Is "God doesn't exist if Jesus didn't exist" an argument any atheist uses?

[Unknown Soldier]

I was recently watching a YouTube video in which Bart Ehrman asserted that Jesus mythicism is a way that many atheists use to falsify the existence of God. Do any atheists actually argue that since Jesus didn't exist, then God doesn't exist? I cannot recall ever hearing or reading that argument. No doubt proving Jesus didn't exist would be a major problem for Christian theism, but the basis for the existence of most other Gods would be unaffected by such a discovery. Yahweh, for example, would be safe as would Brahma. Even Christians might save their faith in their God by creating a doctrine in which Jesus never actually visited the earth as a physical man but only reigns from heaven and only interacts with people via revelation, a "Pauline" Jesus.

 

[TomC]

I was recently watching a YouTube video in which Bart Ehrman asserted that Jesus mythicism is a way that many atheists use to falsify the existence of God. Do any atheists actually argue that since Jesus didn't exist, then God doesn't exist? I cannot recall ever hearing or reading that argument.

This isn't a clear OP.

I've never heard anyone use the exact words "since Jesus didn't exist, then God doesn't exist"

But I have noticed that anti-theists, especially on the internet, seem to confuse the concept of "God" with what their Christian neighbors claim about god. That's because most English speakers with internet access live in Christendom.

It's easier to not think about complicated subjects like god and just react to the people around you. So lots of people do, including nontheist people.
Tom

 

[bilby]

That's because most English speakers with internet access live in Christendom.

That's simply not true, now that Christendom encompasses only the United States of America plus a swathe of the rest of the developing world.

It might have been true up to about the 1970s. But most of the English speaking world hasn't been reasonably describable as "Christendom" for a very long time.

Indeed, the word itself is archaic, and describes a medieval subset of the world.

 

[TomC]

That's simply not true, now that Christendom encompasses only the United States of America plus a swathe of the rest of the developing world.

I'm sure you'd prefer to believe that 21st century Australia isn't part of Christendom.
But it is.

Tom

 

[Unknown Soldier]

I was recently watching a YouTube video in which Bart Ehrman asserted that Jesus mythicism is a way that many atheists use to falsify the existence of God. Do any atheists actually argue that since Jesus didn't exist, then God doesn't exist? I cannot recall ever hearing or reading that argument.

This isn't a clear OP.

Feel free to ask questions about anything in the OP you find unclear.

I've never heard anyone use the exact words "since Jesus didn't exist, then God doesn't exist"

LOL. Tom, the exact words aren't important. Have you heard anybody argue something like what I asked in the OP?

But I have noticed that anti-theists, especially on the internet, seem to confuse the concept of "God" with what their Christian neighbors claim about god. That's because most English speakers with internet access live in Christendom.

That's correct. When most people speak of God in places like America, they are referring to the God of the Bible although they might not know much about the Bible. So if an atheist lives in America, when she says she doesn't believe in God, then she's referring primarily to the Christian God.

It's easier to not think about complicated subjects like god and just react to the people around you. So lots of people do, including nontheist people.
Tom

Yes. Most people nowadays don't care if Osiris, Odin, or Zeus exist. Maybe some day Jesus will join the ranks of the "obsolete Gods."

 

[Learner]

"Obsolete Gods.."

One can only hope I suppose, but not actually know, in regards to Jesus.

 

[bilby]

That's simply not true, now that Christendom encompasses only the United States of America plus a swathe of the rest of the developing world.

I'm sure you'd prefer to believe that 21st century Australia isn't part of Christendom.
But it is.

Tom

Not being a part of medieval Europe strongly suggests otherwise.

If the pope orders another crusade, I sincerely doubt that many Aussies will take up arms against the Musalman hordes to reclaim the Holy Land.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Regards the OP I have never encountered the claim. It's as strange claim to say the least.

 

[TomC]

Feel free to ask questions about anything in the OP you find unclear.

One question is "What does he mean by 'Jesus Mythicist"?
As used, I find it confusing. I believe in the existence of an historical person named Jesus who started a movement. I don't believe in a miracle working demigod who formed part of a hitherto unknown pantheon, The Trinity. To me, the logical terms for that is Jesus Historicist and Christ Mythicist.

Also, what context is referring to in the video? I might say that in the context of a discussion with someone who isn't making a distinction between God and The Trinity. There's lots of people like that.
Tom

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Regards the OP I have never encountered the claim. It's as strange claim to say the least.

I think that real-Jesus apologists are trying to discredit mythicists by smearing them as just a bunch of bitter atheists who want to destroy their former religion. I suppose the same game could be played by mythicists by branding real-Jesus apologists as a bunch of weak-willed propagandists who cannot live without their precious Jesus.

 

[bilby]

Jesus is completely irrelevant to any gods or religions other than Christianity, in which he is clearly the central and essential element; and Islam and Judaism, in which he is a trivial footnote, whose non-existence would make barely a ripple.

There are loads of good reasons to think that all gods are fictional; The historicity or otherwise of Jesus isn't one of them. The argument in the OP is a very poor argument, and not one I have ever heard used by any atheist.

 

[TomC]

Jesus is completely irrelevant to any gods or religions other than Christianity,

I honestly don't think that Jesus was even relevant to Christianity.

I'm pretty sure Jesus was gone, probably dead, before people like Paul started creating Christianity around a mythical Christ.

Jesus was a Jew. Christ is the character in a Greek style myth. Jesus the Messiah died along with Judea. Christ the Saviour dominated the Greco-Roman world a few centuries later.
Tom

 

[Bronzeage]

It's a fallacy on its face. "God doesn't exist if Jesus didn't exist" proposes that a previous event is dependent on a later event.

​

Jesus could be the Messiah, a charlatan, or just an ordinary man, who lived sometime before the calendar was rearranged in his memory. Whether he was any of these things or none of them, cannot determine whether or not God exists.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

It's a fallacy on its face. "God doesn't exist if Jesus didn't exist" proposes that a previous event is dependent on a later event.

Actually, the argument doesn't posit events much less their chronological order, so your critique here is a straw man. Even if it did stipulate that a previous event is dependent on a later event, doing so isn't necessarily fallacious. It depends on what is meant by "is dependent." For example, if we know that we can only know that event A has happened if we observe a later event B, then our knowledge of event A "is dependent" on observing a later event B.

​

Jesus could be the Messiah, a charlatan, or just an ordinary man, who lived sometime before the calendar was rearranged in his memory.

Jesus could have been anything we can imagine, and that's what historians seem to say about him.

Whether he was any of these things or none of them, cannot determine whether or not God exists.

Which God are you referring to? If Jesus can be proved to have never existed, then I don't see how the Christian God can exist. Christians are safe, though: They've managed to squirrel Jesus away into a place and time we cannot completely check. If conclusive evidence for a claim is lacking, then make sure the claim is unfalsifiable.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Feel free to ask questions about anything in the OP you find unclear.

One question is "What does he mean by 'Jesus Mythicist"?

I suppose you're the only person who doesn't know. Jesus mythicism is all the rage these days in the study of the historicity of Jesus. The hypothesis that Jesus never existed and was actually a myth like Osiris or Romulus is gaining ground among scholars as well as laypersons.

As used, I find it confusing. I believe in the existence of an historical person named Jesus who started a movement. I don't believe in a miracle working demigod who formed part of a hitherto unknown pantheon, The Trinity. To me, the logical terms for that is Jesus Historicist and Christ Mythicist.

I think you mean that the person we refer to as "Jesus" is not well defined. In historical studies, Jesus of Nazareth is believed to be a Jewish man living in Judea during the Roman occupation who inspired the Christian religion and the New Testament. The name Jesus can be confusing because it can refer to different men, and many historians describe Jesus as being different men. Some say he was a preacher, for example, and others describe him as a revolutionary. So if you are confused, that might be why.

Also, what context is referring to in the video? I might say that in the context of a discussion with someone who isn't making a distinction between God and The Trinity. There's lots of people like that.

I'm not sure if I understand your question, but Bart Ehrman was trying to explain away the prevalence of the view that Jesus never existed. Ehrman's model of Jesus is that Jesus was "an apocalyptic preacher." Ehrman is not a Christian and does not believe that Jesus was divine or a miracle worker, but Ehrman insists that Jesus existed as a man.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Jesus is completely irrelevant to any gods or religions other than Christianity,

I honestly don't think that Jesus was even relevant to Christianity.

His name appears 1089 times in the New Testament.

I'm pretty sure Jesus was gone, probably dead, before people like Paul started creating Christianity around a mythical Christ.

Paul mentions "Jesus" 36 times in his letter to the Romans alone. "Christ" appears 269 times in John. The full "Jesus Christ" appears 134 times in the New Testament. So while Paul may have created Christ, he was well aware of Jesus and saw the two as one.

Jesus was a Jew.

There were many Jewish Jesuses. It was a common Jewish name in the first century.

Christ is the character in a Greek style myth. Jesus the Messiah died along with Judea. Christ the Saviour dominated the Greco-Roman world a few centuries later.

That "Greco-Roman world" was well aware of the figure, Jesus Christ. Contrary to your idea, they never saw Jesus and Christ as two different persons. If they were Christians, then Jesus, the Messiah from Judea, was always the Christ.

 

[Bronzeage]

It's a fallacy on its face. "God doesn't exist if Jesus didn't exist" proposes that a previous event is dependent on a later event.

Actually, the argument doesn't posit events much less their chronological order, so your critique here is a straw man. Even if it did stipulate that a previous event is dependent on a later event, doing so isn't necessarily fallacious. It depends on what is meant by "is dependent." For example, if we know that we can only know that event A has happened if we observe a later event B, then our knowledge of event A "is dependent" on observing a later event B.

​

Jesus could be the Messiah, a charlatan, or just an ordinary man, who lived sometime before the calendar was rearranged in his memory.

Jesus could have been anything we can imagine, and that's what historians seem to say about him.

Whether he was any of these things or none of them, cannot determine whether or not God exists.

Which God are you referring to? If Jesus can be proved to have never existed, then I don't see how the Christian God can exist. Christians are safe, though: They've managed to squirrel Jesus away into a place and time we cannot completely check. If conclusive evidence for a claim is lacking, then make sure the claim is unfalsifiable.

There's no straw here. The statement is quite clear that the existence of God is predicated on the existence of a historical figure from the 1st century. As Jesus is specified, we can assume the God referenced is the God of Abraham, the Deity recognized by the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition.

The JCI God is distinguished by not only being eternal, but is also the Creator of Heaven and Earth. In a room full of Gods, he would be easy to pick out in the crowd. As He is eternal, with no beginning or end, By definition, His existence predates anything we have recorded in history. If it were possible to prove the person known as Jesus never existed, or did exist and never performed a miracle, or any other Messiah like thing, it would mean the Jesus we know is the result of a another mistake made by a human.

Again, by definition, the existence of an Omnipotent entity which is independent of space and time, is not going to determined by a human error.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

There's no straw here. The statement is quite clear that the existence of God is predicated on the existence of a historical figure from the 1st century.

True, but you're changing your argument here. Here's what you said earlier:

"God doesn't exist if Jesus didn't exist" proposes that a previous event is dependent on a later event.

The argument in question, if Jesus didn't exist, then God doesn't exist, states nothing about events. So to criticize the argument for what it allegedly said about one or more events is to criticize it for what it doesn't say, and therefore your criticism is a straw-man argument.

As Jesus is specified, we can assume the God referenced is the God of Abraham, the Deity recognized by the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition.

I'm not completely sure what God Ehrman is referring to. Since Ehrman is mentioning that atheists are supposedly making the argument that God doesn't exist because Jesus never existed, and most atheists don't believe in any God, then I suppose that Ehrman is referring to any God and not just the Bible God.

The JCI God is distinguished by not only being eternal, but is also the Creator of Heaven and Earth. In a room full of Gods, he would be easy to pick out in the crowd.

That long, white beard and baby angels floating around him would be a dead giveaway.

As He is eternal, with no beginning or end, By definition, His existence predates anything we have recorded in history.

Yes, but Christians say Jesus being God is coeternal with God. There is then no date of creation for either God or Jesus.

If it were possible to prove the person known as Jesus never existed, or did exist and never performed a miracle, or any other Messiah like thing, it would mean the Jesus we know is the result of a another mistake made by a human.

Either a mistake or a deliberate lie.

Again, by definition, the existence of an Omnipotent entity which is independent of space and time, is not going to determined by a human error.

That appears to be correct if God truly exists. But if a God's existence is based on the truth of a doctrine, and if that doctrine turns out to be false, then that God cannot exist. If we get back to the OP, only the existence of the Christian God (and evidently Allah) is jeopardized by the nonexistence of Jesus. So if Ehrman is right and atheists are asserting that Jesus didn't exist to disprove the existence of God, then the argument that God doesn't exist because Jesus never existed at most would disprove only the Christian God. It is then an insufficient argument to disprove the existence of any God.

 

[abaddon]

Bart Ehrman asserted that Jesus mythicism is a way that many atheists use to falsify the existence of God

Did he?

What's the exact quote? What video? What timestamp? Anyone who trusts your paraphrases is mistaken.

 

[TomC]

Bart Ehrman asserted that Jesus mythicism is a way that many atheists use to falsify the existence of God

Did he?

What's the exact quote? What video? What timestamp? Anyone who trusts your paraphrases is mistaken.

I still haven't figured out exactly what he means by "mythicism".

I used to think it meant that historical Jesus didn't exist at all. Jarhyn told me differently.

This entire conversation is rife with vague semantics.
Personally, I believe it most plausible that historical Jesus was a major figure in a tiny Judean drama. So tiny, there's no record of it happening.
Christ is a miracle working demigod who became a part of a Divine Trinity. I do not find that plausible at all. Christ is a mythical character.

But Jesus isn't.
Tom