What is your opinion on the historicity of Jesus Christ?

Eric_PK

Well, what proof is there of the existence of Jesus?

There’s Josephus, which on balance I think is likely to be a fabrication.

There’s Tacitus, which I think is a bit more likely to true, but is descriptive of christians rather than Jesus.

Which leaves us with the Gospels, which were written by those who believed that Jesus existed (though much later than the time he was said to have existed), and then the specific story was chosen by the council of Nicaea.

So, I’m not convinced by the evidence.

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SmartLX

Jesus was probably a real man. He would have been one of a multitude of self-proclaimed Messiahs, perhaps the most successful one in terms of publicity. Many of the more public events in his Biblical life can’t have been true, or they’d have been documented outside of the Bible. Being under the Roman yoke, the times and places are well-documented otherwise.

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brian t www

I don’t have a problem with the idea that a person with a similar name might have been wandering around Palestine 2,000 years ago, telling people what they want to hear, making friends and influencing people; maybe even getting nailed to a tree for his “crimes against the state.” None of that is particularly improbable.

It’s only when the legends veer off in to the supernatural that I have a problem. Miracles, resurrections, ascensions, and all that. We’ve had 2,000 years for the legends to be “sexed up” enough to account for such claims. During the “Dark Ages,” only orthodox opinions and records, supporting the Church-approved message, were allowed to survive; conflicting opinions were suppressed and documents destroyed.

Those who tell the stories rule society.

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