JESUS WAS A MYTH

IN REGARDS TO THE HISTORICITY OF YESHUA BEN YUSEF

WHY EVERY ATHEIST IS A MYTHICIST

Over the past few hundred years, scholars have been divided on the historicity of the character known as Yeshua ben Yusef aka (Jesus Christ). The division is the result of a tendency to give the gospel accounts more credibility than they deserve. This subject has been answered at length by Rook on these boards and is not the issue I wish to address at this time. In a way this post is for those, who (like myself) deny the credibility of the accounts attested to in the canonical gospels.

The character known as Jesus in the gospels has the following things said about him:

1. Walked on water
2. Healed the blind
3. Raised the dead
4. Fed 5,000 with 5 loaves and 2 fish
5. Resurrected from the dead after 3 days, etc…
   

If you deny this character (as presented above) as having done these things, what are you saying? Are you not denying that literary character’s existence?

One common reply to the argument is:

Though the Jesus attested to in the gospels is myth, he was probably based on a historical personality.

This is nothing more than an argument of faith. It takes faith to believe in a historical Jesus, since we have absolutely no external attestation to this character outside of the gospel tradition. Why the reliance on their having been a historical figure for the basis of the story? Is this not special pleading? – We don’t say things like: “Dionysus was a myth but he was based on a historical Dionysus, or Hercules had to have been based on a historical figure”. This is the equivalent of saying “Yeah I know the Iliad is mythology, but the Cyclops in the story- that guy was real.”

Tuesday, October 2, 2007