A question for Atheists,from an Atheist,(Christians enter at your own risk)...?

Question

How many of you,really believe that Jesus really existed? I don't believe,he even existed!

Answer 1

I have never seen any reasonable proof that he ever existed. The one source mentioned over and over again is Josephus. Who was a known liar and not a contemporary of this Jesus.

Answer 2

I don't have an issue with the idea that a man named Jesus lived about 2000 years ago in the area around Israel. And I don't have trouble believing he was a person of some influence or significance. But I can't buy in to all the virgin birth, son of God, resurrection, and all the other bs.

That being said, I believe there is very little historical evidence to suggest/prove he actually existed. Even with modern record keeping, I can't imagine there will be much evidence of most of us in 2000 years. Imagine how difficult it would be to find evidence of a specific individual from a time when very few written records were kept - or at least few survived to today.

Answer 3

I think he may have existed, as he is referenced in sources other than the Bible, but his original views may have become hopelessly convoluted and hijacked for social or political agendas. The rest is mythology descended from messiah figures of other religions.

I certainly don't believe he was a divine figure or rose from the dead -- the Romans made Jesus into a mandate in the third century, so a large part of Christianity (all of it) is tailored to this agenda. I think the character of Jesus was somewhere between a philosopher and a demagogue, if you read the bible. It's impossible to tell which was historically accurate, if any. Some passages contradict. One time the man says "love your neighbor" and "turn the other cheek," but the next book says he comes "with the sword" and to "turn brother against brother."

As I don't know to much about history of his era, I can't have a definite belief that he existed or did not exist -- I just think he was one of many religious reformers of his time, and may have been executed as a threat to the Romans, as many people were.

It reminds me of the schools of Confucius -- multiple students published his works, and some of the schools contradicted many of his original statements. Even considering the good records of his civilization and large impact on society, it's hard to know exactly what Confucius believed and his philosophy. The "record" for Jesus is even fuzzier.

Answer 4

People that do not acknowle HIM are doomed and going to hell. I once heard that most people will believe or not believe in anything: Tell a man a bench has wet paint and he'll believe you and not sit down. Tell him the sky is blue and he'll look up to make sure.

An atheist was walking through the woods. "What majestic trees! What powerful rivers! What beautiful animals!" he said to himself.

As he was walking alongside the river he heard a rustling in the bushes behind him. He turned to look. He saw a 7-foot grizzly charging towards him.

He ran as fast as he could up the path. He looked over his shoulder and saw that the bear was closing up on him. He looked over his shoulder again and saw that the bear was even closer.

Then he tripped and fell on the ground. He rolled over to pick himself up, but saw the bear right on top of him, reaching for him with his left paw and raising his right paw to strike him. At that instant the atheist cried: "Oh my God! . . . "

Time stopped. The bear froze. The forest was silent. As a bright light shone upon the man, a voice came from the sky saying:

"You deny my existence for all these years, teach others I don't exist, and even credit creation to a cosmic accident. Do you expect Me to help you out of this predicament? Am I to count you as a believer?"

The atheist looked directly into the light. "It would be hypocritical of me to suddenly ask You to treat me as a Christian now, but perhaps could you make the bear a Christian?"

"Very well," said the voice.

The light went out. The sound of the forest resumed. And then the bear dropped his right paw, brought both paws together, bowed his head, and spoke: "Lord, bless this food which I am about to receive from thy bounty through Christ our Lord. Amen."

Answer 5

Well even the Jews and Muslims believe that Jesus existed... they just don't believe that Jesus was the divine son of God. So I'm sure that Jesus existed and was likely an inspiring and persuasive evangelistic leader to his followers, but he was not the divine son of a deity. He was simply an inspiring prophet to a class of people who were easily persuaded to follow him.

Answer 6

Don't focus on Jesus for proof . Look at the records about the organization and how it rocked the Roman world. Some historians speak of the individual a tiny bit but of the organization the records go on and on.. Even today the psychology of religion is definitely Christian in the America.

Answer 7

Jesus who? Jesus (Yeshua, Yahshua, Yehoshua, and other Hebrew and Aramaic variants upon the name we translate as "Jesus" [which Ironically is the same as "Joshua"]) were popular at that time. Many people were looking for god's "salvation" (that is what "Jesus" means) from the oppressive Romans.

If you mean Yeshua Bar-Yosef (Jesus son of Joseph), or whom the Christians call Jesus Christ, then I say "no", I do not beleive so. But hey, its possible, I guess. I mean, a lot of scholars believe that behind every myth is a kernal of truth...

Here's something to think about. If a group of Jews created a Messiah lore, naming him "Salvation" would be natural, sine they wanted people to believe he was the salvation of god.

Answer 8

There might be a carpenter by the name of Jesus, who knows, he would be too insignificant to be placed into history.

(Put it this way, a mystical character that goes around walking on water, turning water to wine, bringing people back from the dead, etc etc, will definitely be a big news in real history book, especially since the Romans keeps relatively good history records during that period.)

That is UNTIL a Rome Emperor by the name of Constance decided to create his own religion and make use of this carpenter's tale, mixed together with other fables to fight the Pagans.

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Halo Way .... two points :

A. The part about Jesus in Titus Flavius Josephus History book seems to be too christian to be written by a Jew. A Staunch Jew will never call Jesus "The Christ" since Jew believes the Messiah wasn't born yet.

B. How old was Titus Flavius Josephus when Jesus was around to provide a good and non bias record of Jesus's life? My guess is even his grandfather wasn't born yet.

Answer 9

There is historical data showing the high probability that Jesus was alive.

He, himself, was a spiritual giant, as was Buddha, Gandhi, Mother Teresa.

The son of god, NO WAY!

A person that had a wonderful message of forgiveness, tolerance and love, quite possible.

I really don't have a problem with Jesus, it's the followers that are the problem.

Peace.

Answer 10

I believe you should learn how to use a comma. I personally don't have enough evidence to make a sound statement upon whether or not I believe Jesus ever existed. My gut tells me that Yeshua was a real guy, who really got hung on a cross, though.

Answer 11

He existed. There's more than enough to go on and no scholarly, objective reason to doubt his existence as a human being. Josephus was a Jew, Josephus had no motivation to record that a guy called jesus, who people said was the messiah, was crucified, he recorded that fact and in the same paragraph records the weather (and not as dark and stormy either).

The life of Jesus works on many intuitive levels, he was an inclusionist galilean Jew, he seemed to share the worldview held distinctly by inclusive galilean jews at the time. Also, the explosion of little christian cults and texts about Jesus of Nazareth invariably account for an actual person! How else do you explain it?

I think it would be a leap of faith in fact, for an atheist to deny the existance of Jesus, the Galilean Jew. The only reason i could think to deny such a thing would be because of an emotional reason, and you should be better behaved then that athiests, there are enough loony's on the other side running about spouting crap, we don't have to sink to that level. We can accept that jesus existed as much as we can accept that Plato existed- who invented his speeches and ideas which are worded in many apocryphal texts as well as the four books of the NT? The Judean Peoples Front? The Peoples Front of Judea?

I am however interested in hearing your arguments to the contrary.

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By the way, to the Connolly character above me, 'the historical jesus' is a theory i liked a lot too, when i was younger, but i soon after found that it's author, Barbara Thiering, wasn't the most ethical researcher and invented a lot of her evidence.

(edit 2)
You are right on both counts you ninja turtle! And i'm too far from my books right at this point to remember the explanation for those things. But i'll get there and get back to you. But i'm impressed!

(edit 3)
Ok I just checked it out and i think i have a good response to your comments ninja. First off, Flavius was 100 percent not a christian, definately a Jew and a roman citizen, check what you've read, it could have been a copy of his text that was edited by those dastardly christian monks later. To your second point, age- Jesus should be dead by 36ad (That's when Pilate stops being governor) which makes titus -1years old when he is crucified at the oldest. So when titus is writing of his history, he is looking back, 20 or thirty years he reports a 'tribe' of jews called the christians, he quotes as local fact that

"At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus, and his conduct was good, and he was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon their loyalty to him. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion, and that he was alive. Accordingly they believed that he was the Messiah, concerning whom the Prophets have recounted wonders"


This is the arabic translation of Josephus' account, it's damn old and comes from the dark ages- those muslims were damn good at keeping books we were too busy burning and rewriting, so i like this version.

Now, i do not understand where here, you see anything too christian, i see no reason for Josephus to lie, especially something that has so recently happened and really has no bearing on his own life, this guy is a roman soldier and a Jew. Josephus also refers to James the brother of jesus, and this is once again accounted for in all range of biblical and apocryphal literature. To suggest Jesus never existed, is like saying that there was a conspiracy from around 20 years after he died to create a family history, thousands upon thousands of pieces of literature by hundreds of cults who spread across Jerusalem and infiltrated into the armies and neighbouring roman regions all made to knowingly decieve others in the future!

Hmm i seem to be making enemies with this post, what's wrong??