There is apparently evidence that there was a Jesus¹ who preached and was crucified for causing a pain for those in power. But the version of Jesus in the bible is likely no more real than the Abraham in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012).
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[1] or someone going by another name which became Jesus over time, many names in the new testament are suspiciously unlike those likely to be found in the middle east in the first century CE.
Not at all. The bible is famously allegorical which is known by everyone who practices catholicism, but the historical evidence and written records are quite clear - there was this incredibly charismatic guy who grew a following, helped the poor and got crucified.
There are non-christian references to Jesus in roman/jewish history books written in the same century, which give pretty strong support to the idea he was an actual person and was killed for his charity 'work' that catered to the poor and sick. Obviously no real 'historical evidence' is possible beyond that.
Sorry, I studied this ~30 years ago, and am not really in the mood to dig for more details :)
When you see the multiple conflicting written records, and actually look at the historical evidence, the only thing that is clear is that people keep curating what people read so they have ‘a clear written record’ that benefited them at the time. Not that the record was ever clear or unconflicted. Sometimes it was really obvious (Council of Nicea, the Anglican ‘reformation’, other times a lot more subtle - like check out what the Dead Sea scrolls say).
This should be especially clear for anyone that has studied the history of the Catholic Church, eh?
Frankly, while I’ve read many versions of the Bible (and a version of the Koran and Hadiths), the underlying theme that has always struck me is how apparent it is that at least the self-stated followers of the book i’ve met never have?
Or if they have, blanked out very large portions of it. Typically the most outspoken ones, anyway.
The new testament is also famously contradictory (as is the old, but not so obviously nor so much so). When it was pulled together from multiple sources a shoddy editing job was done.
And the old testament is taken as allegorical when it would be inconvenient for the believers to follow exactly, but taken very literally in specific parts when people want others to live a certain way. Or just ignored completely, like the existence of other gods being specifically mentioned (though IIRC not necessarily as equals) which stands in contradiction to the monotheistic view.
It is great that Jesus works for you, but you have to separate real-Jesus versus storybook-Jesus. No doubt he lived, but written stories can be elaborated on.
For all I know, Jesus could have been the world's first great magician.
The world has seen quite a few people in it, some quite remarkable - for which stories have been written. No deity or supernatural abilities need to apply.
Don't fall into a fallacy: just because "no deity or supernatural abilities need to apply" doesn't mean that a deity or supernatural abilities haven't applied.
The only honest positions we can take are: I believe / I don't believe.
I'm happy if you find calm in your faith, but one of the biggest cause leading our insanity is the idea "both side can be the truth and it's all about what you believe" when in most cases one is much more likely than the other. This causes alternative facts and idiocracy. There are a lot of "facts" online so we can "choose" the most comfortable one, and "my ignorance is as good as your knowledge".
Strong claims require strong evidence. Some book written by many, some properly delusional or crazy folks, claiming various outlandish things not physically possible these days (staying away from word "lies" but not too far, basic physics laws worked the same 2000 years ago).
Or preaching behavior absolutely unacceptable these days (Old testament would force you to be murderer pretty quickly nowadays, and I haven't heard a single Christian rejecting all of it... they can't so just they ignore most of it like it doesn't exist). All this decades and centuries after claimed facts, that ain't a proof in any sense. You can believe it for sure, I can choose to believe in Great Spaghetti Monster and its holy teachings and its about the same.
There are no contemporary roman records from that time, earliest (with both eyes squinted and a lot of wishful thinking) is more than century afterwards. Quite an impressive record for claimed son of God, or God himself or whatever it should be.
I've been reading a bit about various sects recently, today it was Jim Jones and his escapades. With enough steps back, it all looks exactly the same, including behavior of believers. To the very last bolt. Tells you a lot about humans and how they internally try to handle tough times, but not much else.
So please, lets have a more rational discussion rather than level our grandparents may consider passable but many of us don't.
Sure, but saying that such a person "is Jesus" is a strong claim.
I mean, ignore the name itself[0], and the iconography[1], and the things that can be justified by misunderstandings[2], and that the reason he got stabbed in the belly by the Roman soldier was because dying that fast was incredibly suspicious: do you really think there's evidence for someone in that era, actually making genuinely lame people walk, actually blind people see, and actually coming back from the dead?
The account can be fictional even when the person exists. Consider how there's a lot of people today, even on Hacker News, who say that Elon Musk "single-handedly" did all the things done by the companies he owns and the people employed there, and then imagine those "single-handedly" accounts became a book, and people deified his memory a century later based on the "single-handedly" claims in that book — even though there's a real Musk behind it, the person in the book would be a fiction inspired by the truth.
[0] Which will obviously be wrong, given a few layers of mis-hearing, phonetic transcription, ambiguous reading of that transcription, and the way that even William Shakespeare wrote his own name a bunch of different ways none of which is the currently mandatory one to avoid getting dinged points for mis-spelling in an English exam
Also, the Cult of Mithras would have things to say if they were still around…
[2] Take the feeding of the 5000, and apply the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect on the reporting: you could have an actual reality of lots of people bringing their food, not wanting to share, the disciples being told to share what they have, that creating social pressure from everyone else to share, and it's entirely plausible for this kind of thing to be reported as a "miracle" even today, if you look around at the parts of the world press willing to use that kind of language.
Then there's walking on water, where you get the punchline to the old joke about the Priest, the Rabi, and the Wiccan who go on an inter-faith fishing trip together…
Virgin birth: First, the joke about Joseph being a gullible cuckold who just believed the excuse Mary cooked up; second, the possibility of Mary being assaulted while she slept and genuinely not knowing it happened; thirdly, "virgin" having other meanings besides current use; fourthly, pregnancy is possible from dry humping, so technical virginity may be preserved: https://www.allohealth.com/blog/reproductive-health/pregnanc...
The USA brand of 'christianity' is very un-christian-like. In strong catholic countries like most of South America, the old testament is all but entirely rejected, and even the new one treated as mostly fables - they teach you some kind of lesson, not history.
As far as I know the scholarly consensus is that there was a "Jesus" who founded the Christian cult. The only claim being made is that such a person likely existed, not that they were the son of God or actually performed miracles. Just that he wasn't entirely made up. He wouldn't have even been the only "messiah" for whom such claims were made, and the teachings ascribed to him weren't even unique.
Here is a video from the Esoterica Youtube channel which tries to present a historical view of Jesus grounded in contemporary Judaism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82vxOBbYSzk
