the mythical theory of Christ (also known as the theory of Jesus myth , Jesus mythicism , mythicism , or Theory of ahistorisitas Jesus ) is "the view that the man known as Jesus of Nazareth has no historical existence." Or, in the case given by Bart Ehrman per his critique of mythicism, "the historical Jesus does not exist, or if he does, it has little to do with the founding of Christianity."
According to myth, the stories of Jesus are largely, or fully, of the mystical realm; and if there is a historical Jesus, almost nothing can be known about him. Most Christian myths follow three arguments: they question the reliability of Paul's letters and the Gospels concerning the historicity of Jesus; they noted the lack of information about Jesus in non-Christian sources from the first and early second centuries; and they argue that early Christianity was syncretic and mythological from the beginning, as reflected in both the letters of Paul and the Gospel. Christianity, therefore, is not based on a shared memory of a human being, but rather a shared myth.
The mythical theory of Christ is a peripheral theory, supported by several specialists who bertenor or emeritus in biblical criticism or cognate discipline. This is distorted from the mainstream view of history, namely that while the Gospels include many legendary elements, this is a religious explanation added to the stories of historical Jesus crucified in the province of first century Judea.
Video Christ myth theory
Jesus and the origins of Christianity
The rapid Christian origins and revival, as well as the historical Jesus and the historicity of Jesus, is a matter of long debates in theological and historical research. While Christianity may begin with the early core of Jesus 'followers, within a few years after Jesus' supposed death in c. AD 33 , in As Paul began to preach, a number of "Jesus-movements" appeared to have existed, spreading different interpretations of Jesus' teachings. A central question is how these communities flourish and what their original beliefs are, as various beliefs and ideas can be found in early Christianity, including adoptionism and doketisme, as well as the Gnostic tradition that uses Christian imagery, all of which are perceived to be heretical by the proto- orthodox.
Mainstream scholarship sees Jesus as a real person who is subsequently deified, while traditional Christian theology and dogma see Jesus as God's incarnate on earth. Mythicists take another approach, assuming a widespread set of Jewish ideas about aspects of God's personification, which later became historic when proto-Christian spread among non-Jews.
Mainstream history view
Jesus is being studied by a number of disciplines, using a variety of textual critical methods. These critical methods, and the search for the historical Jesus, have led to the demythologization of Jesus, and the mainstream historical view is that while the Gospels incorporate mythical or legendary elements, this is a religious interpretation of the life and death of the historical Jesus who dwells Roman Palestine of the 1st century. While scholars differ on the historicity of certain episodes described in biblical accounts of Jesus, baptism and crucifixion are two events in Jesus' life that are subject to "almost universal agreement". According to historian Alanna Nobbs,
While the historical and theological debates remain about the actions and significance of this character, his fame as a teacher, and his crucifixion under Father Pontius Pilate, can be described as a particular history.
New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman states that Jesus "must exist, for almost every competent scholar of ancient, Christian or non-Christian, agrees," and also states that the existence of Jesus and his crucifixion by the Romans is evidenced by various sources including Josephus Tacitus.
Although there is widespread scientific agreement about the existence of Jesus as a historical figure, the portraits of Jesus are often different from each other and from the images depicted in the Gospel narratives.
Traditional and modern Christian views
Traditional Christian theology and dogma view Jesus as the incarnation of God/Christ on earth and as Messiah, whose death is a sacrifice that results in redemption for all who believe that Jesus is the Christ. According to Christian tradition, the Gospel and the letters of Paul are inspired writings, which tell us in a reliable way about the birth and life of Jesus, his ministry and speech, and his crucifixion and resurrection, according to God's plan.
Liberal theology, following the demythologization of Jesus, emphasized his earthly life as an example model to follow by Christians.
Christ myth Theorist
Most mythologists, like mainstream scholarship, note that Christianity develops in Hellenistic Judaism, which is influenced by Hellenism. Early Christianity, and the stories of Jesus must be understood in this context. Departing from general science, mythologists argue that Jesus' stories are largely, or entirely, of a mythical nature, questioning the mainstream paradigm of historical Jesus in the early first century that was deified.
Carriers and other mythologists are critical of the conclusions and prejudices of proponents of historicity, questioning the value of consensus as the criterion for the historicity of Jesus.
Some moderate writers, especially Wells, argue that there may be a historical Jesus, but that this historic Jesus is united with another Jesus tradition, Christ's mythological Christ. Others, especially early Wells and Alvar EllegÃÆ' Â¥ rd, argue that Jesus Paul probably lived much earlier, in the vague past.
The most radical myths hold, in the terms given by Price, the point of view of "atheism of Jesus," ie, there is no historical Jesus, only mythological character, and the myth of his incarnation, death, and glorification. This character evolved from the syncretistic synthesis of Jewish, Hellenistic and Middle Eastern thought; put forward by Paul; and historic in the Gospels, which are also syncretistic. The leading "Atheists" are Paul-Louis Couchoud, Earl Doherty, Thomas L. Brodie, and Richard Carrier.
Some other writers argue for the point of view of Jesus agnosticism. That is, we can not conclude whether there is a historical Jesus. And if there is a historical Jesus, almost nothing can be known about him. Leading agnosticists are Robert Price, Thomas L. Thompson, and Raphael Lataster.
While supporters such as Earl Doherty, Price, and Carrier, concerned with the origins of Christianity and the origin of Christ, the perception and debate about the mythical theory of Christ increasingly turn to the simpler question of whether Jesus exists or not and as a result some scholars propose a more moderate position.
Maps Christ myth theory
Arguments
According to New Testament scholar Robert Van Voorst, most Christian myths follow three arguments: they question the reliability of Paul's letters and the Gospel on the historicity of Jesus; they noted the lack of information about Jesus in non-Christian sources from the first and early second centuries; and they argue that early Christianity was syncretic and mythological from the beginning.
Overview of main arguments
Most mythologists of Christ argue that the evidence of the existence of the historical Jesus Christ is the weakest, pointing to a series of perceived peculiarities in sources they deem unbelievable for a historical record. Early Christian and other sources lacked biographical information about Jesus, called the argument of silence. Instead, Christ of Paul and Jesus of the Gospels has a mythical and allegorical nature. They further argue that the Gospels are a composite of the various lines of thought, dependent on Jewish writings, and record the similarity of early Christianity and the figure of Christ with the mystery religions of the Greco-Roman world.
- Jesus Paul is a heavenly being, not a historical person, or may live in a bleak past - Paul's letters are older than the gospels but, in spite of several possible passages is an insertion, not referring to the historical Jesus living in the flesh of the Earth, nor does it quote anything from Jesus. There is no complete biographical information as expected if Jesus was contemporaries of Paul; on the contrary, Paul calls Jesus a supreme being. Therefore, Paul may have written about the mythical entity, the heavenly god, "a patterned rescue character after similar figures in ancient mystery religions" named Jesus; or historical people who may live in a bleak past, long before the beginning of the General Era.
- The gospels are not historical records - although the Gospels seem to present a historical framework, they are not historical records, but theological writings, based on various sources and influences, including Old Testament Writings, stoic Greek philosophy and Philo's exegetical methods. The Gospel genre is a legendary myth or fiction that has imposed a "fictitious historical narrative" on the "myth of the cosmic rescue myth" by unifying the pseudo-historical Jesus traditions, especially the "supernatural figures" of letters and "Paul's ideas" literature of Jewish Wisdom ".
- No independent eyewitness account - No independent survivor eyewitness accounts, despite the fact that many writers wrote at the time. The early Roman accounts of the second century contain little evidence and may depend on Christian sources.
- Diversity in early Christianity, and parallels with other religions - Early Christianity was very diverse and syncretic, sharing philosophical ideas and common religion with other religions at the time. Its origins can not be traced to a single group of founders, but must have been rooted in a wider religious movement. It appeared in the Greco-Roman world in the first and second centuries, which synthesized the Greek and Jewish philosophy of the Second Temple period. Parallels with other religions include ideas from aspects personified from God, proto-Gnostic iden- tions, and safety figures displayed in mystery religions, which are often (but not always) risen gods and rise up.
The Pauline epistles
Dating
Main view
The seven disputed Pauline letters considered by scientific consensus to be genuine letters are generally dated 50-60 AD (ie about twenty to thirty years after the period of time generally accepted for the death of Jesus around AD 30-36) and is the earliest surviving Christian text that may include information about Jesus.
Mythicist View
Some myths have questioned the initial calendar of the letters, increasing the likelihood that they represent a more advanced early Christian thought path.
The theologian Willem Christiaan van Manen from the Dutch school of radical criticism records various anachronisms in Paul's Epistles. Van Manen claims that they can not be written in their final form earlier than the 2nd century. He also noted that the Marcionite school was the first to publish the letters, and that Marcion ( c. 85 - c. 160 ) uses it as a justification for his gnostic views and his doctrine that the incarnation of Jesus is not in the physical body. Van Manen also studied Galatia Marcion's version differently from the canonical version, and argues that the canonical version is a later revision that does not emphasize the Gnostic aspect.
Price writes that "the problem of the historical Jesus replicates itself in the case of Paul," and that his letters have the same restrictions as the Gospel as historical evidence. Price sees letters as a compilation of fragments (possibly with a Gnostic core), and argues that Marcion is responsible for many corpus Pauline's or even writes his own letters, while criticizing the mistakes of ad hominem fault myths, the myth theory that holds the first medieval date of the letters (eg Galatians are conventionally dated <533 AD 53 ) for their own apology of reason. Price argues that passages like Galatians 1: 18-20, Galatians 4: 4 and 1 Corinthians 15: 3-11 are late Catholic interpolations and that 1 Thessalonians 2: 14-16 is unlikely to be written by Jews.
Lack of biographical information
Mainstream view
Modern biblical scholarship records that "Paul tells relatively little about Jesus' biographical information," regarded Jesus as "a contemporary one." Bishop and historian Paul Barnett explain it
The lack of Paul's detailed reference to the historical Christ is usually explained in one of two ways: does Paul only know that there is such a person but know (or care to know) a bit more (Bultmann), or he knows enough but need not elaborate this in his letters are beyond what his readers already know.
Mythicists View
Wells criticized the inaccuracy of reference to Jesus in Paul's letters and said there was no information in it about Jesus' parents, birthplace, doctrine, trial or crucifixion. Robert Price notes that Paul does not refer to Jesus' earthly life, nor does that life possibly provide the right example and justification for Paul's teaching. Rather, revelation seems to be a major source of Paul's knowledge of Jesus.
Wells also notes that Paul's letters do not refer to Jesus' words, or only in a vague and general sense. According to Wells, as meant by Price in his own words, the New Testament writers "must have quoted it when the same subject appeared in the situation they were in."
Celestial beings
Main view
Most scholars view the letters of Paul as important elements in the study of the historical Jesus, and the development of early Christianity. The New Testament scholar James Dunn states that in 1 Corinthians 15: 3 Paul "reads the basic belief," namely "that Christ died." According to Dunn, "Paul was told about a Jesus who had died two years earlier or more." 1 Corinthians 15:11 also refers to others before Paul preaching the creed. Additional elements in Paul's letters relating to the existence of Jesus and himself as a Jew including Galatians 4: 4 which states that he was "born of a woman" and Romans 1: 3 that he was "born under law".
The letters of Paul include a creed, or confession of faith, which precedes Paul, and provides important information about the early Jerusalem community faith around James, the 'brother of Jesus'. Paul's letters contain elements of the myth of Christ and his cult, like Christ's singing from Philippians 2: 6-11, which describes Jesus as incarnate and then exalted with perseverance. This pre-Pauline creed dates within a few years of Jesus' death and flourished in the Christian community in Jerusalem. Scholars see this as an indication that the incarnation and glorification of Jesus were part of the Christian tradition several years after his death and more than a decade before the writing of Paul's letters.
However, the development of early Christian views on the divinity of Jesus is a matter of debate in contemporary scholarship. According to a long-standing consensus, the earliest Christology is "Christendom of exaltation," which according to Jesus later "was elevated to divine status." This "exaltation Christology" may have evolved from time to time, as witnessed in the Gospels, with the earliest Christians believing that Jesus became divine when he was resurrected. The next belief shifts the exaltation to baptism, birth, and then to the idea of ​​its eternal existence, as witnessed in the Gospel of John. This "High Christology" is "the view that Jesus is a divine pre-existence being man, doing the will of the Father on earth, and then brought back to heaven where he originally came." However, as Ehrman notes, the later "Christendom of the Incarnation" is also preached by Paul, and even precedes him. According to the "Early High Christology Club," this "Incarnational Christology" or "High Christology" did not evolve in a longer time but was the "big bang" that emerged in the first few decades of the church, as witnessed in Paul's writings.
Scholars also argue that Paul was a "myth-maker," who gave his own different interpretations of the meaning of Jesus, built a bridge between the Jewish and Hellenistic worlds, thus creating a Christian faith.
Mythicists view>
The myth of Christ theorists generally reject the idea that Paul's letters refer to real people.
According to Doherty, Jesus of Paul is the divine Son of God, who is in the spiritual realm where he was crucified and resurrected. This mythological Jesus is based on the exegesis of the Old Testament and the mystical vision of the risen Jesus.
Carrier argues that Paul actually wrote about a heavenly god named Jesus: Carrier notes that there is little concrete information about Christ's earthly life in the letters of Paul, even though Jesus is mentioned more than three hundred times. According to Carrier, Paul's original letters show that the Apostles Peter and the Apostle Paul believed in a visionary or dream of Jesus, based on the pesher of the Septuagint verses, Zechariah 6 and 3, Daniel 9 and Isaiah 52-53. Carrier further states that according to Paul (Philippians 2,7), Christ "came" in human form (homoiomati anthropon) and was found "in human form" (schemati euretheis hos anthropos) and (in Rom 8.3). that he was only sent 'in the form of sinful flesh' (en homoiomati sarkos hamartias). It is a doctrine of a pre-existing creature assuming the human body, but not completely transformed into a human, just looks like a person.
Jesus lives in a bleak past
Mythicists View
The early well, and Alvar EllegÃÆ' Â¥ rd, have stated that Jesus Paul probably lived much earlier, in the vague past.
Wells argues that Paul and other letter writers - early Christian writers - gave no support to the idea that Jesus lived at the beginning of the 1st century and that - for Paul - Jesus may have existed decades, if not centuries before. According to Wells, the earliest layers of New Testament literature present Jesus as "an essentially supernatural figure only vaguely on Earth as a human being in an unspecified period in the past". In The Myths Myth, Wells argues that the two stories of Jesus fused together: the mythological Jesus of Paul and the minimal historical Jesus whose teachings are preserved in document Q, the hypothetical general source for Matthew and Luke's gospels..
Some proponents of the myth claim that the Epiphanius writings of Salamis refer to a group of Jewish Christians who thought that Jesus lived during the reign of Alexander Jannaeus - "put Jesus around 100 BC" - and that this is also the view presented in the Jewish writings about Jesus in the Talmud and Toledot Yeshu.
According to Panarion by Epiphanius, the Judeo-Christian sect known as the Nazarene (???????) began as a Jew who moved from the Apostles. Richard Carrier argues that "Epiphanius, in Panarion 29, says there is a still-Torah-Christian sect that teaches that Jesus lived and died in the days of Jesse, and all the Jewish sources to Christianity that we have (from Talmud to Toledot Yeshu) reported no view other than that Jesus lived in Jannaeus's time ".
Mainstream critic
Theologians Gregory A. Boyd and Paul Rhodes Eddy, Professor of Bible and Theological Studies at Bethel University, criticized the idea that "Paul saw Jesus as a lifelong cosmic savior," referring to various passages in Paul's letters that seem to contradict the idea this. In Galatians 1:19, Paul says he met James, "the brother of God"; 1 Corinthians 15: 3-8 refers to the people to whom Jesus has appeared, and who are the contemporaries of Paul; and in 1 Thessalonians 2: 14-16 Paul refers to the Jews "who both killed the Lord Jesus" and "cast us out" as the same person, indicating that Jesus' death was within the same time span of persecution against Paul. Boyd and Eddy doubted that Paul regarded Jesus as resembling the god of salvation found in ancient mystery religions.
The gospel is not a historical record
The general consensus of modern scholars is that Mark is the first Gospel to be written and dates from no earlier than c. AD 65 , while Matthew and Luke, who used it as a source, were written between 80 and 85 AD The history of John's composition is very complex, but most scholars see it happening gradually beginning as early as 70 M and extends to the end of this century.. None of the authors who bear witness to the life of Jesus, "(t) the general wisdom of the academy is that the stories and sayings of Jesus circulated for decades, experienced countless retardations and ornaments before they were finally written down." According to scholar in theology of Richard Bauckham, the authors may have received their information very close to the eyewitness accounts.
According to Carrier, "The Gospels can not really be dated, nor the real authors, their names are set early, but it is not early enough for us to believe that they are accurately known.This is based on speculation that Mark is the one first, written between AD 60 and 70, Matthew second, between AD 70 and 80, the third Luke (and Acts), between AD 80 and 90, and the last John, between AD 90 and 100 ".
Genre
According to Richard Burridge, priest and Bible scholar, every study of the gospel must first determine the genre in which they fall, to interpret it correctly, since the genre "is a key convention that guides both the composition and interpretation of the writings". Gospel writers may intend to write novels, myths, histories, or biographies, which are different genres and have a tremendous impact on how they should be interpreted. Among contemporary scholars, there is the consensus that the Gospels are a kind of ancient biography, although theologian Rudolf Bultmann notes that the Gospel writers were not interested in history or in the history of Jesus. Michael Vines, Professor of Religious Studies at Lees-McRae College, notes that Mark's Gospel may have similar aspects to the Jewish novel. Some scholars argue that the Gospel is a symbolic representation of the Torah, written in response to Roman occupation and the suppression of Jewish religiosity.
According to Paul Eddy and Gregory Boyd, mythologists argue that in the Gospels the "fictional historical narrative" is imposed on the "myth of the cosmos of salvation" created by Paul.
Robert Price notes support for the view that the Gospels are a fictional composition, arguing that the Gospel is a legendary type of fiction and that the story of Jesus is depicted in the Gospel according to the mythical heroic archetype.
Some proponents of the myth claim that some parts of the New Testament are meant to attract Gentiles as a known allegory rather than history. According to Richard Carrier, the Gospels "are basically allegories and fictions".
Hebrew Bible Parallel
The arguments that illustrate the comparison between the New Testament and the Old Testament have traditionally been made by Christian theologians to defend their teachings, but without questioning historical Jesus.
Some proponents of the myth note that some of the stories in the New Testament seem to try to reinforce Old Testament prophecies and repeat stories of such figures as Elijah, Elisha, Moses and Joshua to attract converts. Price notes that almost all Gospel accounts have parallels in the Old Testament and other traditions, concluding that the Gospel is not an independent source for historical Jesus, but "legends and myths, fictions and editors".
Greek influence
In Christ and the Caesars (1877), the philosopher Bruno Bauer states that Christianity is a synthesis of the Stoicism of Seneca the Younger, Greek Neoplatonism, and Philo Jewish theology as developed by pro-Roman Jews like Josephus. This new religion requires the founder and created Christ. In Bauer's review, Robert Price notes that Bauer's basic stance on the Stoic tone and the fictional nature of the gospels is still repeated in contemporary scholarship.
Weaving together various traditions
According to Wells, there is a minimal historical Jesus, whose teachings are stored in document Q. According to Wells, the Gospels weave two narratives of Jesus, the mythological Jesus Paul and Galilean preacher of the document Q. Doherty disagrees with Wells regarding the Q-teacher of this document, that he is an allegorical character personifying Wisdom and then regarded as the founder of the Q-community. According to Doherty, Jesus Q and Christ Paul are combined in the Gospel of Mark by a largely non-Jewish community.
No independent eyewitness account
Lack of historic recordings that last
The mainstream Bible scholars point out that many ancient writings have been lost and that there is little writing about Jews or Christians in this period. Ehrman shows that we have no archaeological or textual evidence for the existence of most people in the ancient world, even famous people such as Pontius Pilate, who are believed by the myth of theorists. Robert Hutchinson notes that this also applies to Josephus, despite the fact that he was "the personal favorite of the Roman Emperor Vespasian". Hutchinson quotes Ehrman, who notes that Josephus was never mentioned in the Greek and Roman sources of the 1st century, despite his "personal friend of the emperor". According to Classical historian and popular writer Michael Grant, if the same criterion applies to others: "We can reject the existence of many pagan figures whose reality as historical figures is never questioned".
Proponents of myth claim there is significance in the lack of a living historical record of Jesus of Nazareth from non-Jewish writers until the second century, adding that Jesus did not leave any other archaeological writings or evidence. Using the argument of silence, they note that the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria did not mention Jesus when he wrote about the atrocities of Pontius Pilate around 40 AD.
Josephus and Tacitus
There are three non-Christian sources that are usually used to study and establish the historicity of Jesus - two mentions in Josephus and one mentions in the Roman source Tacitus. According to John Dominic Crossan:
That [Jesus] was crucified was certainly a historical thing, because both Josephus and Tacitus [...] agree with the Christian record at least on that basic fact.
Josephus
Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews , was written about 93-94 AD, including two references to biblical Jesus in Books 18 and 20. The general scientific view is that while the longer section in book 18, known as Testimonium Flavianum , most likely not genuine in its entirety, it is widely agreed that it originally consisted of an authentic nucleus, which was subsequently subject to Christian interpolation or forgery. Proponents of myth also argue that the Testimonium Flavianum may be a partial or falsified interpolation by Christian apologists Eusebius in the 4th century or by others.
Other references in Josephus are as follows:
... the brother of Jesus, called Christ, who is called James
According to Josephus scholar Louis H. Feldman, "little doubts the authenticity" of Josephus's reference to Jesus in Antiquities 20, 9, 1 and is only disputed by a small number of scholars.
Paul Eddy and Gregory Boyd, critical of Christ's mythological theorists, note that Josephus "mentions twenty-one others by the name of Jesus," and argues that when Josephus calls James the "brother" of Jesus "called Christ" in < Antiquities , he did so to distinguish "from someone else named 'Jesus' whom he mentioned."
Richard Carrier disagrees, proposing that the original text referred to the brother of the high priest Jesus son of Damneus, named James, mentioned in the same story, where James (brother of Jesus) was executed by Ananus ben Ananus. Carrier further argues that the words "so-called Christ" are likely to result from the deliberate insertion of marginal notes added by some unknown readers.
Others speculate that he is referring to an inherited mythic Christ, or a brotherhood brotherhood than a literal brother. This was dismissed by some mainstream academics on the ground that there is no evidence of "the brotherhood of Jerusalem".
Tacitus
The Roman historian Tacitus refers to "Christus" and his execution by Pontius Pilate in Annals (written c. AD 116 ), the book 15, chapter 44:
... class is hated for their abominations, called Christians by the people. Christus, from whom it came, suffered extreme punishment during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate.
The very negative negative tone of Tacitus' comments on Christians makes most scholars believe that this passage is highly unlikely to have been faked by a Christian writer. The Tacitus reference is now widely accepted as an independent confirmation of the crucifixion of Christ, though some scholars question the historical value of that passage for various reasons.
Proponents of Christ's myth theory like G. A. Wells and Carrier argue that sources like Tacitus and others, written decades after the alleged incident, do not belong to an independent tradition relating to Jesus, and therefore can not confirm historical facts about it.
Other sources
In Jesus Outside the New Testament (2000), mainstream scholar Van Voorst considers references to Jesus in classical writings, Jewish writings, hypothetical sources of the canonical Gospels, and Christian writings outside New Testament. Van Voorst concludes that non-Christian sources provide "little correction of certain New Testament historical traditions on the family background, life, ministry, and death of Jesus", and "proof of the content of Christian preaching that it does not depend on the New Testament" , while extra-biblical Christian sources provide access to "some important information about Jesus' earliest tradition". However, the New Testament sources remain important for "the main lines and details of Jesus' life and teaching".
Diversity and alignment
The diversity of early Christian tribes to some roots
Early Christianity varied widely, with proto-orthodoxy views and "misguided" views such as gnosticism side by side. According to Mack, various "movements of Jesus" exist, whose ideas meet in early proto-orthodoxy.
According to Doherty, the rapid growth of early Christian communities and various ideas can not be explained by a missionary effort, but point to parallel developments, which appear in various places and compete for support. Paul's argument against rival apostles also shows this diversity. Doherty further notes that Yeshua (Jesus) is a generic name, meaning "Yahweh saves" and refers to the concept of divine salvation, which can apply to any kind of savings entity or Wisdom.
Parallel to other religions
Doherty notes that, with the conquest of Alexander the Great, Greek culture and language spread throughout the eastern Mediterranean world, affecting the culture already there. The Roman conquest of this region adds to the cultural diversity, but also to the sense of alienation and pessimism. The rich diversity of religious and philosophical ideas is available and Judaism is highly respected by non-Jews for their high monotheistic ideas and moral standards. But monotheism is also offered by Greek philosophy, especially Platonism, with its high God and intermediate Logos. According to Doherty, "From this rich land of ideas comes Christianity, a product of Jewish and Greek philosophy", echoing Bruno Bauer, who argues that Christianity is a synthesis of Stoicism, Greek Neoplatonism, and Jewish thought.
Jewish belief in the heavenly angel called Jesus
The mainstream scholars have noted the level and significance of Jewish belief in the main angels acting as heavenly mediators during the Second Temple period, as well as the similarities between Jesus and the main heavenly angel. Ehrman goes even further to suggest that Paul regarded Jesus as an angel, incarnate on earth.
According to Carrier, originally "Jesus is the name of heavenly beings, under God". According to Carrier, "This 'Jesus' is most likely the same evangelist identified by Philo of Alexandria as existing in Jewish theology". Philo knows this figure with all the attributes Paul knew about Jesus by: God's first son (Letters to Romans 8:29), heavenly images of God (Second Letter to Corinthians 4: 4) and God's creation agency (First Epistle to Corinthians 8: 6 ). He is also God's heavenly high priest (Hebrews 2:17, 4:14, etc.) and God's Logos. Philo says this creature is identified as a figure named Jesus in Zechariah.
Personification Logos and Wisdom
Separately from myth, the scholar of ancient religious studies Peter SchÃÆ'¤fer argues that the Logos of Philo probably derives from his understanding of "the literature of Postdate Wisdom, especially the Wisdom of Solomon". New Testament Professor at Loyola University Urban C. von Wahlde notes that Philo's philosophical literature and philosophical writings can complement the "Logos background of the Johannine Prologue".
According to myhticists, Christianity comes from a Jewish sect in an environment where some Jews practice the form of proto-gnosticism - seeking salvation by gnosis revealed - through a mediator between God and man, the mediator known as "someone like the son of man", "Logos divine ", etc. From the cult of Paul, a different form of salvation theology was then promoted to the Gentiles.
According to Doherty, an idea somewhat similar to the Greek Logos is found in Judaism, where Wisdom, a personified part of God, brings knowledge of God and the Law. Similar ideas are also developed in other cultures and religions. According to Wells, the history of Jesus comes from this Wisdom tradition, the personification of the eternal aspect of God, who came to visit humans. Doherty notes that the concept of the spiritual Christ is the result of the common philosophical and religious ideas of the first and second centuries, where the idea of ​​the intermediate power between God and the world is common. Doherty further notes that divine inspiration is a common concept.
Jewish-Hellenistic Mystery Reminiscence
According to Doherty, Christ of Paul has in common with the Greco-Roman mystery cults. Writers Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy explicitly state that Jesus is a god, similar to a mystery cult, while Dorothy Murdock argues that the myth of Christ is very interesting on the Egyptian story of Osiris and Horus. According to Robert Price, the story of Jesus depicted in the Gospels is similar to the mythical hero archeette. The mythical archetypal heroes present in many cultures that often have a magical conception or virgin birth are heralded by wise men and marked with a star, tempted by or against evil forces, dying on a hill, emerging after death and then ascending to heaven. According to Carrier, early Christianity was just one of several mystery cults that developed from Hellenistic influence on local cult and religion.
Mainstream scholarship does not agree with this interpretation. Many mainstream biblical scholars respond that most of these parallels are coincidental or without historical basis and/or that this parallel does not prove that the figure of Jesus is not alive. Christian theologians have cited the mythical hero archetypes as a defense of Christianity while fully affirming the historical Jesus. Secular scholars have also shown that the teachings of Jesus mark "a radical departure from all the conventions with which the heroes are defined".
supporters of the 18th and 19th centuries
According to Van Voorst, "The argument that Jesus never existed, but was created by the Christyian movement around the year 100, returns to the Enlightenment, when a historical-critical study of the past is born," and probably derived from Lord Bolingbroke, a British deist.
According to Weaver and Schneider, the beginning of the formal denial of Jesus' existence can be traced to the late 18th century France with the works of Constantin Fran秧ois Chasseboeuf de Volney and Charles-François Dupuis. Volney and Dupuis argue that Christianity is the incorporation of ancient mythologies and that Jesus is an entirely mythical character. Dupuis argues that ancient rituals in Syria, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, and India have influenced the Christian story attributed to the history of the sun god, such as Sol Invictus. Dupuis also said that Jesus' resurrection is an allegory for the growth of solar power in the Aries sign in spring equinox. Volney argues that Abraham and Sarah are from Brahma and his wife Saraswati, while Christ is related to Krishna. Volney uses a draft version of Dupuis's work and is sometimes different from him, eg. by stating that the Gospel narratives were not deliberately made, but organized organically. Volney's perspective became associated with the ideas of the French Revolution, which impeded the acceptance of these views in England. Nonetheless, his work garnered significant followers among British and American radical thinkers during the 19th century.
In 1835, German theologian, David Friedrich Strauss, published his highly controversial work. The Life of Jesus, Critically Considered ( Das Leben Jesu ). Though not denying that Jesus exists, he argues that the miracles in the New Testament are retweeting the myth of a normal event as a supernatural event. According to Strauss, the early church developed these miracle stories to present Jesus as the fulfillment of the Jewish prophecy of how the Messiah looks. This rationalist view goes against the supernaturalist view that the Bible is accurate both historically and spiritually. This book caused an uproar throughout Europe, such as Anthony Ashley-Cooper, the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury called it "the most severe book ever to vomit out of the jaws of hell" and the appointment of Strauss as the theological director at the University of ZÃÆ'¼rich led to such controversies. that the authorities offered him a pension before he had a chance to start his job.
German Bruno Bauer, who teaches at the University of Bonn, takes Strauss's argument further and becomes the first author to systematically argue that Jesus does not exist. Beginning in 1841 with his Critique of the History of the Synoptic Gospels, Bauer argues that Jesus is primarily a literary figure, but remains open to the question of whether historical Jesus exists. Later in his book Criticism of Paul's Epistles (1850-1852) and in Criticism of the Gospel and Their Origin of History (1850-1851), Bauer argues that Jesus did not yet exist. Bauer's work was heavily criticized at the time, as in 1839 he was removed from his post at the University of Bonn and his work did not have much impact on future mythologists.
In his book of two volumes, 867 pages Anacalypsis (1836), English man Godfrey Higgins said that "Hindu myths, Jewish myths and Greek myths are all under the same, and are tools under the appearance of history to perpetuate doctrine "and that Christian editors" either from roguery or ignorance, ruin everything ". In his 1875 book The Sixteen Hidden Savers of the World, American Kersey Graves says that many gods from different countries share the same stories, traits or quotes as Jesus and he uses Higgins as the main source for his argument. The validity of the claims in this book has been heavily criticized by supporters of Christ myth like Richard Carrier and largely rejected by biblical scholars.
Beginning in the 1870s, English poet and writer Gerald Massey became interested in Egyptology and reportedly studied his own Egyptian hieroglyphs at the British Museum. In 1883, Massey published The Natural Genesis where he asserted a parallel between Jesus and the Egyptian god Horus. His other major work, Ancient Egypt: The Light of the World, was published shortly before his death in 1907. His statements have influenced later writers such as Alvin Boyd Kuhn and Tom Harpur. Despite criticism from Stanley Porter and Ward Gasque, Massey's theory of Egyptian etymology for certain scriptures is supported by renowned contemporary Egyptian scholars.
In the 1870s and 1880s, a group of scholars associated with the University of Amsterdam, known in the German scholarship as a Dutch Radical school, rejected the authenticity of Paul's letters and took a general negative view of the historical value of the Bible. Abraham Dirk Loman argued in 1881 that all New Testament writings date from the 2nd century and doubt that Jesus is a historical figure, but then says the essence of the Gospel is original.
Additional supporters of Christ's early myth include Swiss skeptic Rudolf Steck, the English historian Edwin Johnson, British radical priest Robert Taylor and his colleague Richard Carlile.
Initial supporters of the 20th century
During the early twentieth century, some authors published arguments against the historicity of Jesus, which often portray the work of liberal theologians, who tend to reject any value to sources outside of the New Testament and limit their attention to Mark and the source Hypothetical Q. They also made use of a growing field of religious history that found the source for Christian ideas in the mysteries of Greek and Oriental cultures, and not Judaism. Joseph Klausner wrote that biblical scholars "try hardest to find in the historical Jesus something that is not Judaism but in its actual history they find nothing of this, because this history is reduced to almost zero, so it is not surprising that at the beginning of this century there has been a revival of the eighteenth and nineteenth century views that Jesus never existed. "
The work of social anthropologist Sir James George Frazer had an influence on the mythological myths, though Frazer himself believed that Jesus existed. In 1890, Frazer published the first edition of The Golden Boughs that attempted to define elements of shared religious beliefs. This work became the basis of many later writers who argued that the story of Jesus is a fiction made by Christians. After a number of people claimed that he was a mythologist, in the expanded 1913 edition of The Golden Bough he explicitly stated that his theory assumed the historical Jesus.
In 1900, Scottish Parliament Member John Mackinnon Robertson argued that Jesus never existed, but was an invention by a first century messianic cult. In Robertson's view, religious groups created new gods to fit the needs of the community at that time. Robertson argues that the sun god symbolized by the sheep and ram has long been worshiped by the Israeli cult of Joshua and that the cult then created a new messianic figure, Jesus of Nazareth. Robertson argues that a possible source for Christian myth is probably the Talmudic account of the executed Jesus Pandera dating from 100 BC. Robertson assumes that Paul's letters are the earliest surviving Christian writings, but view them as primarily concerned with theology and morality, not historical details. Robertson sees references to the twelve apostles and institutions of the Eucharist as a story that must be developed later among Gentile believers who were converted by Jewish evangelists such as Paul.
British school lord George Robert Stowe Mead argued in 1903 that Jesus existed, but that he had lived in 100 BC. Mead bases his argument on the Talmud, which refers to the crucified Jesus c. 100 BC . In Mead's view, this means that the Christian gospel is a myth. Tom Harpur has compared Mead's influence to the theory of myth with the theory of Bruno Bauer and Arthur Drews.
In 1909, school teacher John Eleazer Remsburg published The Christ , which made the difference between the possible history of Jesus (Jesus of Nazareth) and Jesus of the Gospel (Jesus of Bethlehem). Remsburg thinks that there is a compelling reason to believe that historical Jesus exists, but that "Christ Christianity" is a mythological creation. Remsburg compiled a list of 42 names of "writers who lived and wrote during that time, or within a century after time" which according to Remsburg should have been written about Jesus if the Gospel account is accurate, but it is not.
Also in 1909, the German philosophy Professor Christian Heinrich Arthur Drews wrote The Christ Myth to declare that Christianity was a Jewish Gnostic cult that spread with appropriate aspects of Greek philosophy and the gods of life-death- rebirth. In his later books Historical Witnesses of Jesus (1912) and Rejection of the History of Jesus in the Past and Present (1926), Drews reviewed the biblical scholarship of his time as well as the work of mythologists others, trying to show that everything that is reported about the history of Jesus has a mythical character. Drews met with criticism from Nikolai Berdyaev who claimed that Drews was an anti-Semite who opposed the historical existence of Jesus for the sake of Aryanism. Drews took part in a series of public debates with theologians and historians who opposed his argument.
Drews's work found fertile ground in the Soviet Union, where Marxist-Leninist atheism is the official doctrine of the country. Soviet leader Lenin argued that it was important in the struggle against religious obscurantists to form union with the likes of Drews. Some editions of Drews' The Christ Myth were published in the Soviet Union from the early 1920s onwards and his arguments were included in school and university books. The public meeting asked "Is Christ alive?" organized, in which the parties argue with the priests.
In 1927, the English philosopher Bertrand Russell declared in his lecture Why I am not a Christian that historically it is very doubtful that Jesus existed, and if he did we would know nothing about him, so I no matter with the historic question, which is very difficult, "although Russell did nothing to further develop the idea.
The founder of the Church of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard believes that Jesus never existed, declared that Christianity evolved from "R6 Implant": "The man on the cross No Christ! Roman Catholic Church, through watching the dramatization of those who chose some small fragments of R6 ".
modern supporters
Paul-Louis Couchoud
The French philosopher Paul-Louis Couchoud, published in the 1920s and 1930s, but is a precursor to contemporary myths. According to Couchoud, Christianity begins not with Jesus' biography but "a collective mystical experience, preserving the mystical history mystically revealed." Couchaud's Jesus is not a "myth", but a "religious conception".
Robert Price mentions Couchoud's commentary on the Hymn of Christ, one of Christ's relics of the transformed by Paul. Couchoud notes that in this hymn the name of Jesus was given to Christ after his torturous death, implying that there can be no ministry by a teacher called Jesus.
George Albert Wells
George Albert Wells (1926-2017), a German professor, revived an interest in the mythical theory of Christ. In his original work, including Did Jesus Exist? (1975), Wells argues that since the Gospels were written decades after the death of Jesus by theologically motivated Christians but have no personal knowledge of him, rational people must believe the gospel only if they are independently confirmed. Atheist philosopher and scholar Michael Martin supported his thesis, claiming: "Jesus was not placed in the historical context and biographical details of his life were left unpredictable [...] a powerful prima facie case challenging the historicity of Jesus could be built". Martin adds in his book The Case Against Christianity that "Yah's argument for [Jesus'] historicity is sound."
Then Wells concludes that the historical Jesus figure exists and is a Galilean preacher, whose teachings are stored in document Q, the hypothetical general source for Matthew and Luke's gospels. However, he continues to insist that the biblical Jesus does not exist and argues that stories such as virgin birth, crucifixion around A.D. 30 under Pilate and the resurrection should be regarded as a legend. Bible scholar Robert E. Van Voorst says that with this argument, Wells has done the same thing. However, other scholars continue to take Wells as a mythicist.
In his 2009 book Cutting Jesus Down to Size, Wells explains that he believes the gospel reflects the fusion of two originally independent streams: a Galilean preaching tradition and a supernatural figure from Paul's early epistles, but he says that both the figure owes much of their substance to the ideas of the Jewish wisdom literature.
In 2000, Van Voorst provided an overview of the proponents of the "No Hypothesis" and their arguments, and eight arguments against this hypothesis as Wells and his predecessors put it:
- 1. "The silence argument" should be rejected, because "it is wrong to assume that what is not mentioned or not exists." Van Voorst goes so far as to suggest that early Christian literature was not written for historical purposes.
- 2. The date "invention" of Jesus around 100 AD is too late; Mark was written before, and contains the abundant details of history that are true.
- 3. The argument that the development of the gospel tradition shows that no history of Jesus is untrue; "Development does not prove the invention of wholesale, and the difficulty does not prove invention."
- 4. Wells can not explain why "no Gentiles and Jews who oppose Christianity deny the historicity of Jesus or even question it."
- 5. The refusal of Tacitus and Josephus to ignore scientific consensus.
- 6. Advocates of "No Hypothesis" are not driven by scientific interest, but by anti-Christian sentiments.
- 7. Wells and others do not offer an alternative "other credible hypothesis" to the origins of Christianity. 8. Wells himself accepts the existence of a minimal historical Jesus, thus effectively abandoning "Nonexistence Hypothesis."
According to Graham Stanton, writing in 2002, Wells advanced the most sophisticated version of Christ's myth theory, noting that "[t] the interesting theory lies in several pillars, each of which is faltering." According to Maurice Casey, Wells's work repeats the main points of Religionsgeschichtliche Schule , which are considered outdated by common knowledge. His works are not discussed by New Testament scholars, because "they are not considered original, and all the major points are deemed to have been disputed long ago, for a very well known reason."
Earl Doherty
Canadian writer Earl Doherty (born 1941) was introduced to the theme of the myth of Christ by a lecture by Wells in the 1970s. Doherty follows Wells's footsteps, but disagrees on the historicity of Jesus, arguing that "everything in Paul refers to the belief in a fully divine Son who" lives "and acts in the spiritual realm, in the same mythical environment in which all other divine deities the day was seen operating ". According to Doherty, Christ Paul originated as a myth derived from Middle Platonism with some influence from Jewish mysticism and the belief in the history of Jesus arose only among the Christian community in the second century.
Paul and other authors of earlier proto-Christian documents do not believe in Jesus as incarnate people on Earth in a historical setting, but they believe in Jesus as a heavenly being who suffered the death of his sacrifice in the lower layers of heaven, where he was crucified by Satan and then resurrected by God. This mythological Jesus is not based on the historical Jesus, but rather on the Old Testament exegesis in the context of Hellenic-Jewish syncretism and what the early writers believed as mystical vision of the risen Jesus.
Doherty agrees with Bauckham that the earliest Christology is already a "high Christology," that is, Jesus is an incarnation of the Christ who had existed before, but considered it "unbelievable" that such a belief could develop in such a short time among the Jews.. Therefore, Doherty concludes that Christianity begins with the myth of the incarnate Christ, which later became historic.
According to Doherty, the essence of this historic Jesus' holy book can be found in the movement of Jesus who wrote the source of Q. According to Doherty, the Q writers may regard themselves as "spokespersons for God's Wisdom", with Jesus as the embodiment of this Wisdom, which added to the last phase of development Q. Q then began to take the form of "foundation documents", in response to the concurrent sect that saw John the Baptist as its founder. Finally, Jesus Q and Christ Paul are combined in the Gospel of Mark by a largely non-Jewish community. Later, the Gospel narratives of this manifestation of Wisdom are defined as the literal history of the life of Jesus.
The New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman quotes Doherty from The Jesus Puzzle for maintaining that it is Paul's view that Jesus' death occurred in the spiritual realm rather than the world, but according to Ehrman, not only was there. â € there is no evidence to support Doherty's statement about Paul's view of Jesus, "but there are also" a number of reasons for calling Doherty's view a serious question. "
In a book that criticizes the mythical theory of Christ, the New Testament scholar Maurice Casey described Doherty as "perhaps the most influential of all myths", but one who can not understand the ancient texts he uses in his argument.
Robert M. Price
The American New Testament scholar and former Baptist pastor Robert M. Price (born 1954) was a fellow of the Jesus Seminar, a group of writers and scholars who studied the historicity of Jesus and who argued that the Christian image of Christ is a theological construct into which Jesus' trail of Nazareth has been woven. He is also a member of the Jesus Project.
Price questioned the historicity of Jesus in a series of books, including Deconstructing Jesus (2000), The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man (2003), Jesus Is Dead (< 2007), and the contribution to The Historical Jesus: Five Views (2009), in which he acknowledges that he is opposed to the view the majority of scholars, but cautioned not to try to resolve the issue by appealing to the majority. Note the price that "consensus is no criterion" for the historicity of Jesus.
In Deconstructing Jesus , Price indicates that "Jesus Christ of the New Testament is a composite figure", in which various kinds of historical Jesus can be reconstructed, one of which may be the real Jesus, but not all together. According to Price, various images of Jesus flow together in the origins of Christianity, some of which may be based on myth, some of which may be based on "the history of Nazorean Jesus". Price recognizes the uncertainty in this case, writes in conclusion: "There may be a real figure there, but there is no way to be sure".
According to Price, Jesus' stories are derived from Jewish writings, which show Greek influence and equality with Pagan worshiping gods. Christianity is a historical synthesis of Egyptian, Jewish, and Greek mythology. Price states that there are three key points to the traditional mythological theory of Christ:
- Not mentioned about Jesus performing miracles in secular sources.
- The letters, written earlier than the gospels, do not provide evidence of Jesus' recent history and all that can be derived from the letters, according to Price, is that Jesus Christ, the son of God, lives in the realm of heaven, there died as a sacrifice for human sin, resurrected by God and crowned in heaven.
- The narratives of Jesus are parallel in Middle Eastern myths about death and the rise of gods. The price names of Baal, Osiris, Attis, Adonis and Dumuzi/Tammuz as examples, all of which, he writes, persist in the Hellenistic and Roman periods and thus affect early Christianity. Price alleges that Christian defenders have tried to minimize this parallel.
To quote the stories that Jesus had crucified under Alexander Jannaeus (83 BC) or in his 50s by Herod Agrippa I under Claudius Caesar (41-54 AD). Price argues that "this fickle date is a remnant of efforts to relate the early or legendary Jesus in history more or less recently."
Thomas L. Thompson
Thomas L. Thompson (born 1939), Professor emeritus of theology at the University of Copenhagen, is a prominent biblical biblical of the Old Testament. According to Thompson, the stories of Jesus come from Jewish writings. In his 2007 book The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David , Thompson argues that the biblical story of King David and Jesus of Nazareth is mythical and based on Mesopotamia, Egypt, Babylonian and Greek and Roman literature. For example, he argues that the resurrection of Jesus is taken directly from the story of the risen and risen god, Dionysus. However, Thompson does not draw any final conclusions about the historicity or ahistoricity of Jesus, but argues that every historical figure will be very different from Christ (or Messiah) identified in Mark's Gospel.
Thompson contributed contributions from diverse scholars in the 2012 book Is It Not The Carpenter ?: The Question of the History of Jesus' Characters . Write in the introduction, "Essays are collected in bu
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