There's an old expression,”If it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck then it's a duck.”
This expression is very applicable to Jesus Christ.
“If Jesus looks like a myth, and walks like a myth, and quacks like a myth then he is a myth.”
Disclaimer: When I speak of Jesus I am referring to the Jesus Christ of the gospels and Acts. I acknowledge there may have been an earthly character upon which the legend of Jesus Christ was based. Most scholars accept this although they have no historical proof for such.
I can give you a few dozen credible reasons—let's call them “facts” why the Jesus of the New Testament is a myth. Plain and simple, he never existed. That many credible reasons adds up to a mountain of proof.
Christians cannot give you a single credible reason why the Jesus of the New Testament was and is real. The one possible “fact” they can offer is that Josephus is reputed to have written a single phrase in his Antiquities of the Jews:
“...so he assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ...”
That's it. In the entire 1st century when Christianity was supposedly spreading like wildfire across the Mediterranean, a single historian supposedly says a single phrase about a Jesus so-called the Christ and Christians say “Ah ha! You see? That's proof Jesus was real.”
But there are a lot of problems with this phrase:
- It does not identify which Jesus is the brother of James, since Jesus was a common name in that era, (there are 20 so-named in Josephus), and no secular scholars believe Josephus ever wrote that any Jesus was “Christ”.
- It is inconsistent with the other non-Josephan accounts of James' death. In other accounts, historians write of a large gang of Jews collectively murdering him as well as their leaders (with no reference to Ananus as in Josephus).
- It would be one of only 2 places in the entire catalogue of Josephus’s works where he says someone was said to be a Messiah or Christ — not even other clearly would-be messiahs were so described by Josephus
For brevity I've left off four other important reasons why it is wise to question the authenticity of this phrase as being written by Josephus. Most secular scholars believe it is an interpolation by Eusebius 4th century henchman to Constantine to make Jesus look real. Interested parties can read the other reasons here:
https://vridar.org/2010/02/13/that-b...ephuss-teacup/
Bart Ehrman, noted Bible historian had this to say about Jesus:
“In the entire Christian century, Jesus is not mentioned by a single Greek or Roman historian, religious scholar, politician, philosopher or poet. His name never occurs in a single inscription, and it is never found in a single piece of private correspondence. Zero! Zip references!”
— Bart Ehrman (c.2012)
John Remsburg, an American skeptic in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in his 1909 book,
The Christ, lists forty-two ancient writers who did not mention Jesus.
Barbara G.Walker, noted author:
"One of the problems faced by Christian scholars is that there is no record of Jesus' existence in any contemporary source."
__ Barbara G.Walker ("The Jesus Myth")
https://ffrf.org/about/getting-acqua...the-jesus-myth
Clement, Bishop of Rome c. 100 CE mentions not a single detail of Jesus' life in his 1st Epistle. His 2nd Epistle is a known forgery.
Paul, the apostle doesn't mention any details of Jesus earthly life prior to his supposed crucifixion.
That would be enough to make most sensible question whether the Jesus of the New Testament really existed, but there are more—many, MANY more reasons why I can definitively say the Jesus of the New Testament was a myth.
One of the most powerful proofs is what we find in something called the Rank-Raglan mythotype scale. This is a scale devised by, Otto Rank, a contemporary psychiatrist of Carl Jung and an archeologist, Lord Raglan.
“Otto Rank and Lord Raglan noticed that mythical characters often share similar biographical traits. They attempted to score people against biographical criteria that supposedly allowed mythical and historic characters to be distinguished. Jesus's biography fits Lord Raglan's hero pattern remarkably well, with Jesus having a score of 18 to 20 out of 22. This makes him comparable with several legendary heroes, like Romulus and King Arthur (both 19) and Hercules (17).”
Here are the 22 traits. You will readily notice nearly all of them in the story of Jesus as it appears in the gospels:
- Mother is a royal virgin (Jesus' mother Mary was a descendant of David)
- Father is a king
- Father often a near relative to mother (Joseph was 2nd cousin to Mary)
- Unusual conception (Jesus' mother, Mary impregnated by the Holy Spirit)
- Hero reputed to be son of god (Jesus was the son of God)
- Attempt to kill hero as an infant, often by father or maternal grandfather (Herod tried to kill Jesus when he was a baby)
- Hero spirited away as a child (Jesus, Mary and Joseph flee to Egypt)
- Reared by foster parents in a far country (Jesus reared in Egypt until Herod dies)
- No details of childhood (Jesus' childhood is a complete blank)
- Returns or goes to future kingdom (Jesus goes to temple and proclaims himself fulfillment of Isaiah prophecy)
- Is victor over king, giant, dragon or wild beast (Jesus defeats Satan)
- Marries a princess (often daughter of predecessor)
- Becomes king (“This is Jesus, King of the Jews”)
- For a time he reigns uneventfully
- He prescribes laws (Jesus' teachings on how one should live)
- Later loses favor with gods or his subjects (Jews deliver Jesus up to be crucified)
- Driven from throne and city
- Meets with mysterious death (Jesus, declared by Pilate to be innocent, is still crucified)
- Often at the top of a hill (Jesus on Golgatha)
- His children, if any, do not succeedhim
- His body is not buried (Jesus not thrown in a pit as per custom)
- Has one or more holy sepulchers or tombs (Jesus buried in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rank%E...glan_mythotype
Note a list of the other mythical heroes who share nearly all the same traits as Jesus:
Oedipus (21 or 22 points),
Theseus (20 points),
Moses (20 points)
Dionysos (19 points),
Romulus (18 points),
Heracles (17 points),
Perseus (18 points),
Jason (15 points),
Bellerophon (16 points),
Pelops (13 points),,
Apollo (11 points),
Zeus (15 points),
Joseph (12 points), ,
Elijah (9 points)
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Hero_pattern
So this astonishing fact begs the question:
Is it likely that the Jesus of the gospels lived his life out coincidentally nearly exactly the way Romulus and Hercules lived out theirs,
OR did the gospel writers borrow traits from other mythical heroes' lives who preceded Jesus because these kinds of traits were familiar to the audience of the day?
Just these two facts—no historical record for Jesus, and Jesus' life reading like that of a dozen mythological heroes—should be enough to convince most logical-thinking people that the Jesus of the New Testament wasn't a real person, he was a myth.
But if that doesn't convince you, there is more—much MUCH more than can be squeezed into this tiny space called an OP that would prove beyond a shadow of doubt that the Jesus of the New Testament never existed.
So a Christian is confront with this question: "Am I going to continue believing in this Jesus Christ character for whom there isn't the slightest bit of evidence he ever existed, or am I going to continue to believe in Jesus based solely on the warm fuzzy feeling I get in my heart whenever I think of him?"
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Jesus Christ of the Gospels Never Existed. He's a Myth and I Can Prove It (Part 1).
