Why do scholars generally agree that a historical "Jesus" existed...

>emotional dismissal with nothing substantive to say on the matter

He's asking a fair question. And he wasn't even particularly rude about it. Why do you instantly act like that? Wouldn't it be easier to show him why he's so clearly wrong?

Ahem
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historiography_of_Alexander_the_Great#Contemporary_sources

The literary nature (histories are a lit genre in antiquity, it is nothing similar to what modern historians do) of much of the textual evidence from antiquity makes it that very little texts are contemporary to the events which they depict.

>he's asking a fair question
>6th grade level inquiry
>something that has already been dealt with in detail for centuries if you took the time to inform yourself instead of shitting up Veeky Forums with such a low quality thread
>a fair question

Nothing was preserved these authors are all reported in texts written 200 years afterwards

Except none of that is true.

>famous
>Within 10 years of his death
Are you fucking serious?

>hahaha this is so juvenile to even ask it's like 6th grader shit please just delete thread now

You're the kind of user who nervously overreacts to mask the fact that he doesn't even know how to debate a point properly.

Prove me wrong - in detail. I dare you.

>"you're shitting up Veeky Forums!"
>implying your reply isn't.
Nice self-awareness there, pal.

>Why do scholars generally agree that a historical "Jesus" existed, if there is not a single piece of contemporary evidence?

Because it is the best and only consistent explanation for the narrative and movement. Earliest writing we have to his life is within months of his death and within the same year.

hi wolfie
I assume you're talking about that bit in 1 corinthans? how do scholars figure its written so early?

>within months of his death and within the same year
Which writings, then?

The creed that St. Paul cites in the First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter fifteen. Beginning at verse three. And interesting enough it references scriptures existing in that time as well.

I'm no historian but it's just generally dated to the same year Jesus died or within two years. I dunno.

>I'm no historian but it's just generally dated to the same year Jesus died or within two years. I dunno.
isn't this just an appeal to authority then

Does this mean Socrates didn't exist? How about Alexandre? How about just about every other ancient figure?

>The creed that St. Paul cites

Paul was an allegorical-minded gnostic, if anything. He didn't support exoteric literalism. In fact he was in pronounced opposition to that.

>citing the views of historians on history is an appeal to authority if I can't cite their reasoning myself

Looking into it, the dating comes from it being given to Paul while in Jerusalem for his conversion in 33 or his conversion in 31/32. Historians attribute time to this creed being formalized and spreading. Hence it being dated to with 24 months of his death. His death, specifically, because the evangelizing of the church began at pentecost a little over a month after.

Well nice bait, Valentinus, but that's very off topic.

>comes from it being given to Paul while in Jerusalem for his conversion in 33 or his conversion in 31/32. Historians attribute time to this creed being formalized and spreading.
and how do they figure this?

>Well nice bait

It isn't bait. And it couldn't be more on topic re: historical Jesus. What are you talking about?

Everyone seems to be forgetting that Jesus does not appear exclusively in Christian scriptures and that is a big fucking deal.

You might want to read this:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

All the sources are well researched and if you want to get deep into it you're going to have a good time.

The Gospel of John was told by an eyewitness. It's the only gospel that explicitly claims eyewitness testimony.

I honestly wouldn't know how those dates come about.
The bit of text is very blatantly a taught creed. You can understand the words as you want and think all you want on its use in Christian circles but it is blatantly a creed in formula that is being said. I'm honestly not sure how this can directly relate to the historicity of Jesus.

People taking literally the tales of a supernatural kike is a good reason to lose hope in humanity, I agree.

>christcucks will never not be retarded

>individuals speak for a group
Anti-Christians in action.

I believe you're thinking about Luke

>tripfag
>weebnigger
>christcuck

...

I'm not a Christian dummy.

...

people always say stupid shit like this but can't explain why the new testament isn't evidence. at least Pauls writings and the gospels

You're not better.

>if there is not a single piece of contemporary evidence?
thats not true you little shit
why make the thread when you haven't done proper research.

could you post some contemporary evidence?

>this whole thread
>spoon feed me
no
this shouldn't be a thread and yet it is gonna stay up for a few days and hit bump limit

...

thats now how history works, retard

>done no real research
>have no real sources
>pretending like they have
>in absolute panic mode

the state of this board...

>unable to supply even a fraction of the food on the supposed spoon

there is LITERALLY no ancient witness that argues the nonexistence of Christ. Every time an ancient argument is made against Christianity, it has to do with Christ's divinity, his death, his resurrection, interpretations of scripture, things like that. NEVER is an argument made that Christ never existed. It is a recent invention

"You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger" -Jesus

what?

if you weren't such an obvious larper at the very least you'd have some textfile of pertinent info saved somewhere - be it articles, quotes, works of secondary scholarship etc - that you've accrued through your time of so-called research that would be able to steer user into the direction that you think they should be heading.

but you don't have and therefore can't forward user anywhere that because you haven't actually done the research.

Well lets get into evidence for Jesus.
Besides Tacitus' emotional comments on Nero, he is thought to source all of his comments based on Roman annals. That such a movement existed within his life (58-120AD) that made a harsh claim to a Roman governor and is treated as fact is best explained by historicity of the man.

Beyond this we do have Josephus' writings. The only alteration in regards to Jesus is assuming he believed the divinity of Christ. Origen quotes Josephus before alterations happened and the whole "james brother of jesus" and his baptism segments are irrevocably true and have been reviewed and confirmed by non-christian academics time and time again.

Else, we have:
- Pre-Pauline hymns of Jesus resurrection (1 Corinthians 15) that date from weeks to months after the death of Jesus within the same year
- Pre-Pauline hymns of Jesus as God (Philippians 2)
- Peter's speech in Acts 2
- Paul's conversation with James the brother of Jesus and Peter in Galatians
- Pre-Markan Narrative of the resurrection
- Mark's preservation of Jesus Aramaism
- Mark's preservation of Peter's embarrassments presupposes Jesus existence
- Multiple attestation of the sermon on the mount and of John the Baptist
- Suetonius mentions Christ having instigated the Jews against the Roman

You're not going to find hardly any professional historians who dispute the existence of Jesus. Bart Ehrman, who is known for being extremely critical of Christianity, only notes two people in relevant fields becoming notable for such a position. It's not a tenable position in modern historian circles. It's like trying to argue that Hannibal or Boudicca or Alexander didn't exist. It's a view that is only popular in anti-Christian circles.

Historicity is probability based and there is no better understanding of the coming of Christianity than the historicity of Jesus.

Hope that helped.
Cheers.

here are ancient names explicitly mentioning christ
new testament documents, written independently
tacitus
pliny the younger
josephus
suetonius

before you go stuttering "b-but those don't count" with some smug cartoon reaction image, can you name ONE ancient witness that refutes Christ's existence. literally one. I just named 5 myself, so please name one single ancient witness. Surely if Christianity could be so easily then there would have been one person from the apex of Greek civilization to rise up and say "hm has anyone ever really seen this Jesus guy"
come on pseud. I gave names now you give one. I only want one

OP BTFO

Oh god, it's like the thread with the guy asking if Socrates existed, again...

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

Maybe opening a fucking wikipedia page once in a while could help. There are a lot of historical evidence in written form from non-christian sources. As for most historical characters, all that is left of them is what was written about them.

>if Christianity could be so easily then
easily refuted*

Wow a serious response. Thank you.

>It's like trying to argue that Hannibal or Boudicca or Alexander didn't exist.
It's nothing like that because Hannibal, Boudicca or Alexander didn't have a bunch of typal solar deity figures from other times and nations in the past whose acts, events and dates therein perfectly synch up with theirs in what seems to be a chain of ritual procession. This is a misleading analogy.

>It's nothing like that because Hannibal, Boudicca or Alexander didn't have a bunch of typal solar deity figures from other times and nations in the past whose acts, events and dates therein perfectly synch up with theirs in what seems to be a chain of ritual procession.
except thats called christ myth theory and has been disproved repeatedly
if you're gonna say it hasn't then YOU source an example from an ancient document since we've all given you multiple sources and you also ignored literally 90% of Wolfs whole post

>Wikipedia
>The same site that says 6 million jews were killed by the germans between 39-45

We have letters from someone who knew Jesus' closest followers. Paul met Peter, James, and John and spoke to them about Jesus. He wrote about 20 years after Jesus' death, which is pretty damn close considering the period.

We also have Mark, written around 40 years after Jesus' death, which was probably based on earlier stories told by other Christians, some probably based on memories of Jesus' actual life. In any case, all of Mark portrays Jesus as a real, flesh and blood, preacher who was executed.

The details are open to question, because all the earliest sources are Christian and are trying to prove theological positions, but there almost certainly was a historical Jesus.

Actually, there is better evidence for Socrates, both Plato and Xenophanes are first-hand witnesses who personally knew Socrates. We don't have that for Jesus. But the later evidence does all point to Jesus existing.

noice

i'm not well versed on this, any recs on books on the historicity of jesus?

>implying that isn't what 99% of historical books/articles says
>implying wiki page would survive if it was """"""redpilled""""""

anyway wikipedia is at the very least good to check references.

It's at the very end of John.

"That disciple is the one who is bearing witness to these things, and the one who wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true.
And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if written in detail, I reckon not even the world itself would be able to hold the books that would be written."

I forgot about that, my mistake

>Does this mean Socrates didn't exist? How about Alexandre? How about just about every other ancient figure?
Exactly. They likely didn't, at least not in their described and prescribed forms.

>Exactly. They likely didn't, at least not in their described and prescribed forms.
"didn't" and "not in their described forms" are 2 VERY different arguments

>Suetonius (c. AD 69 – c. AD 122)

>except thats called christ myth theory and has been disproved repeatedly

List your sources that disprove this, please. I'm not saying that in an antagonistic way; I'm genuinely interested.

I've yet to see any work that sufficiently discredits all the astronomical relationships at play here. I don't know how it possibly could: there are far too many at play. The massive amounts of data that comparative religion and mythology bring to light are too glaring to deny. Though I'm open to pursuing any legitimate works you recommend. I'm no staunch partisan for any camp here.

>List your sources that disprove this, please
you'll have to give an example of exactly what similarities you're referring to.
>all the astronomical relationships at play here
>The massive amounts of data that comparative religion and mythology bring to light
this is what I mean by specific examples. you haven't actually given me anything to respond to, its just cryptic assertions. The most common claims are the ones put forth in Peter Josephs Zeitgeist documentary, which can be debunked very easily by just searching "jesus horus myth theory" or replacing horus with whichever mythological figure you're referring to. the debunk articles are certainly going to be among the very first results to come up

So you don't have any books you could give me on this? I would actually like to read them if you know of some.

Because we don't actually have all that much to go on and have no reason to think he's fake.

The only thing possibly even close to contemporary from a non-Christian source is Josephus, and the passage about Jesus in his Antiquities is unanimously agreed to be a Christian interpolation. He may have mentioned Jesus off-hand, and that's what was modified by a Christian scribe, but we'll never know. Tacitus only confirms that followers of Jesus existed in the early 2nd century.

Paul's letters are actually the strongest evidence, since he was a contemporary and knew Jesus' earliest followers. We can safely say he existed based on that and the early biographies.

Not all of that's correct, but I'll say that Jesus almost certainly existed and only cranks like Richard Carrier advocate mythicism.

>Pre-Pauline hymns of Jesus resurrection (1 Corinthians 15) that date from weeks to months after the death of Jesus within the same year
It's probably pre-Pauline, and is the best candidate for the earliest Christian creed we have, but the claims of it being made in a few weeks of Jesus death are not substantiated. It could be as late as c.40 AD when Paul started preaching, we just don't know.

>Pre-Pauline hymns of Jesus as God (Philippians 2)
The pre-Pauline nature of the poem is debated. And "though in the form of God" etc. is possibly the most debated part of the New Testament, it's far from decided what Paul meant.

>Peter's speech in Acts 2
Acts is a classical biography combined with a classic travel story, both genres are marked by putting extensive speeches into the mouths of (real) subjects. It may reflect what Peter taught in general, but it's certainly not a transcript.

>Paul's conversation with James the brother of Jesus and Peter in Galatians
This is very solid evidence, Galatians in itself seals the deal that Jesus was a real person

>Pre-Markan Narrative of the resurrection
Correct, but the details of earlier passion narratives are largely unknown. Paul only says Jesus died and rose.

>Mark's preservation of Jesus Aramaism
There's no guarantee those are genuine, being Aramaic doesn't mean Jesus had to have said it, but they are possibly original to Jesus.

>Mark's preservation of Peter's embarrassments presupposes Jesus existence
The theological message of Mark is that Jesus' identity is mysterious, it's not a mark (ha) of authenticity that the disciples make mistakes about who Jesus is in his gospel.

>Multiple attestation of the sermon on the mount and of John the Baptist
There is only one attestation to the Sermon on the Mount: Matthew, its composition suggests a compilation of Jesus' saying, and not a memory of an actual sermon, as Richard Bauckham argues. John the Baptist is indeed a well-attested historical figure.

>Suetonius mentions Christ having instigated the Jews against the Roman
Suetonius mentions a "chrestos" associated with Jewish unrest at the time of Claudius, who reigned 41-54, after Jesus' death. Additionally neither Paul nor the gospels suggest that Jesus caused any kind of insurrection.

That picture isnt very accurate regarding the carbon dating

Jesus does not even fall into those "typal solar deity figures" as has been refuted time and again after the release of zeitgeist. Regardleas, the fact that you, like christian believers, confuses the historical man jesus with the myth surrounding him (inc all the supernatural bullshit) only proves that you are not interested in a historical investigation of the matter, but only to pick and choose and distort evidence to satisfy your personal biases and ideologies against christianity.

>josephus
HAHAHHA a forged in akwardly placed sentence doesn't count

Jesus did not exist, it's that simple. Paul never talks about an actual historical being, his Jesus is more like an angel. All Gospels were created after him, so they have zero validity in corroborating whether Jesus existed.

Read the books from Richard Carrier for more amazon.com/Historicity-Jesus-Might-Reason-Doubt/dp/1909697494/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=MMQ7ZMWHA28FQG57HVBG

>this

How does it feel to lose an argument?

Huh?

>only proves that you are not interested in a historical investigation of the matter
I have literally been saying that I am no staunch partisan and am genuinely interested and asking for books to further study on this. Read more than one post before you decide to get angsty and spaz out.

You're qualified enough to answer that on your own, methinks

Ok, here's some books on the historical Jesus:

Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millenium
-Bart Ehrman
Did Jesus Exist?
-Bart Ehrman
Jesus of Nazareth: Millenarian Prophet
-Dale Allison
Constructing Jesus: Memory, Imagination and History
-Dale Allison
The Historical Figure of Jesus
-E. P. Sanders
Jesus and Judaism
-E. P. Sanders
Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews
-Paula Fredriksen
Jesus the Jew
-Geza Vermes
Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian's Account
-Maurice casey
Jesus, Criteria, and the Demise of Authenticity
-Chris Keith

Now, please read someone other than Carrier, he's a single historian and holds an extreme minority view.

>Oh no! He took a pee on my poop.

Socrates is not only referenced in philosophical sources but also historical sources. For example he was the epistates in the trial of the generals for the battle of arginusae during the pelloponesian war.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Arginusae
perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0206:book=1:chapter=7:section=15

Thanks. I'll check these out.

Aristophanes? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Clouds

>Now, please read someone other than Carrier, he's a single historian and holds an extreme minority view.
So what? Holding a minority opinion is no reason to outright dismiss their premise with zero arguments. Lazy posturing desu.

So, what do we actually know about the historical Jesus?

He was an aramaic-speaking jewish preacher from Galilee who was executed by crucifixion in Jerusalem. He had a core of close followers which included guys called Peter and John, and had at least one brother, one of whom was called James.

That's pretty much it. Everything else is speculation.

try reading the four gospels

Because deep down we know he was just Caesar.

>Historical Jesus
>Gospels
Shoo out of here

you: small brain
me: large brain

brainlet even talkslie a caveman

Do we know if he was illiterate?

We don't know, but coming from a poor rural area, he was very likely illiterate. The scene where he reads from Isaiah in Luke 4:16-19, what he says is a mash-up of phrases from Isaiah, not an actual passage. If it's a genuine episode (a big if), it would suggests he was illiterate and was reciting from memory.