Any non-biblical references to Christ?

However there is now firm prove that this existed before around 1850ish

 

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is this a mistake on your part pi, or are you being sarcastic.

 

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Cris: The reference to Christus by the Roman historian Tacitus seems to suggest the existent of a man who was crucified. The Babylonian Talmud references to Yeshu being hanged also suggest an actual historical person.

The Josephus paragraph seems to be some sort of fraud, as suggested by various scholars. However, references to Josephus from other sources (particularly Arab documents) strongly suggest that Josephus wrote something about Jesus. This suggests that the original Josephus text was rewritten by Christians to include some Pauline theology.

The above is all from posts to this thread. I did not do any research. While I do not believe in any of the mystical events attributed to and relating to Jesus, I have become convinced that he existed and that his activities resulted in the foundation of the Christian religion. As mentioned in a previous post, my interpretation of the Biblical accounts suggest to me that he intended to be a reformer rather than the founder of a new religion.

I strongly believe that had he existed in modern times, he would be diagnosed as a psychotic, and probably would have manifested some form of anti-social behavior. In his era, I would expect schizophrenics to display religious convictions due to the cultural context. In our culture, they go in a different direction.

 

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jesus in reality was a skillful manipulator of politics as spectacle. he wanted to reform the religion of the jews probably, to acehive this, he ripped off 90% of john the baptist's teachings, stole some of his followers, threw in a dash of pagan mystery and set out to change the world. what christianity has become today, even what it became shortly after jesus's death would probably make him shit himself with grief were he alive to see it.

 

There is absolutely no independent eyewitness verification of Jesus' existence. Lots of people wrote and write about him, but no one who has ever seen him has written one word of corroborating 'evidence' of his actual existence. Josephus never saw him. There were lots of reporters abounding at the time.. Not one word other than anecdotal, heresay, of the 'self-referential', loaded with contradictions, bible. See HERE.

 

an especially interesting fact is that the majority of the new testament was written by a man who never claimed to have seen jesus christ.

 

since Jesus is alive and fully accessible to you yourselves....ASK HIM!! and you will find him....seriously how important is this to you....?....important enough to ask him and look for the answer? if not, you are frauds, and not worth your weight in salt.

 

of course we're not worth our weight in salt. we're worth less than a dollar in chemicals. salt's worth a lot more than that.

and jesus is, in fact, dead, and not accessible. he's busy rotting away somewhere around Jerusalem. i'd ask him, but corpses aren't very responsive to questions.

 

If so, then he can post his own comments.
You gotta be kidding!
Your name must refer to your thought processes... <sigh>

Uh oh, wait a minute, perhaps you live in Mexico where everyone and his brother is named Jesus (hay-soos)??

 

Dr. Cello: I thought that Mark (author of the second gospel) was believed by some scholars to have been a contemporary of Jesus.

Nameless: I do not know of any specific examples, but I am sure there are historical figures who existed, but were never written about by eye witnesses to their deeds.

BTW: I am an atheist. My interest in religion is due to wanting to understand the psychological and sociological aspects/effects of religious beliefs & institutions. While it is possible that he never existed, I believe that it is highly likely that there was such a person. It is the details of his life that do not seem to be supported by any reasonable evidence.

While I do not believe in the existence of god, I like the following remark made by somebody.

• God is not a bad guy. It is his fan club that causes all the trouble.

 

He did see him-- in a vision. The Christ (saviour) principle within us all. It is possible to see the past (memory) also.

You can only understand physical things because you only believe in the physical. You become what you think. You are what you want. You see what you are. You speak what you're not.

God gave me five fingers in both hands. Isn't he nice to me? Nature did that to me.

 

Paul wrote most of the New Testament. Mark was said to have seen Jesus, but he was not the majority. sorry i wasn't clear on that.

c7: i think the correct term there might be 'not see him', given the circumstances. but my point stands. by all accounts, the only words Paul ever exchanged with Christ were not the sort that really grant you insight into his nature or access to his teaching.

i understand a lot more than physical things, though your mystical gibber is not among them. what you were responding to there is what we in the business refer to as a joke. i'm not sure what laymen call it, but it's when we say something that's supposed to be funny, and not taken seriously. very technical term. you probably won't have heard it without having taken some really advanced classes.

 

Knowing of NO 'specific examples', yet being 'sure', is what religion is all about. There were historians all over the place, Pliny the something, Tacitus, and more.. easy to look up, and with all of those 'miraculous deeds' youd think someone would write home about it. But, being 'sure' with no evidence is what superstition/religion is made of. Mushy brains. Mushy emotions.

And Mark is not accepted by scholars to have written anything, IF he even existed.
Lots of questions about Xtianity can be answered HERE
Which is where the following can be found, and more.

Please pardon the length of what I'm pasting (and pardon the 'paste') here, but it does seem quite relevent to the thread, so...

The Historicity Of Jesus

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It appears that the Christian writings that give Jesus a historical place only appeared in the closing years of the first century and even these took quite some time to be established and accepted. Therefore with regard to Jesus of Nazareth being some kind of historical person, surely one is justified in asking why there appears to be so little said by this figure that is original; for example, a good deal of the Sermon of the Mount goes back to the Old Test or lst cent BCE apocryphal writings, eg. the Book of the Secrets of Enoch. Secondly, why there is the astounding silence over biographical - or chronological - details about Jesus' life until ca. 90 CE. Paul, in the period before this time, never invokes his words when they would be invaluable in supporting his argument, and this is not only with Paul, but elsewhere, eg. l Peter. The authors of Romans l3:l-3 and l Peter 2:l3-l4 certainly couldn't have been aware of the story of Jesus appearing before Pilate in view of what they say. This silence continued over into the end of the lst century; in fact when the author of 1 Clement wrote, he seems to suffer from the same problem as Paul and others - total ignorance about Jesus and the Gospels; obviously as is so clearly demonstrated, Christians always used scripture or suchlike to support any argument they were making, so is it somewhat bizarre that Clement does not do this. In chap. 3-6 he lists Abel, Joseph, Moses and David as examples of people who suffered through jealousy - but surely Jesus would have been the ideal example of this - Matt 27:l8/Mark 15:l0 ??? When he speaks about people preaching repentence in 7-8, he uses Ezekiel and Isaiah as examples - but again surely Jesus would have been the ideal example to use - Luke 13:3,Matt l8:3 ? In 9-l2 he lists examples of faith - but yet again they're all Old Test and fails to give any Gospel example that would be more fitting. In l6 he refers to Jesus' humility and one would expect a reference to his humble birth in a stable,but instead he quotes from the Old Test again (Isa 53). In chap l7 he speaks about those dressed in animal skins who annou -nce the coming of Christ. Surely John the Baptist (Matt 3:4) ? however he lists the Old Test prophets Elijah and Ezekiel. And so it goes on.
It is very clear that although the Gospels emerged in the last decade of the lst century AD, they took a long long time to be circulated and/or accepted which is strange if they are accurate reports of Jesus' life. With regard to the eyewitness testimony for Jesus' existence, there is certainly a problem. It is amazing that anything up to 70(100 ?),000 people saw Jesus, but no one made an eye-witness record of it. Mark was obviously not an eyewitness due to his host of errors concerning chronological, historical, geographical and theological matters in lst. cent Palestine.

The writers of Matt and Luke have to use Mark as their source (which they obviously wouldn't have needed to do if they were eyewitnesses); in the case of John,this has always caused problems for the church as the Jesus it speaks of is so different from the Synoptics. Also, it details events that could not have happened, eg. eg. Jesus' speech about drinking blood to a Jewish audience in John 6; it has to be rejected if the Synoptics are accepted as it conflicts with them, eg. his dating of the Temple-clearing and the last supper etc in relation to the Passover. He also reports situations eg. expulsions from the synagogue (l6:2) that didn't occur until after 90 CE (ie. Rabbi Gamaliel II's official cursing prayer of the 'Minim' in ca. 90 CE). In the case of Paul, he gives virtually no detail about Jesus' earthly life, other than he was a descendent of David, was crucified and was raised by God. If Romans, a genuinely Pauline letter, and the longest, is examined to discern Paul's reference to Jesus' earthly life, the silence becomes most apparent:

(l)Jesus was a Jew/descended from David (l:3, l5:8,12);

(2)Jesus was human (8:3);

(3)His blood was shed (3:25, 5:9);

(4)Jesus suffered/died/was crucified (5:6,8,10,l5, 6:3,4,5,6,8, 8:l7, l4:l5);

(5)Jesus rose from the dead (l:4, 4:24,25, 6:4,5,9,l0, 8:ll,34, l0:7,9, l4:9):

As can be seen, the same few details are repeated over and over again; in the letters that are genuinely accepted as being written by Paul there is no specific reference to the parents of Jesus, and certainly not a virgin birth; his place of birth or the area in which his ministry took place is not mentioned either; 'Of Nazareth' is never used; the details Paul supplies give no indication whatsoever of the time or place of Jesus' earthly existence.

Paul never refers to Jesus' Roman trial, and in fact he does not appear to even know who crucified Jesus - in l Cor 2:8 he refers to the death of Christ by 'rulers of the age' - this hardly fits a tinpot prefect called Pilate; this term really denotes supernatural spirits - 2 Cor 4:4, Col 2:l5 *. Paul never refers to Jerusalem as the place of Jesus' execution and never mentions John the Baptist, nor Judas, nor Peter's denials (This would have been quite pertinent in combatting Cephas/Peter at Antioch - Gal 2:ll-l7. Paul's position was apparently being threatened by Peter and despite calling him a hypocrite, he does not allude to his three denials of Jesus, as recorded in the Gospels, eg. Mark l4:30 par). The only chronological reference to Jesus in the Pauline corpus is in l Tim 6:13 and this letter is widely accepted as post-Pauline. Furthermore it appears to be a non-Pauline insertion from a baptismal creed.

(* Although some say Paul's ref in 1 Thess 2:l4-l5 shows he knew the Jews crucified Christ (which is in- correct - the Romans did), this clearly refers to God's vengeance on the Jews and the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE - therefore it has to be an interpolation as 1 Thess was written ca. 55 CE; however insistence that Paul did write this statement originally would preclude Paul being the author as it would have to be after 70CE, but Paul died before this date.

Paul also fails to mention any of the miracles Jesus is reported to have accomplished in the Gospels; Paul suggests that miracles might be expected wherever a Christian mission went, for he includes the working of them among 'the gifts of the Spirit' (l Cor 12:l0,28) and himself claimed to have won converts by 'the power of signs and wonders' (Rom l5:l9).

Among the signs of a true apostle, he lists 'signs and wonders and mighty works' (2 Cor 12:12); the striking feature is that he fails to mention that Jesus is reported as having done on an extensive scale in his earthly life. Another striking feature is that whilst the Synoptic Gospels portray Jesus as an ethical teacher, there is no suggestion of this in Paul's letters; Paul is certainly not indifferent to ethical problems and on several occasions his letters contain a sizeable amount of ethical instruction. On only one occasion does he represent Jesus as having made an ethical injunction and this is in l Cor 7:l0 when Paul discusses the subject of divorce. The Gospel 'parallel' to this is Mark l0:ll-l2 (Matt is simply following Mark), but there is a difficulty even here as some reject this is authentic as Jesus refers to women divorcing their husbands - something that was not possible in Palestine.

Some say the statement was assigned to Jesus through Paul quoting a Christian prophet (himself ?) through whom the risen Lord was speaking and it was then utilised by the author of Mark who placed it in the mouth of Jesus whilst on earth, but was careless in not realising that its context was Gentile rather than Palestinian. It is clear from such early Christian writings as the Didache that as late as the end of the first century Christian prophets were viewed as being channels of communication for the risen Lord.

Paul was content to suffer weakness, insults, humiliation, persecution and hardship (2 Cor l2:l0) adding that he entreated the readers by the 'meekness and gentleness of Christ' (2 Cor l0:l). He stated that he imitated Christ (l Cor ll:l) and that his whole existence was 'to know nothing....except Jesus Christ and him crucified' (l Cor 2:2) and then goes on to say he was with his readers in 'weakness, much fear and trembling' (l Cor 2:3). If this is Paul's 'imitation' of Christ, then it is a far cry from the Jesus of the Gospels and particularly the picture of Jesus portrayed in John. It appears Paul thought Jesus led a humble inconspicuous life that went completely unnoticed by the world.

Other situations arise in Paul's writing that suggest knew very little about Jesus' supposed earthly life. He clearly was unaware of Jesus' command not to go to the Gentiles (Matt l0:5) in Rom ll:l3, and in Rom 8:26 he states 'for we do not know how to pray as we ought' suggesting he knew nothing of Jesus instructions of how to pray in Matt 5:7-l3, Luke ll:l4; the instructions regarding baptism by Jesus in Matt 28:l9 were also apparently unknown to Paul (l Cor l:l7).

The person of Paul was that of someone who believed that God was now revealing secrets or mysteries; these term arise frequently in Paul's letters, eg. l Cor 2:7, l3:2, l4:2,, l5:51, with 'revealed' or similiar arising frequently also, eg. Rom l:l7,l8, 8:l8, l6:25, l Cor 2:l0,l3, 3:l3, 2 Cor 12:l. Paul believed that he had seen the risen Jesus (l Cor l5:8) and he had spoken directly to him (2 Cor l2:8-9); he had experienced ecstatic states (2 Cor l2:l-4, l Cor l4:l8) and God was now revealing previously-hidden information (1 Cor 2:l0,12-13, 7:40). A question therefore arises, did Paul's rather scant knowledge about Jesus arise through his belief that the risen Lord was now communicating with and through him, alongwith other Christian prophets, or from information gleaned from earthly companions and eyewitnesses of the earthly Jesus. One passage in which Paul clearly refers to a historical event in Jesus' earthly life, ie. the last supper, is 1 Cor 11:23-26. However even this passage begins "For I received from the Lord...." and again, suggests this information was transmitted directly from the risen Christ, rather than from the apostles.

The inevitable question arises, ie. why this should be as Paul had met the apostles (Acts 9:27, Gal 1:18-19, 2:2,9) and would have been given this information by them - that is of course if these "apostles" had in fact accompanied the earthly Jesus rather than being as Paul, ie. Christians receiving information direct from the risen Lord, but that is what the situation appears to have been.

Reference to Jesus' resurrection, rather than his earthly life appears in l Cor l5:3-8, when Paul lists the resurrection appearances (apparently in chronological order); these bear no resemblance to the Gospels and reference to an appearance to 'all the 12' whilst Matt report Judas' suicide again suggests lack of information; his mention of an appearance to five hundred brethren at one time (l5:6) is quite extraordinary as it would be inexplicable for the Gospel writers to have omitted this event if they had known of it. The empty tomb, nor Jerusalem itself is ever mentioned by Paul; his several visits to Jerusalem, recorded in both Acts and Gal. surely would have brought him into contact with the empty tomb.

The failure of Paul to mention the empty tomb, which surely would have had great significance for Paul due to his preoccupation with Jesus' death and resurrection, may have been due, unlike the Gospels reporting a physical resurrection, to a belief in Jesus being raised as a spirit (l Cor l5:44,45,50). The l Cor l5:3-8 passage does not link Jesus to any specific historical time; it simply reports that he died, was buried, was raised, and had appeared to a number of people alive in Paul's time. There is no suggestion whatsoever that these appearances occurred immediately after his death/resurrection. Whilst the Gospels have Jesus appearing as a resurrected physical human being to his apostles and Acts having Jesus appearing in a totally different form to Paul (ie. after his ascension), there is no such suggestion here; Paul does not differenciate in any way between the earlier appearances in l Cor l5:3-7 and the one to him (l5:8). It appears from this that he believed all those listed in l5:3-7 had experienced the same vision as he had done - they are certainly not made to be companions of Jesus in his earthly life and Paul appears to think of the others who are listed as experiencing a supernatural vision as he had done. The reason for Jesus now appearing was apparently because of the approaching end which was imminent (l Cor 7:29, l5:23-24, l Thess 4:14-17, etc, etc).

Examples of Paul's failure to invoke Jesus' words are:-

Rom 2:l,l4:l3/Matt 7:l, Luke 6:37

Rom l2:l4,l7/Matt 5:44, Luke 6:38

Rom l3:9,Gal 5:l4/Matt 22:39-40, Mark l2:31, Luke l0:27

Rom l3:6/Mark l2:l7

Rom l4:l4/Mark 7:l8-l9

l Cor 6:7/Matt 5:39-40

l Cor l5:35-55*/Mark l2:25

l Thess 4:9/John l5:l7

(* In l Cor l5, Paul uses the O.T. rather than Jesus' statements in the Gospels ie. l5:45 (Gen 2:7), l5:54 (Isa 25:8) and l5:55 (Hos l3:l4).

Paul argues that the 'spirits of this age' will be put down at Christ's second coming (l Cor l5:24-25) - he appears to be ignorant of the fact that spirits were overcome by Jesus in his earthly life (eg. Mark 3:ll) and furthermore this was when Satan himself was judged and cast out (John 12:31).

Furthermore there seems to be no pagan evidence for Jesus' existence either. Reference to his existence doesn't occur until well into the second century and even then the writers seem to be merely repeating Christian statements about Jesus (eg. Tacitus in 120 CE). What is really striking is that thee same ignorance about Jesus' earthly life is found in most other N.T writings, eg. in l Pet, readers are told to love one another, have unswerving faith and put away malice - but the writer never quotes Jesus' words in the Sermon on the Mount - instead he quotes the Old Testament.

With regard to Paul and the origins for Jesus, it does seem that Jesus' 'teachings' overall were borrowed from the O.T. and occasionally elsewhere. It does also seem that messages received 'from the risen Lord' by Christian prophets in trance were fed back into Jesus' earthly life. The Didache, a Christian writing of ca. lst century (probably from Syria) writes of Christian prophets; "Welcome them as the Lord...Every missioner who comes to you should be welcomed as the Lord....While a prophet is uttering words in a trance, you are on no account to subject him to any tests or verifications - this is the sin that shall never be forgiven.......They exhibit the manner and conduct of the Lord.....". Here it can be seen these prophets were treated with the same respect as Jesus himself; what they said was treated as coming direct from Jesus and was not to be questioned. Furthermore this feature is found elsewhere, eg. B.E.Beck (Senior Tutor and Methodist minister, New Testament Studies, Wesley House, Cambridge), in his Reading the New Testament Today, "....Sayings attributed to Jesus in the gospels were used by Christians without acknowledgement, but the possibility cannot be ruled out that the reverse process has occurred - maxims in general use, from whatever source, have been mistakenly attributed to Jesus, eg. Matt 6:34, 7:6. Apparently Christian prophets spoke in the name of the risen Lord, that is, on his behalf. Were such sayings treasured as those of the earthly Jesus ? Was any real distinction made between them when both were felt to express the mind of the Lord who had now risen and was still acting through his church ?

If the distinction was not sharply drawn, what was to prevent a saying of the Lord, delivered through a prop- het, being attributed to the Lord in his earthly minis- try ?...". Much the same thing is said by Ernest Best (Professor of Divinity and Biblical criticism, Univers- ity of Glasgow) in his book, 1 and 2 Thessalonians.

As Paul and indeed other N.T. writers say little or nothing about Jesus' earthly life and Paul's knowledge of him appears to have come directly through revelations and ecstatic states (See 2 Cor ll:1, Gal l:12); at the end of the day it appears that Paul and a few others* believed there were getting messages from the crucified and now-risen Christ who had lived on earth 'sometime in the past' and was now revealing himself as the close of the age dawned (See l Cor 7:29, l0:11). * Note how the post-resurrection appearances listed in l Cor l5:5-8 (which flatly contradicts the Gospels) does not differentiate between the appearances to those listed in l5:5-7 and the one to Paul, but in fact the Gospels and Acts have Jesus' appearances to some of those in l5:5-7 in a physical body and before his ascension, but to Paul it was a wholly different experience, ie. a blinding vision (eg. Acts 9:3-5).

However, the way in which the 1 Corinthians l5 list is worded certainly suggests, as some have noted, that Paul believed the others who had seen the risen Lord experienced it in the same way he did - ie. by direct revelation. He seems to know nothing of any idea that they had ever seen the earthly Jesus.

It is necessary to comment on the argument that proposes that as Josephus and Tacitus, both non-Christians, refer to Jesus, this surely proves he was a historical personage.

These references are very brief fleeting statements concerning a Jesus by (1)Josephus (XVIII, 3.3), ca. 95 CE and (2)Tacitus (anals. xv, 44) ca. 120 CE. However with regard to these, it must be asked, (1)Josephus. (i)Why do no Christians up to the 4th cent. refer to Josephus' priceless remark that 'Jesus was the Christ' ? (ii)Why does the Christian apologist Origen (l85-254 AD) state categorically that Josephus did NOT believe that Jesus was the Christ in view of the statement that calls Jesus by this very title ? (iii)How could a strict Pharasaic Jew make such a statement ? (iv)Why is it written in the same style as Luke ? Surely this suggests rather than being written by Josephus it was taken from this Gospel ? (v)Why does it look like an insertion in the narrative and appears to interrupt the flow, not following on from what is said before and not leading into what is said afterwards ? (vi)Why doesn't Josephus say more about Jesus if he did really believe 'he was the Christ' ? (vii)How it is that a whole host of eminent Christian theologians/scholars who firmly believe in Jesus' historicity reject the passage ?

(viii)Why should this be genuine when other copies of Josephus's Antiquities have been discovered that are heavily interpolated with Christian references ?

(ix)The very fact that it does appear to be a Christian interpolation surely suggests there was a problem, as why should Christians feel there was a need to even do this ?

(2)Tacitus. It is never clear why this is even referred to; this was written nearly a century after Jesus' supposed existence - it is hardly 'contemporary'. If he is quoting a historical fact, then why does he make the same error that Christians also made about Pilate, ie. calling him a procurator when really he was a prefect. Trilling - an orthodox Christian - comments that Tacitus was saying what 'could have reached him from any educated contemporary' and 'is no more than what could be learned anywhere in Rome'. In fact when Pliny wrote to Trajan (ca. 117 AD) he admits that his information about Christians came through actually questioning Christians - not by using any historical record or common knowledge. Tacitus is undoubtedly doing the same. Tacitus does not refer to Jesus as 'Jesus' but 'Christ' - ie. the title ('Anointed/Messiah') that Christians gave Jesus. He could have hardly found this reference in any records he consulted (which would have therefore read:- 'We executed the Christ today' !). Again it is obvious he is only repeating what he had heard Christians believed.

Therefore, despite the feats supposedly accomplished by Jesus according to the four Gospels, apart from there being no eyewitness account about him by any Christians there is none by any non-Christian also, and furthermore there is not even a mention of him by any non-Christian until well into the second century. Somewhat strange if he live, and lived the life as Christians teach.

In sum, there is no eyewitness account of Jesus' supposed life, belief in him apparently arose from a small group of messianists who believed the Christ had lived an incon -spicious life, and died sometime in the past and was now, as he was about to shortly return to usher in the end of the age, revealing himself to them; only by the close of the first century, was this person's life set down as in the 30's and then given a chronological, geographical and historical setting.

"Of the 27 books of the New Testament only the authentic Pauline epistles are, strictly speaking, the testimony of an apostolic witness. And even Paul...was not a witness of the historical Jesus. Since the earliest witnesses wrote nothing...there is not a single book in the New Testament which is the direct work of an eyewitness of the historical Jesus..." (page 197).

(Professor Fuller, Professor of New Testament, Union Theological Seminary, New York. A Critical Introduction to the New Testament, p.197)

 

Last one... Sorry.. from the same site...

No Evidence Of Jesus

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By Larry Sites
Recently, several fundis have asserted that there is much historical evidence that Jesus acyually existed as have alluded to a few round about references by early writers. I can accross the following in a file in America OnLine Religion library:

The early Christians, Origin, for instance, in his reply to the rationalist Celsus who questioned the reality of Jesus, instead of producing evidence of a historical nature, appealed to the mythology of the pagans to prove that the story of Jesus was no more incredible than those of the Greek and Roman gods. This is so important that we refer our readers to Origin's own words on the subject. "Before replying to Celsus, it is necessary to admit that in the matter of history, however true it might be," writes this Christian Father, "it is often very difficult and sometimes quite impossible to establish its truth by evidence which shall be considered sufficient" [Origin Contre Celsus. 1. 58 et Suiv.] This is a plain admission that, as early as the second and third centuries the claims put forth about Jesus did not admit of positive historical demonstration. But in the absence of evidence Origin offers the following metaphysical arguments against the skeptical Celsus: 1. Such stories as are told of Jesus are admitted to be true when told of pagan divinities, why can they not also be true when told of the Christian Messiah? 2. They must be true because they are the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies [Ibid.] In other words, the only proofs Origin can bring forth against the rationalistic criticism of Celsus is, that to deny Jesus would be equivalent to denying both the Pagan and Jewish mythologies. If Jesus is not real, says Origin, then Apollo was not real, and the Old Testament prophecies have not been fulfilled. If we are to have any mythology at all, he seems to argue, why object to adding to it the myths of Jesus? There could not be a more damaging admission than this from one of the most conspicuous defenders of Jesus' story against early criticism.

Justin Martyr, another early Father, offers the following argument against unbelievers in the Christian legend: "When we say also that the Word, which is the first birth of God, was produced without sexual union, and that he, Jesus Christ, our teacher, was crucified, died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, we propound nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter." [First Apology, Chapter xxi (Anti-Niacin Library.] Which is another way of saying that the Christian myths is very similar to the pagan, and should therefore be equally true. Pressing his argument further, this interesting Father discovers many resemblances between what he himself is preaching and the pagans have always believed: "For you know how many sons your esteemed writers ascribe to Jupiter. Mercury, the interpreting word (he spells this word with small w, while in the above quotation he uses w to denote the Christian incarnation) and teacher of all; Aesculapius ... to heaven; one Hercules ... and Perseus; ... and Bellerophon, who, from mortals, rose to heaven on the horses of Pegasus." [Ibid.] If Jupiter can have, Justin Martyr seems to reason, half a dozen divine sons, why cannot Jehovah have at least one?

Instead of producing historical evidence or appealing to creditable documents, as one would to prove the existence of a Caesar or an Alexander, Justin Martyr draws upon pagan mythology in his reply to the critics of Christianity. All he seems to ask for is that Jesus be given a higher place among the divinities of the ancient world.