Was Jesus a Myth? Part 2

Justin Martyr and the Charge of “Nothing Different”

Yep, First Apology chapters 21, 22, and it looks like also 60, 64.

Um, Dan, have you read all the First Apology textbooks?

No, I haven't read all of them.

So, uh, you said, quote, and I quoted this, I read this, that Justin Martyr's argument is you should all convert to Christianity because it is all the same. Do you really feel that's what Justin Martyr was saying to those guys?

Well, the words he used is we propound nothing different. And those were Justin Martyr's words. Nothing different from what you believe.

But you haven't read the rest of his argument. You don't know what context that was, do you?

No, I haven't read all of Justin Martyr. But, uh, if you can enlighten us how the phrase nothing different means something different, let us know.

Dying-and-Rising Gods, Vegetation Cycles, and Historical Fiction

Um, the concept of dying and rising, uh, saviors. I gave a quote from Benninger, um, who, upon examination, and he is a world-renowned scholar teaching in Stockholm, upon examination of the ancient world, uh, concluded, uh, that none of these dying and rising gods all associated with the vegetation cycle, not only that Yahweh was never a vegetation god, uh, but that there was no connection whatsoever between the Jesus story and, uh, these vegetative gods, all of these religions, et cetera, et cetera.

Uh, do you agree with him or disagree with him?

I agree that Christianity introduces some new elements to theology. Otherwise, we wouldn't have Christianity. I think they were pretty creative in what they did. They were good at marketing as well, although a lot of them got killed for it.

But, um, but that's true in all religions. But, um, the, um, the New Testament makes these, uh, allusions to planting the seed in the ground, the seed must die, and then it must be brought up again. We do have allusions within the New Testament itself, but those people were also aware of vegetation cycles, uh, that Jesus himself would have to die and then rise again.

So, um, when you're writing historical fiction, you're using fiction. Like James Michener, let's say, writes his books. He puts a lot of good history in there, but then he elaborates on it. He's emulating, he's taking, um, he's taking the history that those people would have known at the time and then making a new story on top of all that.

So, I'm not surprised that Christianity has some special, different theology and uniqueness to it, but all religions can make that.

But would James Michener allow himself, um, to be nailed to a cross, uh, for failing to deny his historical fiction?

I don't know, I'd have to ask him. He might.

He might actually defend his fictional stories, though. Okay, alright, thank you.

Well, you know, if any followers of Michener, years later, were to believe, actually, that he was the Savior, that some of them, I mean, often all we did is we have followers who are willing to die for their hero, whether he was historical or purely legendary.

Thank you.

Uh, Mr. Barker, you now have 15 minutes for...

No, just, just go like this.

He said something.

Historical Fiction, Miracles, and the Quirinius Census

The first atheist martyr. Um, well, I started rebutting, actually, the last thing I said was rebutting what you had raised in your statement about external confirmation. And, um, when we are, when someone is writing historical fiction, like the New Testament was, it was fiction within a historical context.

He wanted the readers to know, oh, yes, there was a Jerusalem, yes, there was a Rome, yes, there was a Herod, yes, just like James Michener would say, yes, there was a Stalin, yes, there was a Hitler, yes, there was a Hawaii.

But the stories within that historical framework, those stories are made up stories. Now, I'm putting aside for tonight's, for today's debate, the notion of whether Jesus existed historically or not. Skeptics and atheists are not in agreement on that.

There are many who think that when Mark wrote his first gospel, there actually was another of many self-proclaimed first century Christ figures who thought they were the one. There was a, there was a Judas the Christ.

Josephus writes about that, and he gives more space to that Christ figure than, if he wrote about Jesus, than he gives to Jesus. There was an Egyptian Jew messiah. There was a man named Theodos the Christ.

So there may have been a self-proclaimed Jew who thought he was the messiah. And there have been many after that as well. And his name might have been Yeshua or Jesus. But when the gospels were written, they were not written as biographies.

When you read them, they're not biographies. They are, they are theologically motivated. They take one little story, there's almost all these biographies of big heroes in the past, you know, like Hercules or Alexander the Great.

They put in one or two childhood stories just to say, hey, we should have known. He was really special. And, of course, Mark does the same thing. He puts in a childhood story, and there's this idea that, oh, Jesus should have been known, and he was prophesied.

But the stories that these gospel writers came up with were fictional stories based on history. It should not surprise us in the New Testament to find actual history. It doesn't surprise us to find in Mishnah actual history.

The characters and the stories are elaborations on that. Now, you misrepresented my position on natural explanations. And for the record, I did not say that the naturalistic worldview rules out miracles.

In fact, if you read my book carefully, I go out of my way to say that miracles may have happened. I say that very clearly. What the historical method does is it doesn't rule out miracles. History, being the weakest of all sciences, it's a legitimate science.

In working with probabilities to a greater degree than other sciences, history, in order to work, has to make an assumption. The assumption might be wrong, but historians have to make an assumption of natural regularity over time.

We have to assume that the laws of nature today worked the same as they did then. We have to assume that if somebody says an alien appeared to them in their backyard out of thin air, we have to assume that, well, that's probably very unlikely to have been true, right?

We make those assumptions. So, my point, and I go out of the way to show in this point, that history doesn't rule out miracles. What it does is the assumption of natural regularity over time limits history to what it can actually know.

History is the wrong tool for examining miracles. Maybe the miracles happened, but you need some other tool. It would be like looking for extrasolar planets with a microscope. You're not going to see them because you're looking through this lens.

And history is that lens of a microscope that is so limited that you have to assume that the plays of Shakespeare did not just magically appear on the table in front of them because somebody said so. We assume regularity over time.

That is not a a priori naturalistic rejection of miracles, and that's always been my position. As a sort of knee-jerk casual position, I will say, yeah, miracles don't happen, but I could be wrong. The burden of proof on showing that I'm wrong is on your shoulders, and you cannot use history as your tool of showing that the miracles happened or did not happen.

Because there are always other explanations.

For example, exaggeration, misinterpretation, lying, outright fraud. Those explanations, however unlikely they might seem, are at least more likely than that the laws of nature were violated. Quirinius, by the way.

You're wrong about Quirinius. I have studied a lot and have worked with Richard Carrier, probably. The scholar Richard Carrier has written an exhaustive analysis of Quirinius. The problem here is that Matthew reports that Jesus was born under King Herod, who died in the year 6 BC.

Luke reports that Jesus was born under the census by Quirinius, who, excuse me, Herod died in 4 BC. Quirinius became governor of Syria in the year 6 AD. So, there's a nine-year gap in there. There was no year zero.

There's a nine-year gap in there where Jesus had to have been born here or here and later. Quirinius became governor of Syria in the year 6 AD. Before that, we know where he was. We know what he was doing.

In fact, Syria wasn't even a part of the empire. It didn't even need a census at the time, before 6 AD. So, there's a contradiction in the New Testament about the dating of the birth of Jesus. Of course, we don't have time to go into all the references on all of that.

I will agree with you that since my recent studying in this field, that I'm now going to take Barbara Walker to a lower level of confidence than I used to before. I agree with that. I like her. I know her.

I've talked to her. I've met her. We've interviewed her on our national radio show. I think she's a wonderful person. You are right. Her real passion is feminism. She opposes the patriarchy of Christianity.

She opposes Paul who told women to keep silent in the church. Paul who said it is not good for a man to touch a woman. The Christian patriarchy where women are second class citizens. In fact, many denominations can't even be ordained.

She opposes all of those things. But, I'm questioning the breadth of her scholarship. Which is the main reason why I went to stronger evidences tonight than Barbara Walker. I don't want to belittle her because I know she's working with her own sources.

That's why I thought it was a bit out of line for tonight's debate. For you to introduce and try to rebut something that I did not raise during the debate itself. Mithraism. Actually, we don't know much at all about Zoroastrian Mithraism.

It's a mistake to say that Mithraism came from Zoroastrianism because it may not have at all. There is a Mithra named in Zoroastrian religion as a god. But, that's all we know about it. It was the Romans who took that.

Especially Roman sailors and soldiers. Who took that and made a new religion out of an existing ancient practice. All we know about Mithraism comes through the lens of the Romans. By the way, that's true of Christianity.

All we know about Christianity comes through the lens of the Romans. We don't have any first century paramedic sources. We don't have any actual historical records of what went on there. We are looking at Christianity through the lens of a foreign government.

But, we do know that within the Roman world. There are inscriptions of the slaying of the bull. Showing the twelve signs of the zodiac. And showing twelve events in the life of Mithra. As the Romans viewed it.

Which is probably not what the Zoroastrians thought. And we do show that the birth of Mithra. That Mithra that the Romans believed. Occurs in the same spot as the winter solstice. At that time in history the winter solstice was December the 25th.

And then we see it moving across the top of the cave. We see these inscriptions. So, that's a bit tenuous. But it does show a connection between the birth of Mithra. As the Romans thought of it. And the date of December the 25th.

And besides, you're right. It's beside the point. Because the early Christians didn't even celebrate Christmas. There was no command to celebrate Christmas. They didn't think it was on December the 25th.

Anyway, there's debate among the churches. The early churches never even thought we should celebrate Christmas at all. So, there is some connection with Mithraism. But I admit that Mithraism is not the strongest argument to use.

To show the pagan precedence to Christianity. Some of the other ones I gave tonight are much clearer. Much stronger. Much more relevant to the writers who wrote the Gospels. So, in James' statement. He did agree that there were stories or myths of dying and rising gods.

I'm sure he doesn't believe they actually happened. I don't think James believes that Caesar Augustus was born of a virgin and the god Mars.

I don't.

Do any of you?

But some people did.

There were proclamations. There are documents that predate Christianity. But at least James is admitting that those stories were in existence. And the likelihood that an educated writer. Like people who wrote in Greek.

Because most of the people were not literate. Somebody like Mark and Matthew and Luke and John. The likelihood that they would have been familiar. Especially in that part of the cosmopolitan part of the world.

That crescent there where exchange of cultures was clashing. And they were from all over the place. The likelihood they would have been familiar with those stories is extremely high. It would be extremely bleak to think that these Christians just suddenly sat down.

And were just writing in the back.

Ex nihilo.

So. I.

Well, I've gone through rebutting the basic points that I thought I needed rebutting during your opening statement.

Wait.

One more thing.

Yes.

Jesus.

In many ways was unique. But so was my Three Little Donkeys story. It's unique. No one's ever had a story like that. So is Mormonism.

Unique.

Mormonism.

When you think about it. Think about how Mormonism has attracted so many people because of their special message. There's nothing like it. You can show the pagan precedence to Mormonism. You can show Christian precedence to Mormonism.

I'm sure nobody thinks that Mormon. Joseph Smith just dropped out of Nobel and just suddenly. We all know it was a fraud. We know it was phony. We know he was using the beliefs of the people of his time.

Dressing it up in the language that they would find acceptable. Bringing in Christian precedence and so on. And building this new religion. And if it's true that where there's smoke there's fire. Well look at the success of Mormonism.

Does the worldwide success and impressive growth of Mormonism. They were willing to become martyrs for their faith. Does that prove that the angel Moroni visited the hill Cumorah in Palmyra, New York.

And gave these gold tablets to the Nubians. Does that prove it?

Of course not.

We're all healthy in our skepticism about that story. Unless there's a Mormon here tonight.

Is there?

Today?

I know there's some ex-Mormons here.

So that's.

There's one in the front row there. I just found out from Steve Benson by the way. That there's actually an Arabic island called Cumorah. And you know what the capital of that island is?

Moroni.

And Joseph Smith would have known that at the time. He was pulling the wool over people's eyes, right? Well, you know. Mormonism's unique.

Yeah, yeah, great.

People have changed lives.

And they're good people.

And they have a sense of community.

And they're moral, ethical people, right? But Joseph Smith did not talk to the angel Moroni in the hill Cumorah. Jesus did not go up to a mountain and get transfigured and see these resurrected bodies of Elijah and Moses.

He didn't.

Those things did not happen. You can claim they happened. But a healthy skepticism that I think all of us in this room have. Requires that we back up and say, wait a minute. Am I that gullible? These people that I don't know much about.

From the period of time when I'm not really sure how to interpret what they wrote. I'm just going to take it as historical truth. The historical truth in the New Testament is background truth. The story of Jesus himself.

The actual stories and, in fact, many of the things that he said. Which, you know, seek and ye shall find was said by the Delphic oracles. There was a lot of these things you could find out by the Greeks a lot more.

The story of the widow's mite. That story had already been said centuries before by the Delphic. By the woman who was supposedly inhaling those gases and getting visions from God. Upon which entire civilizations based their strategies.

That was a big deal back then to get these words. Other stories that had predated Christianity. A do unto others actually had been said earlier. At least by the Jewish Rabbi Hillel. And had been said earlier, of course, by others.

Not that Confucianism affected Christianity. But Confucius came up with an even better way of saying it. Don't do unto others that which you would not have them do unto you. So I think in rebuttal to James' opening statement.

We can show that we can grant James a lot of ground. We can grant him some uniqueness within Christianity. But so what? We can do that with all religions. I don't think we can grant him the high level of historical certainty.

Or probability of certainty that he seems to think we should attach to the New Testament. Because it's his personal favorite religion.

If you believe that James Mishner would die for not denying his own fiction. Then most of what I would have to say to you isn't really going to be overly worthwhile. I think it is very obvious that there is a fundamental difference.

Between the stories that are presented by the Gospel writers. And those of the myth writers of the ancient world. We have had it asserted that the Gospels are historical fiction. We have not had it proved.

Assertion is not the same as proof. We had a lot of assertions made during the opening presentation. That if we were to take the time to look carefully at them. I hope you did look carefully at them. And should review some of the things.

Especially some of the alleged Homeric parallels provided there. I think if you'll go into the text. You will discover that just as Dan inserted the word first into 1 Corinthians 15. It wasn't there. You'll discover these individuals are translating the text.

So as to create the very parallels. That they then go, look at this.

It's right here in the text itself.

And they are ignoring the differences that exist. That's the problem. You have here the idea that monotheistic Jews. Who had for centuries suffered under various rulers. Prior to the coming of Christ.

And were always found to be reprehensible to people around them. Because of their monotheism. Because of the fact that they rejected the pagan religions around them. In fact, what were the prophets always going after them about?

But their failures in that very place. The Baals. The Ashtoreth. Which were fertility gods. The dying and rising god stuff. Here in the intertestamental period. And up to the point in the time of Christ.

That has become burned into their national self identity. And so what we're being asked to believe. Is that these writers. And it's amazing to me. I debate John Donovan Croson. And these writers are ignorant men.

Who are unlettered and know almost nothing. Now we're being told.

Oh they knew Homer.

And they knew Roman religious history.

And they knew this mythology. And they had.

I mean these people knew more than almost any person today. Who doesn't have a degree in religious studies. And they could draw from all of these different things.

I still want to know.

Which one were they drawing from?

Was it the Romulus story? Was it the Homer story? Was it Dionysus? Was it Mithra? Was it Osiris? Which one of these many contradictory stories. All coming from a completely different world view. Are they actually drawing from?

That's what I'd like to know.

It's real easy to do the scatter gun approach. And say well they're drawing from this. This is a scholarly debate. There's something that you should be asking each one of us.

Prove it.

Don't just give me an assertion.

Prove it.

Prove that these individuals had resources like this.

Prove that this is what they're drawing from. Don't use very edited, highly edited translations. Where you leave stuff out just to create parallels.

I can do that with anything.

I can find a book by Dennis McKenzie. And I can accuse him of plagiarism by doing the same thing to his text.

Why?

Because they're talking about similar things.

That doesn't mean that there was any dependence between the two at all. Let me tell you what Luke said about his gospel. He started off in writing to Theophilus. He said, inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile the account of the things accomplished among us.

Just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. It seemed fitting for me as well. Having investigated everything carefully from the beginning to write it out for you in consecutive order.

Most excellent Theophilus. So that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught. Now I ask you a simple question. If that's historical fiction, then I don't know what historical fiction is.

That's what was so scandalous about Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code. Is it was upside down history. It was pure, fraudulent, ridiculous fiction. But at the beginning of the book he said, all references to historical documents are true.

Well that was a bold faced lie. It made him millions and millions of dollars. But it was a bold faced lie and people believed it. Is that what Luke's doing? You have to recognize that the writers are not saying this is historical fiction.

The writers are not saying, well I'm going to put some nice stories together for you to convince you that my God does more miracles. As I pointed out, the very miracles found in the New Testament are not meant to demonstrate that in the first place.

And Mark, of all the writers, has the least interest in those types of things. And so the fact of the matter is, the texts that are being attacked here. And it is an attack to say that these are historical fiction.

When the writers never say anything like that, they say the exact opposite. You're saying that they were lying. That they were creating something. In fact, an entire genre that I would challenge Dan to demonstrate existed at the time.

He said, these aren't biographies.

Actually, I know many scholars would say this fit perfectly in the realm of historical biographies of the day. So, the text themselves. If you're not familiar with the text, then you might buy some of this.

The more familiar you are with the text, it makes absolutely no sense. In the same way, I would challenge every single one of you. Go to ccel .org.

Look up Justin's First Apology. Read it for yourself. He said exactly the opposite.

His argument in that point was, you are killing Christians. But you're not killing these people who believe these things. But then he goes on to say, but what we believe is different.

Because it's true.

And in fact, we don't have a God like your God. Who commits parricide. And is himself a one who commits parricide. Who then is killed by someone else. And your sons of God do all these things. And we don't do these things.

He specifically draws the contrast. It is gross misrepresentation of Justin Martin. And I have read him.

All of him.

And I encourage you.

Just do it.

Don't listen to what I have to say. Go read it for yourself. You will discover that Justin Martin argues the exact opposite. What he's saying is, you Romans are being inconsistent. To kill us Christians.

When you yourselves do these things. He's not saying we're all saying the same thing. Becoming Christian. Anything that Dan misinterpreted Justin Martin's statement. To actually say. Take the time to read.

I've read Justin Martin. His dialogue with Trifold. His Second Apology. Things like that. Take the time to find out for yourself. You'll discover it's a commonly misapplied text. He's not the only one who's done it.

But it is found in a lot of atheist books. And it's context is completely different.

So.

Just a couple of other things here. He said that I was wrong. In my representation of him. In regards to a citation from Godless. I was simply citing the book. And I will confess.

I continue to be in under shock.

It's the first time in almost 90 debates. That I have debated someone in a scholarly debate. Where they have said it was absolutely unfair. For me to quote them from their own book. As I said at the beginning.

I wish people would quote me from mine.

That would mean that they actually took the time to find out. What a person believes. And I am very appreciative of the fact. That Dan says.

You know what.

Maybe that long quotation from Barbara Walker. Need to move that down or something. I think that's a good thing. And I commend him for that. And I would hope that the next edition.

This edition only came out a few years ago as I recall. Isn't it fairly recent?

Godless. Two years ago.

Okay. Well.

What came out two years ago. Is fair game in a scholarly debate. In regards to what a person is going to believe. I find it fascinating.

That the entire presentation.

Didn't draw from the same sources. And all that did. Was increase the number of self-contradictory sources. Now we have at least 16 to 20 possible sources. That these Galilean fishermen are trying from.

To create the story of Jesus. To convince monotheistic Jews. Who hated all of this stuff. To become Christians.

Is that really.

A meaningful historical argument.

The terminology that. Was used by Dr. Dan Wallace. And his co-authors. In what reinvented Jesus. And I don't believe that Dr. Nash used that. But there's excellent work on this very subject. The gospel of the Greeks.

That would demonstrate. The fraudulent use of parallels. In historical research. The term parallelomania. I think was illustrated perfectly. In those slides. Where you have for example.

People got in boats.

And people fell asleep in boats. And people got scared in storms in boats.

Well yeah that happened.

Does that demonstrate a parallel? I mean if you go on the internet today. You'll find all sorts of people. Who will tell their stories. About the last cruise they went on.

And guess what?

There will be all sorts of.

Absolutely identical language.

There will be stuff like. Oh the food was great. And there will be stuff like. Oh the food was horrible. They must have been on the same cruise right?

No.

Obviously not. Oh the ship rocked so much I got sick.

Well that's a common one.

Does that mean they're all on the same ship?

No.

This kind of parallelomania. Is utterly invalid. From any logical or rational perspective. The question you have to ask yourself. Given the nature of the Gospels. And the context in which they were written.

What is the background and source. Of the stories of Jesus? Is it not Second Temple Judaism?

Tananic Judaism?

The Judaism of the Second Temple? Is it not the Greek Septuagint? Is it not the prophecies. Of the Old Testament itself?

Is that not more than sufficient?

Is that not what the sources themselves say? Then from whence comes this desire. To come up with something else? Especially since as Dr. Nash has argued. As far as critical scholarship is concerned. This parallelomania was put to bed 50 years ago.

It has been resurrected primarily through the internet. Folks the internet is a wonderful thing. I spend too much time on it myself.

But when it comes to sober scholarship. It's not our best source.

And when I look at movies like the Zeitgeist movie.

Is that really a sober sound source of information?

Or might somebody have.

Somewhat of a. An astrogram. I think they have an astrogram. The New Testament documents. Do not present themselves. As historical fiction. The only reason. That I believe Mr. Barker views it that way.

Is what he himself said. In his fourth argument. In his own book. And that is. Since these documents. Include the miraculous. They are ahistorical. Now he's expanded on that. They are ahistorical. Well how is that.

And how is that being used by Mr. Barker. Well they don't have. The same historical value. As something that would be written by. A good naturalistic materialist. Because they believe in miracles. So God is.

Locked out of his creation. And if he does anything. That actually impacts history. That's not historical. Do you see. The presuppositional nature. Of that argumentation. That was my whole point. It creates a presupposition.

We all have our presuppositions.

But the naturalistic materialist.

Has his presuppositions. And maybe so thoroughly. That he does not even. Recognize them. When they cause. Circular argumentation. As they do in this situation. The historical evidence.

Is that.

The Christian message. Was derived. From the first few decades. Of the first century. That his first adherents.

Were Jews.

That they were not seeking to. They did not intend to. They were not utilizing. Any kind of pagan mythology. As the foundation. Of their presentation of Jesus. It would have gone against. Everything they believed in.

It would have gone against. Everything of the people. They were seeking to convert. And bring into the Christian faith. And any kind of parallelism. Is either falsely constructed. Or is based upon the reality.

That religions.

Talk about similar things.

It is not a parallel. Demonstrating dependence. Or influence. When you talk about death. And if something happens.

After death.

And the purpose of life. And how we should live our lives here. Every religion. Is going to address those things. In a greater or lesser way. Some religions. Didn't care about moral. Or ethical issues.

And so they didn't talk much.

About stuff like that.

Some didn't care much. About the afterlife. They might not talk about much. But they're going to talk.

About creation.

They're going to talk. About where we came from. And what our purposes are.

But to assume.

Therefore.

That there is any kind.

Of dependence.

Or that Mark.

Is just sitting back.

And going.

Well I've got Homer.

Let's see. Mark chapter 5.

Let's mix in some Dionysus. A little Osiris.

And.

I've just got to go back to Homer. I just like Homer so much. That's the perspective. That's being presented.

And I go.

What evidence do you have of this?

The parallels don't work.

Because they involve taking.

This sentence here.

And I'm going to use this word. And so I'm going to use this word.

Over here.

And try to make a connection here. Do you see the thing about Augustus?

Soter.

Is a Greek word.

It has a meaning in political discourse. That is somewhat different than. That in theological discourse. But by translating the same way. You can create it. You can create a connection. That actually has no weight to it.