Talk:Jesus Christ

Atheists denying existence of historical Jesus?

I seriously challenge this and would like to see some evidence for it. As the article correctly notes, the historical evidence for the life of Jesus of Nazareth is very good. Dpbsmith 06:08, 22 February 2007 (EST)

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The article still says "Occasionally someone denies the existence of Jesus, but few scholars take this seriously." No source is cited. Who, exactly, denies the existence of an historical Jesus of Nazareth? If this belief is widely held someone, somewhere ought to have published something about it and the publication ought to be cited.

There's no need to introduce this section with a straw man. Dpbsmith 21:24, 4 March 2007 (EST)

Want confirmation of this? Go to this section of Wikipedia's article on Jesus. It's true that some people deny his existence. It's not a widely held belief; it's only held by a small, and I do emphasize small, minority. Scorpionman 11:17, 7 March 2007 (EST)

When using Wikipedia as confirmation of a fact, I try to follow the trail of cited sources. In this case, the trail leads to Wikipedia's article on Historicity of Jesus, thence to a footnote, which quotes the source as saying

The nonhistoricity thesis has always been controversial, and it has consistently failed to convince scholars of many disciplines and religious creeds. ... Biblical scholars and classical historians now regard it as effectively refuted." - Robert E. Van Voorst, Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000), p. 16.

I don't think "Biblical scholars and classical historians now regard it as effectively refuted" supports the statement that "a small minority [of scholars] argue that Jesus never existed as a historical figure..." Neither of the Wikipedia articles names any scholars, or anyone else, who hold that Jesus of Nazareth was not a real figure in history.

I still will think it's a straw man unless someone produces some reasonably mainstream, reasonably modern examples of people challenging the historicity of Jesus. Wikipedia's neutrality policy says you can include "facts about opinions" when the opinions are reasonably widely held. I think the idea of there not being an historical Jesus of Nazareth is so rarely held that it is not worth mentioning. Dpbsmith 11:48, 7 March 2007 (EST)

I think you have serious defintional issues here that may alter whether or not this is at all a commonly held view. For example, do we mean that Jesus is a figure made up out of whole cloth? I don't think anyone seriously argues for that. Do we mean that he is a historical figure but many details of other preachers at the time got glommed onto his life-story? Many more would agree with this. Do we mean that Jesus is a compilation of the lives of a variety of people from that time period and one of their names happened to stick? I think you would get a lot for this last one. So when denying historicity you need to be very careful what you mean. JoshuaZ 14:15, 7 March 2007 (EST)

Locked

Can someone unlock this article? It needs more information. Scorpionman 11:21, 7 March 2007 (EST)