Repetition does not eventually make something true, Martin Ibn Warriq.

>>The historical evidence is massive enough to convince the open-minded inquirer.<<

Welcome back, by the way.

The entire edifice of historical evidence falls away when you examine the sources, none of which was compiled during the lifetime in question.

Far from being "massive" in any stand-alone fashion, the evidence is almost exclusively self-referential. If you believe the first few stanzas of Luke, for example, you can build an entire mesh of interlocking evidence, based entirely on his one claim, that he researched it thoroughly.

But the clincher, to me, is that there are no contemporary accounts. At all.

Historians were in fact hard at work, in a number of places that should have been in total upheaval, if the events described in the Gospels actually occurred.

But did any of them notice a thing? Not one.

Philo Judaeus apparently didn't, despite the fact that he lived in Jerusalem at the time. Where are his reports of the excitement caused by the moneychangers being swept from the Temple? Or the triumphant procession into town of a Jewish messiah on the back of a donkey, preceded by a massive crowd throwing their coats on the ground?

As a noted Jewish philosopher, he would be expected, surely, to have noticed something?

In fact, according to Luke himself, everyone in town was aware of it.

"...Cleopas, answering said unto him, Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem, and hast not known the things which are come to pass there in these days?" Luke 24:18-19

A conspiracy of silence, perhaps, prevented Philo Judaeus from jotting anything down.

Or just possibly, this might be an indication that the sources Luke relied upon as "eyewitnesses" were simply gossipmongers. At the very least, it has to cast doubt upon the confidence with which Luke sets out his stall of information goodies.

"Even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses, and ministers of the word; It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first" Luke 1:2-3

Pericles, are you aware that most ancient history was written way after the events?

For example, Mohammed's biography wasn't written till well over 100 years after his death. As with Jesus, I'm fairly sure no university historian doubts Mohammed's existence, and with good reason. But my point is, the gospels were written 30-50 years after, which is within the lifetime of eye witnesses.

You keep making this interesting claim regarding contemporary accounts here on OLO. Yet I haven't heard or seen you actually explain why you'd expect a contemporary account. Correct me if I've missed your explanation (and please direct me to it), otherwise, feel free to explain this expectation of yours.

It seems that no one has pointed to the weak point in my argument and that is that the risen Christ is relegated to the merely subjective. I say merely because that is where science places subjective experience. Hobbs is the extreme in this when he describes consciousness as phantasms, as not existing in the real world. A friend pointed out to me that if the risen Christ is merely subjective how come he is responsible for something in the real world. i.e. the church? This led my scurrying to read the phenomenologists, Husserl, Heidegger et al . They take objects within consciousness as real objects but objects of a different nature to the things in the world. They cannot be dismissed of being of no importance because they make up what is human. So to say that the risen Christ was an experience of the disciples does not detract from the reality of the risen one. There must be a difference between the living Christ and the risen Christ who ascends to the Father. If we are to hold a coherent understanding of the world together in that God is not a being who can break the laws of nature, then there is no other possibility. God is an object in consciousness but that object is connected to events in the real world, that is why the incarnation is so central. Without it we could go off into any religious imaginings that suit us. It is the incarnation and the death of Christ that confront us with a reality that is in the world and over and against us so that we cannot simply dream up a religion that we find satisfying.

Another friend pointed out that the resurrection was not an extra piece of history added to the life and death of Jesus. It is not in the formal sense history, but experience.

I can only assume that our posts crossed, Trav.

>>You keep making this interesting claim regarding contemporary accounts here on OLO. Yet I haven't heard or seen you actually explain why you'd expect a contemporary account. Correct me if I've missed your explanation (and please direct me to it), otherwise, feel free to explain this expectation of yours.<<

As I mentioned to Martin Ibn Warriq in the post immediately preceding yours, I would have expected someone as smart as Philo Judaeus to have noticed what was happening outside his study window. He was a) alive at the time and b) a noted Jewish historian.

I would expect a contemporary account (Philo Judaeus' work is available in its original form, by the way) from such a person to have referred directly to such acts as the chucking out of the moneylenders - surely they would have made a bit of a row?

If that event had escaped his notice - say, he was away on his holidays at the time - I'm sure he would have been moved to comment on the arrival, on a donkey, of a self-proclaimed messiah, preceded by vast crowds of people throwing down items of clothing and bits of trees as he passed by.

And that was just Jerusalem.

According to the books, Jesus travelled far and wide... Galilee, Syria, Decapolis, Judea, across the Jordan... surely, surely, someone must have been sufficiently interested to have written a few words in their annals.

Nope.

None.

I hope that clears it up for you.

As Justin Martyr said 'if God wanted us to believe in a spiritual resurrection, why the empty tomb?' The Gospels are clear it is you who have reinvented a Jesus to suit your philosophy - one that makes the universe eternal or uncreated and physical laws 'God' in some Platonic sense. You Sells as Paul would say the saddest of all men.

Pericles it seems you argue the Gospels are mythical. I'll leave you to google that one if you will. The mythical gospels greatest champion is Richard Carrier - in the latest debate with Prof. William Lane Craig Carrier was pushed to this admission; the logical outcome of his 'mythical' hypothesis 'the Gospels are works of astounding literary genius'. If you want to live your life believing the disciples had Shakespearan abilities that is up to you. But it is shameful. Very soon who we have really been worshipping all this time will be revealed for everyone to see and that shame will burn like a fire that never goes out. We're men and the meaning and reason of life is to find the true and the good and follow it.

Pray from your heart to Him, you have nothing to lose.

'I am the Way the Truth and Life'.

"Very soon who we have really been worshipping all this time will be revealed for everyone to see and that shame will burn like a fire that never goes out."

o.k. i'll iron my shame suit, make myself a cup of hot cocoa, and sit down to wait. may i watch "south park" while i wait?