Talk:Christ myth theory

What real historians study

In a survey of topics covered by historians of the classical period, it is clear that the idea of Jesus being mythical is not even entertained by historians.Tthe historical person is a rich topic of study though. Note a search of [1], which from there website

Bryn Mawr Classical Review publishes timely reviews of current scholarly work in the field of classical studies (including archaeology). This site is the authoritative archive of BMCR's publication, from 1990 to the present. Reviews from August 2008 on are also posted

- A search using "historical Jesus" [2] compared to "Jesus myth" [3] Hardyplants (talk) 09:38, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Bad example as many of the second group of hits are for anything that have Jesus and myth in the text. Examples like "The compares the creation myth of Adam and Eve found in the .... useful and much needed survey of the image of Jesus in Manichaean writing...) show just how messed up this method is. The hit on "historical Jesus" is similarlly misleading as one hit is due to this sentence: No references to the Quest for the Historical Jesus are found, and one cannot help but believe that such a topic deserved a little more mention.--BruceGrubb (talk) 08:55, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

That is the whole point, historians of the classical period do not even consider it worthy of discussion. They study Jesus and they study myths but not a "Jesus Myth" as in he never existed. Hardyplants (talk)

Source request for Wells 2009

For this sentence:

Since then, The Jesus Legend and The Jesus Myth have been called continuations or modifications of Wells' original position by Price, Dunn, and Eddy-Boyd, leading Wells to clarify again in 2009 that his position since The Jesus Legend (1996) should not be considered part of the Christ myth theory.

Could we have a page number for Wells 2009 (footnote 4), and be told exactly what he says, please? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 20:13, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

It was presented by User:Akhilleus (Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_35) and was quoted at length but I can't seem to find it in the archive at this time.--BruceGrubb (talk) 10:04, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

I'll remove it for now until we know what it says and have a page number. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:17, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I missed this before. The relevant pages of Wells 2009 are 327-28; a relevant quote appears at Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_33#G._A._Wells. Note that Wells essentially says that he has repudiated the Christ myth theory... --Akhilleus (talk) 17:46, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Citation templates

Does anyone mind if I start to go through the article to remove the short refs and the citation templates? They are causing the article to be very slow to load—diffs and preview can take several minutes to load on my computer. They also mean we have to keep jumping back and forth to find the full citation. My preference is simply to write, e.g.:

<ref name=Stanton>Stanton, Graham. ''Name of Book''. Oxford University Press, 2008, p. 1.</ref>

If there are no objections, I'll start doing that slowly over the next couple of weeks. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:11, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Arguments against the theory

One of the problems I've always had with this article is that, after reading it, I still don't know why anyone believes Jesus existed. I know why we say Socrates existed: we have the writings of Plato, who knew him. I know why we say Euripides existed: we have his plays and there is contemporaneous reference. But why do biblical scholars say Jesus existed? If that could be written up in clear language, so that we're presenting the best arguments that exist (arguments, not rhetoric), I think it would improve this article a lot.

For example, this section about Paul is weak, yet it is apparently the primary data people rely on:

Biblical scholar L. Michael White, not a Christ-myth theorist, writes that the earliest writings mentioning Jesus that survive are the letters of Paul of Tarsus, written 20–30 years after the dates given for Jesus's death. Paul did not know Jesus, and does not claim ever to have seen him.

Many biblical scholars nevertheless turn to Paul's letters (epistles) to support their arguments for a historical Jesus. Theologian James D.G. Dunn argues that Robert Price ignores what everyone else in the business regards as primary data. Biblical scholar F. F. Bruce (1910–1990) writes that, according to Paul's letters, Jesus was an Israelite, descended from Abraham (Gal 3:16) and David (Rom. 1:3); who lived under Jewish law (Gal. 4:4); who was betrayed, and on the night of his betrayal instituted a memorial meal of bread and wine (I Cor. 11:23ff); who endured the Roman penalty of crucifixion (I Cor. 1:23; Gal. 3:1, 13, 6:14, etc.), although Jewish authorities were somehow involved his death (I Thess. 2:15); who was buried, rose the third day and was thereafter seen alive, including by over 500 on one occasion, of whom the majority were alive 25 years later (I Cor. 15:4ff). The letters say that Paul knew of and had met important figures in Jesus's ministry, including the apostles Peter and John, as well as James the brother of Jesus, who is also mentioned in Josephus. In the letters, Paul on occasion alludes to and quotes the teachings of Jesus, and in 1 Corinthians 11 recounts the Last Supper.

All it does is tell us what Paul's letters say, but Paul never met Jesus. So it remains unexplained why we should take what he says as evidence. Can we explain in clear language why Paul's letters are viewed as authoritative? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:55, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Ari, rather than reverting what other people write, can you help to develop the article? What we need is an explanation, in clear language, of why anyone believes Jesus existed:

1. We say Socrates existed because Plato's work survived, and Plato knew and wrote about Socrates.
2. We say Euripides existed because his own work survived. The work of his contemporaries survived too, and they mention him.
3. We say Jesus existed because ... ?

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:38, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Reverting

When an edit is made, other editors have these options: accept the edit, change the edit, or revert the edit. These options may be discussed if necessary.

Ari, please stop reverting. The article is poorly written, POV, incomplete, difficult to read. It needs to be fixed. I wouldn't mind your reverts so much if you were also working to improve the page, but all you do is revert. It makes progress slow to non-existent. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:49, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Look, Ari, why not allow work to continue for, say, three months with no reverts, then judge the page overall? That way, at least you'd be able to stand back and see what the rest of us have to offer, which would put you in a better position to evaluate it. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:53, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Please explain this revert. [4] SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:55, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

SlimVirgin, how about you give me the right to edit just as much as any other editor. You made edits that were not agreed to and discussions were not in favour of it. You disregarded these and made bold edits. Good for you, your bold edits have been disagreed with and I am trying to gain consensus by implementing both the previous consensus version and your bold version. All constantly reverting of my changes does is slow down the process. --Ari (talk) 00:01, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

The thing is that you don't edit, Ari. You only undo other people's work. That isn't fair, especially when it's carefully written and sourced. The adding of the Swedish scholar to the lead, for example, is important, because it finally explains why there seems to be such a rift within academic: biblical scholars calling people who question Jesus flat-earthers, accompanied by mostly silence on the other side. It's important to put that in the lead, and the reason for it. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:05, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

No, I do edit - and the only reason I am not editing at this very moment is to respond to childish accusations against myself. Ellegard's personal non-scholarly opinion on why there may be a rift is really not lead worthy, and it contradicts reliable sources by relevant scholars that have actually engaged the theory. E.g. Robert Van Voorst talks of the arguments being answered time and time again. Furthermore, Ellegard does not understand how historians work - they see Jesus existing because they can attributed authentic words and deeds to the main. This isn't just using historical method to demonstrate Jesus' existence but moving beyond that to determine what he said and did.

In addition to this, there are also problems with the definition. That some proponents may believe the sayings go back to some or a series of historical figures, this was dropped to "They". --00:19, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Why do you call Ellegard's paper personal and non-scholarly? It seems to be a scholarly paper. [5] And it explains very well why there seems to be such a rift about this.

I asked above if someone could explain why we believe Jesus existed. Could you contribute that to the article? It is currently very unclear. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:33, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Your constant reversion to a non-consensus bold version is quite tedious and in direct contravention to WP policies on editing. --Ari (talk) 00:39, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

There are multiple objections to saying there is no support for this among classical historians, yet you keep restoring it. You must not keep doing that. The version I put up gives us in-text attribution for it, and an explanation, at long last, of why it might be the case. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:41, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Multiple objections that have no basis in reliable sources. On the other hands, reliable sources make consensus statements explicitly stating "Biblical scholars and classical historians." That said, that does not seem to be the objection and you are opting to use false edit summaries to cover up reversions. There is no need for the latter. --Ari (talk) 00:47, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Could others please give an opinion on the two versions of the lead that Ari and I disagree about?

Ari

SlimVirgin

The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the hypothesis that Jesus of Nazareth was not a historical person, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community. Some proponents of the hypothesis argue that events or sayings associated with the figure of Jesus 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. Arguments in support of the theory emphasize the absence of extant reference to Jesus during his lifetime and the scarcity of non-Christian reference to him in the first century. In determining how early Christians viewed Jesus, proponents prioritise the New Testament epistles over the gospels, on the basis that many of the epistles pre-date the gospels. Some proponents contend that Christianity emerged organically from Hellenistic Judaism, and draw on perceived parallels between the biography of Jesus and those of Greek, Egyptian, and other gods. The history of the Christ myth theory can be traced to the French Enlightenment thinkers Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 1790s. Notable proponents include Bruno Bauer in the 19th century, Arthur Drews in the early 20th century, and more recently G.A. Wells, Robert M. Price, and Earl Doherty. The theory remains essentially without support among biblical scholars and classical historians.

The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the idea that Jesus of Nazareth is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community. Some proponents argue that events or sayings associated with the Jesus of 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 origin of the theory can be traced to the French Enlightenment thinkers Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 1790s. Notable proponents include Bruno Bauer in the 19th century, Arthur Drews and John M. Allegro in the 20th century, and more recently G.A. Wells, Alvar Ellegård, Robert M. Price, and Earl Doherty. Arguments in support of the theory emphasize the absence of extant reference to Jesus during his lifetime and the scarcity of non-Christian reference to him in the first century. In determining how early Christians viewed Jesus, proponents prioritize the New Testament epistles over the gospels, on the basis that many of the epistles pre-date the gospels. Some contend that Christianity emerged organically from Hellenistic Judaism, and draw on perceived parallels between the biography of Jesus and those of Greek, Egyptian, and other gods. Biblical scholars largely affirm the existence of Jesus, though a more skeptical approach can be found elsewhere. Graeme Clarke, professor of classics at the Australian National University, said in 2008 that he knows of no ancient or biblical historian who doubts that Jesus existed as an historical figure. Swedish academic Alvar Ellegård argues that the failure by theologians to question Jesus's existence can be attributed to a lack of communication between them and lay scholars, which he writes has caused some of the basic assumptions of Christianity to remain insulated from general scholarly debate.

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:49, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

SV, that is not my version. What may be said as "my" (although I very much dislike the possessive on WP) is not presented above as it is the fusion of the previous consensus version and your own version.

Ari has reverted the lead again to include the disputed "classical historians" material. [6] SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:02, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

It was not a revert, it was a revamp of most of the lead fusing the consensus version and your bold version. Is this not how consensus is made? --01:08, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Lead

Previous consensus	SlimVirgin's bold version	Possible compromise, current version
The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the hypothesis that Jesus of Nazareth was not a historical person, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community. Some proponents of the hypothesis argue that events or sayings associated with the figure of Jesus 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. Arguments in support of the theory emphasize the absence of extant reference to Jesus during his lifetime and the scarcity of non-Christian reference to him in the first century. In determining how early Christians viewed Jesus, proponents prioritise the New Testament epistles over the gospels, on the basis that many of the epistles pre-date the gospels. Some proponents contend that Christianity emerged organically from Hellenistic Judaism, and draw on perceived parallels between the biography of Jesus and those of Greek, Egyptian, and other gods. The history of the idea can be traced to the French Enlightenment thinkers Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 1790s. Notable proponents include Bruno Bauer in the 19th century, Arthur Drews in the early 20th century, and G.A. Wells, Robert M. Price, and Earl Doherty more recently. The theory remains essentially without support among biblical scholars and classical historians.	The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the idea that Jesus of Nazareth is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community. Some proponents argue that events or sayings associated with the Jesus of 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 origin of the theory can be traced to the French Enlightenment thinkers Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 1790s. Notable proponents include Bruno Bauer in the 19th century, Arthur Drews and John M. Allegro in the 20th century, and more recently G.A. Wells, Alvar Ellegård, Robert M. Price, and Earl Doherty. Arguments in support of the theory emphasize the absence of extant reference to Jesus during his lifetime and the scarcity of non-Christian reference to him in the first century. In determining how early Christians viewed Jesus, proponents prioritize the New Testament epistles over the gospels, on the basis that many of the epistles pre-date the gospels. Some contend that Christianity emerged organically from Hellenistic Judaism, and draw on perceived parallels between the biography of Jesus and those of Greek, Egyptian, and other gods. Biblical scholars largely affirm the existence of Jesus, though a more skeptical approach can be found elsewhere. Graeme Clarke, professor of classics at the Australian National University, said in 2008 that he knows of no ancient or biblical historian who doubts that Jesus existed as an historical figure. Swedish academic Alvar Ellegård argues that the failure by theologians to question Jesus's existence can be attributed to a lack of communication between them and lay scholars, which he writes has caused some of the basic assumptions of Christianity to remain insulated from general scholarly debate.	The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the hypothesis that Jesus of Nazareth was not a historical person, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community. Some proponents of the hypothesis argue that events or sayings associated with the figure of Jesus 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 history of the Christ myth theory can be traced to the French Enlightenment thinkers Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 1790s. Notable proponents include Bruno Bauer in the 19th century, Arthur Drews in the early 20th century, and more recently G.A. Wells, Robert M. Price, and Earl Doherty. While historians largely affirm the existence of Jesus the idea has become popularised in the works of writers such as atheist activists Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. Arguments in support of the theory emphasize the absence of extant reference to Jesus during his lifetime and the scarcity of non-Christian reference to him in the first century. In determining how early Christians viewed Jesus, proponents prioritise the New Testament epistles over the gospels, on the basis that many of the epistles pre-date the gospels. Some proponents contend that Christianity emerged organically from Hellenistic Judaism, and draw on perceived parallels between the biography of Jesus and those of Greek, Egyptian, and other gods. The theory remains essentially without support among biblical scholars and historians.

--Ari (talk) 01:28, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

The lead is is still a mess. I think my version better reflects the litature

The Christ myth theory (also known as the Jesus myth theory and the nonexistence hypothesis) is the hypothesis that none of the Jesus account in the New Testament including proving his very existence is historical accurate. The concept can include the idea Jesus never existed, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community., is a modern form of docetism , or the events or sayings associated with the figure of Jesus 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.

This addresses issues like:

"Strauss included, that Jesus of Nazareth, the Jesus of the Gospels, actually lived as a historical character.." (The Jesus of the Gospels and the Influence of Christianity; A. Hatchard (2006))

"I proved to you beyond dispute and against the cavil of all the Freethinkers in Europe, Strauss included, that Jesus of Nazareth, the Jesus of the Gospels, actually lived as a historical character" (The origins of theosophy: Annie Besant--the atheist years Annie Wood Besant, J. Gordon Melton - 1990)

The puzzle of the Gospels Peter Vardy, Mary E. Mills (1997) Page 99 makes the point that the Jesus of the gospels (ie Jesus of Nazareth) and the historial Jesus may be two different people.

"Emerging from Bultmann's literary analysis is the conclusion that the Jesus of the Gospels is the Christ of the apostolic experience. No historical foundation by legitimately be sought in the Synopitics--a judgment based on a twofold premise" (Bromiley, Geoffrey W. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J - Page 1037)

There are many other examples but they all say that Jesus of Nazareth is the Jesus of the Gospels. The problem with that connection is if you say there was 1st century teacher named Jesus who along with other teacher was used to from the gospel Jesus you are still saying Jesus of Nazareth didn't exist by the very definition of composite character! Given the Talmud has been on occasion presented as evidence for the historical Jesus and yet as Mead points out the temporal markers put the Jesus described within as being c100 CBE and for pointing this out he is labled a Christ myther.--BruceGrubb (talk) 09:50, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I think many people who reject CMT regard the New Testament as historically unreliable. So, I question this: "CMT is the hypothesis that none of the Jesus account in the New Testament including proving his very existence is historical accurate." I'm not sure about this either: "The concept can include the idea Jesus never existed, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community." For example, Alvar Ellegard believes the NT Jesus is based on a historical figure, an Essene who lived around 100 BC. That's not considered a historical Jesus, just because its distance from the NT Jesus crosses an undefined line. Still, it's an historical figure. Noloop (talk) 01:14, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, first read Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_37#Getting_a_handle_on_the_various_definitions_.28again.29 as that goes into the various sources.

"CMT is the hypothesis that none of the Jesus account in the New Testament including proving his very existence is historical accurate." is the best way I can sum up Boyd and keep true to spirit of the other sources in the above link.

"The concept can include the idea Jesus never existed, but is a fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community" statement is backed up by Goguel, Meynell, and Horbury as well as Walsh, Remsburg and Baker so there is no debate on that part. Please note what is ALSO in that sentence:

• is a modern form of docetism (citing Grant)

• or the events or sayings associated with the figure of Jesus 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. (this covers about everybody else as well as addressing Wells post Jesus Legend (1996) still being put into the Christ Myth category by so many authors and Wells challenging of that classification.).

It is an attempt to be as NPOV as possible with all the different definitions using the source material as it stands. IMHO is is the best of a very confusing situation. --BruceGrubb (talk) 05:33, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Epistles, gospels

This comment may be an unwelcome distraction but do we have evidence that "mythers" (in particlar) "prioritize the New Testament epistles over the gospels"? My impression would be that there is little dispute, away from fundamentalism, that the epistles are closer to the life of Jesus and therefore more reliable. The Christ Myth Theory may hold this view, but I would not be surprised if the Archbishop of Canterbury does too. --FormerIP (talk) 00:57, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

FormerIP, we had an issue with that earlier. Price in 2009 states that the traditional CMT argument prioritises the Epistles over the gospels. However, that really doesn't encapsulate it, does it? E.g. they tend to only give priority to the epistles and ignore the gospels. Furthermore, advocates do not limit themselves to the Pauline epistles (e.g. Doherty with Hebrews). --Ari (talk) 01:01, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Ari: does (edit: Price) note that CMT is unusual in its preference for the epistles? If not then surely it is misleading to include the info in the lead (compare "proponents of the Christ Myth Theory prefer to read their bibles with the light on"). --FormerIP (talk) 01:12, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I will recheck the wording of Price shortly. They are probably unique in that they on the whole reject the gospels in favour of the epistles, but other historical Jesus scholars such as Paul Barnett prioritise the historical value of the epistles. --Ari (talk) 01:15, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

"The second of the three pillars of the traditional Christ-Myth case is that the Epistles, earlier than the Gospels, do not evidence a recent historical Jesus." (emph in text) Price 2009, p.63. --Ari (talk) 01:28, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

That's poor support, then, for "proponents prioritize the New Testament epistles over the gospels". Suggest this should be removed, since it is very misleading. --FormerIP (talk) 01:49, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree that should be removed. It always struck me as confusing. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:55, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Definition again

"Accordingly, though the Gospels are entirely fictional in their portrayal of Jesus as an itinerant preacher and wonderworker, accompanied by twelve disciples, Paul's Jesus was indeed a historical figure, namely, the Essene Teacher of Righteousness." (Theologians as historians Alvar Ellegård Scientific Communication Lunds Universitet pg 171-172)

"This again has been pushed to the extreme of maintaining that Jesus never existed as a historical person... (citing Drews and Smith) (Encyclopædia of religion and ethics, Volume 7 edited by James Hastings, John Alexander Selbie, Louis Herbert Gray pg 574)

"The last was made necessary by a number of British writers who had been attracting attention with the theory that Jesus never existed at all; he was a mythological figure, they said, invented like the Greek gods as a symbol of a new faith." (Albert Schweitzer: a biography By James Brabazon pg 222)

"They could have exploded the whole thing if Jesus never rose because He never died, and never died because He never lived, and there was no Jesus either to die or rise." (The facts of life in relation to faith Patrick Carnegie Simpson (1913) Page 134)

"When, several years ago, the theory was revived that Jesus never existed — that he was a myth..." (A Jewish View of Jesus 2009 H G Enelow)

"The story that this God Jesus lived in Judea as man was but the result of giving the subject of the myth a human form. In reality the man Jesus never existed. If this theory of W.B. Smith were but the fancy of an amateur,..." (What is the truth about Jesus Christ?: Problems of Christology Friedrich Loofs (1913) Page 6)

"The element of truth in much perverse criticism, arguing that Jesus never existed, is that the Jesus of history is quite different from the Lord assumed as the founder of Catholic Christianity." (Landmarks in the history of early Christianity Kirsopp Lake (1922) Page 60)

"The result, at least, in this author's learned pages, is the removal of the last particle of historicity from the life of Jesus in the Gospels. Such a person as Jesus of Nazareth never existed " — " never lived."(p 1026) "The Jesus-legend is a Israelitish Gilgamesh-legend" (p1024), attach to some person of whom we know absolutely nothing--neither time nor country."(p 1026) (The resurrection of Jesus By James Orr (1908) pg 243)

"Some nineteenth-century rationalists maintained that he never existed, that the gospels portrayed an ideal Jew who never was." Jesus: Word made flesh By Gerard S. Sloyan (2008) pg 160)

"Bauer who argued that everything in the New Testament is a myth and that Jesus never existed as a historical person." (What have they done to the Bible? John Sandys-Wunsch (2005) Page 321)

This quick sampling of varies authors shows a fundamental problem with our definition. Many of them are say that the Christ Myth theory is that Jesus was a pure myth but you have others that indicate something different. Again the exact meaning of "Jesus never existed" seems to vary depending on the author going from "Jesus never existed except as a fictional creation no more historical than Osiris or Zeus" to "Jesus of the gospels is a composite character and therefore never existed in the same way King Arthur or Robin Hood never existed" which are really are two different issues.--BruceGrubb (talk) 19:03, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Arguments against the theory again

The section outlining arguments against the Christ myth theory is weak, and I would like to try to strengthen it with a clear introduction. I'm re-posting my question here in case it gets lost in the above. Can anyone help me out, from a historian's perspective, with the most basic, brief arguments in the simplest language?

1. We say Socrates existed because Plato's work survived, and Plato knew and wrote about Socrates.
2. We say Euripides existed because his own work survived, as did the work of his contemporaries, who wrote about him.
3. We say Jesus existed because ... ?

It is acknowledged by all that no writings of his exist; that no one who knew him wrote about him; and that no one wrote about him in his lifetime. So what is the strongest evidence, and why is it regarded as strong?

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 18:03, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I could be wrong, but I think people generally think he existed is that there's so much text in the Bible or whatever about him, that there was probably someone who they are writing about. And we call that person Jesus, although who really was and exactly what he really did is debated. That's my guess. I haven't seen a good RS summary of it, or at least don't remember one. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 18:40, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

There's a lot of writing about other gods too, though, and we don't argue that therefore they must have existed. Dionysus, for example, was often described as if he was a real person who turned up here and there to cause chaos. What is the evidence that people rely on to argue that Jesus was real? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 18:47, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Its basically the Great Man Theory--Christianity is so large so grand that is impossible for it to have evolved on its own. There has to be a Great Man behind it and that Great Man is Jesus.

The counter to this is System theory--events are shaped by a complex series of interconnecting social political factors. The Jewish community had been waiting for a messiah a Christ to lead them back to greatness. There were many would be claimants to this title of which Jesus may have been one (or elevated to that status after his death by his followers). From all this Christianity came into existence with varies views of who or even what the messiah was. Eventually one form became dominate in the Roman Empire with varies Pagan elements added in so it could replace various Pagan religions eventually becoming the version we know.--BruceGrubb (talk) 19:39, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that there's a circular logic. I've seen Occams Razor quoted often - the easiest option is that the Gospels are mostly based on a real person. The trouble then is that most of the historical christ scholars basically make an a priori assumption that there was a real person in there somewhere, and then anyone questioning it is automatically fringe. We know about Alexander the Great, although his biography was written ages after he died, because he was a political leader who conquered stuff, built stuff etc, so he leaves a mark in the archaeological record. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:23, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

There is some evidence of the very early church suppressing information about both James (the one who is listed as Jesus brother) and Mary Magdalen, suggesting that there might have been a real person who had a brother James (problematic for virgin birth) and a wife Mary (problematic for the son of god). The other real challenge, the one that never gets talked about, is that Jesus might be more than one person. We really have nothing to verify that there was only one of him, other than Occam's razor.Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:28, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

(ec) Right, Alexander the Great left something. Socrates, via Plato who was his pupil, left something. Euripides left his plays.

Jesus left nothing. No one who might have known him left anything. There are no diaries, no witness accounts. There are only stories written after he is said to have died, by people who never claim to have seen him. The earliest writings that mention him are the letters of Paul, also written decades after the dates given for Jesus's death.

So could someone explain what the evidence is that is so strong it is causing people who don't believe it to be compared to flat-earthers? This is not a facetious question. I would like to write it up in the article so that the strength of the argument is clear, which it currently isn't. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:32, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I think it isn't on the basis of the material being so strong, but that this is a question which, so far as I can determine, seems to be raised only regarding a select few characters in Jewish and Christian history. I don't see any questions raised about whether Gautama Buddha ever existed, although the evidence of his existence is similar to that of Jesus. The same applies for figures of other religions as well. There isn't much sourcing available for his existence, perhaps beyond the possible references in the Babylonian Talmud, but the question of his non-existence seems to many/most in the Western world to posit some points which they regard as being basically of the conspiracy theory type, and about as "fringey" as other such theories. It was only in the past 100 years or so that we had any reliable external evidence of the existence of Pontius Pilate, although there doesn't seem to have been much question of his existence raised. The fact that other figures, whose existence is often no better founded than Jesus of Nazareth's is, such as Buddha, do not face such questioning, at least so far as they can see, can lead them to think that the question might be motivated by reasons other than historical accuracy. And there doesn't seem to have been much relatively contemporary questioning of Jesus' existence; it is hard for many to believe that, if there were contemporary questions regarding his very existence, that some first or second century CE Jews wouldn't have raised the point much more strongly than it seems to have been raised, particularly come the Pauline era. And at least two of the evangelists are within the texts supposed to have had direct contact with the subject.

But again, I think, in the eyes of many, they do not see the question as being about the quality of the sourcing, but the reasons for raising the questions, particularly so late after the alleged existence of the subject. John Carter (talk) 21:08, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

"Why are you picking on Jesus?" might be a rational thing to raise out there in RL, but here we have an article title "Christ Myth Theory". --FormerIP (talk) 21:16, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Your point seems to be more about WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS in some form, which I acknowledge would go against policy and guidelines, and wasn't what I was really trying to indicate. There does seem to be some roughly contemporary sourcing of Jesus's existence, certainly similar to other individuals whose existence is not seriously questioned. The fact that this evidence is apparently discounted, even though sourcing of a sort does seem to exist, and that that sourcing did not, apparently, receive significant historical questioning at the time, like I think we would expect of Jews who knew about the Jesus movement gaining credibility elsewhere but didn't say "Who? No such person seems to have existed" raises the conspiracy theory question, particularly in light of the question seeming to get serious discussion only a significant period of time after the fact. Lack of direct, verifiable evidence, particularly when the sources one would expect were apparently destroyed during conflict, is not, to many people, sufficient evidence to say that the less reliable evidence which does exist is necessarily questionable. John Carter (talk) 21:23, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

We don't really know what discussion of these sources there may or may not have been in antiquity. None survives - that's all we can really say about it. --FormerIP (talk) 21:32, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Carrier's Kooks and Quacks of the Roman Empire: A Look into the World of the Gospels (1997) takes a brief look into mind set of the 1st century Roman Empire. The one thing people forget that Carrier points out using Josephus as his source is that you are not dealing with highly skeptical people in 1st century Roman Empire.

Another thing is there there were would be Messiahs (ie Christ) showing up all the time so the Jewish community would have been like that scene in Napoleon Bunny-part--"Here's another Christ. That's the sixth one today." Israel Knohl and Michael O. Wise have recently suggested two such Christs before Jesus that they feel inspired the 1st century prophet (The Messiah before Jesus:The Suffering Servant of the Dead Sea Scrolls; The First Messiah: Investigating the Savior Before Christ) with the kind of reaction one normally sees reserved for Christ Mythers: "they've lost control and gone out on limbs." (Lawrence Schiffman, Edelman professor of Hebrew and Judaic studies at New York University quoted in New York Times)

Price in The Historical Jesus: Five Views on page 65 calling (Ellegard a mythicist along with the early Wells) give another view of the mindset of the time: "the first Christians had in mind a Jesus who had lived as a historical figure, just not of the recent past, much as the average Greek believed Hercules and Achilles really lived somewhere back there in the past" (reference given regarding that last part is Veyne, Paul (1988) Did the Greek Believe in Their Myths? An Essay on the Constitutive Imagination trans Paula Wissing University of Chicago Press)

So the idea that Jesus might have been a totally fictional would likely have never occurred to either the the Jewish or Roman communities of the time. The attitude would have been more "oh, another one?" Even if you take the two passages of Josephus as factual it is clear Jesus brother of James was so minor that he got little more than a passing foot note. The Christ Myther's point is that if the Gospel Jesus was even remotely historical Josephus would have written more than that for reasons pointed out in The God Who Wasn't There--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:22, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

I think the problem may be that the article treats the reality or otherwise of JC as an academic question (as opposed to a question of faith) to a greater extent than it actually is. --FormerIP (talk) 21:00, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

John, regardless of whether we ought to question other people's existence, why do we say Jesus exists? There are no contemporaneous sources; no one disputes that. The earliest, Paul, comes decades after the dates for Jesus's death, and Paul did not claim ever to have seen or had contact with Jesus. Hence my problem in trying to write up the strongest arguments. Are you able to summarize them for us? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:33, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Paul may have been the earliest, but two of the gospels are (allegedly) written by individuals who were among the 12 apostles, John and Matthew, and who thus would have been speaking on the basis of direct personal knowledge of the subject. I guess you somehow missed that point. I think Matthew is even, by at least some scholars, considered to have been the person who actually wrote his book. They may not have been the earliest sources, which seems to the point you find most important, but I think we have some modern cases where authors of first biographies of individuals are by people not familiar with the subject, and sometimes those books are followed by others who do have personal memories of the subject. John Carter (talk) 20:01, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

If that is correct—if it's accepted that two of the gospels were written by people who knew Jesus—why does L. Michael White (and all the other academics I've read) say that no one with personal knowledge of Jesus wrote anything about him? He writes that are no records, diaries, eyewitness accounts, or any other kind of first-hand record. Am I misunderstanding? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 20:34, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

(out of sequence)@John Carter. All scholars of the history of the new testament now seem to agree that the Matthew who wrote the gospel was not Matthew Levi the apostle. That's been the case for at least 30 years. However, 30 years ago, there was still a subset at least who held that John the Evangelist was John bar Zebedee. This view seems to have declined since then. Others would be better placed to tell you why. The last view of the Gospels that I saw was that Marks (the earliest) had a predecessor that was just a collection of sayings and parables, with no 'biographical' details at all - although that view may have changed since the last time I looked.--Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:40, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Elen. I'd really like to pin this down. My worry is threefold. First, we're not doing the historical Jesus perspective justice in the article, so it would be good to clarify it. Secondly, I worry that there are editors on this page (not talking about John or anyone in particular), who are arguing from a position that's not fully understood. Third, Ellegard says that one of the problems with the historical Jesus theory is that scholars have dressed it up in such fancy language that it's impenetrable, and in so doing have hidden how weak it is, perhaps including from themselves. I would like to try to prevent that impenetrability from affecting this article, or the way we discuss the issues on this page. We should be able to produce an article that says "Here is why people say he existed," and "here is why people say he didn't" in language anyone can understand. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:59, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

I think the problem is that everyone working in the field makes an a priori assumption that there was a person. Even Cupitt, whose base position is that "God is the sum of our values, representing to us their ideal unity, their claims upon us and their creative power’.God is ‘real’ in the sense that he is a potent symbol, metaphor or projection, but He has no objective existence outside and beyond the practice of religion(from the Sea of Faith manifesto, and from Taking Leave of God) still argues that Jesus himself was an almost purely secular teacher of wisdom whose teaching was buried beneath the Church. I've not read Ellegard - is he trying to make the point that they cannot speak of Jesus as not existing, and so they dress it up in fancy language, to hide the concept that they cannot speak of??Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:23, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

The Ellegard article is here, Elen (I fixed a typo in your post that was caused by a typo in mine; my apologies). He writes that the dogma is concealed under a cover of mystifying language, and gives an example of the kind of thing that's hard to penetrate (p. 171). Interesting point about Cupitt, but I wonder if he means Jesus really existed, or whether he's recounting a description of him from the stories. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:35, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

@SlimVirgin, you probably want to ask Akhilleus for an answer to that question. Sometime in the past, he had recommended some book (books?) that covered historical methodology in relation to the historical Jesus. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 21:40, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Bill, you also argue in favour of Jesus's existence and the importance of making clear that doubting it is fringey. Can you summarize the strongest arguments? I'm not looking for anything fancy or dozens of quotes from other people. I'm looking for a very simply worded two or three sentences. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:51, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I'll see what I can find. I've moved several times over the last 10 years, and I tend to sell books with each move (they're heavy!!). So, give me a day or two to see what I can dig up. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 21:57, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, though I should add that I'm not at this stage looking for anything from sources. I'm willing to do that legwork myself. I'm just looking for a sentence or two very briefly summarizing why (the historical reasons, not the religious) biblical scholars believe so strongly that he existed. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 22:10, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

American conservative influence

One of the themes I'm picking up as I do some background reading is that there's a bit of a rift between European scholars and the conservative Christian scholarly community in the United States, the latter pushing for the most conservative interpretation of texts. That's something else it would be good to watch out for by making sure we don't rely too heavily on modern American biblical scholarship. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 20:47, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable source that puts the issue in terms of Christian vs secular scholars? I mean, it sure seems to me that you are implying that Christian scholars (or Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, etc.) are second rate scholars and therefore must take a back seat to the more authoritative "secular" scholars. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 21:29, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I do have a source for that (see above), but that's not what I was writing about in this section. There is apparently also a rift (though that is perhaps not the right word) between theologians and biblical scholars in Europe, and conservative religious scholars in the United States. Yes, I do have sources, obviously. That is what I meant when I talked about background reading. I'm not psychic. :) SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:36, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

So you have a source that says Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, et al, scholars are considered by the historical community as being in some way "second rate"? Or do you have a fringe source that says something to that effect? I mean, I've seen a bunch of militant atheists who make such claims, as well as editors here (such as Noloop) who sincerely believe that, but that idea is rejected, as far as I can tell, by virtually all historians. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 21:51, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Bill, you're not reading what I wrote. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:52, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Well it's not like this discussion page is short.

You got that right, Bill. Slim, what does the sentence about seculars start with, so I can ctrl f this page. Also, do you have a link about the European stuff? Thanks. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:31, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I think I can't have made myself clear, sorry. :) I am currently doing some reading to try to learn about this. One of the themes I keep seeing briefly mentioned is that European scholars tend to have more liberal views than American scholars do, and that there seems to be a Conservative Christian strain that is overly influencing the scholarly approach. So I was saying we should be careful to make sure we use a wide range of sources: American, European, Christian, secular, biblical scholars, other academics, so that no single group gets to frame the issue for us entirely. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:47, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I believe all that. If you read a book that has a good google preview, hook us up. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:50, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm sure that attitudes towards Christianity differ between the U.S. and Europe, and that the difference is reflected in scholarship. But I don't see what that has to do with the topic of this article. Unless someone has some evidence that the CMT is more popular in European scholarship than it is in the U.S.... --Akhilleus (talk) 13:34, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

What I've seen in the way this article has been edited has been American conservative Christian certainty. You'll recall the lead: that anyone doubting the existence of Jesus was like a Holocaust denier. In doing some of the background reading, I see others mention that too, in terms of the general academic approach to the historiography. So it makes me feel even more that we must make an extra effort to include a wide range of sources (secular, Christian, American, European), to avoid the dominance of any group. Peregrine, when I next see it I'll send a link. If I can find enough of it, it would be worth adding to the article. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 15:15, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Some of the people making the comparison you mention were neither Christian nor conservative. I certainly agree that a variety of sources should be included in the article; the problem is that editors do not seem to realize that there is a huge diversity of scholarly opinion towards the historical Jesus. Bart Ehrman is very different than Darrell Bock; April DeConick is different than Burton Mack and L. Michael White. But there are some Wikipedia editors who would look at each one of the people I just named and decide they're all theologians and conservative Christians. Lumping everyone together like that blinds one to the fact that an ideologically and religiously diverse range of scholars all agree that there was a historical Jesus. --Akhilleus (talk) 00:55, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

True, true. However, in the course of a rather unfortunate rant in another place, Slrubenstein has just said that the above are Christians, even Ehrman who (as I recall) does not believe in a divine Christ. I do think that all those who claim to be 'Christians' by whatever definition they choose to adopt (unless they explicitly state that their stance does not require a historical Jesus, which I suppose is possible) must have satisfied themselves by whatever signs or tokens they choose, that there was a historical Jesus. That few of them choose to focus on what those signs and tokens were (unless they are making fairly conventional religious statements) leaves the gap which we are finding hard to fill, with the suspicion among the 'other side' that the answer is along the lines of 'because I believe it to be so,' which is perfectly valid in terms of personal philosophy, but not so satisfactory when placed against the query 'why do you believe that there was this chap called Jesus'Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:46, 3 August 2010 (UTC).

If we can return to SV's initial comment: "One of the themes I'm picking up as I do some background reading is that there's a bit of a rift between European scholars and the conservative Christian scholarly community in the United States, the latter pushing for the most conservative interpretation of texts." There is a slightly circular element to the query, since you use the adjective "conservative" in the subject and in the predicate. Of course conservative scholars will push for conservative interpretations, I assume that is how we know they are conservative. But if the query is really about a rift between American and European scholars, this is my sense: among critical historians, whatever their training or affiliation, scholars in the US and Europe pretty much agree: there is no conclusive proof that Jesus existed but all the scholars I have read consider it more rather than less likely that he existed (one argument sounds counterintuitive: it is the contradictions among the Syncretic Gospels that incline historians to think there was a real man, because if he were invented, those that invented him would have come up with a uniform account. Another argument is that there are within the Syncretic Gospels enough statements or acts by Jesus that are compatible with what we know of 1st century Jewish life and less compatible with the Christian image of Jesus as wholely divine, which means that there were stories about Jesus so widely held that early Christians could not exclude them from written accounts even when they would have been very problematic for early Christians - one example being the fact that Jesus was crucified ... if you are a Christian today you were probably brought up to believe that this was all part of God's plan and thus completely normal, but historians try not to look at things from today's perspective but rather to try to imagine how things looked to people back then and in the second century, the fact that Jesus had been crucified would have been a big headache for early Christians to make sense of). At the Jesus article we spent a lot of time comparing different historians to see what if anything they agreed on, and this is what we came up with: "Jesus was a Jew who was regarded as a teacher and healer, that he was baptized by John the Baptist, and was crucified in Jerusalem on the orders of the Roman Prefect of Judaea, Pontius Pilate, on the charge of sedition against the Roman Empire." As best we could tell, historians are divided on just about everything else in the Gospels. When we tried to sum up the major debates among critical historians, this is what we came up with and I think it is a pretty good catalogue of the range of views: "Critical scholars have offered competing descriptions of Jesus as a self-described messiah, as the leader of an apocalyptic movement, as an itinerant sage, as a charismatic healer, and as the founder of an independent religious movement." Maybe the "and" at the end should be an "or," grammatically, I am not sure - the idea is that few if any scholars believe he was all these things, each of these is a theory argued by a different group of historians. I actually have some misgivings about this sentence, I think it leaves some important views out, but there you have it, a sentence by committee. In any event, I think you will find these views held by historians on both sides of the Atlantic.

I do suspect however that SV has a point about conservative Christians in America. The US has something like 300 million people, and that means it has a lot more Christians than any single European country with the exception of Russia I think, and it certainly has a lot of conservative Christians, and they do have their own Bible colleges and what have you, and they will certainly generate a good deal of very conservative scholarship. I would imagine they too have their counterparts in England, Germany, France - but in much much smaller numbers. In the US conservative Bible colleges seem to spring up like weeds. If there are any in Europe I would bet they are more likely as common as orchids. That said, there is also a strong atheist movement in the US and they have their own publishing venues (but nothing like the clout of conservative Christians). Slrubenstein | Talk 16:07, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

"in the second century, the fact that Jesus had been crucified would have been a big headache for early Christians to make sense of" Interesting that you would pick up on that. It is often used (by a different set of sources, often lawyers for some reason) as the central plank of the case that Jesus must have risen from the dead [7] [8]. It does show the problem with that kind of argument, that it can also be used perfectly respectably to support the "supernatural" (probably the wrong word, but you know what I mean) claims in the Gospel. But if one argues that it cannot be so used in that context - because it requires an act of faith and no less to believe that a man can rise from the dead - then it makes the entire exercise suspect in the eyes of some. The Gospels appear to be whole cloth. The sayings, the parables and the miracles all fit together seamlessly, and the use of this kind of analysis to validate only some of the whole is suspect in the eyes of some.

I think historians would argue that most Christians are just not aware of how many people - let alone how many Jews - the Romans crucified. Most Christians also believe he was crucified because he committed blasphemy (which is implied by the Gospels). All historians I have read agree that the Romans would not have crucified anyone for committing blasphemy, certainly not a Jew for committing blasphemy, which most historians also believe Jesus did not do. The account of the trial by the sanhedrin also does not fit with what we know of Jewish legal practice at the time, so historians reject this too. However, that a man either claiming to be the messiah or predicting that the Kingdom of God was nigh (and neither of these claims are in Judaism blasphemous), however, would be crucified, is eminently plausible. Historians thus conclude that Jesus (if he existed) was crucified, and so the account of his crucifixion arose at the time. But the suggestion that he was crucified for blasphemy after a trial by the Sanhedrin was added at a much later date. To believing Christians today, all these parts fit together seemlessly, but historians are claiming that they did not fit together for Christians in the first century. If any of Jesus's original followers believee that Jesus was the messiah (and not all historians agree that this was even the case), most of them would have given up on Jesus after he was executed. Those who continued to believe in Jesus could easily have believed that he was risen to heaven, since Jews believed that about a couple of other people in their past, but that he would return very soon to innaugurate the kingdom of God. As long as people believed this, crucifixion was an embarassment but something that they could explain away with wishful thinking of his return. For these Jewish Christians, the idea that Jesus committed blasphemy would still have been unthinkable. But Jesus was still guilty of sedition, and these Jewish Christians who preach that the Kingdom of God is at hand are also seditious, which is why Jewish authorities (including Saul) "persecuted" them - these Jewish Christians could make the Romans think the Jews were about to revolt (whcih in fact they did in 70, and again in 135). The next crisis for Christians occurs when they start giving up on the idea that Jesus is coming back to innaugurate God's kingdom during their lifetime. When this occurs, virtually all Jews abandon Christianity. And this would be the time when Paul's ideas, which are not based on the teachings of a human named Jesus who (like Ezekial and Isaiah) preaches about God's Kingdom, but rather on the God Jesus, whose Kingdom is not on earth but in heaven, and whose function is to save people from sin. This has no foundation in Judaism of the time, but it takes on among Gentiles. But for these Gentile Christians the idea that Jesus was seditious is a real problem, because they all see themselves as good Romans and they do NOT believe that an independent Jewish kingdom will be restored, as Jewish Christians believed. But by this time there is no way to deny that Jesus was crucified, everyone, including all those non-Christians, know it. So instead of blaming the Romans for Jesus' death, they blame the Jewish authorities. And since they care more about the Divine Jesus than the human Jesus, crucifixion is actually a good thing (which Jews still cannot believe ... but remember these are gentiles in the Hellenic world and all the educated ones had read Plato and knew from Plato's "Apology" and "Crito" that death liberates the spirit to the world of truth).

Historians often study the complex processes by which institutions and ideas change. But when looking at Mark or Matthew or Luke, their starting point is: what in this text would have been uncontroversial to people in the 1st century, based on what we know about Jews in the 1st century from other sources? This is typical of the way historians typically go about analyzing the texts available to them (how well does this fit with what we know from other texts that are from the time claimed? If something does not fit well with what other sources from that time, does it fit with other sources from a later time? Or from an even later time? When we thus separate a text into elements that seem to be written at different times, can we then reconstruct a plausible narrative of how we move from one period to the next? This method is very much like that used by historians studying any composit text, e.g. Homeric myths. And it is very unlike the approach taken by fundamentalists, who start off assuming the text must be interpreted as a unified whole, that all parts must be consistent with one another. I think the difference in approach is clear.)

To be clear, fundamentalists assume that the text is unified; therefore, any inconsistency, contradiction, or repetition is the clue to some deeper truth. Modern historians make no such assumption. Therefore, when they see inconsistencies, contradictions, or repetitions, they (1) separate out what they consider distinct segments of the text, (2) try to assign each distinct element to a period in history, based on its similarities or congruences to other texts that we know to be from that period, and (3) see if the new sequence of segments tells a comprehensible story. This in fact is quite similar to the methods that had developed among geologists a century earlier, and that were being developed among archeologists, for reconstructing history (natural or cultural) through stratigrify. My point is that the diagnostic difference between fundamentalists and modern historians is not belief in god versus atheism, or assuming that jesus did exist or assuming that he did not. The diagnostic difference is in how they read texts. The innovation that marked the rise of modern history was to abandon metaphysical questions (does God exist) in favor of hermeneutic questions (how does one properly read a text?) (One thing i find interesting is that many atheists read texts just the same way that fundamentalists do; here the difference is in metaphysics, here the difference is in whether they believe in God or not) Slrubenstein | Talk 17:22, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I do not myself see how this is resolvable. There are a group of scholars - religious and non-religious - who start from the basis that there was a historical Jesus, who may or may not be reflected in the Gospels, and examine the evidence in that light. There are another group who start out from the basis that there was no such person/there were several people/there was someone but he was in fact called Brian/etc, who examine the evidence in that light. There are yet another group who claim to have started from a position that there was no Jesus, and to have eventually arrived at religious faith through convincing evidence that he existed as depicted in the Gospels. How do we regard that group? Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:42, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

If you are inviting response from anyone, my own view is this: keep the focus on what this article is about, viz. the "Gospel Myth Theory" which as I understand it is the claim that the basics of Christology were created out of existing religious beliefs and myths in the Hellenistic/Ancient Near Eastern world, and that this explanation for the origins of Christianity invalidates Christianity. Our obligation is to provide a proportionate account of all significant views from reliable sources on this topic, distinguishing when possible between mainstream, majority, minority, and fringe views. My understanding is that this theory is a fringe view among Biblical historians, but (if others agree with me) this need be stated only once, somewhere, with a link to the article on the historicity of Jesus for mainstream (as I see it) views of Biblical historians.

What is important is to distinguish majority and minority views about "the jesus myth theory" and we just have to follow the sources. You distinguish views based on their assumptions. But is this how the sources represent these views? I thought the sources distinguish themselves based on their conclusions rather than their starting-points. Of course, if part of the argument made in a source calls attention to their starting point, that has to be mentioned. I am just saying we follow the sources. You ask about "another group who claim to have started from a position that there was no Jesus, and to have eventually arrived at religious faith through convincing evidence that he existed as depicted in the Gospels" any my question is, how many people from this group have written about the Christ myth theory? Are they a majority, or minority, or just another view? To be frank, I would not think most of them would have much to say about the Christ Myth theory except that like Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and maybe even the theory of evolution, it is one of the many things they do not believe in. We do not have to include there view in this article if they have not written notable accounts of their views. NPOV does not require us to include views we can imagine, only those views that are in verifiable sources. Slrubenstein | Talk 17:22, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Slrubenstein, the only problem is what the "Jesus myth theory" even is about is somewhat of a mess following the sources. Some are vague, some same one thing while others say another, and then there is the occupational "now how does that fit?" Yes it its fringe but its exact limits as to what it is and who should be put under it is a game of pick that source.--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:54, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Bruce (and Elen) I appreciate that ... but look, I made only a few edits to this article maybe several months ago. I am only familiar with the most frequently cited sources, Wells and Doherty (and please do not misunderstand me, while I think these two authors are fringe in the jesus article, I fuly acknowledge they are central to this article). Beyond that I just do not know enough to get involved. The only constructive point I can make is, when in doubt, check policy, and try to come up with a process that all editors can agree on, regardless of their own views. The process I would propose is: first make a list of the most frequently cited sources. Pay attention as well to who is citing them. In the process, you might discover that there are two

or more non-contiguous groups who cite (or favor) different sources - in other words, if you made a venn diagram, you would have two circles, one circle that commonly cite p, q, and r, and another circle that favor x, y, and z. At that point you might want to consider a content fork, perhaps we really need two different articles. Are pqr and xyz presenting different theories? Or is the difference in the followers, the people who cite them? Is the difference in the questions they ask? The methods they use? I just ask because sometimes these matter more than the specific conclusions. If you decide to keep one article, it just has to say that there are two (or more) different theories, or approaches to the theories, or reasons for liking (or not liking) the theories. My point is simply this: they do not all have to fit together. If you do not mind an analogy, this is often a problem at the articles on race and ethnicity - in those cases though it is very easy to diagnose the problem: the definitions of these words, or the way scholars used them, and therefore debates over them, changed over time. It was impossible to fit pqrxyz together, because p and q turned out to be two different views about ethnicity as it was definesd in the 1940s, and r and x were two different views about ethnicity as defined in the 1960s and y and z are two different views debating each other in academe today. So, really three different debates, and occuring at different times. Is it possible that your sources do not fit together because they are not supposed to fit together? If so, identifying distinct debates or conversations (however you want to describe multiple points of view that are clearly nevertheless about the same thing, clearly talking about the same thing, maybe even debating one another directly) and treating each distinct circle separately may make a lot more sense than trying to fit it all together.

If I am right, this would help you deal with the "who is fringe" issue because obviously someone who is central in one circle will be fringe or entirely outside another circle. I realize it may be a challenge deciding what and how many "circles" to include in this article, but if you can do that, the inclusion criteria becomes "a source that is notable in at least one of these circles." If you have several sources left over even after doing this, you just have to ask: do they constitute another "circle," or perhaps these sources really are entirely fringe and should be excluded from the article.

But NPOV simply demands we include all significant views. In my own experience, you can tell that one view is significant if it is significant to (discussed in some detail or at some length by) another significant view. But we have NO obligation to include all views. A view has to be significant to some vocal group of people outside of Wikipedia.

I apologize if this is all stuff you have considered and tried to work through. I am just trying to be constructive. If this is not helpful I can only wish all of you good luck. Slrubenstein | Talk 10:06, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Not at all as a fresh look at some of the old stuff it is order. However NPOV says (this is sic BTW):

"All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view, representing fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources. This is non-negotiable and expected of all articles and all editors."

So it must not only be significant but also by a reliable source. Remsburg's list is certainly significant (he is used by at least 5 different non scholars as well as 200 some bloggers) and notable but he doesn't meet the reliable source requirement--he wasn't a professor in a relevant field and AFAWK none of his books were published through what Wikipedia call reliable publishers. It would be a good NPOV to point out his use by the Christ Myth group if we could find reliable source that tells us this. So far it has been dry well time and the subject matter is filled with annoying things like that.--BruceGrubb (talk) 15:25, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Alvar Ellegard

Could someone please explain why it's so important that Alvar Ellegard, whose academic expertise is in the linguistics of English, be cited in the lead, especially in a way that seems to affirm that the lack of attention paid to the CMT by theologians is a failure? --Akhilleus (talk) 17:42, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Because he explains what seems to be the rift between theologians (whether you call them biblical scholars or ancient historians) and the rest of academia and sources outside academia. It's something that needs explaining, because to any rational person first approaching this article, it does seem bizarre that almost all specialists are saying he definitely existed and anyone denying it is a flat-earthist, when there is no firsthand evidence. Ellegard explains that phenomenon. If you read his whole paper, it's really quite interesting. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 17:55, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

The problem with what you're saying is there is no rift between theologians and "the rest of academia and sources outside academia." The view that Jesus was is historical is the standard view; it's not hard to figure out that this is overwhelmingly the mainstream position, and it's not limited to "theologians". The fact that you seem to be saying that a biblical scholar or an ancient historian who says there was a historical Jesus is a theologian is, at best, mistaken.

It certainly would be nice to have some explanation of why there is such a profound gap between the views of academic experts and amateurs on this subject, but Ellegard does not have the relevant expertise. In fact, his writing on Jesus seems to have attracted no scholarly attention whatsoever, unlike Wells and Price. --Akhilleus (talk) 18:24, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

It's your opinion that there's no rift, and you may be right, but we go by what the sources say, and Ellegard says there is one (though I don't think he uses the word "rift"). The view that Jesus existed is the standard view, in Ellegard's opinion, because theologians are failing in their job as humanities scholars. It's an interesting view, which explains a lot. I'm only surprised that he hadn't already been added to the article as an example of a scholar writing about this. Why was he left out? In dismissing him, you illustrate exactly his point, not to mention that you violate Wikipedia's sourcing policy.

I'm also confused about the insistence that biblical scholars not be called theologians. I used to attend theology lectures at Cambridge because there were a few star lecturers there at the time. I recall no such distinction being made by them. A distinction can be made, of course, but for the most part one is a subset of the other. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 18:39, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

A distinction should be made, because far too often on this talk page "theologian" is taken to mean a person who unthinkingly espouses Christian doctrine and so is unable to rationally and impartially think about the CMT. That leads to people thinking that most academic experts on Christianity can't be used as sources on this article. The blanket use of "theologian" also obscures the fact that many people who study early Christianity do so as historians, not as a religious enterprise.

As for Ellegard, I'm quite puzzled by your attitude. You're taking the opinion of a scholar who studied English linguistics as more authoritative and worthwhile than the opinions of people who have spent their careers studying the subject. This seems to be equivalent to thinking that the opinions of, say, a specialist in South Asian history regarding the authorship of Shakespeare's plays deserve more play in a Wikipedia article than the opinions of Shakespeare scholars... --Akhilleus (talk) 19:16, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Again, Akhilleus, we have to stop paying attention to distinctions made on this page, arguments and opinions put forward on this page. The only thing that matters is what reliable sources say about the topic. That Christian scholars have had difficulty approaching this rationally is a legitimate POV, and it's expressed by Ellegard, so we include it. We don't only use biblical scholars as sources about Jesus. Please stick to the policies. And please don't make us keep on having to post that! SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:25, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

And the question of Akhilleus, with which I agree, is whether Ellegard is a sufficiently reliable source, as per policy and guidelines, that his opinion merits inclusion in the lead. I know that he has published a number of works on the subject of his Jesus myth proposal, and even been the co-recipient/dedicatee of a volume of festschriften, but that collection seems to not be particularly about this topic, but rather "language and literature" [9]. I don't doubt that he may be the best source available, considering the topic is one which has received comparatively little attention in the academic community of late. I tend to think myself that a comment from David Boulton's Who on Earth was Jesus?, which discusses the topic in general, might be more appropriate. Boulton is, as I recall, a Quaker and an investigative journalist, so he isn't exactly a neutral "expert" on the topic, but the book was well received, is more or less of a "review of literature" type, and basically discusses the "Jesus as myth" theory as a separate chapter. John Carter (talk) 19:39, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

SV, you know quite well that the policies don't mandate including everything said by anything that might conceivably be called a reliable source. The policies, as I think you know quite well, say that "All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view, representing fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources." What's your evidence that Ellegard's view is significant? If it is significant, why is it more significant than those of biblical scholars, etc.? Because we know that there are biblical scholars who think that CMT proponents are nutbars, yet the lead doesn't report those opinions at the moment. --Akhilleus (talk) 19:36, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

John, the problem we have had on this page is that a small number of editors only ever argue in one direction, and Akhilleus is one of them. That makes the arguments very hard to keep having to address, because they are always the same, no matter the issue. If you have a better suggestion for the lead than Ellegard, by all means write it up, but it would be good to include a point of view that explains the ideological background to this, and Ellegard's strikes me as eloquent, reliable, and with a lot of explanatory power. Again, it is:

Swedish academic Alvar Ellegård argues that the failure by theologians to question Jesus's existence can be attributed to a lack of communication between them and lay scholars, which he writes has caused some of the basic assumptions of Christianity to remain insulated from general scholarly debate.

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:58, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

"theologians"

I've mentioned several times that the constant references on this page to academic experts on early Christianity as "theologians" are misguided, both because it is inaccurate to describe all scholars who study early Christianity as theologians, and because the argument that theologians, as Christian believers, cannot be used as sources for this article means that editors are willfully disregarding the type of expert sources on which this article should rely.

The article by Ellegard that SlimVirgin has proposed citing in the lead can be found here: [10]. Ellegard's article is followed by a response by Bertil Albrektson, an Old Testament scholar. I thought what he had to say about "theologians" was interesting:

It may be appropriate to give some attention here to the term "theologian". The word is ambiguous, with at least two different meanings. It can denote (a) a person who studies the theology, i.e. the religious doctrine, of Christianity or some other religion, with scientific methods and regardless of the scolar's own faith or lack of faith. But it may also refer to (b) someone who embraces such a theology, who tries not only to analyse and understand it but also to defend and develop and propagate it…All theologians in sense (a) are not theologians in sense (b). In fact a great many biblical scholars do practise their profession as an ordinary philological and historical subject, avoiding dogmatic assumptions and beliefs. It is unfortunate that the same word is used both about preachers and about scholars, and Ellegard has exploited this ambiguity.

Albrektson's is only one of several responses to Ellegard, each of which finds fault with his ideas about Jesus and his characterization of academic responses to his ideas. As I've said, I don't see any reason to include Ellegard's opinion in the lead, but if it is included there, the responses of these scholars should be mentioned as well. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:26, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Not all theologians are religious, Akhilleus. Some are atheists. I told you I used to attend theology lectures when I was at Cambridge. The ones I recall were all atheists, or were at the very least exploring it, including Don Cupitt, an Anglican priest. Theologian is not an insult in my book, or an attempt to denigrate; quite the reverse. I was surprised when I was first asked on this page not to call someone a theologian, but to say he was a biblical scholar instead. The latter sounds much less distinguished to my ears than the former.

I'm fine with including material from Albrektson too (or whoever), if it directly addresses the issue. Could you write up how you'd want the other sources to be used in this context? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 15:49, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Comment: Please also note that not all "biblical scholars" are even theologians in the "(a)" sense of the term either -- at the very least in American academic usage of those terms. The amount of confusion surrounding the term theologian that I've seen in discussions surrounding scholarship on Jesus in the last couple of weeks is rather staggering. Maybe someone needs to write a FAQ, tack it to a relevant page like Theology and handily refer to it as needed.Griswaldo (talk) 15:56, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

The concern is not that all scholars who study Christianity are theologians, or that Christians cannot be used as sources. The concern is very specific: many of the actual, specific sources used in these articles are, in fact, theologians and Christian publishing houses. For example, here is a common source: Charlesworth, James H. (2006), Jesus and Archaeology, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Charlesworth is a professor at a theological seminary of the Presbyterian Church. The publisher, Eerdmans, "publishes a variety of books suitable for all aspects of ministry. Pastors, church education leaders, worship leaders, church librarians... will find a wealth of resources here." This is not a historical source that "happens" to be Christian. The objection is that the vast majority of sourcing is like this, not that a little of it is. Noloop (talk) 16:35, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Uh huh. James Charlesworth holds a named chair at Princeton Theological Seminary and is the director of the Dead Sea Scrolls Project at Princeton. This is one of the most eminent New Testament scholars in the world, exactly the type of source that should be used in Wikipedia articles, and you want to exclude him. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:39, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

That's right, he teaches at Princeton Theological Seminary, which is a theological seminary of the Presbyterian Church. He is not the director of anything at Princeton University. The publisher of the book in question has an overtly Christian mission statement. As I've said, how many times, I do not want to "exclude" anyone. It gets harder and harder to assume good faith when you mischaracterize my position immediately after I explicitly give it. Noloop (talk) 16:48, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

That's interesting. I thought it was Princeton the university, but it's Princeton the town, I guess. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 16:59, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, fine, you don't want to exclude him. However, you seem to be going to great lengths to ignore that Charlesworth is an eminent scholar, and you seem to think that because of where he teaches/researches and because of the press he's published with that the source is problematic. It sure looks like you're saying you will only trust scholarship that you think is secular. Meanwhile, people who spend their professional lives studying this stuff think that Charlesworth is a good source, and that Eerdmans publishes quality work. For instance, this review of Charlesworth's Jesus and Archaeology says "This is a book suitable for upper division undergraduate courses, graduate courses, and is recommended reading for New Testament scholars interested in the ways in which archaeology is brought to bear on Jesus research." Obviously not the most enthusiastic review in the world, but it does say that the book is a useful resource. On the other hand, the review appeared in Review of Biblical Literature, so I suppose if you're inclined to distrust Christians, it's easy to discount this review... --Akhilleus (talk) 17:15, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I'd always thought that mainline protestant seminaries were notorious as breeders of atheists. Princeton Theological Seminary is not a bible college. john k (talk) 18:49, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Care should be taken with journals that exist mainly to promote a particular point of view. Journals that are not peer reviewed by the wider academic community should not be considered reliable, except to show the views of the groups represented by those journals. Ergo, Jesus and Archaeology should not be considered reliable, except to show the view of "pastors, church education leaders, worship leaders, church librarians." Noloop (talk) 23:06, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Graeme Clarke

The best source is Clarke (for the lead), because he's a classicist who, so far as I can tell, has no connection to biblical studies or theological seminaries. I suggest we rewrite that sentence and use in-text attribution. Noloop's point is a good one, namely that classical historians largely ignore this topic, so we can't have a sweeping statement about their views in Wikipedia's voice—as though they all agree that Jesus existed, when in fact most have never paid attention to it. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 16:03, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Multiple reliable sources state that it is not accepted in mainstream historical studies. It is a consensus fact - not a personal opinion therefore not to be attributed as if it is an isolated opinion. In fact, we have no reliable sources contrary to this.

Noting that someone is a pastor or that an world renowned academic is at a seminary connected at the Presbyterian church is meaningless. Reliable sources are reliable sources, no matter the religious persuasion. I am restoring the previous lead and the multiple sources. Misleading the reception of the theory after so many discussions is pushing agf. --Ari (talk) 23:38, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

• The problem with Clarke is that it's a total anecdote. We have an op-ed by a biased source relating how he called his buddy in Graeme Clarke, and Grame told him over the phone... Not a reliable source.
• We do not have reliable sources stating that it is "not accepted" (or discredited, which is what matters). We have a lot of excerpted quotes, and personal opinions to that effect, and so on. We have poor information--since we have unknown context--about whether "mainstream" refers to Biblical studies (predominantly Christian theologians), or secular historians or what, in the (often informal, offhand) opinions we have. We have no formal, neutral polling, which is the only way to truly have neutral information about a distribution of opinions. Finally, we have the nagging problem that we can't actually find "widespread" acceptance anywhere except among Christian theoligians publishing in Christian presses. Noloop (talk) 01:44, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to return the Ellegard sentence to the lead ("Swedish academic Alvar Ellegård argues that the failure by theologians to question Jesus's existence can be attributed to a lack of communication between them and lay scholars, which he writes has caused some of the basic assumptions of Christianity to remain insulated from general scholarly debate").

I was going to restore the Clarke material too ("Graeme Clarke, professor of classics at the Australian National University, said in 2008 that he knows of no ancient or biblical historian who doubts that Jesus existed as an historical figure"). Rather than just having the classical historians sentence unattributed. Noloop, I think if we have the Clarke material followed by Ellegard, that will be quite neutral. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 02:24, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't have a huge problem with adding Clarke, but it would be better to cite a scholarly source than a newspaper op-ed. We don't exactly lack for scholarly sources that say that classical historians think there was a historical Jesus. They've been mentioned over and over again on this page.

I still don't see any evidence that Ellegard's opinion is notable or authoritative, so I see no reason to put it in. And I do not think it is at all neutral to end the lead with a sentence that says that theologians have failed. Whether intentionally or not, that makes the lead slanted toward the position that the CMT is not only plausible but correct. --Akhilleus (talk) 13:21, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

They go together. One professor saying "all classical historians think X." Another saying "that's because of Y." It's a good juxtaposition. We can move it so it's not at the end of the lead. As for the newspaper article, I don't see that it matters where he said it. He said it very clearly, and said he had no hesitation in doing so when asked explicitly about it within the context of doubting the existence, so that makes it a perfect source for our purposes, in terms of avoiding NOR and SYN.SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 15:10, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

But Ellegard is not talking about classical historians. He's talking about theologians. So it's not a reply to Clarke at all. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:47, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

According to Ellegard's WP article "He is most widely known for his books about the conflict between religious dogma and science and his promotion of the Jesus myth hypothesis". On that basis, the answer to the question of whether his opinion is notable in this article seems clear. --FormerIP (talk) 15:50, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

(ec) You are splitting hairs, Akhilleus. Look, you, Bill, and Ari have uniformly argued against anything that would make the lead sound more neutral. It gets to be too much. Can you please start writing for the enemy, as we're all supposed to? I'm trying to do it by asking for ideas to strengthen the section of arguments against the Christ myth theory. Please join me in helping to explain why questioning the existence of Jesus has the respect of some good scholars. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 15:56, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

How is it splitting hairs to point out that Ellegard is not talking about classical historians? It's a straightforward reading of what he says. And you seem to be missing the point that I think including Ellegard in the way you have proposed makes the lead less neutral. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:02, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

He does not need to mention historians. His point stands alone. You think it makes it less neutral because you have a very strong POV about this, and haven't once written, argued, or even tweaked the article in any direction but that POV, while insisting that everyone else be neutral. I can't keep responding to you if it's always going to be the same story, Akhilleus. Life's too short! Please let us see another side to you! :) SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 16:12, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

SV, I'm sorry that you're finding me too stubborn, but precision is important. Above, you've said that the opinions of Clarke and Ellegard "go together"—"One professor saying 'all classical historians think X.' Another saying 'that's because of Y.'" But Ellegard is not saying anything about what classical historians think; he speaks of theologians, the theological establishment, etc. Last time I heard, classicists aren't theologians—unless the definition of theologian has changed in some unexpected fashion. So Ellegard's statement cannot be regarded as a rejoinder to Clarke in any way. --Akhilleus (talk) 18:11, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

If anything, Ellegard is saying something which is in completely contradiction to what Clarke says. Clarke says "all classical historians think X." Ellegard is saying, "theologians think X, but only because they haven't talked to classical historians, who know that X is nonsense." john k (talk) 15:49, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Break

Okay, in the meantime, could you give us a two-sentence summary of the strongest evidence in Jesus's favour, the reason classical historians are so certain of it? I'd like to strengthen the introduction to that section. I've asked a few times on this page for someone to clarify, and Bill referred me to you, so if you could post something (here would be fine), that would be very helpful. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:22, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure that there is any particular overwhelming strong argument in favor of Jesus's existence. The question, as the article states, has rarely received much critical attention in the realm of history. I don't think, as you say, that the "classical historians are so certain of it," but rather that, perhaps, none of the arguments to the contrary have, in the eyes of those historians, been sufficiently without perceived problems that those arguments to the contrary necessarily need detailed refutation. Basically, perhaps, it may not be the case that the historians are certain of it, but rather that the arguments to the contrary to date have not necessarily been so strong that the historians have necessarily seen that the arguments need to be necessarily refuted. Note that even Robert Price says that the theory of Christ's existence falls apart if methodology is applied with "ruthless consistency." How many times, within the field of history, is methodology applied with ruthless consistency? Not that often. History is a rather conservative field. It is kind of difficult for any modern writer to ignore the material available to him, questionable or not, particularly if that material forms the basis of the history of a significant period. And the existence of Jesus, the fundamental basis of what is, basically, 2000 years of western history, is something that a lot of people will request very serious evidence for before accepting. There is, in a sense, a "default" to accept material which has been regarded as historical before, even if it is later challenged, if that challenge is not itself overwhelmingly powerful. In effect, the evidence to the contrary needs to be much stronger than the prevailing "historical" historical opinion for it to be changed. This sometimes happens in matters of recent history, but revisionist history of a period about which the documentation is weak for both or all sides generally faces a significant uphill battle. And the inductive reasoning behind these theories is based on applying very general arguments to a specific case which has some virtually contemporary sourcing, none of which argues that "Hey, I was there, and I don't remember this stuff." So, any and all such evidence, of any kind anywhere, was comparatively quickly, over like 30 years, thoroughly and completely destroyed, to the extent that even letters, memoirs, and the like which may have referred to these contradictory documents was destroyed in short order. And this was done by a group which had no government support for several hundred years and comparatively small numbers at the time the wholesale destruction of all records everywhere would have had to take place. Such unprecendented and thorough destruction of all documents, whether known to these bookburners or not, which is required for these theories, honestly seems, well, miraculous. John Carter (talk) 21:51, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

You also have this resistance to anything that resembles old discarded theories. This is why the idea that Vikings landing before Columbus had such a hard time of it in the 1960s and 1970s--it smacked of the old Imperial Synthesis period (c1770-c1890) where theories were based more on racial or nationalistic grounds (many times to justify suppression of indigenous populations in colonies) than any real data. So the historical and archeological communities were going "Oh, not this nonsense, again" and required an insane amount of proof before accepting the idea.--BruceGrubb (talk) 11:41, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I find the request for a "strong argument in favor of Jesus' existence" strange. Most scholars of early Christianity simply look at the Pauline epistles, Gospels, and Acts, and say that they provide evidence for reconstructing the life of Jesus; useful information can also be gleaned from other early Christian writing, and testimonia in non-Christian authors of the 1st and early 2nd century. This is far richer evidence than exists for many historical figures of antiquity, e.g. Solon and Epimenides. It's only through treating this evidence in non-standard ways that one arrives at the conclusion that Jesus didn't exist. --Akhilleus (talk) 01:28, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Yeah. The Bible has a lot of text about Jesus, and people basically figure you wouldn't go to that trouble without there being a person who existed. I imagine there are lots of historical figures who are believed to exist, based on text only. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:25, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

What form of documentation do you think exists outside the textual for the time period that Jesus is said to have existed in? I can't tell how one is supposed to take that comment. Maybe that was just meant as a straight comment in case ... yes I agree.Griswaldo (talk) 02:30, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

It was a straight comment, I guess. I just saw an interview on the Daily Show about Hannibal whooping up on some Romans in 200 something BC in Italy. The only physical evidence was a stone that said "Hannibal", the rest of the info is taken from two Roman's who wrote about it. That's how they learn about history, I guess. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:19, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that just because there are a bunch of stories about a figure in the past, does not mean that figure was a single person, or that the stories are not more legend than reality. (The more outlandish the claims in the stories, the more reason to be skeptical.) There were any number of people wandering around claiming to be mystics or the messiah in that time period, and Yeshua was a very common name. A lot of the philosophy of Jesus closely matches the Cynical philosophy of that time period (not to be confused with the modern meaning of cynicism!), and there were a lot of homeless Cynics wandering around at that time preaching their philosophy. (If my reading of the Wikipedia article on Cynicism is accurate.) The problem is that Jesus may very well be a legendary figure like Robin Hood. There are any number of theories about who Robin Hood was, and the reality was that a composite story about Robin Hood based on what were probably multiple people was composed over the course of several years or decades. Was there ever really a person actually named John Frum on Vanuatu? There must of been some individual or individuals on whom that cargo cult was based on, but the details of how it got started are lost to the mists of time. PeaceLoveHarmony (talk) 03:23, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't disagree, although that's all stuff for cited scholars to comment on and not us. Anyways, my one sentence answer to Slim's question about what's the strongest evidence in two sentences is "The Bible has a lot of text about Jesus, and people basically figure you wouldn't go to that trouble without there being a person who existed." It could use a copyedit, but I think it's the truth, and might even be supported by an RS somewhere out there. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:29, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that reliable sources do not doubt the basic notion of a historical Jesus, even if they differ drastically on what we know or can know about him. There are all kinds of legends out there, but that doesn't mean we assume something that scholars believe to be historical is a legend. We just need to follow the scholarship.Griswaldo (talk) 03:37, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

But again we get into this semantic issue. Clearly there are people called Christ Mythers that argued that Jesus was a pure myth-no more historical than Zeus or Osiris and then you have the writers that say the Gospel Jesus is myth in the way King Arthur and Robin Hood are and yet have been labeled "Christ mythers". That is also a big problem with article.--BruceGrubb (talk) 12:11, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Two other problems I see. The lack of any contemporary assertions that Jesus was a mythical figure is one other reason the idea might get comparatively little attention. Were any followers of Apollonius Roman citizens who had to be tried, convicted, and executed by the Roman government, like Saint Paul was? Or, perhaps, did the early Christians make that up too? Would it not have been expected that with the executions of Paul, Peter, the victims of the Diocletian persecution, and however many other Christians by the Roman government in Rome, not counting all the other executions elsewhere in the empire, that no one would have checked the records of the Sanhedrin, the High Priest, or Pilate and the others, including perhaps the record-keepers when they heard about the worship of a Jewish man-god who allegedly they were partial contemporaries of? If they had, and they found that there was no contemporary evidence to support the existence of Jesus, why on earth would they not have said so?

I see no evidence that anyone did question the existence of Jesus in the first few centuries, including any statements by Augustine and others about the possible silliness of such proposals. And, as indicated above, comparisons to other individuals who were not perceived as possible threats to the government are a bit strained. And, despite the repetition of "thirty years" as possibly some form of mantra, believe it or not guys, there were quite a few people who actually lived longer than that at the time. Some even made seventy or more. So, despite the implicit assumption that thirty years was enough time for people to basically forget everything about the time, the evidence of logic and history says otherwise.

Yes, there is a problem with this article that there is no independent roughly contemporary documents which say anything about the existence or nonexistence of Jesus one way or another. We are aware that the sack of Jerusalem, the sack of Rome, and lots of other sacks destroyed a lot of documents. I can and do see that point being mentioned prominently in the article, possibly in the lead. I could even see mentioning, if anyone has, that Constantine might have had a vested interest in destroying documents that disagreed with him, although he must have done a really good job if he did. Equally problematic is the fact that this theory seems to have not been given any weight at any time prior to the seventeenth or eighteenth century. Prior to that time, there were lots of stories that Jesus was a bastard, a warlock, and God knows what all else, but apparently none that he never existed. That, I think, deserves a degree of mention as well.

If Bruce is suggesting that the article be split into two articles, one for "Jesus never existed theory" and one for "the Gospels are a crock of noxious extrusion of the bowels theory", I would not necessarily have any objections to that, other than the fact that at least some of the parties discussed, like Price, seem to be saying something along the lines of "the Gospels are a crock of whatever, so bad that I can't even say for sure that he ever actually existed," because their statements make it hard to determine which article their theories should be most prominently discussed in. John Carter (talk) 15:21, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Breaking this article into two would be a very bad idea. On the Wikipedia side you have WP:CFORK and on the practical side the literature doesn't support such a split. The Christ myth theory might have have two parallel tracks from the get go with Dupois and Volney; Dupois went the "Jesus is a pure myth" route while Volney went the "hazy memories of an obscure historical figure was integrated into existing mythology" route; AFAIK to date every source that mentions one mentions the other--Dupois and Volney are a package deal with being the "founders" of the Christ Myth theory and that creates a major problem. One thing the article currently doesn't do is follow the Volney path--only the more extreme Dupois path.--BruceGrubb (talk) 16:32, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I think there's actually more components to it than these two. Most scholars who write on the historical Jesus are looking for some kind of religious teacher, but I've read a number of offerings now from people arguing that the chap who eventually became immortalised in the gospels was no such thing. Which raises the interesting prospect of having two people, one was called Jesus and one who wrote all the stories. There needs to be some kind of coverage of that as well, I feel Elen of the Roads (talk) 15:56, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

If you're referring to Baigent's theory that Jesus was a revolutionary who changed his mind, grassed on his buddies and got something like witness protection from Pilate for it later, yeah, I agree. If Baigent's own rep were a bit better, I might think it the most likely alternative here myself. I'm not sure what you mean by the "one who wrote all the stories", though. Do you mean the Gospels or the stories Jesus allegedly told? The Gospels are generally considered to be based on some other now-lost source; the parables may have been based on other sources since lost; the stories about Jesus, well, they could be based on either repetition of other stories or an attempt to get all the predictions of the OT addressed. John Carter (talk) 17:32, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Ellegard again

Outside comment, and forgive me if I'm repeating something because I haven't read through all the previous debate yet. I tend to share some objections against the recent rewrite of the lead and the addition of Ellegard in particular. Reasons:

1. Generally speaking, a lead section shouldn't engage in extensive "X said, Y said". That's for the main body. A lead section should be bold enough to synthesize a generalized overview of the state of debate in Wikipedia's own third-person voice. (Whether the previous "...essentially without support..." sentence did this correctly is a different matter, but as far as I can see, it most likely did.)
2. The current wording, giving Ellegard pride of place by having the "last word" in the lead, gives his view an extra, and probably undue, amount of weight.
3. Grammatically, its summary is problematic because "...argues that the failure..." is most naturally understood as presupposing that the "failure" is a fact. That's what happens when you use a definite article in the subject of a that-clause. The summary needs to explicitly bring the "fail" claim into the scope of the attribution. Something like: "...argues that X have failed... and that this is because ...".
4. The description as a "Swedish academic" unduly glosses over the fact that he is an academic of an unrelated discipline, and hence not an expert, but precisely an example of the non-expert partisans of this non-mainstream hypothesis. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:14, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I was about to re-describe him, but I see you did it, so thank you. I also moved him from the end of the lead, so he doesn't have the last word. As for in-text attribution in the lead, it's normal where the issue is a contentious one, and it's important to know who said what. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 08:28, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

We'll probably disagree about the role of in-text attribution in leads (I personally happen to believe its "commonness" is a sign of a misdirected development in Wikipedia owing to a misinterpretation of the NPOV and NOR policies). But another more concrete little detail: "...lack of communication between them and lay scholars". Is "lay" a correct summary? The word is ambiguous: it most usually means "non-expert"/"non-professional" (in which case "lay scholar" is a contradiction in terms, and would lead to a very serious distortion of what I believe is meant here.) It can also mean "non-cleric". But first, that meaning is much less prominent in common English, and second, not all theologians are clerics. I don't think "lay" can ever mean "non-theologian". Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:41, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Lay scholar is the term he used. He means non-specialist academics, and that often boils down to non-Christians, because the specialists tend to come from within the Christian faith, even though some have left it. That indeed is his point. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 09:01, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

No, he means specifically non-theologians (explicitly including historians under the term, who are of course also specialists). He uses "lay" in scare quotes, because he knows he is just using it as an ad hoc substitute for a concept for which there isn't really a good word in English. We can easily avoid this by simply saying "other scholars" or "scholars in other fields", or "non-theologians". Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:07, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

That's fine with me if you feel it preserves the meaning. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 09:15, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Small note: thanks for this removal; I had just copied the old sentence there as a model to work from and then forgot to remove it from the edit window when hitting save. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:32, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

No worries, it's easily done. Your edits are good. If you could see your way to sticking around, we could use the fresh input. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 09:49, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree completely with SlimVirgin's last post. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:29, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't want to change it yet, because of our talk page dynamics, but the Ellegard part doesn't mesh with the rest of the summary style sentences of the lead. It would be nice to have another person who says the same thing, or disagrees, put them in the body and a summary sentence in the lead. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 15:39, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

And maybe this is it.[11] - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 16:03, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Over the next few days I'll be reading the rest of the responses to Ellegard in that series of 2008 articles that we're using as a source, and I'll be adding responses and criticisms to the Ellegard section (but tightening as I go along because length is becoming an issue), so it will change a little, perhaps a lot. Once that's done, there might be something there to summarize in the lead. But it's quite a lot to read and digest, so I won't be able to do it today. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 18:07, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Have you read the exchange between Doherty and Ellegard? [12] Noloop (talk) 22:56, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

JESUS — ONE HUNDRED YEARS BEFORE CHRIST by Alvar Ellegard is interesting though as I have noted before he does weird things with the definition of Jesus-myth theory: "The year 1999 saw the publication of at least five books which concluded that the Gospel Jesus did not exist. One of these was the latest book (The Jesus Myth) by G. A. Wells, the current and longstanding doyen of modern Jesus mythicists." I put this under definition under "possible agenda" in my fledgling FAQ along with Holding slapping the Christ Myth theorist label on Remsburg despite Remsburg effectively going the minimalist route.--BruceGrubb (talk) 12:03, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

The Historical Jesus spectrum and the Christ Myth Theory

Ok, we are starting to go off the rails a bit, again. Look at these two reliable sources:

"We have in effect been looking at two myths in this introductory chapter; two views of the historical Jesus which stand at opposite ends of the spectrum of opinions about him. At the one end is the views that there never was such a person as Jesus; the Gospels are descriptions of a fictitious person. [...] At the other end of the spectrum is the view the Gospels give us a picture of the historical Jesus, every detail in the Gospels being recorded just as it happened." (Marshall, Ian Howard (2004), I Believe in the Historical Jesus (rev. ed.), Vancouver: Regent College Publishing, ISBN 978-1573830195 pg 24)

"To accomplish this, it will prove helpful to break down the wide variety of views regarding the Jesus of history found in New Testament scholarship today into four broad (and admittedly overly simplistic) categorizes. This spectrum of views points is, of course, ideal-typical in nature is offered merely as a useful heuristic" (Eddy, Paul R.; Boyd, Gregory A. (2007), The Jesus Legend: a Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition, Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, ISBN 978-0801031144 pg 24-25)

Note what both these reliable sources are saying: the views of the historical Jesus is a spectrum of ideas. Marshall tells us the full range of that spectrum and Eddy-Boyd tells us that this spectrum can be broken up into "admittedly over simplistic", "ideal-typical", and "useful heuristic" categories. At least two other notable authors have also broken up the historical Jesus spectrum into four broad categories: John Remsburg in his 1909 book The Christ and Dan Barker in his 2006 book Losing Faith in Faith on pg 372.

If you examine these categories you will see the definitions don't exactly match and that is our main problem with the article; Eddy-Boyd even explains why. There is a fringe "Christ Myth Theory" category but where the break between it and the equally fringe extreme minimalist position varies from author to author. Walsh's "The theory that Jesus was originally a myth is called the Christ myth theory" causes loads of other headaches as a strict reading would put Wells' current position in the Christ myth theory category which several authors (Price, Dunn, Carrier, Eddy-Boyd) have done. Sure Wells has challenged this categorization but is he and these other authors using the same definition? That question is not really answered.--BruceGrubb (talk) 06:02, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the question is going to be answered, Bruce, because authors are using the terms interchangeably. I notice Eddy and Boyd also introduce a "legendary Jesus" theory. The fact is that the terms are not pinned down as rigidly as earlier versions of this article suggested. There is a flux, as you'd expect, because obviously no academic is going to say categorically that Jesus definitely did not exist, so there is always going to be an element of "well, he might have, but there's no real evidence," which morphs into what editors here have been calling biblical minimalism. But these are false categories and red herrings. The best way forward is simply to report the views of reliable sources who say Jesus should be viewed as myth, not history, and the views of those who argue that it's wrong. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 08:29, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

On that note, the second sentence says (my bold): "Some proponents argue that events or sayings associated with the figure of Jesus 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." Is there any proponent, particularly any modern proponent, who doesn't argue that? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 08:34, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

The Extreme "Jesus is a pure myth with no historical foundation" group with Acharya S, Tom Harpur, and John M. Allegro as kind of poster children. To rework what I said on one of the noticeboards back in March 2009 looking at all the material you effectively get four definitions for Christ Myth theory:

• Jesus is a pure myth--no more historical than Osiris or Zeus.
• Jesus started out as a myth myth regardless of connection to any historical person (Walsh)
• There was a historical Jesus but he lived in a different time.
• The Gospel Jesus has had so much added that nothing discernible about the actual man remains (The He might as well not existed tack, ala Price).

As for the "reliable sources who say Jesus should be viewed as myth" you run into another point raised in my still being worked on FAQ:

I am confused by the use of myth I am seeing in some of the literature. It seams to mean something other than totally made up story.

Response: Myth to the scholar has many meanings. Biblical studies professor J. W. Rogerson goes into the many definitions in his paper "Slippery words: Myth" (Dundes 1984) but to the layman Remsburg gives what is likely the easiest to understand explanation: "Myths are of three kinds: Historical, Philosophical, and Poetical."

Using modern examples here is a rough break down:

Historical myth: They Died With their Boots on, Little Big Man, and Son of the Morning Star--Battle of Little Big Horn. Washington Irving's story that Columbus sailed west to prove the Earth was round,

Philosophical myth: Mason Locke Weems' story of Washington's chopping down of the Cherry Tree. Death as a person is a pure myth version of Philosophical myth.

Poetical myth: Longfellow's Paul Revere

Now what "Jesus should be viewed as myth" mean in that context ie what version of "myth" are you aiming for?--BruceGrubb (talk) 13:14, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I think Bruce may have missed the option that Jesus, in some sense, was a historical person about whom a whole mess of legends, none of which may have had anything to do with the historical person, accumulated. However, even with all 4 or 5 options outlined, I can see how they could be broken into two larger classes of theories:

• 1) Maybe he existed, maybe not, but the evidence that we have is insufficient to support any claims to his existence. (the Jesus maybe never existed option)
• 2) He did (or probably did) exist, but the stories that have accumulated to him are unreliable. (the Gospels are unreliable option)

Maybe in one way of addressing the article might be to break the content regarding the theories that have been proposed into some types of groupings, maybe the above, maybe others. But such breakdown might make it easier to see how the extant theories relate to each other, and make it a bit easier to read. John Carter (talk) 17:42, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I didn't miss them as per Boyd-Eddy that would be more along the line of minimalist position something even Remsburg put into a different category back in 1909 and back then he put it as the domain of radical Freethinkers. Remsburg is the closet thing to the view you are looking for and while notable his impact on the scholarly community has been nil though he is a favorite with the armchair researcher and blogger brigade. Here are his exact words on the matter: "Jesus of Nazareth, the Jesus of humanity, the pathetic story of whose humble life and tragic death has awakened the sympathies of millions, is a possible character and may have existed; but the Jesus of Bethlehem, the Christ of Christianity, is an impossible character and does not exist." Dan Barker echoes that view with the statement "we need to distinguish the Jesus of history and the Jesus of the New Testament; they were not necessarily the same person" and going on to say that while there is a 5 to 10 percent chance there were a teacher named Jesus in the 1st century the Gospel Jesus did not exist.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:13, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I really have no idea why this discussion is happening again. Of course there are people who have said categorically that Jesus didn't exist, that the figure in the Gospels is pure myth; Wells used to argue that there was no historical Jesus. He changed his mind in the mid-1990s, but that doesn't mean that the definition of the CMT changed; it means that Wells moved away from denying Jesus' historicity, as he himself says. Here's excerpts from the entry on "Jesus, historicity of" from The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief (Prometheus 2007), written by G.A. Wells:

Denying Jesus' historicity means asserting that Christianity is based on a founder figure who is wholly mythical. This was the position argued by Bruno Bauer in 1850 and later; he was supported at the turn of the century by Arthur Drews in Germany, William Benjamin Smith in America, and John M. Robertson in England, among other, in a fierce debate on the subject that was not without some impact even on Christian scholars. Thus in chapters added to the second German edition of his famous history of life-of-Jesus research, Albert Schweitzer allowed that Christianity must reckon with the possibility that it will have to surrender the historicity of Jesus altogether, and must have, in readiness for such a contingency, a metaphysical basis for its belief…by around 1920 nearly all scholars had come to regard the case against Jesus' historicity as totally discredited…Today, most secular scholars accept Jesus as a historical, although unimpressive figure. They are aware that much that is said of him, and by him, in the New Testament is no longer taken at face value even by scholars within the mainstream churches…However, from about 1960 an increasing number of skeptics have come forward with denials of Jesus' historicity. In my first books on Christian origins, I myself denied it, but in works published since 1995 I am not quite as radical…The more radical view that there was no historical Jesus at all is still vigorously defended by a few scholars, notably Earl Doherty and Robert M. Price.

So, Wells plainly says that there are people who have denied Jesus' historicity and argued that its founder figure, Jesus, is wholly mythical. The people who have argued this are Bruno Bauer, Arthur Drews, William Benjamin Smith, John M. Robertson, Earl Doherty, Robert M. Price, and G. A. Wells (although he became "not quite as radical" after 1995). Furthermore, the denial of Jesus' historicity has been regarded as "totally discredited" since about 1920, and today most secular scholars accept Jesus as historical. This is straight out of Wells' mouth, so there should be no suspicion that it's being distorted by Christian belief. But what Wells says agrees with what other reliable sources are saying, including Eddy and Boyd.

As for this business about a spectrum of opinions, that doesn't prevent us from seeing useful distinctions within the spectrum and writing articles about those distinct positions. The difficulty of defining the subject of this article has been grossly over-exaggerated, for years and years now. Wells gives us a simple definition, he identifies major proponents (including himself), and in this he echoes many earlier sources, including Albert Schweitzer. This really should not be this hard. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:35, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Akhilleus is leaving out the reason provided why the early denial of Jesus' historicity was totally discredited: "However, Robertson and the other of that time made the mistakes of setting aside at interpolation all News Testament passages they found inconvenient and of trying to explain Jesus away in terms of pagan parallels (as simply another Osiris or Hercules), then the Jewish background is clearly of greater importance" ([13]. Also position of Price presented is by the standards of Eddy and Boyd incorrect never mind that back on February 23, 2006 a user named Giovanni33 (the first archive of this thing) quoted Price's Deconstructing Jesus showing his position and in Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_37#What_is_the_real_difference_between_Christ_myth_theory_and_.27Jesus_existed_but_the_Gospel_Jesus_is_a_myth-fiction.27_Idea.3F I quoted some more from the same book. The relevant part of those quotes so you can find them through the amazon link are as follows:

"I am not trying to say that there was a single origin of the Christian savior Jesus Christ, and that origin is pure myth; rather, I am saying that there may indeed have been such a myth, and that if so, it eventually flowed together with other Jesus images, some one of which may have been based on a historical Jesus the Nazorean." (pg 85)

"As Dundes is careful to point out, it doesn't prove there was no historical Jesus, for it is not implausible that a genuine, historical individual might become so lionized, even so deified, that his life and career would be completely assimilated to the Mythic Hero Archetype. But if that happened, we could no longer be sure there had ever been a real person at the root of the whole thing. [...] The apparent links with Roman and Herodian figures is too loose, too doubtful for reasons I have already tried to explain. Thus it seems to me that Jesus must be categorized with other legendary founder figures including the Buddha, Krishna, and Lao-tzu. There may have been a real figure there, but there is simply no longer any way of being sure." (pg 260-261)

Price clearly is NOT saying there is no historical Jesus the above states but rather that there is so much mythology in the Gospel account that the real man and his real actions have been lost. That is TOTALLY DIFFERENT from the argument Earl Doherty presents which is a pure myth variant.--BruceGrubb (talk) 17:47, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

This summary by Akhilleus is not what is said in the quote: the denial of Jesus' historicity has been regarded as "totally discredited" since about 1920 Noloop (talk) 22:47, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Well kind of. The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief [Hardcover] put out these additional quotes Akhilleus also left out of above: "...since then, attempts to reopen the discussion have met witht he responce that that battle has been fought and won by the apologists, and that it would be otiose to fight it all again. [...] However, from about 1960 an increasing number of skeptics have come forward with denials of Jesus's historicity."--BruceGrubb (talk) 04:35, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Yep. I don't think my excerpting altered Wells' meaning at all: he says that circa 1920 the scholarly establishment thinks the theory was effectively refuted, and since then most scholars have paid it no mind. (You can confirm this by looking at Michael Grant's book, among others.) Of course Wells and other skeptics think that the scholarly establishment is wrong, but the point here is that someone who's friendly to the CMT acknowledges that it gets no respect within the academy. --Akhilleus (talk) 13:00, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

This comment, and BruceGrubb's excerpt, are part of the context: "Today, most secular scholars accept Jesus as a historical, although unimpressive figure. They are aware that much that is said of him, and by him, in the New Testament is no longer taken at face value even by scholars within the mainstream churches…However, from about 1960 an increasing number of skeptics have come forward with denials of Jesus' historicity". The language has shifted from terms like "all" and "totally discredited" to describe the 1920's to "most," "unimpressive," and "increasing number of skeptics." Note, btw, that this is simply not language found in reliable sources to describe fringe theories like Holocaust denial and the flat Earth. The labeling of CMT as a fringe theory, in the Wikipedian sense, is absurd. Noloop (talk) 14:56, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't think you're quite getting what Wells is saying. He makes a contrast between the majority of scholars, who say there was a historical Jesus, and the skeptics who deny it. It's still the case that the theory is regarded as "totally discredited" by the vast majority of academia; there is, after all, a reason why Ellegard feels the need to complain that his ideas don't get a fair hearing, and why Wells has said in a different piece that it's customary for academics to dismiss the denial of Jesus' historicity with "amused contempt." Actually, in a 1988 book, Wells said: "the view that there was no historical Jesus, that his earthly existence is a fiction of earliest Christianity—a fiction only later made concrete by setting his life in the first century—is today almost totally rejected." (The Historical Evidence for Jesus Prometheus, 1988, p. 218) --Akhilleus (talk) 15:18, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Except on the entry for Guignebert pg 372 in The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief we have the Christ myth theory defined: "which held no historical Jesus existed". As shown above Price clearly does NOT believe that and yet Wells puts him in the same category as Doherty and if Wells flubbed that you have to ask what else did he flub in this entry.--BruceGrubb (talk) 16:59, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

But Price does believe that. He writes that, of course, it's possible —how could it not be possible?—but that it's extremely unlikely. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 10:12, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

"Criticism" section

There doesn't seem to be any extant section on the critical responses to the theory/theories in the article. Such a section is generally found in most theory articles, and I'm wondering why there isn't one here. Specifically, Allegro's "Magic Mushrooms" theory received such extreme response that, according to sources, the publisher of the book later "apologized" for publishing it. I would think that that particular matter would be significant and notable enough to be mentioned in virtually any discussion of his theory, but it isn't mentioned here.

Breaking the article into two sections, one of which deals with theories which, basically, accept the existence of Jesus, but none of the material about him, and the other which deals with those who see no reason to accept his existence, would make it easier to break up the critical response into similar sections as well. Alternately, the criticism could be included in the discussion of each proposal, although that would include a lot of repetition. John Carter (talk) 17:51, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

John, the only criticism section we have is Christ_myth_theory#Counter-arguments, which is currently weak. We could perhaps rename is to "Criticism of the theory" to make clearer that that's what it is. I've been asking on this page for help with ideas for how to strengthen it. It needs to be developed (a) so that readers can see clearly why biblical scholars argue there was an historical Jesus, and (b) so they can read the specific objections to the arguments of the Christ-myth theorists.

I didn't quite follow your suggestion about the different sections. Would you mind rephrasing? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 18:01, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

The original plan (such as it was) was to flesh out the various supporters and eliminate need for thing like an arguments or criticism section. As with a lot of plans that promptly went pearshaped.--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:31, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Will Durant argues against the "theory" here [14]

I Howard Marshall

Bruce, what do you see this paragraph as adding to Christ myth theory#Definition of the theory that the rest of the section doesn't already say?

However, biblical scholar I. Howard Marshall writes that there are "two views of the historical Jesus which stand at the opposite ends of a spectrum of opinion about him." At one extreme is the view that Jesus never existed, and that the gospels describe an essentially fictional person. At the other extreme is the view that the gospels portray events exactly as they happened, and each event depicted in the New Testament is the literal truth.

The paragraph before it and after it jointly contain the same information. It's also problematic because it's sourced first to Marshall (there are two views), but then to Ruthen to explain what those views are, and I can't find Marshall's views mentioned in the Ruthven book via a Google Books search (which may be incomplete).

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:52, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

It adds several things. First, I. Howard Marshall establishes what the full spectrum is--Boyd-Eddy does not (they leave off the very extreme fringy "every detail in the Gospels being recorded just as it happened" end of the spectrum). Second, it sets up a transition from George Walsh's excluded middle definition to Boyd-Eddy's spectrum categories (Marshall did not break the spectrum into categories). Finally, it establishes that the spectrum idea is not exclusive to Boyd-Eddy (Remsburg and Barker while notable don't IMHO fit the requirement for reliable)

As for the Ruthven reference that was in the version I went back and got trusting that the editor who added it to my original Marshall reference knew what they were doing. Looking at Ruthven I see what they were doing--presenting an example of just how extreme that "every detail in the Gospels being recorded just as it happened" could get. It isn't Marshall and should be reworded to reflect that.

I think Boyd-Eddy included the fundamentalism perspective: "Finally, there is the position that the gospels are reliable historical sources. The supernatural claims may be mythical, but critical historiography should not rule out the possibility of this kind of occurrence." They may not express it as strongly as Marshall, but they're referring to the same attitude. I agree that we should remove Ruthven regardless. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 03:53, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Actually, looking at it again I think you're right. It does transition us into the Boyd-Eddy categories. I tweaked the writing a little, and removed Ruthven, but otherwise left it as it is. I hope the tweaking is okay with you. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 04:05, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

I see you mostly reverted. I think Ruthven is too much, and we shouldn't use "however." SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 04:08, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

The tweeking lost important information ie the "admittedly over simplistic", "ideal-typical", and a "useful heuristic" quotes. One big problem this article has is people think the categories are set in stone or have one and only one definition. I put in the point Ruthven was raising but if you feel it doesn't really fit feel free to throw it out. The "however" needs to be in there because George Walsh's presents an excluded middle definition ie that it is A or B while I. Howard Marshall presents it as a spectrum of idea raising the possibility there are ideas that straddle two concepts--sort of like the issue of "is 484 THz 750 nm red or orange in the visible spectrum?"--it all a matter of how you define red and orange.--BruceGrubb (talk) 04:18, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I see your point, but I'm not keen in including that much commentary about ideal typical etc. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 04:24, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Those are their exact words reflecting exactly what the feel their categories are.--BruceGrubb (talk) 11:44, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

But there's no reason to repeat everything they say. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 20:59, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

In this case I believe that it is critical spell out using their own words that these categories we keep seeing are not set in stone. The only other sources that talk about the categories are only notable.--BruceGrubb (talk) 03:11, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Thomas L. Thompson: Christ myther or minimalist

I just noticed the the moving of Thomas L. Thompson from minimalist to Christ mythist (especially as the only Thompson Boyd-Eddy refers to is a Michael Thompson). The inclusion of Thomas L. Thompson and biblical minimalism was not through Boyd (as was spelled out in my original version) but via Bennett 2001, pp. 7, 131; Thompson 2005, p. 8.

The original text read as follows: "Somewhere in between these extremes lies biblical minimalism,[Goguel 1926b, p. 117-118] as expressed by writers such as Rudolf Bultmann and Thomas L. Thompson, who argue that a historical Jesus did exist but that virtually nothing can be known about him, and that many (perhaps all) of the episodes in the gospels are legendary. [Bennett 2001, pp. 7, 131; Thompson 2005, p. 8]"

When I integrated this into Boyd-Eddy categories note the care I took in my original version: "A historical Jesus did exist but that virtually nothing can be known about him represented by Rudolf Bultmann and Mack (ie biblical minimalism with Thomas L. Thompson provided as an additional example by other authors [Bennett 2001, pp. 7, 131; Thompson 2005, p. 8])

I trusted the original citation in putting Thomas L. Thompson where I did--did I err?--BruceGrubb (talk) 14:39, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Um, I don't think Bennett says anything about Thompson. Maybe I'm forgetting, but I'm pretty sure about that. In fact, I don't think we have any good secondary sources that place Thompson anywhere—arguments on this talk page and elsewhere have been based either on what Thompson says in his book, or on the jacket copy of his book. Having read his book, Thompson doesn't spell out the consequences of his treatment of the NT for the historicity of Jesus, and in fact says that his book isn't about Jesus' historicity—"The purpose of this book is not historical reconstruction. Nor is it centered in the problems of the historical Jesus." (p. 16) The only review of his book that I found in an academic journal, by William Arnal, in Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 26 (2008) 175-79 ([15]), doesn't present the work as one that says there was no historical Jesus. Arnal does say that Thompson believes that the NT is literary/exegetical in orientation, not historical, and is therefore useless for reconstructing history, but that's not at all the same as saying there's no history to reconstruct. So I would not put Thompson into the "mythicist" category without some good secondary sources to put him there, or an explicit acknowledgment on his own part that he thinks he belongs in the mythicist camp. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:11, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Do think removing entirely from the Boyd-Eddy categories would be a good idea?--BruceGrubb (talk) 16:03, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Kind of. Boyd-Eddy don't discuss Thompson at all, but I think they do provide examples of people who fit into each category they discuss—so we could just reuse their examples. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:05, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Methodological concerns section

I tried to tidy this, but it's mostly OR. It's not clear that the sources say those things exactly, and it's poorly written. I'll move it here until we decide what to do with it.

=== Methodological concerns ===

The church historian Geoffrey Bromiley argues that, while many versions of the Christ myth theory assume that Christianity had obscure beginnings, early Christians appealed to historical events already known to the general public.

While advocates rely on the absence of contemporaneous reference to Jesus, and the relative silence of Paul regarding much of Jesus' life, specialists like R. T. France regard such arguments with deep suspicion, arguing that various sources may not mention Jesus for any number of reasons. Further, while many Christ myth theorists draw parallels between early Christianity and Hellenistic mystery religions, relatively little is actually known about the beliefs and practices of the latter. Scholars like Herbert George Wood have suggested that, given the above issues, the Christ myth theory can only be advocated in defiance of the available evidence. A number of scholars therefore classify it as a form of denialism and compare it to a variety of fringe theories. For example, the |BBC's Today programme once asked N. T. Wright if he would appear on-air to debate Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy concerning the thesis of their book The Jesus Mysteries. Wright, whom Newsweek once deemed "perhaps the world's leading New Testament scholar", declined, saying that "this was like asking a professional astronomer to debate with the authors of a book claiming the moon was made of green cheese."

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 20:58, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Doherty

I asked this before but it was never resolved. Are Earl Doherty's books self-published? If they are, should we devote a whole section to him? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:47, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Canadian writer Earl Doherty argues in The Jesus Puzzle (2005) and Jesus: Neither God Nor Man—The Case for a Mythical Jesus (2009) that no historical Jesus stands behind even the most primitive hypothetical sources of the New Testament. He argues that Jesus originated as a myth derived from Middle Platonism with some influence from Jewish mysticism, and that belief in an historical Jesus emerged only among Christian communities in the second century. He further argues that none of the major apologists before the year 180, except for Justin and Aristides of Athens, included an account of an historical Jesus in their defences of Christianity. Instead, he writes, the early Christian writers describe a Christian movement grounded in Platonic philosophy and Hellenistic Judaism, preaching the worship of a monotheistic Jewish god and what he calls a "logos-type Son." Doherty argues that Theophilus of Antioch (c. 163–182), Athenagoras of Athens (c. 133–190), Tatian the Assyrian (c. 120–180), and Marcus Minucius Felix (writing around 150–270) offer no indication that they believed in a historical figure crucified and resurrected, and that the name Jesus does not appear in any of them.

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:47, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes they are self-published but his views are noted in several reliable sources.--BruceGrubb (talk) 03:07, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

This is a place where Bruce and I agree—Doherty is self-published, but he's attracted a lot of attention (e.g., the long Wells quote I posted above). So I think he's worth covering in his own section. (See, I'm not always contrary!) --Akhilleus (talk) 03:31, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I'll restore the section. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 03:34, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Docetism

I'm wondering if we should remove this from the definition section. It jumps out as unclear, and not obviously related, and is a very old idea.

Historian Michael Grant argues that Jesus skepticism reached its culmination in the position known as docetism (seeming), which maintained that Jesus never came into the world "in the flesh," but only seemed to.

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 04:09, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The text represents an incomplete and misleading understanding of Docetism. Hardyplants (talk) 05:09, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

"Michael Grant was one of the few classical historians to win respect from academics and a lay readership." Michael Grant The Times October 13, 2004. The independent reliable source The Times labeled the late Michael Grant as a classical historian who had one respect from academics as well as laymen. I used Michael Grant's exact quotes but the somehow they got turned into this misleading mess. I am resorting the original wording I used.--BruceGrubb (talk) 06:40, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

I do not have a problem with the source, but with the incomplete quote used. Hardyplants (talk) 07:00, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

We now have an entire quote. It would be good if we could paraphrase. Having to quote at length in this way, with no summarizing text around it, suggests we don't understand what is being said. And indeed it's very unclear.

Historian Michael Grant stated: "This skeptical way of thinking reached its culmination in the argument that Jesus as a human being never existed at all and is a myth. In ancient times, this extreme view was named the heresy of docetism (seeming) because it maintained that Jesus never came into the world "in the flesh", but only seemed to; (I John 4:2) and it was given some encouragement by Paul's lack of interest in his fleshly existence. Subsequently, from the eighteenth century onwards, there have been attempts to insist that Jesus did not even "seem" to exist, and that all tales of his appearance upon the earth were pure fiction. In particular, his story was compared to the pagan mythologies inventing fictitious dying and rising gods. (paragraph break) Some of the lines of thinking employed to disprove the Christ-myth theory have been somewhat injudicious."

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 07:09, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The word Docetism and its blue link are not very helpful to the average reader. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:15, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The link there for people who don't know what docetism is. As for possibly being confusing we have no shortage of those if you go through the archives.--BruceGrubb (talk) 09:19, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

My understanding of docetism makes it entirely different from the Jesus of Nazareth never existed theory. Most docetists, I think, would have agreed that people in Gallilee and Jerusalem saw what looked like a human walking and talking as described in the Gospels. They just think it was not a real human body, but a ghostly body made to look like a human body - it could not feel pain for example. E4mmacro (talk) 02:46, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

RfC to move Christ myth theory to Jesus myth theory

This article is about the theory that Jesus did not exist as an historical being. Should it be moved from Christ myth theory to Jesus myth theory? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 05:13, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments

• Support move. The article was called Jesus myth hypothesis until February 2009 when Akhilleus moved it to Christ myth theory without much discussion; see here. The current title is a little misleading, because it doesn't make immediately clear that we're discussing the historiography of the person, unrelated to the Christian belief in his divinity. Calling it "Jesus myth theory" would make the title more consistent with the rest in the series of articles about the historiography of Jesus: Historical Jesus, Historicity of Jesus, and so on. Both titles are well-represented on Google.

The hits for each are:

• "Christ myth": Google (38,900), Google Books (7,730), Google Scholar (651)
• "Christ myth theory": Google (25,200), Google Books (247), Google Scholar (46)
• "Christ myth hypothesis": Google (59), Google Books (12), Google Scholar (1)
  
  

• "Jesus myth": Google (48,000), Google Books (2,990), Google Scholar (242)
• "Jesus myth theory": Google (56,900), Google Books (16), Google Scholar (1)
• "Jesus myth hypothesis": Google (63,400), Google Books (2), Google Scholar (3)

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 05:14, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Support' Oppose', preferring instead Jesus hoax as most scientifically accurate. Noloop (talk) 05:22, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Just kidding. I'm neutral. Noloop (talk) 16:55, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Changed my mind again, preferring leadership in accuracy over popular misinformation. Noloop (talk) 17:01, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose for now. In Google scholar "Jesus-myth theory" gets 1 hit, compared to 46 for the current title. In Google books we have another ratio favoring the current title - 24 v. 263. It was also my impression that early works espousing the theory that are notable used this term.Griswaldo (talk) 05:28, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Strongly Oppose move If you go back through the archives you will see that I could find only one reference to Jesus myth hypothesis (Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_20) and that was to "Jesus myth" hypothesis (Turner, J.E. (1931) Revelation of Deity Macmillan company (Original from the University of California, originally from University of Liverpool) and as I pointed out back then what he is arguing is confusing as all get out. "Christ Myth Theory" seems to have the largest number of reference and most of the time is in reference to Drews books with in English is titled "Christ Myth" So "Christ Myth Theory" more accurately means "Christ Myth by Drews Theory". THis is all ignoring the fact the first book Wells admits to there be a historical Jesus behind Q is called Jesus myth as well as Jesus myth being the title of a 1971 "Jesus is historical" book by Andrew M. Greeley Furthermore, the phrase "Jesus myth" is like "Christ Myth" use in reference to the myth that grew up around a historical Jesus as well as Jesus never existed as a human being. IIRC, Burton Mack uses "Jesus myth" in this manner. IMHO you're just moving the punching bag and making things worse.--BruceGrubb (talk) 06:11, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• (EC) CMT doesn't describe what this article is about, since Christ means "anointed one" or whatever (basically supernatural). But, COMMON may mandate it, since JMT doesn't seem to be how people refer to it. There may be no good name. It really should be merged into "Historicity of Jesus", but I don't think that's going to happen. Barring that, we should name it as a spin out of that article. What name, I don't know. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:09, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
  • I was asked to take a second look after SV added those stats above. If "Jesus myth hypothesis" really is the COMMON name, then go with that (other than merging). One has to be careful with interpreting google searches, of course. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:28, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
    • Actually, it's complicated. I think Google Books is probably the best of the various searches, and it recommends "Christ myth". So, that's my final vote until I change my mind. "Jesus myth" is my second choice. It's much more accurate, but much less COMMON, and I think COMMON is more important that accuracy. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:34, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
    • Get rid of "theory". It's not helpful. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:36, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Support Because Jesus is being discussed as a historical person, not as "Christ" which is more related to belief rather than history.Civilizededucation (talk) 07:20, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Comment Please, in the name of sanity do not get read of "theory". The article is enough of a train wreck with "I see Christ Myth used this way" or "I see Jesus Myth used this way" coming up from time to time without opening the freaking flood gates. On the merging issue I think that Quest for the historical Jesus would be the more logical choice.--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:35, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
• Oppose Both titles are acceptable, no compelling reason for change. Google results suggest "Christ myth" being more commonly used in academic literature, no doubt because of the wording of one of the foundational books proposing the theory. The apparently contrary results on Google web may well be due to the effect of Wikipedia's own (former) choice being mirrored in many places. Retain "theory" as part of the title. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:39, 5 August 2010 (UTC)`
• Weak Oppose I changed my "oppose" to "weak" given the comments, although in this case I still think Google Books hits are more diagnostic than plain Google hits. Also, it seems to me that this theory calls attention to the crucifiction and resurrection and other (e.g. virgin birth) unnatural elements that are precisely what make Jesus "christ" and not just plain Jesus. Also, speaking personally, while I understand that many have used this theory to argue against the existence of any historical Jesus, it is my sense (and I admit I may be mistaken) that some (including many historians) have used this theory to argue that while a man named Jesus may have preached love and was believed to be a charismatic healer in the Galilee, what is myth is the claim that he was a god born of a virgin who was killed and resurrected, and that this myth was built of out of parts of other Hellenistic/ANE myths (e.g. Mithra), so the theory really is about the "christ" part more than the "Jesus" part. regardless of the number of opposes and supports, the key thing I think is that the article clearly and accurately explain the diverse views.Slrubenstein | Talk 09:28, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Actually Slrubenstein, what you are running into is the phrase "Christ Myth" being used in a different manner. Remsburg used "Christ Myth" the way you are described in The Christ (1909) saying while there was a 1st century teacher named Jesus the Gospels give us little if any insight to this man. Also Mead and Ellegard with their c100 BC historical Jesuses throw a monkey wrench in the "Jesus didn't exist as a historical person" definitions of Christ Myth Theory as they have been called mythists.--BruceGrubb (talk) 09:55, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

SLR, this is a good example of why Christ myth theory is a misleading title. The theory is not about the supernatural aspects being myth (everyone agrees with that, except the fundamentalist category). The theory is that Jesus did not exist as an historical figure. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 10:15, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Actually that is one definition largely based on Drews work, there are are others:

• Jesus of Nazareth didn't exist as an historical figure (to allow Mead and Ellegard with their historical c100 BC Jesuses to fall under the Christ Myth banner. Used by Price)
• Jesus began as at a Myth (Walsh)
• The Gospels are to mythologized that all trace of a historical person, if there was ever one was to begin with, has been lost. (Jesus agnosticism-used by Boyd-Eddy)
• The Gospel Jesus never existed (Doherty's and Holding's definitions)

As you can see from this just what the Christ myth theory is is somewhat of a mess.--BruceGrubb (talk) 10:52, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• In my comment I am thinking of Price and people like him. Slrubenstein | Talk 11:30, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Except your definition covers what Boyd-Eddy called the "legendary-Jesus thesis" which covers far more than most of what most of the material that actually bothers to define "Christ Myth theory" does.--BruceGrubb (talk) 20:38, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

I've been very slowly trying to read about this topic for the last few months so I can edit this article—and it has been slow because essentially I have little interest in the issue, but somehow got attached to it only after it ended up twice at FAC with some very strong language in it, and so my reading has been ponderous—but what is becoming every day clearer is twofold: (a) this article is a POV fork of Historicity of Jesus; and (b) that the Christ myth theory is that we're not in a position to say that Jesus existed, and we ought to stop being so certain about it. That's it.

You can build onto that basic plank that he was really a mythical trace of the Teacher of Righteousness, or that he was really a metaphor for the dying of winter and the coming of spring, or that he was really a dream of Paul's about people who were about to arrive in spaceships. You can also build onto it various conspiracy theories about the greatest lie ever told and how church fathers have deliberately hidden this or hidden that. This article used to focus on the wilder aspects, and still does more than it should, in order to discredit the theory and call it crazy fringe. But the fact remains that the essence of the article is who throughout the ages has argued—and sometimes argued quite sensibly—that there isn't enough evidence to indicate that Jesus existed. That should be in Historicity of Jesus, but if it has to be here it makes more sense to call it the Jesus myth theory, or just the Jesus myth, so that we cut out the religious aspect entirely. There is enough use of all these terms, so we can freely choose which one to use ourselves. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:20, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

If you got that just from reading the article the talk pages on this article are even worse. Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_8 (back in 2007) showed a concern about this being a POV fork by Jim62sch. Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_9 have even more concerns with ThAtSo flat out calling this article a WP:CFORK. In Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_21 User:Dbachmann again raised this issue (2009) and I agreed with him in Feb of that year asking "why does so much of the material on BOTH sides of this issue have problems? As I said elsewhere Creationism and New Chronology get better treatment than this and they are even more off the wall." By Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_22 User:Dbachmann seems to be to the point where nuking the article from orbit seemed to be a good idea. Hans Adler in Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_24 brought up the WP:CFORK issue again, in Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_28 Ttiotsw brought up WP:COATRACK concerns, and then you came on board in Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_30 with your WP:CFORK concerns. The article has improved much since then but as I pointed out in Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_21 many of the problems with this article is in the literature itself. When people bother to actually define it you get conflicting definitions that keep turning this into the monkey house of the week.--BruceGrubb (talk) 00:46, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

• Neutral I moved the article to its current title and I think that its the best choice based on the use of "Christ myth theory" in scholarly sources, but "Jesus myth theory" is also used in scholarly sources and pretty widely on the web. Honestly, I don't think it makes much difference either way. Arguments based on a distinction in meaning between "Christ" and "Jesus" don't strike me as compelling, because while these words mean different things to some people, you can find plenty of folks who use the two interchangeably. --Akhilleus (talk) 13:11, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Is there a general policy on how to handle it, when the most common name is widely regarded as a misnomer? I think even GA Wells chafed at the term. Ellegard's theory is that there was a historical figure who is the basis for the NT figure. The name is clearly misleading, yet common. The situation doesn't seem like it would be rare on Wikipedia, so I wonder if there's precedent. Noloop (talk) 16:59, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• Support Actually I would prefer Jesus Christ Legend Myth Hypothesis Theory, since that would get the most Google hits as long as you don't use quotes. (Sorry, just trying to inject some levity into a very serious debate.) PeaceLoveHarmony (talk) 18:13, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
• Comment Will it merge back into Historicity of Jesus. Because there is only a tiny part of this about the idea that Christ (the anointed one) is a myth (spiritual, heroic or legendary story not intended to have a historical basis). Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:54, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
• Comment While it is part of the Historicity of Jesus spectrum there is enough to show that it is regarded a quasi separate category--the problem keep being that there is not a uniform clean constancy about just what the bounties between it and the minimalist position are. This mess sort of reminds me of the chaotic mess old AD&D alignments were--you had clear descriptions of the extremes there too but where the exact boundaries between any two were was anyone's guess.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:21, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• There is no clean boundary between the Christ myth position and other minimalist positions, because they amount to the same thing depending on which words you stress. The search for a clean boundary is fruitless. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:27, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

• You are saying what I have been saying for years on these talk pages (see talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_12#removed_sentence_from_lead regarding the range of the definition)--BruceGrubb (talk) 01:49, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

In cleaning up this article remember that Inline citations are part of Wikipedia's MoS

To all editors I recommend following Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Inline_citations given the way this article gets changed about:

"An inline citation is a citation next to the material it supports, rather than at the end of the article. Inline citations are used to directly associate a given claim with a specific source."

In most cases, an inline citation is required, either in addition to, or instead of, a full citation in the References section, depending on which citation method is being used (see below). Inline citations show which specific part of the article a citation is being applied to. They are required by Wikipedia's verifiability policy for statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, including contentious material about living persons, and for all direct quotations. Inline citations are also mandated by Wikipedia's featured article criteria, where appropriate. An inline citation should appear next to the material it supports." (sic)

In short, Inline citations seem to be the preferred way to do cite things on Wikipedia especially in an article where nearly everything falls under challenged or likely to be challenged having citation within a sentences makes the most sense. I do think the article is growing at a some what frightening rate but am unclear what to do about it." (sic)--BruceGrubb (talk) 11:05, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Inline citations are needed, and they are in the article. But they don't need to be in the middle of a sentence. :) Usually the end of the paragraph is enough, or if it's a long paragraph or a contentious one, the end of sentences. The point is simply to maintain a reasonable degree of text-source integrity. When articles come up at FAC, if there's a lot of unnecessary refs inside sentences, the writers are usually asked to clean up. I'm not hugely bothered one way or the other, but it would be good if it could be avoided if it's not needed. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 11:11, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

"if the material is particularly contentious, the citation may be added within a sentence but adding it to the end of the sentence or paragraph is usually sufficient." Given the way sentences and paragraphs change putting it next to what we are referring makes sence. Otherwise you wind up with orphaned references that sit at the end of sentences and paragraphs that have no relation to what is in them anymore. Besides my field of anthropology thinks nothing of shoving inline citations in the middle of sentences--Look at "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" by Horace Miner for an example. Ironically Michel Grant is another one I actually cleaned up; that (I John 4:2) in the middle of a sentence is actually a Inline citation by Grant!--BruceGrubb (talk) 11:28, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Wells section

I changed the final paragraph of the Wells section to reflect what Akhilleus posted above, regarding what Wells actually said. He didn't mention Price or the others, only Boyd and Eddy. I've edited it to stick closely to what Wells said.

In response to being called the leading contemporary Christ myth theorist by Paul Eddy and Gregory Boyd in 2007, Wells clarified again in 2009 that in his books of 1996, 1999, and 2004, he repudiated the idea that Jesus is virtually and perhaps entirely fictional. He writes that he belongs in the category of those who argue that Jesus did exist, but that reports about him are so unreliable that we can know little or nothing about him. For a statement of his position, he refers readers to his article, "Jesus, Historicity of" in Tom Flynn's The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief (2007). He writes there that, while he is not as radical as in his 1975 work, he still argues that the story of the suffering and execution of Jesus under Pilate is non-historical.

Refs are:

• Wells, G. A. Cutting Jesus Down to Size. Open Court, 2009, pp. 327–328.
• Wells, G.A. in Tom Flynn. The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief. Prometheus Books, 2007, p. 446ff.

SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 11:50, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The only problem is this leaves Price, Richard Carrier, and Doherty either still calling or implying that Wells Post-Jesus Legend was in the Christ Myth theory camp. Price and Carrier are a real mess with Can We Trust the New Testament? (2005) with Price commenting that Wells was an "eminently worthy successor to radical 'Christ myth theorists..." right on the back of the very book and Carrier putting the book in the Ahistoricity category with Drews, Doherty, Liedner, Price, and Thomas Thompson in the Handout for the May 30 2006 Stanford University presentation he gave.--BruceGrubb (talk) 12:36, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

That doesn't matter. We can't account for the way everyone views Wells, and they're entitled to view him as they choose, no matter what he has said about himself. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:22, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, you just lost me. Are you saying that we should count him as a Christ Myther as Price, Richard Carrier, and Doherty do or take his challenging of Boyd-Eddy with Van Voorst as support to where his position is?--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:26, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

No, we just repeat what the sources say, without SYN violations. Wells said what he said, so we summarize that without putting words in his mouth. It may be inadequate, in that it didn't mention Price etc, but that was his decision. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:25, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, then do we note that Price, Richard Carrier, Doherty, and Boyd-Eddy put Wells in the Christ Myth/Jesus myther/ahistorial category but that he only corrected Boyd-Eddy on the point?--BruceGrubb (talk) 01:54, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Grant

I would like to remove this from the definition section:

Historian Michael Grant stated: "This skeptical way of thinking reached its culmination in the argument that Jesus as a human being never existed at all and is a myth. In ancient times, this extreme view was named the heresy of docetism (seeming) because it maintained that Jesus never came into the world "in the flesh", but only seemed to; (I John 4:2) and it was given some encouragement by Paul's lack of interest in his fleshly existence. Subsequently, from the eighteenth century onwards, there have been attempts to insist that Jesus did not even "seem" to exist, and that all tales of his appearance upon the earth were pure fiction. In particular, his story was compared to the pagan mythologies inventing fictitious dying and rising gods. (paragraph break) [sic] Some of the lines of thinking employed to disprove the Christ-myth theory have been somewhat injudicious."

It's just a stand-alone quote with no attempt to summarize his views. It doesn't fit the surrounding text, in that it begins with "this skeptical way of thinking," whereas the previous sentence describes a non-skeptical way of thinking. It adds nothing that hasn't been said already, except the bit about docetism and it's far from clear how that fits in.

I don't know what the "paragraph break" was added for. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 23:22, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The (paragraph break) is because Wikipedia doesn't make duplicating the exact format used easy. Here is a fuller quote with everything exactly as it appears in version I am using:

"In reaction against this "criticism conducted under church bells", Wilhelm Bousset has put forward the opposite proposition: "If we believe and honour, we no longer see objectively." According to his view, then, only an unbeliever could write a truly historical record of Jesus; [8] and Schweitzer, who liked a paradox, pointed out that some of the greatest of Jesus' Lives were written with hate. [9] Certainly, some partial measure of scepticism regarding the Gospel stories is inevitable, if historical standards are going to be applied. And it started extremely early, even inside the church. Indeed, it goes back to the new Testament itself, in which Martha commented that Jesus could not possibly raise Lazarus from the dead since his body was already decomposing. [10] In the third century, too, the Christian philosopher Origen conceded to his pagan opponents that some passages in the Gospels were by no means literally true, and indeed both absurd and impossible.

This sceptical way of thinking reached its culmination in the argument that Jesus as a human being never existed at all and is a myth. In ancient times, this extreme view was named the heresy of docetism (seeming) because it maintained that Jesus never came into the world "in the fles", but only seemed to; [11] and it was given some encouragement by Paul's lack of interest in his fleshly existence. Subsequently, from the eighteenth century onwards, there have been attempts to insist that Jesus did not even "seem" to exist, and that all tales of his appearance upon the earth were pure fiction. In particular, his story was cmpared to the pagan mythologies inventing fictitious dying and rising gods.

Some of the lines of thinking employed to disprove the Christ-myth theory have been somewhat injudicious. For example, the student of history, accustomed to the "play of the contingent and unforseen", will remain unimpressed by the argument that the vast subsequent developments of Christianity must have been launched from imposing beginnings, or that mighty religions must necessarily have derived from mighty founders: some, notably Hinduism, have not." (Attitudes to the Evidence cross referenced to (Grant, Michael. Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels. Scribner, 1995; first published 1977, p. 199))

[8] Quoted by G.E. Ladd, The New Testament and Criticism (Hodder & Stoughton, 1970 ed.), p. 153.

[9] A. Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, op. cit., p. 4.

[10] John 11:39.

[11] I John 4:2.

Does THAT help or make things worse?--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:38, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Worse, We still do not have context because you are cutting and pasting together different sections of his writing, and it seems you are promoting a novel synthesis of the material. Hardyplants (talk)

There are a lot of SYN violations (original research) in this article, where people have chosen a factoid here and another one there, and pushed them together. We see a lot of sentences with multiple refs in them. "A argued that X—which is the view that Y is not good—is a better solution than Z." But which source is making which point?

The Grant quote isn't quite as bad as that, but it's heading in the same direction. What is the benefit of including it? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:01, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Personally, I don't think there's much benefit in including this bit. I think SV's proposal to remove it is a good idea. --Akhilleus (talk) 01:02, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

What's the benefit of including it? It shows just how messed up some of the material that defines Christ Myth theory is. Hardyplants as for "cutting and pasting together different sections of his writing" if you has bothered to follows the link you would have seen the final quote is straight from the article with no editing except for formating with everything exactly as it was. While you are at it I suggest you go over to Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_12#Grant:_what.27s_the_full_quote.3F explain how what I did was any different from what Akhilleus did all those years ago.--BruceGrubb (talk) 02:13, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

I think we should remove it until we can say clearly what the point of it is, and what it's saying. I'm also inclined to remove Marshall, because what he's saying is a little obvious:

However, biblical scholar I. Howard Marshall writes that there are "two views of the historical Jesus which stand at the opposite ends of a spectrum of opinion about him." At one extreme is the view that Jesus never existed, and that the gospels describe an essentially fictional person. At the other extreme is the view that the gospels portray events exactly as they happened, and each event depicted in the New Testament is the literal truth.[7]

Clearly there are two ends of the spectrum, and clearly each end will be an extreme. I wonder whether we really need to point that out. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 03:54, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Given the on again off again we have had over the years that Christ Myth theory is somehow separate from the historical Jesus idea we really need this. Besides it serves as a good transition between Walsh and Boyd-Eddy, is reliable, and gives a much broader range than Boyd-Eddy.--BruceGrubb (talk) 04:09, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

The Marshall quote doesn't help with that, though. It just says there is a spectrum and it has two ends (as of course it must). That's what Eddy and Boyd say immediately afterwards, so it's just repetition. What does Marshall say that Eddy and Boyd do not say? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 05:13, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Well here is how Marshall exactly describes the far historical end: "the Gospels give us a picture of the historical Jesus, every detail in the Gospels being recorded just as it happened." Now contrast that with Boyd-Eddy's far more moderate historical end: "these scholars maintain that historical research can indeed disclose a good deal of reliable information about the historical Jesus". Since Boyd-Eddy is arguing against the other three categories in favor of his remaining category it makes sense that he cut it off before he get to the extreme "every detail in the Gospels being recorded just as it happened" end of the full spectrum. Boyd-Eddy on Pg 32 has our old favorites including Thallus and on page 173 goes into detail. Richard Carrier give two articles regarding Thallus Jacoby and Müller on "Thallus" (1999) and Thallus: an Analysis (1999), as well as R.T. France (Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_14) making me question Boyd-Eddy's reasoning for even trying to use Thallus.--BruceGrubb (talk) 07:38, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

The people we include in the "development of the theory" section

I want to make sure that we are including examples of proponents—in the "development of the theory" section—whose arguments academics have responded to at some point—either as myth theorists proper, or as people who paved the way by engaging in radical questioning.

My worry is that we have included a few to make the Jesus myth theory seem less serious. But we could include examples of less-serious arguments in favour of Jesus's existence too to make that belief look lightweight. Our job here is to highlight the most coherent, the people serious sources have responded to, or people serious sources have included in the history of the idea. Is that true of all examples? I'm listing below examples of who has discussed whom (discussed might mean just a mention), whether those sources are currently cited in our article or not—and the ones I mention are just examples; most have been cited multiple times.

1. Charles François Dupuis and Constantin-François Chassebœuf, discussed by Albert Schweitzer in The Quest of the Historical Jesus.
2. David Strauss, discussed by James Beilby and Paul Eddy in The Quest for the Historical Jesus, and by Thomas L. Thompson in "The Messiah Myth.
3. Bruno Bauer, discussed by Beilby and Eddy
4. Radical Dutch school, discussed by Schweitzer
5. J.M. Robertson, discussed by Schweitzer
6. William Benjamin Smith, discussed by Robert E. Van Voorst
7. Arthur Drews, discussed by Brian Gerrish
8. Paul-Louis Couchoud discussed by Walter P. Weaver
9. John M. Allegro, discussed by Michael Martin in The Case Against Christianity
10. G. A. Wells, discussed by Graham Stanton
11. Alvar Ellegård, discussed by Matti Klinge
12. Thomas L. Thompson, discussed by Clyde Edward Brown
13. Robert M. Price, discussed by Doulas A. Jacoby
14. Earl Doherty, discussed by Robert M. Price (does anyone know where offhand?)
15. Albert Kalthoff, apparently discussed by Schweitzer, though I haven't checked that.
16. Peter Jensen, ditto.
17. Joseph Wheless, discussed by?
18. Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy, discussed by?
19. D.M. Murdock, discussed by?
20. Tom Harpur, discussed by?

I've placed in bold the ones it would be good to find secondary sources for, either as explicit myth proponents, or as people whose ideas were part of the development of the movement. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:28, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Schweitzer discusses Jensen on pp. 369-372 of this edition of the Quest of the Historical Jesus; also pp. 432, 435. Apparently Jensen started off by claiming that both Jesus and Paul were mythical figures, and then later allowed that there might have been a historical Jesus; he argued that the NT figure of Jesus was adapted from the Epic of Gilgamesh.

Schweitzer discusses Kalthoff on pp. 279-283 of Quest. My impression is that Jensen and Kalthoff are not very influential figures, and that if there's cutting to be done in this section, they could be candidates.

I'm pretty sure Bennett discusses D.M. Murdock/Acharya S, but I don't have his book handy. --Akhilleus (talk) 01:48, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, this is helpful. I'll take a look around for Bennett. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:56, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Bennett's In search of Jesus: insider and outsider images is searchable through google books (found D.M. Murdock under Acharya S), . Looking for some of the others.--BruceGrubb (talk) 02:23, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Joseph Wheless, discussed by Bennett

Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy --having a problem finding someone who is reliable.--BruceGrubb (talk) 02:30, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

"A historical" or "an historical"?

We currently say both, so we should choose. My preference is "an historical"; "a historical" always looks like an error to me. But I don't mind so long as we're consistent. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 06:46, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

IIRC we has a debate on this. Strictly speaking "an historical" is more gramically correct but "a historical" is what is more commonly used:

• "In some cases where "h" is pronounced, such as "historical," use an:
• An historical event is worth recording."

In writing, "a historical event" is more commonly used.(Purdue Online Writing Lab)

Personally I think "a historical" could too easily mistaken for or mistyped as "ahistorical" something totally different but as long as it is consistent I don't really care.--BruceGrubb (talk) 08:14, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

I've always thought that "an historical" was the correct choice. ^^James^^ (talk) 10:48, 6 August 2010 (UTC)