Talk:Christ myth theory

See also
Talk:Christ myth theory/definition
Talk:Christ myth theory/FAQ discussions
Talk:Christ myth theory/POV tag
Talk:Christ myth theory/pseudohistory
Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Sources

Issues to be addressed

1. Is the CMT fringe? (Yes)
2. Is the CMT pseudo-x? (It's regarded as such by many scholars. Such information will appear in a sentence in the lead but not in a category tag due to policy concerns.)
3. Is the FAQ #2 NPOV? (Moot; the FAQ was deleted.)
4. Should the scholarly response be one major section (as it currently is) or should it be distrbuted throughout the article?
5. What is the notability/publication criteria for including a CMT author among the advocates? (3 scholarly mentions specifically connected to an advocates CMT advocacy)
6. What is the criteria for determining if an included advocate warrents a separate section apart from the "other authors" sections? (a dedicated rebuttal or major section in a scholarly work contentrating on the advocate's CMT work or something like 10 passing mentions)
7. Are "Christian" scholars, and publishers of their books, reliable? (The number of scholars teaching at seminaries who appear in the in-line text will be minimized wherever possible to reduce the appearence of bias.)
8. Should non-experts be used to undercut mainstream scholarly consensus?
9. How should the article indicate that Wells changed his stance in 1999? (Done)
10. How should Price's section be structured?
11. Should the definition section include a "background" related to the NT documents, and if so, how should it be crafted and which authors should be included?
12. Should we delete the FAQ page, and move the valuable info into the body of the article, as most readers won't see it? (The FAQ was deleted.)
13. 'continue list here (for example, Is the FAQ #x NPOV?)"

Case Closed

Earl Doherty

Here is some material from two scholars, Ben Witherington III (PhD from the University of Durham, England; currently Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland) and Paula Fredriksen (PhD from Princeton University; currently William Goodwin Aurelio Professor of the Appreciation of Scripture at Boston University), who have addressed Earl Doherty's work. Witherington's stuff is from a blog artcle he wrote concerning Doherty, Fredriksen's stuff is from private correspondence which Doherty has put online.

Fredriksen on Doherty (organized in categories of pseudoscholarship tactics)

Self-serving redating

Around the year 107, the Christian bishop of Antioch made a last, doleful journey. Under military escort Ignatius travelled by land from Antioch to Rome, where in its brutal arena he was to die a martyr's death. Along the way he wrote to several Christian communities.

These letters are now dated c. 98-100

And yet when we step outside those Gospels [Doherty dates them all to the second century] into the much more rarefied atmosphere of the first century epistles, we encounter a huge puzzle...

I assume that this means "apart from the gospels." Ignatius is generally held to have been writing after some of them had been written.

Anthony's response to these 2 purported examples of Doherty's pseudoscholarship:: I have now spent 7 hours looking for anybody who dates the Ignatius epistles before 100 A.D. and found none but lots of serious scholars who, like Doherty, date them 2nd C. The second example is no example at all - see James's comments below. I am worried this whole list may be a bunch of wild geese put here to waste my free time while Eugene, Bill, and NJMauthor have their way with the article. Anthony (talk) 16:58, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

"...Ignatius the martyr of circa A.D. 110"

Ignatius of Antioch and the Second Sophistic: a study of an early Christian ... (2006) By Allen Brent (A. prof. History, University of North Queensland, Member of the faculty of Divinity University of Cambridge) Page 98

"Writing between A.D. 108-117, Ignatius can take this structure for certain..."

Antioch and Rome: New Testament cradles of Catholic Christianity By Raymond Edward Brown, John P. Meier (1983) Page 77

"This study exegetes the passage in the second-century letter of the bishop Ignatius of Antioch to his fellow bishop Polycarp in Smyrna."

"Ignatius, Ad Polycarp. 4.3 and the Corporate Manumission of Christian Slaves" By J. Albert Harrill. Journal of Early Christian Studies Volume 1, Number 2, (1993) Page 107

"...what the listeners or readers of Ignatius in these cities of Roman Asia (c. 110 C.E.) would think of when Ignatius used these analogies..."

"Christ-Bearers and Fellow-Initiates: Local Cultural Life and Christian Identity in Ignatius' Letters" By Philip A. Harland Journal of Early Christian Studies Volume 11, Number 4, (2003) Page 481

I don't understand the second quote/critique. Do I need more information, or is it just because I'm tired/stupid? I'll look at it again tomorrow. Doherty dates the gospels into the 2nd century? and all after Ignatius' epistles? And that contradicts the more mainstream chronology? Is that it? Anthony (talk) 23:13, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The second quote is not a critique. She is just clarifying that when Doherty writes "when we step outside those Gospels" he means "apart from the Gospels". ^^James^^ (talk) 00:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, Anthony, Doherty late dates the gospels well outside of the mainstream chronology, putting most (he thinks maybe all) well after Ignatius wrote his letters. Eugene (talk) 03:15, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

That is not what is indicated above. Doherty responded I had said in the opening part of the first sentence above, "when we step outside those Gospels into...the first century epistles" and she correctly, if reduntantly, inferred, “I assume this means apart from the gospels." Later he writes Why is Ignatius early in the 2nd century the first to mention even the most basic of these? (Of course, outside the Gospels.) This doesn't mesh at all with what you wrote. ^^James^^ (talk) 04:40, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Does he think his late gospel dates are mainstream, or does he present them as such? If he acknowledges they differ from mainstream, does his argument for them rely on falsified data or flawed logic? Anthony (talk) 08:14, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Another quote from his site: Those familiar with my writings will know that I do not subscribe to the very radical late dating of the Gospels (post-130 and beyond) held by the likes of Joseph Wheless or the Dutch Radical School of the 19th century, or moderns like Hermann Detering and Acharya S, and even Robert M. Price, but would place Mark in the late first century (the 90s, let's say, as does G. A. Wells, discussed below), with the other three canonicals following within the next few decades. ^^James^^ (talk) 08:49, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Look, the essential problem is that Doherty dates the formation of the Gospels to some time after the epistles. This ignores all evidence that the Gospels as we have them are based on material that predates the epistles. There is no reputable scholar who would endorse Doherty's position here. Barrett Pashak (talk) 12:50, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

That is a different argument and is not what Fredriksen is saying above. And the Pauline epistles are usually dated before the Gospels. ^^James^^ (talk) 17:45, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't want to lose sight of the fact that Doherty's essential premise--that the formation of the Gospels postdates the epistles--is unanimously rejected by scholars. All contemporary scholars acknowledge the existence of proto-gospels, written and/or oral, prior to the epistles. Barrett Pashak (talk) 18:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The reading I've done suggests that you are simply wrong here. Doherty does not ignore "proto-gospels". Again, the Pauline epistles are usually dated before the Gospels. This is not controversial. Please backup your statements; give us the secondary sources making these critiques of his work. ^^James^^ (talk) 18:31, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

In Doherty's view, proto-gospel material did not contain anything of a human Christ (see Richard Carrier's review).This is in direct contradiction to all scholarly understanding of the proto-Gospel material (see, for example, The Reliability of the Gospel Tradition by Birger Gerhardsson). So, we can safely say that Doherty, contrary to all scholarship, dates the first depiction of the human Christ after the epistles. Barrett Pashak (talk) 20:07, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

That's yet another separate critique. Are we at four now? And this claim has nothing to do with "self-serving redating". I'll look into his interpretation of the proto-gospel material later. ^^James^^ (talk) 20:31, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Maybe it would be easier if you could give some indication of where in the 28 page essay Carrier critiques Doherty on the relevant points. The book you linked to does not appear to mention Doherty either. ^^James^^ (talk) 21:54, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

[unindent]The relevant passage from Carrier:

After the confusion of the Jewish War and persistent battles over power in the church, rooted in a confused mass of variant sectarian dogmas, a new cult arose with the belief that Jesus actually came to earth.

Gerhardsson does not mention Doherty. I cite him as representative of the consensus scholarship that the proto-gospel material is concerned with the human Christ, and predates the epistles. Barrett Pashak (talk) 22:03, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Barrett. Could you provide a secondary source which criticizes Doherty on this count? And can you show me where Doherty argues that the proto-gospel material is not concerned with the human Christ? ^^James^^ (talk) 11:18, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

There is this from Doherty:

We are led to conclude that the beginning of the Christian movement was not a response to any human individual at one time and location.

I am not aware of any criticism of Doherty on this point. But this might explain why Doherty is completely ignored by qualified critics: The idea that proto-Gospel accounts of the life and teaching of Jesus of Nazareth do not appear until after the epistles is completely preposterous. Barrett Pashak (talk) 12:59, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

I understand it sounds preposterous to you. But without secondary sources there is not much reason to discuss it here. And I still don't know what Doherty actually argues. I only have your characterizations. Have you read his treatment of the proto-gospel material? ^^James^^ (talk) 17:59, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Anachronisms

In all the Christian writers of the first century, in all the devotion they display about Christ and the new faith, not one of them expresses the slightest desire to see the birthplace of Jesus, to visit Nazareth his home town, the sites of his preaching, the upper room where he held his Last Supper, the tomb: where he was buried and rose from the dead. These places are never mentioned. Most of all, there is not a hint of pilgrimage to Calvary itself, where humanity's salvation was consummated. How could such a place not have been turned into a shrine?

Pilgrimage is a late third-fourth century phenomenon. This just is not odd.

Is there indeed, in this wide land so recently filled with the presence of the Son of God, any holy place at all, any spot of ground where that presence still lingers, hallowed by the step, touch or word of Jesus of Nazareth? Neither Paul nor any other first century letter writer breathes a whisper of any such thing. Nor do they breathe a word about relics associated with Jesus. Where are his clothes, the things he used in everyday life, the things he touched? Can we believe that items associated with him in his life on earth would not have been preserved, valued, clamored for among believers, just as things like this were produced and prized all through the Middle Ages? Why is it only in the fourth century that pieces of the "true cross" begin to surface?

It has a lot to do with the Constantinian church. This isn't a huge mystery: it's been treated in many studies.

Is it conceivable that Paul would not have wanted to run to the hill of Calvary, to prostrate himself on the sacred ground that bore the blood of his slain Lord?

Yes: he was not a fourth-century, relic-conscious Christian.

Anthony's response to this critique: The erection of shrines and pilgrimage to them was the norm among Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Jews, Persians and Indians in the 1st century. It was normal practice, how you honored your god. Doherty's question is fair. The critic's response is ignorant (or disingenuous) and circular: "There was no pilgrimage in the first two or three hundred years because... it didn't begin until late third-fourth century" and does not answer the question, "Why?" Anthony (talk) 14:14, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Christian pilgrimage is a development of the 4th century. It's not ignorant or disingenuous to say that; that's what the historical record shows. --Akhilleus (talk) 14:21, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, Akhilleus, I wasn't making my point clear. It was normal practice across the Mediterranean and at least as far as Sri Lanka, long before the first century and long after, for people to construct shrines to their gods and make pilgrimage to those shrines. That was how people honored their gods (and many still do). It is reasonable for Doherty to ask "Why did it take 300 years for this to happen with the Christians. They were people of the region, of the time?"

I'm not saying it is a strong point, a killer blow to the historical Jesus. Just reasonable. Not a case of faulty reasoning or misrepresenting the facts, which is the quest I am on here. You could save me a lot of time by pointing me to some actual pseudoscholarship if you know of any. (That said, the next lot looks decidedly nonsensical, so this may be it.) Anthony (talk) 18:10, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Honestly, Anthony, I think this is a waste of your time. Unless you have demonstrable expertise in this area, your opinion of whether there's pseudoscholarship here doesn't matter; what matters is what the reliable sources say... --Akhilleus (talk) 18:15, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Evidence Denial

...Before Ignatius, not a single reference to Pontius Pilate, Jesus' executioner, is to be found.

Is to be found where? I'm not certain of what he's trying to say here. [Matthew, Mark, Luke, John all refer to Pontius Pilate and precede the writtings of Ignatius. Also, the Pilate Stone precedes the letters of Ignatius.]

And yet there is a resounding silence in Paul and the other first century writers. We might call it "The Missing Equation." Nowhere does anyone state that this Son of God and Savior, this cosmic Christ they are all talking about, was the man Jesus of Nazareth, recently put to death in Judea.

He's exaggerating the disconnect between Paul and the historical Jesus.

Paul and other early writers, however, seem to speak solely of a divine Christ.

According to Paul, Jesus was "born of a woman, born under the Law," (Gal. 4:4); and he was "son of David according to the flesh" (Rom 1:3).

In passing, it must be noted that those "words of the Lord" which Paul puts forward as guides to certain practices in his Christian communities (1 Corinthians 7:10 and 9:14) are not from any record of earthly pronouncements by Jesus.

The no-divorce stuff in 1 Cor 7 resonates immediately w/ instructions in Mt's Sermon on Mount.

What could possibly explain this puzzling, maddening, universal silence?

It's only a "universal" silence if you bracket out the gospels—and there were many more than the four that made it into the canon.

In the epistles, Christ's anticipated Coming at the End-time is never spoken of as a "return" or second Coming.

But that's what the word "parousia" means.

In Paul the impression conveyed is that this will be his first appearance in person on earth.

Paul's got all this blood imagery in Romans connected with the crucifixion—that certainly requires a first, earthly, embodied appearance, doesn't it?

Misc. False Disconfirmation

Both Paul (1 Thessalonians 4:9) and the writer of 1 John even attribute such love commands [a central pillar of Jesus message] to God, not Jesus!

? But the Jesus of the Gospels also attributes it to God, since he's quoting Torah when he "says" it.

In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul is anxious to convince his readers that humans can be resurrected from the dead. Why then does he not point to any traditions that Jesus himself had raised several people from the dead? Where is Lazarus?

Paul writes before John writes. The resuscitations of dead people are NOT what Paul is talking about with cosmic transformation in 1 Cor 15.

*Concluding Remark*

[Doherty] seems to be working very hard to create a straw man that he can then begin to knock down.

Witherington on Doherty

The blog article is longish and should probably just be read in its entirety. Here are some of the more pertinent points Witherington makes about Doherty's work:

• [re. Doherty's claim that the Testimonium Flavianum is universally recognized by scholars to be bogus] DOHERTY'S CLAIM THAT IT IS 'UNIVERSALLY' RECOGNIZED IS SIMPLY A CANARD, WHICH SHOWS HE HASN'T BOTHERED TO EVEN READ THE SCHOLARSHIP AND TEXT CRITICISM ON JOSEPHUS' WORK.
• [re. Doherty's claim that Paul and others originally thought Jesus was only a mythical being] THIS MUST BE SEEN FOR WHAT IT IS-- A BALD FACED ASSERTION WHICH COMPLETELY IGNORES THE EVIDENCE. GAL. 4 IN PAUL'S EARLIEST LETTER WRITTEN IN A.D. 49 OR SO WE HEAR THESE WORDS " BUT WHEN THE TIME HAD FULLY COME, GOD SENT HIS SON, BORN OF WOMAN, BORN UNDER THE LAW TO REDEEM THOSE UNDER THE LAW." IN ONE OF HIS LATEST LETTERS WE HEAR: "FOR THERE IS ONE GOD AND ONE MEDIATOR BETWEEN GOD AND HUMAN BEINGS, THE MAN JESUS CHRIST, WHO GAVE HIMSELF AS A RANSOM FOR ALL."

  IN SHORT, DOHERTY SEEMS TO HE CHANNELING THE MISINFORMATION OF THE LATER GNOSTIC GOSPELS, NOT THE EARLIER AND FAR MORE HISTORICALLY GROUNDED CANONICAL ONES. NOT ONLY DOES HE BADLY MISREAD PAUL, HE EQUALLY MISREADS THE CANONICAL GOSPELS ON THESE VERY MATTERS. IT IS PRECISELY THESE SORTS OF REMARKS WHICH SHOW SUCH IGNORANCE OF THE EARLIEST CHRISTIAN SOURCES WHICH LEAD NT SCHOLARS OF CHRISTIAN FAITH, JEWISH FAITH, AND NO FAITH TO COMPLETELY IGNORE THE PURE POLEMICS OF DOHERTY--- HE IS NO HISTORIAN AND HE IS NOT EVEN CONVERSANT WITH THE HISTORICAL DISCUSSIONS OF THE VERY MATTERS HE WANTS TO PONTIFICATE ON.

• [re. Doherty's claim that early Christians thought Jesus died in a heavenly realm at the hands of demons] HERE AGAIN THIS SORT OF ASSERTION BETRAYS A COMPLETE LACK OF UNDERSTANDING OF PAUL'S WRITINGS, AND INDEED OF EARLY JEWISH DEMONOLOGY. IN EARLY JUDAISM DEMONS AND EVIL SPIRITS ARE INVOLVED IN THE HUMAN SPHERE AND IN THE HUMAN REALM, AS WELL AS IN THE HEAVENLIES. IT IS NOT AN EITHER OR MATTER. PAUL CERTAINLY DOES NOT SUGGEST JESUS WAS CRUCIFIED AND ROSE IN THE SPIRITUAL REALM. TO THE CONTRARY, PAUL RECITES THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CREED IN 1 COR. 15.1-5 THAT JESUS DIED AND WAS BURIED LIKE ANY OTHER MORTAL, AND THEN WAS SEEN ALIVE ON EARTH AFTER HIS DEATH. SINCE TACITUS AS WELL STRESSES JESUS DIED A MUNDANE DEATH AT THE HANDS OF PILATE, ON THE BASIS OF HIS KNOWLEDGE OF THE ROMAN RECORDS, IT IS QUITE IMPOSSIBLE TO DISMISS SUCH EVIDENCE, OR PROJECT IT INTO A MERELY SPIRITUAL REALM. FURTHERMORE, THE BOOK OF HEBREWS IS PERFECTLY CLEAR THAT JESUS SUFFERED AND DIED IN JERUSALEM, NOT IN SOME SPIRITUAL REALM ( SEE E.G. HEB. 13, OR HEB. 7-11). IT DOES REFER TO JESUS GOING TO HEAVEN AFTER HIS DEATH AND ASCENSION INTO HEAVEN. BUT HIS DEATH IS SAID TO BE A SACRIFICE ON EARTH, LIKE THAT OF A PASSOVER SACRIFICE. ONCE AGAIN. DOHERTY HAS TOTALLY FAILED TO INTERACT WITH ANY OF THE EXPERTS ON EITHER PAUL OR HEBREWS, AND CHOOSES TO MAKE UP HIS INTERPRETATIONS AS HE FEELS LED.
• [re. Dohery's veiws on the relationship between mainstram Judaism and Platonism] MOST OF WHAT IS SAID ABOUT HEAVEN AND EARTH AND SALVATION AND ESCHATOLOGICAL ARISES NOT OUT OF REFLECTION ON THE WORKS OF PLATO BUT OUT OF EARLY JEWISH APOCALYPTIC THINKING WHICH BEGAN IN EXILE BEFORE ALEXANDER THE GREAT OR THE AFFECTS OF HELLENISTIC THINKING ON JEWS. IT IS TOTALLY ANACHRONISTIC TO SUGGEST OTHERWISE. THE SOURCE OF OTHER WORLD AND AFTERLIFE THINKING IN THE NT AND IN MOST EARLY JEWISH LITERATURE IS CLEARLY ENOUGH BOOKS LIKE DANIEL, EZEKIEL, ZECHARIAH AND OTHER JEWISH APOCALYPTIC PROPHETS. THE 'HELLENISTIC' EXPLANATION OF THEIR OTHERWORLDLY THINKING COMPLETELY IGNORES THE EARLIER JEWISH LITERATURE
• [re. Doherty's understanding of the New Testament documents] THIS COULD BE SAID TO BE A FAIR SUMMARY OF GNOSTIC THEOLOGY, THAT GOD WHO IS SPIRIT WHO CAN HAVE NO CONTACT WITH THE MATERIAL WORLD, BUT IT BADLY MISREPRESENTS THE THOROUGHLY JEWISH THEOLOGY OF THE NT WRITERS WHO NOT ONLY AFFIRM AN INCARNATION OF JESUS THE SON OF GOD, AND HIS DEATH AND RESURRECTION ON EARTH BUT STRESS HE WILL RETURN TO EARTH TO BRING IN A NEW HEAVEN AND NEW EARTH. IN OTHER WORDS, THE NT REFLECTS THE OT THEOLOGY ABOUT THE GOODNESS OF THE MATERIAL CREATION. THERE COULD HARDLY BE A MORE STRONG AFFIRMATION OF THE GOODNESS OF CREATION THAN THAT GOD'S SON WOULD TAKE ON A PHYSICAL AND GENUINE HUMAN NATURE. IN OTHER WORDS, THE ATTEMPT TO READ A RADICAL SPIRITUAL/MATERIAL DICHOTOMY INTO THE EARLY CHRISTIAN ERA AND ITS FIRST CENTURY DOCUMENTS SIMPLY DOES NOT WORK, AND AGAIN REFLECTS A TOTAL FAILURE TO ACTUALLY DEAL WITH THE HISTORICAL SOURCES AS THEY EXIST.
• [re. Doherty's belief that all the Gospel are exclusively dependant on Mark] I MUST STRESS THAT WE NOW HAVE CLEAR EVIDENCE OF ACTS BEING A FIRST CENTURY DOCUMENT. I HAVE SEEN THE FRAGMENTS OF A COPY OF ACTS IN SYDNEY AT MACQUARRIE AND THEY DATE TO NO LATER THAN 125 A.D. IT IS CLEAR AS WELL THAT THEY ARE NOT THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT, BUT ONE OF MANY LATER COPIES. SO THE ATTEMPT TO LATE DATE ACTS WILL NOT WORK (SEE MY ACTS COMMENTARY). FURTHERMORE, THE VAST MAJORITY OF NT SCHOLARS THINK THAT JOHN IS AN INDEPENDENT WITNESS TO THE GOSPEL STORY, INDEED IT CLAIMS TO BE AN EYEWITNESS TESTIMONY (ON THE TRUTH OF WHICH--- SEE MY WHAT HAVE THEY DONE WITH JESUS?). WHAT IS ESPECIALLY ODD ABOUT THIS TENET OF DOHERTY'S IS THAT IT FAILS TO RECOGNIZE THE MANY DIFFERENCES IN THE THREE SYNOPTIC ACCOUNTS. THIS DOES NOT SUGGEST THEY ALL ONLY HAD ONE VERSION OF THE STORY. IT SUGGESTS THEY HAD SEVERAL, AND INDEED THE PROLOGUE IN LK.1.1-4 MUST BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY--- LUKE CONSULTED BOTH EYEWITNESSES AND EARLY PREACHERS OF THE GOSPEL, AND INDEED HE ADMITS VARIOUS PERSONS HAD WRITTEN ACCOUNTS OF THE GOSPEL STORY BEFORE HIM, NOT JUST MARK. I WOULD TAKE THIS TO BE A REFERENCE TO AT LEAST MARK AND MATTHEW'S ACCOUNTS.

  NOTICE AGAIN THE DELIBERATE DISTORTION OF THE USE OF GLOBALIZING LANGUAGE--- "NOW ALMOST A UNIVERSAL SCHOLARLY CONCLUSION". HE CANNOT BE TALKING ABOUT NT SCHOLARS, OR CLASSICS SCHOLARS, OR ANCIENT HISTORIANS OF THE PERIOD. SO WHAT SCHOLARS IS HE REFERRING TO. SO FAR AS I CAN SEE, THIS IS JUST ANOTHER BALD ASSERTION WITHOUT EVIDENCE, WHICH IS TYPICAL OF THIS SORT OF BRAZEN POLEMIC WHICH DOES NOT DEAL EITHER WITH THE HISTORICAL SOURCES, OR WITH THE CAREFUL SCHOLARSHIP DONE FOR CENTURIES UPON IT.

• [re. Doherty's understanding of Q] I KNOW OF NO Q EXPERT WHO SUGGESTS THAT THE Q COMMUNITY INVENTED A JESUS FOUNDER FIGURE. IN FACT EVEN THE MOST LIBERAL Q SCHOLARS WOULD REJECT THIS ASSERTION AS PURE NONSENSE AND WISHFUL THINKING ON DOHERTY'S PART.
• [re. Doherty's belief that early Christianity was radically diverse] THE ATTEMPT TO PREDICATE THE LATER DIVERSITY FOUND IN THE LATE SECOND THROUGH FOURTH CENTURIES BACK INTO THE FIRST CENTURY JEWISH SECT CALLED CHRISTIANITY IS BOTH BAD HISTORY WRITING AND POOR RESEARCH. IT ONCE AGAIN COMMITS THE SCHOLARLY SIN OF ANACHRONISM-- READING THE TRAITS OF A LATER AGE INTO AN EARLIER PERIOD. WHAT IS ESPECIALLY EGREGIOUS ABOUT THIS WHOLE APPROACH IS IT IGNORES THAT THERE WAS A STRONG SENSE OF ORTHODOXY AND ORTHOPRAXY IN EARLY CHRISTIANITY FROM THE START. THIS IS HARDLY A SURPRISE IN A MOVEMENT FOUNDED BY DEVOUT EARLY JEWS. ALL THE NT BOOKS WERE WRITTEN BY SUCH JEWS, WITH THE POSSIBLE EXCEPTION OF LUKE-ACTS AND 2 PETER.
• [re. Doherty's explanation of how the mythic Jesus was transformed into the historical Jesus] IGNATIUS I AM SURE WOULD BE TRULY SURPRISED TO DISCOVER HE WAS THE FIRST PERSON TO SPEAK OF A HISTORICAL FIGURE NAMED JESUS WHO LIVED AND DIED UNDER PILATE. NO, THIS WAS ALREADY WIDELY KNOWN FOR ALMOST 90 YEARS BEFORE HE WROTE. NOTICE FOR EXAMPLE PAUL'S WORDS IN 1 TIM. 6.13-- "IN THE SIGHT OF GOD WHO GIVES LIFE TO EVERYTHING, AND OF CHRIST JESUS, WHO WHILE TESTIFYING BEFORE PONTIUS PILATE MADE THE GOOD CONFESSION..."

  MR. DOHERTY UNFORTUNATELY IS A MERE POLEMICIST. HE HAS NOT DONE HIS HISTORICAL HOMEWORK, HE CLEARLY HAS NOT BOTHERED TO READ THE BROAD RANGE OF NT SCHOLARSHIP, AND OF COURSE HE COMES AT HIS STUDY WITH A STRONG AX TO GRIND.

Conclusion

Both of these scholars point out Doherty's pseudoscholarship. They call attention to his tendentious, self-serving late dating of certain texts, his willful ignorace of Christianity's initial cultural milleu, his denial of certain strands of evidence, and his glaring anachronisms. It's for these reasons that John Dominic Crossan compared Doherty to a moon landing skeptic and even the somewhat sympathetic R. Joseph Hoffmann labeled Doherty's work "qualitatively and academically far inferior to anything so far written on the subject."

G. A. Wells

Voorst on Wells

Robert E. Van Voorst (PhD from Union Theological Seminary, an institution affiliated with the Ivy League Columbia University; currently Professor of New Testament Studies at Western Theological Seminary) has helpfully summarized the many problems associated with Wells' earlier work. He includes a list of seven of these serious issues in both his Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence (Eerdmans) and the article "The Nonhistoricity hypothesis" he contributed to Jesus in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia(ABC-CLIO). Here's a summary of the list:

1. Wells based his argument largely on silence, specifically Paul's relative silence regarding Jesus' life, which is inherently dubious.
2. Wells radically late-dated the synoptic gospels and just assumed that they were written outside Palestine despite their many referenece to that very place.
3. Wells jumped from a belief in development among the gospels to a belief in their non-historicity
4. Wells has no explantion for why early opponents of Christianity didn't mention that Jesus was a myth.
5. Wells employs a contrived skepticism when dismissing the scholarly consensus regarding the value of early non-Christian references to Jesus
6. Wells denied the historical existence of Jesus "not for objective reasons, but for highly tendentious, anti-religious purposes"
7. Wells failed to advance a credible susbstitute hypothesis which would "fill in" for a historical Jesus.

Dunn on Wells

James D. G. Dunn (PhD from the University of Cambridge; currently emeritus Lightfoot Professor of Divinity at the University of Durham) also notes in The Evidence for Jesus (Westminster John Knox) that #1 (the argument from silence) was Wells' primary justification for his early denial of Jesus. Dunn further commented in Jesus Remembered (Eerdmans) that Wells "displays an unyielding determination to interpret all data in favor of his thesis, whatever the probabilities... such a tendentious treatment is less deserving of the description 'historical' than Jesus."

Conclusion

These serious problems (especially #1, 2, 4, 5 & 6) are enough to label Wells past advocacy pseudoscholarship. They were indeed enough to motivate even as unsympathetic a scholar (unsympathetic to Christianity, that is) as Morton Smith (PhD from Hebrew University in Jerusalem and ThD from Harvard; late emeritus professor of ancient history at Columbia University- him of the gay sorcerer Jesus theory) to say, "When Professor Wells advances such an explanation of the gospel stories he presents us with a piece of private mythology that I find incredible beyond anything in the gospels."

Wells' response

In reponse to these sorts of criticism (especially Dunn's) Wells came to abandon the Christ myth theory--at least in its unadulterated form--declaring that he now accepted that a historical Jesus stood behind the earliest Christian community and that now "it will not do to call me a mythicist tout court."

Meta-Conclusion

As I've said, WP:V clearly indicates that no one (Anthony presumably included) need be personally convinced of some bit of material for that material to be included in an article. Rather, all that's required is verifiability. Given that it's cleary verifiable that many scholars consider the CMT pseudoscholarship, there's no good reason against indicating as much in the lead, especially considering that WP:FRINGE warns against making a fringe theory seem more mainstream than it is.

Even so, I've taken the time to humor Anthony. Here it is, this is why Wells' old stuff and Doherty's current stuff is psuedoscholarship. You've said that this might help in the future, but I sincerely doubt that. New critics of the page will just demand further proof and further argument. As Johannes Weiss once observed in relation to the Christ myth theory, "It is the most difficult task in the world to prove to nonsense that it is nonsense". But there it is.

So, does anyone still object to including a comment in the lead indicating that scholars consider the CMT pseudoscholarship? Eugene (talk) 18:29, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Eugene, I suggest you save the above information somewhere. I have a feeling that it will need to be put in a FAQ. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 19:12, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Okay, so no one has objected. Here's the last paragraph of the lead then:

The hypothesis has at times attracted a great deal of scholarly attention, but it nevertheless remains essentially without support among biblical scholars and classical historians, nearly all whom today accept that Jesus existed, and many of whom regard the Christ Myth Theory as pseudoscholarship.

Eugene (talk) 14:17, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Who are you calling nonsense? ☺

I spent four hours looking for someone who dated Ignatius' epistles before 100 A.D. and failed, but found many who date them after. So the first accusation against Doherty in your list, above, seems baseless. I have asked you to point out the deception, false data or flawed logic in the second point, and am waiting for a reply. I intend honoring the work you put in there, which I genuinely appreciate, (as I do all the effort you're putting in here, by the way) by examining each point. Can you hold off on inserting the above until I've encountered a few examples of pseudoscholarship? Anthony (talk) 23:44, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I've no intention of engaging in a point-by-point debate on this material. As I said, WP:V clearly states in its first sentence, "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true." (emphasis original) Given this, that you remain personally unconvinced that the Christ myth theory is pseudoscholarship is totally irrelevant to the way the article should be written. Despite our disagrements regarding this article, I think that SlimVirgin would concur on this point.

You had indicated that you were uncomfortable allowing the word pseduoscholarship into the lead on the basis that the scholars who've applied that epithet to this topic could potentially be using it as nothing more than a slur. I felt that, while somewhat agravating, that was a legitimate concern. So I provided the above material to show that the designation "pseudoscholarip" is not being used as a thoughtless slur in this case, that scholars have actual (non-ideological) reasons for using that word in this case (regardless of whether an editor fells that those reasons are particularly persuasive). That's as far as I'm willing to go. Like this talk page says at the top, "This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject." Eugene (talk) 03:39, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

We do have editorial discretion. If a claim is just plain false we are free to ignore it. We don't have to document every aspect of the debate. ^^James^^ (talk) 08:24, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

That's reasonable, Eugene. And that last incarnation of the last paragraph of the lead looked OK to me. Are the footnotes linking to anything I'm going to react against (skinheads, moon-cheese, flat earth)? I'll continue working through the critiques above, looking for clear instances of actual pseudoscholarship, and try inserting a couple. Should I find none, I'm not sure I'll be sanguine about it.

The point is to satisfy skeptical or open-minded readers, not offend them and insult their intelligence by just quoting the scholars' "We don't like it." Until that is done, this will remain a battleground. You'll never satisfy evangelical atheists or other agenda-pushers, of course, but most of your most vehement critics are neutral ideologically. The kinds of people who turned up here to comment are the very kinds of people who come to the article out of curiosity. I'm not sure you've fully absorbed the main lesson from the bulk of community comments over the last 3 weeks, which is "Reasonable people object to the ad hominem, it makes the article unconvincing and works diametrically against your argument."

Do you think there is consensus on the definition? Anthony (talk) 09:21, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for being reasonable. The quotations don't appear in the footnotes, just Harvard notes directing the reader to the pertinent bibliogaphic entry. Yes, I think that there is consensus on the definition. Bruce no doubt objects, but he always objects, and the second sentence of the lead addresses his concerns. Since you say the "last incarnation of the last paragraph of the lead looked OK to me", I'm going to request an admin insert the new lead. Eugene (talk) 14:17, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm sure you'll be just as reasonable if I find no pseudoscholarship in that list above. Anthony (talk) 19:11, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

{{editprotected}}

After a lot of debate, it looks like this new lead has consensus:

The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the argument that Jesus of Nazareth never actually existed as a historical person at all, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community. Additionally, some proponents of the theory believe that some of the events or sayings associated with the Jesus figure in the New Testament may have been drawn from one or more individuals who actually existed, but that those individuals were not in any sense the founder of Christianity.

The theory emphasizes the absence of extant reference to Jesus during his lifetime and the scarcity of non-Christian reference to him in the first century. It gives priority to the epistles over the gospels in determining the views of the earliest Christians, contends that Christianity emerged organically from Hellenistic Judaism, and draws on perceived parallels between the biography of Jesus and those of Greek, Egyptian, and other pagan gods.

The history of the idea can be traced to the French Enlightenment thinkers Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 1790s. Academic such as Bruno Bauer and Arthur Drews advocated the theory in the 19th and early 20th centuries. And authors such as G.A. Wells, Robert M. Price, and Earl Doherty have popularized the theory in recent years.

While the hypothesis has at times attracted a great deal of scholarly attention, it nevertheless remains essentially without support among biblical scholars and classical historians, many of whom regard the Christ myth theory as pseudoscholarship.

Please replace the current lead with this one. Eugene (talk) 14:17, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Just in time to make the edit yourself. The protection has expired. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:26, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Vote stacking and Stealth Canvassing for the RfC

I've recently submitted a complaint to the AN/I concerning vote stacking and stealth canvassing related to this article. Eugene (talk) 16:32, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

The issue seems to have been settled. All future RfCs are to be listed at all this article's associated Wikiprojects, which includes Christianity. Eugene (talk) 18:49, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Why did SV add this to the Atheism wikiproject? This article doesn't seem to have anything to do with the philosophy of atheism or criticism of religion. 137.22.11.219 (talk) 19:50, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

To stack the vote, of course. But it's been settled and I don't think it will work anyway. The RfC concensus is pretty clearly against including Martin's quote in the lead. Eugene (talk) 19:52, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Of course to stack the vote. Not to ask for fresh eyes from editors with no religious affiliations. Only to stack the vote. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 20:03, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

What is your concern about those with religious affiliations? Also, are you implying that only those without a religious affiliation can be unbiased? Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 21:19, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

SlimVirgin, this is crossing a major line. I am deeply disturbed by your conduct here. Also, is what 137.22 said true, about you being the one who added back the WPA tag? NJMauthor (talk) 23:22, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't think this section is going to help us improve the article much. However, at the risk of adding to a distraction, I would like to comment that the assumption that the members of the Christianity Wikiproject have a religious affiliation is problematic, just like assumptions that scholars who study early Christianity or who hold positions in religious studies departments are themselves religious. You can, you know, be interested in and study things that you don't personally believe. For that matter, there's no reason to assume that members of Wikiproject Atheism are all atheists. I sometimes work on articles about ancient Greek religion; using the assumptions often in play on this talk page, that must mean I sacrifice bulls to Zeus... --Akhilleus (talk) 01:51, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

What is also quite problematic is the assumption that if one does not consider ad hominem attacks the most effective form of reasoning, one must be a supporter of this theory. Vesal (talk) 11:48, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

That doesn't make sense to me, Vesal. Can I ask you to explain that last statement? (P.S., the assumption that scholars who study Christianity are themselves Christian is an ad hominem argument...) --Akhilleus (talk) 15:04, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Ah, it doesn't make sense indeed. I believe I was tired of the assumptions that if one disagrees that the best way to characterize myth theory is by means of comparisons to holocaust denial, one must be a supporter of the theory with an agenda to present this as a respectable minority position. It was not even really related to anything that you have said or done just the general atmosphere here. And my way of improving that atmosphere was to post the above cryptic message. ;) Vesal (talk) 15:17, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

You do have to admit that comparison of the Christ myth theory to holocaust denial does come off as a desperate strawman because the latter is so well documented with contemporary accounts most written while the events were happening. Jesus has no true contemporary accounts--everything about him was written decades after the events happened more than enough time for what fact there were to get muddled and distorted. Furthermore unlike holocaust deniers Christ myth theorists can point to modern version of what they think might have happened in the form of John Frum cargo cult. To date even with all the technology and information at our disposal we cannot confirm that the John Frum the cult describes ever existed; the best we can do is some native some 10 years later who took up the name John Frum some 10 years later form the appearance of the "real" John Frum. As Peter Worsley in his "The trumpet shall sound: a study of cargo cults in Melanesia" (1968) said "Belief in Christ is no more or less rational than belief in John Frum".--BruceGrubb (talk) 04:24, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Bruce, we've told you time and time again that this is not a forum. We know you don't think the gospel accounts are accurate or that Jesus did anything special. It doesn't affect the article, it's not relevant. NJMauthor (talk) 04:52, 4 May 2010 (UTC)NJMauthor (talk) 04:51, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Bruce. Anthony (talk) 05:47, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

On what point, anthony? NJMauthor (talk) 07:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

He only made the one: Evidence for the holocaust is of a different order of quality and quantity to that for the historical Jesus, so equating arguers against one with arguers against the other is sleazy tar-brushing. Anthony (talk) 10:06, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh. I thought you meant a point related to the topic. NJMauthor (talk) 00:54, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

It was a point on the topic. Using such clear strawmen arguments of comparing the Christ Myth theory to holocaust denialists or Moon hoax theorists is clearly ad hominem as well as non sequitur and much the same can be said for the idea that only atheists believe in the Christ Myth theory. On the other hand it is kind of hard see how anyone could call them themselves "Christian" and also say Jesus never existed in any shape, way, or form; you are left with a "now how does that work?" feeling. Even the less extreme Jesus existed but the Gospel don't really tell us anything meaningful about him or his ministry view is hard to reconcile with what is normally regarded as "Christianity". The religion as we normally understand it would seem to depend on the Gospels providing a meaningful guide on at least what Jesus said even if you hold to the he was simply a man turned into a myth idea.--BruceGrubb (talk) 10:56, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Tom Harpur writes "I have indeed found for myself, in the course of all the emotional and intellectual wrestling involved in coming to grips with this material, not just a deeper faith but a far more bracing, more intellectually honest, more tuned-into-the-universe-itself kind of belief system than I ever dreamed possible. I see my Christian faith with a transformed vision." ^^James^^ (talk) 15:28, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

"non sequitur and much the same can be said for the idea that only atheists believe in the Christ Myth theory." I agree, Bruce. But as far as I know, SlimVirgin isn't a Christian and supports the Christ Myth Theory, and it looks like she's the one who kept sticking the Atheism tag back, and appealed on the wikiproject page. It seems to me an underhanded attempt to create a false "Atheist vs. Christian" mentality, similar to what proponents of Intelligent Design attempt to do.NJMauthor (talk) 20:32, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Tom Harpur's statement seems to show something more in line with Gnosticism than what the average person would call "Christianity". John Remsburg who is used with gay abandon by the non scholar crowd even though Remsmburg (notable in his own time) felt while there was a historical Jesus nothing meaningful could be gleamed about him from the Gospels (a fact that got eliminated from this article somewhere down the line but remains in his article). Please note that Remsburg's The Christ (now retitled The Christ myth) was published the same year as Drews Die Christusmythe (1909) and neither uses the exact phrases "The Christ myth theory is..." or "The Christ myth theory, namely the belief that..." that Eugene seems to obsess over so by his logic we cannot use either of them to define the Christ myth theory. Heck as I've show with quotes straight from Drews himself, the only times the man actually uses "Christ myth" is either as a reference to his book or the story about Jesus and not in reference to his theory.--BruceGrubb (talk) 19:15, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Drews and Remsburg aren't used to source this article's definition either. Think of all the amazing stuff you could do with the time you'd save, Bruce, if you stopped beating this dead horse here. You could join an ultimate frisbee league. Eugene (talk) 19:24, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Then you admit that the article's definition violates WP:NPOV ("Neutrality requires views to be represented without bias.") because it doesn't use definitions that conflict with the ones chosen. We'll keep that in mind.--BruceGrubb (talk) 11:14, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't admit that for a second. We're simply using the defintions that are strongest in terms of quality (published by major university presses) and clarity (make states like "the Christ myth theory is..."). Eugene (talk) 14:43, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Welsh says otherwise, Eugene. "The theory that Jesus was originally a myth is called the Christ-myth theory, and the theory that he was an historical individual is called the historical Jesus theory" Wells with his mythical Jesus accounted by Paul predating a historical Jesus fits the first part as does Dodd no matter what cleaver little tricks you try to use to claim otherwise and the second part fits the c100 BCE Jesuses of Meed and Ellegard. Also Boyd, Gregory A. (2007) Jesus Legend, The: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition Baker Academic clearly states "thereby refuting the Christ myth theory that Paul thought of Jesus as mythological figure who lived in the distant past." Now what does Wells do with the Jesus of Paul? Why have him a "mythological figure who lived in the distant past". Also Boyd clearly lists Wells Jesus Myth as being of the same thought as Drews earlier in the book. The definitions of Dodd, Welsh, and Boyd are all against the Jesus never existed at all nonsense no matter what little tricks you try to use to handwave them away so let's stop the POV pushing.--BruceGrubb (talk) 06:19, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Definition of Christ myth theory

Not being able to spend as much time here as I'd like, I have lost track of the discussion about what is and isn't CMT. Can someone point me to where that is at, or summarize present consensus/controversy? Anthony (talk) 09:52, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

How many times do you need this answered, Anthony? NJMauthor (talk) 01:58, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

So it's not settled yet? Or can you point me to where the definition was agreed in this discussion? Anthony (talk) 08:19, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

The discussion is ongoing here. ^^James^^ (talk) 09:18, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

The discussion is not "on-going". The attempted education of Crum375 is on-going. Eugene (talk) 14:01, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Mmmm. Anthony (talk) 17:59, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry Eugene, but as Boyd (2007) shows Wells with his historical Q Jesus of Jesus Myth as clearly labeled a part of the "mythic Jesus thesis" crowd with Bauer and Drews with the book later identifying this "mythic Jesus thesis" as the "Christ myth theory"--BruceGrubb (talk) 03:56, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Wells' newest book complains that Boyd didn't read his 1996 book carefully enough, so you should be careful about this. Boyd is talking about Wells' pre-1996 views; Wells makes it clear that after his change of mind in the 1990s he no longer advocates what Boyd describes as the "mythic-Jesus thesis". See quotes from Wells here and here. The section in which I made these posts is above. --Akhilleus (talk) 04:05, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Christ Myth Theory is the position that Jesus of Nazareth never existed; Christ Myth Theory is not the position that Jesus of Nazareth existed, but not as the Christ. Christ myth theory is not the position that Jesus of Nazareth existed, but not as the gospels depict him. If someone holds that "Jesus of Nazareth may have existed, but..." and also seperately professes the belief that "Jesus of Nazareth never existed" then the former is not Christ Myth Theory, and the latter is Christ Myth Theory. NJMauthor (talk) 01:49, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

That is the way some people define it. Others like Dodd say that it includes a obscure by historical person may have been tack on to an already existing myth--which is essentially Wells current position which also fits into Welch's definitions of both "Christ Myth Theory" and historical Jesus.

Please note that Boyd, Gregory A. (2007) Jesus Legend, The: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition Baker Academic lists G A Wells with Bauer and Drews and cites citing "Jesus Myth" (1999) (which per Voorst accepts a historical Q Jesus) on page 24 as part of the "mythic Jesus thesis" and gives a similarly broad view of "Christ-myth theory" on 186: "...the Christ myth theory that Paul thought of Jesus as mythological figure who lived in the distant past." and clarifies this in the chapter "The Silence of Paul?" which begins on page 201. Baker Academic identifies itself as "Publisher specializing in scholarly books, reference works, and textbooks for the Christian academy in a variety of disciplines." So here we have a book intended for "the Christian academy" that clearly puts G A Wells Jesus Myth with its historical Q-Jesus with Bauer and Drews as part of the "mythic Jesus thesis" which the book later identifies as the "Christ-myth theory".--BruceGrubb (talk) 03:49, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, it's nice that you recognize this as a definition of the CMT. Here's what Boyd says on pp. 24-25:

Scholars such as Bruno Bauer, Arthur Drews, and G. A. Wells have argued that the Jesus tradition is virtually--perhaps entirely--fictional in nature (i.e. "legendary" as we are using the term). Indeed, it might be more accurate to refer to this position as the mythic-Jesus thesis rather than the legendary-Jesus thesis inasmuch as in common parlance "myth" tends to connote a story that is without any historical foundation, while "legend" tends to connote a fictitious story that revolves around an ostensibly historical figure. In any event, this view holds that we have no good grounds for thinking any aspect of the Jesus narrative is rooted in history, including the very existence of an actual historical person named Jesus. Some scholars we could include in this category, such as Robert Price, would back off this thesis slightly and argue that we simply lack sufficient information to decide whether a historical Jesus existed. Here, a sort of "Jesus agnosticism" emerges.

Note the sentence "this view holds that we have no good grounds for thinking that any aspect of the Jesus narrative is rooted in history, including the very existence of an actual historical person named Jesus." I agree with you that this is a good source, and I like the way it presents Price—not as someone who whole-heartedly endorses the theory, but rather is a "Jesus agnostic".

Also, note (as I commented just above) that Wells has responded to Boyd's book, and complained that it doesn't accurately describe his position post-1996, because he no longer denies that there was (some kind of) historical Jesus. --Akhilleus (talk) 04:11, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry Akhilleus, but the phrase is perhaps entirely not just entirely. This is just more evidence of possible POV pushing.

Sure, Grubb. I've encountered this in article-crafting before. We can include a little section clarifying that a very small minority of CMT writers define the term differently, and some of the varying terms. In fact, we can make it a "main article: Historicity of Jesus" under the subsection heading. But the whole thing should take up a tiny sliver of the article. For sources, though, you seem to be stretching things a bit. Your quote clearly says "...the Christ myth theory that Paul thought of Jesus as mythological figure who lived in the distant past" if the author wishes to alter the definition of CMT after affirming what the mainstream conception of it is, that's fine, it's his choice. But the article has to reflect the fact that the author has not succeeded. NJMauthor (talk) 04:18, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Bruce, Dodd is not saying that a historical Jesus existed. Dodd is saying that some of the actions or sayings of an "obscure" person were added to the "record" of the mythical Jesus, to give it gravitas or credibility or something. That is not at all the same as saying "there was once a real Jesus". We have covered this in the lead quite adequately. The Q-Source is so far unidentified - it could have been the work of a single sage, or it could have been a collection of wisdom accumulated over centuries by a society or pagan cult, or it could have been cribbed from the Egyptians or something else. The fact that a Q-Source existed does not equate to a "historical Jesus", nor is that Dodd's claim. Wdford (talk) 08:31, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

As I mention what I first presented this source Dodd doesn't give a time frame for the reports of "obscure Jewish Holy man" nor does he say this man did not exist.--BruceGrubb (talk) 10:43, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

True enough, but actually Dodd does not claim that the hypothetical "obscure Jewish Holy man" was Jesus of Nazareth, merely that some of the possible doings and sayings of a hypothetical "obscure Jewish Holy man" may possibly have been ascribed to the mythical Jesus character - irrespective of whether the "obscure Jewish Holy man" in question lived before or after the Jesus-period. Therefore, the proposed wording of the lead already adequately covers views such as those of Dodd. Why do you continue to have a problem with this, Bruce? Wdford (talk) 10:56, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Background and definition section

As it stands, this section needs a lot of work to be NPOV and so on. But it has the potential to address a recurring complaint leveled against this article: that it does a poor job of indicating that the CMT is opposed to any sort of historical Jesus--even minimalistic purely human reconstructions. I floated a graphic a while back but it ran into objections. Here's my second try.

The Christ myth theory is an alternative explanation of Christian origins to the historical Jesus. The Christ myth theory is to be distinguished even from biblical minimalism, with fundamentalism occupying the extreme maximalist pole of the historical Jesus spectrum.

I think that the text currently in the caption should appear in the article's in-line text instead, but I've included it here to show that the graphic can be well sourced. What do you guys think, would this be helpful in the definition section? Eugene (talk) 15:06, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

No because there are definitions such as Dodd that totally invalidate it.--BruceGrubb (talk) 17:51, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm still waiting on that Dodd definition, Bruce. Where does Dodd say "The Christ myth theory is..." or "The Christ myth theory, namely the belief that..." ? Eugene (talk) 17:55, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

You are again playing word games. Show me where Bromiley expressly and directly states the Christ myth theory is that Jesus himself never existed. It doesn't. All it says is the "This view states that the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology, possessing no more substantial claims to historical fact than the old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes..." It says NOTHING about the man not exist in any phrase containing "Christ myth theory". You lose.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:20, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Bromiley isn't being used to source the definition of the Christ myth theory at any point in the article. So, actually, I win. Eugene (talk) 18:28, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

The only reason Bromiley had been kept out is his definition doesn't agree with the others and only a bunch of handwaving WP:OR garbage to make it proving my point the definition as it stands is full of WP:SYN and WP:OR nonsense. Furthermore I have shown people who accept a historical Jesus being listed with the Christ Myth Theorists. Again your talk page shows possible WP:COI with the definition.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:47, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I've noted this several times, but I'll repeat myself: Bromiley is the editor of The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, but that's no reason to assume that he wrote the entry Bruce cites. What's more, that article's understanding of the Christ myth theory is exactly the same as the one given in our article. "This view states that the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology, possessing no more substantial claims to historical fact than the old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes..." is pretty clear! Especially when the Christ myth theory is presented as one of the "doubts that have been cast on the historical life of Jesus", in a section of the article titled, "Did Jesus ever live?" I know that it can sometimes be hard to pay attention to context, but really, it's not so hard to keep in mind the previous sentence or the section title, is it? --Akhilleus (talk) 19:18, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

And those "old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes" involved events that actually happened like the Battle of Troy and discovery if Vinland (Better known as North Amercia) ie not all the stories were made out of total cloth but rather what is historical and what is tall tale had been lost. Richard Dawkins who holds that Jesus likely was a historical person also states "The only difference between the Da Vinci Code and the gospel is that the gospels are ancient fiction while The Da Vinci Code is modern fiction." (The God Delusion pg 97). How is that any different from Bromiley's story is? The simple matter is it isn't!--BruceGrubb (talk) 11:41, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Again, someone seems to have lost track of the section heading: "Did Jesus ever live?" --Akhilleus (talk) 14:23, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Somebody seems to have forgotten that I pointed out that Lucian and Bertrand Russell are also in this section. By your logic since they are here in the "Did Jesus ever live?" section they are clearly part of the Christ Myth theory and therefore it is not defined the way you claim. You lose.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:27, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Such sparkling repartee you have going there, Bruce. I think I've pointed out many times that Lucian and Russell aren't being used as examples of the Christ myth theory. Lucian is cited as an early parallel to a claim that some CMT proponents make, and when Russell is mentioned, the article has moved from the CMT to a different subject.

You are, of course, right that I lose--not because your reading of the article is correct (it's not), but because you keep on saying the same things over and over again, as you have for years now. I lose time and brain cells when I respond to it. Sad, really. --Akhilleus (talk) 18:42, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Akhilleus, you're not being consistent as Lucian and Bertrand Russell are "Did Jesus ever live?" section and no amount of handwaving is going to change that FACT.--BruceGrubb (talk) 05:40, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Okay, enough is enough. I'm going to get the diffs together to submit a complaint regarding Bruce to the ANI for disruptive editting. WP:DISRUPT prohibits Bruce's sort of obstruction on talk pages just like main pages. Would someone like to be the person who submits the report when ready? I don't want to make a nuisance of myself over there. Eugene (talk) 05:55, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, Eugene but if anything it is you and Akhilleus who can be shown to be more in violation WP:DISRUPT than I. The long challenge of anything that challanges the one particular definition used in this article and support of questional sources (Grant) shows this and I have finally gotten tired of this nonsense and brought it to the attention of an another administrator. I take your comment as a personal threat with is not allowed, I noted you called another editors a lier which is not allowed and your possible WP:COI was also duly noted. --BruceGrubb (talk) 07:51, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

POV?

With the new lead and the excision of Powell's actual quote, does anyone still think that the article has POV problems? Eugene (talk) 20:07, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

SV, I noticed that you restored the POV tag. What specifically do you object to at this point? Eugene (talk) 14:29, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Alright, SlimVirgin reinserted the tag on the following basis: (1) lead doesn't include a dissenting voice, (2) a reference to pseudoscholarship appears in the lead, (3) the "historical responses" appears outside the arguments section and so masquerades as some neutral and comprehansive accounting, and (4) Price's section is... something-or-other. These don't seem like sufficient reasons for a NPOV tag.

1. The RfC sided clearly against mentioning Martin in the lead; he now appears in the 20th century's "Other authors" section.
2. Including a reference to pseudoscholarship in the new lead was the the consensus of the editors here with only one giving any reasons against including the material--reasons which he explicitly conceded violated WP:V.
3. The "Historical responses" section has been renamed "Historical rebuttals" to prevent confusion.
4. Price's section includes many new elements which SlimVirgin originally put in: a new picture, a quote about finding a skeleton, his nationality, an allusion to the Jesus Seminar, his disdain for appeals to authority, etc. I simply don't see how this section can be faulted for POV.

Given all this it seems that the tag should come down. I'm not saying that the article is perfect, but the specific issues advanced to justifty the tag have either been resolved or are trivial. If someone objects, please give reasons why, reasons which do not themselves violate policy or seem like little more than sour grapes over a RfC that didn't go your way. Eugene (talk) 15:08, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I've waited 24 hours and, again, no one has responsed with reasons. On the assumption that SlimVirgin isn't just stonewalling, I'm taking the tag down. Eugene (talk) 15:16, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Bauer and Drews' motives

A while back the article made reference to the motives of Bruno Bauer (anti-Semitism) and Arthur Drews (anti-Semitism & idealistic monism) in their respective sections. The information was supported with reliable references. A couple of weeks ago an editor deleted this information in a flurry of attempted rehabilitation. Now, Vestal has re-raised the idea of adding the information. I think it's a good idea, what is the general feeling on this? Eugene (talk) 04:16, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I second the motion. NJMauthor (talk) 04:21, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I third the motion. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 04:26, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

You've just added (in red):

Drews wrote that his purpose was to show that everything about the historical Jesus had a mythical character, and there was no reason to suppose that such a figure had ever existed, as such a historical focus conflicted with his philosophical and racial beliefs.

Does Drews say that?

Imputing motives to authors will need to be seriously supported by their own words. Anthony (talk) 16:41, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

(unindent) The statement is supported by reliable secondary sources:

• "Two features of the work of Arthur Drews arrested my attention. In the first places it was clear that his historical judgements were determined by his philosophy and not be a straightforward survey of the evidence. To his type of spiritual monism a faith which attaches value to historic events or persons is a kind of idolatry. I failed to see why the question of the historicity of Jesus should be determined in defiance of the principles of rational criticism, merely to bolster up the philosophic prejudices of Arthur Drews."

  Herbert George Wood, Christianity and the Nature of History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1934) p. xxxii

• "It is no doubt difficult for the reader of the two volumes of The Christ-Myth to believe it, but it is important that we shoud understand that Drews is animated by an earnest and even religious purpose. ... He conceives himself to be engaged in a struggle in behalf of the freedom and independance of the human spirit, and indeed for the very existence of religion. ... Filled with zeal for this high--'mysticism,' we may be permitted, for the purposes of effect, to call it, though of course it is too purely pantheism to be properly called 'mysticism'--he finds Christianity with its emphasis on the separation of man from God, its proclamation or redemption in Another than one's self, its 'historicism' as opposed to his 'idealism', athwart his path. It must be got rid of at all hazards. 'I insist,' he declares 'that belief in the historical reality of Jesus is the chief obstacle to religious progress; and therefore the question of his historicity is not purely historical, but also a philosophic-religious question.'" (emphasis original)

  B. B. Warfield, "book review of The Witnesses to the Historicity of Jesus by Arthur Drews", The Princeton Theological Review 11 (2), 1913, pp. 297 ff.

• "Drews was neither an historian nor an original researcher, he relies chiefly upon the works of Smith. Drews -- is a philosopher of the Hartmann school. In his capacity as an Hartmannist, he preaches a religion of pure spirit. And he fights against the historicity of Jesus Christ in the name of a religion of spirit, he contends against the religious materialism which he detests. He is prepared to admit the existence of Christ, as the Logos. But for him the Logos never could have been incarnated into a man upon the earth, within earthly history. The religious materialism of Christianity is a legacy inherited from Judaism, it is a Semitic graft, and Drews in his capacity as a religious anti-Semite, struggles against this materialistic Semitic graft for the religious life of Aryanism, expressing itself in its purest guise in India."

  Nikolai Berdyaev, "The Scientific Discipline of Religion and Christian Apologetics", translated by S. Janos, Journal 'Put, 1, 1927

Given that Drews is long-dead and therefore BLP issues don't apply, this should be more than enough to support the in-line text. Eugene (talk) 17:36, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not that thrilled with the text as it stands. First, it merely labels Drews as a racist without explaining why that's important, or what effect it had upon his ideas. Second, the source used to establish Drews' belief that the religious materialism of Christianity was Semitic in origin comes from 1927. I've read a number of more recent sources about Drews that explain his ideas without mentioning antisemitism at all.

So, I'm kind of inclined not to mention antisemitism in the Drews section, but if it is mentioned there, the text needs to explain how this shaped his thought, rather than just using it as a label. --Akhilleus (talk) 17:50, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

How about:

Drews' personal philosophy, a kind of monism (Wood, 1934) or pantheism (Warfield, 1923), was incompatible with the religious materialism implicit in the idea of an historical Jesus. He saw the religious materialism of Christianity as a legacy inherited from Judaism, a Semitic graft.

And if there is to be a mention of his views about race or "religious anti-Semitism" it'll need to be explained just what those terms mean in relation to Drews and, per Akhilleus, how this shaped his thought. Anthony (talk) 18:20, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't see how race has anything to do with it. The first attempt at a "Christian" bible (Marcionite Bible) was itself antisemetic and it certainly excepted Jesus was a historial person. Heck, even the most rabid antisemite the modern world knew believed Jesus was a historical person; in fact here are his own words written down in Mein Kampf: "Of course, the latter made no secret of his attitude toward the Jewish people, and when necessary he even took the whip to drive from the temple of the Lord this adversary of all humanity, who then as always saw in religion nothing but an instrument for his business existence. In return, Christ was nailed to the cross, while our present-day party Christians debase themselves to begging for Jewish votes at elections and later try to arrange political swindles with atheistic Jewish parties--and this against their own nation."

As I said before there are atheists that hold Jesus existed and Deists that hold that he might as well not existed because nothing in the Gospels holds up to external fact and all kind of kludges are need to even get one of the accounts to fit.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:30, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

For the thousandth time, Bruce, this isn't a forum. I think the information in Drews section is helpful but I don't have any objections to reworking it into a fuller statement such as Anthony offers. Eugene (talk) 18:37, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

(remove indent)Stop using the old forum claim every time you don't understand an argument. To put is a blunt as possible Drews' racial bias (if there were any) has no relevance to his position on this topic.--BruceGrubb (talk) 19:33, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

It's very easy to understand what you are saying Bruce, it's just entirely irrelevant to the question. To the point at issue: if Drews' supposed 'racial bias' was a motivation for his theories then it would be relevant, but these are not very good sources - they are very old and locked into debates at the time - and none of them says that 'racial bias' or even anti-semitism was a motivation, or at least not racial anti-semitism. Only one mentions it, and that's in a complex sentence that has to be placed in the cultural context of the time. It refers to "relgious anti-semitism", which probably means something very different from what is meant by anti-semitism today. It's the same word, but quite a different concept. He means more or less the same as "anti-Abrahamic": opposition to the idea of a personal God, as opposed to the "Aryan" (ie Hindu-Buddhist) notion of an impersonal divine spirit. The notion is that the Abrahamic ("semitic") model of god as a person - with opinions, preferences etc - is "materialistic". It reduces the divine to human form, while the Aryan model allegedly elevates it to its "its purest guise". The problem is that words like Aryan and anti-Semitic have different connotations for modern readers, since they immediately imply the racial ideologies of Nazism. I don't think we can simply bandy about terms like "anti-semitic" which will be interpreted by the reader to mean "hating Jews", which is not necessarily fair on Drews who is oopposing "semitic" (Judeo-Muslim) thought to "Aryan" (Hindu-Buddhist) thought, a common argument at the time. Paul B (talk) 22:59, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Paul's comment is a nice corrective to the usual low level of discourse around here, in which subtlety and nuance is impossible because some editors don't seem to be able to comprehend more than a sentence at a time. Anyway, it seems that an explanation of what antisemitism means in Drews' thought would require a good amount of space, probably more than should be expended in this article, especially considering that we can give a decent summary of what he was up to without mentioning contentious concepts. It might be worth including in Arthur Drews, though. --Akhilleus (talk) 03:36, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

I grasp Paul's argument and concede that he may be on to something. But given Arthur Drews' clear Nazi sympathes and antipathy for the Jews, I'm not sure that one can so neatly separate his distain for what we might call the "Semetic faith cluster" and his distain for the Semites. Given this, and given that we have a source in place, and given that the word "anti-semitism" itself doesn't appear in Drews section as it is, I'd rather keep the material. As it stands, the article refers to Drews' "racial" beliefs and not the far more disreputable "racist" beliefs. Eugene (talk) 14:54, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

So, by "religious antisemitism," the source means "opposed to attributing a human nature to God," but it is okay for this article to use it as (1) proof of Drews' racism and (2) proof that this racism was his motivation? Did I get that right? Anthony (talk) 19:01, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Not quite. I'm saying that Paul is reading into the source a bit, speculating essentially. And while I think his speculation may be on to something, even so, it wouldn't undermine a more straight-forward reading of the text. Drews was undeniably an anti-Semite--in the modern sense of the word; his criticism of Neitchze makes that pretty plain and he's often described as an intellectual leader in the "völkisch racism" of the earl thirties leading to the rise of the Nazis. So while Berdyaev's particular comment regarding Drews' anti-semitism may encompass a broad antipathy for the Abrahamic tradition, there's no good reason to suppose that it excludes a more basic and straight-forward racial interpretation. Eugene (talk) 23:21, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

'If' he was a classic racist, and given the zeitgeist it is perfectly possible, and 'if' it is relevant, you'll need a better source. If you want to make the claim racism was the 'motive' behind his theory, how do you plan on proving that? Anthony (talk) 23:50, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

This is getting way too off topic (which is why I didn't want us going down this road in the first place). If Drews reasoning is too complex to explain here I say we leave it out in this article and explain it on the page regarding him with reliable sources.--

BruceGrubb (talk) 12:05, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Anthony, it seems you keep misunderstanding (or ignoring) WP:V. I don't have to "prove" that Drews' scholarship was motivated by racism in some sort of air-tight way; I merely need to be able to support such a statement using reliable sources. Given that the Berdyaev article says Drews argued against the historicity of Jesus specifically "in his capacity as a religious anti-Semite", I think that's enough. I'll try to find other, more modern sources though. Eugene (talk) 17:19, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, if the Berdyaev article is the only source you can find that says Drews was motivated by racism, then a more appropriate sentence would read "One single source asserts that Drews may have been motivated by racism" - if we include this assertion at all. It's a bit of a stretch to call a man a racist because one article makes that claim - especially when we have already seen that scholars get emotional about this topic, and resort to childish insults. Wdford (talk) 17:38, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

The article currently has Drews refereed as an anti-Semite in the hating Jews mold. Per most of the above I don't see how is really relates to Drews' position that Jesus wasn't a historical person especially as the term as it was used in his time may have a very different meaning than in ours.--BruceGrubb (talk) 19:37, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

The article does not currently refer to Drews as an anti-semite. Eugene (talk) 19:45, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Sigh, yes it does, Eugene. "In keeping with his pervasive anti-Semitism..."--BruceGrubb (talk) 20:34, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't know which article you think you're reading, but this article uses that phrase in connection with Bauer, not Drews. Stop wasting our time, Bruce, please go join that frisbee league. Eugene (talk) 21:18, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

I grant that if the Berdyaev source is all I can find then the comment should stay out of the article. The source is indeed "locked into the debate" and so on. But there are other sources that support Berdyaev. Richard Noll makes essentially the same point in The Jung Cult, sketching out the way that German intellectuals dressed up their racial anti-semitism in a cheap spiritual suit beginning on page 130, and mentioning Drews and his The Christ Myth in that context on page 132. Further, the Berliner Institut für Faschismus-Forschung (a German organization, obviously), quotes Drews as saying essentially what Anothy wanted to hear to justify the inclusion of the racial stuff: "The "Freie Religion" left no doubts about Free-Religious orientation when it published the following in 1934, under the heading "Blood and Soil Religion": "For that religion always grows and blossoms out of the blood relations of the nation's soul is proven by history. And what is right in this respect for the Chinese or for Jews is worthless to the German Volk, a member of the Indo-Germanic family of Voelker and races". The racist Arthur Drews - still published today by the Secretary of State's, Eckhart Pick's, local sect, the Free-Religious Parish of Mainz, and propogated by the WOD, press successor to the 'Freie Religion' - opined: 'Essential and original religion of German blood can persist in the face of other types of sensibilities', Jews and Christians - as alien types - should therefore get out of Germany." Given that the text being considered for inclusion in the article merely refers to Drew's "racial beliefs" and doesn't make any specific claims about racial anti-semitism, this seems more than adequate. Eugene (talk) 20:08, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

The old Arthur Drews (1865 – 1935) Professor der Philosophie an der Technischen Hochschule Karlsruhe, Vortrag von Dr. Bernhard Hoffers, Lehrte, im Geschichtssalon Karlsruhe, 24. April 2003 reference in Drews' article as translated by User talk:Hans Adler reads "For justice' sake [I] should first, after I have made these hints about Drews and Nazism, also say that Drews has spoken out publicly against the enormous rise of antisemitism in the 20s." paints a slightly different pictures of Drews racial views.--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:35, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Have you read The Jung Cult, or are you relying on this snippet? If you have it, could you please copy the bit that describes the nature of his racism and how it motivated his theory?

This website you cite calls Drews a racist but it is clearly not an RS And its only quote from Drews seems to espouse the feasibility of religions persisting alongside each other: "Essential and original religion of German blood can persist in the face of other types of sensibilities" The "Jews and Christians should get out of Germany" which you attribute to Drews is not in quotes, so I assume those are the words of the author of the web page.

You have not provided sufficient evidence either of the nature of his racism or of it as a motivation for his theory. Anthony (talk) 04:09, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Okay, so here's what we've got:

• Berdyaev, Nikolai (1927), "The Scientific Discipline of Religion and Christian Apologetics", Put' Vol. 6, pp. 50–68

  "The religious materialism of Christianity is a legacy inherited from Judaism, it is a Semitic graft, and Drews in his capacity as a religious anti-Semite, struggles against this materialistic Semitic graft for the religious life of Aryanism, expressing itself in its purest guise in India."

• Noll, Richard (1997) , The Jung Cult: Origins of a Charismatic Movement (Touchstone)

  In the midst of a discussion of volkish racism and its various intellectual advocates, Noll mentions "the volkisch work of Drews" and mentions The Christ Myth by name. (the section, "Jung's Volkisch Sources for Wandlungen", can be read in full here.)

• Kratz, Peter (1999), "The Whole Rosenberg Story Again?", at the Berliner Institut für Faschismus-Forschung und Antifaschistische Aktion

  Kratz, who's published on the relationship between the rise of esoteric religious sects in Germany in the 20s and 30s and the rise of Nazism in mainstream print sources--therefore indicating that his web offerings can stand as a reliable source per WP:IRS, states, "The 'Freie Religion' left no doubts about Free-Religious orientation when it published the following in 1934, under the heading 'Blood and Soil Religion': 'For that religion always grows and blossoms out of the blood relations of the nation's soul is proven by history. And what is right in this respect for the Chinese or for Jews is worthless to the German Volk, 'a member of the Indo-Germanic family of Voelker and races'. The racist Arthur Drews - still published today by the Secretary of State's, Eckhart Pick's , local sect, the Free-Religious Parish of Mainz, and propogated by the WOD, press successor to the 'Freie Religion' - opined: 'Essential and original religion of German blood can persist in the face of other types of sensibilities', Jews and Christians - as alien types - should therefore get out of Germany."

• Langenbach, Christian G. (2007), "Freireligiöse und Nationalsozialismus", Humanismus Aktuell Vol. 20, pp. 43-54 (helpfully translated for us by user:Hans Adler)

  Langenbach writes that Drews "expressed thoughts that correspond to a racial religiosity. For example Drews asserted that Christianity was the expression of a 'sunken time and the mindset of a race foreign to us'. He stressed that 'Christianity [had] absolutely nothing to do with Germanhood' and therefore a 'German Christianity' would represent 'nonsense'."

• Drews, Arthur (1911), Die Christusmythe Vol. 2 (E. Diederichs) (helpfully translated for us by user:Hans Adler)

  All the best for which the Germanic spirit has thought and felt, has fought and suffered, the deepest hunches of its own ancestral religion, which failed to fully unfold in it but were prematurely destroyed by the mission work of the Christian Church, have found their childbirth to light in yonder monistic religion of our great thinkers and poets – and under these circumstances we should be obliged once and for all to obtain our religious property from the orient, and the world-view of a time long gone and a depraved culture should hold us in its spell forever?"

Considering that all I'm shooting for is the addition of the green text ("Drews wrote that his purpose was to show that everything about the historical Jesus had a mythical character and there was no reason to suppose that such a figure had ever existed, as such a historical focus conflicted with his philosophical and racial beliefs.") the above sources should be more than adequate. I'm not trying to add anything about Jew-hating, or that he's a huge racist, I'm just pushing for the inclusion of the phrase "racial beliefs". I'll reinsert the phrase with a couple of references. Eugene (talk) 06:12, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

21st century section

The statement "By the 21st century, the non-existence of Jesus had become a dead thesis within academia.[71]" is apparently based on a book written in 1998, The Christ and the Spirit: collected essays of James D.G. Dunn, page 191. Seems problematic and the source of statement in the book is from a 1971 source. I suppose in the grand scheme of things a few years here and there don't matter much but I thought I'd mention it.Sean.hoyland - talk 13:32, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I think there's no real problem sourcing a statement that says "By the 21st century" with a work published in 1998. Eugene (talk) 14:54, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

That is because you didn't pay attention to the tense of the verb, Eugene. Basics English lesson here--you can't talk about "By the 21st century" in the past tense until the year 2000 (2001 if you want to get technical). Ergo if the 1998 and 1971 sources are saying this they are talking nonsense.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:05, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

The Dunn source, published at the close of the 20th century, describe the CMT as a "dead thesis". This clearly means that "By the 21st century" the CMT was a dead thesis. Thanks for the lesson though. Eugene (talk) 15:32, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

So why not just say 'By the end of the 20th century' which is far more accurate?--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:39, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Counter Arguments

Since someone recently brought it up, let's tackle the next issue on the list: Should the scholarly response (recently relabeled "arguments against") be one major section (as it currently is) or should it be distrbuted throughout the article, possibly divvied among the "arguments for"? Eugene (talk) 15:03, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

This was kicked around back in Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_19#The_article_order and Akhilleus and I both agreed that an arguments section per say was a majorly bad idea. Akhilleus main argument back then was "by combining arguments from different authors it creates a version of the "hypothesis" that no single person holds. At points it crosses the line into OR. It encourages a polemical tone, and is likely to degenerate into a repository of pro and con positions." In fact this a good description of the 01:26, August 24, 2005 version of this article which was nearly entirely arguments with perhaps a paragraph of history before it. I felt that as more information on the authors various positions emerged the arguments section would diminish--perhaps into oblivion. The only source who came close to arguing every possible variant of the Christ Myth theory that has been presented was John Remsburg.--BruceGrubb (talk) 19:03, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

The concerns that the arguments section will neccesarily be OR have been addressed through citations from Boyd & Eddy which mention the various arguments used. So, given that the arguements are well sourced and are therefore going to stay, should we try to integrate the counter arguments into this section or simply keep the status quo? Eugene (talk) 15:29, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Some input regarding the RFC.

Hello there! I was browsing through ANI's page on fringe theories when I came across this page. I see that the RFC has been archived already, but it's open for two more days. So I'll just toss my two cents in here.

It seems to me that this article should definitely be listed as pseudo-history. It's pretty much a settled fact that Jesus, as a person, did exist. There are plenty of citations here that show that it's a fringe theory. I just don't know if it can be any clearer. It just seems like this is squarely in the realm of pseudo-history. So, I would support its categorization as pseudo-history. Deep Purple Dreams (talk) 19:17, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Whether it is fringe has been fairly well settled. Clearly it is. Whether it is pseudo-scholarship, that is, pretended, fabricated, posing as scholarship, is a different question. Fringe doesn't mean pseudo, it means unpopular. Heliocentrism and plate tectonics were fringe for quite a while. Though the theories were plausible and based on honest data and sound method, mainstream scholars simply denied them because they didn't like them. Anthony (talk) 05:06, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry Anthony. Your analogy fails. Heliocentrism and plate tectonics were never refuted or considered "dead theses". The CMT, on the other hand, has been almost universally rejected in the strongest possible terms. And if this doesn't convince you, then nothing will. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 05:24, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually the analogy is valid. Aside for the occasional side track that led nowhere Heliocentrism was effectively dead as a valid theory from c270 BCE to 1543 because it was viewed as too ridiculous to even consider. The same is true of Abraham Ortelius whose Continental drift-plate technologist theory of 1587 was worked on some some 300 years later by Wegener and got even more of a hostile reaction. Scheidigger (1953), "Examination of the physics of theories of orogenesis", GSA Bulletin 64: 127—150 rejected Wegener's theory several grounds--all of which did a spectacular crash and burn in Carey, S. W. (1958), "The tectonic approach to continental drift", in Carey, S. W., Continental Drift—A symposium, Univ. of Tasmania, pp. 177—355.

"The remark was made in the course of a symposium on continental drift that exemplified greater diversity of opinions than paleontology can offer. Doctor van der Gracht's dictum becomes amusing when it is noticed that on his particular p. 2 subject the verdict of paleontologists is practically unanimous: almost all agree in opposing his views, which were essentially those of Wegener." [...] "The fact that almost all paleontologists say that paleontological data oppose the various theories of continental drift should, perhaps, obviate further discussion of this point and would do so were it not that the adherents of these theories all agree that paleontological data do support them. It must be almost unique in scientific history for a group of students admittedly without special competence in a given field thus to reject the all but unanimous verdict of those who do have such competence." [...] "The known past and present distribution of land mammals cannot be explained by the hypothesis of drifting continents. It can be accommodated to that hypothesis only by supplementary hypotheses effectively indistinguishable from those involving stable continents and not really involving or requiring drift. This distribution could be explained in terms of transoceanic continents but it is more consistent with fully stable continents. There appear to be no facts in this field that are more completely or more simply explicable by transoceanic than by stable continents and the supposed evidence of this sort is demonstrably false or misinterpreted. The distribution of mammals definitely supports the hypothesis that continents were essentially stable throughout the whole time involved in mammalian history." G.G. Simpson (1943), "Mammals and the Nature of Continents", American Journal of Science 241:1-31. There it is, straight from the American Journal of Science, the rejection of continental drift you claimed wasn't made.--BruceGrubb (talk) 08:07, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

I realize that this isn't entirely on topic, but I think it may be helpful. Anthony (and I'm asking Anthony specifically here) you've implied that the only legitimate justification for labeling something "pseudo-X" is falsification of data or self-consciously unsound method. Would you, honestly now, apply this heuristic even-handedly to other fields? The Wikipedia article on intelligent design effectively labels ID pseudo-X several times in the lead. Given that men like Michael Behe, Stephen C. Meyer, and William Dembski probably aren't just outright lying about data or consciously contriving a faux-method, do you object to that article's lead then? Eugene (talk) 05:40, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

There are actually three issues here. First, several agencies as well as individuals have stated intelligent design is not science (U.S. National Academy of Sciences) as well as it being pseudoscience (U.S. National Science Teachers Association and American Association for the Advancement of Science).

Second, intelligent design unlike history goes into the field of physical (hard) sciences which as a general rule of thumb have a higher bar of quality than the social (soft) sciences. Take my own field of anthropology/archaeology for example. A quick read through Bruce Trigger's A History of Archaeological Thought will show that both fields are very fragmented in terms of concept, theory, and even structurally methodology and yet no one would not call them sciences.

Finally, Intelligent design fails the most important requirement of any true science--it is not testable. The Christ Myth Theory on the other hand works with the idea that so much of the Gospels are mythical that even if there is a man behind them he cannot be found ie the Jesus the canonal Gospels describe didn't exist. It is akin to saying Robin Hood and King Arthur as we know them didn't exist--strictly speaking that is true but it does not exclude the possibility that deep within the legends and mythology there is a "historical" Robin Hood and King Arthur but such a search is ultimately useless.--BruceGrubb (talk) 09:47, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

This is waaay off topic. You've spammed quotes and citations from Trigger all over this page, but I bet he's written absolutely nothing that directly applies to the topic of this article. (It would also be nice if people stopped acting like this article is about a scientific topic--history isn't science, people! You can't perform an experiment to determine whether there was a historical Jesus.) --Akhilleus (talk) 14:37, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

As I said (and as Bruce seems to have ignored), I'm asking Anthony specifically here. So, Anthony, how do you respond to my question? Eugene (talk) 14:02, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

NPOV tag

Eugene continues to remove the tag though it's clear that the dispute remains unresolved, and most of the people who've commented believe the article has POV issues. Eugene, you've undone most of the material that was added in an effort to improve things, and you've made the lead worse by removing the dissenting voice and restoring the "pseudo" issue. If you remove the tag again I'm going to request admin assistance. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 00:40, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

It might be helpful if you summarized what you felt the remaining POV issues were. Eugene asked for this recently and you didn't respond, so he may have concluded that there was no longer an active dispute. --Akhilleus (talk) 00:52, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

It is way too early to remove the tag Eugene. Anthony (talk) 01:09, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

If that is so, he should have been answered. NJMauthor (talk) 02:47, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Akhilleus, the disputes seem to have driven several of the uninvolved or less involved editors away. That doesn't mean the issues are resolved, simply that people have been worn down. Two key issues for me are, as I said, no dissenting voice in the lead, and the addition of the "pseudo" issue or any other phrase that denigrates the sources (these are not the only issues, but they're the most immediate ones). I've said this many times; if I fail to answer on any given occasion it doesn't mean there's been a resolution. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 02:49, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Just to clarify, this is the version I added the tag to on April 12 because efforts to improve the article were being undone. This is the current version. The lead still has no modern dissenting voice. There is still a prominent "pseudo" claim. The historical responses section is still entirely negative, but is placed outside arguments and counter-arguments as though it's definitive and neutral. The Price section is almost the same as it was; all the extra details have been removed, though at least now we have a decent image. Those are just some of the issues to be starting with. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 06:30, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Response to SV's list: the historical responses section needs to be improved, but I tend to agree that it needs to be incorporated into the arguments and counter-arguments section. I would also like to improve the arguments and counter-arguments section so that each argument has the "for and against" in the same paragraph, as it makes more sense than having the counter in a different section entirely. However that can be managed. Please add back the "missing" Price details, with a justification for each, and let's debate the justifications before anybody removes them again. But as far as the lead is concerned, I still don't understand the need for a "modern dissenting voice". The lead currently states what the proponents believe, and that the many detractors reject their assertions. If you want to know who and what, you have ten pages of "history" to wade through. I don't see why you need to mention a particular individual in the lead, either for or against, as the lead summarises all the content of the article. There is nothing wrong with the pseudoscholarship comment, as many people have indeed made that comment, and it does say "many" not "all". We don't need to have a counter to that, as the existence of the Theory alone indicates that some think its a valid Theory based on good evidence - some of which evidence is already summarised in the lead. I think the use of the word "pseudoscholarship" already indicates that the detractors tend to be emotional rather than scientific, which I think is an accurate assessment in many cases, but adding an equally-emotional "voice" in favour of the Theory adds nothing to the lead. Wdford (talk) 09:19, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

SV, the RfC is very clearly against including the Martin quote and the new lead--with the referene to many scholars considering the theory pseudoscholarship--was agreed to here on the talk page. If that's all you've got, then that isn't much. Eugene (talk) 14:46, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Pseudo-Scholarship

Eugene has made a good case to support his assertion that many scholars call arguments in support of CMT "pseudoscholarship." On that basis I have no objection to that appearing in the article. I asked him to also make the case that it is in fact pseudoscholarship. He obliged me with two critiques each for Doherty and Wells, which I am slowly working through. I don't have a lot of spare time right now, but am making headway. If, at the end of this process, I find clear evidence of false data and poor method in both of these authors' work, I shall be happy to (1) insert clear, concise statements of the nature of their pseudoscholarship in the body of the article and (2) have it labeled such in the lead.

If, however (as I have found so far, but it is early days) there is no example of pseudoscholarship in that list, and no one can provide me with it, I shall oppose any mention in the lead, and insert something along the lines of this in the body of the article:

Though many establishment scholars have labeled contemporary proponents as "pseudoscholars," the editors of this article have been unable to find a single instance of falsification or poor historical method in their work.

Anthony (talk) 17:49, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Why isn't that Original Research, Anthony? NJMauthor (talk) 01:27, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Fair point NJM. Hopefully it won't come to that. Hopefully, among that litany of criticisms Eugene has pasted above I shall find instances of false data or poor method underpinning Doherty's or Wells' theses. If I don't, I'll come back to you, Eugene, Bill, Ari and Akhilleus for the pseudoscholarship. You are all so confident that their work is poor scholarship; your confidence must be based on more than faith. It must be based on more than the wish that it were true; more than a willingness to uncritically swallow any insult about those who question your view. You each must have it clear in your minds just what the epithet refers to.

Above, Akhilleus makes the point:

Honestly, Anthony, I think this is a waste of your time. Unless you have demonstrable expertise in this area, your opinion of whether there's pseudoscholarship here doesn't matter; what matters is what the reliable sources say

which means I am not making myself clear. I'll try harder. I am a reader of Wikipedia. That is how I approach you. I have come to this article to find out what is meant by Christ Myth Theory and the merits and demerits of the theory. I found the article riddled, nay infected with sleazy ad hominems about moon-cheese, skinheads, flat earth etc, declarations that "no serious scholar argues this" (a formulation repeated so often it stinks like a political slogan) and "pseudoscholarship" leveled at the proponents, but no explanation of the nature of the flawed method or fabricated facts underpinning their arguments.

Implicit in Akhilleus' statement is: "that a number of scholars call it pseudoscholarship should be enough for readers of this page". It is not; as I am sure it is not for you. I am sure you can list the fabrications and poor method underpinning Wells' and Doherty's arguments that condemn them. I'm sure you didn't just read their opponent's insults and swallow them whole without critically analyzing their reasons. What baffles me is your reluctance to putting the pseudoscholarship on this page, why you are so enthusiastic about reporting their opponents' opinions but so reluctant to explain the clear fraud or flawed method of the proponents.

This wouldn't matter if your strategy were convincing. It is not. Not delineating the pseudoscholarship makes this a sermon from the pulpit. "We, the authorities. scoff at this concept. Proponents are beneath contempt. Trust us, because lots of us say this." Rational readers require rational explanations, not the voice of authority. Anthony (talk) 04:50, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure who you're addressing here, Anthony, I assume the second half is directed at Akhilleus. As for my opinion, I have my opinion based on my exposure to several of these claims, their sources, and their proponents over the years. I could make several points challenging CMT's methodology, such as the fact that some proponents, such as Gerald Massey, completely ignore the notion of Convergent Cultural Evolution in order to pursue grand unlikely conspiracies. Let me highlight an example of this kind of illogical thinking on a related topic:

1: The Egyptian pharaoh, Akhenaten, worshipped the disc of the sun.

2: The Aztecs worshipped the disc of the sun.

3: Therefore, either Akhenaten informed the Aztecs, or the Aztecs informed Akhenaten.

But I can't put my personal conclusions in the article. I know you respect that. Just as I'll respect you not adding OR, even if it "comes to that." Have a nice night, I want you to know that I do appreciate your input and your willingness to study the material before making edits. NJMauthor (talk) 05:05, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Forgive me if I don't follow up on Gerald Massey. No need for OR NJM. Just go to the textbooks or peer-reviewed history articles that explain the nature of Wells' and Doherty's pseudoscholarship, paste the words in here, shuffle them a bit into a readable paraphrase and post them. Anthony (talk) 17:49, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm a little confused. What claim of mine are you addressing, specifically?

To avoid a debate of subject, let me clarify:

You agree that the fact scholars consider CMT work to be pseudoscholarship should remain in the article. You also believe that, for the reader to receive a valid impression of the subject, those methodological concerns should be outlined in the article and sourced.

Is the above position what you hold to? A simple "Nay" or "Yea" will suffice so that we don't go down a bad road. NJMauthor (talk) 22:16, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

You said, "But I can't put my personal conclusions in the article." That's what I was addressing. I don't "hold" to anything. I'm not a believer. My position on everything changes in light of new data, new analysis, reflection.

On the question of the article reporting that some scholars label the theory pseudoscholarship, I'm having doubts. There is more than one theory proposed by more than one author. To accuse all of them of pseudoscholarship without showing it seems wrong and possibly just repeating libel. I read an excellent analysis of David Irving's holocaust theories once, that laid out his lies and slight of hand first, then concluded the man was a fake. This article calls them all fakes in the introduction and for reasons best known only to you guys promoting the slur, makes no effort to show the fraud. You (pl.) think just having a lot of opponents say "I don't like it", "they're crap" makes the case. Clearly it does for believers, but rationalists require more. Anthony (talk) 00:50, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

If mainstream scholars report that it is pseudoscholarship, it must be placed in the article. It is not mudslinging, we are reporting the facts. And the fact stands that they do indeed consider CMT to be pseudoscholarship. I agree with you that it would be very nice to include "peer-reviwed" examinations of why they believe so. However, very few scholarly refutations are produced to refute a specific brand of a fringe, blip-on-the-radar theory like CMT. Regarding Massey, I will use him as an example again in the future, because he was a Christ Myth Theorist with obvious methodological errors, including source-forging.

One thing seriously concerns me. You said that you'd be in favor of introducing a line like "the editors of this article have been unable to find a single instance of falsification or poor historical method in their work." That is blatant original research. It is unacceptable conduct on wikipedia. NJMauthor (talk) 02:42, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree, and did so above. That wording would not be appropriate. Anthony (talk) 08:45, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

What Anthony is saying is the same thing I said a long time ago; if the Christ Myth theory has a range and mainstream scholars report criticize a part of that range you can't use that to cover the entire range. On Gerald Massey, his The Historical Jesus and Mythical Christ (c1900) in part covers similar ground as seen Mead's later work. Also we need to remember he lived during that Trigger called the Imperial Synthesis period and that period is well known for having (in our eye) some wild theories. Digging around I found a 1888 magazine called Knowledge by Richard A Proctor Volume 11 that on Page 90 that stated that Isis was a virgin goddess. Freethinker, Volume 15, Part 2 (1895) states "The virgin births of Osiris, Horus, Buddha, and other sun and culture heroes, have long been pointed out by men like Dupuis, Higgins, and Bonwick."--BruceGrubb (talk) 09:27, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I understand what Anthony is saying. Grubb, if I may ask, which CMT theories do you believe that scholars are accusing of pseudoscholarship? Would it be more accurate to say that scholars have critisized several approaches to CMT as being pseudoscholarship? (not to assume that any aren't pseudoscholarship, of course.) Also, do you have a source for the term "Imperial Synthesis period"? I'm not challenging you, I'm genuinely interested in learning more about what period it defines. I'm fairly certain I know what you're referring to.

And what do you make of Eugene's citations above, his extensive list of methodological concerns? Scholarly refutations, Anthony? NJMauthor (talk) 20:29, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm commenting as I go, beneath each critique. I'm up to Evidence denial and am examining Doherty's dating which, as characterized here, seems ridiculous. Will comment in due course. Anthony (talk) 20:51, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

And it is Bruce. Calling people by their surname is impolite and reflects badly on you. Anthony (talk) 21:01, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant no offence. NJMauthor (talk) 21:16, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

The pseudoscholarship challenge applies to those CMT theories that ignore intervening developments since the idea they present was first made. The December 25 date and sun deity connection being the best example; it have been known for a while that the December 25 date was chosen in the 4th century (c334) so that Christ could replace a popular pagan sol deity. We also know from Irenæus writings c180 that the general Christ story (virgin birth, crucifixion, death and resurrection) though perhaps not all the details (Irenæus had Jesus being 50 years old when he died-totally impossible with the timeline as we now know it) in what eventually became our Gospels had been established. So at best the Christ story co opted rather than came from sun deity mythology and it did it relatively late in its history-roughly around the same time the canon of what the Jesus story actually was was official established.

The term "Imperial Synthesis" comes from Bruce Trigger's History of Archaeological Thought (I have the 1989 version in my personal library) and covers roughly c1770 (Edward Long) to c1890 and was eventually replaced by the Culture-historical/Historical Particularism/Boasian school of thought which began in the 1880s. Nearly all the developmental theories formed in this period have since been rejected due to new discoveries or that the original theories were more based on racial or nationalistic grounds (many times to justify suppression of indigenous populations in colonies) than any real data. On a side note I should mention this is why the Vikings landing in North American theory had such a hard time of it in the 1960s and 70s--most of the scientific community saw it as a revival of the old Imperial Synthesis idea that the Native Americans couldn't have produced that they did without outside (read European or European-like) help. If you think about it Erich von Däniken's alien visitor theory is little more than the "Imperial Synthesis" idea in a brand new package only the entire planet Earth is the primitive culture that had to "educated" by the wise outsiders.--BruceGrubb (talk) 22:02, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Does this period encapsulate the arguments for "Aryan race" theory notions like Indo-European Linguistics as a racial characteristic, an "Indo-European" origin to all near-eastern monotheism, and the attempted identification of all major ancient civilizations with Indo-European language speakers? NJMauthor (talk) 00:52, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Most definitely as the very term "Aryan race" didn't really exist in English until 1861 when Max Müller produced it. It should be mentioned that John Lubbock's idea that Western civilization would lead to an early paradise while "The most primitive were doomed to vanish as a result of the spread of civilization, since no amount of education could compensate for the thousands of years during which natural selection had failed to adapt them biologically to a more complex and orderly way of life" (Trigger pg 117) was also popular as unilinear evolution and in part led to the Boasian mentality of recording these "doomed" people in detail before civilization's advancement made them go the way of the dodo. In addition Charles Étienne Brasseur de Bourbourg in 1862 put forth the idea of Atlantis being a "Golden Age" civilization that became popular with the masses with Donnelly's 1882 Atlantis: The Antediluvian World and since plate tectonics didn't exist as a theory until 1912 the required land bridges (need for the movement of animals and people) made the idea less fringe then one would think. So the classic Aryan race theory could be viewed as a mixture of Bourbourg, Lubbock with a little of Donnelly.

To get this back on topic, we need to remember that the Christ Myth theorists of Drews and his predecessors worked from a very different model of the world than we do today largely because many concepts those models were based on have been shown to be in error. When those changes are ignored (as in the Christ-sun deity connection) you have pseudoscholarship.--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:19, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Spectrum Image created by Eugene

This looks like WP:OR to me. And I don't think it's a very good representation anyway. A better image would have a single continuum with "complete myth" on one side and "literal history" on the other. (Minimalism falls pretty close to "complete myth".) ^^James^^ (talk) 20:26, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

The graphic appears in the article with a caption thusly...

The Christ myth theory is an alternative explanation of Christian origins to the historical Jesus. The Christ myth theory is to be distinguished even from biblical minimalism, with fundamentalism occupying the extreme maximalist pole of the historical Jesus spectrum.

Each statement in the caption is well supported with citations, and the picture itself is merely a graphic representation of the caption. As for your concerns regarding a strict distinction between the CMT and minimalism, take it up with Maurice Goguel:

Negative as these [hyper-minimalist] conclusions appear, they must be strictly distinguished from the theories of the mythologists. According to the critics whom we may term minimalists, Jesus did live, but his biography is almost totally unknown to us. The mythologists, on the other hand, declare that he never existed, and that his history, or more exactly the legend about him, is due to the working of various tendencies and events, such as the prophetic interpretation of Old Testament texts, visions, ecstasy, or the projection of the conditions under which the first group of Christians lived into the story of their reputed founder.

Maurice Goguel, "Recent French Discussion of the Historical Existence of Jesus Christ", Harvard Theological Review 19 (2), 1926, pp. 117–118

Eugene (talk) 20:38, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, they must be strictly distinguished precisely because they are so similar to each other. The more I look at your graphic the sillier it looks. Your scale doesn't include mythicists by definition. It's arbitrary. Mythicists only fall outside of your scale because you defined it that way. And it is supposed to tell us something useful? If we must have a scale, it makes far more sense to have "pure myth" on one side and "literal history" on the other. ^^James^^ (talk) 21:47, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

References

References