User:TrumpetPower!/Jesus as Mythical Creation

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Although the great majority of historians and Biblical scholars accept the historicity of Jesus, a small but often-vocal minority consider him to be a purely mythical creation. Arguments come in two varieties: historical and mythological. The former notes that there is no eyewitness, contemporary, or near-contemporary evidence of Jesus (even the earliest dates given for the earliest sources are in the latter half of the first century); asserts that extant evidence (which can mostly be found in the Christian Bible) is late and often self-contradictory and unreliable; and notes that many early sources--including a number of Christians who believed in a spiritual Christ--explicitly denied the existence of Jesus. Those who approach the matter from a mythological perspective see in Jesus an abstract, symbolic, and metaphorical allusion to a higher knowledge that dovetails well with recognized heroic archetypes and mythological constructions. Echoes of the debate can even be found in the Bible itself, as the Second Epistle of John warns that "many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh," a reference to the Docetic perspective that Jesus was a purely spiritual being.[1] The theory has not currently found widespread acceptance among Bible scholars and historians[2], though in more recent times a few scholars, such as Hyam Maccoby and John Shelby Spong, and some popular authors, such as Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy, have championed its cause.

Contents

[edit] Background

The modern concept that Jesus is an ahistorical figure arose from nineteenth century scholarship on the formation of myth, in the work of writers such as Max Müller and James Frazer. Müller argued that religions originated in mythic stories of the birth, death and rebirth of the sun. Frazer further attempted to explain the origins of humanity's mythic beliefs in the idea of a "sacrificial king", associated with the sun as a dying and reviving god. According to Frazer, the king's death and rebirth was connected to the regeneration of the earth in springtime and was often required for the continuity of a ritual-based community.

At the same time, historians associated with the Higher Criticism were deconstructing the New Testament, arguing that mythic ideas had been imposed over the life of the historical Jesus to create the incarnated God of Christian doctrine. It was a short step from this for more radical scholars to deny that the Gospels told us anything about a historical Jesus, but that "Jesus" was little more than a name used as a peg on which to hang a conflation of mythical, messianic and philosophical ideas of the era.

[edit] Early proponents

The first scholarly proponent of this theory was probably nineteenth century historian Bruno Bauer, a Hegelian thinker who argued that the true founder of Christianity was the Alexandrian Jew Philo, who had adapted Judaic ideas to Hellenic philosophy. His arguments made little impact at the time. Other authors included Edwin Johnson, who argued that Christianity emerged from a combination of liberal trends in Judaism with Gnostic mysticism. Less speculative versions of the theory developed under Dutch Bible scholars such as A.D. Loman and G.I.P. Bolland. Loman argued that episodes in Jesus's life, such as the Sermon on the Mount, were in reality fictions to justify compilations of pre-existing liberal Jewish sayings. Bolland developed the theory that Christianity developed from Gnosticism and that "Jesus" was a symbolic figure representing Gnostic ideas about godhead.

By the early twentieth century a number of writers had published arguments favoring the mythical origins of Jesus, ranging from the highly speculative to the more scholarly. These treatments were sufficiently influential to merit several book-length responses by traditional historians and New Testament scholars. The most influential of the books arguing for a mythic Jesus was Arthur Drews's The Christ-Myth (1909) which brought together the scholarship of the day in defence of the idea that Christianity had been a Jewish Gnostic cult that spread by appropriating aspects of Greek philosophy and Frazerian death-rebirth deities. This combination of arguments became the standard form of the mythic Christ theory.

While aspects of the theory were influential, most mainstream scholars at the time rejected the notion that "Jesus" was little more than a fiction, arguing that the Gospels, Pauline epistles and Acts of the Apostles contained some reliable information about the events they describe. Since Frazerian theories about myth have been largely debunked, and the priority of Gnosticism questioned, established scholarship continues to reject the notion of a purely mythical Jesus.

[edit] Recent scholarship

In recent years, few academicians have questioned the historicity of Jesus, but the idea has been advanced by William B. Smith and George Albert Wells (The Jesus Legend and The Jesus Myth); Timothy Freke, philosopher and expert on mysticism, and Peter Gandy, a scholar of mystery religions (co-authors of The Jesus Mysteries and Jesus and the Lost Goddess); and noted humanist Earl Doherty (author of The Jesus Puzzle), a scholar of Ancient History and Classical Languages.

There are many different views regarding the nature of the early texts. Earl Doherty argues that Jesus is a historicized mythic figure created out of the Old Testament, whom the early Christians experienced in visions, as Paul says he did. Joseph Atwill, on the other hand, argues that Jesus is the deliberate and malefic creation of powerful Romans of the family of Vespasian, who sought to divide and destroy Judaism. Hence in Atwill's version, there really is a historical Jesus, but he is Vespasian's son Titus, and the gospels are a complex allegory of his conquest of Judea.

Opponents of Jesus's historicity do not agree amongst themselves on the dating and meaning of the early Christian texts, with recent advocates like Doherty holding to traditional scholarly dating that puts the gospels toward the end of the first century, and others, like Hermann Detering (The Fabricated Paul), arguing that the early Christian texts are largely forgeries and products of the mid and late second century.

Presently, many New Testament scholars and historians consider the question as resolved in favour of Jesus' historicity. Nevertheless, Earl Doherty has infused the debate with fresh vigour with his website and publication of his book, The Jesus Puzzle. Doherty's treatment of the issue has received much attention on the internet from both sides of the debate, including favourable reviews by skeptics Dr. Robert M. Price and Richard Carrier [3].

No peer-reviewed work rejecting the historicity of Jesus exists and it has had little impact on the consensus among New Testament academics of Jesus' historicity.

[edit] Historical perspective

Naturally, conclusive evidence of Jesus's existence would preclude the debate from occurring in the first place. Price and others argue that the inconsistencies between the Gospels, birth stories, genealogies, chronologies, and other parts of the narrative makes them worthless as historical documents. According to these authors, the historiography of the Gospels means that they can provide no meaningful historical information about the time Jesus was alleged to have lived, but only about the authors of the Gospels and their own communities [4]. As the Gospels themselves constitute the only detailed historical evidence of Jesus, excluding them from consideration leaves little else for consideration.

Although seldom remarked on by New Testament scholars, some who reject the historicity of Jesus argue that historians lack any reliable and widely accepted methodology for determining what is historical and what is not. As J. D. Crossan, a well respected scholar of early Christianity, comments, I do not think, after two hundred years of experimentation, that there is any way acceptable in public discourse or scholarly debate, by which you can go directly into the great mound of the Jesus tradition and separate out the historical Jesus layer from all later strata. While this is not an argument that Jesus did not exist any more than it is an argument that the Paul described in Acts, or even Napoleon, did not exist, those who reject Jesus's historicity believe it does call into question the results of supposed historical inquiry into Jesus of Nazareth.

Those who reject the notion of a purely mythical Jesus, including skeptical commentators such as the Jesus Seminar, maintain that some reliable information can be still extracted from the Gospels so long as consistent critical methodology is used.

[edit] Notable omissions in extant contemporary records

Some of the strongest evidence against the historicity of Jesus lies in the fact that no mention of him or the events of the New Testament can be found in any of the numerous contemporary and near-contemporary records of the day. Traditional scholars generally explain these omissions by claiming that Jesus would have been of little or no interest to contemporary authors and historians and offer their reconstruction of a humble charismatic preacher by way of demonstration. Those who reject the historicity of Jesus similarly reject such reconstructions, noting that there is no historical evidence, including amongst early Christian heretics, that Jesus was ever regarded in such a fashion; they further contend that at least some of the following sources still would or might have recorded the humble version of Jesus that traditional scholars suggest. And those who view Jesus as a mythical creation doubt that such a figure would have been substantial enough to spark such a powerful new world religion.

[edit] Philo (20 BCE - 40 CE)

By far, the most notable omission is Philo's. Philo was a Hellenized Jew who lived in Alexandria, Egypt. He visited the Temple in Jerusalem, and corresponded with family there. He wrote a great many books on religion and philosophy which survive to this day, and mentioned many of his contemporaries. His main theological contribution was the development of the Logos, the "Word" that opens the Gospel of John. Yet Philo not once mentions Jesus, anybody who could be mistaken for Jesus, or any of the events of the New Testament. His last writings come from 40 CE, only a few years after the end of Pontius Pilate's reign, when he was part of an embassy sent by the Alexandrian Jews to the Roman Emperor Caligula.

[edit] Seneca (ca. 54 BCE - ca. 39 CE)

Seneca the Elder wrote many philosophic (Stoic) and satirical books and letters (and Tragedies) in Rome. He wrote a great deal on many subjects and mentioned many people. He was a Stoic, a school of thought considered sympathetic to Christian teachings. Even if Jesus was nothing more than a popular rebel preacher, it is possible that he would have caught Seneca's attention.

Seneca's omission was sufficiently troublesome to certain early Christians that they forged correspondence between Seneca and St. Paul. Jerome, in de Viris Illustribus 12, and Augustine, in Epistle 153.4 ad Macedonium, both make reference of the forged communication.

[edit] Plutarch (ca. 46 - 127)

Plutarch wrote, about the same time as Josephus, about contemporary Roman figures, oracles, prophesies, and moral, religious, and spiritual issues. A figure such as Jesus, whom the Gospels portray as interacting with Roman figures, making prophecies, and giving sermons on novel religious and spiritual issues, would have been of great interest to him.

[edit] Justus

Justus of Tiberias wrote, at the end of the first century, a history of Jewish kings in Galilee. As the Gospels record Jesus as having significant interactions with the Jewish political and religious leaders, as well as the highest-ranking local Roman officials, one would expect Justus to have made mention of those events, yet Photius (Bibliotheca, XXIII) explicitly impugns Justus for his omission. Justus's works survive only in fragmentary form to this day.

[edit] Josephus (ca. 37 - ca. 100)

For those who reject the authenticity of both the Testamonium Flavanium and the xx.9 reference to James, Josephus would belong on this list. Naturally, those who accept the authenticity of one or the other, in whole or in part, see Josephus as providing evidence for an historical Jesus and thus would object to Josephus's inclusion. As the only first-century non-Christian to perhaps write of Jesus, the two brief mentions to be found in Antiquities of the Jews (written ca. 94) are the subject of often-heated debate.

[edit] Others

There are a number of other sources that survive from the period in which it would not have been unreasonable to find mention of Jesus, though in no particular case would one be surprised to find mention of Jesus lacking. However, Jesus is missing from all of them.

These include: Damis, who wrote of Apollonius of Tyana, a philosopher and mystic who was a contemporary with Jesus; Pliny the Elder, who wrote, in 80 CE, a Natural History that mentions hundreds of people, major and minor; Juvenal, Martial, Petronius, and Persius, Roman satirists who favored topics similar to Jesus's story; Pausanias, whose massive Guide to Greece includes mentions of thousands of names, including minor Jewish figures in Palestine; historians Epictetus and Aelius Aristides, who both recorded events and people in Palestine; and Fronto who, in the second century, scandalized rites about Roman Christians without ever mentioning Jesus.

Other writers and historians who could possibly have mentioned Jesus, though they perhaps would have not had any special reason to do so, include Dio Chrysostom, Aulus Gellius, Lucius Apuleius, Marcus Aurelius, Musonius Rufus, Hierocles of Alexandria, Cassius Maximus Tyrius, Arrian, Appian, Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, Lucius Annaeus Florus, and Marcus Annaeus Lucanus. On the other hand, one would have expected all of these people to have mentioned the earth-shaking events of the New Testament.

[edit] Biblical contradictions

The Christian Bible is a collection of the majority of documents supporting the historicity of Jesus, and the only reliable sources for details on his life. Those who advocate the theory that Jesus is a myth consider contradictions in the Bible to impeach the credibility of those documents. Those who oppose the theory generally consider the contradictions to be inconsequential and largely the result of the orally-transmitted roots of the documents. A significant minority of Christians hold to the concept of Biblical Inerrancy and assert that contradictions are apparent only and result from human failings to properly interpret the Bible.

The following is a partial listing of significant contradictions in major biographical details of Jesus's life and death. Those who deny the historicity of Jesus would claim that facts such as these should not be in dispute.

[edit] Genealogy

Matthew 1:1-16 traces Jesus's lineage from King David's son Solomon through to Joseph's father, Jacob. Luke 3:23-31 traces a completely different lineage from King David's son Nathan to Joseph's father, Heli. Christian apologists traditionally explain this discrepancy by suggesting that one records a patrilineal genealogy while the other a matrilineal one, but both identify different fathers for Joseph and neither mentions Mary. Further, there is no historical precedent for indicating a matrilineal genealogy for a first-century Jewish man, and especially not to establish that man's royal heritage.

[edit] Early childhood

According to Matthew 2:13-16, Mary and Joseph fled with the infant Jesus to Egypt in order to escape Herod's slaughtering of "all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under." The family does not return until the end of Herod's reign. In Luke 2:39-40, the holy family returns directly to Nazareth from Bethlehem, traveling to Jerusalem every year for the Passover feast. No mention of any acts of infanticide is made.

[edit] The Disciples

The Disciples of Jesus were twelve men personally selected by Jesus and who served as his traveling companions throughout his ministry. They would have come to know each other as well as any close family member.

Matthew 4:18-20 and Mark 4:18-20 both recount the same story of how Jesus selected his first Apostle, Peter, but the stories of Peter's selection from Luke 5:2-11 and John 1:35-42 are completely different.

Matthew 10:2 and Mark 3:16-19 both list the same set of Disciples. Luke 6:13-16 omits Thaddaeus and includes Judas son of James in his place. Acts 1:13,26 agrees with Luke but adds that the remaining Disciples chose Matthias to replace Judas Iscariot. John neither provides a list nor indicates their number, though it does mention nine of them by name at various places.

[edit] The trial

According to Matthew 26:18-20, 26:57-68, 27:1-2, Mark 14:16-18, 14:53-72, and 15:1, Jesus's initial hearing was at night on the first evening of Passover; in the morning, he was taken to Pontius Pilate. Luke 22:13-15 and 54-66 record the hearing as having taken place in the morning, and in John 18:28 and 19:14 it happened the day before. This is especially significant as the first evening of Passover was and is one of the holiest days of the year for Jews, a day on which conducting business of any kind would be anathema.

In Matthew 26:59-66 and Mark 14:55-64, Jesus is tried by the entire Sanhedrin, the Jewish high court. In Luke 22:66-71, there was no trial, but only an inquiry held by the Sanhedrin. In John 18:13-24, Jesus was never brought before the Sanhedrin at all; Jesus only had private hearings before Annas and Caiphas.

Matthew 27:11-14 reports that Jesus maintained a stoic silence at his hearing before Pilate. According to John 18:33-37, Jesus answered all the charges eloquently and at length.

The chief priests and elders persuade the people to demand the release of Barabbas in Matthew 27:20, whereas in Mark 15:11 only the chief priests are responsible, and in Luke 23:18-23 the people seem to decide for themselves without prompting from leadership.

[edit] The Resurrection

Biblical accounts of the resurrection differ on a great number of details of varying significance, including who was at and who went to the tomb, when they arrived, whether nor not the stone covered the tomb, whether or not there was an earthquake, who did what afterwards, how and to whom Jesus made his initial appearances after his resurrection, and the reactions of those he appeared to. The discrepancies are generally attributed to either an understandable confusion on the part of those who witnessed this most extraordinary event, or a sure sign of multiple sources offering creative fictional interpretation of an event they were not witness to themselves.

[edit] The Ascension

In both Mark 16:14-19 and Luke 24:50-51, the Ascension takes place the same day as the Resurrection. In Mark, while seated at a table in or near Jerusalem, Jesus commands the Disciples to spread the Gospel and tells them that they may identify themselves to unbelievers by their invulnerability to poison and abilities to heal the sick and then is received into Heaven. In Luke, the Disciples are outdoors at Bethany where Jesus was in the act of blessing them when he was carried up to Heaven.

In Acts 1:9-12, forty days have passed, during which Jesus continued to preach the Gospel. The Disciples are northeast of Bethany, at Mount Olivet. Jesus delivers a brief final message to his Disciples and is taken up and received by a cloud. Two men, clothed in white, appear out of nowhere to tell the Disciples that Jesus will return in the same manner as he was taken.

Matthew contains no mention of the Ascension.

[edit] Events only recorded in the Bible

In addition to the numerous contradictions in the Bible's own account of Jesus's life, those who reject the historicity of Jesus consider the numerous spectacular events recorded only in the Bible and nowhere else as irreparably condemning the Bible's reliability as a historical account.

Those who hold to the historicity of Jesus generally, though not universally, acknowledge that the Bible is not to be considered the literal truth, and that it contains many obviously-mythical elements; rather, they consider what follows to be later additions to the core truth of the historical Jesus, in much the same way that a caught fish gets bigger each time in the re-telling. Those who hold that Jesus is a myth see no evidence that any fish was ever caught in the first place.

[edit] Star of Bethlehem

Although many explanations have been offered for the Star of Bethlehem, no actual record of any such astronomical phenomenon can be found.

[edit] Herodian slaughter of infants

As mentioned above, Matthew 2:16 claims that Herod ordered the slaughter of all the children "in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof," who were two years old or younger. Bethlehem is situated about fifteen miles from the coast of the Dead Sea, and about twice that distance to the coast of the Mediterranean, in the heart of Judea. No mention is made anywhere of any infanticide of any proportion anywhere near that time or region, let alone one of such a horrific magnitude.

[edit] Flight to Egypt

Also as mentioned above, Matthew 2:13-16 records the holy family as having fled to Egypt. Though they may well have remained incognito while they lived there, the Bible says nothing on the matter one way or the other. If they did not keep their identities hidden, it is most likely that Philo, who was living in Alexandria at this time, would have recorded the presence of the prophesied and persecuted future King of the Jews.

[edit] Public miracles

The Bible records Jesus as having performed some very public miracles, in front of crowds numbering, in some cases, in the thousands. He healed the sick, blind, and lame; he raised the dead; he walked on water; and he fed multitudes with table scraps. History is replete with people doing such deeds, but every other instance is universally assumed to be mythic fiction.

[edit] Public ministry

Jesus preached the Sermon on the Mount to a crowd of "multitudes," and the Sermon on the Plain to "great multitude of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases." This clearly indicates that Jesus must have been a popular figure known throughout the entire region; yet, no mention is made of any preacher giving such a sermon to such crowds.

[edit] The trial

Jesus's trial is notable for what it describes as a great many of the most egregious possible violations of Jewish and Roman law and custom by all officials involved. The trial is said to have taken place during Pesach, one of the holiest holidays for Jews then and now, on which such activities are most strictly forbidden. There was no need for the Jews to appeal to Roman authority for assistance in the trial; they had full authority from the Romans to execute anybody for any reason sanctioned by their own laws. There was even less reason for the Romans to agree to intervene in what would have been to them internecine provincial politics. The behavior of the Sanhedrin, such as spitting on Jesus, would have been just as shocking to people then as would similar action by the members of the United States Supreme Court today. If Pilate had agreed to take the case, he would not have permitted an unruly mob to have remained present, let alone have a say in the trial. While the Romans courts, like all courts, surely freed the guilty and executed the innocent, they never would have publicly declared their intention to do so any more than would any modern court; Pilate's acquiescence in granting the mob Barabbas in exchange for Jesus is incomprehensible. Finally, had Pilate actually acted as described, Rome would have had his head on a platter, figuratively if not literally, for letting a mob dictate his actions as well as for general gross misconduct.

In short, if even one aspect of the trial happened as described, it would have caught the attention--and raised the ire--of a great many important people in the region and beyond. If all of it happened as described, it would have been the most scandalous trial of the millennium.

[edit] The crucifixion

While there are undoubtedly many people who were crucified who remain unknown to history, various records of countless crucifixions survive. Romans saw crucifixion as a most ignominious way to die, and, as such, crucifixions often caught the attention of local historians. Sometimes Romans would crucify hundreds of people a day, but they also crucified people singly or in small groups. Josephus records many of these, including that of a Jesus who was the son of a man named Stada, but nobody recorded any crucifixion of a charismatic rebel preacher who could be mistaken for Jesus Christ.

[edit] Portents at Jesus's death

The Gospels record ominous portents as having occurred at the time of Jesus's death. As recorded in Matthew 27:45-54 and similarly in the other synoptic Gospels, a three-hour darkness was "over all the land"; the veil of the temple was rent; there was an earthquake; and the graves opened and dead saints "appeared unto many" in Jerusalem.

No eclipse would have been astronomically possible at the time; Pesach, according to the lunar calendar, always is celebrated with the start of the full moon, and eclipses can only happen when the moon is new. Further, no eclipse ever lasts for more than a few minutes--let alone three hours. No account of this most remarkable event, visible from "all the land," can be found outside the Gospels.

Records of major earthquakes from the period are rather comprehensive, yet no recorded earthquake happened at a time when the crucifixion could have happened.

The rending of the veil of the temple would have been a most remarkable occurrence, yet it remained intact until the temple was destroyed in 70 CE.

Had presumably all the graves in the area been opened and a corresponding number of dead saints "appeared unto many" in Jerusalem, it is absolutely certain that those many would have reported the fact, yet none did.

[edit] The Resurected Jesus

Acts 1:3 says that, for forty days after his resurrection, Jesus continued his ministry, yet no extra-Biblical record can be found of the most remarkable fact of a man, very publicly executed, continuing to do for over a month that which got him executed in the first place.

[edit] The Ascension

According to Acts 1:9, Jesus Ascended to Heaven from atop Mount Olivet, which would have been in full view of all of Jerusalem. Once more, no account of the Ascension can be found outside of the Bible.

[edit] Early non-Christian references to Jesus

As far as is known at present, only about six or seven early non-Christian references to Jesus appear to exist. This is despite the high degree of literacy in the Roman world, and despite the relatively large number of Roman and Jewish commentators and historians writing in the first century. The paucity of non-Christian evidence is, to those who reject Jesus's historicity, an argument from silence that Jesus was a later invention. To traditional scholars as well as many [Christian apologetics|Christian apologists]], the silence is attributed to the relative unimportance of the historical Jesus at the time as viewed by Romans, Greeks, and most Jews. Those who reject historicity counter this response by noting that all the evidence which does exist to support Jesus--mainly, the Gospels--describes a monumental figure, performing wondrous miracles and butting heads with the most prominent figures of the day, not a minor non-influential personage

Those who reject Jesus's historicity point out that the earliest references to Jesus are by Christian writers (in the New Testament and its Apocrypha). Of the few non-Christian references, almost all merely mention the existence of Christians and their belief, rather than explicitly mentioning Jesus as having existed. The most cited example for a non-Christian reference to Jesus is Josephus (37 CE - c. 100 CE), whose Antiquities, written in 93 CE (more than three generations after most Christian scholars date the crucifixion), as preserved in the writings of the Christian apologist Eusebius, contain two references to a Jesus as the founder of a sect.

The first reference, the Testimonium Flavianum, contains content that affirms core religious tenets of Christianity rejected by Judaism and thus is most uncharacteristic of a lifelong Jew such as Josephus. It not mentioned by second-century Christian authors, though several scholars have proposed that when stripped of the implausible Christian phrases, the core witness to a Jesus as a leader of a sect is reliable [5].

The second reference, which merely mentions that a person named Jesus was the brother of a person named James who is traditionally identified as James the Just, is also disputed [6], though it is mostly--though not universally--regarded as significantly more likely to be authentic than the Testamonium [7]. Nevertheless, the Hebrew form of Jesus, a colloquial form of the name Joshua, was a particularly common name at the time, and the second reference provides only Jesus's name, identification as the Christ ("Messiah" or "anointed one"), and relationship to James.

[edit] Paul's presentation of Jesus

Several of the epistles of Paul are regarded as not authentic by a majority of scholars, with the Pastoral Epistles being singled out as least likely to be genuine by over two thirds. When the authorship of the Pauline epistles is considered, the epistles can be split into two groups - the seven considered by almost everyone to be genuine, against the rest. In this division, the theology of the disputed group seems, in the eyes of a majority of scholars, to be quite distinct from the theology of the seven undisputed letters. For some writers it is almost as if the disputed group were written specifically to counter the group thought to be genuine.

Although there are occasional references in the disputed group to a flesh-and-blood Jesus, the undisputed group contains limited mention of Jesus as an historic figure. Even though Paul's letters are widely regarded as the earliest Christian documents, they contain very few references to Jesus' actual life and ministry, which the later Gospels detail. Traditional scholars and Christian apologists propose that Paul's letters were written in response to specific problems unrelated to the details of the life of Jesus, and so the occasional and epistolary nature of Paul's correspondence are sufficient explanations for the lack of detail of Jesus' life. Those who reject Jesus's historicity note an abundance of missed rhetorical opportunities to reinforce Paul's points by quoting Jesus or citing well-known events in his life that were directly relevant to the topics he was discussing.

Several commentators, from writers whose theories have not received widespread acceptance, such as Earl Doherty, to widely respected academics and experts in the field, such as Harvard professor Elaine Pagels, have argued that Paul's writing should be interpreted as gnosticism. Christianity arose under a heavy Hellenic culture, Paul himself growing up in Tarsus, the centre of one of the major mystery religions of the time, and Pagels and Doherty (and others) believe that Paul's writing should be viewed in the context of the Hellenic culture which formed his background.

Gnosticism, a diverse religion some of whose branches used some Christian names and ideas and which flourished and subsequently died out in the first through fourth centuries, frequently used allegory and metaphor to guide its initiates towards salvation, which Gnosticism viewed as a form of knowledge (gnosis). Many Gnostic groups even regarded Jesus himself as an allegory, rather than historic, and docetism was rife in Gnostic groups. Those who consider Jesus a mythical creation believe that many parts of the New Testament were written as Gnostic documents, and that Paul's writing is a prominent example of Gnosticism in the New Testament[8]. Accordingly, in this interpretation, those references in the undisputed epistles that appear to refer to events on earth, and a physical historic Jesus, should instead be regarded as allegorical metaphors [9]. These interpretations, of for example Galatians 1:19, 3:16, 4:4, Romans 1:3, 3:1, 15:8, and 1 Corinthians 11:23-25, 15:4, are regarded by mainstream scholars and Christian apologists as based on forced and erroneous translations [10].

[edit] Mythological Perspective

Even if one rejects the existence of an historical Jesus, Jesus as a religious, spiritual, and mythological figure casts a very long shadow on history. Those who approach the question from a mythological perspective attempt to explain how Jesus could have come into being without benefit of an historical personage at the foundation.

[edit] Jesus and syncretism

The existence of Gnosticism and various mystery religions with similarities to Christianity has led those who consider Jesus a mythical creation to suggest that Christianity was strongly influenced by these, essentially building a mystery religion on the foundation of a Judaic tradition (syncretism). This would have included linking the two through Jesus' attempts to fulfill Old Testament prophecies. More generally, it would have included mythologizing a Jewish leader into a Son of God, and a representative of wisdom and knowledge.

Jesus as Sol-Invictus, the image is found in the oldest parts of the centre of Roman catholicism - the grottoes of the vatican
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Jesus as Sol-Invictus, the image is found in the oldest parts of the centre of Roman catholicism - the grottoes of the vatican

Some of the most well-known early adherents of the mythological school include Voltaire, Friedrich Engels, Karl Kautsky (Whose 1908 work 'Foundations of Christianity' [11] remains one of the important works in this respect) and David Strauss (1808-1874), who was the most intellectually influential early mythologist. Many of these authors did not absolutely deny Jesus's existence, but they believed the miraculous aspects of the Gospel accounts to be mythical and that Jesus' life story had been heavily manipulated to fit Messianic prophesy. Both Strauss and Kautsky argue that very little can be deduced from the surviving documents concerning the historical Jesus. According to the Slovenian scholar Anton Strle, Nietzsche lost his faith in Christianity as a result of reading Strauss' book Leben Jesu. Another important mythologist was Paul-Louis Couchoud (1879-1959), a philosopher and a consistent defender of the thesis that Jesus did not exist.

Another integral part of this view is the idea the early Christians were docetic - that Christ was a spiritual being rather than flesh and blood. Professor of German G.A. Wells says regarding the New Testament:

"It is not just that the early documents are silent about so much of Jesus that came to be recorded in the gospels, but that they view him in a substantially different way—as a basically supernatural personage only obscurely on Earth as a man at some unspecified period in the past, 'emptied' then of all his supernatural attributes (Phil.2:7), and certainly not a worker of prodigious miracles which made him famous throughout 'all Syria' (Mt.4:24). I have argued that there is good reason to believe that the Jesus of Paul was constructed largely from musing and reflecting on a supernatural 'Wisdom' figure, amply documented in the earlier Jewish literature, who sought an abode on Earth, but was there rejected, rather than from information concerning a recently deceased historical individual. The influence of the Wisdom literature is undeniable; only assessment of what it amounted to still divides opinion."

During the first and second centuries BC, Hellenic philosophy merged with various minor deities to produce mystery religions, in which a Life-death-rebirth deity was used as an allegory for the search for wisdom. Such religions quickly replaced or absorbed local religions and became the dominant beliefs in many places throughout the Mediterranean, with the resulting variations of the central god-man figure becoming known as Osiris-Dionysus.

Some scholars, notably Martin A. Larson, believe that Jesus existed, but that Christianity is based on the soteriology of Osiris and the ethics and eschatology of other beliefs, while the Messianic concept is a uniquely Jewish addition to the development of Christianity. More recently, writer Timothy Freke and scholar of mystery religions Peter Gandy, who wrote The Jesus Mysteries, think that Jesus did not exist as a historical figure but was in fact one of the forms of Osiris-Dionysus. CNN's David Dodson, in a review of their book, however, noted that "while the authors discuss many examples of elements of Osiris/Dionysus in the Jesus story, they virtually ignore the more direct ties to Jewish tradition and prophecy. This oversight undermines the credibility of many of their arguments, and could have the tendency to mislead the novice reader in this subject" [12]. On the other hand, the Canberra Times said

"The theory is not new. For two centuries at least, scholars have been aware of the intriguing parallels between the accounts of Jesus' life and that of preceding and contemporaneous figures such as Osiris, Dionysus, and Mithras. What is new is the powerful scholarship brought to the issue by authors Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy in The Jesus Mysteries, just published in Australia. The result, which draws strongly on the Gnostic gospels discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945, is so persuasive that it is doubtful whether theological scholarship will ever be the same."

A recent book, The Pagan Christ: Recovering the Lost Light (2004), by journalist-priest Tom Harpur, discusses another possible origin, based partly on the writings of Alvin Boyd Kuhn and Egyptologist Gerald Massey. Massey's The Historical Jesus and Mythical Christ: A Lecture, published in 1880, explores the similarity between what has been written about Jesus and what has been written about Jehoshua Ben-Pandira, who "may have been born about the year 120 B.C." From page 2 of the lecture: "... according to the Babylonian Gemara to the Mishna of Tract 'Shabbath', this Jehoshua, the son of Pandira and Stada, was stoned to death as a wizard, in the city of Lud, or Lydda, and afterwards crucified by being hanged on a tree, on the eve of the Passover. ..." See Yeshu.

[edit] The influence of the Old Testament

According to a majority of scholars, the synoptic problem - the strong similarities between three of the gospels, is most accurately resolved by the two-source hypothesis, according to which most of the content of Matthew and Luke were copied wholesale from the Gospel of Mark and a lost collection of quotations known as the Q document, with which the Gospel of Thomas is the most similar document of the era. In the small amount of additional material unique to Matthew, amongst the three, Jesus is presented in a way that has strong parallels with significant Old Testament figures, most noticeably Moses, whose birth narrative, and sojourn in the wilderness, Matthew appears to have used as the basis of that of Jesus.

It is widely accepted that the Gospel accounts were influenced by the Old Testament. In particular, many quotations attributed to the Q document, which the Gospels attribute to Jesus, find parallels in several places of the Old Testament. Those who view Jesus with a purely mythical perspective believe that the gospels are not history but a type of midrash: creative narratives based on the stories, prophecies, and quotes in the Hebrew Bible. In particular, there is no reason to assume that the sayings attributed to Q, a document theoretically devoid of narrative, originated with Jesus, rather than just being a collection of wisdom from several independent sources, such as the Old Testament. As such, those who reject Jesus's historicity claim that, when the midrashic elements are removed, little to no content remains that could be used to demonstrate the existence of an historical Jesus [13].

Though conceding that the Gospels may contain some creativity and midrash, mainstream scholars and Christian apologists argue that the Gospels are more akin to ancient Graeco-Roman biographies. Although scholars do not agree on the exact nature of this genre, associated works attempted to impart historical information about historical figures, but were not comprehensive and could include legendary developments. Nevertheless, as ancient biographies, proponents of Jesus' existence believe they contain sufficient historical information to establish his historicity.

Although there are many types of midrash, the Toledot Yeshu jumps out as being the most similar to the proposal that characters and situations were invented wholesale according to religious dogma and Old Testament prophecy. However, most scholars and Christian apologists have argued that the closest parallels to potential Moses-based embellishment of the Jesus narrative, are inapplicable. Moreover, there are many examples of ancient Jewish and Christian literature that shaped their stories and accounts according to Old Testament influence, but nevertheless provided some historical accounts [14]; for example, in 1 Maccabees, Judas and his battles are described in terms which parallel those of Saul's and David's battles against the Philistines in 1 and 2 Samuel, but nevertheless 1 Maccabees has a degree of respect amongst historians as having a reasonable degree of historical reliability (John R. Bartlett, The First and Second Books of Maccabees, p. 15-17).

[edit] Parallels with Mediterranian mystery religions

Some of those who advocate the mythical origins of Jesus have argued that many aspects of the Gospel stories of Jesus have remarkable parallels with life-death-rebirth gods in the widespread mystery religions prevalent in the hellenic culture amongst which Christianty was born. The central figure of one of the most widespread, Osiris-Dionysus, was consistently localised and deliberately merged with local deities in each area, since it was the mysteries which were imparted that were regarded as important, not the method by which they were taught. In the view of some, most prominently Freke and Gandy in The Jesus Mysteries, Jewish mystics adapted their form of Osiris-Dionysus to match prior Jewish heroes like Moses and Joshua, hence creating Jesus.

Several parallels are frequently cited by these advocates of the purely mythical genesis of Jesus, and often appear, somewhat less carefully mixed with more dubious parallels, on internet sites. The most prominently cited and plausible parallels are with Horus and Mithras. Horus was one of the life-death-rebirth deities, and was connected and involved in the resurrection of Osiris, whose Egyptian name (Asar) is very similar to the root of Lazarus. Some versions of the Book of the dead report that Horus fed 5000 with just a few loaves of bread, since he was born and lived at the house of bread (it was a historic capital of Egypt, and grain store), which translated into Hebrew is bethlehem, and was named Annu in Egyptian, which translated into Hebrew is bethany (house of Any/Anu).

In Egyptian myth, Horus gained his authority by being anointed by Anubis, who had his own cult, and was regarded as the main anointer; the anointing made Horus into Horus karast (a religious epithet written in Egyptian documents as HR KRST) - embalmed/anointed Horus - in parallel to Jesus becoming Christ by being baptised by John, who had his own followers, and was especially regarded as a baptiser. Worship of Isis, Horus' mother, was a prominent cult, and the proposal that this is the basis of veneration of Mary, and more particularly Marian Iconography, has some merit.

The suggestion of parallels with such myths, however, has frequently gained little traction in the academic community. Primary source materials supporting these claims are rarely cited, some rely upon non-standard terms (e.g. anup the baptiser rather than Anubis the anointer/embalmer) which others fail to recognize as significant. Scholars who draw parallels between Egyptian, Greek, Christian, and other theologies generally only observe broad patterns amongst them, identifying common archetypes, and do not attempt to claim that one is wholly or significantly derived from the other. Naturally, such a perspective would not rule out influences from one culture or religion into another, but wholesale plagiarism is generally dismissed.

As such, traditional scholars occasionally accuse those who advocate the existence of such parallels of confusing the issue of who was borrowing from whom [15], a charge which was also made in ancient times by prominent early Christians. However, it is notable that, unlike modern opponents, several prominent early Christians, like Irenaeus, actually acknowledged the existence of many parallels, complaining that the earlier religions had copied Christian religion and practices, before Jesus was even born, as some form of diabolically inspired pre-cognitive mockery. For their part, the historic opponents of early Christians wrote that Christians had the same religion and practice as they but failed to realized the fact.

In later years, Mithras worship became the most prominent rival to Christianity, and the idea that many Christian practices, including 25th December being Jesus' birth-date, and Sunday being the dedicated day of worship, derived originally from Mithraism is regarded as likely by many mainstream historians. Mithras was a solar deity, and so was seen as being born just after the winter solstice, and the day each week officially dedicated to him by the Roman empire was later renamed the day of the invincible sun, in turn being renamed Sunday; the references in Luke and Matthew, though, point to Jesus being more likely to have been born in April or September, and Saturday was the original day of Christian worship before Constantine I moved it. Parallels between Mithras and the birth-narrative of Luke are also proposed by some who see mythical origins for Jesus, since Mithras, as a sun god, was born under the zodiac sign that at that time was known as the stable of Augeas, though these latter parallels are not widely supported in the academic community.

When Christianity became the official and only religion in the Roman Empire, many temples of Mithras became Christian churches. Those who propose mythical origins for Jesus regard this as significant since the lack of dissent appears to them to indicate that the religions were so similar that the prior Mithras-worshippers felt that few significant changes had occurred.

Supporters of Jesus' historicity point out that even Christian sources acknowledge that the public celebration of Jesus' birth was adopted from the date of the festival of Sol Invictus, and that this has no bearing on the reliability of the Gospels, since they make no claims about the date. Neither do any Christian churches claim that the date for the celebration is anything other than symbolic.

[edit] Notes

1. ↑ Michael Grant, Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels; Rudolf Bultmann, Jesus and the Word; Robert Van Voorst, Jesus Outside the Gospels, and Graham Stanton, The Gospels and Jesus.

2. ↑  G.L. Borchert, "Docetism" in Elwell Evangelical Dictionary; Catholic Encyclopedia, 1909/2003; D.C. Duling & N. Perrin, The New Testament: Proclamation and Parenesis, Myth and History, 1993; "Docetism", Encyclopædia Britannica, 2006; J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines. "Book 24 - John's Second Letter". J.B.Phillips, "The New Testament in Modern English", 1962 edition.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  • Atwill, Joseph. 2005. The Roman Origins of Christianity.
  • Atwill, Joseph. 2005. Caesar's Messiah.
  • Brodie, Thomas L. 2000. The Crucial Bridge: the Elijah-Elisha Narrative as an interpretive synthesis of Genesis-Kings and a literary model for the Gospels. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press.
  • Doherty, E.,The Jesus Puzzle (1999; revised edition 2000) ISBN 0968601405
  • Ellegard, Alvar. 1999. Jesus: One Hundred Years Before Christ. London: Century.
  • France, R. T. The Evidence for Jesus.
  • Freke, T. and Gandy, P. The Jesus Mysteries, by Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy, ISBN 0609807986
  • Meier, John. 1987. A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus. Volume One: The Roots of the Problem and the Person. Anchor Bible Reference Library. New York: Doubleday.
  • Price, Robert. 2004. New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash. In Neusner, J., Avery-Peck, A., eds. The Encyclopedia of Midrash: Biblical Interpretation of Formative Judaism.
  • Price, Robert. 2003. The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man. Amherst, NY: Prometheus.
  • Price, Robert. 2000. Deconstructing Jesus. Amherst, NY: Prometheus.
  • Sanders, E. P. 1995. The Historical Figure of Jesus. Penguin.
  • Sherwin-White, A. N. 1963. Roman Society and Roman Law in the New Testament. Oxford.
  • Theissen, G., and Merz, A. 1998. The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide. Minneapolis: Fortress
  • Thompson, Thomas L. 2005. The Messiah Myth. New York: Basic Books.
  • Van Voorst, R. Jesus Outside of the New Testament.
  • Wells, G. A. 1999. The Jesus Myth. Peru, IL: Open Court (Carus Publishing)
  • Wells, G. A. The Historical Evidence for Jesus.

[edit] Additional References

  • Cohn, Norman 1993. Cosmos, Chaos and the World to Come, The Ancient Roots of Apocalyptic Faith. New Haven:Yale.

[edit] External links

Category:Jesus Category:Biblical criticism

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