The Jesus myth Part I

[Kishkumen]

This is all allegory, as he explicitly says in Galatians 4:24.

22For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman.b 23His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born through the promise.

24These things serve as illustrations, for the women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children into slavery: This is Hagar. 25Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present-day Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children

The women and their children serve as "illustrations." Which women? The women he has just talked about in verses 22 and 23. He is very clear what he is allegorizing with here, stem. Also, he is not claiming that Abraham did not have two sons by two different women. He is using sons and women he assumes to be real in an allegorizing way. Similarly, he is treating Jesus and the woman who made him as real people. They are not the allegories. They are the real-world examples from which one can allegorize.

[Manetho]

There's also Romans 1:3, where Paul calls Jesus "descended from David according to the flesh".

[dastardly stem]

Thanks for the comments Manetho, and Kish. I enjoy the push back for sure. Eager still to see how this works out in the end. I might get to change my mind.

On Romans 1:3. This is Paul's solid effort to fulfill Old Testament prophesy, it appears. In the gospels Joseph is said to be from the line of David. But Jesus is not biologically from Joseph. So it's kind of confusing. Anyway, the word, as stated in the KJV is "made" again. Its almost as if, on a mythicist position, the seed of David was used to make the mortal body that Jesus inhabited. I always think it funny to think the ancients could really track, at least with much accuracy, lineages over the course of hundreds or thousands of years (I mean, even in our modern day, the Church with it's familysearch arm, can't really take seriously anything before 14 or 1500. Its all just kind of a mess or wash before that time. And the only reason to go to that era is there are records, at least, somewhat available). Since it's hard to take it seriously, I'm not sure they treated it any more than in a mythical sense anyway. How would Paul know, for instance, Jesus, if he lived, was a real direct descendant of David? Sounds like, as suggested, he was aware of Old Testament prophesy and made the fit to fulfill it.

Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh;

With that all said, it is true that there are a couple of allusions in Paul that fight against mythicism. Even though each is explainable in some way, we can safely say that some of these point towards historicity on their own. But such readings for historicity also fights all the descriptions and explanations of mythicism. yet to come.

[huckelberry]

Thanks for the comments Manetho, and Kish. I enjoy the push back for sure. Eager still to see how this works out in the end. I might get to change my mind.

On Romans 1:3. This is Paul's solid effort to fulfill Old Testament prophesy, it appears. In the gospels Joseph is said to be from the line of David. But Jesus is not biologically from Joseph. So it's kind of confusing. Anyway, the word, as stated in the KJV is "made" again. Its almost as if, on a mythicist position, the seed of David was used to make the mortal body that Jesus inhabited. I always think it funny to think the ancients could really track, at least with much accuracy, lineages over the course of hundreds or thousands of years (I mean, even in our modern day, the Church with it's familysearch arm, can't really take seriously anything before 14 or 1500. Its all just kind of a mess or wash before that time. And the only reason to go to that era is there are records, at least, somewhat available). Since it's hard to take it seriously, I'm not sure they treated it any more than in a mythical sense anyway. How would Paul know, for instance, Jesus, if he lived, was a real direct descendant of David? Sounds like, as suggested, he was aware of Old Testament prophesy and made the fit to fulfill it.

Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh;

With that all said, it is true that there are a couple of allusions in Paul that fight against mythicism. Even though each is explainable in some way, we can safely say that some of these point towards historicity on their own. But such readings for historicity also fights all the descriptions and explanations of mythicism. yet to come.

Stem, I have never been able to read the gospel ancestry without feeling some uncertainty. On the other hand, it is a limited area and David was close to a thousand years earlier. One can be sure anybody local was descended from David by some path, every body other than foreigners would be.

[dastardly stem]

Stem, I have never been able to read the gospel ancestry without feeling some uncertainty. On the other hand, it is a limited area and David was close to a thousand years earlier. One can be sure anybody local was descended from David by some path, every body other than foreigners would be.

Well, foreigners over ran the area. But I'd agree otherwise. if the Israelites remained in the limited area, and all of that, every single one, by the time of the first century, would be descended from David. Any claim of Davidic lineage is absolutely pointless. It's like they weren't inspired by God at all. But that's another matter.

It's like in the Book of Mormon when after hundreds of years there was an effort to claim nobility, of sorts, by being of the blood of Nephi. Its like, "Well yah..dumbass, we all are."

[huckelberry]

Stem, I have never been able to read the gospel ancestry without feeling some uncertainty. On the other hand, it is a limited area and David was close to a thousand years earlier. One can be sure anybody local was descended from David by some path, every body other than foreigners would be.

Well, foreigners over ran the area. But I'd agree otherwise. if the Israelites remained in the limited area, and all of that, every single one, by the time of the first century, would be descended from David. Any claim of Davidic lineage is absolutely pointless. It's like they weren't inspired by God at all. But that's another matter.

It's like in the Book of Mormon when after hundreds of years there was an effort to claim nobility, of sorts, by being of the blood of Nephi. Its like, "Well yah..dumbass, we all are."

Stem, I see nothing in Paul to indicate he is trying to nominate Jesus for King. I think all he is saying is that he was a Jew. I am not seeing how inspiration or no inspiration would make a difference one way or the other with that. Pauls claim in that opening Romans statement is Jesus was designated Son of God in Power according to the Spirit of Holiness by his resurrection.

[Kishkumen]

How would Paul know, for instance, Jesus, if he lived, was a real direct descendant of David? Sounds like, as suggested, he was aware of Old Testament prophesy and made the fit to fulfill it.

That may be so, but this does not count toward the lack of Jesus’ historicity. Fictitious genealogies were the standard way that elites or remarkable people were given a suitable origin. Julius Caesar used the family story that he was descended from Venus’ affair with a Trojan prince. That did not make Caesar fictitious, of course. It only meant that his genealogy was fantastical. When Romans found it necessary to harmonize the story of Romulus with Aeneas, they created a new genealogy to bring the two fictions together. But, again, this did not make the Romans or the people who claimed descent from Aeneas fictitious. They were doing the standard thing.

In Jesus’ world, remarkable people were reputed to descend from the gods. We should not be surprised that the story arose that Jesus was the Son of God. Alexander was the son of a god. So too was Augustus. If Jesus is to be Judea’s new god, or demi-god, or hero, then he, too, must have a suitably noble and divine ancestry. Predictably, the same gospels that focus on establishing his miraculous conception and birth give us his fictitious genealogies, but this does not move the needle one micrometer toward making Jesus himself a fiction, any more than it makes Alexander the Great a fiction or Augustus a fiction. When Julius Caesar became a god of the Roman state, his historical life did not evaporate.

Showing that these stories were told about a person does not make the person less real. We must look elsewhere to make an argument that the person about whom such stories were told was not a real person.

[Res Ipsa]

Good points, Reverend. One thing that strikes me. I’m having a hard time picturing Paul just making up Jesus’ lineage to fulfill prophecy. It makes more sense to me that he’s repeating stories he’s heard about Jesus. Those stories eventually were written down as the gospels, where the lineage appears.

But maybe I’m trying to force 22nd century “common sense” on 1st Century peoples. How did the fictitious lineage for famous figure come to be? Did somebody think “Hmm, descending from a goat herder just won’t do for Alexander. Let’s make something up that is more suitable.” Or is a matter of tall tales working their way into an official biography?

[Kishkumen]

Good points, Reverend. One thing that strikes me. I’m having a hard time picturing Paul just making up Jesus’ lineage to fulfill prophecy. It makes more sense to me that he’s repeating stories he’s heard about Jesus. Those stories eventually were written down as the gospels, where the lineage appears.

But maybe I’m trying to force 22nd century “common sense” on 1st Century peoples. How did the fictitious lineage for famous figure come to be? Did somebody think “Hmm, descending from a goat herder just won’t do for Alexander. Let’s make something up that is more suitable.” Or is a matter of tall tales working their way into an official biography?

That is an excellent question, RI. I don't think it was just one or the other. If important people are thought to come from divine origins, then either those origins will be claimed by the important person or handed to them by others. I am sure both things happened. One of the interesting things about both Alexander and Augustus is that they clearly both had human fathers that people knew, and yet within their lifetimes they were given divine fathers too. Somehow this was not seen to be a contradiction. So the fact that people knew Joseph and the claim that Jesus was the Son of God was not, I believe, a problem.

[dastardly stem]

THanks Kishkumen and Res Ipsa, for those insightful comments.

I'm going to try and set us where we are so far.

If Jesus lived, he died around 30 A.D.

The religion, we can assume, started at that date (It had to come before Paul's letters in the 50s A.D. because Paul was a convert, and said he wrote these some years after he converted).

Paul's letters are the earliest source of any words about Jesus, on Christianity. That suggests if Jesus lived, any source that made note of his existence was lost, destroyed or never was.

Very few words from Paul can be used to say Paul thought Jesus was a real human. And each of those are disputed on the mythicist position.
Paul never points to anyone who claims to have known a mortal Jesus
Paul never says there was a Jesus who walked among everyone and taught them anything.
Everything Paul claims to be true about Jesus and his religion can only be gained through revelation. He doesn't suggest people who knew
Jesus were around teaching things this supposed preacher preached.

Some years, maybe 2 decades after Paul's writing and then likely after Paul had died, an anonymous writing appears describing fantastic things about this Jesus' life. Everything mentioning Jesus after that, seems to draw directly from that source or other sources already reliant upon that one source, or that mixed with "vague" allusions from Paul.

Before we move on, I'd like anyone to chime, who cares to, with other evidence that may be used to say Jesus lived. We can add that to the mix.