People interested in investigating the historicity of Jesus might want to investigate the work of Richard Carrier and John Dominick Crossan.
Crossan who was educated by the Roman Catholic Church in Dublin and Rome was associated with “The Jesus Seminar” a group of scholars interested in the historical Jesus. He has written many books and has participated in a large number of forums and interviews available on YouTube. I’m not sure he ever seriously questioned the historicity of Jesus, but with “The Jesus Seminar” and on his own, he works to separate the history from the mythology in Christian scripture.
Richard Carrier, outside the mainstream of scholarship and crowd funded by group that seemed dominated by atheists, wrote “On the Historicity of Jesus: Why We Might Have Reason for Doubt”. It’s a fat, well researched book that does a pretty good job of going over the history of questioning and defending the legitimacy of a historical Jesus. Overall, he’s hostile to the idea, but in the end allows that there might be a 30% chance that Jesus was an actual historical figure. He is also featured in some interviews and seminars available on YouTube.
Carrier actually does a pretty good job of demolishing most “evidence” for an historical Jesus and undermining the rest. Ultimately, though the question of the historicity of Jesus is NOT a question of “evidence” but only ONE question of faith - and the more one thinks about it, the historicity of Jesus is not even the most important question of faith presented by the Gospels or in Christianity.
you might want to start by reading Crossan's book "The Historical Jesus" in which he describes his research methodology in detail and then goes on to document the very few fragments of speech and activities etc that are directly attributable (from multiple reliable sources) to the historical Jesus, leaving the reader with a very small collection of the most puzzling, mysterious, somewhat bizarre and often arcane twilight language laden quotes you can imagine. I read the book maybe 25 years ago, it helped me begin to begin to see the entire confection of the Judaic supremacist grift that comprise the entirety of the Abrahamic Judeo-Christian pantheon of nonsense.
Okay... sure... but if we required "multiple reliable sources" and "directly attributable speech" to historical figures in order to consider them historical, we'd have much fewer historical figures.
The question to me is: Who has the burden of proof? The people saying Jesus did exist, or the people saying he didn't?
I’m not sure I can recommend any videos of Carrier. He’s too much of a wise ass. But one of the points he hammers home in his book is the unreliability of ancient texts. Except for what’s uncovered by archeology, nothing really comes down to us that wasn’t copied multiple times under Christian authority. The reference to Jesus in Josephus is a particularly easy mark. Read in the context of the surrounding text, it protrudes quite suspiciously especially if you compare it to Josephus’ account of John the Baptist who got way more “ink”. Carrier does a good job of comparing the more reliable epistles of Paul to other pre-Gospel sources. He’s also somewhat interesting in how he locates so much of the myth making about Jesus in Alexandria. I wish he’d write a shorter, less argumentative book that covers the basics of his arguments more concisely. He also spends too much time in the book doing Bayesian statistical analysis which is kind of fascinating but too hard for me to follow.( Bayesian methodology is how he grants Jesus a 30% of having once been flesh and blood.) Thomas Bayes developed his methodology (which is mathematically sound) in the mid 1700s to support claims for religious miracles in the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament . There’s a good account of this somewhere in Substack. Oh, and Jesus (Joshua) and Judas were VERY common names in the historical time and place in question. One of his snarky (but probably valid claim is that Jesus Christ can legitimately be translated as “Savior Savior”. Last I knew, Carrier was offering online courses, and I bought and read his book thinking I might sign up for one.
Crossan, even for a non theist like me, is quite delightful.
Crossan is interesting on a number of levels. Among the least of those very important and valued levels is that he is a serious and enthusiastic scholar who builds on careful research with disciplined thinking.
What most intrigues me about Crossan is an unfamiliar (to me) approach to Christianity which is probably similar to that of many scholars, but ALSO seems to break the stereotype of academics whose serious study leads them “to lose their faith”. That stereotype is probably an ideological construct based on the emphasis “orthodox” Christianities place on “beliefs.”
I’m not completely confident what Crossan’s beliefs are regarding the *divinity* (His Christ-ness? might be a different matter) of Jesus though he clearly believes Jesus was born of a human mother, lived a human life, became an disciple of John the Baptist, generated some sort of following based on “healings”, preachings, and a new type of message regarding “the Kingdom of Heaven.” Crossan also believes this Jesus was murdered by the state terror of the Roman Empire for being a non violent revolutionary. (Crossan argues that if Jesus HAD advocated violence, the Romans would have crucified as many of his followers as they could round up.)
But Crossan does not seem to believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus which for many (and apparently for mainstream and orthodox organized churches) is a core tenet in the sense that one may reject certain claims in the Nicene Creed (like “the Trinity”) but NOT the bodily resurrection (and still be a “Christian”)!. But Crossan, (I believe) still DOES think of himself as a Christian. And he can (up to a point) invoke the precedent of Saint Paul who (I believe) DID believe in the bodily resurrection though he never claimed to have met Jesus before the crucifixion and presented his interactions with the “risen” Jesus as powerful visions. If I’m right, the only “Apostle” who encountered the risen Jesus and actually touched him was “Doubting” Thomas though there is the claim that Jesus “ate and drank” with some Apostles at least once (with no mention of any need for JC to relieve himself in the aftermath).
So, for me, Crossan represents something new. I’m not sure what he thinks about heaven and hell or other forms of ‘afterlife”. But he does seem to believe there is something in the teachings of Jesus regarding the “kingdom of heaven” that is within us and that offers some version of “salvation” from our violence whether it be within our households, our communities, or projected out to the margins of our extremely violent empire even though those margins are not just in Gaza, Iran, Africa, Indochina, the Philippines, Latin America, etc. They are wherever there is exclusion and rejection — and wherever we cannot find the means for forgiveness and reconciliation.
This is where “faith” diverges from “belief” if “belief” is some attempt to reify or condense “faith” (which is more like a process) into some single, incontrovertible nugget (or unchanging “particle”) that can be instilled, drilled into, or imposed onto others.
The thing that has appealed to me about Jesus ever since I was a boy was that Jesus, in much of what is told about him in the Gospels, countered the hypocritical expectations and customs of society, he stood with the poor and oppressed, defended the women, forgave and healed, and appeared to despise convention in nearly every way. I do not know if any of that is historical, if Jesus or what was said about him was historical; perhaps it is just something that resonates deep inside of me that at times allows me to overlook the textual inconsistencies and the parts I really abhor, which mainly come later in Paul's (if Paul is Paul) interpretations (e.g. "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." ; "The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life.") that include the idea of holding people accountable for "sin" (however petty or grave), sentencing them a priori to eternal damnation, and then miraculously forgiving them through a device that harkens back to the sacrifice of animals and even children ("he has made him a propitiation for our sins", etc.) All of this is absolutly absurd and archaic. If Jesus was killed on a cross, it was the Roman state that did it in that everimposing barbarism that is the state; it has nothing to do with appeasing a "God" that cannot be satisfied otherwise. If there is a God of mercy, he is a God of mercy, not of Rome-like justice nor the barbaric justice of Yahweh's priests. If there is a God of love, he is a God of love.
It is perhaps unsurprising that Crossan does not appear to believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ: the scene of the ressurection in Mark does not appear in the earliest manuscripts; an entire half of the last chapter was added later.
So I need go and read Mark again sometime and pay close attention to what he says and what he does not say that was only added later.
GEORGE: (in mock consternation) It’s all too much!
PAUL: (reassuringly fakin’ Jamaican) Neevah too much, Mun. Only jest outta sight.
Here’s the ending to the short version of Mark:
16.5 And entering into the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe; and they were amazed.
16:6 And he saith unto them, Be not amazed: ye seek Jesus, the Nazarene, who hath been crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold, the place where they laid him!
16:7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter, He goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you.
16:8 And they went out, and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them: and they said nothing to any one; for they were afraid.
The first “they” there are the women, Mary (Jesus’ Mom), Mary Magdalene, and another named Salome (presumably not the one who dished the Baptist’s head). There is a REFERENCE to a resurrection (“he is risen”) but Jesus could either already BE in Galilee or was planning to get there soon from wherever else he was that particular morning. The women did not obey “the young man”. Trembling and astonished, they were “afraid.”
Scholars (who knows how?) date the authorship of Mark to approximately between 65 and 75 CE. At about 66 CE was the beginning of first BIG Jewish revolt when insurgents managed to destroy a Roman legion sent down from Antioch to quell them! That would be nearly equivalent to Hamas managing to sink a US aircraft carrier when Nero (I mean Trump) is president. We already know the US/Israeli response to 10/6, so even if “Mark” was writing before 70 CE, it would not be too outlandish to predict the Romans might destroy Jerusalem, tear down the temple, crucify thousands (as they did following the revolt after the death of Herod the Great) and send the sons of the Jerusalem elite that they
'spared" to die slaving in Egyptian copper mines. (That was just how the Romans rolled.)
“for they were afraid.”
Here’s the ending of the longer version of Mark:
16:9 Now when He was risen early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons.
16:10 She went and told them that had been with Him, as they mourned and wept.
16:11 And they, when they heard that He was alive, and had been seen of her, disbelieved.
16:12 And after these things He was *manifested* in *another form* unto two of them, as they walked, on their way into the country.
16:13 And they went away and told it unto the rest: neither believed they them.
16:14 And afterward He *was manifested* unto the eleven themselves as they sat at meat; and He upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them that had seen Him after He was risen.
16:15 And He said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to the whole creation.
16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that disbelieveth shall be condemned.
16:17 And these signs shall accompany them that believe: in my name shall they cast out demons; they shall speak with new tongues;
16:18 they shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall in no wise hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
16:19 So then the Lord Jesus, after He had spoken unto them, was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.
16:20 And they went forth, and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word by the signs that followed. Amen
It’s not clear whether the final part was added to the shorter version or the shorter version was the result of someone intentionally (or accidentally) clipping off the "original" ending. It’s not clear who “Mark” was. It’s not clear that Mark was even one person. One of the many virtues of Richard Carrier’s “On the Historicity of Jesus” is his coverage of the literary sophistication found in Mark even though the Greek used to write that text was not the favored form of those (like Saul of Tarsus) educated in more elite circles.
Someone who knows (ancient) Greek could say more about the meanings inherent in the Greek words here translated as “manifested” and “form” (schema?). Carrier and Crossan both explore how most people (even today) relate to the experience of “visions” especially in the guise of visitations from significant figures who have died. Today, in “the West” (and where its influence is most powerful) there may be CENTURIES of teachings, habits, institutions, and strictures that discourage people from widely sharing such experiences. (People will laugh, condescend, or call you "nuts") But they are still everywhere in all kinds of expressive modes that we are taught to bracket as fantasy, woowu, delusional, hysterical, or the magical thinking of marginalized romantic simpletons. How many Elvis sightings were there in the twenty-five years after the death of “the King?” Last year by accident I came across the Peter Jackson video of the “final” Beatles song (I thought I was simply gonna listen for how Paul had excised a segment of John's audio) and to say I was STUNNED by the resurrection manifested there (Talk about a “young man in white”!) is just a failure to convey a somatic experience in words.
This idea of “bodily” resurrection v the idea of “resurrection” in the ‘forms” of visions and *collective visions* is absolutely vital here. But if we bracket the idea of the physical resurrection of a blood drained corpse and how THAT might “manifest", there is still a lot to explore regarding individual visions and collective vision which must then deal with the perils of veering into derogatory versions of terms like “hallucination” and “mass delusion.” But that writhing growing ball of confusion is something we are NOW being forced to deal with given how rule-of-law democracy is being tested by the ongoing developments in social media, “artificial intelligence”, “virtual reality” etc even as nuclear destruction, ecological disaster (including plagues) and gun cultured social violence (not restricted to mass deportations) loom ever larger as potent force wielding specters.
More minor issues (though still important) in the final verses of Mark (both in the long and shorter) versions include (first of all) the primacy of Mary Magdalene and what that says about the earliest Jesus Movement communities trying to “manifest” various versions of “the kingdom of heaven” as described by Jesus and many prophets that preceded him. But it had to be important that Mark has the risen Jesus first directly "manifest" (in whatever “form) to Mary Magdalene and not to Peter or his mother. If a Jesus movement preaching non violence managed to exist in Judea during the carnage and slaughter of the First Jewish War, it could well have given women’s voices a larger opportunity to be heard. Carrier tries to make a case that the Jesus Movement in Alexandria was much more important than it had ever been (if it existed at all, in his estimation, in Judea), but women seemed to play a much more active role in all the Jesus communities as they popped up in the Mediterranean world even despite increasing efforts to marginalize them as time went on.
Then there are the issues of believing in Jesus or some version of his resurrection which mostly involves the question of believing the various apostles who claimed to have had visions of a risen Jesus. (People back then knew about insanity but seeing visions was not anything likely to cause one to be labeled “mad”. ) The letters of Paul (the ones judged as most likely to be authentic) deal with this issue quite a lot both in terms of the “truth” of Jesus’ resurrection, but also in terms of a “general resurrection” soon to come of all those (Jesus followers?) martyred by Rome’s vengeful terror.
Interesting... but I don't think the argument about Christians inaccurately copying Josephus is a death blow... Scholars seem to agree that did happen, the specific writing regarding Jesus is also preserved in an Arabic version of Josephus.. see: https://youtu.be/7VRQ6zY5wzA
As for Christians inaccurately copying Tacitus, that doesn't seem to make much sense. After all, he calls Christianity an evil superstition. If Christians were going to inaccurately copy something, why would they copy that?
The author of the linked video makes two assumptions that weaken his propositions. One, he assumes that since Josephus claims to be a Jew, and especially a pharisee, he would not accept Jesus being the Messiah. That's nonsense, since Christianity is Judaism 2.0.
The second assumption is that since Josephus in Antiquities of the Jews says some of the same things as are recorded in the Gospels, this gives the gospels historical validity; but if, as Tereza Corragio puts forth, Josephus and the gospels - specifically the first of the synoptic gospels, Mark - had the same (Flavian) authors who invented both Jesus and Josephus Flavius in order to convert the Jews to a less insurrectionary religion (less threatening to Rome) then it would make sense for them to have Josephus and Mark telling a similar story. This to me is a very interesting question.
My doubts come in, however, with Jesus turning over the tables of the money changers in the temple: how would that story and possibly other stories in the gospels serve the interests of the Flavians (Rome)?
I'm curious, though, which passages, acts or words Crossan thinks are legitimately attributable to Jesus and how he makes such a determination.
To me the question of the actual historicity of Jesus is both unresolvable and also relatively uninteresting when compared to the significance of Christianity to the human spirit in antiquity to on through today. Examining the controversies regarding the documentation of his historicity is interesting for what we can learn about the historical context of those documents and the processes of writing history versus the processes of engendering and adapting mythology and religious practice and belief to the needs of humanity and the various ways we are governed and governed ourselves. The “pseudo” and “fake” epistles are fascinating in that context. Josephus is an amazing source, not so much for Christianity but for its historical context. This applies to Tacitus even more so.
On the other hand Carrier only speaks about historiography and methodology while Crossan covers the history in broader, more relevant, and more interesting ways.
To me the question of the actual historicity of Jesus is both unanswerable and also relatively uninteresting when compared to the significance of Christianity to the human spirit in antiquity to on through today. Examining the controversies regarding the documentation of his historicity is interesting for what we can learn about the historical context of those documents and the processes of writing history versus the processes of engendering and adapting mythology and religious practice and belief to the needs of humanity and the various ways we are governed and governed ourselves. The “pseudo” and “fake” epistles are fascinating in that context. Josephus is an amazing source, not so much for Christianity but for its historical context. This applies to Tacitus even more so.
I will have to save this for future reading but I am always fascinated between the Historical Birth and Childhood Person of Jesus of Nazareth and the historical accounts of the Death of Jesus of Nazareth.
Here's a question for you: Was Jesus from Nazareth? There's an interesting reason that some scholars believe he wasn't.
I'll let Chat GPT explain: The theory you're referencing touches on an interesting linguistic and historical debate surrounding the term "Nazarene" and its possible implications for understanding Jesus' origins and identity.
"Nazarene" vs. "Nazareth"
The Mistranslation Hypothesis:
Some scholars argue that the term "Nazarene" (Greek: Nazarēnos) might not originally have referred to someone from the town of Nazareth, as is commonly believed. Instead, it could be linked to:
- A sect or group, such as the "Nazarenes," possibly related to early Jewish-Christian sects.
- A title or descriptor, such as a connection to the Hebrew word netzer (meaning "branch" or "shoot"), which some link to messianic prophecies in Isaiah 11:1 ("A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse").
- The association with Nazareth may have been retroactively applied due to the Gospel writers' desire to locate Jesus' origins in line with prophecy (Matthew 2:23 states, "He will be called a Nazarene").
The Sect Hypothesis:
Another theory is that "Nazarene" refers to a sect of Jewish ascetics or a group like the Nazirites (nazir in Hebrew). Nazirites, as described in Numbers 6:1–21, took a vow that included abstaining from alcohol, avoiding contact with corpses, and not cutting their hair.
However, there’s no direct evidence connecting Jesus to the Nazirite vow. In fact, Jesus' actions (e.g., drinking wine) would contradict such a vow.
Jesus' Appearance
The Bible doesn’t describe Jesus’ physical appearance in detail, but cultural and historical context suggests he likely had:
- Brown skin, given his Middle Eastern origins.
- Hair that might have been long or uncut if influenced by ascetic traditions, but not definitively so. The idea of dreadlocks is speculative and not supported by historical evidence, though it's an intriguing cultural interpretation.
Why This Matters
The debate about "Nazarene" highlights how translation and interpretation can shape our understanding of historical and religious figures. Whether or not Jesus had long hair, the theory invites deeper inquiry into the social, cultural, and linguistic context of the New Testament.
Great comment. Its been a looong time since I read that chapter.
Can you say something more about '"the kingdom of heaven" as desribed by Jesus and many prophets that preceded him'? What prophets spoke about "the kingdom of heaven" before Jesus?
Also I'm curious about the Jesus movement in Alexandria that you mention. I'd like to know more.
People interested in investigating the historicity of Jesus might want to investigate the work of Richard Carrier and John Dominick Crossan.
Crossan who was educated by the Roman Catholic Church in Dublin and Rome was associated with “The Jesus Seminar” a group of scholars interested in the historical Jesus. He has written many books and has participated in a large number of forums and interviews available on YouTube. I’m not sure he ever seriously questioned the historicity of Jesus, but with “The Jesus Seminar” and on his own, he works to separate the history from the mythology in Christian scripture.
Richard Carrier, outside the mainstream of scholarship and crowd funded by group that seemed dominated by atheists, wrote “On the Historicity of Jesus: Why We Might Have Reason for Doubt”. It’s a fat, well researched book that does a pretty good job of going over the history of questioning and defending the legitimacy of a historical Jesus. Overall, he’s hostile to the idea, but in the end allows that there might be a 30% chance that Jesus was an actual historical figure. He is also featured in some interviews and seminars available on YouTube.
Carrier actually does a pretty good job of demolishing most “evidence” for an historical Jesus and undermining the rest. Ultimately, though the question of the historicity of Jesus is NOT a question of “evidence” but only ONE question of faith - and the more one thinks about it, the historicity of Jesus is not even the most important question of faith presented by the Gospels or in Christianity.
Good points! Could you recommend any lectures or interview with either Crossan or Carrier?
you might want to start by reading Crossan's book "The Historical Jesus" in which he describes his research methodology in detail and then goes on to document the very few fragments of speech and activities etc that are directly attributable (from multiple reliable sources) to the historical Jesus, leaving the reader with a very small collection of the most puzzling, mysterious, somewhat bizarre and often arcane twilight language laden quotes you can imagine. I read the book maybe 25 years ago, it helped me begin to begin to see the entire confection of the Judaic supremacist grift that comprise the entirety of the Abrahamic Judeo-Christian pantheon of nonsense.
Okay... sure... but if we required "multiple reliable sources" and "directly attributable speech" to historical figures in order to consider them historical, we'd have much fewer historical figures.
The question to me is: Who has the burden of proof? The people saying Jesus did exist, or the people saying he didn't?
I’m not sure I can recommend any videos of Carrier. He’s too much of a wise ass. But one of the points he hammers home in his book is the unreliability of ancient texts. Except for what’s uncovered by archeology, nothing really comes down to us that wasn’t copied multiple times under Christian authority. The reference to Jesus in Josephus is a particularly easy mark. Read in the context of the surrounding text, it protrudes quite suspiciously especially if you compare it to Josephus’ account of John the Baptist who got way more “ink”. Carrier does a good job of comparing the more reliable epistles of Paul to other pre-Gospel sources. He’s also somewhat interesting in how he locates so much of the myth making about Jesus in Alexandria. I wish he’d write a shorter, less argumentative book that covers the basics of his arguments more concisely. He also spends too much time in the book doing Bayesian statistical analysis which is kind of fascinating but too hard for me to follow.( Bayesian methodology is how he grants Jesus a 30% of having once been flesh and blood.) Thomas Bayes developed his methodology (which is mathematically sound) in the mid 1700s to support claims for religious miracles in the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament . There’s a good account of this somewhere in Substack. Oh, and Jesus (Joshua) and Judas were VERY common names in the historical time and place in question. One of his snarky (but probably valid claim is that Jesus Christ can legitimately be translated as “Savior Savior”. Last I knew, Carrier was offering online courses, and I bought and read his book thinking I might sign up for one.
Crossan, even for a non theist like me, is quite delightful.
https://youtu.be/C2m7I4WEoso?si=zQi2fu4NqxRefklY
Delightful indeed! Crossan is such an intelligent thinker, and expresses himself so well. Thanks so much for sharing!
Crossan is interesting on a number of levels. Among the least of those very important and valued levels is that he is a serious and enthusiastic scholar who builds on careful research with disciplined thinking.
What most intrigues me about Crossan is an unfamiliar (to me) approach to Christianity which is probably similar to that of many scholars, but ALSO seems to break the stereotype of academics whose serious study leads them “to lose their faith”. That stereotype is probably an ideological construct based on the emphasis “orthodox” Christianities place on “beliefs.”
I’m not completely confident what Crossan’s beliefs are regarding the *divinity* (His Christ-ness? might be a different matter) of Jesus though he clearly believes Jesus was born of a human mother, lived a human life, became an disciple of John the Baptist, generated some sort of following based on “healings”, preachings, and a new type of message regarding “the Kingdom of Heaven.” Crossan also believes this Jesus was murdered by the state terror of the Roman Empire for being a non violent revolutionary. (Crossan argues that if Jesus HAD advocated violence, the Romans would have crucified as many of his followers as they could round up.)
But Crossan does not seem to believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus which for many (and apparently for mainstream and orthodox organized churches) is a core tenet in the sense that one may reject certain claims in the Nicene Creed (like “the Trinity”) but NOT the bodily resurrection (and still be a “Christian”)!. But Crossan, (I believe) still DOES think of himself as a Christian. And he can (up to a point) invoke the precedent of Saint Paul who (I believe) DID believe in the bodily resurrection though he never claimed to have met Jesus before the crucifixion and presented his interactions with the “risen” Jesus as powerful visions. If I’m right, the only “Apostle” who encountered the risen Jesus and actually touched him was “Doubting” Thomas though there is the claim that Jesus “ate and drank” with some Apostles at least once (with no mention of any need for JC to relieve himself in the aftermath).
So, for me, Crossan represents something new. I’m not sure what he thinks about heaven and hell or other forms of ‘afterlife”. But he does seem to believe there is something in the teachings of Jesus regarding the “kingdom of heaven” that is within us and that offers some version of “salvation” from our violence whether it be within our households, our communities, or projected out to the margins of our extremely violent empire even though those margins are not just in Gaza, Iran, Africa, Indochina, the Philippines, Latin America, etc. They are wherever there is exclusion and rejection — and wherever we cannot find the means for forgiveness and reconciliation.
This is where “faith” diverges from “belief” if “belief” is some attempt to reify or condense “faith” (which is more like a process) into some single, incontrovertible nugget (or unchanging “particle”) that can be instilled, drilled into, or imposed onto others.
The thing that has appealed to me about Jesus ever since I was a boy was that Jesus, in much of what is told about him in the Gospels, countered the hypocritical expectations and customs of society, he stood with the poor and oppressed, defended the women, forgave and healed, and appeared to despise convention in nearly every way. I do not know if any of that is historical, if Jesus or what was said about him was historical; perhaps it is just something that resonates deep inside of me that at times allows me to overlook the textual inconsistencies and the parts I really abhor, which mainly come later in Paul's (if Paul is Paul) interpretations (e.g. "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." ; "The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life.") that include the idea of holding people accountable for "sin" (however petty or grave), sentencing them a priori to eternal damnation, and then miraculously forgiving them through a device that harkens back to the sacrifice of animals and even children ("he has made him a propitiation for our sins", etc.) All of this is absolutly absurd and archaic. If Jesus was killed on a cross, it was the Roman state that did it in that everimposing barbarism that is the state; it has nothing to do with appeasing a "God" that cannot be satisfied otherwise. If there is a God of mercy, he is a God of mercy, not of Rome-like justice nor the barbaric justice of Yahweh's priests. If there is a God of love, he is a God of love.
It is perhaps unsurprising that Crossan does not appear to believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ: the scene of the ressurection in Mark does not appear in the earliest manuscripts; an entire half of the last chapter was added later.
So I need go and read Mark again sometime and pay close attention to what he says and what he does not say that was only added later.
GEORGE: (in mock consternation) It’s all too much!
PAUL: (reassuringly fakin’ Jamaican) Neevah too much, Mun. Only jest outta sight.
Here’s the ending to the short version of Mark:
16.5 And entering into the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe; and they were amazed.
16:6 And he saith unto them, Be not amazed: ye seek Jesus, the Nazarene, who hath been crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold, the place where they laid him!
16:7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter, He goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you.
16:8 And they went out, and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them: and they said nothing to any one; for they were afraid.
The first “they” there are the women, Mary (Jesus’ Mom), Mary Magdalene, and another named Salome (presumably not the one who dished the Baptist’s head). There is a REFERENCE to a resurrection (“he is risen”) but Jesus could either already BE in Galilee or was planning to get there soon from wherever else he was that particular morning. The women did not obey “the young man”. Trembling and astonished, they were “afraid.”
Scholars (who knows how?) date the authorship of Mark to approximately between 65 and 75 CE. At about 66 CE was the beginning of first BIG Jewish revolt when insurgents managed to destroy a Roman legion sent down from Antioch to quell them! That would be nearly equivalent to Hamas managing to sink a US aircraft carrier when Nero (I mean Trump) is president. We already know the US/Israeli response to 10/6, so even if “Mark” was writing before 70 CE, it would not be too outlandish to predict the Romans might destroy Jerusalem, tear down the temple, crucify thousands (as they did following the revolt after the death of Herod the Great) and send the sons of the Jerusalem elite that they
'spared" to die slaving in Egyptian copper mines. (That was just how the Romans rolled.)
“for they were afraid.”
Here’s the ending of the longer version of Mark:
16:9 Now when He was risen early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons.
16:10 She went and told them that had been with Him, as they mourned and wept.
16:11 And they, when they heard that He was alive, and had been seen of her, disbelieved.
16:12 And after these things He was *manifested* in *another form* unto two of them, as they walked, on their way into the country.
16:13 And they went away and told it unto the rest: neither believed they them.
16:14 And afterward He *was manifested* unto the eleven themselves as they sat at meat; and He upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them that had seen Him after He was risen.
16:15 And He said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to the whole creation.
16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that disbelieveth shall be condemned.
16:17 And these signs shall accompany them that believe: in my name shall they cast out demons; they shall speak with new tongues;
16:18 they shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall in no wise hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
16:19 So then the Lord Jesus, after He had spoken unto them, was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.
16:20 And they went forth, and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word by the signs that followed. Amen
It’s not clear whether the final part was added to the shorter version or the shorter version was the result of someone intentionally (or accidentally) clipping off the "original" ending. It’s not clear who “Mark” was. It’s not clear that Mark was even one person. One of the many virtues of Richard Carrier’s “On the Historicity of Jesus” is his coverage of the literary sophistication found in Mark even though the Greek used to write that text was not the favored form of those (like Saul of Tarsus) educated in more elite circles.
Someone who knows (ancient) Greek could say more about the meanings inherent in the Greek words here translated as “manifested” and “form” (schema?). Carrier and Crossan both explore how most people (even today) relate to the experience of “visions” especially in the guise of visitations from significant figures who have died. Today, in “the West” (and where its influence is most powerful) there may be CENTURIES of teachings, habits, institutions, and strictures that discourage people from widely sharing such experiences. (People will laugh, condescend, or call you "nuts") But they are still everywhere in all kinds of expressive modes that we are taught to bracket as fantasy, woowu, delusional, hysterical, or the magical thinking of marginalized romantic simpletons. How many Elvis sightings were there in the twenty-five years after the death of “the King?” Last year by accident I came across the Peter Jackson video of the “final” Beatles song (I thought I was simply gonna listen for how Paul had excised a segment of John's audio) and to say I was STUNNED by the resurrection manifested there (Talk about a “young man in white”!) is just a failure to convey a somatic experience in words.
This idea of “bodily” resurrection v the idea of “resurrection” in the ‘forms” of visions and *collective visions* is absolutely vital here. But if we bracket the idea of the physical resurrection of a blood drained corpse and how THAT might “manifest", there is still a lot to explore regarding individual visions and collective vision which must then deal with the perils of veering into derogatory versions of terms like “hallucination” and “mass delusion.” But that writhing growing ball of confusion is something we are NOW being forced to deal with given how rule-of-law democracy is being tested by the ongoing developments in social media, “artificial intelligence”, “virtual reality” etc even as nuclear destruction, ecological disaster (including plagues) and gun cultured social violence (not restricted to mass deportations) loom ever larger as potent force wielding specters.
More minor issues (though still important) in the final verses of Mark (both in the long and shorter) versions include (first of all) the primacy of Mary Magdalene and what that says about the earliest Jesus Movement communities trying to “manifest” various versions of “the kingdom of heaven” as described by Jesus and many prophets that preceded him. But it had to be important that Mark has the risen Jesus first directly "manifest" (in whatever “form) to Mary Magdalene and not to Peter or his mother. If a Jesus movement preaching non violence managed to exist in Judea during the carnage and slaughter of the First Jewish War, it could well have given women’s voices a larger opportunity to be heard. Carrier tries to make a case that the Jesus Movement in Alexandria was much more important than it had ever been (if it existed at all, in his estimation, in Judea), but women seemed to play a much more active role in all the Jesus communities as they popped up in the Mediterranean world even despite increasing efforts to marginalize them as time went on.
Then there are the issues of believing in Jesus or some version of his resurrection which mostly involves the question of believing the various apostles who claimed to have had visions of a risen Jesus. (People back then knew about insanity but seeing visions was not anything likely to cause one to be labeled “mad”. ) The letters of Paul (the ones judged as most likely to be authentic) deal with this issue quite a lot both in terms of the “truth” of Jesus’ resurrection, but also in terms of a “general resurrection” soon to come of all those (Jesus followers?) martyred by Rome’s vengeful terror.
I started watching that lecture... very interesting! I plan to watch the rest at some point. Definitely seems like someone worth listening to.
Interesting... but I don't think the argument about Christians inaccurately copying Josephus is a death blow... Scholars seem to agree that did happen, the specific writing regarding Jesus is also preserved in an Arabic version of Josephus.. see: https://youtu.be/7VRQ6zY5wzA
As for Christians inaccurately copying Tacitus, that doesn't seem to make much sense. After all, he calls Christianity an evil superstition. If Christians were going to inaccurately copy something, why would they copy that?
The author of the linked video makes two assumptions that weaken his propositions. One, he assumes that since Josephus claims to be a Jew, and especially a pharisee, he would not accept Jesus being the Messiah. That's nonsense, since Christianity is Judaism 2.0.
The second assumption is that since Josephus in Antiquities of the Jews says some of the same things as are recorded in the Gospels, this gives the gospels historical validity; but if, as Tereza Corragio puts forth, Josephus and the gospels - specifically the first of the synoptic gospels, Mark - had the same (Flavian) authors who invented both Jesus and Josephus Flavius in order to convert the Jews to a less insurrectionary religion (less threatening to Rome) then it would make sense for them to have Josephus and Mark telling a similar story. This to me is a very interesting question.
My doubts come in, however, with Jesus turning over the tables of the money changers in the temple: how would that story and possibly other stories in the gospels serve the interests of the Flavians (Rome)?
I'm curious, though, which passages, acts or words Crossan thinks are legitimately attributable to Jesus and how he makes such a determination.
To me the question of the actual historicity of Jesus is both unresolvable and also relatively uninteresting when compared to the significance of Christianity to the human spirit in antiquity to on through today. Examining the controversies regarding the documentation of his historicity is interesting for what we can learn about the historical context of those documents and the processes of writing history versus the processes of engendering and adapting mythology and religious practice and belief to the needs of humanity and the various ways we are governed and governed ourselves. The “pseudo” and “fake” epistles are fascinating in that context. Josephus is an amazing source, not so much for Christianity but for its historical context. This applies to Tacitus even more so.
On the other hand Carrier only speaks about historiography and methodology while Crossan covers the history in broader, more relevant, and more interesting ways.
I'm open to the idea of real Paul and pseudo-Paul, by the way. I haven't examined that controversy.
To me the question of the actual historicity of Jesus is both unanswerable and also relatively uninteresting when compared to the significance of Christianity to the human spirit in antiquity to on through today. Examining the controversies regarding the documentation of his historicity is interesting for what we can learn about the historical context of those documents and the processes of writing history versus the processes of engendering and adapting mythology and religious practice and belief to the needs of humanity and the various ways we are governed and governed ourselves. The “pseudo” and “fake” epistles are fascinating in that context. Josephus is an amazing source, not so much for Christianity but for its historical context. This applies to Tacitus even more so.
I will have to save this for future reading but I am always fascinated between the Historical Birth and Childhood Person of Jesus of Nazareth and the historical accounts of the Death of Jesus of Nazareth.
Here's a question for you: Was Jesus from Nazareth? There's an interesting reason that some scholars believe he wasn't.
I'll let Chat GPT explain: The theory you're referencing touches on an interesting linguistic and historical debate surrounding the term "Nazarene" and its possible implications for understanding Jesus' origins and identity.
"Nazarene" vs. "Nazareth"
The Mistranslation Hypothesis:
Some scholars argue that the term "Nazarene" (Greek: Nazarēnos) might not originally have referred to someone from the town of Nazareth, as is commonly believed. Instead, it could be linked to:
- A sect or group, such as the "Nazarenes," possibly related to early Jewish-Christian sects.
- A title or descriptor, such as a connection to the Hebrew word netzer (meaning "branch" or "shoot"), which some link to messianic prophecies in Isaiah 11:1 ("A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse").
- The association with Nazareth may have been retroactively applied due to the Gospel writers' desire to locate Jesus' origins in line with prophecy (Matthew 2:23 states, "He will be called a Nazarene").
The Sect Hypothesis:
Another theory is that "Nazarene" refers to a sect of Jewish ascetics or a group like the Nazirites (nazir in Hebrew). Nazirites, as described in Numbers 6:1–21, took a vow that included abstaining from alcohol, avoiding contact with corpses, and not cutting their hair.
However, there’s no direct evidence connecting Jesus to the Nazirite vow. In fact, Jesus' actions (e.g., drinking wine) would contradict such a vow.
Jesus' Appearance
The Bible doesn’t describe Jesus’ physical appearance in detail, but cultural and historical context suggests he likely had:
- Brown skin, given his Middle Eastern origins.
- Hair that might have been long or uncut if influenced by ascetic traditions, but not definitively so. The idea of dreadlocks is speculative and not supported by historical evidence, though it's an intriguing cultural interpretation.
Why This Matters
The debate about "Nazarene" highlights how translation and interpretation can shape our understanding of historical and religious figures. Whether or not Jesus had long hair, the theory invites deeper inquiry into the social, cultural, and linguistic context of the New Testament.
Great comment. Its been a looong time since I read that chapter.
Can you say something more about '"the kingdom of heaven" as desribed by Jesus and many prophets that preceded him'? What prophets spoke about "the kingdom of heaven" before Jesus?
Also I'm curious about the Jesus movement in Alexandria that you mention. I'd like to know more.