Anonymous asked:
You said there was overwhelming evidence for the existence of the bible Jesus (born to Mary and joseph, born in Bethlehem etc). What are some of those overwhelming evidences outside the bible and the two other documents mentioning him (based of off the bible and the Christian sects beliefs at that time)?
I actually commented that there is a “large amount” of evidence that Jesus existed which is quite different from “overwhelming.” No matter the term used I think you simply want to know what exactly is that evidence I’m claiming exists. Firstly it’s important to remember the Bible is not one large source document to be treated as a cohesive unit but rather a compilation of texts many of which are independent of one another, specifically in the New Testament which is relevant for the life of Jesus. Moreover the fact the NT is a religious book written by followers of Jesus doesn’t always work against it’s credibility on a given subject, as I will try to show.
When it comes to establishing the life of Jesus we have 9 independent sources within about 100 years of his death which is more than most figure’s of Jesus’ time who were of similar stature while alive (Jesus wasn’t really popular until long after his death). Essentially in chronological order the Christian sources are Paul, Mark, Q (the hypothetical written source of some of Matthew and Luke’s sayings), M (another Matthew source), L (another Luke source), John and the Gospel of Thomas. Additionally there are the brief mentions by Josephus and Tacitus (the only of non-Christian sources in this time frame who say anything at all about Jesus himself). While the multiple attestations may help establish Jesus existed it is really the evidence against interest or of no particular theological benefit (sometimes called the criterion of embarrassment or dissimilarity when examining the NT) presented in the gospels which provides solid evidence for his life and some actions in it. Obviously I’m not going to recount all of it here but what follows are some examples, all of which could be expounded in far greater detail, of how we know Jesus existed and some details about his life.
If you were to create a Jewish messiah from scratch you certainly wouldn’t have him be crucified as there was no such tradition in the Jewish scriptures but this shows up 7 of the 9 sources with the exceptions being Josephus and the Gospel of Thomas. Prior to Christianity there are no traditions of Jews believing the messiah to be anything other than grand leader of Israel, certainly none with the messiah suffering and dying young. This is actually the main reason why Jews didn’t and don’t accept Jesus as the messiah which Paul acknowledged in 1 Corinthians 1:23. Therefore in addition to being multiply attested it makes no sense for Christians to have invented this lie and hence it’s reasonable to conclude they didn’t and that it really goes back to a person they believed to be the messiah.
You also wouldn’t have a person who supposed to be divine baptized as early Christians thought the person doing the baptizing was spiritually superior to the person being baptized yet Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist and this shows up in Mark, Q and is hinted at in John. Likewise mentions of his family would also do you little good to establish him as divine so early remarks which would not have bolstered the story like mentions of James, brother of Jesus, by Paul which are later confirmed by independent Christian sources further solidify the story. Josephus also mentioned Jesus and his brother James in passing, though his second mention was undoubtedly altered later by Christians who preserved Josephus’ writings, nonetheless few scholars maintain the entirety of the second passage was a fabrication and the mention of James comes in the first portion which is not believed to have been altered.
Keeping the above criteria of multiple sources and dissimilarity while maintaining the general rules that earlier sources are preferable to later ones, bias of the writers should be accounted for, the less theologically developed the better and the steadfast criterion that the actions have to make sense in first century Palestine this type of reasoning can be used to deduce quite a bit about Jesus including his apocalyptic views, having more brothers than just James, being from Nazereth, etc. When you take these pieces of information in sum, though individual sources are highly flawed and collectively contradictory on a number of points, they represent a very strong case that an apocalyptic Jewish leader named Jesus (or rather Yeshua) really existed and at least some of what is portrayed about him in the gospels is accurate. It took me far too long before I recognized this and it is a fact I wish more nonbelievers would acknowledge. Ultimately instead of saying there was a “large amount of evidence” perhaps simply stating there is “very good evidence” would have been a better choice of words but I hope you see why I say think this evidence for Jesus existing is strong and though I haven’t had the chance to read it yet myself I’ve heard Bart Ehrman’s Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium is a great examination of historical Jesus so you may want to look into it if you are interested to learn more.
Thanks for the question, sorry I took so long to answer it and that the answer itself is so long.
