Historical Jesus

[lpetrich]

If there is some controversy over the big J's historicity, then maybe it's time to get rid of the A.D. counting system and make it more contemporary. Personally, I'd be fine with counting time based on the years since Otis Redding's birth...or Janis Joplin's. Those people we have high school yearbooks and videos and cd's for. Right now we're in the year 62 A.O. (Anno Otisia) or 60 A.J. (Anno Janisia). However, I take back this concept if the honor goes to Billy Ray Cyrus, Ted Nugent, Whitney Houston, or Barbra Streisand.

More suitable Latinized versions, working from Anno Domini, "In the Year of the Lord", and using these lords and ladies:

Anno Otissi, Reddingi
Anno Janissae, Joplinae
Anno Guillermi, Cyri
Anno Theodori, Nugenti
Anno Vitniae, Houstonae
Anno Barbarae, Streisandae

I think it was Asimov who suggested a calendar based on the nuclear age, with the first nuclear weapons detonation(s) as the epoch, separating time into the pre-nuclear and nuclear ages.

That's what I'd mentioned earlier, the proposal of an Anthropocene Epoch. BTW, something of that sort of calendar is in use among researchers into Holocene prehistory: Before Present (BP), where "Present" is defined as 1950 CE.

 

[lpetrich]

As to the epoch date, when to start a calendar, there are a variety of choices. Ours is from someone's calculation of when Jesus Christ was born, something that is now recognized as somewhat off. JC was described as being born in the reign of King Herod the Great, and that monarch was later shown to have died in 4 BCE, a bit too early.

 Epoch - "In chronology and periodization, an epoch or reference epoch is an instant in time chosen as the origin of a particular calendar era." -  Calendar era -  Anno Mundi ("In the Year of the World", dating from some calculated date of creation") -  Regnal year (year in the reign of some leader)

Regnal years were the first calendar-year system, used for a long time in many places. Regnal years for some present-day leaders: Biden 3, Charles III 2, Macron 7, Scholz 3, Putin 25, Xi Jinping 12, Naruhito 5, Modi 5, ...

So it's not surprising that alternatives were eventually invented.

One of them is the creation of the Universe, and if one works from the Bible, one has a problem. There are two main versions of the Old Testament that have survived to the present: the Masoretic Hebrew version and the Septuagint Greek translation. The Jewish calendar is based on the Masoretic version and starts from 3761 BCE, and the Byzantine calendar the Septuagint version and starts from 5509 BCE.

There are lesser events that have often been used as epoch references.

Ab urbe condita ("From the founding of the city") is dating from the founding of Rome, calculated by Marcus Terentius Varro to be 753 BCE (our calendar).

The Seleucid Era, used in the Middle East for a long time, dates from when one of Alexander the Great's successors, General Seleucus I Nicator, captured Babylon, in 312 BCE.

In Greece, a common system was dating by Olympiads, four-year periods starting from the first recorded Olympic Games, in 776 BCE.

More recently, the French revolutionaries used the founding of their nation's First Republic, in 1792 CE.

Most recently, the Holocene calendar involves adding 10,000 to our calendar dates, making its epoch about 300 years before the beginning of the Holocene Epoch as currently defined, the end of the Younger Dryas cold period. Thus, this year is 12,023 HE.

 

[bilby]

the beginning of the Holocene Epoch

An epoch is a point in time. It has a duration of zero, and so has no beginning (or end). The Holocene Epoch is the point when the Holocene Era begins.

 

[lpetrich]

 Geologic time scale - in geological timekeeping, an epoch is a division of time, not some time-reference event.

We live in the last one of each of these in my list.

• Eon: Hadean, Archean, Proterozoic, Phanerozoic
• Era: Paleozoic, Mesozoic, Cenozoic
• Period: Paleogene, Neogene, Quaternary
• Epoch: Pleistocene, Holocene
• Age: Greenlandian, Northgrippian, Meghalayan

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Jesus Who?

The crucifixion is one of the very few facts of Jesus' life that can be inferred with near-certainty. And crucifixion had to be ordered by the Roman governor.

Near certainty.

But he wouldn't have ordered it unless the Temple priests had brought Jesus before him and persuaded him to give this order, or persuaded him that Jesus was a serious threat to be eliminated by whatever means.

Suppose Jesus had been a small time leader in some Jewish underground group of the day. Judea was rife with them.

One of the group turned Jesus in for bounty money. His disciples all know about this. Jesus winds up in front of Pontius Pilate, accused of being a messiah. King of the Jews. Anointed by God.

That would be nothing unusual. There were many other similar "small time" leaders, and many were arrested and executed. It happened hundreds (even thousands) of times throughout the Roman Empire, and also in many previous empires.

At that point, Jesus had a choice to make. He knew it and so did His followers...

He could keep His mouth shut and almost certainly have a short and ugly life.
OR
He could start telling Pilate about other people. Give Pilate names and descriptions and whereabouts of other, more criminal, miscreants. Maybe Simon Peter, or James, or anyone. He might have gotten a less severe sentence. He could have "Done unto others as Others have done unto Him". He might have walked away free with some bounty money of His own. But He didn't do that.
He chose the first one. He deliberately chose an incredible self sacrifice for His buddies. Torture and crucifixion, but only for Himself.

That made Him a Hero!

There were easily thousands of such heroes. Tens of thousands if you include all the empires and oppressive rulers/kings/tyrants where there were heroes, freedom-fighters, resistance movements, and those who bravely stood up to the oppressors and suffered torture and martyrdom in various ways.

And these who sacrificed themselves became greatly revered by their followers or patriots who kept alive their memory. Certainly Spartacus, e.g., would be a more high-profile case of such heroism, and for each Spartacus there were a dozen similar but lower-profile hero martyrs like Jesus. John the Baptizer and James the Just are 2 similar cases, though they also were higher-profile cases than Jesus.

If all the dime-a-dozen heroes of antiquity similar to Jesus had been made into miracle-working resurrected gods, like Jesus became, we'd have at least 100 (1000) Christianities today, each with its miracle-worker hero savior martyr, each with their Gospels and epistles preserved through the centuries. And there'd be no "Christian Church" today, but instead hundreds of small religious communities with each promoting its particular Savior with his separate historical and geographical identity. And these would possibly go to war with each other, each claiming to be the one exclusive true Savior-God for all. Or maybe these would get together into an Ecumenical movement to try to hammer out a common doctrine taught by all their respective Savior-deities.

Obviously such a hero-martyr drama cannot explain the origin of the Jesus legend emerging out of the 1st century. He must have done something more than only die a hero's death.

When no Roman soldiers came out arresting His friends and compadres, they all knew the sacrifice Jesus had made for them. They started referring to themselves as "Brothers of Christ", Christ meaning Jesus the Messiah. No praise was too high. No legend too flattering.

And the Legend began.

There were easily hundreds of such heroes and legends, including ones more dramatic than the Jesus legend.

What we need is an explanation how the miracle healing stories got started, and how this one hero martyr alone was turned into a resurrected miracle-worker deity and Savior-Messiah who got published in written accounts of the time, even though his example of bravery was less dramatic than many others. This one did not stand apart from hundreds of other heroes, even thousands, before and after that time.

But, what if Jesus didn't actually die on the cross?

What if half the events in our history books never really happened?

Open your history book to a random page, put your finger randomly somewhere on that page, and ask: What if this event described here did not actually happen?

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Maybe the events of history never really happened.
"Sounds plausible."

Yet another possible scenario. It is endless.

Sounds plausible.

Suppose Jesus didn't die on the cross. Suppose He were sentenced to death by crucifixion, but dodged somehow.

The Romans were brutal, organized, and efficient. They were nevertheless human.

Suppose Jesus' biological father, Pantera, pulled some strings and got his boy off with a lashing?
Suppose Jesus's compadres pulled together enough money to bribe some prison guards into crucifying someone else?
Suppose Jesus would up on the cross. But before He was dead Mary Magdalene took the Roman guard for a romp behind the bushes while Jesus's compatriots got Him down from the cross?

Regardless of how Jesus escaped death on the cross, He would remain a criminal under sentence of death, by Pilate. He would remain wanted for His entire life. Anybody could turn Him in again. He could be summarily executed, along with anyone He happened to be with at the time. He was a dangerous man.

Maybe He figured out a way to stay in Judea incognito. Maybe He left Judea completely. But people saying "I thought Jesus was dead. I saw Jesus weeks later! What gives?" would explain why some folks would invent a Resurrection.

Better than saying "We bribed some Roman guards."
If you valued your life.

If it could happen, it would have happened many times, and we'd have hundreds of "Gospel" accounts of similar resurrections.

What if Jesus acquired an android / cyborg body to replace him when the soldiers took him, and he traded places with this duplicate. "Sounds plausible."

No matter what the "What if" is, if such a thing could happen, it would have happened many other times, and not just this one time, in the case of Jesus only. Unless you assume Jesus had a special connection to this "what if" possibility, so that it would happen only in his case and not any others, you have to assume it would happen in hundreds or thousands other cases also. But if so, we'd have "Gospel" accounts describing this "what if" happening in all those other cases.

You don't resolve the question of what happened by only tossing out "what if this" or "what if that" etc. These "what ifs" require something additional, which is a certain acceptance of the written accounts of the time which say this or that is what happened. When you choose to reject the written accounts of the time, you have essentially abandoned any serious pretense of caring what happened.

It would be more honest to just say, "It doesn't matter what happened. It would be better to ignore this topic."

 

[Swammerdami]

If all the dime-a-dozen heroes of antiquity similar to Jesus had been made into miracle-working resurrected gods, like Jesus became, we'd have at least 100 (1000) Christianities today, each with its miracle-worker hero savior martyr, each with their Gospels and epistles preserved through the centuries. And there'd be no "Christian Church" today, but instead hundreds of small religious communities with each promoting its particular Savior with his separate historical and geographical identity. And these would possibly go to war with each other, each claiming to be one exclusive true Savior-God for all. Or maybe these would get together into an Ecumenical movement to try to hammer out a common doctrine taught by all their respective Savior-deities.

Wrong. You're missing a key point: Clustering I don't know the right search terms for this, so just offer examples.

The Andromeda galaxy has about a trillion stars. The Milky Way galaxy is smaller but still has hundreds of billions of stars. In between are hardly any stars at all; and what few rogue stars there are there, were mostly in a galaxy previously but expelled.

Does this mean our Galaxy was founded by a special miracle-working black hole? No. It's just the way gravitational attraction plays out mathematically.

Here's another example: When I learned Bridge 55 years ago, there were many popular bidding systems just in North America: Goren's Standard American, Western Standard American, Kaplan-Sheinwold, Roth-Stone, Schenken Club, Precision Club. The systems each had their adherents, and their particular strengths and weaknesses. My partner and I even dabbled with more exotic systems like the Neapolitan Blue Team Club.

After a long hiatus, I've taken up bridge again, on-line. Almost everyone at the biggest site plays the same system now -- SAYC., almost identical to the Western Standard American we played 50 years ago. Momentum. Strength in numbers. Clustering.

As a final third example, consider the political situations in England before and after 1066. Before 1066, Danes and Anglo-Saxons spoke different languages and kept a distance from each other. After Normans invaded in 1066, these groups quickly united ("My enemy's enemy is my friend.") This unity was NOT caused by some special miracle-worker. It was simply an example of a natural tendency to cluster.

Now ...
Suppose we have a town with two small religions, very similar to each other. (Let's say one worships John Baptist, the other John's disciple Jesus Nazarene.) Each has 20 adherents; neither has enough money to build a chapel. Which is more likely? (a) the two congregations merge, getting enough funds to build a chapel; or (b) the Jesus faction splits in half, disagreeing over whether Jesus' girlfriend was Mary or Martha.

Obviously such a hero-martyr drama cannot explain the origin of the Jesus legend emerging out of the 1st century. He must have done something more than only die a hero's death.

The Eastern Mediterranean world, and Jewry more specifically, were ripe for a new religion. This was especially aggravated by political and religious conflicts in Judaea and came to a head with the destruction of Jerusalem. People were ready to rally around the best hero-martyr they could come up with.

It's interesting to speculate about why they picked Jesus of Nazareth rather than some other hero-martyr, but it should not be a surprise that they soon settled on a single one. Momentum. Strength in numbers. Clustering.

There were easily hundreds of such heroes and legends, including ones more dramatic than the Jesus legend.

Do you have an example of someone "more dramatic" than the Nazarene from roughly the same time and place as Jesus? -- the time and place ripe for a new religion? (The one name that comes to my mind is James the Just, probably Jesus' natural brother).

What we need is an explanation how the miracle healing stories got started, and how this one hero martyr alone was turned into a resurrected miracle-worker deity and Savior-Messiah who got published in written accounts of the time, even though his example of bravery was less dramatic than many others. This one did not stand apart from hundreds of other heroes, even thousands, before and after that time.

The salvation myth, and techniques of personal conversion were key to Christianity's origin. Once a religion starts gaining momentum, embellishing its hero's biography with miracle myths is common.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Explanation: Jesus did the miracle acts. Mystery solved.

If all the dime-a-dozen heroes of antiquity similar to Jesus had been made into miracle-working resurrected gods, like Jesus became, we'd have at least 100 (1000) Christianities today, each with its miracle-worker hero savior martyr, each with their Gospels and epistles preserved through the centuries. And there'd be no "Christian Church" today, but instead hundreds of small religious communities with each promoting its particular Savior with his separate historical and geographical identity. And these would possibly go to war with each other, each claiming to be one exclusive true Savior-God for all. Or maybe these would get together into an Ecumenical movement to try to hammer out a common doctrine taught by all their respective Savior-deities.

Wrong. You're missing a key point: Clustering I don't know the right search terms for this, so just offer examples.

The Andromeda galaxy has about a trillion stars. The Milky Way galaxy is smaller but still has hundreds of billions of stars. In between are hardly any stars at all; and what few rogue stars there are there, were mostly in a galaxy previously but expelled.

Does this mean our Galaxy was founded by a special miracle-working black hole? No. It's just the way gravitational attraction plays out mathematically.

Maybe you're right, basically. That is, perhaps after 1900 years all those Savior-cults would have gotten together, or there would have been shifting of believers this way and that so that the number of these cults would have decreased, finally down to one which wins out, and so we end up with something like "Christianity" today, united around one Jesus person, one historical figure, adopted by all of them. And you could say this uniting "clustering" process might have got finished off in the 4th century, with Constantine.

But this doesn't fit what has happened with Christianity, because the "unitedness" here, the "clustering" around one Savior-Person-historical figure, had already happened by about 100 AD. There is no chance that the Savior-Person-historical figure could ever have been anyone other than the Galilean Jesus of about 30 AD. There's no way someone like John the Baptizer or James the Just or Rabbi Hillel or any other prophet/rabbi could have been chosen (in the clustering process) to be this miracle-worker Messiah figure for whom the fictional miracle stories could have been added. These could not be added to the Messiah-elect until after he was chosen, could they?

If the election of Jesus to this role (the others getting eliminated in the clustering competition ("playoffs"?)) took place sometime in the 2nd or 3rd centuries, then the writings (sources we rely on for the evidence) would be happening prior to the clustering activity which whittles them down to one only -- which is the reverse order that is required: The order has to be -- 1) the clustering elimination process which reduces the Messiah-Savior candidates down from many to only one, and then 2) the creation of the evidence-sources-writings as fictions to show that this Chosen One must be the only one, or the True One to the exclusion of the others.

My last "maybe these would get together" point above, would be some kind of "clustering" phenomenon that would have happened, given several centuries. But not over a period of only 50 years or so. In the 1st century there were no other choices for a single miracle-worker figure to get shaped into the literature as this one-only miracle-worker which could be chosen, from among many. There were no others.


Was it the Council of Nicaea which selected Jesus to be the Messiah?
from a list of Messiah candidates?

The Jesus miracle-worker was in the written record, in multiple accounts, by about 60 or 70 or 80 AD, and no other such person is to be found (who could be a CANDIDATE for the Messiah role). If there was some kind of need for all the believers (Messiah-seekers) to "cluster" around one person, in the 1st century, that choice had to be the Jesus miracle-worker of 30 AD, whose resurrection is reported no later than about 50-55 AD, by Paul, and there was no other reported resurrected person. So there were not all those other candidates.

Would you be making a mistake similar to that of Keith&Co. a few years ago? -- He thought that the Council of Nicea was convened partly to decide who the "Messiah" or Savior would be, and there were some other candidates, with John the Baptist being one. And the Council was like a Political Party Convention of delegates choosing a Messiah-Savior from among these candidates, and it was a tight race between Jesus and John, with a floor fight between the delegates for Jesus and the delegates for John -- and there was almost a brawl between the John delegates and the Jesus delegates, and the Nicaea police were called in to break it up (I'm adding a little embellishment).

But in the real world there was no such contest between these, or between Jesus and any other candidates. The popularity of Jesus in 100 or 200 AD was still very low. If an election was to take place to choose by vote who would be made the Savior-hero-Messiah leader, someone other than Jesus probably would have won. Maybe by 300 or so, Jesus would win the plurality (but not majority) of votes.

But the real selection process, the events and evidence, which made Jesus stand apart as singular, was all over by 100 AD, or 70 or so. Because all our sources naming him as this Savior-hero were written or being written by then, or were fixed in place to be used by those Gospel writers -- there could not possibly have emerged any other name of someone contending to win this contest who would have crossed the finish line ahead of Jesus in this contest, like a "dark horse" coming out of nowhere. All the writings certifying Jesus as having this unique position/office were fixed in place, being written or about to be written based on the original written or oral sources.

Here's another example: When I learned Bridge 55 years ago, there were many popular bidding systems just in North America: Goren's Standard American, Western Standard American, Kaplan-Sheinwold, Roth-Stone, Schenken Club, Precision Club. The systems each had their adherents, and their particular strengths and weaknesses. My partner and I even dabbled with more exotic systems like the Neapolitan Blue Team Club.

After a long hiatus, I've taken up bridge again, on-line. Almost everyone at the biggest site plays the same system now -- SAYC., almost identical to the Western Standard American we played 50 years ago. Momentum. Strength in numbers. Clustering.

And your theory is that any of the original systems could have eventually emerged as "the one" united system for all, to which everyone would finally gravitate over a period, and it was by chance that SAYC came to be that one -- through this clustering process.

Maybe there were causal factors which caused this one to prevail, and with enough information, details, on how the process played out, one could figure out what caused this one to win out over the others. Or, maybe it's impossible to figure it out, no matter how much information one has.

But this cannot be cited as the explanation in all cases when one "competitor" wins out over others. You could name the many competitors, in your example above. But can you name who the "Messiah-Savior" competitors were in about 30 or 40 or 50 AD, who were other candidates in addition to the Jesus "Messiah-Savior" competitor? Let's say you put the name James the Just into the competition and suggest that it's just random chance that Jesus somehow beat out James in the competition -- or there's no way to identify any reason he should lose out. Somehow he got beat out by Jesus, by random chance.

A big problem with this is that during this time -- 30-60 AD -- James the Just probably had a wider reputation than Jesus, had more disciples, more status, more recognition. As did John the Baptist and also many others. The Rabbis Hillel and Shammai also were more widely known. And other rabbis too, also the militant rebels like Judas the Galilean and other militants, some of whom died as martyrs, even were crucified.

How did Jesus end up being the only one recognized as a miracle-worker resurrected Messiah-Martyr-Savior, by about 150-200 AD? When did the "clustering" take place?

The problem you have is that in the years when the written record for Jesus was in formation, from 50-70-80 AD, he was not the leader in the competition, among the candidates listed or offered to the Messiah-Savior seekers. These crusaders had other candidates/leaders who were more widely recognized than Jesus, during that period.

Of course it's impossible to know for sure what the numbers were, but at least one scholarly source, Robert Eisenman, documents extensively how James the Just was much more widely respected and revered than Jesus was. Probably also John the Baptist, who had attracted large crowds and is documented by Josephus and appears to have out-performed Jesus throughout the 1st century in popularity. This competition for followers, between Jesus-believers and John-believers, explains why the Gospels say so much about John and have to keep giving arguments and pronouncements that Jesus is superior to John.

As a final third example, consider the political situations in England before and after 1066. Before 1066, Danes and Anglo-Saxons spoke different languages and kept a distance from each other. After Normans invaded in 1066, these groups quickly united ("My enemy's enemy is my friend.") This unity was NOT caused by some special miracle-worker. It was simply an example of a natural tendency to cluster.

OK, but I don't think this "cluster" theory can explain why there's only one documented miracle-worker Resurrected Savior-Messiah Martyr figure emerging in the 1st century. Your two last examples involved humans making choices, even if there was some random-chance process going on which resulted in a united "clustering" outcome -- or a "winner" prevailing over the others, winning in the competition. It still required humans making choices during the time, in which their choices ended up causing some "winner" to prevail around whom those religious Messiah-seekers united.

But there were no "voters" making any choices like this in the period of 50-100 AD. Or if there was such voting, then whatever "clustering" election going on would have chosen someone other than Jesus, who was far from being the most popular in the '80s or '90s. Even by 100 AD there was no "winner" in this competition between Savior-Messiah candidates. Christianity was still a very small % of the population, less than 1% by the end of the 1st century. There was no kind of a "triumphant" Church or Christianity by this time. And yet, the facts which make Jesus stand out as unique, the evidence that he did the miracle acts/Resurrection, is all fixed in place, in the written accounts, by this time.

It's not the popularity polls or the membership numbers in the different religions by 100 AD which make Jesus stand out as a uniquely-recognized miracle-worker at this time. There's not yet any New Testament canon, and the documents giving the facts about him don't yet have any official recognition or status. What does exist are the written accounts, the sources. I.e., the facts in them are fixed in place by this time and are being copied and circulated, or about to be circulated. No choices by anyone are deciding at this time which of the Savior-Messiah candidates is going to win out. The outcome, the "winner" of this competition between the candidates, is already fixed in place. It got fixed in place decades earlier, in the 60s or 70s or thereabouts. Or even earlier by 30 AD when the actual Jesus events happened.

There was not some elite Council somewhere taking a vote on who to choose to fill the Messiah-Savior vacancy needing an occupant. There was no choice being made by anyone, because there were facts already in place, having happened decades earlier, which decided that this Jesus person of about 30 AD is going to be, or already is, the desired miracle-worker figure around whom the new Savior-religion would unite, to the exclusion of all the other possible candidates.

Now...
Suppose we have a town with two small religions, very similar to each other. (Let's say one worships John Baptist, the other John's disciple Jesus Nazarene.) Each has 20 adherents; neither has enough money to build a chapel. Which is more likely? (a) the two congregations merge, getting enough funds to build a chapel; or (b) the Jesus faction splits in half, disagreeing over whether Jesus' girlfriend was Mary or Martha.

When is this choice taking place?

If it happens around 50 AD, they choose John the Baptizer, because he's more popular, has a much larger following. So they merge and worship John as the Messiah. It's not a toss-up at all. And yet it's Jesus in 30 AD who ends up being reported in multiple written accounts as the resurrected miracle Messiah-Savior, even though he's less popular and lost that vote.

So it could be true that John could have ended up being more popular and even could have become the central figure in a new Baptizer-John religion which would take over the world. But even so, the written accounts say it was Jesus who did miracles and resurrected, and not John. That new John cult/religion could not have changed the facts of the period 30-60 AD which were already being recorded.

Obviously such a hero-martyr drama cannot explain the origin of the Jesus legend emerging out of the 1st century. He must have done something more than only die a hero's death.

The Eastern Mediterranean world, and Jewry more specifically, were ripe for a new religion. This was especially aggravated by political and religious conflicts in Judaea and came to a head with the destruction of Jerusalem.

There's no reason this couldn't be said of other countries also -- Persia, Egypt, Phoenicia, Carthage, Greece, Gaul, Asia Minor (Phrygia, Lydia, Galatia), Sicily. Many countries had been aggravated by such conflicts and had suffered more than Jews had. There's no special reason why a unique miracle "Messiah" should appear in Judea or Galilee rather than these other places. Or why similar messianic wonder-workers couldn't appear there also, so there'd be more than only one reported case of this.

People were ready to rally around the best hero-martyr they could come up with.

It's interesting to speculate about why they picked Jesus of Nazareth rather than some other hero-martyr, but it . . .

No, it's very obvious why. It's that he did the miracle acts and resurrected back to life after he was killed. They didn't want only a hero-martyr, but one who had shown miracle power. And the Jesus of 30 AD is the only one who did this, based on the evidence from the written record.

. . . but it should not be a surprise that they soon settled on a single one. Momentum. Strength in numbers. Clustering.

Then they should not have settled on Jesus. In the first century he had less momentum and lower numbers than several others who were more well-known. What happened is that there was a written record, plus oral reports, saying that Jesus had done those miracle acts, which was not the case for any of the others. E.g., James the Just and John the Baptist, both more popular than Jesus, in 40-50-60 AD, had no record of performing any miracle acts, though they were more popular. But over time their popularity gradually declined, because there was no reason anyone should believe they were special. But the "Good News" about the power Jesus demonstrated, to heal the physical afflictions, plus that he had risen back to life after being killed, had an impact and gradually the believers kept increasing in numbers -- because these reports about Jesus gave hope for the possibility of eternal life.

There were easily hundreds of such heroes and legends, including ones more dramatic than the Jesus legend.

Do you have an example of someone "more dramatic" than the Nazarene from roughly the same . . .

What I meant by "more dramatic" was more aggressive and charismatic, and even more brave or self-sacrificing, suffering as a martyr. There were many of these. The militant military rebels like Judas the Galilean, e.g. They put their lives on the line, made extravagant promises of doing some grand wonder and bringing God's wrath down upon the enemy, and then went out to battle the Romans and got their butt kicked. Certainly some of these drew more followers than Jesus, who did nothing spectacular except to heal the blind and the lepers, etc., but did not impress the apocalyptic warrior crusaders who wanted to kill Romans.

. . . from roughly the same time and place as Jesus? -- the time and place ripe for a new religion?

Why assume Galilee in particular was the time and place ripe for a new religion? Why not Greece or Egypt or Asia Minor or Persia or Babylonia etc.? How about France (Gaul) which was putting up with the Roman Yoke pressing down on its neck just as much as Judea or Galilee?

In Judea there were several rabbis who were more popular than Jesus. As was John the B. and James the J. There were many they could have chosen to be their Messiah-Savior, but the difference is that none of them had performed miracle acts, as Jesus did.

(The one name that comes to my mind is James the Just, probably Jesus' natural brother).

Yes, he was a better choice, by all accounts. So, why didn't he get chosen as the Messiah? The answer is that he did not do any miracle acts. There's no other reason that makes any sense. If the people wanted someone brave, pious, popular, charismatic, etc. James the Just meets all those requirements better than Jesus did. So, obviously that's not what people wanted, in the long run. They wanted someone who had power, such as power to heal -- and thus, hopefully, power that could produce eternal life -- so in the long run the status of Jesus increased, because he had this distinction, while all the others were only religious gurus, or (in the case of the militants) they showed military talent to do battle against the Evil Empire.

What we need is an explanation how the miracle healing stories got started, and how this one hero martyr alone was turned into a resurrected miracle-worker deity and Savior-Messiah who got published in written accounts of the time, even though his example of bravery was less dramatic than many others. This one did not stand apart from hundreds of other heroes, even thousands, before and after that time.

(clarification: he did not stand apart other than the reports of his miracle acts, which distinguished Jesus from all the other hero-martyr figures.)

The salvation myth, and techniques of personal conversion were key to Christianity's origin. Once a religion starts gaining momentum, embellishing its hero's biography with miracle myths is common.

No it's not. Unless you mean over many centuries. It required centuries for the various miracle myths of the miracle heroes to evolve. Those heroes did not get embellished with miracle myths except after centuries of legend-building.

Unless you mean a powerful widely-famous hero like Alexander the Great. In that kind of hero myth it's possible for some miracle beliefs to emerge early, even during the hero's life. But not anyone who isn't widely famous, as Jesus was not famous in the 1st century. There are no cases of any miracle heroes emerging in the culture in less than 200 years, other than a famous king or emperor or warrior-general hero worshiped by millions during his lifetime.

 

[Swammerdami]

I think you are wrong on several points:

• The "clustering" process was several dozens of times faster than the 1900 years you mention. I focused on the example of a single town coalescing on a single martyr-hero before building a chapel. This takes place during months, not centuries.
• John Baptist and James Just were themselves closely affiliated with the Christian movement. (James Just was apparently Jesus' natural brother!) You imply there were many "messiahs" to choose from, but besides these two you mention Hillel the Elder, born decades before Jesus and who was NOT martyred. But even if you came up with one other good example, so what? Either Jesus or George(!) could have been the single "messiah." Call it a coin-toss if you wish.
• You misunderstood my point about Judaea's uniqueness. It was monotheistic. Jews were deeply religious and narratives like the Exodus and Captivity gave them a unique world-view, and perhaps sense of persecution. This led to a vicious cycle in their interactions with Roman authorities. Conditions there were ripe for a new religion for reasons simply not applicable elsewhere.

But why did Simon Peter's hero become the special messiah rather than "George"? As I've implied before, I think the early Christians' (hypnotic?) technique of personal conversion may have been a key.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Why was Jesus elected to be the "Messiah"?
Why not John the Baptist? or others more widely recognized, more widely revered than Jesus was?

I think you are wrong on several points:

• The "clustering" process [the process by which a particular historical person was chosen to be the "Messiah-Savior" to suffer martyrdom] was several dozens of times faster than the 1900 years you mention. I focused on the example of a single town coalescing on a single martyr-hero before building a chapel. This takes place during months, not centuries.

And in that example, the answer is that the town would have chosen the John martyr-hero rather than Jesus, because John had much wider recognition at that time than Jesus had. That would not have been a coin-toss. For something random, a coin-toss, you have to give a different example. What is your hypothetical need-for-a-chapel example supposed to prove? When those choices had to be made, it was John who won, and the John cult/religion kept expanding as the Jesus cult(s) declined, as a result of that "clustering" process. So then, what point does this prove? According to your theory, the Jesus movement slowly died out and was replaced by the John movement, as a result of this "clustering" process where the stronger faction wins over the weaker faction.

You didn't answer at what time period this choice was to be made, of the two cults choosing to combine their resources and decide whose "Messiah" to adopt as the true one. Your example is meaningless unless you say when this is happening. 40 AD, 70 AD, 100 AD, 150 AD etc.

• John Baptist and James Just were themselves closely affiliated with the Christian movement. (James Just was apparently Jesus' natural brother!) You imply there were many "messiahs" to choose from, but besides these two you mention Hillel the Elder, born decades before Jesus and who was NOT martyred. But even if you came up with one other good example, so what? Either Jesus or George(!) could have been the single "messiah." Call it a coin-toss if you wish.

There were probably dozens of others, even completely missing from any mention in any written record of the time. What reason is there to believe Jesus was any more important than a hundred others? a thousand? What was more important about him? He was less popular than others, less able to do anything military, like the charlatans mentioned by Josephus (and 1 or 2 dozen others not mentioned by him), and especially less revered as a teacher than a large number of rabbis along with James J. and John B (and probably a few other forgotten prophets). There was also the sage Hanina ben Doza, to whom miracle stories were attributed 300 years later in the Talmud.

Basically what you're saying is that Jesus did nothing noteworthy at that time, and there's no explanation why we today know anything about him at all (except that he got chosen sort of by lot to serve the "Messiah" function), or why anyone 100 years later would know anything about him since he should have been forgotten just like 99.99% of all humans end up totally forgotten, never recorded. But, you're saying, he got snagged by accident in a lottery of candidates for "Messiah" which would pick one out of several hundred or thousand candidates for this role.

I have identified several times what he did that caused him to stand out as unique and thus why later generations learned of him, ongoing, all the way up to us today. But you're saying he did nothing that distinguished him from all the others, and yet such undistinguished persons might get snagged up in some kind of political-religious "revolution" and swept to deity status, for no apparent reason except that people needed someone for a symbol of some kind, and then the person chosen for this gets martyred.

By your explanation, Jesus was maybe a 1-in-10 or 1-in- 20 unusual type. He was mostly chosen to be "Messiah" by some random chance, singled out from millions of others in history to become a resurrected miracle Savior Messiah which status could have been given to any of millions of others who were just as noteworthy as he was (but didn't win the Messiah lottery).

So you're saying that if John B. or James J. had been randomly chosen for this role, today we'd have 4 Gospels of John or James, miracles attributed to him in those writings, and these would tell a "trial" of this hero-martyr-Messiah and condemnation and execution, followed by Resurrection and a "Church" carried on by his disciples and later followers.


John Christ rather than Jesus Christ -- a random choice

You're saying there would be a Resurrection story of John B. if he had been chosen to be the Messiah, and this story would have been recorded in writings 20 years after his death.

You understand that the conflict between the John disciples and Jesus disciples was going on for many decades, even up to the time the Gospels were written, 70-80-90 AD. But you're saying that by 50 AD there would have been a wide Resurrection of John story circulating, found in the existing writings.

Also the miracle healing stories are before Mark, probably, because they're in the Q source, assuming it existed and was quoted by Mt and Lk. Probably this goes back to about the same time as Paul, maybe as early as 50 AD.

So your theory has the "clustering" process happening and being completed by 50 AD. Maybe in the '40s.

Can you name any other reputed miracle-worker in antiquity, whose record of miracle acts was in circulation, published in written account(s), 20 years or less from when he lived? 30 years? 40 years? Of course you cannot -- there's no such other case.

• You misunderstood my point about Judaea's uniqueness. It was monotheistic.

There were other monotheistic religions, depending on how you define it. There were plenty of Jews, maybe most of them in 500 BC, who believed their Jerusalem-centered god was the most powerful of all the gods competing with their god who could beat those others.

And there were many Egyptian and Persian monotheists. They may not have been the majority of Egyptians and Persians in 500 BC, but the offshoots from Akhenaten and from Zoroaster were proliferating, increasing in number through this period. It's not proved that Jews were the first monotheists -- and even if they were theoretically first, there were effectively others of about the same time. And these cultures also were dominated by the Romans or others trying to impose an alien culture upon them, and had just as much incentive to create a "new religion" of some kind.

Even many early Christians believed their god was the most powerful of the gods, having power to outdo the other gods, as was proved by the Resurrection. Belief in demons and Satan was essentially the same as polytheism, or competing gods, and the Father of Jesus was more powerful than the others.

The terms "monotheism" and "polytheism" did not exist back then, were not found in the writings, including Bible, and it's not clear that they understood this distinction as we understand it today.

Persian King Cyrus, who is termed "Messiah" by Isaiah 45:1, issued an edict for Jews to go to Jerusalem to rebuild their Temple --
Ezra 1:2-4:

. . . and He hath charged me to build Him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whosoever there is among you of all His people--his God be with him--let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of the LORD, the God of Israel, He is the God who is in Jerusalem.

That last sentence "He is the God who is in Jerusalem" -- did not have a capital "G" but rather a small "g" -- "He is the god who is in Jerusalem."

This sentence is censored out by some Christian bibles, but it's there in the Hebrew Bible. It was written by Jewish "monotheists" (maybe Ezra) sometime after 500 BC. It refers to "the god who is in Jerusalem" as opposed to the god in Athens or in Damascus or in Persepolis or in Samaria or in Babylon or in Nineveh, etc.

It's a mistake to think Judaism was a uniquely monotheistic religion essentially distinct from all the other religions. Most pagan religions thought their god was superior to all the other gods in the other nations.

• Jews were deeply religious and narratives like the Exodus and Captivity gave them a unique world-view, and perhaps sense of persecution.

Other cultures had similar traditions, and also felt persecution from the other nations in power over them, and prayed to their gods to protect them from the aliens threatening them. Other nations also suffered "captivity" to the oppressive empires, but they didn't leave many writings about it. There's nothing about Israel's persecution which made it uniquely on the verge of creating a "new religion" with a miracle-working resurrected Messiah-Savior person.

Of course there are unique elements within any culture which might lead to some new phenomenon in history. So these theories cannot be disproved. If all the Jesus events had instead happened in Egypt or Asia Minor, similar theories would emerge to explain how that region had evolved in a special way to prepare it for such a "new religion" or "revolution" etc. Such intellectual activity gives scholars and clerics something to do to keep them out of mischief.

• This led to a vicious cycle in their interactions with Roman authorities. Conditions there were ripe for a new religion for reasons simply not applicable elsewhere.

There have always been conditions ripe for a new religion, in most cultures, each having its own unique conditions they think make them exceptional -- Plus also other reactionary conditions in opposition and trying to suppress anything new. The Jewish culture distinguished itself by producing more writings than average.

But why did Simon Peter's hero become the special messiah rather than "George"? As I've implied before, I think the early Christians' (hypnotic?) technique of personal conversion may have been a key.

That sounds like something they borrowed from the Mystery Cults of the period. The "personal conversion" technique did not produce instant miracle-worker "Messiah" figures in the other religions.

And you think they could just as easily have chosen George? and then recorded all the miracle acts and got these published, copied, circulated -- all by 20 or 30 years after the hero got martyred. And then instead of "Messiah Jesus" today, it would be "Messiah George" to whom Handel's Messiah would be performed today.

There were easily thousands of ("George") martyrs to choose from -- no shortage of these. And you're saying they could just as easily have chosen any one of those thousands, at random, and agreed to make him the "Messiah" and could have gotten those stories circulated and believed by hundreds (at first) and later by thousands.

And how many other times has such an instant miracle-worker been created? Can you name another case in antiquity of an instant miracle-worker = ordinary historical human who did virtually nothing noteworthy (nothing you can name) turned into a miracle-worker published in writings by 20 or 30 or 40 years after he got martyred? or 60 or 80 or 100 years after?

In a later Wall of Text I'll take this up again.

 

[Swammerdami]

In a later Wall of Text I'll take this up again.

I do NOT like to read long Walls of Text (though I'm afraid my own posts also get long).

I stand by the points I tried to make. I do not want to go around and around in circles repeating them.

 

[bilby]

Why was Jesus elected to be the "Messiah"?

He wasn't. He never appeared on any ballot.

 

[TomC]

Why was Jesus elected to be the "Messiah"?
Why not John the Baptist? or others more widely recognized, more widely revered than Jesus was?

That's easy.
Because there was nobody like Paul the Evangelist to spread a garbled and paganized version of the JtB story and message into the wider pagan world of the Roman Empire. So, whatever was left of the JtB Movement got toasted by the Romans when they trashed Judea.
Tom

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Origin of the Resurrection Story
and other Jesus miracles

What got it started?
The straightforward answer is that those events simply happened, and then it was told to others, it was passed on orally, then written down. Like other events of history.

But that's no fun. Can't we find a sexier answer than that?

How did the Resurrection story get started?
("if Jesus did NOT do the miracle acts")

There are many possible scenarios one could imagine:

Back when I was a devout Christian, I was often in prayer vigils. People gathered around, kneeling or even prostrate on the ground. If what we were praying for was especially worrisome, like the terminal illness of a beloved friend, then the prayers were all the more passionate and heartfelt.

On more than one occasion, someone -- call him Bob -- would pipe up, "He's here! I can feel the presence of Jesus in this very room!" Bob would certainly sound certain, and would look sincere. He wasn't the type of person to lie or embellish anything. He honestly and truly believed that Jesus was standing in the middle of our group, . . .

No he did not truly believe that. He did not believe Jesus was there in the same sense that he believed the others present were there. He knew the difference, and everyone there knew the difference, just as the Jesus disciples knew the difference 2000 years ago when they saw the real person Jesus appearing to them alive vs. only reflecting on him other times when he was not there.

A "feeling" like this is not how beliefs or events, or reported events, get started. To say someone is really there is not the same as to say you "feel" a (recently deceased) person's presence there who's not there physically. There's not some confusion of these which results in later published reports of people, like the worshipers in that room, having witnessed someone who died and literally returning to life and being present physically, in the sense of really seeing or feeling his body the same as experiencing the others there who really are physically present.

You can't name any known example of this confusion of reality with Bob's "feel the presence" allegory or metaphor. You don't know any real example of such confusion where someone in a group spoke in such metaphor and others there took it to be real and physical and then this led to a widely believed falsehood outside that group. You don't know of any such real case recently or historically, nothing you directly experienced or learned indirectly from others. And, to pretend such a thing did happen only once in history, 2000 years ago, only demonstrates the frustration of modern debunkers who want fervently to refute the Resurrection but can't find any facts/evidence to argue the case for this.

No such confusion of reality with metaphor explains what caused the disciples to believe Jesus had resurrected, claiming they saw him physically there. What they saw was the same person they had known from their earlier experience, physically present just as he had been seen physically by them earlier before he was killed. That has no similarity to one person in the group hallucinating or "feeling" something they express by means of allegory.

. . . in the middle of our group, and he would go to his grave with the firm conviction that . . .

Something's fundamentally wrong with this analogy, or would-be analogy. To correct this from being a false analogy, we have to clean it up. It can't be "Jesus" whose presence is felt (in the story about "Bob" having a feeling), because "Jesus" denotes a famous historical figure from many centuries previous to this meeting, whereas "Peter" (in the earlier story) is talking about someone directly known to the members of the group, in their own time. These two meetings, about 2000 years separate in time, are not analogous to each other. Just because there's a "Jesus" character mentioned in each case does not mean there's anything comparable between these two meetings or the "Jesus" mentioned in the two cases.

To clean up this analogy, let's at least change these names:

[Bob] would pipe up, "He's here! I can feel the presence of Joe Doakes in this very room!" Bob would certainly . . . etc.

Or let's just say "Joe" is his name. Or we could call him "crusader Joe" = noteworthy character of that group (but of no importance outside that small group). This is a recent member of the group who got killed/martyred. Perhaps it was at a protest rally of some kind, like a civil rights demonstration in the 1960s, or an antiwar rally -- except that it's more like the protests in the Middle East where many protesters get killed as the norm (so it's analogous to the case of "Jesus" getting killed back in 30 AD). So this "Joe" who's being remembered is not anyone special who stood out as distinct from others in the society. I.e., in this analogy you have to keep in mind that "Joe" is not a special person (outside that group) other than just another martyr, like dozens of others, being remembered by this dissident group of which he had been a member.

To make it analogous to the disciples 2000 years ago, the analogy cannot be about someone feeling Jesus present "standing in the middle of our group," but about feeling a recent-time or current member of the group, Joe, who was recently killed or martyred. Possibly he had been a "leader" of this small group, who is missed, and now the group is meeting and remembering him. So the story continues:

. . . the firm conviction that Joe was alive and with us. Certainly none of us could argue with him -- we wanted Joe to be with us there as much as he did, and if Bob believed it then who are we to disagree?

Maybe not "disagree," but everyone there disbelieved his claim as being literally true (which he did not intend anyway), and with no need to express disagreement -- no one believed Joe ("Jesus") was present physically, but only in some poetic sense. Even if others present tried to have the same feeling and succeeded in "feeling" Joe's presence themselves, that's still not believing it literally so that someone would report to others that this recent friend of the group was really there and experienced as alive the same as the participants were there physically.

No one believed this was a literal/physical presence of that one who had been killed, not even "Bob" who expressed this feeling to the others, and none would report it to others outside the group as real, or say to others that Joe showed up or write an account of it as a real event for later generations to read about, as if it was real or important for the future to know of it.

Nor did anyone 2000 years ago, e.g., the disciples, report any such "feeling" a Jesus mystical presence as being a real presence. Rather they reported someone really present, the same person they had known from the earlier time, making a real physical appearance, as the accounts describe. They all saw him physically present just as they had seen him earlier before he was killed, not the same as someone in the group having a "feeling" that others didn't have. To claim otherwise is to reject the evidence, i.e., the written accounts, and substitute your creativity as the source for determining the facts of history, i.e., of this 1st-century event of the disciples in a group and seeing Jesus physically there.


"Visions" of someone who is or is not there

Some "visions" are real: We can acknowledge reported cases of a group of worshipers seeing something real -- like Catholics having a vision of the Virgin Mary in the distance -- and in those cases which actually are documented the explanation is that a real person was seen, probably a woman dressed in a blue gown, who appeared in the distance. Like an Elvis sighting, where it's not just a "feeling," but a real presence of an Elvis impersonator.

As long as several witnesses do report seeing something as a group and they describe it the same, independently of each other, then they probably saw something really there which met that description. But this could not be the case of a nearby encounter with someone they knew from before and recognized (unlike that crowd of Catholic worshipers seeing "the Virgin Mary" in the far distance rather than close by where they'd be able to distinguish and recognize her individual features) and heard speaking to them, only a few feet away from them. From such a close proximity to someone they had known before, they'd be able to identify the one they're seeing (connecting this to their memory, to the one remembered from earlier) .

Just because the ones having the vision claimed it was an ancient saint doesn't change the fact that they really saw a person of that description actually there in the distance without recognizing her personal features. There are no examples of such visions or mystical encounters which show similarity to what the disciples saw. E.g., there's no evidence in the sources of a Jesus impersonator wearing a Jesus costume and posing for the disciples.

So, we can't simply say people reportedly have "visions" of whatever and so we can't understand someone reporting they saw something -- it's more complicated, but we can understand it. And we do understand it (though maybe sometimes it's more fun to pretend we don't). In some cases they saw something real, and in other cases they're just speaking allegory, and we know the difference.

(Hmm, I thought to myself, maybe if I was a more devout Christian I could sense the presence of Joe too. I'll just play along for now so that the others don't question my faith.)

Even if something like this happens so that you humor "Bob" having his "feeling," that doesn't mean any of you report to the outside community-at-large that such a real person was physically there and was seen by everyone present, or that he would have been seen by an outsider who might enter the room, as Jesus would have been seen by an outsider entering the room 2000 years ago. I.e., one does not invent, with their mystical feeling, a new event or reported historical fact of that envisioned person being physically there who really was not there but was only the mystical feeling someone had.

Facts or recorded events do not get created this way (a "feeling" someone had) in the written record of the time, even if it seems someone believed it. The truth is that they really did not believe it in that sense and no one really reports this as something to be taken as a generally-recognized fact or event that really happened and was witnessed by whoever was present. There's no evidence that the appearance of Jesus after the crucifixion was in some category of a mystical experience which got confused with something real or a real physical appearance the same as the others there were physically present, i.e., the same as the ones there who saw him were physically present.


Give us a real example of such a thing.

If history (reported event) can get spun this way, by someone having a feeling which then infected others, it's necessary to have a REAL example of it. If it's really possible for a non-physical non-real appearance to morph into a real or physical appearance, i.e., to get reported or written into the recorded accounts of the time as a real appearance or a real event (but which actually did not happen), then we need to consider a real (non-hypothetical) example of this that has been corroborated, or verified, through investigation. It's not clear that any such thing has actually happened, ever, in modern or in ancient times.

We must have examples of both kinds of events -- 1) the real physical events, which really happened and are known to not be illusion (like the moon landing really happened); and 2) the unreal ones which only appeared to happen because someone had a "feeling" of something that wasn't really there, i.e., was not experienced by any others present, but then spread somehow and got falsely reported as having happened. Then we can compare these two different kinds of reported events and determine which category a certain disputed case goes into -- i.e., which category the Jesus reported appearance goes into.


real vs. unreal -- testing an "appearance" claim

There has to be a way to distinguish such a non-real event which got recorded (though usually such an "event" is NOT recorded) from the real events which got recorded. Which means we need a real example of this which is confirmed. If there is no example of it (unreal appearance reported as real), then saying such a thing might have happened suggests that ALL events might be unreal, ALL history only something hallucinated by someone in the past -- i.e., it's possible there have never been ANY real physical and literal events which have happened (or never any that we know happened, or none which goes into the known history category because whatever example one offers might be only a "feeling" someone had) -- so all history possibly originates only from a "feeling" someone had, or any history you want to debunk -- and thus:

the Universal Historical-Event-Debunker Argument
sure to work every time! without fail!!

Name any historical event you don't like --- here is the ultimate refutation of it, full-proof, guaranteed or your money back!


But, if we assume most reported events are real
what then? we must distinguish the real from the non-real.

Theoretically there could be such non-real events which got recorded in contrast to the real events (which are most of the recorded events) -- such a thing can't be ruled out -- in some sense there are such non-real events, illusions etc. -- even conceivably cases which got reported and published as real, at least for a time, before eventually being debunked. But there has to be a way to test the difference. And once the criteria are identified for determining which is which, then it becomes obvious that the Jesus appearance events, in the Gospels, fit into the real events category rather than the unreal category.

scientifically "impossible" or "supernatural" etc.: Just because one believes the reported event is impossible scientifically cannot be made part of the criteria for distinguishing the real events from the unreal. How was it decided, in the unreal cases which were "feeling" only, that this case was in this unreal feeling-only category? There has to be something in the experience itself, how it's reported or described by witnesses, which makes clear which category it belongs in. It can't just be a claim that such a happening is intrinsically impossible that puts this into the unreal-only category. The "impossible" label might be appropriate only if the reported event is intrinsically self-contradictory -- such as: Jesus did appear and did not appear at exactly the same time.

So, for the test, in a real case which could be investigated (a modern example), no dogma or premise about whether the doubtful event is scientifically possible could be used as a criterion to judge whether it's in the real or the unreal category. Rather, the test would be done by comparing the testimonies of the different witnesses claiming to have seen the appearance we're investigating. These different witnesses would be interrogated and their answers compared, along with testimony from anyone there, etc., to figure out what really happened.

Today we can't do a test of what the witnesses saw 2000 years ago, but the criteria to distinguish the real from the unreal could be determined with modern cases, and then these criteria could be considered in connection with the Jesus appearances in the Gospel accounts. The truth probably is that there really is no such case ever in history which can be identified -- where a "feeling" of something not there actually caused a new reported event (fictional) to get published as something that really happened. There have been mistakes/distortions which were passed on -- that can be proved -- but not due to someone having a "feeling" or vision which most others there did not experience -- that cannot be proved (or, we need to have an example of it). There's probably no such case.


A reported event is "innocent" until proven "guilty"

It's not good enough to just say what MIGHT have happened 2000 years ago (like accusing a scapegoat of a crime he didn't commit -- guilt by accusation only -- "you never know, he might be guilty"). To just "suppose" what might have happened (instead of what the evidence says happened), with no proper test of such a thing, is an argument to undo ALL reported historical events, because it's always possible that ANY historical event did not really happen but was just a "feeling" someone had. If that's how we judge what did or did not really happen, then you can just dismiss ANY historical fact you don't like by simply saying it maybe didn't really happen, because maybe it was only a "feeling" someone had and nothing else.

So, if a serious criterion is provided, for distinguishing the real events from the unreal, then we can apply that to the Gospel accounts, to the Jesus appearances described. For most if not all the reported history events we assume those reporting it understood it as a real event rather than only a "feeling" someone had. No one has shown how the reported Jesus appearances are not also in this category along with all the other reported events.

It's not good enough to just argue that you're uncomfortable with such a claim, or embarrassed by the one claiming it, their manner or attitude, etc. If the one claiming it speaks like they're crazy or intoxicated or mesmerized etc., this has to be disregarded as irrelevant in itself -- it's not from this that we judge the claim. Rather -- do the different observers saying it report the same description of the one they saw "appearing" there? Only that kind of examination can determine if they saw something real. And we can ask these questions about a given case, even one which happened years or centuries ago, even though the answers are obviously more difficult to determine if the witness is not present now. But that's just another normal problem about trying to figure out history, or what happened in the past -- probability, guessing, etc.

If there are certain cases in the record of something which was only a "feeling" someone claimed, these must be identifiable in some way. And they obviously can be identified (at least 99% of time), probably even from the one reporting it, because even that person knew the difference, i.e., they knew the "spiritual" presence of someone is not the same as the real or physical or literal presence, despite being certain of the "feeling" they had.

Historically there are both kinds of cases we can consider: Cases of someone seeing the real appearance of a real person, centuries ago; and cases of someone having only a "vision" of that person, like envisioning a past friend or hero etc. who is now gone. We today can tell the difference between these two, from the written record of the past, from the accounts which have survived to us.

Even the one who had a vision only, like the worshiper at the meeting who had the "feeling" -- even that one does not go out and report it as a real event, or write and publish that this was a real physical presence that others also saw, if it was really only a "feeling" he had. Those who have such a mystical experience really do know the difference. E.g., if they had to testify in court, they'd report what everyone there witnessed rather than their subjective "feeling" of something that was not felt by the others present. Because they really do know the difference.


(this Wall of Text to be continued)

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Origin of the Resurrection Story
and other Jesus miracles

(continued from previous Wall of Text)


Did Jesus really appear? was he literally present?
Or did someone only "sense the presence" of him?
-- and then others played along?

. . . maybe if I was a more devout Christian I could sense the presence of Joe too. I'll just play along for now so that the others don't question my faith.)

Now by analogy, the comparison is made to the Jesus disciples 2000 years ago (whose "Joe" was Jesus), who are depressed over the crucifixion, a normal event back then even more common than a protester today getting killed at a protest rally:

Looking back, it's not difficult to picture the same thing happening in Jerusalem. Jesus dies, and for whatever reason is removed from the cross by Joseph of Arimathea. Joseph quickly puts Jesus' body in a nearby tomb because it's almost sundown before the Sabbath, but before the women arrive on Sunday morning, Joseph moves the body to a nearby permanent resting place and exits stage right, never to be heard from again.

The women arrive, see an empty tomb, and conclude that Jesus might be walking around somewhere. The story spreads.

This is really a "revisionist" theory of what happened. I.e., instead of the standard version of what happened based on the known evidence, here's a different version of what might have really happened, but not based on any evidence -- just a supposition. What's the reason to believe this revised version of what happened rather than the version told in the writings from that time, i.e., from the normal evidence?

Any unusual event in history could be debunked by suggesting something else which seems more likely or closer to the norm, or less surprising or less jarring. E.g., maybe the Joan-of-Arc event didn't really happen -- it obviously contradicts all the norms for history events, i.e., a nobody peasant-girl teenager leading a weaker nation's military forces to defeat the greater forces of a stronger and wealthier nation. So, maybe it didn't really happen but was caused by someone having a "feeling" or a wish for it to happen, and then "the story spreads" as others start having a similar "feeling" of this fantasy girl heroine.


A "feeling" gets reported and published as a real event?

Similarly, what about the possibility of the Jesus Resurrection originating as a result of a "feeling" someone had at a meeting of the disciples? How often does a fluke event like this happen (a "feeling" gets mistaken for something real)? it spreads to others who didn't feel it at first, those ones then report it around and then soon a Resurrection story gets circulated and Gospels and epistles are published so that hundreds/thousands begin worshiping Joe Doakes as a Messiah and Savior of the world?

To see the unlikelihood of this, we must consider how unimportant Jesus must have been in 30 AD if he never did perform the miracle acts described in the writings. In that case Jesus was a run-of-the-mill Joe Doakes of little or no significance. Maybe a "crusader Joe" of sorts (small "c" crusader, no official title, lower status than priests, e.g., who were recognized/appointed by those in authority).

Since there was nothing special about Joe -- i.e. there have been millions of these through the centuries, or certainly thousands, who suffered a violent death during times of conflict, with some of their admirers/disciples having a "feeling" at a meeting, and yet many times this led to a re-appearance or resurrection claim and a new Resurrection Cult -- That being the case, we should as a result have thousands of acclaimed resurrected Messiahs and Saviors in the historical record by now, each with thousands/millions of devotees, as their followers had visions of their re-appearances after they were killed.


There was nothing special about Jesus
(if he did not do the miracle acts).

There's virtually nothing about the Jesus death (in 30 AD) which separates him from many thousands of other prophets or dissidents or heroes who suffered as some kind of martyr for their cause. (Today there aren't so many martyrs, but in the 1st century these were common -- most people probably knew someone who had been similarly martyred.)

Of course there can be a one-in-a-billion chance happening of something bizarre (or one-in-a-million). But this certainly has to be a tiny fraction of a random-chance happening to a particular person who gets killed followed by someone having a "feeling" at a meeting which then causes a bizarre story to circulate -- and this all happening to a nobody who eventually becomes famous from it.

The case of Jesus (in the 1st century) is not unusual at all, if we subtract the miracle healing acts and the Resurrection -- for now let's just assume these did not happen. What is left that makes Jesus in 30 AD anything other than just another Joe Doakes who joined the long list of dissident troublemakers who got martyred? Except for the miracle power he reportedly had -- healings and Resurrection -- he is indistinguishable from thousands of others in the ancient world, over the 2 or 3 centuries period when Rome rose to its peak of power and dominated Judea and Galilee and other regions.

We can easily name several other characters who were more prominent and controversial than he was -- as recognized at that time -- plus we know there were easily hundreds others, totally forgotten by history, who were as prominent as Jesus was, or more prominent. E.g., any priest was more important than Jesus, having officially recognized status.


Did martyrdom make someone important?

-- Let's dispel this one notion: Just because Jesus was martyred does not qualify him for exaltation or Messiah or Hero status in the 1st century. Martyrs were not made into gods or resurrected heroes -- anyone wanting a hero figure would more likely choose a WINNER, not a martyr/victim. A recognized Messiah or Hero would be someone with a record of success and conquest, a successful Conqueror -- a "Son of Man" -- a Warrior-Conqueror, or the Emperor or King. Conquerors like Cyrus and Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar were much more in demand for the Messiah role than a failed and defeated sidewalk preacher like Jesus (crusader Joe Doakes with his couple dozen admirers). The Emperor Vespasian was worshiped (by millions) and credited with doing a miracle similar to the Jesus healing miracles.

So you can't make his crucifixion and martyrdom a mark of distinction qualifying him to be anointed and crowned as a Miracle-Messiah-Savior. Martyrs were a dime-a-dozen at the time and had no status from this. (What about Spartacus? Virtually no one worshiped him until modern times when Hollywood made him into a famous hero. But even in his case it has to be recognized that he at first was a Conqueror (warrior-hero), having won many impressive battles before finally being crushed = he influenced the political power events then which impacted the lives of millions.

So, since Jesus had no recognized status at all, and no wide impact (in his lifetime) -- compared to hundreds of ordained priests and prophets and political leaders and officials who had recognized status and were served by disciples or worshipers or subjects subservient to them, and also who had long careers during which to secure their position and status -- there is no way to claim Jesus stood out as any hero to be made into a legend or messiah (if he did not do the miracle acts).

So as compared to others of distinction, Jesus had no status, even less than average itinerant preachers who had much longer careers than his short public career of only 1-3 years. No one whose career was that short had any recognition or any significant following or influence over others -- unless he did the miracle acts (this qualifier has to be repeated so it's kept in mind as the real factor distinguishing Jesus from all the other messianic apocalypticists).


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[Lumpenproletariat]

Origin of the Resurrection Story
and other Jesus miracles

(continued from previous Wall of Text)


Jesus was a nobody
(if he did not do the miracle acts)

Here is a statement from non-Christian scholar Reza Aslan, in the introduction to his Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, in which he describes the non-uniqueness, or non-importance, or non-noteworthiness of Jesus in the 1st century. Note especially his first sentence:

It is a miracle that we know anything at all about the man we call Jesus of Nazareth. The itinerant preacher wandering from village to village clamoring about the end of the world, a band of ragged followers trailing behind, was a common sight in Jesus' time, so common in fact, that it had become a kind of caricature, among the Roman elite. . . . Countless prophets, preachers, and messiahs tramped through the Holy Land, delivering messages of God's imminent judgment. Many of these so-called false messiahs we know by name. A few are even mentioned in the New Testament.

The prophet Theudas, according to the Book of Acts, had 400 disciples, before Rome captured him and cut off his head. A mysterious charismatic figure known only as "The Egyptian" raised an army of followers in the desert, nearly all of whom were massacred by Roman troops. . . . Another messianic aspirant called simply "The Samaritan" was crucified by Pontius Pilate even though he raised no army and in no way challenged Rome.

"It is a miracle that we know anything at all about" him (if he did not do the miracle acts).

All the above messianists and hundreds of others were more significant than Jesus -- and thousands equally significant. Notice the quote says it's a "miracle" that we know anything at all about Jesus. He had a small "following" just like we all know someone who has several admirers.

He was so insignificant, of so little note, that we can't explain how he came to be published at all (extremely rare 2000 years ago), or recorded for later generations. Some semi-important figures are named in various written accounts, for their particular impact in stirring up trouble and attracting the Romans to put them down. There were surely hundreds of them, many others beyond the above ones who got this kind of publicity, named in a written source, for being more conspicuous or vulnerable in one way or another.


Jesus has status/recognition TODAY
But not in the 1st century (if he did not do the miracle acts).

We imagine today that Jesus was important, or stood out as highly recognized, but that's only due to our culture today and 2000-year Christian tradition. We have no evidence that he stood out -- if he did not do the miracle acts -- as any more special than the hundreds of other sidewalk preachers in Jerusalem, or thousands throughout Judea and Galilee.

How do we explain how Jesus got publicized at all? Even if we speculate there was some mix-up about where he was buried, even if one or two followers had hallucinations of him re-appearing alive, something similar surely happened to others here and there, and not to only this one obscure dissident apocalyptic preacher figure. No other such resurrection stories appear in any written record -- why should this one stand apart, as though his case was unique?

So in this case a one-in-a-million fluke must have happened, a one-time-only odd circumstance. Which is possible. You can always claim this is more plausible than a real miracle resurrection of a dead person-- just like you can say the Joan of Arc story originated from a fantasy feeling someone had, claiming that's more plausible than what the historical evidence says happened.

But to the above unlikelihood a second one has to be added: The record of Jesus the miracle healer is also something which must be explained, unless we simply believe the evidence that he had some unique healing power that distinguished him from all the others, but
-- we're not supposed to believe that.
That's verboten.

We're told instead that there were many other healers also, a dime-a-dozen -- which is not true. So let's go along with the politically-correct requirement that he could not uniquely have done any miracles or had any such unique power. (Though the truth is that there is unique evidence in this one case only -- there is no other historical figure in all the ancient writings, over many centuries, who is described as performing numerous healing acts where the victim's recovery is described in the written account, telling us that the recovery happened instantly, such as instant curing of lepers or the blind or the lame, etc. There is no other such reputed healer to be found for whom there is evidence.)

But for now let's assume the miracle acts have to be fiction.

So, in addition to the Resurrection unlikelihood, we have the instant healer Jesus equally unexplainable, equally impossible. What are the peculiar circumstances which might have happened, in this one case only, to get these stories circulated claiming a miracle was happening to this nobody, or this dime-a-dozen eccentric wandering sidewalk preacher type like hundreds or thousands others of that time -- peculiar circumstances producing a reputed miracle-worker who resurrects back to life after he got killed, such that there is no other reported case of such a thing?

This means two unlikelihoods, either one of which is a one-in-a-million or one-in-a-billion chance of happening to a person, which could turn him from a normal human dime-a-dozen dissident crusader into a miracle god-hero figure.

One unlikelihood -- one-in-a-million chance -- can be supposed in the case of one particular individual. It's not inconceivable. But how can two such unlikelihoods both converge onto the same individual, who was of no significance other than being an eccentric preacher/crusader like hundreds or thousands of others doing the same? Who made the decision to turn this nobody into someone special, such that he in effect won 2 lotteries, each a one-in-a-million chance happening? Even if we suppose there was a conspiracy to bestow such a distinction onto him, why did they choose this particular character rather than some other? Did the conspirators one day observe the mass of passer-byes in the crowded street, and one of them randomly pointed his finger and said "How about that character"?

"eeny, meeny, miny, moe" ? How was the choice made? Jesus just happened to be in the right (wrong) place at that moment?

Then the disciples have a prayer meeting, wondering what in the world is going on. Suddenly Peter -- you just know it has to be Peter -- pipes up, "He's here! I can feel the presence of Jesus in this very room!" The other . . .

. . . the presence of who? You mean Joe Doakes, just an ordinary preacher-guy they admired, like hundreds of others, who was killed recently like many other dissidents, and his admirers are depressed? What's the chance of a Resurrection story evolving out of this during the next 10 or 20 or 30 years and getting published in multiple writings? in an historical period when there was no tabloid journalism? virtually no publishing as we know it today?

Even if such a crusader Joe Doakes might get some publicity today, with our modern mass media, no such thing could happen 2000 years ago when writing a book and circulating copies of it was economically impossible for 99.9% of the population. Costly production of writings was not wasted on such trivia as someone having a vision at a meeting of common-folk nobodies. Those who recorded the Jesus events and had copies done -- this had to be a large number, not just 2 or 3 individuals -- to go to this expense they must have thought he was special. What did they think was special about him?

The other disciples, caught up in grief and wonderment and confusion, decide that if Peter says [Joe] is alive, then who are they to argue.

How often does a small-time sidewalk preacher admired by his small flock get promoted to a widely-publicized Divine Resurrected Messiah-Savior status, then published at high cost in Gospels and epistles, because an admirer once felt a mystical presence and the others all believed it because "who are they to argue?"?? at an obscure gathering when they were remembering him, and so they all started to feel the same sensation and reported his physical re-appearance and resurrection? and then hundreds who had never known anything about him start believing he's a unique miracle resurrected Savior hero? This is less likely than that he simply did the acts described.

So, even if this resurrection-story scenario can be hypothesized as a one-in-a-million chance unlikelihood (because someone had a "feeling"), how does it also happen that additional fluke unlikelihoods cause this same undistinguished person to be promoted to most documented healer status, curing all kinds of physical afflictions, instantly healing blindness and leprosy, etc., documented in multiple written accounts, with no such thing happening to any other person, even though there were hundreds others who had more recognition than Jesus had, and higher status and wider reputation as divine authority figures who might get mythologized into a miracle-working hero?


How did someone earn Divine Messiah-Hero status?

This is not a credible explanation how this sidewalk preacher Joe came to achieve Divine Miracle-Working Resurrected Savior status. He had to have done something more than just preach hell-fire to a few disciples like dozens or hundreds other non-ordained apocalyptic rabbis/prophets were doing.


Did Jesus attract large crowds?

It's true there's a passage or 2 saying he attracted large crowds, or his "fame" spread, etc. But these also say it was his miracle healing acts which were attracting the large crowds. If the miracle acts are dismissed as something which did not happen, then you must also dismiss the claim that these caused his "fame" to spread throughout the region.

(The truth is probably that for a few months he attracted wide attention locally, by word-of-mouth, into neighboring regions, and some of the sick traveled a good distance to him hoping to be cured, or anticipated he would visit their town.)


being worshiped as a god

By comparison to this, what about someone really of status? like an emperor (Caesar Augustus) or popular military conqueror (Alexander or Julius Caesar), etc.? These can inspire a "feeling" in the admirers, including later generations, who might believe the famous hero figure re-appears or is present, later after he's gone. There are many cases of someone being inspired by a grand honored hero of the past, a legendary figure, whose presence is felt by admirers years or generations later -- hundreds, maybe thousands, all converging on the same hero celebrity.

Of course everyone really knows the ancient revered hero is not literally there centuries later. But still the devotees sort of pretend that he is there, "in spirit" at least, and they try to feel this as being real, in some cases maybe even having hallucinations. This maybe happened to some 19th-century Germans who had visions of hero Emperor Frederick Barbarossa returning to life. (Of course they all knew Frederick was not really there -- it was just poetry, allegory, a symbolism to unite patriots, for good national spirit.) Nothing like this explains a Jesus "feeling" someone had in 30 AD when Jesus was just another run-of-the-mill crusader Joe Nobody (if he did not do the miracle acts).

Or what about worship of a CURRENT hero-messiah figure still alive? This same reverence for an ancient hero legend can be similar to the case of a present hero still alive, who has unusual widespread fame due to his great charisma and career of inspiring large audiences with good oratory. Mohammed and Napoleon and Hitler and FDR and Billy Graham and Martin Luther King and Ronald Reagan and Barrack Obama are good later-history examples. They all had status, vast power or influence over millions, widespread popularity as famous celebrities, worshiped by millions in their time, even when still alive. But not small-time crusader Joe Doakes with no credentials and only 2 or 3 dozen admirers in his brief public life.


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[Lumpenproletariat]

Origin of the Resurrection Story
and other Jesus miracles

(continued from previous Wall of Text)


How "history" originated
("if Jesus did not do the miracle acts")

And after forty years of the Telephone Game, we have the Gospel of Mark.

Calling it the "Telephone game" doesn't change the fact that this is how history is recorded and preserved. That communicating of the information is what makes it a known historical event/fact which is probably true (though not 100% certain or 100% probable). All knowledge of history -- all the ancient history you know -- is a result of "the Telephone Game" passing on the actual events first happening back there centuries ago, and then the later written accounts which report it. What is called "history" (ancient, not modern history) is mainly the Telephone Game happening after the events which are told and retold and handed on and on, orally at first, and eventually written down 50 or 100 years after the event happened, and then copied.

That's what mainline history is (98% of it), and also what the 4 Gospels and Paul's epistles are -- the same as all our known (ancient) history events. The "Telephone Game" passed on the earliest reports of the events which were then recorded and came down to us later. And these are tainted with some errors or discrepancies or distortions, etc., and so give a partially correct picture of what happened, plus incorrect also -- but that's history (we think it's "mostly" correct). If you toss out the Gospels because they're not perfect and infallible, you have to toss out all the other history sources also, as tainted, leaving us with no ancient history we can believe (if you require perfect sources).

So some error and distortion and propaganda is part of ALL our ancient history record ("the telephone game"). And yet we can reasonably believe most of it, and maybe figure out the part that's not reliable, comparing the different writings, piecing together what probably happened. Where the sources agree, and there's no evidence contradicting it, then it's probably true. Maybe, we hope.

Does my version of events align perfectly with all four Gospels?

Cut out the "perfectly" nonsense. Does it align reasonably with the Gospels? i.e., with the evidence? No, it contradicts the evidence. And it adds facts not contained in the evidence. Which isn't necessary to do unless you're trying to impose your dogmatic ideology onto the facts or the evidence in the sources, in effect trying to rewrite the history we have in the sources.

. . . align [reasonably] with all four Gospels? Of course not -- no story possibly could.

Yes, a story can align with the evidence, the Gospel accounts. Which would be the simple "story" that Jesus did the miracle acts and resurrected after being killed -- this does align reasonably with all four Gospels -- but omitting the dubious parts or discrepancies or less credible parts. As long as the "story" is short enough to not include dozens of excess details, it can be consistent with all the evidence. Of course one can go further and conjecture about the details that are less certain. But it's legitimate to take only what all the sources agree on, to formulate a reliable version of what happened, and leaving many details unexplained. Maybe those details don't matter so much?

This approach is appropriate for ALL historical events, to present the basics of what happened, what is best determined from the evidence, and to leave out the part that's more dubious, or putting it in the unresolved category. Where several sources agree we can assume it's mostly accurate.

But it certainly is more plausible than two angels in shining raiment walking around, hordes of dead people rising from their graves and appearing to their families again, Jesus having long conversations with disciples without them knowing who it was, and with him popping in and out of rooms magically, before rising up to the vacuum of space.

"it certainly is more plausible"? What is? the "feeling" theory? No it's not more plausible. The "feeling" theory -- that some disciple had a "feeling" which then magically spread like an infection to others -- is as equally implausible. What really "is more plausible" is whatever is reported and confirmed in all the written accounts about it and which is not contradicted by any evidence. Those extra sexy details are dubious, maybe laughable. But the basic scenario of the Jesus death and burial and resurrection is told in all the sources without any sources saying something to contradict it.

So, what's really "more plausible" is not something which contradicts the evidence in all the sources (it started from a "feeling" someone had about something not really there). For anything doubtful, the most plausible explanation relies on the evidence, i.e., whatever is agreed by all the written accounts about it, or the written sources we have. So, we have at least 5 sources saying something about the Resurrection of Jesus, and, leaving aside the discrepancies or confusions and unanswered questions about it which are not resolved, there are a few points the sources all agree on:

After the burial Jesus rose back to life and was seen alive by many witnesses over the following days. Is anything else definite? Yes, there's agreement that "the empty tomb" (or burial site with the body missing) was discovered by Mary Magdalene (or by her and the other Galilean women), so this much is credible, as to what happened.

The alternative to this is that the evidence should be rejected in favor of ideological theories about what ought to have happened rather than the evidence. And this is the only argument why the Resurrection did not happen: i.e., the doctrine or ideological premise that such a thing cannot happen. So what you have is a circular argument that it could not have happened because of your a priori premise that such a thing cannot have happened.

But what about this a priori premise? It can't simply be argued that the dead never rise back to life, as a scientific principle, because there is no such proven principle. That subject is more complicated than simply pronouncing this as some kind of proven Law of Nature.


evidence of the dead raised/rising back to life

There are many reported cases of a body returning to life after death had been pronounced, and many of these cases are corroborated, although the time lapse from the death pronouncement to the revival of the "dead" person is usually only a few minutes, or a few hours in some cases. In the case of Jesus it happened 2 or 3 days later. So the difference from other reported cases, corroborated in multiple sources, is that this was for a much longer period, i.e., one or two or three days later, or longer time period, between death and the returning back to life.

Here are 2 different rules (take your pick):

1) No such thing can happen unless there are other cases of the same phenomenon (e.g., dead bodies never come back to life, EVER!); and

2) It's possible for a totally unique or unusual event to happen which is unprecedented, with no other similar case = very special, maybe a "miracle" etc.

We cannot dictate that either of these rules is universally true or binding for everything ever reported to have happened. They sort of contradict each other, and yet there is a logic to each of them. Such a rule alone might be useful but cannot resolve what the truth is. We can apply each to the case of Jesus as presented in the 1st-century written accounts:

1) His miracle acts, healing and Resurrection, may not be absolutely unique in all history, because there are some possible other cases of healers, probably with less power, and we know of "dead" bodies which came back to life; and

2) Jesus is unique in ancient history, the only one documented as a miracle healer and as having resurrected back to life after being killed -- the only one for whom there is credible evidence, multiple sources saying it happened and nothing contradicting it.

What about other cases of bodies which revived?

That all other known cases are of a much shorter time period is not an open-and-shut argument that therefore the Resurrection is impossible. That there are cases of a short time span, from pronouncement of death and then a return to life, means a "dead" body can come back to life in some cases, and then there's doubt about how long this time period might be, or what the limit is. Obviously there are many theories about it, and for medical purposes there are some rules put in place to guide the decision when or whether to make the official pronouncement of death. But how standard are these rules, as fixed principles agreed by scientists?


The longest return-from-death case on record

Here's an article which says the record is 17 hours, and claims this is definitely the longest on record. https://www.joe.co.uk/life/woman-ba...-17-hours-and-then-coming-back-to-life-366479 But there are some reported cases (unconfirmed? dubious?), which claim longer than this. How can we be sure? This is not resoundingly answered by science. Obviously in any reported case we must demand extra sources. For the Jesus case there are 5 sources, an unusually high number for ancient history events.

Maybe there are cases of reported resurrections which were later debunked. But was there corroboration in those cases in multiple accounts attesting that such a resurrection of a dead person had happened? Maybe the original story was a hoax. We don't seem to have other cases of reported resurrections, but if there is a case that wasn't a delusion or hoax, let someone present it, give it the same attention/investigation as is given to the Jesus case 2000 years ago. Bottom line: the Resurrection of Jesus cannot be dismissed by the simplistic pronouncement that the dead never return to life, because there are cases where the "dead" did return to life.


How "dead" is really really dead?

It has not been totally established how the official point of death is determined. Maybe some corpses are "more dead" than others. Theories that the time lapse has to be a certain maximum figure, determined accurately by some calculation, are not based on any real consensus so far established scientifically.

Some experts claim the "dead" body of Alexander the Great was only in a coma for a day or two before becoming "really really dead" for sure. (And since this case stood out as a very publicized and high-profile case, what about all the millions of other "dead" persons who also were really only in a "coma"?) "The Science" on this is not fixed.

So claims that "the dead" can't ever rise back to life are very weak as some kind of Ultimate Refutation of the Resurrection event in the Gospels. Such claims that it can't ever happen have to be set aside as ambiguous, and all we really have is the evidence from the 1st-century accounts saying that this did happen at least this one time in history, even if 99.99% of reported cases are hoaxes. And maybe there has been another case of the same thing, somewhere at some time, or maybe not. It doesn't seem there are other cases anyone wants to offer, from the historical record.

Raising the dead: In the Gospels we're told Jesus revived 3 "dead" persons, though he's quoted in one case saying the deceased was only sleeping and not really dead (Mark 5:39). This is legitimate evidence (not proof) that Jesus at least had an ability to revive someone who recently died or was thought to be dead.

How many other cases are there of someone in history reported as bringing a dead person back to life? (Let's say "dead" for more than 10-20 hours.) A few such legends exist, but the evidence is always very poor -- such as ancient legend which developed over many centuries -- also, only one source = not good evidence. There were beliefs that the healer Asclepius (later made into a god) raised someone back from the dead. But this legend required about 1000 years to evolve in the mythology. And there's a similar Hercules legend. Miracle legends which require 1000 years to evolve are not credible, not good evidence.

Of course in modern times there might be charlatans claiming something like this, with so much media potential today where anything can be easily fabricated and published as fact. Someone can produce these examples and show what the evidence is. What if there are some other cases?


What if there are other reported resurrections?

Even if it did happen somewhere, it's still not clear if that refutes the Jesus Resurrection. Would it mean any and all such claims must be hoaxes no matter what? and so never can such a claim be true? Why? What if someone did rise back to life somewhere, 100 or 1000 years ago, or last Tuesday -- does that debunk the Jesus Resurrection 2000 years ago? How does it debunk anything? What other credible claims are there?

Obviously we have this one case from 2000 years ago, of Jesus raising the dead and also of himself resurrecting. So, here's one case based on real evidence. Are there others? I.e., others for which we have multiple sources of the time saying it happened, such as in this case?

Whatever the evidence (multiple attestation) says happened is probably true if there's no evidence to contradict it. And what's not known, but is only speculation without evidence, has to be set aside if it contradicts the evidence, like supposing someone had a "feeling" and this somehow caused the Jesus Resurrection story. That should be rejected in favor of the evidence that the Resurrection happened, since no evidence contradicts this (an ideological dogma that something is scientifically impossible is not evidence).

And even so there's always some doubt: For any claim of a "miracle" event, there has to be at least some doubt. Even a believer cannot claim total certainty, 100% probability. Absolute certainty is not what "faith" or "belief" has to mean. The belief of the disciples, and also of those healed by Jesus, shows indication also that they doubted at the same time that they believed. Belief and doubt can co-exist. For all historical events there is at least some doubt (maybe only a tiny fraction in some cases):

Will Durant said: "History is mostly guessing; -- the rest is prejudice."

And whether Jesus resurrected is not poetry or symbol, but a question of history -- what really happened? -- not of someone having a "feeling" or impulse somewhere in their gizzard, maybe caused by something they ate for breakfast. Just because there is doubt and some guessing doesn't mean it isn't fact. And if there's evidence that it happened, then it's reasonable to believe it, even though there's also doubt.


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[Lumpenproletariat]

Origin of the Resurrection Story
and other Jesus miracles

(continued from previous Wall of Text)


Revisionist theories

("if Jesus did not do the miracle acts")

Could the conventional belief be wrong?
"Revisionist" here means replacing the standard belief and substituting some other explanation of what happened. This might be legitimate in some cases, but it has to be more than just "Why don't we toss out the evidence we don't like and substitute something else we think could have happened instead?" (or, something else we want to have happened instead? something that makes us more comfortable?)



Does this Revisionist Theory make any sense:
Someone invents history by having a "feeling" ??

Can historical events (published events, reported in the writings) be invented by someone who has a "feeling" of someone or something not really there?

So, maybe the Resurrection didn't really happen because something else really happened instead (maybe someone had a "feeling") -- And maybe Abraham Lincoln was not really ever President because something else really happened instead of that. Our standard history of this may be the result of someone back then having had a vision or "feeling" of something happening, which then somehow spread to others. So, what really happened must have gotten replaced by this new "feeling" that got started somehow and then became our standard history in the written accounts of the time.

So our evidence that a certain event happened might be wrong somehow -- there are many possible ways it could happen. And so we might dismiss any historical event we don't like by just saying, "Well, maybe someone imagined something here, which others then heard about and started believing -- and, and then that's how our historical account of it got started." And with that you've pretty much disproved any reported historical event you learned in school but which you think should not have happened.

OR INSTEAD -- the process of debunking a reported historical event has to be more than just saying someone had a "feeling" which then spread to others, and then these caught the same "fever" and spread the rumor which became reported in written accounts one year or 10 years or 20 years later -- and "the rest is history."

Certainly anyone is free to dismiss the evidence and invent some other possibility. But it's also reasonable to believe what the evidence shows. So, the 1st-century evidence tells us that Jesus did the miracle healing acts and also rose back to life after he was killed. Those who believe the evidence think (and hope) this is what happened. But those who want this not to be the truth can reject this evidence and suppose a possibility that something else might have happened instead (e.g. someone had a "feeling" etc.), even though it contradicts the evidence. And, maybe in some cases of history the evidence is wrong.

So we're free to choose. But if you choose to go by the evidence, then you must offer more than just guessing it all got started by someone who maybe had a "feeling" about something.


What does the EVIDENCE indicate happened?

The other disciples, caught up in grief and wonderment and confusion, decide that if Peter says [crusader Joe Doakes] is alive, then who are they to argue.

We should be more careful than this about assuming that people of other times or places were idiots who believed and reported as fact anything someone expressed as a feeling they had. The evidence does not show any such thing. The people of the 1st century were not such imbeciles as this implies they were. All the evidence is that those people were just as skeptical as we are today about any claims of something unlikely or miraculous.

The only miracles they believed in were those of the ancient gods/heroes which evolved in the cultural traditions; including Jews who believed in Moses or Elijah legends, the ancient legends which evolved over many centuries. Likewise in other cultures. There's no evidence of anyone believing claims of recent miracle acts or amazing feats by a miracle-worker of their own historical period. Nor is their evidence of them believing a miracle happened because someone in the room had a "feeling" of something present which was not really there. E.g.,

"He's here! I can feel the presence of Jesus in this very room!" Bob . . . would look sincere. He wasn't the type of person to lie . . . He honestly and truly believed that Jesus was standing in the middle of our group, . . .

There's no evidence in ancient writings to show that anyone reported factual events having happened because someone in a group had an inspiration-outburst like this. This is superimposing a modern theory of psychology onto a different culture where we have nothing in any recorded evidence showing such a pattern of behavior or thinking (i.e., no pattern of someone's "feeling" becoming reported broadly as a real event, or being translated into a reported fact of what really happened).

Yes, "feelings" or visions do happen -- a devotee at a meeting "feels" the presence of someone who's not really there, and others are inspired, etc. -- this happens, but it does not translate into a reported fact being added to the history of the time, bringing that one back to life in written accounts, in the media, etc. saying Joe Doakes resurrected and lived again, creating a new belief that someone dead returned to life. Where in the news has this been reported? Where is there any evidence of any such thing happening in the 1st-century period, in the ancient religious culture?

There were skeptics of many kinds, social critics, e.g., Cicero, who wrote of superstitious belief and religious deception, etc. Where do we find any indication of a psychology pattern like this among the superstitious or religious worshipers? You can't find anything in the literature of the time suggesting such belief, or religious claims of events happening, which originated from someone's confusion or depressed mood, or emotional vibes transmitted from one devotee to another, new events being created by devotees having visions at a meeting.

The writings of Cicero, or Lucian of Samosata, or of skeptics and cynics and Epicureans and Stoics, would be good places to seek such references. Do they give examples of disciples at a meeting, and one of them has a "feeling" which then is transmitted to others, and a new belief is born which soon becomes reported as a factual event?

The cult leader, guru: This isn't about the charismatic cult leader we know preached and mesmerized his disciples into believing something, though it may be similar. But this "feeling" theory is about a rank-and-file disciple "Bob" in the group, not leader, who has an unscripted "feeling" which erupts from him and then spreads contagiously to the others present, and a new fact of history is born, about one member of the group having died but now having returned to life, physically, literally. What evidence is there that any belief about events got started this way?

We see evidence of "speaking in tongues" back then, and also performing rituals to expel demons. But where do we have written accounts saying someone rose back to life, or that a blind person or leper was instantly cured because someone had a vision or a "feeling" at one of these religious gatherings where such behavior was practiced? such rituals? such emotional outbursts by this or that devotee? We don't have such reports in the accounts. What we have are prescribed rituals, descriptions of the rituals and the religious behavior, but not written reports of miracle cures and the dead raised back to life. Nor accounts of the mentally deranged being cured.


Were there other Jesus-like miracle-workers in the 1st century?

We today, in the 20th and 21st centuries, show more such credulity regarding miracle claims than those of the 1st century. We notice some such claims today (maybe because there's so much greater potential to publish anything bizarre, with mass media, etc.), claims which do not spread among the general population, claims mostly debunked if they're investigated, and the tiny few today who believe such things are a greater number (as a % of the population) than those who believed such claims 2000 years ago.

And virtually no such claims get published in multiple sources -- Or, in a few cases of a notorious charlatan they are also debunked in multiple sources and mostly rejected as not credible, unlike the 1st-century Jesus miracle acts which are reported in multiple written accounts but are NOT debunked in any written accounts of the time.

You can't explain away some miracle claim by assuming everyone in those days was an empty-headed idiot into whose mind anything could be poured and accepted as The Truth without any critical thought. It's not true. They were just as skeptical of miracle claims as we are today, even more skeptical.

We are not superior to them because everyone back then was stupid. It's true that we snobbishly today pretend that the ancients were imbeciles who believed any claim of something miraculous. But there's no evidence to support this snobbery -- not about people in the 1st century, or from 500 BC - 100 AD. You can't cite any case of it in any of the ancient writings. There was not a pattern of naïve belief in miracle-workers.


The ABSENCE of miracle-workers before Jesus

There were plenty of writings where we should see such examples of reported miracle-workers similar to Jesus in the Gospels, if they existed. They did not. The Dead Sea Scrolls and hundreds other writings should contain examples of them, and yet they do not. The Qumran Teacher of Righteousness is frequently compared to Jesus, and the many parallels are cited, and yet, conspicuously, one major characteristic of Jesus not found in this Qumran Righteous Teacher is any mention of miracle acts or resurrection after he was killed.

This Teacher was killed, martyred, according to the Scrolls, but did not resurrect. Rituals for healing the sick are contained in the writings, but no mention of the Righteous Teacher healing any sick person, restoring sight or health, or raising anyone back to life. The absence of any such miracle-working deeds is a striking contrast to the picture of Jesus in the Gospel accounts. It is really a prejudiced and insulting put-down of the people through this period of history to insinuate that their minds were ready mush-bowl receptacles for miracle claims or miracle-workers, and that any of them could get a new miracle fad circulating by expressing a "feeling" they had at a meeting.


The popular belief was in the ANCIENT gods/heroes
not in current miracle-workers healing the physically afflicted.

What's described in the Gospels was NOT the norm. The popular practice -- cultural FAD -- was that the ancient traditions were taught, including ancient religion, indoctrinated into the minds of children (maybe hammered into their young brains). But there was nothing about recent miracle-workers, at that time, not about healers attracting crowds of physically afflicted, among ancient worshipers observing in amazement miracle-worker deeds happening before them; and nothing to suggest that a worshiper having a "feeling" would suddenly be believed as reporting a new miracle event, or historical fact, and thus changing the recognized history or events or traditions.

What we have are the Gospel accounts which report the Jesus miracle acts --

but these are outside the norm for the first century.

They are an exception to everything else in that current religious culture. There are no other 1st-century writings (or of centuries preceding) indicating a particular pattern of believing recent miracle events or claims about miracle-workers doing acts like we see Jesus described as doing. No claims of instant healing acts, resurrections, or a dead hero appearing to a group and becoming worshiped; and nothing about someone having a "feeling" about something miraculous and then the others automatically believing it and reporting it as fact.

Where is the evidence that this period of history had any special desire for miracles or miracle-workers, compared to other periods? including the 1st and 2nd centuries BC, leading up to Jesus in about 30 AD? or that people were more prone to believe such claims? You can't find evidence of it. You need more than only your prejudice toward the people in other times or places to claim they believed uncritically anything they were told or that they imagined miracles happening because someone had a "feeling" about something odd. To ridicule them like this you need evidence or facts, not simply the snobbery that your modern debunker guru preached at you.

Most miracle stories being published during this period were in the writings of Virgil and Ovid, and all their stories were about ancient heroes 500 or 1000 or 1500 years earlier, not about recent miracle-workers of that period.


(this Wall of Text to be continued)

 

[steve_bank]

Devotees of the mythical aspects of Jesus freely resume to fill in the blanks like 'Jesus did this because of that..he would have done that and thought this'. None of it explicitly in the gospels.

Given the paucity of specifics from Jesus the followers freely project into Jesus and create a narrative.



The mother of all rationalizations, and the mother of all Rorschach tests.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Origin of the Resurrection Story
and other Jesus miracles

(continued from previous Wall of Text)


Some revisionist history is legitimate.

There are hundreds, even thousands of examples of reasonable revisionist theories. The revisionist generally should admit that it's not definite, and his revisionist theory could be wrong, because revisionism challenges the most prominent existing evidence. To deny the existing evidence one needs some additional evidence, or facts from the existing or known evidence which has been overlooked, or disregarded, and so maybe if we now consider this evidence (which until now has been disregarded), the current version of history might be corrected. That's legitimate revisionism.

To say someone had a vision or "feeling" which might be the source of the present accepted version of history, because this "feeling" was expressed to others who immediately accepted it and retold this to others as though it was fact -- this is not legitimate to explain what happened, as there's no evidence of history being invented this way. Such revisionism as this means essentially dumping all the evidence, and creating your own facts as a "suppose that" suggestion -- "how about this" -- "how about that" -- "No? well, try this on" -- like selecting a pair of shoes at the store. There must be something more, some facts from the time, something in the written record of the time, to show that "feelings" people had were somehow causing the reports of what happened.

What are examples of legitimate revisionist theories, based on some real evidence? There are many serious examples, unlike the theory that a Jesus disciple might have had a "feeling" and then other disciples caught this same "feeling" from that one, and the fever spread and got reported as a physically real event.


some serious revisionist theories:

Jesus was not really born in Bethlehem.
Jesus did not really predict his death and resurrection.
Jesus did not preach baptism.
King Herod did not kill the babies in Bethlehem.
John the Baptist's head was not presented "on a platter" to Salome.
Jesus believed his Kingdom would begin in his generation.
Jesus believed the Son of Man conqueror would come in his generation.
Jesus did not institute a new religion, or new rituals.
The "sayings of Jesus" are really words put into his mouth by later writers.
Etc.

Those who promote the above each give some evidence for these, whether the overall theory is correct or not. There at least are some facts from that time, or evidence, for these revisionist theories. Any revisionist theory disagreeing with the conventional beliefs should have such evidence to offer.


an example of Historical Jesus Revisionism:

Mary and Joseph were not the parents of Jesus.
And James was not the brother of Jesus.

The standard version is that Jesus was the son of Mary and Joseph, and he was the brother of James. This version is told in some of the NT texts, not only in the Gospels, but also in Paul who referred to James as "the brother of the Lord," meaning Paul believed Jesus and James were brothers. This was some time around 50-55 AD, when Paul wrote this. But maybe he was wrong, i.e., this was becoming accepted by Paul's time, and he believed it, but this was not originally the understanding in 30 AD, and did not become widely recognized until generations later. (There's no indication where Mary was by 40-50 AD. But definitely she had been one of the Galilean women sympathetic toward Jesus.)

So a reasonable alternative revisionist theory is: it was not known where Jesus came from, but people wanted to identify him with a family, to connect him. A close relation to Mary might explain how he got connected, identified as to his genetic lineage. Mary was one of the Galilean women who were attracted to Jesus and gave material support to him.


evidence to support this theory

This is not just a "Let's suppose that . . ." etc. There is some evidence to support this "revisionist" version of the facts, in the 3 synoptic Gospels:

"Mary" at the scene of the crucifixion and burial
Mary is described as being present, along with the other Galilean women, and she is referred to as the "mother of James and Joseph" and also as "the other Mary" (other than Mary Magdalene). -- Matthew 27:55-56, 61 and Mt 28:1; and she is referred to as "Mary the mother of the younger James and of Joses" and "Mary the mother of Joses" and "Mary the mother of James" -- Mark 15:40, 47 and Mk 16:1; and in Luke she is referred to as "Mary the mother of James" -- Lk 24:10.

This "Mary" at the crucifixion scene and later the burial is almost certainly the same "Mary" as in Mark 6:3 which names her as his mother and the brothers including James and Joses/Joseph and 2 others. This means that the Gospel writers, in their scene of the crucifixion, identify Mary as there, watching from a distance away, and yet identifying her as the "Mother of James and Joses" and not the mother of Jesus. Why? If she is the mother of Jesus, right there watching him suffer, why should they not refer to her as his mother? As he suffers and dies right there before her eyes, shouldn't she be identified as his mother? This makes no sense.

And there's one further piece of evidence --
The epistles of James and Jude.
These may not have really been written by those 2 brothers, but it was believed that James and Jude wrote them, and both these epistles claim to have been written by those 2 named authors.

What's odd is this: Even though James and Jude presumably were brothers of Jesus, neither of these authors claims to be the brother of Jesus. In both epistles, the author identifies himself as "servant" or "slave" of Jesus Christ, but not brother of Jesus. Why? There's no explanation for this omission. Either author had an incentive to include this identification with Jesus as brother. That this is omitted is evidence that the two were not brothers of Jesus. The Jude author has no problem saying that he's the brother of James, who was a recognized leader of the Jerusalem church. So, why does he fail to identify himself as brother also of Jesus, of whom he calls himself "servant" or "slave"?

So, this revisionist theory is that Jesus was not really the son of Mary and Joseph, and also was not the brother of James, despite the consensus that he was both, as is stated in the Gospels and in Paul. This identification of him with the Mary family in Nazareth can be explained as a belief by the time of about 50 AD when Paul began writing. But maybe this was a belief that evolved over the 20-year period after Jesus. So this identification of him (maybe fictional) could have emerged during those 20 years.

And the above is evidence to support this revisionist theory.

A theory which contradicts some of the standard evidence or the conventional belief needs to have some evidence for it (from the known evidence, maybe showing discrepancy in the evidence), rather than contradicting ALL the known evidence or sources.


The name "Jesus of Nazareth"

There is a (revisionist?) theory that this name originally had a different meaning, that Jesus was a "Nazarite" which was a separatist order or sect having nothing to do with the village of Nazareth, and not only Jesus but also James and the early Christian community in Jerusalem were connected to this order. And this word got corrupted to mean someone originating from the village of Nazareth.

One scholar who explains this is Robert Eisenman (James the Brother of Jesus, 242-245). If he's right, it's a good guess that Jesus was not from Nazareth at all. This is a legitimate revisionist theory because there are at least some facts to support it -- in contrast to the theory that a fictional event gets invented and circulated as fact because it's possible it was only a "feeling" someone had at a meeting, and this then was the real origin of the claimed event. This is not legitimate revisionism because a "feeling" someone hypothetically might have had about something not really there is not evidence for what happened in history.

So the serious revisionist theory needs to be based on real evidence rather than only a speculation that something might have happened which contradicts every known source from the time. With that kind of argument any historical fact could be debunked by a crusader-debunker-ideologue, with no way to question the speculation (e.g. about a "feeling" which no one can prove didn't happen).

Revisionist theory + evidence = the more plausible explanation.
There is no evidence that the Resurrection did not happen -- there's only the premise that such a thing cannot happen, and speculating what might have happened instead, based on the premise that the miracle acts are excluded, as any possibility. I.e., they're off the table, automatically excluded as a condition before any "Quest for the Historical Jesus" can begin.

The alternative scenarios -- what really happened instead -- obviously include suggestions that the taboo miracle claims are symbols only, metaphors, a "feeling" someone had, etc., all of which contradicts the evidence.

All the language about the "empty tomb" and about the appearances is straightforward language indicating nothing metaphorical or "spiritual" vs. physical. There was a physical killing followed by a physical bodily burial followed by a physical bodily rising from the grave and then physical appearances at locations where several witnesses were present and saw him. The best theory of what happened is whatever conforms to this and the other evidence.

The Paul language "he was buried . . . he was raised . . . he appeared" etc. should be understood as the most basic evidence for the Resurrection, while the Gospel stories ("empty tomb") etc. are later and less basic but all confirm Paul and so are also part of the evidence, or strengthen the evidence, confirming that the event happened.


extra sources = stronger evidence

We should be critical toward ALL our sources for past events, and when there are unusual claims made, we should be skeptical, and we need extra sources to confirm it, such as we do have multiple sources for the Jesus Resurrection. If we had only one source for this, or only sources from 200-300 years later, it would not be credible. But since we have 5 sources saying the resurrection physically happened -- the burial and then rising and then appearances -- and no evidence or sources of the time saying otherwise, this is good evidence, just as 5 sources is good evidence for ANY ancient event, and it's rare for an ancient history event to have this much evidence.