Jesus was a communist
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Just running across an interesting book, that tries to estimate the size of the pool of witnesses to Jesus' life (they estimate is about 60,000 possible ey witnesses to the ministry, given the estimated popultion of ancient Judeah). Around half of these would have been alive thirty years later when the Gospels started to be written.(MEMORY, JESUS, AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS, McIver, Robert K. (Robert Kerry),c2011.) As McIver notes, the various gospls contain aphorisms which are pretty consistent with a single teacher being behind them (IIRC the Gospel of Thomas is pretty much all aphorisms). Clearly, there was a Jesus group, but whether he did much more than teach them isn't clear.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_JesusThe "reconstructed" kernal of what Josephus probably did write is instructive:
reconstruction wrote:Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man. For he was a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. And he gained a following both among many Jews and many of Greek origin. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.Also, note, Josephus was writing about 60 years after Jesus' death, so we have time for the legend to grow.This would apply even for the version we have
Josephus wrote:About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who performed surprising deeds and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Christ. And when, upon the accusation of the principal men among us, Pilate had condemned him to a cross, those who had first come to love him did not cease. He appeared to them spending a third day restored to life, for the prophets of God had foretold these things and a thousand other marvels about him. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared.Flavius Josephus: Antiquities of the Jews, Book 18, Chapter 3, 3Quote:If evolution was based on eye witness accounts then it would be 'bunk science'.Does that mean using a telescope in astronomy makes it a bunk scienceI have always been interested in the evolution of the Jesus Movement, from John the Baptist following of which Jesus was a member to the Jewish Christians like the Ebionites.Also interesting is how the victims quickly became the persecutors once christians acquired political powerWhen in Kerala i came across the Apostle Thomas Christian community, who trace their history back to when he came to India. Since the Jewish presence in Kerela is dated to the First Century it is a credible claim.They were first persecuted as heretic by the portuguese and then when the protestant dutch arrived persecuted as catholics.As an aside, the ATM to withdraw cash i used was the Catholic Syrian Bank's
I'll say it again. Nobody has ever been able to produce the slightest physical evidence to support a historical Jesus; no artifacts, dwelling, works of carpentry, or self-written manuscripts. All claims about Jesus derive from writings of other people. There occurs no contemporary Roman record that shows Pontius Pilate executing a man named Jesus. Devastating to historians, there occurs not a single contemporary account that mentions Jesus. All documents about Jesus came well after the life of this alleged individual from either unknown authors, people who had never met him, or from fraudulent, mythical or allegorical writings. Although one can argue that many of these writings come from fraud or interpolations, they still could not serve as reliable evidence for a historical Jesus, simply because all sources about Jesus derive from hearsay* accounts.*Hearsay – noun:i) unverified, unofficial information gained or acquired from another and not part of one's direct knowledge: ii) an item of idle or unverified information or gossip; rumour:
What artifact would you expect? He was a day laborer … how would you even know if came from Jesus of Nazareth? The same with the dwelling, you think they'd find his signature? What self written manuscripts?have you studied the sources for any ancient figure? What autograph manuscripts do we have for ANYONE in the ancient world. You're talking shit Gnome. What contemporary account is there for any ancient figure? Even most of the important people, Kings and so on, come from later sources.its obvious you haven't studied anything on how ancient history is done. And frankly you're making an ass of yourself; to anyone who knows how history is done you sound like a creationist saying "well if we used to be monkeys, why are there still monkeys."
alanjjohnstone wrote:Quote:If evolution was based on eye witness accounts then it would be 'bunk science'.Does that mean using a telescope in astronomy makes it a bunk science
Yes. If we depend soley upon the the witness account of the person using the telescope.
I see this newcomer has no evidence so he offers abuse. Moderator?
iRoman was well out of order there, people were polite to him on libcom after I asked people to give him a break. But I would suggest we turn the other cheek and suggest to the moderator we forgive him. …notjustseven times,butseventy-seven times!,… It is a bit unfortunate in that on libcom it started with a political analysis of early Christianity there and quickly degenerated to a historicity of JC thing. It is a bit daft really as it is bit like attacking and derailing a thread on News From Nowhere or Animal farm on the basis of it never happened and pigs can’t talk etc. I came from the leftist perspective that it was all made up and fabricated in the ‘conference of Nicae’ circa 320AD ‘kind of thing’. Not sure where exactly I got that from; but it is bollocks. As to written material from the first century I don’t think people understand how little there actually is. Take out Josephus and the poets and there is very little, probably less than half a book shelf. So you can get serious bods like Quirinus which we would nothing about outside Josephus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quirinius And for that matter Pilate himself who must have been the most important bod in Judea at the time. The archaeological evidence for Pilate is limited to a coin or two and an inscription on stone monument or something; recent 20thdiscoveries I think. And there is no non-Christian material about where he came from or where he ended up. Another example would be a connected big global event and that was the empire wide, but excluding Judea as a client state, census of Augustus for a kind of William the conqueror Domesday Book book taxation thing around 10 BC. It seems to have taken about 10 years as you might expect. [This is relevant as regards Roman’s materialist economic input into the debate which I had been aware of but it was reassuring to here the same thing coming from an unlikely direction.] The data and references on that in non Christian material is very patchy. Although it looks as though ‘Luke’ mentions it even though the opening passages of Luke may be a prologue written by someone else. The Luke nativity narrative opens up with a Roman Empire census being carried out by Augustus. That matches totally separate non Christian material on the subject and, given the patchy nature of historical data, should be interesting. But Luke then conflates the ‘factual’ census of Quirinus in Judea only, in 6AD, with the factual Augustus Roman empire one that ended sometime before. So as just a flaky historical document without even any social economic content, as they normally are from that period, it is worth analysis. As socio economic pamphlets the gospel material is much, much more interesting. There is loads of socio-economics in it that can be analysed using albeit non vulgar Marxist theory that leaps out of the pages when you look at it like that. In fact it even has parallels with Lenin’s analysis of the emancipation of the Serfs thing in 1860 and stuff like that. So before 6AD the Jewish state had their own ways of dealing with stuff. The peasant farmers and what not, and the agricultural economic base paid taxes to the state in surplus product or stuff. That wasn’t a problem because it was just a cut of what you produced; not nice that it took 20% of your stuff but what the hell you knew where you where. The Roman empire wasn’t interested in stuff it wanted money lolly and after 6AD the Roman cash nexus hit Judea. Screw your 50 bushels of corn and olive oil taxes; we want the real stuff, sell it and give us the cash. They were annual taxes demanded on tax and harvest day or months. The stupid peasants would think everything was dandy and take their surplus products to market to sell for cash when the market price was at a low. It started of ok except that the clever peasants held out, paid their money taxes from their cash reserve, and waited for the prices to go up before they sold their surplus product at higher prices. Accumulating an even bigger cash reserve. Then as things went on over years. The stupid peasants couldn’t cover the cash tax payment from sale of their surplus product on tax and harvest low market price day. So they went to the amigo 60% PA interest payday loaners like you do when the electric bill comes in at a bad time. Then it gets worse and next thing you know you are being loan sharked for 1000% and the clever peasants foreclose on the farm. Then you are dispossessed of the means of simple commodity production and selling your linen, olive oils and bushels of wheat etc. You are left with all that remains to sell; the body and soul of labour power for wages to the clever peasants that now own your farm; in 30AD! But surely this idea of agricultural wage labour in 30AD must be Marxist bonkers [It is quite clever really and very modern. I knew someone who wrote computer programmes for a loan company. If the borrower had a nice house and they had borrowed money and was running behind on payments etc. They had a coded ‘bottom drawer’ programme with data inputs etc; where they didn’t hassle the borrower for late payments and horrid computer generated automatic letters etc. Then they would slam them and foreclose; they had a sister company of course that snapped up distressed sales of houses for rent.] These stupid peasants were probably a bit stupid before the fact but woke up later too late. But their concerns are historically reflected theologically in the economic content of the gospel material. Taxes, accumulation on capital ,wages, usury and debt forgiveness; which is all over the place. These Christians and new testament scholars can be really nasty.
roman wrote:You're talking shit Gnome. What contemporary account is there for any ancient figure? Even most of the important people, Kings and so on, come from later sources.Cage rattled, roman?The difference between a religious character like Jesus and other historical figures is that if those other characters prove to be fictitious, few people will care. If Pythagoras turns out to be a composite figure, the geometry he/they pioneered will stand. If Attila the Hun were revealed to be three men, the conquests would still be as consequential.Religious figures, by contrast, gain validity by existence, so proving that existence becomes vitally important. If Jesus proves to be fictitious, much of the air goes out of Christianity. That's why his existence is so hotly debated. Or, even granting the existence of an itinerant Jewish preacher among many, it's necessary to single him out as some uniquely divine creature.Atheists, of course, have no obligation to prove his non-existence, and theists have great difficulty assembling enough evidence to demonstrate existence. One would imagine that such a supremely powerful and wise entity would have taken steps to leave evidence beyond campfire tales.
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Hinduism have followers of over a billion and the existence or non-existence of their plethora of Gods does not discourage their devotion. If Jesus proves to be a will o the wisp and does not exist it will not diminish the faith of his believers.On the other hand, i wonder what the effect would be if by some remote chance, his corpse is found thus proving that the resurrection did not happen and he did not rise to the heavens as stated in the Gospels but like all men rotted and eaten by worms. As i said in my post, the most interesting aspect of Christianity is its evolution, from a local Jewish doom merchant very much in the tradition of many other preachers of the era and early prophets, forecasting the imminent end of the world (which in 70AD did happen for the Jews in a sense) then turning into a global state-sponsored church. How ideas grow and spread and evolve into something different is the food for thought for historical materialists to wonder about and study. It is no surprise that Marx partly came to socialism through a chain of ideas arising from the study of religion.Christianity's content changed with time and reflected changes of beliefs that arose (Gnostic Gospels, for example.) But even the accepted beliefs undergo continual re-interpretation.The Q Source appears to reveal the original teachings of this Jewish preacher, for what it is worth in the 20th Centuryhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q_sourceSocialists can stand amazed at the diversity of Christian belief through history across the world up to even present times. That some of its followers at some periods of history sought to associate it with a socialistic way of life is an interesting aspect of this religion.As Roman (and DaveB) seems to suggest, those who reject this link are the Christians of modern times. Does it harm the socialist case to remind them of it, as we do in commemorating others in human history…from John Ball to Gerard Winstanley…
Buddha seems to be a comparative figure for us to include in this debate.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gautama_BuddhaNo written records about Gautama were found from his lifetime or some centuries thereafter…The oldest surviving Buddhist manuscripts …date from the first century BCE to the third century CE…The sources for the life of Siddhārtha Gautama are a variety of different, and sometimes conflicting, traditional biographies… the earliest full biography, an epic poem written by the poet Aśvaghoṣa in the first century CE…In the earliest Buddhist texts, the Buddha is not depicted as possessing omniscience nor is he depicted as being an eternal transcendent being. According to Bhikkhu Analayo, ideas of the Buddha's omniscience (along with an increasing tendency to deify him and his biography) are found only later,…the Buddha's disciple Ananda outlines an argument against the claims of teachers who say they are all knowing while in the Tevijjavacchagotta Sutta the Buddha himself states that he has never made a claim to being omniscient, instead he claimed to have the "higher knowledges". This is very similar to Jesus and his description of being the "son of man" and "son of God"…terms of that time which were not to be taken literally…Reference has been made to the historicity of Mohammed.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_MuhammadOne thing we have to be clear about…hard evidence and written documents are not the be all and end all in debates of history. Both the Aborigines and American natives have a rich legacy of oral history and their accuracy is frequently confirmed. Absence of evidence does not equate with proof of absence.http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-16/research-gives-merit-to-accuracy-of-aboriginal-storytelling/6861614http://www.pbs.org/indiancountry/history/oral1.htmlThe Ebionites have been mentioned because of a fleeting reference in some scrap of document from the early Church Fathers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebionites"They regarded Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah while rejecting his divinity and insisted on the necessity of following Jewish law and rites. They used only one of the Jewish–Christian gospels, revered James the brother of Jesus (James the Just), and rejected Paul the Apostle" Other groups are the Carpocratians, the Cerinthians, the Elcesaites, Nazarenes, and the Sampsaeans, most of whom were Jewish Christian sects.There seems to be local traditions in the geographic vicinity within living memory of Jesus's life-time so perhaps someone did wander about preaching offered hope and refuge in the hereafter for the dispossessed and the despairing of those tumultuous times when traditional Judaism is quite vague about the after-life
Gnome, it doesn't matter what theists or atheist think or want to be the truth. What matters is the scholarship on the matter. If you care about he actual scholarship then read that. I have the deal with mythecists and their terrible arguments more often than I would like, and they very often come with a total ignorance of how historical scholarship isn't done, a complete ignorance of the literature on the subject, and a lot of arrogance. So forgive my harsh response. Anyway, I'd much cry prefer to talk about the actual arguments in my book.
While walking the dog i had a thought – yes, wonders will never cease.And it was this…Why did the early non-Christians try to associate Jesus with being the illegitimate off-spring of a Roman soldier? Why not simply deny Jesus existed and apply the arguments for his non-existence as being done on this forum? Why did these anti-christians accept that he was real and not a made-up person and resorted to accusations about the circumstances of his birth.Was it because the Virgin Birth and the Christian movement's absorption of various of religious miraculous birth myths require a put-don?https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberius_Julius_Abdes_PanteraIt was in Justin's 150 AD writings that we first hear Trypho indicate the non-existence of Jesus “But [the] Christ—if indeed he has been born and exists anywhere—is unknown, and does not even know himself, and has no power until Elijah comes to anoint him and make him known to all. Accepting a groundless report, you have invented a Christ for yourselves, and for his sake you are unknowingly perishing.”Or was he referring to The Christ persona of Jesus being pure invention?
iThere has been another example of oral history recently. https://indiancountrymedianetwork.com/history/events/the-inuit-were-right-shipwreck-find-confirms-168-year-old-oral-history/ there is a radiocarbon dated Quran. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_Quran_manuscript There is also a cross over with the Quran and Christianity. JC and his mother Mary are mentioned positively. There is also passages in the Quran on JC taken from the non canonical Infancy gospel of Thomas with JC doing magic tricks of turning clay into birds etc. Mohamned was supposed to have owned a Christian slave and there is a strong allusion in the Quran to him being illiterate and his babblings thus written down by others. The major theological split was over the holy trinity and the father, the son and the holy ghost etc. Which Islam saw as a creeping return to pagan polythesism. And the Christian patron ‘saint’ theology which was viewed as the same as Hellenistic and Roman multiple demi -god theology in a different framework. Alan’s thesis has been done before thus; Conclusion As has been pointed out by others, the testimony of hostile witnessesis particularly valuable. As John Meier has noted, “such positiveevidence within a hostile source is the strongest kind of evidence.” If Celsus, who would likely have wished Christ away from the Roman Empire if he could, testified to his existence, that in some ways is evenmore valuable than positive testimony from a Christian source. Ultimately,neither Celsus nor any of the polemicists who followed himcould scientifically validate the existence of Christ, but at every turnwhen historical issues were raised, neither he nor they ever claimedthat Christ was a myth. This would have been the simplest approach,surely, to insist that there was no birth of Christ, virgin or otherwise,no deeds, miraculous or otherwise, and no death, atoning or otherwise.This would have been devastatingly effective, had there beenanyone for whom such an approach seemed credible. The Alethes Logos of Celsusand the Historicity of ChristDavid Neal Greenwood
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