Did
Jesus Even Exist?
Posted
by Clark Bates
March 16, 2016
March 16, 2016
Given the upcoming Easter holiday,
there are a predictable amount of articles and programs spending time on the
nature of Jesus. This holiday is rivaled
only by Christmas in the plethora of media attention given to the resurrection,
the life and the person of Jesus of Nazareth, most of which does its best to
call into question the historicity of the New Testament biblical claims. Beyond this however, the holiday of Easter is
of paramount importance to those who hold to a Christian worldview. This “holy day” (holiday) commemorates the
single most miraculous moment in the history of the world and the cornerstone
of the Christian faith, the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
In the next week, I'll be posting
several articles regarding the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ in
honor of this most special of days.
While Easter deals specifically with the resurrection, it would be best
to backtrack to the question of Jesus' actual existence. After all, there can be no resurrection if
the figure in question is nothing more than a fable. So what can be said about this one they
called “the Christ”? Was there ever such
a man, or was he merely the thing of legend and myth?
The Historical Jesus
“Historically,
it is quite doubtful whether Christ ever existed at all, and if He did we do
not know anything about him.”[1]
-
Bertrand Russell
Russell's claim still resounds among
many grouping in internet chat rooms all across the globe, but finds few
adherents in the realms of academia.
Even the most skeptical of scholars concede that Jesus of Nazareth was
indeed a real figure. Skeptical scholar
Bart Ehrman, infamous for his work Misquoting Jesus, has even noted
that,
“Jesus
existed, and those vocal persons who deny it do so not because they have
considered the evidence with the dispassionate eyes of the historian, but
because they have some other agenda that this denial serves.”[2]
But how do we know this to be the case? What criteria must be met to verify a claim
made in ancient history? Much like a
police investigation, the historian must examine the existing evidence for a
claim and use that which is before them to come to a conclusion. As it relates to the nature of historical
claims, like the existence of an individual such as Jesus, the evidence falls
into several categories:
1.
Multiple
independent sources make a historical claim highly probable.
2.
Sources
that can be dated closely to the event in question are considered more reliable
than later sources.
3.
Sources
that contain material that may serve as an embarrassment to the author are more
trustworthy than those which highlight only the successes and victories.
The
more of these criteria a specific claim can meet, the higher on the scale of
probability it goes. In the words of
Paul Maier, “it renders the fact unimpeachable.”[3]
While it is still argued that the four
biblical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John should not be accepted as
historical attestation on the grounds that they are religious texts, such
argumentation is inherently flawed. This
sort of a priori approach to ancient texts commits the genetic fallacy
of discounting information on the basis of its source as opposed to its
content. There is no logical reason even
a religious text, written with direct theological intent, cannot simultaneously
contain historical fact. The gospels
themselves serve as testable documentation of the person of Jesus Christ and
should be recognized as such. If these
are accepted, four independent sources attest to the existence of Jesus of
Nazareth, fulfilling the first category of historical reliability, however
these are not the only accounts available, as we will see below.
Extra-Biblical Sources
“Now
there was about this time Jesus, a wise man. . . a doer of wonderful works, a
teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and
many of the Gentiles . . . and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal
men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first
did not forsake him. . .”[4]
Given
that Josephus was a Jew and, in historical context, would be considered an
enemy to first century Christianity, his testimony to the life and crucifixion
of Jesus serves as a powerful reinforcement for his existence.
In addition to Josephus is the Roman
historian Cornelius Tacitus (A.D. 55-120).
Having survived more than six imperial reigns and known as the “greatest
historian” of ancient Rome, Tacitus is generally acknowledged among scholars as
a man of moral integrity and goodness.[5] In his work the Annals, writing about
the reign of Nero, he stated,
“Hence
to suppress the rumor (the burning of Rome), he (Nero) falsely charged with
guilt, and punished with the most exquisite tortures, the persons commonly
called Christians. . . Christus, the founder of the name was put to death by
Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius.”[6]
It was
common for pagan writers to mistake the name “Christus” for Christ, therefore
this reading clearly evidences a non Christian, objective attestation to the
existence of Jesus of Nazareth. Beyond
these examples are multiple other sources that speak of the life and death of
Jesus Christ that can be studied in addition to the two listed here.[7]
Early Creedal Material
While touching on the extra biblical
material for the historical Jesus, the issue of early Christian creeds must be
addressed. It is within this portion of
historical writings that we find possibly the greatest support for primitive
Christian belief and the existence of Jesus Christ. These creeds were first repeated verbally
among believers as a means by which fundamental positions of the Christian
faith might be retained and disseminated prior to any written histories or
epistles. In a manner of speaking, these
creeds are also extra biblical accounts of Christianity, but the earliest forms
of these creeds are found within the pages of Scripture, so they might also be
seen as internal biblical evidence even though they circulated prior to its
writing.
Many of these creeds exist within the
epistles of Paul, however the oldest and most valuable of them is found in 1
Cor. 15:3ff, and it is there I will spend the remainder of this article. The opening of the passage begins as follows,
“For I
delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died
for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was
raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.”
Paul
goes on to record, in vv. 5-8, the appearances of the resurrected Christ to
Peter, to the “twelve” disciples, to more than 500 people at once, to James the
brother of Jesus, the apostles, and finally to himself.
Paul's opening statement of repeating
(delivered) what he has “received” are terms of imparting tradition. The apostle is emphasizing that what follows
is not his own, but another's. Noted
authority Joachim Jeremias notes within this creed multiple phrases that are
non-Pauline such as, "for our sins," "according to the
scriptures," "he has been raised," "third day," "he
was seen," and "the twelve".[8]
Given that this epistle to the Corinthian was likely written around A.D. 52,
and the creed was given to Paul prior to this date, we must ask how old the
creed is.
Dr.
Gary Habermas summarizes the prevailing narrative regarding the age of Paul's
Corinthian creed,
"Dating Jesus' crucifixion around A.D. 30, Paul's
conversion would have occurred shortly afterwards, about A.D. 33-35. Three years after his conversion (A.D. 36-38)
he visited Jerusalem and specifically met with Peter and James (Gal.1:18-19). .
. . the presence of both Peter and James in the list of appearances (1 Cor.
15:5,7) indicates the probability that Paul received this creed from these
apostles when he visited them in Jerusalem."[9]
If Habermas is correct and Paul received this creed
in Jerusalem, that would place his reception of the creed within 6 years of the
crucifixion of Jesus. However, given
that the creed was extant at the time of Paul's hearing it, it is reasonable to
date the creed two years prior, within three to four years of the
crucifixion. What does this mean, then? This creed provides historically testable
material to the belief in Jesus of Nazareth by primitive Christianity as far
back as the time of the crucifixion.
According to German historian Hans von Campenhausen, "This account
meets all the demands of historical reliability that could possibly be made of
such a text."[10]
Conclusion
As was mentioned above, during this time of Easter celebration the question of Jesus' resurrection is often posed. The believability of such a supernatural event is called into question repeatedly, and the very foundation of Christian belief is debated with intense skepticism. While it has become less of an objection in the modern age of scholarship than in times past, the first question to the validity of the resurrection of Christ is the very existence of the man, Jesus. As can be seen from the brief survey above, the historical evidence for the existence of Jesus of Nazareth and his death by crucifixion is overwhelming and exhaustive.
[1]Bertrand
Russell, Why I am not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion and Related
Subjects, ed. Paul Edwards (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1957), 16.
[2]Bart
Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth,
(New York: HarperOne, 2012), 7.
[3]Paul
L. Maier, In the Fullness of Time: A Historian Looks at Christmas, Easter,
and the Early Church, (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1991), 197.
[4]Flavius
Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, (New York: Ward, Lock, Bowden &
Co., 1960), XVIII, 33.
[5]Gary
R. Habermas, The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ,
(Joplin, Mo: College Press Publishing Company, 1996), 87.
[6]Tacitus,
“Annals” in Great Books of the Western World, ed. Robert Maynard
Hutchins, (Chicago: William Benton, 1952), XV, 44.
[7]Greek
satirist Lucian of Samosata in The Death of Peregrine, 11-13. Roman historian Seutonius in Life of
Claudius 25.4 and The Lives of the Caesars, 26.2. Pliny the Younger, governor of Bythinia, in a
letter to emperor Trajan, Epistles X, 96. Historian Phlegon in Chronicles,
preserved by Julius Africanus in Chronography, 18.1. The Babylonian Talmud, Sanh. 43A; 10:11;
7:12.
[8] Joachim Jeremias, Eucharistic Words, 101-102.
[9]
Gary R. Habermas, The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ, 155.
[10] Hans von Campenhausen, "The Events of
Easter and the Empty Tomb," Tradition
and Life in the Church, (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968), 44.
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