Firstly, I apologize for the delay in this. Life, as it is wont to do, got in the way
You're correct, my mistake.
Fair Enough
Other than the bible, there's hardly any historical evidence that a historical Jesus existed
That's a neat trick. Other than the best evidence for a thing, there's hardly any evidence for a thing.
I've run into it a bit, but mostly when dealing with the conspiracy theorist folks, who like to start from "sure, the evidence the goverment tells us is true
seems to show that the Jews/Templars/CIA/Mossad/Aliens/Whomever didn't pull off 9/11, but if you put that to the side for the moment, isn't it interesting that...."
No. The Gospels are historical accounts, written as such.
Finally, afaik, other than the bible, you have Josepheus, and like the gospels writers, he wasn't a contemporary of Jesus. And most biblical scholars now believe that part of his writing is forged.
Josephus actually mentions Jesus twice. In one of those sections (the Testimonium), it does look like a later Christian author inserted the description "He was the Christ". If you remove the (likely) insert, however, you are left with two additional mentions by a single author.
Mara Bar Serapion is another outside mention from a (likely) first century author. Tacitus and Pliny the younger (early second century) also mention a historical Jesus, who was killed under Pontius Pilate during the reign of Tiberius and who was worshiped by his followers as a God. Suetonius confirms the expulsion from Rome mentioned in Acts 18, Thallus and Phlegon recorded darkness and an earthquake as described in the Synoptic Gospels, etc. so on and so forth. Lucian of Samosata (mid second century) derided Chrisitanity, but recorded that Jesus was crucified and worshiped by his followers, who believed they have eternal life. Celsus (later second century) recorded in his criticism of Christianity that Jesus performed miracles, but blamed sorcery. So did the Hebrew Talmud, who describes a Jesus who came out of Egypt, performed miracles, an led many "astray" (though their dates jump around a bit; the Talmud itself wasn't really put together for a few centuries).
I can live with you saying Jesus the man existed. But I am curious how why you think that Jesus is attested to to such a high standard of evidence? No eye witnesses. Nobody knows who wrote the gospels. Other than the bible, no evidence of what Jesus actually said.... That's nice, but they are anonymous, and they are not contemporary. They are written like a game of telephone, one after the other, each making the story crazier and crazier.
you are unfortunately incorrect on a couple of accounts.
Firstly,the Gospel authors are hardly unknown. There is solid external and internal evidence for the authorship of all of them, stemming from the earliest days of the Church.
Secondly, all of them contain contemporary accounts. Two of them (Matthew and John) are the accounts of the disciples themselves (though, in John's case, likely written by his disciples at the end of his death), and the other two (Mark and Luke) are written by aids to disciples (Mark was the helper of Peter, and Luke the helper of Paul). Luke, in particular, went even further, and appears to have traveled through the first-generation Christian church in Judea, to speak with others who had been part of the life of Jesus. For example, Luke has material that seems to have come from Jesus' immediate family.
Thirdly, you are incorrect on the transmission of verbal accounts - it is hardly the child's game of telephone. Firstly, within the first three generations, you have a period of transmission that is pretty critical - you have the witnesses, the people who heard it from the witnesses, and then the people who can recount the accounts received from the witnesses. For example, I've talked with someone who was a veteran of the Son Tay Prison raid, and can tell you what he said about it. You would be able to recount my telling, but after that it becomes the friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend-who-heard-it-from style material.
But that is only with a single, relatively minor (though cool) event, and only with two people. Within a community, transmission of highly valued material is far more protected. Think, for example, of a game of telephone where, instead of whispering in the ear of the person next to them, each individual spoke the message out loud, so that both the person who had told
them and
everyone else in the room who had heard the message reiterated multiple times up until that point could hear
their iteration. Mistakes can certainly happen (as my wife is fond of pointing out to me, the hearing of man is imperfect), but are also subject to immediate correction by the group. This in-group correction happens more, the more the group values the content.
