Christian Texts and History • Re: On the Neil Godfrey's criticism against Richard Carrier

My primary problem with attempts to prove or disprove the historicity of Jesus is that, even if we can show that the mythology surrounding Jesus in the New Testament was fabricated from various sources, that does not, in and of itself, disprove that there was an actual man at the core. The example I like to use is Arthur. Here we have a huge body of mythology and legend, obviously assembled from various earlier sources, but attached to a figure that may well have been historical. And this happened much more recently than Jesus. My point is, yes, it is unlikely that a man ever lived the life and said all the things attributed to Jesus in the Gospels, but that does not eliminate de facto the possibility that there was indeed a figure, perhaps of some prominence, perhaps not, that was the root of these stories.

Comparing Jesus and Arthur

Your point is one that is often voiced, and not just in answer to me. At first glance, it sounds reasonable, except for a number of considerations. First, as I have pointed out in several places, the picture offered by the early writers about their faith and its history is often presented in ways which exclude room and role for "an actual man at the core." (Titus 1:3, for example, or Paul's talk of the Spirit.) If we had near-contemporary material about the history of England which covered the presumed time and place of the legendary Arthur, and this said things which tended to exclude the possibility of such a king having been on the scene, this would very much weigh against any historical Arthur's existence.

Second is the highly problematic nature of any thesis which postulates that a human man, especially one who did not do the amazing things attributed to him in the Gospels, could have been raised to the cosmic level this Jesus was supposedly raised almost as soon as he was laid in his grave (and especially in a Jewish milieu). One does not turn an obscure preacher, let alone a crucified criminal, into a transcendent deity for no justifiable reason. And the record shows, by its silence, that he would not have been a figure of any great "prominence". This dilemma I discuss at the end of my Postscript.

Attaching "a huge body of mythology and legend" to a humble rabbi makes far less sense than translating a mythological figure into a story of a human man, and the latter fits the documentary record, especially in terms of order, much better. I would also maintain, as a third point, that the profound depth of the silence which is found in the non-Gospel and Acts record, about any "actual man at the core", is strong evidence in itself against such a man's existence. Your comparison with Arthur is not really valid, because the myth and legend attached to him is still at the human, historical level; it has not turned Arthur into a god with absolutely no reference to any kingship on earth.