Oh my. This thread just appeared and already has 50+ posts.
And I have already given the correct answer in earlier threads!
So I briefly reviewed only the thread's earliest posts.
While the Gospels are often dated to circa 90 AD or even later, in fact there were antecedent texts (including an early John, a hypothetical "Q" and possibly an early Mark) that were closer in time to Paul's writings.
Yet the Gospels never mention Paul, and Paul ignores almost all the stories in the Gospels. If these Jesuses were invented, they were TWO different inventions. (The Christ Mythicists at IIDB would agree with this, I think, perhaps positing three or more legendary Jesuses or inventions.)
The earliest evidence we have for Christianity is Paul's letters which have been dated to about 50 CE. Unlike the Gospel writers, Paul says almost nothing about a Jesus living on earth. Paul's Jesus only speaks in visions and revelations. Could it be that Paul created a celestial Jesus only to have the Gospel writers historicize Jesus decades later? Obviously, if Jesus never existed as a real man, then somebody else had to set the wheels of Christianity in motion. Paul, I submit, is the most likely candidate as the creator of Christ and Christianity.
I'm not sure what the reddened clause means. Does 'historicize' here mean 'invent'? I agree that much — BUT NOT ALL — of the Gospels were invented but that the earliest (
non-surviving) Gospels predate the Fall of Jerusalem and were roughly contemporaneous with Paul's writings. (Paul mentions Simon Peter and his presence in Rome IIRC.)
A key fact which leads almost inevitably to the realization that there was a single historic Jesus is that James is mentioned as the Christ's brother INDEPENDENTLY in THREE sources: (1) Paul in
Galatians, (2) Josephus in
Antiquities, and (3) "Mark" in the same-named Gospel ("Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and ... ")
Mythicists grasp at straws to deny this inevitability. Richard Carrier has a "solution" for James/Jesus which is absurdly laughable! Josephus' paragraph about James mentions a High Priest named Jesus: Carrier makes HIM the brother! Yet
Galatians — where Paul meets James brother of the Christ — is generally agreed to be authentic Paul.
There are various other arguments for historicity, but just the James/Jesus brothership by itself reduces the mythicists to blither and babble.
I think Jesus was based on a real person.
Ding ding ding! Excreationist wins the thread.
...
Some atheists say the appearance to the 500 involved a mass hallucination. I think it was a case of mistaken identity - after all a similar thing happened involving thousands of people:
The original Gospel of Mark — probably the earliest Gospel excepting "Q" and perhaps John — barely mentions the Resurrection while that's all Paul wants to talk about! I think Jesusism (Christianity) developed very early and almost immediately split into two (or more) camps.
The post-crucifixion sightings may have been mistaken, lies or other confusion, or — see my recent post on Jaynes' bicameral brain — the result of hallucination or hypnosis.