Yes, the evidence is that Jesus did the miracle acts -- Get used to it!
If Jesus did not do the miracle acts, then there's no explanation why the Gospel accounts were written. Or the Paul epistles.
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Here are a few candidate explanations for Mark's motives, ranked in decreasing order of probability:
1. Mark's gospel is wholesale fabrication.
You need to explain why the author fabricated these miracle stories, if you claim to give his motivation. There's no other written account narrating fabricated miracles and written less than 100 years after the reported events which it fabricates. It's not normal to write anything like this -- there's no other case.
Even though there are some miracles in the ancient literature, there is nothing reporting page-after-page miracle acts of a recent historical person (less than 100 years earlier than the written account).
In the literature before 100 (90) AD, claims of RECENT miracle events are virtually nonexistent. I.e., there are claims only of ancient miracles, the ancient myths and gods/heroes. Extremely rare exceptions might be a prophecy or portent or vision someone had, e.g., in Herodotus or Josephus. But nothing like lepers being instantly cured, or a resurrection from the dead.
What motivated Mark to invent an instant miracle-worker unlike anything previous?
And we have a total of 4 (5) sources for the Jesus miracles, for which there is nothing else comparable. So to explain Mark's "motivation" you need to explain what was so different in this case, or what was the extra motivating force which drove the author, and also the other Gospel writers, to record these alleged miracles, if they were fiction like all the others.
You could cite the isolated Vespasian miracle healing as a similar case, reported in 2 sources, but those don't appear until after 100 AD and so are part of a pattern we see in the literature at that time, where miracle claims start appearing, indicating a new motive of some writers to start fabricating miracle stories,
after the gospels were written. But the earlier Mark miracle claims were unprecedented at the time they were recorded. So your top most probable explanation is one requiring a unique event unprecedented up to that point in history. Also, the Vespasian story is about one miracle event only, while Mark presents at least 30 different miracle acts by one person.
This is a very strange group of documents -- the 4 gospels -- reporting a parade of 2 or 3 dozen miracle acts by one person, performed in a short time space, harmonizing on many details, but also with discrepancies (showing non-collaboration between them), giving a time frame of only a few decades earlier when it happened, as an historical event. There is absolutely nothing like this in all the ancient literature. It's a radical extreme outburst of reported miracles having no resemblance to anything earlier. You have to account for this in your explanation of "Mark's motives."
The closest thing resembling it would be the Elijah/Elisha stories, but these are from one source only, and they appeared almost 300 years after the reported events and so could easily be explained as caused by mythologizing, and not a report of some recent miracle-worker event in history.
It's not true that miracle stories were
routinely fabricated by writers, especially before 100 AD. When we see miracle claims appearing, presumably fabricated, they fit a recognizable pattern.
Clue that miracle claims are fabrication
examples:
Vespasian, Joseph Smith (for the 20th time), Asclepius, etc.
The examples we see of reported miracle-workers fit a pattern showing that they are typically COPIES of earlier tradition, in which case the stories can easily be explained as fiction.
In these 3 examples (and many others), where a miracle is reported, or many miracles, there is one factor they all share which explains why they were easily believed and perhaps published: All of them are based on an ancient miracle healing tradition, devoted to an ancient healing deity, already believed in popularly in the culture, by millions (or tens of millions) of worshipers/believers. The reported miracle healing stories are always performed in the name of the ancient healing deity, and in accordance with the ancient rituals.
In cases like these -- e.g., Vespasian, Joseph Smith, Asclepius -- the believers are already devout worshipers of the specific ancient healer-deity in whose name the healing rituals are practiced, and there are current priests or prophets or cult leaders who administer the rituals, healing a disciple who is already an ardent believer in the ancient god. In the case of Vespasian, the believers who reportedly were healed came to him in the name of the ancient healing god Serapis, who they were convinced would heal them if only the emperor would perform the ancient rites prescribed by this god.
So it's this faith in a particular established ancient miracle tradition, already entrenched, firmly embedded in the minds of the believers, including the victim to be healed, which produces the fiction story of a miracle taking place.
Fabrications don't just happen randomly without explanation or cause. You have to look for the causal factors, such as the long time period, centuries, in which mythologizing takes place, but also the
already-existing traditions which shape the current miracle event. Also the celebrity status of the miracle-worker, his charisma, published reputation, long-term psychological impact on his disciples.
What makes the Jesus case different is that these explanations do not apply. He had no wide recognized status at the time (far less than Joseph Smith during his life, e.g.), and he did not promote an ancient healing ritual tradition, worshiping an ancient healing deity in whose name he performed his miracle healing acts. In the absence of these factors, the best explanation in this case is that the reported miracle acts must have really happened. Whereas in other reported cases of miracle claims we can see these factors producing the fictional healing stories which were believed by followers because they were influenced by the miracle-worker's charisma and by the ancient religious traditions he practiced and which they already believed.
He wanted to popularize the Jesus cult around a flesh-and-blood messiah (perhaps Paul's Jesus), . . .
What? "popularize"? What's the motive?
WHICH "Jesus cult"? There were MANY Jesus cults, or communities. You're calling Paul's Jesus a "flesh-and-blood messiah"? Or you're saying Paul's Jesus is the one Mark wanted to "popularize"? Whatever you mean, it makes no sense.
Why would anyone choose a particular cult to "popularize"? Why this particular cult rather than another?
Why did no one earlier ever want to "popularize" a miracle-worker cult? or turn a "messiah" cult into a miracle-worker cult? Why out of nowhere does a writer pop up with a peculiar desire to "popularize" a "messiah" cult which was no different than hundreds or thousands of such cults earlier which no educated people ever believed in or had any desire to "popularize"?
It was not a practice of anyone ever to "popularize" any such cult, of which there were many and all of which were ridiculed by writers, by the elitists and the commoners, by the educated class as well as uneducated average people, and rejected in favor of the ancient religious traditions which were popularly believed.
You might be saying Mark was disappointed in "Paul's Jesus" because he was not a "flesh-and-blood" messiah such as Mark preferred, so he took this Jesus and turned him into a "flesh-and-blood" messiah, but that makes no sense, as Paul's messiah was
already a flesh-and-blood messiah, as is clear in Paul, even though he concentrates 99% on the later Risen Christ rather than the biographical Jesus.
Mark's Jesus vs. Paul's Jesus: 2 different versions of the same person
Paul omits everything about the earthly Jesus except the very end, the night of the arrest, and the death and resurrection. Of course Mark wanted to add more, i.e., the earlier biographical part, and Matthew and Luke even more still. If this is all you mean -- that the Gospel writers wanted to add the biographical element to Paul's Jesus -- then it's a normal expansion of the earlier accounts. It's even possible they added some fictional elements along with the factual part, because they had limited information.
This would be like the later writer Tacitus adding further information to the earlier accounts about Julius Caesar, which were lacking so much in biographical matter. Like the earlier Cicero references to Caesar which leave out so much.
That Mark fills in earlier details omitted by Paul does not mean everything earlier has to be fiction. We can't explain Mark's motive unless it was a real person he "wanted to popularize," and then in adding the earlier detail we can assume the normal mixture of fact and fiction, as with virtually all the ancient accounts of people and events.
None of this explains anything about Mark's motives, if it's a fictional miracle-worker he creates. Rather, your explanation makes sense if the Jesus miracle-worker he presents was a real person, who did those acts, and Mark wants to fill in important details about the earthly Jesus which Paul omitted. Yes, then you're on the right track.
But if Mark's miracles are fiction added to a non-miracle-worker "messiah" figure, then you can't explain why Mark would choose this unlikely Jesus figure to popularize. To EXPLAIN Mark's motives you have to identify what was special about his "messiah" Jesus person, distinguishing him from all the other "messiah" upstarts, of which there were many running around, having a similar following at the time. This is another unprecedented event -- that a writer popularizes a "messiah" figure, when all such figures were disdained by any writers who wrote anything about them. There's no other case of a document which wants to popularize such a "messiah" figure, other than perhaps the Roman emperor or similar powerful high-profile celebrity of the time, which Jesus was not.
. . . so he deliberately made up these stories to reach out to the masses.
"reach out to the masses"? That's nonsensical, especially in the 1st century.
There's no other case of anyone making up such stories in order to reach out to the masses, unless it was about the ancient gods/heroes and their miracle deeds. The masses did not believe in such stories about some upstart "messiah" charlatan doing miracles. The charlatans existed but had no appeal to anyone other than a tiny minority of nutcases which no writer wanted to "reach out to" with stories made up for them. You can't name any other case of such a thing.
This is highest in your "order of probability"? Why can't you come of with an "explanation" which has any resemblance to reality, to actual cases in real history, instead of goofy scenarios of something dissimilar to anything else which had ever happened before?
2. Mark heard some miracle stories (no sources cited) . . .
Not giving sources is the norm, for 99% of the ancient writings. The mainline professional historians sometimes gave sources for a claim, for which we can admire them. But we can't toss out the vast majority of the ancient writings just because they failed this standard for the elitist historical writers. And even in the mainline history writings we're not provided with the sources for most of the reported facts.
. . . and used that as an inspiration for writing his gospel.
That makes sense, assuming he believed the stories and thought they were important for people to know about, unlike fiction stories which were not noteworthy. He must have been struck by the stories, thinking they were different than other similar claims of miracles which were routinely rejected by both the masses and by the educated elite and never recorded in writing.
This explanation has some merit, assuming Mark believed the stories, but you have to include
WHY Mark believed them while not believing all the other dozens or hundreds of miracle stories floating around but not worth recording.
What made these Jesus miracle claims different than all the others? If they were not different, but just more of the same fiction, then you've not explained why they were recorded and no others were.
3. Mark heard some miracle stories (no sources cited), was convinced these accounts were true, and wrote up the stories just as he had heard them.
But why was he convinced these accounts were true, if they were just as fictional as all the others? Why would he choose only the Jesus miracle stories to believe and write up instead of any others?
Even assuming (3) to be true, there is no case to assert that the miracle stories are probably true, given the background information cited previously.
If they're not true, then there's no explanation why Mark believed them and disbelieved all the others. Your "background information" gives no explanation why Mark believed the Jesus miracle stories if they were not true.
People of the time were gullible . . .
No they were not, compared to other times.
. . . were gullible and believed all sorts of nonsense claims (and people still do).
No, they rejected miracle claims of any charlatans popping up here or there claiming to do miracles. You can't name any other miracle-worker who was believed, other than by a tiny group of wacko followers. The charlatans were rejected by the masses as well as by the educated elite, who did not record their miracle claims.
But educated writers did record the Jesus miracle stories, going against the general pattern which was to reject such claims or ignore them.
The "all sorts of nonsense claims" of miracles became a fad only after 90-100 AD, not before. The period when Jesus appeared in history was one where the people were the most NON-believing and NON-gullible with regard to miracle claims. There's virtually NO miracle claims you can name which caught on in the period of about 200 BC up to 90-100 AD (other than Jesus in the Gospels). Of all time periods, this one had the
fewest believers in miracle claims. And virtually all the earlier miracle claims required centuries of mythologizing in order to evolve in the popular culture.
But here's the last nail in the coffin. Even . . .
What happened to the earlier nails? I think you missed them and hammered your finger instead.
. . . in the coffin. Even if Mark were supported by the sworn testimony of a dozen named eyewitnesses, and we had good reason to believe that the testimony was sincere, there are still other explanations for the reports that do not require the laws of nature to be broken, which make them more probable.
No, they're not more probable if they're not reported in any accounts saying they happened. If no other similar miracle events happened or are reported (especially in written accounts of the time when the events allegedly happened), and no such "explanations" are reported in this case, then it's LESS probable, not more. I.e., you can't pronounce something as "more probable" if it's something which never happened before.
Magicians routinely trick audiences of hundreds of people into believing all manner of impossible things;
Not "all manner" -- There's much they cannot trick them into believing, and they don't even try. All the illusionists are limited to a narrow range of miracle possibilities they can trick the audience into believing. They choose what crazy scenario to show the audience, from among the possibilities, greatly restricting the "impossible things" which they can successfully perform.
. . . that may be one candidate.
"candidate explanations for Mark's motives"?
You're not saying the author of Mark was a magician, are you? So what magician are you claiming was trying to trick someone? and what does that have to do with Mark's motive?
There have always been magicians who perform impressive tricks, but no cases of audiences "routinely" tricked by a magician into believing someone was
instantly healed of blindness or leprosy or that
a dead person resurrected. And there are no writers motivated to report any such scenarios in order to "popularize" anything or create a "flesh-and-blood" version of someone's abstract "messiah" vision. Your explanations are delusions having no connection to anything which has ever happened. There are no magicians meeting your description, nor any writers having any motivation such as you're imagining.
So let's forget the magicians, also Mark's motivation, which you obviously cannot explain, and instead assume you're drawing analogies to some modern evangelists who perform healing "miracles" before live audiences.
Miracle healings before live audiences, televangelists, etc.
As explained earlier, those who believe these miracles are disciples of the evangelist and worshipers of the same Christ tradition the evangelist practices, dating back centuries. In addition to believing the Christ miracles of about 30 AD, for which there is evidence, they want that miracle power to be shown to them live, now, before their eyes, as a present experience for them, just like the Asclepius worshipers 3 or 4 centuries before Christ. This wish can easily explain their readiness to believe the claims that real miracle healings took place when the evangelist prayed in the name of Jesus.
Healers of this kind always have to invoke the name of the ancient healing deity which the audience already believes in. And this explains their success in winning over some believers. The evangelist or priest or prophet who performs the healing usually does some act or ritual popularly established within the culture, as part of the performance to impress the audience of believers.
No such explanation can apply to Jesus in 30 AD who was not practicing any recognized religious ritual or tradition established in the popular culture, or invoking an ancient healing deity. This kind of religious practice is the only phenomenon, in ancient times or modern, having any resemblance to a magician performing before an audience and creating the illusion of a miracle healing, or of raising the dead to life.
Everyone in the audience would swear that the magician had teleported across the room, or that a pretty young woman had been sawed in half, but we know those were merely cleverly designed illusions.
There are explanations how these tricks are done. Here's a teleportation video with the explanation how it's done:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22BFbGjdkHw
But where are the demonstrations or explanations on healing blindness and leprosy? Where are the videos showing how it's done, and the audiences who witnessed it and "swear that the magician" healed the victim? Or where is the demonstration of a person killed and then returning to life?
Your assertion that the claims are probably true is ridiculous. You have not met your burden.
The "burden" is met by the fact of the extra sources we have for the Jesus miracles, which evidence is lacking in other cases of miracle claims.
You could say the "burden" is not met for much/most of our recorded history which we believe. The evidence is sometimes from one source only, even an anonymous source in some cases, and yet the claims are probably true. Some claims are contradicted by other claims and yet are probably true anyway, because the evidence is heavier on one side than the other, like the evidence for the Jesus miracles which are not contradicted by any other source. We don't know if the source is reliable or how to "authenticate" or "assess the historicity" of the source in many cases, and yet this does not falsify the claimed historical facts. It depends on how much doubt there is, how much evidence there is, e.g, how many sources, etc.
For miracle claims we need extra sources rather than only one, and we need sources near to the time of the alleged event. It's because we don't have such evidence that most ancient miracle claims have to be rejected. It's not that all miracle claims per se are automatically rejected -- but rather, it's that we need the extra evidence for such claims and virtually all of them are lacking such evidence.
For modern miracle claims we need extra evidence also, including an additional quantity of published evidence to outweigh the published sources which deny the claims. I.e., positive (affirming) published sources minus negative published sources = total net evidence for any claim.
Higher standard of evidence for modern claims vs. the 1st century
And to take into account the extremely vast increase of publishing today (vastly greater publishing industry) in comparison to that of the 1st century, we need enough evidence -- for modern claims -- for it to constitute a significant percent of the total of all that's published. E.g., if the Gospel accounts comprise .001% of the total of everything published in the 1st century, then miracle claims 1000 or 2000 years later must also comprise about .001% of the total of everything published in their time (i.e., in the 9th or 10th or 18th or 19th or 20th centuries), in order to be comparable to the quantity of evidence we have for the Jesus miracle acts.
(It is nonsensical to compare the sources/evidence for modern miracle claims vs. that for the 1st century and yet fail to take into account the vastly greater degree of publishing in modern times = vastly more "sources" for virtually any wacko cult claim, in the mass media, the Internet, etc.)
E.g., for
Joseph Smith we would need at least 20 or 30 sources reporting his miracle acts, to be a legitimate comparison to Jesus in the 1st century when virtually nothing was published. And yet there are really only 2 or 3 sources reporting a J. Smith miracle, and they are laughable, such as they are (which is why no one will ever quote any of them here). Had he lived in the 1st century and done everything the same, he would have been totally unreported in any writings -- completely ignored, forgotten without a trace.
And to add irony to your attempts at making up shit, you are skeptical of every other miracle claim out other than your preferred claim, . . .
All the miracle claims, including that of Jesus in the Gospels, have to be judged by the same standards. I.e., all ancient claims have to be included and compared, along with all modern claims. You can't single out one ancient claim and compare it only to some modern claims for which there is a vastly greater publishing industry providing an infinity of sources.
I've noted some other miracle claims and explained why we should disbelieve them. I've mentioned the
Vespasian miracle story and why we can easily attribute that to normal mythologizing. And others, like the
Apollonius of Tyana stories, which don't appear in a written account until 150 years later than the alleged events, and also which are found in one source only. And similarly the Jewish miracle-workers
Honi the Circle-Drawer and
Hanina Ben Dosa, of that period. These are comparable miracle claims which are sometimes mentioned and are lacking in evidence, such as the need for more than one source and the need for something near to the time the alleged miracle event happened.
I've considered the
Asclepius miracle claims, which are similar to healing miracle claims throughout all cultures based on ancient folk religious tradition, in which the ancient healing gods are credited with healing sickness as a result of religious rituals and prayers offered for the sick. In such practices the local priests or prophets do the ancient rituals and prayers and sometimes a sick person recovers, and so the gods are given credit for the healing, and in some cases they imagine something sensational/miraculous.
"every other miracle claim" out there?
Give examples (or at least one) so we can look at them one-by-one to consider what the evidence is in each case. And not just a laundry list of names you copy-and-paste from your debunker guru, but a serious example accompanied by the ancient written text describing the alleged miracle which happened. You cannot automatically assume that ALL the claims are equally lacking evidence and credibility. You must be willing to consider each case individually instead of just pretending that ALL miracle claims are equal and must be fiction only because that's your ideological bias taught to you by your Jesus-debunker guru pundit.
So there are reasons to discount the miracle claims when they are a result of the widespread devotion to an ancient miracle tradition, which is different than the Jesus miracle acts which were not part of any ancient religious healing rituals or prayers offered in the name of the ancient healing god. The ancient tradition explains why people sometimes believed these claims of messiah cult leaders or reports of healings by priests in the temples. And without the ancient traditions established in the popular mind, the normal response was to disbelieve miracle claims from a charlatan instant miracle-worker "messiah" or magician using some kind of trickery.
"preferred claim" -- It's appropriate to prefer a claim for which there is the extra evidence, i.e., Jesus in the Gospels, which cannot be explained as ordinary mythologizing and religious tradition established in the popular culture.
. . . your preferred claim, which points to considerable bias on your part.
What's wrong with "bias" in favor of a claim for which there's extra evidence? The extra evidence for the Jesus miracle acts is very conspicuous, making this case stand far apart from all the other reported miracle claims.
Yes, you fail to give an example for which there's evidence for comparison to that of Jesus in the Gospels. All you can do is toss out phrases like "every other miracle claim" as if there are others for which there is evidence, and yet you never give the examples and the evidence, such as written accounts from the time saying those miracles happened.
All you can do is copy-and-paste a list of "miracle messiahs" from the ancient world, without ever citing the ancient text which documents them. You keep insisting there are others for which there's evidence, but can't come up with any evidence or documentation, other than to quote your 21st-century guru-debunker propaganda pope as your infallible source which is never to be questioned.
Fail!
