Talk:Evidence for the historical existence of Jesus Christ/Archive1

Stub
This is a crappy, crappy stub. But I think I've overviewed the basics. I need to cite and get specifics but it's a massively complex topic. I quite like EP Sander's comment about how we have better evidence for Jesus than we do about Alexander the Great, but I'd have to read up on that more closely before including it. Please fix if you have the time/knowledge. 09:05, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Logical fallacies
This article is pretty heavily laced with logical fallacies and deliberately misleading rhetorical flourishes, not in a way that undermines the central thesis, but they are frequent enough that I am fairly dismissive of it when reading it (PJR style - one fallacy and it is game over). Is this being copied from another source? It reads like it is an apologetics piece (Atheist Apologetics, might be the next big thing). I might compile a list when I have time. -  π    06:48, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * It is also unduly focused on what theologians & Christian apologists say on the subject rather than academic historians, & implies that apologists are the only group who would assert that Jesus was historical, which is very misleading.  08:07, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * The problem I have with this is that we have about as much historical evidence for the existence of Socrates and even less for Pythagoras. No current accounts, nothing written about them during their lives. The best we have with Socrates is from Plato written after his death. How do we know he didn't just create him out of cloth? Other source were oral histories, until they were written down by people born after he died. This article sets too high of a condition for the existence of Jesus than we would normally place. -  π    11:28, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I know we do snark but we do need to keep to a reasonable standard. However, evidence for the lives of Socrates and Pythagoras is secondary to their body of work. In the case of Jesus his existence (and alleged resurrection) is primary; if the issue was just his moral teachings as reported in the gospels (rather than all the other stuff added by Paul) then there would be little to argue about. 12:03, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * While the extent of the work is a good improvement on the first stub, I'd say it's very marred by some of the language. A bit too much "the alleged Jesus" and the "so-called Crucifixion" type stuff - is this what you mean by "deliberately misleading rhetorical flourishes" and "Atheist Apologetics"? Tightening that up would be good move. Also, in reference to what Pi is talking about above, I suggest an extended section putting the evidence into context of what else we know about other historical figures would go some way to addressing that issue. While if such a thing could be made extensive enough it could warrant an additional article of "evidence for the existence of various historical characters", which would be an interesting topic in itself considering how it would focus on appreciating the value of available evidence. 12:53, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * It is massively better than before, it is some of the writing style I have problems with. Other than that it is well on the way to being a highly brained article. -  π    11:46, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
 * My advice would be to carefully scrutinize what PC added in the last few days. She is an awful writer, and bit of a dog-legged pony when it comes to her anti-Christianity. For Becathly (talk) 12:23, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't find the examples of Socrates and Pythagoras particularly great. There weren't any contemporary historians (independent writers) around to record their existence, except perhaps Herodotus, who was however more preoccupied with military history and the Persians. Even Alexander lived at a time which wasn't thoroughly documented yet. In contrast, what was going on in the early first century AD in Judaea (and other regions around the Mediterranean) is exceedingly well documented in comparison. So it makes much more sense to compare what we know of other historical figures who were living at the same time in the same general area, and how well documented their existence is by contemporary writers, and specifically independent sources or even antagonistic witnesses. --84.151.170.11 (talk) 22:50, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Socrates has four known contemporary sources (ie as in lived during his life time) supporting his existence--Plato, Xenophon, Aristotle, and Aristophanes. Jesus has NONE--the Gospels are anonymous accounts that are not even quoted from until the 2nd century CE.--BruceGrubb (talk) 02:06, 23 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Another significant difference is that Socrates and Pythagoras, and their likes, were specialists in certain fields of knowledge and thus would have only been known to certain circles of society, and their existence itsef is not important in any way since we only care about their theories and thoughts. Most importantly, they never claimed popular fame and a following of multitudes. They did not perform miracles for all to see nor cause such natural sign as eclipses to occure. etc... All of these and more are claimed for Jesus, though, and it is very hard to believe that if such a person had caused such a stirring in a society at large and had the powers of the religious establishment, army and state thrown at him, there were no one who even found it necessary to mention his name at that time in any letter, a record of some sort, or even a carving on a cave wall. Biraqleet (talk) 21:02, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Red herring?
The section Trial and Crucifixion is something of a red herring. How are accounts of his death related to whether he actually lived? Also I would not that the bible does not mention an eclipse, it says the moon turned to blood, you are attacking a strawman. -  π    09:02, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Could be. I'm just trying to fix the text.--BobSpring is sprung! 09:05, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Well Matthew tells us:
 * 27:45 Now from noon until three, darkness came over all the land. ..... 27:51 Just then  the temple curtain  was torn in two, from top to bottom. The  earth shook and the rocks were split apart. 27:52 And tombs were opened, and the bodies of many saints who had died were raised. 27:53 (They  came out of the tombs after his resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.) 27:54 Now when the centurion  and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and what took place, they were extremely terrified and said, “Truly this one was God’s Son!”
 * If the gospels are the prime source for the historical existence of Jesus then their failure to match up with historical records is presumably important.--BobSpring is sprung! 09:14, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The gospels say a lot of things that we can assume probably aren't true - e.g. their accounts of miracles. This doesn't invalidate the hypothesis that JC actually existed & that some other aspects of the gospels may be more or less factual.  Ideally, the stuff about the eclipse should be moved to the puzzling details section of the Jesus article rather than here.   13:59, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, it's an open question about how much of the gospels are pure fiction. They were all written many years after his death and are pretty much unsubstantiated by any outside authorities. They clearly weren't written by the people who are claimed to have written them - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Why only discount the miraculous stuff?--BobSpring is sprung! 16:30, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The trial and crucifixion are part of the very essence of the story. It's the core part of the Nicene Creed. Without that there still could have been some dude called Joshua bar Joseph but there's a certain amount of meh. Jack Hughes (talk) 16:43, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Not exactly -- the trial and crucifixion aren't the essence of the story; the resurrection is the essence. (Though to be fair, they were the prelude.) That was one the criticisms leveled as The Passion of the Christ -- it was entirely focused on the death of Christ, with the resurrection added almost as an afterthought. MDB (talk) 16:59, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Well for classical Christian religions the son of God bit via the virgin Mary, the crucifixion to (somehow) atone for sins and the resurrection are pretty basic. But my question is: if we can easily dismiss the magical parts of the story why should we believe in the reality of any of it?  Especially when none of it is independently attested to and those bits that can be checked don't match the historical record.
 * I'm fully prepared to accept that somebody called Jesus existed and that the Christian religion began with him. But apart from that how can we know that any of the other good and wise sayings attributed to him aren't as invented as the magical stuff? I'd say that logically we can't.--BobSpring is sprung! 18:25, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Bronze
So there. Dissent? - David Gerard (talk) 12:05, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I dissent. Now, what is it that I'm dissenting against? 17:46, 31 March 2011 (UTC):
 * Wow, you forgot about your own article rating system. Support for Bronze. ТyUser_talk:Tyrannis 17:50, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Birther question
I have the urge to ask where is Jesus' long-form birth certificate but can't find the right place to add it.--BobSpring is sprung! 14:34, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Suggested compromise
It doesn't make much difference once magic Jesus is discounted. From my limited lay person's perspective it seems either is reasonable. Since many Jews of the time eagerly awaited the messiah mythological hype about the messiah could be piled onto a real person or an empty name. Let's state in the article that we don't know whether or not Jesus existed and give both sides of the argument equal weight. Proxima Centauri (talk) 17:22, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
 * 1) Jesus could have been a real ordinary man who had mythological hype piled onto him after his time.
 * 2) Jesus could have been as unreal as John Frum. Mythological hype could have been piled onto the name Jesus.
 * The consensus, which is supported by secular scholarship, is for #1. But I have no objection to including -- along with the consensus position -- the scholarship that argues for #2. The reasons it matters are twofold: 1. Truth always matters, and 2. Christianity is a fascinating example of how a religion becomes such, how it grows and spreads, and how it dominates much of history. Understanding how that all happened is incredibly valuable in innumerable ways: sociologically, historically, and psychologically, as well as politically.---Mona- (talk) 19:49, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Sure it's interesting academically. Everything is interesting at some level to somebody. But it's not like, for example homeopathy, which is a form of woo which could kill people.
 * Does holding one or another opinion of non-magical Jesus make any difference to the way anybody lives their lives?--Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 21:20, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes. See my point #2.---Mona- (talk) 21:28, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Again this article is NOT about the whole Christ myth issue...we have another article for that. This article is about the evidence evaluated in a rational manner, it is NOT about consensus OR about the how fields of Religious and Bible studies are improving but the state of the evidence that general presented for Jesus form a layman comon sense manner. PERIOD.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:41, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Well no, Bruce. I'm not interested in a blog-sy level of article, one that just cranks out text that is Some Guy's opinion or evaluation. In most articles I edit where an academic discipline is heavily implicated -- and I'm not alone in this -- I cite experts in that field. And, their consensus is what guides me. I don't give a crap what, e.g., Some Guy thinks about GMOs or evolution. Or what Some Woman thinks about free speech doctrine in the U.S. or what constitutes psychosis. No, I care what the consensus of scientists is on the safety of GMOs, or evolution, or what knowledgeable lawyers and legal scholars state is or is not protected speech in America, or whether a certain behavior should be classified as a symptom of mental illness. Caring about all of that is as rational as it is reasonable.---Mona- (talk) 01:10, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I don't trust consensus in this area because Christians had and have too much influence shaping consensus. Some influence is through traditions developed centuries or decades ago when Christian influence was stronger generally. Some influence happens when Christians work as New Testament historians.  Other influence happens indirectly when Christians decide which research academic gets promotion, which academic or academic department gets public funding.  Look at Enemies of Christianity writing embarrassing accounts.  Why did it take so long for anyone to notice that there is no reason to treat Canonical Gospels differently from Non-Canonical Gospels or other writings?  Christians believe God supervised writings that eventually got into the Bible.  Non Christians somehow followed Christian influence here. Proxima Centauri (talk) 01:56, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Proxima Centauri, there is no reasonable basis to distrust the consensus of the secular field of religious studies. I would, and have, saidthe same thing to Christians who argue that religious studies has too many non-believers and atheists in its ranks. I majored in the field, and the nominal Xtians who were my professors -- and they were the minority -- didn't accept anything but higher biblical criticism and the approaches that have flowed from that 19th century intellectual trend, a trend that helped spawn the fundamentalist movement. Before I accept that religious studies is unreliable, I will have to see a great deal of evidence. And not just a handful of atheist/skeptics making the claim. It's not reasonable to think only avowed atheists can conduct worthwhile scholarship in this area. It is reasonable, however, to require evidence that they cannot and/or do not.---Mona- (talk) 02:38, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm not an expert in this field. I'll suggest another compromise, -Mona- and BruceGrubb can each write your views as essays and RationalWiki can link to those essays from the See also section of the article.  Readers can read both viewpoints and decide. Experienced RationalWiki users can show you how to start an essay. Proxima Centauri (talk) 06:40, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * PC, I just don't have time for that. My interest here is merely to argue for the validity of the secular field of religious studies. The burden is on those who argue that this field -- religious studies, not sectarian biblical studies -- is somehow uniquely unreliable due to X, Y, and Z factors. That's a matter that should be capable of resolution here if the burden of evidence is placed on those maligning religious studies and requiring competent and sufficient evidence in support of their low opinion.---Mona- (talk) 14:59, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Are all academic institutions as impartial as yours appeared to be? If your profs were sometimes tempted to follow the money would ordinary students have found out?

It is not so much unreliable but an emic-etic problem. As Miner showed some 60 years ago a field can get so wrapped up in a model that it can't see that the model itself is effecting every aspect of research...even to the point of how the field views what it is gathering. Only by taking the model of his time to its logical (and ultimately absurd) conclusion was Miner able to show that the model itself was in need of heavy revision if not replacement. Miner also showed there were still vestiges of models (such as Imperial Synthesis) thought to have been discarded decades ago in the current model. Effectively a can't see the forest for the trees situation.

The claim that Hector Avalos, a professor of Religious Studies at Iowa State University, is just Some Guy shows just how off base your argument it. Never mind your total denial regarding how the UK academic community does peer review in a pathetic attempt to deny that On the Historicity of Jesus is peer reviewed.--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:12, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * How much straw can Bruce throw? "The claim that Hector Avalos, a professor of Religious Studies at Iowa State University, is just Some Guy" Of course, I never said that, nor implied it. "how the UK academic community does peer review" . (Also, non sequitur, even if true.) You've convinced me, Bruce. Postmodernism is true and right. Science is corrupted by bias and money; one can't believe any claimed results. Libruls hate god so: evilution. And, what Miner shows about models means all scholarship is so much partisan bilge.---Mona- (talk) 14:52, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Trying to salvage a losing position by resorting to sarcasm isn't going to cut it. For another example of the loopyness  in Bible Studies let's look at the general dating of Mark (c 70 C) vs 1 Clement (80 -140 CE) based on Historical criticism.  Anyone with a basic understanding of the history of the region can see the flaw and using basic logic would put 1 Clement before 70 CE as it is acting as if the Temple is still intact a point Carrier makes pg 271-3 of OHJ and there are other various clues in the original Greek that similarly point to 1 Clement being before the 70 CE destruction of the Temple with the deaths of Peter and Paul being very recents events.  Evidence of an inconsistent methodology is another sign that a field's model is out to lunch and either in need of some serious adjustments or total replacement.-- BruceGrubb (talk) 22:16, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

Is accademic consensus and peer review reliable?
Some critics believe that peer review has a built-in bias against highly original works and results because reviewers (as do people in general) tend to be more tolerant of works and results that are consistent with their own views and more critical of those that contradict them. It should be kept in mind that history is replete with examples of innovations that were originally ridiculed by their peers because they contradicted the common wisdom of the day. The bias by academics against highly innovative work may be in part a result of the fact that they have vested interests in maintaining the status quo after having spent many years or decades supporting it. (.....) Because it allows anyone to publish and to do so at virtually no cost, the Internet makes it much easier to give swift and widespread exposure to highly innovative and controversial works that might have a difficult time being getting into mainstream, peer reviewed hard copy publications. However, there are so many articles and other items of obviously dubious quality on the Internet that it can be difficult to find those that are truly promising. From Peer Review Definition

It seems to me there is a real possibility acamedic consensus that Jesus was a real man is preventing the alternative, that Jesus may not have even existed getting the attention it merits. Christian influence may be adding to this problem. If this is happening it is bad science. I feel RationalWiki should provide a platform for the view that Jesus never existed pointing out that it's a minority view. This article does that.

I suggested -Mona- and BruceGrubb should each write essays expressing their respective viewpoints. That's one possibility. An alternative could be to move this article to a new title like, "The case that Jesus never existed". That would allow BruceGrubb and others who are skeptical that Jesus existed to edit that article. We can have a second article, "The case that Jesus existed" for supporters of the consensus view. Meanwhile removing material based on work by qualified historians who support the minority point of view just because it's against the consensus looks like censorship. Proxima Centauri (talk) 14:09, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * "looks like censorship." If that's how it looks to you, you do not understand either what censorship is or how wiki editing works. Tell me, do you advocate "teaching the controversy" on other pages as well, such as perhaps Evolution? Do you advocate site-wide abandonment of scholarly consensus as having any privilege?---Mona- (talk) 23:30, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Evolution has many competing theories within it such as neo-Lamarckian and Punctuated equilibrium as well as the classic Darwinian model. The counter-Evolution argument involves ignoring basic fundamentals of many different physical sciences like physics, geology, and biology so your counter example is nonsense.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:43, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Teaching the controversy between science and pseudoscience is different from teaching controversy between different groups of scientists. Proxima Centauri (talk) 23:47, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Says who? Besides, there are creationist scientists whose hold degrees in relevant fields. Who is to say they are wrong and the consensus of other scientists is right? Consensus means nothing, and to argue otherwise constitutes censorship. Anyway, I won't be editing the article any longer, at least not any time in the near future. So, you and Bruce can have it as you will.---Mona- (talk) 00:17, 6 January 2016 (UTC)


 * I agree but can anyone actually look at the majority of the evidence for the Jesus of the NT existing and NOT say that much of it fits into the pseudoscience category? I have yet to see an intelligent explanation for even the redacted versions of Testimonium Flavianum fit in with the next paragraph's "And about the same time another terrible misfortune confounded the Jews ...”.  As Carrier flippantly puts it in one of his lectures 'what "terrible misfortune"?  We just got a commercial for Jesus.'
 * Paul and company having visions and anonymous works written sometime between 70-120 CE that have historical, social-political, and geographic SNAFUS out the yin-yang to the point they read like bad historical fiction.
 * Pliny the Younger and Suetonius come off as desperate grabs in an effort to find something anything that can be presented as evidence for Jesus (Movements do not prove the existence of supposed leaders per Ned Ludd and John Frum)
 * Tacitus, at best, seems to be only repeating what the local group of Christians believed and other groups of contemporary Christians had accounts totally at odds with Tacitus (Nero either reacting to claims of sedition or leaving the group alone after the death of Paul) and there are enough irregularities to make the passage suspect especially as the material actually covering the traditional period of Jesus ministry (28-31 CE) is conveniently missing; cut with such a precision that it cannot be an accident.
 * Thallus is such a train wreck how any scholar can present it as evidence is beyond me.
 * Everything else is far too late or vague to show anything outside of what was believed.--BruceGrubb (talk) 00:09, 6 January 2016 (UTC)


 * As I wrote before that is the Historicity-Christ myth debate WHICH WE HAVE ANOTHER ARTICLE REGARDING. THIS article is regarding the EVIDENCE for the Jesus we have the most information on (ie the NT one) PERIOD NOT the Historicity-Christ myth debate (which as that article os a total ClusterFUBAR regarding what the definition even is).  Consensus is NOT evidence nor does it improve the odds that a belief is true and therefore has no relevance to THIS article.


 * The fact that Carrier's On the Historicity of Jesus IS peer reviewed (by the accepted standards of UK academia) as well as published by Sheffield Phoenix Press "a leading publisher in the field of Biblical Studies", "one of the leading sources of new research for the scholarly community" disproves the above with regards to the Christ Myth theory.  More over I have found that "highly original works " tends to consist of "poorly researched crap", "overly speculative nonsensical garbage", and-or "ravings of delusional nutcase".


 * Continental drift appeared in several peer reviewed journals of the time well before Alfred Wegener's 1912 paper ever saw the light of day.  Heck, even though they were ignored Gregor Mendel managed to have peer reviewed presentations of his work at two meetings of the Natural History Society of Brn.  Homeopathy, long discredited as having any validity still on occasion manages to get a peer reviewed paper (such as K. Linde, N. Clausius, G. Ramirez, et al., "Are the﻿ Clinical Effects of Homoeopathy Placebo Effects? A Meta-analysis of Placebo-Controlled Trials," Lancet, September 20, 1997, 350:834-843) through though such papers are general refuted (per "The end of homoeopathy" The Lancet, Vol. 366 No. 9487 p﻿ 690. The Vol. 366 No. 9503 issue (Dec 27, 2005)).  Even the Sphinx water erosion hypothesis has seen several peer reviewed papers (mostly regarding the problem with said idea).


 * As for this essay thing, -Mona- has already said she doesn't have the time and I can't be bothered rehashing that is already presented elsewhere in Rationalwiki.  Mona has demonstrated being a revert monkey, claiming demonstrable facts (such as her "compulsive reverting without reading" -David Gerard) are "non sequitur", claiming that Carrier's On the Historicity of Jesus  being peer reviewed and scholarly published was "horseshit" and "shoddy and "that is not how peer review, done properly, works", even by all accounts that is exactly how peer review works in the UK academic world, and loads of other BS.   She says she can't find any reviews regarding Carrier's book...funny thing about that, sheffield phoenix description of the book provides such a review from Raphael Lataster of the Journal of Religious History.  A little research shows the actual article (DOI: 10.1111/1467-9809.12219) published December 2014 by WIley.  This is the kind of piss poor research I would expect from Holding not someone that should know what the sam hill they are doing when it comes to research.  So far all I have seen from Mona as bunch of FUD with no real foundation and not really worth anyone's time outside pointing of how useless it is to this article.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:07, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Bruce, my, you write a lot of dense stuff that is hard to follow. I honestly don't know what you are on about regarding my claiming not to find reviews of Carrier & etc. Moreover, I didn't revert anything of yours without reading it. I've never said minority views cannot be presented -- indeed, they should be. I'm merely stating that the fact of scholarly consensus must be presented and cannot reasonably be dismissed on the grounds you would do it.---Mona- (talk) 23:38, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * "Consensus is NOT evidence nor does it improve the odds that a belief is true" I see. Well then, it is as reasonable to believe that climate change is a hoax as it is to believe it is a serious problem. The overwhelming consensus of climate scientists means nothing. For a non-scientist to invoke that consensus as a reason to accept that climate change is a problem is very foolish.---Mona- (talk) 23:42, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
 * " I didn't revert anything of yours without reading it" YES YOU DID. Here is the PROOF YOU DID with the comment "(brudce, I'm holding off on the rest of your edits for now to see where we actually disagree, but on this, this is the correct, factual state of scholarship)".  You can hem and haw all you want by that PROVES you were not reading the article you reverted.  Unless you can explain how "Even if the consensus there was something there (Eddy, Paul Rhodes; Gregory A. Boyd   (2007) The Jesus Legend  Baker Academic ISBN-13: 978-0801031144 pg 157) is correct" denies the correct, factual state of scholarship
 * Climate Change is another physical science thing and is therefore a different animal from the social sciences which as Minor showed are more prone to falling into their own little echo chamber.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:52, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

No Bruce, I did not revert anything without reading it. You are either lying or deeply mistaken. Moreover, again you are adding criteria to your rejection of the value of consensus because you do not like the application. In any event, I have other issues to tend to, so edit this article as you will and I will not be further intruding on your desire to control this piece.---Mona- (talk) 00:03, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I JUST POSTED PROOF THAT YOU DID REVERT WITHOUT READING so I am neither lying or mistaken as you didn't explain HOW how "Even if the consensus there was something there (Eddy, Paul Rhodes; Gregory A. Boyd (2007) The Jesus Legend Baker Academic ISBN-13: 978-0801031144 pg 157) is correct" denies the correct, factual state of scholarship as you claimed in the note for the revert. Give it a rest.--BruceGrubb (talk) 00:28, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Why do you continue with this daft, obscure argument? I DID NOT revert you without reading. I did not. End of. Your claim I did is not even wrong.---Mona- (talk) 01:03, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Trying to claim something is not so when it can be shown to be so and failing to explain HOW your position is valid is delusional if not trollish. Give it a rest.--BruceGrubb (talk) 06:51, 6 January 2016 (UTC)