Debunking The Christ Myth?
Argument from Glenn Kimball against
The Christ Conspiracy
(which he hasn't read)
This thinking is a new fade [sic] whose time for debunking is at hand.
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"This thinking," i.e, that Jesus Christ is a mythical character, is not at all a "new fad." It has been
around since the very beginning, because the intelligentsia of the ancient world knew that what the early Church fathers were
palming off was mummified mythology. As Rev. Robert Taylor says:
And from the apostolic age downwards, in a never interrupted succession, but never so strongly and
emphatically as in the most primitive times, was the existence of Christ as a man most strenously
denied.
Indeed, the first and second epistles of John were written principally to combat such deniers of the historical
Christ. (1 Jn. 4:2-3; 2 Jn. 7) The denial of "Christ come in the flesh" is an early "heresy" called "Docetism," whose proponents
not only abounded during the first centuries of the Christian era but were the original "Christians," i.e., Gnostics.
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| We have letters written in the hand of Jesus. A myth doesn't write letters. |
As concerns the "letters from Jesus's own hand," no scholar of any worth, Christian or otherwise, has ever
considered these "letters" to be "genuine." Like most Christian writings and artifacts, these "letters" are forgeries. The
Catholic Encyclopedia truthfully asserts that the legendary event purported in the most infamous of these "letters,"
i.e., that to "King Abgar," is an
"imaginary occurrence," and states concerning the spurious letter from Christ:
The text is borrowed in two places from that of the Gospel, which of itself is sufficient to disprove the
authenticity of the letter. Moreover, the quotations are made not from the Gospels proper, but from the famous
concordance of Tatian, compiled in the second century, and known as the "Diatessaron," thus fixing the date of the
legend as approximately the middle of the third century.
The Catholic Encyclopedia also says of this "letter":
Its legendary environment and the fact that the Church at large did not hand down the
pretended epistle from Our Lord as a sacred document is conclusive against it.
As Wells says in The Historical Evidence for Jesus:
About 1200, Constantinople was so crammed with relics that one may speak of a veritable industry with its
own factories. Blinzler (a Catholic New Testament scholar) lists, as examples, letters in Jesus' own hand, the gold
brought to the baby Jesus by the wise men, the twelve baskets of bread collected after the miraculous feeding of the
5000, the throne of David, the trumpets of Jericho, the axe with which Noah made the Ark, and so on . .
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And Wheless says in Forgery in Christianity:
[T]hat "very dishonest writer," Bishop Eusebius, in the fourth century...forged the Letters between Abgar
and Jesus, falsely declaring that he had found the original documents in the official archives, whence he had copied
and translated them into his Ecclesiastical History... If the Gospel tales were true, why should God need pious lies to
give them credit? Lies and forgeries are only needed to bolster up falsehood: "Nothing stands in need of lying but a
lie." But Jesus Christ must needs be propagated by lies upon lies; and what better proof of his actuality than to
exhibit letters written by him in his own handwriting? The "Little Liars of the Lord" were equal to the forgery of the
signature of their God - false letters in his name, as above cited from that exhaustive mine of clerical falsities, the
Catholic Encyclopedia.
No, a myth doesn't write letters. Forgers do.
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| There was a recent discovery of a prescription written by Jesus. A myth doesn't write
prescriptions. |
In the first place, considering the Holy Forgery Mill, I wouldn't trust that this "document" even
dated from the proper time and place. I haven't seen it or any scholarship on it. Just Kimball's word. In the second place, the
names IES, IESIOS, IASIOS, JESUS, etc., were terms that mean "salvation" and represented the mystical, allegorical and
non-historical spiritual head of salvation cults that proliferated from England to China. The terms were used as
secret spells by healers, or Therapeuts, who may have written a "prescription" with the word
on it. Such claims as Kimball's truly reveal the shoddy "scholarship" and "science" accepted by blind believers. |
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For those who really have read they know that Jesus is mentioned in the archives of Roman, Druid, Indian, Japanese
and a dozen more cultures. A myth doesn't get mentioned as a personal visit to that many diverse cultures and people during His
lifetime.
We have financial records of the family. A myth didn't have money.
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These claims is completely untrue. There are NO contemporary records,
Roman, Indian, Druid, Japanese, or otherwise, of any character as depicted in the Gospel. There WERE plenty of people running
around with the name of "Joshua" or "Jesus" or "Jason" or any variant thereof. None of their stories is what is recorded in the
New Testament. (See also the IES, etc., comment above: To wit, there were salvation cultists from England to
China.)
"Financial records" of his family? What's next, Mary's gynecological exam
results?
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| The records of the Romans alone about the life and times of Jesus should be enough to convince the
masses. Tiberius went to the floor of the Roman senate just after the death of Christ and petitioned that Rome adopt Jesus as a
god (little g). (Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbons 1782) Tiberius knew Jesus and his family personally and said so.
Tiberius corresponded with his Granddaughter Claudia Procula who was married to Pilate on the matter of Jesus. Tiberius made the
foster father of Jesus Noblis Decurio for the Roman Empire. That made Jesus and His foster father Roman citizens worthy of note
in the records of Rome. |
Again, there are NO Roman records, save for countless FORGED "documents." The statement about
Tiberius going to the Roman senate was made by Tertullian (c. 160-230 CE), one of the "little liars of the Lord," long after the
purported event. Of this statement by Tertullian, the Catholic
Encyclopedia (CE) says:
The narrative is not worthy of belief, still it is probable that Tertullian knew a document that professed
to be a report of Pilate.
"Professed" being a key word here. Kimball is again referring to FORGED texts regarding Procla, etc., one of
the many such spurious texts found in The Lost Books of the Bible, which is one of Kimball's "sources." The reason why
these texts were "hidden" is because they are known forgeries.
In reality, according to GA Wells, the Roman historian Tacitus reported that UNDER TIBERIUS (42 BCE-37 CE)
THERE WERE NO DISTURBANCES IN PALESTINE. If Tiberius had actually spoken about the god "Jesus," he would have been referring to
the ubiquitous pre-Christian non-historical, non-carnalized "savior" of the (Gnostic) salvation cultists and would thus represent
one of the first conspirators.
How is it that the early Church fathers and all the other Christian fanatics overlooked all of these "archives"
and "records" when they were pressed to provide proof of their fables?
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| Longinus converted to Christianity and so did Pilate and his wife. They were slain for their
conversion. Longinus converted and went with the Virgin Mary in exile to England. He was the one who threw the sword into the
side of Christ at the cross. Longinus had a good job with the Romans and was the one who stood on the steps of the Roman Senate
when Julius Caesar was stabbed to death. Would you have abandoned your entire life to live in exile for no reason? |
The story of "Longinus" and the spear, like basically everything else in the gospel fable, including the Virgin
Mary, is found in older mythologies. The rest of Kimball's assertion is fiction. Where do these people come up with this
nonsense?
Regarding the old spear motif, here's an excerpt from The Christ Conspiracy:
The Spear of Longinus
Longinus was the name of the Roman soldier who stuck Jesus in the side with a spear. Legend held that Longinus
was blind and was subsequently cured by Jesus's blood. Again, this is not a historical event but part of the mythos and sacred
king ritual, as Walker relates:
The true prototype of the legend seems to have been the blind god Hod, who slew the Norse savior Balder
with the thrust of a spear of mistletoe.... March 15, the "Ides of March" when most pagan saviors died, was the day
devoted to Hod by the heathens, and later Christianized as the feast day of the Blessed Longinus.
Walker also states:
Up to Hadrians time, victims offered to Zeus at Salamis were anointed with sacred ointmentsthus becoming
"Anointed Ones" or "Christs" then hung up and stabbed through the side with a spear.
In addition, the Scandinavian god Odin, and the god Marsyas of Mindanao in the Philippines were hung on a
"fatal tree" and stabbed with a spear. The Hindu god Vishnu (Bal-ii) was crucified with a spear in his side, bearing the epithet
"side-wounded." The gods Wittoba and Adonis were also crucified and "side-wounded" saviors.
Although a myth, many "authentic" "spears of Longinus" have been "found" in the Christian world. Indeed, Hitler
purportedly spent a great deal of time, money and energy to track down the "true" spear, believing that it, like so many other
"sacred" objects, held occultic powers.
The side-wounding in the mythos is due to the position of the sun near Sagittarius, the archer, also a centaur
or centurion..
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| Pilate was the world's most important witness of the life of Christ. Pilate left his letters to Rome
on this matter and met the resurrected Jesus face to face in the streets. Why would Pilate leave us letters describing a myth
which cost him his life? |
Writings regarding Pilate and Jesus, such as the obviously fictitious "Acts of Pilate," are well-known forgeries,
admitted by the Catholic Encyclopedia. The Jewish historian Philo wrote about Pilate, mentioning his abuses, but not a
single word about anyone remotely resembling Jesus Christ being crucified under his procuratorship.
These "letters" are KNOWN FORGERIES, which is why they are apocryphal. Much mythmaking
surrounded Pilate. The Catholic Encyclopedia relates the troubles Pilate had with the Samaritans and
states:
That is the last we know of Pilate from authentic sources, but legend has
been busy with his name. He is said by Eusebius (H.E., ii, 7), on the authority of earlier writers, whom he does not
name, to have fallen into great misfortunes under Caligula, and eventually to have committed suicide. Other details come from
less respectable sources. His body, says the "Mors Pilati," was thrown into the Tiber, but the waters were so disturbed by
evil spirits that the body was taken to Vienne and sunk in the Rhone, where a monument, called Pilate's tomb, is still to be
seen. As the same thing occurred there, it was again removed and sunk in the lake at Lausanne. Its final disposition was in a
deep and lonely mountain tarn, which, according to later tradition, was on a mountain, still called Pilatus, close to
Lucerne. The real origin of this name is, however, to be sought in the cap of cloud which often covers the mountain, and
serves as a barometer to the inhabitants of Lucerne. There are many other legends about Pilate in
the folklore of Germany, but none of them have the slightest authority.
Kimball is also evidently referring to the "letter purporting to have been sent by
Pontius Pilate to the Emperor Claudius" embodied in the apocryphal (BOGUS) "Acts of Peter and Paul," of
which the Catholic Encyclopedia states, "This composition is clearly apocryphal though unexpectedly brief and
restrained."
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| In his article Hidden Stories of the Childhood of
Jesus, Kimball further claims that "there are millions of ancient texts that
spoke of what He did and where he went in his life." |
This statement that there are "MILLIONS of ancient texts" is completely absurd. What we have are some 200 gospels
and epistles, many of which were Gnostic, i.e., they represented a fictional or allegorical Jesus, not a "man
who walked the earth." The childhood stories as found in the Infancy Gospels are in large part tales about the Hindu god Krishna,
whose name was "Christos" in Greek, by which the soldiers of Alexander the Great called him. The Indian text, the Bhagavat
Purana, was historicized and Judaized sometime during the second century. Other "texts" purportedly mentioning Jesus that
Kimball is apparently referring to are the myths of other cultures that revolve around the ubiquitous sun god or solar hero.
These various Gnostic and noncanonical texts are not "hidden" but have been known for centuries and correctly dismissed as
"apocryphal" or bogus. Kimball is attempting to make this "discovery" appear earth-shattering.
Kimball claims that these various "childhood" texts were written by those authors purported,
i.e., the apostles such as Matthew and James. They were not. They are pseudepigraphical forgeries. As concerns such apocryphal texts, which were all the rage
during the centuries preceding and succeeding the Christian era, the Catholic Encylopedia
acknowledges:
Pseudographic composition was in vogue among the Jews in the two centuries before Christ and for some time
later. The attribution of a great name of the distant past to a book by its real author, who thus effaced his own
personality, was, in some cases at least, a mere literary fiction which deceived no one except the ignorant. This holds
good for the so-called "Wisdom of Solomon," written in Greek and belonging to the Church's sacred canon. In other
cases, where the assumed name did not stand as a symbol of a type of a certain kind of literature, the
intention was not without a degree of at least objective literary dishonesty.
One of the texts Kimball uses, the Infancy Gospel of James, also known as the Protoevangelium Jacobi, is well
known to be an apocryphal or pseudepigraphical forgery. As the Catholic Encyclopedia says:
It purports to have been written by "James the brother of the Lord," i.e. the Apostle James the Less. It
is based on the canonical Gospels which it expands with legendary and imaginative elements, which are sometimes
puerile or fantastic. The birth, education, and marriage of the Blessed Virgin are
described in the first eleven chapters and these are the source of various traditions current among the faithful....
Critics find that the "Protoevangelium" is a composite into which two or three documents enter. It was known to Origen
under the name of the "Book of James". There are signs in St. Justin's works that he was acquainted with it, or at
least with a parallel tradition. The work, therefore, has been ascribed to the second century.
Of the Arabic Gospel of the Infancy, evidently also promoted by Kimball, CE
says: "It is a tasteless and bombastic effort, and seems to date from about the fourth century."
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| His book Hidden Politics of the Crucifixion, Kimball claims, "includes the
actual letters of Pilate, Herod and the Caesars discussing the events of the Crucifixion. It also contains the actual
conversation recorded in ancient texts between the resurrected Jesus and Pontius Pilate." |
The "actual letters of Pilate, etc." Addressed above, but these specific "letters" are found in the "minor Pilate
apocrypha, the Anaphora Pilati, or 'Relation of Pilate,'" in which, the Catholic Encyclopedia says, "There exists
a puerile correspondence consisting of a pretended Letter of Herod to Pilate and
Letter of Pilate to Herod." These spurious texts are no older than the fifth century.
Kimball is also evidently referring to the "Acts of Pilate" or the "Gospel of Nicodemus," an
obviously fictitious forgery of the fourth century that is so ridiculous it even presumes to record the actual conversations of
the astonished faithful and prophets of old, such as David and Enoch, who have been resurrected from the dead after Jesus's own
resurrection and ascension! This text was considered so evidently fictitious that it was nixed and buried, because it would so
readily cast doubt upon the "veracity" of the gospel tale as well. Only the credulous and uncritical do not realize the
fictitious nature of this text. These are, in short, fairytales, not historical accounts. As the Catholic Encyclopedia
says of the so-called Gospel of Nicodemus, "The writers (for the work we have is a composite) could not have expected their
production to be seriously accepted by unbelievers."
As concerns these various apocryphal gospels, the Catholic Encyclopedia says:
When, therefore, enterprising spirits responded to this natural craving by
pretended Gospels full of romantic fables and fantastic and striking details, their fabrications were
eagerly read and largely accepted as true by common folk who were devoid of any critical faculty and who were predisposed to
believe what so luxuriously fed their pious curiosity. Both Catholics and Gnostics were concerned in writing these fictions.
The former had no other motive than that of a pious fraud.... But the heretical apocryphists, while gratifying
curiosity, composed spurious Gospels in order to trace backward their beliefs and peculiarities to Christ Himself.
The Church and the Fathers were hostile even towards the narratives of orthodox authorship. It was not until the Middle Ages,
when their true origin was forgotten even by most of the learned, that these apocryphal stories began to enter largely into
sacred legends, such as the "Aurea Sacra," into miracle plays, Christian art, and poetry. A comparison of the least
extravagant of these productions with the real [sic] Gospels reveals the chasm separating them. Though worthless
historically, the apocryphal Gospels help us to better understand the religious conditions of the second and third centuries,
and they are also of no little value as early witnesses of the canonicity of the writings of the four
Evangelists.
Of yet another forged "letter," that of "Lentulus," CE says:
A brief letter professing to be from Lentulus, or Publius Lentulus, as in some manuscripts, "President of
the People of Jerusalem", addressed to "the Roman Senate and People", describes Our Lord's personal appearance.
It is evidently spurious, both the office and name of the president of Jerusalem being grossly
unhistorical. No ancient writer alludes to this production, which is found only in Latin manuscripts. It has
been conjectured that it may have been composed in order to authenticate a pretended portrait of Jesus, during the
Middle Ages.
The list of spurious "documents" goes on and on, and it is from these that Kimball gets his "new history" of the
mythical Jesus. For more information, please see the Catholic Encyclopedia entry for Apocrypha.
And for those who have problems with the truthful statements from the Catholic Encyclopedia regarding
fraudulent compositions from its own Church hierarchy, we have plenty of Protestant scholars also attesting to the fact of
Christian forgery.
The Protestant Encyclopedia Biblica states, "Almost every one of the Apostles had a Gospel fathered upon
him by one early sect or another."
Another Protestant authority, Dr. Conyers Middleton said:
There never was any period of time in all ecclesiastical history, in which so many rank heresies were
publicly professed, nor in which so many spurious books were forged and published by the Christians, under the names of
Christ, and the Apostles, and the Apostolic writers, as in those primitive ages. Several of forged books are frequently
cited and applied to the defense of Christianity, by the most eminent fathers of the same ages, as true and genuine
pieces.
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| He also states, "Buddhism has also been influenced by Christianity, though it does not believe in a
supreme being. At least we do not have an argument with the Buddhist over the name of God, or arguments over which brother
received the real birthright. The Buddhists were influenced by the tradition of the Christian Gnostics, in that they knew Jesus,
the prophet King, and felt that spiritually originates from within the individual and not necessarily from the hierarchy of the
church." |
Buddhism existed first and was copied by Christians. Many attributes and sayings of "the Buddha" were
taken by the Christians in their creation of Jesus Christ. Kimball certainly does not know his history very well and simply makes
any bald statement to support his case. The rest of his book seems to be composed of the endless silly legends made up by
numerous priests to bedazzle their gullible followers. These legends are NOT history. These puerile and gullible statements are
an insult to the intelligence, as well as to all the other cultures that had these stories long before the Christian era and the
mythical advent of Christ. |
| I could go on for volumes, but it wouldn't do any good for those who have already made up their minds
that Jesus was a myth. I had a near death experience seven years ago and I changed my mind in a tenth of a second. I have been an
atheist most of my life and fought against religions and tradition. I was wrong. I have a personal witness that Jesus did live
and still does. |
Many people have had near-death experiences. They prove nothing but the conditioning of the
individual's mind. The followers of Osiris, Isis, Buddha, Krishna and many others ALSO saw them in NDEs, visions and
hallucinations. Hindus see the elephant-headed god Ganesha. If such serve as "proof" of their reality, then these gods are also
real. I personally have had visions of Krishna, Buddha, Jesus and Mickey Mouse.
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| Someone has sold your friends a terrible lie. This movement is typical. It is easier to deny the
existence of someone than to fight His teachings. The ignorant will follow anyone with passion until they read and study for
themselves. |
Sorry, Glenn, but it's you have been sold a "terrible lie." "The ignorant?" Much of what you have
claimed is indicative of a profound ignorance of the ancient world. The mythicists have in general been better educated than
blind believers. I too invite everyone to read and study for themselves - they will easily see that the absurd claims of
believers, which should have been evident as fiction in the first place, completely fall apart. (My book, The Christ Conspiracy, lays out the case in over 400 pages. For
FREE reading on this subject, please see my dissertation Origins of Christianity
and Christ Conspiracy Links.) |
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However, don't believe me. Jesus said it Himself that in the end every knee shall bow and tongue confess that He
was the Christ. After my experience and study I would like to be a fly on the wall when these people who believe Jesus to be a
myth meet Him face to face. I too was not only brought to my knees, but lifted at the same time. I cried a steady stream of tears
for two weeks solid. Try shedding tears for two solid weeks. Part of me wanted to hide under a rock and part of me had to do
something to make amends. You will have to make up your own mind. I wish you well. I don't wish to make fun of those who have
perpetrated this lie.They are trying to make sense of the world like everyone else. My old father told me something when I was
very young that I didn't understand at the time. He told me it was a thousand times easier to critique than it was to advocate.
Surely a belief in Jesus will take a thousand times more effort than to make Him into a myth in the minds of men. A belief in
Christ changes a person. It is a belief that requires effort and character. It will take the rest of my life to make amends for
what I have done to bring Him down. However, I have only one option left. I can't fight my eyes and ears.
Glenn Kimball
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I don't accept that this wretched phantasm is a "god" of any sort. And the condescension of BLIND believers never
fails to astound. Nice touch, the "atheist persecutor" bit. Where have I heard that before? Oh yeah, some guy named Saul who
became Paul! And are you suggesting that your measly "efforts to bring him down" have somehow hurt this "omnipotent" god?
While the rest of this maudlin mush may evoke sympathy for an apparently pained existence, it
does not serve as a demonstration of anything other than the mental state of its author.
Regarding the statement that it is "a thousand times easier to critique than to advocate" - HARDLY a truism in
the case of Christianity, the proponents of which have tortured and slaughtered some 200 million or more unbelievers over the
centuries. Considering how even today critical scholars and scientists are shouted down by emotional believers, it is MUCH more
difficult to point out that there is NO historical or archaeological record for this fable having taking place in history. It
takes an enormous amount of courage, in fact.
No matter what these guys come up with, the fact will remain that virtually the entire gospel story is found
around the globe for centuries and millennia prior to the Christian era and represents the personification of the sun.
Acharya S
Update: Not content with hawking spurious Christian comic books, Kimball is now pretending to have found
King Arthur's legendary sword, Excalibur, as was well as the stone it
was stuck into!
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