Bonnie ***** <nospam@nospam.org> wrote in
news:d2t2v09jdee51llshk3gkmlb1dnaicgc2e@4ax.com:

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 18:00:10 GMT, Alabama Pete <psmith@bellsouth.net>
wrote:

HOMOSEXUALTY IS SIN AND JESUS IS THE ANSWER.

Of course, the question then becomes:

"What is a CHristian's favorite lie, which they attribute to a person
who never existed?"

Belated Happy MLK,Jr.Day --
Bonnie *****

Did Jesus really exist? Not only Christians but probably most non-
Christian historians answer this question in the affirmative.

Bonnie ***** <nospam@nospam.org> wrote in
news:d2t2v09jdee51llshk3gkmlb1dnaicgc2e@4ax.com:

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 18:00:10 GMT, Alabama Pete <psmith@bellsouth.net>
wrote:

HOMOSEXUALTY IS SIN AND JESUS IS THE ANSWER.

Of course, the question then becomes:

"What is a CHristian's favorite lie, which they attribute to a person
who never existed?"

Belated Happy MLK,Jr.Day --
Bonnie *****

Did Jesus really exist? Not only Christians but probably most non-
Christian historians answer this question in the affirmative. For the
most part, it seems that critics of the Biblical Jesus don't question
Jesus' existence but instead question the picture that the canonical
Gospels paint of Jesus. Christianity often finds itself defending the
historicity of specific canonical statements concerning Jesus but not
his mere existence. However, the more extreme skeptic might question
Jesus' existence and argue that there was no historical figure of Jesus.
The present essay responds to the view that Jesus never existed and
attempts to point out problems with the extreme skepticism behind this
view.

In attempting to reconstruct the historical Jesus, scholars often rely
on the canonical Gospels as evidence. There are a number of critical
tools that historians can use to show material in the canonical Gospels
as historically probable. For example, it is unlikely that the canonical
authors would have fabricated material that was potentially embarrassing
to early Christianity; and thus, such material has strong likelihood of
being historical. Likewise, material that is dissimilar to early
Christian thought and practice also has strong likelihood of being
genuine. Finally, there is source independence across the canonical
documents that gives us multiple attestation of Gospel material. These
three criteria of embarrassment, dissimilarity and multiple attestation
can establish strong probability to much of what the canonical documents
say about him. The point here isn't that we should categorize as non-
historical that which these criteria fail to identify. Instead, these
criteria offer strong argument that much of the canonical material
accurately reflects the historical Jesus. Granted, Robert Funk and Roy
Hoover of the Jesus Seminar claim to show that Jesus only said 20% of
what the Gospels depict him as saying (The Five Gospels, 1993, p. 5).
However, we might restate this sensational Seminar claim and say that
historical criticism confirms that Jesus said at least 20% of what the
Gospels purport. In this case, we might take the other 80% by faith and
use the 20% as an historical basis for this faith. If historical
criticism shows part of the Gospels to be historically likely, then this
apologetically grounds the Christian faith in history and supports the
whole as reasonable.

The more extreme skeptic however, might reject the 20% of the Jesus
Seminar and instead see the Gospels as total fabrication. An extreme
skeptical argument is that the Apostle Paul made up the notion of Jesus,
and the Gospels are a later spin off from Christianity as started by
Paul. At any rate, extreme skeptics seem to launch their argument from
rejection of the canonical Gospels and Pauline corpus and then demand
that Christians produce independent corroboration of Jesus' existence.
In other words, the skeptics demand documentary evidence from other than
Christian documents. Now certainly it is important to consider early
non-Christian sources that pertain to Jesus' existence. However, we
don't need to vindicate the canonical material by corroborating it from
non-Christian sources. Instead, corroboration from non-Christian sources
provides additional augment to an already established argument from the
canonical documents. The historicity of Jesus doesn't stand or fall on
corroboration from non-Christian material. Nevertheless, for the sake of
argument this essay plays the skeptics' game of looking for non-
Christian corroboration of the existence of Jesus. The intent of this is
to beat the skeptics at their own game.

Before presenting the non-canonical evidence, it is important that we
first discuss the use of evidence in historical reconstruction. The
historian is unlike the scientist, in that the historian can't use
experimentation and observation to test theories. Instead, the historian
tests theories against bits and pieces of historical evidence. The
theory that best explains all the evidence is the most corroborated.
Other theories that disregard pieces of evidence and only explain a
subset of the evidence lack corroboration. All the evidence is important
to the historian because each piece of evidence is yet another part of
an incomplete puzzle. Each piece of this puzzle takes the historian
closer to understanding the whole. It is a mistake, therefore, to
disregard partial evidence on the basis of it not proving the whole. We
can't completely observe the whole picture of history, and our
reconstruction depends on all evidence that we possess, in all its
imperfect parts.

The skeptic who asks for anything like scientific evidence sets up a
false analogy and simply doesn't ask for historical evidence. It is also
a false analogy for the skeptic to ask for evidence that would prevail
in a court of law. While the skeptic may or may not explicitly use a
court analogy, it seems that the more extreme skeptic still tends to
presupposes a court test for evidence. The skeptic can appear as a
defense attorney who pleads that evidence be ruled inadmissible. In a
criminal court, there is a formal bias for the defendant's innocence.
The defense attorney attempts to discredit evidence that seems damaging
to the defense. Often the defense asks the court to find such evidence
as inadmissible and to keep it from the jury's consideration. This
certainly isn't like the historian who instead must resist the
temptation to ignore this or that little piece of evidence. The more
pieces of evidence that the historian's theory can explain, the more
that theory seems likely. The historian often has nothing but secondary
and circumstantial evidence yet wouldn't think of categorizing this
evidence as inadmissible. The historian isn't a defense attorney that is
more interested in discrediting evidence than in using evidence to
reconstruct history.

As is often the case with historical reconstruction, the evidence for
Jesus is imperfect. However, The question of Jesus' historicity isn't
one of "proof" in some ideal sense. Instead, it is a question of
likelihood. If the evidence establishes strong likelihood of Jesus'
existence, then this is about all that one can expect from the evidence.
The skeptic who demands proof analogous to scientific or legal proof
simply isn't facing that the issue is one of likelihood and not proof.
An important point here is that if the evidence establishes strong
likelihood of Jesus' existence, then there is also strongly likelihood
that the skeptics are wrong in arguments against Jesus existence. In
this case, these skeptics will be pushing against the weight of the
evidence, and this will give us good reason to be skeptical of these
skeptics.

A good place to start among the non-Christian material is Josephus'
book, The Antiquities of the Jews. Josephus was a 1st century Palestine
Jew who in his later years moved to Rome and wrote two major historical
works: The Antiquities of the Jews, and The Wars of the Jews. Since
Josephus was born in 37 CE, he obviously couldn't have been a eye
witness of Jesus who died about 29-33 CE. However, being an educated
political and religious figure in Palestine, Josephus would have almost
certainly been aware of any common 1st century Jewish perspective about
the origin and claims of early Christianity. In the extant copies of
Josephus' Antiquities, there are two references to a Jesus that
obviously pertains to the Christian Jesus. However, at least one of
these references clearly seems to involve the work of a later Christian
scribal hand. This reference, Ant. 18:63-64, at least in part seems
spurious. Some scholars have even argued that it is completely Christian
interpolation. However, the majority of scholars, whether Christian or
not, seem to accept the other reference, Ant. 20,200, as genuine. In
this reference Josephus speaks of an incident in 62 CE when Ananus a new
high priest in Jerusalem named Ananus eliminated many of his enemies.
This occurred when the Roman Albinus was traveling to Palestine as the
replacement for the recently deceased Roman procurator Festus. The
temporary absence of Roman authority in Palestine gave Ananus the
opportunity to kill his enemies. Concerning Ananus' elimination of his
enemies, Josephus explains the following:

Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he

assembled the Sanhedrim of judges, and brought before them the brother
of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others,
[or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation
against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned
(Ant. 20,200).<<<

There simply isn't reason to doubt the authenticity of Ant. 20,200. It
is present in all extant manuscripts of Antiquities and neither its
wording or context suggests Christian scribal addition. Granted it is
possible that interpolation is involved; however, Josephus is the
accepted author of Antiquities, and nothing about 20,200 suggests that
it specifically is other than by Josephus' hand. Thus, specific
interpolation in 20,200 is unlikely. The burden of proof so to speak
rests on the skeptic who argues for specific interpolation in 20,200.
Now in assuming this burden, the skeptic is without evidence since the
passage on all accounts has no appearance of interpolation.

Granted the skeptic might point to the apparent Christian interpolation
in Ant. 18,63-64 as sufficient reason to suspect such in 20,200 as well.
However, just because both passages mention "Jesus" doesn't mean that
both are interpolation. Also, there is clearly a difference between the
two passages, and this difference suggests that unlike 18,63-64, Ant.
20,200 is genuine Josephus. While 18,63-64 has grandiose Christian
language that glorifies Jesus as the Christ, 20,200 doesn't. Instead,
20,200 has incidental and neutral language for Jesus, that is quite
unlike that of 18,63-64. The words of Ant. 20,200 that say of Jesus,
"who was called Christ" are markedly more neutral than the words of
18:63-64, "He was the Christ." Also obviously Christian sounding are the
words of 18:63-64, "Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a
man..." The grandiose religious language of 18,63-64 is clearly
different from the words of 20,200, "who was called Christ." The obvious
interpolation in 18,63-64 clearly contrast with the incidental and
neutral sounding 20,200; and thus, the latter simply doesn't sound like
interpolation.

The skeptic might here agree that 20,200 doesn't involve intentional
Christian scribal addition, but instead suggest that it involves
unintentional addition of a marginal note. The suggestion here is that
perhaps a scribe wrote a clarifying note in the margin, and then a later
scribe inadvertently added this marginal note into the text. While there
is no evidence to suspect this, it is perhaps a better suggestion than
that 20,200 involves intentional Christian addition. The words of 20,200
that could have the look of an added marginal note are, "the brother of
Jesus, who was called Christ." These words function to define what James
died at the hands of the high priest Ananus. Now if these or similar
words weren't in the original text, then it is easy to see why a scribe
would have added clarification in the margin. Without clarification,
James would just be one of many unknown countless men called James, and
this leaves the text very ambiguous. Nevertheless, it is hard to believe
that Josephus failed to define the James in question. Not supplying
clarification such as this isn't characteristic of Josephus who
characteristically defines people in terms of personal relations. If
Josephus defined James, as it seems he would have, then there wouldn't
have been need for marginal clarification. Clearly then, marginal
addition as an explanation of this passage seems very unlikely.

It appears that neither intentional Christian propaganda nor
unintentional marginal addition is involved in 20,200. The passage
simply doesn't appear to involve either. Instead, it has the look of
being genuine Josephus. This seems evident from the general appearance
of the passage, but it also seems evident from further consideration of
the passage. Whether intentional propaganda or marginal addition, the
scribes involved would still be Christian, and a Christian in defining
James probably wouldn't have said, "brother of Jesus," but instead said.
"brother of the Lord." The argument here is that early Christian usage
tended to speak of a relative of "the Lord" and not "of Jesus." John P.
Meier in volume one of his monumental, A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the
Historical Jesus, argues that neither the New Testament nor the earliest
patristic writings denote the brother or family of Jesus with the term
"Jesus." Instead, they use the more respectful construction involving
"Lord." This seems apparent from the following quotations:

But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother

(Gal 1:19).<<<

Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other

apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas? (I Co. 9:5).<<<

But the Jews, after Paul had appealed to Caesar, and had been sent by

Festus to Rome, frustrated in their hope of entrapping him by the snares
they had laid, turn themselves against James, the bother of the Lord, to
whom the episcopal seat at Jerusalem was committed by the apostles
(Hegesippus in Eusebius, Hist. 2,23).<<<

But after James the Just had suffered martyrdom, as our Lord had for

the same reason, Simeon, the son of Cleophas our Lord's uncle, was
appointed the second bishop, whom all proposed, as the cousin of our
Lord (Hegesippus in Eusebius, Hist. 4,22).<<<

Since the evidence speaks of relatives of Jesus as of "the Lord/Savior"
and not "Jesus," it seems that early Christianity typically used "the
Lord/Savior" and not "Jesus." It doesn't work to argue that the
hypothetical Josephus scribe wasn't aware of the above examples, and
thus wouldn't have used "Lord" instead of "Jesus." This doesn't work
because the scribe was almost certainly familiar with the Pauline
passages. Also, since the above examples apparently reflect broad
normative usage, the use of "Lord" most likely wasn't restricted to
these passages. Given that there isn't sufficient reason to suspect
interpolation in the first place, then this argument from apparent
normative early Christian usage is particularly strong. Not only is
there a lack of evidence to suggest specific interpolation in Ant.
20,200, but there is specific evidence that suggests that there isn't
interpolation.

Another point that Meier raises against interpolation is that the mid
2nd century Hegesippus, the later Clement of Alexandria and the 4th
century Eusebius relay a different martyrdom of James tradition than
does Ant. 20,200. This strongly suggests that 20,200 isn't early
Christian interpolative propaganda. Granted, a hypothetical
interpolating Christian scribe might not have been aware of Hegesippus
nor even Clement of Alexandria (Eusebius is later than the hypothetical
interpolation). However, a Christian scribe is exactly the type of
person who would be familiar with these works. More important here is
that these works clearly seem to reflect early normative Christian
tradition. A Christian scribe would have likely conformed to this
tradition whether or not that scribe was familiar with Hegesippus or
Clement of Alexandria. The point is that the scribe would probably have
been aware of this tradition and would have employed it and not
something incongruent with it as we find in Ant. 20,200.

Overall, the evidence indicates that Ant. 20,200 is very likely genuine
Josephus and thus provides independent non-Christian verification of
Jesus' existence. There is no viable argument to doubt its genuineness,
and there is even positive argument for accepting it. As it stands, it
is more than enough to provide independent attestation to Jesus'
existence. Again, the event that Josephus describes involves a James of
62 CE and defines this James as "the brother of Jesus, who was called
Christ." Two things are important concerning this passage. The first is
that it clearly speaks of the existence of a Jesus that was called
Christ, and does so within the correct time period that makes sense with
the Gospels. This in itself strongly corroborates Jesus' existence. The
second important point is that like the New Testament, 20,200 depicts
Jesus as having a brother named James who is associated with the Law.
Given this corroborative detail, it seems that the best and only
reasonable explanation is that Josephus in this passage speaks of the
New Testament Jesus, and thus corroborates his existence apart from
Christian documentary evidence.

There is also the other passage in Josephus, which is the one that
clearly seems to involve Christian interpolation. This passage is the
Testimonium Flavianum of Ant. 18:63-64. It clearly seems that a
Christian hand has influenced this passage, which is evidence from the
following translation:

Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to

call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such
men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of
the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate,
at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to
the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he
appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had
foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him.
And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this
day.<<<

The majority of scholars, Christian and non-Christian, see the
Testimonium as involving Christian embellishment or revision. However,
it seems that the majority don't see it as 100% forgery or
interpolation. Granted, Christian embellishment leaves the exact wording
of the underlying text uncertain, but the apparent underlying text still
seems to verify Jesus' existence. Granted a few individuals have argued
that Josephus' hand doesn't underlie this passage because as they argue
the Testimonium breaks the narrative progression of Antiquities 18. Now
it is true that the Testimonium's overdone Christian language gives it
an odd appearance; yet, beyond this observation, this argument seems to
subjectively presuppose what Josephus must have said. Also, if Ant.
18:63-64 is embellishment of a simple report of Jesus' death, then it
does seem to fit into its immediate context. As Meier points out,
directly before the Testimonium Josephus speaks of Pilate's solders
killing many Jews (60-62) and directly after speaks of others being
crucified (65-80). A short report of Jesus' death by Pilate fits quite
well within this context!

It is also interesting that the 3rd century Origen speaks of Josephus as
"not believing in Jesus as the Christ" (Contra Celsus 1:47). Origen says
this when he quotes Ant. 20,200. Again, Josephus in 20,200 is neutral
toward Jesus and just says that Jesus was "called Christ." Thus, it
seems that Origen is perhaps aware of a passage other than 20,200 in
which Josephus rejects Jesus as Christ. Now it seems that the only other
passage that it could be is Ant. 18,63-64 as it stood before what was
probably 4th century Christian embellishment.

Finally, Josephus' non-Testimonium reference to Jesus of Ant. 20,200
seems to presuppose an earlier reference to Jesus as called Christ. Ant.
20,200, identifies a man named James as "the brother of Jesus, who was
called Christ." This method of identifying James with his brother Jesus
presupposes that Jesus is well know to the reader, otherwise it wouldn't
clarify the identify of James. This strongly suggests that Josephus had
previously mentioned Jesus who is called Christ. Now in the extant text
of Antiquities, the only passage before 20,200 that mentions a Jesus who
fits the idea of being "called Christ" is a pre-embellished text behind
the Testimonium of 18:63-64. This clearly suggests that the Testimonium
is the previous reference to Jesus, or at least that the pre-embellished
text is.

There are other reasons for taking the Testimonium as Christian
embellishment and not 100% interpolation. A number of terms in the
Testimonium are incongruent with early Christian usage but make sense in
1st century Jewish usage. This strongly suggests the existence of an
underlying text written by Josephus that has been altered by a later
Christian hand. The reader who is interested in this linguistic evidence
should consult the above mentioned work by Meier. A final important
point is that even Pilate killing Jesus in the Testimonium sounds more
Jewish than Christian. We might expect an early Christian of the Roman
empire to blame the Jews instead of the Roman Pilate. This observation
gives this part of the text added probability of being genuine. In
summary, it seems that the Testimonium is embellishment of an underlying
text that verifies Jesus' existence and his death by Pilate's hand.
Still, when it comes to establishing the mere existence of Jesus, it's
not the Testimonium that is the best evidence in Josephus. Instead, it
is obviously Ant. 20,200. Nothing gives 20,200 the look of
interpolation, not even the look of embellishment. There is even
positive reason for seeing 20,200 as genuine Josephus. It is more than
enough to provide independent attestation to Jesus' existence.

Further, independent support for the existence of Jesus exists in the
writings of the Roman historian Tacitus who lived from the mid 1st
century into the 2nd. In his Annals, which he wrote at about 115 AD,
Tacitus explains that the emperor Nero blamed the burning of Rome of 64
CE on Christians in the hope of stopping a rumor that Nero himself was
responsible. Concerning Nero and the Christians of Rome, Tacitus
explains the following:

Therefore, in order to suppress the rumor, Nero falsely charged with

the guilt, and punished with the most exquisite tortures, those persons
who, hated for their crimes, were commonly called Christians. The
founder of that name, Christus, had been put to death by the procurator
of Judaea, Pontius Pilate, in the reign of Tiberius<<<

Tacitus speaks of Christians in 64 AD being called "Christians" after
the name of their founder "Christus" who is certainly Jesus Christ.
Tacitus is apparently so used to hearing Jesus called "Christ" that he
has mistakenly taken this messianic title as the proper name, Christus.
Now it is important that we no make too much of what Tacitus says in
this passage. He clearly wasn't an eyewitness of Jesus and perhaps not
even to official documents from Palestine concerning Jesus' death by the
Roman Pilate. The latter is possible but perhaps not even probable.
Thus, it would be to overstate the case if we were to regard Tacitus as
anything other than secondary evidence, meaning without first hand
knowledge of Jesus. Nevertheless, this doesn't mean that Tacitus is
useless as evidence for Jesus' existence. It would be to falsely apply
the court of law analogy to historical reconstruction if we were to
dismiss Tacitus as inadmissible evidence.

Tacitus was probably familiar with Christian claims concerning Jesus,
specifically his death at the hands of Pontius Pilate during the reign
of the emperor Tiberius. The point here is that it is possible and
perhaps likely that Tacitus' information comes primarily from Christian
claim and not from official Roman reports. However, we must remember
that Tacitus was an educated Roman historian and as such certainly had
informed opinions concerning the factuality of popular views of recent
history. This being the case, it seems very unlikely that he would have
stated what he does if he had any reason to doubt that Christianity's
founder existed and died by Pilate's hand during Tiberius' reign.
Certainly an educated 1st-2nd century Roman of Tacitus' caliber wouldn't
have spoken of Christianity's founder being killed by Pilate if Tacitus
knew of valid reason to doubt Jesus' existence. Tacitus apparently
doesn't see any reason to doubt Jesus existence, and this provides good
evidence for the existence of Jesus.

Another case of non-Christian documentary evidence that supports Jesus'
existence is the letter of Mara bar Sarapion to his son. Mara bar
Sarapion was a Syrian stoic who while in a Roman jail wrote a letter to
his son, and a copy of this letter is extant. This letter seems to date
from about 73 CE. Mara bar Sarapion isn't Christian, and probably isn't
an eye witness of Jesus. He discusses the killing of three wise men of
history, and he seems to depict Jesus as one of them. He seems to refer
to Jesus with the following two comments:

What did it avail the Jews to kill their wise king, since their

kingdom was taken away from them from that time on<<<

Socrates is not dead, thanks to Plato; nor Pythagoras, because of

Hera's statue. Nor is the wise king, because of the new law which he has
given<<<

In corroborating Jesus existence, this documentary evidence isn't as
strong as that provided by Josephus nor perhaps even Tacitus. Still, it
does have value and adds to the growing momentum from Josephus and
Tacitus for Jesus' existence. Mara bar Sarapion doesn't mention the name
"Jesus," but his speaking of the Jew's wise king whom they killed sure
sounds like Jesus. Now, because Mara bar Sarapion sees this wise king as
living on through his new law, it seems that he either hadn't heard of
the resurrection or didn't accept it. Nevertheless, he does seem to
believe that the Jew's had killed their wise king who had taught a new
law and whose death was followed by the War of 66-72. At any rate, Mara
bar Sarapion's letter clearly seems to shows that a 1st century non-
Christians thought that Jesus existed, apparently without doubting that
he did. It's value as evidence is similar to that of Tacitus, which
shows that an educated non-Christian Roman of the late 1st and early 2nd
century also saw no reason to doubt Jesus' existence.

The evidence from Tacitus and Mara bar Sarapion strongly suggests that
educated 1st century non-Christians saw no reason to doubt that Jesus
had existed. Instead, it seems that they accepted that he did. This also
seems evident from the rabbinical literature of the Talmud. It is true
that the apparent Talmudic references to Jesus seem to consist largely
of responses to Christian claims. Many scholars doubt the possibility of
reconstructing any reliable independent Jewish tradition concerning
Jesus from this literature. It seems that at best the rabbinical
literature offers a few instances of 2nd century and later attempts by
rabbis to discredit the Christianity of their day. Perhaps these rabbis
used some limited older independent Jesus tradition, but reliably
identifying this tradition seems next to impossible. While some scholars
think otherwise, rabbinical literature seems virtually useless in
reconstructing particular facts about Jesus. However, it does seem to
have value in supporting that Jesus existed. Passages such as bSanh 43a;
Sanb. 10:1-2, Abot 5:19 and Aboda Zara 16b-17 have the purpose of
discrediting Christianity by attacking Jesus. However, while using a
variety of means to attacking Jesus, there is apparently no instance in
which this literature questions Jesus' existence. It seems that if the
2nd century and later compilers of the rabbinical literature had known
any reason to doubt Jesus' existence, they would have included this in
the attempt to discredit Christianity. It seems, then, that rabbinical
Judaism saw no reason to doubt the existence of Jesus. This is
particularly important because rabbinical Judaism was certainly
interested in Jewish oral tradition. The point here is that rabbinical
Judaism was in a position to know of any reason to doubt Jesus
existence, and it clearly had motivation to exploit any such knowledge.
However, rabbinical Judaism clearly didn't exploit such knowledge; and
thus, quite apparently saw no reason to doubt Jesus existence. This
leaves us with strong reason to conclude that Jesus did in fact exist.
When we couple this with Tacitus showing that an educated late 1st
century Roman also saw no reason to doubt Jesus existence, this line of
argument for Jesus existence becomes weighty, indeed.

As I explained at the beginning of this essay, the historicity of Jesus
doesn't stand or fall on corroboration from non-Christian material. I
believe that the canonical documents provide sufficient evidence to
critically show Jesus' existence as very likely. It was for the sake of
argument that this essay played the skeptic's game of looking for non-
Christian corroboration of the existence of Jesus. In doing this, it
seems that this essay has beaten the more extreme skeptics at their own
game. Josephus' Ant. 20,200 by itself shows that Jesus existed, was
called Christ and had a brother named James. Next, careful consideration
of Ant. 18:63-64 shows that underlying the obvious Christian
interpolation Josephus again seems to speak of Jesus and explain that he
died by Pilate's hand. Tacitus also provides evidence of Jesus
existence, in that it is unlikely that Tacitus would have been so
accepting of Christian claims if he had any reason to doubt Jesus
existence. Tacitus, like Ant. 18:63-64 corroborates Jesus death at the
hands of Pilate. Finally, Mara bar Sarapion and the Rabbinical
literature by assuming Jesus existence also show his existence as
likely. The point in all this is that even apart from the canonical
Gospels' witness to Jesus, there is sufficient evidence to show that
Jesus existed, was called Christ and died at Pilate's hand. It seems
that there is good reason to be skeptical of the more extreme skeptics
who question the existence of Jesus.

Bonnie ***** <nospam@nospam.org> wrote in
news:d2t2v09jdee51llshk3gkmlb1dnaicgc2e@4ax.com:

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 18:00:10 GMT, Alabama Pete <psmith@bellsouth.net>
wrote:

HOMOSEXUALTY IS SIN AND JESUS IS THE ANSWER.

Of course, the question then becomes:

"What is a CHristian's favorite lie, which they attribute to a person
who never existed?"

Belated Happy MLK,Jr.Day --
Bonnie *****

Did Jesus really exist?

Did Jesus really exist?

Not only Christians but probably most non-
Christian historians answer this question in the affirmative.

For the
most part, it seems that critics of the Biblical Jesus don't question
Jesus' existence but instead question the picture that the canonical
Gospels paint of Jesus.

Christianity often finds itself defending the
historicity of specific canonical statements concerning Jesus but not
his mere existence.

However, the more extreme skeptic might question
Jesus' existence and argue that there was no historical figure of Jesus.