Talk:Jesus as myth/Archive6

message: dear All,
I just thought I would notify you that I am removing the neutrality warning from the start of this article, as I regard it as being inappropriate. My reasons for this are very simple. This page is NOT saying that Jesus is a myth, as it makes clear in its opening statement. It is a review of the theories and claims advanced by other people that Jesus was a myth. The article does not therefore have a POV, since it is just reviewing other peoples ideas and claims, not advancing any of its own. The only grounds for challenging the neutrality of an article of this kind would therefore be;
a) That it unfairly represented or characterised the ideas of one of the theorists it discusses.
b) that it made incorrect or inaccurate statements regarding the amount of support that a particular theorists ideas' possessed within the academic community.
c) that it unfairly or inaccurately represented the degree of support that the theory of 'Jesus as Myth' as a whole enjoys within the academic community.
Clearly, c) does not apply, as the page makes clear in its second section the extremely limited levels of suport for the idea among contemporary scholars, and that the theory is generally rejected by the mainstream.
In the case of either a) or b), the neutrality warning should be attached to the top of the relevent subsection of the page, to indicate where the problem is, not to the page itself, as its overall tone and stance, as set out in its opening statement, is correctly neutral. 
Furthermore, a number of issues have been raised ragarding the accuracy of some of the material included in the page. For example, someone raised an issue regarding the validity of certain statements about language ie that a word was arabic and not ancient egyptian. I cannot comment on whether these criticisms are fair or not, as i am no sufficiently well informed on the topics in question. However, i can suggest what the correct wikipedia response should be. Either, an accuracy warning at the start of the section,or the addition of a warning at the start of the page that some people have disputed the accuracy of some statements, and leave it there until such time as their accuracy has been properly debated on the discussion pages, and the staements adjusted accordingly. The use of the quality/cleanup warning is not apropriate for such a situation, as it is meant for situations where the grammar, presentation, spelling etc have problems, not the content itself.
In light of these arguments, I am going to alter the warning signs at the start of this page to fit the the correct useage. Anyone who feels that their are any problems with the neutrality of certain sections, or their accuracy, should reattach signs to those sections, and preferably edit them to bring them into line with the generally accepted facts and interpretations of particular authors works.
Mattlav 06:22, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Neutrality Warning Removal

message: material removed by SOPHIA and Wesley on April 29 moved to /Archive 3. Arch O. La Grigory Deepdelver 15:57, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Removed from page

message: Previous discussion (AJA proposal from May 2006) moved to /Archive 5
This section as it now stands is pure nonsense, especially the Horus claims, which are nothing but pseudo-Egyptology based on the work of three or four authors who are not Egyptologists.  None of the people making these claims are mentioned in M.L. Bierbrier's "Who Was Who in Egyptology" or in I.B. Pratt's exhaustive Egyptology bibliography.  One of the claimants, A.B. Kuhn, was a high school English teacher.  Most Egyptologists have not even heard of these claims, and those who know of them roundly scoff at them.  I'll just give a few examples to give everyone an idea of how ridiculous this stuff is:
--"KRST" is not a title of Horus or anyone else.  It is the Egyptian word for "burial".  Similarly, the Egyptian word for "coffin" is "KRSW".
--Osiris was never viewed as a creator deity (he was the god of the dead), so Horus was never viewed as the son of a creator deity.
--Isis was never known as "Meri".
--Neith's identity was absorbed into Nephthys, not Isis.
--The Egyptians never referred to the stars in Orion's belt as "MNTK", "ANLM", and "ALNTK".  This claim is a lie, as "Mintaka", "Alnilam", and "Alnitak", like most modern star names, come from Arabic.  "Mintaka" comes from the Arabic "mantaqah", meaning "belt".  "Alnilam" comes from the Arabic "an-nizam", meaning "the string of pearls".  "Alnitak" comes from the Arabic "an-nitaq", another phrase meaning "the belt".  This is a blatant attempt at fooling people who don't know the Arabic origin of these star names, fabricating pseudo-Egyptian names by removing the vowels from the modern English names.
--Horus did not resurrect his father Osiris.  Osiris' wife, Isis, resurrected him after piecing together his dismembered body.  Horus had not even been conceived at the time.
--Heliopolis was never known as "Beth-Annu" in Hebrew, though it was sometimes referred to as "Beth-Shemesh" (house of the Sun, translated literally from the Egyptian "per-Atum").  In any case, Bethany was a real historical village, today known as el-Azariyeh (Arabic for "place of Lazarus").
--Set never tried to tempt Horus with gifts.  The struggle was much more bloody than that, with Set gouging out one of Horus' eyes and Horus castrating Set (neither of which have any parallel in the Gospels).
--Satan is not based on Set, though Set was often identified with the Canaanite deity Baal and the Hittite deity Teshub.  In Judaism, Satan (actually a title, hasatan, "the accuser") is not a dualistic evil entity like the Christian Satan or the Egyptian Set, but rather plays a role more similar to that of a plaintiff.  The Christian concept of Satan comes from the Zoroastrian influences absorbed by the Jews while in exile between 586 and 537 BCE.
--Etc., etc., etc....
Clearly these claims are the work of someone not qualified in Egyptology.  More information can be found here:  http://hnn.us/articles/6641.html (George Mason University's History News Network).  The Dionysus and Mithra claims suffer the same factual inaccuracy; much like the urban legends on Snopes.com, these silly claims often surface in a slightly different form, with Horus being replaced with Osiris or Dionysus or Mithra as the claimed origin of the Jesus-Myth.
This section should be either deleted entirely, or heavily fact-checked and corrected (a process which I am sure will yield roughly the same result as a full deletion).
128.227.188.147 05:11, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The main point of this article is not to describe ancient religions per se; it's to describe what proponents (and hopefully opponents) of the "Jesus as myth" theory have said. If you disagree with the theory, compare it with writing about Aristotle. An article on him wouldn't be complete without a description of his theories, even if some of them are thoroughly discredited. That being said, I agree that the article needs some indication of the source(s) for the claims. If a specific refutation or counterargument has been published, it should be included as well. Maestlin 21:42, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've added the POV-section flag to this section.  Given the IP editor's statement above a stronger flag might be needed, but at the very least the section violates the NPOV policy by giving undue weight to these arguments without any critical discussion of them.  I'm tempted to add a NPOV flag to the whole article, but the first few bits looked reasonable, so what it really needs is a NPOV-hereafter flag, and I don't have time to figure out where the line belongs.  Perhaps at the "Influences on the earliest Christianity" section break.  GRBerry 21:10, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree that the article should describe the specific postulates of the Jesus-Myth theory, but should we really present supporting "evidence" that is not at all factual?  It would be like having an article that says "Holocaust denial is supported by the failure of the Allies to recover any bodies from Nazi concentration camps".  I do think that the article should describe the Jesus-Myth theories' assertions of a connection between Jesus and Egyptian mythology, but I don't think it's appropriate to "support" these theories with fabricated "evidence", even if it is immediately rebutted.  This is a fringe theory, and like most of the fringe, fabrication and misconception abounds; I do not think Wikipedia should be contributing to that. 128.227.188.147 16:52, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

text: * Reply -- "Mithraism predates Hipparchus by several hundred years." -- Mithra predates the discovery, but not Mithras. Don't get the two related deities confused. Mthra did not fight the bull... that's Mithras. It is difficult to say exactly when the cult of Mithras first got it's start, but (according to the page on Mithraism) it is estimated that it first appeared some time after 168AD. But it's hard to say just how long after 168AD. It is generally reckoned that Hipparchus discovered the Precession of the equinoxes in the 130's BC, which is fairly close to the beginnings of the Mithras cult. Mithraism, like Christianity, did not emerged fully-formed. There is little information concerning Mithraism during the first 100 years or so of it's existence. It isn't very hard to believe that Hipparchus' new-found discovery would have had a profound effect on the "science" of astrology, and could have quite possibly lead to the development of two new religions -- Christianity and Mithraism. -- "The Christian New Testament actually only states that he was *approximately* 30." - Then feel free to add the word "approximately". -- Also, the claim is made that Jesus' ministry is said to have lasted for one year. - I have heard estimates of either one year or three. Feel free to add that info if you wish. Big Brother 1984 10:28, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

text: * 'Additional Reply' -- I cleaned up the portion on The Precession of the Equinox. The discovery of precession did not challenge the geocentric theory; the non-geocentric (sun-centered and NOT earth-centered solar system) theory is attributed to Galileo at a much later time in history. I tried my best to preserve the link to [] because it contains valuable information.  Never-the-less, precession is NOT the movement of the entire outer universe; precessional movement is determined by eccentricities in the earth's axis rotation that makes it seem that the entire outer universe is gradually moving 'backwards'. If anyone wishes to 'revert' to the original that's cool with me, however, the original is erroneous. The link to www.themystica reveals much interesting information, however, I question the conclusions as speculation. I tightened up and trimmed the text because these side issues (e.g. precession, astrological ages, astrology) are of immense importance to the article but can get out of hand. I would like to note that issues like 'precession, astrological ages, and astrology' are not within the western mind-set (fringe elements only) so drafting this article becomes much more of a challenge. Additionally, The Gregorian Calendar is at war with astrology [] and The Roman Catholic Church has done everything (it seems) possible in the creation of The Gregorian Calendar to divorce itself from its possible astrological/astronomical origins. For instance: On this issue of precession....  The Sun 'precesses' out of the astrological sign of Virgo (The Virgin) into Leo, the sign of the king. Thus, a son (sun) 'born' (precessed out of) of a virgin (Virgo) as a king is an astronomical/astrological allegory dealing with astrology and celestial mechanics []. This analysis also suggests that any ancient civilization that created a 'myth' regarding a deity (king) born of a virgin was aware of precession. See, []. Portions of precessional information as it relates to Christianity, as quoted here, cited and quoted with permission of the author/researcher []. Note: Nothing in this comment should be interpreted as debunking the teachings of Christianity, rather I am suggesting that The New Testament contains (also) an allegorical depiction of ancient astrological beliefs regarding the spiritual nature of Man.  I am not suggesting that Jesus was a myth; I am suggesting that The New Testament contains mythological elements that are directly related to ancient astrology and celestial mechanics. Let's not throw out the baby with the bath water.  I doubt that George Washington (1st President of USA) ever cut down the cherry tree, but I do not doubt that George ("G") existed. Mythological elements do not disprove an historical Jesus, archaeological elements (writings in this instance) should be the focus of this article. (Additionally there are 24+ 'gospels' in existence, only 4 of which are included in The New Testament.) Revealing 'mythological' components (Ben Franklin's kite & key or Sir Isaac Newton's head bonking by a falling apple) regarding an alleged historical personage is not proof of a full blown 'myth'. It is only proof of mythological embellishments.  John Charles Webb 21:59, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have added a  due to these objections. --Awesome 03:35, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Specific arguments of the theory 

message: The article's tone and execution rests uncomfortably upon errors in logic. See, Logical_fallacy, False_Dilemma,
Begging_the_question, Biased_sample, Denying_the_antecedent, plus many more. One error is that the presence of 'mythological components' is conclusive evidence to debunk the entire Jesus cosmology as myth. Any professor of "Logic and Argumentation" will tell you that you have to consider your 'audience' in determining the tone and flow of an 'argument' (a logical progression of thought and evidence). The conundrum of this article is in attempting to present information (fact) that challenges deeply held emotional/religious beliefs. As such, this article will be closely scrutinized for errors, unsupported conclusions, bias, poor scholarship, logical fallacies and fringe theories.  
I have tried to re-write the opening paragraphs (nothing posted) of this article numerous times, however, the body of the article has too many fatal flaws to be considered 'encyclopedic'. The article is a 'tirade' disguised as scholarship. It needs to be recreated from the ground up. The topic is important enough to suffice as a thesis for a Ph.D candidate. You cannot just 'graffiti' in a few swipes of text , cite a few non-relevant links to create the illusion of validity and then conclude that Jesus is a myth using bold type as additional proof. The article requires a thorough analysis of all 24+ gospels, a search for historical records via earlier scholarly articles, and a search for physical archaeological artifacts including all pertinent writings. 
This article has just won a reprieve from a death sentence, and now it is committing suicide. The third paragraph states, "The study of whether or not Jesus might be a purely mythological requires academic analysis of the available evidence from times near-contemporary with the dates for Jesus' life, and on analysis of how reliable such evidence is..." 
Well.....  where is it? I am going to repeat this (opinion) "The article is a 'tirade' disguised as scholarship". 
How about (proposed flow): The evidence for Jesus, The 24+ gospels, The gospels determined to be closest to the time frame, The similarities between The New Testament and earlier writings or syncretisms, The Writings of Josephus and THEN a critical analysis of the referenced materials including ancient astrological beliefs (Egypt and Sumeria) and astronomical symbolism, etc. 
I have no interest in reviving the deletion debate.  I strongly support the decision that this article should be published. However, I can take you to the 'finish line' ... There is only very little archaeological evidence of the existence of an historical Jesus. The 'evidence' is hotly disputed and is considered as 'clues' rather than conclusive. The matter has already been covered in the Wikipedia article Historicity of Jesus although lacking in depth the historicity article is 'encyclopedic'. 
A new roof and a coat of paint is not going to suffice for a house built upon a crumbling foundation; this article, presently, is based upon a logical fallacy (its foundation) and that (repeat) illogical foundation is that the presence of syncretism and mythological components equates to Jesus as Myth. (See also, Newton's apple, Ben Franklin's Kite & Key, Washington's Cherry Tree, etc). An additional fallacy is that you cannot refute The New Testament's 4 gospels and then impliedly attest to the accuracy of The New Testament by ignoring the 22+ other gospels not included in the bible as (presumably) inconsequential.  
If you are going to gore somebody's ox then you better have a swift steed, a formidable suit of armor, have no stone left unturned AND iron clad verifiable references. Even if all of those tasks are performed, the best that you will be able to come up with (absent POV and personal conclusion) is where you started from.... i.e. There is no significant body of archaeological evidence, outside of the bible, to prove the existence of an historical Jesus. To conclude that Jesus is a myth, based upon the lack of archaeological evidence is, however, illogical. John Charles Webb 00:42, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you know how offended I am by your comments?  And of course, there are sections of Wikipedia that discuss the Holocaust, Pogroms, the Klu Klux Klan, Adolph Hitler, Creationism, Loch Ness Monster, and the Toronto Maple Leafs that are highly offensive to me, and that's just free speech.  If you would like to censor, I don't think that Wikipedia is the place for you to be.  Since the Bible is not a verifiable source of information, there is no other source for the existence of jesus, except for the guy that trims my hedges every Thursday morning.  And no, but you must not know much about Wikipedia--opinion does not prevail over fact, or we would be thriving under the Nazis and I would be in a concentration camp.  I'm guessing that you need to read the following:  WP:NPOV, WP:VERIFY, WP:TIGER, and who knows what else WP there is.  By the way, Jesus is a myth.  What you believe is faith, and that's not something that can put into an encyclopedia.  Orangemarlin 22:33, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Logical Fallacies 

message: User LaC9187 recently made substantial changes to this article, possibly a revert. The edit summary said "Corrected citation usage" which IMO is misleading. I will revert to the previous version so that readers who monitor this page know that something substantial has happened. Edits to such a controversial page should be done with more care, by describing changes in full, and hopefully discussing in advance or else taking small steps and giving others a chance to look over changes. If such steps were taken and I simply missed it, please accept my apologies. Maestlin 16:24, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent edit by LaC9187 

message: The article's lead, reads more as an original research essay than an encyclopedic entry. As per the Wikipedia:Lead_section guideline:
: The lead section should contain up to four paragraphs, depending on the length of the article, and should provide an overview, or executive summary, of the main points the article will make, summarizing the primary reasons the subject matter is interesting or notable, and including a mention of its notable controversies, if there are any. The lead should be capable of standing alone as a concise overview of the article, or abstract, should be written in a clear and accessible style, should be carefully sourced like the rest of the text, and should encourage the reader to want to read more.
≈ jossi ≈  t • @ 19:31, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just to clarify, is this an explanation of why you tagged the article for possible OR, or a separate point? Maestlin 15:33, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: On another note, but still in the realm of the lead article, why does the article constantly refer to the claim that Jesus is 100% myth as the "extreme" side of the argument?  There are always two extremes if there is even one, and the other extreme would be to claim that Jesus is 100% real and the gospels are 100% accurate.  It just seems a little POV to me. Flannel 18:14, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The argument in question is the "Jesus = myth" argument. "Jesus is not myth" lies outside the argument, since it contradicts it. Clinkophonist 10:31, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

text: As well, isn't it a logical assumption that if an extreme is Jesus as 100% myth than the other pole is as you described?  I don't see POV in this article. --Rec Specz 12:46, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article's lead 

message: I noticed that a user edited this page for content, which is prohibited, adding that Pliny's letters mention Jesus, which they don't.  See http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/pliny-letters.html for the full text of these letters.  Futhermore, if there are to be edits of this page, they should be backed up with reliable sources.  Devotional literature is not a reliable source, any more than racist literature is an authority on minorities.  Please edit this article impartially for facts, not to prove the point you like the best.  --Chuchunezumi 01:23, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Editing the talk page and biased editing

message: Due to editorializing, I believe this article shuld be deleted.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wikilagata (talk • contribs) .
:Then don't say so here - say so here: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jesus as myth, but remember the fact that the current article is a mess does not mean that there should be no article at all. Paul B 01:06, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Deletion?

message: A question has come up at Talk:Jesus about Thompson, Thomas L. 2005. The Messiah Myth. New York: Basic Books. Does Thompson actually argue that David and Jesus are myths, or is Thompson summarizing the opinion of others? If Thompson does make this argument, on which page number does he state his conclusion? Grigory Deepdelver of BrockenboringTalkTCF 13:04, 6 April 2006(UTC)
:Cautionary Comment: There is a legal copyright infringement issue to take an author's conclusions (the heart and soul of the published work) and to publish those conclusions without the author's permission. The legal theory is that the publishing of an author's conclusions devalues the work and reduces book sales. Any such use violates the fair use exemption of national and international copyright laws. John Charles Webb 22:05, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There shouldn't be a copyright issue if someone summarizes the conclusion with the source identified. If doing so were a problem, most academic writing would come to a grinding halt, since academics constantly write about the work of their colleagues without getting permission. Informing potential readers about the conclusions of a book can stimulate book sales. I cannot imagine any copyright infringement that would occur if someone were to write: "Thompson states on page X that he believes David and Jesus are fictional creations." (Or whatever his conclusion is.) Maestlin 18:02, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Reply - I agree with you, partially, however, this is a global forum and not just communication among the members of an academic group. In a copyright infringement case the author does not have to prove 'actual damages', the author only needs to prove that an infringement occurred. The crux of the matter is defined by Fair_use. It is one matter to cite and quote a copyrighted work, however, there is a difference between citing a work for critical analysis and giving away the author's conclusions. The burden of proving 'no infringement' is upon the person or persons sued (In other words, you are already in court). It is similar to writing a movie review and giving away the ending or stating, in a review, 'who did the deed' in a mystery novel. The solution is easy, get the author's or publisher's permission by showing them the proposed article. Seeking permission shows good faith and avoids lawsuits. Otherwise, the self-test to apply is, 'is the quoting of this work considered fair use [] and does such usage devalue the commercial value of the quoted work'. John Charles Webb 05:19, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I looked at your links and I confess I don't see how they apply here. If what you say is true, the Wikipedia article on Fair use is worse than useless. Maestlin 17:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This sounds like nonsense to me. I don't see anything about "giving away" an author's conclusions being an infringement of copyright. Conclusions are not copyrighted. Einstein did not get royalties everytime someone wrote about relativity theory. Not giving away plot twists in novels and films is a matter etiquette, not copyright. Paul B 18:04, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Messiah Myth

message: The article is now 90k. This is much too large! Only a few will want to sit down and read through such a long article, and editors will have increasing trouble keeping track of what is/isn't included as it continues to grow. Please consider what is most important before you add new information to the article, and ask if it should be elsewhere. For instance, there is an article on Mithraism that includes a section on possible parallels with Christianity. Astrological parallels might do better in the article on the Great Year or another astrology article. Maestlin 18:02, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Readability and usability are paramount in an encyclopedia (otherwise, why bother?). That means striking a balance between completeness and brevity. Encyclopedias are rarely complete on any subject they cover. As I said, some information could be better added to other articles, or new articles started. In particular, some of the authors and books could be covered in a lot more detail. That would add a lot of information to Wikipedia while keeping this article short enough to read in a single sitting. Maestlin 17:26, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Article length problem

message: This section states:
"It is important to note that Celsus, a first century critic of Christianity, accused Jesus of being a bastard child and a sorcerer.  He never questions Jesus' historicity."
But here is a quote from Celsus (quoted by Justin Martyr).
"[Christianity] continues to spread amongst the vulgar, nay one can even say it spreads because of its vulgarity, and the illiteracy of its adherents. And while there are a few moderate, reasonable, and intelligent people who are inclined to interpret its beliefs allegorically, yet it thrives in its purer form among the ignorant."  
Celsus is stating here that the gospels are merely allegorical fiction. How does this jive with the above statement which claims that Celsus never doubted Jesus' historicity? Big Brother 1984 06:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Celsus certainly thought Jesus was a historical figure and cited that he had sources in his polemic:
"In VI.75 Celsus says that Jesus' body was, 'as they say, small and ugly and undistinguished.' Origen finds an unlikely source for 'ugly' in Isaiah 53.1-3, but knows of no evidence for 'small and undistinguished,' yet 'they say' indicates that Celsus had some source. His statement that Jesus claimed to be a god (II.9, etc.) is explicable from Christian texts, but is also attributed in the gospels to Jesus' opponents. That he was thought an 'angel' looks like a reflection of an early Jewish Christology not represented by the gospels. 'Deserted and betrayed by his associated, hid, fled, and was caught' (II.9-12) all might have come from the gospels; but 'hid' and 'fled' could better have come from a different account of the same events, and Celsus said he was betrayed by 'many' disciples (II.11)." Morton Smith, Jesus the Magician: Charlatan or Son of God? (1978) pp. 78-79
See http://www.anthropoetics.ucla.edu/Ap0301/CELSUS.htm for his charges of sorcery and such.  I am removing your disputed section, there is nothing being dsputed.  -Wikilagata
* Reply - There certainity is something to be disputed here. You can't say that Celsus never doubted Jesus' historicity when Celsus refers to the gospels as allegorical literature. Justin Martyr responds to Celsus' allegation as follows:
"But we, in proving the facts related of our Jesus from the prophetic Scriptures, and comparing afterwards His history with them, demonstrate that no dissoluteness on His part is recorded. For even they who conspired against Him, and who sought false witnesses to aid them, did not find even any plausible grounds for advancing a false charge against Him, so as to accuse Him of licentiousness; but His death was indeed the result of a conspiracy, and bore no resemblance to the death of AEsculapius by lightning. And what is there that is venerable in the madman Dionysus, and his female garments, that he should be worshipped as a god? And if they who would defend such beings betake themselves to allegorical interpretations, we must examine each individual instance, and ascertain whether it is well founded, and also in each particular case, whether those beings can have a real existence, and are deserving of respect and worship who were torn by the Titans, and cast down from their heavenly throne. Whereas our Jesus, who appeared to the members of His own troop--for I will take the word that Celsus employs--did really appear, and Celsus makes a false accusation against the Gospel in saying that what appeared was a shadow. And let the statements of their histories and that of Jesus be carefully compared together. Will Celsus have the former to be true, but the latter, although recorded by eye-witnesses who showed by their acts that they clearly understood the nature of what they had seen, and who manifested their state of mind by what they cheerfully underwent for the sake of His Gospel, to be inventions? Now, who is there that, desiring to act always in conformity with right reason, would yield his assent at random to what is related of the one, but would rush to the history of Jesus, and without examination refuse to believe what is recorded of Him?"  - "Contra Celsus", Book III, CHAP. XXIII .
What is important here is not what Martyr says, but rather what this is written in response to. Celsus is clearly doubting the historicity of the gospels by calling them allegory. Martyr's response to Celsus is that the gospels are allegory, but allegory based on an historical character. It is clear that Justin Martyr viewed Celsus' claim that the gospels are allegory as an attack on the historicity of Jesus. Calling a story "Allegory" generally implies that the work in question is pure fiction, but allegory can sometimes be based on real people and events. And this is the view that Martyr seems to take, which is apparently contrary to Celsus' view.
Perhaps I can just reword the statement to say something like.... 
"Celsus, a second century critic of Christianity, attacked Christianity in a writing titled "The True Word". In this piece, Celsus mocks the Christian faith by claiming that Jesus was a bastard child and a sorcerer. Although Celsus' generally doesn't question the historicity of Jesus (he is more content to take the Jesus story at face value so he can then lampoon it), he does on several occasions imply that Christian writings were meant to be interpreted allegorically rather than as literal history."
Does that qualify as NPOV? Big Brother 1984 10:43, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

text: "Some of them interprete it allegorically" is different from "it is allegory".  A.J.A. 15:31, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I second that.  BB, Celsus called JJesus "a mere man" and a "bastard child."  These are not accusations thrown around by someone who thinks his opponent was not real.  He would have said, "Jesus is not real!"  The fact of the matter is that he does rgw opposite and it is likely his sources were rabbinic satires of Jesus.  Lastly, though there is nothing specifically wrong ith your paragraph, there is nothing wrong with the current one.  A sentence that Celss believed that stories of Jesus' life were allegorical could be added, but there seems to be no questioning that he thought Jesus was real.-Wikilagata
There existed several Jesuses (Josephus reports them). When Celsus speaks about a historical Jesus it can not be used as evidence for the existence of a historical Jesus of Nazareth (as claimed by the gospels). --Der Eberswalder 23:59, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Celsus' View

message: I suggest a new framework for this article that compares histocic method that must get extremely relaxed in order to support a historical-Jesus hypothesis. The genealogies that explain Jesus in terms of other phenomena are fine, but it does not take the place of the inability to posit the figure in the first place. There should be a section that is devoted to these alternate theories, many of which I find compelling and interesting, but should not substitute for the break, or percieved break, with modern historical method.
1) All historical indices at Jesus come from heresay accounts which lack Contempraneous corroberation outside of the new testament. 
2) The bulk of description of Jesus takes place in the Gospels to which different variations have both existed and been selected against by athorities such as Nicea. The Authorship usually posited to the appropriate authors, comes from variations we have from hundreds of years later in preserved texts. The gap between his supposed death and the first gospels are attributed to being at least over 3 decades due to the mention of the fall of the temple in Mark which is placed at around 70 c.e. Side from the true Authorship being unknown in the case of the canonical gospels, there is a host of non biblically incorperates gospels as well as epistles, many of which appear to scholars as equally viable to the cononical texts, perhaps even more so as they had less opportunity to be altered.
3) Archealogical evidence does not support theories of an historical figure of Jesus during his lifetime, but has found a wealth of non-canonical texts dated at around the same time as the canonical texts. the bulk of sources do not come from his supposed time, but rather from the time of the growing movement. 
4)The gospels mention a degree of fame and infamy that had traveled around the following of the man of Jesus. The discrepancies of supporting this fame, with its lack of mention in any sources predating Mark (70 c.e.) are further bothered by the the evidence other cult figure heads have left behind.
5)The geographical idosyncracies provided by the text of the New Testament are too clumbsy for anyone familiar with the area to have made them. The Bible depicts Herod, the Ruler of Jewish Palestine under Rome as sending out men to search and kill the infant Jesus, yet nothing in history supports such a story. Pontius Pilate supposedly performed as judge in the trial and execution of Jesus, yet no Roman record mentions such a trial. The gospels portray a multitude of believers throughout the land spreading tales of a teacher, prophet, and healer, yet nobody in Jesus' life time or several decades after, ever records such a human figure. 
::Oh, for God's sake, as though we have records of any other trials performed by Pontius Pilate.  Are you suggesting that Pilate was not involved in any trials during his period of rule in Judaea? I don't think anybody except fundamentalists believes that the massacre of the innocents is based on fact.  And there just aren't any good sources on Judaea written in Jesus's life time.  The best source we have, Josephus, er, does mention Jesus. john k 12:53, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Older

message: I have restored the Totally Disputed template. The article presents minority opinions in such a way as to make them sound like theories that are currently broadly accepted by academics, especially in the extended section on pagan parallels with Christianity. The same section is also biased towards parallels with Egyptian mythology and religion, and to a lesser extent the Dionysian/Bacchic and Orphic mysteries (which are not simply interchangeable), even though important works have alleged parallels with various other mythical figures. I suspect that much of the article is modeled on a single book, maybe Tom Harpur's Pagan Christ (this is a guess since I haven't read the book). That's the bias, in my opinion: slanted towards exaggerating the scholarly acceptance of the Jesus-myth theory, as well as the importance of just one thread within the theory. Factual problems have been listed at length on the talk page, and they don't stop being relevant just because nobody has added to them in the past fortnight. Now the discussion is not "stale". Maestlin 20:20, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. I restored the POV/bias tag.  08:44, 23 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I was thinking the same thing and was about to point out the WP:NPOV#Undue_weight Wikipedia policy in a separate section in the discussion page.  This Jesus myth article really seems to violate WP:NPOV#Undue_weight given how much material here is in favor of the myth (many of it unsourced to boot).  Compare this with the intelligent design entry, which follows WP:NPOV#Undue_weight to the extent that it looks more like a "why mainstream scientists reject intelligent design" entry (after every ID argument is explained, it's picked apart).  --Wade A. Tisthammer 04:11, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Science is an observable and objective discipline. Myth, religion and history are not. It's one thing for a bunch of scientists to have consensus on something that is repeatable, like the evolution of finches, mice or other lower life forms. It is quite another to come to consensus on such a subjective subject as the theoretical historical existence of a mytho-religious icon. Please note that this is one of three articles (all part of the larger Jesus series), it's companion article is Historical Jesus. Are you suggesting that both articles devote equal space to both arguments, when each page is about the specific sides (thus both are companions to the Historicity of Jesus article, which is about the debate itself, suggesting that there is no consensus, since there isn't)? I mean, because if so maybe all the articles should be merged. Which is kind of silly, since there's all this information to present. Also I will be working on the citations and info over the next few weeks. And yes, Homestarmy, "some" is the correct word. "Most" implies unsupported POV. I'm going to change it back.Phyesalis 04:14, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Unsupported POV of what now? It doesn't matter how low a view you wish to hold the majority of historians who think Christ was real in some fashion, most of them think Christ existed anyway, "some" can imply that it is around 50 percent, or worse, that only a small amount of them believe Christ existed. Homestarmy 04:19, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problems with neutrality and factual accuracy of article 

message: I wonder given this response to a Google Answers question here why Josephus is not mentioned more in this article? Is it wrong? Extremely biased?--Filll 19:54, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: see above - where the “Jesus” sections are shown to be later edits of wishful thinking and outright forgery. Which begs the question who keeps putting him into this article without mentioning that actual fact? Maybe I'm not seeing the good faith others claim I should ...  - Sparky 16:22, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Josephus

message: I've just  edited this article a fair bit, and I felt that as I changed so much it would be best if I explained my edits on the talk page.
In Influences on the earliest Christianity, I felt that the original article presented an obvious false dichotomy between 'evangelicals' holding that there was absolutely no influence on Christianity from the surrounding culture, and 'critical' approaches, which held that there probably was, and seemed to imply that this indicated that Jesus was simply a myth.  This is a false dichotomy - very few evangelicals would hold that culture had no impact upon Christianity; for example, evangelicals usually refer to "Greet one another with a holy kiss" as a cultural interpretation.  They would generally dispute that culture affected Christian beliefs as such, and there'd be a range of positions on this whole issue from the fundamentalists down to the jesus as a myth types.
In The influence of the Old Testament, I first of all changed 'conceding' into 'often believing' in the sentence "Though conceding that the gospels may contain some creativity and midrash".  I did this because 'conceding' is POV - it's arguing that otherwise they wouldn't want to, etc.  I added the 'often' because I'd be very surprised if that was a universal - really, I would have changed it to 'sometimes' or 'occasionally' if I hadn't been feeling charitable to the original editor, since I've studied the gospels academically at a secular university and never come across that particular interpretation, so I expect it's pretty minor.  That said, I couldn't verify it, so it wouldn't be fair for me to add a comment like 'occasionally'.
I also removed reference to the scholar, F. F. Bruce, as an example of someone who holds the gospels to be sufficiently historical to be used as a source, because although this is true of F. F. Bruce, he actually goes a lot further than that - if I remember correctly, his position is that when the bible is correctly interpreted (e.g. in context of genre etc) it is without error anywhere.  Therefore, he's not a good example of a scholar who argues that the bible is simply "sufficient" to establish the historicity of the Bible.
In Gnostic themes, I edited 'Undisputed epistles' to 'generally accepted epistles', because nothing is undisputed in New Testament studies!  The seven epistles concerned are near to universally held, but they're not quite universally held.
A similar rationale was behind my editing of "from writers whose theories have not received widespread acceptance", because it is contrasted with Elaine Pagels, whose theories have also not receieved widespread acceptance - but she is nonetheless respected as a scholar herself.  I meant to not mention "theories" and just turn the contrast into a contrast of how well respected the scholars are, but looking at it now I must have carelessly forgotten to remove "theories" in my editing.  I'll try to remember to change that when I've finished writing this.
I edited the later comment on the fact that Paul doesn't often quote Jesus to comment that there is also the explanation from believers in the historical Jesus that it is explained by the fact that Paul had not had a great deal of contact with the original disciples, as he himself said (Gal 1).  (There's also the theory that he lost contact with those kind, explaining a greater use of historical material about Jesus in 1 Cor to the later Romans, but that's not really worth mentioning.)
I added a couple of Fact citation required markers to Parallels with Mediterranean mystery religions and other non-Abrahamic sources, because both of the comments there were things that I would expect to be familiar with had they been the case to any great degree, but I have knowledge of limited truth in either of those cases.  I'm currently not sure whether I was right to assume that, since both of the comments were certainly true to some extent, perhaps not the extent implied by the language - I wonder whether I should have simply deflated the language a bit.  But hey, citations are required all over the place in this article, hopefully that'll just make someone make a start.
In Timeline of Jesus' life, I simply pointed out that the reference to Jesus' ministry as lasting a year is not universal, which it isn't.
In, Criticism of the theory I removed ", but to what degree the dispute is grounded in historical accuracy versus Christian apologetics is unclear", on the grounds that it is simply false.  This is the most strong of a number of points in the article which imply that the only people who dispute the 'Jesus as myth' hypothesis are "Christian apologists", which is plainly false; I've read atheist and Jewish scholars who regard the hypothesis as utter rubbish.
Later I removed "Scholars believe that the apostle Paul did not quote Jesus more often, because he took for granted that Christians knew what Jesus said. Jesus Myth proponents believe this is a weak argument from silence", because this is a response to a criticism by the "Jesus as Myth" people that is already dealt with above, and it's not the obvious responseto mention - better or more typical explanations for this include are occasionality of the Pauline corpus, and the suggestion that Paul himself said that he didn't see much of the initial disciples, so why should he know a lot about the precise history?
I'll probably make some significant alterations to this article in the future, too, because I do think it can do with a lot of improvement in various areas, but I think that what I've done is enough for one day!TheologyJohn 00:55, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: My recent edits

message: Interested editors should see Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 December 20#Category:Jesus as myth. — coelacan talk — 05:14, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  category for deletion 

message: Until recently, the section of this article on Dionysus contained some highly inaccurate statements about Jesus-like deeds supposedly ascribed to Dionysus by Euripides and Achilles Tatius. The problem was not simply the strength of the parallels; rather, the texts simply don't say what the article claimed they do. I've corrected the relevant paragraphs.
Seeing the inaccuracy of the sourced paragraphs in the Dionysus section, I feel it would be irresponsible to leave the unsourced paragraphs in the article, even with them fact-tagged. So I've moved them here. Obviously, if reliable sources can be found for them, they can be restored. They follow:
:*The Passion of Jesus has a number of features which are argued by Jesus-Myth-theory advocates to be borrowed from Dionysus. Just before his actual crucifixion, the narrative portrays Jesus as being tortured - during which his captors make him wear a purple robe and crown of foliage, both of which were said to be ordinarily worn by Dionysus (due to being imperial symbols). According to Christian apologists the temporary similarity is co-incidental and due to universals, but advocates of the theory that Jesus was derived from myth contend that although temporary, the similar appearance during the torture scene was a deliberate reference by the early gospel writers to Dionysus, in a similar manner to plays and dramas when an actor breaks the fourth wall and reveals their disguise to the audience.
:**Apologists would argue that the resurrection of Dionysus/Bacchus was different than that of Jesus, because Bacchus had the help of Pegasus to escort him to heaven.http://www.answeringinfidels.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=87
EALacey 20:29, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Dionysus

message: Not quite sure why.  It is a common argument by popular-level critics of Christianity.  Don't see why removed from this article. TheologyJohn 01:10, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The article is currently long enough that a case can be made for splitting some of its content off into other articles. However, many sections of the present article are unreferenced, and there's some needless repetition. I think the article could be shortened significantly by removal of repetition and unverifiable claims, and that we should try to do that before splitting. The "Parallels with non-Christian myths" section is particularly short on references, and I'm concerned that splitting parts of it off in their current state will simply make their problems easier to overlook. EALacey 09:15, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: The value of Josephus and other non-Christian sources in establishing the historicity of Jesus is currently discussed in the Historicity of Jesus article. Josephus should probably be mentioned here under Criticism of the theory, however. EALacey 13:20, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: TheologyJohn is correct, those sections should not be removed but summarized with a link to the child article (using Template:Main). KillerChihuahua?!? 13:59, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: And upon taking a look at the supposed "child" articles, I find see Similarities between Jesus and Horus, Similarities between Jesus and Dionysus, and Similarities between Jesus and Mithras, none of which are sourced or formatted as articles. Now we have a POV fork splitting off as "Criticisms" which is quite similar. I hate spamming Afd but this is ridiculous. Thoughts, everyone? KillerChihuahua?!? 14:04, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: We should NOT do this for Criticisms, that is a POV fork. KillerChihuahua?!? 14:11, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This page is such a mess, and so heavily protected, that it would be very hard to make any improvements, IMHO. I am just observing, but my goodness...--Filll 14:36, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Jesusmyth - why?  This article is only so long because it is written so badly.  We should just try to shorten it down to a sensible length article. What's more, I'm not sure that any subset of this article is notable enough in itself for its own article - this is, after all, a pretty obscure theory in scholarly circles (even if more popular in non-scholarly ones). TheologyJohn 14:15, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Depends what you mean by "very common" - was always a minority opinion in scholarly circles.  Also depends upon what you mean by "forgotten" - the reason it's been forgotten is because experts generally now regard it as refuted (as indeed at least some of its proponents regard the older versions to which you refer.) TheologyJohn 14:55, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: I object. KillerChihuahua?!? 14:52, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Not quite sure what you're suggesting, Jesusmyth, but it sounds unencyclopediac, pointless, and just would be better done by improving the Horus section so that a table isn't needed. TheologyJohn 14:55, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Agreed. A table is not suitable for complex comparisons. EALacey 14:56, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The theory is gaining popularity even in academic circles due to the Nag Hammadi texts and the Dead sea scrolls. The theory was effectively refuted at the turn of the 20th C but neither of these sources had been discovered. There is a lot of interest in the early church now and that is raising questions that are difficult for the "official" history to answers. However all this is personal speculation and therefore worthless to the article. What this article should do is give a brief summary of the ideas (opening paragraph), set it in the context of its academic field (minority) and then give a history of the theory, with the main points that various ideas have raised. There should be a section dealing with balanced criticism of the theory. As this theory is not in the form of a Gospel and does not have the power and ruthlessness of an organised religion behind it to ensure the purity of the message it is understandably a diverse subject. Check out the late April 2006 copy to see how the article was prior to it's vast "improvements"by some very devout Christians and you will see why I am sceptical of the ability of "believers" to be impartial on this subject. It just becomes a breeding ground for apologetics which I have neither the time or the energy to bother with.  Sophia 17:11, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This article is a complete mess.  The problem, IMHO, is that there are certain individuals that are not going to allow this to be written as NPOV no matter what is written.  As I have been lectured over and over (to the point that I gave up on participating in a couple of articles) that NPOV means that we have to deal with the title of the article without our own belief set clouding how it is written.  Factually, there is evidence for and against the existence of jesus.  It is not meant to debunk Christianity or faith in Christianity.  In addition, it must be verifiable.  Just because everyone (which I highly doubt) assumes that jesus existed, only means that we can verify that a bunch of people assume that he existed, not that he actually did or did not exist.  If it's going to be an article to slam Christianity, then sure it should be deleted.  If it is going to, using WP:NPOV to discuss the Myth of Jesus and what supports or debunks that, then this article needs a serious rewriting.  Orangemarlin 22:54, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent removal of Mithras section 

message: A request was put in at Wikiproject:Ancient Egypt for someone to swing by and check the osiris stuff for factual accuracy. Now, I have read it and found it to be quite... "interesting," let us say. What is currently there is at best rather... warped; at worst original research. It needs to be tagged and then cited, and what cannot be cited after reasonable amounts of time must be removed or reworded.
I get a horrible hunch when I read it that it's based upon the works of Wallace Budge, an Egyptologist whose works are far out of date. If so, it can be mentioned as a historical theory but not an actual modern theory. To include this material you need to have a statement "such and such argues," and if that person is not either a scholar of ancient egypt whose works are from at least the 60's or later, or of Second Temple Judaism whose works come from preferrably after 1991 (the date by which the last of the Dead Sea Scrolls were finally translated, but the middle 70's aren't unuseable), then there must be an appropriate proviso.
I have some particular doubts that any competant historian or linguist would call the etymology of Christ with the greek word for anointing and thus messiah anything other than a dead certainty; the corrolating the breath of life with the holy spirit is... interesting; I could go on and on.
On a secondary note, that section seems to be more aptly suited to be in a page titled "Second Temple period Jewish messiology as an introduction from Egyptian mythology" since the arguments there have little to do with Jesus, but more to do with what the dead sea scrolls show to be widespread Jewish opinion during the perod 200 BC – AD 70. It has very little to do with Jesus himself, except inasmuch as the gospels tie him into Jewish messiology. Thanatosimii 05:29, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the very helpful comments. I've added an unreferenced template to the section, and with luck somebody will be able to indicate who's made this argument (and when). EALacey 17:49, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Osiris stuff.