For instance Independent contemporary reports, preferably 1st hand. There are none for Jesus. Not even 2nd hand. The oldest parts of the Bible are from 50 years or later after the fact, and written quite some distance away from where it should have allegedly happened, by anonymous writers. The names we apply are fake.
This lack of evidence, is despite the search for evidence of Jesus is by far the greatest ever undertaken. The Catholic Church have spend almost 2000 years now looking for it (since about 2nd century). They have spend huge amounts of money and manpower. That alone is more than anything else, but on top of that, you have for instance Later Day Saints, who have also attempted to find historical evidence. Along with many many other Christian and even non Christian organisations.
To be frank, it’s amazing nobody haven’t been able to make fake evidence that is widely believed. The so called evidence there is, is only called evidence by Christian historians, and does not pass the requirements for actual historical evidence.
Jesus is a fairy tale, It’s very clear if you investigate the history of Christianity, that Jesus was a myth.
It’s also clear if you investigate philosophy at the time, that it was widely believed that something imagined could be believed to be real if you believed it hard enough. We even have some of it today, with for instance faith healing, prosperity gospel, and the idea that if something is imagined to be perfect it must exist, otherwise it isn’t perfect.
Unless you already know, people 2000 years ago, on average, weren’t exactly smarter and more enlightened than people of today. They didn’t even have the scientific method, to show how real knowledge about our world can be achieved way more reliably than with religion.
So superstition was widespread to the extreme, and myths were easily believed.
Christianity being probably the most powerful myth of the time, was believed exactly because it seemed powerful. The same way some Africans name their children Hitler, because it’s a name of power.
So Jesus and god were imagined as being perfect, ergo they must have been real. That’s what it basically boils down to. And there is a surprising LACK of evidence for his existence, making the only rational conclusion that he probably didn’t exist. Not even as one or more normal humans, that have later been build a story around.
Not sure if this a strawman or hyperbole, maybe both.
For most people we have very reasonable claims, consistent stories, and first hand accounts. For Jesus we have absurd claims, inconsistent stories, and hearsay accounts.
Not firsthand: they are all written in Greek not in Aramaic, they reference an event that hasn’t happened yet, none of the apostles (don’t even try Luke) were literate, the Gospels show sophisticated use of writing techniques and references to myths the apostles would not have heard, stuff is missing that should be in there, exact copies of text are found word for word across them, you can see traces of the arguments that were going on decades later, and the godpels dont even claim to be first hand. Oh and the geography of Mark is totally off.
They are not consistent: go ahead and answer these questions
Where was Jesus born? 2. Why did the family go to Bethlehem? 3. Tell me his lineage. 4. What year was he born? 5. How many trips to Jerusalem did he make? 6. How long was the ministry? 7. When did the curtain rip? 8 Who exactly went to the cave? 9. Was the rock there or was it moved? 9
What did they see at the cave? 10. How long was Jesus back on earth for? 11. Was the trial brief like Mark or sitcommish long like in John? 12. What did he say on the cross? 13. What did he say on the way to the cross? 14. What animal(s) did he ride? 15. Did he rebuke the leaper at the temple or not?
These are all off the top of my head. There are hundreds out there.
No history is consistent. It is the nature of history being derived from human perspective. As the line goes in Memento “Memory can change the shape of a room; it can change the colour of a car.” This is true. Good historians analyze a wide variety of sources and then corroborate them to discover the truth. Sure there are inconsistencies in the Gospels, but if you measure their accounts to the same standard that other histories are measured, the Gospels are remarkably consistent compared to other historical texts that we trust anyway.
“…and not firsthand.”
Have you any grounds for such assertion? An honest approach to history tells us that three out of the four Gospel writers would have known this Jesus of Nazareth in person, and the fourth interviewed hundreds of people who did experience Jesus of Nazareth and the surrounding events firsthand. Unless you have reason to doubt the dozens of historical accounts that corroborate the existence of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John we have all reason to believe that the Gospel accounts are first or second hand.
.
“Not based on firsthand accounts because the events happened in Aramaic and then written in Greek.”
If this is how a “firsthand account” is measured, then we have no reason to trust a practically all of Roman history. Romans wrote in latin, even if they were writing about events that transpired in other languages all across the Roman empire. Josephus then, should be tossed out, and Tacitus, and Plutarch, and others who all wrote latin histories of non-latin people founded on firsthand accounts–not to mention much English contemporary chronicle. The traditional style of history of that day–founded by the Greek historians Herodotus and Thucydides–was based on interviewing hundreds, even thousands, of firsthand witnesses. I do not even comprehend how a chronicle being written in a different language than in which the events occurred would in any way disqualify it from being validly sourced. One must always consider the audience of a text, and the Gospel writers weren’t writing books for a relatively small portion of Aramaic-speaking people, but for the entirety of Asia Minor–which spoke Greek.
It’s also important to note that all historical dialogue not recorded on an audio recording device or a direct transcript is more likely than not a paraphrase. Paraphrase is the important note here, it is highly likely that dialogue has been changed in some respect (like the language), but that the content of the dialogue would be largely the same.
“An event that has not happened yet.”
What event “has not happened yet.” There are no grounds for this assertion unless other historians date the life of Jesus of Nazareth to a different period. Even if there were such accounts that exist firsthand, they would be of a minority historical opinion.
"On ‘sophisticated’ writing.
The Gospels are somewhat unsophisticated as they are written in Greek and not Latin during the Roman Empire, but I agree that they are remarkably sophisticated in technique. Now again, we have no grounds to assert that the Gospels are not firsthand accounts because the people that wrote them were “unsophisticated.” We know who the Gospel writers were, and even if they were illiterate, it is highly likely that they dictated the work to a scribe–who would have been well trained in sophisticate writing. Why not “try” Luke? It sounds like you are simply trying to invalidate him as an option as he is the most likely of the four to be educated. There’s also Matthew who was a tax collector who would have likely been literate. John himself claimed to write several books after as well (1,2,3 John and Revelation)
"There are myths in the Gospels the Apostles would not have heard.
I don’t know what “myths” you believe you are referring to nor how this would prove anything. It is simply impossible to prove that an individual did not hear a myth. It is possible to prove if someone heard a myth, and it is proven by if they recount that myth. It then follows that if the Gospel writers are who they say they are, they would have heard said myth even if it was unlikely. Since myths are usually oral tradition, it is strictly impossible to date their origin accurately.
“Stuff is missing that should be there.”
What is this “stuff”? How do you know it exists? How do you know that it should be in the Gospel accounts. There are all sorts of “stuff” historians leave out for various reasons mostly indiscernible to the modern reader. Why would something not being there also change the nature of whether or not an account is valid historically. History is built on the selection of important events and the leaving out of unimportant ones. Different historians believe different events are more or less important, which is how we get vastly different accounts of the same histories.
“Exact copies of text are found word for word between them”
I do not know what sections you are referring to because the English translation does not have large passages that are word for word between them–which is strange because I would expect any translator with his head screwed on properly to translate passages that are the same as the same. Neither does this really mean anything as to the accuracy of the Gospels as they witnessed the same events.
“You can see traces of arguments that were going on decades later.”
What arguments are you referring to? If there were arguments going on decades later, than I expect they were caused by the Gospels. Arguments don’t just exist out of nothing, they come about because of differences in interpretation of texts and events.
“The Gospels don’t claim to be firsthand”
The Gospels do claim to be firsthand if I am remembering properly, but whether or not they claim to be firsthand would not change whether or not the Gospels are actually firsthand.
“The geography of Mark is totally off.”
If we measure Mark’s account against other histories of that time, we discover that before the advent of geographically triangulated maps in the Early Modern Era all historians are pretty terrible geographers. Geography, also, in no way damages the veracity of accounts.
“The questions that I refuse to answer.”
You are simply asking the wrong questions. These are detail oriented questions, which different historians with different processes of selection, will always get differently. Some are better, like “where was Jesus born” but have a fairly reasonable answer (Bethlehem) that other accounts do not contradict. These questions are unfair to ask of any historian, so why apply such a standard only to the Gospels.
These questions are all questions that automatically assume that the Gospels are incorrect, instead of being reasonably minded questions of whether or not the claims of the text are true. The question “why did the family go to Bethlehem” only makes sense if you first assume that there was no Roman census. All of these questions are loaded, it assumes that the Gospel answer is wrong, so when someone gives the fairly reasonable answer provided by historical texts that corroborate on the issue (like the Gospels) they can say 'ha gotcha! You’re wrong!" There is no answer other than that, but you can always ask, how do you know this?
none of the four gospels even make the claim to be eyewitness to Jesus!
what you claim is “all the reason to believe” is literally an indirect assumption(and cope) that, “well the writers must have at least known someone who knew Jesus, because that is the only way they could have obtained that information!”. this assumes the information wasn’t made up narratively.
i find it weird that you attacked the very idea of asserting that the gospels never witnessed Jesus when there’s nothing to directly suggest so even from the gospels themselves…
your logic is literally “4 people wrote about Nosferatu, therefore Nosferatu can be historically assumed to exist.”
you can worm your assumtion even deeper by also making the claim that “anything that looks like what people describe to be Nosferatu is, IS Nosferatu”, which is a massive logical fallacy.
even something like a direct eyewitness account of what appears to be a real a man transforming into a bat would not prove that man was Nosferatu…
hell, this wouldn’t even prove that the man was a vampire as opposed to a zillion other narrative shape shifting ideas which are more accurate in describing what truly happened, or even that the person turned into a bat at all! it could have been an incredibly clever magic trick.
history is ultimately an incredibly unreliable source of true facts. there are some things in history we can be reasonably sure of, such as the evolution of language, in which historical texts themselves would count as a sort of evidence if we can confirm the age of the texts, but otherwise, evidence has to confirm history, not the other way around…
i heard someone put it well, that if you had to fight a court case to prove that Jesus existed, you would lose based on hear-say and a lack of evidence, as well as having a ton of reasonable doubt for anyone claiming John Wick or whoever existed based on words in a book alone.
Don’t care about pretty sure, I care about evidence. Please show me primary evidence of his existence.
How do you know anyone existed in history? You cant have the bodies of every historical figure. This happened 2000 years ago.
For instance Independent contemporary reports, preferably 1st hand. There are none for Jesus. Not even 2nd hand. The oldest parts of the Bible are from 50 years or later after the fact, and written quite some distance away from where it should have allegedly happened, by anonymous writers. The names we apply are fake.
This lack of evidence, is despite the search for evidence of Jesus is by far the greatest ever undertaken. The Catholic Church have spend almost 2000 years now looking for it (since about 2nd century). They have spend huge amounts of money and manpower. That alone is more than anything else, but on top of that, you have for instance Later Day Saints, who have also attempted to find historical evidence. Along with many many other Christian and even non Christian organisations.
To be frank, it’s amazing nobody haven’t been able to make fake evidence that is widely believed. The so called evidence there is, is only called evidence by Christian historians, and does not pass the requirements for actual historical evidence.
Jesus is a fairy tale, It’s very clear if you investigate the history of Christianity, that Jesus was a myth.
It’s also clear if you investigate philosophy at the time, that it was widely believed that something imagined could be believed to be real if you believed it hard enough. We even have some of it today, with for instance faith healing, prosperity gospel, and the idea that if something is imagined to be perfect it must exist, otherwise it isn’t perfect.
Unless you already know, people 2000 years ago, on average, weren’t exactly smarter and more enlightened than people of today. They didn’t even have the scientific method, to show how real knowledge about our world can be achieved way more reliably than with religion. So superstition was widespread to the extreme, and myths were easily believed.
Christianity being probably the most powerful myth of the time, was believed exactly because it seemed powerful. The same way some Africans name their children Hitler, because it’s a name of power.
So Jesus and god were imagined as being perfect, ergo they must have been real. That’s what it basically boils down to. And there is a surprising LACK of evidence for his existence, making the only rational conclusion that he probably didn’t exist. Not even as one or more normal humans, that have later been build a story around.
Not sure if this a strawman or hyperbole, maybe both.
For most people we have very reasonable claims, consistent stories, and first hand accounts. For Jesus we have absurd claims, inconsistent stories, and hearsay accounts.
The four gospels are pretty consistent and are literally firsthand???
They are no consistent and are not firsthand.
Not firsthand: they are all written in Greek not in Aramaic, they reference an event that hasn’t happened yet, none of the apostles (don’t even try Luke) were literate, the Gospels show sophisticated use of writing techniques and references to myths the apostles would not have heard, stuff is missing that should be in there, exact copies of text are found word for word across them, you can see traces of the arguments that were going on decades later, and the godpels dont even claim to be first hand. Oh and the geography of Mark is totally off.
They are not consistent: go ahead and answer these questions
These are all off the top of my head. There are hundreds out there.
“They are not consistent…”
“…and not firsthand.”
. “Not based on firsthand accounts because the events happened in Aramaic and then written in Greek.”
“An event that has not happened yet.”
"On ‘sophisticated’ writing.
"There are myths in the Gospels the Apostles would not have heard.
“Stuff is missing that should be there.”
“Exact copies of text are found word for word between them”
“You can see traces of arguments that were going on decades later.”
“The Gospels don’t claim to be firsthand”
“The geography of Mark is totally off.”
“The questions that I refuse to answer.”
none of the four gospels even make the claim to be eyewitness to Jesus!
what you claim is “all the reason to believe” is literally an indirect assumption(and cope) that, “well the writers must have at least known someone who knew Jesus, because that is the only way they could have obtained that information!”. this assumes the information wasn’t made up narratively.
i find it weird that you attacked the very idea of asserting that the gospels never witnessed Jesus when there’s nothing to directly suggest so even from the gospels themselves…
your logic is literally “4 people wrote about Nosferatu, therefore Nosferatu can be historically assumed to exist.”
you can worm your assumtion even deeper by also making the claim that “anything that looks like what people describe to be Nosferatu is, IS Nosferatu”, which is a massive logical fallacy.
even something like a direct eyewitness account of what appears to be a real a man transforming into a bat would not prove that man was Nosferatu…
hell, this wouldn’t even prove that the man was a vampire as opposed to a zillion other narrative shape shifting ideas which are more accurate in describing what truly happened, or even that the person turned into a bat at all! it could have been an incredibly clever magic trick.
history is ultimately an incredibly unreliable source of true facts. there are some things in history we can be reasonably sure of, such as the evolution of language, in which historical texts themselves would count as a sort of evidence if we can confirm the age of the texts, but otherwise, evidence has to confirm history, not the other way around…
i heard someone put it well, that if you had to fight a court case to prove that Jesus existed, you would lose based on hear-say and a lack of evidence, as well as having a ton of reasonable doubt for anyone claiming John Wick or whoever existed based on words in a book alone.