Maybe I'm just dense, but I honestly cannot fathom the purpose of posters who spend time arguing that there never was a Jesus.
Attacking Christianity and Christian teachings I can understand.
Attacking unjustified religious authority I can understand.
Attacking sloppy history (ancient or modern) I can understand.
But -- spending time arguing over the possible life of some obviously obscure Jew from 2000 years ago, I can't understand.
So, for those of you who delight in such stuff, I'll ask a simple question -- where is your "line in the sand?" What assumption do you refuse to allow as a possibility?
1. There were persons named Yeshua in Palestine 2000 years ago
2. There were Yeshuas who had mothers named Miriam
3. There were Yeshuas who could read the Hebrew scriptures
4. There were Yeshuas who observed/taught the Jewish oral law
5. There were Yeshuas whose teachings were proto-Christian
6. There was at least one Yeshua whose followers formed a sect
7. There was a Yeshua who was God; who rose from the dead, etc.
Where's your cut-off point? Mine is somewhere around item #6 -- maybe between #5 & #6
Some folks here may remember Byron Marchant, an ex-LDS who published several interesting pamphlets on Mormonism.
Byron once expressed to me the notion that our attacking the Jesus Christ of the Joseph Smith "first vision" was the best way to begin the destruction of Mormonism itself.
I suppose that the discovery of there never having been a Jesus Christ of the LDS-Christian teachings came as a profound shock and marvelous insight to my old friend. In one fell swoop the entire LDS system was cut off at the root.
The discovery was so liberating for my old friend, that he wanted to disprove Christianity in the same way. Not for some learned audience, but for the typical ex-Mormon.
Somewhere around the last iteration of this method (showing that even the expected Jewish messiah is an absurdity) my support began to wane. But, for some ex-LDS the discovery must seem so bright, shiny and wonderful that it simply has to be evangelized, as modern day "good news!"
It doesn't matter to me if he existed or not. If the story is just a collection of added-upon stories conflated through the centuries (My theory) who cares. I just cherry-pick it with a skeptical attitude. There are some revolutionary concepts in the "words of Christ," even if a bunch of people made it it up.
I enjoy the "did jesus even really exist" threads because I always learn something new.
Having believed in jesus of nazareth for most of my life, it's always amazing to me just how weak the evidence is that this jesus character actually existed.
I'm always entertained by those arguing both sides, with Bona Dea & Janeeliot on one end, and a bunch of others on the other side, with me in the stands eating a bowl of popcorn.
Not likely. Many of us came to our exmormonism via skepticism. Skepticism as asserted by Hume, is the philosophical approach which asserts that any approximation to truth must withstand critical scrutiny and doubt.
Doubt about the existance of an historical Jesus is clearly alive and well. If the central figure of atonement in Christian theologies was not, in fact, a real person; then the whole story is clearly false. Just as the BOM (and Nephi, Lehi, and The Bodily resurrected Jesus) hinges on a few key aspects. If any one of those key points has no merit, then the entire case is lost.
If there was, indeed, no real person whic can be attached to the character of Jesus then everything else is just horror, wisdom, and myth akin to THE CAT IN THE HAT. No one spends 10 percent of thier income, hopes for THINGS A-Z to save them. The COST of a Mythological Jesus is very high. Who wants to pay the costs if its clearly, and irrefutably false?!
That is why it persists... Oh... Ad because the mythicists are making a more coherant and reputable case all the time.
As the perfesser in the video that was posted today makes clear, the case for an historical Jesus is based on flawed scholarship. Occam's razor does the rest.
The reason why these threads are so popular is that it is immensely fascinating to realize that 2 billion people worship a figment of someone's imagination and get offended when someone dare to point this out.
I haven't read the other thread but really like Uncle Dale's approach here. It's helpful to break the problem down in that way.
My line is before or after Point Six. There must have been Yeshuas whose mothers were named Miriam, who read Hebrew, and taught new as well as old ideas.Given that the Essenes and many other groups with proto-Christian ideas were influential at the time, it seems likely that some of those Yeshuas taught things that would later find their way into Christianity.
Point Six itself is a bit tougher, but isn't Christianity itself a sect formed by followers of a Yeshua? It is possible that the sect formed independently and coopted the name Yeshua, but wouldn't it make more sense to say that one or more rabbis named Yeshua were part of the cauldron of new ideas that eventually crystallized in the form of early Christianity?
Thanks again, Dale, for a novel approach to an old problem.
Inspired Stupidity Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > ... > It's helpful to break > the problem down in that way.
On the other hand, there are people who really crave simple answers -- thinking already dished out by some expert or authority figure. I've met thousands of folks like that in southern Idaho and northern Utah.
It would be so simple -- so easy -- to just dispense with the whole religious "problem" by our being told that the Emperor Constantine wrote the Bible, and it's all a fake.
But, for me at least, leaving Mormonism does not mean that I will simply jump from one easy set of answers to another.
There is an untold story waiting to be discovered -- of how the first Christians came into being and when, how, where and why they composed their first writings.
I'm not willing to take some "expert's" pre-digested opinion of how that all played out, just because it is easy to fit into my brain's non-critical thinking department.
whatiswanted Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Just because there was a "Clark Kent" born in Iowa > in June 1938 does not mean there was a Superman. > > Why does the topic of historical Jesus keep coming > up on a board about recovering from Mormonism? > > Because it is relevant....that is why.
Of course,it's relevant. And why not discuss it? I'm fine with it. It goes to the core of how God Myths develop, how they are combined from other myths and sources.
It seems to me that if Jesus didn't exist as a regular guy, then it's even dumber to believe in him as a divine being. It's interesting, it's science(-y). It's also history. And some people enjoy arguing. Those would be my guesses.
Good board parenting, btw.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/24/2013 07:21PM by munchybotaz.
Believing in Christ negates belief in moism. It is more certain that moism is wrong than any issue with belief in Christ.
While one can be skeptical as to Christ, one cannot really deny the possibility of Christ. Reaching the penultimate level on the scale of Uncle Dale, one may be skeptical of the final point, but one cannot claim it is not possible unless one also claims that there cannot be a god, and can claim such non-existance as an absolute.
rhgc Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Believing in Christ negates belief in moism. It is > more certain that moism is wrong than any issue > with belief in Christ. > > While one can be skeptical as to Christ, one > cannot really deny the possibility of Christ. > Reaching the penultimate level on the scale of > Uncle Dale, one may be skeptical of the final > point, but one cannot claim it is not possible > unless one also claims that there cannot be a god, > and can claim such non-existance as an absolute.
Unlike numerous other posters here, I remain a theist -- so, for me at least, the origins of Christianity is a topic pretty much separate from what God is or is not.
I doubt very much that any of my Jewish relatives would concede to the possibility of Jesus being God (and particularly the God of Abraham) just because they too are theists.
However, there remains an even more comprehensive idea -- that we all share divinity in some inexplicable way, and should that be true, even my extended family might be inclined to listen to certain arcane Christian doctrines.
But I meant that final item in the list to say that a Yeshua born about 2000 years ago is God of the universe in a specific and unique way, not shared by any other human being, past, present or future -- in or out of the "body of Christ."
There are literally hundreds of millions of people now living on this planet who swear to this purported "fact," some of whom would give up their lives, and the lives of their children, in defense of the Jesus-is-God profession. THAT is what I meant to be the far end of the spectrum. I doubt if even a hundredth of 1% of RfM folks profess it.
Compared to the number of times IRL we hear "Jesus lives!" or claims that Jesus is God, flying around in zombie form, I'd say the number of discussions about him not existing pales in comparison. :-)
I tend to think there might be a seed character or composite characters that fueled the legends, however many legends likely did not. Who knows. There is certainly nothing credible to justify the god claims.
I posted this in the other thread but thought I would post it here to. Hoffman is an historian who explains what he thinks is wrong with the mythicists.
History written in a magical book by believers? How accurate is that?
If you only read the history of Roswell written by those who believe it was a UFO then you are not going to get what actually happened...only the faith promoting lies.
We are the ones promoting history as opposed to improbable conspiracy theories. BTW, I believe as does Hoffman, Ehrman etc that Jesus lived and was a human being just like the rest of us.That is perfectly plausible. There is nothing mythical there and there is actual historical evidence. You might try reading Ehrman
The site's tag line is "Religion and Culture for the Intellectually Impatient." Not that it matters but the whole site appears to be a giant Catholic Fair site. Not that you can't find nuggets on apologetic sites.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/24/2013 09:38PM by dagny.