Consciencebound

The Jesus Project

I just listened to a podcast from the Center for Inquiry which is one of my favorite podcasts to listen to on a regular basis. You can listen to the podcast yourself at www.pointofinquiry.org/ (scroll down the page to the Joe Hoffman interview) or you can subscribe through iTunes which is what I do. The particular episode was an interview with Joe Hoffman and is described as follows:

Joe Hoffmann, formerly at Oxford, is director of Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER). He has appeared widely in the media and at venues across the United States speaking on Christian origins, the historical Jesus, the proper role of religion in society, and similar topics. He is the author or editor of a number of books, including Just War and Jihad: Violence in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

In this discussion with D.J. Grothe, Dr. Hoffmann details a new project involving scholars from many disciplines that is trying to determine the likelihood of Jesus of Nazareth having ever existed. The goal of The Jesus Project, according to Dr. Hoffmann, is not to “prove” the non-existence of Jesus, but to take the theory as a “testable hypothesis” and use the best methods of critical inquiry to reach a probable conclusion. Additionally, Dr. Hoffmann addresses critics by clarifying the agenda of the project.

As usual, I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation and thought it was very informative and helpful in understanding exactly what the agenda of The Jesus Project is. Similar to the Jesus Seminar, they are trying to get at the truth about Jesus Christ as he is known by our modern world. Given the length of time that has transpired between the first century and the present, it is always good to ask questions about how we know what we know so that we are not believing things on insufficient or just plain wrong evidence. The Jesus Project does not start with the same assumptions that the Jesus Seminar started with though. Namely, that Jesus did in fact exist in the first place. This is an assumption that needs to be examined just as much, if not more than the actual sayings that are attributed to Jesus.

My first response to people who suggest that Jesus was a mythical figure who was not rooted in an actual historical person was to just blow them off. “Of course there was a historical Jesus. He is one of the most well attested historical figures of the west and there is more evidence for Jesus’ existence than George Washington” The difficulty is that the kind of evidence that we have for Jesus is very different than what we have for George Washington and given the nature of the things that are reported about Jesus (miracles, resurrecting from the dead, ascending into heaven, born of a virgin, etc.) we should pause to examine the nature of this evidence to see how credible it really is. When you look into the claims that are made of Jesus you also find that there were quite a few figures that came before Jesus who curiously were reported to have done the same things that Jesus did. There is also seemingly no contemporary sources who attest to the existence of Jesus in the first century which I found puzzling. If you are interested in reading a summary of the mythic Christ position you can go to one of the following links:

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_jcno.htm

http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/article_005.htm

At this point in time, I am not making a determination as to whether or not Jesus was an actual historical figure. What I find interesting is that much of the Christian apologetic literature seems to paint a picture that is not backed up by the facts when examined. They make it seem like there is no debate on this issue when there actually is quite a bit of debate which should be taken seriously by both sides. Either way, it is a serious subject with serious ramifications for which ever position you take. If you reject Christ when he was an actual historical person who was who he said he was, then you get to spend an eternity in hell. If you accept Christ as real and devote your life to him and it turns out there there is really no actual historical Jesus, then you have wasted your life in a pursuit which will gain you nothing. Because the consequences of our choices on this matter are so critical, we should all take the time to seriously look at the evidence that is available and try to not insert our preconceived biases onto history.

Similar Posts:

• The Bones of Jesus
• Debate on the Resurrection of Jesus: William Lane Craig vs. Bart Ehrman
• Christianity and Pseudoscience
• What Would Jesus NOT Do?
• Misquoting Jesus:The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why by Bart Ehrman
• Book Review: Losing My Religion by William Lobdell
• Book Review: The Language of God by Francis Collins