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Old 08-04-2012, 04:56 PM
 
Location: Parts Unknown, Northern California
48,564 posts, read 24,012,076 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Oleg Bach View Post
I would stake my life on the fact that Jesus was a man who existed....
Under what circumstances do you imagine that your life might rest on the answer to the question?


It would seem a remote risk, for you to lose your life would require someone proving a negative. In this case it would mandate unearthing some authentic 1st Century document which contains the minutes from the meeting where whoever decided to concoct the Jesus myth, did so.

I think you are safe.
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Old 08-06-2012, 09:14 AM
 
77,920 posts, read 60,076,765 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dd714 View Post
Even the vast majority of agnostics and athiests acknowledge that historically, a person named Jesus existed, served as a spiritual preacher and teacher, and was put to death by Roman authorities in Roman occupied Judea during the first century. Their is really no doubt on that.
What he did during his life - the events depicted in the new testemant (besides his crucifition), and of course his divine origin, are subject to debate.
^^^Yep.

The Romans documented things thoroughly, along with others....so there is a vast amount of information out there about Jesus from unrelated sources.

He was as real as Nero or Cleopatra etc etc etc.
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Old 08-06-2012, 09:25 AM
 
77,920 posts, read 60,076,765 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Grandstander View Post
Under what circumstances do you imagine that your life might rest on the answer to the question?


It would seem a remote risk, for you to lose your life would require someone proving a negative. In this case it would mandate unearthing some authentic 1st Century document which contains the minutes from the meeting where whoever decided to concoct the Jesus myth, did so.

I think you are safe.
Maybe they play really high stakes trivial pursuit?
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Old 08-06-2012, 09:47 AM
 
14,780 posts, read 43,543,561 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mathguy View Post
^^^Yep.

The Romans documented things thoroughly, along with others....so there is a vast amount of information out there about Jesus from unrelated sources.

He was as real as Nero or Cleopatra etc etc etc.
While I share that thought, I think Grandstander made an excellent point that the Roman's who wrote of Jesus were writing about him in response to the 'cult' that had risen around him. Essentially the Christians had become noticeable and the Roman historians were writing about what inspired them. The writings are all along the lines of: "there is a group calling themselves Christians who were inspired by this man Jesus they called The Christ and he was apparently crucified for his actions." Basically, the Romans are parroting what amounts to the story of Jesus.

I happen to believe that he existed, it is only logical to me that he did. However, I think GS made an excellent point that even the independent sources are still based on the "story of Jesus" not some additional concrete evidence from Roman history. So, from a strict evidentiary perspective, there is nothing conclusive that would hold up in a court of law to prove that he existed. However, the evidence we do have leads one to the conclusion that such a man most likely existed.

In the case of people like Nero and Cleopatra we have a vast trove of evidence that they existed from sources contemporary to them and later historians that wrote extensively about them. Basically, you could prove Nero or Cleopatra existed in court, not so much for Jesus.
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Old 08-06-2012, 01:48 PM
 
Location: Parts Unknown, Northern California
48,564 posts, read 24,012,076 times
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While we cannot absolutely establish Jesus as a historical figure, on the assumption that he was, we do have the tremendous contribution of Josephus' two books which recreate the world of Jesus for us and explain a great many factors which had to have served as influences on Jesus' life.

The picture Josephus draws of Roman occupied Palestine is one of relentless hostility and suspicion. Hebrew society of course was never without internal discord and rival groups, but had always had the Temple as the singular unifying edifice and symbol of what made them distinct. The Romans fractured that long before they physically destroyed the temple.

Palestine was a poor place. Hardly the land of "Milk and Honey", it was a nation which had difficulty feeding itself and very little in the way of excess to export in exchange for internal improvements capital. Its value to the Romans was not so much any wealth which they could extract via taxes as it was its strategic position. It was the land bridge to Rome's African provinces and a gateway to trade with the Persian empire to the east.

In this society composed largley of poor peasants, the high priests still lived quite well and they were not begrudged these privileges because of the shared belief in their importance to the faith. They were the keepers of the temple and the Temple was everything. The Romans fractured that.

After the conquest of Palestine, Rome first set up their puppet King Herrod the Great to administer the land in their name. Herrod was a powerful man with a secular orinetation, an enthusiast for Rome, and they were well pleased with his rule. After he died the Romans did not view any of his sons, or other possible candidates, to be as trustworthy or effective as Herrod was, so they split Palestine into regions, Galilee to the north which would be governed by Herrod Antipas, the son of The Great, and Judea to the South. For that southern regions' adminsitration, the Romans offered the Sadducees a deal. If they agreed to adminsiter Judea in the name of Rome and discourage anti Roman revolts, then they would be allowed to retain their lofty positions and the Temple would be left unmolested. If they refused, they would lose their standing and the Temple would be dismantled.

The Sadducees accepted, viewing the alternative as the worse of two evils. Though the arrangement might cause them to have to sometimes behave in a manner which went against their own people's interests, far better that than the loss of the Temple. Some Judeans accepted and understood their reasoning, many more saw the dynamic as the Sadducess selling the nation out in exchange for comfort and power. This latter interpretation was greatly reinforced when the Romans built a fabulous Roman villa style residence for the high priests, complete with indoor pools, mosaic tiled floors, exotic fabric curtains...all of the marks of Roman wealth.

So, for the first time ever, large segments of the Judean population began to view the Temple faction as unclean and untrustworthy. This generated a theological problem because a core belief of the Hebrew faith was that everything good flows from the Temple, that the temple was absolutely necessary to sustain their special covenant with Yahweh. The consequence was the rising of a groups of dissidents, some strictly political, some mixing politics with religion, and some strictly religious. The most famous among that last group was John the Baptist.

What John preached the Temple faction viewed as hersey.....that Yahweh was approachable by anyone, anywhere, at anytime. No temple was needed apart from the temple of each individual's soul. If you kept the faith, if you abided by the laws of Yahweh, then you were blessed. You did not need to go to the Temple each year at Passover, you did not need to make offerings...you only needed to make a public gesture of your being born again in Yahweh's grace. Baptism was the symbolic ceremony of having embraced this reordering of Hebrew doctrine.

Needless to say, John was viewed as an extremely dangerous character by the Temple faction, by the Romans and by Herrod Antipas. John was clever. He set himself up on the east bank of the Jordon River, just across from Herrod's controled lands and out of Herrod's legal reach. Rather than travel around seeking converts, John relied on word of mouth to have the potential converts come to him at the river.

The gospels have it that when Jesus arrived to investigate the John phenomena, John recognized Jesus as the holier of the two and was subservient to him. That may have happened, or that story might have been a historical rewrite in the aftermath. It seems improbable since at the time of their meeting, John was a 1st Century celebrity and Jesus was a nobody. It seems apparent that Jesus was tremendously influenced by John, embraced John's ideas regarding the legitimacy of the temple, and decided to fuse this approach with his own developing apocalyptic "Kingdom of Heaven" concept.

Unlike John, Jesus decided to travel about spreading the message. The tales of his attracting a following were disturbing to the Sadducees, but as long as Jesus confined himself to making trouble in Herrod Antipas' district, they were not unduly concerned. He was Herrod's problem.

What doomed Jesus was when he decided to take his ministry to Jeruselem, to directly confront the Temple faction. Compounding his offense, Jesus did this in a hyper provocative manner. He selected Passover, the time of greatest Hebrew/Roman tensions. He entered the city in a delberately staged parade designed to make it appear that he was the fulfillment of the Messiah prophecies. Most appalling, he went to the Temple and attacked the merchants and money changers, making it manifest that he had contempt for the hypocrisy of the Temple leaders and was not subject to their authority.

Whether deliberate and in anticipation of the Temple's strong reaction, or just from the hubris of his own self conception, the above actions condemned Jesus. The Sadducees had to react, they could not allow the Romans to see them being made fools of by this peasant preacher and his apostate followers.

The above were the conditions which prevailed when Jesus was born. He would have been raised seeing a society where the Hebrews who cooperated most closely with the Roman authorities, prospered the most. He would have seen how while the poor people endured the same 15 to 30 % Roman tax on all their goods, the benefits were all flowing to those who were the ones least concerned with preserving the special spiritual identity of their nation and its special relationship with their god. He would have seen how the very people charged with keeping the faith, the Sadducees, appeared to have sold out to Rome in exchange for power and comfort. Consequently, it is easy to understand how Jesus would have found John the Baptist's message extremely appealing. And it becomes easier to understand how Jesus' concept of the Kingdom of Heaven, where life on earth was but a prelude to an eternity where the poor would be raised up over the wicked rich, would have enormous appeal among the lower classes of Palestine.

And it also becomes easy to see why someone like Jesus was viewed by those in authority as someone who absolutely had to be supressed.

Last edited by Grandstander; 08-06-2012 at 01:59 PM..
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Old 08-06-2012, 02:45 PM
 
14,780 posts, read 43,543,561 times
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Excellent post GS. What you bring up and explain is what it is often missing from the religious study of Jesus; the social, political and economic stage upon which he became a player. It's also important to realize that men like Jesus were not all that unique in Palestine at the time. The religious study of Jesus attempts to make him a unique individual bringing a unique philosophy when that is entirely untrue and he was basically one of dozens of "preachers" and revolutionaries running around.
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Old 08-06-2012, 09:55 PM
 
Location: West Hollywood
127 posts, read 197,702 times
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We only have 1 source about Jesus' existence, and that is the bible.
The bible isn't exactly known for being a very accurate source, and it has been rewritten and translated for thousands of years.
Unless we have a physical evidence, we cannot say that Jesus in fact did exist.
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Old 08-06-2012, 10:24 PM
 
Location: Earth
24,620 posts, read 28,217,392 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dd714 View Post
Even the vast majority of agnostics and athiests acknowledge that historically, a person named Jesus existed, served as a spiritual preacher and teacher, and was put to death by Roman authorities in Roman occupied Judea during the first century. Their is really no doubt on that.
What he did during his life - the events depicted in the new testemant (besides his crucifition), and of course his divine origin, are subject to debate.
I don't know if this is true.
And I've never seen any proof to support it.
There are no Roman records of this "person" and the Romans kept great records.
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Old 08-06-2012, 10:40 PM
 
Location: Parts Unknown, Northern California
48,564 posts, read 24,012,076 times
Reputation: 21237
Quote:
Originally Posted by chielgirl View Post
I don't know if this is true.
And I've never seen any proof to support it.
There are no Roman records of this "person" and the Romans kept great records.
The absense of Roman records on Jesus isn't especially meaningful. The Romans killed so many trouble makers in so many places, keeping such records would have been an immense amount of work for no perceived gain. Within the Roman Empire it truly meant something to be a citizen. Rome demanded, and got, respect for Roman citizens wherever they might travel within the empire. If a citizen was injured in some remote corner of the empire, the Romans would go to a great deal of trouble seeking justice for that person..all to ram home the lesson..."don't screw with a citizen."

Everyone else fell into various catagories of useful, but disposable if necessary. And no one was lower in the disposable class than trouble making peasants in the provinces. And no province produced trouble makers with the annoying frequency of that hell hole backwater Palestine. For all their civilized ways and accomplishments, the Romans were also cold blooded and relentless about protecting their authority.

The Roman authorities in Palestine cared not a wit for the internal religious disputes of the Jews. Some whack job is running around saying he is the son of god and has the power to forgive sins? So what? Let him rave....What? He is challenging the lawful authority of Rome's ruling agents? Haul him away and stick him on a cross."

And that is the full extent of what Roman interest in Jesus would have been. Just one among thousands of these religious nut jobs that they had to squash in order to keep the peace. There would have been no reason at all for them to have kept a record of the event.
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Old 08-06-2012, 10:47 PM
 
Location: Ostend,Belgium....
8,827 posts, read 7,307,089 times
Reputation: 4949
there is no solid proof he (or anyone else for that matter) ever lived but anyone wanting to believe, will do so. I can't say I care either way because it doesn't affect me in daily life; what I do not believe at all is his divine origin. That's just a tall tale. Some woman saw some "angel" telling her she'd have a baby and Joseph went along with all that? As if he never thought she'd slept with some other guy and got pregnant but he accepted the kid as his...People just need a hero time and time again...
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