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More Conspiracy Nonsense

Poor Hercules, trying to fight the Hydra. Once he lops off *one* head….

So I’ve received several emails over the past couple of days about the breathtaking new announcement to be made on October 19 (assuming the world still is functioning after October 17!) in London by “American Biblical scholar” Joseph Atwill (whom – I have to admit – I have never even heard of, to my recollection) In this announcement Mr. (so far as I can tell, from his blog, he is not a “Dr.”; in what sense is he a “scholar”? Is it because he’s read a bunch of books? Hmm….) Atwill will “prove” that “the New Testament was written by first-century Roman aristocrats and that they fabricated the entire story of Jesus Christ.”

In other words – brace yourself – Jesus is in fact a myth. Has anyone heard this before?

For the full story, go to

http://uk.prweb.com/releases/2013/10/prweb11201273.htm

Atwill is a different breed from most mythicists. That’s probably good and bad. Good because, well, you wouldn’t like to be like the others. Bad because, well, you really shouldn’t want to be one at all. In any event, here is Mr. Atwill’s case in a nutshell, as described in this earth-shattering press release (referenced above):

“Atwill asserts that Christianity did not really begin as a religion, but a sophisticated government project, a kind of propaganda exercise used to pacify the subjects of the Roman Empire. “Jewish sects in Palestine at the time, who were waiting for a prophesied warrior Messiah, were a constant source of violent insurrection during the first century,” he explains. “When the Romans had exhausted conventional means of quashing rebellion, they switched to psychological warfare. They surmised that the way to stop the spread of zealous Jewish missionary activity was to create a competing belief system. That’s when the ‘peaceful’ Messiah story was invented. Instead of inspiring warfare, this Messiah urged turn-the-other-cheek pacifism and encouraged Jews to ‘give onto Caesar’ and pay their taxes to Rome.”

The operative word in this description is the second one: “asserts.” I know sophomores in college who could rip this assertion to shreds. For now, let me just put out some talking points, in hopes that I don’t have to talk about them at any length.

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Caesar’s Messiah was a book published by a dot com businessman named Joseph Atwill in 2005. Last year, he released a documentary based on the book and everyone is talking about it all of a sudden, because Atwill put out the world’s most misleading press release for his film screening in London. Richard Dawkins then retweeted the press release, even though he said he didn’t endorse the theory, and now this eight-year-old theory is news again. Thank you, Richard Dawkins.

Titus - The inventor of Jesus according to Atwill

The basic premise of Caesar’s Messiah is that the Roman Imperial family, the Flavians, invented Jesus by using the Jewish historian Josephus and, presumably, other people to write the gospels after Rome defeated the Jews in 70 AD. The idea was to make the militant Jewish rebels accept a peaceful Messiah and, thereby, give Rome less trouble.

Atwill says that the New Testament was written in a code that requires you to read Josephus’ War of the Jews alongside the New Testament to get the joke. He, of course, is the only person to crack this code, making him super smart.

The following are just some of the major problems with this theory. For footnotes and references to the claims I’m about to make, go to the link in the description or to the website ceasarsmessiahdebunked.com.

One of the biggest problems this theory has is the existence of Christianity before 73 AD, when Atwill says that the idea was concocted by the Romans. Quite simply, if Christianity can be demonstrated to exist before that time, this theory is toast.

The famous historian Tacitus says that Nero was persecuting Christians in Rome in 64 AD. He also mentions that “immense multitudes” of Christians were living in Rome at the time. Try to figure out why “immense multitudes” of Christians are in Rome ten years before Christianity was supposed to have been invented.

Suetonius also mentions Nero punishing Christians, as well as many Christian historians. That seems like a bad PR idea to write this kind of stuff: “Hey, everyone! Join the new religion so we can burn you alive and feed you to lions. The signup sheet is right over there.”

Paul, who tradition has being killed by Nero around 66 AD, wrote thirteen of the letters in the New Testament, all of them very Christian. Even the most skeptical scholars in this field don’t date these letters later than 68 AD, and most of them much earlier than that. You should find out why even these skeptical scholars feel the need to place these letters so early, which you can do at the website caesarsmessiahdebunked.com.

Okay, so, let’s move beyond the historical problems with saying that Christianity didn’t exist before 73 AD, and let’s look at some of the common sense or logical problems with his theory. http://caesarsmessiahdebunked.com/