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Frequently asked questions
A: This article discusses the very basic issue of "existence of Jesus as a historical figure", not what he did and taught. On the other hand, the Historical Jesus article discusses the various aspects of what can be gathered about the activities of Jesus. In basic terms this article answers the question: "Did Jesus walk the streets of Jerusalem?" without addressing any details about what he said, did or taught as he walked the streets. The other article addresses broader questions such as "Was Jesus seen as an apocalyptic prophet by the people of his time?" which are beyond the scope of this article.
A: The two separate aspects of historicity vs historical portraits require different lines of reasoning. Historicity is largely a yes/no question: "Did he exist and walk?" while historical portraits are far more involved and are based on "historically probable events" with different scholars having different levels of confidence in various aspects of what can be known about Jesus. Moreover WP:Length has specific length limits (as in WP:SIZERULE) and there is enough distinct material in each article that combining them would create too large an article that would be too hard to read and follow. And in any case the articles have different academic focuses and while there is widespread agreement on existence (discussed in this article), that does not extend to the portraits constructed in the other article and these issues are logically distinct.
A: Yes:
A: The internet includes some such lists, and they have been discussed on the talk page, the list in the box below is copied from the talk page discussion:
The list came from a non- WP:RS website and once it was analyzed it became clear that: Most of the authors on the list were not scholars in the field, and included an attorney, an accountant, a land surveyor, a film-maker, as well as a number of amateurs whose actual profession was less than clear, whose books were self-published and failed the WP:RS requirements. Some of the books on the list did not even deny the existence of Jesus, e.g. Burton Mack (who is a scholar) holds that Jesus existed but his death was not due to his challenge to Jewish authority, etc. Finkelstein and Silberman's work is about the Old Testament and not really related to Jesus. The analysis of the list thus shed light on the scarcity of scholars who deny the existence of Jesus.
A: The article Christ myth theory discusses that issue in much more detail because it is more relevant to the denial existence issues. As stated there, and briefly in this article:
Specific issues regarding this topic are discussed at more length in that article.
A: This has been discussed on the talk page of this article, as well as a number of other talk article pages. There are 2 aspects to this:
Moreover, Wikipedia policies do not prohibit Jewish scholars as sources on the history of Judaism, Buddhist scholars as sources on Buddhism, or Muslim scholars as sources on the history of Islam provided they are respected scholars whose works meet the general WP:RS requirements in terms of publisher reputation, etc.
A: In fact the formal Wikipedia guidelines require us not to do our own survey. The Wikipedia guideline WP:RS/AC specifically states: "The statement that all or most scientists or scholars hold a certain view requires reliable sourcing that directly says that all or most scientists or scholars hold that view." Given that the guideline then states: "statement in Wikipedia that academic consensus exists on a topic must be sourced rather than being based on the opinion or assessment of editors." we should not rely on our own surveys but quote a scholar who states what the "academic consensus" may be. Moreover, in this case, after much discussion, no reliable source has yet been presented that presents a differing statement of the academic consensus, and opposing scholars such as Robert Price acknowledge that their views are not the mainstream.
A: The difference is "historically certain" versus "historically probable" and "historically plausible". There are a number of subtle issues and this is a somewhat complicated topic, although it may seem simple at first:
As the article states Amy-Jill Levine summarized the situation by stating: "Most scholars agree that Jesus was baptized by John, debated with fellow Jews on how best to live according to God's will, engaged in healings and exorcisms, taught in parables, gathered male and female followers in Galilee, went to Jerusalem, and was crucified by Roman soldiers during the governorship of Pontius Pilate." In that statement Levine chose her words very carefully. If she had said "disciples" instead of followers there would have been serious objections from other scholars, if she had said "called" instead of "gathered", there would have also been objections in that some scholars hold that Jesus preached equally to all, never imposed a hierarchy among his followers, etc. Scholars have very specific positions and the strength of the consensus among them can vary by changing just one word, e.g. follower to disciple or apostle, etc.
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The contents of Talk:Historicity of Jesus/Merged content 2005 were merged into Historicity of Jesus in 2005. The page is now a redirect to here. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected article, please see its history. |
This article, along with other related articles on the topic, possesses flaws with respect to the strong language used. Having read some of the sources, I am of the belief that the majority of scholars on the topic believe it more likely that Jesus existed than that he did not, based on the available, but limited, primary sources. But the language used in this article make it seem like this is an overwhelming fact, which it quite clearly isn't. If I say, have a bag of pebbles where 70 percent of the pebbles are brown, and 30 percent are white, the fact that I'm more likely to draw a brown pebble doesn't make it a certainty. More efforts should be made including discussions about the relevant primary evidence.
Also, if he existed historically, the claims of him being baptised and crucified have far less evidence: at this point you're more or less restricted to the bible (maybe a few other sources, but fewer). Even if this were the best hypothesis to make, the level of certainty should be clarified.
I'm afraid to say, with the current language, the article seems unscientific. I'm not denying that Jesus possibly existed, but the burden of proof lies on proving that he did, which requires more critical analysis of the evidence. 2A02:3031:17:25E9:1:1:F038:BD16 ( talk) 15:49, 29 November 2023 (UTC)
Typical that the link for Historicity of Muhammad is incorrect. And if we are to compare articles, take a look at Quest for the historical Jesus - actually, read it. The sole reason that the Historicity of Jesus-article exists is because people keep arguing that there was no historical Jesus, and that that all scholarship on this topic is wrong and biased - augh... Don't bother about scholarship when you believe something, right? Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 19:20, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
Yes, of course, why do you think we wouldn't keep the guidelines in mind?
I basically gave the advice to check the verifiability and to
WP:MINE the cited sources.
WP:RS: “Proper sourcing always depends on context; common sense and editorial judgment are an indispensable part of the process”. And of course there's
WP:5P5, especially
WP:COMMONSENSE and also
WP:CSIOR.
Could you maybe consider when your ad infinitum standard replies may go over the fine line between [insert your reason for reply here] and
WP:LAWYERING or
WP:HEAR, or maybe a bit of
WP:OWN?
You know I backed up my "personal" views with some RS that may actually deserve some place on the page. But you personally brought up these mainstream peer-reviewed volumes that seem to be even more reputable and much more critical of biblical scholarship:
-On the Historicity of Jesus by
historian
Richard Carrier (2014
Sheffield Phoenix Press)
-Questioning the Historicity of Jesus by
religion scholar Raphael Lataster (2019
Brill Publishers, available to active wikipedians via WikipediaLibrary) (note that wikipedia explicitly calls the academic discipline that Lataster worked in "Objective study of religion", although it has nonetheless been
criticised for imposing a theological Christian agenda.
Sorry for being slow with reading and processing all that information (between other tasks and distractions), but is there any reason why you still haven't used these sources for the article (despite that Carrier-quote in this thread)?
Joortje1 (
talk) 17:46, 4 December 2023 (UTC)
is there any reason why you still haven't used these sources for the article- yes, because it is a fringe-view, rejected by 'virtually all acholars of the topic'. Carrier and Lataster are treated at the CMT-page, to which this page links; Bart Ehrman, among a few others, has been so kind to spend his valuable time at explaining why this is a fringe-view; most scholars won't even bother to do so. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 19:48, 4 December 2023 (UTC)
Carrier was guided by his ideological agenda, not by serious historical work, which is most evident in his readings of Paul’s epistles. In addition, Carrier’s underlying assumption about the development of Jesus’ tradition in the 1st century is completely wrong. His theses are utterly misplaced without any positive evidence in primary sources. Hence, it is no surprise that Carrier hasn’t won any supporters among critical scholars.
...one may be sorely disappointed by the lack of interaction with secondary literature in this book. Most of James D. G. Dunn’s work on Paul goes unreferenced [...] why write a book if you are unable to interact with the current scholarship and research? [...] the shortcomings that would be spotted by nearly any academic familiar with the issues that he engages [...] I cannot recommend this book for much other than rebuttal [...] its lack of interaction with leading scholarship on the issues it covers means that all of its evaluations and conclusions are wholly lacking, as they simply do not account for other prominent arguments and positions. If one is interested, I could only recommend borrowing it from a university library because the volume is certainly not worth the expense of $210.
Dykstra: "I question the value of both the “quest for the historical Jesus” and the opposing quest to prove that Jesus never existed." The question of the historicity of Jesus is another question than the attempts to reconstruct this historical Jesus. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 16:55, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Hi, I reverted your add on public perceptions [5] because such information, if used, belongs in the Christ myth article since there is a section like that already there. For one the, article is on the academic question, not public perceptions of fringe views. Looking at other historical articles like the Holocaust or Moon landing article they do not feature such type of information at all. There are studies that there is a significant public denial of the holocaust (1 in 5 think it is a hoax in US [6] and similar numbers for the Netherlands [7]) and moon landing (1 in 5 Europeans think it was a hoax [8]) by the public but those are not mixed or even featured into those main articles. Fringe material belong in the pages for fringe views, if anywhere at all, not the main article. Certainly not its own section either. Its obvious that the public is not very good with historical topics in general, so it does not reflect much on the question of historicity. Ramos1990 ( talk) 10:15, 17 December 2023 (UTC)
The opinions of a lay audience are "objective information," while the conclusions of scholars are just "the opinions of a handful of biblical scholars and theologians"? If that's the kind of information you want to share with the world, please go to Quora. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 17:57, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
As a "lay person" who came upon this wikipedia page after googling "was jesus real?", I agree that this article is clearly biased and it should include information about "Christ Myth Theory". I came here to find out whether Jesus has been scientifically proven as a real person, and what I got was "Everyone knows Jesus was real because they wrote about him in the bible and anyone who doesn't think so is a conspiracy theorist." This article is full of opinions from historians which is not what I came here for. I want to understand the methods we used to determine that Jesus was real. Not the opinions of old white men over the last several centuries. Opinions are subjective, even when they come from educated people.
Thanks for your efforts on this Joortje1 😊
216.122.139.89 (
talk) 00:58, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
By definition, history is about what people did in the past. We do not automatically disregard past scholarship when a recent opinion contradicts it, merely because it is more recent. The recent opinion may be factually wrong, and if new evidence has indeed been discovered, then the entire field (those who are still alive) will recognize this. That does not seem to currently be the case with Biblical research, unless you know something that I haven't seen yet? PS: You made a case about "feminist scholars and feminist biblical criticism". I don't understand why feminist scholars would necessarily hold a different view about Biblical history, and your source doesn't go into any detail at all. Please could you share some examples? Wdford ( talk) 14:32, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
The problem with this article remains its absolutist tone based on a relatively insignificant number of sources. Once the opinions of Christian theologians are discarded, there are precious few sources (and those sources are not 100% clean ... a lot of "former Evangelicals" and "former Catholic priests" and the like). It's kind of telling that there doesn't seem to be a single Hindu or Buddhist historian that has ever considered the question of Christ's historical existence to be both interesting enough to investigate and answered by sufficiently compelling evidence that they published an opinion.
I've tried a few times to rephrase the consensus in a more rational tone, that it's far more likely that Jesus existed than that he did not. Those edits have been reverted in favour of Ehrmann's absolutism ... an absolutism that makes me uneasy about using him as a source at all.— Kww( talk) 02:41, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
Once again, the disputes are not about the historicity of Jesus the normal human teacher and trouble-maker - almost everyone agrees on that, and he is not really notable. The disputes are about the claims that Jesus was a divine being, and a part of God himself. The supernatural aspects of the gospels are not well supported in mainstream scholarship at all. If this was properly reported, these disputes would evaporate. However some editors have fought tenaciously for years to protect their POV. Wdford ( talk) 15:58, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Mainstream Bible scholars use the name "Palestine". Why? I don't know, but they do. tgeorgescu ( talk) 23:28, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
"but declared first to them of Damascus, at Jerusalem, and throughout all the country of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, doing works worthy of repentance."
"He was also one of the captives, which Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon carried from Jerusalem with Jeconiah king of Judea; and this was his dream:"
"When Herod had sought for him, and didn't find him, he examined the guards, and commanded that they should be put to death. He went down from Judea to Caesarea, and stayed there."
Shall I continue?
Ironcladded ( talk) 02:04, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
Mainstream Bible scholars use the name "Palestine".I did not say Jesus's land was called Palestine in the 1st century CE. Big difference. I also said that I was simply not looking for "Palestine" when I gathered those quotes. "Palestine" is bycatch.
Palestine at page 8, but perhaps Shaye J. D. Cohen is not Jewish enough or professor enough for your standards.
Or at first page of chapter 6, but perhaps Joel S. Baden is not Jewish enough or professor enough for your standards. And Candida Moss does not know what she is talking about, according to you. tgeorgescu ( talk) 04:53, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
Dunn, Jesus remembered, p.257-258: "the usage itself is very old and common among Greco-Roman writers. Herodotus in the fifth century BCE already speaks of 'the Syrians of Palestine'." Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 05:31, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
The area Jesus lived in was known as Judea (by both the Romans and locals) until 132CE, when it was changed to Syria Palestina. No historical figures are referenced by contemporary geography, why should this be any different? Unless there is polemic reasoning, contemporary names for regions should not reference historical figures.According to Dunn, the name "Palestine" was already used by Greece-Roman writers in the 5th century BCE, so your argument fails. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 06:54, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
We might as well remove "Palestine"; no one doubts he lived there. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 07:14, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
"'Syro-Palestinian archaeology' is not the same as the 'biblical archaeology'. I regret to say that all who would defend Albright and 'biblical archaeology' on this ground, are sadly out of touch with reality in the field of archaeology." [1]
References
The purpose of Wikipedia is preservation of information, right? Not to argue for any religions authenticity over others, right? Imagine if any page written about any other religion was written this way. Nearly every paragraph here pretends at legitimacy while asserting a certainty that does not exist outside of Christianity. The primary argument here is that some guy who wasn’t Christian mentioned that he heard of Jesus. So that means the man must with certainty exist? they mods here Christian and simply trying to maintain the artifice of certainty. The historicity of Jesus is a maybe at best, but this page reads as tho to say that doubting his existence is silly. It just doesn’t seem like an unbiased encyclopedia entry 2600:1007:B0AF:CE83:D9F7:706C:7D6F:B276 ( talk) 02:17, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
Justin Meggitt’s More Ingenious than Learned? (2019) is cited on our page. Its main point quite clearly is that doubting/denying HoJ “should not be dismissed with problematic appeals to expertise and authority and nor should it be viewed as unwelcome” but that it is “at the very least, a pressing, prior question for those wishing to say anything about the historical Jesus.”
The way this source is abused on our page seems a pretty good example of the wp:cherrypicking approach that may very well have been applied to most of the cited sources. Please read the following argument from Meggitt's article carefully:
“Indeed, the lack of conventional historical training on the part of biblical scholars may well be evident in the failure of any scholar involved in discussing the Christ-myth debate to mention long-established historiographical approaches associated with the study of the poor in the past, such as History from Below, Microhistory or Subaltern Studies, approaches that might help us determine what kind of questions can be asked and what kind of answers can reasonably be expected to be given when we scrutinise someone who is depicted as coming from such a non-elite context.
For example, given that most human beings in antiquity left no sign of their existence, and the poor as individuals are virtually invisible, all we can hope to do is try to establish, in a general sense, the lives that they lived. Why would we expect any non-Christian evidence for the specific existence of someone of the socio-economic status of a figure such as Jesus at all? To deny his existence based on the absence of such evidence, even if that were the case, has problematic implications; you may as well deny the existence of pretty much everyone in the ancient world.''”
What our page takes away from Meggitt’s article: “Historiographical approaches associated with the study of the poor in the past, such as microhistory, can help assess what type of sources can be reasonably expected in the historical record for individuals like Jesus. For instance, Justin Meggitt argues that since most people in antiquity left no sign of their existence, especially the poor, it is unreasonable to expect non-Christian sources to corroborate the specific existence of someone with Jesus's socio-economic status.”
We are thus misleading our readers with the suggestion that proper methodologies like microhistory have actually been applied by Meggitt and other biblical scholars/theologians. As purported conclusion we offer the rather common “ absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” argument. The notion may be valid because some mythicists indeed all too easily use an argument from silence. However, in Meggit's statement it is merely a simplistic example and not a properly researched acadamic argument (it all too easily overlooks how historians really should be sceptical and actually do express serious suspicions when ancient figures lack evidence, as for instance with Homer, or Romulus). Meggitt’s main point of the section was clearly that HoJ defenders have failed to use accepted historical methodologies if they wanted to counter HoJ denial; he was continuing his call for them to really make some effort in “raising the standard of debate”.
I'm not against countering unacademic use of the argument of silence, but I suggest that we use another source for that (I believe Ehrman 2012 says more about it, possibly even with citations of proper academic research, at least it would be in line with the main gist of the book). Let's use Meggitt's relatively nuanced and objectively voiced Cambridge University Press article to incorporate its main points at a due place on our page. Joortje1 ( talk) 14:44, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
The main point of Meggit "To deny his existence based on the absence of such evidence, even if that were the case, has problematic implications; you may as well deny the existence of pretty much everyone in the ancient world." And criticizes mythicists after that by continuing "Indeed, the attempt by mythicists to dismiss the Christian sources could be construed, however unintentionally, as exemplifying what E. P. Thompson called ‘the enormous condescension of posterity’ in action, functionally seeking to erase a collection of data, extremely rare in the Roman Empire, that depicts the lives and interactions of non-elite actors and seems to have originated from them too." Clearly he is not a mythicicst and starts off the paper with "Virtually no scholar working in the field of New Testament studies or early Christian history doubts the historical existence of Jesus of Nazareth". He is just saying that the question has a place, not that there is a shift in scholarship. Walsh is not a mythicist either. Mythicists do not use historical methods in general they use literary methods or philosophy for their arguments. Often anit-historical methods too like Meggit says "functionally seeking to erase a collection of data, extremely rare in the Roman Empire, that depicts the lives and interactions of non-elite actors and seems to have originated from them too." Ramos1990 ( talk) 18:28, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
Gaming the system may include: [...] Filibustering the consensus-building process by [...] sticking to a viewpoint that the community has clearly rejected.
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Frequently asked questions
A: This article discusses the very basic issue of "existence of Jesus as a historical figure", not what he did and taught. On the other hand, the Historical Jesus article discusses the various aspects of what can be gathered about the activities of Jesus. In basic terms this article answers the question: "Did Jesus walk the streets of Jerusalem?" without addressing any details about what he said, did or taught as he walked the streets. The other article addresses broader questions such as "Was Jesus seen as an apocalyptic prophet by the people of his time?" which are beyond the scope of this article.
A: The two separate aspects of historicity vs historical portraits require different lines of reasoning. Historicity is largely a yes/no question: "Did he exist and walk?" while historical portraits are far more involved and are based on "historically probable events" with different scholars having different levels of confidence in various aspects of what can be known about Jesus. Moreover WP:Length has specific length limits (as in WP:SIZERULE) and there is enough distinct material in each article that combining them would create too large an article that would be too hard to read and follow. And in any case the articles have different academic focuses and while there is widespread agreement on existence (discussed in this article), that does not extend to the portraits constructed in the other article and these issues are logically distinct.
A: Yes:
A: The internet includes some such lists, and they have been discussed on the talk page, the list in the box below is copied from the talk page discussion:
The list came from a non- WP:RS website and once it was analyzed it became clear that: Most of the authors on the list were not scholars in the field, and included an attorney, an accountant, a land surveyor, a film-maker, as well as a number of amateurs whose actual profession was less than clear, whose books were self-published and failed the WP:RS requirements. Some of the books on the list did not even deny the existence of Jesus, e.g. Burton Mack (who is a scholar) holds that Jesus existed but his death was not due to his challenge to Jewish authority, etc. Finkelstein and Silberman's work is about the Old Testament and not really related to Jesus. The analysis of the list thus shed light on the scarcity of scholars who deny the existence of Jesus.
A: The article Christ myth theory discusses that issue in much more detail because it is more relevant to the denial existence issues. As stated there, and briefly in this article:
Specific issues regarding this topic are discussed at more length in that article.
A: This has been discussed on the talk page of this article, as well as a number of other talk article pages. There are 2 aspects to this:
Moreover, Wikipedia policies do not prohibit Jewish scholars as sources on the history of Judaism, Buddhist scholars as sources on Buddhism, or Muslim scholars as sources on the history of Islam provided they are respected scholars whose works meet the general WP:RS requirements in terms of publisher reputation, etc.
A: In fact the formal Wikipedia guidelines require us not to do our own survey. The Wikipedia guideline WP:RS/AC specifically states: "The statement that all or most scientists or scholars hold a certain view requires reliable sourcing that directly says that all or most scientists or scholars hold that view." Given that the guideline then states: "statement in Wikipedia that academic consensus exists on a topic must be sourced rather than being based on the opinion or assessment of editors." we should not rely on our own surveys but quote a scholar who states what the "academic consensus" may be. Moreover, in this case, after much discussion, no reliable source has yet been presented that presents a differing statement of the academic consensus, and opposing scholars such as Robert Price acknowledge that their views are not the mainstream.
A: The difference is "historically certain" versus "historically probable" and "historically plausible". There are a number of subtle issues and this is a somewhat complicated topic, although it may seem simple at first:
As the article states Amy-Jill Levine summarized the situation by stating: "Most scholars agree that Jesus was baptized by John, debated with fellow Jews on how best to live according to God's will, engaged in healings and exorcisms, taught in parables, gathered male and female followers in Galilee, went to Jerusalem, and was crucified by Roman soldiers during the governorship of Pontius Pilate." In that statement Levine chose her words very carefully. If she had said "disciples" instead of followers there would have been serious objections from other scholars, if she had said "called" instead of "gathered", there would have also been objections in that some scholars hold that Jesus preached equally to all, never imposed a hierarchy among his followers, etc. Scholars have very specific positions and the strength of the consensus among them can vary by changing just one word, e.g. follower to disciple or apostle, etc.
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This article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's
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The contents of Talk:Historicity of Jesus/Merged content 2005 were merged into Historicity of Jesus in 2005. The page is now a redirect to here. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected article, please see its history. |
This article, along with other related articles on the topic, possesses flaws with respect to the strong language used. Having read some of the sources, I am of the belief that the majority of scholars on the topic believe it more likely that Jesus existed than that he did not, based on the available, but limited, primary sources. But the language used in this article make it seem like this is an overwhelming fact, which it quite clearly isn't. If I say, have a bag of pebbles where 70 percent of the pebbles are brown, and 30 percent are white, the fact that I'm more likely to draw a brown pebble doesn't make it a certainty. More efforts should be made including discussions about the relevant primary evidence.
Also, if he existed historically, the claims of him being baptised and crucified have far less evidence: at this point you're more or less restricted to the bible (maybe a few other sources, but fewer). Even if this were the best hypothesis to make, the level of certainty should be clarified.
I'm afraid to say, with the current language, the article seems unscientific. I'm not denying that Jesus possibly existed, but the burden of proof lies on proving that he did, which requires more critical analysis of the evidence. 2A02:3031:17:25E9:1:1:F038:BD16 ( talk) 15:49, 29 November 2023 (UTC)
Typical that the link for Historicity of Muhammad is incorrect. And if we are to compare articles, take a look at Quest for the historical Jesus - actually, read it. The sole reason that the Historicity of Jesus-article exists is because people keep arguing that there was no historical Jesus, and that that all scholarship on this topic is wrong and biased - augh... Don't bother about scholarship when you believe something, right? Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 19:20, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
Yes, of course, why do you think we wouldn't keep the guidelines in mind?
I basically gave the advice to check the verifiability and to
WP:MINE the cited sources.
WP:RS: “Proper sourcing always depends on context; common sense and editorial judgment are an indispensable part of the process”. And of course there's
WP:5P5, especially
WP:COMMONSENSE and also
WP:CSIOR.
Could you maybe consider when your ad infinitum standard replies may go over the fine line between [insert your reason for reply here] and
WP:LAWYERING or
WP:HEAR, or maybe a bit of
WP:OWN?
You know I backed up my "personal" views with some RS that may actually deserve some place on the page. But you personally brought up these mainstream peer-reviewed volumes that seem to be even more reputable and much more critical of biblical scholarship:
-On the Historicity of Jesus by
historian
Richard Carrier (2014
Sheffield Phoenix Press)
-Questioning the Historicity of Jesus by
religion scholar Raphael Lataster (2019
Brill Publishers, available to active wikipedians via WikipediaLibrary) (note that wikipedia explicitly calls the academic discipline that Lataster worked in "Objective study of religion", although it has nonetheless been
criticised for imposing a theological Christian agenda.
Sorry for being slow with reading and processing all that information (between other tasks and distractions), but is there any reason why you still haven't used these sources for the article (despite that Carrier-quote in this thread)?
Joortje1 (
talk) 17:46, 4 December 2023 (UTC)
is there any reason why you still haven't used these sources for the article- yes, because it is a fringe-view, rejected by 'virtually all acholars of the topic'. Carrier and Lataster are treated at the CMT-page, to which this page links; Bart Ehrman, among a few others, has been so kind to spend his valuable time at explaining why this is a fringe-view; most scholars won't even bother to do so. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 19:48, 4 December 2023 (UTC)
Carrier was guided by his ideological agenda, not by serious historical work, which is most evident in his readings of Paul’s epistles. In addition, Carrier’s underlying assumption about the development of Jesus’ tradition in the 1st century is completely wrong. His theses are utterly misplaced without any positive evidence in primary sources. Hence, it is no surprise that Carrier hasn’t won any supporters among critical scholars.
...one may be sorely disappointed by the lack of interaction with secondary literature in this book. Most of James D. G. Dunn’s work on Paul goes unreferenced [...] why write a book if you are unable to interact with the current scholarship and research? [...] the shortcomings that would be spotted by nearly any academic familiar with the issues that he engages [...] I cannot recommend this book for much other than rebuttal [...] its lack of interaction with leading scholarship on the issues it covers means that all of its evaluations and conclusions are wholly lacking, as they simply do not account for other prominent arguments and positions. If one is interested, I could only recommend borrowing it from a university library because the volume is certainly not worth the expense of $210.
Dykstra: "I question the value of both the “quest for the historical Jesus” and the opposing quest to prove that Jesus never existed." The question of the historicity of Jesus is another question than the attempts to reconstruct this historical Jesus. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 16:55, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Hi, I reverted your add on public perceptions [5] because such information, if used, belongs in the Christ myth article since there is a section like that already there. For one the, article is on the academic question, not public perceptions of fringe views. Looking at other historical articles like the Holocaust or Moon landing article they do not feature such type of information at all. There are studies that there is a significant public denial of the holocaust (1 in 5 think it is a hoax in US [6] and similar numbers for the Netherlands [7]) and moon landing (1 in 5 Europeans think it was a hoax [8]) by the public but those are not mixed or even featured into those main articles. Fringe material belong in the pages for fringe views, if anywhere at all, not the main article. Certainly not its own section either. Its obvious that the public is not very good with historical topics in general, so it does not reflect much on the question of historicity. Ramos1990 ( talk) 10:15, 17 December 2023 (UTC)
The opinions of a lay audience are "objective information," while the conclusions of scholars are just "the opinions of a handful of biblical scholars and theologians"? If that's the kind of information you want to share with the world, please go to Quora. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 17:57, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
As a "lay person" who came upon this wikipedia page after googling "was jesus real?", I agree that this article is clearly biased and it should include information about "Christ Myth Theory". I came here to find out whether Jesus has been scientifically proven as a real person, and what I got was "Everyone knows Jesus was real because they wrote about him in the bible and anyone who doesn't think so is a conspiracy theorist." This article is full of opinions from historians which is not what I came here for. I want to understand the methods we used to determine that Jesus was real. Not the opinions of old white men over the last several centuries. Opinions are subjective, even when they come from educated people.
Thanks for your efforts on this Joortje1 😊
216.122.139.89 (
talk) 00:58, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
By definition, history is about what people did in the past. We do not automatically disregard past scholarship when a recent opinion contradicts it, merely because it is more recent. The recent opinion may be factually wrong, and if new evidence has indeed been discovered, then the entire field (those who are still alive) will recognize this. That does not seem to currently be the case with Biblical research, unless you know something that I haven't seen yet? PS: You made a case about "feminist scholars and feminist biblical criticism". I don't understand why feminist scholars would necessarily hold a different view about Biblical history, and your source doesn't go into any detail at all. Please could you share some examples? Wdford ( talk) 14:32, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
The problem with this article remains its absolutist tone based on a relatively insignificant number of sources. Once the opinions of Christian theologians are discarded, there are precious few sources (and those sources are not 100% clean ... a lot of "former Evangelicals" and "former Catholic priests" and the like). It's kind of telling that there doesn't seem to be a single Hindu or Buddhist historian that has ever considered the question of Christ's historical existence to be both interesting enough to investigate and answered by sufficiently compelling evidence that they published an opinion.
I've tried a few times to rephrase the consensus in a more rational tone, that it's far more likely that Jesus existed than that he did not. Those edits have been reverted in favour of Ehrmann's absolutism ... an absolutism that makes me uneasy about using him as a source at all.— Kww( talk) 02:41, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
Once again, the disputes are not about the historicity of Jesus the normal human teacher and trouble-maker - almost everyone agrees on that, and he is not really notable. The disputes are about the claims that Jesus was a divine being, and a part of God himself. The supernatural aspects of the gospels are not well supported in mainstream scholarship at all. If this was properly reported, these disputes would evaporate. However some editors have fought tenaciously for years to protect their POV. Wdford ( talk) 15:58, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Mainstream Bible scholars use the name "Palestine". Why? I don't know, but they do. tgeorgescu ( talk) 23:28, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
"but declared first to them of Damascus, at Jerusalem, and throughout all the country of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, doing works worthy of repentance."
"He was also one of the captives, which Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon carried from Jerusalem with Jeconiah king of Judea; and this was his dream:"
"When Herod had sought for him, and didn't find him, he examined the guards, and commanded that they should be put to death. He went down from Judea to Caesarea, and stayed there."
Shall I continue?
Ironcladded ( talk) 02:04, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
Mainstream Bible scholars use the name "Palestine".I did not say Jesus's land was called Palestine in the 1st century CE. Big difference. I also said that I was simply not looking for "Palestine" when I gathered those quotes. "Palestine" is bycatch.
Palestine at page 8, but perhaps Shaye J. D. Cohen is not Jewish enough or professor enough for your standards.
Or at first page of chapter 6, but perhaps Joel S. Baden is not Jewish enough or professor enough for your standards. And Candida Moss does not know what she is talking about, according to you. tgeorgescu ( talk) 04:53, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
Dunn, Jesus remembered, p.257-258: "the usage itself is very old and common among Greco-Roman writers. Herodotus in the fifth century BCE already speaks of 'the Syrians of Palestine'." Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 05:31, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
The area Jesus lived in was known as Judea (by both the Romans and locals) until 132CE, when it was changed to Syria Palestina. No historical figures are referenced by contemporary geography, why should this be any different? Unless there is polemic reasoning, contemporary names for regions should not reference historical figures.According to Dunn, the name "Palestine" was already used by Greece-Roman writers in the 5th century BCE, so your argument fails. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 06:54, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
We might as well remove "Palestine"; no one doubts he lived there. Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! 07:14, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
"'Syro-Palestinian archaeology' is not the same as the 'biblical archaeology'. I regret to say that all who would defend Albright and 'biblical archaeology' on this ground, are sadly out of touch with reality in the field of archaeology." [1]
References
The purpose of Wikipedia is preservation of information, right? Not to argue for any religions authenticity over others, right? Imagine if any page written about any other religion was written this way. Nearly every paragraph here pretends at legitimacy while asserting a certainty that does not exist outside of Christianity. The primary argument here is that some guy who wasn’t Christian mentioned that he heard of Jesus. So that means the man must with certainty exist? they mods here Christian and simply trying to maintain the artifice of certainty. The historicity of Jesus is a maybe at best, but this page reads as tho to say that doubting his existence is silly. It just doesn’t seem like an unbiased encyclopedia entry 2600:1007:B0AF:CE83:D9F7:706C:7D6F:B276 ( talk) 02:17, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
Justin Meggitt’s More Ingenious than Learned? (2019) is cited on our page. Its main point quite clearly is that doubting/denying HoJ “should not be dismissed with problematic appeals to expertise and authority and nor should it be viewed as unwelcome” but that it is “at the very least, a pressing, prior question for those wishing to say anything about the historical Jesus.”
The way this source is abused on our page seems a pretty good example of the wp:cherrypicking approach that may very well have been applied to most of the cited sources. Please read the following argument from Meggitt's article carefully:
“Indeed, the lack of conventional historical training on the part of biblical scholars may well be evident in the failure of any scholar involved in discussing the Christ-myth debate to mention long-established historiographical approaches associated with the study of the poor in the past, such as History from Below, Microhistory or Subaltern Studies, approaches that might help us determine what kind of questions can be asked and what kind of answers can reasonably be expected to be given when we scrutinise someone who is depicted as coming from such a non-elite context.
For example, given that most human beings in antiquity left no sign of their existence, and the poor as individuals are virtually invisible, all we can hope to do is try to establish, in a general sense, the lives that they lived. Why would we expect any non-Christian evidence for the specific existence of someone of the socio-economic status of a figure such as Jesus at all? To deny his existence based on the absence of such evidence, even if that were the case, has problematic implications; you may as well deny the existence of pretty much everyone in the ancient world.''”
What our page takes away from Meggitt’s article: “Historiographical approaches associated with the study of the poor in the past, such as microhistory, can help assess what type of sources can be reasonably expected in the historical record for individuals like Jesus. For instance, Justin Meggitt argues that since most people in antiquity left no sign of their existence, especially the poor, it is unreasonable to expect non-Christian sources to corroborate the specific existence of someone with Jesus's socio-economic status.”
We are thus misleading our readers with the suggestion that proper methodologies like microhistory have actually been applied by Meggitt and other biblical scholars/theologians. As purported conclusion we offer the rather common “ absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” argument. The notion may be valid because some mythicists indeed all too easily use an argument from silence. However, in Meggit's statement it is merely a simplistic example and not a properly researched acadamic argument (it all too easily overlooks how historians really should be sceptical and actually do express serious suspicions when ancient figures lack evidence, as for instance with Homer, or Romulus). Meggitt’s main point of the section was clearly that HoJ defenders have failed to use accepted historical methodologies if they wanted to counter HoJ denial; he was continuing his call for them to really make some effort in “raising the standard of debate”.
I'm not against countering unacademic use of the argument of silence, but I suggest that we use another source for that (I believe Ehrman 2012 says more about it, possibly even with citations of proper academic research, at least it would be in line with the main gist of the book). Let's use Meggitt's relatively nuanced and objectively voiced Cambridge University Press article to incorporate its main points at a due place on our page. Joortje1 ( talk) 14:44, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
The main point of Meggit "To deny his existence based on the absence of such evidence, even if that were the case, has problematic implications; you may as well deny the existence of pretty much everyone in the ancient world." And criticizes mythicists after that by continuing "Indeed, the attempt by mythicists to dismiss the Christian sources could be construed, however unintentionally, as exemplifying what E. P. Thompson called ‘the enormous condescension of posterity’ in action, functionally seeking to erase a collection of data, extremely rare in the Roman Empire, that depicts the lives and interactions of non-elite actors and seems to have originated from them too." Clearly he is not a mythicicst and starts off the paper with "Virtually no scholar working in the field of New Testament studies or early Christian history doubts the historical existence of Jesus of Nazareth". He is just saying that the question has a place, not that there is a shift in scholarship. Walsh is not a mythicist either. Mythicists do not use historical methods in general they use literary methods or philosophy for their arguments. Often anit-historical methods too like Meggit says "functionally seeking to erase a collection of data, extremely rare in the Roman Empire, that depicts the lives and interactions of non-elite actors and seems to have originated from them too." Ramos1990 ( talk) 18:28, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
Gaming the system may include: [...] Filibustering the consensus-building process by [...] sticking to a viewpoint that the community has clearly rejected.