The atheists in this forums will probably appreciate this thread... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Ancient Confession Found: 'We Invented Jesus Christ' http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/10/prweb11201273.htm "Atwill asserts that Christianity did not really begin as a religion, but a sophisticated government project, a kind of propaganda exercise used to pacify the subjects of the Roman Empire. "Jewish sects in Palestine at the time, who were waiting for a prophesied warrior Messiah, were a constant source of violent insurrection during the first century," he explains. "When the Romans had exhausted conventional means of quashing rebellion, they switched to psychological warfare. They surmised that the way to stop the spread of zealous Jewish missionary activity was to create a competing belief system. That's when the 'peaceful' Messiah story was invented. Instead of inspiring warfare, this Messiah urged turn-the-other-cheek pacifism and encouraged Jews to 'give onto Caesar' and pay their taxes to Rome."'
Atwill seems like a crank, honestly. While there's really no question the Biblical Jesus is a mythic figure, I tend to lean towards there being some sort of historical basis for him.
Romans was particular in their documentation of events, especially ones involving trials. If there was supposedly a Jesus figure then Pontius Pilate would of had scribes document it and that documentation would have made it's way to Rome. The only documentation that apparently exists about such things is what the New Testament is based upon, so without evidence to the contrary it can suggest that the source is self-prophecising (in other words it's unreliable) To be honest you'll probably find that Jesus was actually a personification of Judaea much like Athena was of Athens. If that was the case then it could be questioned as to if the "biblical disciples" were personifications of other provinces.
What has always been curious to me, is that Muslims, Jews and Christians all have a different ''version'' of who Jesus was, in terms of any religious idea of him. (which could lead one to believe that he didn’t exist at all, because if he did, why isn’t there agreement (at least) amongs followers of the Abrahamic faiths?) That has always stood out to me as odd. Jesus may have existed as an ordinary man however, but I believe that any religious ‘spins’ on him, are the inventions. The only questionable piece of this puzzle though is why did Peter (who was ''chosen'' by Jesus to build Jesus' church, and is known as the Catholic Church's first pope) die a martyr for ...a myth? People typically don't sacrifice their lives for myths. Hmm....Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
If the stories of Jesus are fiction, then it seems logical that the stories of Peter are also fiction.
I agree with Balerion. Yeah, me too. I'm inclined to think that not only was there a historical Jesus, but that he probably was crucified. Given all the seeming excitement about Jesus being the Jews' awaited messiah, his being executed sounds like a tremendously embarassing difficulty. That makes me think that particular part of the story probably did happen. It's something that needed a creative explanation that would pull victory out of the jaws of defeat. The Romans, and the Jewish authorities along with them, probably figured that if the crowds were acclaiming somebody as messiah, the most straight-forward way to terminate that was to terminate him, publicly for all to see. The subsequent Christian myth, especially Paul's after-the-fact New Testament theological speculations about what everything supposedly meant, is probably less historical.
True. Interesting to note though, a person "automatically" received "sainthood" status if he/she were martyred, during the time of the early Christian church. The formal canonization "process" (within the Catholic Church) didn't take place until the 12th century, I believe. Peter is known as a saint, in the Catholic community. There is no historical evidence however, to support Peter's crucifixion, and there are even Bible scholars who suggest that the passage illustrating Jesus giving the "keys of the kingdom to Peter," is taken out of context. Perhaps the more appropriate question here should be...are all of the stories contained in the Bible, mere inventions of man? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I think that all three of them, Jews, Christians and Muslims, all agree that the historical Jesus existed. Where they disagree is about what his religious significance was, if any. The Jews probably have the most historically accurate idea, that Jesus was a messianic-pretender who was promptly executed and about whom a subsequent myth developed. The Christians obviously not only think that Jesus really was the messiah, they also insist that Jesus was God himself, in human flesh. My guess is that Jesus himself would have been totally aghast at that suggestion and would have emphatically rejected it. And the Muslims think that Jesus was another in the line of God's prophets, one that the Christians subsequently grieviously misinterpreted and confused with God himself. My view is that the Muslim version might be closest to how Jesus actually thought of himself and his mission. I'd speculate that he probably did think of himself as a prophet, he may or may not have thought that he was the messiah (some in the Jerusalem crowds apparently hoped that he was), but any suggestion that he was God in the flesh would probably have sounded like blasphemy to his Jewish ears.
