Ducktown wrote:proudfootz wrote:Yes, Mohammed (PTUI) is of more recent vintage than Jesus.
Arthur also more recent - and Robin Hood.
St Christopher would be another.
Sherlock Holmes is tough case: is being based loosely on a real person the same thing as his being historical? Not in this case IMO. If Bell were a private detective, then we'd be moving a little closer to 'historical' territory. Some of the adventures are supposed to be based on real events - more like 'inspired by'.
I bought a book called the
Annotated Sherlock Holmes thinking it would be like Martin Gardner's
Annotated Alice (which I am very fond of) but it turns out the 'notes' treat Holmes as if he were a real person and the adventures thinly veiled true accounts.
Therein lies the historicity claim in a nutshell. Just because a fictional character is modeled on or inspired by something actual is not proof of historicity. Proof of historicity requires that the individual in the account have an actual physical existence.
If I write a story about a billionaire I know and I model this story on my neighbor who I consider wealthy but who is not even a millionaire, is my neighbor the historical billionaire of my story? Is my billionaire now historical?
This is the problem with the "historical Jesus' argument. There is no such chap. That should be obvious to the most illiterate among us. Now we wish to know what inspired the jesus tale but unfortunately the authors are dead and anonymous.
It is most likely no person inspired these tales but they are simply religious fables like many others designed to satisfy a religious need.
Free gave us his version of the "historical Jesus." His is as farcical and fantastic as all the rest and totally without justification. It is safe to assume the authors of other jesus tales did the same thing with their version of fan fiction.
Well, I think it depends on the type of claim being made. Many people engaged in HJ debates think that if there was a Jesus he was only an inspiration for the character presented in the gospels. And, yes, that means that they think there was an historical person behind it.
That does not mean they think that there was anything in the gospels that is historical except maybe his death, possibly some details that we cannot prove one way or another at this late date.
This is why I don't understand why people spend so much time on this debate. I think it is much more interesting to look at how the gospels appear to have been constructed, but that is just my own take on it.
Personally, I don't see how anyone could say that there was or was not a person who could have served as inspiration. You can say you personally believe there was no one behind the stories and provide a reconstruction that makes sense or say that you personally believe that there was someone behind the stories and provide the alternate reconstruction. I think that is as far as we can take it.
ETA To answer your question, no the billionaire would not be historical; but that is not what some HJers maintain. I don't think anyone involved in a debate in this forum thinks that many or even any of the stories about Jesus are true, again aside from some details -- like possibly death at the hands of the Romans, etc.