-------- Original Message -------- On Dec 24, 2017, 4:50 PM, James A. Donald < jamesd@echeque.com> wrote: On 12/24/2017 8:50 PM, John Newman wrote: > I agree, Wikipedia is badly skewed on this, but it seems like they are > probably just following conventional thought on the issue. Which I feel > is coming around to be more widely accepted that there was no Jesus > as described in the gospels that started the early Christian church This is stupid. There is plausible historical evidence that Jesus did not rise from the dead, nor did the sun stand still over one of the Empire's dominions, but we have ample historical evidence for Jesus the man, who was crucified by Pontius Pilate, and anyone who denies it is just stupid or ignorant. If anything, we have better historical evidence for Jesus the man than Mohammed the Prophet. In actual practice, the Church was founded by Paul, who used the conveniently dead Jesus as basis for what we now know as Christianity. Lots of aspects of the founding myth of Christianity are improbable, and either supported only by suspiciously weak evidence, or contradicted by compellingly strong evidence, but that Jesus lived and was crucified by Pontius Pilate is undeniable by anyone half way sane. The Jewish religion was in a holiness spiral which put them on course for a suicidal confrontation with Rome, therefore one would expect a prophet to condemn this holiness spiral in exactly the manner that Jesus is recorded as condemning it. And one would expect a prophet who spoke the truth on this matter to get crucified. As Jesus the man is recorded as being crucified. This aspect of the founding myth is inherently plausible, and is supported by compellingly strong evidence. --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. <br /><br />https://www.avast.com/antivirus <br /><br />Avast is virus you been had!