Greg Koukl - Jesus and Other Myths

Taken from our blog, Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason answers the question, "Is the account of Jesus in the Bible just copying earlier mythical traditions with similar stories?". For more information, visit http://www.str.org.

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• koukl
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• jesus
• myths
• christianity

[Hufflewaffle]

How ridiculous. Historicity and chronology are utterly meaningless when you look at the deeper significance of mythological motifs expressed by the human imagination. These motifs have appeared in cultures and in individual dreams all over the world since the beginning of time. They are expressed in art and literature everywhere. They are deep expressions of primal fears and desires inherent in the human psyche. Christianity is STRENGTHENED by its alignment with this great human narrative.

[WestonPDX100]

@STRvideos Jesus, and by extension, Christianity, is likely just a copy of the cult of Dionysus.

[BobTheAtheist2]

@LogosApologia One final thought. Looks like you were going to use the tired "why would they die for a lie?" argument.

1. How do we know that they died martyrs? From second century sources. As late as the Gospels are, this is far later still! Not a reliable source.

2. For them to "die for a lie," they must be given a chance to recant. To what charge could they say, "Kidding about Jesus!" and be let off?? Not disturbing the peace. Not inciting to riot. Not rabble rousing.

[BobTheAtheist2]

@LogosApologia Note that the NT records the infighting between the different factions. Having Peter deny Jesus could have been written by someone ... who didn't like Peter.

One book says James thought Jesus was crazy. A different book says nothing of the kind; it says that James was the head of the Jerusalem church.

Your job is to show that the natural explanations are not unlikely but *impossible.* The plausible natural explanation always trumps the supernatural one.

[BobTheAtheist2]

@LogosApologia I do not suggest that the Jesus story was deliberately made up any more than we'd call the end result of the game of telephone deliberately made up. It's false, but that was an accident, just like the errors that accumulated in the Gospels stories over *decades* of oral history.

Stories change over time. Why would this story be any different?

[LogosApologia]

@BobTheAtheist2 the apostles did not expect Jesus to resurrect, they are portrayed as clueless until it becomes blatantly obvious. If they made up the story as you would argue, why would they be so dumb? Then Paul whose mission in life was to stop the spread of Christianity. Also Jesus' brother James thought he was crazy. Then he sees the resurrected Jesus and becomes a leader in the church. These facts are not explained by the fabrication of legend. These guys die for their belief w/o recantin

[BobTheAtheist2]

@LogosApologia I agree with you if you're simply saying that the dying-and-rising savior stories that preceded the Jesus stories aren't identical. I agree--the Jesus story adds important new elements. But isn't the fact that the authors of the books in the New Testament doubtless knew of these other gods relevant? When they write up a story that takes important features from previous stories, doesn't that give you pause?

The natural explanations for the Bible are sufficient. No need for god.

[BobTheAtheist2]

@cottoncandicane I may be misunderstanding your point. You're not saying that the Jesus story was accurately predicted in the Old Testament, are you?

[brianhar100]

@sandrock605 So i watched this 2 hrs of nonsense , and i have to say if you want to change anyone's view of Jesus. You are going to have to do better than William Lane Craig. The bible is not evidence of anything. We cannot know if anything in it is true since most of it is not. Give me some hard proof . A actual account of Jesus from someone who knew him personally would be nice.

[brianhar100]

@cottoncandicane I can't remember if i responded to you, or not so i will. You are absolutely right. The story of Horus the Egyptian sun God did come before the OT, and was probably one of the stories the Christian founders plagiarized the Jesus myth from.