[ALB]

I wasn't arguing that the hypothesis in Rene Salm's book that the village of Nazareth didn't exist at the time the Jesus was supposed to have been born was valid, but merely that it was further evidence of a controversy on the subject of Jesus and Nazareth.  I agree that the non-existence of Nazareth would not demonstrate the non-existence of Jesus.When I said that this was the subject of controversy over a hundred years ago I was referring to a 7-page long passage in J. M. Roberston's Christianity and Mythology. The first edition was published in 1900. I read some time ago the second, 1910 edition and have just re-read the passage.It's a detailed discussion of the difference, in Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Aramaic,  between the terms for "Nazarite" and "Nazarene".  His view is that the Jesus was originally regarded as a member of the "Nazarite" Jewish sect and that later christians wanted to dissociate themselves from this (and Judaism) and so turned the "Nazar" references to references to his place of birth instead.  The Nazarites, apparently, derived their name from a passage in Isaiah in the "Old Testament" which prophesised that the Messiah would come from a branch (Hebrew "nazir") of the descendants of King David (which of course the "New Testament" tries to make out that their Jesus was). So, whether or not the village of Nazareth existed at the time, the Jesus would not have been born there (had he been born, that is). Roberston's discussion of the question can be found on pages 311-318 here.Incidentally, Robertson mentions in a footnote that

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It has been several times been urged that there is no trace outside the gospels and the Acts of such a place as Nazareth in the accepted Jesuine period.

So Salm's hypothesis is not new either.

[ALB]

Marcos wrote:

alanjjohnstone wrote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazareth

During the biblical time that city did not exist, it was a cemetery, there was a religious sect known as the Nazarenes. Wikipedia is written by peoples who support the mythology of Jesus and they are based on The Bible. The city is not mentioned in the Old Testament and the Talmud, and Josephus does not mention it either.  This is the real history of the city of Nazareth, and Jesus was not born in Israel or Palestine, the mythology comes from Egypt, and he never walked on the city and places mentioned in the Greek writings. The city is not mentioned on the Masoretichttp://ateismoparacristianos.blogspot.com/2010/06/la-ciudad-de-nazaret-no-existia-en-el.html. ( insert it on a digital translator ) http://ateismoparacristianos.blogspot.com/2010/07/las-falsas-evidencias-arqueologicas-de.html.   ( insert it in a digital translator, the city was interpolated in the NT )

It's been known for over a 100 years that there was a problem about Jesus "of Nazareth". Recent research would seem to confirm this:From the blurb about this book:

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The Myth Of Nazareth presents convincing archaeological evidence that the town of Nazareth was not settled until after the First Jewish War, around 70 CE. Exhaustive reconsideration of ALL artifacts from present-day Nazareth shows that the site was not inhabited at the time Jesus of Nazareth and his family are supposed to have been living there. In this book researcher René Salm proves that a core element of the Jesus story was an invention of the evangelists who wrote their gospels towards the end of the first century CE — as it turns out, at the same time the village of Nazareth was coming into being. Requiring eight years of painstaking research, The Myth Of Nazareth surveys the archaeological record of the Nazareth basin from the Stone Age until modern times. It guides the reader through a stunning odyssey of discovery — one which exposes not only the true history of the site but also a scandalous history of evidentiary suppression reaching back into Early Christian Times. The here-established fact that Nazareth is a literary invention puts Jesus of Nazareth in the same class as the Wizard of Oz and implies that Jesus too is a literary invention. Coming shortly after the claim of Israeli archaeologist Aviram Oshri that Bethlehem in Judea also was uninhabited at the time Jesus is supposed to have been born there, Salm's research seems to be delivering a one-two knockout punch to the character known as The Historical Jesus.

[ALB]

I hadn't realised that in Hebrew and Arabic the word for 'christian' in 'Nazarene'. Perhaps that's what we should call them too. After all, we don't accept either that Jesus, mythical or not, is the messiah, the "anointed one".

[ALB]

Alan Kerr wrote:

@ALBIt 1) corrected item in your ADM report and 2) argued … That capitalist ownership is a hindrance to production. That the small capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to that of the big capitalist. That the big capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to Socialist Production. That this supplements your Object So far as we know, I was the first to argue that this supplements your Object. And the argument was right wasn’t it Adam. 

Yes, it's coming back to me now. That fits in with something I remember you saying at a meeting on the Luddites. The Party speaker expressed some sympathy for them, but you argued that socialists should be opposed to them because they were a hindrance to the further development of capitalism and so to the creation of the material basis for socialism. A point of view.

[ALB]

Alan Kerr wrote:

@ LBird,No the alternative is not just democracy as such. The alternative to the market is in Marx’ Capital here.http://www.econlib.org/library/YPDBooks/Marx/mrxCpA1.html#I.I.133

As elaborated on in this article "A World Without Commodities" in this month's Socialist Standard:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2017/no-1357-september-2017/world-without-commodities

[ALB]

Also the author of this book we reviewed:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2014/no-1323-november-2014/book-reviews-notes-end-history-village-against-wHe also appears on our facebook page to "like" things from time to time.Of course it's an interview with him about TA Jackson not him interviewing Jackson.

[ALB]

Alan Kerr wrote:

I was once SPGB and wrote a one page letter to all members. Adam Buick will be unlikely to forget this.  On his advice, I gave to my branch and had hundreds of copies printed for all members of WSM. Branch asked EC to forward copies to companion parties with copies to branches and members of central branch.Please see if you can get copy of that letter and post for anyone to discuss here. It will be relevant to this topic.

I do remember this even if it's going back well over 20 years. There must be a copy somewhere. Was it the one where you argued that labour-time vouchers and labour-time accounting would be needed in socialism?

[ALB]

Here's another, Richard Branson:https://www.virgin.com/richard-branson/experimenting-universal-basic-incomeHe's not calling for full UBI, though, only for the poor.Meanwhile, according to today's i paper, he weathered hurricane Irma in luxury:

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The British billionaire Richard Branson rode out the storm at his home on private Neckar Island in a 'concrete wine cellar'

It's alright for some.

[ALB]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Why is there such a determination to declare Jesus did not exist? In no way does it affect historical materialism or Marxism or the Socialist Party of Great Britain as would be the position if the existence of God was accepted.

The Party does not take a position either way. This is just a discussion amongst socialists and others about the question. As you say, in the end it doesn't really matter whether or not he existed as a person. If he did, christianity would still be crap. After all, Mohammed existed (as a war lord, merchant and paedophile) but islam is still also a load of crap.Ps. I don't think I need to reply to all 30 or so of your identical postings on this.

[ALB]

I have noticed that neither Origen nor Tertullian (whose name has also been bandied around here) are christian saints. This wasn't because they couldn't work miracles from beyond the grave but because some of their views were denounced as heretical. I don't know if this has any bearing on what we're discussing (I think Tertullian thought that Jesus wasn't a god or part of god — don't ask me to explain the doctrine of the trinity; it's a complete mystery). Perhaps our learned friend Roman can tell us what light his fellow christian "scholars" can cast on this.

[ALB]

That book is very good. In fact 10 more copies have been ordered for resale to Party members. If you want to order one email Head Office. Cost, including postage, will be £10 or so.

[ALB]

DaveB, you say that Celsus didn't employ the jesus was a myth argument as he wouldn't have been taken seriously. But why not?  Wasn't this the argument that Christians used to debunk the Greek and Roman gods? According to my Oxford Classical Dictionary someone called Eusebiu did this but you are the expert on these early christian polemicists. 

[ALB]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

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The name "Jesus" means saviour and christianity originated as a saviour religion

not so sure about that. There were on record many Jesuses from that period so not quite a satisfactory defence.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_(name)"The archetypal Jewish hero was Joshua ) otherwise known as Yehoshua (Yeshua) bin Nun (‘Jesus of the fish’). Since the name Jesus (Yeshua or Yeshu in Hebrew, Iesous in Greek, source of the English spelling) originally was a title (meaning ‘saviour’, derived from ‘Yahweh Saves’) probably every band in the Jewish resistance had its own hero figure sporting this moniker, among others."[so saviour or freedom fighter?] "Josephus, the first century Jewish historian mentions no fewer than nineteen different Yeshuas/Jesii, about half of them contemporaries of the supposed Christ! In his Antiquities, of the twenty-eight high priests who held office from the reign of Herod the Great to the fall of the Temple, no fewer than four bore the name Jesus: Jesus ben Phiabi, Jesus ben Sec, Jesus ben Damneus and Jesus ben Gamaliel"http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/surfeit.htmWere they all fictitious because of their name?Should i endow your own name with some religious significance Adam = hebrew "man" or my own =  either "little rock" or "handsome"

The fact that Jesuses, claiming to be saviours and/or messiahs, were 10 a penny in the area at the time (or at least 3 or 4 a penny) strengthens the Jesus is a myth view. Why do think a new saviour cult/sect would name its mythical founder "Jesus". And, no, it doesn't mean everybody called Jesus in the period was fictitious.(Actually, "Adam" does have a religion significance in the context of Northern Ireland where my father was from. There it indicates a Protestant as opposed to a Catholic, not quite so much as Samuel, though)

[ALB]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

As i said and it is reinforced each week on Time Team – absence of evidence does not equate with proof of absence. 

True, but "absence of evidence" is at least evidence of absence though not proof of it. Otherwise your mind would be so open that anything or everything could pass through it.

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Your citation showed that for a quite a senior provincial Roman official, there was no hard proof except hearsay and Josephus until 1961 so a very much younger ALB could easily have been on this forum asserting he did not exist.

You have missed the point. Roman claimed that there was as little evidence for the existence "Ponteous (sic) Pilate" as for his "Jesus". I merely countered by saying that there was more evidence in the form of this artefact. Even before it was discovered, however, there sufficient evidence of his existence, in the writing of Philo of Alexandria as well in Josephus. In 1961 the younger ALB had already read Grant Allen's The Evolution of the Idea of God, published in 1897. I still remember that one of his arguments that what was in the Ark of the Covenant was a huge phallic symbol. Just checked and see he was also sceptical about the historical existence of Jesus. His argument on christianity is that it was just one saviour religion among others that flourished in the Eastern Mediterranean coast at the time (and that proved to win out in the Darwinian struggle for existence among them). Here's what he wrote in one passage:

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I am not such a "gross and crude Euhemerist" as to insist dogmatically on the historical existemce of a personal Jesus. Of the Christ himself, if Christ there were, we know little or nothing. The account of his life which has come down to us in the Gospels is so devoid of authority, and so entirely built up of miraculous fragments, derived from elsewhere, that we may well be excused for gravely doubting whether he is not rather to be numbered with St. George and St. Catherine, with Perseus and Arthur, among the wholly mythical and imaginary figures of legend and religion.

Don't ask me what a "Euhemerist" is. I have just looked it up and see that in this discussion you are one. It's not an insult, by the way.

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Do you dispute the existence of John the Baptist, another only mentioned by Josephus and the Gospels yet lacking artifact proof?

Actually, there's more evidence for his existence than there is of Jesus, which would be why the gospel-writers would have been keen to include a reference to him so as to lend credibility to their myth, just as they did with Pontius Pilate. I'm not saying that you have to have artefact evidence to prove someone existed but it is a clincher.What clinches the argument that "Jesus" was a mythical figure is:1. That he is claimed to be the son of a god. That's a common feature of all myths, especially ones in that part of the world.2. The name "Jesus" means saviour and christianity originated as a saviour religion in which a god-figure sacrifices themself to save his or her followers (and to some extent still is with its talk of Redemption, Salvation, Blood, etc)3.  Paul, the earliest christian to write about Jesus, portrays him as such a saviour-god and not at all as a historical person.As to the early christians, there would have beem more like today's Jehovah's Witnesses, expecting that the "end of the world is nigh" and not interested in changing the world down here, than communistic revolutionaries.

[ALB]

roman wrote:

Spartacus, for one, has MUCH less evidence for his historicity than Jesus. All second hand accounts, no one from his actual community, and, all accounts after his death. I'm not sure what source criticism has been done on the Sparticus account, but I'm quite sure there are probably only one or two sources which the ancient historians used.The High Priest Ciaphas, Ponteus Pilate, and so on.We would expect MUCH MORE evidence for those guys than we would for Jesus (given that during his lifetime Jesus was just another rabble rousing prophet, most of whome we don't know anything about, and a few who get a passing mention in Josephus).For Jesus we have many indepentant sources (Q, Mark, Paul, John, Matthew and Lukes individual sources) with varying degrees of historicity all of which agree on the basics, and the basics fit with everything else we know about second temple Judaism.

Maybe Spartacus did not exist but then no-one is creating a song and dance about it like christians do about their supposed founder. For the record, here's the evidence for the historical existence of a Roman official called Pontius Pilatus:

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The only physical, archaeological evidence that confirms the existence of Pilate is the Latin inscription found on a limestone block relating Pilate's tribute to Tiberius.[11] The artifact, sometimes known as the Pilate Stone, was discovered in 1961 by an archaeological team led by Antonio Frova.[12] It was found as a reused block within a staircase located in a semicircular structure behind the stage house of the Roman theatre at Caesarea, the city that served as Rome's administrative centre in the province of Judaea. Roman governors were based in Caesarea and only visited Jerusalem on special occasions, or in times of unrest. The artifact is a fragment of the dedicatory inscriptions of a building, probably a temple, which was constructed, possibly in honour of the emperor Tiberius,[13][14] dating to 26–36 AD.[11] The dedication states that Pilate was prefect of Judaea, read praefectus Iudaeae. The early governors of Judaea were of prefect rank, the later were of procurator rank, beginning with Cuspius Fadus in 44 AD. The artifact is currently housed in the Israel Museum, Jerusalem,[15][16] while a replica stands at Caesarea.[17]The remaining text reads (conjectural letters in brackets):[11][DIS AUGUSTI]S TIBERIÉUM[…PO]NTIUS PILATUS[…PRAEF]ECTUS IUDA[EA]E[…FECIT D]E[DICAVIT]The translation from Latin to English for the inscription reads:To the Divine Augusti [this] Tiberieum…Pontius Pilate…prefect of Judea…has dedicated [this]

He also figures in a list of Roman governors of Judea drawn up by Josephus, presumably on the basis of consulting original Roman archives. Of course the christians also refer to his existence as a key part of their crucifiction story. No better way of lending some credibility to a myth than by throwing in a historical fact or two..Got to laugh at the authors of the "New Testament" being described as "independent sources" (not that for Paul Jesus was a historical person, just an idea). All the historical record establishes is the existence of a religious sect called "christians"and their beliefs but not that of their supposed founder any more than it does of the supposed founders of other saviour cults that existed in the same historical period.

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