The Jesus Myth

The Jesus Myth
ISBN-10
0812693922
ISBN-13
9780812693928
Category
Religion / Biblical Studies / New Testament / General
Pages
329
Language
English
Published
1999
Publisher
Open Court
Author
George Albert Wells

Description

Does the New Testament story of Jesus contain any elements of historical truth, or is it pure legend? In The Jesus Myth, Professor G. A. Wells presents an up-to-date, radical, and well-reasoned argument, drawing upon his sure grasp of the wide-ranging evidence. The accounts of Jesus in the four canonical gospels not only contradict each other, but are also not in harmony with the earliest Christian documents, which never present Jesus as an itinerant preacher, a performer of miracles, born of a virgin, associated with Nazareth, or executed under Pilate. The gospels were composed after A.D. 70 by unknown individuals who could not have been eyewitnesses to the events they describe. All the earliest non-Christian testimony, pagan and Jewish, is dependent upon Christian accounts. The frequently voiced notion that there is independent corroboration of the life of Jesus from 'Roman records' or elsewhere is wishful thinking. Professor Wells has become known as the foremost contemporary exponent of the purely legendary or 'mythicist' theory, but he has recently come to accept that there is a historical basis for one strang of the composite picture of Jesus: that deriving from the lost gospel, known as 'Q'. -- from back cover.

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