Your first point is the most convincing and there really doesn't need to be anything else said. There is not ONE mention, one WORD, of a man of Jesus' description ANYWHERE, by ANYBODY, despite the claim he had hundreds, no, THOUSANDS of loyal followers. This despite the fact Jerusalem was TEEMING with historians. It was a troublesome area but also the seat of Roman influence in the Middle East. Many would-be messiahs were mentioned by these sources, but of "Jesus," not a single word? NOTHING? That's not possible; it just isn't.
I could embellish, expand upon, elaborate about this and your other points. Add it all up and you begin to realize the amazing thing is that anybody still believes there is one chance in a thousand there was such a man. The New Testaments are factually inaccurate and baldly contradict each other. In fact, there is hardly anything therein contained that is provably true.
No, "Jesus" is a myth. I personally like the broad outlines of Atwill's thesis that Christianity was a Roman creation. At the very least it would have withered and died without massive Roman backing, and it was how Rome maintained it's mortal lock on power long after the Roman legions had disappeared. That Christianity (and Islam) horribly warped our idea of reality and continues to to this very day is beyond dispute It is and always has been a gigantic hoax..

Hi! I listen to a podcast of a Italian atheist who wrote a book claiming Christ didn't exist it almost makes me want to listen that podcast over again.

A small part of the confusion is the fact that there is evidence (Josephus for example) that there were men named Yeshua roaming Judea throughout the era . Thus we have our “historical” (hysterical) Jesus, just not the itinerant preacher working miracles.

First I was a tadpole swimming fast as thunder
Then I was bullfrog with my tail tucked under
Then I was a monkey swinging from a tree
Now I'm a professor with a PHD.

Isn't it sad to learn that your life has no meaning at all.

Just pull your head out your behinds to stop global warming. After you use up 5 rolls of TP to wipe the crap out of your eyes. Try something new and read the Bible.

Remember Jesus is coming soon!

Having read many of the books referenced here, I'm still just as confused whether the Jesus story is “historicized mythology” or "mythologized history" but it really doesn't matter much to me.

All that matters is that there is a character, with a pretty flimsy genealogy, mixed messages as to what he supposedly said and did, and various accounts of a "resurrection" and so on, which seems to me to point to a myth created for the reason of charismatically attracting followers for a purpose. That time has come and gone.

I don't care one way or another if he was indeed a real person, the real matter is whether the teachings attributed to him are true today in lifting up humankind, and if so, and/or if not, have there been others in more recent history who have packaged a better message, or many messages and values to practice in this modern time, in our present environment, with our current social issues?

Whether he was real or not, there are plenty of other luminaries who have enlightened humanity with more pertinent values and behaviors. The time of Jesus has come and gone, and now we should listen to more educated, more worldly, more PEACEFUL leaders to add their suggestions for bettering humanity.

The bible and jesus are worst writings of fiction, but there are still dummies in the world that believe it to be non fiction.

Nothing, short of any god presenting itself to me in real time, will ever convince me of the veracity of any religious bullshit.
As far as I'm concerned, all these "biblical scholars" are wasting everyone's time.
There are no gods. It has always been man made garbage.

I had hypothesized severl times on this site that Jesus as depicted in the bible did not exist, but it was more likely that there was a philosopher who was distorted and mythologized with traditional myths added to his story and supernatural characteristics added as well.

It is much easier to see what happened by looking at the story of Buddha. He was a philosopher who taught a philosophy of not desiring excess or deprivation as a way to achieve happiness. However, after his death, storytellers added traditional story themes and supernatural aspects to his life story to make him seem more than human or divine. I think a similar thing happened with the character who came to be known as Jesus.

He was a philosopher who had a following. Then after his death, they took many traditional story themes and added them in, as well as adding supernatural aspects to make him see more than human or divine.

Buddhism works as a life philosophy, but not as a religion with supernatural aspects.

With the person who came to be known as Jesus, I do not think there is enough left of his actual orifinal philosophy to determine if it work work without the supernatural religious aspects and beliefs., but it certainly doesn't work with them.

Meme evolution is very much scientifically and historically observable. As with complicated scientific, historic and evolutionary processes it is not easily understood and not at all well enough known.

Myth in the mind of people is an aspect of how meme organism is passed from person to person thru a culture. The myth in the mind of the old testiment generations is apart of the meme organism that evolved to be Jesus style meme God organism of new testiment in person.

It's why I have my group to explain to people the evolution of Jesus character and meme organism. "Illogical atheists guide for ending Christianity "

I do not believe in the dude that walked on water, but I do believe in Bugs Bunny, and the Easter Bunny, who lays chocolate eggs--- I've seen them both on TV.

Those are some of the things I ran onto while studying for the ministry. What keeps all of this going is a basic fear of death and tradition itself. Man wants to think he has found a way to live forever or at least be alive once a make believe part of him leaves his body. We can thank Saul of Tarsus for that one.

It's based on fear and why more people have been killed in the name of God than any other reason . Today's new God's are the financial pyramids empires

Honestly, it doesn't damn well matter.

The biblical, water-walking, crucified and resurrected, 5000-feeding Jesus most certainly didn't exist.

Yes that myth 'was inspired by something' - it could be earlier myths, it could be a real person, it could be any number of things - but that makes no difference whatever to the fact that the christian, biblical Jesus is a myth.

Yes - Bugs Bunny was 'inspired' by real rabbits, but that doesn't make Bugs any more believable, meaningful or significant.

My own suspicion? That the myth of biblical Jesus was just re-written, re-cast versions of earlier myths... but who cares?

It doesn't bloody matter.

There are, and have been several different positions on the issue. Not just history or myth, but also pure fiction, garbled pro-Roman propaganda earlier Jewish texts reused etc.

My own thought is that whatever theory people hold, given the almost complete lack of any real evidence, and what evidence there is badly garbled, it is a delusion to think that any theory could ever be provable. I have seen people make what seemed like really good cases for all of them, but nobody had a single bit of solid evidence.

Hello! For the record I do believe Jesus existed but since I'am a Raelian Chrisitian and the prophet Rael met Jesus on the eternal life planet.I have no doubt Jesus was a prophet of our ET creators the Elohim and after he was executed and dead the Elohim took a cell sample from his dead body and cloned Jesus back to life on the eternal life planet where he has remained there to this day.

Theologians have never advanced a serious objection to evolution and its findings. Nor do they dispute the implication that Adam didn't exist. Jesus refers to Adam as a living, breathing human as real as Moses (!), and yet theologians relegate Genesis to symbolic allegory. However, without a real Fall, the entire premise for Jesus's redemption vanishes and goes poof!

If Christians have any disproof of evolution, let them show it. Otherwise, the whole of the NT must be waved off.

To recap: Romans 5:14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.

Notice how Adam and Moses are mentioned in one breath. The author of Romans believed that Adam and Moses were real people rather than symbols or allegories. The passage also states that death started with Adam. This refers to the phrase, “The wages of sin is death.” It is Adam’s Original Sin that brings about the existence of death.

Without Adam, Jesus's death and resurrection are BS. Adam is BS, so Jesus is too. And the whole of Christianity.

I'm glad so many have made it their life's work to unravel Jesus. Me? I never believed the dude was real. Learning about the 7th Dayers, Mormons and JWs totally reinforced the idea Jesus was just a means to an end. People are so gullible.

Up check for the Valerie Tarico reference. I've followed her for years especially though her blog, 'AwayPoint'.

My personal feelings map pretty much to number 1 -- all the things that were written about Jesus when he was supposedly alive -- exactly nothing. The Romans were good at keeping records (for taxes if nothing else) but somehow he never got recorded -- color me very dubious.

This simply reinforces what I have believed for a long time, that the bible was written by a number of different men to bolster their own personal beliefs.

Nailed it!