Thus saith the LORD of hosts: In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold, out of all the languages of the nations, shall even take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying: We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.
This blog's been flagged because it includes content that "other people" on Facebook have reported as abusive. Share B"H
Christian, what are you going to say to G-d of Israel when your god Jesus doesn’t return?
Worshiper of Jesus, Christian/Messianic, what are you going to say when you stand before G-d after the false man-god Jesus whom you worship and to whom you pray doesn’t appear? What are you going to say to your Maker when you knew all along (and I am merely reminding you here now) that worshiping anyone or anything other than Him is a grave sin and betrayal? How will you justify your worship of a mortal creature to whom billions bow their knees? Will you deny that you knew that He has warned you that He was neither a man nor a son of man (Numbers 23:19), that He had no visible form and that He can’t be compared to anything He created? Will you try to defend yourself that you only followed your leaders or will you admit to G-d your sin of idolatry? Will you appeal to the polished literary character from the pages of your New Testament? Will you tell G-d that Jesus paid for your sins by his blood when He explicitly warned that He doesn’t approve of human sacrifices (Leviticus 18:21 and Deuteronomy 12:31) and that no man can punished for the sins of another (Ezekiel 18:20)? Will you point to the [Greek] Testament in your defense and claim it to be the “word of G-d”? Will you claim that you have put your faith in Jesus, Paul, apostles, the church scribes, church fathers, pastors and evangelists? Will you attempt to boldly walk into the Holy of Holies as the author of Hebrews exhorts you to do (Hebrews 10:19) and demand to be allowed in since you placed your trust in a “son of man”, despite the fact that G-d has told us in Numbers 23:19 not to do just that? What will come out of your mouth? Do you know?
The Bible already knows what you are going to say. Indeed, it gives us a glimpse of your very words and it tells us in the Jewish scriptures, the writings that you call “the Old Testament”, the words all of the nations will utter before the G-d of Israel in the end of days:
“To you (Hashem) shall the nations come from the ends of the earth and say: “Our fathers have inherited nothing but lies, worthless things in which there is no profit. Do people make their own gods? Yes, but they are not gods!” (Jeremiah 16:19-20)
Today, however, the choice is still yours. Today, you can still either choose to continue worshiping Jesus as you god, to proclaim him as your “lord and savior” or you can choose to discard your idolatry and turn to the living G-d of Israel and Him alone. Make no mistake – you DO have a choice whom you will serve – if a man Jesus whom Christianity has deified to seat him on G-d’s throne is your ba’al (Hebrew word for “lord”), serve him. But if the G-d of Israel is the L-rd, then you know what you need to do. If you choose idolatry over the Living G-d of Israel, do not think that there is safety in the great numbers among the nations that Christianity and other religions can boast. As G-d said:
“Before Him all the nations are as nothing; they are regarded by Him as worthless and less than nothing. To whom, then, will you compare G-d? What image will you compare him to?” (Isaiah 40:17-18)
A reposting of Uri Yosef’s THE "LAST AND FINAL SACRIFICE" TAKES THE TEN-COUNT after a Christian apologist made
this comment recently. May it be a light to anyone seeking the G-d of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob.
“The reason Jews as a
whole haven't embraced Jesus Christ as Messiah is partly because of hard
hearts, and partly because Jesus came to die for our sins. It was foreseen by
God the Father that He would be rejected, per Isaiah 53 - which Jews have NEVER
been able to "explain" - which then paved the way for His
once-for-all sacrifice for sin.”
A KNOCK-OUT PUNCH:THE "LAST AND FINAL SACRIFICE" TAKES THE TEN-COUNT
Professor Uri Yosef
I. INTRODUCTION
Christian missionaries claim that those who do not accept Jesus as their lord and
savior, which includes the Jewish people, are doomed to burn in “hell” because
they cannot have their sins forgiven by God. This claim is rationalized with the
allegation that, in Biblical times, the only way to bring about the remission of sins
was via the blood of a certain animal. This animal had to be brought to the priest
to be slaughtered at the altar in the Sanctuary, first while in the portable
Sanctuary and later in the Temple, as a sacrificial offering. According to this
claim, since there has been no Temple standing in Jerusalem since the year 70
C.E., valid sacrificial offerings can no longer be made and, therefore, the only
way for Jews to have their sins forgiven is through the blood shed by Jesus in his
"sacrificial" death on the cross. In other words, the claim is that the blood of
Jesus, who was allegedly sacrificed by God (the "Father") as a demonstration of
his great love for mankind,
has once and for all removed the stain of “Original
Sin" from those who follow Jesus (the "Son"). This act of love by God allegedly
made Jesus the "last and final sacrifice" forever.
There are two main aspects to the claim that Jesus was "the last and final
sacrifice". The first concerns the suitability of Jesus and his death as a sacrificial
offering for the remission of sins. The second aspect, which was investigated in
another essay, concerns the need for blood in the atonement process.
This essay examines the suitability of Jesus and the manner in which he died as
a sacrificial offering for the remission of sins.
II. THE CHRISTIAN PERSPECTIVE VERSUS THE SPECIFICATIONS IN THE HEBREW BIBLE
The process for testing this claim by Christian missionaries consists of
contrasting the requirements concerning sacrificial offerings, as specified in the
Hebrew Bible, against the accounts in the New Testament that describe the
death of Jesus on the cross as a sacrificial offering. As part of this analysis, it is
important to bear in mind the following two conditions that existed during the life
of Jesus, at the time of his death, and for several decades following his death:
The Second Temple was still standing in Jerusalem
The Hebrew Bible was the Scripture in force
The salient issue to be addressed, and answered, is:
According to the requirements set forth in the Hebrew Bible, was Jesus a valid sacrificial
offering, and was his death by crucifixion an acceptable process, for remission of sins?
The analytical phase of the testing process identifies ten elements for which the
respective accounts in the New Testament are compared with the specifications
provided in the Hebrew Bible, primarily in the Torah.
One
According to the accounts in the New Testament, Jesus was crucified by
Roman soldiers:
John 19:18,23(KJV) – (18) Where they crucified him, and two other with him, on either
side one, and Jesus in the midst.
(23) Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made
four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam,
woven from the top throughout. [See also Matthew 27:35; Mark 15:24; Luke 23:33.]
According to the Levitical Law of Sacrifice in the Torah, the animal brought as
a sin sacrifice had to be slaughtered by the person who offered it:
Leviticus 4:27-29 - (27) And if any one person from among the common people sins
unwittingly, by performing one of the commandments of the Lord which may not be
done, and incurs guilt; (28) Or if his sin, which he has committed, is made known to
him, then he shall bring his sacrifice, an unblemished female goat, for his sin which he
has sinned. (29) And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the sin offering, and he
shall slaughter the sin offering in the place of the burnt offering.
Two
According to the Levitical Law of Sacrifice in the Torah, some of the blood of
the (sin) sacrifice had to be rubbed by the priest with his finger on the horns of
the altar in the Temple, and the rest had to be poured out at the base of the
sacrificial altar. The fat of the sacrifice had to be removed and burnt:
Leviticus 4:30-31 - (30) And the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger, and
put [it] upon the horns of the altar [used] for the burnt offering; and [then] he shall
pour out all of [the rest of] its blood at the base of the altar. (31) And he shall remove
all of its fat, as was removed the fat from the sacrificial peace offerings; and the priest
shall burn it upon the altar for a pleasant fragrance to the Lord; and [thus] shall the
priest make an atonement for him, and he shall be forgiven.
The New Testament is silent on what was done with the blood of Jesus and
with the fat of his body.
Three
According to the accounts in the New Testament, Jesus was beaten,
whipped, and dragged on the ground before being crucified:
Matthew 26:67(KJV) - Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him; and others
smote him with the palms of their hands, [See also Mark 14:65; Luke 22:63; John 18:22.]
Matthew 27:26,30-31(KJV) – (26)Then released he Barabbas unto them: and when he
had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified.
(30) And they spit upon him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head. (31) And
after that they had mocked him, they took the robe off from him, and put his own
raiment on him, and led him away to crucify him. [See also Mark 15:15-20; John 19:1-3.]
According to the Torah, a sacrificial animal had to be without any physical
defects or blemishes:
Deuteronomy 17:1 - You shall not sacrifice to the Lord your God an ox or a sheep that
has in it a blemish or any bad thing, for that is an abomination to the Lord, your God.
Sidebar Note: As a born Jew, Jesus was circumcised on the eighth day following
his birth, a ritual that leaves a scar (Genesis 17:10-13; the “sign of the covenant”).
The circumcision of Jesus is mentioned in the New Testament (Luke 2:21), yet Paul
refers to circumcision as being tantamount to mutilation (Galatians 5:11-12;
Philippians 3:2).
Four
According to the New Testament, Jesus was "the Lamb of God" whose bones
may not be broken [a reference to the Paschal Lamb of Exodus 12:46 and
Numbers 9:12]:
John 1:29(KJV) – The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold
the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
John 19:36(KJV) - For these things were done, that the scripture should be fulfilled, A
bone of him shall not be broken.
According to the Torah, the Paschal Lamb was not offered for the removal of
sins. Rather, it was a festive, or commemorative, offering. Yom Kippur (the
Day of Atonement) would have been a more appropriate time for a sin
offering:
Numbers 29:11 - One young male goat for a sin offering, beside the sin offering of
atonement, and the continual burnt offering, and its meal offering, and their drink
offerings. [Yom Kippur – Individual sin offering]
Leviticus 16:15 - He shall then slaughter the he goat of the people's sin offering and
bring its blood inside the dividing curtain, and he shall do with its blood as he did with
the blood of the bull and sprinkle it upon the cover of the ark, and before the cover of
the ark. [Yom Kippur – Communal sin offering]
Five
According to the Torah, the Paschal Lamb had to be slaughtered and its
blood used to place markings on the side-posts and lintels of the entrances to
the dwelling. Moreover, the meat had to be roasted and eaten, and whatever
was not consumed by the time the Israelites were to leave their homes, had
to be burnt and destroyed:
Exodus 12:6-10 - (6) And you shall keep it under watch until the fourteenth day of this
month; and the entire congregation of the community of Israel shall slaughter it at
dusk. (7) And they shall take [some] of its blood, and place it on the two doorposts and
on the lintel, on the houses in which they will eat it. (8) And they shall eat the meat in
that night, roasted over fire, and [with] unleavened bread; with bitter herbs they shall
eat it. (9) You shall not eat from it raw, nor boiled in water; but roasted over fire, its
head with its legs, and with its inner parts. (10) And you shall not leave any of it until
morning; and that which left over until the morning you shall burn in the fire.
According to the accounts in the New Testament this was not done with
Jesus after his death. In fact, Jesus was buried.
Matthew 27:57-60(KJV) – (57) When the even was come, there came a rich man of
Arimathaea, named Joseph, who also himself was Jesus' disciple: (58) He went to
Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded the body to be
delivered. (59) And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen
cloth, (60) And laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock: and he
rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre, and departed. [See also Mark 15:42-46;
Luke 23:50-53; John 19:38-42.]
Six
According to the New Testament, the death of Jesus was a sacrificial offering
that expiated the sins of mankind for all times:
Hebrews 10:10,18(KJV) – (10) By the which will we are sanctified through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
(18) Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin. [See also
Romans 6:10; Hebrews 9:12.]
According to the Torah, the Passover (sin) sacrifice, a male-goat, had to be
offered on an individual (per household) basis, not as a communal offering:
Numbers 28:22 - And one young male goat for a sin offering, to make atonement for
you.
Seven
According to the New Testament, the death and blood of Jesus took care of
(almost) all sins:
Hebrews 9:22(KJV) – And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and
without shedding of blood is no remission.
According to the Levitical Law of Sacrifice in the Torah, the sacrificial sin
offering brought atonement only for unintentional sins, except as noted in
Leviticus 5:1-6, 20-26[Leviticus 5:1-6, 6:1-7 in Christian Bibles]:
Numbers 15:27-31 - (27) And if a person sins inadvertently, then he shall offer a female
goat in its first year as a sin offering. (28) And the priest shall atone for the erring
person who sinned inadvertently before the Lord in order to make atonement on his
behalf; and it shall be forgiven him. (29) For the native born of the children of Israel
and the stranger who resides among them, one law shall apply to him who sins
inadvertently. (30) And the person who does anything presumptuously, whether he is a
native born or a stranger, that person blasphemes the Lord; and that person shall be
cut off from among his people. (31) Because he has scorned the word of the Lord, and
has violated his commandment; that person shall surely be cut off, for his iniquity is
upon him.
Eight
According to the New Testament, the death of Jesus brought about the
remission of sins yet uncommitted, and of sins of those yet to be born:
Hebrews 10:18(KJV) – Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for
sin.
According to the Levitical Law of Sacrifice in the Torah, sacrifices could bring
atonement only for sins committed prior to the offering of the sacrifice. No
sacrifice was provided for the atonement of sins committed after the sacrifice
was offered and, thus, no sacrifice can bring atonement for sins of people
born after it was offered. This includes both טּאתָחַ (haTAT)], a sin offering,
described in Leviticus 4:1-5:13, and שׁםָאָ (aSHAM), a guilt offering,
described in Leviticus 5:14-26. Had there been, among the listed sacrifices,
even one kind of sin or guilt offering that could bring atonement for future
sins, the person who would have offered that particular sacrifice would not
have had to do so again for the rest of his life. Moreover, Yom Kippur (the
Day of Atonement), which is ordained by the Torah as an annual Holy Day
(Leviticus 16:29-34), would have had to be celebrated by the Israelites only
the very first time after the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai, had they used one
of those "super" sacrificial offerings that could atone for sins of the future.
The claim by the author of Hebrews, that there are no more sin offerings
required following the death of Jesus, is false for other reasons as well:
The Second Temple stood in Jerusalem for nearly 40 years following the death of
Jesus, during which time literally thousands of animals were offered as sacrifices
of all sorts, including sin and guilt offerings, as prescribed by the Torah.
The Hebrew Bible contains prophecies about the building of the Third Temple in
the messianic era, and of the resumption of the sacrificial system at that time. All
the types of sacrificial offerings described in the Hebrew Bible will be made on the
sacrificial altar [חַ בֵּזְמִ (mizBE'ah)] in the Temple, including both the טּאתָחַ and
שׁםָאָ sacrificial offerings. In other words, the sacrificial system, which has been
in a state of suspension since the year 70 C.E., when the Romans destroyed the
Second Temple, will be completely restored in the messianic era:
Ezekiel 43:21-22 - And you shall take the bull of the sin offering, and he [the priest]
shall burn it at the edge of the Temple, outside the Sanctuary. (22) And on the
second day you shall offer an unblemished he-goat for a sin offering, and they [the
priests] shall purify the altar as they purified it with the bull. [See also: Isaiah 56:7;
Story of Jesus Christ was 'fabricated to
pacify the poor', claims controversial Biblical scholar
Christianity
was a sophisticated government propaganda exercise used to pacify the subjects
of a the Roman Empire, claims scholar
A controversial
American biblical scholar is set to make his first appearance in London next
week to present a discovery that he claims proves the story of Jesus Christ was
invented as asystem of mind control to
enslave the poor.
Joseph Atwill, who is
the author of a book entitled'Caesar's Messiah: The Roman
Conspiracy to Invent Jesus', asserts that Christianity did not
begin as a religion, but was actually a sophisticated government propaganda
exercise used to pacify the subjects of the Roman Empire.
At the 'Covert Messiah' conference, to be
held at the Conway Hall in Holborn a week on Saturday, Mr Atwill will present
his theory that the New Testament was written by first-century Roman
aristocrats and that they entirely fabricated the story of Jesus Christ.
Outlining his ideas in a blog posting on his
website Mr Atwill writes: "Christianity may be considered a religion, but
it was actually developed and used as a system of mind control to produce
slaves that believed God decreed their slavery."
Mr Atwill says that acts of insurrection by
Jewish sects, who were awaiting the arrival of a so-called 'warrior Messiah' in
Palestine, were a perpetual problem for the Roman Empire and that after the
Empire had exhausted all traditional means of dealing with the problem they
resorted to psychological warfare.
"They surmised
that the way to stop the spread of zealous Jewish missionary activity was to
create a competing belief system," Atwill toldPRWeb.com
"That's when the 'peaceful' Messiah
story was invented.
"Instead of inspiring warfare, this
Messiah urged turn-the-other-cheek pacifism and encouraged Jews to 'give onto
Caesar' and pay their taxes to Rome."
Mr Atwill continues: "Although
Christianity can be a comfort to some, it can also be very damaging and
repressive, an insidious form of mind control that has led to blind acceptance
of serfdom, poverty, and war throughout history.
To this day, especially in the United States,
it is used to create support for war in the Middle East."
Elsewhere, Mr Atwill also writes: “In fact he
[Jesus] may be the only fictional character in literature whose entire life
story can be traced to other sources. Once those sources are all laid bare,
there’s simply nothing left.”
Atwill says he made his discovery when while
studying the New Testament alongside the 'War of the Jews' by Josephus - the
only surviving first-person historical account of first-century Judea.
Mr Atwill claims that he began to notice a
sequence of parallels between the two texts.
"What seems to have eluded many scholars
is that the sequence of events and locations of Jesus ministry are more or less
the same as the sequence of events and locations of the military campaign of
[Emperor] Titus Flavius as described by Josephus," Atwill claims.
"This is clear evidence of a
deliberately constructed pattern", he continues.
"The biography of Jesus is actually
constructed, tip to stern, on prior stories, but especially on the biography of
a Roman Caesar."
Richard Dawkins, the English evolutionary
biologist and author, well known for his anti-religion views, yesterday tweeted
a link to the press release advertising the event in London.
However, he later tweeted: "RT doesn't
imply endorsement. I'm not qualified to judge Atwill's thesis. Just thought it
might be worth a look."
Mr Atwill's theory is simply one of a number
of what are known as Bible conspiracy theories.
These theories
commonly include the suggestion that secret societies, mysteryschoolsand other religions
used the fictional story of Christ to unify the Roman Empire under one state
religion.
“So do you think that those who reject Jesus are supernaturally blinded – how about those who accept him? How did their eyes “get opened”? And how about people who accept Jesus – but then come to the recognition that they were hoodwinked – and leave him – what “blinded” them?”
Isaiah 2:22
Many Christians have a difficult time understanding why it is that Jews view their faith in Jesus as idolatrous. Christians assert that Jesus is “one and the same” as the God of Israel. How could veneration of Jesus be considered idolatry?
It may come as a surprise to some Christians if they were to realize that many Jews have a difficult time understanding Christians. After everything is said and done, Christianity is pointing to a man, and calling him “god”. What else is there to discuss?
This article is written in an effort to help Christians see things from a Jewish perspective.
Imagine the following scenario.
The Messianic era is here. God is revealed to all mankind. Every human being clearly sees that the One Creator of heaven and earth is the only true power. Everyone understands that every facet of existence is just an expression of His will and His love. All the nations recognize that every bit of adoration that the human heart can generate belongs only to the Almighty God who called the universe into existence.
And Jesus is not there. The man from Nazareth is nowhere to be seen.
What will the Christian then feel about the relationship he shared with this man? How will they view all the adoration that they were persuaded to pour out towards that individual?
The fact that you could imagine this scenario, should tell you that Jesus is NOT one and the same with the Creator of heaven and earth. The fact that this scenario is hypothetically possible should help you separate between Jesus on the one hand and the God of Israel on the other.
This scenario is not just a hypothetical possibility. If you believe those God fearing Jews whose words are immortalized in the Jewish Scriptures, you will realize that this scenario was at the heart of their vision for the future.
I will provide a list of Scriptural references for you to study. Please bear in mind that when these words were originally written, no one had heard of Jesus. When the Jewish prophets penned their words, the concept: “trinity” – was not yet invented. Please realize that for a Jew who would have read these words before the advent of Christianity, the words “God”, “Lord”, and “Almighty” would mean one thing and one thing only – The One Creator of heaven and earth.
A) Nowhere in the Tanach does it say to believe in mashiach “or else”
B) Nowhere in the Tanach does it say that mashiach will be a hybrid god-man.
C) Nowhere in the Tanach does it say that mashiach will fulfill the law and replace it with a law of messiah.
D) Nowhere in Tanach does it say the mashiach will sacrifice himself for the sins of the world for all time.
E) Nowhere in Tanach does it say that a human sacrifice is permitted.
F) Nowhere in Tanach does it say that human vicarious atonement is permitted.
G) Nowhere in Tanach does it say that it is permissable to crown king mashiach prior to his fulfillment of ALL the messianic duties.
H) Nowhere in Tanach does it ever say that G-d has three personages or “Triune”
Had G-d chose to teach such things, He would have EXPLICTLY and plainly said so. Just as He explictly gave us details on what is a kosher animal, how to sacrifice an animal, matters of family purity etc…When Hashem gave the law at Sinai, he was silent on all matters that Christians claim, such as G-d’s nature, form and the personage of messiah.
Hashem isnt going to then, 1500 years into the future say, I told you could do the law (Deut 30) but you CANT! I told you I was alone….but I’m NOT! I actually have a son….and he is Me! and even though I told you NOT to sacrifice your sons and daughters, like the baal worhsipers….I am going to sacrifice my human son….who is really me.
I will kill him (myself) on a wooden stick by suffocation. He will not be required to be slaughtered per the Torah, his blood not sprinkled on the altar, his fat not burned and in fact, he will be placed in a tomb, alone and I will raise him (myself)…even though I never taught you any of this…you must accept it or be thrown into the pits of hell.
These are obviously BIG, HUGE concepts that had they been part of Hashems revelation to mankind, would have been given at Sinai. Otherwise, as Christians have done, they have made G-d a liar (G-d forbid) who decieves His people and who changes the paradigm midstream.
This is not the G-d of the Tanach. The Christian paradigm in the god of Rome….everyone of the new aspects of the Gospel can be found in Grecco-Roman paganism but NOT in Jewish doctrine.
Eating a god-man’s flesh and drinking his blood…pagan.
A hybrid god-man….pagan.
A virgin birth….pagan.
A resurrected savior…pagan.
Miracles by the god-man…pagan.
Only through eisegesis can you shoe-horn this paganism into the Tanach." ~
One of the things that fundamentalist Christians find disturbing about the world is the existence of cults. Cult leaders are said to be self-centered and egotistical because they require complete obedience and conformity to whatever agenda the leader has in mind. On top of this, cult leaders tend to divide people into two groups, those who are members of the cult and those who aren't. Those who don't accept the agenda and views of the cult leader are often vilified and declared enemies of the group. Cult leaders also try to separate children from their parents and create a division between them which often results in total isolation and rejection of the parental influence. Cult leaders will also promise great rewards to their followers for their sacrifice to the cult service.
Christians can often be found issuing warnings about the evils of cult environments and the destructive influence they can have on the minds of emotionally and economically stressed people. Cults are said to create an atmosphere of extremely negative attitudes because the cult leader replaces God, parents, and the very mind of an individual with the personal agenda and views of the cult leader. The cult mentality with all its ramifications is said to spawn horrible fanatical movements and produces petty, self-serving, egotistical, and often power-hungry leaders who wish to manipulate and control others.
All these points and observations about cults ring true in the minds of objective people. However, what is ignored by Christians is that their Lord and Savior, Jesus, exhibited exactly the same traits that zealous cult leaders do. Christians will close their eyes to the same things they find so disturbing in other cult leaders. This is understandable to some extent because Christianity is above all else, a religion that promotes itself through aggressive advertising and the unquestioning submission to a superficial God, a God of shine and little substance. Believers are told to do the "will of God" and serve him totally. After all, Jesus himself gave Christians their marching orders in the Gospel of Matthew.
Matt 28:18-20 And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power(authority) is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.
It should be noted that Jesus makes quite a claim here. Jesus claims, like all cult leaders do, that special "all power" has been given to him exclusively. In other words, whatever the cult leader commands, the follower should do because the highest level of authority resides in the cult leader. And of course, the follower wants to please his Master and will go out and attempt to coerce others to also obey the commands of their Master. As the cult evolves, Jesus the man becomes Jesus the God and his followers can go out and conquer the world for him knowing that they are doing their duty as good and faithful servants of their Master. The world is full of sheep and if one falls into a ditch, the rest start jumping in. In other words, there isn't any need to question these rules because they're found in the Holy Bible and whatever the Bible says must be true.
The disturbing cult leader characteristics of Jesus don't stop with this one example. The New Testament has many other examples which are always ignored by Christians because it spoils the fluffy image of Jesus that they so love to portray to the world. They will only quote the "nice" sayings of Jesus while ignoring the many ugly and self-absorbed things he said.
Let's have a look at some of the other cult leader traits exhibited by Jesus, the alleged "Prince of Peace". Jesus was a cult leader who wanted to bring division and disharmony. It was all part of his ego-based new world order.
Luke 12:49-53 I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished! Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division: For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And like most cult leaders, Jesus wanted people to leave their families and make him the centerpiece of their existence.
Matt 10:37 He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And like most cult leaders, Jesus promised potential recruits to his new cult a great big reward for leaving their current responsibilities behind to serve him alone.
Matt 19:29 And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life. And like many self-absorbed cult leaders, Jesus deemed anyone who didn't jump on his theological bandwagon to be an enemy.
Matt 12:30He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad. And like many cult leaders, Jesus won't tolerate anyone who doesn't want him to rule their lives.
Luke 19:27 But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me. As other cult leaders proclaim, simple unbelief will merit punishment.
Mark 16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And like many cult leaders, Jesus in his glorified Final Solution, will send out his army of drones to cleanse the world of anything that Jesus deems or defines as "wicked". Naturally, unbelievers will be exterminated along with all the other unworthy human "weeds".
Matt 13:40-42 As therefore the tares(weeds) are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. The whole teaching foundation of Christianity is that anyone who doesn't declare and "confess" that Jesus is their Lord and Savior is doomed to eternal damnation. The context is quite clear. It's an ultimatum designed to coerce and manipulate others into compliance with a religious agenda that seeks to dominate others to enhance its power and influence.
Oddly enough, the Hebrew scriptures, which Christians label as the "Old Testament", doesn't support Jesus and his attempt to usurp authority from Yahweh. Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, said quite clearly that he is not a man(Num 23:19) and will not give his glory to another(Isa 42:8). There is nothing in the Old Testament which states that people should worship a man, a Son of Man, or a Messiah as God and such a thing is abomination in the eyes of Yahweh. All of these Old Testament scriptural facts are ignored by Christians however. Christians are far too entranced with their worship of a "God" who appeals to their need to feel "chosen" and "elect" by a God.
Christians will only recognize as the "Word of God", those parts of the Bible that they like the sound of and any parts which don't appeal to them they'll ignore or rationalize away as not pertaining to them. Jesus demonstrated exactly the same traits that other cult leaders exhibit. Of course, since it was Jesus the disturbing similarities are deemed "holy" and the"will of God". But let there be no mistake, the character called Jesus, as defined by the New Testament has the same egotistical, power hungry message that any other zealous cult leader or dictator has. That message is…Obey me in all things or you will be punished. Addendum: Over the centuries and continuing today, Christianity has conducted a very successful advertising campaign that promotes "Jesus" as a paragon of love, higher wisdom, and selfless service to others. This version of Jesus can be found everywhere, from Christian enclaves to mainstream media programs, and is also commonly found in "new age" teachings. The Bible itself undermines the fantasy image of Jesus that Christianity has worked so hard to create. However, a popular cotton candy version of Jesus has been so systematically entrenched in the minds of people, that they will do just about anything to prop up and perpetuate this fantasy.
Christian position: In Luke 19:27, where Jesus is telling a story in the form of a parable, he speaks of a ruler that demands the death of those that don't want to recognize him as king.
Luke 19:27 But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.
This is only a story, it doesn't mean that Jesus would ever approve of such actions.
Commentary: Jesus showed signs of not only approving of such actions, he had plans to carry them out. It's remarkable that Christians, who often tell unbelievers that the Hebrew scriptures foreshadowed, or indirectly pointed to Jesus, will deny an example of it when it's right in front of their face, from their own New Testament. The story Jesus told in Luke 19:27 was just prior to his entry into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey and portraying himself as king, even though he planned on being an absent king, one who planned on ruling when he returned in his glorious second coming. The story conveys the message that those people that work for the interests of the ruler, even in his absence, are given great rewards and find favor with the king when he returns. Those who offend the king, such as those that have no interest in having him rule over them, were to be brought before the king and killed.
Jesus told his disciples that any city that did not accept the gospel, in which Jesus becomes the their Lord, would be punished to an even greater extent than Sodom and Gomorrha were punished. That implies a great deal of killing would take place(Gen 19:24-25). Matt 10:14-15 And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet. Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.
Jesus stated that simple unbelief was enough to offend him. Unbelievers are damned by Jesus. Mark 16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.
Jesus stated quite clearly that he would conduct a great scourge of the earth when he returned to set up his kingdom. Included in the list of people to be killed are those that offend him. Matt 13:41-42 The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
The theme of burning or killing off those that don't comply with what Jesus wants is repeated here: John 15:6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.
The killing spree that Jesus will conduct is also spelled out clearly in the Book of Revelation, where Jesus gives his testimony of things that where to occur in the near future. There's going to be a lot of killing going on when the aspiring king returns. Rev 19:15 And out of his(Jesus) mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.
Note that Jesus will treat the nations of the earth this way, he shall "rule them with a rod of iron". That certainly doesn't bode well for any that don't want Jesus to be king over them.
Paul, who claimed that he was directly instructed by Jesus in Gal 1:12, echoed the message of mass killing that would take place when the wrathful Lord Jesus comes to rule the world. Those that fail to obey Jesus will be punished with "everlasting destruction". 2 Thess 1:7-9 And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
Attempting to dismiss Luke 19:27 as only a story that Jesus told, but would not approve of or actually do himself, is a faith based adventure in self-delusion. The doctrine is ugly, intolerant, and displays the leadership style of petty dictators or violent minded cult leaders, but there it is, right in the Holy Bible. If that's too much reality for a believer to digest, then that's their problem.
Christian position: Jesus is not a cult leader of a small cult because Jesus is God and because Christianity is a doctrine, not a cult. Christianity is a world religion with millions of followers. It is an ancient religion and will be around long after you and I are gone. Christianity is a DOCTRINE. Not a cult.
Commentary: According to the New Testament, around the time Jesus left earth, just prior to the Pentecost, the cult numbered about 120 believers. Jesus was the leader of a small cult, despite what this believer wants to think. Acts 1:15 And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples,and said, (the number of names together were about an hundred and twenty,)
The fact that it's now a long-running popular cult, with millions of followers, is immaterial to the discussion.
Some definitions of the word CULT:
a system of religious beliefs and ritual
great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work
A cult leader is one that has commanding authority or influence, which is the very definition of Jesus.
Christianity has many doctrines just as cults do, and is centered around one figure, just as many cults are. In this case the figure is a god-man that claimed all power and authority had been given to him. Many egotistical cult figures share the same claim, along with claiming that they have superior "truth". Jesus claimed to not only have superior truth, he claimed to be the only conduit to God. John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
Jesus, like many cult leaders, wasn't shy about proclaiming that he had been given ultimate authority, and in this case Jesus boasted to have power over the entire universe. Matt 28:18-20 And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.
Christian assertion: You used these words to describe what Jesus said: "Obey me in all things or you will be punished." Jesus never said that nor did any of his phrases indicate that.
Commentary: The evidence supporting an intolerant, demanding, and wrathful Jesus is rather clear, but it's often so unpleasant for some believers to digest that they deny it exists. The myth of an ever humble Jesus is heavily promoted in Christianity. However, the Prince of Peace is only peaceful once he has killed off anything that offends his self proclaimed majesty. Jesus indicated that there is very little middle ground with him, you're either for him or against him. Matt 12:30 He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.
The New Testament exhibits the same dogmatic attitude in the following: John 3:36 He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.
Jesus told his disciples to teach the world that they were to obey all the commands of Jesus. Matt 28:19-20 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.
Simple unbelief is offensive to Lord Jesus, as pointed out in Mark 16:16 and Matt 13:41-42.
The penalty for disobedience is punishment. It doesn't get much clearer than this. 2 Thess 1:8-9 In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
Since this believer thinks Jesus is God, Jesus said that he should be feared because he had the power to not only kill people but to cast them into hell after they were dead. Luke 12:5 But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him.
Some people that received a mark on themselves will be cruelly tortured in the presence of Jesus, the King of Kings. This is the message from Jesus in that regard: Rev 14:10-11 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.
This belief system, which this apologist can't bring themselves to recognize as a form of cult, asserts that its followers are special because they're covered by the blood of a human sacrifice. This cult leader also urged his followers to eat his flesh and drink his blood so they could live forever(John 6:53-55). Then, according to cult teachings, these followers, who consider themselves to be vice-regents of God, will reign with the cult leader Jesus when he flies back to earth from his current perch in heaven. These believers often say that they want to spend eternity in a place called "heaven" where they'll constantly be singing praises and giving glory to the cult leader.
Concerning the earlier claim that Jesus is God: This must be real news to Jesus, who said that he has a God. Jesus said it no less than four times in one verse. Rev 3:12 Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and I will write upon him my new name.
The Jesus that said this wasn't the one that was speaking on earth, it was the glorified Jesus that was resurrected and had ascended to heaven. Jesus clearly stated four times in one verse that he has a God, but that doesn't impede believers from peddling the "Jesus is God" myth as if it was some sort of universal fact. An absurd Jesus fetish permeates society, where people are sold a bill of goods rooted in delusion and propaganda.
Fox News Anchor Totally Outmatched By Religious Scholar- How do Muslims View Jesus of Nazareth? Fox News Anchor Totally Outmatched By Religious Scholar Defending His Book On Jesus
A rather awkward exchange occurred on Fox News' "Spirited Debate" program Friday, with religion correspondent Lauren Green somewhat incredulous that Muslim scholar Reza Aslan could write a book about Jesus Christ.
"You're a Muslim, so why did you write a book about the founder of Christianity?" Green asks at the beginning of the interview.
"Well, to be clear, I am a scholar of religions with four degrees, including one in the New Testament, and fluency in biblical Greek, who has been studying the origins of Christianity for two decades," Aslan says, "who also just happens to be a Muslim."
This wouldn't be the only time Aslan had to remind the host he was a religious scholar and an academic. As a professor of religion, Aslan says, "that's what I do for a living, actually."
Later in the interview, Green likens his writing on the topic to having a "Democrat write a book about why Reagan wasn't a good Republican. That just doesn't work."
"It would be like a Democrat with a Ph.D. in Reagan who has been studying his life and history for two decades writing a book about Reagan," responds Aslan.
How Muslims View Jesus of Nazareth, The Virgin Birth and Mary? (Video Below) Debate Pentecostal Christian vs Muslims "To use the New Testament to prove New Testament concepts is like using Twilight book to prove vampires are real."
originated: 12 June 1997 / additions: 22 Apr. 2011
Amazingly, the question of an actual historical Jesus rarely confronts the religious believer. The power of faith has so forcefully driven the minds of most believers, and even apologetic scholars, that the question of reliable evidence gets obscured by tradition, religious subterfuge, and outrageous claims. The following gives a brief outlook about the claims of a historical Jesus and why the evidence the Christians present us cannot serve as justification for reliable evidence for a historical Jesus.
ALL CLAIMS OF JESUS DERIVE FROM HEARSAY ACCOUNTS No one has the slightest physical evidence to support a historical Jesus; no artifacts, dwelling, works of carpentry, or self-written manuscripts. All claims about Jesus derive from writings of other people. There occurs no contemporary Roman record that shows Pontius Pilate executing a man named Jesus. Devastating to historians, there occurs not a single contemporary writing that mentions Jesus. All documents about Jesus came well after the life of the alleged Jesus from either: unknown authors, people who had never met an earthly Jesus, or from fraudulent, mythical or allegorical writings. Although one can argue that many of these writings come from fraud or interpolations, I will use the information and dates to show that even if these sources did not come from interpolations, they could still not serve as reliable evidence for a historical Jesus, simply because all sources about Jesus derive from hearsay accounts. Hearsay means information derived from other people rather than on a witness' own knowledge. Courts of law do not generally allow hearsay as testimony, and nor does honest modern scholarship. Hearsay does not provide good evidence, and therefore, we should dismiss it. If you do not understand this, imagine yourself confronted with a charge for a crime which you know you did not commit. You feel confident that no one can prove guilt because you know that there exists no evidence whatsoever for the charge against you. Now imagine that you stand present in a court of law that allows hearsay as evidence. When the prosecution presents its case, everyone who takes the stand against you claims that you committed the crime, not as a witness themselves, but solely because they claim other people said so. None of these other people, mind you, ever show up in court, nor can anyone find them. Hearsay does not work as evidence because we have no way of knowing whether the person lied, or simply based his or her information on wrongful belief or bias. We know from history about witchcraft trials and kangaroo courts that hearsay provides neither reliable nor fair statements of evidence. We know that mythology can arise out of no good information whatsoever. We live in a world where many people believe in demons, UFOs, ghosts, or monsters, and an innumerable number of fantasies believed as fact taken from nothing but belief and hearsay. It derives from these reasons why hearsay cannot serves as good evidence, and the same reasoning must go against the claims of a historical Jesus or any other historical person. Authors of ancient history today, of course, can only write from indirect observation in a time far removed from their aim. But a valid historian's own writing gets cited with sources that trace to the subject themselves, or to eyewitnesses and artifacts. For example, a historian today who writes about the life of George Washington, of course, can not serve as an eyewitness, but he can provide citations to documents which give personal or eyewitness accounts. None of the historians about Jesus give reliable sources to eyewitnesses, therefore all we have remains as hearsay.
THE BIBLE GOSPELS The most "authoritative" accounts of a historical Jesus come from the four canonical Gospels of the Bible. Note that these Gospels did not come into the Bible as original and authoritative from the authors themselves, but rather from the influence of early church fathers, especially the most influential of them all: Irenaeus of Lyon who lived in the middle of the second century. Many heretical gospels existed by that time, but Irenaeus considered only some of them for mystical reasons. He claimed only four in number; according to Romer, "like the four zones of the world, the four winds, the four divisions of man's estate, and the four forms of the first living creatures-- the lion of Mark, the calf of Luke, the man of Matthew, the eagle of John (see Against the Heresies). The four gospels then became Church cannon for the orthodox faith. Most of the other claimed gospel writings were burned, destroyed, or lost." [Romer] Elaine Pagels writes: "Although the gospels of the New Testament-- like those discovered at Nag Hammadi-- are attributed to Jesus' followers, no one knows who actually wrote any of them." [Pagels, 1995] Not only do we not know who wrote them, consider that none of the Gospels existed during the alleged life of Jesus, nor do the unknown authors make the claim to have met an earthly Jesus. Add to this that none of the original gospel manuscripts exist; we only have copies of copies. The consensus of many biblical historians put the dating of the earliest Gospel, that of Mark, at sometime after 70 C.E., and the last Gospel, John after 90 C.E. [Pagels, 1995; Helms]. This would make it some 40 years after the alleged crucifixion of Jesus that we have any Gospel writings that mention him! Elaine Pagels writes that "the first Christian gospel was probably written during the last year of the war, or the year it ended. Where it was written and by whom we do not know; the work is anonymous, although tradition attributes it to Mark..." [Pagels, 1995] The traditional Church has portrayed the authors as the apostles Mark, Luke, Matthew, & John, but scholars know from critical textural research that there simply occurs no evidence that the gospel authors could have served as the apostles described in the Gospel stories. Yet even today, we hear priests and ministers describing these authors as the actual disciples of Christ. Many Bibles still continue to label the stories as "The Gospel according to St. Matthew," "St. Mark," "St. Luke," St. John." No apostle would have announced his own sainthood before the Church's establishment of sainthood. But one need not refer to scholars to determine the lack of evidence for authorship. As an experiment, imagine the Gospels without their titles. See if you can find out from the texts who wrote them; try to find their names. Even if the texts supported the notion that the apostles wrote them, consider the low life expectancy of humans in the first century. According to the religious scholar, J.D. Crossan, "the life expectancy of Jewish males in the Jewish state was then twenty-nine years." [Crossan] Some people think this age appears deceptive because of the high infant mortally rates at birth. However, at birth the inhabitants of the Roman Empire had an even lower life expectancy of around twenty-five years. [source] According to Ulpian, a Roman jurist of the early third century C.E., the average life expectancy at birth came even lower to around twenty-one. [Potter] Of course these ages represent averages and some people lived after the age of 30, but how many? According to the historian Richard Carrier: "We have reason to believe that only 4% of the population at any given time was over 50 years old; over age 70, less than 2%. And that is under normal circumstances. But the Gospels were written after two very devastating abnormal events: the Jewish War and the Neronian Persecution, both of which would have, combined, greatly reduced the life expectancy of exactly those people who were eye-witnesses to the teachings of Jesus. And it just so happens that these sorts of people are curiously missing from the historical record precisely when the Gospels began to be circulated." [Carrier] Even if they lived to those unlikely ages, consider the mental and physical toll (especially during the 1st century) which would have likely reduced their memory and capability to write. Moreover, those small percentages of people who lived past 50 years were usually wealthy people (aristocrats, politicians, land and slave owners, etc.). However, the Gospels suggest that the followers of Jesus lived poorly, and this would further reduce the chances for a long life span. Although the New Testament does not provide the ages of the disciples, most Christians think their ages came to around 20-30 years old. Jesus' birth would have to have occurred before Herod's death at 4 B.C.E. So if Jesus' birth occurred in the year 4 B.C.E., that would put the age of the disciples, at the time of the writing of the first gospel, at around age 60-70 and the last gospel at around age 90-100! Based on just life expectancies alone, that would make the probability unlikely they lived during the writing of the first gospel, and extremely unlikely any of them lived during the writing of the last gospel (and I have used only the most conservative numbers). The gospel of Mark describes the first written Bible gospel. And although Mark appears deceptively after the Matthew gospel, the gospel of Mark got written at least a generation before Matthew. From its own words, one can deduce that the author of Mark had neither heard Jesus nor served as his personal follower. Whoever wrote the gospel simply accepted the story of Jesus without question and wrote a crude an ungrammatical account of the popular story at the time. Historians tell us of the three Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke), Mark served as the common element between Matthew and Luke and provided the main source for both of them. Of Mark's 666* verses, some 600 appear in Matthew, some 300 in Luke. According to Randel Helms, the author of Mark, stands at least a third remove from Jesus and more likely at the fourth remove. [Helms] * Most Bibles show 678 verses for Mark, not 666, but many Biblical scholars think the last 12 verses came later from interpolation. The earliest manuscripts and other ancient sources do not have Mark 16: 9-20. Moreover the text style does not match and the transition between verse 8 and 9 appears awkward. Even some of today's Bibles such as the NIV exclude the last 12 verses. The author of Matthew had obviously gotten his information from Mark's gospel and used them for his own needs. He fashioned his narrative to appeal to Jewish tradition and Scripture. He improved the grammar of Mark's Gospel, corrected what he felt theologically important, and heightened the miracles and magic. The author of Luke admits himself as an interpreter of earlier material and not an eyewitness (Luke 1:1-4). Many scholars think the author of Luke lived as a gentile, or at the very least, a Hellenized Jew. Many modern scholars think that the Gospel of Matthew and Luke came from the Mark gospel and a hypothetical document called "Q" .(German Quelle, which means "source"). [Helms; Wilson] . However, since we have no manuscript from Q, no one could possibly determine its author or where or how he got his information or the date of its authorship. Moreover, some scholars challenge its existence and those who do think that Q existed have problems explaining it. Again we get faced with unreliable methodology and obscure sources. John, the last appearing Bible Gospel, presents us with long theological discourses from Jesus and could not possibly have come as literal words from a historical Jesus. The Gospel of John disagrees with events described in Mark, Matthew, and Luke. Moreover the unknown author(s) of this gospel wrote it in Greek near the end of the first century, and according to Bishop Shelby Spong, the book "carried within it a very obvious reference to the death of John Zebedee (John 21:23)." [Spong] Please understand that the stories themselves cannot serve as examples of eyewitness accounts since they came as products of the minds of the unknown authors, and not from the characters themselves. The Gospels describe narrative stories, written almost virtually in the third person. People who wish to portray themselves as eyewitnesses will write in the first person, not in the third person. Moreover, many of the passages attributed to Jesus could only have come from the invention of its authors. For example, many of the statements of Jesus claim to have come from him while allegedly alone. If so, who heard him? It becomes even more marked when the evangelists report about what Jesus thought. To whom did Jesus confide his thoughts? Clearly, the Gospels employ techniques that fictional writers use. In any case the Gospels can only serve, at best, as hearsay, and at worst, as fictional, mythological, or falsified stories.
OTHER NEW TESTAMENT WRITINGS Even in antiquity people like Origen and Eusebius raised doubts about the authenticity of other books in the New Testament such as Hebrews, James, John 2 & 3, Peter 2, Jude, and Revelation. Martin Luther rejected the Epistle of James calling it worthless and an "epistle of straw" and questioned Jude, Hebrews and the Apocalypse in Revelation. Nevertheless, all New Testament writings came well after the alleged death of Jesus from unknown authors (with the possible exception of Paul, although still after the alleged death). Epistles of Paul: Paul's biblical letters (epistles) serve as the oldest surviving Christian texts, written probably around 60 C.E. Most scholars have little reason to doubt that Paul wrote some of them himself. Of the thirteen epistles, bible scholars think he wrote only eight of them, and even here, there occurs interpolations. Not a single instance in any of Paul's writings claims that he ever meets or sees an earthly Jesus, nor does Paul give any reference to Jesus' life on earth (except for a few well known interpolations). Therefore, all accounts about a Jesus could only have come from other believers or his imagination. Hearsay. Epistle to the Galatians: In this letter Paul describes a meeting with Peter and James, the Lord's brother (Gal: 1:18-20). The problem here involves the meaning of "Lord's brother." Some scholars think this means the biological brother of the Lord while others think it means brother in a communal spiritual sense, as all Christians are the Lord's brothers and sisters. Note, never does any epistle refer to the brother of Jesus. In all cases, Paul uses the word "Lord," consistent with the spiritual sense. In any case, even if this phrase did mean a biological brother, Paul could not have known that James had a brother. At best he could only have believed it because his information could only have come from another person, most likely James himself. That makes this letter hearsay. Epistle of James: Although the epistle identifies a James as the letter writer, but which James? Many claim him as the gospel disciple but the gospels mention several different James. Which one? Or maybe this James has nothing to do with any of the gospel James. Perhaps this writer comes from any one of innumerable James outside the gospels. James served as a common name in the first centuries and Biblical scholars simply have no way to tell who this James refers to. More to the point, the Epistle of James mentions Jesus only once as an introduction to his belief. Nowhere does the epistle reference a historical Jesus and this alone eliminates it from an historical account. [1] Epistles of John: Scholars tell us the epistles of John, the Gospel of John, and Revelation appear so different in style and content that they could hardly have the same author. Some suggest that these writings of John come from the work of a group of scholars in Asia Minor who followed a "John" or they came from the work of church fathers who aimed to further the interests of the Church. Or they could have simply come from people also named John (a very common name). No one knows. Also note that nowhere in the body of the three epistles of "John" does it mention a John. In any case, the epistles of John say nothing about seeing an earthly Jesus. Not only do we not know who wrote these epistles, they can only serve as hearsay accounts. [2] Epistles of Peter: Many scholars question the authorship of Peter of the epistles. Even within the first epistle, it says in 5:12 that Silvanus wrote it. Most scholars consider the second epistle as unreliable or an outright forgery (for some examples, see the introduction to 2 Peter in the full edition of The New Jerusalem Bible, 1985). The unknown authors of the epistles of Peter wrote long after the life of the traditional Peter. Moreover, Peter lived (if he ever lived at all) as an ignorant and illiterate peasant (even Acts 4:13 attests to this). In short, no one has any way of determining whether the epistles of Peter come from fraud, an author claiming himself to know what Peter said (hearsay), or from someone trying to further the aims of the Church. Encyclopedias usually describe a tradition that Saint Peter wrote them. However, whenever you see the word "tradition" it refers to a belief passed down within a society. In other words: hearsay. [3], [4] Epistle of Jude: Even early Christians argued about its authenticity. It quotes an apocryphal book called Enoch as if it represented authorized Scripture. Biblical scholars do not think it possible for the alleged disciple Jude to have written it because whoever wrote it had to have written it during a period when the churches had long existed. Like the other alleged disciples, Jude would have lived as an illiterate peasant and unable to write (much less in Greek) but the author of Jude wrote in fluent high quality Greek.
Of the remaining books and letters in the Bible, there occurs no other stretched claims or eyewitness accounts for a historical Jesus and needs no mention of them here for this deliberation. As for the existence of original New Testament documents, none exist. No book of the New Testament survives in the original autograph copy. What we have then come from copies, and copies of copies, of questionable originals (if the stories came piecemeal over time, as it appears it has, then there may never have existed an original). The earliest copies we have came more than a century later than the autographs, and these exist on fragments of papyrus. [Pritchard; Graham] According to Hugh Schonfield, "It would be impossible to find any manuscript of the New Testament older than the late third century, and we actually have copies from the fourth and fifth. [Schonfield]
LYING FOR THE CHURCH The editing and formation of the Bible came from members of the early Christian Church. Since the fathers of the Church possessed the scriptoria and determined what would appear in the Bible, there occurred plenty of opportunity and motive to change, modify, or create texts that might bolster the position of the Church or the members of the Church themselves. The orthodox Church also fought against competing Christian cults. Irenaeus, who determined the inclusion of the four (now canonical) gospels, wrote his infamous book, "Against the Heresies." According to Romer, "Irenaeus' great book not only became the yardstick of major heresies and their refutations, the starting-point of later inquisitions, but simply by saying what Christianity was not it also, in a curious inverted way, became a definition of the orthodox faith." [Romer] If a Jesus did exist, perhaps eyewitness writings got burnt along with them because of their heretical nature. We will never know. In attempting to salvage the Bible the respected revisionist and scholar, Bruce Metzger has written extensively on the problems of the New Testament. In his book, "The Text of the New Testament-- Its Transmission, Corruption and Restoration, Metzger addresses: Errors arising from faulty eyesight; Errors arising from faulty hearing; Errors of the mind; Errors of judgment; Clearing up historical and geographical difficulties; and Alterations made because of doctrinal considerations. [Metzger] The Church had such power over people, that to question the Church could result in death. Regardless of what the Church claimed, most people simply believed what their priests told them. In letter LII To Nepotian, Jerome writes about his teacher, Gregory of Nazianzus when he asked him to explain a phrase in Luke, Nazianzus evaded his request by saying “I will tell you about it in church, and there, when all the people applaud me, you will be forced against your will to know what you do not know at all. For, if you alone remain silent, every one will put you down for a fool." Jerome responds with, "There is nothing so easy as by sheer volubility to deceive a common crowd or an uneducated congregation." In the 5th century, John Chrysostom in his "Treatise on the Priesthood, Book 1," wrote, "And often it is necessary to deceive, and to do the greatest benefits by means of this device, whereas he who has gone by a straight course has done great mischief to the person whom he has not deceived." Ignatius Loyola of the 16th century wrote in his Spiritual Exercises: "To be right in everything, we ought always to hold that the white which I see, is black, if the Hierarchical Church so decides it." Martin Luther opined: "What harm would it do, if a man told a good strong lie for the sake of the good and for the Christian church … a lie out of necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie, such lies would not be against God, he would accept them." With such admission to accepting lies, the burning of heretical texts, Bible errors and alterations, how could any honest scholar take any book from the New Testament as absolute, much less using extraneous texts that support a Church's intransigent and biased position, as reliable evidence?
GNOSTIC GOSPELS In 1945, an Arab made an archeological discovery in Upper Egypt of several ancient papyrus books. They have since referred to it as The Nag Hammadi texts. They contained fifty-two heretical books written in Coptic script which include gospels of Thomas, Philip, James, John, Thomas, and many others. Archeologists have dated them at around 350-400 C.E. They represent copies from previous copies. None of the original texts exist and scholars argue about a possible date of the originals. Some of them think that they can hardly have dates later than 120-150 C.E. Others have put it closer to 140 C.E. [Pagels, 1979] Other Gnostic gospels such as the Gospel of Judas, found near the Egyptian site of the Nag Hammadi texts, shows a diverse pattern of story telling, always a mark of myth. The Judas gospel tells of Judas Iscariot as Jesus' most loyal disciple, just opposite that of the canonical gospel stories. Note that the text does not claim that Judas Iscariot wrote it. The Judas gospel, a copy written in Coptic, dates to around the third-to fourth-century. The original Greek version probably dates to between 130 and 170 C.E., around the same time as the Nag Hammadi texts. Irenaeus first mentions this gospel in Adversus Haereses (Against Heresies) written around 180 C.E., so we know that this represented a heretical gospel. Since these Gnostic texts could only have its unknown authors writing well after the alleged life of Jesus, they cannot serve as historical evidence of Jesus anymore than the canonical versions. Again, we only have "heretical" hearsay.
NON-CHRISTIAN SOURCES Virtually all other claims of Jesus come from sources outside of Christian writings. Devastating to the claims of Christians, however, comes from the fact that all of these accounts come from authors who lived after the alleged life of Jesus. Since they did not live during the time of the hypothetical Jesus, none of their accounts serve as eyewitness evidence. Josephus Flavius, the Jewish historian, lived as the earliest non-Christian who mentions a Jesus. Although many scholars think that Josephus' short accounts of Jesus (in Antiquities) came from interpolations perpetrated by a later Church father (most likely, Eusebius), Josephus' birth in 37 C.E. (well after the alleged crucifixion of Jesus), puts him out of range of an eyewitness account. Moreover, he wrote Antiquities in 93 C.E., after the first gospels got written! Therefore, even if his accounts about Jesus came from his hand, his information could only serve as hearsay. Pliny the Younger (born: 62 C.E.) His letter about the Christians only shows that he got his information from Christian believers themselves. Regardless, his birth date puts him out of range as an eyewitness account. Tacitus, the Roman historian's birth year at 64 C.E., puts him well after the alleged life of Jesus. He gives a brief mention of a "Christus" in his Annals (Book XV, Sec. 44), which he wrote around 109 C.E. He gives no source for his material. Although many have disputed the authenticity of Tacitus' mention of Jesus, the very fact that his birth happened after the alleged Jesus and wrote the Annals during the formation of Christianity, shows that his writing can only provide us with hearsay accounts. Suetonius, a Roman historian, born in 69 C.E., mentions a "Chrestus," a common name. Apologists assume that "Chrestus" means "Christ" (a disputable claim). But even if Seutonius had meant "Christ," it still says nothing about an earthly Jesus. Just like all the others, Suetonius' birth occurred well after the purported Jesus. Again, only hearsay. Talmud: Amazingly some Christians use brief portions of the Talmud, (a collection of Jewish civil a religious law, including commentaries on the Torah), as evidence for Jesus. They claim that Yeshu in the Talmud refers to Jesus. However, this Yeshu, according to scholars depicts a disciple of Jehoshua Ben-Perachia at least a century before the alleged Christian Jesus or it may refer to Yeshu ben Pandera, a teacher of the 2nd centuy CE. Regardless of how one interprets this, the Palestinian Talmud didn't come into existence until the 3rd and 5th century C.E., and the Babylonian Talmud between the 3rd and 6th century C.E., at least two centuries after the alleged crucifixion. At best it can only serve as a controversial Christian or Jewish legend; it cannot possibly serve as evidence for a historical Jesus. Christian apologists mostly use the above sources for their "evidence" of Jesus because they believe they represent the best outside sources. All other sources (Christian and non-Christian) come from even less reliable sources, some of which include: Mara Bar-Serapion (circa 73 C.E.), Ignatius (50 - 98? C.E.), Polycarp (69 - 155 C.E.), Clement of Rome (? - circa 160 C.E.), Justin Martyr (100 - 165 C.E.), Lucian (circa 125 - 180 C.E.), Tertullian (160 - ? C.E.), Clement of Alexandria (? - 215 C.E.), Origen (185 - 232 C.E.), Hippolytus (? - 236 C.E.), and Cyprian (? - 254 C.E.). As you can see, all these people lived well after the alleged death of Jesus. Not one of them provides an eyewitness account, all of them simply spout hearsay. As you can see, apologist Christians embarrass themselves when they unwittingly or deceptively violate the rules of historiography by using after-the-event writings as evidence for the event itself. Not one of these writers gives a source or backs up his claims with evidential material about Jesus. Although we can provide numerous reasons why the Christian and non-Christian sources prove spurious, and argue endlessly about them, we can cut to the chase by simply determining the dates of the documents and the birth dates of the authors. It doesn't matter what these people wrote about Jesus, an author who writes after the alleged happening and gives no detectable sources for his material can only give example of hearsay. All of these anachronistic writings about Jesus could easily have come from the beliefs and stories from Christian believers themselves. And as we know from myth, superstition, and faith, beliefs do not require facts or evidence for their propagation and circulation. Thus we have only beliefs about Jesus' existence, and nothing more. FAKES, FRAUDS, AND FICTIONS Because the religious mind relies on belief and faith, the religious person can inherit a dependence on any information that supports a belief and that includes fraudulent stories, rumors, unreliable data, and fictions, without the need to check sources, or to investigate the reliability of the information. Although hundreds of fraudulent claims exist for the artifacts of Jesus, I will present only three examples which seem to have a life of their own and have spread through the religious community and especially on internet discussion groups. The Shroud of Turin Many faithful people believe the shroud represents the actual burial cloth of Jesus where they claim the image on the cloth represents an actual 'photographic' image left behind by the crucified body. The first mention of the shroud comes from a treatise (written or dictated) by Geoffroi de Charny in 1356 and who claims to have owned the cloth (see The Book of Chivalry of Geoffroi De Charny). Later, in the 16th century, it suddenly appeared in a cathedral in Turin, Italy. (Note that thousands of claimed Jesus relics appeared in cathedrals throughout Europe, including the wood from the cross, chalices, blood of Jesus, etc. These artifacts proved popular and served as a prosperous commercial device which filled the money coffers of the churches.) [See The Family Jewels for some examples.] Sadly, many people of faith believe that there actually exists scientific evidence to support their beliefs in the shroud's authenticity. Considering how the Shroud's apologists use the words, "science," "fact," and "authentic," without actual scientific justification, and even include pseudo-scientists (without mentioning the 'pseudo') to testify to their conclusions, it should not come to any surprise why a faithful person would not question their information or their motives. Television specials have also appeared that purport the authenticity of the shroud. Science, however, does not operate though television specials who have a commercial interest and have no qualms about deceiving the public. Experts around the world consider the 14-foot-long linen sheet, which has remained in a cathedral in Turin since 1578, a forgery because of carbon-dating tests performed in 1988. Three different independent radiocarbon dating laboratories in Zurich, Oxford and the University of Arizona yielded a date range of 1260-1390 C.E. (consistent with the time period of Charny's claimed ownership). Joe Zias of Hebrew University of Jerusalem calls the shroud indisputably a fake. "Not only is it a forgery, but it's a bad forgery." The shroud actually depicts a man whose front measures 2 inches taller than his back and whose elongated hands and arms would indicate that he had the affliction of gigantism if he actually lived. (Also read Joe Nickell's, Inquest On The Shroud Of Turin: Latest Scientific Findings) Walter C. McCrone, et al, (see Judgment Day for the Shroud of Turin) discovered red ochre (a pigment found in earth and widely used in Italy during the Middle Ages) on the cloth which formed the body image and vermilion paint, made from mercuric sulphide, used to represent blood. The actual scientific findings reveal the shroud as a 14th century painting, not a two-thousand year-old cloth with Christ's image. Revealingly, no Biblical scholar or scientist (with any credibility), cites the shroud of Turin as evidence for a historical Jesus. The Burial box of James Even many credible theologians bought this fraud, hook-line-and-sinker. The Nov./Dec. 2002, issue of Biblical Archaeology Review magazine announced a "world exclusive!" article about evidence of Jesus written in stone, claiming that they found the actual ossuary of "James, Brother of Jesus" in Jerusalem. This story exploded on the news and appeared widely on television and newspapers around the world. Interestingly, they announced the find as the "earliest historical reference of Jesus yet found." Since they claimed the inscribing on the box occurred around 70 C.E., that agrees with everything claimed by this thesis (that no contemporary evidence exists for Jesus). Even if the box script proved authentic, it would not provide evidence for Jesus simply because no one knew who wrote the script or why. It would only show the first indirect mention of a Jesus and it could not serve as contemporary evidence simply because it didn't come into existence until long after the alleged death of Jesus. The claim for authenticity of the burial box of James, however, proved particularly embarrassing for the Biblical Archaeology Review and for those who believed them without question. Just a few months later, archaeologists determined the inscription as a forgery (and an obvious one at that) and they found the perpetrator and had him arrested (see 'Jesus box' exposed as fake and A fake? James Ossuary dealer arrested, suspected of forgery). Regrettably, the news about the fraud never matched the euphoria of the numerous stories of the find and many people today still believe the story as true. Letters of Pontius Pilate This would appear hilarious if not for the tragic results that can occur from believing in fiction: many faithful (especially on the internet) have a strong belief that Pontius Pilate actually wrote letters to Seneca in Rome where he mentions Jesus and his reported healing miracles. Considering the lack of investigational temper of the religious mind, it might prove interesting to the critical reader that the main source for the letters of Pilate come from W. P. Crozier's 1928 book titled, "Letters of Pontius Pilate: Written During His Governorship of Judea to His Friend Seneca in Rome." The book cites Crozier as the editor as if he represented a scholar who edited Pilate's letters. Well, from the title, it certainly seems to indicate that Pilate wrote some letters doesn't it? However, unbeknownst or ignored by the uncritical faithful, this book represents Crozier's first novel, a fictionalized account of what he thought Pilate would have written. During the first publication, no one believed this novel represented fact and reviews of the day reveal it as a work of fiction. Crozier, a newspaper editor, went to Oxford University and retained an interest in Latin, Greek and the Bible. He wrote this novel as if it represented the actual letters of Pilate. Of course no scholar would cite this as evidence because no letters exist of Pilate to Seneca, and Seneca never mentions Jesus in any of his writings. The belief in Pilate's letters represents one of the more amusing fad beliefs in evidential Jesus, however, it also reveals just how myths, fakes, and fictions can leak into religious thought. Hundreds of years from now, Crozier's fictionalized account may very well end up just as 'reliable' as the gospels.
WHAT ABOUT WRITINGS DURING THE LIFE OF JESUS? What appears most revealing of all, comes not from what people later wrote about Jesus but what people did not write about him. Consider that not a single historian, philosopher, scribe or follower who lived before or during the alleged time of Jesus ever mentions him! If, indeed, the Gospels portray a historical look at the life of Jesus, then the one feature that stands out prominently within the stories shows that people claimed to know Jesus far and wide, not only by a great multitude of followers but by the great priests, the Roman governor Pilate, and Herod who claims that he had heard "of the fame of Jesus" (Matt 14:1)". One need only read Matt: 4:25 where it claims that "there followed him [Jesus] great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judea, and from beyond Jordan." The gospels mention, countless times, the great multitude that followed Jesus and crowds of people who congregated to hear him. So crowded had some of these gatherings grown, that Luke 12:1 alleges that an "innumerable multitude of people... trode one upon another." Luke 5:15 says that there grew "a fame abroad of him: and great multitudes came together to hear..." The persecution of Jesus in Jerusalem drew so much attention that all the chief priests and scribes, including the high priest Caiaphas, not only knew about him but helped in his alleged crucifixion. (see Matt 21:15-23, 26:3, Luke 19:47, 23:13). The multitude of people thought of Jesus, not only as a teacher and a miracle healer, but a prophet (see Matt:14:5). So here we have the gospels portraying Jesus as famous far and wide, a prophet and healer, with great multitudes of people who knew about him, including the greatest Jewish high priests and the Roman authorities of the area, and not one person records his existence during his lifetime? If the poor, the rich, the rulers, the highest priests, and the scribes knew about Jesus, who would not have heard of him? Then we have a particular astronomical event that would have attracted the attention of anyone interested in the "heavens." According to Luke 23:44-45, there occurred "about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour, and the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst." Yet not a single mention of such a three hour ecliptic event got recorded by anyone, including the astronomers and astrologers, anywhere in the world, including Pliny the Elder and Seneca who both recorded eclipses from other dates. Note also that, for obvious reasons, solar eclipses can't occur during a full moon (passovers always occur during full moons), Nor does a single contemporary person write about the earthquake described in Matthew 27:51-54 where the earth shook, rocks ripped apart (rent), and graves opened. Matthew 2 describes Herod and all of Jerusalem as troubled by the worship of the infant Jesus. Herod then had all of the children of Bethlehem slain. If such extraordinary infanticides of this magnitude had occurred, why didn't anyone write about it? Some apologists attempt to dig themselves out of this problem by claiming that there lived no capable historians during that period, or due to the lack of education of the people with a writing capacity, or even sillier, the scarcity of paper gave reason why no one recorded their "savior." But the area in and surrounding Jerusalem served, in fact, as the center of education and record keeping for the Jewish people. The Romans, of course, also kept many records. Moreover, the gospels mention scribes many times, not only as followers of Jesus but the scribes connected with the high priests. And as for historians, there lived plenty at the time who had the capacity and capability to record, not only insignificant gossip, but significant events, especially from a religious sect who drew so much popular attention through an allegedly famous and infamous Jesus. Take, for example, the works of Philo Judaeus whose birth occurred in 20 B.C.E. and died 50 C.E. He lived as the greatest Jewish-Hellenistic philosopher and historian of the time and lived in the area of Jerusalem during the alleged life of Jesus. He wrote detailed accounts of the Jewish events that occurred in the surrounding area. Yet not once, in all of his volumes of writings, do we read a single account of a Jesus "the Christ." Nor do we find any mention of Jesus in Seneca's (4? B.C.E. - 65 C.E.) writings, nor from the historian Pliny the Elder (23? - 79 C.E.). If, indeed, such a well known Jesus existed, as the gospels allege, does any reader here think it reasonable that, at the very least, the fame of Jesus would not have reached the ears of one of these men? Amazingly, we have not one Jewish, Greek, or Roman writer, even those who lived in the Middle East, much less anywhere else on the earth, who ever mention him during his supposed life time. This appears quite extraordinary, and you will find few Christian apologists who dare mention this embarrassing fact. To illustrate this extraordinary absence of Jesus Christ literature, just imagine going through nineteenth century literature looking for an Abraham Lincoln but unable to find a single mention of him in any writing on earth until the 20th century. Yet straight-faced Christian apologists and historians want you to buy a factual Jesus out of a dearth void of evidence, and rely on nothing but hearsay written well after his purported life. Considering that most Christians believe that Jesus lived as God on earth, the Almighty gives an embarrassing example for explaining his existence. You'd think a Creator might at least have the ability to bark up some good solid evidence.
HISTORICAL SCHOLARS Many problems occur with the reliability of the accounts from ancient historians. Most of them did not provide sources for their claims, as they rarely included bibliographic listings, or supporting claims. They did not have access to modern scholarly techniques, and many times would include hearsay as evidence. No one today would take a modern scholar seriously who used the standards of ancient historians, yet this proves as the only kind of source that Christology comes from. Couple this with the fact that many historians believed as Christians themselves, sometimes members of the Church, and you have a built-in prejudice towards supporting a "real" Jesus. In modern scholarship, even the best historians and Christian apologists play the historian game. They can only use what documents they have available to them. If they only have hearsay accounts then they have to play the cards that history deals them. Many historians feel compelled to use interpolation or guesses from hearsay, and yet this very dubious information sometimes ends up in encyclopedias and history books as fact. In other words, Biblical scholarship gets forced into a lower standard by the very sources they examine. A renowned Biblical scholar illustrated this clearly in an interview when asked about Biblical interpretation. David Noel Freeman (the General editor of the Anchor Bible Series and many other works) responded with: "We have to accept somewhat looser standards. In the legal profession, to convict the defendant of a crime, you need proof beyond a reasonable doubt. In civil cases, a preponderance of the evidence is sufficient. When dealing with the Bible or any ancient source, we have to loosen up a little; otherwise, we can't really say anything." -David Noel Freedman (in Bible Review magazine, Dec. 1993, p.34) The implications appear obvious. If one wishes to believe in a historical Jesus, he or she must accept this based on loose standards. Couple this with the fact that all of the claims come from hearsay, and we have a foundation made of sand, and a castle of information built of cards.
CITING GEOGRAPHY, AND KNOWN HISTORICAL FIGURES AS "EVIDENCE" Although the New Testament mentions various cities, geological sites, kings and people that existed or lived during the alleged life of Jesus, these descriptions cannot serve as evidence for the existence of Jesus anymore than works of fiction that include recognizable locations, and make mention of actual people. Homer's Odyssey, for example, describes the travels of Odysseus throughout the Greek islands. The epic describes, in detail, many locations that existed in history. But should we take Odysseus, the Greek gods and goddesses, one-eyed giants and monsters as literal fact simply because the story depicts geographic locations accurately? Of course not. The authors of mythical stories, fictions, and novels almost always use familiar landmarks as placements for their stories. The authors of the Greek tragedies not only put their stories in plausible settings as happening in the real world but their supernatural characters took on the desires, flaws and failures of mortal human beings. Consider that fictions such as King Kong, Superman, and Star Trek include recognizable cities, planets, and landmarks, with their protagonists and antagonists miming human emotions. Likewise, just because the Gospels mention cities and locations in Judea, and known historical people, with Jesus behaving like an actual human being (with the added dimension of supernatural curses, miracles, etc.) but this says nothing about the actuality of the characters portrayed in the stories. However, when a story uses impossible historical locations, or geographical errors, we may question the authority of the claims. For example, in Matt 4:8, the author describes the devil taking Jesus into an exceedingly high mountain to show him all the kingdoms of the world. Since there exists no spot on the spheroid earth to view "all the kingdoms," we know that the Bible errs here. John 12:21 says, "The same came therefore to Philip, which was of Bethsaida of Galilee. . . ." Bethsaida resided in Gaulonitis (Golan region), east of the Jordan river, not Galilee, which resided west of the river. John 3:23 says, "John also was baptizing in Aenon near Salim. . . ." Critics agree that no such place as Aenon exists near Salim. No one has evidence for a city named Nazareth at the time of the alleged Jesus. [Gauvin] Nazareth does not appear in the Old Testament, nor does it appear in the volumes of Josephus's writings (even though he provides a list of cities in Galilee). Oddly, none of the New Testament epistle writers ever mentions Nazareth or a Jesus of Nazareth even though most of the epistles appeared before the gospels. In fact no one mentions Nazareth until the Gospels, where the first one didn't come into existence until about 40 years after the alleged death of Jesus. If a city named Nazareth existed during the 1st century, then we need at least one contemporary piece of evidence for the name, otherwise we cannot refer to it as established history. Many historians do not agree with this of course. Some think Nazareth existed, some don't think it existed, and some remain skeptical, but the fact that historians still debate it should tell you that that we should not use this uncertainly as a certainty. Moreover, some scholars think it as a moot point because they believe "Nazareth" refers to a Christian movement, not a city. For one example, Acts 24:5 refers to a sect of the Nazarenes. The Gospel writers then might have confused the term to mean the city (which by the time they wrote the gospels, a city did exist with that name). We have a lot of educated guesses by scholars, but no certainity. Many more kinds of errors and uncertainties like this appear in the New Testament. And although one cannot use these as evidence against a historical Jesus, we can certainly question the reliability of the texts. If the scriptures make so many factual errors about geology, science, and contain so many contradictions, falsehoods could occur any in area. If we have a coupling with historical people and locations, then we should also have some historical reference of a Jesus to these locations and people. But just the opposite proves the case. The Bible depicts Herod, the Ruler of Jewish Palestine under Rome as sending out men to search and kill the infant Jesus, yet nothing in history supports such a story. Pontius Pilate supposedly performed as judge in the trial and execution of Jesus, yet no Roman record mentions such a trial. The gospels portray a multitude of believers throughout the land spreading tales of a teacher, prophet, and healer, yet nobody in Jesus' life time or years after, ever records such a human figure. The lack of a historical Jesus in the known historical record speaks for itself.
COMPARING JESUS TO OTHER HISTORICAL FIGURES Many Christian apologists attempt to extricate themselves from their lack of evidence by claiming that if we cannot rely on the post chronicle exegesis of Jesus, then we cannot establish a historical foundation for other figures such as Alexander the Great, Augustus Caesar, Napoleon, etc. However, there sits a vast difference between historical figures and Jesus. There occurs either artifacts, writings, or eyewitness accounts for historical people, whereas, for Jesus we have nothing. Alexander, for example, left a wake of destroyed and created cities behind. We have buildings, libraries and cities, such as Alexandria, left in his name. We have treaties, and even a letter from Alexander to the people of Chios, engraved in stone, dated at 332 B.C.E. For Augustus Caesar, we have the Res gestae divi augusti, the emperor's own account of his works and deeds, a letter to his son (Epistula ad Gaium filium), Virgil's eyewitness accounts, and much more. Napoleon left behind artifacts, eyewitness accounts and letters. We can establish some historicity to these people because we have evidence that occurred during their life times. Yet even with contemporary evidence, historians have become wary of after-the-fact stories of many of these historical people. For example, some of the stories of Alexander's conquests, or Nero starting the fire in Rome always gets questioned or doubted because they contain inconsistencies or come from authors who wrote years after the alleged facts. In qualifying the history of Alexander, Pierre Briant writes, "Although more than twenty of his contemporaries chronicled Alexander's life and campaigns, none of these texts survive in original form. Many letters and speeches attributed to Alexander are ancient forgeries or reconstructions inspired by imagination or political motives. The little solid documentation we possess from Alexander's own time is mainly to be found in stone inscriptions from the Greek cities of Europe and Asia." [Briant] Inventing histories out of whole cloth or embellished from a seed of an actual historical event appears common throughout the chronicle of human thought. Robert Price observes, "Alexander the Great, Caesar Augustus, Cyrus, King Arthur, and others have nearly suffered this fate. What keeps historians from dismissing them as mere myths, like Paul Bunyan, is that there is some residue. We know at least a bit of mundane information about them, perhaps quite a bit, that does not form part of any legend cycle." [Price, pp. 260-261] Interestingly, almost all important historical people have descriptions of what they looked like. We have the image of Augustus Caesar cast on denarius coins, busts of Greek and Roman aristocrats, artwork of Napoleon, etc. We have descriptions of facial qualities, height, weight, hair length & color, age and even portraits of most important historical figures. But for Jesus, we have nothing. Nowhere in the Bible do we have a description of the human shape of Jesus. How can we rely on the Gospels as the word of Jesus when no one even describes what he looked like? How odd that none of the disciple characters record what he looked like, yet believers attribute them to know exactly what he said. Indeed, this gives us a clue that Jesus came to the gospel writers and indirect and through myth. Not until hundreds of years after the alleged Jesus did pictures emerge as to what he looked like from cult Christians, and these widely differed from a blond clean shaven, curly haired Apollonian youth (found in the Roman catacombs) to a long-bearded Italian as depicted to this day. This mimics the pattern of Greek mythological figures as their believers constructed various images of what their gods looked like according to their own cultural image. Historical people leave us with contemporary evidence, but for Jesus we have nothing. If we wanted to present a fair comparison of the type of information about Jesus to another example of equal historical value, we could do no better than to compare Jesus with the mythical figure of Hercules.
IF JESUS, THEN WHY NOT HERCULES? If a person accepts hearsay and accounts from believers as historical evidence for Jesus, then shouldn't they act consistently to other accounts based solely on hearsay and belief? To take one example, examine the evidence for Hercules of Greek mythology and you will find it parallels the "historicity" of Jesus to such an amazing degree that for Christian apologists to deny Hercules as a historical person belies and contradicts the very same methodology used for a historical Jesus. Note that Herculean myth resembles Jesus in many areas. The mortal and chaste Alcmene, the mother of Hercules, gave birth to him from a union with God (Zeus). Similar to Herod who wanted to kill Jesus, Hera wanted to kill Hercules. Like Jesus, Hercules traveled the earth as a mortal helping mankind and performed miraculous deeds. Similar to Jesus who died and rose to heaven, Hercules died, rose to Mt. Olympus and became a god. Hercules gives example of perhaps the most popular hero in Ancient Greece and Rome. They believed that he actually lived, told stories about him, worshiped him, and dedicated temples to him. Likewise the "evidence" of Hercules closely parallels that of Jesus. We have historical people like Hesiod and Plato who mention Hercules in their writings. Similar to the way the gospels tell a narrative story of Jesus, so do we have the epic stories of Homer who depict the life of Hercules. Aesop tells stories and quotes the words of Hercules. Just as we have a brief mention of Jesus by Joesphus in his Antiquities, Joesphus also mentions Hercules (more times than Jesus), in the very same work (see: 1.15; 8.5.3; 10.11.1). Just as Tacitus mentions a Christus, so does he also mention Hercules many times in his Annals. And most importantly, just as we have no artifacts, writings or eyewitnesses about Hercules, we also have nothing about Jesus. All information about Hercules and Jesus comes from stories, beliefs, and hearsay. Should we then believe in a historical Hercules, simply because ancient historians mention him and that we have stories and beliefs about him? Of course not, and the same must apply to Jesus if we wish to hold any consistency to historicity. Some critics doubt that a historicized Jesus could develop from myth because they think there never occurred any precedence for it. We have many examples of myth from history but what about the other way around? This doubt fails in the light of the most obvious example-- the Greek mythologies where Greek and Roman writers including Diodorus, Cicero, Livy, etc., assumed that there must have existed a historical root for figures such as Hercules, Theseus, Odysseus, Minos, Dionysus, etc. These writers put their mythological heroes into an invented historical time chart. Herodotus, for example, tried to determine when Hercules lived. As Robert M. Price revealed, "The whole approach earned the name of Euhemerism, from Euhemerus who originated it." [Price, p. 250] Even today, we see many examples of seedling historicized mythologies: UFO adherents whose beliefs began as a dream of alien bodily invasion, and then expressed as actually having occurred (some of which have formed religious cults); beliefs of urban legends which started as pure fiction or hoaxes; propaganda spread by politicians which stem from fiction but believed by their constituents. People consider Hercules and other Greek gods as myth because people no longer believe in the Greek and Roman stories. When a civilization dies, so do their gods. Christianity and its church authorities, on the other hand, still hold a powerful influence on governments, institutions, and colleges. Anyone doing research on Jesus, even skeptics, had better allude to his existence or else risk future funding and damage to their reputations or fear embarrassment against their Christian friends. Christianity depends on establishing a historical Jesus and it will defend, at all costs, even the most unreliable sources. The faithful want to believe in Jesus, and belief alone can create intellectual barriers that leak even into atheist and secular thought. We have so many Christian professors, theologians and historical "experts" around the world that tell us we should accept a historical Jesus that if repeated often enough, it tends to convince even the most ardent skeptic. The establishment of history should never reside with the "experts" words alone or simply because a scholar has a reputation as a historian. Historical review has yet to achieve the reliability of scientific investigation, (and in fact, many times ignores it). If a scholar makes a historical claim, his assertion should depend primarily with the evidence itself and not just because he or she says so. Facts do not require belief. And whereas beliefs can live comfortably without evidence at all, facts depend on evidence.
THEN WHY THE MYTH OF JESUS? Some people actually believe that just because so much voice and ink has spread the word of a character named Jesus throughout history, that this must mean that he actually lived. This argument simply does not hold. The number of people who believe or write about something or the professional degrees they hold say nothing at all about fact. Facts derive out of evidence, not from hearsay, not from hubris scholars, and certainly not from faithful believers. Regardless of the position or admiration held by a scholar, believer, or priest, if he or she cannot support a hypothesis with good evidence, then it can only remain a hypothesis. While a likely possibility exists that an actual Jesus lived, another likely possibility reveals that a mythology could have derived out of earlier mythologies or possibly independent archetypal hero worship. Although we have no evidence for a historical Jesus, we certainly have many accounts of mythologies from the Middle East during the first century and before. Many of these stories appear similar to the Christ saviour story. Just before and during the first century, the Jews had prophesied about an upcoming Messiah based on Jewish scripture. Their beliefs influenced many of their followers. We know that powerful beliefs can create self-fulfilling prophesies, and surely this proved just as true in ancient times. It served as a popular dream expressed in Hebrew Scripture for the promise of an "end-time" with a savior to lead them to the promised land. Indeed, Roman records show executions of several would-be Messiahs, (but not a single record mentions a Jesus). Many ancients believed that there could come a final war against the "Sons of Darkness"-- the Romans. This then could very well have served as the ignition and flame for the future growth of Christianity. Biblical scholars tell us that the early Christians lived within pagan communities. Jewish scriptural beliefs coupled with the pagan myths of the time give sufficient information about how such a religion could have formed. Many of the Hellenistic and pagan myths parallel so closely to the alleged Jesus that to ignore its similarities means to ignore the mythological beliefs of history. Dozens of similar savior stories propagated the minds of humans long before the alleged life of Jesus. Virtually nothing about Jesus "the Christ" came to the Christians as original or new. For example, the religion of Zoroaster, founded circa 628-551 B.C.E. in ancient Persia, roused mankind in the need for hating a devil, the belief of a paradise, last judgment and resurrection of the dead. Mithraism, an offshoot of Zoroastrianism probably influenced early Christianity. The Magi described in the New Testament appears as Zoroastrian priests. Note the word "paradise" came from the Persian pairidaeza. Osiris, Hercules, Hermes, Prometheus, Perseus, Romulus, and others compare to the Christian myth. According to Patrick Campbell of The Mythical Jesus, all served as pre-Christian sun gods, yet all allegedly had gods for fathers, virgins for mothers; had their births announced by stars; got born on the solstice around December 25th; had tyrants who tried to kill them in their infancy; met violent deaths; rose from the dead; and nearly all got worshiped by "wise men" and had allegedly fasted for forty days. [McKinsey, Chapter 5] Even Justin Martyr recognized the analogies between Christianity and Paganism. To the Pagans, he wrote: "When we say that the Word, who is first born of God, was produced without sexual union, and that he, Jesus Christ, our teacher, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven; we propound nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter (Zeus)." [First Apology, ch. xxi] Virtually all of the mythical accounts of a savior Jesus have parallels to past pagan mythologies which existed long before Christianity and from the Jewish scriptures that we now call the Old Testament. The accounts of these myths say nothing about historical reality, but they do say a lot about believers, how they believed, and how their beliefs spread. In the book The Jesus Puzzle, the biblical scholar, Earl Doherty, presents not only a challenge to the existence of an historical Jesus but reveals that early pre-Gospel Christian documents show that the concept of Jesus sprang from non-historical spiritual beliefs of a Christ derived from Jewish scripture and Hellenized myths of savior gods. Nowhere do any of the New Testament epistle writers describe a human Jesus, including Paul. None of the epistles mention a Jesus from Nazareth, an earthly teacher, or as a human miracle worker. Nowhere do we find these writers quoting Jesus. Nowhere do we find them describing any details of Jesus' life on earth or his followers. Nowhere do we find the epistle writers even using the word "disciple" (they of course use the term "apostle" but the word simply means messenger, as Paul saw himself). Except for a few well known interpolations, Jesus always gets presented as a spiritual being that existed before all time with God, and that knowledge of Christ came directly from God or as a revelation from the word of scripture. Doherty writes, "Christian documents outside the Gospels, even at the end of the first century and beyond, show no evidence that any tradition about an earthly life and ministry of Jesus were in circulation." Furthermore, the epistle to the Hebrews (8:4), makes it explicitly clear that the epistle writer did not believe in a historical Jesus: "If He [Jesus] had been on earth, He would not be a priest." Did the Christians copy (or steal) the pagan ideas directly into their own faith? Not necessarily. They may have gotten many of their beliefs through syncretism or through independent hero archetype worship, innate to human story telling. If gotten through syncretism, Jews and pagans could very well have influenced the first Christians, especially the ideas of salvation and beliefs about good and evil. Later, at the time of the gospels, other myths may entered Christian beliefs such a the virgin birth and miracles. In the 4th century, we know that Christians derived the birthday of Jesus from the pagans. If gotten through independent means, it still says nothing about Christian originality because we know that pagans had beliefs about incarnated gods, long before Christianity existed. The hero archetypes still exist in our story telling today. As one personal example, as a boy I used to read and collect Superman comics. It never occurred to me at the time to see Superman as a Christ-figure. Yet, if you analyze Superman and Jesus stories, they have uncanny similarities. In fact the movie Superman Returns explicitly tells the Superman story through a savior's point of view without once mentioning Jesus, yet Christians would innately know the connection. Other movies like Star Wars, Phenomenon, K-PAX, The Matrix, etc. also covertly tell savior stories. So whether the first Christians borrowed or independently came up with a savior story makes no difference whatsoever. The point here only aims to illustrate that Christians did not originate the savior story. The early historical documents can prove nothing about an actual Jesus but they do show an evolution of belief derived from varied and diverse concepts of Christianity, starting from a purely spiritual form of Christ to a human figure who embodied that spirit, as portrayed in the Gospels. The New Testament stories appears as an eclectic hodgepodge of Jewish, Hellenized and pagan stories compiled by pietistic believers to appeal to an audience for their particular religious times. A NOTE ABOUT DATING: The A.D. (Anno Domini, or "year of our Lord") dating method derived from a monk named Dionysius Exiguus (Dennis the Little), in the sixth-century who used it in his Easter tables. Oddly, some people seem to think this has relevance to a historical Jesus. But of course it has nothing at all to do with it. In the time before and during the 6th century, people used various other dating methods. The Romans used A.U.C. (anno urbis conditae, "year of the founded city," that being Rome). The Jews had their own dating system. Not until the tenth century did most churches accept the new dating system. The A.D. system simply reset the time of January 1, 754 A.U.C. to January 1, of year one A.D., which Dionysius obliquely derived from the belief of the date of "incarnation" of Jesus. The date, if one uses the Bible as history, can't possibly hold true. * Instead of B.C. and A.D., I have used the convention of B.C.E. (Before the Common Era) and C.E. (Common Era) as often used in scholarly literature. They correspond to the same dates as B.C. and A.D., but without alluding to the birth or death of an alleged Christ. * Dionysius believed that the conception (incarnation) of Jesus occurred on March 25. This meant that the conception must have occurred nine months later on December 25, probably not coincidentally, the very same date that the Emperor Aurelian, in 274 C.E., declared December 25 a holiday in celebration of the birth of Mithras, the sun god. By 336 C.E., Christians replaced Mithras with Jesus' birth on the same date. Dionysius then declared the new year several days later on January 1, probably to coincide with the traditional Roman year starting on January 1st. Dionysius probably never read the gospel account of the birth of Jesus because the Matthew gospel says his birth occurred while Herod served as King. That meant that if he did exist, his birth would have to occur in 4 B.C.E. or earlier. He made another 'mistake' by assigning the first year as 1 instead of 0 (everyone's birthday starts at year 0, not 1). The concept of zero (invented from Arabia and India) didn't come into Europe until about two hundred years later.
QUOTES FROM A FEW SCHOLARS: Although the majority of scholars today believe that a Jesus lived on earth, the reasons for this appear suspicious once you consider the history and evolution of Jesus scholarship. Hundreds of years ago all Biblical scholars believed in God. Considering their Christian beliefs, they would, of course, believe in a historical Jesus. In the last two centuries, the school has loosened up a bit, and today they even allow atheists into their study rooms. But even today you had better allude to a historical Jesus even if you question the reliability of the sources, otherwise, you may not have a job. If, indeed, Bible scholars did allow skeptics of a historical Jesus into their studies, and they presented a convincing case, that could threaten the very branch of Jesus scholarship that studied a historical Jesus. It could very well disappear like that of euhermerism. Although some secular freethinkers and atheists accept a historical Jesus (minus the miracles), they, like most Christians, simply accept the traditional view without question. As time goes on, more and more scholars have begun to open the way to a more honest look at the evidence, or should I say, the lack of evidence. So for those who wish to rely on scholarly opinion, I will give a few quotes from Biblical researchers and scholars, past and present:
When the Church mythologists established their system, they collected all the writings they could find and managed them as they pleased. It is a matter altogether of uncertainty to us whether such of the writings as now appear under the name of the Old and New Testaments are in the same state in which those collectors say they found them, or whether they added, altered, abridged or dressed them up. -Thomas Paine (The Age of Reason)
The world has been for a long time engaged in writing lives of Jesus... The library of such books has grown since then. But when we come to examine them, one startling fact confronts us: all of these books relate to a personage concerning whom there does not exist a single scrap of contemporary information -- not one! By accepted tradition he was born in the reign of Augustus, the great literary age of the nation of which he was a subject. In the Augustan age historians flourished; poets, orators, critics and travelers abounded. Yet not one mentions the name of Jesus Christ, much less any incident in his life. -Moncure D. Conway [1832 - 1907] (Modern Thought)
It is only in comparatively modern times that the possibility was considered that Jesus does not belong to history at all. -J.M. Robertson (Pagan Christs)
Many people-- then and now-- have assumed that these letters [of Paul] are genuine, and five of them were in fact incorporated into the New Testament as "letters of Paul." Even today, scholars dispute which are authentic and which are not. Most scholars, however, agree that Paul actually wrote only eight of the thirteen "Pauline" letters now included in the New Testament. collection: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. Virtually all scholars agree that Paul himself did not write 1 or 2 Timothy or Titus-- letters written in a style different from Paul's and reflecting situations and viewpoints in a style different from those in Paul's own letters. About the authorship of Ephesias, Colossians, and 2 Thessalonians, debate continues; but the majority of scholars include these, too, among the "deutero-Pauline"-- literally, secondarily Pauline-- letters." -Elaine Pagels, Professor of Religion at Princeton University, (Adam, Eve, and the Serpent)
We know virtually nothing about the persons who wrote the gospels we call Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. -Elaine Pagels, Professor of Religion at Princeton University, (The Gnostic Gospels)
Some hoped to penetrate the various accounts and to discover the "historical Jesus". . . and that sorting out "authentic" material in the gospels was virtually impossible in the absence of independent evidence." -Elaine Pagels, Professor of Religion at Princeton University
The gospels are so anonymous that their titles, all second-century guesses, are all four wrong. -Randel McCraw Helms (Who Wrote the Gospels?)
Far from being an intimate of an intimate of Jesus, Mark wrote at the forth remove from Jesus. -Randel McCraw Helms (Who Wrote the Gospels?)
Mark himself clearly did not know any eyewitnesses of Jesus. -Randel McCraw Helms (Who Wrote the Gospels?)
All four gospels are anonymous texts. The familiar attributions of the Gospels to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John come from the mid-second century and later and we have no good historical reason to accept these attributions. -Steve Mason, professor of classics, history and religious studies at York University in Toronto (Bible Review, Feb. 2000, p. 36)
The question must also be raised as to whether we have the actual words of Jesus in any Gospel. -Bishop John Shelby Spong
But even if it could be proved that John's Gospel had been the first of the four to be written down, there would still be considerable confusion as to who "John" was. For the various styles of the New Testament texts ascribed to John- The Gospel, the letters, and the Book of Revelations-- are each so different in their style that it is extremely unlikely that they had been written by one person. -John Romer, archeologist & Bible scholar (Testament)
It was not until the third century that Jesus' cross of execution became a common symbol of the Christian faith. -John Romer, archeologist & Bible scholar (Testament)
What one believes and what one can demonstrate historically are usually two different things. -Robert J. Miller, Bible scholar, (Bible Review, December 1993, Vol. IX, Number 6, p. 9)
When it comes to the historical question about the Gospels, I adopt a mediating position-- that is, these are religious records, close to the sources, but they are not in accordance with modern historiographic requirements or professional standards. -David Noel Freedman, Bible scholar and general editor of the Anchor Bible series (Bible Review, December 1993, Vol. IX, Number 6, p.34)
Paul did not write the letters to Timothy to Titus or several others published under his name; and it is unlikely that the apostles Matthew, James, Jude, Peter and John had anything to do with the canonical books ascribed to them. -Michael D. Coogan, Professor of religious studies at Stonehill College (Bible Review, June 1994)
A generation after Jesus' death, when the Gospels were written, the Romans had destroyed the Jerusalem Temple (in 70 C.E.); the most influential centers of Christianity were cities of the Mediterranean world such as Alexandria, Antioch, Corinth, Damascus, Ephesus and Rome. Although large number of Jews were also followers of Jesus, non-Jews came to predominate in the early Church. They controlled how the Gospels were written after 70 C.E. -Bruce Chilton, Bell Professor of Religion at Bard College (Bible Review, Dec. 1994, p. 37)
James Dunn says that the Sermon on the Mount, mentioned only by Matthew, "is in fact not historical." How historical can the Gospels be? Are Murphy-O-Conner's speculations concerning Jesus' baptism by John simply wrong-headed? How can we really know if the baptism, or any other event written about in the Gospels, is historical? -Daniel P. Sullivan (Bible Review, June 1996, Vol. XII, Number 3, p. 5)
David Friedrich Strauss (The Life of Jesus, 1836), had argued that the Gospels could not be read as straightforward accounts of what Jesus actually did and said; rather, the evangelists and later redactors and commentators, influenced by their religious beliefs, had made use of myths and legends that rendered the gospel narratives, and traditional accounts of Jesus' life, unreliable as sources of historical information. -Bible Review, October 1996, Vol. XII, Number 5, p. 39
The Gospel authors were Jews writing within the midrashic tradition and intended their stories to be read as interpretive narratives, not historical accounts. -Bishop Shelby Spong, Liberating the Gospels
Other scholars have concluded that the Bible is the product of a purely human endeavor, that the identity of the authors is forever lost and that their work has been largely obliterated by centuries of translation and editing. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "Who Wrote the Bible," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
Yet today, there are few Biblical scholars-- from liberal skeptics to conservative evangelicals- who believe that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John actually wrote the Gospels. Nowhere do the writers of the texts identify themselves by name or claim unambiguously to have known or traveled with Jesus. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The Four Gospels," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
Once written, many experts believe, the Gospels were redacted, or edited, repeatedly as they were copied and circulated among church elders during the last first and early second centuries. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The Four Gospels," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
The tradition attributing the fourth Gospel to the Apostle John, the son of Zebedee, is first noted by Irenaeus in A.D. 180. It is a tradition based largely on what some view as the writer's reference to himself as "the beloved disciple" and "the disciple whom Jesus loved." Current objection to John's authorship are based largely on modern textural analyses that strongly suggest the fourth Gospel was the work of several hands, probably followers of an elderly teacher in Asia Minor named John who claimed as a young man to have been a disciple of Jesus. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The Four Gospels," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
Some scholars say so many revisions occurred in the 100 years following Jesus' death that no one can be absolutely sure of the accuracy or authenticity of the Gospels, especially of the words the authors attributed to Jesus himself. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The catholic papers," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
Three letters that Paul allegedly wrote to his friends and former co-workers Timothy and Titus are now widely disputed as having come from Paul's hand. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The catholic papers," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
The Epistle of James is a practical book, light on theology and full of advice on ethical behavior. Even so, its place in the Bible has been challenged repeatedly over the years. It is generally believed to have been written near the end of the first century to Jewish Christians. . . but scholars are unable conclusively to identify the writer. Five men named James appear in the New Testament: the brother of Jesus, the son of Zebedee, the son of Alphaeus, "James the younger" and the father of the Apostle Jude. Little is known of the last three, and since the son of Zebedee was martyred in A.D. 44, tradition has leaned toward the brother of Jesus. However, the writer never claims to be Jesus' brother. And scholars find the language too erudite for a simple Palestinian. This letter is also disputed on theological grounds. Martin Luther called it "an epistle of straw" that did not belong in the Bible because it seemed to contradict Paul's teachings that salvation comes by faith as a "gift of God"-- not by good works. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The catholic papers," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
The origins of the three letters of John are also far from certain. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The catholic papers," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
Christian tradition has held that the Apostle Peter wrote the first [letter], probably in Rome shortly before his martyrdom about A.D. 65. However, some modern scholars cite the epistle's cultivated language and its references to persecutions that did not occur until the reign of Domitian (A.D. 81-96) as evidence that it was actually written by Peter's disciples sometime later. Second Peter has suffered even harsher scrutiny. Many scholars consider it the latest of all New Testament books, written around A.D. 125. The letter was never mentioned in second-century writings and was excluded from some church canons into the fifth century. "This letter cannot have been written by Peter," wrote Werner Kummel, a Heidelberg University scholar, in his highly regarded Introduction to the New Testament. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The catholic papers," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
The letter of Jude also is considered too late to have been written by the attested author-- "the brother of James" and, thus, of Jesus. The letter, believed written early in the second century. -Jeffery L. Sheler, "The catholic papers," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
According to the declaration of the Second Vatican Council, a faithful account of the actions and words of Jesus is to be found in the Gospels; but it is impossible to reconcile this with the existence in the text of contradictions, improbabilities, things which are materially impossible or statements which run contrary to firmly established reality. -Maurice Bucaille (The Bible, the Quran, and Science)
The bottom line is we really don't know for sure who wrote the Gospels. -Jerome Neyrey, of the Weston School of Theology, Cambridge, Mass. in "The Four Gospels," (U.S. News & World Report, Dec. 10, 1990)
Most scholars have come to acknowledge, was done not by the Apostles but by their anonymous followers (or their followers' followers). Each presented a somewhat different picture of Jesus' life. The earliest appeared to have been written some 40 years after his Crucifixion. -David Van Biema, "The Gospel Truth?" (Time, April 8, 1996)
So unreliable were the Gospel accounts that "we can now know almost nothing concerning the life and personality of Jesus." -Rudolf Bultmann, University of Marburg, the foremost Protestant scholar in the field in 1926
The Synoptic Gospels employ techniques that we today associate with fiction. -Paul Q. Beeching, Central Connecticut State University (Bible Review, June 1997, Vol. XIII, Number 3, p. 43)
Josephus says that he himself witnessed a certain Eleazar casting out demons by a method of exorcism that had been given to Solomon by God himself-- while Vespasian watched! In the same work, Josephus tells the story of a rainmaker, Onias (14.2.1). -Paul Q. Beeching, Central Connecticut State University (Bible Review, June 1997, Vol. XIII, Number 3, p. 43)
For Mark's gospel to work, for instance, you must believe that Isaiah 40:3 (quoted, in a slightly distorted form, in Mark 1:2-3) correctly predicted that a stranger named John would come out of the desert to prepare the way for Jesus. It will then come as something of a surprise to learn in the first chapter of Luke that John is a near relative, well known to Jesus' family. -Paul Q. Beeching, Central Connecticut State University (Bible Review, June 1997, Vol. XIII, Number 3, p. 43)
The narrative conventions and world outlook of the gospel prohibit our using it as a historical record of that year. -Paul Q. Beeching, Central Connecticut State University (Bible Review, June 1997, Vol. XIII, Number 3, p. 54)
Jesus is a mythical figure in the tradition of pagan mythology and almost nothing in all of ancient literature would lead one to believe otherwise. Anyone wanting to believe Jesus lived and walked as a real live human being must do so despite the evidence, not because of it. -C. Dennis McKinsey, Bible critic (The Encyclopedia of Biblical Errancy)
The gospels are very peculiar types of literature. They're not biographies. -Paula Fredriksen, Professor and historian of early Christianity, Boston University (in the PBS documentary, From Jesus to Christ, aired in 1998)
The gospels are not eyewitness accounts -Allen D. Callahan, Associate Professor of New Testament, Harvard Divinity School
We are led to conclude that, in Paul's past, there was no historical Jesus. Rather, the activities of the Son about which God's gospel in scripture told, as interpreted by Paul, had taken place in the spiritual realm and were accessible only through revelation. -Earl Doherty, "The Jesus Puzzle," p.83
Before the Gospels were adopted as history, no record exists that he was ever in the city of Jerusalem at all-- or anywhere else on earth. -Earl Doherty, "The Jesus Puzzle," p.141
Even if there was a historical Jesus lying back of the gospel Christ, he can never be recovered. If there ever was a historical Jesus, there isn't one any more. All attempts to recover him turn out to be just modern remythologizings of Jesus. Every "historical Jesus" is a Christ of faith, of somebody's faith. So the "historical Jesus" of modern scholarship is no less a fiction. -Robert M. Price, "Jesus: Fact or Fiction, A Dialogue With Dr. Robert Price and Rev. John Rankin," Opening Statement
It is important to recognize the obvious: The gospel story of Jesus is itself apparently mythic from first to last." -Robert M. Price, professor of biblical criticism at the Center for Inquiry Institute (Deconstructing Jesus, p. 260)
CONCLUSION Belief cannot produce historical fact, and claims that come from nothing but hearsay do not amount to an honest attempt to get at the facts. Even with eyewitness accounts we must tread carefully. Simply because someone makes a claim, does not mean it represents reality. For example, consider some of the bogus claims that supposedly come from many eyewitness accounts of alien extraterrestrials and their space craft. They not only assert eyewitnesses but present blurry photos to boot! If we can question these accounts, then why should we not question claims that come from hearsay even more? Moreover, consider that the hearsay comes from ancient and unknown people that no longer live. Unfortunately, belief and faith substitute as knowledge in many people's minds and nothing, even direct evidence thrust on the feet of their claims, could possibly change their minds. We have many stories, myths and beliefs of a Jesus but if we wish to establish the facts of history, we cannot even begin to put together a knowledgeable account without at least a few reliable eyewitness accounts. Of course a historical Jesus may have existed, perhaps based loosely on a living human even though his actual history got lost, but this amounts to nothing but speculation. However we do have an abundance of evidence supporting the mythical evolution of Jesus. Virtually every detail in the gospel stories occurred in pagan and/or Hebrew stories, long before the advent of Christianity. We simply do not have a shred of evidence to determine the historicity of a Jesus "the Christ." We only have evidence for the belief of Jesus. So if you hear anyone who claims to have evidence for a witness of a historical Jesus, simply ask for the author's birth date. Anyone whose birth occurred after an event cannot serve as an eyewitness, nor can their words alone serve as evidence for that event.
Sources (click on a blue highlighted title if you'd like to obtain it or read it):
Worshiper of Jesus, Christian/Messianic, what are you going to say when you stand before G-d after the false man-god Jesus whom you worship and to whom you pray doesn’t appear? What are you going to say to your Maker when you knew all along (and I am merely reminding you here now) that worshiping anyone or anything other than Him is a grave sin and betrayal? How will you justify your worship of a mortal creature to whom billions bow their knees? Will you deny that you knew that He has warned you that He was neither a man nor a son of man (Numbers 23:19), that He had no visible form and that He can’t be compared to anything He created? Will you try to defend yourself that you only followed your leaders or will you admit to G-d your sin of idolatry? Will you appeal to the polished literary character from the pages of your New Testament? Will you tell G-d that Jesus paid for your sins by his blood when He explicitly warned that He doesn’t approve of human sacrifices (Leviticus 18:21 and Deuteronomy 12:31) and that no man can punished for the sins of another (Ezekiel 18:20)? Will you point to the [Greek] Testament in your defense and claim it to be the “word of G-d”? Will you claim that you have put your faith in Jesus, Paul, apostles, the church scribes, church fathers, pastors and evangelists? Will you attempt to boldly walk into the Holy of Holies as the author of Hebrews exhorts you to do (Hebrews 10:19) and demand to be allowed in since you placed your trust in a “son of man”, despite the fact that G-d has told us in Numbers 23:19 not to do just that? What will come out of your mouth? Do you know?
