The Jesus miracle stories are more credible than those of Perseus, Joseph Smith, etc. etc.
The single most plausible explanation of the existence of the "Jesus" myth is that the character evolved from a variety of sources with extraordinary details (miracles) added as the story grew over decades of retelling. The single most unlikely explanation for the existence of these stories is that everything happened exactly as described . . .
Then why aren't there several of these Jesus myths? Why aren't there other characters, other names, in other places, where the same story unfolds and we would have several of them instead of only this one?
I've named several already but will name some again:
Horus, Osirus, Perseus, Promethus, Mithras, Hercules, Bacchus.
Each of these epic hero-god myths was around for centuries before their stories were reheated with your favorite hero-god's name inserted in place of their names.
But these are not historical persons, or alleged historical persons, who reportedly did miracle acts. My claim is that the accounts we have of Jesus performing these acts is evidence (not proof) that he did these acts, which indicates that he had super-human power. And there are no other cases of such miracle-workers in history, i.e., actual historical persons, for whom we have evidence.
Perseus and Hercules were alleged historical persons. Demonstrate otherwise. Their stories were set on planet earth with actual locations.
OK, they were believed (by many) to be historical persons, and maybe they really were historical and the miracles were added later as they were mythologized.
More importantly, there is no written record of them any time near to when the believed miracle events happened. When the only accounts are something many centuries later, even more than 1000 years later, we should dismiss the miracle accounts as fiction.
Also, there is nothing in the Jesus miracle events which is based on these earlier pagan myths. We cannot explain where the Jesus miracle stories came from. They popped up too soon after his life for them to be attributed to the normal mythologizing process which we see with Perseus and Hercules and so on. Such myth-making requires centuries to develop, not just a few decades. The Jesus "myths" emerged within 30 or 40 years after he lived, which puts him in a totally different category than these pagan myth legends.
So there is no evidence that Horus, Osiris, etc. were historical persons who performed miracle acts. But there is evidence that Jesus had such power because of these reported acts that he did. That's how he differs from the gods you're citing. They are not analogous to him.
There is absolutely no evidence that Jesus was a historical person.
Of course there is. We have more evidence for him in history than we have for hundreds, even thousands of historical figures we take for granted. We believe historical persons existed because we have sources, documents, written accounts, attesting to their existence. This is the evidence we have for virtually ALL historical figures (prior to modern times).
Of course there are major figures like Caesar and Pericles and others for whom there is more evidence, more sources, but for most figures of history, who are not as prominent, there are far fewer sources, and there are many minor figures for whom there's only 1 or 2 sources. For Jesus we have more evidence than this, so that he was an historical person is more established in the record than for those minor figures who are taken for granted.
And also there are legendary figures for whom there is evidence, and they probably existed, like Zarathustra and King Arthur and William Tell and so on (for whom there is less evidence than we have for Jesus), and it's perfectly reasonable to believe they really existed, though there is some doubt. That there is doubt in some cases does not mean the historical figure did not really exist. More likely is that the person did exist as a real historical figure, but the emerging "legend" took on fictional elements in a gradual mythologizing process.
There is strong evidence that the miracle acts of Jesus were made up.
No, there's no such evidence at all. There are some difficulties with the gospel accounts, as with many historical documents, but no "evidence that the miracle acts of Jesus were made up."
Evidence that has been presented again and again, and which you continue to ignore. The evidence is, once again:
The earliest writings that talk of Jesus were the authentic Pauline epistles, in which Jesus was talked about in vague terms, never mentioning any act that he did, any place he visited or any time frame in which he supposedly lived.
That's true of many historical figures. That's no "evidence" that anything was "made up."
However, there is plenty in the Paul epistles to identify Jesus with the same figure as in the gospel accounts. That Paul omits biographical details in no way means the events did not happen, including the miracle acts. And Paul does mention the resurrection, which is the most important of all the Jesus miracles.
Paul names certain persons who saw Jesus after the resurrection, and these named persons are the same as mentioned in the gospel accounts. It's clear that Paul is speaking of a recent historical person, and, though he gives virtually nothing biographical, he says enough to identify his Christ person as the same figure who is presented in the gospel accounts.
He says things about Jesus which had to refer to a real person who lived recently in history. Such as referring to Jesus as the "brother" of James, and other points which clearly identify his Jesus as a real historical person.
For at least 30 (more like 40) years from the alleged time frame in question nobody wrote down anything that would make this figure an historical one.
You mean anything which has survived. There surely were other writings, but none that survived, as 99% of all documents did not survive. So, more correctly:
For at least 30 (more like 40) years from the alleged time frame in question [nothing written has survived] that would make this figure an historical one.
But that can be said of HUNDREDS or even thousands of historical persons prior to 1000 AD, persons who really existed and are recognized as historical persons, while the first written record of them doesn't appear until 50 or more years later.
But you have to change your number to 20-30 years, because Paul says many things that clearly assume Jesus was an historical person. An explicit reference is:
1 Corinthians 2:6-8
Yet among the mature we do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. But we speak God’s wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
It's clear in this text that Paul is speaking of someone crucified by recent earthly rulers. This was written about 56 AD, less than 30 years from the event.
And along with this there are even earlier writings by Paul identifying Jesus and the resurrection, making this a recent historical person, from about 20 years earlier.
But it's true that often an historical figure is not written about until 50 or even 100 years after he lived. This is not any indication that the person in question did not exist or that the reports are fictional, or that anything was "made up."
Every source for this "historical figure" was written anonymously by people who did not claim to be witnesses, nor did any of them claim to have talked to anyone who was a witness of any of this stuff.
Paul is a source, not anonymous, and he did claim to have talked to witnesses, who are named by him, i.e., James, Peter, John.
But also the gospel accounts are credible sources, and that they are "anonymous" and not from direct witnesses does not undermine their credibility, and it's nutty to call this "strong evidence that the miracle acts of Jesus were made up."
One might believe they were "made up" (based on the premise that ALL miracle stories must be made up), but there is no "evidence" that they were made up, rather only a premise that all such stories must have been made up. You have to stop confusing "evidence" with your dogmatic premise. You're entitled to your premise, but not "evidence" which is based only on your premise. For evidence you need some established facts, not just a dogmatic premise.
The life story that emerged once people did start claiming he had lived in recent history was suspiciously similar to the well-known myths about "Sons of Jupiter," . . .
No, there is nothing similar to any such myths. Many times these analogies have been made, but no example is ever given. No example can be cited showing any serious similarity between Jesus and the earlier myths. (Possible exception would be the birth/early childhood stories of Mt and Lk, which is all you can point to. Not anything relating to the miracle acts of Jesus.)
The only way to make this claim is to just say that ANY miracle story whatever is "similar" to the gospel account of Jesus. You could just as easily say there are similarities to the Chinese or Hindu or Mayan myths. Or any miracle myths no matter what. Just as you could say that Superman is similar to Zeus or Apollo etc. Or even a real figure like Davy Crockett or Ted Williams, after being mythologized, is similar to some ancient hero legend.
. . . so much so that Justin Martyr not only mentioned the similarities, . . .
No he did not. He never said there were similarities. Perhaps he thought in some sense that there was an analogy, but he did not say there were similarities, nor did he name any similarities.
. . . but apologized that "Satan must have known this was going to happen and planted these other stories to subvert the one true one when it did come out."
That's a very poor paraphrase of what he said. Rather, he said Satan invented the pagan stories and that these are fiction, whereas the miracles of Jesus were real historical events. He drew this contrast between them, never saying there was any similarity. It's possible he thought there was some point of comparing them, as if they were analogous, but he never draws any analogy or states any "similarity" to the pagan myths.
It is ludicrous to suggest that a quote like this is some kind of "strong evidence that the miracle acts of Jesus were made up." There is no such evidence. You reject these miracle accounts only because you have a premise that no such stories can possibly be true. Other than this dogmatic premise, you have no "evidence."
That some mythic symbols also became attached to Jesus is irrelevant. Why did they choose only Jesus to attach these symbols to? Where are the other reputed historical figures who became mythologized like he did? They could find only one figure to whom they could attach these symbols?
Even if the Jesus myth was the only one that ever followed this pattern it would not make the story more worthy of rational people believing the miracle claims happened.
Yes it does make the "Jesus myth" more credible, because there needs to be an explanation why they chose only this Jesus figure to make into a new miracle legend. There were many other would-be miracle figures who could just as easily have been mythologized this way. Why were no others similarly mythologized and made into a "messiah" or "savior" or copy of those pagan myths?
There has to be an answer to this, and a reasonable answer is that Jesus actually did perform these acts of power, so that the miracle reports are true, rather than fiction. And other such stories, of which we have little or no written account, and which were fiction, did not attract the same attention, and those alleged miracle-workers were
not mythologized because they did not have any such power and so were dismissed and not taken seriously. Or in other cases some hero figure did become mythologized and published, but only after a long process of storytelling which spanned many generations or centuries.
The charismatics who really had no power were dismissed simply because they were normal charlatans or hoaxes, whereas Jesus really had power and did perform those miracle acts. This answers why we have a written record of the Jesus miracles but little or no record of the other mythic miracle heroes.
What is a better answer to our question? The only reason to reject this answer is that you impose the dogmatic premise that there can be no miracle acts whatever -- period. Except for that dogmatic premise, the hypothesis that he really did have power is the best answer.
People believe miracle claims because they want to . . .
But why didn't they want to believe
all the other miracle claims? There were plenty other miracle pretenders and gurus and "savior" heroes to choose from. Why did people want to believe ONLY THE JESUS miracle claims?
. . . or out of ignorance and superstition, . . .
But why was their ignorance and superstition limited to ONLY THIS one miracle legend such that it was the only one that spread and became published in multiple documents, and not any others? There were easily hundreds of other gurus and mythic hero pretenders and "messiah" figures running around to feed on their ignorance and superstition, not only this one.
. . . not because there is any rational reason to believe them.
A better answer is that they believed in this case -- to the point of publishing a written record about him -- because
this time the miracle claims were more credible than the dozens or hundreds of other miracle claims, which were not credible.
This is a better explanation, because to just attribute it to superstition and ignorance, or to their
wanting to believe it, fails to answer why they did
not believe the other miracle claims, or why no one wrote anything down about all the other cases, if all the others were just as credible as the Jesus miracle claims.
The best explanation is the one which best answers the questions. The question is: Why did they publish written reports about the Jesus miracle claims and copy these reports into accounts to be preserved for the future, but they did not do the same for the hundreds of
other miracle claims or miracle-worker legends or heroes?
And the answer is: The Jesus miracle reports were more credible. This answers the critical question.
That is the exact reason I copied the Justin Martyr quote which you evidently didn't read (or comprehend). The quote doesn't imply that Jupiter was a man, it implies that Martyr was aware of many similar myths about Roman god-men who were "sons of Jupiter" whose story lines followed virtually identical paths to the one attributed to your favorite hero-god myth.
But there is no evidence that those gods did perform any miracle acts, and they were not even historical persons. The legends about them obviously evolved over many centuries and are not based on reports written during their lifetime (if they did live 1000 years earlier as real persons), and so there is no comparison between them and the historical Christ person of 29-30 AD. Nothing about them is any evidence that the Jesus accounts are untrue.
The evidence that these god-men were historical figures and performed marvelous acts is exactly as good as the evidence that your favorite god-man lived and performed marvelous acts.
No, there is no such evidence. The Jesus evidence is the several documents written about him from 30-70 years after the reputed events. There is no such evidence as this for the pagan myth heroes. Documents written this soon after the events are evidence. Much of our history is based on such evidence. But documents written 1000+ years after the alleged miracle event are not acceptable evidence that the event happened.
Towns in which Perseus and Hercules lived were mentioned in their stories.
You have to
name the locations and dates (APPROXIMATELY, not exactly). Cite the text which gives that information, just as we have the location and date of the Jesus events in the gospel accounts. We need to have some indication of when and where an historical figure lived in order to believe the reports.
But secondly, we also need to know the approximate date of the earliest known written record of this historical person. We know the gospel accounts are dated from about 65-100 AD. We need a written record of the historical person which is less than 1000 years after he lived. Or less than 500 years.
You do not have such documentation for Perseus and Hercules and the other myth heroes. Stop claiming there's evidence for them which is "exactly as good as the evidence" for the Jesus events. 1000 years after the alleged events happened is not "exactly as good" as 30-70 years after the events. When will you finally get serious?
People with whom they interacted were mentioned in these stories.
That helps, if those characters are established as real persons, such as John the Baptist is established as a real person, but you still have to establish where and when the events happened, and when the documents reporting them were written.
Hercules once held the sky on his shoulders, an absurd a claim as Jesus looking at all kingdoms of the earth from an exceedingly high mountain.
We have far more detail than this about the location and date of the Jesus events. Even if there is some metaphor in the gospel accounts, there are real events at real known locations happening at about 30 AD.
Perseus was able to use the cloak of Hades to run around in public completely invisible to everyone around him. He used the decapitated head of Medusa to rescue Andromeda in Phoenicia. He showed it to the Krakon, a horrid sea monster Poseidon had sent to devour Andromeda, which immediately turned the Krakon into stone. Later he stormed the castle of Polydectes in Seriphus in an attempt to rescue his mother from being forced to be a sex slave to Polydectes. Once he had gained entry to the castle he again used Medusa's head to turn Polydectes and his court into stone.
When did it happen, and when were the documents written which tell us about it? Did all this happen in "Phoenicia"? We have this kind of information about the historical Jesus, i.e., the approximate locations and dates.
Perseus and Andromeda had seven sons and two daughters and their descendants eventually became the Persians, growing into a mighty empire that conquered the Babylonians.
It sounds like the date of this had to be prior to 1000 BC.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perseus
The two main sources regarding the legendary life of Perseus—for he was an authentic historical figure to the Greeks— are Pausanias and the Bibliotheca, but from them we obtain mainly folk-etymology concerning the founding of Mycenae.
Bibliotheca is 100-200 AD, way too late. The name Pausanius is too common, but he has to be later than 500 BC.
Obviously there is no source for this that is any less than 500 years from the reputed events, and probably even 1000 years.
You need to stop horsing around with silly examples like this. Anyone with half a brain or more can see the difference between a reported historical person/event who is 1000 years earlier than any written record of him, and a figure for whom there are written records less than 100 years and even less than 50 years after the reported events.
When will you stop this horseplay and get serious?
You keep having to draw increasingly tiny circles around your favorite god-myth in an attempt to extricate it from the context in which it is found.
I've asked for the "context" many times and you cannot give it. There is nothing in the pagan myths that has any connection to the "Jesus myth" except in the same sense that you could connect Superman or Davy Crockett or William Tell to the pagan myths. Just because there is a miracle event or heroic deed, does not make it connected to those earlier myths. (Again, you can make a slight case for comparison of the birth/early childhood narratives to the pagan myths, but that's all.)
These arbitrary criteria you cite are truly irrelevant.
You mean, to determine whether a reported event really happened, it is "irrelevant" when the written reports were written? A source 2000 years later is just as reliable as a report 50 years later? You mean Shakespeare is just as reliable for the Julius Caesar events as Cicero or Tacitus is?
It doesn't matter whether the stories found themselves in written form within 50 years of when they allegedly happened or 100 years, 500 years or 1000 years.
At this point, you are conceding something: For anyone who disagrees with you here and who believes that Cicero is more reliable for Julius Caesar than Shakespeare -- such a person does have reason to believe the Jesus miracle stories are more credible than those of Perseus.
So, are you conceding that we have more evidence for the Jesus miracles than we have for the Perseus miracles, assuming that
a source 50 years later is more credible than a source 1000 years later?
The only reason you are saying the Perseus stories are just as credible is that you also believe that
Shakespeare's account of Caesar is just as reliable as Cicero's. The separation of time from the events to the reports of it are
IRRELEVANT according to you. You are entitled to believe this if you insist. But don't you recognize that there are many people who do think that the closer proximity of time does make the written account more credible?
And for those who do think this time span is relevant, it is clear that the Jesus miracle stories are more credible than the Perseus miracle stories.
Truth is we have no way to determine when the Perseus story was first written down, . . .
No no no no no no no -- Don't try to pull a fast one! -- you're not being asked for the
very first written account of Perseus, but rather, for the
first one that has survived and which we have available to us today.
We also don't know when the first Jesus account was written. This isn't what we rely on. We have written documents now in museums, and these are what we rely on. And we have these for Perseus. And you know that the earliest we have is many centuries, probably more than 1000 years, later than the actual events. And that's why we do not believe the Perseus miracle events.
. . . but we have many written variants of it extending back hundreds of years before your favorite god-myth was ever thought about.
Of course, because the actual events go back probably 2000 years. And you believe those accounts are just as credible as ones written within 100 or 50 years, just as you believe Shakespeare is just as credible as Cicero for the events about Caesar. But for those who believe the time distance does matter for judging the credibility, the credibility of the gospel accounts is greater for the miracles of Jesus than any accounts we have for the miracles of Perseus.
(to be continued)
