He existed. He was just a liar. Mithras before him and a whole LINEAGE of other "Prophets" are known to have sprung up over time all claiming to be gods son in much the same manner as Jesus. Jesus was just the latest and most successful in the way in which he convinced people of his claimed divinity.

so he's just a spiritual conman?

how do you explain then, the number of followers he has, as opposed to Mithras and the others?

Looks like you're arguing that popularity equals truth here. Do you really think that's a logical proposition?

i'm saying that the popularity has some basis stemming from truth - otherwise, how can so many people fall into the claptrap if it's just an artful con propagated through the centuries?

surely there's a basis for their belief?

otherwise I can be a great deceiver and propagate my own divinity and later they're be millions of Weeists? (my last Chinese name)

So if Mormonism or Scientology are major world religions two thousand years from now that means they're true?

Janszoon has it right here, but even if your claim were addressed at face value, Jesus is simply the last in a line of many. If popularity implies Jesus is believable to the point of assuming he was telling the truth, why then were the previous incarnations of his story NOT the truth?

Answer: None of them are telling the truth. Jesus is perhaps slightly more convincing than his forebears but his story is the same as theirs to a remarkable and suspect degree, leading me to believe he is simply retelling an old tale. Think of Stephen Fry reading a Harry Potter book vs A drunkard doing it. One is clearly far more convincing and charismatic, but neither of them is telling the truth.

i can't say much for Mormonism, i still say it's up for debate whether Joseph Smith Jr. really did receive the message from God, and the Book of Mormons has as much fallacies as the Bible so I can't vouch for its truth and veracity

all i'm saying that all the Christians I know feel they were touched by something that led them to believe, and so did I - you just have to feel it yourself - i don't think any amount of charisma by a charlatan can do that - and neither is just reading the book and believing it at face value enough to convince anybody about Jesus

Scientology is pretty telling from how they treat the non-celebrity folowers from the followers, so it's pretty much a fad

and don't get me wrong either, i'm here for a healthy debate, Gnostic Christians are more interested in knowledge than blind belief

Now come on. At this point I really think you should try and put on a counter-thesis. You think that the story of Jesus evolved over hundreds of years, and then all of a sudden coagulated into this incredibly split personality, and they all weirdly think he is from Nazareth, and they all weirdly think he was killed by Pilatus. That is really a coincidence. I don't think you would get many historians to believe that.

Your implication about Hercules makes no sense. Reductio ad absurdum. Really, if you want to be so scientific, bring up a counter-thesis, and we'll discuss how believable that one is.

The thing is: You can get absolute proof about very few people from that time. Aristoteles, Platon, Socrates. All of that could conceivably have been constructed after the fact, from oral traditions. Do you question their existence as well?

I don't think the basis of this thread was whether or not Jesus was extraordinary, or whether his life, if he did exist, in anyway mirrored the accounts in the New Testament, but whether or not he as a person, not the living incarnation of god, actually existed.

I think it's silly to claim that you know someone existed, to a certain extent. While I obviously wouldn't contest that Louis XIV was a real historical figure, I think a healthy amount of skepticism goes a long way when it comes to figures that supposedly lived before, to be completely arbitrary, the 1300's. And I don't just mean in the realm of religion, I mean philosophers, writers, revolutionaries, etc. I think it's healthy to hold a standard of evidence that goes beyond relayed word of mouth and transcribed texts.

That was my initial question, paraphrased. Personally, I don't think there is enough evidence to back up any claims that Jesus existed as a person in history, and I think stories of his divinity and/or how he obtained it are greatly exaggerated.

I'm pretty close to agreeing with you, but I disagree with your final sentence. If the standard of evidence aren't good enough for Yeshua, then you could say the same about an awful lot of figures. And about transcribed texts: The things they wrote on back then broke down quite easily. If you don't take transcriptions to be good evidence, then you really have to doubt pretty much everyone... It's just a level of sceptisism that seems unreasonable.

@ burning down: What would constitute enough evidence? Now, I always think this debate is somewhat weird. Really, Yeshua is one of the best documented carpenters of the first century. Why doubt it? It should really be the doubters who should bring forth the arguments. Science work by making hypothesis and then try and falsify them. The theory that seems least implausible would be considered correct. But what on earth is a more plausible theory, than the existence of Yeshua? Without a counter-theory, the existence of Yeshua is the most plausible theory - be default... - and the true reasonable sceptic has no reason to really doubt it. Is his existence a fact? No. But it seems highly likely.

And just to clarify: Yeshua is the Aramaic form of Jesus, i.e. the name the real historical person would go by. And if you try and work through the bible historigraphically, apparantly Yeshua never stated that he was the son of God, nor that he was the Messiah, or anything. All that was probably grafted on afterwards.

Science works by first collecting evidence, second making a hypothesis based on that evidence, and third having it ruthlessly peer reviewed.

I don't think you can say that history and science are the same thing either. While the method of collecting, hypothesizing, and peer review is more or less the same, the kind of evidence used is totally different and the amount of clarity and truth that it is possible to achieve is also different.

Normally the amount of evidence that you need in order to believe something should change depending on the significance of the claim. For me to believe in God, I need very substantial evidence because of the size of that claim. But if you tell me that you have $3.25 in your right pocket, I'd just believe you because it isn't that impressive of a claim. So I'm more willing to suppose that Jesus might have been based on a real person, because that claim isn't that impressive.

What do you mean "put a counter-thesis"?

How does it make no sense? People really believed in, and worshipped, Hercules. According to you that makes him real, right?

As far as I know there is a lot more evidence for those guys than there is for Jesus. I'm not sure about Socrates, but Plato and Aristotle actually have writings that survive to this day so I'm not sure why you'd describe either as part of an oral tradition.

In reverse order...

1) With Platon and Aristotle we only have transcripts, written much longer and after the fact. So it could easily be seen as having been constructed afterwards.

2) "People really believed in, and worshipped, Hercules. According to you that makes him real, right?" Nope. That is not even close to what I said. I described a certain incident, with certain other facts. You took it out of a context, in a ridiculous way, it is really not a very good way to argue, even on the internet.

3) I explained 'counter-thesis' above. Put forth a more likely explanation, than that Yeshua existed. And argue for it. Not just say: 'It might be, that...'. Yes, there can be other explantions. But they seem unlikely.

I seriously doubt that Jesus, Hercules, or Homer ever existed.

edit: No Shakespeare either, probably. But I do believe the Greek philosophers existed.

What do you mean by transcripts? I'm talking about the actual writings of Plato and Aristotle. They still exist and are still read by people today.

I guess I misunderstood what you meant by this then: "People seemingly actually believed that stuff to a very large extent, he was a dominant figure much more than a silly 'urban legend'. It does seem much less reasonable to me, than that someone existed."

Please explain what you meant.

You first. "They seem unlikely" isn't much of argument.

Hercules existed. It's a fact because he's popular.

1) We do have their writings, but not the original, handwritten copies. Only copies of copies of copies of transcripts of copies. While it seems overwhelmingly likely that they existed, we cannot be completely sure, that their writings were not written by a small group of conspirators. Perhaps even much later.

2) You continue to take that out of a context... You, my friend, need to work on your debating skills. I promise I'll work on my english skills then. What is there is a comparison between Yeshua and an Urban Legend. Both of them developed over a short period of time - as opposed to Hercules, who therefore has nothing to do with this, really - but people would have been much more concerned about the details about Yeshua, since he meant much more to them.

3) Seruously? You want me to do your work? It's not my job to develop counter-thesises, when I'm perfectly fine believing in the dominant one. That would be your job.

You, my friend, has stopped seeming like a sceptic to me. You seem more like a denier (which does not mean that you are like other kinds of deniers). But ok. As I see it, there are three thesises:

1) Yeshua. What are the problems with this thesis? Yes there is a lack of concrete evidence (if you discount the gospels, the dead sea scrolls and Josephus, which hardly is what a historian would do...), but that isn't really surprising, so it can't be used as evidence against it.

2) Developed out of folklore. Elements of Jesus definitely did so. But some of the details, like dying under Pilatus, like coming from Nazareth. There is such an agreement about this, and it has happened in 40 years, that it seems unlikely. I would say, that there must be some agency behind it.

3) Conspiracy. Some people made it up to further their own goals. But then much of the gospels seem counterproductive. Why would he be from Nazareth? Why would he have followed John the Baptist if he had been the Messiah all along? Why did he talk against giving money to the church (something the church completely negated afterwards, obviously).

I can't see other hypothesis. The story of the creation of the gospels is probably a mixture of the three, but without a healthy dose of 1) it becomes really hard to explain.

The existence of Socrates isn't really important compared to the question of Jesus's existence. Let me explain why:

The fictional or real character of Socrates leaves us philosophy in writings which we may still study to this day. The merit of those writings aren't dependent on them being said by Socrates, because they would mean the same if they came from anyone.

Jesus on the other hand, was supposed to be the son of God. So the words credited to him are completely dependent on it being him who said them. If someone who was not the son of God said them, then their merit becomes far far less.

Could be. I guess one never knows. They do have more evidence for their existence than Jesus does though.

I posted a quote from you and asked what it meant. How is that taking it out of context?

You are the one making the assertion. The burden of proof is on you. Sorry, them's the rules.

Er... okay. If being ambivalent about the issue makes me a denier I guess that's the case.

I would think that a historian who bases their opinions on mythology would be someone who isn't very good at their job but, hey, maybe it's just me.

There is agreement about a lot of Hercules' life as well I'm sure. I guess that makes him real, right?

This one seems like a non-point to me.

Why?

Exactly.

Aren't we in a way making the assumption that if Jesus did exist as a human being that that would automatically validate the Christian philosophy, doctrine, and any supernatural claims that surrounds his existence? It doesn't.

And while we do not have any original copies of any of the New Testament gospels (It wouldn't matter if we did, it's still all conjecture), there are a few of the original Pauline epistles preserved and intact.

No of course we're not. Does it seem that way? Read back.

Hey it's all anal beads to me...

or rosary beads, if that's more thread appropriate...

or a peacock feather.

Right, I'm stopping my participation in this debate, Janszoon. I don't know if you won't discuss this subject in a reasonable way, or if you're simply not able to do so, but your answers were sort of embarassing. I've said my piece, and it's been great thinking about this issue. It is an interesting question. But I can see we're not getting any further. If anyone want's to give real answers to what I wrote on the page before, feel free to do so.

Best wishes everyone.

The Virgin redux.

The story of Jesus has a lot in common with other religious beings and stories. For example, the idea of the king who has to suffer and die or be sacrificed for the good of the land and the people is old and not uncommon, one example being Domalde. Since I mentioned the movie Wicker Man yesterday, I can squeeze in a mention here too as it has a similar theme :D

The idea of the ressurrection deity who dies and comes back is also old and precedes Jesus by thousands of years. Probably, most if not all of these ideas come from primitive rites and ideas about re-fertilizing a barren land. Since I mentioned Wicker Man, maybe I can also mention Princess Mononoke here :p: Christian holidays coincide with many annual pagan events and other pagan ideas certainly could have influenced or ignited the spark which became the story of Jesus.

Thank you for this morning dose of unintentional irony. :)

:laughing:

that right there is just downright blasphemy.
i'll pray for you and hope God won't take offense on this.

The Gospels are not ancient oral traditions where the writers of the Gospel wrote them down hundreds of years later where generation and generations pass them on by word of mouth unitl it was written down and then attributed to a writer. With Jesus there were 4 witness in the form of the writers of the 4 Gospels that were written within a few decades after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. So in this case people do when and where these stories started. That is not true with mythological character who origins are lost to the ages.

Er, no. Please read this.

I think something to posit here as an aside to the debate regarding whether or not Jesus existed, is what the lack of historical record surrounding his life and crucifiction implies.

For one, the Roman empire was notoriously thorough in keeping records of everything that happened. There are no roman records of Jesus life or death and all the upheaval that the gospels portray as surrounding the passion of christ. This means that he was a person who never existed or someone who's ministry and death were greatly exagerated in the new testament. Essentially, in the 30 year span between Jesus' death and the first gospel, Jesus was deified. If the accounts of Jeus' life were accurate there would have at least been records of his dealings with Pontious Pilate. There are not.

Secondly, Christian doctrine had been established prior to the compilation of the biblical canon, namely The New Testament. In case nobody is aware, Christian doctrine was essentially voted upon by a committee at the Council of Nicaea If you're a christian that will blow your mind, and yes, it is historically documented fact. The tricky part here is that only scriptures that perfectly aligned with Christian doctrine were included in The New Testament. There are more relevant scriptures that are contemporary with the life of Christ that have been left out of the New Testament than are included in it. What's more, all subsequent interpretation and translations of the New Testament have been filtered through the lens of doctrine and political agenda.

Obviously that's the tip of the iceburg. What we know of as the Holy Bible is quite possibly the most disfigured and disjointed compilation of literature that the world may know, so in my mind his existence is a moot point. I like to believe that Jesus existed because my subversive nature really jives with his story. I also like to believe that if most holier-than-though holy roller Christians saw Jesus lurking anywhere near their home, they'd probably lock all the doors and call the police. I don't think Jesus was the messiah or the son of god, but I choose to believe he existed. Why? Because I think he was a badass.

and I'll pray for your sinful soul so that you won't burn in Hell

I enjoyed the first time I read it when it was a part of Biblical commentary.:rolleyes:

I'm not an athiest, but I was for a long time. I now absolutely believe in God, but I don't follow any specific religion. Anyway....

I don't believe Jesus ever did exist. The story of Jesus is just a combination of maybe a dozen earlier stories from various religions. I've done my research and I know this to be a fact.

was that even a valid site?

No matter how much research anyone does, it is impossible to know that for a fact. His story is nearly identical to lots of other ancient stories, but that doesn't automatically preclude him from existing, albeit having his story embellished.

Oh okay, so you know what you were saying above what incorrect then.

Yes, and a fairly well known one. It's not an in-depth scholarly analysis or anything but it is a good summary of the established scholarship on the subject.

oh yes, smarter than average Biblical scholar, Thee Virgin is

(my sides hurt)