Could Jesus Have Been Simply a Fraud?

[columbus]

Many many years ago I heard a theory about Jesus I dismissed at the time. It just seemed to calculated to cause offense. But then I read something by Isaac Asimov fleshing out the theory and it started to make sense. The more I learned the more sense it made.

Suppose Jesus were a terrorist? Or a freedom-fighter, if you oppose the Roman occupation of Judea. I don't claim to have any special information, just going by what's in the NT and the situation in 1st century Judea. Judea was rife with violence and intrigue, rather like Baghdad under the second Bush administration. An occupying empire and a puppet government against weak but determined Jewish resistance, with the majority of people just trying to get along in difficult and confusing times.

This explains all sorts of otherwise confusing things, from the noticeable lack of personal history to Pilate executing Jesus with a method usually reserved for rebel slaves and traitors to the Empire. It explains the lack of writing for the first few decades after Jesus' death, as His followers were expecting God to deliver them the victory they were striving to achieve. Then along came Paul, who for some reason picked up Christianity as useful. The original Apostles were hardly going to tell Paul the truth, what with his background in suppressing dissent. So Paul wound up creating a whole new religion based on a garbled version of what Jesus said in public. As Paul's fame grew the Apostles had works written that pointedly did not include Paul. Voila, the synoptic Gospels.

Imagine if the "Kingdom of Heaven" were code for "Sovereign Judea". But obviously things didn't work out to well for Jesus actual followers. And Paul goes on to found a polytheistic Jeudaism, without Mosaic Law
Jesus must be spinning in His grave!

Tom

Now that those who are into T&A have their own special place to go, can we discuss the OP again?

How different does the historical Jesus have to be from the Bible accounts to qualify as a fraud? Must He have made the claims the Gospel writers say He did?

Tom

 

[outhouse]

How different does the historical Jesus have to be from the Bible accounts to qualify as a fraud? Must He have made the claims the Gospel writers say He did?

Tom

It doesnt matter how different he was from real life. That just means people described him differently based on limited knowledge.

It would not prove he was fraudulent.


Fraudulant would mean the man himself tried to trick people, and it doesnt look that way.

 

[oldbadger]

How different does the historical Jesus have to be from the Bible accounts to qualify as a fraud? Must He have made the claims the Gospel writers say He did?

Tom

Hi Tom....
No...... If folks wrote loads of claims and untruths about you, you would not be a fraud. But they would!

 

[columbus]

Hi Tom....
No...... If folks wrote loads of claims and untruths about you, you would not be a fraud. But they would!

That's the way I see it. If Jesus were a fraud there is no way to tell today. He didn't make any claims we know about. All we have is secondhand stories about Him told by people with their own agendas. And it has been too long to even be confident about their agendas.

Tom

 

[steeltoes]

I don't think we can know whether Jesus existed or not, I don't know if that is what the OP is getting at or not, it's not that clear.

 

[columbus]

I don't think we can know whether Jesus existed or not, I don't know if that is what the OP is getting at or not, it's not that clear.

We can't know if Jesus existed. The OP assumed that He did. He couldn't be a fraud if He didn't exist.

Tom

 

[steeltoes]

We can't know if Jesus existed. The OP assumed that He did. He couldn't be a fraud if He didn't exist.

Tom

Okay.

 

[Thief]

Which has nothing to do with historicity of events.

Exactly.
This isn't about Jesus having lived or not.
Here we should be looking to the character.

Did He lie?

 

[steeltoes]

Exactly.
This isn't about Jesus having lived or not.
Here we should be looking to the character.

Did He lie?

Could He lie?

 

[outhouse]

Exactly.
This isn't about Jesus having lived or not.
Here we should be looking to the character.

Did He lie?

We have such limited credible information to base what he really did or said.


All I can personally say, is I don't think so. I think he was deified after death.

He was martyred due to his death at Passover.

 

[VocoInDubium]

Well, that answers my question anyway: obviously you do believe it's OK to re-write history in order to make religion look bad. You're rational being "They started it!".

As you believe mate.

 

[outhouse]

We can't know if Jesus existed.

Tom

Sure we can.


Nothing explains the evidence we have like a martyred man at Passover.


JtB, Caiaphas, Pilate, the Temple, and historical in the same exact time period.

We have many many people from that time period and later telling us how much they hate Paul and what a heretic they think he is.


But not one source says the gospel of Mark is fiction, nor does anyone claim Jesus did not exist.


The people started writing about him and no one during that era said "I was there at Passover and that did not take place"


It looks like Jesus crucifixion was common knowledge by people who lived at that time.

 

[roger1440]

1. Cephas and Mark both knew Yeshua.
2. Ireneaus and Papias both write of their authorship....
3. Don't try to throw either away......
4. G-Mark shows that the author-compiler had INTIMATE KNOWLEDGE of the very subject matter. Such accuracy and mention about small specifics, that no outsider what have focused upon.
EDIT:- The very fact that G-Mark survived in the NT compilation is corroborative evidence that it had to be compiled using Cephas's notes, with Mark's additions, etc.


Lumps of your hypothesis (or your scholar's) fall down, because their opinions are no stronger than those of the lay. Scholar's have value in what they DO, what they can DISCOVER........ their opinions differ from each other so significantly that their scholarship cannot gain ground through their opinions, unless a greater mass of the public might find them appealing.

Are you saying Ireneaus and Papias authenticates the Gospel of Mark?

 

[steeltoes]

Sure we can.


Nothing explains the evidence we have like a martyred man at Passover.


JtB, Caiaphas, Pilate, the Temple, and historical in the same exact time period.

We have many many people from that time period and later telling us how much they hate Paul and what a heretic they think he is.


But not one source says the gospel of Mark is fiction, nor does anyone claim Jesus did not exist.


The people started writing about him and no one during that era said "I was there at Passover and that did not take place"


It looks like Jesus crucifixion was common knowledge by people who lived at that time.

Okay, maybe you can know, but don't expect all of us to be so blessed.

 

[oldbadger]

That's the way I see it. If Jesus were a fraud there is no way to tell today. He didn't make any claims we know about. All we have is secondhand stories about Him told by people with their own agendas. And it has been too long to even be confident about their agendas.

Tom

....second hand stories....
Even today, Courts come to false conclusions made from wrong verdicts .... even when considering recent Direct and Primary evidence.

To turn through weak indirect and secondary evidence that has been fiddled with, from 2000 years ago ...... don't leave an investigator with a whole lot of chances..... = No trusty verdict.

But..... ( ) we can gather what evidence there is (might be) and offer it AS A CASE for or against the existence of Yeshua the hand-worker who-was-a-natural-born-healer.

So far, after a lifetime of conversations and a (recently) reading professor's, doctor's, pro-researchers and lecturer's opinions about him I have not found any two people with exactly the same conclusions.

I am just as happy sitting in a transport cafe and listening to a labourer's ideas as I am reading the opinions of scholars. If any two (detached) scholars could agree (wholly) about this investigation then that might help.

When dealing with secondary and indirect evidence, tampered with, there are no experts.......none at all. I know. I worked for defence solicitors for many years, and also caught thieves for many years, so I know a lot about both sides of the 'evidence' fence.

 

[Thief]

We have such limited credible information to base what he really did or said.


All I can personally say, is I don't think so. I think he was deified after death.

He was martyred due to his death at Passover.

As close to agreement as we have ever been.

 

[steeltoes]

....second hand stories....
Even today, Courts come to false conclusions made from wrong verdicts .... even when considering recent Direct and Primary evidence.

To turn through weak indirect and secondary evidence that has been fiddled with, from 2000 years ago ...... don't leave an investigator with a whole lot of chances..... = No trusty verdict.

But..... ( ) we can gather what evidence there is (might be) and offer it AS A CASE for or against the existence of Yeshua the hand-worker who-was-a-natural-born-healer.

So far, after a lifetime of conversations and a (recently) reading professor's, doctor's, pro-researchers and lecturer's opinions about him I have not found any two people with exactly the same conclusions.

I am just as happy sitting in a transport cafe and listening to a labourer's ideas as I am reading the opinions of scholars. If any two (detached) scholars could agree (wholly) about this investigation then that might help.

When dealing with secondary and indirect evidence, tampered with, there are no experts.......none at all. I know. I worked for defence solicitors for many years, and also caught thieves for many years, so I know a lot about both sides of the 'evidence' fence.

For me this whole discussion is not about whether or not Jesus existed, it is about the amazing logic that people use to arrive at their conclusions. For example, it's been claimed that people believed the gospel story to be true right from the onset of its publication because we have no one saying it wasn't true. It's comforting to know that we can know this, I mean really, first century middle east is an open book, we can somehow know that they all believed and that should be good enough for us, so therefore Jesus existed and we can know this with confidence. Truly amazing.

 

[AmbiguousGuy]

For me this whole discussion is not about whether or not Jesus existed, it is about the amazing logic that people use to arrive at their conclusions. For example, it's been claimed that people believed the gospel story to be true right from the onset of its publication because we have no one saying it wasn't true. It's comforting to know that we can know this, I mean really, first century middle east is an open book, we can somehow know that they all believed and that should be good enough for us, so therefore Jesus existed and we can know this with confidence. Truly amazing.

Yeah, that's a good example. People are absolutely sure that no one ever denied Jesus' historicity in the early days (since that supports their theory).

The same people will claim that we can't know much about Item X (since Item X might cripple their theory.)

Hey, if intellectual humillty ruled the day, everyone would shrug and admit, "Yeah, we really can't know anything about Jesus." ... but that would spoil the game.

 

[outhouse]

Nobody claims the historicity of Jesus due to any one claim.


It is the totality of evidence.


Every angle has debated and so far there is no probable refutation that has made sense.



From a view of ignorance it is easy to cast opinion.

 

[AmbiguousGuy]

Every angle has debated and so far there is no probable refutation that has made sense.

No matter how many times we declare a false thing to be true... it is still false.