Who claimed to have met a historical Jesus ?

Gday,

Originally posted by texastig
What do you think Peter and John were doing with Jesus for three years?
They walked with Him, lived with Him and talked with Him, etc...

Sigh.
Once more you post Christian BELIEFS.
There is no evidence that happened.

There is NOT ONE claim to have personally met Jesus - as shown clearly by your repeated faulure to quote even ONE !

Originally posted by texastig
Again, see my answer above.

Again,
see my answers above, over and over, again and again.

You have NOT ONE claim to have met Jesus personally.
What you have is CLAIMS and BELIEFS from later Christians.

Originally posted by texastig
Before turning to this topic, I will first note that the vast majority of scholars, both conservative and liberal alike, generally disdain radical theses that question the very existence of Jesus. For example, theologian Rudolf Bultmann asserted, "By no means are we at the mercy of those who doubt or deny that Jesus ever lived."

Later claims and beliefs.
No actual claim to have met Jesus.

Originally posted by texastig
Historian Michael Grant termed the hypothesis that Jesus never lived an "extreme view." He charges that it transgresses the basics of historiography: "if we apply to the New Testament, as we should, the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material, we can no more reject Jesus' existence than we can reject the existence of a mass of pagan personages whose reality as historical figures is never questioned." Grant summarizes, after referring to Wells as an example: "modern critical methods fail to support the Christ-myth theory." These positions have been "annihilated" by the best scholars because the critics "have not succeeded in disposing of the much stronger, indeed very abundant, evidence to the contrary."[ii]
From: www.bethinking.org...

Later claims and beliefs.
No actual claim to have met Jesus.

Originally posted by texastig
99% of scholars believe that Paul wrote 1cor 15 and Paul said that Peter seen Him and the twelve, etc...

Paul does NOT claim to have met Jesus.
Paul says they had VISIONS of Christ.
That is NOT personally meeting Jesus.
You fail again.

Originally posted by texastig
So do you and they fail against the vast majority of scholars.

NO scholar argues there is a claim to have personally met Jesus.
Which is why you keep FAILING to quote any.
Still NOT ONE claim to have personally met Jesus.

You keep thinking that a BELIEF that someone DID meet Jesus is the same as an actual 1st CLAIM to have met Jesus - wrong.

Originally posted by texastig
I'm not talking about the book of James.

Of course not!
Because it shows you are WRONG.
So naturally you ignore it.

Originally posted by texastig
Paul seen James. James told Paul about his brother Jesus.

Paul does NOT say that.
James does NOT say that.

Paul says the exact opposite - he learnt of Jesus from NO MAN !
Paul says you are wrong right there in scripture.

Originally posted by texastig
He is not alleged. See my answer above.

Does James claim to be the brother of Jesus?
No.
LATER Christians BELIEF he was.
Still NOT ONE claim to have personally met Jesus.

You keep thinking that a BELIEF that someone DID meet Jesus is the same as an actual 1st CLAIM to have met Jesus - wrong.

Originally posted by texastig
Then that means your theories are against scholars who believe that Paul wrote 6-8 epistles. Scholars believe what Paul wrote was authentic!

Paul does NOT claim to have personally met Jesus.
Do you have ANY idea what this thread is about?
It certainly appears not.

A dozen pages in and you CANNOT produce ONE SINGLE claim to have personally met Jesus.

Just page after page of LATER CLAIMS and BELIEFS.

Originally posted by texastig
Since the majority of scholars believe what Paul wrote was authentic, then it stands to reason in what Paul said about Peter and others seeing the resurrected Christ.

Paul discusses people who had VISIONS of Christ.
SO what?
People have VISIONS of Christ to this day.
And Buddha, Krishna, Satan, etc. etc.
So what?

A dozen pages in and you CANNOT produce ONE SINGLE claim to have personally met Jesus.

Originally posted by texastig
Kap, that is not true. Are you saying that all of the scholars are liars? Can you look at Gary Habermas's information or have you seen it?
Can I get your permission to send your original post to Gary for him to critique?

Scholars do NOT argue anyone claimed to have personally met Jesus.
Which is whay you have FAILED to quote any doing so.

You keep thinking that a BELIEF that someone DID meet Jesus is the same as an actual 1st CLAIM to have met Jesus - wrong.


Gary Habermas does NOT argue anyone claimed to have personally met Jesus.
which is why you have FAILED to quote him doing so.

Over and over you FAIL to provide any example of anyone who claimed to have met Jesus.

Page after page, you post CLAIMS and BELIEFS -
but
you CANNOT produce ONE SINGLE claim to have personally met Jesus.


Don't bother posting more CLAIMS and BELIEFS that people did meet Jesus.

Everytime you do it highlights your total failure to quote even ONE claim to have personally met Jesus.

You keep thinking that a BELIEF that someone DID meet Jesus is the same as an actual 1st CLAIM to have met Jesus - wrong.


Why don't you just admit the clear and obvious fact :
NOT ONE Christian claims to have personally met Jesus
(excepting the forged 2nd C. 2 Peter.)


Kap


[edit on 11-7-2010 by Kapyong]

Gday,

Originally posted by texastig
Kap, that is not true. Are you saying that all of the scholars are liars? Can you look at Gary Habermas's information or have you seen it?
Can I get your permission to send your original post to Gary for him to critique?

Of course I know Habermas and his argument.
He's a maximal conservative - essentially a true-believer.

His views are faithful crap,
here is Robert Price demolishing Habermas -
www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com...


"Habermas’s Ennead

Our apologist lays out a hand of trump cards he thinks will justify him gathering up all the stakes. But does he win the game? We need to take a closer look at his cards. First, “There is little doubt, even in critical circles, that the apostle Paul is the author of the book of 1 Corinthians. Rarely is this conclusion questioned” (p. 264) But there is reason to question it, and this is where the appeal to the majority is so misleading. Bruno Bauer and a whole subsequent school of New Testament critics including Samuel Adrian Naber, A.D. Loman, Allard Pierson, W.C. van Manen, G.A. van den Bergh van Eysinga, Thomas Whittaker, and L. Gordon Rylands all rejected the authenticity of 1 Corinthians as a Pauline epistle. And they did so with astonishing arguments that remain unanswered to this day, the major strategy of those few “consensus” scholars who even deigned to mention them being to laugh them off as a priori outrageous. These arguments have been revived and carried further today by Hermann Detering, Darrell J. Doughty, and myself. Again, appealing to authoritative names in the manner of an exorcism is vain in scholarly matters. I mean only to indicate that there are real and open issues here, and that one must not over-simplify the debate by taking important things for granted.

Second, “Virtually all scholars agree that in this text [1 Corinthians 15:3ff] Paul recorded an ancient tradition(s) about the origins of the Christian gospel. Numerous evidences indicate that this report is much earlier than the date of the book in which it appears” (ibid.) This is not really a separate argument from the next two following, but let us briefly note the oddity of the whole notion of Paul, if he is indeed the author, passing down a “tradition,” much less an “ancient” one (though perhaps Habermas means ancient in relation to us, but then that’s true of the whole epistle, isn’t it?). Habermas has set foot on one of the land mines in Van Manen’s territory: the anachronism of the picture of Paul, a founder of Christianity, already being able to appeal to hoary traditions, much less creedal formulae! All this demands a date long after Paul.

Not only that, but as Harnack showed long ago, the 1 Corinthians 15 list is clearly a composite of pieces of two competing lists, one making Cephas the prince of apostles, the other according that dignity to James the Just. The conflation of the lists (to say nothing of the addition of gross apocryphal elements like the appearance to the half-thousand!) presupposes much historical water under the bridge, way too much for Paul.

Third, “The vast majority of critical scholars concur on an extremely early origin for this report. Most frequently, it is declared that Paul received the formula between two and eight years after the crucifixion, around A.D. 32-38” (ibid.) because…

Fourth, “Researchers usually conclude that Paul received this material shortly after his conversion during his stay in Jerusalem with Peter and James (Gal 1:18-19), who are both included in Paul’s list of individuals to whom Jesus appeared (1 Cor 15:5, 7)” (ibid.).

First, one may ask concerning all this what it is that Paul was supposed to have been preaching prior to this visit, since 1 Corinthians 15:1 makes the list the very content of his initial preaching to the Corinthian church! The text as we read it gives no hint that Paul is supposed to be citing some older material (though I agree the material is alien to the context, not being the writer’s own words. I just make it a later interpolation, not a Pauline citation of prior material. It’s just that the text does not mean to let on to this). But if he does regard the list as a piece of earlier material, he leaves no interval between the beginning of his apostolic preaching and the learning of this so-crucial list. Ouch.

Nor should we forget how Galatians tells us in no uncertain terms that the gospel message of Paul was in no way mediated through any human agency, which would just not be true if he was simply handing on tradition “like a plastered cistern that loses not a drop.”

Besides this, it is sheer surmise that Paul would have memorized this text at the behest of Peter and James when he was in their company in Jerusalem on the occasion mentioned in Galatians. In fact, to bring the list and the visit together in the same breath is already a piece of harmonization after the manner of hybridizing Mark with Luke by saying one of Luke’s angels was out buying a lottery ticket when Mark got there, pen in hand. It is like pegging the visionary ascent to the third heaven (2 Corinthians 12:1-10) as the same as the Damascus Road encounter of Acts. Purely gratuitous.

To make things worse, there is the serious question of whether the fortnight’s visit of Paul to Jerusalem in Galatians 1:18-24 is original to the text either. It bristles with odd vocabulary, even in so short a text!, and neither Tertullian’s text nor Marcion’s seems to have contained it. It looks like a Catholicizing interpolation trying to shorten the span between Paul’s conversion and his first encounter with the Jerusalem apostles, fourteen years after (Galatians 2:1).

I realize that evangelical readers will be snickering by this time. They have been led to scoff at this way of scrutinizing the text for interpolations too early for the extant manuscript sources to attest them. I recommend William O. Walker’s Interpolations in the Pauline Letters as a good introduction to this methodology and its inherent plausibility. Conservatives have elevated to a dogma the premature and groundless judgment that we can take for granted that no important interpolations crept into the text during that early period for which there is absolutely no manuscript evidence either way."


...

...

Price on Habermas continued :


"Fifth, Habermas takes it as independent corroboration of Paul’s (= the list’s) claim that various people saw the Risen Jesus that Paul got the creed from James and Peter: “if critical scholars are correct that Paul received the creedal material in 1 Corinthians 15:3ff. from Peter and James in Jerusalem in the early 30s A.D., then we have strong evidence that the reported appearances of the risen Jesus came from the original apostles.” (p. 267). If they gave him the list, they must have drawn up the list to begin with, or at least informed those who did. I don’t see how this follows. And the whole scenario reminds me too much of the old legend that the Apostles Creed was written, an article at a time, as each apostle added on his favorite tenet.

Habermas points to Galatians 1:18-20, the mention of Paul heading for Jerusalem to seek Peter’s expertise, presumably on the main features of his gospel or about the life of Jesus: if they had told him something very different concerning the resurrection than we read in Paul, wouldn’t he have said so? But again, this is part of that harmonizing interpolation, inserted just to make things easier for apologists like Habermas himself.

And in general, we must recognize that references to what the apostles may or may not have said, occurring not in writings by them but rather in writings by a different author have no independent historical value. We might as well invoke John the Baptist’s endorsement of Jesus from the gospels as independent evidence for the historical Jesus!

Sixth, Paul (= the list) includes an appearance to Paul himself. I think the interpolated list mentioned Paul in the third person, and that the redactor (inevitably) made it first person, an adaptation the interpolator of 2 Corinthians 12:1-0 could not competently carry through. In any case, if it is an interpolation, it is post-Pauline and pseudepigraphical, so this one depends on a prior decision as to authorship.

Habermas notes that the three accounts in Acts of Paul’s encounter with the Risen One on the road to Damascus tend to corroborate the statement of the 1 Corinthians 15 list about a Pauline appearance. This is ironic, since Luke seems instead to want to ring down the curtain on the resurrection appearances with the ascension, allowing Paul and Stephen to have mere visions afterward. This he does to rebut claims for their non-twelve apostleship. And, as Detering notes, the element of Paul being blinded (borrowed ultimately from the conversion of Heliodorus in 2 Maccabees 3) surely means to deny that Paul saw the Risen Jesus in any manner analogous to the twelve, who, after all, had tea with the Risen Savior on more than one occasion.

Seventh, Habermas cites Paul’s Jerusalem visit in Galatians 2:1-10, which issued in an A plus report card, as further evidence that Paul and the Jerusalem apostles had no serious disagreement. Suffice it to say that the text is very clear on the point at issue in these discussions: not resurrection but rather circumcision of the Gentiles. We simply do not know if the question of the resurrection came up on that occasion. There is no point in pretending we do, or we are making it up as we go along. Habermas warns: “rather than highlight what many contemporary scholars think cannot be known about the New Testament testimony, I want to concentrate on the evidence that we do have” (p. 262). But this isn’t part of it.

Eighth, “After recounting the creed and listing key witnesses to the appearances of Jesus, Paul declared that all the other apostles were currently preaching the same message concerning Jesus’ appearances (1 Cor 15:11-15). In other words, we have it on Paul’s authority that these resurrection appearances were also being proclaimed by the original apostles” (p. 267). But we cannot say we know they were preaching the same list or the same listed appearances until we read some other document by one of them that has the list in common with 1 Corinthians 15. And we have no such text. You can’t blithely quote Paul as evidence for what others were saying. The 1 Corinthians text does not take us out of the range of what Paul is saying—unless we recognize that the material is interpolated! And then the point is that it is a Catholicizing gloss, rewriting history to make it look like Paul agreed with the Jerusalem apostles when in fact he hadn’t.

Ninth, “Another indicator of the appearances to the original apostles is the Gospel accounts… Even from a critical viewpoint, it can be shown that several of the appearance narratives report early tradition [an apologetical euphemism for “early rumor”] as Dodd argues after a careful analytical study. He contends that the appearance narratives in Matthew 28:8-10, 16-20 and John 20:19-21, and, to a lesser extent, Luke 24:36-49, are based on early material [again: apologetical euphemism—“material”!]. The remaining Gospel accounts of Jesus’ resurrection appearances are lacking in typical mythical tendencies and likewise merit careful consideration” (p. 268). Now isn’t that special?"


In short -
Habermas is a faithful believer preaching faithful beliefs.


Kap

Found this , sorry if it has already been posted as I haven't yet read the entire thread ..

Non-biblical accounts of New Testament events and/or people
Following is a list of extra-biblical (outside of the Bible) references of biblical events, places, etc. The list is not exhaustive but is very representative of what is available.

Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?, a Jewish historian) mentions John the Baptist and Herod - Antiquities, Book 18, ch. 5, par. 2
"Now some of the Jews thought that the destruction of Herod's army came from God, and that very justly, as a punishment of what he did against John, that was called the Baptist: for Herod slew him, who was a good man, and commanded the Jews to exercise virtue, both as to righteousness towards one another, and piety towards God, and so to come to baptism; for that the washing [with water] would be acceptable to him, if they made use of it, not in order to the putting away [or the remission] of some sins [only], but for the purification of the body; supposing still that the soul was thoroughly purified beforehand by righteousness."
Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?) mentions Jesus - Antiquities, Book 18, ch. 3, par. 3.
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, (9) those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; (10) 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.
There is debate among scholars as to the authenticity of this quote since it is so favorable to Jesus. For more information on this, please see Regarding the quotes from the historian Josephus about Jesus
Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?) mentions James, the brother of Jesus - Antiquities, Book 20, ch. 9.
"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: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done."
Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?) mentions Ananias the High Priest who was mentioned in Acts 23:2
Now as soon as Albinus was come to the city of Jerusalem, he used all his endeavors and care that the country might be kept in peace, and this by destroying many of the Sicarii. But as for the high priest, Ananias (25) he increased in glory every day, and this to a great degree, and had obtained the favor and esteem of the citizens in a signal manner; for he was a great hoarder up of money
Acts 23:2, "And the high priest Ananias commanded those standing beside him to strike him [Paul] on the mouth."
Tacitus (A.D. c.55-A.D. c.117, Roman historian) mentions "Christus" who is Jesus - Annals 15.44
"Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular."
Ref. from classics.mit.edu...
Thallus (Circa AD 52, eclipse of the sun) Thallus wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean world from the Trojan War to his own time. His writings are only found as citations by others. Julius Africanus, who wrote about AD 221, mentioned Thallus' account of an eclipse of the sun.
"On the whole world there pressed a most fearful darkness; and the rocks were rent by an earthquake, and many places in Judea and other districts were thrown down. This darkness Thallus, in the third book of his History, calls, as appears to me without reason, an eclipse of the sun."
Is this a reference to the eclipse at the crucifixion? Luke 23:44-45, "And it was now about the sixth hour, and darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour, 45 the sun being obscured; and the veil of the temple was torn in two."
The oddity is that Jesus' crucifixion occurred at the Passover which was a full moon. It is not possible for a solar eclipse to occur at a full moon. Note that Julius Africanus draws the conclusion that Thallus' mentioning of the eclipse was describing the one at Jesus' crucifixion. It may not have been.
Julius Africanus, Extant Writings, XVIII in the Ante Nicene Fathers, ed. by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1973), vol. VI, p. 130. as cited in Habermas, Gary R., The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ, (Joplin, MO: College Press Publishing Company) 1996.
Pliny the Younger mentioned Christ. Pliny was governor of Bithynia in Asia Minor. Pliny wrote ten books. The tenth around AD 112.
"They (the Christians) were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before it was light, when they sang in alternate verses a hymn to Christ, as to a god, and bound themselves by a solemn oath, not to any wicked deeds, but never to commit any fraud, theft or adultery, never to falsify their word, nor deny a trust when they should be called upon to deliver it up; after which it was their custom to separate, and then reassemble to partake of food but food of an ordinary and innocent kind."
Pliny, Letters, transl. by William Melmoth, rev. by W.M.L. Hutchinson (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1935), vol. II, X:96 as cited in Habermas, Gary R., The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ, (Joplin, MO: College Press Publishing Company) 1996.
The Talmud
"On the eve of the Passover Yeshu was hanged. For forty days before the execution took place, a herald went forth and cried, "He is going forth to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostasy. Any one who can say anything in his favor, let him come forward and plead on his behalf." But since nothing was brought forward in his favor he was hanged on the eve of the Passover!"
Gal. 3:13, "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree."
Luke 22:1-2, "Now the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which is called the Passover, was approaching. 2And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how they might put Him to death; for they were afraid of the people."
This quotation was taken from the reading in The Babylonian Talmud, transl. by I. Epstein (London: Soncino, 1935), vol. III, Sanhedrin 43a, p. 281 as cited in Habermas, Gary R., The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ, (Joplin, MO: College Press Publishing Company) 1996.
Lucian (circa 120-after 180) mentions Jesus. Greek writer and rhetorician.
"The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account. . . . You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains the contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws. All this they take quite on faith, with the result that they despise all worldly goods alike, regarding them merely as common property."
Lucian, The Death of Peregrine, 1113, in The Works of Lucian of Samosata, transl. by H.W. Fowler and F.G. Fowler, 4 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1949), vol. 4, as cited in Habermas, Gary R., The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ, (Joplin, MO: College Press Publishing Company) 1996.
Though Lucian opposed Christianity, he acknowledges Jesus, that Jesus was crucified, that Christians worship him, and that this was done by faith.
___________________
Sources

McDowell, Josh. Evidence that Demands a Verdict. San Bernardino, CA: Here's Life Publishers, Inc., 1979.
Habermas, Gary R. The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ. Joplin, MO: College Press Publishing Company, 1996.
Encarta on the Web at encarta.msn.com...

Source

I will also say that I have not yet been able to confirm these claims independently as of yet , just found it actually .

Gday,

So, I'd like to bring us back to the topic please.

texastig -
please read the topic again to make sure we are talking about the same thing, OK?

The topic is :
"Who claimed to have met a historical Jesus"

The topic is NOT :
"Who is CLAIMED to have known Jesus (by some later person)"

The topic is NOT :
"Who is BELIEVED to have known Jesus"

The topic is also NOT :
"Who had VISIONS of the Risen Christ (after Jesus was dead)".

You have answered those last 3 questions over and over, on and on, again and again, repeatedly, over and over, on and on, again and again, repeatedly, over and over, on and on, again and again, repeatedly, over and over, on and on, again and again, repeatedly ....

So, please no more of that - we KNOW who is BELIEVED and CLAIMED to have met Jesus and had VISIONS of him, OK? We got it :-)


Why can't you just come out and say :
"Yes, there are no 1st hand accounts of personally meeting Jesus, (except the disputed 2 Peter.)

Is that SO hard to do, tex?


Kap


[edit on 11-7-2010 by Kapyong]

Gday Max_TO,

Thanks for your post.
But may I point out the topic to you?

It's about people who claimed to have met Jesus personally.
It's not a general thread about whether Jesus existed.
But I'll answer you points anway :-)

Originally posted by Max_TO
Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?, a Jewish historian) mentions John the Baptist and Herod - Antiquities, Book 18, ch. 5, par. 2

So what?
Who is talking about Herod and John?
That has nothing to with Jesus existing at all.

Originally posted by Max_TO
Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?) mentions Jesus - Antiquities, Book 18, ch. 3, par. 3.

JOSEPHUS (c.96CE)

The famous Testamonium Flavianum (the T.F.) in the Antiquities of the Jews is considered probably the best evidence for Jesus, yet it has some serious problems :
* the T.F. as it stands uses clearly Christian phrases and names Christ as Messiah, it could not possibly have been written by the devout Jew Josephus (who remained a Jew and refused to call anyone "messiah" in his book which was partly about how false messiahs kept leading Israel astray.),
* The T.F. was not mentioned by any of the early Church fathers who reviewed Josephus.
* Origen even says Josephus does NOT call Jesus the Messiah, showing the passage was not present c.200CE.
* The T.F. first showed up in manuscripts of Eusebius, and was still absent from some manuscripts as late as 8th century.
* The other tiny passage in Josephus refers to Jesus, son of Damneus. The phrase "so-called Christ" may have been a later addition by a Christian who also mis-understood which Jesus was refered to.

An analysis of Josephus can be found here:
www.humanists.net...

In short - this passage is possibly a total forgery (or at best a corrupt form of a lost original.)
But, yes,
it COULD just be actual evidence for Jesus - late, corrupt, controversial but just POSSIBLY real historical evidence.

Originally posted by Max_TO
Flavius Josephus (AD 37?-101?) mentions James, the brother of Jesus - Antiquities, Book 20, ch. 9.

The mention is un-natural - possibly an interpolation.
Perhaps more on this one later.

Originally posted by Max_TO
Tacitus (A.D. c.55-A.D. c.117, Roman historian) mentions "Christus" who is Jesus - Annals 15.44

TACITUS (c.112CE)

Roughly 80 years after the alleged events (and 40 years after the war) Tacitus allegedly wrote a (now) famous passage about "Christ" - this passage has several problems however:
* Tacitus uses the term "procurator", used in his later times, but not correct for the actual period, when "prefect" was used.
* Tacitus names the person as "Christ", when Roman records could not possibly have used this name (it would have been "Jesus, son of Joseph" or similar.)
* This passage is paraphrased by Sulpicius Severus in the 5th century without attributing it to Tacitus, and may have been inserted back into Tacitus from this work.

This evidence speaks AGAINST it being based on any Roman records -
but
merely a few details which Tacitus gathered from Christian stories circulating in his time (c.f. Pliny.)
So,
this passage is NOT evidence for Jesus,
it's just evidence for 2nd century Christian stories about Jesus.

Originally posted by Max_TO
Thallus (Circa AD 52, eclipse of the sun) Thallus wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean world from the Trojan War to his own time. His writings are only found as citations by others. Julius Africanus, who wrote about AD 221, mentioned Thallus' account of an eclipse of the sun.

THALLUS (date unknown)

We have NO certain evidence when Thallus lived or wrote, there are NONE of Thallus' works extant.
What we DO have is a 9th century reference by George Syncellus who quotes the 3rd century Julianus Africanus, who, speaking of the darkness at the crucifixion, wrote: "Thallus calls this darkness an eclipse".
But,
there is NO evidence Thallus made specific reference to Jesus or the Gospel events at all, as there WAS an eclipse in 29. This suggests he merely referred to a known eclipse, but that LATER Christians MIS-interpreted his comment to mean their darkness. (Also note the supposed reference to Thallus in Eusebius is a false reading.)

Richard Carrier the historian has a good page on Thallus:
www.infidels.org...

So,
Thallus is no evidence for Jesus at all,
merely evidence for Christian wishful thinking.

Originally posted by Max_TO
Pliny the Younger mentioned Christ. Pliny was governor of Bithynia in Asia Minor. Pliny wrote ten books. The tenth around AD 112.

PLINY the Younger (c.112CE)

About 80 years after the alleged events, (and over 40 years after the war) Pliny referred to Christians who worshipped a "Christ" as a god, but there is no reference to a historical Jesus or Gospel events.
So,
Pliny is not evidence for a historical Jesus of Nazareth,
just evidence for 2nd century Christians who worshipped a Christ.
www.earlychristianwritings.com...

Originally posted by Max_TO
The Talmud

TALMUD (3rd C. and later)

There are some possible references in the Talmud, but:
* these references are from 3rd century or later, and are merely negative Jewish responses to Christian beliefs.
* the alleged Jewish references to Jesus are highly variant, and very different to the Gospel stories (e.g. that "Jesus" was born about 100BC, that he had 5 disciples, that he learned black magic in Egypt, was the bastard son of a Roman soldier, conceived during menstruation, now in hell in vat of boiling excrement.)
So,
the Talmud contains NO evidence for Jesus,
the Talmud merely has much later Jewish responses to the Gospel stories.


So,
of that impressive looking list - you actually have ONE passage from 2 or 3 generations later, that is partly corrupt (if not forged outright.)

Jesus himself actually left NO mark at all on history - not one contemporary piece of evidence, not even ONE CHRISTIAN who claimed to have met him.


Kap

reply to post by Kapyong


Thanks for that informative reply . As mention I have not yet had time to research the claims , as I just found and posted .

Your reply provided a pretty good starting point for me to look into it further .

Now as mentioned , I have not yet read this thread in its entirety , but would I be correct that the book " Miss Quoting Jesus " has come up ?

If not , its a good read and indirectly related to this topic .

Originally posted by Max_TO
Now as mentioned , I have not yet read this thread in its entirety , but would I be correct that the book " Miss Quoting Jesus " has come up ?
If not , its a good read and indirectly related to this topic .

A great book, I loved it.

I hope tex reads it :-)


Kap

its terrible that i dont have anything to say. because this is such a great thread, not saying much cant do it justice. but these poor poor people are really gassed up on a disney story. and they want so desperately to be right. you could take people literally back in time and show them and they'd just think your time machine messed up. i looked for a long time. all accounts have been shown to be misconstrued or flat out falsified.

excellent op. sad results for humanitys i.q.

reply to post by mav0360


one night I went to pick up a small green Gideons NT that a woman had left on the bar a few days earlier and as soon as I began to open the cover I heard an AUDIBLE voice as if sitting to my left that said-my name, I am Jesus I died for your sins believe in Me and you will never perish- AWESTRUCK (i was not raised churched or knew any scripts) I stood to my feet turned to the voice and said yes Lord, and years later came across these-

I tell you the truth, a time is coming and has now come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live.-John5.25

Christ has indeed been raised from the dead-1Cor15.20

For Christ's love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died.2Cor5.14

But everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said:
"Wake up, O sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you."-Eph5.13

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst.-1Tim1.15

For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.-John6.40

I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.-John10.28

reply to post by No King but Jesus


Your post is simply a declaration of faith and does absolutely nothing to prove the existance of an historical Jesus. See:

Originally posted by Kapyong
But may I point out the topic to you?
It's about people who claimed to have met Jesus personally.

Have you personaly met Jesus around 30 ce?

...as soon as I began to open the cover I heard an AUDIBLE voice as if sitting to my left that said-my name, I am Jesus I died for your sins believe in Me and you will never perish- AWESTRUCK

If you like audible voices, you can get the whole thing for free as an audio book here. Unfortunately, the link doesn't specify whether or not Jesus is the actual narrator.