Did Jesus Christ Actually Exist?

[joelr]

The quote said “All Mystery religions have personal savior deities”.

They do not.

Well let's clear it up then, there are a few groups found in mystery religions. I wasn't being specific enough. So let the expert explain,


"

The Savior-God Mytheme


Not in ancient Asia. Or anywhere else. Only the West, from Mesopotamia to North Africa and Europe. There was a very common and popular mytheme that had arisen in the Hellenistic period—from at least the death of Alexander the Great in the 300s B.C. through the Roman period, until at least Constantine in the 300s A.D. Nearly every culture created and popularized one: the Egyptians had one, the Thracians had one, the Syrians had one, the Persians had one, and so on. The Jews were actually late to the party in building one of their own, in the form of Jesus Christ. It just didn’t become popular among the Jews, and thus ended up a Gentile religion. But if any erudite religious scholar in 1 B.C. had been asked “If the Jews invented one of these gods, what would it look like?” they would have described the entire Christian religion to a T. Before it even existed. That can’t be a coincidence.


The general features most often shared by all these cults are (when we eliminate all their differences and what remains is only what they share in common):

• They are personal salvation cults (often evolved from prior agricultural cults).
• They guarantee the individual a good place in the afterlife (a concern not present in most prior forms of religion).
• They are cults you join membership with (as opposed to just being open communal religions).
• They enact a fictive kin group (members are now all brothers and sisters).
• They are joined through baptism (the use of water-contact rituals to effect an initiation).
• They are maintained through communion (regular sacred meals enacting the presence of the god).
• They involved secret teachings reserved only to members (and some only to members of certain rank).
• They used a common vocabulary to identify all these concepts and their role.
• They are syncretistic (they modify this common package of ideas with concepts distinctive of the adopting culture).
• They are mono- or henotheistic (they preach a supreme god by whom and to whom all other divinities are created and subordinate).
• They are individualistic (they relate primarily to salvation of the individual, not the community).
• And they are cosmopolitan (they intentionally cross social borders of race, culture, nation, wealth, or even gender).

You might start to notice we’ve almost completely described Christianity already. It gets better. These cults all had a common central savior deity, who shared most or all these features (when, once again, we eliminate all their differences and what remains is only what they share in common):

• They are all “savior gods” (literally so-named and so-called).
• They are usually the “son” of a supreme God (or occasionally “daughter”).
• They all undergo a “passion” (a “suffering” or “struggle,” literally the same word in Greek, patheôn).
• That passion is often, but not always, a death (followed by a resurrection and triumph).
• By which “passion” (of whatever kind) they obtain victory over death.
• Which victory they then share with their followers (typically through baptism and communion).
• They also all have stories about them set in human history on earth.
• Yet so far as we can tell, none of them ever actually existed.

This is sounding even more like Christianity, isn’t it? Odd that. Just mix in the culturally distinct features of Judaism that it was syncretized with, such as messianism, apocalypticism, scripturalism, and the particularly Jewish ideas about resurrection—as well as Jewish soteriology, cosmology, and rituals, and other things peculiar to Judaism, such as an abhorrence of sexuality and an obsession with blood atonement and substitutionary sacrifice—and you literally have Christianity fully spelled out. Before it even existed.


You can find all the evidence and scholarship establishing these facts in Elements 11 and 31 of my book On the Historicity of Jesus (pp. 96-108; 168-73). This “common package” was indeed simply “syncretized” with Jewish elements, ideas, requirements, and sensitivities (e.g. Element 17, ibid., pp. 141-43). The mytheme was simply Judaized. And thence Christianity was born. The “differences” are the Jewish element. The similarities are what were adopted from the widespread mythemes raging with popularity everywhere around them.


The Dying-and-Rising God Mytheme


Not all these savior gods were dying-and-rising gods. That was a sub-mytheme. Indeed, dying-and-rising gods (and mere men) were a broader mytheme; because examples abounded even outside the context of known savior cults (I’ll give you a nearly complete list below). But within the savior cults, a particular brand of dying-and-rising god arose. And Jesus most closely corresponds to that mythotype.


Other savior gods within this context experienced “passions” that did not involve a death. For instance, Mithras underwent some great suffering and struggle (we don’t have many details), through which he acquired his power over death that he then shares with initiates in his cult, but we’re pretty sure it wasn’t a death. Mentions of resurrection as a teaching in Mithraism appear to have been about the future fate of his followers (in accordance with the Persian Zoroastrian notion of a general resurrection later borrowed by the Jews). So all those internet memes listing Mithras as a dying-and-rising god? Not true. So do please stop repeating that claim. Likewise, so far as we can tell Attis didn’t become a rising god until well after Christianity began (and even then his myth only barely equated to a resurrection; previous authors have over-interpreted evidence to the contrary). Most others, however, we have pretty solid evidence for as actually dying, and actually rising savior gods."

Dying-and-Rising Gods: It's Pagan, Guys. Get Over It. • Richard Carrier Blogs

Easter this year lands most fittingly on April Fool’s Day. Because indeed, the resurrection of Jesus is akin to the greatest prank in history. Not because anyone actually faked it (though the evidence we have left, remains fully consistent with their having done so: see Robert Price’s chapter...

www.richardcarrier.info

A category that is generally considered not to be very meaningful by modern scholars.

Not true for Carrier. Klause, Lataster,

Lets look at some journal papers:

The Relationship between Hellenistic Mystery Religions and Early Christianity: A Case Study using Baptism and Eucharist
Jennifer Uzzell
"

Dying/rising demigods


In Pagan Hellenistic and Near Eastern thought, the motif of a “Dying and Rising God” existed for millennia before Christ and there had been stories of divine beings questing into the underworld and returning transformed in some way."



Hellenistic Ideas of Salvation, Author(s): Paul Wendland
Source: The American Journal of Theology , Jul., 1913, Vol. 17, No. 3 (Jul., 1913), pp. 345-351
Published by: The University of Chicago Press Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3154653

"Christian and Hellenistic ideas of redemption cannot be sharply separated.
The deity's resurrection from the dead gives to the initiates, who see their own destiny prefigured in his adventures, hope of a life after death."


But which historical scholar says this and when? Not J.Z. Smith?

So? It would hardly be surprising if Christianity was influenced by its time and place of evolution.

You would expect this regardless.

Yes you would expect it to be syncretic if it was just man-made. And it is. It's Mesopotamian, Persian, Greek and it borrows massive amounts of theology from those nations.

But like all other “gods” who were deified close to their purported lives, he was someone that actually existed.

If we are getting into that, many Greek and Roman leaders were deified while alive. Jesus is a dying/rising savior demigod. Different group.
That is who he is being compared to.
Other dying/rising saviors are listed here:

Dying-and-Rising Gods: It's Pagan, Guys. Get Over It. • Richard Carrier Blogs

Easter this year lands most fittingly on April Fool’s Day. Because indeed, the resurrection of Jesus is akin to the greatest prank in history. Not because anyone actually faked it (though the evidence we have left, remains fully consistent with their having done so: see Robert Price’s chapter...

www.richardcarrier.info

All mythical gods seem to have existed in either mythic time, or at least in a long distant past. This is to be expected.

Can you think of any purely mythical gods who were deified close to their purported lives by people who were their contemporaries or would Jesus be completely unique in that regard?

Yes. Mormonism grew at the same rate of Christianity.

Another is Romulus. The mythical founder of Rome.
From Dr Carrier's OHJ

Romulus

1- The hero son of god

2 - His death is accompanied by prodigies

3 - The land is covered in darkness

4- The heroes corpse goes missing

5 - The hero receives a new immortal body, superior to the one he had

6 - His resurrection body has on occasion a bright shining appearance

7 - After his resurrection he meets with a follower on the road to the city

8 - A speech is given from a summit or high place prior to ascending

9 - An inspired message of resurrection or “translation to heaven” is delivered to witnesses

10 - There is a great commission )an instruction to future followers)

11- The hero physically ascends to heaven in his divine new body

12 - He is taken up into a cloud

13 - There is an explicit role given to eyewitness testimony (even naming the witnesses)

14 - Witnesses are frightened by his appearance and or disappearance

15 - Some witnesses flee

16 - Claims are made of dubious alternative accounts

17 - All of this occurs outside of a nearby but central city

18 - His followers are initially in sorrow over his death

19 - But his post-resurrection story leads to eventual belief, homage and rejoicing

20 - The hero is deified and cult subsequently paid to him (in the same manner as a God)

 

[blü 2]

Looking for some feedback on this. Here's an idea for a line of argument/reasoning I'd like to try out: prove to me that the President of the United States exists.
If I want to be cynical about his existence, there is no amount of evidence that proves his existence.
For example, there are numerous writings about him and the events of his presidency, but the various sources are contradictory. There are numerous pictures and videos, but those can be fabricated. All current scholars agree that Joe Biden exists, but consensus is not proof. "If the president existed, he would fix the border crisis."
Does this make sense as a line of reasoning to demonstrate that one cannot prove the existence of anyone, regardless of the amount of historical evidence? Or is this stupid, and why?

The problem only arises when you start attributing supernatural deeds to Biden. Otherwise we take Biden's existence as a fact unless and until something unignorable arises that shows he doesn't exist.

You can see what pure faith, unsullied by and impervious to facts, can do when you look at the followers of Trump.

 

[joelr]

You should know, since you opened that comment... by gaslighting, trying to go from the factual proposition that the other Gospels including Mark among their sources to the baseless proposition that the Gospels had only Mark as their sole source.

Nope, not a great way to apologize for gaslighting, by just making up lies? Baseless? Note #37.

Dr Carrier:

41 Reasons We're, Like, Totes Sure Jesus Existed! • Richard Carrier Blogs

People often ask me about Christian apologist James Bishop’s “41 Reasons Why Scholars Know Jesus Really Existed.” Because it’s the highest number of reasons anyone has attempted to claim (apart from the 10/42 apologetic, which Matthew Ferguson thoroughly annihilated). This piece doesn’t try...

www.richardcarrier.info

4. “The Gospels”

“This should actually count for four reasons to accept Jesus’ existence as each Gospel is an independent account of his life.” Nope. See above. Every Gospel is just an embellished redaction of Mark. Even John (OHJ, ch. 10.7).

32. “Q Document/Source”

Doesn’t exist (OHJ, pp. 269-70, 470-73).

And even if it did, for all we know it was just another redaction of Mark.

Contrary to what Bishop claims, there is absolutely no evidence whatever that Q was written before Mark, or even that it didn’t use Mark as a source—that Q was separate from Mark is based solely on a circular argument.


33. “L Document/Source”

Doesn’t exist. See item 4.

34. “M Document/Source”

Doesn’t exist. See item 4.

35. “Pre-Markan source”

Doesn’t exist (OHJ, ch. 10.4). This is nothing but a speculative invention of Christian apologetics.

36. “Q, L, M, pre-Mark were likely multiple sources themselves”

There is absolutely no reason to believe this. Or that any of these sources even existed in the first place. Bishop simply deploys a possibiliter fallacy (Proving History, ch. 2, Axiom 5), arguing from what is merely possible, to what is somehow magically probable.

37. “Pre-John Source”

Doesn’t exist (OHJ. ch. 10.7). John is a free redaction of Mark and Luke. With even more ridiculous embellishments than were attempted by Matthew.


"By contrast, when you consult my section on this in On the Historicity of Jesus, you’ll see a large list of recent top scholars who have published peer reviewed studies on the authorship and redaction-history of John. These are not hacks or radicals. These are the leading mainstream experts in the field."

I have this, we can go over it.

So this is an amusing bit of irony.

sorry, there is some irony but it's not from what you think.

A self-own, you could say.

You could say. Seems to be common, I mean, lean into the gaslighting and then be completely wrong with your argument? Ok?

You're doing a good job demonstrating how mythicism is more ideological than rational or evidential. This is about going scorched Earth against Christianity, even if you have to sacrifice rationality, evidence, or truth to do so. That's... sad. And hypocritical.

The Synoptic Problem is not about mythicism. It's about Mark wrote a fictive story, maybe he used a human Rabbi as the Hellenistic savior demigod, we don't know? Once again, from Robert H. Stein’s The Synoptic Problem: An Introduction, 8 solid arguments why Mark is the source. On a Christian site, written by believing Christians who do honest scholarship.

The Synoptic Problem | Bible.org

Any serious discussion of the Synoptic Gospels must, sooner or later, involve a discussion of the literary interrelationships among Matthew, Mark, and Luke. This is essential in order to see how an author used his sources (both for reliability’s sake as well as for redactional criticism), as...

bible.org

Baseless?


Jesus Archaeology # 8 Does the Gospel of John Have any Worthwhile Historical Evidence?

Dr James Tabor


6:40 Matthew rewrites Mark, Luke rewrites Mark


7:00 It is likely that John knows Marks Gospel.

John is not demonstrated to have any other sources.

Why You Should Not Believe the Apostle John Wrote the Last Gospel • Richard Carrier Blogs

This month I have been showcasing how apologetics is fundamentally bankrupt methodologically. It depends on fallacious reasoning, held up as sound and professional, yet which adheres to the methods of no actual legitimate academic field—except those very fields dominated by apologetics, whose...

www.richardcarrier.info

As I wrote in On the Historicity of Jesus (see there for abundantly cited scholarship):

That John is responding to Luke is actually a growing consensus in Johannine studies; likewise that John has been multiply redacted, such that our version is not the one originally written. … External evidence placing the Gospel of John’s appearance in history is also the scarcest [relative to the previous three Gospels]. It could have been written as late as the 140s (some argue even later) or as early as the 100s (provided Luke was written in the 90s [which a growing consensus now considers its earliest likely date]). I will arbitrarily side with the earlier of those dates. John was redacted multiple times and thus had multiple authors. (This is already the consensus of Johannine experts.) Nothing is known of them. John’s authors (plural) claim to have used a written source composed by an anonymous eyewitness (21.20-25), but that witness does not exist in any prior Gospel, yet is conspicuously inserted into John’s rewrites of their narratives (e.g. compare Jn 20.2 with Lk. 24.12 [likewise his insertion into the fishing story and last supper story and crucifixion story and his replacement of the resurrections at Nain and Gerasa]) and so is almost certainly a fabrication (as I show in Chapter 10, §7).
OHJ, pp. 268-69

Why You Should Not Believe the Apostle John Wrote the Last Gospel​

Of course the main problem with the Christian faith-belief that “the Apostle” John wrote the Gospel John is that the Gospel now named John never once says any such person wrote it. The title line (“according to John”) was added by the later editor who assembled this Gospel with the three Synoptics into a new “foursquare” edition to combat Marcion’s canon (whose was the first actual canon assembled, which does not survive). Worse, the Gospel itself says no Apostle wrote it—of any name. This is often disguised by specious translating, but the actual Greek text of John 21:24, referring to the anonymous “disciple” whom Christians now identify as John the Apostle (even though the Gospel of John never does), says “that” (whoever that is) is “the disciple who testifies regarding these things and who wrote them down, and we know that his testimony is true.” Likewise in John 19:35, which in the Greek says (referring to Jesus being stabbed by a spear), “And the one who saw this has borne witness, and his testimony is true, and that man knows that he speaks the truth, so that you [plural] may believe.”

These are all references to a source, not an author. An anonymous “we” are the actual authors of this book, and they claim to have consulted something this unnamed disciple wrote—meaning, not what they are writing, but something else. The implication is that these authors were using some now lost Gospel or testimonium. But Christians routinely fabricated sources like this: see Element 44 in Chapter 5 of On the Historicity of Jesus, as well as the fake Abgar correspondence, the fake Pilate correspondence, the fake correspondence of Paul and Seneca, Eusebius’s ready fabrication of history, or that of Apollinaris, and so on. Fabricating sources was a common tactic in ancient hagiography generally (Alan Cameron devotes an entire chapter to the phenomenon in Greek Mythography in the Roman World). And that is not the only reason to conclude no such person or source really existed (I’ll summarize the full case below) or that if it did, that it was itself fake—whether that fact was known or unknown to John’s actual authors claiming to have used this now-lost written “source.”



baseless?
You are way to hung on this mythicism thing, the Gospels are fiction either way. Romulus was fictional but there could have been a leader named Romulus but he obviously didn't ascend to heaven and become the national god and return after ascension. That part is the fiction. But with Romulus there was no person. And Jesus has a very similar story.

 

[Augustus]

Yes. Mormonism grew at the same rate of Christianity.

Another is Romulus. The mythical founder of Rome.

Joseph Smith was not a god, and actually existed.

Romulus was not deified within a generation of his purported life by people who were his contemporaries.

So, if Jesus was purely mythical, he would be unique in this regard (unless you can think of any actual examples). On the other hand, were he a human who was deified, this would be fairly common.

 

[joelr]

Joseph Smith was not a god, and actually existed.

The myth, the golden plates, the revelations, similar growth rate. But right, the similarity is the angel Moroni who came and gave Smith revelations.

Romulus was not deified within a generation of his purported life by people who were his contemporaries.

Yes he was, his story is very similar to the Jesus narrative in many ways. Right down to the passion narrative.

Plutarch tells us about annual public ceremonies that were still being performed, which celebrated the day Romulus ascended to heaven.
The story goes, at the end of his life, amid rumors he was murdered by a conspiracy of the senate (just as Jesus was murdered by a "conspiracy of the Jews"), in fact by the Sanhedrin, the Jewish equivalent of the senate. The sun went dark, (just as it did for Jesus), and Romulus's body vanished (just as Jesus did).
The people wanted to search for him but the senate told them no, "for he has risen to the gods" (much as a mysterious man tells a woman in Mark's Gospel). Most went away happy, hooping for good things from their new god, but some doubted (just as all later Gospels say of Jesus).
Soon after a close friend of Romulus, Proculus, reported he met Romulus "on the road" nearby town and asked him "Why have you abandoned us?", to which Romulus replied he had been God all along but had come down to earth and became incarnate to establish a great kingdom, and now had to return to his home in heaven. (pretty much as happens to Cleopas in Lk).
Then Romulus told his friend to tell Romans that if they are virtuous they will have all worldly power.

Luke converts this tale and inverts the message of Romulus. There are many more similarities.


Mark may have been fashioning Jesus into the new Roomulus with a new superior message, a superior kingdom. The Romulan tale looks a lot like a skeleton for the passion narrative. A great man, founder of a great kingdoom, despite coming from lowly origins is actually an incarnated son of god, dies as the result of a conspiracy, darkness covers the land, his body vanishes, those who follow him flee in fear, are told he is not here, he has risen, some doubt, then the risen god appears to select followers to deliver his gospel.


This tale is widely attested as pre-Christian, Plutarch is recording a long established Roman tale and custom and his sources are pre-christian.
Cicero, Laws 1.3, Republic 2.10; Livy, From the Founding City 11.16.2-8. The story's antiquity was acknowledged by Christians: Tertullian, Apology 21.

Now we don't hear about Jesus until the 50's and it's vague. 20 years. The Gospel tales are way further out. This sounds very similar to Romulus. According to the story it happened in real time, just like the Gospel narratives. Which were probably compiled and invented over a few decades. Until Mark who had a clear plan and knew exactly what he wanted to rewrite, OT, Romulus, Hellenistic theology, Homer, Paul, hero narrative.....

So, if Jesus was purely mythical, he would be unique in this regard (unless you can think of any actual examples). On the other hand, were he a human who was deified, this would be fairly common.

Besides Romulus Carrier goes on to say in OHJ:


There were, in fact numerous pre-Christian savior gods who became incarnate and underwent sufferings or trials, even death and resurrections. None of them actually existed, neither did Romulus. Yet all were placed in history, and often given detailed biographies. Just like Plutarch's.
pg 58

 

[Ebionite]

Since when is for example parting of the sea a public observation?

The public observation is the of the texts that describe the event and the larger context of the related texts and physical artifacts.

 

[joelr]

The public observation is the of the texts that describe the event and the larger context of the related texts and physical artifacts.

Like the Mormon Bible, The Quran and Hindu scripture. And Bahai scripture. Oh doesn't work for them. You neither.

 

[Augustus]

The myth, the golden plates, the revelations, similar growth rate. But right, the similarity is the angel Moroni who came and gave Smith revelations.

Thank you for confirming he is not an example of what I asked for.

Yes he was,

Nonsense. Don’t be silly.

There is no evidence for this and mythical founders of cities are not invented in real time as the myths describe fictional foundations for real cities with real histories. The myths get invented after the city has become established, and this is a long and gradual process of growth and evolution.

Romulus was not deified close to his purported life, but many centuries later.

There were, in fact numerous pre-Christian savior gods who became incarnate and underwent sufferings or trials, even death and resurrections. None of them actually existed, neither did Romulus. Yet all were placed in history, and often given detailed biographies. Just like Plutarch's.

Numerous gods, none of whom were created within a generation of their purported lives by their contemporaries.

On the other hand, the humans who were deified tended to be deified during their lives or by their contemporaries after death.

 

[blü 2]

Your opinion about what constitutes authentication isn't relevant.

My opinion ─ my observation ─ is a direct and relevant response to your question about bias.

Put it this way ─ either the yeti is a creature found in reality, and is therefore of interest to those who study of animals; or else the yeti is not found in reality and thus exists only as an idea, concept, thing imagined in an individual brain.

And the same goes for supernatural beings.

How do you see it?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Since when is for example parting of the sea a public observation?

The public observation is the of the texts that describe the event and the larger context of the related texts and physical artifacts.

For example?

 

[Ebionite]

My opinion ─ my observation

Opinions are subjective, facts are not.

 

[Ebionite]

For example?

Look it up.

 

[blü 2]

Opinions are subjective, facts are not.

It is a fact that we have not one authenticated example of a supernatural being in reality ie found in the world external to the self. So far they exist solely as concepts, notions, things imagined in individual brains, frequently as the result of acculturation.

 

[Ebionite]

It is a fact that we have not one authenticated example of a supernatural being in reality ie found in the world external to the self. So far they exist solely as concepts, notions, things imagined in individual brains, frequently as the result of acculturation.

Again, your opinion about authentication is irrelevant.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Again, your opinion about authentication is irrelevant.

Why irrelevant?

 

[joelr]

Thank you for confirming he is not an example of what I asked for.

Right, and then below you go and make stuff up. Super. But the growth of the Mormon myth is similar in timeline to the Christian myth.

Nonsense. Don’t be silly.

So silly, quoting Plutarch. I'm sure you will have the exact dates since you seem to find it silly.

There is no evidence for this

Plutarch, Life of Romulus

and mythical founders of cities are not invented in real time as the myths describe fictional foundations for real cities with real histories.

and dying/rising savior demigods are also not invented in real time. In the 50's we get stories of an already spirit Jesus appearing to Paul.
Decades later we get an earthly story that Paul knew none of and 38 years is the average lifetime at this time. But we have 50% Gnostic gospels, 40 Acts and many other forged, made up text. Sounds quite made up.

The myths get invented after the city has become established, and this is a long and gradual process of growth and evolution.

That is why Genesis was written in 600BCE, they became established, exiled, came across other myths, returned home and began to write their own stories.
Greeks conquer Judea 332 - 110 B.C.Greek idea (Hellenism) flows into Judaism.
Eventually stories about their own savior begin.

Now, we get to the 2nd century and what do we have? A story about Jesus? No. A huge mess of conflating ideas.



These various interpretations were called heresies by the leaders of the proto-orthodox church, but many were very popular and had large followings. Part of the unifying trend in proto-orthodoxy was an increasingly harsh anti-Judaism and rejection of Judaizers. Some of the major movements were:

• Gnosticism – second to fourth centuries – reliance on revealed knowledge from an unknowable God, a distinct divinity from the Demiurge who created and oversees the material world. The Gnostics claimed to have received secret teachings (gnosis) from Jesus via other apostles which were not publicly known, or in the case of Valentinius from Paul the Apostle. Gnosticism is predicated on the existence of such hidden knowledge, but brief references to private teachings of Jesus have also survived in the canonic scripture (Mark 4:11) as did warning by the Christ that there would be false prophets or false teachers. Irenaeus' opponents also claimed that the wellsprings of divine inspiration were not dried up, which is the doctrine of continuing revelation.[citation needed]
• Marcionism – second century – the God of Jesus was a different God from the God of the Old Testament.
• Montanism – second century – a pentecostal movement initiated by Montanus and his female disciples, featuring prophetic continuing revelations from the Holy Spirit.
• Adoptionism – second century – Jesus was not born the Son of God, but was adopted at his baptism, resurrection or ascension.
• Docetism – second to third century – Jesus was pure spirit and his physical form an illusion.
• Sabellianism – third century – the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three modes of the one God and not the three separate persons of the Trinity.
• Arianism – third to fourth century – Jesus, while not merely mortal, was not eternally divine and was of some lesser status than God the Father.[note 1]

In the middle of the second century, the Christian communities of Rome, for example, were divided between followers of Marcion, Montanism, and the gnostic teachings of Valentinus.

Many groups were dualistic, maintaining that reality was composed into two radically opposing parts: matter, usually seen as evil, and spirit, seen as good. Proto-orthodox Christianity, on the other hand, held that both the material and spiritual worlds were created by God and were therefore both good, and that this was represented in the unified divine and human natures of Christ.[63] Trinitarianism held that God the Father, God the Son, and the Holy Spirit were all strictly one being with three hypostases.


The official canon was not developed until closer to the 3rd century. In 313 the council made it official. So we are at centuries later now.

Romulus was not deified close to his purported life, but many centuries later.

What is your source?

When the Greeks invaded a nation, that nation always came out with a mystery religion. Similar to Christianity. You are going to claim this always happens centuries later, yet Hellenism starts 3rd century BCE and Christainity is the last version.

Elusinian Mysteries = Mycenaean + Hellenistic


Bacchic Mysteries = Phoenician + Hellenistic


Mysteries of Attis and Cybele = Phrygian + Hellenistic


Mysteries of Baal = Anatolian + Hellenistic


Mysteries of Mithras = Persian + Hellenistic


Mysteries of Isis and Osiris = Egyptian + Hellenistic


Christian Mysteries = Jewish + Hellenistic

On the other hand, the humans who were deified tended to be deified during their lives or by their contemporaries after death.

There are many similar myths and the timeline is something you are making up.


Not only does Plutarch say Osiris returned to life and was recreated, exact terms for resurrection (anabiôsis and paliggenesia: On Isis and Osiris 35; see my discussion in The Empty Tomb, pp. 154-55), and also describe his physically returning to earth after his death (Plutarch, On Isis and Osiris 19), but the physical resurrection of Osiris’s corpse is explicitly described in pre-Christian pyramid inscriptions! Osiris was also resurrected, according to Plutarch, on the “third day,” and died during a full moon, just like Christ: Passover occurs during the full moon; and in Plutarch, On Isis and Osiris 39 and 42, Osiris dies on the 17th of Athyr, the concluding day of the full moon, and is raised on the 19th, two days later—thus three days inclusively, just like Jesus.

The official canon of Jesus took centuries and it was just picking what they liked the most for the story.
But the first Gospel, Mark, is full of rewrites and metaphors. When you take them aside there is zero history. OT, Moses, Elijah, Romulus, hero narrative, Jesis Ben A, Homer, Paul, Greek theology, Persian end-times theology, OT wisdom/Hillel school...

 

[Augustus]

So silly, quoting Plutarch. I'm sure you will have the exact dates since you seem to find it silly

Haha, you consider it problematic that Christian texts were written a few decades after Jesus’ purported life, then insist that Plutarch writing around 700 years after Romulus’ purported life is great evidence Romulus was deified by his contemporaries.

Doesn’t seem very intellectually honest to me.

What is your source?

You are aware that Romulus didn’t actually found Rome, aren’t you?

That Rome gradually emerged from smaller settlements, and only got its founding myths after it had already become a significant city?

Plutarch puts the founding of Rome at 8th C BC, when do you think the earliest historical source is that could accurately verify that Romulus was deified by his contemporaries?

There are no sources of course that could possibly do this.

Stop being silly with this ridiculous attempt to fit the evidence to your preconceived opinions.

There are many similar myths and the timeline is something you are making up.

So you can’t name a single entirely mythical god deified by his contemporaries?

Thank you for acknowledging that.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I think we all know about the controversial writings of The Antiquities of the Jews by Flavius Josephus and The Annals of Tacitus for example. Some say the parts about Jesus in their writings were forgeries and others think they were authentic. But these men were not even born at the time of the supposed crucifixion of Jesus that happened in 30-33AD. They were born after his death.

The only reason I might believe that Jesus existed 'possibly' is through the Pilate stone finding by archaeologists in 1961 which was dated between AD 26-37. And this is the correct time frame for the events described in the Gospels. But this is not evidence for Jesus but for Pontius Pilate.

The translation from Latin to English for the inscription reads:

To the Divine Augusti [this] Tiberieum...Pontius Pilate...prefect of Judea...has dedicated [this]...


Confirming this biblical figure's existence was crucial insofar that he played an important role in the execution of Jesus. This makes me think it's more plausible now that Pontius Pilate probably knew of a man named Jesus at the time and maybe even had a man named Jesus executed. But this is me just imagining such a scenario now. I can't ask Pilate what really happened then because he's been dead for about 2,000 years.

So, what is the evidence for Jesus?

First, I'm not a mythicist.
I consider it quite plausible that the Jesus story is based on a real historical figure (or several historical figures) and turned into legend / myth.
But it doesn't keep me awake at night. Frankly, it matters not to me if there was actually such a figure around which the religion was build or not.

Having said that.... I don't think the evidence for the existence of a Pontius Pilate prefect changes anything.
To me, that's not different from a story where The Avenger members receive a medal from president Obama at the white house for saving the world.

Finding evidence that president Obama was real and that he lived in the white house, doesn't count as evidence for The Avengers being real.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

To me, Bible is the evidence.

The bible is the claim. It can't be evidence of itself.

I don't think we would have it, if Jesus was not real.

We have LOADS of religious books and legendary stories that aren't real.
Your personal thoughts or preferences or hopes aren't really relevant.

It's not like we don't have precedents here of people making up stuff....
Hercules, Romulus & Remus, etc.
History, religions and mythology is filled with fictional characters presented as "real".

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

And that is possibly why Paul, formerly known as Saul, was approached by Jesus in a great blinding light.

Or so the story goes.