Did Jesus really exist?

[Diplomat]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: j-can</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Which side of the &quot;evidence&quot; are you looking at? </div></div>

I am looking at the evidence given in the bible(new testement)...and i should have said given the lack of evidence </div></div>
So you're looking for evidence of the historial Jesus and expected to find it in the Bible? There are tons of literature written on the subject, and if your search is genuine, you can start with Lee Strobel's &quot;The Case for Christ&quot; and &quot;The Case for the Real Jesus&quot;.

[j-can]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Wahalla</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
And yes J can..I find nothing serious about this whole question..

Can you demonstrate that Alexander the Great was real ? or the Trojan war ???? How bout Mohammed ????? buddah ?????

the authentistic of a historical Jesus has nothing to do with the Christinity as a social poltical religion.. It is purely a matter of individual metaphysical faith... </div></div>

Their is a great deal of difference between say Alexander the Great and Jesus Christ
with Alexander the Great we have artifacts and writings , cities ruined and built
Alexander, for example, left a wake of destroyed and created cities behind. We have buildings, libraries and cities, such as Alexandria, left in his name. We have treaties, and even a letter from Alexander to the people of Chios, engraved in stone, dated at 332 B.C.....

[j-can]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: j-can</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Which side of the &quot;evidence&quot; are you looking at? </div></div>

I am looking at the evidence given in the bible(new testement)...and i should have said given the lack of evidence </div></div>
So you're looking for evidence of the historial Jesus and expected to find it in the Bible? There are tons of literature written on the subject, and if your search is genuine, you can start with Lee Strobel's &quot;The Case for Christ&quot; and &quot;The Case for the Real Jesus&quot;. </div></div>

What can Lee Strobel tell me about a historical Jesus?...Was he an eyewitness to the jesus
walking the earth..What I want is proof not hear say..Which up to this week was what I thought the bible was

[Diplomat]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

So, going back to your first post, the issue is not so much that you are honestly looking for answers, but rather taking the dogmatic position that unless you can find something from someone who actually saw him, as far as you're concerned, he didn't exist. Do you take the same position regarding other historical figures whom we have no literal eye witness accounts of? Kind of go back to Wahalla's two posts above, doesn't it? My position is that if you took the time to read and quote the references in your first post, you should be able to take the time to read points of view that counters those positions. To even remotely suggest that any historian back in the day would be interested in what was going on in the backwater towns where Jesus walked is to show a lack of understanding of the times back then and how those provinces were perceived. If the story of the actual eye witnesses isn't good enough, the historical events (the persecution/matryrdom of The Twelve who were with him, for example) should be good enough to look at what is available. You may be surprised at what Strobel's investigations could tell you.

[H_O]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: j-can</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: j-can</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

Which side of the &quot;evidence&quot; are you looking at? </div></div>

I am looking at the evidence given in the bible(new testement)...and i should have said given the lack of evidence </div></div>
So you're looking for evidence of the historial Jesus and expected to find it in the Bible? There are tons of literature written on the subject, and if your search is genuine, you can start with Lee Strobel's &quot;The Case for Christ&quot; and &quot;The Case for the Real Jesus&quot;. </div></div>

What can Lee Strobel tell me about a historical Jesus?...Was he an eyewitness to the jesus
walking the earth..What I want is proof not hear say..Which up to this week was what I thought the bible was

exactly.

.

[H_O]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?


Characteristics Horus Yeshua of Nazareth, a.k.a. Jesus
Nature&quot; Regarded as a mythical character. Regarded as a 1st century CE human man-god.
Main role: Savior of humanity. Savior of humanity.
Status: God-man. God-man.
Common portrayal: Virgin Isis holding the infant Horus. Virgin Mary holding the infant Jesus.
Title: KRST, the anointed one. Christ, the anointed one.
Other names: The good shepherd, the lamb of God, the bread of life, the son of man, the Word, the fisher, the winnower. The good shepherd, the lamb of God, the bread of life, the son of man, the Word, the fisher, the winnower.
Zodiac sign: Associated with Pisces, the fish. Associated with Pisces, the fish.
Main symbols: Fish, beetle, the vine, shepherd's crook. Fish, beetle, the vine, the shepherd's crook.

[Wahalla]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

I think he needs collaborative evidence.. from an independent source other than the bible.. Frankly none have been offered.... Joshepus unfortunately is compromised... Even the gospels are secondary historical accounts.. A more contemporanious account would be the Gnostic Gospels.. The Gospel of Philip, the Gospel of Mary Magnaline, the Gospel of Peter... However the early history of christianity was one of multi fractions. Many of these were lost.

As I kid I wonder if there was 12 deciples how come there were only 4 Gospels. ???? . these were not saved... As there were more than 80 Gospels before the 4 were formalised ie a compromise to bring unity to the faith as the Nicea conference... These Gospels if taken as fact would destroy the essence of Christinity... And be further contradiction.. The Gospel of Peter is closer to the Islamic veiw of Jesus.. He did not die on the cross.. Mary Magnaline made her an intercedere between Jesus and the other lesser disciples.... And I belive have her as a companion... Other sources Kabra Nagat and there are I beleive several small sects of Christians that survived in the fastness of the east in Iran and Iraq who had otehr rictuals and writings escaped the Nicean influence which is the basis of all Western Chrisitianty be they Rasta or Jehovah Witnesses... And all the African based millenium sects...

I beleive there are Gospels that claim Mary was a temple virgin.. A whore in all but name...

Recently there was a tomb find that said Jesus son of mary... about three miles from where traditionally Jesus was said to be buried.. However this would contradict the biblical version as I belvie that there were siblings...

Hell dont listen to me I beleive god died on 12 October 1492... at 2pm Greenich Mean Time....

[Mutty]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body">To even remotely suggest that any historian back in the day would be interested in what was going on in the backwater towns where Jesus walked is to show a lack of understanding of the times back then and how those provinces were perceived.</div></div>

CEW I hear this argument all the time. There are those who say that Jesus was not of importance to the masses and certainly not to the Romans so his story was insignificant and thus making it plausible that little (or no) contemporary information was written about him. Then I read this:


&quot;<span style="font-style: italic">And immediately <span style="font-weight: bold">His fame spread throughout all the region</span> around Galilee.</span>&quot;

This after a couple of miracles if not more. What he was doing (according to the Gospels) would have been unprecedented in that area and while Nazareth and other such places might have been backwater towns, Jerusalem was a buzzing cosmopolitan city and towns like Capernaum were on the Galilee's shores making news easily transmitted across the area. A guy supposedly raising up dead people and healing fearful diseases would have sure made the newswire in the entire region I would think.

[H_O]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Mutty</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body">To even remotely suggest that any historian back in the day would be interested in what was going on in the backwater towns where Jesus walked is to show a lack of understanding of the times back then and how those provinces were perceived.</div></div>

CEW I hear this argument all the time. There are those who say that Jesus was not of importance to the masses and certainly not to the Romans so his story was insignificant and thus making it plausible that little (or no) contemporary information was written about him. Then I read this:


&quot;<span style="font-style: italic">And immediately <span style="font-weight: bold">His fame spread throughout all the region</span> around Galilee.</span>&quot;

This after a couple of miracles if not more. What he was doing (according to the Gospels) would have been unprecedented in that area and while Nazareth and other such places might have been backwater towns, Jerusalem was a buzzing cosmopolitan city and towns like Capernaum were on the Galilee's shores making news easily transmitted across the area. A guy supposedly raising up dead people and healing fearful diseases would have sure made the newswire in the entire region I would think. </div></div>*****!! if that happen today AP-Associated Press an Reuters would have that spread faster than a barnfire!

[Wahalla]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

Nope its success was based on the fact it is a religion that focused not on the educated but the slave. It adhererents were the mass of the prolieterians..... At the center is offered a paradise in some otherness at the intervention of some super human being.. .. The subtlty is that proptrites needed to survive opression, meekness in the face of opression, disregard for ones own betterment are identical to those nessesary to survive in a world of slavery and social stratification where there was minimal multi generational social movement...

[Diplomat]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Mutty</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body">To even remotely suggest that any historian back in the day would be interested in what was going on in the backwater towns where Jesus walked is to show a lack of understanding of the times back then and how those provinces were perceived.</div></div>
CEW I hear this argument all the time. There are those who say that Jesus was not of importance to the masses and certainly not to the Romans so his story was insignificant and thus making it plausible that little (or no) contemporary information was written about him. Then I read this:

&quot;<span style="font-style: italic">And immediately <span style="font-weight: bold">His fame spread throughout all the region</span> around Galilee.</span>&quot;

This after a couple of miracles if not more. What he was doing (according to the Gospels) would have been unprecedented in that area and while Nazareth and other such places might have been backwater towns, Jerusalem was a buzzing cosmopolitan city and towns like Capernaum were on the Galilee's shores making news easily transmitted across the area. A guy supposedly raising up dead people and healing fearful diseases would have sure made the newswire in the entire region I would think. </div></div>
Some of the stuff wasn't unprededented at all, and the name &quot;Jesus&quot; wasn't unique. People were casting out demons and doing healings well before Jesus' time, and that continued afterwards. Heck, there could be one in some country of the world right now that we know absolutely nothing about. Not unlike other writings from the Ancient Near East, some of the Biblical language is hyperbolic. A sentence like the one quoted above is relative to Jesus' sorroundings. It doesn't mean at the time that it went further than his sorrounding neighbourhood as evidenced in the last two words &quot;around Galilee&quot;.

[rudemonk]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

Walhalla,

There are two citations by Josephus regarding Jesus which are important, and a reference to Josephus' position elsewhere- while some feel the first is a later addition at worst, an interpolation in varying degree, there is a strong case for authenticity especially considering the weight of the other passages. The second is generally accepted as genuine- plus there is other reference amongst early church fathers to the fact that Josephus did not believe in Yashua's divinity, hardly flattering to their apologetics but there it is.

Of course, &quot;Christ&quot; refers to &quot;Anointed&quot; so that must be made clear. But if Josephus was known to dismiss Yashua's divinity clearly he knew of Yashua and the claims being made of him.

The link I provided is quite informative, I think.

Error- you are skirting around the fringe of the effects of what is called by Campbell and others, the &quot;Monomyth.&quot; There is actually quite a body of mythology which gets laid out according to the influence of this mythic structure. There are certain aspects of this myth that &quot;had&quot; to be applied to Yashua.

Whether or not he existed is not dependent on what people have come to believe about him, to sort of echo what Walhalla was saying...but there is some significant historocity to the case of his existence...J-Can, but I would say to avoid looking in the &quot;Bible&quot; for it. Just because you were led to believe that those books are the direct word of God or whatever doesn't make that the case, but oftentimes people move from extreme to extreme when the truth is somewhere in the middle. Biblical archaeology is a fascinating field and I always caution against people making concrete claims about what we know- at best you can just make your case based off what is now known. Think of it, before there was the Nag Hammadi find or the Qumran find...well just look how much further our knowledge was advanced. Maybe this is a case where the baby is being tossed out with the bathwater? It's not Yashua's fault that Paul got his hands on the legacy and swindled all these people and sects into believing his version of things rather than what was perhaps Yashua's.

We have to remember that Paul was rather ignorant of certain things which especially in this day and age have proven fatal to his salvation plan, as were the gospel authors and also perhaps Yashua if everything said of him in the Gospel accounts are true.

Geography for one, seems to be a big problem, as well as the concept of a round earth.

[Mutty]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Mutty</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CEW</div><div class="ubbcode-body">To even remotely suggest that any historian back in the day would be interested in what was going on in the backwater towns where Jesus walked is to show a lack of understanding of the times back then and how those provinces were perceived.</div></div>
CEW I hear this argument all the time. There are those who say that Jesus was not of importance to the masses and certainly not to the Romans so his story was insignificant and thus making it plausible that little (or no) contemporary information was written about him. Then I read this:

&quot;<span style="font-style: italic">And immediately <span style="font-weight: bold">His fame spread throughout all the region</span> around Galilee.</span>&quot;

This after a couple of miracles if not more. What he was doing (according to the Gospels) would have been unprecedented in that area and while Nazareth and other such places might have been backwater towns, Jerusalem was a buzzing cosmopolitan city and towns like Capernaum were on the Galilee's shores making news easily transmitted across the area. A guy supposedly raising up dead people and healing fearful diseases would have sure made the newswire in the entire region I would think. </div></div>
Some of the stuff wasn't unprededented at all, and the name &quot;Jesus&quot; wasn't unique. People were casting out demons and doing healings well before Jesus' time, and that continued afterwards. Heck, there could be one in some country of the world right now that we know absolutely nothing about. Not unlike other writings from the Ancient Near East, some of the Biblical language is hyperbolic. A sentence like the one quoted above is relative to Jesus' sorroundings. It doesn't mean at the time that it went further than his sorrounding neighbourhood as evidenced in the last two words &quot;around Galilee&quot;. </div></div>

I realize there were other &quot;charlatans&quot; running around the place and with end time euphoria running high, any madman who honed his magic skills would have fooled many into thinking he was the next messiah. Jesus, on the other hand, was said to have raised people from the dead and not once or twice either. That piece of news alone would have reached Walla Walla, Washington in record breaking time if it existed back then. If the news traveled around the lake, it is not hard to believe it also went beyond the lake, don't you think?

Of course you already know my issue in regard to this storytelling. Jesus dies on a cross (according to the NT) and upon doing so, dead people arose from their graves (according to the book of Matthew and THAT book ONLY) and walked into Jerusalem and was seen &quot;by many.&quot; After that, we hear nothing of them ever again. How that story did not make it across the Mediterranean from independent sources is beyond me. It's not everyday you see dead people walking about the place, yet here we have a single account, recorded by one person, not corroborated by anyone else and it is supposedly the &quot;Gospel truth.&quot;

[dahjah]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Error403_0</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Wahalla</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Proof is for science.. this is faith.. dont confuse the two... </div></div>
describe faith?

Faith- believing in something you THINK.

Proof- absolutely -by showing the FACTS.
religion ignores the facts </div></div>

Faith is belief in unverified thought

[David Mullings]

Re: Did Jesus really exist?

My answer to this question i simple:

Why does it matter?

If you find a note right now that says that some guy named David, wrote in 1847 saying that if humans were to treat each other kindly and the World would be better, would it matter if you couldn't find this person?

The <span style="font-weight: bold">man</span> is not nearly important as the <span style="font-weight: bold">message</span>.

The proper question is whether or not the teachings of Jesus are true.

I for one believe that it is true that &quot;do unto others as you would have them do unto you&quot; would lead to a more harmonious World.

It matters not if Jesus was real.