The Origins Of Christianity: A Radical Hypothesis

[poliphilo]

If Jesus died c. AD. 30 how come his name doesn't start appearing in the archaeological record until 100 years later?

There were two Jewish revolts during the reign of Hadrian. Evidence for Jesus  (mostly in the form of fragments of gospels) starts appearing at just this time.

It wasn't that easy to get published in the Roman world. If lots of manuscripts of a given text are in circulation it argues official connivance or even sponsorship.

Christianity is a radically Hellenized version of Judaism- outward looking and friendly to the Empire. Jesus is a God-man on the Hellenic model- like Hercules, Dionysus, Alexander, Mithras, Antinous, etc. The early Christian texts show the Romans in a favourable light  and demonize the Jewish authorities. ("Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites."). 

All this fits with Christianity being a creation of the Hadrianic period- a state-sponsored religion designed to draw adherents away from Judaism.   Its leading personalities- Jesus, the Apostles, Paul- were all "invented" at this time- and placed (conveniently beyond the reach of living memory) in the golden age of the early Empire. The gospels and other early Christian writings are essentially  "black propaganda" aimed against the Jewish rebels and their separatist ideology 
 
This is the barest outline of the hypothesis. The detailed evidence and arguments are here.

Comments

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

What of Justin Martyr? He was only thirty or so, at the end of the Second Roman-Jewish War, and survived Hadrian by 27 years. Should we question his existence or his religion or his sincerity?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

If the hypothesis is true then all the early Christian leaders and apologists were either fraudsters or dupes.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Having chewed on this for a while, I must admit having no evidence compelling me to question St Justin's testimony. That gives me no satisfaction but it seems to be the truth. At most we might question whether the Christianity he confessed would have withstood the scrutiny of the great councils. I rather doubt it, but then I doubt anyone in the early Church, saint or sinner, would have passed muster on every point.

On the whole, Hadrian was not a bad emperor, as emperors go. From a Jewish standpoint of course he was one of the great monsters of history, but the Seven Hills had witnessed much worse. And I think in order to swallow some of this argument one must make the worst of his story, such as assuming that he deliberately sacrificed his teenaged lover in some bizarre exercise in god-making. We cannot know exactly what happened, not for certain, but Hadrian was not a madman. The emperor we see portrayed on these pages resembles a high-functional Caligula or Elagabalus. This does not seem warranted and that give me pause.

There is a page on which Antinous is referred to as a catamite, a term seldom used in 21st-century prose, at least not with a straight face. To my mind, either someone just learned a new word and all that implies or they are unsuccessfully hiding a certain schoolboy homophobia. Given the apparent tone of several such passages, I am just not willing to give Mr Bartram and company the full benefit of the doubt.

On the bright side, the site is a goldmine of historical factoids, many of which may turn out to be true. As I say, I love a house of cards like this and many thanks. I think exploring the relationship between Alexandria and Palestine and Rome is interesting and may prove fruitful in understanding both the development of early Christianity and the dynamics of the early empire. I just do not see the authors of these pages being up to that challenge.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I agree about Hadrian. The theory that he deliberately sacrificed Antinous seems a bit screwy to me. Is there a single example in history of someone killing someone, then turning them into a god? I'd prefer to think that the drowning was an accident and that the Antinous cult was the creation of a bereaved lover- not unlike the Albert cult which Queen Victoria fostered.

[apollinaris.livejournal.com]

Thank you all for your comments, including criticisms.
Tony's summary of our hypothesis is surprisingly good, considering how our study is spread in fragments (a result of posting blog-style, as our work progresses).
Justin: no original work bearing his name exists - they are from later centuries. We have shown how NT texts have been altered to changed 'Chrest' to 'Christ' and scholars generally accept how many early 'sacred' texts went through stages of development.
Antinous: apotheosis was a common phenomena in Classical Antiquity, as was assassination and murder for simple, political ends, so killing somebody then declaring them a god happened many times. Think of an emperor killing his wife, or mother-in-law, then declaring her divine - and you'll see that what happened to Antinous is not as odd as one may think. Even without that, consider the date and place - wouldn't these make his drowning by accident even more incredible? Archaeology deals with the balance of probabilities.
I posted an article today to provide a history for the first century: When evil mixed itself with good and befuddled the world
http://historyhuntersinternational.org/2010/11/11/when-evil-mixed-itself-with-good-and-befuddled-the-world/

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Thank you for stopping by.

I wrote this post mainly for my own use- in order to get the main points of your thesis straight in my head. I'm pleased you think I've grasped the essentials. I find what you're doing fascinating- and I've friended you so as not to miss future developments.

And now I'm going across to read your latest post.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

With all due respect, are you suggesting that St Justin is a mythical figure? If your claim is anything less than that, then you fail to rebut my point. The mere fact that Justin Martyr professed a Christian faith, of whatever flavor, before, during, and after, Hadrian's reign, seems fatal to your theory as presented.

The problem, as I see it, is that we can just as easily take the mass of evidence you have collected as proof that there really was a man named Jesus and that rumor of his miracles and good works had spread across the Mediterranean in just a few score years. Whether we interpret this individual as a magician or prophet or the divinely chosen and annointed king of the Jews is just that: a matter of interpretation, having no particular relevance to the question of the man's existence. The Jews claim one thing, the Romans another; I cannot see that it matters. What matters is hard evidence and that evidence is wanting, on all sides.

Christianity did not arise as traditionally claimed. This fact has been kicked around for at least a century and is really nothing new. For that matter, the traditional origins of Judaism are equally mythical and absurd. All available evidence suggests that the Mosaic tradition was invented out of whole cloth at the end of the Babylonian captivity. Even such basic claims as the Jewish Diaspora have come into serious question, in light of the genetic evidence now in our possession.

[apollinaris.livejournal.com]

michaleen: There can be no "mere fact" of Justin's faith without good evidence and for that, we would need something better than texts made centuries after.

My response here made no claim at all for Justin, nor for those texts bearing his name, other than stating that no original work bearing his name exists - they are from later centuries.

Maybe he did exist. If so, nobody can be sure of exactly what he may have written. Perhaps, if any part of this opus is genuine, he wrote of Chrestians, for which we do have good evidence and then, as you say, it is a matter of interpretation: what was a Chrestian? That is a question I have been exploring, based on what evidence I have.

We know for certain that there was a Jesus - it was not an uncommon name and there is reason to believe that there were High Priests of that name before the First Jewish-Roman War. For me to accept that one of these was also 'Jesus Christ', or a messiah in any form, I would need evidence and I do not know of any. Do you?

My method has been to work with reliable evidence and the balance of probabilities. I would be happy to work with any other such evidences which you may have.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Apparently, I did not make myself clear and for that I apologize.

Did Justin Martyr exist or was he a myth? A simple "yes" or "no" might be preferable and we shall go from there.

[apollinaris.livejournal.com]

michaleen:
Yes-no question
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yes-no_question
"...the answer "yes" asserts a positive answer and the answer "no" asserts a negative answer, irrespective of the form of the question. But in fact simple "Yes." or "No." word sentence answers to yes-no questions can be ambiguous in English. For example, a "Yes." response to the question "You don't beat your wife?" could mean either "Yes, I don't beat my wife." or "Yes, I do beat my wife." depending from whether the respondent is replying with the truth-value of the situation, or is replying to the polarity used in the question."
So I won't be playing that game with you.

Your use of the term "Justin Martyr" indicates to me a prejudgment, which is not conducive to a balanced debate on evidence.

The Latin name of this Justin, in the texts attributed to him, is Flavius Iustinus. I think a better question than yours is: was he a Christian and martyr to Christian beliefs?

Do we know of him from any contemporaneous source? Do we know anything of him, other than what appears in the texts purportedly by him, or from later writers? I don't have any such evidence; do you? If not, then what exactly is there to believe?

There may have been a Flavius Iustinus and I know of no reason why there should not be. If he existed, who he may have been and what exactly he may have believed, though, is an open question.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

You certainly are courageous; I'll give you that.

There is more probative evidence for the existence of Justin Martyr than there is supporting any of your theories, on any point, yet you dismiss him with a wave of your hand.

Best of luck.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

My knowledge of classical antiquity is not all that, but I cannot think of a single verifiable instance of someone being killed with the purpose of turning them into a god. The Romans offed a lot of people and a few of those were deified, but without exception these were two separate processes.

The death of Antinous must have been a horrific blow. The technology for his deification lay readily to hand. Such a deification makes some sense, in the context of the imperial cult.

Conversely, the Romans abhorred human sacrifice and I cannot see how the premeditated pumkinification of Antinous might be seen as anything other than human sacrifice. The authors are asking us to believe that Hadrian flaunted Roman sensibilities like this, to a truly unprecedented degree, and no one questioned it. As Bartram himself notes, it is a matter of probabilities and in this case I am afraid the probabilities are against him.