Originally Posted by Thunderstick
Originally Posted by antelope_sniper
Originally Posted by DBT
There is no historical evidence for the existence of Jesus. All we have are the words of anonymous writers, accounts written decades after the described events. And before Josephus, et al, is brought up, the few brief mentions outside of the gospels were made on hearsay, so these are not eyewitness accounts. Paul himself was not aware of some of the things mentioned by the later works of the gospel writers.


As for the passage in some copies of Josephus, the Testimonium Flavianum it's a 4th century interpolation added by Eusebius.


There are variations in Josephus' account with some details of the Biblical record, which indicate that they would not very likely have been a Christian interpolation. Early Christian writers actually disputed some of Josephus’ details as inaccurate--which shows they did not interpolate them.

Questions for the skeptic: Why is it that of the 120 Greek and 170 Latin extant manuscripts, the only copies which survived have the Testimonium Flavianum in them? How did an interpolator make sure all the other copies were destroyed and only the ones with interpolations survive? Furthermore at least 5 early church writers reference this passage to skeptics. Why would they reference this passage if the passage itself was in question or if other copies existed at that time without these passages?

To date every skeptic to which I have addressed these questions ... the result has been -- NO EVIDENCE BASED ANSWER.



Not you're just making stuff up. The passage in question was not referenced. Before the 4th century.

You didn't use logic or reason to get into this opinion, I cannot use logic or reason to get you out of it.

You cannot over estimate the unimportance of nearly everything. John Maxwell