The problem you have with Jesus is that there isn't any record of him at the time of his life. All the text referencing him were written at least 70 years after his death at the earliest and by third party account.
Keep in mind that the gospel are ACCORDING to and not WRITTEN by the apostles. Josephus wrote about CHRISTIAN also from third party account. The Romans didn't write anything about Jesus in any of their official correspondence. There is only mention of a christian sect but no mention of Jesus.
Also the Bible was written around 324 by the catholic to push their agenda and impose their flavor of Christianity over the other christian sect mostly the Aryans & the Cathar who didn't recognised the divinity of Jesus.
Jesus of Nazareth looks more like a literary invention to teach morals and religion which can be a good thing if he is used as such. But instead he became a reason to torture and kill millions of people over the years in religious war. A real shame.
I promised myself that I wouldn't reply to this but I saw some of the other replies and these kinds of posts make me sad for our society.
The Internet -which has given a voice to millions for many good causes- has also allowed us -as a society- to confuse the line between opinion and fact. Simply posting something like 'Jesus never existed' or 'Bigfoot is real' requires nothing from the poster, no empirical evidence or even shred of evidence to support your statement.
You can to say it because you feel it and people accept it as fact. Well, thankfully not everyone...
As university professor -as many professions should and do- you can't blindly make a statement without providing honest, empirical evidence to support your statement.
When I see posts like 'Jesus never existed' I wonder how that is possible in 2011? Whats next? Copernicus was wrong and the Sun revolves around the Earth? The Holocaust was a lie? Julius Caesar never existed?
As long as I don't have to provide a shred of empirical evidence, I believe that Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak created the Amiga.
Jesus of Nazareth is probably one of the most proven historical figures in ancient history. Was he God? The son of God? A prophet? Did he raise people from the dead? That is an entire different subject and will most likely end in an opinion.
When Ancient Historical Researchers look to prove or disprove a person in history they look at hundreds if not thousands of documents and records (historical method) from that time period that would substantiate a conclusion one way or the other.
And before I read another sentence involving Bigfoot or the Yeti, they both fail the Historical Method test.
Look, I'm not trying to crucify Darrin (no pun intended) but it does bother me that as a society people post statements like this without thinking it through. I believe everyone in the world has a right to Freedom of Speech but that comes with a great deal of responsibility.
If I stated in a post that I believe the Earth is flat, that Julius Caesar is a myth, or that the Sun revolved around the Earth, many here would flame me for being ignorant of the facts.
If we don't hold everyone accountable for their statements then what are we teaching the next generation?
-P
