In a recent discussion in the comments section of one of my blog posts, a person who doubts the historicity of Jesus suggested that an appropriate comparison of ancient figures would be that with Socrates, Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar. These three have solid contemporary witnesses, whereas there is none for Jesus.
While I disagree that there is no good contemporary witness for Jesus, that is not where I want go. I will give that there is very solid historical information for Julius Caesar. The advantage there is that we have what people wrote about Caesar as well as some of his own writings. It would be hard to argue with, although I suppose if someone was determined enough, all they would have to do is insist that it is all forged.
I want to focus on the other two though. First of all, I have no doubt that Socrates and Alexander were historical figures. But what do we know of them and how reliable are our accounts? Socrates is known to us primarily from Plato, although he is mention by Xenophon and Aristophanes (no one would use Aristophanes as history). Yet, Platonic scholars will readily admit that very often Plato is using the figure of Socrates as a character in his books to express Plato’s own thoughts rather than recounting Socrates own teachings or experiences. We have no idea where Socrates ends and where Plato begins.
What about Alexander the Great? We have a number of surviving biographies. The fact that we have a number would seem to put us on firmer historical ground. The problem is that all of these were written long after the events. The five main surviving accounts are by Arrian, Curtius, Plutarch, Diodorus, and Justin. Of these, all but Diodorus lived after the time of Christ. Even Diodorus was from the second half of the first century BC. I find it it interesting that people will take these accounts seriously as history and then dismiss Paul because he wrote twenty to thirty years after the events and the Gospels because they were written forty to fifty years after the events. Would it really be preferable to have accounts three hundred years after the events?
Does this “prove” Jesus existed? But it should make us be cautious in what standards we use to decide who is historical and who is mythical.
Is the question whether we can know they existed, full stop, or is it whether we can reliably know their deeds and words, etc.? With the Socrates example, it sounds like you are questioning the latter, but surely Plato’s work is enough to establish the former with reasonable certainty.
The whole Jesus myth movement to me seems to be built on an overextrapolation from “there are some elements of the Bible that seem clearly mythologized” to “all of the Bible is mythologized.” I happen to agree with the first statement, but not the second. You can probably make the same point against the parallels drawn between ancient hero figures and Jesus.
I am more responding to the idea that there was no historical Jesus and that he is just another Horus or Mithras. What I am trying to demonstrate that it is not so clear that we have really bad witnesses for Jesus and then these great, contemporary and unbiased sources for other ancient figures.
Sir,
I think whether it is Socrates, Jesus or Alexander the Great, they were part of history, because many papers that write about their history, but perhaps there is no definite information about the year.
Thanks for the Great Post
I really enjoyed this post, Stephen. Many people who wish to dismiss Jesus as an historical person seldom take into consideration that to do so, based on the same criteria they use, is to dismiss a host of other historical persons whose existence never comes into question.
It is one of my pet peeves that critics use different standards when it comes to Jesus. We cannot let them get away with it.
Great post! So many people are completely unaware that much of what they hear and read about the historicity of Jesus is biased. Fair-minded post. I particularly like that you don’t try to overstate your case.
Thanks!
What we have received as the teachings of the Great Master Jesus Christ, are the machinations of the Church and Royalty. The deep truths and secrets revealed by Jesus have been either distorted or abandoned.
All you have done is make an assertion without providing any evidence.