KillerMovies - Movies That Matter!

REGISTER HERE TO JOIN IN! - It's easy and it's free!
Home » Community » General Discussion Forum » Religion Forum » Did a historical Jesus exist?

Did a historical Jesus exist?
You do not have permission to vote on this poll.
Yes 14 51.85%
No 9 33.33%
Don't know or don't care. 4 14.81%
Total: 27 votes 100%
  [Edit Poll (moderators only)]

Did a historical Jesus exist?
Started by: Da Pittman

Forum Jump:
Post New Thread    Post A Reply
Pages (6): « 1 2 [3] 4 5 » ... Last »   Last Thread   Next Thread
Author
Thread
Ushgarak
Paladin

Gender: Male
Location: Chelmsford, Essex, UK

Co-Admin

ushomefree, I hope the change to small text is permanent. Don't post in such big font in future.

Anyway. Whilst it is true that historians like Tactitus are not contempories of Jesus, we tend to value their contributions to plenty of other areas which are equally not recorded by contemporary scholars yet which we take as our best guide to that history. His mention of Jesus is no less than any of that. Historians in that period tended to be respected people who were not expected to justify their work with sources to everyone reading it. Nonetheless within their own scholarly fraternity there were certain standards. Tacitus is a trusted historical source and we cannot just ignore that in this single instance and keep all the rest. Furthermore, there is no motivation for Tactitus to make any of it up or to incllude it without good reason, as the mention is sucvh a sideline of a larger subject. There was nothing in it for him to do so.

A better doubt to Tactitus word is that he might simply have been echoing the word of someone else who was mistaken. But this only brings us back to the same problem- basically, this could apply to just about everything we know about ancient history.

The best sources we have for understanding ancient times are these very historians and Jesus is mentioned by them. No, it's not proof, but none of this ancient history is proof. But the best guidelines we have says such a man did exist. Of course, that's all they say. Of his works and deeds we know nothing.


__________________



"We've got maybe seconds before Darth Rosenberg grinds everybody into Jawa burgers and not one of you buds has the midi-chlorians to stop her!"

"You've never had any TINY bit of sex, have you?"

BtVS

Old Post Jul 18th, 2007 01:37 PM
Ushgarak is currently offline Click here to Send Ushgarak a Private Message Find more posts by Ushgarak Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
tsilamini
Junior Member

Gender: Unspecified
Location:

I think people are missing a very important point

Do you know how many "messiahs" are out there today? Not just the crazies on street corners, but those pseudo-intellectuals who speak as if they have a connection to deeper knowledge? You know, they are on Oprah and Montel all the time.

Well, guess what, they were ALWAYS around. I bet if you go back to the year 0, you can find hundreds if not thousands of people who considered themselves to be the Jewish Messiah.

I think the argument that "oh, there was probably someone" is just a cop out, seeing as there were probably hundreds. To say with any conclusiveness that any one of them was the true messiah is ridiculous.


__________________
yes, a million times yes

Old Post Jul 18th, 2007 01:48 PM
tsilamini is currently offline Click here to Send tsilamini a Private Message Find more posts by tsilamini Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
mr.smiley
Senior Member

Gender: Male
Location: beyond time and space

quote: (post)
Originally posted by ushomefree
Mr. Smiley-

The Christian faith is founded on Jesus Christ and His resurrection. Before the New Testament gospels were even written, the early Christian leaders declared their belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus through a statement of belief known as a creed. The earliest record of the Christian creed is presented by Paul and found in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8:


“For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the scriptures: And that He was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve: After that, He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep. After that, He was seen of James; then of all the apostles. And last of all He was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.”

One of the biggest arguments against the Christian faith is that the resurrection story is a myth that developed over as much as a century after Jesus was crucified on a Roman cross. It was originally thought that the gospel accounts were written as much as 100 years after Jesus walked the earth. Recent scholarship in manuscript reliability and textual criticism now places the gospels at 30 to 50 years after Jesus. Why is the above passage so important? Because Biblical scholars, using the historical records of Paul and his early travels to Damascus and Jerusalem, place the above scripture at about 35 A.D., just 3 to 5 years after the death of Jesus Christ. This is dramatic, because those same scholars would hold that this basic creed for the Christian faith developed far too quickly for a myth to develop and distort the historical record of the resurrection.

Since the foundation of the Christian Faith is Jesus Christ and His resurrection, then the historical veracity of His life, death and resurrection are tantamount. For as Paul declared later in his letter to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 15:14-17):


“And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ: whom He raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.”

The majority of sources provided in my previous message supporting the historical Jesus were "non-Christian." Your counter argument is baseless--completely false. It does not take all day to recognize sunshine, and I am at complete odds with people that deny the historical Jesus. Do your research, please. No pun intended.



With all due respect,you list a bunch of names,type in bold text,and quote some Bible passages.I have done my research long enough and a lot of these arguments have already been made.You offer the talmud as supporting evidence of Christ.This is very loosely based and can be debated either way.It mentions Yehoshua/Jesus,which isn't suprising.Josephus mentions no less than 10 jesus'.Passages have been translated to manipulate different Jesus' into one character in his writings through biased translations..They even call the man Yeshu the Nazarene.Again,nothing impressive.The Nazerens were a religios branch of the Jews and does not mean from Nazereth,as many have speculated. or guessed.The Talmud wasn't written until 200 CE.It was supposedly based on older writings but that is as old as it gets in terms of physical evidence.The chronology offered in the Talmud is very vague and some scholars have noted how the dates given to the Yehoshua of the Talmud very by 200 years.I could go on about more of your sources,but inimalist summed up in a paragraph what it would take me three pages worth of writing to do,so I will move on to the end of your reply to Debbie JO.

Did something big happen for so many people to be willing to die in the name of Christ?Why would so many offer their lives if nothing happened at all?Most Christ enthusiast bring this point up and belive it to be unique to the Christian faith,when in truth their is nothing unique about it at all.

Christians were offered up as sacrifices to the gods and were horribly executed for their beliefs.This same fate was handed upon the initiates of Dionysus as well.The followers of Mithra also went through terrible persecution for their beliefs.While many belive ther persecution of Christians lasted for a long time and that many were killed,we really know little about it.Looking back at the works of Origen he tells us that the Christians who died for their faith were easily numbered.

To say Christians are unique because they died for their beliefs offers little to nothing in terms of verifiying a historical Christ.It tells they belived in something,I will admit that,but we can apply this same fundementalist belief to religious fanatics flying planes into builings because they belive they will be blessed with virgins in paradise.We can apply this thinking to bizarre cults who commit mass suicide beliving they will be taken to higher intellegence on the back of a comet.We can apply this thinking to the iinitiates of Dionysus,who also died for their beliefs.In the end,you could attempt to verify any religion by these means.

What further complicates the history of Christianity is some of the earliest members of this faith.The Gnostics.To dispute matters even more,some Gnostic groups belived Christ never even exisisted,and many of these Gnostics were persecuted for this belief,which they held true.I can use the same arguement and claim Jesus couldn't have existed because Gnostics were persecuted and killed for beliving he didn't exist.


__________________
Check out my sound cloud.

http://soundcloud.com/pytt-1

Old Post Jul 19th, 2007 07:49 PM
mr.smiley is currently offline Click here to Send mr.smiley a Private Message Find more posts by mr.smiley Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
The Grey Fox
Restricted

Gender: Unspecified
Location: Unspecified Purpose: Unspecified

Account Restricted

I'M BACK. IT IS TIME.


__________________


Old Post Jul 19th, 2007 08:47 PM
The Grey Fox is currently offline Click here to Send The Grey Fox a Private Message Find more posts by The Grey Fox Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

Bump.

Plan on posting some stuff on this topic. It is fascinating, indeed.

Particularly fascinating is that there are at least several "dying and rising" gods that predate Jesus in the general location. So clearly it's not a coincidence that such a character that influenced a huge religion originated in this area instead of say, Japan or China...


__________________

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 09:38 PM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Adam_PoE
Senior Member

Gender: Male
Location: Royal Palace

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Patient_Leech
Bump.

Plan on posting some stuff on this topic. It is fascinating, indeed.

Particularly fascinating is that there are at least several "dying and rising" gods that predate Jesus in the general location. So clearly it's not a coincidence that such a character that influenced a huge religion originated in this area instead of say, Japan or China...



I have his book, it is good. I have not gotten all the way through it yet, it is a little repetitive. But it is because he throroughly addresses every point, and lays out a very robust case.


__________________

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 10:04 PM
Adam_PoE is currently offline Click here to Send Adam_PoE a Private Message Find more posts by Adam_PoE Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Adam_PoE
I have his book, it is good. I have not gotten all the way through it yet, it is a little repetitive. But it is because he throroughly addresses every point, and lays out a very robust case.


On The Historicity...?

Yeah, I hear it's long and thorough.

Please, do share any tidbits you find particularly interesting.


__________________

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 10:15 PM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Blakemore
Restricted

Gender: Male
Location: The station!

Account Restricted

There are no historical records of Jesus outside of the Bible: Fact.

Mithra, Krishna, Attis, Dionysus, Hercules, Thor and even Joseph all had similar stories of miracle births and healing the sick. The oldest one, I believe, was Horus, from ancient Egypt.


__________________
Sig by Nuke Nixon

Last Edited by Blakemore on Jan 1st, 2000, at 00:00 AM

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 10:31 PM
Blakemore is currently offline Click here to Send Blakemore a Private Message Find more posts by Blakemore Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Blakemore
There are no historical records of Jesus outside of the Bible: Fact.

Mithra, Krishna, Attis, Dionysus, Hercules, Thor and even Joseph all had similar stories of miracle births and healing the sick. The oldest one, I believe, was Horus, from ancient Egypt.




I think these are the main dying and rising gods that predate Hey-Zeus...
...

Attachment: dyingandrising.jpg
This has been downloaded 0 time(s).


__________________

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 10:39 PM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Blakemore
Restricted

Gender: Male
Location: The station!

Account Restricted

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Patient_Leech
I think these are the main dying and rising gods that predate Hey-Zeus...
...
Inanna looks hot. Are you sure she's a virgin?


__________________
Sig by Nuke Nixon

Last Edited by Blakemore on Jan 1st, 2000, at 00:00 AM

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 10:47 PM
Blakemore is currently offline Click here to Send Blakemore a Private Message Find more posts by Blakemore Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Blakemore
Inanna looks hot. Are you sure she's a virgin?


Haha.. that I don't know.

She may even be a fertility goddess of some sort, who knows...


__________________

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 10:49 PM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

...

Attachment: inanna1.jpg
This has been downloaded 0 time(s).


__________________

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 11:01 PM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Blakemore
Restricted

Gender: Male
Location: The station!

Account Restricted

dark


__________________
Sig by Nuke Nixon

Last Edited by Blakemore on Jan 1st, 2000, at 00:00 AM

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 11:23 PM
Blakemore is currently offline Click here to Send Blakemore a Private Message Find more posts by Blakemore Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
eThneoLgrRnae
Restricted

Gender: Male
Location: United States

Account Restricted

Yup, He absolutely did... not only that, but He still does as the the Son of God. wink


__________________
Paleontologists have tried to turn Archaeopteryx into an earth bound feathered dinosaur. But it is not. It is a bird, a perching bird. And no amount of 'paleobabble' is going to change that.-- Alan Feduccia-a world authority on birds, quoted in "Archaeopteryx:Early Bird Catches a Can of Worms," Science 1994, p.764-765

Old Post Nov 20th, 2021 11:31 PM
eThneoLgrRnae is currently offline Click here to Send eThneoLgrRnae a Private Message Find more posts by eThneoLgrRnae Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

quote: (post)
Originally posted by eThneoLgrRnae
Yup, He absolutely did... not only that, but He still does as the the Son of God.


Fixed. And...

(please log in to view the image)


__________________

Old Post Nov 21st, 2021 01:31 AM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Darth Thor
Senior Member

Gender: Male
Location: Asgard

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Blakemore
There are no historical records of Jesus outside of the Bible: Fact.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...-lived-and-died

Old Post Nov 21st, 2021 12:37 PM
Darth Thor is currently offline Click here to Send Darth Thor a Private Message Find more posts by Darth Thor Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Blakemore
Restricted

Gender: Male
Location: The station!

Account Restricted

quote: (post)
Josephus' record was a plagiarism, the others only mention the "Christ" or "Jesus, brother of James."

They don't actually go into the detail that you read in the Bible. People can't even accurately say when he was born, and seriously, a virgin birth? Curing lepracy? Walking on water? Use your ****ing head.


__________________
Sig by Nuke Nixon

Last Edited by Blakemore on Jan 1st, 2000, at 00:00 AM

Old Post Nov 21st, 2021 12:52 PM
Blakemore is currently offline Click here to Send Blakemore a Private Message Find more posts by Blakemore Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Darth Thor
Senior Member

Gender: Male
Location: Asgard

Call down dude. You implied his existence was factually own recorded in the Bible. I posted an argument piece showing thats not quite true.

Old Post Nov 21st, 2021 01:41 PM
Darth Thor is currently offline Click here to Send Darth Thor a Private Message Find more posts by Darth Thor Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Blakemore
Restricted

Gender: Male
Location: The station!

Account Restricted

"the Christ" is a title. Many messiahs were recorded around the time.

It's much more likely the Catholic Church wanted to unite all the messiahs into one single entity. Even the Orthodox Christians see Jesus existing in different forms than just one man.


__________________
Sig by Nuke Nixon

Last Edited by Blakemore on Jan 1st, 2000, at 00:00 AM

Old Post Nov 21st, 2021 04:16 PM
Blakemore is currently offline Click here to Send Blakemore a Private Message Find more posts by Blakemore Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
Patient_Leech
Ungod

Gender: Male
Location: AMERIKA

quote: (post)
quote: (post)
Originally posted by Blakemore
Josephus' record was a plagiarism, the others only mention the "Christ" or "Jesus, brother of James."


It's true, the mention of Jesus in the writings of Josephus is highly suspect and almost certainly a forgery. That's the problem with a lot of the remaining history over the years is that it has so much Christian contamination all over it. "Christian interpolation," which is basically the fancy word for scribal counterfeit/forgery/alteration. Even the biggest atheist proponent of Jesus' historicity, Bart Ehrman, has books and talks about the many forgeries and contradictions. So the evidence of Jesus' existence to say one way or the other is highly tampered with and anything that would confirm his non-existence was likely destroyed. You'd have to assume that if these religious scribes were adding things to make Jesus seem like a real historical person, they'd almost certainly be eliminating anything that questioned his existence. Jesus' historicity became more central to the religion as it grew.


"It is also difficult to imagine why Christian writers would invent such a thoroughly Jewish saviour figure..."

It's statements like that that are misleading and annoying. Clearly there was a "dying and rising" god trend at the time, and there was apparently even a trend to insert them into history. It doesn't seem much different from our fiction writings today, like Spiderman is New York city or pick your superhero. Why is that so difficult to imagine?

Another thing that tends to get left out is that there seems to be sort of an institutionalized dogma of historicity in academia because if you even question the idea, you will have your career derailed terribly. So it's only those who don't rely on such funding and career stability who can question the dogma.

It just seems odd to me that if you're writing allegorical parables about this new Jewish "dying and rising" god, why would you bother to pick a real person to base it on? Obviously all the miracles, raising people from the dead, walking on water, and death and resurrection, etc is made up. So it just makes sense that the entire figure is made up, too.

But anyway, since the history is such a mess, I think Richard Carrier has said that he puts the odds of there actually being an historical Jesus at about 1 in 3.

Oh, and any article that continues to show "Jesus the White Dude" pictures needs to immediately lose all credibility... haha...


__________________

Old Post Nov 21st, 2021 08:32 PM
Patient_Leech is currently offline Click here to Send Patient_Leech a Private Message Find more posts by Patient_Leech Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote Quick Quote
All times are UTC. The time now is 07:31 PM.
Pages (6): « 1 2 [3] 4 5 » ... Last »   Last Thread   Next Thread

Home » Community » General Discussion Forum » Religion Forum » Did a historical Jesus exist?

Email this Page
Subscribe to this Thread
   Post New Thread  Post A Reply

Forum Jump:
Search by user:
 

Forum Rules:
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
HTML code is OFF
vB code is ON
Smilies are ON
[IMG] code is ON

Text-only version
 

< - KillerMovies.com - Forum Archive - Forum Rules >


© Copyright 2000-2006, KillerMovies.com. All Rights Reserved.
Powered by: vBulletin, copyright ©2000-2006, Jelsoft Enterprises Limited.