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The Jesus myth

© Francois Tremblay

Even today, urban legends about specific individuals propagate even though there are obviously people who would have been witnesses to the rumoured events. Besides, this objection would mean that the testimonies of all religions are automatically true, which is clearly unacceptable to the Christian.

The atheistic objection about the possibility of a human Jesus is much more interesting. Given that the Jesus of the Bible did not exist, they say, a human Jesus could have existed and inspired the myth.

There were plenty of godmen at the time of Jesus, and a great number of them were called Jesus. Only in the New Testament we have Jesus Bar Abbas (in later manuscripts called Barabbas) and Bar Jesus. Josephus identifies a few of these messiahs: Jesus son of Danmeus, Jesus son of Sapphias, Jesus son of Ananus, Jesus the high priest and son of Onias, Jesus son of Gamaliel, Jesus son of Gamala, Jesus son of Saphat, Jesus son of Thebuthus. Couldn't Jesus have been inspired by some of these messiahs?

The most obvious reply to this argument is that we went from a myth to a history, not the reverse. If a human Jesus existed, then the early Christian leaders would have started from those mundane events and built a myth around it. But they did precisely the reverse.

A more fundamental reply is the following: without the Bible, we have no definition of who Jesus was. The Bible is our only source to analyze the existence or non-existence of Jesus. Even if other Jesii did inspire the Jesus myth, it would be completely irrelevant to the fact that the Jesus character as portrayed in the Bible did not exist.

Furthermore, the Gospels contradict themselves on details of Jesus' life, thus making the very definition of Jesus dubious at best. In his book "Losing Faith In Faith", Dan Barker has an Easter Challenge, in which he asks Christians to submit a consistent report of Jesus' last day, according to the Gospels. No one has been able to complete that challenge. The Gospels contradict themselves on such basic things as who visited the tomb, whether it was opened or not, who was at the tomb, the people to whom Jesus appeared, how long he stayed, and where he ascended.

Easter itself is rooted in Pagan origins. The very name "Easter" comes from the pagan goddess "Eostre", the Great Mother Goddess of the Saxons. The bunny (Easter Bunny) was the sacrificial companion of Eostre. Lent, the "hot cross bun" and "Good Friday" are also pagan. The spring equinox had been celebrated long before Christianity existed. In the Mediterranean, at the same time than Christianity existed, the cult of Attis celebrated the spring equinox also.