On Jesus

Mythicists’ Mythicism

Myth

On Jesus’ Existence, Mythicism, Pagan Copycat, Marriage, Tomb, and Beyond

by Ken Ammi

“…it’s both amusing and sobering to realize that if the Docetists had won the wars of the second and third centuries…We’d be debating something much more significant like was there a historical tooth fairy.”

—Frank Zindler

No End Books

“…of making many books there is no end;

and much study is a weariness of the flesh.

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter:

Fear God, and keep his commandments:

for this is the whole duty of man.”

—Ecclesiastes 12

Copyright © 2017 AD

Ken Ammi

truefreethinker.com

Cover photograph of author Ken Ammi taken by Larry CdeBaca, Copyright © 2017 AD, contact e-address: lamy2001@mac.com

Introduction

A lack of balance is readily discernable when we weigh the number of books, TV shows, lectures, etc. regarding the historical Jesus versus the same regarding the historical well, anyone else: Krishna, Zoroaster, Lao Tzu, Buddha, Muhammad, et al.

Many issues revolve around the main topic of the search for the historical Jesus, beginning with just that: what is the evidence that He even existed? Then there is the related issue of mythicism which claims just that: Jesus is a fictional character and a Pagan copycat, meaning that the mythology was pieced together from various and sundry portions of previous Pagan myths. And, of course, every few years we hear about Jesus having been marriage, Jesus’ tomb, and much, much more. Thus, this work is not solely about mythicism but also touches upon various views.

I have interacted with personages who outright claim that Jesus never even existed at all. At that point, I do not deal with the claim as a historical one but a logical one. This is because to claim that Jesus never even existed at all is what is known as a positive affirmation: this means that since the person is claiming to know that Jesus never even existed at all, it is incumbent upon them to evidence and prove it.

When I request such evidence and proof the reply is that if I believe that Jesus existed then I am making a positive affirmation and must provide evidence and proof. Yet, this is a style tu quoque logical fallacy. When I reiterate that they made the positive affirmation, they instantly drop the claim that Jesus never even existed at all and take the fallback position that a person named Jesus may have, or did actually, exist (actually Yehoshua or Yeshua) but that He was not the Messiah, was not the Son of God, was not God incarnate, etc.

Of course, these are also positive affirmations so you know where this is going. But what about the positive affirmation of someone who does indeed, claim that Jesus existed and did so not merely as a human person but was also the Messiah, the Son of God, God incarnate, etc.? Well, this is where the historical Jesus issue proper bifurcates as one discussion is historical evidence for the existence of the Jesus mentioned in the Bible and the other issue is theological as it moves into the area of whether He was the Messiah, was the Son of God, was God incarnate, etc.

Another issue is that when one points out that the person making the positive affirmation must provide the evidence, they may claim that they cannot prove a negative. Now, of course, negatives can be proved but a helpful reply is that if they cannot prove a negative then they should not be making a positive affirmation to possess negative knowledge. In other words, they should only go as far as the agnostic (literally lacking knowledge) position of stating that they are unsure as to whether Jesus existed or not.

I have learned a lesson about when people ask me for evidence of Jesus’ existence (as with when they ask for evidence of the existence of God in general). I would begin presenting evidence only to have them (subjectively) dismiss me with a wave of their hand and a claim that what I presented does not count.

As an important side note: I reference evidence and proof separately since proof denotes undeniable, undisputable, assured certainty, etc. and such is often hard to come by as the standard is very high—particularly when dealing with historical issues for which the evidence is generally pieced together from accounts, archeology, etc.

In turn, evidence is more akin to the pieces of the puzzle which, if we have enough of them, can result in proof but may only point us towards a conclusion and be able to not go any further.

Thus, I learned to first ask them what they would consider acceptable evidence which counts and take it from there. Now, sometimes I actually have to point out to them that what they are demanding is not legitimate and there are basically two categories into which their demands generally fall: evidence that I can provide and evidence that only God could provide.

For example, if someone says, “Well, if Jesus is real then He can appear before me right now” which is certainly something that I cannot do. Yet, if they say “Well, if Jesus is real then there should be historical accounts of His life” then that is something I can do.

Thus, this work is an example of a few of the things that I can do.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Table of Contents

On Chronological Terminology: BC and AD vs. BCE and CE

The Lost Tomb of Jesus

Sensationalistic Claims - The Hype is Ripe

Let the Debate Begin…Without Us:

Deoxyribonucleic Acid:

Statistical Probability:

Theological Considerations - The Resurrection and the Ascension:

Odd and Unfounded Assertions:

Some Academics Dare to Disagree:

Erudite Elucidators?:

The James Ossuary:

Concluding Musings:

Thank God for Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code!

The Jesus Tablet

Was Jesus Married? Manuscript Says Yes

“Their Own Whims and Lusts” Liberal Scholars and Jesus’ Marriage

“The Lost Gospel” by Barrie Wilson and Simcha Jacobovici

Michael Paulkovich Claims “No Meek Messiah” But a “Fable of the Christ”

Did Jesus exist? Michael Paulkovich and AaronRa

Raphael Lataster’s “Celestial Jesus”

Lataster’s “Interview” with Phil Robinson

“There Was No Jesus, There Is No God”

Historical or Mythical Jesus?

On Miracles and Flavius Josephus

Lataster’s Conspiracy Theorizing Modus Operandi

My Discussion with Lataster

Richard Carrier on Lataster’s Jesus Did Not Exist - A Debate Among Atheists

No Historical But a celestial Jesus in Paul’s Writings

Historical Jesus vs. Mythical Jesus Research Methodology

Cracked Mag Smackdown of Bill Maher and Other Jesus Mythicists

Jesus Mythicism in Tom Harpur’s “The         Pagan Christ”

Ken Humphreys vs. J.P. Holding, Nick Peters, and On the Christ Myth

Mark as Playwright:

On Tim O’Neill’s “An Atheist Historian Examines the Evidence     for Jesus”

Jerry Coyne on Jesus: Historical or Mythical?

Valerie Tarico’s “5 Reasons To Suspect Jesus Never Existed”

Troll FAIL on Historical Jesus Myth

Sir Elton John’s Historical and Theological Elucidations

Atheist Reginald “The Infidel Guy” Finley vs. Agnostic Bart Ehrman

Bart Ehrman vs. Robert Price

Mythicism “has no ancient precedents”

Justin Martyr

Julius Firmicus Maternus

Digging Into Osiris

Achilles Mythicism

Luigi Cascioli vs. Enrico Righi

Buddha and Jesus

Burning Cross and El Zorro (…aster, That Is)

Appendix: Historical Jesus - Two Centuries Worth            of Citations

Index

Endnotes

On Chronological Terminology: BC and AD vs. BCE and CE

I am an historian, I am not a believer, but I must

confess as a historian that this penniless preacher

from Nazareth is irrevocably the very center of history.

Jesus Christ is easily the most dominant figure in all history.

—H.G. Wells

That which follows may seem an odd manner whereby to begin this work and yet, it ties into the issue about the unbalance between the number of books, TV shows, lectures, etc. regarding the historical Jesus versus those regarding the historical well, anyone else: Krishna, Zoroaster, Lao Tzu, Buddha, Muhammad, et al.

You may have noticed that in recent years it has become all the rage, particularly in academia, to make references to historical dates not in the traditional manner of BC or AD but rather BCE and CE.

To begin with, here are the definitions:

BC: Before Christ

AD: Anno Domini

BCE: Before Common Era

CE: Common Era

This is simply another commandment of the politically correct movement: thou shalt exclusively exclude Christianity whilst seeking to be all-inclusive.

Indeed, this is merely an, obviously quite failed, attempt at removing yet another reference to Jesus from public view.

But why “obviously quite failed”? If it is not obvious then consider that the demarcation between the dates which are BC and AD hinge upon the birth of Jesus (give or take, that is).

Now, upon what do the BCE and CE dates hinge? Anyone? Anyone? The very same thing, Jesus’s birth.

The terminology has changed from BC to BCE and AD to CE but the time, event, hinge which demarks between the two, or four, is exactly the same and thus, it is a failed attempt at disregarding Jesus.

Every time you are writing a date and include the year, place the appropriate “AD” after it.

This will get attention and direct the attention in the right direction: Jesus the Messiah and His undeniable place in history.

The Lost Tomb of Jesus

If Jesus’ tomb has been found and His bones are therein, then it may prove the historical Jesus but would disprove

the theological Jesus thus, it seemed fitting to deal with this claim immediately. That which follows considers, dissects, and responds to the documentary “The Lost Tomb of Jesus“: hereinafter, DSC denotes The Discovery Channel.

On March 4, 2007 AD The Lost Tomb of Jesus, a documentary produced by James Cameron and directed by Simcha Jacobovici, aired on the DSC which describes it as, “Part archaeological adventure, part Biblical history, part forensic science, part theological controversy.”1

The documentary revolves around the discovery, in the 1980s AD, of a tomb that contained 10 ossuaries (bone boxes) that date to circa 2,000 years ago. The site was surveyed by archaeologist Shimon Gibson who also drew the layout plan. The ossuaries were described by L.Y. Rahmani in “A Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries.” The ossuaries were found in the Talpiot region of Jerusalem, the “Talpiot Tomb,” or “Tomb of Ten Ossuaries,” included the following inscriptions:

Ossuary 80/500 – Mariamne e Mara

Ossuary 80/501 – Yehuda bar Yeshua

Ossuary 80/502 – Matia

Ossuary 80/503 – Yeshua bar Yosef

Ossuary 80/504 – Yose

Ossuary 80/505 – Maria

James Cameron stated, “It doesn’t get bigger than this. We’ve done our homework; we’ve made the case; and now it’s time for the debate to begin.”2

How does the documentary begin? By making this statement, “Leading scientists and theologians have not reached agreement on the meaning of this archeological discovery and questions remain. We invite viewers to apply their own judgments and interpretive skills.”

Interesting, I thought that we were constantly told that making judgments and interpretations were bad things—but alas.

Sensationalistic Claims - The Hype is Ripe

DSC states:

The documentary includes dramatic recreations, based on the latest historical evidence, illustrating accurate images of Jesus of Nazareth, his family, his followers, his ministry, his crucifixion and his entombment.3

It is granted, given the lowly state of the Da Vinci culture (to which we shall get), that the most half-baked theory backed by the least amount of evidence is exalted beyond the incredible amount of evidence supporting the New Testament’s reliability—this is a substandard double standard. Thus, this documentary depicts, in living color, Jesus and His family, something which is, as we shall see below, simply unfounded. In this case, the latest historical evidence is the fanciful imaginations of the documentary’s storytellers. This is where a documentary goes from simply showing us what was found to weaving stories based on personal interpretation of evidence.

Simcha Jacobovici states:

An incredible archaeological discovery in Israel changes history and shocks the world. Tombs with the names The Virgin Mary, Jesus of Nazareth, Mary Magdalene and Judah, their son, are found and an investigation begins.4

The problem with this claim is that it is a good old- fashioned overstatement. This is not surprising since the quote came from his web site’s homepage. Apparently, it is supposed to peak your interest. However, accuracy is always important. Let us consider the claim, “changes history,” how so? “shocks the world,” shocks with accurate revelation or shock at the weak evidence and imaginative storytelling?

We are then told that the tombs are inscribed with the names “The Virgin Mary, Jesus of Nazareth, Mary Magdalene and Judah, their son.” But the fact is: “No” on the first claim, “No” on the second, “No” on the third and “No” on the fourth.

“The Virgin Mary” was not found but rather, “Maria,” with no indication of who she was nor whether or not she was a virgin.

“Jesus of Nazareth” was not found but rather, “Yeshua bar Yosef” Jesus son of Joseph—it may be Jesus of Talpiot, Jesus of Jerusalem, Jesus of Fresno, etc.).

“Mary Magdalene” was not found but rather, “Mariamne”- ”Magdalene” denotes her being from Magdala, but again, this could be Mary from elsewhere. One reason that Mariamne is interpreted to be Mary Magdalene is that “Mariamne e Mara” is said to mean “Mary the Master.”

At least it is said to mean that within the confines of the documentary. However, the original scholars who worked on the site, and who are cited as sources on DSC’s website, are of a different opinion.

In his “Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries,” L.Y. Rahmani translates “Mariamne e Mara” as “of Mariamne, who is (also called) Mara.”5 He also notes that “Mara” is “a contraction of the name Martha.” And that “e” is “used in cases of double names.”

Likewise, in his “A Tomb With Inscribed Ossuaries in East Talpiyot, Jerusalem,” Amos Kloner translates “Mariamne e Mara” as “of Mariamene, [also called] Mara.”6 And likewise states, “Mara, a contraction of the name Martha, is used here as a second name.”

Richard Bauckham makes the following statement, “‘Mara’ in this context does not mean Master. It is an abbreviated form of Martha. probably the ossuary contained two women called Mary and Martha (Mariamne and Mara).”7

“Judah, their son” was not found but rather, “Yehuda bar Yeshua” or “Judah the son of Jesus“-there is absolutely no indication that it was the son of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, or even this Yehuda and this Mariamne; in this regard chapter “Their Own Whims and Lusts” Liberal Scholars and Jesus’ Marriage may be of interest.

The documentary’s narrator asks, “Why didn’t anyone take notice of these names?” Considering that the tomb was found two decades ago.

They did, and they found them to be generic and inconclusive. This is actually something that the documentary goes on to firmly establish by citing various scholars.

Also, what are we to make of “Matia,” (Matthew)? Who is he to the family? It is inferred that since there are Matthew- like names in the genealogy in the Gospel of Luke (which according to James Tabor, “people don’t notice it much,” see below).

At this point, it may be advantageous to mention that it appears that the way in which the documentary explains various discrepancies in the evidence is by plugging them into their preconceived notions.

In other words, instead of the evidence informing the theory, it appears that the theory is manipulating the evidence.

If we say, “Well, certainly there is a New Testament character, in fact, the author of a Gospel, that is named Matthew. This must be him.” Please do keep in mind that as appealing or even as correct as this may be; we are simply inventing 2,000-year-old history right off of the tops of our 21-century heads merely in order to force a piece of evidence to fit our preconceived theory.

Clearly, what Jacobovici presented us on his website is a perfect example of mixing the evidence with a personal interpretation which is then retold as if it was what the inscriptions actually stated.

Let the Debate Begin…Without Us:

Cameron stated, “We’ve done our homework; we’ve made the case; and now it’s time for the debate to begin.”8

However, the producer and director also take a Dan Brownesque retreat from the debate as James Cameron stated, “I’m not a theologist [sic.]. I’m not an archaeologist. I’m a documentary film maker”9 and Jacobovici stated, “I am not a theologian. I didn’t want to take anyone on”10 and also “We’re just reporting the news. We’re not statisticians. We’re not theologians.”11

You may recall how Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons, claimed that he had done the historical research and now he would leave it up to the historians to debate the facts. He quickly took his millions of dollars and disappeared from public view (in order to work on his next book about Freemasonry).

There is something important to point out here; something about how the fact/fiction of Brown and Cameron and Jacobovici function: Brown has stated, “How historically accurate is history itself?”12

Think about it: if history is not historically accurate how can he begin his novel The Da Vinci Code with the word “FACT” and claim that “All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate”? Just how does he know that the history upon which he is relying is accurate?

We ought not to make the claim of pure subjectivism in history in order to construct a self-fulfilling prophecy by dealing loosely with the facts—on purpose.

Now Cameron and Jacobovici are making a charge at a theological, historical, archeological subject while at the same time retreating virtually before the debate begins. At least Jacobovici appeared on a debate forum after the documentary was released. Here I only wanted to note the “Don’t ask me, that’s not my field” preemptions; the “I made the charge but will not debate” mentality.

Deoxyribonucleic Acid:

It appears that some of the unfounded claims of the documentary The Lost Tomb of Jesus are supposed to be excused due to reliance on “science.” DNA research is a science but the documentary’s conclusions are not scientific. Here is one such claim made by DSC,

“The film also documents DNA extraction from human residue found in two of the ossuaries and reveals new evidence that throws light on Jesus’ relationship with Mary Magdalene.”13

If you found my DNA how could you prove that it was mine? You would have to extract DNA from me and match it up. Finding DNA in an ossuary that says Yeshua does not tell us who this Yeshua was.

Note this interesting comment by Jacobovici regarding “Ossuary 80/503 ‘Yeshua bar Yosef’ - ‘Jesus, Son of Joseph’”:

…there is a large cross mark right next to the name “Jesus.” A cross, deliberately carved. The archaeologists, however, immediately and ever since, dismissed this as a mason’s mark. Besides, they say, Christians didn’t use crosses until the time of Constantine in the 4th century.

This “Jesus, Son of Joseph” ossuary couldn’t belong to that Jesus [he emphasized the word “that”], son of Joseph. Back in 1926, another “Jesus, son of Joseph” ossuary was discovered…[it] is on display at the Israel Museum. It is in no way connected with Jesus of Nazareth but instead is on display to send a message: don’t get excited if you find archaeological mention of any “Jesus.” The name is common.14

Simply stated, since there is no independent DNA control sample, the storytelling in the documentary about Jesus, His alleged wife, and His alleged child is simply unfounded and merely disguised as science.

We are told that since the DNA in the Yeshua and the Mariamne ossuary does not match the best explanation, considering that they are in a family tomb and yet not genealogically related, is that they were husband and wife. But how do we know this? Because it fits the theory. In fact, Yose may have been married to Mariamne and Yeshua could have been their son. Then Yeshua could have been married to Maria and had a son named Yehuda.

For proof that Jesus was married the documentary relies heavily on The Acts of Philip. They particularly rely on the most complete version of the text ever found.

In 1974 AD a 700-year-old manuscript of the 4th-century text of The Acts of Philip that contained “an early description of Mary Magdalene, unmarked by later Christian tradition.” Think about it; some three centuries after the time of Jesus and Mary Magdalene a text was written. We then find a manuscript that dates to circa fourteenth century which is considered the most reliable version. At this point, we may state that the skeptics will instantly embrace, accept, exalt and proclaim the absolute truth of any text that contradicts the New Testament. They do this by establishing different standards for that which will back up what they already believe; if it contradicts the New Testament it must be true-clearly, this denotes the aforementioned substandard double standard.

Therefore, they consider The Acts of Philip to be, pardon the pun, gospel truth. In reality, The Acts of Philip does not mention “Mary Magdalene” but it does include some interesting stories about the conversion of a talking leopard and goat.

Of course, we have no historical evidence that Jesus was married or that He had a child. I wrote about this in “Their Own Whims and Lusts” - Liberal Scholars and Jesus’ Marriage. Ah, but there is no evidence because it was kept secret-lack of evidence is not evidence, we cannot say that we know that it is true because there is no evidence.

Statistical Probability:

We again find personal interpretations of evidence being passed off as scientific conclusions. Statistical probability is a mathematical discipline but it is only as accurate as the numbers that are being used.

Let us begin with James Cameron‘s sensationalistic claims. On NBC’s “Today,” he claimed that statisticians favored the documentary’s conclusions about the ossuaries “in the range of a couple of million to one.”1

Also, note that DSC claims that “A statistical study commissioned by the broadcasters…concludes that the probability factor is 600 to 1 in favor of this tomb being the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth and his family.”15

Moreover, “Cameron and Jacobovici said statisticians who have looked at markings on the bone boxes estimate that the probability that the remains uncovered in 1980 are not those of Joseph, Mary, Jesus, Mary Magdalene, a son of Jesus and other relatives are more than 100 to 1.”16

On Larry King’s show, Jacobovici claimed that the stats were “2,000,000 to 1” in favor.

The claims were: “a couple of million to one,” “600 to 1,” “100 to 1,” “2,000,000 to one.”

This poses quite a statistical discrepancy.

Moreover, the calculations are based “on a few assumptions: that the Maria on one of the ossuaries is the mother of the Jesus found on another box, that Mariamne is his wife and that Joseph (inscribed as the nickname Jose) is his brother.”17

Darrell Bock (author of Breaking the Da Vinci Code) notes, “Joseph is the second most common male name in the period. Jesus is the sixth. Matthew’s the ninth…Mary is the most popular female name - 21 percent of the female names of the period. So, you’re dealing with a lot of familiar names.”18

Also, note that Bar Ilan University’s Amos Kloner:

…is adamant there is no evidence to support claims that it was the burial site of Jesus…”I’m a scholar. I do scholarly work which has nothing to do with documentary film-making’ he told AFP in a telephone interview…”

“Who says that “Maria” is Magdalena and “Judah” is the son of Jesus? It cannot be proved. These are very popular and common names from the 1 century BC,” said the academic at Israel’s Bar Ilan University.

Kloner said that of 900 burial caves found within four kilometres (two and a half miles) of Jerusalem’s Old City and from the same era, the name Jesus or Yeshu was found 71 times, and that “Jesus son of Joseph” had also been found.19

At the end of the essay Archeological Identity Theft, the author makes short work of the statistical calculations.20

Theological Considerations - The Resurrection and the Ascension:

As we have seen, Cameron stated, “I’m not a theologist [sic.]” and Jacobovici stated, “I am not a theologian.”  Yet, it is easy to see how theological issues are raised by their assertions. It would also be easy to accuse them of besmirching Christianity. Certainly, they filmed the documentary two decades after the tomb was found, after the success of The Da Vinci Code, and just before Easter.

Personally, I will be disappointed with them if they do not continue corroborating and continue making documentaries that call into question each of the world’s religions. But, and it may be due to the fact that they are not theologians, they appear to be taking a fairly non-confrontational approach. That is to say, let us be fair about what they are actually claiming. Although, let us keep in mind that they tend to take a grain of sand’s worth of evidence and turn it into an edifice of biblical proportions-pun intended.

Regarding the resurrection, Jacobovici, in a paraphrase of DSC, states:

“The Lost Tomb Of Jesus” does not challenge the Resurrection. It asks viewers to consider the possibility that the Resurrection occurred from a second tomb…Belief in the resurrection is based not on which tomb he was buried in, but on alleged sightings of Jesus that occurred after his burial and that are documented in the Gospels.21

Granted, they do not prove that Jesus, at least Jesus the Messiah, was in the Talpiot tomb. But they are at least offering the possibility that Jesus the Messiah did resurrect.

Regarding the ascension, Jacobovici states (paraphrase of DSC):

There is much debate among Christians as to whether this was a spiritual or a physical ascent. Did he leave his body behind or did he take it with him? If Jesus’ mortal remains have indeed been found, this would contradict the idea of a physical ascension.

However, it says nothing against the possibility of a spiritual ascension.22

Be that as it may, it appears that if you can believe in something as magical (see James Tabor’s comment below) as a resurrection and ascension you might as well believe that they were spiritual and not physical (whatever that may mean). For information about the Judeo-Christian theological position on the physical resurrection and particularly that of Jesus.

Odd and Unfounded Assertions:

When we are presented with fanciful interpretations of evidence we inevitably run across strange comments on all sorts of issues.

Here are two examples:

Carney Matheson, a scientist at the Paleo- DNA Laboratory at Lakehead University in Ontario, Canada…”Judah,” whom they indicate may have been their son, could have been the “lad” described in the Gospel of John as sleeping in Jesus’ lap at the Last Supper.23

One could only wonder whence the word “lad” was being quoted or where it is stated that anyone fell asleep in Jesus’ lap.

What we know about the event is the following:

But there was one of His disciples leaning upon Jesus’ bosom, the one whom Jesus loved. Peter therefore signaled to him to ask whom it might be of whom He spoke. And lying on Jesus’ breast, he said to him, Lord, who is it? (John 13:23-25).

Then Peter, turning around, saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following (the one who also leaned on His breast at supper, and said, Lord, who is he who betrays You?) Seeing him, Peter said to Jesus, Lord, and what of this one? (John 21:20-21).

The “lad” was John, who constantly describes himself as being the one whom Jesus loved. Moreover, we are told that it was a “disciple” and not a son. Although, the documentary claims, without evidence, that the beloved disciple was John’s way of secretly referring to Jesus’ son.

Furthermore, John did not lay down in Jesus’ lap in the way we would describe laying down. The way that they ate communal meals at that time was not to sit around a table (as in the Last Supper painting). Rather, they lay on their sides, on the floor, with their heads towards the meal and their legs away from it. In order to “lay on” Jesus’, John would merely have to lean back slightly: “they reclined and ate” (Mark 14:18), “He and the twelve apostles with Him reclined” (Luke 22:14).

Jacobovici states (paraphrase of DSC):

The writer of the Gospel of Matthew (28:12-

15) addresses a rumor that was circulating in Jerusalem at the time of the Crucifixion, a rumor that we suggest can be taken for the truth. The rumor was that the disciples came by night to remove Jesus’ body from the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. They would have done this to safeguard his remains from desecrators. His followers then would have taken the body of Jesus to a permanent tomb.24

The documentary’s narrator stated:

But according to the Gospel of Matthew there was another story circulating after Jesus’ death. And though the Gospel called it a lie, it was rumored that Jesus’ disciples secretly too their mater’s body. Presumably to give Him a permanent burial.

Simply stated, there is absolutely no historical/archeological evidence, not even in the documentary, that the disciples ever did any such thing. This is purely imaginative storytelling that will, sadly, be taken by some to be more reliable than, among other things, the over 25,000 manuscripts of the New Testament (in various languages: see the end of Appendix: Comparison of New Testament vs. Other Ancient Documents). Moreover, the rumor was not that they wanted to give Him a permanent burial but that they sought to deceive people into thinking that Jesus had physically resurrected (this would have made them purposeful deceivers who later were martyred for the lie that they invented).

Incidentally, there are also some other simply odd details shown in the reenactments: the woman caught in adultery is actually shown being stoned and Jesus literally jumps into the middle of flying stones. The woman who washed Jesus’ feet and dried them with her hair actually cuts her hair and then uses the handful that she cut to dry them. Etc.

Some Academics Dare to Disagree:

Let us consider some of the academics who are not considered in Jacobovici and DSC’s “all.”

Recall that in the section above entitled Utterly Absolute Unquestionable Certainty I quoted Jacobovici’s web site to the effect that “there is absolutely no academic dispute concerning the provenance of any of the inscriptions. Nor is there any question as to how they should be read.” And that DSC claimed that “All leading epigraphers agree about the inscriptions. All archaeologists confirm the nature of the find.”

Kloner was:

…the first archaeologist to examine the site, said the idea fails to hold up by archaeological standards but makes for profitable television. “They just want to get money for it”…Kloner also said the filmmakers’ assertions are false. “The names on the caskets are the most common names found among Jews at the time.”25

Kloner also stated, “It’s a beautiful story but without any proof whatsoever.”26

Shimon Gibson, one of three archaeologists who first discovered the tomb in 1980, said Monday of the film’s claims: “I’m skeptical, but that’s the way I am. I’m willing to accept the possibility.”27

Stephen Pfann, a biblical scholar at the University of the Holy Land in Jerusalem who was interviewed in the documentary, said the film’s hypothesis holds little weight. Pfann is even unsure that the name “Jesus” on the caskets was read correctly. He thinks it’s more likely the name “Hanun.” Ancient Semitic script is notoriously difficult to decipher.28

William Dever, an expert on near eastern archaeology and anthropology, who has worked with Israeli archeologists for five decades, said specialists have known about the ossuaries for years. “The fact that it’s been ignored tells you something,” said Dever, professor emeritus at the University of Arizona. “It would be amusing if it didn’t mislead so many people.”29

Ben Witherington is the author of the book What Have They Done With Jesus? and he was involved in DSC’s special on the James ossuary that was produced by Jacobovici about whom Witherington had the following to say:

He is a good filmmaker, and he knows a good sensational story when he sees one. This is such a story. Unfortunately, it is a story full of holes, conjectures, and problems. It will make good TV and involves a bad critical reading of history. Basically, this is old news with a new interpretation. We have known about this tomb since it was discovered in 1980. There are all sorts of reasons to see this as much ado about nothing much.30

Witherington then enumerates various problems with the documentary’s various assertions (please see his website for these31).

Erudite Elucidators?:

John Dominic Crossan is the co-founder and former co- chair of “The Jesus Seminar.” He makes his obligatory appearance in the documentary in order to make one

statement:

If the bones of Jesus were to be found in an ossuary in Jerusalem tomorrow. Without doubt, let’s say they are definitely agreed to be the bones of Jesus. Would that destroy Christian faith? It certainly would not destroy my Christian faith [he emphasized the word “my”]. I leave what happens to bodies up to God.

Note that on June 26, 2000 AD, ABC aired “Peter Jennings Reporting: The Search for Jesus” in which Crossan stated that crucifixion was feared because it “was not simply that it made you suffer a lot. It meant that you didn’t get buried. That’s what made it one of the supreme Roman penalties- lack of burial.” Crossan believes that Jesus’ body was simply thrown in the city dump and was eaten by wild dogs.32

Firstly, let us note that the problem with this statement is lack of evidence. Moreover, the evidence we do have on this subject proves him wrong and proves the Bible right. In 1968 the remains of a crucified man named Yhohnn (or Yohann) Yehohanan were found in an ossuary at Giv’at ha- Mivtar in Jerusalem. This find proved many details of the biblical account including a large nail embedded through the heel bone and still embedded into a piece the wood, broken shin bones and burial in a family grave.

In 2000 AD Crossan’s expertise informed us that crucifixion victims did not get buried. In 2007 AD Crossan’s expertise informed us that Jesus may have been buried and may be found. It would appear that the only thing that could challenge Crossan’s faith would be if the New Testament were to be taken in a literal, traditional, orthodox manner and if he would consider other historical and archeological evidence.

Another expert who seems to be up for anything is Tabor of whom Witherington comments thusly:

What should we make of James Tabor’s being co-opted into this project? You will remember his book which came out last year The Jesus Dynasty. In that book he had quite a good deal to say about the Talpiot Tomb, and about Panthera being the father of Jesus, and about Jesus being buried in Galilee, and of course nothing about a ossuary which claims that Joseph is the father of Jesus.33

While it is certainly difficult to discern a person’s mood and unacceptable to determine the motive of their heart; James Tabor appeared to be almost capricious or belittling at times:

When He’s first buried it’s in a temporary tomb. And later, unless He somehow magically disappears and goes to heaven, which is a position of Christian faith, but if you’re gonna be historical and realistic, uh, He, He was put in a, would be put in a permanent place.

The very cornerstone of the Christian faith is referred to as magical; well, we have been told worse. Notice his preconceived notion; “historical” and “realistic” does not allow the magical. You may say “Rightly so,” but do keep in mind that he is presenting us with an a priori commitment to naturalism/materialism. Unless it has been proven that naturalism/materialism is absolute we cannot simply dismiss the “magical.” It is a false dichotomy to juxtapose “historical” and “realistic” on the one hand and “magical” aka miraculous or supernatural on the other whilst asserting that never the twain shall meet.

He also states:

Tell you something very interesting, there’re two genealogies of Jesus. Everybody reads the formal genealogy of Joseph…but the other genealogy is imbedded in Luke, people don’t notice it much, it’s Luke chapter three, you gotta turn a few pages.

Who would a'thunk it? Apparently, in two thousand years, only James Tabor and a handful of people have noticed the genealogy in Luke. This reminds me of the author who wrote, “in a little-known passage of the Bible, the credit for killing Goliath is actually given to somebody completely different - David’s champion Elhanan”—”little known”?34

We seem to be dealing with experts for whom any non- New Testament theory de jour will do.

The James Ossuary:

The “James son of Joseph brother of Jesus,” ossuary is mentioned in the documentary:

Forensic testing of the patina on the Jesus ossuary and that of James conclude that they came from the same tomb seemingly proving the authenticity of the often- questioned James ossuary and further increasing the likelihood that it is the tomb of the holy family.

But there is one wrinkle that is not examined in the documentary, one that emerged in a Jerusalem courtroom just weeks ago at the fraud trial of James ossuary owner Oded Golan, charged with forging part of the inscription on the box. Former FBI agent Gerald Richard testified that a photo of the James ossuary, showing it in Golan’s home, was taken in the 1970s, based on tests done by the FBI photo lab. The trial resumes tomorrow.

Jacobovici conceded in an interview that if the ossuary was photographed in the 1970s, it could not then have been found in a tomb in 1980. But while he does not address the conundrum in the documentary, he said in an interview that it’s possible Golan’s photo was printed on old paper in the 1980s.35

Moreover:

Archaeologists also balk at the filmmaker’s claim that the James Ossuary - the center of a famous antiquities fraud in Israel - might have originated from the same cave. In 2005, Israel charged five suspects with forgery in connection with the infamous bone box. “I don’t think the James Ossuary came from the same cave,” said Dan Bahat, an archaeologist at Bar-Ilan University.

“If it were found there, the man who made the forgery would have taken something better. He would have taken Jesus.”36

Furthermore:

The antiquities dealer (Oded Golan) from which the James ossuary was procured, attests that it came from Silwan, not Talpiot, and had dirt in it matching the soil from that location in Jerusalem, whereas the ossuaries from Talpiot came out of a rock cave from a different place, without such soil in it. “To theorize that there was a Jesus family tomb, and yet the one member of Jesus” family who we know was buried in Jerusalem for a long time did not come out of the ground from that locale contradicts this theory.

Furthermore, Eusebius reports that the tomb marker for James’ burial was close to where James was martyred near the temple mount, indeed near the famous tombs in the Kidron valley such as the so-called tomb of Absalom. Talpiot is nowhere near this locale.37

The Geological Survey of Israel (GSI) and the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) have declared that the inscription on the James Ossuary is a forgery. They also state, “the ‘letters patina’ of ‘James Ossuary’ reveals that the patina could not have formed under natural climatic conditions (temperature and water composition) that prevailed in the Judea Mountains during the last 2000 years.”38

Most noteworthy is the fact that Kloner was specifically asked, “What of the assertion that the 10th ossuary disappeared from your care and may be none other than the ‘James’ ossuary?”

He responds thusly:

Nothing has disappeared. The 10th ossuary was on my list. The measurements were not the same (as the James ossuary). It was plain (without an inscription). We had no room under our roofs for all the ossuaries, so unmarked ones were sometimes kept in the courtyard (of the Rockefeller Museum).39

Of further archeological interest may be The Jesus Tablet - “L'shloshet Yamin-In Three Days” - “Sar Hasarin-Prince of Princes.

Concluding Musings:

It appears that the documentary is accurate in its depictions of actual findings:

A tomb was, in fact, found.

Ossuaries were, in fact, found.

Legible inscriptions were, in fact, found.

Very common names were, in fact, found.

Perhaps it was a family tomb.

Perhaps someone name Yeshua was married to Mariamne or Mara or Maria.

Perhaps Yehuda was their son.

Perhaps this was even the family tomb of Jesus the Messiah.

Perhaps.

The “facts” are one part of the documentary and the “perhaps” are another. It is the perhaps portions that threaten to discredit an otherwise interesting documentary about ancient history and modern archaeology. The dramatic recreations, being based on perhaps, are unfounded personal interpretations that are only an accurate representation of the filmmaker’s active imaginations.

We find the filmmaker’s irresponsible hype in his claims to have found the ossuaries of “The Virgin Mary, Jesus of Nazareth, Mary Magdalene and Judah, their son,” when, in fact, no such thing was found.

The scientific fact of DNA is less than conclusive. The statistics are questionable, at best. We are left with many unanswered and unasked questions.

Thank God for Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code!

Having noted the Dan Brownesque nature of some of the above, it seems that delving into this topic next is fitting.  As we got closer to the release of the movie Angels and Demons (released on May 15, 2009 AD) I thought that pop- culture was sure to revisit the very same historical myths that are so very popular with conspiracy theorists and those lacking in the knowledge of History 101.

But “Thank God for ‘The Da Vinci Code’!”? Indeed. Dan Brown should: at least for the freedom he has to besmirch Christianity, at least because Christianity is the

only religion that is still politically correct to attack, at least for the forgiving nature of Christianity.

Christians should: at least for the opportunity it gives to Christians to respond with much more convincing evidence than a fictitious novel.

We should immediately point out Brown’s answer to the question, “Are you a Christian?” Brown responds:

Yes. Interestingly, if you ask three people what it means to be Christian, you will get three different answers. Some feel being baptized is sufficient. Others feel you must accept the Bible as absolute historical fact. Still others require a belief that all those who do not accept Christ as their personal savior are doomed to hell. Faith is a continuum…we’re each following our own paths of enlightenment.40

What of Brown’s real-life theology? Here is a taste:

We now turn to God for only a handful of questions that science has not yet been able to understand. We still have religion based on “proof from incredulity” (it must be so because there is no other explanation). We still believe in a God of the gaps…We are unable to conceive of our hopes, dreams, memories, and spirits evaporating into thin air when we die, so therefore we say there must be an afterlife. We can’t imagine it another way…The biggest challenge to our spiritual being is our brains are evolving…How do we become solidly minded scientifically, without losing our religion?41

As Brown’s theology sinks in please consider a comparison:

Salman Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses, and Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code:

1. Rushdie wrote a fictional novel about Islam. Brown wrote a fictional novel about Christianity.

2. Rushdie was rewarded by being condemned to death. Brown was rewarded by becoming a millionaire.

3. Rushdie was forced to run for his life, go into hiding, and live a secluded life. Brown became an instant celebrity with millions of adoring fans.

4. Rushdie’s novel is actually based on a subject matter that the Qur'an itself refers to as fact- Muhammad’s proclamation and later revocation of certain verses that were explained away by the claim that he had been influenced by Satan in moments of weakness. The verses that Muhammad dictated during these moments are known as the satanic verses and were known as such long before Rushdie wrote of them in his novel. Brown’s novel is based on old and utterly discredited paranoid conspiracy theories.

Islam, including the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens (now known as Yusuf Islam), placed a price on Rushdie’s head. See the end of this article for elucidation on the Rushdie and Stevens/Islam controversy. Christianity has responded by dealing with the claims made in Brown’s novel by providing scholarship that counters Brown’s allegedly accurate depiction of works of art and historical sources.

Indeed, Brown should be very thankful that he targeted his attack upon Christianity, the only religion that, according to pop-culture’s concept of political correctness, is still eligible for constant besmirching.

But haven’t many people already been deceived and lost their faith due to Brown’s deceptions?

A survey of British readers of Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code” shows that reading the book causes people to believe its claims over those of the Bible. Those having read the book are twice as likely to believe Jesus Christ fathered children and four times as likely to think the conservative Catholic group Opus Dei is a murderous sect, Reuters reported…The poll of 1,000 adults showed 60 percent believed Jesus had children by Mary Magdalene - a claim presented in the book - compared with just 30 percent of those who had not read the book, reported Reuters.42

However, seekers of the truth will find it or return to it. Moreover, the response is not suppression but viable responses utilizing annoying little things that Brown did not allow himself to be hindered by little things such as facts, evidence, historical records, etc., etc.

Consider another comparison:

Michael Moore, author and movie maker recently famous (or infamous) for Fahrenheit 911, and Dan Brown who has become the Michael Moore of religious scholarship.

1. Both weave a tangled web of fiction and alleged fact.

2. Both claim to base their works on fact but have been discredited by actual fact finders.

3. Both have become millionaire celebrities by engaging in besmirchment.

4. Both have, to a very large extent, flatly refused to respond to rebuttals of their works.

5. Both have, apparently, become successful because they are stating what some people want to hear with their itching ears, “But the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

But why is The Da Vinci Code successful? There are, perhaps, quite a few reasons:

People who have no interest in such discussion of facts with regards to these issues find the novel to be an interesting and exciting story.

Others go beyond reason “1” and believe that they have now educated themselves by reading these novels.

Others go beyond reasons “1” and “2” and go on to demand that Christians answer the allegations made in the novel.

Others go beyond reasons “1,” “2” and “3” and solidify their denial of the truth of the Christian faith.

People who do practice some form of “Christian religion” but do not know what they believe, nor why they believe it, consider the novel a great challenge to their faith and they spend more time reading it than the Bible (or various Christian scholarly works, including those that respond to the novel). Suddenly, the novel, and the corresponding movie, video game, etc., become more important.

Perhaps the biggest reason for the novel’s popularity is to be explained in the context of presupposition apologetics. Since Christianity is true it is under constant attack in thought, deed, and word. Even though light has come into the world, men love darkness because their deeds are evil. Brown has provided a ready-made excuse to reject Jesus as He presents Himself through the people who knew Him personally and from the personal testimony of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. Moreover, some people will not bother to read the vast amount of material available in the form of refutation of that which Brown claims as fact (if they are even aware that such information exists).

It’s just a good book (which is debatable).

I for one would encourage Brown to continue his literary pursuits. Perhaps he will next write a novel that besmirches Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism or others. Pop-culture and its ethics wing, the politically correct movement, would never allow such well-balanced besmirchment. Actually, his next book will be about the same main character unlocking the mysteries of Freemasonry.

Although, actually the back of the title page states, “All of the characters and events in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental” (Doubleday hardcover ed.) or “This is a work of fiction, that characters, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or they are used entirely fictitiously” (Corgi Books paperback ed.). Thus, is the novel claimed as truth? Yes, no, maybe so. It is, of course, a concoction of old, and thoroughly discredited, conspiracy theories based upon the anything but the facts ma'am concept.

One can only wonder (since he is no longer accepting interviews) if he has read the various rebuttals to his novel or if he, in the first place, read anything that was contrary to his conspiracies (such as, oh, the Bible, for instance).

The responsibility for the confusion and controversy over The Da Vinci Code is, of course, to be placed at the feet of Brown himself. This is not only because he is the author but because of the notorious concoction of what has been referred to as fact and fiction but what is, in reality, actual fiction and alleged facts (which are also fiction).The fictitious nature of the work is established by the publisher’s disclaimer. Yet, the novel begins with the word, “FACT.” Is the word fact to be considered part of the fiction, in other words, are the facts only facts within the context of a fictitious story or is the author establishing actual facts that will then be woven into the body of the fiction?

Brown has stated, “How historically accurate is history itself?”43 While there is some legitimacy to this statement it is also a tool by which to deny any possibility of objectivism while likewise allowing one to deal creatively with historical facts. Let us not make the claim of pure subjectivism in history a self-fulfilling prophecy by dealing loosely with the facts—on purpose. If history is not historically accurate, how can Brown claim to base his novel of historical fact? This is a substandard double standard.

The dogma of subjectivism has so taken hold of our culture (perhaps a universal pop-culture) that people believe that they can read a fictional novel and learn truth, truth with which to overthrow actual and well-established fact. This confusion is also furthered by people who are supposed to be serious scholars as may be seen in an interesting prediction by “James M. Robinson, America’s leading expert on such ancient religious texts from Egypt” and “an emeritus professor at Claremont (Calif.) Graduate University, chief editor of religious documents found in 1945 at Nag Hammadi, Egypt, and an international leader among scholars of Coptic manuscripts…speculated the timing of the release is aimed at capitalizing on interest in the film version of The Da Vinci Code.”44

The confusion presented by The Da Vinci Code is not solely due to the indifferent, the skeptics and the yea of little faith, as it were, but confusion is fueled by the presentation of the work and the words of those involved in both book and movie.

Brown has made the answer to this riddle very clear, he claims that it is fact with fiction and fiction with fact:

I really began writing this book as a skeptic. I expected to disprove a lot of what’s in the book, and the more research I did, the more I began to believe it and realized, Wow, this makes an awful lot of sense…It’s important to remember this is a work of fiction. All of the references in the book - whether it’s the documents or secret societies - all of that information is drawn from fact. But anyone who turns to popular fiction as some sort of historical textbook - I don’t think anybody is doing that.45

The Da Vinci Code is a novel and therefore a work of fiction. While the book’s characters and their actions are obviously not real, the artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals depicted in this novel all exist…it is my belief that some of the theories discussed by these characters may have merit…the secret behind The Da Vinci Code was too well documented and significant for me to dismiss.46

Brown told National Public Radio’s “Weekend Edition” during a 2003 publicity tour - he declines interviews now - that his characters and action are fictional but “the ancient history, the secret documents, the rituals, all of this is factual.” Around the same time, on CNN he said that “the background is all true.”47

From an interview with Weekend Edition’s Linda Wertheimer:

I assume that, among other things, you would hear from the world if you’ve got anything wrong.

Mr. BROWN: Certainly…

WERTHEIMER: You’re trying not to get too fictional with the facts here?

Mr. BROWN: Absolutely. The only thing fictional in “The Da Vinci Code” is the characters and the action that takes place. All of the locations, the paintings, the ancient history, the secret documents, the rituals, all of this is factual.48

On The Today Show (6-9-03) Matt Lauer asked Brown, “How much of this is based on reality in terms of things that actually occurred?” to which Dan Brown responded, “Absolutely all of it. Obviously, there are - Robert Langdon is fictional, but all of the art, architecture, secret rituals, secret societies, all of that is historical fact.”

On Good Morning America (11-3-03) Brown was asked, “if you were writing it as a nonfiction book, how would it have been different?” to which he responded, “I don’t think it would have. I began the research for The Da Vinci Code as a skeptic. I entirely expected, as I researched the book, to disprove this theory, and after numerous trips to Europe and two years of research, I really became a believer.”

Brown told The Chronicle’s Mary Richardson:

I wanted to write a book that while it entertained at the same time, you close that last page and go “Wow, do you know how much I just learned? That’s fascinating.” That is really what I set out to do…When I started researching Da Vinci Code, I really was skeptical and I expected on some level to disprove all this history that is unearthed in the book and after three trips to Paris and a lot of interviews, I became a believer.

TIME magazine described the novel as a “historical thriller purporting to expose a centuries-old Vatican conspiracy to conceal the marriage and offspring of Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene.”49

Brown made the following statements at a lecture to the

New Hampshire Writers Project:

We were born into a culture. We worship the gods of our fathers. I humbly submit that if all of us in this room had been born in Tibet, probably a lot of us would be Buddhists. I think the chances are pretty good and I also think that we would hold on to all that Buddhist philosophy with all the passion that some of us might hold on to our Christian ideals…Again, we worship the gods of our fathers. It is truly that simple…The world is a big place and now more than ever, there is enormous danger in believing we are infallible. That our version of the truth is absolute.

What do other notable figures have to say on this issue?: Ron Howard stated, “It’s not theology. It’s not history…this is a work of fiction.”50

Also, “‘to deny the right to see the film is a fascist act,’ and also ‘to tell someone not to go see the film is an act of militancy and militancy generates hatred and violence.’”51

And:

There’s no question that the film is likely to be upsetting to some people…My advice, since virtually no one has really seen the movie yet, is to not go see the movie if you think you’re going to be upset. Wait. Talk to somebody who has seen it. Discuss it. And then arrive at an opinion about the movie itself. 52

Ron Howard also expressed his view of reviews:

Of course it’s frustrating that some of the critics have been harsh with it and that’s disappointing, because I’m the type of person that likes to please everyone. I think with this project, that’s an impossibility and I’ve kind of known that all along.53

And now from the peanut gallery:

The reaction immediately after the first press screening at the Cannes film festival on Tuesday was mainly negative…Many people in the audience at the screening laughed at the pivotal moment, and the ending was greeted with stony silence.54

Plus, a bit of merchandising never hurt,

Howard even had a suggestion on how to boost that number [the projected opening] “This sounds a little ‘hucksterish’, but people really respond to the movie better the second time than they do the first time.”55

SONY called the novel, “a work of fiction, and at its heart, it’s a thriller, not a religious tract.”56

Tom Hanks stated, “This is not a documentary, this is not something that is pulled up and said, these are the facts and this is exactly what happened.”57

When the movie cast was asked if they believed Christ was married Tom Hanks answered, “Well, I wasn’t around.”58

Hanks has also stated, “But the story we tell is loaded with all sorts of hooey and fun kind of scavenger-hunt-type nonsense,” and “If you are going to take any sort of movie at face value, particularly a huge-budget motion picture like this, you’d be making a very big mistake.”59

“John Calley, a co-producer of ‘Da Vinci Code,’ has admitted that the film is anti-Catholic.”60

Fine, although one wonders what would happen if, for instance, a fictional novel was written about a character named Ron Howard who is described as a former child star and current movie director who is also a depraved maniac. Or, Tom Hanks, a Hollywood actor, lives a double life as a

( fill in the blank).

In fact, any time that Brown is asked about the controversy stirred by his wild false accusations he responds that at least people are talking and that discussing the issues is always a good thing. But what if we wrote a novel about a novelist named Brown who, although he is married, is an adulterer. Then, upon being sued for defamation of character we could state that at least people are talking about marriage and commitment and that discussion is always good.

Then they may be a bit more cognizant of referring to such convolution as mere fiction. In fact, when Brown was accused of plagiarism he fought the charge in court and did not say, “Well, it’s an interesting topic of discussion.” I’m my wives husband and I love her very, very much but would I ever write a book that besmirches her, that makes all sorts of malicious accusations against her? Never!

As far as Brown’s claims, there are various books, videos, and websites that have done a fine job of bringing out the actual truth of the matter. It seems appropriate to refer to Brown’s style of making claims about history by invoking the technical term yrotsih. Basically, we can take whatever he claims to be historical facts, turn them backward and only then do we get a good assessment of reality. I for one cannot help but point out one inaccuracy.

Brown claims that the Council of Nicaea voted Jesus into deity and did so by “a close vote.” This “close vote” was actually 316 to 2. Now, I wonder how Dan Brown would feel if his accountant and money managers engaged in such fuzzy-math, “Well, Mr. Brown we have ensured that your money is well accounted for. We came close to making an accurate assessment, we could have placed 316 million dollars in your account but we got close and placed 2 million instead.”

Thus, not only was the vote the very opposite of “close,” it was not about establishing Jesus’ divinity. In fact, what the early church sought to establish regarding Jesus were two issues: One was Jesus’ humanity, two early unorthodox positions were Modalism and Gnosticism who did not attribute humanity to Jesus. The other was, and in the case of this council, whether he is of the same substance as God the Father.

Rather, there is a more appropriate way to go about engaging in discussions of important issues. One would be to publish a non-fiction book that presents the research (like the authors of Holy Blood Holy Grail, who were discredited on their own merits) another would be for Dan Brown to take up the challenge and agree to debate that which he claims to be factual.

Perhaps Brown will write a novel about a Caliph, whom he could name 'Uthman. The story could state that this Caliph attempted to concoct an authorized text of the Qur'an due to variant readings in the numerous manuscripts. He could state that after concocting his own authorized version 'Uthman burnt all the manuscripts that disagree with his new one. Wait a minute! Sorry! This actually happened! (see my article On the Qur'an’s Composition61).

Others are using the novel to actually propose the same old conspiracy theories, as Brown retells, “One academic told me her enthusiasm for The Da Vinci Code was based in part on her hope that ‘this ancient mystery would be unveiled to a wider audience.’”62

Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince are the co-authors of The Templar Revelation from which Dan Brown drew some inspiration:

…assured the audience that they had no hidden agenda when writing their book. “We were following a trail. If people don’t agree with us, that’s fine. They can check our sources and come to their own conclusions.”63

Picknett further stated, “I would say to the Catholic Church

- get a grip. You’ve been dishing it out for years - but now you’ve proved you can’t take it.”64

ABC News reporter Elizabeth Vargas, raised Roman Catholic, said ABC had no proof Jesus had a wife but could not discount the theory either. “For me, it’s made religion more real and, ironically, much more interesting - which is what we’re hoping to do for our viewers.”65

How could we fail to mention the comment made within the context of a call for the movie to display a disclaimer that would identify it as a work of fiction:

…famed British actor Ian McKellen [Gandalf of Lord of the Rings], piped up: “Well, I’ve often thought the Bible should have a disclaimer in the front saying this is fiction. I mean, walking on water, it takes an act of faith. And I have faith in this movie.

Not that it’s true, not that it’s factual, but that it’s a jolly good story. And I think audiences are clever enough and bright enough to separate out fact and fiction, and discuss the thing after they’ve seen it.”66

Certainly, it was Brown’s claims of facts behind the descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals that have caused much of the responses to the novel. There is not much argument about whether the novel is well written.

Rather, the responses come into play when a person claims that certain things are facts and other people can ascertain the accuracy of that statement by doing their own research.

This is an area from which Brown wishes to stay away. Brown has retired from the spotlight, and from those pesky calls for explanations of his vast inaccuracies, while he works on his follow-up novel about the Masons:

…people always want me to speak about The Da Vinci Code. And this is information that I researched a couple of years ago, it’s no longer on the tip of my tongue.67

Though he’s been hit with lawsuits and rebuffed by the Vatican, author Dan Brown said Sunday it’s not his responsibility to address controversies stirred up by his book…” Let the biblical scholars and historians battle it out.”68

Even some of the old time (you know, way back in the 1980’s AD) conspiracy theorists are still playing the fact/fiction/fiction/fact game:

What has attracted readers to “The Da Vinci Code” is its central theme, which Dan Brown claims is not fiction but fact - that a mysterious European society, known as the Priory of Sion, has for centuries guarded a momentous secret.

That secret, which is the theory at the heart of the novel, is that Jesus Christ married Mary Magdalene and today their descendants are living in France.69

Henry Lincoln, scriptwriter who produced three documentaries for the BBC and is the co-author of Holy Blood, Holy Grail, concocted a theory that:

Mary Magdalene had married Jesus and the Holy Grail that she allegedly brought to France was not the cup from the Last Supper but the child that she and Jesus had together…does Lincoln still believe in that story today? “I can’t say that it’s a fact because it isn’t. It’s an idea. But it fits the facts that we have, very few though they be,” Lincoln says.70

Brown’s fiction is a success but his “facts” are a dismal failure as evidenced by the vast amounts of literature that have arisen to present the actual facts behind the fictional facts.

Brown should most certainly thank God for his freedom, his success, and his ability to excuse himself from the fray.

The Jesus Tablet

L'shloshet Yamin—In Three Days

Sar Hasarin—Prince of Princes

No, “The Jesus Tablet” does not refer to the Ten Commandments, neither to the good ol' doctor’s advice, take two of these and call me in the morning.

What is at issue is the following:

A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.71

The tablet has come to be known as “Gabriel’s Revelation” because the text claims to be “a vision of the apocalypse transmitted by the angel Gabriel, draws on the Old Testament, especially the prophets Daniel, Zechariah and Haggai.”72

While it is reported that the tablet was “probably found near the Dead Sea in Jordan”73 it has also been noted that “The tablet was not discovered in an organized archaeological excavation, therefore the location of its discovery is not clear.”74

The tablet consists of “stone with ink writings…written, not engraved, across two neat columns, similar to columns in a Torah. But the stone is broken, and some of the text is faded, meaning that much of what it says is open to debate.”75 Two terms deciphered from the tablet are “L'shloshet yamin - in three days” and “Sar hasarin-prince of princes.”

As to the tablet’s recent history:

…the stone…was found about a decade ago and bought from a Jordanian antiquities dealer by an Israeli-Swiss collector who kept it in his Zurich home…

“I couldn’t make much out of it when I got it,” said David Jeselsohn, the owner, who is himself an expert in antiquities. “I didn’t realize how significant it was until I showed it to Ada Yardeni, who specializes in Hebrew writing, a few years ago. She was overwhelmed. ‘You have got a Dead Sea Scroll on stone,’ she told me’“…

Yardeni, who analyzed the stone along with Binyamin Elitzur, is an expert on Hebrew script, especially of the era of King Herod, who died in 4 BC The two of them published a long analysis of the stone more than a year ago in Cathedra, a Hebrew- language quarterly devoted to the history and archaeology of Israel, and said that, based on the shape of the script and the language, the text dated from the late first century BC.76

As to the content of the tablets what, for some, is at issue are the tablet’s BC statements regarding “a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.” Although, as noted above, this is at issue. Note the qualifier “may,” “because it may speak of a messiah...” and it is furthermore emphasized that there is a “debate over whether it speaks of a resurrected messiah.”77

Assuming that the text does make BC statements regarding “a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days,” some of the arguments that follow are:

If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re- evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.78

It seems to me that there is much ado about nothing since it would not impact Christianity negatively, but may impact it positively, “If such a messianic description really is there.”

Yet, the supposed controversy has been emphasized as follows:

Daniel Boyarin, a professor of Talmudic culture at the University of California at Berkeley, said that the stone was part of a growing body of evidence suggesting that Jesus could be best understood through a close reading of the Jewish history of his day. “Some Christians will find it shocking - a challenge to the uniqueness of their theology - while others will be comforted by the idea of it being a traditional part of Judaism,” Boyarin said.79

Israel Knohl goes as far as stating:

This should shake our basic view of Christianity…Resurrection after three days becomes a motif developed before Jesus, which runs contrary to nearly all scholarship. What happens in the New Testament was adopted by Jesus and his followers based on an earlier messiah story.80

He certainly appears hopeful that he has found legitimacy for his own views. However, there is nothing within Christian theology to the effect that it would be problematic if Jesus’ “death and resurrection was not unique” in fact, it would enforce the concept of Jesus fulfilling what may be termed, messianic expectations.

Further elucidation of the supposed controversy is as follows:

Israel Knohl, an iconoclastic professor of Bible studies at Hebrew University in Jerusalem…posited in a book published in 2000 the idea of a suffering messiah before Jesus, using a variety of rabbinic and early apocalyptic literature as well as the Dead Sea Scrolls. But his theory did not shake the world of Christology as he had hoped, partly because he had no textual evidence from before Jesus…

Knohl is part of a larger scholarly movement that focuses on the political atmosphere in Jesus’day as an important explanation of that era’s messianic spirit. As he notes, after the death of Herod, Jewish rebels sought to throw off the yoke of the Rome-supported monarchy, so the rise of a major Jewish independence fighter could take on messianic overtones.81

As previously stated, the table “draws on the Old Testament, especially the prophets Daniel, Zechariah and Haggai” and would, therefore, strengthen the Christian claim that Jesus’ messiahship was prophesied and prefigured in the Old Testament.82

As to the “political atmosphere in Jesus’ day as an important explanation of that era’s messianic spirit,” there may be something to be said about this. However, Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver has identified another well-known reason for “that era’s messianic spirit”:

Prior to the first century (c.e.) the Messianic interest was not excessive…The first century, however, especially the generation before the destruction [of the Second Temple], witnessed a remarkable outburst of Messianic emotionalism. This is to be attributed, as we shall see, not to an intensification of Roman persecution, but to the prevalent belief induced by the popular chronology of that day that the age was on the threshold of the Millennium…

When Jesus came into Galilee, “spreading the gospel of the Kingdom of God,” and saying the “time is fulfilled” and “the Kingdom of God is at hand,” he was voicing the opinion universally held that…the age of the Kingdom of God-was at hand…It was this chronological fact which inflamed the Messianic hope rather than the Roman persecutions…Jesus appeared in the procuratorship of Pontius Pilate (26-36 c.e.)…

It seems likely, therefore, that in the minds of the people the Millennium was to begin around the year 30 c.e.…The Messiah was expected around the second quarter of the first century c.e., because the Millennium was at hand. Prior to that time he was not expected, because according to the chronology of the day the Millennium was still considerably removed.83

Recalling that “the stone is broken, and some of the text is faded, meaning that much of what it says is open to debate”84 it is of interest to note what Moshe Bar-Asher stated regarding Knohl’s views (Bar-Asher is the president of the Israeli Academy of Hebrew Language and emeritus professor of Hebrew and Aramaic at the Hebrew University):

“There is one problem,” he said. “In crucial places of the text there is lack of text. I understand Knohl’s tendency to find there keys to the pre-Christian period, but in two to three crucial lines of text there are a lot of missing words.”85

Perhaps unwittingly, Knohl ends up supporting the New Testament as he claims that the tablet:

…strongly suggested that a savior who died and rose after three days was an established concept at the time of Jesus. He notes that in the Gospels, Jesus makes numerous predictions of his suffering and New Testament scholars say such predictions must have been written in by later followers because there was no such idea present in his day.86

Thus, there is no indication that such predictions must have been written in by later followers since there were such ideas present in Jesus’ day.

The premise that the Messiah died and was resurrected after three days is considered the foundation of the Christian faith, one which differentiates it from Judaism. Through the generations, this belief stood at the center of the debate between Christians and Jews. But now, a mysterious tablet from the time of the second temple has led researchers to believe that this premise of messianic resurrection is not unique to Christianity, but rather existed in Judaism years before Jesus was born.87

It is quite an overstatement to claim that “The premise that the Messiah died and was resurrected after three days…stood at the center of the debate between Christians and Jews.” The fact is that within Judaism there have always been various messianic concepts. While articles such as Rabbi Shraga Simmons’ Why Don’t Jews Believe in Jesus have made quite the rounds online they present an extremely narrow and convenient messianic view.

Throughout history, there have been various Jewish messianic concepts such as:

Some claimed that the Messiah would be a divine agent, some a mere man and still others an impersonal era.

Some thought that he would work miracles and some, through politics.

Some said that he would bring instant world peace and some that redemption will come gradually.

Some taught that one Messiah would come twice and some that two Messiahs would come one time each.

Some claimed that he would be a humble suffering servant who would die for our sins and some that he will be a triumphant conquering king who will re-gather Israel and wipe out her enemies.

Et al.

Some examples follow.

The Talmud* (Sanhedrin 98a) presents us an example of the discussions regarding the various messianic concepts:

R. Alexandri said: R. Joshua opposed two verses: it is written, “And behold, one like the son of man came with the clouds of heaven” (Daniel 7:13) while it is written, “[behold, your king comes to you…] lowly, and riding upon an ass!” (Zechariah 9:7) If they are meritorious, [he will come] with the clouds of heaven; if not, lowly and riding upon an ass.”88 [brackets in original, “R.” refers to Rabbi]

Pesikta Rabbati* (15:10) presents us with the concept of two comings of one Messiah (Midrash Rabbah*—Ruth 5:6 states virtually the same thing):

My beloved is like a gazelle [Song of Solomon 2:9]. R. Isaac said: As a gazelle appears and then disappears, so [Moses], the first Messiah, appeared to Israel and then disappeared from them…R. Berechiah said in the name of R. Levi: Like the first redeemer, so the last redeemer; as the first one appeared before them and them disappeared from them, so the last redeemer will appear to them and then disappear from them. [brackets mine]

Gershom Scholem (Professor Emeritus of Jewish Mysticism, Hebrew University, Jerusalem) explains:

Even as Moses ascended to heaven in body and soul and remained there for forty days, so also this messiah, while remaining unknown to others and known only to himself…will be hidden away body and soul in the manner of [Moses, of whom the Scripture says] “and Moses entered into the cloud.” Then he will be raised up to heaven even as Moses ascended to heaven, and thereafter the messiah will reveal himself fully and all Israel will recognize him and gather around him.89

Let us also consider the two Messiah theory whereby we get a view of the Jewish concepts of a Messiah who is killed. The Messiahs were named Messiah ben Yosef and Messiah ben David. We find the following elucidation from Raphael Patai (noted anthropologist and Biblical scholar who taught at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem):

This splitting of the Messiah in two persons, which took place in the Talmudic period, achieved another purpose besides resolving the dilemma of the slain Messiah [referring to Dan. 9:24-26]. According to an old tradition, the Messiah was perfectly prefigured in Moses. But Moses died before he could lead the Children of Israel into the Land of Promise. Consequently, for the parallel to be complete, the Messiah, too, had to die before accomplishing his great task of ultimate Redemption. Since, however, the Messiah would not be the True Redeemer of God if he did not fulfill that task, the only solution was to let one Messiah, like Moses, die, and then assign the completion of the work of Redemption to a second Messiah.90

Note also that Zechariah 12:10 states:

I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn (NKJV).

Dr. Abraham Cohen comments on this text thusly:

In the Talmud the passage is interpreted with reference to the Messianic era, and the martyr who was thrust through is the Messiah the son of Joseph who will fall in battle.91

Furthermore, note that Pesikta Rabbati* (37:1) presents the Messiah as suffering imprisonment and insults (note the references to Psalm 22):

…in the year when the Messiah appears, the Patriarchs will ask him whether he is displeased with Israel because of the affliction he endured on their account…The Patriarchs will arise and say…thou didst suffer for the iniquities of our children, and terrible ordeals befell thee, such ordeal as did not befall earlier generations or later ones; for the sake of Israel thou didst become a laughingstock and a derision among the nations of the earth; and didst sit in darkness, in thick darkness, and thine eyes saw no light, and thy skin cleaved to thy bones, and thy body was as dry as a piece of wood; and thine eyes grew dim from fasting, and thy strength was dried up like a potsherd-all these afflictions on account of the iniquities of our children(1), all these because of thy desire to have our children benefit by that goodness which the Holy One, blessed be He, will bestow in abundance upon Israel.

…our true Messiah…will be shut up in prison, a time when the nations of the world will gnash their teeth at him every day, wink their eyes at one another in derision of him, nod their heads at him in contempt, open wide their lips to guffaw [loud course burst of laughter], as is said All they that see me laugh me to scorn; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head (Ps. 22:8); My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my throat; and thou layest me in the dust of death (Ps. 22:16).

Moreover, they will roar over him like lions, as is said They open wide their mouth against me, as a ravening and roaring lion. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is become like wax; it is melted in mine inmost parts (Ps.

22:14-15). [italics in original, brackets mine]

Footnote:

…when Israel’s sins exceeded all bounds, God first vented His wrath on the sticks and stones of the Temple…It may be that after the Temple’s destruction the Messiah, by the same token, became a divine whipping boy upon whom God’s wrath was vented.

Furthermore, note that there are circa 558 separate quotations from Rabbinic writings in which 456 biblical texts are interpreted messianically and certainly these do not all speak of a Messiah who is a conquering king who brings instant world peace.

For example, some of the Rabbinic writings, individual Rabbis and Jewish scholars who have applied Isaiah 53, the suffering servant who dies passage, are as follows:

The Talmud, Midrash Rabbah, Pesikta Rabbati, Midrash Tillim, Midrash Tanhuma, Midrash Yalkut Schimeon (or Yalqut Shimeoni), Midrash Siphre, the Targumim, Rabbi Moses Ben Maimon (aka the Rambam or Maimonides), Rabbi Mosheh Ben Nachman (aka the Ranban or Nachmanides), Rabbi Sh'lomoh Astruc, Rabbi Shim'on ben Yohai, Rabbi Levi ben Gershon, Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, Rabbi Mosheh Kohen ibn Crispin, Rabbi Isaac Abrabanel, Rabbi Eleazer Kalir, Rabbi Levi Ben Gershom, Rabbi Moses Haddarshan, Rabbi Elijah Ben Moshe De Vidas, Rabbi Moses Alshekh (or El-Sheikh), Rabbi Naphtali ben Asher Altschuler, Rav Asher Soloff, Herz Homberg, Yefeth ben Ali (The Karaite or Quarite), Jacob Mann, Ralbag (Gersonides), Raphael Patai, Julius H. Greenstone, Abraham Ezra Millgram, Claude Joseph Goldsmith Montefiore, Herbert Martin James Loewe, Michael Fishbane, Gershom Scholem, Max I. Dimont.

Lastly, the fact that the authoritative Rabbinic writings were put into writing after the time of Jesus, although they derive from earlier oral tradition, only strengthens the point of these concepts being known before, during and after the time of Jesus, as will the tablet.

* Succinct definition of the Rabbinic writings cited above: The vast amount of rabbinic commentary/interpretation that developed eventually came to be/was put into written form. The Mishnah (which contains the oral laws) was compiled around 200 AD along with the Gemara (which comments on the Mishnah). When both the Mishnah and Gemara were combined, it came to be called the Talmud (which means study). Sometimes the term Gemara is used in referring to the Talmud as a whole. There are actually two Talmuds: the Babylonian or Bavli and the Jerusalem (or Palestinian) or Yerushalmi. They were put into writing between 400-600AD.

The Midrashim (Hebrew plural of Midrash) are compilations of homilies, including biblical exegesis3 and sermons from 400-1200AD. Two well-known Midrashim are Midrash Rabbah (fourth century AD) and Pesikta Rabbati (ninth century AD).

For more details on all such issues, see my book Is Jesus the Messiah? A Judaism vs. Judaism Debate.

Was Jesus Married? Manuscript Says Yes

Christians, let us get one thing straight right off of the bat: you should not be made to answer whether Jesus having been married is problematic to Christian theology.

Rather, you should note the following: for the New Testament there are over 25,000 manuscripts (in various languages: see the end of Appendix: Comparison of New Testament vs. Other Ancient Documents). For the “Gospel of Jesus’ Wife” there is ONE fragment. Oh, but you will be told to not concern yourself with that, as that ONE fragment is thought to successfully discredit the over 25,000.

Also, why is it that for New Testaments the demand is that we must have the earliest possible ones. However, for anything that appears to contradict it one, two, three, four centuries from Jesus’ time is perfectly acceptable, the later the better.

We are dealing with a substandard double standard.

Every few decades or so the same scenario is played out. Someone finds a manuscript which states something contradictory to traditional Christians, to the New Testament, and it is hailed as the truth. As a convenient side effect, such texts are employed by those seeking to justify their rebellion against God via claims to have finally toppled Christianity.

Karen L. King and AnneMarie Luijendijk have penned a Harvard Theological Review article on the find (106:1, January 2013 AD). An online version is titled “Jesus said to them, ‘Take my wife, please…’” oh, no, right, that was Henny Youngman. The article is titled, “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife…’ A New Coptic Gospel Papyrus” which states:

Published here for the first time is a fragment of a fourth-century CE codex in Coptic containing a dialogue between Jesus and his disciples in which Jesus speaks of “my wife.”92

When the Gospel of Judas was found I wrote about it93 and that article could be edited as to as remove the word “Judas,” replace it with “Jesus’ Wife” and it would make the same point as it is the same issues repackaged.

From the following section, you can see that up until now that Jesus was married was simply historically unknown. Now, because of two words in an incomplete sentence, some claim that there is. The fragment contains about as much text as a Tweet, the relevant portion reads, in its entirety, “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife” period (or ellipses with the rest of the text, you know, the context, missing).

The translators also say that one line either says “deny. Mary is worthy of it” or else says, “deny. Mary is not worthy of it.” What like ever, right?!

So, for the New Testament if we do not have authographas (the original handwritten manuscripts) along with the author’s bio, then they are to range from suspect to discredited.

But what of the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife? What is the time of the event to the time of the writing? What is the time of the writing to the time of the earliest manuscript we have? Who wrote it? How do we know? Why did they write it? These and other questions, the basic “5 Ws” of journalism: Who? What? When? Where? and Why?, are not bother with.

If it helps discredit Christianity, it is accurate and reliable, it is gospel truth.

Of course, we must parse the self-appointed experts, who think that biblical scholarship is typing something like, “Jesus was evil” into a search engine on the one hand, and actual scholarship—some need to learn that I.E. refers to Internet Explorer and not to Instant Expert.

King and Luijendijk write:

This is the only extant ancient text which explicitly portrays Jesus as referring to a wife.

It does not, however, provide evidence that the historical Jesus was married, given the late date of the fragment and the probable date of original composition only in the second half of the second century.

In a footnote they note:

2 The use of the term “gospel” here regards the probable genre of the work to which this fragment belonged (see below, “Genre”) and makes absolutely no claim to canonical status nor to the historical accuracy of the content as such. This invented reference in no way means to imply that this was the title in antiquity, or that “Jesus’s wife” is the “author” of this work, is a major character in it, or is even a significant topic of discussion—none of that can be known from such a tiny fragment. Rather the title references the fragment’s most distinctive claim (that Jesus was married), and serves therefore as a kind of short-hand reference to the fragment.

The text is in Sahidic Coptic and apparently found in Egypt, “Nothing is known about the circumstances of its discovery.” However, it may have been in the possession of

U. Laukamp since the 1980s AD.

Here is the entire text read as being “along the fibers” or “against the fibers.”

Along the fibers:

1. “not [to] me. My mother gave to me li[fe…”

2. The disciples said to Jesus, “

3. deny. Mary is worthy of it [or is not]

4. Jesus said to them, “My wife

5. she will be able to be my disciple

6. Let wicked people swell up

7. As for me, I dwell with her in order to

8. an image

Against the fibers:

1. my moth[er

2. three 3. …

4. forth which

5. [illegible ink traces]

6. [illegible ink traces]

Yes, that’s all folks.

Now, read what Jaweed Kaleem had to say:

The quote about Jesus’ wife is part of a description of a conversation between Jesus and his disciples. In the conversation, Jesus talks about his mother twice and speaks once about his wife. One of them is identified as “Mary.” His disciples discuss whether Mary is worthy of being part of their community, to which Jesus replies, “she will able to be my disciple.”94

Now, we get to the rub, to the bottom line as the issue of Mary being worthy directs people who know of such things towards one conclusion.

Firstly, note that Jesus having women disciples “she will able to be my disciple” is actually not new, not controversial and is found directly in the New Testament. Jesus had 12 male “apostles” but originally had circa 70 male and female “disciples” (in the Bible, as a whole, there were women judges, prophetesses, business owners, landowners, teachers, etc. see my articles Biblical Women and Is the Bible Misogynistic?95).

So what is this stuff about Mary being worthy? Well, it stinks of the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas, a fragment of which was dated to 200 AD, of which line #114 reads:

Simon Peter said to them, “Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life.”

Jesus said, “I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Clearly, the later these pseudo gospels were written and the further from Jerusalem they were written the worse they got.

“Their Own Whims and Lusts” Liberal Scholars and Jesus’ Marriage

But remember, dear friends, that the apostles

of our Master, Jesus Christ, told us this would happen:

“In the last days there will be people who...

make a religion of their own whims and lusts”

—Jude 17-18

Herein, I quote the following exchange from a May 26, 2006 AD NBC Dateline with Stone Phillips presentation entitled Secrets to the Code. My reason for quoting it is in order to demonstrate just how far some people will go in reading their own preconceived notions into the text of scripture.

Margaret Starbird: I think they were a couple. I think he found her irresistible.

Narrator: Author Margaret Starbird, whose controversial research on Mary Magdalene is cited in The Davinci Code, says there’s no need to look to art for clues of an intimate relationship between Mary and Jesus. All you have to do, she says, is read the New Testament, it’s right there in the Book of John.

Margaret Starbird: When Mary Magdalene comes to the garden to mourn for Jesus and to anoint him, for his final anointing, and finds him resurrected in the garden she is overjoyed.

Narrator: Before Jesus ascends to heaven Mary reaches out to him and he tells her, “Do not touch me.”

Margaret Starbird: He’s saying I can’t stay with you now and she’s trying to hold on, it’s not just a touch it’s an embrace. If she weren’t married to him she wouldn’t of dreamed of touching him.

The more things change, the more they stay the same— especially when things do not actually change. If you look up Margaret Starbird today (eleven years after the statements above were made as of this writing) the first thing that will come upon on a search engine is “is the author of seven books arguing for the existence of a secret Christian tradition that held Jesus was married to Mary.” It is fascinating how some people can build an entire career on a pet theory—utterly discredited as it is. Also, lest they truly be lovers of the truth what incentive, pray tell, could such one-hit wonders have to accept the actual real-life facts since such would discredit their entire careers and the livelihood and finances that come therewith?

It is then told that she relies on Gnostic texts such as The Gospel of Phillip, which is a Gnostic work of the late third century—circa 250 years after Jesus died. For conservative Biblical scholars, it is important to get as close to the event that was recorded as possible. For liberal Biblical scholars, it is important to get as far away from the event as possible hopefully reaching such a distance in time that what is written helps them to besmirch the text of scripture, the more these texts distort the person and ministry of Jesus Christ, the better. Upon these works of fantasy, they bestow near infallibility.

The Gospel of Phillip is so poorly represented by manuscript evidence (or lack thereof) that there are holes all over it, literally missing text. What is being referred to in the NBC Dateline presentation is section #63 of that work. Note all of the brackets and ellipsis points in the text, which represent missing and reconstructed (guessed at) text, “And the companion of the [...] Mary Magdalene. [...loved] her more than [all] the disciples [and used to] kiss her [often] on her [...].”96

Another translation takes the liberty of filling in the gaps in the following way, “And the companion of the Savior is Mary Magdalene. But Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on her mouth.”97

The obvious question is, why choose to insert the word mouth into the text instead of cheek or hand? That is the question, the answer being pure conjecture such as, perhaps it was to make it seem as if there is more going on than there really is. However, this whole discussion is secondary to the fact that we are dealing with a text that was written hundreds of years after Jesus died by someone who never knew Him personally.

But what if Jesus did kiss Mary? There were, and are still, many cultures in which it is perfectly normal to kiss people frequently. Someone you are meeting for the first time, and every time you greet each other and depart company, it is likewise perfectly normal for men to kiss each other.

In glorifying these texts one publication states:

These books are rich in cosmogonies and anthropogonies. They contain apocalyptic visions and secret scrolls of Jesus’ life and sayings. The magnificent Gospel of Truth and Gospel of Thomas add greatly to the information provided by the New Testament.98

Recall the wondrous Gospel of Thomas, a fragment of which was dated to 200 AD, which contains the inspirational statement noted above about how “women are not worthy of life” but hey, that’s okay since Jesus will “make her male.”

This sort of sexist concept is utterly foreign to the true Peter, the true Jesus, and the true Gospels in general. In the true Gospels, salvation is not based on sex-change operations of any sort. The Gospel of Truth is likewise of a late date, having been written about 150 years after Jesus died.

All of the apocryphal Gnostic Gospels have a few things in common: they were all written much later than even the latest New Testament book, they were all written long after the Apostles died; they all contain doctrines that betray their late authorship since they include teachings that developed in the second to fourth centuries. Comparing the time of the event to the time of the writing, the time of the writing to the time of the earliest manuscript, the number of manuscript and many other signs of authenticity these Gospels fall far, far short of the reliability of the New Testament texts. As stated before, the liberal scholars appear to prefer these, not because they are superior in any way but, because they allow the New Testament to be besmirched, albeit in an utterly unviable manner.

The NBC Dateline presentation ends with a demonstration of the extreme difference between facts and liberal scholarship’s fantasy:

Stone Phillips: Is there any historical evidence that Jesus fathered any children?

Prof. Bart D. Ehrman: No, there’s not a scrap of historical evidence that Jesus fathered a child.

Prof. Ben Witherington, III: No evidence whatsoever.

Prof. Karen L. King: There’s no evidence at all.

Reading one’s own preconceived notions into the text (in this case in a way that would interest Sigmund Freud) versus letting the text speak for itself and or relying on historical fact is the difference between real scholarship and very popular fiction.

“The Lost Gospel” by Barrie Wilson and       Simcha Jacobovici

Before moving on from Jacobovici’s various and sundry claims let us review another example of his particular and peculiar manner of scholarship.

“[B]ased on an ancient manuscript claims Jesus Christ was not crucified” in 1993 AD, Barrie Wilson and Jacobovici wrote a book about how “Instead, he married Mary Magdalene, and the couple had two children. Entitled ‘The Lost Gospel,’ the book is based off a translation of an Aramaic manuscript found inside the British Library.”

This story certainly belongs within the section of my website titled Unbelievers Compliment Christianity as such personages would never dare attempt to discredit any religion (actually relation as in a personal one with the Messiah Jesus) except for Christianity.99

What was lost has been found! Again? Every few years someone discovers a new document or some such notion (receiving much media attention and approval) it is discredited (the discrediting is not given media attention) and a few years later the claim raises its discredited head yet again and again and again.

The full title of the book is The Lost Tomb of Jesus with the Lost Gospel. Note a substandard double standard; when it comes to the Bible, why, we better have hundreds of thousands of manuscripts (which we do have; see here) but when it comes to anything that seems to challenge the Bible “an Aramaic manuscript” will do; “an” as in singular, as in one—and that is good enough because our pop-occulture is foaming at the mouth to discredit Christianity and only Christianity.

“Gathering dust in the British Library is a document that takes us into the missing years of Jesus’s life,” the book begins. “According to the document that we uncovered, sometime during this period he became engaged, got married, had sexual relations and produced children. Before anyone gets his/her theological back up, keep in mind that we are not attacking anyone’s theology. We are reporting on text.”100

Got it? They are contradicting the historical record within and without the Bible which forms Christian theology but they are not attacking anyone’s theology. We are reporting on text. Well then, perhaps they can write a book entitled The Lost Surah about Muhammad’s suicide attempts because he thought he was being deceived by jinn. After all, they would not be attacking anyone’s theology (and actually, this is a fact of Muhammad’s life)—need I again name Salman Rushdie?

“The Lost Gospel” is based off a translation of the Ecclesiastical History of Zacharias Rhetor, a text brought to the U.K. in 1847 after it was recovered from an Egyptian monastery, the Washington Post reports.

Scholars have studied it but disregarded it. Wilson and Jacobovici studied the text for six years and say that it has “embedded meaning.” While the text does not use the name Jesus Christ, the character described as Joseph bears striking resemblances to Christ, the scholars say.

It is interesting that such personages are never labeled as wacky “conspiracy theorists” by the media. After all, forget what the one text states; it contains “embedded meaning.”

Only revealed to, through and by Wilson and Jacobovici. Note another substandard double standard; when it comes to the Bible, why, we better have autographa (handwritten text by the original authors) that were written while Jesus was speaking (early dated) but when it comes to anything that seems to challenge the Bible one text that was completed circa the end of the 5th century AD will do (the later the better when it comes to such works).

Note that Wilson and Jacobovici conclude that it is not their opinion but “According to the document” it turns out that (or so we are told centuries after the fact) Jesus “became engaged, got married, had sexual relations and produced children” but “the text does not use the name Jesus Christ, the character described as Joseph.”

This is what is meant by “embedded meaning” as Joseph is not Joseph but is Jesus, Joseph’/Jesus’ wife is named Aseneth but is really Mary Magdalene and on it goes with the bait and switch.

So, here is how to can be referred to as scholars; find a long known, studied and discredited (discredited in terms of known to not contain facts) document, read it, claim that it does not mean what it states and does not state what it means and there you have it; the media at your feet, interviews, lectures, book deals, documentaries, etc.

To paraphrase Johnathan Well’s statements with regards to the flawed study claiming to find turkey DNA within a triceratops: this is not scholarship. It is not even myth. It is comic relief!101 (although, it is not even funny). This is either the greatest scholarly hoax since the Jesus Seminar or else the utter bankruptcy of attempts to discredit Christianity.

Michael Paulkovich Claims “No Meek Messiah” But a “Fable of the Christ”

In 2014 AD, news made its rounds that Michael Paulkovich claimed that his historical research has resulted in the assertion that Jesus never even existed. Considering that it has been, at least one year, it seems that his radical claim that not only was Jesus not God but that He never even existed as a person has been weighed and found wanting.

Paulkovich “is an inventor, aerospace engineer, editor and author, columnist for American Atheist magazine, contributing editor for The American Rationalist, and contributor to Free Inquiry and other journals.”102

He claims to base his conclusion on his perusal of 126 texts that were penned around Jesus’ time: during and shortly after His death, resurrection, and ascension. He wrote an article titled “The Fable of the Christ” and a book titled No Meek Messiah.

The Americans Against the Tea Party is a good example of the utter ruin of scholarship as it titled a post “Was Jesus a Real Person? One Biblical Scholar says ‘No’” and again refers to the “Biblical scholar Paulkovich.” Well, his own book’s site, essentially, describes him as a pro-Atheist, “a freelance writer and inventor, Contributing Editor for The American Rationalist, Columnist for American Atheist Magazine and Contributor for Free Inquiry and other journals.”

Just because you have internet access does not mean that you are a Biblical scholar. In fact, DJR aka The Failed Atheist noted, “Michael Paulkovich is an easy target because his ‘research’ is so poor, I’d never heard of him before the internet started fanning the flames of his terribly historically inept work on the historical Jesus…I can’t find out any information but I truly doubt that he has any historical training whatsoever, in fact I’ll close my blog if he has a Ph.D. in History!”

Not surprisingly, the freelance writer and inventor writes, “I must conclude that Christ is a mythical character.”

Well, I am also not a Biblical scholar and so he and I are evenly matched. I found this report fascinating as a few years ago I personally conducted research on documents written 70 AD to 280 AD and chronicled 237 texts that reference Jesus—which I chronicle within this work’s appendix.

The number refers to the texts themselves and not to the number of times that Jesus is referenced in each text.

Counting each reference would take us well beyond the 237 total.

Furthermore, the number refers to the texts and not to each manuscript behind each text.

Counting each manuscript would also take us well beyond the 237 total.

An article on the topic that has been posted about a trillion times on the web states, take careful note, “Even the Apostle Paul, the New Testament figure credited with spreading the new religion that came to be called ‘Christianity’ shortly after the supposed death of Jesus, never says that Jesus was a real person — even in the Bible itself.”

Can you imagine Paul writing the following?

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…oh yeah and, like, He was totally was a real person and stuff; you know, in case my being jailed, beaten, starved, etc. for Him was not enough to make that clear. Oh, and my meeting with people who personally knew Him. Oh, and all of this stuff I say about Him being prophesied “even in the Bible itself” and, like, whatever and stuff.

As for more about “in the Bible itself,” Paulkovich actually claims:

Paul is unaware of the virgin mother, and ignorant of Jesus’ nativity, parentage, life events, ministry, miracles, apostles, betrayal, trial and harrowing passion. Paul knows neither where nor when Jesus lived, and considers the crucifixion metaphorical.

Firstly, based on the Paul “never says that Jesus was a real person” standards Paulkovich would have to provide us a quotation from Paul stating:

Oh yeah, by the way: I am unaware of the virgin mother, ignorant of Jesus’ nativity, parentage, life events, ministry, miracles, apostles, betrayal, trial and harrowing passion, do not even know where nor when Jesus lived and, by the way, the crucifixion may have been metaphorical even though I not only stated to you that “I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received” which is technical terminology for passing on authoritative accounts, how that the actual Christ actually died for our sins according to the actual scriptures and that he was actually buried and that he actually rose again the actual third day according to the actual scriptures.

DJR notes that “serious historians have demonstrated” the “Mythical Jesus” which claims that Jesus resembles mythological figures “to be nonsense, that’s why only one trained historian, Richard Carrier advocates it and why someone like Bart Ehrman who is no friend of Christianity can write a whole book defending a historical Jesus against such inept tripe.”

Well, both Carrier and Ehrman are no friends of Christianity: Carrier is an Atheist and Ph.D. in ancient history and Ehrman is an Agnostic (of course, so are most Atheists).

Carrier thoroughly discredited Kersey Graves’ Mythical Jesus book “The World’s Sixteen Crucified Saviors: Or Christianity Before Christ” (see below). Graves was the Paulkovich of his time much like someone else will be the Paulkovich of the near future: makes a splash and fades away.

For Carrier’s account on this, see below, chapter Christ myth - historical Jesus, Mythras, Horus, Inanna , Santa, etc.

Ehrman engaged in that which pop-culture’s common parlance would refer to as a classic smackdown PWNAGE of Atheist Reginald Finley aka The Infidel Guy (who became The Utterly Devastating Guy) specifically on the specific issue of the historical Jesus and he debated Robert Price on the same issue.

Let us consider some of the references that Paulkovich gives for his view that “Christ is a mythical character” (I am going to glean from Steven Bollinger who is “an atheist but decidedly NOT a New Atheist“103):

Lesbonax: died before Jesus was born (I must admit that he may have been able to access a time machine and thus, the fact that he died before Jesus’ time is no excuse for him to not mention Jesus).

Dead Sea Scrolls: predate Jesus (see comment on Lesbonax).

Soranus: gynecologist (perhaps those referring to Paulkovich as a Biblical Scholar and blindly copying and pasting his article will not comprehend this but expecting a gynecologist to write about Jesus in his works of gynecology is tantamount to well, expecting a gynecologist to write about Jesus in his works of gynecology).

Titus: successfully led Roman troops against the Jewish uprising in AD 70, in Judea. The only writings we have by Titus are correspondence: letters, mail. We actually learn of him via Josephus (who mentioned Jesus), Tacitus (who mentions Christians), Suetonius (who mentioned Jesus) and Dio…no, not the heavy metal singer, see next entry.

Lucius aka Claudius aka Cassius Dio aka Dio Cassius: he wrote a few lines regarding Titus and the Jewish War (recall that this was circa 40 years after Jesus). He mentions no Jews by name whatsoever. Oh yeah, by the way Dio’s lifespan is 155-235 AD…wait, I thought that we could not trust someone who lived even one year much less one decade much less circa a century after Jesus’ time to tell us anything about Jesus.

Lucian of Samosata : Steven Bollinger notes that “The closest any of his works come to Jerusalem or Nazareth is that Adversus Indoctum mocks a Syrian book- collector.”[1] The fact is that Lucian does mention Jesus in The Death of Peregrine which is why he made my list as he wrote that Christians:

…picked up their queer creed. I can tell you, he pretty soon convinced them of his superiority; prophet, elder, ruler of the Synagogue—he was everything at once; expounded their books, commented on them, wrote books himself. They took him for a God, accepted his laws, and declared him their president. The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day—the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account.

Soterichus Oasites: was a poet (from circa AD 300) who wrote poems about Dionysus and Alexander the Great but, apparently, did not want to write poems about Jesus.

Damis of Hierapolis: he studied under Apollonius of Tyana (1 to 2 century AD). The only writings we have preserved from Damis are correspondence. Otherwise, that which we know about Damis is via Apollonius’ biographer Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius of Tyana (dated to 217-238 AD).

Paulkovich has an odd way of reasoning since, for example, he states that “Damis was unaware of Jesus” and of Apollonius, “surely it seems he was unaware of Jesus of Nazareth.” I am unsure as to what surely it seems means but in any case, the logic appears to be that if, for example, if we have no existing writings by Damis and Apollonius (or their biographers) that reference Jesus then they must not have been aware of Him.

This actually, is not too bad an argument since just because their names are known to us today does not mean that they were know-it-alls or would otherwise case about Jew who, like so many others, gathered disciples about Himself. Yet, that they must not have been aware of Jesus simply does not logically result in a conclusion that therefore, Jesus did not even exist as a historical human person.

I will say that I really look forwards to Paulkovich’s book about how Muhammad never existed—but I will not hold my breath.

Did Jesus exist? Michael Paulkovich and AaronRa

In my researching the latest, of a never-ending, round of pop-research on the issue of the historical Jesus and Jesus mythicism. Some Atheists have really taken to the utterly radical view that not only was Jesus not the son of God, God incarnate, etc. but never even existed as a person.

In this case, I ran into an article written by YouTube celebrity Atheist AaronRa who is really good at appealing to the “New Atheist” movement: meaning replacing reasoned discourse with emotional reactions and generally lacking a basic knowledge of contextually relevant theology and history.

He wrote an article that was simply titled “Jesus never existed.”104

I wrote a comment which resulted in a long exchange with a Jew and which included some passing remarked by a few others. When dealing with such a lively comment section it is a good idea to pick the most capable replier to your comments. I am reproducing this herein as an example of real life how to of on the ground apologetics.

My comment began “I found Paulkovich’s claims fascinating as a few years ago I personally conducted research on documents written 70 AD to 200-250 AD and chronicled 205 texts that reference Jesus” and went on to elucidate that which I noted about the totals, etc. I specifically mention what was then 205 but is now 210 because Paulkovich specifically claims to have not found Jesus within 126 texts (and my stopping at 210 was arbitrary as I could have gone on and on and on).

Now, you will find that Atheist of the radical Jesus never existed view will generally immediately back down when challenged and will rabbit trail elsewhere, such was the case with a comment replying to me by a certain MarquisDeMoo:

Jesus may well have existed as a person and I am no historian but I certainly would not take a cascade of mutually referencing religiously inspired texts as evidence. That people are gullible enough to want to believe is after all part of the atheist’s case.

From an evidential perspective I would think you would need independent verification such as a diary or letter, written during the lifetime, administrative document or court record even.

Sorry too but the standard of evidence does have to be higher than that for a Roman General simply because of the importance you put on him existing and the fact that his purported life story matches that of so many others of the time. Whether someone called Jesus actually existed or not adds or subtracts nothing to the atheist case but it is critical to the Christian who has a vested interest in perpetuating the myth based on his life, after all, no Christ, no Christian.

Here is my reply:

Friend, I hope that you will consider the following.

1) You appear to have ignored my evidence and are merely replying to my comment for if you had viewed the evidence you would know that the 205 references are not all to religiously inspired texts.

2) Even if they were all religiously inspired texts that would be no grounds upon which to disregard them as doing so would be unscholarly, not how history is done and would commit the logical fallacy known as the genetic fallacy (disregarding an argument due to its source alone).

3) Your other logical fallacy is known as an ad hominem which is when you take aim at the person making the argument such as those who, as per you, “are gullible.”

4) While this is an argument from silence, in both directions, the fact is that Jerusalem, Jesus’s main place of activity, was utterly destroyed in 70 AD and thus, expecting many records to survive therefrom is tantamount to expecting to find many diaries, letters, admin docs, etc. written on paper from the US embassy in Benghazi.

5) That Jesus’s life story matches that of so many others of the time is a modern day myth based not on primary source material but from pop-”scholarship” from a much, much lower level that the direct references that I present.

Also, you seem rather certain that Jesus’s life story matches that of so many others of the time and yet, I would assume that you conclude that based on religiously inspired texts that supposedly state such things.

I hope you will consider these points as I found your statements interesting enough to consider, muse upon and reply to.

MarquisDeMoo replied thusly:

I make no apology for suggesting that the religiously inspired are gullible, after all it is no more than you might accuse a Mayan who worshipped the Sun and slaughtered his daughter to appease his gods.

Necessity is the mother of invention and in its desperation to backup its fairy tale the church has 2000 years of incremental invention to try and prove the existence of the supposed son of god. A God should be able to do better. That is why I demand better proof.

Now, the last statement was key as it would allow me to have the Marquis set the table, as it were, which would essentially put them on the defense as I could then examine and dissect their demanded standard of evidence.

Here is my reply:

Friend, you seem to be condemning human sacrifice and yet, upon what premise do you do so?

Also, you seem to be demanding proof of “the existence of the supposed son of god” and 205 references to Jesus dating from 70- 250 AD does not suffice. So, what would you consider “better proof”?

Well, I did not hear back from MarquisDeMoo as I tend to find that when I ask people bottom line style question they go away as they prefer having people chase them around various rabbit trails.

Raphael Lataster’s “Celestial Jesus”

“Raphael Lataster lectures at the University of Sydney (Studies in Religion) and teaches about religion at various institutions” (as per his own website). His Amazon author’s page notes that he is “a professionally secular Ph.D. researcher” bet you did not know that there are people who are “professionally secular”—but then again most of our schooling systems are administered by professionally secular personages (education is very different from schooling).

Lataster has been carving out a niche for himself within the historical Jesus subgenre known as the “Celestial Jesus” view. This category seems to have been created by and for those Jesus deniers who recognize that they cannot discount the evidence for Jesus’ life and so they claim that the  events of His life did actually occur but did so in a celestial realm.

Lataster’s “Interview” with Phil Robinson

I titled this a report on an (quote-unquote) “interview” of Raphael Lataster by Phil Robinson because it was not so much an interview as it was Robinson giving Lataster a platform from which to make various and sundry assertions in an utterly uncritical, un-skeptical, unchallenged manner. In fact, Robinson seems all but unconversant with historical Jesus issues and particularly unaware of the key biblical contents, concept, and contexts related to historical Jesus issues. I surmise as much as due to his inability or unwillingness to ask Lataster for quotations and citations for his claims. He simply allows Lataster to paraphrase and generically reference, for example, Paul’s entire corpus and has nothing to say in reply but laughter and agreement at every turn.

Frankly, Robinson seems to only be interested in presenting the unchallenged assertions of those with whom he agrees. I once directed him to my list of the two centuries worth of citations to the historical Jesus contained with the appendix of this work and his reply, in full, was, and I quote, “This is trash” (more on this below).

Conversely, Gary Habermas, Ph.D. (Distinguished Research Professor & Chair of the Department of Philosophy at Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary) told me personally, “I have hung on to it since you sent it, & plan to keep doing so.”

Lataster states that Paul “says virtually nothing about a historical Jesus” and when Robinson parrots Lataster’s book thusly, “Paul doesn’t talk about an Earthly Jesus,” Lataster replies:

You pretty much hit the nail on the head there…Paul not seeming to say much about the historical Jesus is absolutely correct.

Whenever Paul talks about Jesus he’s talking about a heavenly character…Paul does not talk about a historical Jesus, he talks about a heavenly Jesus…it doesn’t seem entirely clear that he’s talking about a person that was on Earth…it is not at all obvious that Paul is talking about a genuine historical character, he does seem to be talking about a spiritual and thus, mythical character…he doesn’t give us any historical details about Jesus such as where He lived or when He lived…There are many cases in Paul’s epistles and related epistles that also seem to indicate that Jesus is indeed a heavenly character.

Actually, Paul’s view is that Jesus was a real historical person who came to live on Earth, being born to Mary (thus incarnated) through a Jewish genealogy. He was crucified after being on trial before Pontius Pilate (giving us a timeline, the “where He lived or when He lived”), died for our sins (on Earth), resurrected (on Earth), will return after having been, as He presently is, at God’s right hand (contextually, this is the only so-called “heavenly” or “celestial” Jesus).

Within subsection No Historical but a Celestial Jesus in Paul’s Writings I provide the quotations for each of these citations.

Robinson asks how Lataster came to the conclusion that “Paul was describing a celestial Jesus.” Within the context of this specific question, Lataster notes Paul’s (one time) rebuking Peter (for issues unrelated to Jesus, the historical Jesus, etc.) and exaggerates this concept in general finally specifically stating that Paul “doesn’t seem to get along with people that we normally associate with Jesus.”

Actually, he gets along with them just fine:

Galatians 1:17-19 Paul spent some time in Arabia and Damascus and then “went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days.” Moreover, he spent time with “James the Lord’s brother.”

Galatians 2:1, 9 Paul notes “I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also. And when James, Cephas [Peter], and John…gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship.”

Acts 9:19 Luke relates that “Then was Saul [Paul] certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus.”

Acts 21:16 Luke notes “There went with us also certain of the disciples of Caesarea, and brought with them one Mnason of Cyprus, an old disciple, with whom we should lodge.”

Lataster asserts:

Whenever he [Paul] says that he knows something about Jesus he basically says it comes straight from God. Now, this is obviously quite shocking to the historian who would rather Paul say that he’s got it straight from Jesus’ mouth because he knew Him all his life or that he’s got it straight from eye witnesses. Rather, than that we see Paul saying that he gets it because of his direct link to the divine.

Well, what Lataster claims historians would prefer is not the issue. As noted above, Paul interacted with eyewitnesses and so Lataster is factually wrong yet again and wrong based on simple quotations and citation of which he should be aware—as should Phil, by the way, who never challenged him on anything nor asks for quotations or citations of anything.

“There Was No Jesus, There Is No God”

With the claim that “There Was No Jesus, There Is No God,” Lataster earned himself a place within my list of Atheists Who Positively Affirm God’s Non- Existence...Without Evidence, Of Course.105

Following up on having considered Paulkovich’s claims, I moved on to Lataster and posted a statement on Facebook about Paulkovich’s claims, my list of citations, etc. This is when the above-mentioned Phil Robinson who replied thusly, “This is trash.”

Well, this generally denotes a throwaway comment with which one does not waste any time yet, I thought to give it a go and wrote back:

Friend, I personally conducted research on documents written 70 AD to 200-250 AD and chronicled 205 texts that reference Jesus. The number refers to the texts themselves and not to the number of times that Jesus is referenced in each text.

Counting each reference would take us well beyond the 205 total. Furthermore, the number refers to the texts and not to each manuscript behind each text. Counting each manuscript would also take us well beyond the 205 total. Now, your reply is “This is trash.” Please attempt to engage in reasoned discourse and propose a scholarly reply.

Well, this time, the reply was more substantive:

I interview scholars. You are not a scholar. you have entirely ignored mainstream scholarship and its methods and made amateur posts with lists of ludicrous sources. Mainstream methods have even been found invalid by every scholar that’s examined them, and, they’re way ahead of you. You haven’t a clue what you’re doing and no clear method save taking texts at face value.

I replied thusly:

Friend, that you generically claim to interview generic scholars and that I am not one is not an issue and hints of an argument to authority.

Let us review the problems:

1) I have entirely ignored mainstream generic scholarship and its generic methods.

2) I made amateur posts (by definition I am an amateur so yes, and it was only one post) with lists of generically ludicrous sources— it is fascinating that you simply wave your hand and declare all 205 references to be ludicrous.

3) “Mainstream” generic “methods have even been found invalid by every scholar that’s examined them,” so if “Mainstream methods have even been found invalid” why fault me for supposedly “entirely” ignoring “mainstream scholarship”?

4) “they’re” apparently a reference to the invalid mainstream scholarship “way ahead of you,” whatever that means—ahead of me in being invalidated?

5) I may not know what I am doing but rely on primary source material and historians, academics and various scholars who research such subjects.

The reply was basically a reference to the historian and Atheist Richard Carrier and, since the commentator interviews scholars, a URL to a video wherein he interviewed Lataster. This was the pseudo-interview noted above which was a platform for Lataster to say whatever he wants, unchallenged and having the interviewers merely, uncritically and un-skeptically agreeing with everything Lataster sated.

Well, I decided to take this matter seriously and within the following segments, I will elucidate the issues of miracles and Josephus, Paul and the celestial Jesus and Lataster’s modus operandi which is literal conspiracy theorizing.

Historical or Mythical Jesus?

Here is my next reply to Robinson:

Friend, I took your statements and references seriously enough to take time out, time I do not really have as I am in the middle of some heavy editing (on an unrelated issue), so as to view your video and read over a dozen pages on Lataster. I suppose that I could write something to the likes of “This is trash” and move on but decided to write a specific reply which turned into the comment which follows.

Firstly, I am afraid that your statements are becoming more and more generic which leads them to be meaningless (meaning that I have to work to derive what you may mean by them and which leads to guesswork which may result in erroneous conclusions on my part). My claim was that there is historical evidence of the existence of Jesus and the evidence is 205 texts dating from pre 70-250 AD [and I elucidate my counting procedure, etc.]…

That Richard Carrier explains the “likely” origin of Jesus means that he came along some two millennia after the fact and wove a tall tale which, as a scholar, he can call a hypothesis. However, I did appreciate reading, which I did some years ago, Carrier’s discrediting of Kersey Graves’ “The World’s Sixteen Crucified Saviors.”

There is a good reason why it took almost a full two millennia for anyone to begin imagining that maybe Jesus did not exist after all. Waiting a year was not enough, a decade was not quite right, a century did not work, one millennia was not far enough but circa two millennia removed from Jesus’ time and place did the trick.

Now, Raphael Lataster claims that “There Was No Jesus, There Is No God” which means that he is making a positive claim to possess positive knowledge that God does not exist and thus, must be asked to his proof. Yet, I want to focus on the issue of Jesus’ existence. Interestingly, Lataster is “a professionally secular Ph.D. researcher” which stinks of bias and, of course, he is an Atheist (by any other name) and is thus not exactly likely to conclude that “There Is A Jesus, There Is A God.”

On Miracles and Flavius Josephus

Let us continue my comment:

An example of his bias is his claim that “a supernatural miraculous explanation is actually, inherently implausible.”

I would imagine that the way that he knows that “a supernatural miraculous explanation is actually, inherently implausible” is either by examining all, each and every, “supernatural miraculous explanation” and determining that they are all “inherently implausible” or by presupposing that “a supernatural miraculous explanation is actually, inherently implausible” which would be unreasonable circular reasoning.

An example of his bias is that he seeks to dismiss Josephus because he mentions miracles. Of course, this is not historical research, this is censorship. He also dismisses Josephus because he mentions Hercules but whereabouts did he do so?

In Against Apion 1.18 he notes “Hercules’s temple” not Hercules.

In War of the Jews 2.16.4, he notes “the pillars of Hercules” not Hercules.

In Antiquities of the Jews 1.15, he is quoting Alexander Polyhistor who is the one that references Hercules.

In Antiquities 8.5.3 he notes “the temple of Hercules…the temple of Hercules” not Hercules.

In Antiquities 10.11.1 he is quoting Megasthenes who is the one who writes that Nebuchadnezzar exceeds Hercules.

So, as a historian, Josephus references landmarks of note and authors who wrote on this or that figure, in this case, Hercules.

I am unsure if this means that he and his reviewing peers simply did not bother checking the citations. In fact, from what I understand, it seems that Lataster simply repackaged what other people have said before him: other Jesus mythicists who made a media splash were discredited by historians and quietly went away only to have someone else do the same a few years later and on and on it goes.

He merely seems to be reiterating only those researchers with whom he already agrees and merely disregards those whom he finds inconvenient.

In fact, he considers “real” research only to be that which is premised upon his secular worldview philosophy.

Hector Avalos, Robert Price, Richard Carrier, John Dominic Crossan, Earl Doherty, Randel Helms, et al. appear to be his go-to guys yet, Ben Witherington, Gary Habermas, Mike Licona, N.T. Wright, Richard Bauckham, et al. are simply ignored.

At least he references Craig Blomberg (although in what Blomberg has stated is a misrepresenting manner) even though he, essentially, allows Carrier to do the arguing for him, meaning that it is a form of a copy and paste job from Carrier.

Sadly, with all regard and discretion, he speaks much like you: in generic terms such as claiming that well, who knows who, some or another Christian scholar or some historian or something or someone applies this or that faulty criterion.

Lataster’s Conspiracy Theorizing Modus Operandi

This is the conclusion of my comment:

With regards to Tacitus, Lataster simply invents something that has never occurred to Tacitean scholars when he merely asserts that “the phrase in the middle of” the key text of Tacitus “could also be a later Christian interpolation.” Apparently, his approach is to consider reference to Jesus after reference to Jesus and simply tell us, without manuscript evidence, that it “could” be an interpolation.

But sometimes Christians interpolate and sometimes they deleted. Lataster speculates that Paul must have written other letters that exclusively taught a cosmic/celestial Christ but these have not been preserved because Christians must have destroyed them (and then he criticized Bart Ehrman for relying on non-existing texts).

Thus, following his “logic”: when there is a reference to Jesus then Christians conspired by interpolating it and when there is no reference to Jesus then Christians conspired to remove it. This is more implausible than the activities of Tom Cruise in the movie Mission Impossible. Christians somehow gained access to any, every and all texts (and copies of texts) and added, deleted and destroyed at will.

This is the exact claim he makes of the missing, historically key, portion of Tacitus (not bothering to note that other portions have also been lost). Lataster mentions that Robert Drews “theorises…pious fraud” and simply goes with it.

His tendency to be vague and generic is not just in your interview but within his book he claims that “many scholars…dismiss this [key Tacitus] passage” as hearsay but does not name or cite a single one; except for Ehrman who he claims is contradicting himself anyhow.

Lataster also says that Hector Avalos points out that since many of the relevant texts we possess date from the medieval times this allows much time for such editing. He  does not present evidence such as, for example, citing early versus latter manuscripts and showing how they differ.

Rather, Lataster merely repeats Avalos’ conspiracy theory. Thus, Lataster is basically not only a revisionist historian but a conspiracy theorist. This means that he knows the evidence is there but merely seeks clever manners whereby to explain the evidence away.

Of the criterion of embarrassment, Lataster writes that it may be that “the author purposely provides an embarrassing example to make a point (perhaps on humility, or separation from the ego), or to provide a feeling of authenticity and credibility, avoiding suspicion over constant positive assertions.”

This is merely more conspiracy theorizing. He seems to suppose that an author foresaw that someone would invent the criterion of embarrassment and then wove embarrassment into the text since someday, such as two millennia later, someone would say, “Hey, this is an embarrassing statement so it must be true.

Oh wait, perhaps the author did that on purpose to get me to conclude that it is true when it is not. Ah, but if that is  the case then the author would have known that I would have known that she was playing a trick on me and would not have done it or would have done it in order to get me to be confused enough to end up thinking that it was true even though it is false so if it seems to be true it must be false  and if it seems to be false it must be true…or, something.”

Interestingly, he complains, as it were, that the gospels do not include the author’s names. However, based on such flights of imaginative theorizing: if they were signed then he would surely claim that someone merely interpolated the name of an Apostle merely to make it appear as if it was written by such a one—or maybe, Christians deleted the author’s names since they were not signed by an Apostle (or Mark who was Peter’s scribe).

He entertains the “possibility” that “the Gospel writer intentionally places such importance on women, to demonstrate just how different this new religion is…” this denotes quite a different criterion of embarrassment as it is just embarrassing that he would promulgate such conspiracy theories and be celebrated for doing so.

The picture that comes across so very clearly is that anything that may favor that Jesus exists is theorized away—via perhaps, maybes, possibilities, could haves, etc.—to the effect that all signs pointing to the reliability of the New Testament and other historical records which verify Jesus must have been written in the way that they were to get us to think that Jesus exists. Of course, that would be the point of writing about the fact that He exists but for Lataster the fact that he can find so many authors writing about the fact that He exists counts against His existence—go figure.

In a somewhat elitist manner, considering the standards de jour to be the tops, he claims that ancient history should be held to modern standards and “If that means historians can say nothing of the ancient world with certainty, then so be it!” Apparently, the only reliable history is that which Lataster literally invents on the spot via his conspiracy theorizing: his flights of imagination as to what occurred outweigh historical documentation.

Consider, for example, Caesar’s crossing the Rubicon which occurred in 49 BC and about which Richard Carrier wrote the following; into which I inserted dates of birth (keeping in mind that it takes a few years after one’s birth to begin writing histories) “we have the story of the ‘Rubicon Crossing’ in almost every historian of the period, including the most prominent scholars of the age: Suetonius [born circa 69 AD], Appian [born circa 95 AD], Cassius Dio [born circa 2 century AD], Plutarch [born circa 45 AD].”

Clearly, not only were these not eyewitnesses but they wrote of the event decades if not over a century later yet, that is a-okay with Carrier and why not, it is called history. In fact, with regards to the eruption of Vesuvius, we only have records from one contemporary who does not even note that towns were destroyed.

Lastly, Lataster wrote, “I just want to know if particular religious claims are true” in which case, I cannot wait to read his book on whether Muhammad existed.

Thus, my comment concluded. Now, as a side note: with regards to Jesus mythicizing, Lataster references that the Jesus story is much like that of Romulus, etc. So we are apparently to believe that the texts which refer to Jesus are not historically reliable but the texts that reference Romulus, etc. are? When is the timespan of Romulus, etc. to the time of the first record of them? What is the timespan from the supposed lifetime to the first manuscript? How many manuscripts are there? How do they compare? Etc., etc., etc. Lataster does not seem to get around to these details.

No, Lataster obviously does not believe that Romulus, etc. actually existed or if they did where that which they are claimed to have been. Yet, he accepts the records of them as accurately recording the beliefs of the time.

My Discussion with Lataster

Spoiler alert, I was having a discussion with Lataster on Facebook106, however, the last time I went in to reply to him I found this displayed therein, “This post has been removed or could not be loaded.”

Well, it loaded just fine since the discussion began so I certainly do not know but it seems like another situation like the one about which I wrote here regarding Ex- Christian.net: I was debating numerous Atheists at the same time and then the page’s admin decided to delete all comments and locked up the comments section. Little did they know that, as in this case with Lataster, I was copying and pasting all comments into a document all along.107

Thus, Facebook is no longer displaying the discussion but here it is. It began when I pointed a link to an article which I will reproduce below in the subsection No Historical But A Celestial Jesus In Paul’s Writings wherein I demonstrate in a straightforward and fact-filled manner (logic, quotations, and citations) that Raphael Lataster is very incorrect on various issues.

Lataster was kind enough to comment on it thusly:

What a silly little article. I did actually mention that Paul’s constant interactions with the CJ [celestial Jesus] are to be expected on both theories.

Well, you can see where he is going with this: no matter what, he can force fit anything into any given theoretical assertions of his. Also, his “What a silly little article” is about as erudite as “Robinson’s “This is trash.” Thus, here is my reply:

Hello friend, I appreciate the reply. In your interview with Phil Robinson, for example, you were extremely one sided such as stating that “Paul doesn’t talk about an

Earthly Jesus…Paul does not talk about a historical Jesus…it doesn’t seem entirely clear that he’s talking about a person that was on Earth…it is not at all obvious that Paul is talking about a genuine historical character…he doesn’t give us any historical details about Jesus such as where He lived or when He lived,” etc. and such claims are simply inaccurate.

So is this some sort of straddling the fence tacit so as to have all of your bases covered and leaning any which way is convenient at the time?

He wrote back:

I think you misunderstand. Paul’s communication with the CJ is to be expected on both theories. His lack of mention of a HJ [historical Jesus] is not. It is super weird on the HJ theory, but totally expected on the CJ theory. Every such supposed mention is either interpolated and/or ambiguous (can also apply to the CJ).

My reply in turn:

Friend, I am not sure how you can prove that any such statement which is inconvenient to your assertion was interpolated but I would ask if and how the following, as a mere few examples, are ambiguous (can also apply to the CJ): Paul writes of Jesus having been crucified and raised him from the dead which are events that occurred to a historical person upon the Earth, notes that “God sent forth his Son, made of a woman” thus, born to a human woman on Earth and stating that He was “made under the law” meaning born Jewish and that “Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession” which gives us a timeline.

Well, perhaps being unable or unwilling (or both), he merely wrote back:

Well the book covers all this. This can all apply to the CJ.

I then asked:

Oh, I see; so the CJ became the HJ, or they are one in the same—or something?

And after thereafter “This post has been removed or could not be loaded.”

Well, as it turns out I suspect that my dissection of his tactic is accurate: he claims that there was no historical Jesus and thus, that Paul was dealing with a celestial Jesus. However, when anyone notes any evidence against his claim he merely asserts that any evidence applies to both so there is apparently no way he can see that his theories can be unfalsified.

Yet, they have been and no amount of deny, deny, deny can rescue Raphael Lataster.

Richard Carrier on Lataster’s Jesus Did Not Exist - A Debate Among Atheists

Richard Carrier wrote an article titled, “Lataster on the Historicity of Jesus Being a Debate Among Atheists” on Freethought Blogs.

Carrier notes that Lataster was, at the time, “an Australian doctoral student in religious studies” and has written a work on:

…the debate over the historicity of Jesus by focusing only on what atheist and agnostic experts are saying, and not Christian believers—regarding the latter as too biased to consider; since any good arguments they have should be as convincing to experts who aren’t believers anyway, so really we should only be looking at the debate among atheists.

About this take on the issue, Carrier notes, “It’s a good point.”

Moreover:

Lataster clarifies that we are talking not about the Christ of faith but whether we can reconstruct a plausible, mundane historical Jesus (in other words, that the only theses being debated here are those of secular nonbelievers in the expert sphere)…he explains in detail why this is in fact only a debate among atheists, and why we should just ignore Christian apologists altogether…he outlines…how he will analyze it as a neutral party.

It appears to be a case of take our word for it—wink, wink, nudge, nudge—as we Atheists will come to conclusions based upon our views alone and will report back to you: we call this being neutral.

Well, of course, it is a good point to only pay attention to those with whom you already agree and will say that which want to hear. However, it is a bit more nuanced and Carrier notes:

Unfortunately, atheist academic monographs defending historicity don’t exist. The only

two so far written this century, by Bart Ehrman and Maurice Casey, were neither published by academic presses, nor underwent any formal peer review…[and Carrier’s own] On the Historicity of Jesus, which was published by an academic press and did pass formal academic peer review. His own result is historicity agnosticism…Lataster operated independently.

The issue of historical agnosticism is an interesting one and a conclusion to which Lataster claims to come via mathematics:

Lataster’s case for his own agnosticism is that Bayesian reasoning soundly shows that there is no evidence that can be trusted enough to sway the conclusion either way, it’s all unsalvageably tainted or problematic…agnosticism is the most he can find any defense of.

No, Lataster’s own result is historicity agnosticism as there is no evidence that can be trusted enough to sway the conclusion either way. But then how, pray tell, can he write books titled “There Was No Jesus, There Is No God” and “Jesus Did Not Exist: A Debate among Atheists”? This is not in the least bit agnostic but denotes a positive affirmation of both God’s non-existence and Jesus’ non- existence which means that he must prove both.

A section of Richard Carrier’s article is “Why Will Critics Not Be Honest about This Debate?” and he focuses solely on “the first review on Amazon.” It is fascinating that the comments section to a book seller’s website has, apparently, the hub of scholarly debate—or something. In fact, Carrier obviously pulled up the Amazon page and picked the very first thing he saw therein. In any regard, Carrier takes the reviewer to task and refers to the person as “a certain atheist enthusiast…a Price, Loftus, and Myers fan” which, let us face it, denotes rather low hanging fruit.

Carrier points out that the atheist enthusiast claims that Raphael Lataster’s book “offers little that is not available elsewhere” but that Carrier “can assure you, some of its content has indeed not appeared elsewhere: many of Lataster’s observations and approaches are novel.”

This is true as Lataster is, as noted above, a conspiracy theorist in the most literal sense as his modus operandi is as follows.

If a historical text references Jesus then he merely asserts that Christians must have inserted a reference to Jesus into the text in which He should have been mentioned.

Conversely, if a historical text does not reference Jesus then he merely asserts that Christians must have deleted a reference to Jesus as the text must have been problematic, embarrassing, etc.

Interestingly, Carrier notes that “resort to lying” as he claims the atheist enthusiast did, “is an increasingly common tactic employed by even atheists who defend historicity.” Well, the term “Now you know how I feel” comes to mind.

Well, in the end, Carrier states that when Lataster “completes his Ph.D., will add his name to the growing number of us with full academic credentials who are admitting the emperor has no clothes.” Yet, they are not merely saying that the emperor has no clothes but are claiming to know that there is no emperor. They do this without positive evidence and under the guise of being unbiased and coming solely to agnostic conclusions.

No Historical But a celestial Jesus in Paul’s Writings

Lataster wrote, “I just want to know if particular religious claims are true” but does not seem to elucidate why he wants to know if particular religious claims are true. He holds to an Atheist worldview whereby he is a hairless ape, a temporarily and accidentally existing bio-organism.

Moreover, on that view, his very thoughts are the result of a haphazardly evolved brain and that being one which evolved for survival (for some unknown reason) and not necessarily in order to ascertain empirical truth.

All of this as Lataster sits atop a spinning rock, orbiting an average star in the backwaters of a temporarily and accidentally existing universe.

Lataster refers to the “independent historian Richard Carrier’s recent defence of” a theory which is “Namely, that the belief in Jesus started as the belief in a purely celestial being (who was killed by demons in an upper realm), who became historicised over time.” He then seeks to summarize Carrier’s book as follows:

…that Jesus was a historical figure who became mythicised over time – both align well with the Gospels, which are later mixtures of obvious myth and what at least “sounds” historical. The Pauline Epistles, however, overwhelmingly support the “celestial Jesus” theory, particularly with the passage indicating that demons killed Jesus, and would not have done so if they knew who he was (see: 1 Corinthians 2:6-10). [“Weighing up the evidence for the ‘Historical Jesus,’” The Conversation, December 14, 2014 AD]

Well, this is very clear indeed as he states that Paul held to the view that “demons killed Jesus, and would not have done so if they knew who he was.” Now, the honest skeptic would read the text and would find that it states:

Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this  world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought: But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:

Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.

Well, this is rather confusing as Lataster is affirming that Paul preached a real, historical Jesus who was, after all, “crucified” so where is the celestial Jesus? Perhaps he has allotted himself some wiggle room so that, when it is convenient, he can claim a “celestial being” Jesus but, when it is convenient, he can claim a Jesus “who became historicised.”

Setting Carrier aside now, Lataster himself asserts that Paul did not even make it clear that Jesus was a person who died on Earth and builds his concept of the celestial Jesus upon this assertion.

Now, the bottom line is another mere assertion which is that Raphael Lataster seems to presuppose that Paul should have written a historical account of Jesus yet, of course, this is but an arbitrary demand. Obviously, he read Paul, noted no synoptic-gospel-like chronological style retelling of the life of Jesus and concludes that Paul did not view Jesus as historical but celestial. But this is no way to do history; to demand who should have written what. The fact is that Paul’s writings are mostly answers to questions and guidance on early church issues. In other words, it was not his job to do history but to lead and guide the church as to doctrine, order, ethics, etc. Lataster does not get to come around two millennia later and demand that Paul ought to have done otherwise. In other words, Lataster sees what is missing in Paul, points it out and demands that it is problematic yet, this is simply unfounded.

It seems that Lataster references a celestial Jesus whilst not seeming to consider that at the time of Paul writing, Jesus was no longer on Earth and so was, at that time, a “celestial Jesus” of sorts: an incarnated, glorified, spiritual (not spirit) resurrected Jesus.

Lataster also asserts that when Paul claims to know something about Jesus, he claims that it came straight from God; thus, not from common historical knowledge. Yet, in Galatians 1:17-19 Paul notes that after spending time in Arabia and Damascus he “went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days” and also spent time with “James the Lord’s brother.” In 2:1, 9 he notes “I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also. And when James, Cephas [Peter], and John…gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship.”

In Acts 9:19, Luke relates that “Then was Saul [Paul] certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus.” In 21:16 he notes “There went with us also certain of the disciples of Caesarea, and brought with them one Mnason of Cyprus, an old disciple, with whom we should lodge.”

We have seen, by Lataster’s own citation, that Paul held to a crucified Jesus. Let us now survey that which Paul did write about the historical Jesus. That which follows amounts to Paul’s view being that Jesus was a real historical person who came to live on Earth, being born to Mary through a Jewish genealogy. He was crucified after being on trial before Pontius Pilate, died for our sins, resurrected, will return after having been, as He presently is, at God’s right hand.

Galatians:

1:1 “Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead.”

3:1 “O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?”

4:4 “when the fullness of the time” temporal, linear, Earthly time, “God sent forth his Son, made of a woman” so not some celestial spirit but born on Earth to a human, “made under the law” meaning born Jewish.

Corinthians:

1:13, 18, 23 “Is Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul?...For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God…But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;”

2:2, 8 “For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified…had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.”

8:11 “And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?”

10:16-17 “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread, and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread.”

11:23 “For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, That the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread:”

15:3 Paul employs technical terminology about how tradition was passed on to him with regards to Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection “I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received.” Paul even encourages people to seek out and question the eye witnesses “the greater part remain unto this present,” which is what Paul personally did.

Corinthians:

4:10 “Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.”

5:14 “For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead:”

Romans:

1:3 “Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh.”

4:25 “Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.”

5:6, 8-10 “…Christ died for the ungodly…Christ died for us…being now justified by his blood…we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.”

6:4-5, 9-10 “…like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father…in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection…Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.”

8:3, 32 “God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh…He that spared not his own Son.”

Colossians:

3:1 “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.”

Ephesians:

1:7, 20 “In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace…Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places.”

2:13, 16 “But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ…And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby.”

Philippians:

3:10-11 “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.”

1 Thessalonians:

1:10 “And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.”

4:16-17 “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

5:9-10 “For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.”

Timothy:

1:15 “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.”

2:6 Jesus “gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.”

3:16 “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.”

6:13 “I give thee charge in the sight of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession.”

Timothy:

2:8 “Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel.”

Hebrews—may have been written by Paul:

Hebrews 1:6 “And again, when he bringeth in the firstbegotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him.”

2:9, 14, 16 “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man…Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil…For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.”

9:15 “And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.”

10:10 “By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”

Acts—Luke wrote Acts but it is telling, nevertheless, as he accompanied Paul and wrote accounts of his doings and words:

20:28 has Paul stating, “Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.”

22:8 “And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest.”

26:8-9 “Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead? I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth.”

Therefore, based on actual historical evidence, it is clear that Paul most certainly believed in a real, historical Jesus.

Historical Jesus vs. Mythical Jesus Research Methodology

I once had an Atheist tell me that since the written records of Jesus’ life come to us from decades after His death then they are “very late.” Note two things: 1) expecting a largely oral culture to behave in our modern manner is illegitimate (perhaps “chronological snobbery” as C.S. Lewis put it) and 2) decades after an event is the historical equivalent of us witnessing something and tweeting about it one minute later. The fact is that decades later is a news flash and that which we know about ancient personages comes to us from centuries if not millennia after the fact.

Stephen Hawking has noted that Jesus’ virgin birth is “A fairy story for people afraid of the dark?” This just in, he has not dared state any such thing about anything within the Qur'an—shocking, I know.

Professor of Mathematics and Linguistics at Dartmouth College Lindsay Whaley noted the presuppositional bias involved in this issue, “If there is nothing beyond the material stuff of this world, then the concept of ‘resurrection’ is ludicrous.”108

Regarding the written records and the (common sense) manner in which different people recount events he notes, “One common problem, particularly in the blogosphere, is to interpret conflicting written testimony to mean that an episode did not take place.”

Also, “Another common mistake – made by internet amateurs and scholars alike – is to over-interpret historical silence.” Michael Paulkovich is a perfect example of this.

It is also important to note that Jesus locus of ministry, Jerusalem, was destroyed in 70 AD. Granted, whether other records which mention Him were destroyed is an argument from silence in either direction yet, it is a noteworthy fact.

Whaley points, out:

…no Roman historical writing from the mid-first century has been preserved. We

know that it was being written because some of it is quoted in later sources, but we just don’t have access to it…

Romans considered Christianity to be a superstition, an unlawful cult. In general, Roman historians didn’t have much interest in curiosities occurring around the Empire. They tended to write about the lives of the emperors, the battles being fought, natural disasters, or political intrigues.

Macquarie University Honorary Fellow of the Department of Ancient History, John Dickson teaches a unit called “Historical Jesus to Written Gospels” for Sydney University’s Department of Jewish Studies. One of his students was Raphael Lataster and so Dickson basically uses him as a target rich punching bad whereby to demonstrate the various errors in pop-Jesus mythicism “research.”109

Dickson notes, “You can almost set your clock by it. Another article appears arguing Jesus never lived - so Christmas must be upon us.” He relates a bit of fake news as Raphael Lataster had a piece published in The Conversation which was picked up by The Washington Post. This just in, he has not dared state any such thing about Muhammad—shocking, I know.

Dickson notes:

As his former lecturer, I am somewhat embarrassed to admit that Raphael’s 1000 words on Jesus would not receive a pass mark in any history class I can imagine, even if it were meant to be a mere “personal reflection” on contemporary Jesus scholarship….his numerous misrepresentations of scholarship would leave a marker little choice but to fail him.

One historically new view of Jesus is that He never even existed. Of course, this is an utterly radical view and it is not surprising that no one even imagined making such a claim a year after Jesus died not a decade later no, not a century nor millennia but it took virtually a full two millennia before someone invented a new way to excuse their rebellion against Jesus.

Well, a side niche group of such deniers claim that Jesus is just a character which is an amalgam of various earlier myths. This is convenient because it is based on mere assertion and they can play fast and loose with the mythology and pick and choose whichever bits they wish so as to formulate their very own neo-mythology.

Dickson notes, “Lataster has offered an academic contrivance, as he seeks to give respectability to what is known as ‘mythicism.’” Playing off of a Latasterism, he writes:

Romulus and Remus, the mythical founders of Rome, were somewhat historicised over the course of about 300 years. But somehow this is meant to have happened to Jesus in the space of 10-20 years: from celestial deity to crucified Palestinian peasant in half a generation!...

But anyone who dips into the thousands of secular monographs and journal articles on the historical Jesus will quickly discover that mythicists are regarded by 99.9% of the scholarly community as complete “outliers,” the fringe of the fringe.

As to the methodology, Dickson notes:

…when mainstream scholars attempt to call their bluff, the mythicists…cry “Conspiracy!”…Lataster‘s arguments amount to an unfortunate disregard toward mainstream scholarship and highlight a worrying trend in new atheist literature generally: the tendency to pontificate on topics well outside one’s area of expertise. And when challenged by those who belong to the relevant field, these evangelists of unbelief…cry foul.

Thus, “with a wave of his hand he dismisses the apparently ‘atrocious methods’ of historians of Jesus. It is as if he thinks he wins the game by declaring all its rules stupid and inventing his own path.”

He also wrote, “no student - let alone an aspiring scholar - could get away with suggesting that Christians ‘ought not to get involved’ in the study of the historical Jesus. This is intellectual bigotry and has no place in academia, or journalism.” This was within the context of that which I noted above about how Lataster had the chutzpah to claim that as Richard Carrier approvingly puts it, “the debate over the historicity of Jesus” should be conducted “by focusing only on what atheist and agnostic experts are saying…really we should only be looking at the debate among atheists.”

There is also the specific claim by Lataster that “the letters of Paul ‘overwhelmingly support the ‘celestial Jesus’ theory’ is an indefensible exaggeration” yet, “Paul’s evidence for the historical figure of Jesus is widely regarded as particularly early and significant.”

Above I demonstrated in explicit, quoted and cited, detail that this is accurate.

John Dickson also notes, “Raphael Lataster reveals that his real interest is in sceptical apologetics rather than ancient history when he opines, ‘There are no existing eyewitness or contemporary accounts of Jesus. All we have are later descriptions of Jesus’ life events by non-eyewitnesses.’”

Just as an FYI: “later descriptions of” whoever’s “life events by non-eyewitnesses” is called doing history.

He further points out:

…virtually everything we know from ancient history comes to us from sources that are neither “contemporary” with events, nor written by eyewitnesses…This is typical of ancient history, and it poses no dilemma to the contemporary scholar…to suggest that the Gospels are somehow dodgy because they are not contemporaneous accounts of Jesus indicates a basic unfamiliarity with the discipline of history.

And unfamiliarity with the discipline of history premised upon the bias of Atheism—which is an anti-Christian support group—is perfectly descriptive of the pop- ”research” occurring today within the realm of what is supposed to be serious historical Jesus studies.

Cracked Mag Smackdown of Bill Maher and Other Jesus Mythicists

Are you listening Bill Maher, Raphael Lataster, Richard Carrier, Dan Brown, AronRa, et al.?!?! Amanda Mannen wrote the article, “6 Famous Documentaries That Were Shockingly Full of Crap”110 and when Cracked Magazine is more scholarly than thou, you may want to rethink your position. For those who are unaware, Cracked is along the lines of Mad Magazine and features cartoons and silly humor.

The contextually relevant portion for our consideration is “#4. Religulous — The ‘Jesus Is Fake’ Evidence Is Fake The Film.” The original article is peppered with expletives so I will relate some nuggets of truth from it herein.

In Religulous, Bill Maher sets out to make you question what you think you know about God, telling you everything church leaders don’t want you to know…poking holes in their beliefs by pointing out things like…how the Christ mythology is eerily similar to other ancient religions — at one point, a Tumblr-ready slideshow informs us of the many similarities between Jesus and the Egyptian god Horus…Man, that’s some incriminating evidence right there. How come the entire Catholic church hasn’t collapsed under the weight of this one documentary?

Well, the Catholic Church has not collapsed even due to centuries, in fact over a millennia, of scandal so sadly now, Bill Maher could not manage that feat.

However, his Jesus mythicism views are very popular with personages (pseudo-skeptics) who think that “research” means opening up a search engine and typing some such thing as that which they know will return only those items that the presuppose are true: Jesus never existed and is a compilation of Pagan mythology, etc.

They are not skeptical enough, and therefore do not conduct enough research, to ask for actual proof such as primary source quotations and citations rather than a game of telephone from one discredited assertion to another, to another, to another. In fact, every few years such claims are popularized regarding Jesus, they are considered and refuted, they quietly go away only to rear their ugly heads again by someone who thinks that they are on to something and who’s BFF says, “Yeah maaaan, you just debunked Jesus, the Bible, Christianity, God,” etc.

Mannen notes that in certain circles, I might add, “All this ‘Jesus was copied from earlier religions’ stuff…will make you look awesome…but none of it is true.”

One issue is that pop-”researchers” will categorize various and sundry things under a single term and then turn around and claim similarity. For example, “virgin birth,” “resurrection,” “Trinity,” etc., etc., etc.

Thus, the Cracked article notes:

Let’s start with the “virgin births” part: You’ve gotta make some pretty big logical jumps to claim that any of those earlier gods were born from virgins, having come from a mother seven times over (Krishna), some freaky necrophilia (Horus), and a [****]ing rock (Mithras).111

And we could add others such as Buddha’s mother dreaming that a white elephant came out of her side.

The article also notes:

Then there’s the resurrection thing. Contrary to Maher’s claims, Mithras was never resurrected, and the older versions of the guy’s story don’t have any of the Jesus similarities — those came about in the first or second century A.D. (that is, after Jesus was born). Horus, like Mithras, was also never resurrected, didn’t have 12 apostles, and didn’t raise Asar from the dead (which doesn’t translate to “Lazarus” even a little bit).112

I wonder why Atheists have not written books, presented lectures, made (pseudo) documentaries, etc. about Mithras mythicism, claiming that Mithras begged, borrowed and stole from Jesus. By the way, even though the Buddha lived circa half a millennia before Jesus, the main texts about him, including stories of miracles, were written when? Also “about in the first or second century A.D. (that is, after Jesus was born).” Buddha mythicism anyone?

But wait, there’s more!

There isn’t even any record of a figure call Anup the Baptizer; the closest we come is Anubis, the god of embalming, which astute readers will note is a leeeeeetle different from baptism.113

It is also noted, “The Egyptian links have been debunked by actual Egyptologists.”114

Lastly:

…and you’d be hard-pressed to find a scholar who disagrees with the overwhelming evidence that a person (not necessarily a divine being) matching Jesus’ description existed during his purported lifetime. 115

So where did Maher get all this crap? Probably from the viral “documentary” Zeitgeist (which doesn’t cite any sources) or, and this is a serious possibility, the [****]ing Da Vinci Code (which is about as historically accurate as the movie Splash).

None of this means the Christian Bible is right or that it represents the one true religion. But if you think something is bull[****], the answer is not more bull[****].

Within my footnotes you will see that one of the hyperlinked citations within the online Cracked article referenced an article by W. Ward Gasque, Ph.D. who is a “Leading Religion Writer in Canada” about whom it is asked “Does He Know What He’s Talking About” is Tom Harpur who, after all, is yet another in a long line of pop- pseudo-”researchers” whom we will consider next.

Jesus Mythicism in            Tom Harpur’s “The         Pagan Christ”

As elucidated by the aforementioned W. Ward Gasque, Ph.D.116, the one-time Anglican priest Tom Harpur wrote a book titled, “The Pagan Christ” which “is the story of his discovery of the writings of one Alvin Boyd Kuhn (1880- 1963)…who argued that all of the essential ideas of both Judaism and Christianity came primarily from Egyptian religion”:

According to Harpur, there is no evidence that Jesus of Nazareth ever lived. He claims that virtually all of the details of the life and teachings of Jesus have their counterpart in Egyptian religious ideas. He does not quote any contemporary Egyptologist or recognized academic authority on world religions nor appeal to any of the standard reference books in Egyptology or to any primary sources. Rather, he is entirely dependent on the work of Kuhn (and [Godfrey] Higgins [1771-1834 AD] & [Gerald] Massey [1828-1907 AD])…

Virtually none of the alleged evidence for the views put forward in The Pagan Christ is documented by reference to original sources. The notes refer mainly to Kuhn, Higgins, Massey, or some other long- out-of-date work. Furthermore, Harpur’s notes abound with errors and omissions. If you look for supporting evidence for a particular point made by the author, it is not there. Many quotations are taken out of context and interpreted in a very different sense from what their author originally meant (especially the early church fathers). [emphasis added for emphasis]

“Who is Alvin Boyd Kuhn? He is given the title ‘Egyptologist’” by Harpur yet, “As it turns out, Kuhn was a high school language teacher who was an enthusiastic proponent of Theosophy” who “self-published most of his books.” Theosophy is an occult cult which did what?

Attempted to mix and match the world’s Pagan myths.

Gasque contacted “twenty leading Egyptologists” from six countries and asked them about claims made by Kuhn, Harpur, et al. specifically various claims that have been parroted by Bill Maher, Raphael Lataster, Dan Brown, the Zeitgeist propaganda film, etc. which I will relate one by one below.

University of Liverpool’s Prof. Kenneth A. Kitchen noted that Kuhn, Higgins, and Massey are not even listed in M. L. Bierbrier’s Who Was Who in Egyptology and they also are not named in Ida A. Pratt’s “very extensive bibliography on Ancient Egypt (1925/1942).”

One Egyptologist noted that anyone can claim the title of “Egyptologist” or themselves which leads to various and sundry claims that “Egyptologists” claim this or that— especially, I would add, those pseudo-Egyptologists that are unknown to scholarly Egyptologists and self-publish that which they will (sans quotations, citations, references to primary source materials, etc.): “He goes on to refer to Kuhn’s ‘fringe nonsense.’”

On the note of self-appointing, note:

Tom Harpur has based The Pagan Christ on the work of self-appointed “scholars” who seek to excavate the literary and archaeological resources of the ancient world the same way an avid crossword puzzle enthusiast mines dictionaries and lists of words.

Now to the specific claims:

That the name of Jesus was derived from the Egyptian “Iusa,” which means “the coming divine Son who heals or saves.”

Generally, “scholars were unanimous in dismissing the suggested etymologies for Jesus and Christ.” Specifically, Professor of Egyptology at the University of Toronto, Ron Leprohan, noted that “iu” means “to come”

and “sa” means “son” yet, the syntax is erroneous as “Iusa” is unknown in Egyptian. Also, the name “Jesus” is a Greek form of the Hebrew name Yehoshua or Y'hoshua (as in Joshua) and is generally known as Yeshua or Y'shua (Josh).

That the god Horus is “an Egyptian Christos, or Christ.... He and his mother, Isis, were the forerunners of the Christian Madonna and Child, and together they constituted a leading image in Egyptian religion for millennia prior to the Gospels.”

That there is iconography of Isis holding Horus as a baby and the later Mary holding Jesus as a baby is as significant as a photo of your mom holding you as a baby. Gasque noted, “There is no evidence for the idea that Horus was virgin born” and, in fact, there is evidence that he was not.

In Legends of the Gods - The Egyptian Texts, edited with Translations, Sir Ernest Alfred Thompson Wallis Budge, the Egyptologist, Orientalist, and philologist who worked for the British Museum and published numerous works on the ancient Near East, noted the following in chap V which is titled (with emphasis added for emphasis) “Legend Of The Birth Of Horus, Son Of Isis And Osiris.

“Attention was first called to” a stele “by Chabas” in 1857 AD, “The hieroglyphic text was first published by Ledrain in his work on the monuments of the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, and I gave a transcript of the text, with transliteration and translation, in 1895” it was “probably composed under the XVIIIth Dynasty.”

“The last paragraph of the text contains an allusion to Isis, the sister and wife of Osiris, and mentions the legend of the birth of Horus…Set succeeded in killing Osiris” moreover, “the Pyramid Texts state that the body of Osiris was hurled to the ground by Set…Isis, and she at once set out to find his body…she took the form of a bird…late form of the legend goes on to say that Isis fanned the body with her feathers, and produced air, and that at length she caused the inert members of Osiris to move, and drew from him his essence, wherefrom she produced her child Horus.”

Thus, his relevant body parts “the inert members” began to animate, to “move” and she “drew from him his essence, wherefrom she produced her child Horus” which is a reference to the physical act of seed passing from a male sex organ into a female one.

Furthermore, the Pyramid Texts contains a hymn to Osiris which states, “Thy elder sister” keeping in mind that Isis was his sister and wife, “clasped thee to her breast [when] she found thee…Thy sister Isis cometh to thee rejoicing in her love for thee. Thou hast union with her, thy seed entereth her. She conceiveth in the form of the star Septet (Sothis). Horus-Sept issueth from thee in the form of Horus…Horus, the son who avenged his father …Horus, son of Isis, the flesh and bone of Osiris.” Well, this just gets expliciter and expliciter.

Other versions of the myth include/add details such as that Set tore Osiris’ body into fourteen pieces and scattered them. Isis manages to find them all except for his schmekel—the key portion, shall we say. Thus, she magicks up a replacement which, some claim, is represented by the obelisk although some claim that the obelisk represents a petrified Sunray.

In other words, no matter how the myth plays out: physical interaction results in Horus’ birth.

That Horus also “had a virgin birth, and that in one of his roles, he was ‘a fisher of men with twelve followers.’”

Gasque further notes, “There is no evidence for the idea that Horus was ‘a fisher of men’ or that his followers (the King’s officials were called ‘Followers of Horus”) were ever twelve in number.”

That the doctrine of the incarnation “is in fact the oldest, most universal mythos known to religion. It was current in the Osirian religion in Egypt at least four thousand years BCE.”

On this point, the following is noted:

Kuhn/Harper’s redefinition of ‘incarnation’ and rooting this in Egyptian religion is regarded as bogus by all of the Egyptologists with whom I have consulted. According to one: “Only the pharaoh was believed to have a divine aspect, the divine power of kingship, incarnated in the human being currently serving as the king. No other Egyptians ever believed they possessed even ‘a little bit of the divine’.”

Lastly is one more that deals with etymology:

That “the letters KRST appear on Egyptian mummy coffins many centuries BCE, and ... this word, when the vowels are filled in., is really Karast or Krist, signifying Christ.” [ellipses in original]

The reply to this one is as follows:

KRST is the word for “burial” (“coffin” is written “KRSW”), but there is no evidence whatsoever to link this with the Greek title “Christos” or Hebrew “Mashiah”. There is no mention of Osiris in Egyptian texts until about 2350 BC, so Harpur’s reference to the origins of Osirian religion is off by more than a millennium and a half. (Elsewhere Harpur refers to “Jesus in Egyptian lore as early as 18,000 BCE” and he quotes Kuhn as claiming that “the Jesus who stands as the founder of Christianity was at least 10,000 years of age.” In fact, the earliest extant writing that we have dates from about 3200 BCE.)

Let us end with a succinct statement by W. Ward Gasque, “In short, Harpur’s book tells us more about himself than it does about the origins of Christianity (or Judaism).”

And yet, utterly discredited texts such as “The Pagan Christ” may not be quoted or cited anymore but they are certainly paraphrased to no end by pop-pseudo- ”researchers.”

For another debunking of Harpur, see J.P. Holding’s Tom Harpur’s The Pagan Christ: A Critique.117

Ken Humphreys vs. J.P. Holding, Nick Peters, and On the Christ Myth

I thought to touch upon a few key issues that were raised within a debate between James Patrick (J.P.) Holding and Ken Humphreys which is titled Did Jesus Exist?118 Holding runs Tekton Apologetics119 and Humphreys asserts, as his website is titled, “Jesus Never Existed” with the subtle subtitle, “Uncompromising exposure of the counterfeit origins of Christianity and of the evil it has brought to the world.”

Humphreys claimed that Christianity is fraught with fraud from beginning to end. He proposes his beginning point to be the claimed letter to have been fraudulently written in the Apostle Paul’s name.

Yet, this does not necessarily follow as he claims that 1) there was a forged letter to which Paul himself alludes and so 2) Christians were perpetrating a fraud.

Yet, he missed a step; he did not prove or evidence that it was Christians who forged it.

Well, who else would have done it?

Let us slow down now because what is happening is that an idea is asserted by Ken Humphreys and then when it is pointed out that he did not prove his case, an argument from silence is asserted in order to prop up the previous assertion.

Who else?

I do not know but this does not resolve the fact that he did not provide evidence that Christians did it. Perhaps antagonists of Christianity did it in order to misguide the Christians who thought that they were getting directions from Paul.

But the deeper issue is that fraud has been perpetrated in every human endeavor; there have been a myriad of frauds in science but do we discount science? There are frauds within the field of anti-Jesus polemics but does that mean that we ought to dismiss Ken Humphreys out of hand?

When it is mentioned to Humphreys that celebrity antagonist of Christianity Bart Ehrman at least affirms the historical existence of Jesus he offers an, well, shall we say interesting response: perhaps in the future, Ehrman will no longer affirm the existence of Jesus (this is from the for what it’s worth files).

During his debate with Nick Peters (a decidedly one sided debate with Humphreys most offering assertions and Peters offering evidence—to which Humphreys replied with assertions), Humphreys made a number of statements that are of contextual interest to our considerations. Some may be a case of imprecise terminology and yet, that would go to evidence the importance of terminological precision.

He begins his rebuttal by referring to “the various defenses that are ever made for the defense of the historical Jesus…these various claims” but then claims that apologists employing such defenses think that Jesus mythicism is “not worth considering.” Well, pray tell: if they do not find it worth considering then how and why are they known for offering such “various defenses”? He may have been getting at categories such as that such apologists employ various defenses when dealing with general historical Jesus issues a radical subset of which is mythicism.

Regarding the historical Jesus, Humphreys states that “the extraordinary thing is: nobody wrote anything for decades.” There are at least two issues with this assertion one of which is that he is making a positive affirmation which is to say that he is claiming to know that it is a truthful fact that nobody wrote anything for decades.

This is simply something that he does not know and likely cannot know. An accurate statement would have been “the extraordinary thing is: based on the current evidence, largely surrounding a city that was destroyed in 70 AD, we do not know if anyone wrote something prior to the writing that we do have, that we have found, that have survived,” etc. In other words, the claim should not be that we know that nobody wrote anything for decades but that our unbiased knowledge of the matter is that the first writing that have been found, preserved, etc. date to decades later.

In fact, Humphreys refers to how such apologists “try to push the gospels into an early date, there is no substantiation that they were made any earlier that, perhaps, the aftermath of the Jewish war which ended in the year 70” yet, he seems to miss the point about why this may be.

It is an argument from silence in either direction but the  fact is that one must take into consideration that when a  city is destroyed no one can simply assert that nothing relevant to the issue at hand was destroyed along with it.

The second is something pointed out by Peters which is that we cannot interpret “nobody wrote anything for decades” as somehow being suspect based on the fact that in our day someone can post online about an event that occurred ten second prior. Such was not the culture two millennia ago, they simply would not have said, “I just heard Jesus say something. Quick, someone get me some papyrus!”

Peters also points out something that I will rephrase thusly: their “nobody wrote anything for decades” is equivalent to our “nobody wrote anything for minutes.” What? Are you telling me that thus and such notable event happened at 1:03:00 p.m.? But no one posted about it at until 1:010:00

p.m. By golly, if it really did happen at 1:03:00 p.m. then we would expect a posting about it at, at least as late as 1:03:10 p.m.

Another in other words is that their decades are equivalent to our minutes. They were a highly oral culture along with which comes very, very well developed memories along with culturally established methods of ensuring accuracy even whilst allowing leeway for a certain level of what we would term technical inaccuracy yet, within the parameters of the established facts.

Peters emphasizes this by pointing out some of the information that I provide in Appendix: Comparison of New Testament vs. Other Ancient Documents: compared to the rest of antiquity, the New Testament writers did provide the equivalent of a virtual as it happened play-by-play online posting.

Mark as Playwright:

Based on his subjective opinion, Humphreys asserted that Mark is a play: it is written as a play to be performed which partly explains his succinct manner of writing and includes stage notes such as “immediately” thus and such occurs.

The problem, for Humphreys, is that we know of what genre Mark’s text is and that is that is it his recording of Peter’s eyewitness testimony statements and this is why it reads as it does: it is essentially bullet-point style notations.

In his Against Heresies (book 3, chap 1), Irenaeus (130- 200AD) noted:

Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while  Peter and Paul were preaching at Rome, and laying the foundations of the Church. After their departure, Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to  us in writing what had been preached by Peter.

In his Dialogue with Trypho (circa 150 AD), Justin Martyr refers to Peter’s “memoirs” which is a good description of how Mark’s text reads. Moreover, Martyr writes that these memoirs include that Jesus “changed the names of others, two brothers, the sons of Zebedee, to Boanerges, which means ‘sons of thunder’” and this is found in Mark’s text.

In Contra/Against Marcion (book 4, chap 5), Tertullian (160-225AD) notes, “that which Mark published may be affirmed to be Peter’s whose interpreter Mark was.”

Eusebius (263-339 AD, see Ecclesiastical History, book 2, chap 15) records the following:

…so greatly did the splendor of piety illumine the minds of Peter’s hearers that they were not satisfied with hearing once only, and were not content with the unwritten teaching of the divine Gospel, but with all sorts of entreaties they besought Mark, a follower of Peter, and the one whose Gospel is extant, that he would leave them a written monument of the doctrine which had been orally communicated to them. Nor did they cease until they had prevailed with the man, and had thus become the occasion of the written Gospel which bears the name of Mark.

And they say that Peter — when he had learned, through a revelation of the Spirit, of that which had been done — was pleased with the zeal of the men, and that the work obtained the sanction of his authority for the purpose of being used in the churches.

Clement [of Alexandria (150-215AD)] in the eighth book of his Hypotyposes gives this account, and with him agrees the bishop of Hierapolis named Papias. And Peter makes mention of Mark in his first epistle which they say that he wrote in Rome itself, as is indicated by him, when he calls the city, by a figure, Babylon, as he does in the following words: “The church that is at Babylon, elected together with you, salutes you; and so does Marcus my son.” 1 Peter 5:13

Eusebius reiterates this in book 6, chap 25, “…Mark, who composed it according to the instructions of Peter, who in his Catholic epistle acknowledges him as a son…”

Book 3, chap 30 notes:

…the tradition which he gives in regard to Mark, the author of the Gospel.

“This also the presbyter said: Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor followed him, but afterward, as I said, he followed Peter, who adapted his teaching to the needs of his hearers, but with no intention of giving a connected account of the Lord’s discourses, so that Mark committed no error while he thus wrote some things as he remembered them. For he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things which he had heard, and not to state any of them falsely.” These things are related by Papias [of Hierapolis (60-130 AD)] concerning Mark.

Book 6, chaps 14 and 25 notes:

Clement [of Alexandria (150-215 AD)] gives the tradition of the earliest presbyters, as to the order of the Gospels, in the following manner: The Gospels containing the genealogies, he says, were written first. The Gospel according to Mark had this occasion. As Peter had preached the Word publicly at Rome, and declared the Gospel by the Spirit, many who were present requested that Mark, who had followed him for a long time and remembered his sayings, should write them out. And having composed the Gospel he gave it to those who had requested it. When Peter learned of this, he neither directly forbade nor encouraged it….

In his first book on Matthew’s Gospel, maintaining the Canon of the Church, he testifies that he knows only four Gospels, writing as follows: Among the four Gospels, which are the only indisputable ones in the Church of God under heaven, I have learned by tradition that the first was written by Matthew, who was once a publican, but afterwards an apostle of Jesus Christ, and it was prepared for the converts from Judaism, and published in the Hebrew language. The second is by Mark, who composed it according to the instructions of Peter, who in his Catholic epistle acknowledges him as a son, saying, “The church that is at Babylon elected together with you, salutes you, and so does Marcus, my son.” 1 Peter 5:13 And the third by Luke, the Gospel commended by Paul, and composed for Gentile converts. Last of all that by John.

That being said, a historian’s (which Humphreys is not: nor is he some sort of literally critic such as one that would analyze plays) task is to elucidate that which has been historically recorded in a just the facts ma'am reporter style manner. The consistent history is that Mark wrote Peter’s statements and so this claim takes priority and is certainly not toppled just because virtually two millennia after the fact a biased pop-critic invent a new view of the situation.

Unfortunately for Humphreys, he loses in at least two ways. Firstly, he has no historical evidence that Mark’s is a play so that his assertion is just that and nothing more.

Secondly, what if Mark was a play? He would have to argue that all plays or for whatever reason Mark’s particular play must be based on fiction.

In other words, what if Mark wrote history in the style of a play? After all, stained glass windows were meant to depict, in vivid colors, historical events that even illiterate people could discern the meaning. Thus, if Mark was performed as a play the effect would be the same.

Thus, the issue is whether the content of Mark’s text, of whatever genre it is, is historical or not and since that is the question it is no use for Humphreys to pull a styled illogical genetic fallacy.

On Tim O’Neill’s           “An Atheist Historian Examines the Evidence     for Jesus”

I am herein combining some statements on some aspects of Tim O’Neill’s “An Atheist Historian Examines the Evidence for Jesus.” We will see where he went right and where he went wrong.

He notes, “The numbers of professional scholars, out of the many thousands in this and related fields, who don’t accept this consensus” that “it is most likely that a historical preacher, on whom the Christian figure ‘Jesus Christ’ is based, did exist” can “be counted on the fingers of one hand.”

Those within the “fingers of one hand” hold to the utterly radical notion that “there was no historical Jesus at all and that ‘Jesus Christ’ developed out of some purely mythic ideas about a non-historical, non-existent figure.” There is a reason that no one within a decade of Jesus’ time could have even imagined that “there was no historical Jesus” nor anyone within 500 years, no not one within one millennia nor a millennia and a half but it took virtually a full two millennia for someone to hit upon such an outlandish, illogical and a-historical assertion—as I have stated more than once and will do so again with certain objetions made by Robert Price whilst debating against Bart Ehrman, as we shall see.

O’Neill notes that such a view “has had a checkered history…but has usually been a marginal idea at best. Its heyday was in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century” and, I will add, has exploded with the advent of the internet whereby any less than half-baked notion can go viral. Thus, “it fell out of favor as the twentieth century progressed and was barely held by any scholars at all by the 1960s.”

Neo-Jesus Mythists, “are almost never scholars, many of them have a very poor grasp of the evidence, and almost all have clear ideological objectives.”

As is readily discernable from the utter beat-down of the Infidel Guy by Bart Ehrman, there is good reason for O’Neill affirming that “Many of the arguments for a Mythic Jesus that some laypeople think sound highly convincing are exactly the same ones that scholars consider laughably weak, even though they sound plausible to those without a sound background in the study of the First Century.”

He notes that “our sources for anyone in the ancient world are scarce and rarely are they contemporaneous—they are usually written decades or even centuries after the fact.” He specifies the example of one of the most “prominent, influential, significant and famous” personages of old: the Carthaginian general Hannibal (247 BC-183 BC). Now, “how many contemporary mentions of Hannibal do we have? Zero. We have none.”

It is noted that “Some ‘Jesus Mythicists’ have tried to argue that certain ancient writers should have mentioned Jesus and did not” and that in “1909 the American ‘freethinker’ John Remsberg came up with a list of 42 ancient writers that he claimed ‘should’ have mentioned Jesus and concluded their silence showed that Jesus ever existed.” As was the case with Paulkovich so it was the case with Remsberg in that “list has been widely criticised for being contrived and fanciful” for examples poets, military historians, those who wrote about medicine are listed even though there is no reason to expect that they would reference Jesus at all.

A good point is made regarding Philo Judaeus aka Philo of Alexandria since he did write on theology, was contemporaneous to Jesus, referenced Judea and Pontius Pilate but: he made no mention of Jesus nor, by the way, “any of the other Jewish preachers, prophets, faith healers, and Messianic claimants of the time, of which there were many.”

One person who seems that he “should” have mentioned Jesus was Flavius Josephus and in fact, he does so in Antiquities of the Jews XVIII.3.4 and XX.9.1. Yet, one of these mentions is controversial, the one about which O’Neill notes that “the majority of modern scholars” argue that “there is solid evidence to believe that Josephus did make a mention of Jesus here and that it was added to by Christians to help bolster their arguments against Jewish opponents.” Note that Josephus’ report that Jesus was called Messiah appears to be original (as it is merely reporting that which people believed) since Origen (mid- third century AD) quotes Josephus’ key passage thrice and includes the phrase, “Jesus who was called the Messiah” each time: Contra Celsum I.4 and II:13 and Commentarium in evangelium Matthaei X.17.

Another view O’Neill reviews is the claim that “The earliest Christian traditions make no mention of a historical Jesus and clearly worshipped a purely heavenly, mythic-style being. There are no references to an earthly Jesus in any of the earliest New Testament texts, the letters of Paul.” This is precisely the view of, for example, Raphael Lataster again which I have provided plenty of evidence to the contrary.

In turn, Lataster was merely parroting the celestial Jesus myth of Earl Doherty’s books “The Jesus Puzzle” (2005 AD) and “Jesus: Neither God nor Man” (2009 AD). This permutation of the myth is “not something accepted by historians of ancient thought but actually a hypothesis developed entirely by Doherty himself.” In fact, as Atheist Biblical scholar, Jeffrey Gibson put it, “the plausibility of D[oherty]’s hypothesis depends on not having good knowledge of ancient philosophy, specifically Middle Platonism. Indeed, it becomes less and less plausible the more one knows of ancient philosophy and, especially, Middle Platonism.”

In short, there is not a single historical (or theological) trace of any such a view or sects having ever existed, “Despite” as O’Neill puts it, this supposedly, “being the original form of Christianity and despite surviving, according to Doherty, well into the second century.” This is merely more waking up one morning 2,000 years after the fact and saying, “Oh hey, I know, I will just invent something!”

There are also those who attempt to correlate various Pagan figures to Jesus claiming that He is just a fictional amalgam. One popular source for such is the New Ager Acharya S’ “The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold” (1999 AD). She based her tall tale on “late nineteenth and early twentieth century theosophist claims…many of these ‘parallels’ are highly strained, with any miraculous conception or birth story becoming a ‘virgin birth’ or anything to do with a death or a tree becoming a ‘crucifixion’ (even if virginity or a cross is not involved in either).” I have made various similar observations on such claims including that, for example, such personages will call a triad or three gods a “Trinity” when there is no such logical or theological correlation between three gods and one God in three persons.

Note that Acharya S is essentially the source upon which the Zeitgeist propaganda film was based and Chris White has done a masterful job of utterly discrediting the film as a whole as well as Acharya S’ follow-up attempts at defending it.120

The symbolic Jesus view was popularized Robert Price in his “Jesus: A Very Jewish Myth” (2007 AD). This view utterly contradicts the view of Paganism as a source for a Jesus myth and affirms early Christianity’s Jewish roots. Yet, it then weaves a tale of an idealized messianic view being personified as “Jesus.”

A cousin to the Jesus as Pagan amalgam view is the Jesus as human amalgam view which baselessly claims that Jesus is a combination of various historical personages’ characteristics. One such proponent is computer programmer Joseph Atwill who wrote “Caesar’s Messiah: The Roman Conspiracy to Invent Jesus,” 2005 AD, see J.P. Holding’s “Joseph Atwill Caesars messiah review.”121 In short, O’ notes that “No scholar takes these theories…seriously.”

O’Neill asks “why do the overwhelming majority of non- Christian scholars also accept that Jesus existed?” Part of the answer for me is the point above about how no one even imagined that He did not until circa two millennia after His time. Another reason is that none of the imagined explanations hold any scholarly weight.

Yet, every few years someone either invents a new tall tale or simply repackages an old one that has already been discredited. These are then discredited and a few years later someone either invents a new tall tale or simply repackages an old one that has already been discredited and on it goes—on and on and on and on.

I find that when I encounter someone who actually claims that Jesus never even existed at all and counter argue, they immediately give up their claim and fall back onto one of the pseudo-scholarly tall tales—at least the ones that admit He existed.

O’Neill notes that “Early Christianity and the critics of early Christianity agree on virtually nothing about Jesus, except for one thing - that he existed as a historical person in the early first century…Justin Martyr, Origen, and Minucius Felix…confront and answer the arguments their critics make about Jesus - that he was a fool, a magician, a bastard son of a Roman soldier, a fraud etc - but none of these apologetic works so much as hint that anyone ever claimed he never existed.”

Well, O’Neill does not deny that a human being named Jesus (Yehoshua aka Yeshua) existed but, of course, he denies that Jesus is God in the flesh, etc. His reasons for the denial appear to be twofold with the two reasons folding into each other: 1) he claims to discern historical problems within the Bible, attempts to make Jesus fit the prophecies about the Messiah, tell the same story in different ways so as to fill in problematic gaps, etc., etc., etc. and 2) he exercises eisegesis by reading his Atheist presuppositions into the text—which is how he ends up with position 1).

For example, he simply dismisses anything with the Bible that relates something “fantastical” and/or miraculous because his Atheist worldview philosophy restricts his thinking in that regard.

It also seems that he has not studied the methods which cultures with a heavy reliance on passing on information orally developed. Thus, he jokes about how Moses could possibly have written the Ten Commandments as God spoke them because, after all, Moses had to chisel them into stone. Why not assume that God would have spoken them to him word by word in a slow cadence? Why not note that Moses spent over a month, 40 days, on Sinai (and that was only a portion of the time he spent there)?

He points out that when ancient emperors gave speeches which were recorded in writing no one was telling them to slow down, repeat this or that since they were having to take notation. Why not point out ancient systems of memory development or otherwise that oral cultures were used to carrying around vast amounts of info within their craniums? Why not point out that there were methods of telling and retelling stories/info/data whereby multiple people hearing the same thing would fact check each other, etc.?

He asserts that no historians hold the gospels to be history to which I would add: except for the historians who do hold the gospels to be history. He states that one reason to know that they are nor history is that they were written decades, don’t-cha-know, after Jesus’ time. Yet, this is a styled anachronistic manner of argument. Firstly, merely a few decades ago historians and scholars of all sorts knew that the gospels were written centuries after Jesus’ time. Yet, continued research proves otherwise. Thus, a few decades ago he would have complained that they were written centuries after the fact but today he complains that they were written decades after the fact.

Also, we are used to instant well, everything. A local news talk radio station has a tagline which states, “Read it tomorrow, watch it tonight—hear it now!” Indeed, we are used to getting tweets the very moment that something is occurring. Well, in Jesus’ time decades later was tantamount to an instant tweet.

O’Neill notes that “the Jesus story actually shows many signs of being shoehorned into such” messianic “expectations and not exactly fitting very well.” As an example, he notes that in the Gospel of Mark Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist, goes into the wilderness and it is only at this “point where Jesus becomes the Messiah” as He had had “his sins washed away by John, since prior to his point he was man like any other.” I will pause to note

that this is going much too far in reading into Mark and yet, indeed John came to baptize for repentance due to washing away sins.

The Gospel of Matthew is said to have “a very different Christology” with Jesus as “ordained Messiah since his miraculous conception” and so Matthew adds that “John tried to deter him, saying, ‘I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?’ Jesus replied, ‘Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.’” I will note that their discussion is not about sin but about preeminence.

Lastly, the Gospel of John deals with this issue by “removing the baptism altogether.”

I simply take this as chronological authorship logic. Mark is tantamount to bullet-point notes from that which Peter preached and is thus, nothing but the most basic of descriptions. Matthew writes later and seems to discern that details are lacking so he includes the discussion. Note that Peter tells us (1 Peter 3:21) that “baptism doth also now save us” but that baptism is “not the putting away of the filth of the flesh” but rather “the answer of a good conscience toward God” which is that which Jesus was displaying.

John then knows that Mark wrote succinctly and that Matthew added details and so he bypasses the actual baptism and yet, he does note the occasion when “John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

Also, Paul tells us “John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people, that they should believe on him which should come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus” (Acts 19:4). Thus, since John identified Him which should come after him as Christ Jesus then Jesus’ baptism was the ultimate fulfillment of John’s ministry.

O’Neill also notes that Luke and Matthew “go to great lengths to tell stories which ‘explain’ how Jesus came to be born in Bethlehem despite being from Nazareth…Both gospels, however, tell completely different, totally contradictory and mutually exclusive stories (one is even set ten years after the other) which all but the most conservative Christian scholars acknowledge to be non- historical.”

Well, this is not the case. Luke 2 notes that Caesar Augustus decreed that taxing was to be reckoned based on everyone returning to their city of origin and so “Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David).” This is that which O’Neill notes is “non-historical” which is somewhat of an argument from silence in either direction. It is not that it is known that this did not happen but that we do not have extra-biblical records which record that it did. On this issue, see J.P. Holding’s “Miller vs Carrier on the Lukan Census.”122

In the case of Matthew 2, the version set “ten years after” is not even a version but a different issue altogether as the  text affirms upfront that “when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea” then “in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.” This leads to Herod murdering children ages two and under. Thus, this is about Joseph, Mary and Jesus absconding to Egypt.

In any case, O’Neill’s point is to ponder “why did they go to this effort?” of allegedly making real-life match prophecies, etc. and concludes that “If Jesus existed and was from Nazareth, this makes sense” since “If Jesus was a purely mythic figure and the stories of his life evolved out of expectations about the Messiah then he would be from Bethlehem, as was expected as a Messiah.”

Very well, yet perhaps the gospels tell of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem because He was born in Bethlehem.

So, overall O’Neill makes some good points contra Jesus mythicists and some bad points contra the gospels being history.

Jerry Coyne on Jesus: Historical or Mythical?

Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago Jerry A. Coyne, Ph.D. wrote the following regarding the issue of whether Jesus is a historical personage or a mythical character:

I have to say that I’m coming down on the “mythicist” side, simply because I don’t see any convincing historical records for a Jesus person. Everything written about him was decades after his death, and, as far as I can see, there is no contemporaneous record of a Jesus-person’s existence (what “records” exist have been debunked as forgeries).

Yet there should have been some evidence, especially if Jesus had done what the Bible said. But even if he was simply an apocalyptic preacher, as [scholar Bart] Ehrman insists, there should have been at least a few contemporaneous records. Based on their complete absence, I am for the time being simply a Jesus agnostic. But I don’t pretend to be a scholar in this area, or even to have read a lot of the relevant literature.

Firstly, it is interesting to hear (or, read) an evolutionist demanding evidence before he will come down firmly on a position.

No, if he does not “see” historical records for a Jesus person then he needs to keep looking. After all, he admits that he has not “read a lot of the relevant literature” and I am going to take the wild guess that what he has read was all Jesus mythicism propaganda. In fact, his statement was specifically related to Michael Paulkovich’s utterly discredited claims.

Yet, his qualifying term is “convincing” which is utterly subjective and yet allows him to deny and reject the very many historical records we have.

Stating that “Everything written about him was decades after his death…there is no contemporaneous record of a Jesus-person’s existence” is that which C.S. Lewis would term “chronological snobbery” as it is anachronistic. In other words, he is applying today’s tweet the very second that something happens to a culture that was highly oral in its communication. Thus, they would have seen no need to write things down until and unless it seems actually necessary to do so such as when Luke write, “many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us…It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order.” Also, others wrote guidance letters to churches, apologetics replies to controversy, etc.

The statement that “what ‘records’ exist have been debunked as forgeries” is not only generic but an extremist view and utterly false.

Subsequently, Coyne also wrote:

What’s more galling is that the BBC is taking what “many scholars believe” as the gospel truth—pardon the pun—despite the fact that close scrutiny gives virtually no extra-Biblical evidence for a historical Jesus. I’m still convinced that the judgement of scholars that “Jesus was a real man” comes not from evidence, but from their conviction that the Bible simply couldn’t be untruthful about that issue. But of course we know of cases where myths grew up that weren’t at bottom derived from a historical individual.

Well, as an example, my list consists of 210 references includes 178 that are extra-Biblical.

Now, of course, it is true that there have been “cases where myths grew up that weren’t at bottom derived from a historical individual” or scientific evidence such as the theory of evolution. Yet, I would love for Coyne to specify such as case because making generically vague assertions is one thing but delving into specific circumstances is quite another.

The fact is that the history of such instances reveals a pattern of who such myths arise and they do not do so, for example, centuries if not millennia after the supposed character existed and Coyne himself admits that in the case of Jesus it was mere “decades after his death.”

At least at the time of his first statement, Coyne was agnostic regarding the historical or mythical Jesus issue. However, he leaned heavily enough to towards mythicism so as to tip over. Also, he was agnostic as in ultimately unsure and agnostic in that he has not read a lot of the relevant literature and so is also literally agnostic: lacking knowledge.

In conclusion, we know of cases where myths grew up around fiction and in the case of Jesus mythicism (or any such permutation which denies the historical Jesus), we have no one within a decade of Jesus’ supposed lifetime who denied He ever existed or was a myth. We have no one claiming as much within the first century. No, not within the first millennia.

Indeed, it is not until circa a full two millennia after the time of Jesus that someone decided to invent the Jesus mythicism myth and have personages such as Coyne who claim to be interested in historical nearness to even consider accepting it.

Valerie Tarico’s                “5 Reasons To Suspect Jesus Never Existed”

After reading Psychologist Valerie Tarico’s article Here are 5 reasons to suspect Jesus never existed, I decided to write of it as #fakenews analysis since, purposefully or not, it contains various characteristics of a classic example of such.123 It was published by The Raw Story and the story is so raw, in terms of serving up undercooked red herring, that there seems to be no fact checking whatsoever.

Interestingly, Tarico is a psychologist and a former Evangelical: I wonder if she has ever placed herself on her own therapy couch so as to seek to discern why she (mis)handles such issues in the manner in which she does.

And in what manner is that? Well, she notes, “Not being an insider to this debate, my own inclination is to defer to the preponderance of relevant experts” and just who are her subjectively preferred preponderance of relevant experts? Well, she refers to that which “Most antiquities scholars think” which is generic enough to be meaningless but sound impressive (also, keep in mind that 51% is “most” but is awfully close to half).

Thus, when she then refers to “these scholars” we know not of whom she speaks. However, she does end up naming names and these are all Atheists, Agnostics and all hyper “liberal” (I quote the term liberal due to a faint memory that G.K. Chesterton asked why theologians are called liberal when they deny miracles: would liberals not liberally allow for them?).

She names Reza Aslan, Bart Ehrman, David Fitzgerald, Richard Carrier, Robert Price, Joseph Atwill, Marcus Borg, John Dominic Crossan and good ol' aforementioned ExChristian.net.

Now, I have read much by Atheists, Agnostics and “liberals” on historical Jesus issues and it has strengthened my acknowledgment of Jesus as a historical personage. But what does Tarico get out of it? Well, she notes that “Most antiquities scholars think” that what the New Testament does is to “borrow and rework mythic themes that were common in the Ancient Near East” so that “a ‘historical Jesus’ became mythologized.” Yet, “other scholars believe that the gospel stories are actually ‘historicized mythology’…those ancient mythic templates are themselves the kernel.” She refers to “arguments on both sides of this question—mythologized history or historicized mythology” and “the heated back and forth between mythicists and historicists”—I am not even joking, astonishingly she only views these (false dichotomy) extremes as the only options.

Yet, keep in mind that her aim is to demonstrate reasons so “suspect Jesus never existed.” While she admits that “The notion that Jesus never existed is a minority position” she has a loophole since “for centuries all serious scholars of Christianity were Christians themselves.”

Apparently, that is just about enough to explain why it took circa two full millennia before someone thought, “By golly, I’ve got it: He never even existed—and we are now historically (and philosophically as well as geographically) far enough away from His time to actually attempt to pull off this claim (and pull the wool over the eyes of psychologist and a former Evangelical, et al.).”

She notes “The internet phenom, Zeitgeist the Movie introduced millions to some of the mythic roots of Christianity. But Zeitgeist and similar works contain known errors and oversimplifications that undermine their credibility”: indeed, see the aforementioned Chris White’s videos The “Real” Zeitgeist Challenge Debunked, Zeitgeist, History Rewritten and Zeitgeist DEBUNKED.

Now, let us get to the 5 reasons.

1. No first-century secular evidence whatsoever exists to support the actuality of Yeshua ben Yosef.

As previously noted, Agnostic scholar Bart Ehrman argues in favor of the historical Jesus and is quoted, in part, thusly, “even if we include the entire first century of the Common Era – there is not so much as a solitary reference to Jesus in any non-Christian, non-Jewish source of any kind.” See how goal shifting works? When you ignore those most interested in Jesus then you can prove that those uninterested in Jesus did not mention Him.

Ehrman further notes, “we do have a large number of documents from the time – the writings of poets, philosophers, historians, scientists, and government officials, for example, not to mention the large collection of surviving inscriptions on stone and private letters and legal documents on papyrus.” Yet, while it is an argument from silence, in either direction, the fact that Jesus locus of activity, Jerusalem, was destroyed in 70 AD seems relevant.

I recall hearing an interviewer asking a detective if he had the case files for a certain case. The reply was no because that was kept in hardcopy within offices at the World Trade Center and when the towers went down the info was destroyed.

My list of citations provides plenty of relevant sources from that time frame.

2. The earliest New Testament writers seem ignorant of the details of Jesus’ life, which become more crystallized in later texts.

A favorite tactic is to ignore all of the New Testament except for Paul since, or so it is asserted, he is an easy target for those scholars whose view range from “mythologized history or historicized mythology.” How so? Tarico refers to “the ‘silence of Paul’ on the most basic biographical facts and teachings of Jesus.”

Yet, note that what we know of Paul is due to his own letters, Luke’s gospel and Luke’s Book of Acts. His own letters were to Christian individuals and churches so he cannot be expected to write biographies: such is simply a conclusion from considering genre. Luke provides biographical info about Jesus and so the Paul obsessed ignore him.

In any case, Tarico writes, “Paul seems unaware of any virgin birth” and yet, Galatians 4:4 states “when the fullness of the time, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman.” Wow, made of a woman!? Well, there’s a newsflash worthy to be preserved for two millennia! Well, fine, he does not use the terms “virgin” followed by “birth” but referring to God sending Jesus “made of a woman” can at least be seen as a hint.

Tarico writes that Paul “never calls the twelve apostles Jesus’ disciples; in fact, he never says Jesus HAD disciples

–or a ministry, or did miracles, or gave teachings.”

1) “never calls the twelve apostles Jesus’ disciples”: (just in case, all Apostles were disciples but only 12 disciples were Apostles). In Acts 9:19 Luke relates that “Then was Saul [Paul] certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus.” In 21:16 he notes “There went with us also certain of the disciples of Caesarea, and brought with them one Mnason of Cyprus, an old disciple, with whom we should lodge.” Oh, but Acts was written by Luke and so you can ignore his biographical statements about Paul so as to ignore Paul’s biographical statements about Jesus. Ah, but in Galatians 1:18-19 Paul write, “Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days. But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord’s brother.”

In verse 14 he noted that “I saw that they” Peter and Barnabas “walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel” yet, in verses 7-9 he referred to how “the gospel of the circumcision was…wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship” and referred to “James, Cephas [an aka for Peter], and John” as “pillars” so the issue was as noted: that in the one case, they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel but did so when it was pointed out.

So, he refers to Peter and James within the context of other Apostles and if the reply is, “Well, sure, he refers to them within the context of other Apostles but did not all the Apostles ‘disciples’” then you know that this is merely a game of semantics.

2) “he never says Jesus HAD disciples”: likely a semantic word game, as just noted, and also in 1 Corinthians 15:9 Paul writes, “For I am the least of the apostles” within the genre of writing to Christians who know of the others.

3) “or a ministry…or gave teachings”: in 1 Corinthians 11:23 Paul refer to when “Jesus the same night” as in a biographical note “in which he was betrayed took bread,” etc. which He did so when? When He was gathered with His disciple Apostles at the last supper, they who were part of His ministry and whom He taught.

4) “or did miracles” this one also relates to the genre issue and keep in mind that Paul’s overall context is to deal with issues within the church such as church discipline about which his letters are often replies to questions.

Tarico also claims, “Peter and James are supposedly Jesus’ own followers and family; but Paul dismisses them as nobodies and repeatedly opposes them for not being true Christians!” This is not only inaccurate but hyperbolic. We have already seen Paul refer to Peter and James as Apostles, a category in which he is placed as well so that he hardly dismissed them. BTW: there is a reason why she does not provide us quotations or citations: she likely is merely repeating the bankrupt claims of others and also, no such evidence exists. In fact, we know of one single instance of Paul confronting Peter and that was due to hypocrisy which Peter goes on to rectify, “when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles: but when they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision” (Galatians 2:11-12) and “And he said unto them, Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or come unto one of another nation; but God hath shewed me that I should not call any man common or unclean” (Acts 10:28).

The only other dispute is when “Paul said unto Barnabas, Let us go again and visit our brethren in every city where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how they do. And Barnabas determined to take with them John, whose surname was Mark. But Paul thought not good to take him with them, who departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work. And the contention was so sharp between them, that they departed asunder one from the other: and so Barnabas took Mark, and sailed unto Cyprus; And Paul chose Silas, and departed, being recommended by the brethren unto the grace of God. And he went through Syria and Cilicia, confirming the churches” (Acts 15:36-41). Thus, this also was not about being considered to be nobodies and certainly not about not being true Christians: Barnabas and Paul both agreed to continue their gospel missions yet, to different regions with different companions.

3. Even the New Testament stories don’t claim to be first-hand accounts.

Tarico asserts “the four gospels were assigned the names of the apostles Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, not written by them.” The claim is that the four gospels were not written by the Apostles but does not consider that, perhaps, they were assigned the names of their authors. They were assigned as such due to the church, as a whole, knowing who wrote what: within a historian’s context, we must give personages who lived 2,000 years ago at least as much regard as personages who lived 2,000 years later to know such things.

Tarico then goes a step further by actually claiming, “the gospel stories don’t actually say, ‘I was there.’” Well, by definition those portions of each gospel which contains references to the assigned author’s own involvement are based on “I was there.” Also, it is not as simple as, for example, looking for the name “John” in the gospel of John (keeping in mind that John the Apostle writes about John the Baptist) since he often refers to himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved” (John 21:20).

Note that 1 John 1:1 states, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life” but, apparently, since this is not a gospel then it does not count.

4. The gospels, our only accounts of a historical Jesus, contradict each other.

This subsection merely repeats the assertion within its tile, “they contradict each other” and “contradict” and simply refers us to the scholarship of the ExChristian.net site.

5. Modern scholars who claim to have uncovered the real historical Jesus depict wildly different persons.

Note that this is not about Jesus but about “Modern scholars” or rather, that which “Modern scholars” do with or make of Jesus.

She refers to options such as “a cynic philosopher, charismatic Hasid, liberal Pharisee, conservative rabbi, Zealot revolutionary, and nonviolent pacifist” and may I add, a composite of Pagan myths and, oh yeah, God incarnate. She quotes John Dominic Crossan of the (anti) Jesus Seminar as stating that “the stunning diversity is an academic embarrassment.”

Yet, Tarico missed quite an opportunity since as a psychologist she could have given us insights into why various people come away with such varied views. For example, Sigmund Freud speculated that theists were seeking a father figure in God. Professor of psychology Paul Vitz noted that, for various reasons, the world’s most well-known Atheists had poor relationships with their dad’s and that, applying Freudian theory, they ultimately rebelled against the ultimate father figure: God—his book on this topic is Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of Atheism. Well, at least Tarico was discerning enough to not title her

#fakenews “5 reasons Jesus never existed” but “5 reasons to suspect Jesus never existed” since her 5 points certainly fail and her lack of knowledge of this topic is quite evident.

Troll FAIL on Historical Jesus Myth

At my Facebook page,124 someone posted a link to Premier Christianity’s “40% of People Doubt Jesus was a Real Person: Here’s How to Change Their Mind” along with this quote:

It’s relatively simple to make the case for the historicity of Jesus. Firstly, it’s what the vast majority of scholars of the ancient world believe (i.e. the ones who actually research these things, rather than the opinion of an Oxford biologist).

We not only have the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life, but his death by crucifixion is one of the most widely attested events in the ancient world, written about by contemporary historians such as Josephus and Tacitus.125

Well, it got a few comments from two personages that ranged from virtually incoherent to downright FAILED attempts at trolling.

The first person, to whom I will refer as Personage one wrote:

Anthropomorphic beings.

An example of something anthropomorphic are the pictures of God that depict Him with human male characteristics without indication or evidence that his appearance is that of an evolutionarily current human.

This is actually biblically accurate except that it utterly misses the point of the article which is about the historically verifiable Jesus who came in human form.

Personage two replied with:

hehe, they like to tell the truth and lie at the same time, depending on the audience. Who is created in who’s image? In the Zohar, man banished God from the garden.

I know that it can be frustrating to read internet comments, particularly when dealing with what are supposed to be scholarly issues. Yet, this is a part of real life, on the ground discussions.

This is generic enough to be meaningless as what is the “truth” and what is the “lie” is left unstated. They then make a historically huge jump from Genesis to the much, much, much latter Rabbinic Jewish folklore mysticism Zohar. To this, Personage one simply replied with “Spot on” and that was the end of them and Personage three chimed in with “What you say is true” and was never heard from again.

Now, the focus will be Personage two who followed up with (and note that as per above also, they do not begin their sentences with capital letters; I am only mentioning this so it does not seem as if I am quoting them half sentence):

even only a short glimpse into the ancient mysteries will prove to any quasi-intelligent person that the historical jesus is only a political manipulation of the truth of the metaphysical Christ within all.

Now, of course, biblically there is no such thing as a “metaphysical Christ” within the context of “ancient mysteries” and certainly not a real, actual, historical, biblical Jesus “within all” but only within those who accept Him as Messiah.

I replied thusly:

Friend, you will find that if you ignore popular level claims and demand primary source material which is supposed to back your claims there either are none or they actually borrowed from Jesus as they date to after His time. Here is a short debate on the topic:

The “Here” referred to a video to which I linked wherein Gary Habermas utterly devastates, is a nice way of putting it, the claims of Tim Callahan during a discussion on Lee Strobel’s show Line of Fire.126

The reply to me was, and I quote in full:

lol your argument is circular

This is a great example of that which Augustine of Hippo wrote in, The City of God, Book 5, Chap. 26, “…it is very easy for a man to seem to himself to have answered arguments, when he has only been unwilling to be silent” which is a quote that is applicable to 99% of instances in which I deal with 99% of Atheists.

They wrote a follow-up comment right away which reads:

seems you don’t want your mind changed

mr true freethinker

The reference to “mr true freethinker” is due to my website being truefreethinker.com

It is also fascinating when people who don’t want their mind changed tell me that I don’t want your mind changed—and state it as if it is any sort of argument. Winston Churchill stated, “A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind” but moreover, “and won’t change the subject.”

Well, you can tell right away that this person is not interested in engaging in reasoned discourse and yet, I made an attempt by replying with:

“your argument is circular” is a conclusion: where is the rest of your argument? Seems you don’t want your mind changed.

That seems clear enough as they had merely made an assertion without, as it were, showing their work. They replied thusly:

thanks for further proving my point. Yes, you are right that it was a conclusion but the second part of your comment is childish and also wrong. I don’t care if my mind got changed in the process of searching for truth. In fact, it had, many times. That is not an issue. “Seems you don’t want your mind changed” was also a conclusion, because you were not at all curious when presented an alternative to your beliefs, thus proving that you are not interested in challenging them. That’s just boring. Both my comments were conclusions, as I am not interested in trying to change your mind. My initial comment was meant to spark some curiosity but still I see none, hence the conclusion.

Bear in mind, though, that the opposite of curiosity is ignorance. I bid you farewell, for I will not be replying to this any longer.

This is a troll hit and run tactic: they make baseless statements that lack reason, logic, and evidence and when challenged they thump their chest and go away.

Here was my reply, the final one, as no one has replied to anything anymore:

Friend, how did I prove your point as your point is one that requires historical evidence and you have provided nothing but assertions?

You are also mistaken as to why, in your estimation, I was not curious. In fact, I have been so curious of such issues that I have read about them and written about them.

Thus, I knew to ask you for primary source information which you have failed to provide.

If you are only interested in sparking some curiosity please place the cards on the table and do not merely imply that you have cards and put them well, somewhere but cannot find them.

And with that, you seem to scurry off in order to do this to another person and another and another and yet, at least you know that you were asked for evidence and simply failed. What a shame.

And this is why people had to wait until circa two millennia after His life, death, and resurrection to even imagine making such a radical claim as that Jesus never existed as a historical person. They needed society to become nice and dumbed down to the point that people react emotionally to intellectual issues which leads to a deconstruction of history based on feelings.

Sir Elton John’s Historical and Theological Elucidations

Yes, everyone is getting into the historical Jesus act from psychologists such as Valerie Tarico to ecologists such as Jerry Coyne and comedians such as Bill Maher to so sure, why not, why not musician Elton John?

As per below:

Clearly, Jesus is such an undeniable personage that every religion, worldview, philosophy, etc. want to appropriate Him for themselves. Thus, to the Hindus Jesus was an Avatar, to the Buddhists Jesus was a Bodhisattva or the Maitreya Buddha, to the Taoists Jesus revealed the eternal Tao, to the Jews Jesus was a Rabbi or prophet (or a false prophet), to Islam Jesus was a prophet, to Atheist and secularists Jesus demonstrated the highest morals, to the Gnostics Jesus was the revealer of the gnosis, the aeon soter.

And to Elton John, he was gay—or, sort of not: as we shall see.

John claims that Jesus was “super-intelligent” – wow! Actually:

Sir Elton John has claimed Jesus was a “super-intelligent gay man” in an interview with a US magazine.

The singer also told Parade Jesus was “compassionate”, forgiving and “understood human problems”.

A spokesman for the Church of England said: “Sir Elton’s reflection that Jesus calls us all to love and forgive is one shared by all Christians.”

“But insights into aspects of the historic person of Jesus are perhaps best left to the academics,” he added.

Sir Elton said in the interview: “On the cross, he forgave the people who crucified him. Jesus wanted us to be loving and forgiving.

I don’t know what makes people so cruel. Try being a gay woman in the Middle East – you’re as good as dead,” he added.127

Now, the article I just quoted states “The full interview will be published on Parade’s website on Friday” and I could not wait to see just how Sir John would elucidate the issue by referencing history, archeology, manuscript evidence, etc.

Yet, the only relevant portion of the Parade article consists of the following paragraph alone:

His take on Christianity.

I think Jesus was a compassionate, super-intelligent gay man who understood human problems. On the cross, he forgave the people who crucified him. Jesus wanted us to be loving and forgiving. I don’t know what makes people so cruel. Try being a gay woman in the Middle East — you’re as good as dead.128

So much for a buildup and follow-up elucidation.

Maybe I am getting to be an old out of touch geezer but I recall a time when an interview consisted of more than texting styled softball Qs and unchallenged As.

Where is the barrage of questions as to how he came to such conclusions?

Where is the evidence which is surely demanded of him? Where is the skepticism?

Where are the demands for his qualifications to speak on matters historical?

Where is anything but a thus saith Sir Elton John? Nowhere to be found.

One year it was claimed that Jesus was married to two women a few years later that Jesus was gay.

Well, subsequently, Sir John has attempted to backtrack and has stated the following to WGN-TV – Chicago, “Parade magazine did a kind of a sneaky thing and put it on their website that I said this.”

Apparently, he did not say that Jesus was super-intelligent. Just kidding.

Here is the elucidation:

Well, let me clarify the situation first of all. It’s not actually in the interview in Parade magazine. Parade magazine did a kind of a sneaky thing and put it on their website that I said this. And I, I might have said this as part of the conversation during the interview. And the interviewer did a wonderful job.

And I’m very, very happy with the article in Parade magazine. I think everybody’s individual faith is their own business, and I do believe in Jesus, and I believe that he was a compassionate person, and I see him as, from my point of view, and that’s just my point of view, and I’m not, as a compassionate gay person.

Someone who was persecuted. Someone who forgave people. And, and that’s how I see him. He could have easily been Jeannie White, Ryan White’s mother, you know, who went through that awful thing. It’s just I identify in my mind as someone like that...Everybody’s idea of faith is their own business. And I think as long as you do believe in someone wonderful, and someone who was such a great person as Jesus Christ, and someone who was compassionate and forgiving, then that’s all I’m saying. I’m not saying to everyone that he definitely was gay. That’s how I see him. That’s my idea of faith.

Everyone has their own idea. If I offended anybody, I don’t see why they should be offended by it because I’m not saying that’s how he definitely was. And, you know, we each have our own idea of what religion should be and our faith should be. And I, I do believe in Jesus Christ, and I do believe he was a wonderful man.

And that’s my view of him. And, and I don’t, I don’t really want to cause a controversy, and I didn’t know it was going to be a sidebar to an article that was a great article. And I think Parade have been a bit sneaky about that. But I can’t do anything about it, and I’m afraid I’m a bit of a lightning rod for these situations.

So, according to Sir John Jesus was a “gay man” and a “gay person” but he is not saying that the man he referred to as “gay” in two interviews was “definitely was gay.”

Moreover, Jesus Christ the Messiah, the Son of God, God Himself in the flesh who proceeded forth from the Triune God to save the lost or Jeannie White—'cause, you know, like whatever and stuff.

But, but, but he qualifies his statements with the obligatory I make outrageous and offensive statements about Jesus without evidence but “from my point of view…my point of view…how I see him…how I see him…my idea…Everyone has their own idea….we each have our own idea…that’s my view…”

Well, of course, it is his idea. It is specifically not history’s idea. It is not the Bible’s idea. But can I say that Sir Elton John beats up his neighbor’s puppies? That is my idea, he may have a different idea. Can I claim that Sir Elton John is a closet heterosexual? That is my idea, his husband may have a different idea.

This is the absolute agnosticism that pop-cultural- philosophy has left us: there is no absolute truth, there is only opinion and it is absolutely true that there is no absolute truth so there is but there is not—but that is my idea.

Why not get to know the one true real historical Jesus?

In this regard, it may be interesting to note what the Barna Group has written:

Americans Wrestle with an Imaginary Jesus

The nature of people’s interacting with Jesus is a central focus of a new book by Matt Mikalatos, entitled Imaginary Jesus. In that story the main character encounters a wide variety of characters who claim to be Jesus, but who actually represent our diverse and ever-changing depictions of who we want Jesus to be and the roles we want Him to fill for our personal benefit. In his take on America’s theological confusion about their savior, Mikalatos gently and humorously exposes the errant views of Jesus that have undermined people’s perspectives about faith, morality, relationships and life purpose.

In his fast-paced, not-quite-true but not- quite-false story, Mikalatos provides a deceptively serious and significant inspection of how Americans’ views of Jesus and how we remake Him into our desired mold before we discard Him in order to move on to our next need.

Introducing us to some of the countless Jesus characters we fabricate for our personal use – ranging from “King James Jesus,” “Magic 8-ball Jesus” and “Testosterone Jesus” to “Free Will Jesus,” “New Age Jesus” and “Meticulous Jesus” – this wild ride pushes the reader to consider the relationship and communication we have with Jesus – the relationship that two-thirds of Americans claim to have firmly in place and the communication that three out of five Americans say influences how they live.129

Atheist Reginald “The Infidel Guy” Finley vs. Agnostic Bart Ehrman

The Finley vs. Ehrman discussion has become a classic. One reason might be that it is a case of enjoying sitting back and watching the fireworks. Another is that it illustrates a scholarly elucidation of scholarship versus the promulgation of well-within-the-box-Atheist-group-think- talking-points-de-jour-one-liners.

Finley’s position is basically nothing but deny, deny, deny—and deny. His tactic is a very typical Atheist one and that is to make a point, have it refuted and go on to insist by making the point again (sometimes using different words to express it) as if it had never been refuted.

Here is my transcription of the relevant portion of the discussion. I am cleaning up Finley’s portion slightly as he speaks in a stuttering manner so I am not including his various stalls and repetitions:

Finley: Do you believe in the historical Jesus?...

Ehrman: …I get the question a lot. I, unfortunately, get quoted as someone who thinks that Jesus didn’t exist, which I think is something very strange because I’ve written an entire book on what Jesus said and did [laughs] and for Him to say and do anything He had to exist. So [laughs] I don’t think there’s any serious historian who doubts the existence of Jesus.

There are a lot of people who want to write sensational books and make a lot of money, who say Jesus didn’t exist but I don’t know any serious scholar who doubts the existence of Jesus. And so absolutely, I think…

Finley: [interrupting] Or, should we say “A Jesus.” Because there are some ideas about this too right, like, 'cause “Jesus Christ” itself just means what, what does it mean “the anointed one” or something?

Ehrman: Well, “Christ” is the Greek word for “anointed one.” It’s the same, it’s the Greek equivalent of the word “Mashiach” in Hebrew.

Finley: [crosstalk] “Messiah.”

Ehrman: [crosstalk] Where we get “Messiah” from.

Finley: Right, so basically, so any, you know, Jewish sect that believed that they had a “Jesus Christ” then that entity would exist, so to speak. So, I guess what I’m saying here, I guess I’m going with, maybe the multiple Jesus hypothesis: that there might have been a variety of different, which is why there are a lot of different stories.

Ehrman: I don’t think there was more than one person, I mean I think there was a historical person, “Jesus,” and that we can say some things historically about Him. But what happened was, after His death, so many people told stories, so many different parts of the Roman Empire, that different portraits of Jesus emerged.

And some of these portraits show up in the Gospels so that in fact, the portrait of Jesus in Luke’s Gospel is different than the portrait in Mark and different from the one in John and different from the one in the Gospel of Peter, or the Gospel of Judas, I mean these are all different portraits.

Finley: Okay well, it sounds like to me, well, many, there are some people in the chatroom right now disagreeing, of course. But they’re saying that there really isn’t any hardcore evidence thought that, there isn’t any evidence really that Jesus did exist except what people are saying about Him.

Ehrman: I disagree with that. Finley: Really?

Ehrman: What hardcore evidence is there that Julius Caesar existed?

Finley: This is the same kind of argument that apologists use, by the way, for the existence of Jesus, by the way. They like to say the same thing you just said just then about well, what kind of evidence do you have for Julius…

Ehrman: [crosstalk] …it’s a historical point, I mean: how do you establish the historical existence [crosstalk. Ehrman seems to say “of any individual”] form the past?

Finley: I guess, it depends on the claims that people have made during that particular time about a particular person and their influence on society.

Ehrman: [crosstalk] It’s not just a claim…one has to look at historical evidence. And if you say that historical evidence doesn’t count then I think you get into huge trouble because then how do you, I mean, then why not just deny the Holocaust or deny that Abraham Lincoln lived or why not deny, I mean, just deny—I think these things, I think it matters what happened in history.

Finley: Right, what I say is, the way I like to word it this way, because, I mean, really, we do have more evidence for those things that you mentioned that we probably do Jesus Christ. But I like to tell people, well, what harm would it do? Because, especially, the information you have just now about, even if there was a Jesus, the Book of Mark shows us that there was an embellishment way after anyway…

Ehrman: [crosstalk] …people want to know what Jesus really did say and, you know, that assumes that he really existed.

Finley: [crosstalk] …and that we can’t know either…

Ehrman: [crosstalk] …you have to look at the evidence.

Finley: But what is the evidence, because even that we cannot know for sure. But I guess you would just say look at the earliest manuscripts that date to, what, around when He should have existed or something or what we have? We don’t have anything that exists until after He died, allegedly, right?

Ehrman: About Him, you mean? Finley: Right, about Jesus.

Ehrman: Well, that’s true of everyone [laughs] I mean [laughs] so.

Finley: Well, no, really, I thought there was some, uhm, I guess so but I thought that there was some contemporary, there are some writers who write about people as they existed as with Julius Caesar… [it is funny, in that he stumbles and virtually said “Jesus Caesar”]

Ehrman: [crosstalk] …we don’t have anybody form that time talking to us now. All we have are ancient records… [crosstalk] all we have for Jesus are ancient records.

Finley: But we don’t have any ancient records of anyone who wrote about Jesus while He was alive, do we?

Ehrman: No. Absolutely not and we… [crosstalk] just as we don’t have for millions of people who lived in the past that we’re pretty sure existed. I mean, we have more evidence for Jesus than we have for almost anybody from His time period so, I mean, you know, I’m not saying this as a believer, I’m not a believer. But as a historian, I’m just saying that [laughs] you can’t just, kind of, dismiss it and say, “Well, you know, we don’t know.” I mean, you have to look at the evidence. So, there is hard evidence, I think.

Finley: Okay, I would look for archeological evidence as well.

Ehrman: For example, we have one author who actually knew Jesus’ relatives and knew His disciples.

Finley: And who is that? Ehrman: Paul.

Finley: How do we know that?

Ehrman: Because we have Paul’s letters.

Finley: How do we know he didn’t lie about it?

Ehrman: Why would he lie about it?... [crosstalk] Paul says things about Jesus as off the cuff comments, where he’s not making a point. And, see, that’s very important to historians. In other words, a historian wants to find disinterested comments and Paul has disinterested comments where he says things, for example, about James the brother of the Lord which is just an off the cuff comment, 'cause everyone that he’s writing to knows who he’s talking about so he just makes the off the cuff comment. It’s very important information…

Finley: [crosstalk] …if he wrote that.

Ehrman: …off the cuff comment about the twelve disciples if, in fact, I mean, so the whole point is, is that you got a disinterested comment from somebody who actually knew these people.

Finley: If he even wrote that though, correct? Because isn’t there some…

Ehrman: No, there is no doubt about Paul writing Galatians.

Finley: Aren’t there some theories that suggest that, maybe Paul himself had a scribe that wrote for him.

Ehrman: Every person who wrote epistles in the ancient world dictated them to scribes.

Finley: Right, so how do we know then that…

Ehrman: How do you know that Cicero wrote his letters?

Finley: I don’t, I’m not a historian so I don’t know much about Cicero.

Ehrman: Right, well I am a historian and I’m telling you [laughs]

Finley: But there are many historians who disagree with you…

Ehrman: None that I ever heard of. Finley: Oh really?

Ehrman: Not serious historians. Finley: Not “serious” historians

Ehrman: I know thousands of scholars of the ancient world and I don’t know anyone, of these scholars who doubt that Paul wrote Galatians.

Finley: Okay.

Ehrman: So, these are people who’ve devoted their lives to this. And a lot of them are like me, it’s not that I’ve a personal investment in Pau, I mean, I’m not even a Christian. I’m just saying, as a historian: there’s no doubt, Paul wrote Galatians.

Finley: Huhm.

I would like to offer some thoughts along the way now that I presented it without butting in.

Of course, Finley and the choir to which he is preaching seem to assume that Ehrman would agree with their radical position.

Finley begins with the presupposition that Jesus did not exist but when Ehrman makes his initial comments Finley does that which I have noted about how such discussions go: he immediately took the one step back position of that “A Jesus” did exist and in fact, multiple ones existed yet, surely coincidentally, not the one and only one in question.

Yes, “Christ” means anointed but the fact is that one particular Jesus was being referred to as having been specifically anointed. So no, every Jewish sect did not have their “own personal Jesus,” to quote the Depeche Mode song. In fact, even if there was more than one person being specifically referred to as “Jesus Christ,” the one in question was born in Bethlehem, raised in Nazareth, born of Mary to the lineage of David and feel free to add various and sundry other specific identifying characteristics.

Next, the different portraits are the result of the various author’s experiences or, in the case of Luke, reporting accounts. This, coupled with their purpose and audience such as emphasizing Jesus’ humanity, emphasizing His divinity, emphasizing His saying, His doings, etc.

We then come to the chatroom subjectively appealing to “hardcore evidence.” Ehrman attempt to introduce them to objective criteria for evidence.

Finley illogically notes that Ehrman’s arguments are of the same kind that apologists use: which means that apologists are relying upon historical objectivity in a valid manner, by the way. Yet, Finley, seems to imply: apologists bad therefore, Ehrman bad for saying something like them. And I conclude this because his was a half thought as it was that Ehrman’s arguments are of the same kind that apologists use period, full stop and not Ehrman’s arguments are of the same kind that apologists use and they are both invalid because               : with a filling in of the blank, with a completion of the thought, with a therefore.

By answering “how do you establish the historical existence of any individual form the past?” by referring to the person’s “influence on society” seems to mean that Finley is inventing a criteria that since Jesus is so very influential—influential enough to power Finley’s entire program—then he demands a special standard of his own subjective making.

This seems to be hinted at by Ehrman’s reference to the Holocaust and Abraham Lincoln and Finley asking “what harm would it do?” to not believe that these were historical. Also, sadly, he never got around to elucidating just how “the Book of Mark shows us that there was an embellishment way after anyway.”

Now, Finley not only claims that “we can’t know” “what Jesus really did say but also that “we cannot know for sure” what is “the evidence.”

By this, he begins opening the door to hyper-skepticism and as G.K. Chesterton put it, “the new rebel is a Sceptic, and will not entirely trust anything…the fact that he doubts everything really gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which he denounces it.”130

Now, that “we don’t have any ancient records” “for millions of people who lived in the past” is why Finley must invent a new criteria when this applies to the very Jesus he is attempting to discredit.

The hyper-skepticism rears its illogical head fully when Ehrman refers to Paul who “actually knew Jesus’ relatives and knew His disciples.” Finley asks “How do we know that?” and “How do we know he didn’t lie about it?” and “if he wrote that” and states “If he even wrote that,” etc.

In other words, this is styled conspiracy theorizing gone wild whereby any evidence that debunks the conspiracy is simply claimed to be a greater part of the conspiracy.

Note also that Finley states, “Aren’t there some theories that suggest that, maybe Paul himself had a scribe that wrote for him.” No, there are not “theories” but there are outright statements within Paul’s letters themselves.

Within some of his letters Paul does some handwriting of his own in order to demonstrate that what was written for him was well, just that, written for him:

The salutation of Paul with mine own hand, which is the token in every epistle: so I write (2 Thessalonians 3:17).

Ye see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand (Galatians 6:11)

This greeting is in my own hand—Paul (1 Corinthians 16:21-23)

I Paul have written it with mine own hand (Philemon 19)

Oh, but then the forgerer would have written that in order  to make us think that it was by Paul—and you see how they hyper-skeptical-conspiracy theorizing goes: deny, deny, deny.

In the end, we come to some styled arguments from authority with Finley basically pitting his anonymous chatroom audience versus the historian whom he is interviewing as well as unnamed “many historians who disagree with you” versus “Not serious historians” out of “thousands of scholars of the ancient world.”

Bart Ehrman vs.               Robert Price

Bart Ehrman found himself having to write:

I have had several persons tell me the following:

In his April 16th “The Bible Geek” podcast, Robert M Price says it has come out that Bart Ehrman never even read through any of the mythicist books he talks about in “Did Jesus Exist.” Ehrman just had his graduate students read them and report to Bart about what sections he should look at.

I have not listened to the podcast, but if Robert did say this, then it’s a flat-out lie. And that probably says something about the attacks being made against my book, and the people making them. I have no problems with Robert (at least I didn’t before now) and think that he is a rare scholar among the mythicists (since he is, in fact, a scholar). And I treat him with respect in my book. I expect the same treatment — and a healthy dose of honesty and integrity — in return….

I decided to listen to Robert Price’s podcast (as if I have time for this kind of nonsense), and in fact it is even *worse* than I indicate in the post I made 30 minutes ago. He flat out accuses me of not reading the mythicists’ books and attacking what my students told me about them.

He excoriates me for several minutes for this kind of irresponsible activity. But in fact, it is a flat out lie. I do not do research like that and certainly did not in this case. I read all the mythicist books I talk about (which made, I’ve got to tell you, for a rather unpleasant summer…) including, in detail, both of his major works.

Again, I believe in engaging in academic back-and- forth with honesty and integrity. If Robert Price does not share the ideals, then I am sorry to hear it. If he wants to talk substance, I’m happy to do it at any time. If he wants to propagate lies and falsehoods, he will have to do it without me. [Second ellipses in original]131

Price is “a rare scholar among the mythicists” in that he actually is a scholar and, as a side note, as per Ehrman “Richard Carrier is one of the new breed of mythicists. He is trained in ancient history and classics, with a Ph.D.” and again, he is a new breed because he is actually relevantly schooled.”132

That was in 2012 AD and Ehrman went on to debate Price in 2016 AD. Now, pray tell, who reared his childishly immature head—in a classic case of illogical category error I might add—during the Q&A session but Frank Zindler a co-authored of Price who stated “it’s both amusing and sobering to realize that if the Docetists had won the wars of the second and third centuries we wouldn’t be having this debate tonight, would we? We’d be debating something much more significant like was there a historical tooth fairy.”

In any case, Zindler asks Ehrman if he read a book  authored by himself and Price to which the reply is that yes, and he has read it twice. The issue is that Ehrman views the mythmaking of the mythicists as being below his scholarship and explains that he would have to write an even lengthier book as a reply to which Zindler and Price would write an even more verbose on in return and on it would go and Ehrman since has no time for it between teaching and doing actual scholarship.

Well, to the issue about which Ehrman wrote above, Price blamed “one of your own grad assistants” and Price assumes that it is true that Ehrman himself does not read them due to how he is “grossly misrepresenting…you fail to grasp what I am saying” but assures us that this is not due to “lack of clarity on my part,” etc.

Mythicism “has no ancient precedents”

Now, as aforementioned, I have often rhetorically wondered why no one doubted Jesus’ existence until a full two millennia after His time.

Well, Robert Price has taken up this issue and claims that it is inaccurate.

During his debate with Bart Ehrman, he referred to just that, the claim that, as Ehrman has written, “the idea that Jesus did not exist is a modern notion. It has no ancient precedents” and that “Even the enemies of the Jesus movement thought that Jesus had existed. Among their many slurs against the religion his non-existence is never one of them.” He stated:

I’m not so sure of that. Justin Martyr ascribes to his dialogue partner Trypho the allegation, “You have received a futile rumor and have created some sort of Christ for yourselves.” [Dialogue With Trypho]

Celsus, the second-century critic of Christianity, says, according to Origen, “It is clear to me that the writings of the Christians are a lie and that your fables are not well-enough constructed to conceal this monstrous fiction” [Contra Celsus].

He then appeals to 2 Peter 1:16 as being a reply to such claims, “we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we told you of the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Of course, this could just as easily be a case of “I’m not making this up” which one would say just in case it would be taken that way: as a preemptive statement.

In fact, the text merely simply and only stated, “we did not follow cleverly devised myths” but Price goes on to puff up his non-case by paraphrasing it as:

Now that’s interesting, some are alleging that “we,” ostensibly Simon-Peter, as the letter starts, and his colleagues were devising myths about the coming of Jesus. That sounds to me like an accusation that Christians had fabricated the whole business. Now, of course, that doesn’t mean that’s what happened, but I’m just saying that was an ancient view.

It appears that Price was self-servingly selective in his quotation from the Dialogue With Trypho—which would be no trifling matter. That was from chap. VIII yet, in XXXII, Martyr writes:

Trypho said, “These and such like Scriptures, sir, compel us to wait for Him who, as Son of man, receives from the Ancient of days the everlasting kingdom. But this so-called Christ of yours was dishonourable and inglorious, so much so that the last curse contained in the law of God fell on him, for he was crucified.”

And this is where we get into difficulties because one could say that Trypho was thereby affirming his knowledge that the historical Jesus was crucified or was reiterating that which Christians claim about him as a part of that which they “have created” for themselves.

However, there is another level of this which is whether he accepts that a “Jesus” existed but thinks that myth has been wrapped around Him. In that case, we would be dealing side one of the historical Jesus research which is the claim of embellishments.

Trypho’s context seems to place him in the latter view, however, further details conclude that he does not deny Jesus existed but is asking for evidence that Jesus is who He is claimed to be as they discuss prophecies. Trypho states:

Let these things be so as you say—namely, that it was foretold Christ would suffer, and be called a stone; and after His first appearance, in which it had been announced He would suffer, would come in glory, and be Judge finally of all, and eternal King and Priest. Now show if this man be He of whom these prophecies were made. (XXXVI)

Trypho has come to the discussion with a background functioning under the auspices of Jewish authorities who obviously had their own views about Jesus. He stated that it is good “if we obeyed our teachers, who laid down a law that we should have no…communication with you on these questions.” In fact, chap. XXXVIII, whence comes this statement, has been titled, “It is an annoyance to the Jew that Christ is said to be adored” and that “Justin confirms it, however, from Ps. XlV” by the way.

Clearly then, as noted above, Trypho’s concern is not that Jesus never existed but that He is merely the “so-called Christ.” This was his premise in fact in that he is debating whether the Messiah/the Christ has come and not if Jesus existed but only if Jesus is the Messiah/Christ. I am unsure which translation Price was consulting but the Roberts- Donaldson version to which I have access has the section quoted by Price as follows, “Christ—if He has indeed been born” as in if the Messiah has come “and exists anywhere—is unknown, and does not even know Himself, and has no power until Elias come to anoint Him, and make Him manifest to all” which is speaking from a Rabbinic Jewish tradition “And you, having accepted a groundless report, invent a Christ for yourselves, and for his sake are inconsiderately perishing” again, this is not about inventing a Jesus but a Christ: claiming that Jesus is the Messiah.

Price is perfectly aware that mine is a standard reply—as it is in keeping with Trypho’s historical, cultural and grammatical context—but he sidesteps these facts by stating that “It seems less contrived to take Trypho as charging that the Christian savior was a figment of pious imagination” which is a lot more contrived and he does not argue to that as a conclusion but merely asserts it and moves on.

Now, what of the Greek philosopher Celsus? The first issue to note is that Price is placing the statement into the historical Jesus context so that “It is clear to me that the writings of the Christians are a lie and that your fables are not well-enough constructed to conceal this monstrous fiction” is about Jesus’ existence.

However, Celsus’ premise was not Jesus’ existence but was claims of Biblical contradiction, inconsistency, etc. For example, he claims that “some of your interpreters...are on to the inconsistencies and, pen in hand, alter the originals writings…to deny the contradictions.”

In Chap. XLI Origen then states about Celsus:

He then goes on to rail against us after the manner of old wives. “You,” says he, “mock and revile the statues of our gods; but if you had reviled Bacchus or Hercules in person, you would not perhaps have done so with impunity. But those who crucified your God when present among men, suffered nothing for it, either at the time or during the whole of their lives. And what new thing has there happened since then to make us believe that he was not an impostor, but the Son of God? And forsooth, he who sent his Son with certain instructions for mankind, allowed him to be thus cruelly treated, and his instructions to perish with him, without ever during all this long time showing the slightest concern. What father was ever so inhuman?”

He does not deny that Jesus existed but that He was an impostor. Also, note that he affirms that Jesus was crucified and provides a window into early Christianity as he is aware that they consider Jesus to be the Son of God and in fact, he is juxtaposing mocking and reviling the statues of “our gods” to doing the same to Jesus so he is recognizing that Christians view Jesus as God.

Celsus also states:

Let us imagine what a Jew—let alone a philosopher—might say to Jesus: “Is it not true, good sir, that you fabricated the story of your birth from a virgin…”

Thus, again, the issue is not Jesus’ existence but the claim that certain details of his bio were invented.

Celsus also noted “I could continue along these lines, suggesting a good deal about the affairs of Jesus’ life that does not appear in your own records” which implies that Jesus existed but again, his context is the Bible’s contents and Christian’s handling of it as Celsus continues by noting “the disciples tell are two very different stories,” etc.

Celsus also refers to “men who fabricated this geneaology” not that He existed as his issue was that they fabricated it so as to prove that “Jesus was descended from the first man and from the king of the Jews” but Celsus also knows of Joseph and Mary “The poor carpenter’s wife” and merely guesses that such could not be so since Mary, or so Celsus subjectively imagines, “seems not to have known she had such a distinguished bunch of ancestors.”

Origen notes:

Celsus has introduced the Jew disputing with Jesus, and tearing in pieces, as he imagines, the fiction of His birth from a virgin, comparing the Greek fables about Danae, and Melanippe, and Auge, and Antiope, our answer is, that such language becomes a buffoon, and not one who is writing in a serious tone. (Chap. XXXVII)

Jesus mythicism does not have two millennia old pedigree, but it appears that the buffoonery of those not writing in a serious tone does—Justin Martyr 100-165 AD and Origen 184-253 AD.

Overall, we have claims that Trypho and Celsus, note that we are supposed to just believe that they existed, are infallibly accurate.

In short, if we grant Trypho and Celsus then what we have is a fringe claim that is about as fringe as anything has ever been since the most qualified mythicists alive today can provide us with no more than two examples of a claim to a Jesus fable within a wide girth time span of close to two millennia.

Yet, one thing should be made clear at this point and that is that Price was not actually claiming that Trypho and Celsus were even denying Jesus’ existence, were not necessarily promulgating Jesus mythicism, etc.

Recall that this was all in reply to Ehrman’s statement, “the idea that Jesus did not exist is a modern notion. It has no ancient precedents…Even the enemies of the Jesus movement thought that Jesus had existed. Among their many slurs against the religion his non-existence is never one of them.” Price began his reply by stating, “I’m not so sure of that” and not, “Ehrman is incorrect, here is the proof.”

I thought to help Price out and offer a few more such claims beyond Trypho and Celsus.

Justin Martyr

From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. I, section The First Apology of Justin, Chap. XXI, Analogies to the History of Christ:

And when we say also that the Word, who is the first-birth of God, was produced without sexual union, and that He, Jesus Christ, our Teacher, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, we propound nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter [Zeus, in Greek mythology].

For you know how many sons your esteemed writers ascribed to Jupiter: Mercury, the interpreting word and teacher of all; Æsculapius, who, though he was a great physician, was struck by a thunderbolt, and so ascended to heaven; and Bacchus too, after he had been torn limb from limb; and Hercules, when he had committed himself to the flames to escape his toils; and the sons of Leda, and Dioscuri; and Perseus, son of Danae; and Bellerophon, who, though sprung from mortals, rose to heaven on the horse Pegasus.

For what shall I say of Ariadne, and those who, like her, have been declared to be set among the stars? And what of the emperors who die among yourselves, whom you deem worthy of deification, and in whose behalf you produce some one who swears he has seen the burning Cæsar rise to heaven from the funeral pyre?

And what kind of deeds are recorded of each of these reputed sons of Jupiter, it is  needless to tell to those who already know. This only shall be said, that they are written for the advantage and encouragement of youthful scholars; for all reckon it an honourable thing to imitate the gods. But far be such a thought concerning the gods from every well-conditioned soul, as to believe that Jupiter himself, the governor and  creator of all things, was both a parricide and the son of a parricide, and that being overcome by the love of base and shameful pleasures, he came in to Ganymede and those many women whom he had violated and that his sons did like actions.

But, as we said above, wicked devils perpetrated these things. And we have learned that those only are deified who have lived near to God in holiness and virtue; and we believe that those who live wickedly and do not repent are punished in everlasting fire.

It would also appear that they are written for the advantage and encouragement of youthful pop-researcher bloggers.

I wonder if Muhammad mythicists will argue that the myth about “Bellerophon, who…rose to heaven on the horse Pegasus” was appropriated by Muslims and added to the Muhammad myth in the form of the tale about him flying from Mecca to Jerusalem, his night journey, upon the winged horse Al-Buraq.

Justin was writing during the time of Roman persecution of Christianity (circa 150 AD) and is thus appealing for what we term tolerance or diversity. In short, he is asking why Rome will allow Greek mythologies—and the unethical lifestyles which result therefrom—but not Christian accounts of Jesus—and the ethical lifestyles which result therefrom.

He is not dealing with Jesus’ existence or Pagan copycat mythicism. However, he may be able to be appealed to within that context. Yet, he is likening certain parallels and the only reason to think that Jesus must have lived a life  that is 100% different from anyone else prior to His birth is because mythicists will claim that any similarity is a case of copycatting—was Jesus having been “born of a woman” (Galatians 4:4) copied from well, every single previous person who was likewise born?

The claim is not that there is nothing about Jesus, His life, His actions or His sayings which is similar to previous biographies, legends or myths. The issue is that the claim of borrowing or copycatting is quite slippery since anyone can simply assert borrowing or copying and leave it at that.

In fact, I will end this section by asserting a claim of copycat borrowing of my own so as to demonstrate how simple it is to assert and run.

Now, that “they are written for the advantage and encouragement of youthful scholars” seems to refer to that such tales of Pagan gods were basically a form of pornography and encouraged such lifestyles.

A juxtaposition is presented with Jesus having been “produced without sexual union” and this being “nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter” and not to Jupiter himself, by the way. Yet, how could this be since he goes on to tell us that “Jupiter himself” was “overcome by the love of base and shameful pleasures, he came in to Ganymede and those many women whom he had violated and that his sons did like actions”? Thus, his sons were not virgin born.

So there must be other concepts that Christians copied. That Mercury was “the interpreting word and teacher of all” seems far too generic to claim borrowing.

That Æsculapius aka Asclepius “was struck by a thunderbolt, and so ascended to heaven” but this is not like Jesus ascension as this merely means that he Æsculapius died. In some versions of the myth Zeus, who murdered him via the thunderbolt, put his body among the stars so he is basically orbiting around the Milky Way and so this “heaven” is the sky, the universe, and not the heaven to which Jesus ascended.

Bacchus “had been torn limb from limb” but Jesus was not.

Hercules “committed himself to the flames to escape his toils” but Jesus committed Himself to crucifixion in order to accomplish his toils, “it is finished” (John 19:30).

There appears nothing to see here with regards to “the sons of Leda, and Dioscuri; and Perseus, son of Danae; and Bellerophon” except what Muhammad mythicists might make of it.

Ariadne, et al., “have been declared to be set among the stars?” of which the Bible knows nothing.

As for the “some one who swears he has seen the burning Cæsar rise to heaven from the funeral pyre?” this does not specify resurrection.

So, did or did not Christians “propound nothing different from what you believe”? Well, yes on a surface level but no in specifics. This is how what we are told to be “virgin births” turn out to not be virginous, what are resurrections are not, etc. The claim and term used to secondhand describe the events some alike but they are not.

In Chap. XXIII, The Argument, Justin writes:

And that this may now become evident to you—(firstly) that whatever we assert in conformity with what has been taught us by Christ, and by the prophets who preceded Him, are alone true, and are older than all the writers who have existed; that we claim to be acknowledged, not because we say the same things as these writers said, but because we say true things: and (secondly) that Jesus Christ is the only proper Son who has been begotten by God, being His Word and first-begotten, and power; and, becoming man according to His will, He taught us these things for the conversion and restoration of the human race: and (thirdly) that before He became a man among men, some, influenced by the demons before mentioned, related beforehand, through the instrumentality of the poets, those circumstances as having really happened, which, having fictitiously devised, they narrated, in the same manner as they have caused to be fabricated the scandalous reports against us of infamous and impious actions, of which there is neither witness nor proof—we shall bring forward the following proof.

Side note: contextually, “the prophets who preceded Him…are older than all the writers who have existed” seems to be stating that Christianity is premised upon Jewish writers who predate Greek writers.

A footnote informs us “The Benedictine editor, Maranus, Otto, and Trollope, here note that Justin” is arguing that “Christian doctrines alone are true, and are to be received, not on account of their resemblance to the sentiments of poets and philosophers, but on their own account” and also that “the demons, having some knowledge of what He would accomplish, enabled the heathen poets and priest in some points to anticipate, though in a distorted form, the facts of the incarnation.”

Another aspect to keep in mind is that after the dispersal of humanity due to the Tower of Babel event various people groups would form different cultures and their previously commonly known history would eventually turn into myth and legend which would differ on this or that point but have much in common: for example, an original garden paradise, a fall, a worldwide flood, etc.

Julius Firmicus Maternus

Popularly referred to as Fermicus, he is known within mythicist circles due to having stated “the devil too has his Christs” out of frustration with encountering so many likenesses between Jesus and Pagan myths.

I thought to quote from Robert Fraser as he was a mythicist himself. In his book The Making of the Golden Bough: The Origins and Growth of an Argument, Chap. XII, The Flutes of Tammuz, he notes:

PERHAPS the most vivid extant account of the Resurrection Show comes from Julius Firmicus Matern us. This fourth-century convert is addressing the emperors Constantius and Constans, whom he wishes to take a firmer hand in suppressing the perfidious practices of the heathen. Do their majesties appreciate just what these pagans get up to in their perverse, clandestine way? Up and extirpate them! In their unthinking perversity they even travesty the Opening of the Tomb:

On a certain night they lay an idol to rest on a funeral bier, weeping over it with a dying fall. Once they have given full vent to their sorrow, they carry the bier out into the light. Then the priest rubs holy oil into the necks of each of the worshippers, and after performing this unction murmurs the words:

Be of good cheer, brother. The Lord is saved.

For us too tribulation is the portal to bliss!

Why do you incite these miserable human specimens to rejoicing? Why do you drive men into a state of ecstasy by such subterfuges? Why bewilder them with vain promises? The death of your God is self-evident; he betrays no sign of life. No divine augury has foreshadowed his resurrection, nor has he shown himself to the people after his death that they should so believe in him. He has given them no advance warning of his intervention, nor has he produced proof or witness that these things shall come to pass.

“Habet ergo diabolus christos suos”, continues Firmicus Maternus: “the devil too has his ointments [as in anointed]” or “the devil too has his Christs”.

The exact rite to which he is referring is uncertain, though it is probable that he is addressing himself to the cult of Attis, which by the fourth century had well and truly entrenched itself in the Western Empire, to the extent that uncomfortable parallels were for ever being drawn between it and the· newer but fast-growing cult of Christianity.

No wonder Firmicus Maternus is so concerned, so defensively dismissive. No wonder too that, when Frazer first sedulously applied himself to an extensive study of the Attis ceremonies in 1906, we find him excitedly writing thus of the new volume to George Macmillan:

The subject is the death and resurrection of these Eastern gods, and I show grounds for thinking that their ritual has influenced that of the Christian Easter ceremonies, as these are observed by the Catholic and Greek churches.

Well, Catholic and Greek churches can answer for themselves with regard to the particularities and peculiarities of their Easter ceremonies. Yet, out context is the mythicism context of Fraser’s statements.

To begin with, indeed, the historical context is the fourth century (circa 306 to 337 AD was when Maternus was active). Fraser affirms that “The exact rite to which he is referring is uncertain” but that it may pertain to the cult of Attis. Well, in order to claim that Christians copied the cult of Attis one would have to do better than that. You see, I could just as easily, and with more backing, assert that since this deals with the fourth century AD when that cult “had well and truly entrenched itself in the Western Empire” it had to have interacted with circa three centuries worth of Christianity and surely borrowed from Christianity.

Following from this claim is the pop-mythicist claim that, as Fraser approvingly quotes James George Frazer, author of the 1890 AD The Golden Bough off of which Fraser is playing, that myths of Eastern gods influenced Christianity based on his “grounds for thinking” of course. Well, perhaps in 1890 AD when ancient foreign texts were much more obscure and far from the common person’s hands one could weave tall tales such as we actually still hear about Attis: virgin born on December 25th, was crucified, died to save humanity, resurrected, communion-style bread was ritually consumed, etc., etc., etc.

Yet, subsequent fact checking proves that such claims were baseless (see James Patrick Holding’s article “Attis, Cybele, and Jesus“).133 It seems that Frazer read his anti- Christian presuppositions into myth (or simply invented neo-mythology of his own) just as Fraser uncritically promulgated his anti-Christian presuppositions—and, for that matter, along the same lines but within a different context Alexander Hislop read his anti-Catholic presuppositions into myth when writing the now long discredited The Two Babylons.

Digging Into Osiris

Overall, Bart Ehrman generally notes, “there is very thin evidence indeed for anything like a widespread pagan belief in a dying-rising god, on which Jesus was modeled.”134

Interestingly enough, he rhetorically asked, “What, for example, is the proof that Osiris was born on December 25.” Well, we would have to likewise ask “What, for example, is the proof that Attis was born on December 25” and, while we are at it, we would have to likewise ask “What, for example, is the proof that Mithra was born on December 25” since the same claim is made for them all, et al.

Even more interesting, main Zeitgeist propaganda film consultant Acharya S claimed just that about Osiris. When challenged on this she noted that since Osiris was correlated with the Sun and the Sun was born every day (“born again” is how she actually put it) then, of course, he was born on December 25 (as well as every other day of the year as well). Ironically, Acharya S passed away on December 25, 2015 AD.

Of course, even if there was any copycat instance, in this case, it would not be the New Testament copying myths since no such date for Jesus’ birth is given within the New Testament so it would merely be a church organization taking it upon themselves to copy.

Now, Richard Carrier claims, “Plutarch attests that Osiris was believed to have died and been returned to earth…and that he did indeed return to earth in his resurrected body.”135 Yet, Ehrman writes, “the myth of Osiris, he does not rise from the dead back to life here on earth.”

The text in question, upon I have already touched in a previous chapter, is Plutarch’s On Isis and Osiris, sec. 19 and to make a long myth short: Osiris was murdered by his brother Set, his corpse was placed within a chest/coffin the location of which was unknown. Isis, who was Osiris’ sister and lover, seeks it, Typhon finds it (note that later Greek myth refers to Set as Typhon), dismembered the corpse, “divided it into fourteen parts and scattered them” as Plutarch has it and about which he comments that this is why:

…there are many so called tombs of Osiris in Egypt; for Isis held a funeral for each part when she had found it. Others deny this and assert that she caused effigies of him to be made and these she distributed among the several cities, pretending that she was giving them his body, in order that he might receive divine honours in a greater number of cities, and also that, if Typhon should succeed in overpowering Horus, he might despair of ever finding the true tomb when so many were pointed out to him, all of them called the tomb of Osiris.

Thus far, there are various tombs containing various body parts or effigies with his body (sans one key portion, if you know the myth): yet, the point is that he is physically dead and physically buried.

Now, Ehrman notes:

Osiris’s body does not come back to life. Quite the contrary, it remains a corpse…It is true that Osiris “comes back” to earth to work with his son Horus…Literally, he came “from Hades.” But this is not a resurrection of his body. His body is still dead. He himself is down in Hades, and can come back up to make an appearance on earth on occasion.

This is not like Jesus coming back from the dead, in his body; it is like Samuel in the story of the Witch of Endor, where King Saul brings his shade back to the world of the living temporarily (1 Samuel 28). How do we know Osiris is not raised physically? His body is still a corpse, in a tomb.

In sect. 20, Plutarch continues by noting that Osiris’ “body is said to have been laid in many different places” as in physically buried. For example, it is claimed that the town Diochites “alone contains the true tomb” to the extent that “the prosperous and influential men among the Egyptians are mostly buried in Abydos, since it is the object of their ambition to be buried in the same ground with the body of Osiris.”

Also, “Memphis, however, they say, the Apis is kept, being the image of the soul of Osiris, whose body also lies there.” Thus, the claim was not that Osiris’ body stood up and walked away but was still physically buried.

Ehrman elucidates, “It is his soul that lives on, in the underworld. Not his body in this world.” In sec. 35, Plutarch writes:

…the tales regarding the Titans and the rites celebrated by night agree with the accounts of the dismemberment of Osiris and his revivification and regenesis ὁμολογεῖ δὲ καὶ τὰ Τιτανικὰ καὶ Νυκτέλια 5 τοῖς λεγομένοις Ὀσίριδος διασπασμοῖς καὶ ταῖς ἀναβιώσεσι καὶ παλιγγενεσίαις. Similar agreement is found too in the tales about their sepulchers. The Egyptians, as has already been stated, point out tombs of Osiris in many places, and the people of Delphi believe that the remains of Dionysus rest with them close beside the oracle.

And in sect. 54:

It is not, therefore, out of keeping that they have a legend that the soul of Osiris is everlasting and imperishable, but that his body Typhon oftentimes dismembers and causes to disappear, and that Isis wanders hither and yon in her search for it, and fits it together again; for that which really is and is perceptible and good is superior to destruction and change.

Since the Egyptians continued to affirm tombs of Osiris then revivification is not physical resurrection but the soul or spirit interacting with the world of the living, “the soul of Osiris is everlasting and imperishable” as opposed to “his body.”

Ehrman concludes, “there is no resurrection of the body of Osiris. And that is the standard view among experts in the field.”

Achilles Mythicism

Here is an example of how simple it is to assert copycat mythicism: in this case Old Testament Copycat.

The Greek myth of Achilles has his mother dipping him into the river Styx which makes him impervious to attacks. However, since she held him by the heel when she dipped him, his heel did not make contact with the waters and so was left vulnerable.

The Old Testament’s protoevangelium, the gospel’s prototype, in Genesis 3 states that in cursing the serpent God stated to it, “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.”

So, the woman’s seed will overall imperviously bruise, or crush, the serpent’s head and yet, the serpent will bruise, or strike, at the vulnerable heel.

Thus, there you have it: the Greeks copycat borrowed from the Old Testament—try to disprove it why don’t cha?

Luigi Cascioli vs.                Enrico Righi

In my book Pop-Atheist Bible Expositors I devoted a chapter to Dan Barker, the Atheist, and co-founder of the activist militant group the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

Within the context of this work, he wrote an article titled with a styled promise “Debunking the Historical Jesus.”136 It pertains to a news report of an Italian lawsuit whereby Luigi Cascioli sued a priest named Enrico Righi who claimed, “Jesus did indeed exist.” Cascioli stated that this was a case of “religious racism,” whatever that means, and “I was born against Christ and God. I’m doing it [filing the lawsuit] now because I should do it before I die”—by the way no, he did not sue an Imam for claiming that Muhammad existed.

The September 13, 2002 AD lawsuit specifies that Righi “had falsely sustained” within his very own “parish gazette” incidentally:

…that the historic figure of Jesus was the son of Joseph and Mary (two totally imaginary characters and therefore historically non existing); of having the same Jesus been born in the village of Bethlehm [sic.] and of having grown up in Nazareth.

It goes on to note that Cascioli asserts:

…the historicization of the figure of Jesus Christ, for the most part based on the figure of John of Gamala, son of Judas, downright descendant of the Asmoneian stock.

…the figure of Jesus has been fully constructed over a certain John of Gamala, son of Judas from Gamala, known as the Galilean, is irrefutably known by such a great number of proofs as to remove whatever doubts about the falsifications carried out by the compilers of the Gospels. It would suffice that concerning the transformation of the appellation Nazireo, as was usually called John of Gamala as inhabitant of Nazareth, to show in the most absolute manner the impersonation stated.

So the historical Jesus is really John of Gamala, son of Judas from Gamala and to think that the Babylonian Talmud aka Talmud Bavli claimed that the historical Jesus was the son of Pantera (which is taken to have been a soldier’s name). Seems that proof is required all around.

Yet, recall my juxtaposition of evidence vs. proof within the introduction to this book. Well, that comes directly into play since Barker comments, “refreshingly demands that Righi prove that Jesus existed.” Thus, the issue is just how do we “prove” that anyone from antiquity lived—an issue touched upon by Bart Ehrman above.

My verdict of the situation is that it was a publicity stunt (premised upon rebellion against God, of course) as the actual lawsuit names a book Cascioli had recently published. Thus, this seems to have been a way to get his name and book into the media.

Barker admits that Righi “trotted out many” of what Barker qualifies as “alleged evidences” and adds that such have been “long ago discounted.” As per the Associated Press, he “cited many known observers, including nonChristian  ones, who have written about the existence of Jesus, such as the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, considered by scholars to be the most important non-Christian source on Christ’s existence.”

Of the many trotted out evidences, Barker began by critiquing Josephus. I suppose that I never understood the controversy about the Jewish/Roman historian Flavius Josephus’ references to Jesus. I am certainly aware of the arguments back and forth but I find that Jesus’ existence deniers do not seem to take into consideration, or are simply unaware, of the fact that their arguments are outdated by over four decades (as of this writing in 2017 AD).

The text in question is Antiquities of the Jews 18:63 which commonly reads:

About this time lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was the achiever of extraordinary deeds and was a teacher of those who accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Messiah.

When he was indicted by the principal men among us and Pilate condemned him to be crucified, those who had come to love him originally did not cease to do so; for he appeared to them on the third day restored to life, as the prophets of the Deity had foretold these and countless other marvelous things about him, and the tribe of the Christians, so named after him, has not disappeared to this day.137

Firstly, some claim Christian manipulation of the text due to the fact that a non-Christian Jew would not write of Jesus that, “He was the Messiah.” Yet, I never understood why this text is taken as Josephus (or Christians placing words in his mouth) expressing a personal belief in Jesus as being the Messiah. A historian records history.

What if I wrote the following?

It has been reported that on Sept. 11, 2001 AD some Muslims attacked America. They were what is known as Jihadists, they believed that they were fulfilling their god, Allah’s, will. They were heroic martyrs.

When they died they went to heaven and enjoyed the companionship of 72 virgins…

Would someone really, seriously, state,

Ken is a Messianic Jew who would never affirm that Muslim terrorists “were fulfilling Allah’s will” that “They were heroic martyrs” and certainly not that “When they died they went to heaven and enjoyed the companionship of 72 virgins”; someone must have corrupted his text later on.

If anyone posed such an argument the response would simply be, “He was not affirming his belief in those positions but was merely recording that which the Jihadists believe.” This is how I read Josephus. He is recording that which was being claimed about Jesus, as a historian.

And what was being claimed? That Jesus existed, was wise, performed extraordinary deeds, was a teacher, won over many Jews and Greeks, was the Messiah, was opposed by the principal men among us, was condemned by Pilate, was crucified, was still loved, appeared on the third day which was prophesied and that Christians still remain.

Now, set the above argument aside if you please because there is evidence to come.

Paul L. Maier—the Russell H. Seibert Professor of Ancient History, Western Michigan University—argues that since Josephus, Tacitus (Annals 15:44), Suetonius (Claudius 25), and Pliny the Younger (Letter to Trajan) reference Jesus this serves to “prove conclusively that any denial of Jesus’ historicity is maundering sensationalism by the uninformed and/or the dishonest. Because the above references to Jesus are embarrassing to such, they have been attacked for centuries, especially the two Josephus instances.”138

Maier, who debated Barker (and stated that as a historian he did not even prep for that debate) notes that in 1972 AD:

Professor Schlomo Pines of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem announced his discovery of a different manuscript tradition of Josephus’s writings in the tenth-century Melkite historian Agapius, which reads as follows at Antiquities 18:63:

At this time there was a wise man called Jesus, and his conduct was good, and he was known to be virtuous. Many people among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. But those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive. Accordingly, he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophets have reported wonders. And the tribe of the Christians, so named after him, has not disappeared to this day.

Here, clearly, is language that a Jew could have written without conversion to Christianity.139

Scholars fall into three basic camps regarding Antiquities 18:63:

1) The original passage is entirely authentic—a minority position;

2) it is entirely a Christian forgery – a much smaller minority position; and

3) it contains Christian interpolations in what was Josephus’s original, authentic material about Jesus—the large majority position today, particularly in view of the Agapian text (immediately above) which shows no signs of interpolation.

What does this version state about Jesus? That He existed, was wise, was of good conduct, was virtuous, had Jewish and Gentiles disciples, was condemned by Pilate to be crucified and die, discipleship of Him was not abandoned, it was reported that He appeared in three days; alive, was perhaps the Messiah, was prophesied, Christians remain. Before having studied this issue enough to become familiar with the Agapian text I had always taken statements such as “he appeared to them on the third day restored to life” to mean that the historian was telling us that “They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive.” This was vindicated by the 1972 find.

Likewise, I took “He was the Messiah” as meaning that this is what was thought of Him by His disciples, since the context is His disciples, or as the Agapian text has “he was perhaps the Messiah” which goes even further. Note also that in Antiquities 20:200 Josephus writes of “Jesus who was called the Christ.”

As an aside: there is no reason to restrict Josephus from considering that Jesus may have been the Messiah. Nor, in reality, is there reason to deny that a Jew would actually have believed Him to be the Messiah. After all, all early “Christians,” early believers in Jesus’ messiahship, were Jews; including the twelve Apostles and Jesus Himself. But I get it; there is no evidence of Josephus’ “conversion”—as if a Jew needs to “convert” in order to become a Christian/accept Jesus’ messiahship; see chapter A Jewish Book Called the New Testament in my book Is Jesus the Messiah? A Judaism vs. Judaism Debate.

A few other notes from Maier:

Josephus must have mentioned Jesus in authentic core material at 18:63 since this passage is present in all Greek manuscripts of Josephus, and the Agapian version accords well with his grammar and vocabulary elsewhere.

Moreover, Jesus is portrayed as a “wise man” [sophos aner], a phrase not used by Christians but employed by Josephus for such personalities as David and Solomon in the Hebrew Bible.

Furthermore, his claim that Jesus won over “many of the Greeks” is not substantiated in the New Testament, and thus hardly a Christian interpolation but rather something that Josephus would have noted in his own day.

Finally, the fact that the second reference to Jesus at Antiquities 20:200, which follows, merely calls him the Christos [Messiah] without further explanation suggests that a previous, fuller identification had already taken place. Had Jesus appeared for the first time at the later point in Josephus’s record, he would most probably have introduced a phrase like “…brother of a certain Jesus, who was called the Christ.”

Maier goes on to discuss the Antiquities 20:200 passage and concludes:

Had there been Christian interpolation here, more material on James and Jesus would doubtless have been presented than this brief, passing notice. James would likely have been wreathed in laudatory language and styled, “the brother of the Lord,” as the New Testament defines him, rather than “the brother of Jesus”…

For Josephus to further define Jesus as the one “who was called the Christos” was both credible and even necessary in view of the twenty other Jesuses he cites in his works…The preponderance of evidence, then, strongly suggests that Josephus did indeed mention Jesus in both passages.

The point about “the twenty other Jesuses he cites in his works” is interesting in the light of The Lost Tomb of Jesus.

Thus, overall there is strong evidence and arguments that support Josephus’ two references to Jesus.

Interestingly, Barker argues, both, that “Everyone agrees there was no ‘tribe of Christians’ during the time of Josephus—Christianity did not get off the ground until the second century” and also that “If Jesus were truly important to history, then Josephus should have told us something about him.” So, granting Barker’s first point would mean that Josephus, who lived 37-100 AD would have had no reason to bother with a minor Jewish preachers which would make his second point irrelevant.

Barker notes that “Righi also cited Pliny the Younger, who, in the early second century (112), reported that ‘Christians were singing a hymn to Christ as to a god’” and comments, “Notice how late this reference is” yet, this appears at slot number 57 in my two centuries worth of citations to Jesus (see the appendix below).

Recall that as per Barker “Christianity did not get off the ground until the second century” and yet, he considers a “second century (112)” citation as being too late. It seems that this citation (which is actually about Christians and which mentions Jesus) is so evidential that Barker seems rather desperate to pick on it—nitpick, that is. He writes, “notice the absence of the name ‘Jesus.’ The passage, if accurate, could have referred to any of the other self- proclaimed ‘Christs’ (messiahs) followed by Jews who thought they had found their anointed one.”

Yet, the passage does not state “Generically, some Jews were singing a hymn to Christ as to a god” but specifically states that it was “Christians” who “were singing a hymn to Christ as to a god” (something, incidentally yet essentially, which Jews generally would not have done).

Barker’s desperation hits a high point when he demands “Pliny’s account is not history” which is an unjustifiable assertion: 1) it is history, 2) it is history about what Christians believed and did at the time, 3) although it is not a biography of Jesus—which according to Pliny’s context cannot be demanded of him. Barker further discredits himself by stating that continuing to elucidate that “Pliny’s account is not history…since he is only relaying what other people believed. No one doubts that Christianity was in existence by this time.”

Here is Pliny’s context which is from a letter he wrote to Pliny to Emperor Trajan which he wrote in order to ask regarding “matters concerning which I am in doubt” since “I have never participated in trials of Christians. I therefore do not know what offenses it is the practice to punish or investigate, and to what extent”:

…in the case of those who were denounced to me as Christians, I have observed the following procedure: I interrogated these as to whether they were Christians; those who confessed I interrogated a second and a third time, threatening them with punishment; those who persisted I ordered executed. For I had no doubt that, whatever the nature of their creed, stubbornness and inflexible obstinacy surely deserve to be punished.

There were others possessed of the same folly; but because they were Roman citizens, I signed an order for them to be transferred to Rome.

Soon accusations spread, as usually happens, because of the proceedings going on, and several incidents occurred. An anonymous document was published containing the names of many persons. Those who denied that they were or had been Christians, when they invoked the gods in words dictated by me, offered prayer with incense and wine to your image, which I had ordered to be brought for this purpose together with statues of the gods, and moreover cursed Christ—none of which those who are really Christians, it is said, can be forced to do—these I thought should be discharged.

Others named by the informer declared that they were Christians, but then denied it, asserting that they had been but had ceased to be, some three years before, others many years, some as much as twenty-five years.

They all worshipped your image and the statues of the gods, and cursed Christ.

They asserted, however, that the sum and substance of their fault or error had been that they were accustomed to meet on a fixed  day before dawn and sing responsively a hymn to Christ as to a god, and to bind themselves by oath, not to some crime, but not to commit fraud, theft, or adultery, not falsify their trust, nor to refuse to return a trust when called upon to do so. When this was over, it was their custom to depart and to assemble again to partake of food—but ordinary and innocent food.

Even this, they affirmed, they had ceased to do after my edict by which, in accordance with your instructions, I had forbidden political associations. Accordingly, I judged it all the more necessary to find out what the truth was by torturing two female slaves who were called deaconesses. But I discovered nothing else but depraved, excessive superstition…

Thus, this was a litigious issue and only tells us that, at least by 112 AD Christians were seen as worshipping Jesus as “a god.”

Barker then notes that Tacitus (note that much of Tacitus’ writing have been lost) as “another second-century Roman writer…Written some time after 117 C.E., Tacitus’ claim is more of the same late, second-hand ‘history” and yet, this falls right within when it should have been written as per Barker’s timeline of Christianity.

Tacitus is slot number 58 on my list, he refers to “the sect known as Christians” and controversy surrounds his

statement that “their founder, one Christus.” Whoever this “Christus” founded the group called “Christians” so that contextualizes the identification for us.140

James Rives who Bart Ehrman describes as “one of the prominent scholars of the Roman world…one of the best known experts on Roman religion (and other things Roman) internationally” noted the following when Ehrman asked him “I’m wondering if there is any dispute, today, over the passage in Annals 15 where he mentions Jesus (whether there is any dispute over its authenticity)”:

I’ve never come across any dispute about the authenticity of Ann. 15.44; as far as I’m aware, it’s always been accepted as genuine, although of course there are plenty of disputes over Tacitus’ precise meaning, the source of his information, and the nature of the historical events that lie behind it. There are some minor textual issues (the spelling “Chrestianos” vs. “Christianos”, e.g.), but there’s not much to be done with them since we here, as everywhere in Tacitus’ major works, effectively depend on a single manuscript.141

Again, that we have over 25,000 New Testament manuscripts (in various languages: see the end of Appendix: Comparison of New Testament vs. Other Ancient Documents) and we are supposed to doubt their accuracy because of “a single manuscript.” Only in mythicism world could an army of one beat an army of 25,000. Now, the one manuscript is for the section they were discussing: we have one manuscript for Annals 1-6 that was written in 850 AD and one manuscript for Annals 11-16 written between

1038-1055 AD. Now, for the New Testament, by golly, we better have autographa—manuscripts written by the original authors—that have been hermetically sealed for two millennia. Yet, Tacitus lived 56-120 AD to all we know of Annals comes to us from over seven centuries to circa one millennia after his time centuries. This denotes a substandard double standard.

Herbert W. Benario has produced works wherein he “summarizes other people’s work on Tacitus.” Rives notes the following of Charles Saumagne’s “Tacite et saint Paul,” Revue Historique 232 (1964 AD) 67-110, as according to Benario, Saumagne:

…claims that the Christians are not mentioned in 15.44, that there is an ancient interpolation, taken from book 6 of the Histories, which were written after the Annals, and that Sulpicius Severus was responsible for the transposition…

Saumagne does argue that this is an interpolation, but only from another of Tacitus’ works; 2) the whole thing sounds like a house of cards to me, since Histories Book 6 doesn’t exist and so can’t provide a firm foundation for an argument; 3) this is clearly a minority opinion…

Indeed, a minority of precisely one—just like Tacitus manuscripts.

Moreover:

Saumagne does think that the text has been interpolated, but also that the reference to Christ being killed under Pontius Pilate comes from a lost portion of Tacitus’ Histories. His argument seems very shaky…

Saumagne thinks that Tacitus knew about and referred to Jesus.

Finally:

Koestermann (an editor of Tacitus), argues that Tacitus made a mistake in associating the Chrestiani with Christ, but doesn’t say anything about the reference to Christ not having been written by Tacitus himself.

There may be scholars who’ve argued that the reference to Christ is a later interpolation into the text, but neither of these two did, and I certainly don’t know of any others.

Back to Barker, he notes, “most damning, the term ‘Christian’ was not even in use in the first century.” Richard Watson’s Watson’s Bible Dictionary notes, “They were denominated Christians, A. D. 42 or 43” (1832 AD ed., p. 233).

The New Testament employs the term “Christian” in Act 11:26 “the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch” and subsequently in Act 26:28 and 1 Peter 4:16.

Barker also enters the mythicism camp by noting “how the myth and legend of Jesus could easily have arisen without a historical founder.”

Barker also fails to consider genre by writing:

The earliest Christian writings, the letters of Paul, are silent about the man Jesus: Paul, who never met Jesus, fails to mention a single deed or saying of Jesus (except for the ritualistic Last Supper formula), and sometimes contradicts what Jesus supposedly said. To Paul, Jesus was a heavenly disembodied Christ figure, not a man of flesh and blood.

From my chapter on Raphael Lataster, we know that the celestial Jesus view—”heavenly disembodied Christ figure”—is simply fallacious.

The problem of genre is that that historical and cultural context is that Paul’s writings were to churches and he was mostly answering their questions, encouraging them, and dealing with their problems but was not writing biographies (to Christians who already knew what Jesus said, by the way) so Barker cannot simply demand that either Paul write that which Barker wanted him to write or else he “fails to mention…” this or that.

In reviewing Cascioli’s book, Price refers to “a mythical figure, one Jesus Christ” via which the Catholic church has been “bamboozling the faithful with a theological boogeyman who had never really existed.”142 Price writes, “one might hope that Mr. Cascioli’s suit does make it a bit further into the courts if only to prompt wider public discussion on the Christ-Myth theory, of which he propounds a new variation.” This is fascinating because it denotes the come-one-come-all nature of the mythicists very own myth-making: Cascioli invented his own theory well then, welcome to the club. In fact, Price himself has not followed upon on this “new variation”—at least not on his entire website.

Price notes that as is the case with “self-educated scholars” like Cascioli, they tend to “suffer from idiosyncrasies and blind spots, and especially, the inability to tell historical reconstruction from wild speculation.”

Price notes that “Cascioli spends many chapters getting a running start” commenting on “the theocratic, nationalistic imperialistic aims of Jews, for whom he seems to bear no love. For him, the Bible is something like The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, a mythic manifesto of nationalistic megalomania.”

As Cascioli attempts to chronicle some Jewish history, Price tells us, “Problems not only of interpretation but even of factual assertion begin to crop up even here” and “Cascioli tantalizes and frustrates with a whole series of assertions about the ancient Mystery Religions and their rather exact analogies to Christian Passion and resurrection mythologies. Was Marduk arrested, Mithras crucified on a pole? Had Mithras given his own Sermon on the Mount?

Cascioli offers not one bit of documentation for any of this” and such, by the way, is the bread and butter of mythicism and at least Price has enough moments of clarity to point out as much.

Price notes, “One may be forgiven for wondering if he is recycling hackneyed myths from previous pseudo-scholarly Christ-Myth polemicists…Cascioli indulges in sheer speculation” on certain issues which is another service of bread and butter.

One problem is that “For Cascioli, all Mystery Religions offered mythic Soters (saviors) who had preached a doctrine and then been persecuted and martyred for it, only to rise again” and we may have to switch to low-carb bread and I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.

To the main point, Price notes that the Essenes:

…fastened upon John of Gamala, son if Judas the Galilean/Gaulonite. Why? He was a revolutionist in good standing, and, unlike the rest, he had been a preacher, too. (Why not his father?

Wasn’t he, too, a rabbi?). To this hypothetical Jesus-like John, Cascioli ascribes various gospel sayings, sometimes with a twist of rewording. John-Jesus even did “miracles,” tricks learned from Indian fakirs, including apparent resurrections.

So Cascioli is going a good deal farther than he first seemed to do; he is contending that “Jesus” was actually a glorification of John of Gamala, not just a handy peg on which to hang the messianic halo. The name “John” survives in the tradition, applied instead to the Son of Zebedee, whose name was originally Lazarus, whom Jesus loved, therefore the Beloved Disciple (as many hold).

Via a series of speculative machinations Cascioli turns Jesus into, as Price puts it “a purely heavenly being!” as per is being popularized by the Latasterian sect of mythicism.

Along the way, Prince notes that “Cascioli says he is presenting ‘irrefutable evidence’ for all this, but I’d be satisfied with any evidence at all. Cascioli does not merely fill the space between bricks of evidence with the cement of speculation; he makes bricks without the straw of evidence at all” okay, B&B no longer refers to bed and breakfast but bread and butter.

Yet, there are greater problems:

The heart of the theory is the speculative part. The whole thing seems completely arbitrary. It is not that the resultant scenario is inherently silly or absurd. But what reason is there to think it happened?

He is essentially positing a cult of John of Gamala as a slain messiah destined to return in glory. That is nothing unparalleled, but why believe it happened in this case?

It is fascinating that Ehrman stated that “I don’t know anyone, of these scholars [the “‘serious’ historians”] “who doubts that Paul wrote Galatians…as a historian: there’s no doubt, Paul wrote Galatians.” Yet, years later, when he debated Price, he learned that Price, the “rare scholar among the mythicists” who Ehrman also notes, “actually has a Ph.D. in the relevant field of New Testament studies,”143 does deny that Paul wrote Galatians—as he did during their debate and about which Ehrman was incredulous.

Well, in turn, Price notes “Cascioli’s own inerrancy is again debunked when he gets to Marcion” is incredulous that “He imagines that Marcion himself penned the Book of Acts, an absolute impossibility.”

There are various other points about which Price notes, “doesn’t Cascioli know” this and “Interesting speculation, but that’s about it” that with some “Cascioli seems to think” the other with a bit of “He quotes what one would have to call ‘apocryphal apocryphal gospels’ I’ve never heard of” to spice things up “And there is more, and worse.”

Price closes by noting that “Cascioli offers a number or arresting ideas, conjectures, and new interpretations of familiar passages. The book is worth reading, certainly. But it is an interesting failure.”

Buddha and Jesus

This chapter begins a critique of Jesus mythicism of the Pagan copycat variety. Thus, we will consider claims that Jesus is a fictional character concocted from previous characters (historical, mythical or legendary). This section was mostly written for my use by Marcus McElhaney (author of the fascinating blog What Had Happen' Was…144) and includes some addendums by myself yet he, in turn, was playing off of J.P. Holding.

In considering supposed likenesses between Buddha and Jesus McElhaney notes:

Well, what about the Buddha and Jesus? How similar is Jesus to Buddha? Let’s examine this question in light of the following article which I will attempt to summarize: Was the story of Jesus stolen from Buddha? (Part 2).145 Some people who want to argue that Jesus is at best based on the same archetype as the Buddha or at worst a complete rip-off on Buddha like to use the following parallels. Let’s look at them one at time:

1. Buddha was born on December 25th of the virgin Maya, and his birth was attended by a “Star of Announcement,” wise men and angels singing heavenly songs.

Jesus was not born on 12/25. It’s pointless to make the comparison. Buddha’s mother was not a virgin because she was a married woman. Even if you grant her the status of conception without her husband’s involvement, she was not a virgin.

Addendum: The traditional claim is that Buddha’s mother dreamed of an elephant entering her side and that when she gave birth the Buddha exited her body from her side.

McElhaney continues:

1. At his birth, he was pronounced ruler of the world and presented with “costly jewels and precious substances.”

Buddha was not prophesied to be a king, as his father wanted, but a holy man.

Addendum: It is noteworthy that there are two stories about how and when Siddhartha Gautama (or Gotama) became a Buddha when he reached enlightenment.

One is that when he was born he took a few steps and spoke; basically announcing his knowledge of the whole cycle of reincarnation and that he was at the tail end.

The other is that this enlightenment did not occur until much later in life whilst meditating under a Bodhi tree.

McElhaney:

1. His life was threatened by a king “who was advised to destroy the child, as he was liable to overthrow him.”

The king that threatened Buddha’s life was his father and it was because he wanted a son to succeed him but it was predicted that Buddha would not follow that path.

2. Was of royal lineage.

Ok, so both Buddha and Jesus were of royal lineage.

Addendum: Even this is questionable since his father was more like a clan leader an elected chief of a tribal confederacy.

McElhaney:

1. Taught in the Temple at age 12.

There is no story of Buddha doing this at age 12.

2. Crushed a serpent’s head (as was traditionally said of Jesus) and was tempted by Mara, the “Evil One,” when fasting.

There is no record of Buddha or Jesus crushing a serpent’s head. The prophecy in Genesis of Jesus is symbolically foretelling Jesus’ triumph on the cross. There is no such record of Buddha. No parallel here either.

Addendum: It is traditionally claimed that Buddha died on a bed due to food poisoning or simply from old age-80 years.

McElhaney:

1. Was baptized in water, with the “Spirit of God” or “Holy Ghost” present.

There is nothing close recorded about Buddha. Nothing.

2. Performed miracles and wonders, healed the sick, fed 500 men from a “small basket of cakes,” and walked on water.

Jesus fed 5,000 men in addition to women and children. There is no record found of Buddha feeding 500 with a basket of cakes.

3. Abolished idolatry, was a “sower of the word,” and preached the “establishment of a kingdom of righteousness.”

Jesus did not have to deal with idolatry. The Jews had that lesson down pat. Don’t forget that Jesus and Buddha preached radically different views of what a kingdom of righteousness is and how a person gains access to it. Jesus taught that we have access to that kingdom through him. Buddha taught that we get there through personal enlightenment and successive reincarnated lives.

4. Followers were obliged to take vows of poverty and to renounce the world.

Nowhere does Jesus teach that you have to take a vow of poverty and retreat from the world in order to follow Him. He told one man in one particular situation at one particular time to sell all he had, give it to the poor, and follow Jesus. He never told anyone else and it was what that man needed. You can tell because that man, known as the rich young ruler, loved his possessions above all else.

5. Was transfigured on a mount, when it was said that his face “shone as the brightness of the sun and moon.”

I’ve got to quote this one verbatim because the only way you can get this out of Buddhist tradition is to define “transfiguration” so broadly that the term loses all meaning.

Transfiguration. In Buddhism, when an individual practitioner reaches a high degree of realization in his or her spiritual evolution, the transformation can manifest itself at the physical level, as well. We find such stories about the Buddha in the sutras.

They begin when Buddha’s disciples notice a physical change in his appearance. A radiance shines from his body. Then one of the disciples asks the Buddha, “I see these changes in you. Why are these changes taking place?” These parables are similar to the Gospel passages on the Transfiguration when Jesus’ face is suddenly glowing.

1. In some traditions, died on a cross. The Bible writers unanimously agree that Jesus died on a cross. Nowhere do we see that of Buddha.

2. Was resurrected, as his coverings were unrolled from his body and his tomb was opened by supernatural powers.

3. Ascended bodily to Nirvana or “heaven.”

There is no record of Buddha being resurrected. His body was cremated.

4. Was called Lord, Master, Light of the World, God of Gods, Father of the World, Almighty and All-knowing Ruler, Redeemer of All, Holy One, the Author of Happiness, Possessor of All, the Omnipotent, the Supreme Being, the Eternal One.

5. Was considered a Sin Bearer, Good Shepherd, the Carpenter, the Infinite and Everlasting, and the Alpha and Omega.

There is no Buddhist documents or tradition that supports Buddha atoning for anyone’s sins. Don’t forget the ideas of sinfulness and atonement are foreign to Buddhism.

6. Came to fulfill, not to destroy, the law.

No way you can equate Jesus and Buddha. No one would conclude that Buddha was pushing the Torah, would they? Let alone fulfilling it perfectly as Jesus did.

Addendum: In fact, Buddhism is, in a manner of speaking, a cult of Hinduism as the Buddha flatly rejected certain Hindu tenets.

McElhaney:

1. Is to return “in the latter days” to restore order and to judge the dead.

Christians believe that the same Jesus who walked the earth will physically return.

Buddhism teaches something really different.

Dr. Yu confirmed:

The Future Buddha called Maitreya (“The Friendly One”) will be born as a human in the future just as the Buddha some 2500 years ago and revive the religion and bring peace to the world.

As anyone can see there is no way to equate Buddha with Jesus. No way. They are too different. Too dissimilar and even disagree and conflict. They both can’t be right. Each of us must evaluate the evidence and decide which if either is true. I challenge everyone to do that. I’ve done that and the only logical conclusion is that Jesus is everything the Bible says He is!

Addendum: Note that while the Buddha’s lifespan in generally 563 BC to 483 BC Buddhist scripture, including records of his life, were not put into writing until about 400 years after his death.

How do we even know that such a personage ever lived? The pseudo-skeptic does not care since they will instantly accredit anything which they consider as a challenge to Christianity.

What is the time of the events of Buddha’s life until the time the event was recorded?

What is the time of the recording until the time of the earliest manuscript?

How many manuscripts are there? How do they compare?

The pseudo-skeptic does not care about these and many other relevant questions since they will instantly accredit anything which they consider as a challenge to Christianity.

Considering the timing of the writing of Buddhist scriptures one might as well claim that Buddhists modified the tales  of Buddha to match those of Jesus (even though similarities are slight to non-existing).

Lastly, Buddha was perhaps best described as an atheist while Jesus was, well, most certainly not.

As we have seen and already noted, the Christ Myth myth is one of those issues much like urban legends that keeps rearing its ugly head time and time again much like the Pagan Copycat claim which copycats keep on copying.

Every generation, or so, someone claims—with much media and pop-cultural fanfare—that there is no such thing as a historical Jesus but that the Christ myth was invented and borrowed from previous myths. Within such claims, similarities between Jesus and other personages are asserted. These are then discredited only to be popularized again in a few years.

Who knows why cyber debates/discussions end when they do and it is a good course of action to not, necessarily, declare yourself the winner simply because someone is no longer responding. Here is the text of a short debate/discussion between this myself and a cyber opponent (who will be referred to as “DG”) which developed after they posted a supposed saying of the Buddha in a favorable light:

Ken Ammi: Of course, how do we know that any such person as the Buddha ever lived?

DG: The same way we know JC [Jesus Christ] lived... faith. Lol

Ken Ammi: Not so my friend. I have chronicled 210 texts that reference Jesus from a pre-70 AD to 280 AD.

Buddhist scripture, including records of the Buddha’s life, were not put into writing until about 400 years after his death.

DG: You have just as many stories and sacred text about Santa Clause. There implies the faith thing. i.e. “take my word for it”.

Ken Ammi: First both are by “faith” (whatever that is).

Then one is known from [at least] 210 texts within two centuries and the other 0 texts within four.

Then they are both by “faith.” A reasonable conclusion is that one is known historically and the other is not.

There is no historical or sacred text backing Santa—except the history that traces the myth back to a real man who was known for his Christian charity. [Subsequently, I wrote an article titled Can you disprove Santa Clause? Atheism and “Santa Syndrome”146]

DG: No, Santa dates back to the ancient gods. Which pre-date Jesus and the hebrew religion.

DG followed immediately with another comment.

DG: Dang my bad.... Jesus dates back to those same gods as well, lol. Horus, Mythras etc.

Ken Ammi: Oh no, you have fallen for that talking point???

Those supposed likenesses have been discredited every time they are brought up. Look at the actual history and actual scholarship and you will see that there are not likenesses between Jesus and Horus, Mythras, etc.

DG: Power coming from the stem of his garment? Casting out demons into swine... there waaaaayyyyy more.

Ken Ammi: When did Horus and Mythra live?

How do you know? What did they do? How do you know? What did they say? How do you know?

What is the time of birth to the time of the first historical record of them?

Who wrote the record?

How many manuscripts are there? From when do the manuscripts date? How do the manuscripts compare?

Just to ask a few questions off of the top of my head.

And that was the end of that discussion.

Burning Cross and El Zorro (…aster, That Is)

No, not the fictional Spanish swashbuckler, El Zorro, but Zoroaster aka Zarathushtra.

In working on a disaccreditation of an argument made by the Arizona Atheist147, I noted one of his sources of information in the form of a website titled Burning Cross.

Therein, I ran across one of sadly very many likewise quite unscholarly articles claiming that since Judaism and Christianity borrowed from Zoroastrianism they are therefore to be relegated to the realm of mythology.

However, the true mythos is the supposed borrowing by Judaism and Christianity when the facts of the matter, those bothersome historical facts that get in the way of a good polemic, imply the reverse is the case.

Again, while likewise tall tales abound, I will respond to an article on the website by the title Burning Cross which is entitled Zoroastrianism and Its Origins. The article seeks to demonstrate that Zoroastrianism originated before Judaism and Christianity and is the source from which they both borrowed, as they state it,

From historical research, and the study of Jewish and Christian texts, scholars have firmly concluded that Judaism and Christianity borrowed heavily from the theological thought of the Persians or Zoroastrians.

One of my favorite things is noting statements which make reference to that which “scholars have…” stated. You could generically write, without those bothersome citations, “scholars have               ” and fill in the blank with anything at all.

This is tantamount to what some atheists like to write about scientists, “scientists say…” or the more impressive “most scientists say               .” Wow, I am impressed by the argument from authority before even hearing it. Note also that “most” can mean 99% and that is almost all of the generic “they/them” but “most” can also mean 51% and that is awfully close to half.

In any regard, let us consider the borrowing scenario as

Burning Cross states:

It is believed that Zoroaster, the founder of Zoroastrianism, was born in the area now know as Afghanistan, though some scholars place his birth as somewhere in the Kashmir Valley. The ancient Greeks, like Aristotle, date the era of Zoroaster as being 6,000 BCE.

Again, “some [generic and un-cited] scholars” say…

I actually do not mean to pick on these generic statements too much but have done so in order to show that the article was heavy on claim and lite on evidence.

For example, since they want to conclude that Judaism and Christianity borrowed from Zoroastrianism it is pointed out that Aristotle “date the era of Zoroaster as being 6,000 BCE.”

Let us ask that which pseudo-skeptics appear to never even bothering asking of anything but the Bible and its characters:

Who was the historical Aristotle?

How do we know that Aristotle even lived?

When did Aristotle live? How do we know?

What is the time of Aristotle’s various words and actions to the time they were recorded?

What is the time of the recording to the time of the first manuscripts we have?

How many manuscripts do we have and how do they compare? Perhaps Bart Ehrman will write a book titled “Misquoting Aristotle.”

It does not matter to the pseudo-skeptical Burning Cross who date Zoroaster to 6,000 before Christ because for all we know a mythological character called Aristotle said so and so it must be true. Take it back as far as you wish for  all I care. In fact, take it to 60,000 or 600,000 BC if you like. The further back Zoroaster is dated the more the pseudo-skeptics think that they can concoct ideas of Judaism and Christianity borrowing from him when in fact, as we shall see, the further back they date him the worse it is for them.

There actually is quite a bit of disparity amongst those seeking to date Zoroaster and it runs from 600 to 6,000 BC. Note that the Encyclopedia Britannica states:

A biographical account of Zoroaster is tenuous at best or speculative at the other extreme. The date of Zoroaster’s life cannot be ascertained with any degree of certainty. According to Zoroastrian tradition, he flourished “258 years before Alexander.”…indicating that his birthdate was 628 bc.

The Burning Cross does get to the point which point which is, you guessed it:

Who was the historical Zoroaster?

How do we know that Zoroaster even lived? When did Zoroaster live?

How do we know?

What is the time of Zoroaster’s various words and actions to the time they were recorded?

What is the time of the recording to the time of the first manuscripts we have?

How many manuscripts do we have and how do they compare? Perhaps Ehrman will write “Misquoting Zoroaster.”

No, they actually do not delve anywhere close to this depth of skepticism as they would surely argue that these questions are irrelevant. Why? Because even if Zoroaster is a completely mythological personage the point is to demonstrate that Zoroastrian theology predates Judaism and Christianity and thereby concoct a theory of borrowing.

The Burning Cross notes,

The main holy book of the Zoroasrians is the Zend Avesta, but only the portion known as the Gathas [hymns], is thought to have been actually written by Zoroaster.

This is actually a lot more telling than its passing reference within the article implies. Indeed, the only portion of the Zend Avesta which are attributed, even just attributed, to Zoroaster are the Gathas. Why is this important? Because they are what we may term “hymns”—as the Burning Cross rightly did. The point is that these, the supposed earliest and original source of Zoroaster’s theology, do not contain Zoroastrian theology but are hymnal in nature. That which Judaism and Christianity supposedly borrowed is not found therein.

Incidentally and for reinforcement; the Encyclopedia Britannica affirms that “Only the hymns, or Gathas, are attributable to Zoroaster. It also states, “The Avesta is in five parts. Its religious core is a collection of songs or hymns, the Gathas, thought to be in the main the very words of Zoroaster.”

Let us dig a little deeper as Burning Cross explains when, from where, and what was borrowed:

For centuries Zoroastrianism spread across Persia under the patronages of two very powerful Persian dynasties, the Achaemenids and the Sassanids.

During this time the cannon of twenty-one Zoroastrian holy texts were compiled called the Nasks.

It is from this cannon of Zoroastrian literature [compiled several millennia before the New Testament or the Old Testament were written] that Judaism and Christianity have received the main tenants of their religion, i.e. the concept of Monotheism, that of a Divine Father and a Divine Son, the idea of a Garden of Eden, the concept of the first created humans Adam and Eve, the Resurrection, the Day of Reckoning, Heaven, Hell, the Duality of Good and Evil [God and the Devil], the belief in a Messiah, the belief in Angels, etc.

Reference is made to the Achaemenids and the Sassanids without any dates.

The Nasks cannon is referenced without any dates but apparently, we are to infer contextually that it was compiled at the time of the undated Achaemenids and Sassanids dynasties.

Then we are told that “this cannon,” the Nasks, were compiled a generic “several millennia before the New Testament or the Old Testament.”

Let us consider the last telling portion of the Burning Cross article and then elucidate:

Some scholars are of the opinion that Judaism, and particularly Christianity, have borrowed stories and theology directly from the Vedas and Puranas, but it is more likely that they received these elements of religion through the Persians without any direct contact with India.

“Some scholars” this, other scholars that…

So, the cannon of Zoroastrian scripture was compiled at the Achaemenids and Sassanids dynasties. The Achaemenids date from 550-330 BC and Sassanids from, as the Encyclopedia Britannica states it, “The present Avesta was assembled from remnants and standardized under the Sasanian kings (3rd-7th century ad)” (emphasis added for emphasis).

Note the detail that the Avestas “assembled from remnants” and feel free to drag these remnants as far back as 550 BC if you wish but they were “standardized between the 3rd- 7th century ad which the Encyclopedia Britannica details as “Sasanian period (ad 224–651).”

Now, let us take the Burning Cross preferred date of 6,000 BC and conclude that we have anywhere from 6,224 to 6,651 years—over six millennia—between Zoroaster’s supposed words and a standardized cannon. See what I mean: let them go back as far as they wish as it only gets worse for them. Even if we go by the 600 BC date we get 824 to 1,251 years—and pseudo-skeptics have conniptions at the fact that the New Testament was written by 70 AD.

As for the Achaemenids (550-330 BC); note the statements of Ilya Gershevitch:

While the Avesta furnishes us with a wealth of diverse religious ideas most of which existed during the Achaemenian period, it lacks a historical contextualization. It is completely devoid of references to persons, institutions, or events of Achaemenian times…

The place names mentioned, apart from mythological geography, are all in Eastern Iran; it is as though Persia did not exist.

Accordingly, as the canonization of the scripture took place long after the Achaemenian period, the lack of references to identifiable Achaemenian realia makes the Avesta an elusive source for the religion of Achaemenians in general and Persia in particular.148

Furthermore, James R. Russell notes,

Zoroaster himself is not mentioned in

Achaemenian monuments, nor indeed is his name to be found in the inscriptions of the Sasanians, who were undoubtedly Zoroastrians.149

For reiteration let us note that Ernst Herzfeld wrote,

Our main source for details on Zoroaster is the Avesta, a collection of sacred texts which was put into writing between 346-360 AD.150

Recall that we must not only consider the time of the writing and the time of the compilation and standardization but the time of the actual manuscripts, even the earliest ones. John Waterhouse relates that the earliest manuscript copies that we have date to the 13th century AD.151

Thus, if dating Zoroaster to 6,000 we have circa 7,200- 8,200 years to the relevant manuscripts and if we date him to 600 we have circa 1,800-1,900 years—go back as far as you like, it only gets worse.

The Pahlavi Texts, Part IV (SBE37), E.W. West, tr. [1892 AD] states the following.

Contents of the Nasks as Stated in the Eighth and Ninth Books of the Dinkard – Observations,

The manuscripts used, being the only two independent authorities for the text of the Dinkard known to exist, are:…written A.D. 1659…written A.D. 1594 and later…

Details of the Nasks from Other Sources – Observations, The manuscripts mentioned are:

…written A.D. 1659…written A.D. 1679…written A.D. 1813…probably written A.D. 1572…written about A. n. 1780…about 150 years old. [this was written in 1892 AD]

Also, IV. From the Rivayat of Dastur Barzu Qiyamu-D- Din:

23. At present, since the Nasks have not remained perfect in the midst of us, it is not possible to solemnize them, because Alexander the Ruman [the Great] carried off a rough draft…and repeatedly burnt the books of the Avesta…every one of the high- priests, in council together, preserved something of the Avesta in his mind…which they wrote correctly; as to the remainder (tatammah) which they did not write, it was on this account, that they did not preserve it correctly in their minds.

And, From the Din-Vigirgard:

8. …the subdivisions of that Nask were fifty when the accursed Alexander had the Nasks burnt up, but after that, as they sought out this Nask, only thirteen of those subdivisions came to hand, and no more remained of those previously existing.

20. …Of all the twenty-one Nasks the Nask of ‘the law against the demons’ has alone remained entire; while several remain scattered by the wickedness (sumih) of the accursed Alexander

22. Now, alas! if all these Nasks do not remain, so that one is not able to solemnize them, that is for this reason, that the accursed Alexander, the Aruman, took several transcripts—in the Aruman language and characters (hurufo)—of any among

those twenty-one Nasks which were about the stars and medicine, and burnt up the other Nasks…

Jenny Rose further notes:

The incorporation of certain motifs into the Zoroastrian tradition in the ninth century CE [AD] could indicate the conscious attempt of the priesthood to exalt their prophet in the eyes of the faithful who may have been tempted to turn to other religions.152

Indeed, if there was any borrowing at all it was not by Judaism and Christianity from Zoroastrianism but by Zoroastrianism from Judaism and Christianity.

Also, note various statements made in the Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology:

…the Persians no doubt received from the Semites the notion of a last judgment and together with related ideas: prophets and world salvation prepared by a messiah. [p. 322]

Though preached by Zoroaster as one aspect of his system, this dualism only became implanted much later under the political pressure of the Sassanians who were eager to renew an ancient and indigenous tradition in opposition to Hellenistic influences. Until then it had been merely an opinion of one sect. [p. 312]

Lastly, consider statements by Jan Bremmer:

For the influence of Christianity in this period we probably also have another

example. According to several Zoroastrian writings, the Greeks under Alexander the Great had destroyed not only a precious Achaemenid Avesta codex but also the other religious books, which had been written in 12,000 ox-hides.

In fact, there is not a trace at all of these writings in the Achaemenid period, and the tradition seems to have been created in order to explain the absence of a Persian holy book in contrast to those of the Jews, Christians and Manichaeans. This lack of written religious tradition seems to have been first seriously felt precisely in the same period in which resurrection became an issue.153

Thus, Burning Cross presented a good polemic but by not bother to cite scholars and not bothering to discuss the diversity of the dates of Zoroaster’s life and, most importantly, not bothering to date the texts to which they made reference they failed to do anything except discredit themselves.

Appendix: Historical Jesus - Two Centuries Worth            of Citations

The question as to how many early ancient texts there are which refer to Jesus is often proposed. So, how many early references are there? No one knows.

The logical question is: how many have been found and or how many do we know about? In other words, we do not know how many references there are since we may discover more manuscripts of ancient works tomorrow and do not know how many undiscovered or destroyed writings there actually have been. This seems like an obvious consideration but it seems particularly important to note considering that Jerusalem, the nexus of Jesus’ activity, was destroyed in 70 AD.

James H. Charlesworth noted, “Jesus did exist; and we know more about him than about almost any Palestinian Jew before 70 C.E.”264 Ed Parish Sanders wrote, “We know a lot about Jesus, vastly more than about John the Baptist, Theudas, Judas the Galilean, or any of the other figures whose names we have from approximately the same date and place.”265 A. E. Harvey, commenting particularly on the crucifixion, “It would be no exaggeration to say that  this event is better attested, and supported by a more impressive array of evidence, than any other event of comparable importance of which we have knowledge from the ancient world.”266

How much do we know about anyone who lived 2,000 years ago or 1,000 or less even? Consider Tiberius Caesar. He was the Roman Emperor from 14-37 AD. How many non-Christian references do we know of which mention him within 150 years of his life? Nine.

Let us consider from whence our knowledge of Alexander the Great comes. Alexander lived 356-323 BC and we only know about him from two sources written circa one century after his death. Most of what we claim to know about him dates to 300 to 500 years after his death.

Below I will present a list of the names of texts and range of dates that they were written. This is not a complete list. I am calling upon the assistance of anyone who may read this and is aware of any that I may have missed, please do inform me of any that you note.

The list below attempts to cover references to “Jesus,” “Christ,” “Jesus Christ,” or references to Jesus Christ which are obvious within the context by titles such as “Lord,” “Savior,” or “Son,” or “Son of God,” etc.

The list will cover a period spanning from pre 70 AD to 200-250 AD (this stopping point is arbitrary). Note also that the list totals 210 texts. This number refers to the texts themselves and not to the number of times that Jesus is referenced in each text. Counting each reference would take us well beyond the 210 total. Furthermore, the number refers to the texts and not to each manuscript behind each text. Counting each manuscript would also take us well beyond the 210 total.

1. The Gospel of Matthew

2. The Gospel of Mark

3. The Gospel of Luke

4. The Gospel of John

5. The Book of Acts

6. Romans

7. 1 Corinthians

8. 2 Corinthians

9. Galatians

10. Ephesians

11. Philippians

12. Colossians

13. 1 Thessalonians

14. 2 Thessalonians

15. 1 Timothy

16. 2 Timothy

17. Titus

18. Philemon

19. Hebrews

20. James

21. 1 Peter

22. 2 Peter

23. 1 John

24. 2 John

25. 3rd John

26. Jude

27. Book of Revelation

These texts make up the body of the New Testament. These were all written prior to 70 AD with the possible exception of Revelation which is dated to circa 95 AD. These represent the very best attested documents of antiquity.

Any other documents would represent vastly inferior works.

50-75 AD : Thallus (works preserved by others, such as Julius Africanus who wrote about 221 AD)

50-120 AD : The Didache

50-140 AD : Papyrus Oxyrhnchus #1224

50-140 AD : The Gospel of Thomas

50-200 AD : The Sophia of Jesus Christ

70-120 AD : Papyrus Egerton #2

70-160 AD : The Gospel of Peter

70-200 AD : Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs

70-200 AD : Fayyum Fragment

70-255 AD : Letter of Clement of Alexandria on Secret Mark

73-200 AD : Mara bar Serapion (referred to the Jews’ wise King)

75-160 AD : Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus (in the section of his writing on Emperor Claudius who ruled 41-54 AD)

80 AD : Phlegon (preserved by Origen and Julius Africanus)

80-120 AD : The Epistle of Barnabas

80-140 AD : The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians

80-150 AD : The Gospel of the Hebrews

80-150 or 130-150 AD : The Gospel of the Egyptians

90-95 AD : Flavius Josephus

100-150 AD : The Preaching of Peter

100-150 AD : The Apocryphon of James

100-150 AD : The Apocalypse of Peter - The Ethiopic Text

100-150 AD : The Gospel of Thaddaeus

100-160 AD : The Gospel of the Ebionites

100-160 AD : The Gospel of the Nazoreans

110 AD : Ignatius to Polycarp

110-140 AD : The Epistle Of Polycarp

110-140 AD : Fragments Of Papias From The Exposition Of The Oracles Of The Lord

110-160 AD : Papyrus Oxyrhynchus #840

110-160 AD : The Traditions of Matthias

112 AD : Pliny the Younger (Plinius Secundus) “Epistles 10.96”

115 AD : Cornelius Tacitus (in his “Histories” (preserved by Sulpicus Severus) and “Annals”.

120-130 AD : Quadratus, Bishop of Athens

120-130 AD : The Apology Of Aristides

120-140 AD : The Naassene Psalm

120-160 AD : Valentinus - Myth according to Irenaeus

120-160 AD : Valentinus - The Divine Word Present in the Infant

120-160 AD : Valentinus - Fragment A

120-160 AD : Valentinus - Fragment B

120-160 AD : Valentinus - Fragment E

120-160 AD : Valentinus - Jesus’ Digestive System: Epistle to Agathapous

120-180 AD : The Apocryphon of John (aka The Secret Book of John or The Secret Revelation of John)

120-180 AD : Gospel of Mary aka The Gospel According to Mary Magdalene

120-180 AD : The Dialogue of the Savior

120-180 AD : The (Second) Apocalypse of James

120-180 AD : Trimorphic Protennoia

130-140 AD : Marcion - The Gospel of the Lord

130-140 AD : Marcion - Antitheses

130-140 AD : The Gospel of Marcion, Section I

130-140 AD : The Gospel of Marcion, Section II

130-140 AD : The Gospel of Marcion, Section III

130-140 AD : The Gospel of Marcion, Section IV

130-140 AD : The Gospel of Marcion, Section V

130-140 AD : The Gospel of Marcion, Section VI

130-160 AD : Second Clement

130-170 AD : The Gospel of Judas

130-200 AD : The Epistle To Diognetus

140-150 AD : The Epistula Apostolorum

140-160 AD : Clement’s Quotations of Isidore

140-160 AD : Ptolemy’s Commentary On The Gospel of John Prologue

140-170 AD : Infancy Gospel of Thomas

140-170 AD : Infancy Gospel of James

140-180 AD : The Gospel of Truth

150-160 AD : The Martyrdom Of Saint Polycarp, Bishop Of Smyrna

150-160 AD : Justin Martyr - Fragments Of The Lost Work Of Justin On The Resurrection

150-160 AD : Justin Martyr - Justin’s Hortatory Address To The Greeks

150-160 AD : Justin Martyr - Dialogue With Trypho

150-160 AD : Justin Martyr - The Second Apology Of Justin For The Christians - Addressed To The Roman Senate

150-160 AD : Justin Martyr - The First Apology Of Justin

150-180 AD : Fragments of Heracleon

150-180 AD : Excerpts of Theodotus

150-200 AD : Acts of Andrew

150-200 AD : Acts of Paul

150-200 AD : Acts of John

150-200 AD : Acts of Peter

150-200 AD : The Ascension of Isaiah

150-225 AD : The Book of Thomas the Contender

150-225 AD : Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles

150-255 AD : “The Acts of Pilate” - The Report of Pilate to the Emperor Claudius

150-255 AD : “The Acts of Pilate” - The Descent of Christ into Hell

150-255 AD : Melchizedek

150 AD : Numenius (preserved by Origen in Contra Celsum)

150-160 AD : Trypho (preserved by Justin Martyr in Dialogue with Trypho)

160-170 AD : Tatian’s Address to the Greeks

160-180 AD : Claudius Apollinaris

160-180 AD : Julius Cassianus

165-175 AD : Fragments of Melito of Sardis

160-250 AD : Minucius Felix - The Octavius, chap. XXXVII

165-175 AD : Fragments of Hegesippus

170 AD : Lucian of Samosata - The Death of Peregrine, 11-13

170-175 AD : Diatessaron

170-200 AD : Treatise on the Resurrection

170-200 AD : The Muratorian Canon

170-200 AD : The Dura-Europos Gospel Harmony

170-220 AD : Letter of Peter to Philip

175-180 AD : Athenagoras of Athens

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Book I

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Book II

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Book III

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Book IV

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Book V

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Fragments From The Lost Writings Of Irenaeus

175-185 AD : Irenaeus - Fragments of Irenaeus in Eusebius

178 AD : Letter from Vienna and Lyons

177-178 AD : Celsus’ view of Christians and Christianity (preserved by Origen in Contra Celsus)

180 AD : The Passion of the Scillitan Martyrs

180-220 AD : Kerygmata Petrou

180-185 AD : Theophilus of Antioch - Book II

180-185 AD : Theophilus of Antioch - Book III

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - Treatise On Christ And Antichrist

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - Expository Treatise Against The Jews

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Extant Works And Fragments Of Hippolytus (Part I - Exegetical)

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome – Fragments From Commentaries On Various Books Of Scripture

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book V

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book VI

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book VII

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book VIII

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book IX

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book X

180-230 AD : Hippolytus of Rome - The Refutation Of All Heresies Book IV

180-250 AD : 1 Apocalypse of James

180-250 AD : Gospel of Philip

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Book III

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Book IV

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Book V

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Book VI

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Book VII

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Fragments Of Clemens Alexandrinus

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Who is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved?

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - To The Newly Baptized (aka Exhortation To Endurance aka To The Newly Baptized Precepts Of Clement)

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - Exhortation To The Heathen

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - The Instructor. [Paedagogus.] The Instructor Book I

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - The Instructor. [Paedagogus.] The Instructor Book II

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - The Instructor. [Paedagogus.] The Instructor Book III

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - The Stromata, or Miscellanies Book I

182-202 AD : Clement of Alexandria - The Stromata, or Miscellanies Book II

185-195 AD : Fragments of Polycrates

188-217 AD : Talmud - Baraitha Bab. Sanhedrin 43a

188-217 AD : Talmud - B. Yebamoth 49a, Yebamoth 4.13

188-217 AD : Talmud - Sanhedrin 107b

189-199 AD : Victor I

193-193 AD : Anonymous Anti-Montanist

197-220 AD : Tertullian - To Scapula

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Chaplet, Or De Corona

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Shows, Or De Spectaculis

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Idolatry

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Apology

197-220 AD : Tertullian - A Treatise on the Soul

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Soul’s Testimony

197-220 AD : Tertullian - An Answer To The Jews

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Prescription Against Heretics

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Five Books Against Marcion. Book I

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Five Books Against Marcion. Book II

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Five Books Against Marcion. Book III

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Five Books Against Marcion. Book IV

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Five Books Against Marcion. Book V

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Scorpiace. Antidote For The Scorpion’s Sting

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Against Praxeas

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On The Resurrection Of The Flesh

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On The Flesh Of Christ

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Against The Valentinians

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Against Hermogenes

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Ad Martyras

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Prayer

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Baptism

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Against All Heresies

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Repentance

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On The Veiling Of Virgins

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On The Apparel Of Women

197-220 AD : Tertullian - Of Patience

197-220 AD : Tertullian - The Passion Of The Holy Martyrs - Perpetua And Felicitas

197-220 AD : Tertullian - To His Wife

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Exhortation To Chastity

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Monogamy

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Modesty

197-220 AD : Tertullian - On Fasting

197-220 AD : Tertullian - De Fuga In Persecutione

200-210 AD : Apollonius

200-210 AD : Fragments of Serapion of Antioch

200-220 AD : Caius

200-220 AD : The Treatise Of Eusebius, The Son Of Pamphilus, Against The Life Of Apollonius Of Tyana Written By Philostratus, Occasioned By The Parallel Drawn By Hierocles Between Him And Christ

200-225 AD : The Acts of Thomas

263-339 AD : The Letters of Christ and Abgarus

200-250 AD : a church was been discovered in Megiddo, Israel. Excavations uncovered a large tile floor and wall remnants. There are mosaics of fish which were the original Christian symbol. Also found were some inscriptions inlaid into the mosaic one which reads, “Akeptous, the God-loving, offered this table for (the) God Jesus Christ, as a remembrance” (“Akeptous” is the name of the woman who offered this “remembrance”).

Index

Acts, 20, 100, 121, 126, 163, 172, 174, 175, 243, 268, 272, 277, 299

Agnostic, 115, 117, 118, 130, 165, 167

Agnosticism, 116, 117, 187

Agnostics, 169, 170

Andrew, 272

Angel, 55

Angels, 125, 126, 245

Apostle, 152

Apostles, 25, 73, 75, 87, 135, 172, 173, 175

Atheist, 85, 86, 88, 89, 92, 102, 104, 118, 127, 155, 158, 160, 183, 189, 225, 255

Atheists, 88, 91, 100, 112, 115, 116, 117, 135, 169, 170, 176, 179

Baptism, 135, 162, 163

Baptist, 98, 162, 175, 267

Baptized, 37, 122, 162, 163, 247

Barker, Dan, 225, 226, 227, 229, 233, 234, 236, 239

Brown, Dan, 17, 18, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 133, 138, 284, 285, 286, 287, 293

Buddha, 3, 11, 135, 183, 245, 246, 247, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 253, 291

Callahan, Timothy, 179

Cameron, James (and Ron), 13, 17, 18, 21, 23, 284, 292

Carrier, Richard, 88, 102, 104, 106, 107, 111, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 130, 133, 164, 170, 202, 219, 290, 291, 292

Cascioli, Luigi, 225, 226, 240, 241, 242, 243, 291

Celestial, 97, 99, 103, 107, 113, 115, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 129, 131, 158, 239

Celsus, 204, 206, 207, 208, 209, 273

Christ, 11, 37, 39, 46, 48, 52, 75, 77, 81, 82, 83, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 93, 107, 114, 116, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 133, 137, 139, 142, 143, 145, 150, 152, 155, 158, 163, 178, 179, 186, 187, 190, 192, 197, 203, 204, 205, 206, 209, 214, 225, 227, 231, 232, 233, 234, 235, 238, 239, 240, 241, 252, 253, 257, 268, 269, 272, 273, 276, 277, 284, 285, 288, 289, 290, 291, 293, 294, 297, 298

Corinthians, 119, 122, 123, 173, 199, 268, 270

Coyne, Jerry, 165, 166, 167, 168, 183

Cross, 19, 122, 124, 158, 184, 247, 249

Crossan, John Dominic, 29, 30, 106, 170, 176

Crucified, 29, 81, 90, 99, 114, 120, 121, 122, 129, 184, 205, 207, 210, 218, 227, 228, 229, 230, 240

Crucifixion, 14, 29, 30, 87, 123, 158, 177, 213, 229, 231, 267

Da Vinci Code, 18, 22, 23, 37, 38, 39, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, 50, 52, 136, 284, 286, 287, 289

Devil, 126, 215, 216

Disciples, 25, 26, 70, 72, 73, 77, 91, 100, 121, 172, 173, 194, 195, 198, 208, 229, 230, 231, 239, 249

Ehrman, Bart, 79, 88, 107, 108, 116, 146, 155, 156, 165, 169, 171, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 201, 202, 203, 209, 218, 219, 220, 221, 222, 226, 236, 242, 257, 258, 291, 299

Ephesians, 124, 269

Finley, Reginald, 88, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199

Flavius, Josephus (and Titus), 104, 157, 227, 270

Galatians, 99, 121, 122, 172, 173, 174, 195, 196, 199, 212, 242, 269

Gasque, W. Ward, 136, 137, 138, 139, 141, 142, 289, 290

Gnosticism, 49

Gnostics, 183

God, 1, 29, 37, 38, 49, 53, 59, 63, 65, 69, 85, 90, 91, 95, 99, 100, 104, 114, 117, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 133, 134, 152, 158, 159, 160, 161, 163, 172, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 187, 205, 207, 209, 211, 214, 216, 222, 225, 226, 247, 250, 259, 268, 277, 294, 295, 296, 297, 299

Gospel, 17, 24, 25, 26, 69, 70, 71, 73, 76, 77, 78, 81, 82, 110, 149, 150, 151, 162, 177, 191, 249, 268, 269, 270, 271, 273, 274, 285, 288, 292, 297, 299

Gospels, 74, 110, 147, 161, 163, 164, 175, 176, 243

Graves, Kersey, 88, 104

Habermas, Gary, 98, 106, 179

Harpur, Tom, 136, 137, 138, 139, 142, 143, 290

Hebrews, 125, 149, 269, 270

Herod, 56, 58, 164

Holding, James Patrick, 143, 145, 159, 164, 218, 245, 289, 290, 291

Holy Ghost, 126, 247

Holy Spirit, 41

Humphreys, 145, 146, 147, 148, 152, 153

Jacobovici, Simcha, 13, 14, 17, 18, 19, 21, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 32, 81, 82, 83, 284, 285

Jesus, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 39, 41, 46, 49, 51, 52, 55, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 67, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 103, 104, 106, 107, 108, 110, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 139, 142, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 152, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 181, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 196, 197, 198, 201, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 218, 219, 220, 225, 226, 227, 228, 229, 230, 231, 232, 233, 234, 236, 238, 239, 240, 241, 242, 245, 246, 247, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 253, 254, 267, 268, 269, 271, 277, 284, 285, 287, 288, 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295, 296, 298, 299

Jewish, 13, 16, 57, 58, 61, 62, 63, 66, 89, 90, 99, 114, 121, 122, 128, 147, 157, 159, 171, 178, 190, 197, 205, 206, 214, 227, 230, 231, 233, 240, 255, 287, 291, 295

Jews, 27, 61, 90, 105, 122, 157, 164, 183, 208, 227, 228, 229, 231, 233, 240, 248, 265, 270, 274, 276

John, 24, 25, 29, 48, 75, 99, 106, 121, 128, 131, 152, 156, 162, 163, 170, 173, 174, 175, 176, 183, 184, 185, 187, 191, 213, 225, 226, 241, 242, 262, 267, 268, 269, 271, 272, 290, 292, 297, 299

Judas, 70, 191, 225, 226, 241, 267, 271, 285, 299

Jude, 75, 269

King, (sometimes to a sovereign and sometimes to Karen L.), 21, 56, 69, 71, 79, 141, 164, 188, 205, 220, 270

Lataster, Raphael, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 103, 104, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 128, 129, 130, 131, 133, 138, 158, 239

Lord, 25, 51, 99, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 150, 173, 174, 194, 204, 216, 232, 250, 268, 270, 271

Luke, 17, 25, 31, 32, 100, 121, 126, 152, 163, 166, 172, 175, 191, 197, 268, 299

Magdalene, Mary, 15, 16, 19, 20, 21, 35, 39, 46, 52, 75, 77, 81, 83, 271, 288

Mark, 25, 110, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 162, 163, 174, 175, 191, 192, 198, 268, 270, 287, 294, 299

Martyr, Justin, 149, 160, 203, 204, 208, 209, 272

Matthew, 16, 17, 22, 25, 26, 149, 151, 162, 163, 164, 175, 268, 299

Mythicism, 3, 91, 128, 129, 134, 135, 146, 166, 167, 168, 208, 209, 211, 217, 222, 237, 239, 240, 242, 245

Mythicist, 165, 201, 202, 215, 218

Mythicists, 106, 130, 164, 170, 201, 202, 203, 209, 211, 212, 213, 240, 242

Myths, 3

Nag Hammadi, 43, 288

O’Neill, Timothy, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 162, 163, 164

Pagan, 3

Paul, 86, 87, 97, 98, 99, 100, 103, 107, 113, 114, 115, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 125, 126, 131, 145, 146, 149, 152, 157, 163, 172, 173, 174, 176, 194, 195, 196, 198, 199, 229, 237, 239, 242, 272, 291, 294, 295

Paulkovich, Michael, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 91, 92, 101, 127, 157, 166, 288

Peter, 25, 29, 74, 78, 99, 110, 121, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 162, 173, 174, 191, 204, 239, 269, 270, 272, 273

Philip, 20, 273, 274

Pilate, Pontius, 59, 99, 114, 121, 125, 157, 227, 228, 229, 230, 238, 272

Plutarch, 111, 219, 221

Price, Robert, 89, 106, 117, 155, 159, 170, 201, 202, 203, 204, 206, 209, 240, 241, 242, 243, 291, 297

Resurrected, 26, 57, 61, 76, 99, 121, 122, 135, 218, 219, 249, 250, 289

Resurrection, 23, 24, 57, 58, 61, 85, 123, 124, 127, 134, 135, 181, 213, 216, 217, 220, 222, 240, 265, 287

Revelation, 15, 150

Righi, Enrico, 225, 226, 233

Romans, 123, 128, 268

Satan, 39

Simon, 74, 204

Starbird, Margaret, 75, 76

Talpiot, 13, 15, 23, 30, 33, 34, 284

Tarico, Valerie, 169, 170, 172, 174, 175, 176, 183, 290

Thaddaeus, 270

Thomas, 73, 78, 269, 271, 272, 277

Timothy, 40, 125, 269

Trypho, 149, 203, 204, 205, 206, 209, 272

Wilson, Barrie, 81, 82, 83

Zindler, Frank, 202, 203

Zoroaster, 3, 11, 255, 256, 257, 258, 259, 260, 261, 262, 264, 265, 292

Endnotes

1 Simcha Jacobovici, “Ossuary Inscriptions”

2 “Has the tomb of Jesus Christ been found?,” The Discovery Channel

3 Ibid.

4 Jacobovici

5 Discovery Channel’s explore the tomb

6 Ibid.

7 Ben Witherington, “The Jesus Tomb? ‘Titanic’ Talpiot Tomb Theory Sunk from the Start”

8 Jennifer Viegas, “Jesus Family Tomb Believed Found”

9 Jerusalem (AP), “Scholars, Clergy Slam Jesus Documentary”

10 Stuart Laidlaw, “Jesus tomb claim sparks furor”

11 “Director Defends Jesus Tomb Findings - James Cameron is Convinced Remains Are of Those of Christ, Family,” TODAY Show/MSNBC

12 Dan Brown quoted in Father Jonathan Morris for FOX Fan Central, “Dan Brown Responds - ‘The Da Vinci Code‘

- Part II”

13 “Has the tomb of Jesus Christ been found?”

14 Simcha Jacobovici, “Yeshua Bar Yosef”

15 Jerusalem (AP), “Archaeologists, scholars dispute Jesus documentary”

16 “Has the tomb of Jesus Christ been found?”

17 Stuart Laidlaw, “Jesus tomb claim sparks furor”

18 Michael Foust, “‘Jesus Tomb’ Documentary Ignores Biblical & Scientific Evidence, Logic, Experts Say”

19 Raw Story, “Israeli expert quashes film claim about Jesus

tomb”

20 “Archeological Identity Theft,” Extreme Theology, March 02, 2007

21 Simcha Jacobovici, “Theological Considerations-The Resurrection” paraphrase from DSC’s “Theological Considerations”

22 Ibid.

23 Viegas

24 “Theological Considerations-The Resurrection”

25 “Archaeologists, scholars dispute Jesus documentary” also “Scholars, Clergy Slam Jesus Documentary”

26 Laidlaw

27 “Archaeologists, scholars dispute Jesus documentary”

28 Same as note #25

29 Same as note #27

30 Same as note #7

31 Witherington

32 Used to be posted here: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,97993 8,00.html

33 Same as note #7

34 “A Lie About Goliath?” True Free Thinker: http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/lie-about-goliath 35 Laidlaw

36 “Scholars, Clergy Slam Jesus Documentary”

37 Same as note #7

38 Kristin Romey, “Geologists: Ossuary Patina Faked,” The Jerusalem Post

39 David Horovitz, “Kloner: A Great Story, But Nonsense,”

The Jerusalem Post

40 Dan Brown from the FAQs section of danbrown.com

41 Morris

42 “‘Da Vinci’ readers really believe Christ had kids 60% of adults who read ‘Code’ think there’s truth in suggestion Jesus was dad,” World Net Daily (retrieved 5-16-06 AD)

43 Brown quoted by Morris

44 Richard N. Ostling, “Expert Doubts ‘Gospel of Judas’ Revelation,” The Associated Press, 3-2-06 AD

45 Gregory Kirschling, “‘Da’ Last Big Interview,”

Entertainment Weekly

46 Brown FAQs

47 “The battle of ‘The Da Vinci Code‘ With movie release imminent, debate heightens,” CNN, 5-1-06 AD

48 Amy Welborn, “In the interest of shutting everyone up,”

May 2006 AD from a Weekend Edition interview dated 4- 26-03 AD between Dan Brown and Linda Wertheimer

49 Michelle Orecklin, “The Novel That Ate the World,”

TIME

50 Gina Serpe, “Howard Shelves ‘Da Vinci’ Disclaimer,”

E!, 5-9-06 AD

51 “Opus Dei Response to Director Ron Howard – ‘Catholics Are Victims of an Offense,’” Zenit, 5-15-06 AD 52 Angela Doland, “Ron Howard Answers ‘Da Vinci’ Critics,” Associated Press, 5-17-06 AD

53 Mike Collett-White, “Howard says Da Vinci reviews ‘frustrating,’” Reuters

54 Ibid.

55 Ibid.

56 Serpe

57 Brooke Anderson, “Fact vs. fiction in the ‘Da Vinci Code,’” CNN, 5-19-06 AD

58 Doland

59 “Hanks: Don’t Take ‘Code’ Too Seriously: Actor Urges Critics To Relax, Says ‘The Da Vinci Code‘ Filled With ‘Hooey,’” Associate Press, 5-13-06 AD, “Hanks Slams ‘Da Vinci’ Code Critics,” WENN, 5-12-06 AD and “Tom Hanks Answers ‘Da Vinci’ Critics,” United Press International

60 “It’s Show Time for Ron Howard,” Catholic League, 5-

12-06 AD

61 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/islam-muslim- qurans-composition

62 Brown FAQs

63 Dan Wooding, “‘Da Vinci’ inspiration tells church: ‘Get a grip’ ‘You’ve been dishing it out for years - but now you’ve proved you can’t take it,’” Assist News Service, 5- 13-06 AD

64 Ibid.

65 “Behind tonight’s ABC Jesus special News team bases report on virulently anti-Christian novel,” World Net Daily, 11-3-03 AD

66 Mark Finkelstein, “‘Da Vinci Code‘ Actor: Bible Should Have ‘Fiction’ Disclaimer,” News Busters, 5-17-06 AD

67 Kirschling

68 “‘Da Vinci’ Author Ducks Controversy - Dan Brown Says He’ll Let Experts Sort Out Issues Raised By His Book,” CBS News, 4-24-06 AD

69 “The Priory Of Sion - Is The ‘secret Organization’ Fact Or Fiction?,” CBS News

70 Ibid.

71 Ethan Bronner, “Tablet ignites debate on messiah and resurrection,” The New York Times, 7-5-08 AD

72 Ibid.

73 Ibid.

74 Ofri Ilani, “Dead Sea tablet suggests Jewish resurrection imagery pre-dates Jesus,” Haaretz

75 Bronner

76 Ibid.

77 Ibid.

78 Ibid.

79 Ibid.

80 Ibid.

81 Ibid.

82 Ibid.

83 Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, A History of Messianic Speculation in Israel (Macmillan Co., 1927 AD), pp. 5-7 84 Bronner

85 Ibid.

86 Ibid.

87 Ilani

88 That he opposed the verses does not mean that he was against them but that he set them opposite each other in order to understand the seeming contradiction.

89 Gershom Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi - The Mystical Messiah

1626-1676 (NJ: Princeton University Press, 1973 AD), pp. 51-52

90 Raphael Patai, The Messiah Texts (NY: Avon Books, 1979 AD), pp. 166-167

91 A. Cohen, The Twelve Prophets, Hebrew Text and English Translations with Introductions and Commentary

(NY: Soncino Press, 1848, 12th ed. 1985 AD)

92 “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife ...,” Template Lab

93 http://www.truefreethinker.com/gospel-judas 94 Jaweed Kaleem, “The Gospel of Jesus’ Wife,” Huffington Post, 9-18-12 AD

95 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/biblical-women

and http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/find-it-fast- fast-facts-bible-misogynistic

96 James M. Robinson, gen. ed., The Nag Hammadi Library

(New York, NY: HarperCollins, 1978, 1988 AD ed.), p. 148

97 Willis Barnstone, ed., The Other Bible (New York, NY:

Harper & Row Publishers, 1984 AD), p. 92

98 Ibid., p. xx

99 http://truefreethinker.com/unbelievers-compliment- christianity

100 Zoe Mintz, “‘Lost Gospel‘ Book Claims Jesus Christ Married Mary Magdalene, Had Two Children,”

International Business Times, 11-10-14 AD

101 Johnathan Wells, Icons of Evolution (Regency Publishing, October 1, 2000 AD), p. 133

102 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Paulkovich

103 “An Open Letter To Michael Paulkovich And Free Inquiry,” The Wrong Monkey, 9-29-14 AD

104 Patheos web site, 11-3-15 AD

105 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/atheists-who- positively-affirm-god%E2%80%99s-non-existencewithout- evidence-course

106

https://www.facebook.com/events/1690214781223893/per malink/1690408524537852/?ref=4&action_history=null 107 http://truefreethinker.com/exchristiannet

108 “Can a classicist believe in Christmas?,” Veritas, 12-23- 16 AD

109 “It’s Beginning to Look a lot Like Christmas ...

Mythicism’s in the Air,” Australia Broadcasting Corporation, 12-24-14 AD

110 “6 Famous Documentaries That Were Shockingly Full of Crap,” Cracked Magazine, 8-12-13 AD:

http://www.cracked.com/article_20585_6-famous- documentaries-that-were-shockingly-full-crap.html 111 Reference is made to James Patrick (J.P.) Holding, Shattering the Christ Myth:

http://books.google.com/books?id=2XHysoHc2ksC&pg=P A309&dq=mithras+not+resurrected&hl=en&sa=X&ei=10y pUc_KKcr8igKFjoG4Bw&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAA and http://books.google.com/books?id=2XHysoHc2ksC&pg=P A224&dq=horus+anup+baptize+false&hl=en&sa=X&ei=H FGpUe_YJIWSiAKGi4HQAQ&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAg

112 Reference is made to Carl E. Olson and Sandra Miesel,

The Da Vinci Hoax: Exposing the Errors in The Da Vinci Code: http://books.google.com/books?id=cUqsPMVOpQgC&pg= PA151&dq=mithras+not+resurrected&hl=en&sa=X&ei=10 ypUc_KKcr8igKFjoG4Bw&ved=0CGEQ6AEwCQ

113 Reference is made to Pat Remler, Egyptian Mythology, A to Z: http://books.google.com/books?id=wLUjtPDyu-

IC&pg=PT33&dq=anubis+god+of+embalming

114 W. Ward Gasque, “The Leading Religion Writer in Canada ... Does He Know What He’s Talking About?,” Columbian College of Arts & Sciences, 8-17-04

115 Ibid.

116 Gasque

117 J.P. Holding, “Tom Harpur’s The Pagan Christ: A Critique,” Tekton web site

118 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/j-p-holding-vs- ken-humphreys-debate-whether-jesus-existed

119 http://www.tektonics.org

120 Find his related videos are at his “VerseByVerseBT” YouTube channel, including the follow up to the follow up “The ‘Real” Zeitgeist Challenge Debunked”: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2im4IjZ6fesK- HmiCz0PFZddPxdApfUo

121 J.P. Holding, “Joseph Atwill’s ‘Caesar’s Messiah’,”

Tekton web site

122 J.P. Holding, “Miller vs Carrier on the Lukan Census,”

Tekton web site

123 Valerie Tarico, “Here are 5 reasons to suspect Jesus never existed,” The Raw Story, 12-15-15 AD

124 http://www.facebook.com/pages/True- Freethinker/121114521301654

125 Steve Cooper, “40% of people doubt Jesus existed. Here’s how to change their mind,” Premier Christianity, 9-

22-15 AD

126 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Nw2Ku1FwlI

127 “Elton John claims Jesus was gay,” BBC News, 2-19-10 AD

128 Dotson Rader, “Elton John: ‘There’s A Lot of Hate In The World,’” Parade, 2009 AD

129 “Americans Feel Connected to Jesus,” Barna Research Group, 2010 AD

130 Written within a chapter of his book Orthodoxy entitled “The Suicide of Thought”

131

http://www.facebook.com/AuthorBartEhrman/posts/31434 1951970939

http://www.facebook.com/AuthorBartEhrman/posts/31439 0851966049

132 Bart Ehrman, “Fuller Reply to Richard Carrier,”

Ehrman Blog, April 25, 2012 AD

133 J.P. Holding, “Attis, Cybele, and Jesus,” Tekton web site,

134 Ehrman, “Fuller Reply to Richard Carrier”

135 Ibid.

136 Freethought Today, Vol. 23, No. 2, March 2006 AD

137 All Josephus citations, except the next, are from Paul L. Maier, ed., trans., Josephus - The Essential Works (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1994). For more info, see Maier’s Josephus: The Essential Writings, Josephus: The Essential Works, The New Complete Works of Josephus and Josephus, the Essential Writings: A Condensation of Jewish Antiquities and the Jewish War

138 Paul L. Maier, “Josephus and Jesus“

139 Schlomo Pines, “An Arabic Version of the Testimonium Flavianum and its Implications,” Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities

140 For details, see J.P. Holding, “Tacitus on Jesus”

141 Ehrman, “Fuller Reply to Richard Carrier”

142 Robert Price, “Review - Luigi Cascioli, The Fable of Christ: Book of Accusation”

143 Bart Ehrman, “Bart Ehrman & Robert Price Debate – Did Jesus Exist?,” March 26, 2017 AD

144 http://mmcelhaney.blogspot.com

145 J.P. Holding, “Buddha vs Jesus,” Tekton

146 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/can-you- disprove-santa-clause-atheism-and-%E2%80%9Csanta- syndrome%E2%80%9D

147 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/atheism-and-

creation-ministries-international-part-9

148 Ilya Gershevitch, ed., The Cambridge History of Iran

(Cambridge University Press, 1985 AD), p. 666

149 James R. Russell, Zoroastrianism in Armenia (Harvard University Press, 1987 AD), p. 49

150 Ernst Herzfeld, Zoroaster and His World (Octagon Books, 1974 AD), p. 774

151 John Waterhouse, Zoroastrianism (Pierides Press, 2008 AD), p. 56

152 Jenny Rose, The Image of Zoroaster (Bibliotecha Persica Press, 2000 AD), p. 27

153 Jan Bremmer, The Rise and Fall of the Afterlife: The 1995 Read-Tuckwell Lectures at the University of Bristol

(Routledge, 2001 AD), p. 50

154 “Letters and Radio,” Richard Carrier Blogs, September 26, 2007 AD

155 Marcus McElhaney, “Is There A Connection Between

Jesus and Inanna?,” 2-5-12 AD

156

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inanna#Inanna.27s_descent_to

_the_underworld

157 http://kingdavid8.com/Copycat/JesusInanna.html

158 http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/atheism-young- white-male-phenomenon

159 The Anchor Bible Dictionary, v. 5, p. 1000

160 Ibid., v. 6, p. 531

161 “Books: Orthodoxologist” a review of Maisie Ward’s book, “Gilbert Keith Chesterton,” Time Magazine, October 11, 1943 AD

162 The Apocryphal New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1924 AD)

163 Robert J. Miller, ed., The Complete Gospels (Polebridge Press: 2010 AD)

164 Ron Cameron, The Other Gospels: Non-Canonical Gospel Texts (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1982 AD) and Vielhauer and Ogg, New Testament Apocrypha (Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1965 AD)

165 The Apocryphal New Testament

166 The Other Gospels

167 The Complete Gospels

168 S. Kent Brown, The Anchor Bible Dictionary, v. 5, p. 1000

169 The Other Gospels and The Complete Gospels

170 Cherubim and Seraphim have wings and other non- human features but these are not Angels but are a different category of being: different titles which reflect different job functions and they look different.

171 The Other Gospels

172 “Americans Feel Connected to Jesus,” Barna Research Group, 2010 AD

173 Nathan Parker, Christ, Christians, & Krishna. Srila

Prabhupada Speaks Out: On Christ, Christians, and Krsna (BTG—Volume 12, No. 12. Dec. 1977 AD). Find my reply here: http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/hinduism- hare-krishna-krishna-consciousness-part-1-10

174 Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Meditations of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (New York: Bantam, 1968 AD), p. 178

175 Kathy Juline, Settled Mind, Silent Mind, an interview with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (Science of Mind, November

1993 AD)

176 Paramahansa Yogananda, Where There is Light (Los Angeles: Self Realization Fellowship, 1988 AD), pp. 136, 169-170, 187

177 Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, quoted in Fear of the Master

(Hemet, CA.: Jeremiah Films, 1987 AD)

178 Baba Ram Dass, Be Here Now (New York: Crown Publishing, 1978 AD), p. 117

179 Mounir Murad, Daheshism and the Journey of the Soul (Virginia: Murad Publishing, Alexandria, 1993 AD), p. 99 180 Mary Lutyens, Krishnamurti, The Years of Awakening

(New York: Avon Discus Printing, 1975 AD), pp. 282, 302, 11, 280-281

181 ECKANKAR; Sri Harold Klemp, Getting Answers from

God through Past Lives, Dreams, and Soul Travel, quoting

ECK Spirituality Today from The ECKANKAR Journal

182 Paul Twitchell, The Tiger’s Fang, p. 171

183 The Summit Lighthouse, “Teachings of the Ascended Masters”

184 Given to the Messengers Mark and Elizabeth Prophet,

Decrees Fiats Prayers Meditations Songs and Mantras (Colorado Springs: Summit University Press, A Summit Lighthouse Publication, 1975 AD), Vol. 1, pp. 3-4

185 The Summit Lighthouse on Jesus’ mission

186 For some reason, this used to be posted on the Baylor College of Medicine website.

187 The Cosmic Harmony’s site article on Sathya Sai Baba 188 This was also on the Baylor College of Medicine website.

189 Ibid.

190 The International Sai Organization, “Where is Sathya Sai Baba?”

191 The International Sai Organization, “Message” 192 Was once posted to http://www.post1.com/home/gurusim/1qna.htm

193 The Prema Sai Baba web site

194 Christopher Hills, The Christ Book: What Did He Really Say? (Boulder Creek, CA.: University of the Trees Press, 1980 AD), p. 48

195 Television movie: Out on a Limb

196 Shirley MacLaine, Out on a Limb (Toronto: Bantam Books, 1983 AD), p. 236

197 Ibid., p. 181

198 Shirley MacLaine, Dancing in the Light, pp. 118-119

199 MacLaine, Out on a Limb, p. 198

200 Shirley MacLaine, Dance While You Can (Toronto: Bantam Books), pp. 288- 290

201 Shirley MacLaine, It’s All in the Playing (Toronto:

Bantam Books 1987 AD), pp. 68-69

202 Ibid., p. 334

203 Written by Ashtar-Athena, The Ashtar-Command, Our Mission, Purpose and Directive

204 Unification’s web site article “Rev. & Mrs. Moon”

205 William L. Rand, Was Jesus a Reiki Master? (Reiki News Articles. The International Center for Reiki Training) 206 The official US Bahá’í web site article “What Bahá’ís Believe: God and His Creation”

207 Walter Martin, The Kingdom of the Cults (Minneapolis:

Bethany Fellowship Inc., Publishers, 1965 AD), pp. 254- 255

208 Justice St Rain, Finding Common Ground-How many beliefs do you share with members of the Baha'i

Community? You may be surprised! (Bloomington, IN.: Published by Special Ideas, 1997 AD), pp. 2, 10-11

209 Lawrence J. Epstein, Questions and Answers on Conversion to Judaism (Northvale, NJ.: Jason Aronson

Inc., 1998 AD), pp. 57, 58

210 Nicholas De Lange, An Introduction to Judaism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000 AD), p. 205

211 Rabbi Morris N. Kertzer, Revised by Rabbi Lawrence

A. Hoffman, What is a Jew? (Don Mills, Ontario: Maxwell Macmillan Canada, Inc. 1993 AD), p. 275-276

212 Alfred J. Kolatch, The Second Jewish Book of Why

(New York: Jonathan David Publishing, Inc. 1985 AD), p. 71

213 Edited by Naomi W. Cohen, Essential Papers on

Jewish-Christian Relations in the United Sates (New York: University Press, 1990 AD), p. 332. Quoting Franz Rosenzweig & David Flusser

214 Kolatch, p. 73

215 J.J. Saunders, A History of Medival Islam (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1965 AD), p. 18 & 36

216 Misha′al ibn Abdullah, What Did Jesus Really Say?

217 Marsh, From Black Muslims to Muslims, p. 53; History of the Nation of Islam, as discussed by Elijah Muhammad (Cleveland: Secretarius Publication, 1993 AD), p. 2-4

218 For Fard’s possibly Jamaican and Palestinian origins, see Eric Lincoln, The Black Muslims in America (Queens, NY.: Kayode Publications, 1991 AD), p. 14; for “Supreme Ruler” quote, see E.D. Beynon, Master Fard Muhammad (New Port News, VA., United Brothers and United Sisters Communications System, 1990 AD), p. 6; Elijah Muhammad, Message to the Blackman in America (Newport News, VA., United Brothers Communications Systems, 1992 AD), p. 20, 24-25

The next couple of quotes are from: Arthur J. Magida, Prophet of Rage, A Life of Louis Farrakhan and His Nation (New York: Basic Books A Division of Harper Collins Publishers, 1996 AD), pp. 42, 46

219 Messenger Elijah Muhammad, Allah is God, Who is that

Mystery God? (Reprinted from The Message To The Blackman in America)

220 Messenger Elijah Muhammad, Jesus Was Only a Prophet (Reprinted from the July 29, 1966 AD issue of

Muhammad Speaks)

221 Messenger Elijah Muhammad, Christianity vs Islam (Transcribed from an audio taped lecture on November 7, 1962 AD in Philadelphia, Penn.)

222 Minister Louis Farrakhan, Jesus Saves (Day address at the International Amphitheater in Chicago on Feb. 26, 1995

AD)

223 Farrakhan speech, April 29, 1979 AD. Jabril Muhammad quoted in Michael C. Kotzin, “Louis Farrakhan’s Anti-Semitism: A Look at the Record,” Christian Century, March 2, 1994 AD, p. 226; Farrakhan

speech, February 22, 1981 AD

224 Farrakhan interview, August 5, 1993 AD. Also see, Arthur J. Magida, Prophet of Rage, A Life of Louis Farrakhan and His Nation (New York: Basic Books A Division of Harper Collins Publishers, 1996 AD), pp. 131, 158

225 Let God Be True (New York: Published by Watch

Tower Bible and Tract Society, Inc.; International Bible Students Association, Brooklyn, Rev. 1952 AD), pp. 100- 101, 109, 102

226 From Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained, 1958 AD, pp. 126-127, 164

227 “The Word” Who Is He? According to John, 1962 AD, pp. 20, 53

228 Studies in the Scriptures, Vol. V, p. 84

229 The Truth Shall Make You Free, p. 47

230 Doctrine and Covenants 20:1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 9

231 The Book of Mormon, Mormon 9:12

232 Ibid., Mosiah 15:2-4

233 The Book of Abraham 4:1

234 Key to the Science of Theology, p. 42

235 Joseph Fielding Smith, The Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 345 cf., Journal of Discourses, Vol. VI, p. 3

236 Lorenzo Snow, former president of the Mormon Church,

Millennial Star, Vol. 54, also Milton R. Hunter, The Gospel Through the Ages, pp. 105-106

237 Time and Seasons, Aug. 1, 1844 AD

238 Journal of Discourses, Vol. I, pp. 50-51

239 Pearl of Great Price, The Book of Moses 4:1

240 The Book of Mormon, Ether 3:14

241 Apostle Orson Hide, see J.W. Gunnison, The Mormons,

p. 68 and J.H. Snowden, The Truth About Mormonism, 1926 AD, p. 130

242 Journal of Discourses, Vol. III, p. 247 and Vol. IV, pp. 219-220

243 The First Church of Christ, Scientists and Miscellany, p. 261

244 DeWitt John, The Christian Science Way of Life

(Englewood Cliffs, NJ.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962 AD), pp. 28, 29, 31, 40

245 Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the

Scriptures (Boston: The First Church of Christ, Scientists, 1971 AD), pp. 583 & 589, 361, 152, 226-227, 330, 327,

350-351, 349

246 This used to be posted here: http://www.leesville.com/grace/resources/library/martin/Cu lts/sld012.htm

247 Unity Definitions (This material was first prepared by

Phil and Mary Stovin and revised and edited by the Executive Committee of the Association of Unity Churches)

248 Glen S. Hayden, Viewpoints of Science Of Mind

Concerning Certain Traditional Beliefs (Item #0936, Los Angeles: Science of Mind Publishing, n.d.), pp. 1, 4

249 Max Heindel, The Rosicrucian Philosophy, p. 181 and

The Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception, p. 374

250 Heindel, pp. 181, 376, 252

251 Walter Martin, The Kingdom of the Cults (Minneapolis: Bethany Fellowship Inc., Publishers, 1965 AD), p. 431

252 Rosicrucian Fellowship article, “Jesus and Jesus Christ”

(International Headquarters-Oceanside, CA.)

253 From the Unitarian Universalist Association web site’s bookstore section.

254 From questions and answers written using excerpts from

a Guide to Unitarian Universalism by Rev. Charles Scot Giles, and Unitarian Universalists Believe by George N. Marshall

255 Unitarian Church Spokesman Rev. Carl M. Chorowsky,

“What is a Unitarian?,” Look Magazine, March 8, 1955 AD 256 First Unitarian Church in Westport statement of what they believe

257 Bishop Barrington Constantine Hibbert’s leaflets on Jesus

258 Dennis and Barbara Tedlock, Teachings From the

American Earth, Indian Religion and Philosophy (New York: Liveright Publishing Corp., 1975 AD), pp. XV, 80- 82, 86-87, 100, 102

259 Dan Vergano and Cathy Lynn Grossman, “Long-lost Gospel of Judas Casts ‘Traitor’ in New Light,” USA Today 260 “Books of New Testament Chosen: A.D. 367,” National Geographic Society

261 “It may be, as Zahn (Geschichte, ii, 66) and others have supposed, that a negative has fallen out of the text here.”

262 “Tregelles suggests that the Latin translator of this document mistook the Greek Philonos ‘Philo’ for philon ‘friends.’ Many in ancient times thought that the so-called ‘Wisdom of Solomon’ was really written by Philo of Alexandria.—M.D.M.” [Michael Marlowe]

263 Bruce Metzger, The Canon of the New Testament

(Oxford: Clarendon, 1987 AD), p. 254

264 James H. Charlesworth, Jesus Within Judaism (New York: Doubleday, 1988 AD), pp. 168-169

265 E.P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus (New York: Penguin Press, 1993 AD), p. xiv

266 A. E. Harvey, Jesus and the Constraints of History

(Philadelphia: Westminster, 1982 AD), p. 11

267 Enrico Tuccinardi, “Nazareth, the Caesarea Inscription, and the hand of God,” (René Salm trans.)

268 Matthew 2:23; 4:13; 21:11; 26:71; Mark 1:9, 24; 10:47;

14:67; 16:6; Luke 1:26, 2:4, 39, 51; 4:16, 34; 18:37; 24:19;

John 1:45-46; 18:5, 7; 19:19; Acts 2:22; 3:6; 4:10; 6:14;

10:38; 22:8; 26:9

269 Bart Ehrman, “Did Nazareth Exist?,” Ehrman Blog, 2015 AD