Is there a single reference that’s clearly to Jesus, that’s actually from a contemporary source (rather than a generation or more after his death)?

He supposedly did a whole bunch of things that cannot fail to have attracted attention (including speaking to very large gatherings).

Was a single one of these newsworthy events ever noted by an actual contemporary?

If we’re can’t be fairly certain of an actual historical Jesus, isn’t all this other stuff just so much back and forth on whether the emperor’s new clothes have a fahsionable cut?

It’s really quite simple:
-The enemies of GW wrote about GW.
-There are tons of historic works about GW.
-The enemies of Christianity wrote about Christ.
-There are tons of historic works of antiquity about Jesus, and His followers.

To claim that Jesus didn’t exist flies in the face of every work of antiquity which claims He did.

Not for nothin’, but replace Jesus with Luke Skywalker and you could, given a couple thousand years, say exactly the same thing, despite the fact that Luke Skywalker never actually existed.

For the record, I think Jesus likely did exist – just not at all like what the Bible says.

As for Julius Caesar, we have coins with his name and face on them. That’s slightly better than the evidence for Jesus.

There is ZERO written evidence about Jesus from the time he lived or shortly thereafter.
Nothing from the Roman historians of that time. Surprising, if he was a big religious figure of the day, with a following of thousands.

Tacitus was not born until long after Jesus died. What he said about Jesus was certainly influenced by Christians of his day.

This is not good historical evidence.

As to whether there are exaggerations or parallels that are made up, I don’t know anything about that. The website that you linked to seemed mostly interested in refuting beliefs that I never heard of. People being what they are, I wouldn’t be surprised if people created spurious parallels. However, my belief that Christianity borrowed heavily from other cults at the time comes primarily from the descriptions of those cults in my two New Testament textbooks (both of which I suspect are written by Christians for a primarily Christian audience). The parallels with the communal meal, and in particular, the Eucharist, stike me as fairly substantial. Neither textbook makes the claim that Mithras was resurrected, or had 12 disciples, so bringing up those beliefs and then refuting them doesn’t do much to change my impression.

Tyler, while I believe that Jesus was a historical figure, your comparison is simply wrong. There are not tons of historical works about Jesus, written down by people living at the time of Jesus. For example, you write that “the enemies of Christianity wrote about Christ.” This is not true. I know of not a single historical work by the enemies of Christianity writing about their first-hand accounts of Christ, or reporting on the actions of Christ. There are probably about 3-4 Roman letters or sentences in the first century A.D. that mention Christians in some way, all of which were written long after Jesus’ death, and all of which only describe Christians, and their beliefs about Christ, not Jesus himself.

to set the record straight, the same way historians figure out George Washington and Julius Ceasar existed is the same way historians figure out Christ existed. it’s called the science of history. Tacitus, the Roman historian who gave us info on Julius Ceasar, wrote more about Jesus Christ than he ever did Ceasar. Yet no one questions whether Julius Ceasar existed.

It’s really quite simple:
-The enemies of GW wrote about GW.
-There are tons of historic works about GW.
-The enemies of Christianity wrote about Christ.
-There are tons of historic works of antiquity about Jesus, and His followers.

To claim that Jesus didn’t exist flies in the face of every work of antiquity which claims He did.

wish i had the time to respond to all 200 comments here, but at least i can try to give you the other side of things on this point.

take care

J.J. Ramsey, your explanations of why Mithraism is not similar to Christianity don’t make a lot of sense…. The claim is not that that Christianity is a carbon copy of any other religion, but that significant, central, elements of Christianity are borrowed from other religions

I know that the claim is that “significant, central, elements of Christianity are borrowed from other religions.” Trouble is, while that claim certainly holds true if the other religions in question are various forms of Judaism, it’s very dicey with regard to pagan parallels.

Take, for example, the supposed parallels between Mithraism and Christianity. The good parallels, such as Mithras and Jesus supposedly being resurrected or Mithras and Jesus having 12 disciples, are made up, and the parallels that aren’t made up, like the communal meal, aren’t very good. I find that this pattern is pretty common, not just with Mithraism, but with other pagan parallels as well.

In case I’m not perfectly clear, when I say that the claim about Mithras being resurrected is “made up,” I mean that there is no evidence that actual worshipers of Mithras actually believed that Mithras was resurrected, and that someone who claims that they did is either lying or mistaken.

These started as an oral tradition, and were not put in writing till at least 40 years after the death of Christ.

I think this bears repeating. Look at how many people believe in alternate versions of history nowadays. Holocaust deniers, Roswell UFO crash believers, et cetera. We know they’re wrong – we have the evidence to prove as much, though they reject it as a matter of doctrine – but their beliefs persist because the myth has evolved. Imagine just how much a simple story about a crucifixion could evolve in an era with no centralized historical record, especially when the story was passed around Telephone-style for 40 years. Pass a myth around long enough and far enough, without any means of refutation other than the word of a religiously and socially oppressive government, and the myth will be accepted as fact.

C. S. Lewis proposed that if Jesus actually said the things the Bible says he did, then he was either a lunatic, a liar, or the Lord. I’d add a fourth option: Legend.

The gospels are legend, not history. It’s ludicrous to assert that virtually all contemporary scholars accept them as fact. Contemporary Christian Biblical scholars do, but I doubt there are many scholars of other faiths, secular scholars, or historical scholars (vice theological scholars) who do so.