Overview

This volume moves beyond the mainstream scholarly scepticism over the Christ of Faith and considers if there is sufficient evidence to establish the existence of the more mundane Historical Jesus. Using the logical tools of the analytic philosopher, Lataster finds that the relevant sources are unreliable as historical documents, and that the key method of those purporting that the Historical Jesus existed is to appeal to sources that do not exist. Considering an ancient hypothesis suggesting that Jesus began as a celestial messiah that certain Second Temple Jews already believed in, and was later allegorised in the Gospels, Lataster discovers that it is more reasonable to at least be agnostic over Jesus’ historicity.

Full Product Details

Author:   Raphael Lataster
Publisher:   Brill
Imprint:   Brill
Volume:   336
Weight:   0.914kg
ISBN:  

9789004397934

ISBN 10:   9004397930
Pages:   494
Publication Date:   18 July 2019
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Available To Order  
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Table of Contents

 Foreword  Acknowledgments  Introduction  1Which Jesus?  2A Debate among Atheists  3The Problem  4The Philosopher’s Probabilistic Approach Part 1: The Case for Historicity  1Ehrman’s Dual Approach towards the Gospels  1A (Mostly) Wonderful Start  2The Gospels and the Folly of the Hypothetical Source  2Beyond the Gospels  1The Problem of Paul  3Casey’s Superfluous ‘Scholarship’  1Poisoning the Well  2‘Method’  3Why the Gospels Ought to Be Trusted, but Only When We Feel like It  4After the Case  5Even Worse than Ehrman: Offensive and Facetious  6Crossan’s Brief Attempt Part 2: The Case for Agnosticism  4Inadequate Methods  1History Concerns What Probably Happened  2Criteria for Authenticity  3Faith and Inconsistency  4A Bayesian Alternative  5The Criteria vs. Bayes  5Inadequate Sources  1The Silence of the Primary Sources  2‘Other’ Christian Sources  3(Non-Christian) Extrabiblical Sources  4Josephus  5Tacitus  6Thallus (and Phlegon)  7Pliny, Suetonius, and Mara Bar Serapion  8The Talmud  9The Less Interesting Books of the New Testament  10The Canonical Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke-Acts, and John  11Mark’s Burden  12The Genre of the Gospels  13Burridge’s Take on the Gospels’ Genre  14Mark’s Failure  6The Problem of Paul  1The Docetic/Marcionite Jesus  2The Earliest Witness’ Sources  3Paul’s Minimal, Unquotable Jesus  4Paul’s Cosmic Christ  5Philo’s Pre-Christian and Pre-Pauline ‘Celestial Jesus’  6The Evolution of Jesus  7Fictitious Founders  8The Revelation of/from Paul  9Agnosticism is Rational Part 3: The Case for Mythicism  7Prior Probabilities  1The Problem  2The Hypothesis of Historicity  3The Hypothesis of Myth  4Background Knowledge (Christianity)  4.1Elements of Christian Origin  4.2Elements of Christian Religion  5Background Knowledge (Context)  5.1Elements of Political Context  5.2Elements of Religious and Philosophical Context  5.3Elements of Literary Context  6The Prior Probability  8Consequent Probabilities  1Primary Sources  2Extrabiblical Evidence  3The Evidence of Acts  4The Evidence of the Gospels  5The Evidence of the Epistles  9Calculations  1Carrier’s Calculations  2Alternative Calculations  3Devil’s Advocate  Conclusions  1The Glory of Agnosticism  2Mainstream Scholars Already Agree with Us  Bibliography  Index

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Author Information

Raphael Lataster, Ph.D. (2017), University of Sydney, is an associate lecturer at that university. He has published monographs and articles on God’s existence and Jesus’ existence, including The Case Against Theism (Springer, 2018).

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