Mythicism, again, this time for keeps

Debate Room
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There is a debate raging between Mythicists (those who think Jesus of Nazareth did not exist) and Historicists (those that think Jesus of Nazareth did exist). Richard Carrier is a great example of a scholar with quality credentials who has written a great book with tons of evidence that Jesus of Nazareth could well be a myth. Bart Ehrman wrote a good response to the rise of Mythicism, giving his evidence that Jesus of Nazareth existed. Most NT scholars, most critical scholarship, maintains that Jesus of Nazareth is based on a real human who lived in the early first century. Given just Carrier and Erhman, I would hedge my bets on the side of the historicity of Jesus, mostly because everything, gospels and Paul, seem to converge near this date of 30 CE.

However, I have found something that changes that equation, so that I am now completely a mythicist. Jesus was an ancient Jewish mythology, and the gospels are based on those ancient Jesus tales.

The names Joshua and Jesus are artificially separated by Martin Luther. Starting in the 1500’s Martin Luther began translating the OT from the Maseretic, which is in Hebrew. So now the OT Jesus would be called “Joshua”, transliterated from Yehoshua or Yeshua. And the NT character remained “Jesus.” Prior to that the sixth book of the Bible, the book right after Deuteronomy, was the book of Jesus!

In this book of Jesus (Joshua), chapter 10, Jesus son of Nun kills the king of Jerusalem, hangs his body on a tree, takes the body down at evening, puts the body in a cave, and puts rocks in front of the cave. It seems obvious to me that this is a partial basis for the end of Jesus of Nazareth.

I have found 85 instances in the 16 chapters of Mark where Mark explicitly reuses Jesus stories from the OT, and made a slideshow I posted on YT.

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While your points are interesting, I think they suggest a false dichotomy . . . as there are, perhaps, other possibilities besides myth or historicity.

In other posts, I described how–in my lifetime–a scam involving a supposed haunted house blew up and spawned over 60 movies and many, many, books (ie: “The Amityville Horror”).

So, I believe that a reformed rabbi named Joshua (or Jesus, or Yeshua, etc.) probably existed, and legends, exaggeration, and tale tales became attached to him until we have a supernatural figure replacing a real person in gradual increments.

We’ve seen a similar process with the legendary “John Henry” who died defeating a steam-powered tunneling machine. There does seem to be historical evidence of a real John Henry (a former slave, who was also incarcerated at some point) who died young from silicosis . . . and this supposed contest happened only about 160 years ago or so in fairly modern times.

So, a third possibility is that Jesus represents a gradual replacement of fact with myth.

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Thank you for responding, and yes, I used to believe the same.
However, these myths about Jesuses PREDATE the Jesus of Nazareth. There were guys named Jesus who inspired the next edition of the mythology -Jesus of Nazareth (Mark’s early edition).
Jesus Nun - preaching the Law to the people with 6 representatives of the people on each side. (Jesus 8) - Jesus of Nazareth speaking to the people with the 12 disciples

  • Killing the king of Jerusalem, hanging his body on a tree, taking the body down at evening, putting large rocks in front of that cave (Jesus 10)
  • Matthew’s expansion put guards in front of that cave - Jesus put guards in front of that cave earlier in Jesus 10.
    -Jesus Nun complaining to Moses of elders prophesying in the camp (Numbers 11)- disciples of Jesus complaining of others throwing out demons in his name
    -Jesus Nun is rejected by the people, they threaten to stone him, Jerusalem falls 40 years later - Jesus of Nazareth is rejected by his town, and Jerusalem falls 40 years later (Jeremiah is also rejected by the people of Anathoth, and Jerusalem falls 40 years later).
  • Jesus Jehozadak is asked who gave him authority to build the temple, in the response a decree by Darius proclaims whoever violates the temple will be strung up on a beam (Ezra) - Jesus of Nazareth makes a ruckus in the temple, is asked by what authority he does these things, and is crucified
  • Jesus Jehozadak stands in for the people of Israel as his rags are traded for clean linen (Zechariah 3)…
    If we found myths of a John Henry competing against, for example, the telescope as invented by Galileo, wouldn’t you stop thinking there is a basis for a John Henry to have actually lived to compete against the steam engine? What if we found not only John Henry vs the telescope but also John Henry vs the diving bell, and John Henry vs the fire extinguisher? Wouldn’t we have to admit John Henry was a literary trope that is AT LEAST not based on a person who lived in the era of “John Henry vs Steam Engine?”
    Logically, if Jesus of Nazareth’s story is almost completely a compilation of previous Jesus stories, then it would seem the idea of there being an actual person it was based on would go away (it won’t).
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Like yourself a student of the Joshua/Yeshua/Jesus stories, my conclusion is that a very human, but charismatic, Jesus figure may have lived in the first third of the 1st century. It is possible.
The Jesus figure, divine, undead and miracle worker as described in the gospels is utterly improbable.

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No doubt a person named Jesus could have existed then (it was supposedly the fifth most popular name). A person named Jesus could have been executed by crucifixion. An apocalytpic preacher could have roamed the Galilean hillside. these are all possibilities.
However, EVERY aspect of Jesus of Nazareth’s gospel according to Mark is either: based on prior Jesuses (and Absalom Son of David), or on Homeric epics.
Saying an apocalyptic prophet named Jesus of Nazareth was probably crucified near 30 CE is akin to saying a teen named Peter Parker roamed Queens, NY, in the late 1990’s when we have stories about Peter Parker roaming NY in the 1970’s.
Dennis MacDonald uses this same logic to discredit the stories of Jesus of Nazareth that he can reliably say come from Homeric epics. (Robyn Walsh says they are more Virgilic than Homeric, though Virgil used Homer). You COULD hand wave that away as stories (legends) that accumalated to the historic core of an actual JEsus.
However, it seems odd to claim the same about my OT Jesuses theory.

  1. I can eliminate 90% of the gospel of Mark to prior Jesus stories (plus Absalom), and
    2)most of these incidents are not comparable to any other OT character, just to a guy named Jesus (plus Absalom). Sirach even suggests that Jesus is a name to be expected of a savior, so it seems to me there was a accepted mythology of a Jesus hero swooping in to save Israel from time immemorial.
  2. The time frame of 40 years, from message to destruction of Jerusalem tells me this is about the destruction of Jerusalem and the role of those who reject the MESSAGE of relative inclusivity preached by the Jesus character (which dates back to Jesus Jehozadak’s descendants in Ezra and Nehemiah)
    Robyn Walsh also goes against the idea that there was anything new in the message of Jesus
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Joshua/Yeshua/Jesus stories.
There are two other main sources. One I would argue is a Jesus, recognized by the readers of that era, Elisha. Elisha is short for Elishua, which means “El saves” instead of “YHWH saves.” This may seem like a random equivocation, but his master’s name means “El is YHWH” so I think the name is changed (he is a second Jesus Nun) with some purpose in mind. Another name change with similarity is one of the last kings of Judah, Eliakim is changed to Jehoiakim in 2 Kings.
Elishua heals a dead child, heals the blind, heals a leper, and receives the spirit at the Jordan (as does Jesus Nun and Jesus of Nazareth). He feeds a multitude and cures water that was making people sick.
Absalom Son of David is not in any way a Jesus. Its hard to explain why he is included unless the gospels are about rebelling causing destruction, which I think they are. Absalom dies hanging in a tree, and his location is exposed by a common soldier to the captain Joab. Joab says the soldier would have received ten shekels of silver if he had just killed Absalom on the spot. Joab then spears Absalom as he is hanging in the tree. Absalom’s top advisor dies as Judas died in Matthew, by hanging himself. Absalom’s captain Amasa dies like Judas in Acts, by his gut burst open and wallowing in a field. Amasa had been gutted by Joab, who fooled Amasa with a kiss of greeting.
Nowhere else in the bible does a person hang himself, wallow in a field with his guts burst open, or use a false kiss to fool anyone. These are story elements only shared between the Rebellion and the gospels.
There are other high level similarities as well. For example, David returns to Jerusalem by crossing the Jordan, and all Israel comes out to greet him. While crossing, David forgives those who transgressed against him.
(There is also one element of the Rebellion that may have been congruent to the Jesus Nun and Elishua narratives, in that David may have miraculously crossed the Jordan in the original. Notice the parallels of David crossing the Kidron to the Jesus Nun story of parting the Jordan with the Levites prominently carrying the ark and all the people passing in front. After crossing the Kidron with such pomp and circumstance David pops over the Jordan rather nonchalantly. However, I don’t think this element would have made it a “Jesus tale.” I just think it points to a mythology of Jordan being much more sacred than we give credit. The Rebellion may have been simply included because of the senseless violence led to the death of so many in Israel, because the savior was supposed to be a “son of David”, or perhaps because the story is used to fill out Zechariah 8-14, and so conflated with Jesus Jehozadak in some way.

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As I have not studied that particular section of the Hebrew legends I really could not say whether your arguments are persuasive or not. Makes an interesting read though.

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Another even more recent example: until shortly after WWII the Japanese people literally believed their emperor was a god.

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I believe there are similarities between the book Joshua and the symbolic meaning toward the essence of Jesus. But you are mixing everything up.OT Joshua was Jewish not Greek or Roman. Jesus was also Jewish. The names are drawn from their lives and their authoritative figures. The angel Gabriel said Jesus name is Jesus. Christ is Jesus Messianic title. Joshua is a Hebrew name.

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Please define what you mean by “angel”. And please give us an empirical demonstration and/or empirical evidence that there is such a thing as an angel.

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Jesus is not a Jewish name, it was altered obviously, but that aside this gets a resounding so what? What objective reason or evidence is there to believe he was anything but human?

You might as well be quoting Superman, and claiming it is evidence he exists. I don’t believe angels are real, and obviously I don’t believe bare claims like this about them. You have created another circular reasoning fallacy.

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But the writers of the of the Greek gospels learned Greek in their schools. They obviously knew Homer, and Mark uses that profusely.
They read the Old Testament in Greek, the Septuagint, and read the sixth book of the Bible as the book of “Jesus.”
Joshua and Jesus are artificially separated names. If you read the NT in Hebrew, you get Yeshua or Yehoshua for Jesus. If you read the OT in Greek, you get Iesous, for Jesus. In Hebrew, Joshua and Jesus converge to Yeshua or Yehoshua. In Greek Joshua and Jesus converge to Iesous. The names are artificially separated.
Jesus of Nazareth is only one iteration of the repeated Jesus mythology. More accurately, the Moses/Jesus Nun saga is repeated by Elijah/Elishua, Jeremiah/Jesus Jehozadak, and even Ezra/Nehemiah. Then we see John the Baptist/JEsus of NAzareth immediately following the fall of JErusalem. The star of Mark’s gospel is the coming destruction of Jerusalem. Mark sets Jesus of NAzareth 40 years before Jerusalem fell, like Jesus Nun was rejected 40 years before `killing the king of Jerusalem (this is an inversion), and Jeremiah is rejected by Anathoth 40 years before Jerusalem is destroyed. Maybe it is better if I just list the themes repeated, and unique to Jesus stories.

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Here are a few examples:
–Jesus Nun receives the spirit from Moses within sight of Jericho, just east of the Jordan, shortly before Moses dies. Elishua receives the spirit from Elijah after splitting the Jordan, on the east side of the Jordan, as Elijah is taken away. Jesus of Nazareth receives the spirit in the Jordan as John the Baptist baptizes him.
– Elishua receives a double helping of the spirit making him greater than Elijah (Sirach says Elishua did double the miracles). Jesus Naz is considered greater than John the Baptist.
– Elishua (and Elijah) raise a child from the dead. Jesus Naz raised a child from the dead. In Mark’s version, the raising of the child is interrupted by the healing of the bleeding woman, where the posture of the woman imitates the pleading mother of the child in the Elishua story, the person telling the healer the child is already dead is copied, the healer being confused this one time in their entire ministry is copied.
– Elishua heals a leper. Jesus Naz heals a leper.
– In Elishua healing the leper, the method of healing is questioned. The response is “would it be easier…” Jesus Naz heals someone and is questioned how he heals, he responds “Would it be easier…”
– Elishua refuses to leave his master as Elijah prepares to be taken away. Peter says he will not leave as Jesus Naz prepares to die.
– Elishua is asked 3 times if he knows Elijah is going to be taken away. Peter is asked three times if he knows Jesus.
– Elishua simply has to not turn away from watching as Elijah is taken away. He does so and receives a double helping of spirit. Peter runs away. In the original Mark ending in 16:8, Jesus’s resurrection is the end of the story. Peter is not affirmed in any way because the women are too scared to tell anyone what they saw!
– Elijah runs away twice. Once he is fed by animals. The second time an angel feeds him enough food to travel 40 days to Mt. Horeb. Jesus Nun goes into the wilderness to fast for 40 days, and animals and angels tend to him.
– Moses flees to the desert in fear after killing an Egyptian. Elijah flees once after declaring a drought and once after killing the Baal priesthood.
– Elijah flees because he fears a powerful queen, who threatens to kill him. John the Baptist is killed by a conniving Queen who requested his head.
– Jesus Nun miraculously splits the Jordan. Elijah and Elishua miraculously split the Jordan.
– Elishua feeds a multitude. Moses also fed a mutlitude (manna, quail, et al), but the format for Jesus Naz’s unexpected feeding with a small amount, and then some is left over, is from the story of Elishua.
– Elijah. on the way to his death, retraces Jesus Nun’s conquest, replacing Ai with Bethel (Ai is never mentioned unless Bethel is, for some reason). Jesus Nun’s destroyed Jericho, it is rebuilt the verse before Elijah is mentioned. That means Eljiah life story is bracketed by mentions, direct and indirect, of Jesus Nun.
– Moses, at Horeb, is promised someone to lead the people into the promised land. It turns out to be Jesus Nun. Elijah, at Horeb, is promised a helper, and is given Hazael, Jeho, and Elishua, the cut down enemies with the sword (Elishua originally must have been violent, according to the promise in 1 kings 19). Jeremiah is promised a leader, the Branch to lead the people back into the promised land. the name, in chapters 23 and 33, is “Yahweh is our righteousness.” The Branch is crowned in Zechariah 6, and it is Jesus son of Jehozadak. (Jehozadak means YHWH is righteous, but it seems clear that Zechariah thinks his son Jesus is the Branch. Haggai thinks Zerubbabel is the rightful leader but never calls him the Branch.)
– Jesus Nun rejected by Israel, 40 years later Jerusalem taken. Jeremiah rejected by Anathoth, 40 years later Jerusalem destroyed. Jesus Naz rejected at Nazareth, 40 years later Jerusalem is destroyed.
– The adults who rejected Jesus Nun (Numbers 14) will not see the promised land. The children will inherit the land. Jesus of Nazareth is asked who will receive the kingdom of god. He says the children.
– Jesus Nun kills the king of Jerusalem, hangs him on a tree, takes him down at eve, puts the body in a cave, cover the mouth with rocks, and remains to this day. (parts inverted here) Jesus Naz is hung on a cross (“hung on a tree” 3 times in Acts), taken down at eve, put in a tomb (ancient Judean tombs were caves carved in the hillside), a rock was rolled in front, and he is not found in the tomb/cave.
– Jesus Nun destroys Jericho. The Levites march around the city playing music, the people shout, and the walls fall. Nehemiah builds the walls of Jerusalem, the Levites march around the city playing music, the people shout (inverted).
– In Nehemiah the land is distributed among the leaders, like in the book of Jesus (Joshua) 14-24. Some towns in Nehemiah are only mentioned in Nehemiah and Jesus (Joshua).
– In Nehemiah Ezra reads the Law on an elevated platform with Levites on either side of him. Jesus Nun did that in Jesus (Joshua) chapter 8.
– Coincidence? Jesus Nun is only mentioned 2 times outside of his life story. Once just before the Elijah/Elishua saga (where Jericho is rebuilt) and once in Nehemiah, when they relate how the festival of tents is celebrated like it hasn’t been since Jesus Nun.
– Jesus and Zerubbabel are asked who gave them the authority to build the temple, the long response includes an edict from from the Persian king saying anyone who messes with the temple will be impaled on a beam (Ezra 5, i think). Jesus Nun overturns tables in the temple. He is asked by whose authority he does these things. He is hung on a cross soon after.
That is most of the biggies, but there is so much more, just based on these Jesuses: Jesus son of Nun, Jesus son of Jehozadak, and Elishua, whose name means El saves, where Jesus means YHWH saves. Elijah means El is YHWH, so there seems to be some reason behind the name variance.

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Actuuaallyyy… Jesus is a Jewish name in Judea of that era. Look at the writings of the time period. New Testament was wrttine by people who considered themselves Jews (Christian Jews). They all wrote in Greek. Philo wrote a lot. All in Greek. Josephus wrote books in Greek, though at least one was originally written in Hebrew, then he himself translated it into Greek. We dont have early copies, and the earliest copies we have are in Greek. Bor Kochba, the rebel leader in 135 CE, his letters have been found. The Jewish rebel against Rome wrote his letters in Greek.
Jesus is Greek for Joshua. Or rather Iesous is Greek for Yeshua. It seems a lot of educated Jews wrote in Greek. So it seems acceptable to say that various Greek versions of name were just as Jewish as a Hebrew name.

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The English name Jesus, from Greek IÄ“sous, is a rendering of Joshua (Hebrew Yehoshua, later Yeshua), and was not uncommon in Judea at the time of the birth of Jesus.*

Um… Have you read the New Testament?
According to Rabbi Michael J. Cook, Professor of Intertestamental and Early Christian Literature at the Hebrew Union College, there are ten themes in the New Testament that have been sources of anti-Judaism and antisemitism:[7]

  1. The Jews are culpable for crucifying Jesus – as such they are guilty of deicide.
  2. The tribulations of the Jewish people throughout history constitute God’s punishment of them for killing Jesus.
  3. Jesus originally came to preach only to the Jews, but when they rejected him, he abandoned them for gentiles instead.
  4. The Children of Israel were God’s original chosen people by virtue of an ancient covenant, but by rejecting Jesus they forfeited their chosenness - and now, by virtue of a New Covenant (or “testament”), Christians have replaced the Jews as God’s chosen people, the Church having become the “People of God.”
  5. The Jewish Bible (“Old” Testament) repeatedly portrays the opaqueness and stubbornness of the Jewish people and their disloyalty to God.
  6. The Jewish Bible contains many predictions of the coming of Jesus as the Messiah (or “Christ”), yet the Jews are blind to the meaning of their own Bible.
  7. By the time of Jesus’ ministry, Judaism had ceased to be a living faith.
  8. Judaism’s essence is a restrictive and burdensome legalism.
  9. Christianity emphasizes love, while Judaism stands for justice and a God of wrath.
  10. Judaism’s oppressiveness reflects the disposition of Jesus’ opponents called “Pharisees” (predecessors of the “rabbis”), who in their teachings and behavior were hypocrites (see Woes of the Pharisees).

Do I need to quote Scripture? I can certainly do that!
a view that arose in intersectarian polemics in Judaism between the followers of Christ and the Jewish leadership.[22]

’ you testify against yourselves that you are descendants of those who murdered the prophets…You snakes, you brood of vipers! How can you escape being sentenced to hell?

— Matthew 23:31-33[23]

You’re all over the place with your assumptions. So, here is the question. So what, and why should we care? Perhaps you should be discussing your views on a religious site.

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For context and my original point, here is the claim. along with my response.

Ipso facto it was not a jewish name?

The first has some traction, though we can’t know it was “a lot of”, only that the area was at a language crossroads then, as it is now really. The second seems like pure assumption, though the name would have also changed through the influence of the translations into English.

Ultimately there is no objective reason to believe he was anything but human, if indeed he existed at all, and the evidence is scant at best to corroborate that.

Just what percentage of the population are you assuming was educated and literate, in order to make that assumption? I’d need to see something more than an assumption, and the fact the name had a Jewish version rather supports my original point, along with the fact that the stories remained oral for decades, with no contemporary texts existing at all.

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When are you going to learn that hit and run posting of blind assertions does NOT constitute “debate”?

We don’t care what fantasies you entertain, but if you want to have your assertions treated with something other than well deserved scorn and derision, you’ll have to support those assertions in a substantive manner.

Once again, learn that we live in an age where fact checking via reliable sources can be performed in seconds, and manifest nonsense is quickly exposed here as a result.

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There are definitely quotes that can be seen a anti-Jewish, and these quotes have been used for centuries against Jews. And it is common for modern scholars to point these quotes out in the New Testament.
What I find odd is ignoring the fact that such statements are found throughout the Old Testament as well.
Prophets constantly rail against the leadership and/or the priesthood. Jeremiah calls out the “lying scribes” who have rewritten the Torah. Jesus of Nazareth, in the book of Matthew, says he is not bringing anything new. The author of Matthew usually recognizes that Mark is using certain sources, and he expands on these sources. There are literally hundreds of examples in the Old Testament from Moses until Malachi where both the people of Israel and various of their leaders are upbraided for refusing to hear the message and/or the messenger, including calling Judah a whore that enjoys the pleasure from a donkey. This is a message from Jews to Jews.
In the same way that scholars often do not recognize OT Joshuas as Jesuses (yet all recognize Jesus as a Joshua), most scholars silo themselves into NT, OT, or Dead Sea Scroll scholars. Perhaps this explains why NT scholars insist the NT is so different from the OT. (Besides, of course the creative genius of Paul’s logic).
There are a very few passages that are anti-Jewish rhetoric that may be considered beyond what is written in the OT. Of them, the ending of Acts and passages in the latest gospel, John, stand out. But all books are somewhat independent, speaking for each author. Mark holds no such view of Jews as found in John. And Paul boasts that he is a Hebrew, from the tribe of Benjamin. Clearly Paul considers himself a Jew, though he too, points out their faults, as did the OT writers.

Why do I care? I think its fascinating. A simple change in perspective could steer all of biblical scholarship in a new direction. It matters both for OT and NT scholarship.

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You do understand that you have just agreed and contradicted your previous position.

\Why do I bother???

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I am not convinced he does.

This one is harder to answer, as I too, often bang my head against that particular type of wall.

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