more sense, both grammatically and in context if the words "the so-called Christ" (a less loaded translation would be "who was called Christ" as per http://www.sacred-texts.com...) are removed. After my opponent's quotation ends, the text goes onto explain that in reparation for the stoning of James, "king Agrippa took the high priesthood from him, when he had ruled but three months, and made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest." This Jesus is clearly the brother of this James. Both names were extremely common in this period, Josephus himself refers to at least ten other people called Jesus. Although I maintain that "who was called Christ" s probably an insertion, as a high priest Jesus of Damneus could well have been titled Christ too. If this is really James the Just then he wouldn't have needed an introduction as anyone else's brother or son as he was supposedly a well known community leader and the Bishop of Jerusalem. The fact that this extract conflicts with the Christian history of James' martyrdom surely supports my position more than that of my opponent. Different Jesus, different James. The idea that Jesus Christ existed but is not mentioned elsewhere by Josephus is unlikely in the extreme. --- 3. My opponent argues that since the gospels make reference to genuine historical figures of the era they are probably accurate about Jesus. The fact that there is historical evidence of these other figures but not of Jesus actually suggests the opposite. The gospels started out as an updating of Hebrew scripture and myth into their modern surroundings. Referring to the gospels as "separate and confirming accounts for the validity of the historical Jesus" is very misleading as it ignores the synoptic problem that the other gospels are all interpretations of Mark and contain much of the same text. --- 4. As I will discuss further, my hypothesis is that the elements of the gospel story were already in place within Old Testament scripture. To say: "there was not enough time between Jesus death and the writing of the gospels" assumes he existed in the first place. As for "some other figure who was a sufficient cause of Christianity's beginnings" we need look no further than Paul. --- 5. As there is no non-biblical evidence for Jesus and his existence would have been note-worthy, I think Occam's razor precludes the creation of the unnecessary entity that is Christ. --- I wasn't intending to use Egyptian mythology as part of my argument but I thank my opponent for bringing up the fact that there are indeed many parallels between the story of Christ and other mythologies. I will limit my references to mystery religions accordingly. PRO: "Given the cultures understanding of writing, there is no reason to believe that there would be anything written about Jesus during his lifetime." On the contrary, the fact that Plato was bemoaning the popularity of writing over speech proves that writing was growing in favour in his time. Philo and many other prolific local writers were recording events at this time but none mention Jesus. Additionally Plato is obviously incorrect here as oral traditions are far more susceptible to corruption than written ones. Ever played Chinese whispers? ____ I have very little space remaining for my own contentions, so I will only present a few and briefly in this round. 1. The epistles of Paul are recognised as being the first wrings to mention Jesus Christ and to predate the gospels( see S.G.F Brandon: Religion In Ancient History p.228). Many of Paul's letters have been proved to be written later than others and/or to have been edited by later writers but if we examine the texts that have been reliably attributed to him, one interesting fact leaps out. None of these writings refer to a flesh and blood Christ that recently lived on Earth and many of the statements made only make sense if 'Jesus Christ' is a metaphorical heavenly symbol of redemption. 2. The gospel of Mark pre-dates the other gospels and they all copied text from it. Mark is not written in the style of a historical document but rather in the style of allegorical fiction. 3. The details of the life of Jesus and the sayings attributed to him in the gospels are almost entirely based on Old Testament scriptures, in some cases they are based on obvious mistranslations. 4. Before Christianity was re-packaged and marketed by the Catholic Church, there were many different philosophies about the existence of Christ including those which claimed he never existed as a man, as evidenced by Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John. As I consider my opponent's arguments effectively rebutted, I should hopefully have enough character space to expand on these points and present new ones in the next round.