Talk:Historicity of Jesus

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Weasely

The article is rife with statements that "most scholars" believe this or that. There are also no lack of statements dismissing legitimate minority views as if they are fringe theories.

Further, it broadly refers to "scholars", not distinguishing between theologians and historians. While I don't argue for a fixed demarcation between the two, I think it's important to distinguish for context.

In the end, the article looks a lot more weasely than it should.

I would like to see this article focus more on the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth, and less on appeals to majority. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fearofreprisal (talk • contribs) 04:25, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

6-10 times a year, I look at this article, and twice it has been awesome - informative, accurate and well argued - and the rest of the time it has been rife with over justification from questionable sources. This seems to be one of those weirdly hot topic pages that gets worse over time. It seems like older versions are better - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Historicity_of_Jesus&oldid=511179350 is a better edit that solves most of the issues, and http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Historicity_of_Jesus&oldid=505875233 as well. It seems that the sort of statements that are removed, are statements like "The evidence for the existence of Jesus all comes from after his lifetime", and many times these are factual and, I'd argue, useful. Perhaps the best action is to rollback to a previous, better version?

Can you please explain the "failed verification" tag, added in this edit? --Akhilleus (talk) 08:48, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

• • I went to the cited book, and read the cited page. It doesn't say what the article says it does. That's the essence of failing verification. Fearofreprisal (talk) 06:46, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

If the CMT is not fringe, then the word "fringe" has no meaning. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 12:21, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

• Nice to know your biases. By the way, where is all that contemporaneous historical evidence? I couldn't seem to find any in this article. Fearofreprisal (talk) 06:50, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

It's the informed statements of scholars. Sorry if you don't like that, but that's just the way it is. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 14:57, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

We should build a robot that responds to these things... the reason we use "most scholars" is because that is what the sources say. That is not the voice of Wikipedia, it is the voice of the sources that are being quoted. ReformedArsenal (talk) 13:32, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

See WP:ABIAS. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:35, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Ha! A "disinterested community of scholars" is precisely what HJ scholarship isn't and we have many sources to back that up. Martijn Meijering (talk) 17:41, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, many HJ scholars may have some bias, but they do not have the same biases. It's not like they have got the lion's share by marginalizing agnostics and atheists, but it seems that most agnostics and atheists are not interested in studying the historical Jesus. And there is Bart Ehrman who is now an agnostic and still believes that it is settled that Jesus has really existed. Tgeorgescu (talk) 23:59, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

In at least some of the cases, the "most scholars" thing appears to be WP:Synthesis.Fearofreprisal (talk) 04:44, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

Could you provide an example for us to discuss? ReformedArsenal (talk) 13:33, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

Here is one example: "Most scholars agree that Jesus was a Galilean Jew who was born between 7 and 2 BC and died 30–36 AD,[12][13][14] that he lived in Galilee and Judea, did not preach or study elsewhere,[15][16][17] and that he spoke Aramaic and perhaps also Hebrew and Greek.[18][19][20]"

There are three claims in this statement:

• First claim: that most scholars agree that Jesus was a Galilean Jew who was born between 7 and 2 BC and died 30–36 AD. The three relevant citations (12, 13, and 14) don't support the "most scholars" part of this claim.
• Second claim: that most scholars scholars agree that Jesus lived in Galilee and Judea, and did not preach or study elsewhere. I wasn't able to find an online source to read citation 15, but citations 16 and 17 do not support the "most scholars" part of this claim.
• Third claim: that most scholars agree that Jesus spoke Aramaic and perhaps also Hebrew and Greek. The three relevant citations (18, 19, and 20) do support the notion that most scholars agree that Jesus spoke Aramaic, but they don't support notion that most scholars agree that he "perhaps" also spoke Hebrew and Greek.

Bottom line is that this example is a WP:SYNTHESIS that is pushing a WP:POV. And there are at least 20 similar claims in this article, that "most" or "virtually all" scholars are in consensus on one viewpoint or another.

If these statements were summaries of a majority viewpoint, supported by a contextual discussion of their rationale, they would have a place in the article. But most of them are divorced from their underlying rationale, and some are actually contradicted by other statements in the article. Fearofreprisal (talk) 00:54, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

I do agree that the "most scholars agree" or "modern scholarship almost universally..." followed by a large number of references from authors is a worrying and indeed telling aspect of this article. The article would be more balanced without them. State the arguments before and against and leave it at that I would suggest. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 13:47, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

One way or another, we have a majority view and a minority/fringe view. This has to be spelled out very clearly. E.g. Bart Ehrman confessed that during a long career as a historian of Christianity he did not come across a single peer-reviewed article denying the existence of Jesus, he only learned from e-mails that there is a Christ myth theory; afterwards, he actively sought for scholarship denying Christ's existence. Tgeorgescu (talk) 19:29, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree we need to mention there is a majority view, just that it doesn't need to be said twenty or so times around. That makes it look overzealous, defensive and frankly a bit insecure. Also the fact that we have a majority view doesn't make the minority view a fringe theory. Both can be explained with arguments pro and con and without constant appeals to authority. The fact that there is a majority view is after all not an argument in itself. Neither is the fact that no peer reviewed articles exist tackling the subject. Also phrases like "almost universal assent" and "effectively refuted" put in the mouths of a sweeping category of people on the basis of a few quotes from authors is a bit strong I think. After all, we are not dealing with the laws of physics here but with history. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 20:32, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Well said. Martijn Meijering (talk) 22:09, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. How should we implement this? Wdford (talk) 08:52, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

It is not a question of "appeals to authority" but, as User PiCo says, rejecting the exact same argument on another page [1] "this is being presented as an "appeal to authority" because that's how Wiki works - we use reliable sources" where he and I and others are arguing against a view that the Book of Daniel was written by Daniel. What PiCo says there applies in this context too - "we're observing WP:WEIGHT by giving the consensual view of scholarship - and we have John Collins, a leading scholar, saying that this is so. "A broad consensus" exists on key issues: Daniel "is pseudographic"; the stories in the first half "are legendary"; the visions were composed "in the Maccabean era"; and the book was put together "shortly after the Maccabean crisis." If you feel Collins is wrong, you'll need equally reliable sources to put against him." The WP:WEIGHT argument in this context means that the overwhelming consensus of reliable sources that there was such a person as Jesus, who was executed under the orders of the Roman authorities must be reflected in the article. Contrary views only come from a tiny minority and cannot be given equal weight with the mainstream view, see WP:WEIGHT. "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means that articles should not give minority views as much of, or as detailed, a description as more widely held views. Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all, except perhaps in a "see also" to an article about those specific views." That is why the leading contemporary scholars, reliable sources and authorities, who disagree on everything except the bare fact that there was such a person as Jesus who was executed by Pontius Pilate are quoted over and over saying so. To paraphrase PiCo above,if you feel John Dominic Crossan is wrong when he says " the crucifixion of Jesus is as certain as any historical fact can be' you'll need equally reliable sources to put against him.Smeat75 (talk) 12:23, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

No one is arguing for equal weight. Also, there is much material that questions the reliability and impartiality of the sources for the majority view. Not enough to discard it, but certainly enough to invalidate comparisons with evolution vs intelligent design as some have made. The article needs to present the majority view as the majority view and the minority view as the minority view, with more weight being given to the majority view. It needs to avoid taking sides, impugning the credentials of proponents of the minority view and puffing up the credentials of proponents of the majority view. Martijn Meijering (talk) 12:34, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Another consideration is that the historicity of Jesus as a concept only makes sense if there is a debate on that historicity. It would be strange to write an article on the historicity of Jesus if no one prominent doubted it or had doubted it in the past. It is very different from say evolution in that respect. In addition, the article cannot fail to mention the minority view, precisely because that would make the article stop making sense. Martijn Meijering (talk) 12:39, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

There is indeed a debate about absolutely everything to do with the historicity of Jesus except for the bare fact that he was executed under the orders of the Roman authorities, there is no debate about that except by one or two scholars in combination with a lot of self-published authors, bloggers and fringe theorists. Yes the idea should be mentioned, but only briefly, and it must be made clear that it is overwhelmingly rejected by mainstream scholarship.Smeat75 (talk) 13:08, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

To clarify, if there were no debate, then there would be no need for a separate page on the historicity of Jesus, all relevant content could be merged with the HJ article instead. In essence, this page should describe a debate, and it cannot merely present one side or give the other side very little attention. That doesn't mean it should give both equal weight. Martijn Meijering (talk) 13:32, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Martijn. That is exactly why there is no article on the historicity of George Washington or Oliver Cromwell. The very fact that there is one about the historicity of Jesus implies that it's an issue. If the concept that among relevant scholars there is "almost universal assent" to the historicity of Jesus and that ideas to the contrary are "effectively refuted" indeed carry the weight that these statements seem to imply, we can put up this whole article for "speedy deletion". That however is obviously not the case. This is for instance illustrated by the following: Tgeorgescu told us that Ehrman found no peer reviewed article that denies the historicity of Jesus. So far so good, but there don't seem to be peer reviewed articles to the contrary either. A set of circumstances that should be taken into account when weighing the "weight" where this particular issue is concerned. I would suggest that this "weight" has a different impact here than the weight of relevant scholars arguing for evolution or indeed the epigraphical merits of the Book of Daniel. The question which field of scholarship is relevant to this issue is another matter about which questions can arise. That, among the other reasons I just mentioned, makes me doubt whether the statement that there is no debate about "the bare fact that he was executed under the orders of the Roman authorities" should be stated so decisively. A statement like that would carry more weight if it was based on peer reviewed research by historians rather then notions about consensus among them. Peer reviewed publications however are nowhere to be found one way or the other. Which by the way is another thing the article should at least mention. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 13:57, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Sorry for constantly editing my above message. I'm done with it now. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 14:00, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

There is much more to the historicity of Jesus than "Was there ever such a person?", ie, where did he come from, what did he do, what did he teach, why was he executed, why was he remembered, about all those historical issues there are huge debates and no agreement, unlike the bare fact of his existence and execution, which is, as Crossan says,"as certain as any historical fact can be." There is a lack of peer-reviewed sources on the subject because serious scholars do not bother with it.Smeat75 (talk) 14:02, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Historicity, in my understanding of the word, deals with the question whether a person or an event (in this case a person) is historical or not. If the lack of peer reviewed research comes about because serious scholars just don't bother, that begs the question why that is. I for one think that disinterest in the matter by said scholars is the least of the problems with that. If unambiguous verifiable information, suitable for use in such an endeavor would be available there would undoubtedly also be peer reviewed research. As there isn't at this point, statements like Crossans "as certain as any historical fact can be", should be weighed with that in mind. On another note.... Why do he and so many others even need to state things like that so emphatically if it's so obvious? All these statements (I quoted a few in this section) to me almost seem like incantations to make it so. As I said earlier, it strikes me as insecure. And I personally feel that insecurity stems from the given circumstance that indeed very few things are as secure in this matter as both sides would like them to be. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 14:43, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

We could write in the article about the electron how it was discovered and how to check that it really exist, without implying that there is a debate upon the existence of the electron. All the historians who do research on the historical Jesus seem to think that a few events of his life can be researched. There are peer-reviewed articles about the historical Jesus. If it were doubtful that Jesus existed, there could be no research on the historical Jesus. There are indeed experts on the historicity of Jesus and experts on the historical Jesus, they are not necessarily the same persons, e.g. a scholar has criticized Ehrman for being no expert in the historicity of Jesus. Tgeorgescu (talk) 22:28, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Sure, but we would not have an article named Existence of the Electron. And there is in fact a bit of a debate. Not much, but more than nothing. Ehrman recently wrote a book against the CMT, Brodie came out in support (albeit in an idiosyncratic way) and Richard Dawkins, who is a far greater scholar than anyone who has studied the historicity of Jesus, considers the CMT quite plausible, though in the end less likely than historicity. Martijn Meijering (talk) 14:01, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

According to Ehrman, the "new atheists" know surprisingly little about religion. So, Dawkins may be a great scholar, but he is not a great scholar of religion. He might be a champion of atheism, but that does not count as historical scholarship or religion studies. Tgeorgescu (talk) 20:40, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Sure, but it does speak to the degree of academic credibility of the CMT. My main objection in all these debates is not so much against saying that the CMT is held only by a tiny group of scholars. This after all is the truth and can (and should) be stated in neutral terms. What I do object to is triumphalist dismissal of the CMT, disparaging remarks about its proponents, overstating the breadth of academic support for theories of the HJ (insisting on using words like "nearly all scholars of antiquity", "historians" instead of the more modest and more accurate "nearly all biblical scholars") or presenting HJ research and scholars like Ehrman as the voice of science when the academic respectability of their discipline leaves much to be desired. Martijn Meijering (talk) 21:00, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't think Dawkins' work says anything about the *academic* credibility of the CMT, any more than an English professor's musings about non-standard cosmologies would say anything about the academic credibility of steady state theory. Each might say something about the credibility of the idea in a wider intellectual sphere, though, to the extent that there is an intellectual sphere in modern society.

I also think remarks about the academic respectability of one discipline versus another are extraordinarily unhelpful here. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:09, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

I believe you are correct that Dawkins doesn't explicitly address academic credibility, but it is a consequence of his own judgement that the CMT is defensible. Dawkins is after all an eminent scientist. As for mentioning relative academic credibility being unhelpful, that is precisely what disparaging CMT does.

That said, there is in fact a hierarchy of scientific credibility, whether you like it or not. Mathematics and theoretical physics are at the top and rank above chemistry which ranks above biology, which ranks above psychology etc. There was a trend in the seventies for scholars in the humanities (including biblical scholarship) to try and emulate the rigour of the exact sciences, but in recent years this has been seen as a mistake. The humanities rightly use different standards of rigour, because their disciplines do not yet lend themselves to it and may never do so.

That said, biblical scholarship is not in a position to brag about its credibility. More importantly, Wikipedia is not the place to promote its academic credibility. Nevertheless editors regularly claim the consensus among biblical scholars should be treated as the equivalent of the scholarly consensus on evolution. It should be remembered that biblical scholarship is a discipline which arose from theology and whose emancipation from its religious roots has been questioned both inside its own community of practitioners and outside it in the wider academic world. I say this not as an attack on HJ scholarship (though the criticism is and should be mentioned), but as an argument against suppression of views that are not popular in the narrow circles of HJ scholarship.

To that I may add the observation that this and related articles suffer from WP:BIAS. The scholarship represented here is mostly North American. This is not surprising for an English language article and we cannot avoid this completely, but it is something we should be aware of and try to counter. Martijn Meijering (talk) 21:37, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

You're misconstruing my comment, I think. What I meant is that I do not think it is helpful to say that biblical scholarship is less credible than other disciplines. I'm sure that's the opinion of some people, but that opinion is subjective--I don't think there's any commonly agreed upon hierarchy of social sciences or humanistic disciplines--and it's unhelpful on this talkpage and in this article. To me, disparagement of NT scholarship sounds like a call to disregard expert opinion on this subject and instead rely upon amateurs (which of course is the opposite of what Wikipedia policy demands).

However, I do think it is helpful to point out that the CMT comes from outside the field of NT scholarship, is advocated by non-experts, and is soundly rejected by experts in the field. (And this, too, is something that Wikipedia policy asks for--an indication of how widely accepted ideas are.) Readers can take this information and evaluate it as they wish. --Akhilleus (talk) 22:01, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

---

Up above, Martijn Meijering says "if there were no debate, then there would be no need for a separate page on the historicity of Jesus, all relevant content could be merged with the HJ article instead." I couldn't agree more. And there is no debate, at least among academics, about Jesus' existence. Those who assert that Jesus didn't exist and those who assert that there's doubt that Jesus existed are outsiders (e.g. Robert M. Price teaches at an unaccredited seminary, and Richard Carrier doesn't hold a teaching or research post). I'm all for having an article about the idea that Jesus didn't exist--that's what Christ myth theory is for--but I still have trouble understanding the rationale for this article, especially because there is still no clarity about whether this article is about Jesus' existence (in which case, what does this article do that [[Christ myth theory doesn't?) or about the historicity of events in his life (in which case it's redundant with historical Jesus). --Akhilleus (talk) 22:39, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

I want to step back, and clarify what it is that we're talking about. This article concerns "the analysis of historical evidence to determine if Jesus of Nazareth existed as a historical figure..." As such, majority and minority viewpoints relate to that analysis of historical evidence--not the question of Jesus' existence. If you look at the article as it is, there is a tremendous amount of space spent on quotations from sources supporting the notion that Jesus existed, and precious little spent on discussing the analysis of historical evidence.

So, let's talk about the majority and minority viewpoints on the analysis of the historical evidence... There seems to be plenty of debate there. Fearofreprisal (talk) 00:33, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

I think that's a good point Fearofreprisal and would provide a rationale for this article, supplying an answer to Akihilleus' question "What does this article do that Christ Myth Theory and/or Historical Jesus do not?"Smeat75 (talk) 01:16, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict w/Wdford's comment below) But there isn't plenty of debate about "the analysis of historical evidence to determine if Jesus of Nazareth existed as a historical figure." You'll find lots of scholarly arguments about how to analyze historical evidence in order to reconstruct Jesus' life, but what little there is about determining his existence comes in response to Christ myth theorists--and when academics talk about the Christ myth theory, they do so with puzzlement and/or scorn, because by the standards of ancient history, Jesus is richly documented. If one sticks to the methods that are standard in ancient history, the existence of Jesus isn't even a question--the question scholars start with is how much of his life can be reconstructed based on our sources. You have to be thinking outside the box (to put it mildly) to get to the point where you ask if Jesus was made up. --Akhilleus (talk) 07:34, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Akhilleus:

> But there isn't plenty of debate about "the analysis of historical evidence to determine if Jesus of Nazareth existed as a historical figure. - There certainly is debate. 10 minutes on Google Scholar will confirm it. As will reading the article.

> by the standards of ancient history, Jesus is richly documented. - Did you bother to check the article? It doesn't show this.

> If one sticks to the methods that are standard in ancient history, the existence of Jesus isn't even a question - Have you even read the article recently? Maybe you should start with the section on "Methods of research."

> the question scholars start with is how much of his life can be reconstructed based on our sources. - OK... It's pretty clear that you haven't read the article. But, to answer you: No, that's the question Christian scholars start with. That question is for the Historical Jesus article, not the Historicity of Jesus article.

> You have to be thinking outside the box (to put it mildly) to get to the point where you ask if Jesus was made up. - Finally, we agree. Since you're posting on this talk page, you yourself must have asked that question at some point (even if you never did get around to actually reading the article.) So, welcome outside the box. In any event, it's primarily Christians (and possibly Muslims) who are inside the box. That leaves 3 billion people on this planet who have probably never even gotten to the point of asking the question. This article is for them. Fearofreprisal (talk) 18:22, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

You seem to be missing my point (although you concede it, sort of, at the end of your response): there is no dispute among scholars who study the historical Jesus that he existed. I spent 10 minutes on Google Scholar looking for someone who holds an academic post and who specializes in the study of early Christianity who argues that Jesus didn't exist: I didn't find anyone. I spent a bit more time doing a search on Google Scholar for the string "+historicity +Jesus" and in the first few pages of results I only found one work that was about Jesus' existence: S.J. Case's The historicity of Jesus, written in 1912 by a theologian at the University of Chicago, discussing the Christ Myth theories that were somewhat popular at the time (those of Arthur Drews, William Benjamin Smith, et al). Like now, the arguments against Jesus' historicity were made by people who didn't specialize in the field--they were either outside academia entirely, or specialists in different fields (philosophy, mathematics). So again, there really is no scholarly debate about Jesus' existence--the arguments that he didn't exist are coming from outsiders (as you yourself acknowledge, though you could really go without the facile assumption that all academics who study early Christianity are Christians).

By the standards of ancient history, Jesus is richly documented. Look at the historical evidence for figures like Solon, Cylon of Athens, Empedocles, Parmenides, Zeno of Elea, Catullus, or Apollonius of Tyana. We've got better and more sources for Jesus' life and views than for any of those guys, some of whom are moderately famous. Our "historicity of Jesus" article demonstrates that there's plenty of dispute about how reliable our sources about Jesus are, but that's partially because of their richness, and because they're saying different things about him. If one approaches the sources about Jesus in the same way that a historian of antiquity deals with sources like Herodotus, Thucydides, or Tacitus, there really is no question that Jesus existed. And in fact the starting point for the Quest of the historical Jesus was precisely the application of the same historical methods used to study ancient history to the New Testament sources.

And yes, I have read this article, as well as historical Jesus and Christ myth theory, and have been editing all of them for awhile now. Because I've read this article, I can see that the bulk of it is 'not about a dispute whether Jesus existed. The article as it exists now is in a very confused state. Some of it is about Jesus' existence; some of it is about what parts of his life can be considered historical (most of the "existence and location" and "background information" parts, for instance), some of it is a history of the Quest for the historical Jesus ("Methods of Research"), and a bunch of it covers the sources used in reconstructing Jesus' life and views ("Non-Christian sources" onward). Most of this duplicates other articles, and I still don't understand why this article exists. --Akhilleus (talk) 20:52, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

>there is no dispute among scholars who study the historical Jesus that he existed. -- Possibly true, but irrelevant. I was talking about debate concerning "the analysis of [the] historical evidence..."

>By the standards of ancient history, Jesus is richly documented. -- Please clarify: Do you mean Jesus of Nazareth (a flesh-and-blood person), or Jesus of Bethlehem (the Christ of Christianity)? Assuming the former (since that is who this article concerns), the documentation is poor: No primary sources, no archeological evidence, and all secondary sources compromised by Christian interpolation.

>The article as it exists now is in a very confused state. -- I agree. I think it would be much clearer, as a start, if the "existence and location" and "background information" sections went away, as they're inapposite. Then, get rid of all the opinions on the existence of Jesus, and focus on the evidence, and its analysis. Fearofreprisal (talk) 22:26, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I mean Jesus of Nazareth, the flesh-and-blood non-divine person. And it is the case that by the standards of ancient history that he is well documented. Scholars regard the letters of Paul and the Gospels as primary sources (and not just one source either, but several, coming from different viewpoints and different early Christian communities). There are other non-canonical Christian sources, and some non-Christian sources which some scholars regard as useful. You wouldn't expect archaeological evidence for Jesus, since he wasn't a member of the upper classes; there is really very little archaeological evidence specific to many of the individuals that we know about from antiquity (I know of none for Solon or Socrates, for example, nor for famous poets like Catullus or Pindar). It really seems that very few people who edit these articles are familiar with the methods and sources of ancient Greek and Roman history, because it is not rare that for major historical events there is only one literary source, written decades or centuries after the event. For Jesus, you've got multiple sources (remember, the New Testament is not a single source), some of which were written within 2-3 decades of Jesus' death. --Akhilleus (talk) 13:56, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

"By the standards of ancient history, Jesus is richly documented." They weren't documenting a man were they. They were documenting a supernatural being, a god/man hybrid. It makes sense to "richly document" a god/man hybrid - if one were to exist. But if there is no such thing as a god/man hybrid, as most of the world believes, then we are left with believing only the man part of the story and ignoring the god part. Is it legitimate to say that a story is real, just ignore all the made-up supernatural stuff as that was just to make it interesting? It is documentation for Christians who believe a god/man once lived on earth. Wickorama (talk) 00:53, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Akhilleus and I are coming at this from different angles but arriving at more or less the same result. I 100% agree with the quote from John Dominic Crossan used as a source in the article -""That he was crucified is as sure as anything historical can ever be, since both Josephus and Tacitus...agree with the Christian accounts on at least that basic fact." Can anyone point me to a historian, not a blogger or self-published author, but a professional historian who doubts the Tacitus passage? Serious question, maybe there are some and I don't know about them. If so I would like to. A lot of this arises from the fact that many more people are interested in Jesus than any other figure from antiquity and do not realise that there is nothing strange at all about there being no archeological evidence for "ordinary people" or anyone but the super-elite, that all but a tiny, tiny sliver of the documents of the period have been lost and what survives has often done so by the merest chance, and that if you are not going to believe Tacitus or the pitifully small remnant of the Roman histories that survive even on the bare fact of the existence of the people the surviving texts talk about, you are going to have to throw out the vast majority of what is known about classical civilisation.Smeat75 (talk) 02:18, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

And btw when I say "are there any historians who doubt the Tacitus passage", I don't mean "doubt its authenticity" but doubt that it confirms the crucifixion of Jesus by the authority of Pontius Pilate as a historical event, as certain as any historical event can be. Tell me the historians who doubt that,give me their names, I really want to know.Smeat75 (talk) 02:24, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

For some reason my last two posts immediately above were moved down the thread from the post I was responding to, which was Wickorama above at 00:53, 22 October 2013.

I moved them down because you a) didn't indent them to reflect a follow-up to my post, and b) you didn't appear to be making a response to my post. My post talked about the statement that the New Testament "richly documents" Jesus. You talked about a paragraph from Tacitus. Wickorama (talk) 04:26, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

The Bible contains descriptions of supernatural acts. Stories with supernatural acts are in the library in the fiction section, not the non-fiction section. I don't think it is valid for someone to suggest that documents with supernatural acts were historical non-fiction because a lot of people believe them to be non-fiction or because they have some actual historical references. Spiderman is not more believable than Superman because the main character comes from Forest Hills, New York, and not the planet Krypton. Wickorama (talk) 23:24, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

"Scholars regard the letters of Paul and the Gospels as primary sources" - and which of those authors do the scholars claim was a witness to any earthly events they describe (if Paul did describe any earthly events)? And the scholars disagree with Wikipedia, so you should update Wikipedia to reflect what those scholars think - that the authors of Paul and the Gospels were written by witnesses. Wickorama (talk) 23:50, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

Herodotus and Livy contain descriptions of supernatural acts. Herodotus (6.105, for instance, reports that Philippides encountered the god Pan as he was going to seek aid from the Spartans). Scholars of ancient history are pretty confident that they can get useful historical information out of these texts, and librarians and booksellers shelve these books in the history section (or sometimes "classics"). And many scholars are confident that they can get useful historical information out of the New Testament sources; you're certainly free to disagree, but the article should be based on the opinion of expert sources. --Akhilleus (talk) 06:49, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Some of what Herodotus wrote was based on his personal observations, some of it was based on tales he was told, and some of it he just made up because it sounded interesting. Much of what he wrote about Egypt, for instance, is considered to be fiction - his own or that of his sources. The "validity" of the works of Herodotus is based today on what can be substantiated and what not - although often that substantiation is a question of personal bias and POV. For example Herodotus wrote quite a bit about the pyramids of Giza. Where he says the pyramids were built by kings as tombs, the modern "experts" agree that he was correct - although they have no evidence for this at all. Where Herodotus says the kings were not actually buried in those tombs, the "experts" say he was wrong. Where Herodotus says the structures were built by the manual labour of Egyptians, the "experts" agree with gusto. Where Herodotus says the Egyptian workers were slaves, the "experts" again conclude he was wrong. Of the fact that Herodotus makes no mention whatsoever of the Sphinx, which is unique and impressive even today, the "experts" make no mention at all. Mmmmm. Those "experts" who consider the authenticity of the New Testament likewise use their own paradigms as a lens - the see what they want to see. However, bearing in mind that the New testament was a work of propaganda, used to define a cult that was shaped for purposes of political power and later the accumulation of wealth and influence, very little of it can be trusted. The very name "Jesus" is a Latin translation, not the pronunciation his mother ever used. Its not the name that Tacitus used either. Wdford (talk) 08:27, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

I consider the New Testament more than just a story that has some supernatural acts. The crux of the New Testament, the whole reason for it's existence, is to describe a supernatural phenomenon. God, caused a virgin birth of a man which "wise men" knew about by following a star. This child was also the Son of God. Both a man and a god. The Son of God performed miracles, let people know that believing in him would send them to heaven, as opposed to hell, was killed, but rose from the dead and after a few days went to heaven. If you take all that is supernatural out of the New Testament, believing it to be fiction, what is the story that remains? Wickorama (talk) 09:07, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Boy, this discussion is bizarre. In the normal world, the one where most historians of antiquity live and work, Herodotus is an essential source, without whom we would know far less about the Greco-Persian wars (he is the sole narrative source for much of it). His account of that war is considered fairly reliable! What he writes about Egypt has often been doubted, yes, but even here, many scholars have found that much of what he reports is based on accurate observation. By the way, experts (don't really understand Wdford's use of quote marks for this word) do have things to say about why Herodotus didn't mention the sphinx--see [2], which gives four possible reasons. I'm sure that scholars are more impressed by Herodotus' account of the pyramids than Wdford is--see, e.g. [3]. Of course, the pyramids were built millennia before Herodotus' time, and it's not as if he was conducting an archaeological dig at the site, so why would we expect him to get everything right? It's impressive that he got as much right as he did.

I don't really understand Wdford's point about Jesus' name. So it got brought into Latin and then into a bunch of different languages. So did most names from the Old and New Testaments, not to mention most of Greek literature. What difference does that make?

As for what's left if the supernatural is removed from the New Testament, there's actually quite a bit. Perhaps you should read historical Jesus, or even better, read one of the books cited there. As a hint, getting crucified and dying is pretty unsupernatural. It happened quite a bit back then... --Akhilleus (talk) 12:38, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, there is the unsupernatural material in the New Testament of death by crucifixion. But that in itself is not a story of merit since you just said that it happened quite a bit. The historical Jesus article lists baptism as the other event people are certain about. So the certain story is a man was baptized and then crucified. But the definition here for Baptism says it is a rite of admission into the Christian Church. So it is an event that appears to be significant because people believe the supernatural part of the story. If the story was "A man at one point in his life went into a river with another man and they performed a purification or religious ritual, and he later was crucified by the Romans because he or others said he was King of the Jews" I don't think we would be having a discussion. Wickorama (talk) 15:58, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Obviously the NT is an important text because of its religious significance. Why you think that means the NT contains no useful historical information, I have no clue. Once you disregard the miracles, divine nature, etc. you still get a bit more than "A man at one point in his life went into a river with another man and they performed a purification or religious ritual, and he later was crucified by the Romans because he or others said he was King of the Jews"--he also said some things, got some people to become his followers, who continued being his followers even after he was crucified. Figuring out which sayings in the NT are authentically those of Jesus, what the nature of his preaching was, why that would cause people to follow him, why they continued to do so after his death, and how that movement developed into a long-lasting church are the focus of considerable scholarly activity... --Akhilleus (talk) 16:17, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

It would actually be a lot more accurate to state that: “Based on unreliable texts from a long-lasting church with a serious POV, some scholars believe that Jesus may have said some things, that some people may have become his followers and may have continued preaching after he was crucified. Alternately, evidence also supports the theory that the development of a long-lasting church may have just been a political maneuver by a dying empire, doing a cut-&-paste job from various existing religions and randomly using an obscure Jewish cult-leader as its basis.” However that’s not how Wikipedia works, is it? Wdford (talk) 07:43, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

No, indeed we don't allow the lazy conflation of different minority views about periods over 2 centuries apart to suit people's POV! Johnbod (talk) 09:43, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

But we should consider that the powerful POV in place during those 2 centuries (and thereafter as well) is known to have cherry-picked a canon from a mass of conflicting works, and then to have burned all the conflicting documents that didn't fit the POV, and sometimes they burned alive the supporters of those alternative POV's as well. Since we are relying on those surviving documents to form a view of "history", its very relevant that the surviving documents are far from original, and that they were copied, translated and interpolated by people for whom history and the truth were secondary considerations at best. Its good that we clearly state that only two facts from all that gospel material are held to be actually historic, but I think perhaps we are overdoing it when we quote somebody saying “it is as sure as anything historical can ever be”. Wdford (talk) 17:04, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

---

Thank you, you made my point for me! Your British Museum source seems to be very pro-Herodotus, but makes the following interesting admissions:

• “He seems to have collected his information through conversations, though he probably spoke only Greek.” It admits he didn't necessarily see what he was writing about for himself. He obviously also didn’t speak with average Egyptians, and who knows how much of the "conversations" were embellished, or innocently misunderstood, to begin with?
• He is described by some as the 'Father of Lies'.” Speaks for itself, doesn't it?
• “The accuracy of some of these stories has been demonstrated by archaeology” – only some of his stories, but not others, and not even most of them.
• “Among his accurate observations is the identification of the pyramids as containing royal burials”, - well, doh!

Your Bryn Marw source is even more revealing. He admits that the failure of Herodotus to mention the Great Sphinx is quite astonishing! He then thumb-sucks four possible reasons for this, the first (and only plausible) reason being that Herodotus didn’t actually visit Giza personally. That the Sphinx was not impressive enough to mention is patent BS – even today in an age of skyscrapers and hydro-dams it’s still impressive. That he didn’t mention it because it was taboo is also patent BS – and the excuse that it was “largely buried in sand” is also nonsense – the head would always be above the sand, you can’t look at the pyramids without seeing it, and the head alone is the size of a two-story house. Add to this his assertions that the kings who built the Giza pyramids were buried elsewhere, and that the pyramids were built by slaves – both of which are vehemently denied by Egyptologists – and you reach the unavoidable conclusion that Herodotus is an unreliable source on Giza, and who knows about what else. Nonetheless, he is apparently considered to be a reliable source by some. If he is the sole narrative for much of the Greco-Persian War, then we probably don’t know as much about the Greco-Persian War as we thought we did. Perhaps large swathes of our “knowledge” are actually just a drunken old soldier’s personal fantasy.

At least Herodotus was objective – can’t say the same for the New Testament authors, whoever they were. Half of the “Letters of the Apostles” are agreed to be fakes, and those that are accredited to Paul are the product of a zealous convert with an obsessive personality and a very particular POV who had never met Jesus, who was known to be in conflict with the teachings of those who had met Jesus, who was writing to audiences who had never been to Jerusalem and who had no way of double-checking him, and whose work had suffered interpolations along the centuries by “Christian authorities” with scant regard for any truth that they didn’t like. If any other apostle had written letters contradicting Paul, they were probably burned as heresy once the canon had been “decided”.

All in all, we can conclude from Tacitus that the Christians were named after somebody called Chrestus, who was executed, and that is about all. But that doesn't stop the "historians". Wdford (talk) 13:51, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Ok, it's pretty clear you have little respect for the work not just of scholars who study the New Testament but also those who study ancient Greek history. I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised--this is Wikipedia, after all, where everyone and their dog thinks he's smarter than people who actually publish and teach. If scholars were to treat the ancient sources the way you apparently wish to do, there would be very little to say about antiquity. Fortunately, that's not the case!

I don't reach the conclusion that Herodotus is unreliable on Giza at all. Nor does the author (Joshua Katz) of the Bryn Mawr review I linked to. Katz is surely better acquainted with Herodotus and Egypt than we are, and his proposals are far from ridiculous. For instance, your insistence that the Sphinx *must* have been impressive assumes that Herodotus was impressed by the same things that we are. But one of the things that impresses Herodotus is scale, and isn't it the case that the pyramids are much larger than the Sphinx? Also, there are plenty of occasions when ancient sources fail to mention monuments that moderns find impressive. For instance, the Sphinx isn't mentioned on inscriptions in tombs at Giza: "There are hundreds of tombs at Giza with hieroglyphic inscriptions dating back some 4,500 years, but not one mentions the statue." And I think you've misunderstood what Katz meant by "largely buried in sand"--I'm pretty sure he means that it was buried up to the shoulders, as it was when Napoleon invaded Egypt. (This has been suggested by several scholars, not just Katz, so it's clearly not an outlandish idea.) So let's say that Herodotus did see the head of the Sphinx, and the rest was buried--this would certainly make the monument less impressive than the massive pyramids, right?

I'm afraid I'm not following you regarding the points about slave labor and where the kings are buried. I don't know this part of Herodotus well, but it appears that in addition to saying that Kheops enslaved the entire population (which sounds like a standard story about the actions of a tyrant), he also says that he was shown inscriptions recording the cost of the food given to the workmen building the Great Pyramid (2.125), so he doesn't seem to be saying that the pyramids were entirely built by slave labor. And I don't see where he says the kings were buried elsewhere.

But this is kind of a distraction--well, everything about Herodotus is a distraction from the subject of Jesus, but I mean that the Egypt material is a distraction from my point, which was that scholars think they can get good historical material out of texts that describe supernatural occurrences (as Herodotus does). There's an obvious difference--at least, there should be--between writing about pyramids that were built almost 2000 years before the time of writing, using information gleaned from informants who are either relying on oral transmission of historical info (if you're charitable) or making stuff up (if you're cynical), who come from a linguistic and cultural background that is not Herodotus' own, and writing about events that occurred in Greece, within the living memory of some of Herodotus' informants. Even scholars who think that the Egyptian material is worthless will still find value in Herodotus' narrative of the Persian Wars. This is actually a problem in the treatment of sources here--the idea that a source is either completely reliable or completely unreliable is at odds with what scholars do. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:53, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

I think it’s fairly obvious that we don’t know as much about ancient history as scholars think they do – largely because of lack of reliable evidence. Scholars are forced to sift through mounds of rubbish looking for diamonds, and usually they don’t have any way of telling the difference. They assume that Herodotus was correct about the Greco-Persian War, purely because there is no conflicting evidence currently available, but that is not a very high standard. We currently have many histories of Winston Churchill, some of which blatantly claim he was a genius and a hero, others showing him to be a bumbling egotistical drunk who made a long series of disastrous decisions that destroyed his empire and almost got his country invaded, and that Britain survived the war only through sheer luck and the help of larger countries with more competent leaders, to the point where his own voters (who never elected him PM in the first place) threw him out at the first opportunity. If due to 2000 years of mischance one or other version was lost, the remaining version would rule by default. I suspect if we found the Persian records of the Greco-Persian War they would read rather differently. Egyptologists uphold the sections of Herodotus that are supported by modern research (some pyramids were tombs) and they ignore the sections they don’t like – that the pyramids were built by slaves, and Khufu wasn’t actually buried in the pyramid. Your defence of Herodotus is a little bit embarrassing – what kind of historian rambles on for entire volumes about inconsequentials but can’t be bothered to even mention the largest statue on earth? (PS – slaves, like livestock, also have to be fed. And the fact that the Sphinx wasn’t ever mentioned in tomb inscriptions is evidence that it wasn’t built by that dynasty, not that every single nobleman thought the king’s favourite statue was utterly insignificant.) The historicity of Herodotus is clearly determined retroactively based on the paradigm of the scholar in question, and likewise the historicity of the New Testament. My point out of all of this – when scholars use phrases like “it is as sure as anything historical can ever be”, it really means very little, and that ought to be mentioned in an encyclopaedia. However that’s not how Wikipedia works, is it? Wdford (talk) 07:43, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

No, for sure WP editors are not allowed to add personal commentary rubbishing scholarly views. Also Talk pages are not a forum for editors to argue their personal point of view about a controversial issue. They are a forum to discuss how the points of view of reliable sources should be included in the article WP:TPG. I know you didn't raise the subject of Herodotus, but I would recommend your dropping your attacks on ancient historians and scholars of ancient history here, you are only losing credibility for any legitimate points you might have.Smeat75 (talk) 14:04, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you Smeat, but its not actually "personal commentary", I am referring to the opinions of scholars going all the way back to Herodotus' own contemporaries. My point in all of this, which I trust has been made, is that we can be more sure about some aspects of history than we can about other aspects, and that the evidence about Jesus is much less reliable than the evidence for the reign of King Herod, for instance, or the evidence of the destruction of Jerusalem. To say therefore that “it is as sure as anything historical can ever be”, is clearly incorrect, and I don't think we should give that statement so much weight. Wdford (talk) 17:04, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

---

Perhaps part of the solution lies in reworking the CMT article as well? We could limit that article to a discussion of the Theory itself, its history, its proponents etc, and merely represent the counterpoint with one line "Many scholars believe Jesus did actually exist in some form, although they also believe that a lot of the gospel stories are not accurate his~tory (insert 10 references) - See Historicity of Jesus for all the details." Would that perhaps make more sense? Wdford (talk) 07:22, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

We could limit that article to a discussion of the Theory itself etc. No you cannot do that Wdford, that would be against WP:NPOV and all sorts of WP policies. Akhilleus says by the standards of ancient history, Jesus is richly documented. Yes, that's exactly what I thought the article could concentrate on explaining if the article were re-organised along the lines of "analysing historical evidence" as Fearofreprisal suggests. The only "debate" comes from people who don't understand that.Smeat75 (talk) 12:30, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

As Cynwolfe says on this page this article might be organised to concentrate on "Maybe the assembly of evidence, and historiographical methodologies brought to bear on the evidence? Isn't there a proposal that it be focused on the sources themselves?"Smeat75 (talk) 13:12, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

An article about sources and methods would be fine, but it wouldn't be called "historicity of Jesus". It would probably be better to have two articles: one would be "sources for the historical Jesus" or something like that. The other could be part of a better developed Quest of the historical Jesus (because methods have changed over time, it's better to have a historical approach). --Akhilleus (talk) 20:52, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

To Akhilleus: I question your comment that Jesus is "richly documented". All we have is:

• one passing comment in Tacitus, that doesn't mention Jesus by name and actually says nothing about him;
• two comments by Josephus - one of which is generally acknowledged to be fake, and the other is disputed;
• four cherry-picked stories written long after the supposed time of Jesus, heavily edited by persons with a strong POV, and which contradict each other on virtually everything of importance;
• A number of "letters of apostles", cherry-picked from a mass of conflicting stories to support a specific POV, some of which are deemed to be fake as well;
• A number of commentaries written long after by persons with a massive POV, based largely on the four contradictory gospels and various cherry-picked "letters of apostles".

If this constitutes "richly documented", I despair. However I would strongly support deleting this article and creating a proper article that discusses these few sources instead.

To Smeat: There seems to be a concern that the CMT article is duplicating this article, and is perhaps eroding this article's reason for existence. I therefore proposed that the duplication be resolved by limiting the CMT article to a discussion of the CMT itself, and that we put the handful of sparse arguments in favor of the existence of Jesus in this article (or its successor), and merely cross-link the two articles. I see no cause for your waving of WP:NPOV - duplication is not a good thing, and serves no useful purpose where we could simply cross-link existing fully-developed articles?

Wdford (talk) 21:03, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, that's "richly documented." I think you're overemphasizing the fact that the NT material is only a slice of a greater mass of material that once existed, especially with pejorative terms like "cherry-picked". You could, I suppose, say the same thing about the works of Herodotus, Thucydides, Tacitus, Caesar--they all emphasize some things, suppress others, and have their own points of view, sometimes overt, sometimes not, but they're still extraordinarily valuable historical sources. Same deal with the NT (I don't think Josephus and Tacitus help us much with Jesus at all). You're also leaving out non-canonical stuff like the Gospel of Thomas, which is very important if you're interested in reconstructing Q, trying to determine authentic sayings, stuff like that.

The major point is that this is far more evidence than exists for many figures in antiquity, even some who were of major historical or literary importance. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:45, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

The Bible can't prove what's in the bible, and hypothetical documents can't prove what's in the Bible, even hypothetically. Religious documents only "richly document" a religious figure for the believers of that religion - the believers of those religious documents. Wickorama (talk) 00:07, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

In a sense you are right that the Bible cannot prove the Bible, but the second phrase makes me wonder how much historical scholarship about Jesus have you ever read. Of course Bible scholars do not take the Bible at face value, instead they critically sift through it. If we could take the Bible at face value in order to establish historical facts, there were no need for historical scholarship. For some Wikipedia articles about the books of the Bible the POV-pushers are generally Christian fundamentalists. But for this article the troublemakers seem to be the atheistic fundamentalists. Tgeorgescu (talk) 00:49, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

The purpose of the New Testament is to tell the story with regard to a few years in the life of a god/man who the mostly anonymous authors worship as a god. And with a focus on one supernatural act - dying, then rising from the dead, walking around for a few days and then disappearing to heaven. I don't see that you can just remove the god part and the supernatural acts - which is the crux of the story, the whole purpose of the story, the only reason we have the story - by "sifting" and get a historical story about a man. Wickorama (talk) 04:45, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, it is up to historians to make that call. Your argument is original research and cannot trump lots of reliable sources. Tgeorgescu (talk) 23:44, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Wdford, please read WP:POVSPLIT - The generally accepted policy is that all facts and major points of view on a certain subject should be treated in one article. You suggest "We could limit (the CMT} article to a discussion of the Theory itself...and merely represent the counterpoint with one line" but that is against the stated guidelines - all major points of view must be treated in one article. You could not patrol the CMT and instruct all editors - "No criticism of the CMT here except for one line! References to the handful of sparse arguments in favor of Jesus' existence go into this other article over here!" And what you say about Josephus on Jesus and Tacitus on Christ is incorrect, you might want to read those WP articles. Akhilleus says those passages don't tell us much about Jesus, maybe not, but they are much stronger confirmations of his existence than there are of many many figures from ancient history whose existence is never doubted. I would like to see a list of historians who, when Tacitus says "So and so did this or that or held such and such a position" respond with "I don't believe there ever was such a person".Smeat75 (talk) 22:17, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

"Sources for the historical Jesus" article?

There is considerable disagreement on this page, which is inevitable considering the subject, but everyone seems to feel that this article "Historicity of Jesus" is either unnecessary or inadequate as it stands and there have been suggestions from Cynwolfe and others that this article be changed to focus on the sources for Jesus' existence and the methodology used to assess them. Akhilleus suggested two articles, one on "sources for the historical Jesus" and re-developing Quest for the historical Jesus. Personally I do not feel that what scholars thought about the question decades or centuries ago is as valuable as what the scholarly consensus is now. So how about moving this article to "Sources for the Historical Jesus" and re-writing it as Cynwolfe, Fearofreprisal, Akhilleus and I, from varying perspectives, have suggested? (I don't have lots of free time right now, so maybe I shouldn't be suggesting this as I cannot promise to devote a lot of effort to it).Smeat75 (talk) 23:03, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

If we are going to leave the full "for and against the existence" discussion at CMT, then the material on sources currently within this article may as well be a section within Historical Jesus, and this article be deleted. If we want to have a separate article just on the sources, then it will again duplicate with CMT, although perhaps to a lesser extent. It will then also duplicate with the Tacitus on Christ article, with the Josephus on Jesus article etc etc, but it seems some people are happy to duplicate all this material. I would rather include a section on sources within Historical Jesus, which briefly summarizes the Tacitus on Christ article and the Josephus on Jesus article etc, with links to the main articles. Much of this material is already present at Historical Jesus, although its scattered throughout the article. Wdford (talk) 08:35, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

OK fine - I boldly created the new article Sources for the Historicity of Jesus. Please help to clean it up and improve it. Once that is done, we can remove a lot of the now-duplicated material from this article, which will help us to make a decision about this article's future. Wdford (talk) 11:47, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

My suggestion was to create a page called sources for the historical Jesus, not sources for the Historicity of Jesus. Aside from the problematic capitalization of "Historicity" in the latter title, the problem is that these sources are not used only to establish the historicity (understood as meaning "existence") of Jesus, they are used to reconstruct his life and teachings. The focus of scholarship, as I have been saying many times here, is on the reconstruction, not on the establishment of historicity. It would therefore be truer to scholarship to call the article sources for the historical Jesus. --Akhilleus (talk) 12:56, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

The Historical Jesus article already discusses its sources - paragraph by paragraph. Unpacking it would be too destructive to the flow of the article. I created Sources for the Historicity of Jesus so that the valuable material in the Historicity of Jesus article could be retained, while the rest of it - now largely just pure duplication with other and better articles - can be merged out or simply deleted. Wdford (talk) 21:57, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

Neutrality Needed

Both in this article and in the Christ Myth Theory, multiple authors are quoted to give the opinion that virtually all scholars believe that the Jesus of the New Testament did in fact exist, at least as a man. The quotes normally give no reasons, just that everyone agrees that he did. However, in this article, George Blainey is semi-quoted with regard to the notion that a few people support the Christ Myth Theory. He is shown to have said that his life is "astonishingly documented" with with numerous books, stories and memoirs written about him. However, per the information in this very article, there are no secular books, stories or memoirs written about Jesus. Only secular sentences and paragraphs are listed here. So Blainey has to be referring only to Christian stories. He is using an "astonishing" amount of Christian documents, to show what he feels is the unquestioned historicity of someone the Christians believe to be a God whom they worship. When I noted that he could only be referring to Christian documents, it was reverted.

The article also states that: . E.P. Sanders and Craig A. Evans independently state that there are two other incidents in the life of Jesus that can be considered historical: that Jesus called disciples, and that he caused a controversy at the Temple. This view has to come from the New Testament, the religious work of Christians. Christians believe that Jesus is a God. This needs to be noted when the article makes a claim (via "experts") about the life of Jesus.

Wickorama (talk) 08:55, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't understand why this section is up at the top of the page instead of underneath the sections that were created before it. Anyway, you say When I noted that he could only be referring to Christian documents, it was reverted. We, as WP editors, are not allowed to point out that notable scholars are talking rubbish. You are drawing conclusions on your own and trying to put them into the article which is not allowed on WP. You would need to back that "note" up with a source, ie find another notable scholar who says Blainey, Sanders and Evans are talking rubbish, then you can put it in the article.Smeat75 (talk) 21:17, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

I used references - I pointed to Wikipedia articles that disagreed with, cast doubt on, or showed the bias, in his claims. Is information in Wikipedia in other articles not valid information to use dispute a quote from a alleged expert? Wickorama (talk) 23:16, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

That the New Testament gospels cannot be taken at face value is the beginning of HJ scholarship, not the end of it. So, HJ scholars overwhelmingly recognize that the gospels have been embellished and do not corroborate the details of their testimony when compared in a synopsis, but this is not the same as saying that they are completely worthless as historical sources. Tgeorgescu (talk) 00:40, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

The New Testament gospels do more than disagree with each other. They talk about a god/man. They revolve around a god/man. No modern god/man exists. No god/man has ever been outside of religious documents like the New Testament. I don't see how they can be viewed as historical unless you believe that there was a god/man named Jesus. In other words, they are history - for the religion of Christianity - not for non-Christians.

But that is not even the point. I was explicitly stating that the "expert" being quoted was referring to Christian documents. Otherwise the reader would easily get the false impression that the Romans and other non-Christians provided a massive amount of documents that the "expert" and others had to sift through.

Wickorama (talk) 00:58, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

I used references - I pointed to Wikipedia articles - Please see WP:CIRCULAR. "Do not use articles from Wikipedia as sources." You can see what a statement in a WP article has been sourced to, check the source and then use the source as a reference but just linking to another WP article is not a reference in WP terms, and especially not in this case "only two brief key secular sources used for evidence of a historical Jesus, one of which is generally believed to have been tampered with by Christians" ,with links to this article itself and Josephus on Jesus, which does not say what you say it does.Smeat75 (talk) 01:07, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

"Which does not say what you say what you say it does" It says: "The general scholarly view is that while the Testimonium Flavianum is most likely not authentic in its entirety". Are you suggesting that that is different than "generally believed to have been tampered with by Christians". If so, how? Wickorama (talk) 01:28, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Modern scholarship has largely acknowledged the authenticity of the reference in Book 20, Chapter 9, 1 of the Antiquities to "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James" and considers it as having the highest level of authenticity among the references of Josephus to Christianity Josephus on Jesus.Smeat75 (talk) 01:54, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

The secular source is Josephus in something called the Antiquities of the Jews. It is generally agreed that source was tampered with. For scholars to say in effect "changed by Christians here, but not changed by Christians there" does not mean that the source of Josephus was not tampered with by Christians. Wickorama (talk) 02:05, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

There seems to be a bit of confusion here. There are two passages from Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews that (perhaps) mention Jesus: book 20, chapter 9, which refers to James, Jesus' brother (we can abbreviate this as AJ 20.9), and book 18, chapter 3, section 3 (this passage is known as the Testimonium Flavianum, or TF). Antiquities 20.9 is commonly regarded as authentic, though there are some scholars who have argued that it's not. The Testimonium Flavianum is generally thought to have been altered at some point by a Christian copyist or editor, but many scholars think that the original passage of Josephus referred to the crucifixion of Jesus. (Of course, you're going to find some people arguing the entire passage was interpolated.)

It's important, then, to be precise in referring to Josephus--it seems like the discussion above is confusing these two passages. And it is important to recognize that in the opinion of most scholars, AJ 20.9 has not been "tampered with", as Wickorama puts it. The fact that one part of a text has been altered obviously doesn't mean the whole thing has been altered; many scholars who see interpolation in AJ 18.3.3 think that AJ 20.9 is what Josephus wrote. --Akhilleus (talk) 07:28, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

About the god-man argument: the only gospel talking about a god-man is the Gospel of John. The other three NT gospels don't consider that Jesus was God. They do have a very good opinion about him, they embellish the events and make claims of supernatural events. But from claims about the miracles made by Roman emperors we don't infer that they did not exist. The embellishment and the disagreements among the gospels are due to recording oral traditions about Jesus: an apostle told stories in order to convert somebody, who told stories to a merchant, the merchant was converted, traveled to another place, told stories which made others convert, they told stories to their neighbors, the neighbors converted and after some decades their stories reached the writers of the gospels. This does not imply that all the stories about Jesus are fictional, it just implies that they have to be critically examined in order to recover historical facts about Jesus. And that's what scholars do. Tgeorgescu (talk) 00:10, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Even the apostle Paul (in his authentic writings) does not state that Jesus was God. So, it's not like there is much evidence that the first generation Christians considered that Jesus was God. If they did, you'd think that Paul should know it and mention it. Or if someone was really smart at doctoring manuscripts, he would have doctored all the NT gospels to make Jesus appear as God. Tgeorgescu (talk) 00:20, 23 October 2013 (UTC)