The Resurrection in its Ancient Mythic Context 

Derreck, this was excellent. I had a Dr. Miller / Romulus moment myself years ago. I suffered actual physical pain during my de-conversion. had taught men’s groups, bible studies, and served as a Deacon. It shattered the paradigm for me. It took years to come to grips with it.

Well said. Yeah it’s unfortunate that there are atheists or nonbelievers (as I prefer to call the type who would make comments such as those Dr. Miller mentioned) who are just shitty people who only share one thing in common with atheists; lack of belief, and are morally & intellectually shallow if not bankrupt on everything else, yet identify as atheists and give the rest of us a bad name. Anyway, I don’t know who that was who made those comments but I’ve noticed just recently on some of Mythvision’s more recent videos a noticeable increase of ppl in the comments who are either full of vitriol, crazy religious nutters banging the Bible over people’s heads, or a lot of just unthoughtful - sorry to say - ignorant opinions & statements by rude & argumentative people in general, atheists or otherwise (I suspect the ppl who made these comments about Dr. Miller fall into this category) that I think must be new to this community bc like I said, in the 5-6 years I’ve been interested in this subject/following Mythvision I’ve never noticed this before to this extent.

Thank you for speaking for us who have deconstructed our faiths. Your description of the struggle fits into my experience quite a lot. This is a lonely path for many. Only a few people understand what we are going through. I didn't feel abused, but rather quite delighted when I was religious. It gave me good friends and a sense of meaning. But I couldn't hold the beliefs any longer, despite having built my whole life upon them. Now I feel very empty, but I must carry on and rebuild my life. Giving up on life is not an option.

I'm one of those ... Angry thou to have lost all this time to this fricken belief... Happy at the same time to be where I am🎉

No such thing a God/God's/Devil/Devils, they are man made mythological utter nonsense. And faith in it's nature is auto deceptive, hence, belief without evidence. I call that self serving delusions. All this man made religious utter nonsense is exactly what it is, man made mythological utter nonsense. Remember no one is born with any religion, no one. Religions are nothing more than mind destroying cults. The problem we have on this planet called earth is people occupying themselves with utter nonsense, I guess it's a lot easier than actually having to use that sponge between their ears. The only reason people fall into this religion trap nonsense is because humans are afraid of death and the unknown, and do to that are easily controlled and manipulated by snake oil salesmen. This religion crap should have ended a long time ago. I can understand to a point people in those primitive times believing "which I am sure was not all of them" this utter nonsense and writing about it, but in today's age is outright idiotic. I guess if you have enough people to sell BS to, that business model will continue to exist, unfortunately. I say it's time and money wasted.

Ur and Babylonian gods and then all the ancients that were before them seem to b at least a starting point for some ideologies... where and who even actually had the notion to think about morality? When does this thought come into being?

I think they took him and put him somewhere else

And speaking of Lazarus, I've been thinking about that why isn't anyone talking about his resurrection more?

So Jesus was the love child of Mary and Panthera and then when it was all said and done they needed to make Jesus exalted being so they did the virgin of birth is that it is that a thought

Or else Rome created Christianity...

@QuestionThingsUseLogic I have often wondered if Rome played a role in this Jewish theological diversion. The motivation? Jews had a zealously annoying connection to Jerusalem and their, 'Holy' Land such that there were constant clashes and confrontations with its inhabitants. Hmm, what if a 'New' concept could be released into the mindstream of these stubborn Jews that might sever its zealous connection to this strategically important strip of land and the temple system? Something more spiritual and less geo-located?... 🤔 And thus, under the sponsorship of a Roman Emperor, is born one of the first examples of mis-information warfare?

exactly, The catholic church is a continuation of the Roman empire from the Popes' title Pontifex Maximum to his red shoes to the latin language to the rituals the plagiarized feasts the churches built on top of Roman deities' temples especially those dedicated to Mary.

​@@QuestionThingsUseLogic or Roman Catholicism

@@christianshaw9102 it's the same thing, but packaged to look 'different'. The Emperor authors knew exactly what they were creating.

An entire eight-person Richard C. panel!

I second that. The Richards need to band together.

How about Carrier - Miller - Walsh? They could tackle Paul's conundrum.

Miller-Ehrman, please!!!

Thank you for not thinking that I will be burned for eternity, I really appreciate it! For real, that's so rare to hear from a Christian.

Thanks for being part of the Christian nationalist problem 🫡

I was too, toward the end of my god belief. The Ken Ham/Kent Hovind wing of the religion pointed out that I couldn't be a "true" christian unless I bought (pun intended) into their views of Genesis, which instead helped push me OUT. And I realized that the type of god I wished for, all-knowing, all -loving, would never let the bible as it stands survive and would instead have written something perfectly aligned to this deity, IF he wanted us to know him. So amen and sayonara, christianity. And ditto all other concepts of a god.

That is an excellent question. I’m curious as well. My question to you, do you currently fall into the mythicist position or historical position? I didn’t want to jump to any conclusion without hearing it from you first. 😌

My level of confidence that Jesus existed is probably about 90-95% and I am always open to new pieces of evidence and interpretations.

​@@Nexus-jg7ev Thank you so much for giving Carrier some credit, that was really big and brave (unfortunate that’s even necessary) of you. You’re on the right track, ignore haters stay fearless.

@@annascott3542 It is clear that the gospels are too unreliable for finding a historical person named Jesus of Nazareth. They are full of Greeko-Roman mythology coupled with 'data-mining' of Old Testament prophecies, so it is really hard to discern what the historical Jesus said and did, or whether he existed at all. I do not think that any of the extra-biblical sources can corroborate the existence of Jesus, as to me it seems that they simply get their information from Christians who already believe in Jesus. Jospehus' work may well be tampered with by early Church fathers, while we cannot know if Tacitus got his information from Christians or if he researched government documentation related to Pilate. I actually have only two reasons to think that Jesus might have been a real person: 1) Paul knew his brother James and one of his closest disciples Peter. To claim that Jesus didn't exist would mean to assume that either Paul lied about his acquaintances or that Peter and James devised a myth. I think that it is more plausible that Paul did know these people, he even had arguments with them as to whether gentiles had to follow Jewish law to follow Jesus. 2) There is no evidence that anyone expected the Jewish messiah to be a martyr who would suffer and die for the sins of others. The common understanding of a messsiah was that of a great king who would restore the Davidic kingdom, gather therein all Jews from around the world, and establish worldwide peace and universal knowledge of Yahweh. He would prepare the way for either Yahweh's advent to Earth for judgement, or the advent of that so-called Son of Man who Jews probably understood to be some archangel, like Michael. It seems very unreasonable and counterintuitive for anyone to invent a crucified messiah, unless there was a person who people believed to be the messiah, and who was crucified, thus making his followers begin to rationalize how he could still be the messiah despite being killed by the oppressors whom he was supposed to expel from Judea. It seems to me far more likely that Jesus was a real person whose followers believed that he was the messiah while he was alive and that he would fulfill all messianic prophecies about restoration of the kingdom, ingathering of the Jews in the promised land, world peace, etc. Jesus, however, got tortured to death, and then cognitive dissonance kicked in among his followers who went back to scripture and found alternative ways in which Jesus could be the messiah which is how the doctrine of substitutional atonement was invented. I am fairly certain that the suffering messiah concept is a post-facto rationalization of a real historical event (the crucifixion) rather than something that was invented from scratch. So, these are my reasons to think that Jesus of Nazareth actually existed. What would make me change my view is perhaps the finding of evidence that the concept of a suffering messiah was already in circulation among Jews before Jesus or at least before his death, as well as finding sufficient reasons to think that Paul did not know either Peter or James and that he made the Jesus myth up, and I am actually quite concerned about the way in which he twists Hebrew scripture and makes theological innovations, although this doesn't necessarily demonstrate that Paul is lying about everything. Another plausible scenario is that Paul might have picked up what was already a myth in development from other people who claimed to know Peter and James. I am actually a bit concerned about the historicity of Peter.

When I went to the Roman Colosseum, the first thing the tour guide did was debunk the "Christians to the lions" myth. For a good book on the subject I would suggest Candida Moss's "Myth of Persecution." Criminals in general were fed to lions, but Christians were not singled out.

@@Ken_Scaletta _grazi,_ I'll check out the book.

The "500 brethren" may also be a later accidental (or intentional) corruption, as the word "pentakosiois" (five hundred) is very similar to "pentēkostēs" (Pentecost).

@@maatjusticia3954 That's interesting!

​@@maatjusticia3954 it might have referred to people who were claiming to have seen the risen Jesus during Pentecost and who were then called the Pentecost brethren, which might have been later mistaken for 500 brethren.

@@Nexus-jg7ev Yes, it's possible.

Fear not. Thousands, if not millions, of us have found our way out of the darkness of superstition into the light of reality. Keep this quote in mind: “Some believers accuse skeptics of having nothing left but a dull, cold scientific world. I am left with only art, music, literature, theatre, the magnificence of nature, mathematics, the human spirit, sex, the cosmos, friendship, history, science, imagination, dreams, oceans, mountains, love and the wonder of birth. That’ll do me.” ~Lynne Kelly

Some relevant information regarding Walton: Travis and his coworkers were loggers and were about to miss a deadline that would cost them ten percent of the contract. Travis and his brother frequently talked about UFOs. NBC has just aired a popular movie about an alien abduction two weeks before during a time when there were three major networks and no cable. There’s no record of his family demonstrating concern during his five day disappearance and his brother stated, “He’s not even missing. He knows where he’s at, and I know where he’s at.” The person who administered a polygraph to him assessed it as “gross deception” and stated Walton was employing polygraph countermeasures.

Lazar’s claims about his education and employment could not be verified. He was arrested in 1990 for running a brothel and again in 2006 for selling hazardous substances and transporting them across state lines. The schools he says he attended have no record of him doing so. Same thing with Los Alamos where he claimed to work.

Yep.

Yep. He was...

Yeah…headphones helped, which I didn’t use until almost the end 🤦‍♀.

Don’t listen if it hurts you. Everyone has the freedom to stay within the fold, or leave if necessary.

That some people were paid off to stand as witnesses is just a supporting element of the existing trope. It doesn't require that such necessarily happened in early Christianity. It could just as easily have been rumors and legends that naturally sprung from the common mythic consciousness of the times. And I'd say that's most likely right, given the slew of other features that fall within that mythic paradigm, including the missing body trope, deification and immortalization, heavenly ascent, prodigies and darkness over the land, a divine command or send-off, etc. And there are completely non-miraculous, sociological, and political reasons for Christianity's spread and eventual success in the Greco-Roman world, including its counter-cultural appeal to women, slaves, and the downtrodden, its offer of personal salvation and eternal life (which tapped into religious impulses of the time), its exclusivity which served to lock in adherents, and its zealous evangelism. Add to that its political advantages for Roman emperors like Constantine and Theodosius, who seized upon it for unity and power, and the rest is history.

@@atheologica Appreciate the reply, thanks, some of the non-miracle reasons for Christianity’s extensive growth even outside it’s own cultural parameters that you mentioned, are very reasonable, and I would say they are very noteworthy and positive. However, noting that syncretism can be a complex subject, I still differ with mythos in that Christianity’s rise was out of this Greco-Roman mythology mindset, all these major elements you mentioned, such as missing bodies, deification, immortalization, heavenly accent ect, are elements that I would agree in the sense that those general categories existed and even existed in some form or another long before Rome, but not that Christianity’s events were a parallel to this. Jesus’s body in contrast with Romulus for example or Asclepius did not just go missing, it went missing from the tomb only, and then as per the scriptures he allegedly rose, and was witnessed in this physical body in which he had bone and flesh and was able to eat fish and drink wine. So for example the alleged witnesses of Romulus or Aristeas (which could have been been paid off) was a type of body mirroring closer to a gnostic idea of a phantom, (see for example Roman biographies that mentioned Romulus’s post death was a translation to the gods) hence why their body went missing in the highest sense. There are even some biographical accounts that specify that Romulus after his death was never found or seen. Deification as well, good place to look is at the Caesars, most deification stories In Greece and Rome, was about significant people who rose or were exalted to a higher status among the mirage of other deities in the heavens, but they themselves were not preexistent from the beginning of time or from long ago along side the supreme God from whom they directly emanate. These are deeply entrenched in Jewish wisdom/glory/Angel of the Lord/Enoch/Metatron/motifs) 55:10 Instead the Greco-Roman’s deities were many times just miraculously born prior to birth on earth through some courtship among the gods. So Jesus’s deity was technically one of permanence, forever past and forever future. Also immortalization of Jesus was one of permanence from his forever past (as the logos, memra, Angel) and forever future after the resurrection, this is vastly different from what we find in Greco Roman mythology, Jesus’s immortalization also was one of physicality in which he would one day return to a new earth in that same physical body, I’ll leave here for now, but thanks for the response. Alex

​@@starshiloh Playing up differences in an effort to ignore the numerous and striking similarities is a common apologetic tactic that gets no sympathy from me. Meanwhile, the differences are not as wide as you make them out to be. As M. David Litwa notes, these deified men "are not just raised in their souls, but in their bodies." Romulus appears to Proculus Julius "greater than human" per Ovid, and dressed in shining armor. Per Celsus, many saw "no mere phantom, but Asclepius himself, healing, doing good, and predicting the future." Heracles' weight (gravitas) was felt upon Mt. Olympus, where he married and procreated. Their *bodies* go missing precisely because it is their *bodies* that have been taken up, deified and immortalized. Divinity entailed having a powerful, supernatural body, not just an impotent soul. Even the notion of pre-existence is found in some of these tales. Romulus relays to Proculus Julius that he was pre-existent among the gods, per Plutarch, that he only became incarnate for a time, but that it was to the gods that he returned. Ovid tells us, concerning Asclepius, "from a god you will turn to a bloodless corpse, and then to a god who was a corpse." And whether Jesus was pre-existent depends entirely on which NT text you're reading. There is no hint of this in the Synoptics. Moreover, several of the Jewish examples you listed, including Enoch and Metatron, stem from Hellenized Judaism, which are already infused with Greek metaphysics. Christianity is a Greco-Judaic phenomenon, which is composed of both Greek and Jewish motifs: It simply isn't an either/or concerning its mythic and literary provenance. Lastly, there is no evidence in the cases I've discussed of anyone being "paid off" to declare their having witnessed the post-mortem, or post-mortal, appearances of these figures. Not with Romulus, not with Aristeas, not with Asclepius. Outside of the Imperial Cult, there simply is no political motive for this. And you cannot generalize from *some* instances of this having happened to *all* or *most* instances of the motif. Frankly, your raising this objection strikes me as a cheap dodge, reaching for any possible reason to dismiss the pagan accounts. The overarching point of Dr. Miller's research remains. Christianity sprung from a Greco-Roman milieu in which the following cluster of motifs were prominent among deities and deified men: missing bodies, deification and immortalization, heavenly ascent, appearances to witnesses, prodigies and darkness over the land, a divine command or send-off, etc. That Christianity shares this cluster of motifs with its surrounding mythic and literary environs is not likely a coincidence. It has all the appearance of being a product of its time and place in history.

The fact that he lived 59 BC - AD 17.

@@atheologica are there independent accounts of those dates? Our do we get those dates from guess work?

​@Atheologica Guess what. Michael Jones at IP will be releasing a video soon on whether Jesus is a pagan construct.

@@epicofatrahasis3775 Great fodder for my channel. 😂

​@@atheologica 😂 I hope you tear him a new one.

Ok So how does that prove Jesus

It’s easy to believe with blind faith & rationalizations….very hard to understand, attain knowledge and get at the truth of something. *You* might want to choose another path.

The question is why Justin Martyr had such strong faith in the first place, considering that he was not among the original 'witnesses' to the risen Jesus like some of Jesus' disciples or Paul. His faith was based on hearsay that he believed. I think that what made Dr Miller's faith weaken was the argumentation and justification of faith on the part of Justin. Furthermore, considering how popular and common martyrdom mythologising was among early Christians, we have to examine the sources and evidence for the martyrdom of Justin very carefully to know whether he really was martyred for his faith and was given a chance to give up on it, or whether he was just one among many victims of Roman persecution who were executed without even being given any chance to abandon their views, or whether he was martyred at all.

@@Nexus-jg7ev I was raised in a Southern Baptist faith. My faith fell apart mostly because of the lack of proof of all the claimed supernatural events of the old and new testament . Faith does not explain supernatural events, evidence is needed. If you are claiming something outside reality happened and your religion is based on it then you need proof. Faith is not fact. Belief is not evidence.

In Justin’s Apology 21. sent to one of the great Roman authorities he does openly admit to the stories being mythical just as that of the early Greek and Hellenistic characters and stories; BUT, his only defense is claiming the other mythologies as being that of “Demons”. So, I think it’s safe to say that’s some serious cognitive dissonance on Justin’s part, and at that point had just spit in the face of Roman authority’s and culture; so whether or not he recanted his testimony/belief in Christianity, he was another idiot who insulted the most powerful empire at that time. He fucked around and found out, just as that of the other “martyrs”.

I am in the same position that you are... The OT uses myths from the ancient near east to make points or to make polemics against other gods. Why can´t the NT writers do the same? Also, we do that many times with heroes and characters of hollywood. But well, I guess I´ll hace to read his book. Blessings from Argentina my brother, may the grace of Jesus be with you

Clarke Morledge, I want to start by noting that your comment is expressed respectfully and without any hint of animosity. As much nastiness as I tend to get from Christians on my channel, you should know that I appreciate your comparatively kinder tone. I am perfectly fine with you taking the approach that the Gospel authors are simply dressing up Jesus' resurrection with the language and decor of Greco-Roman apotheosis. As I try to make clear, I'm not here to deconvert anybody. Rather, I am presenting research and defending nonbelief. But defending nonbelief does not constitute asking believers *not* to believe. I think everyone should be free to believe and practice whatever they want, so long as they aren't harming anyone. That said, I will comment on why it is that I, personally, do not take your approach. It does strike me as special pleading to say that, in every other instance of apotheosis or translation, we are dealing with mythology, whereas this *one* case is truly historical. Occam's Razor comes to bear on this, as well. It seems rather ad hoc to say that either God or the NT authors were utilizing well-known mythic tropes to express a true reality, versus the simpler notion that this is just more of the same. Not to mention, it is remarkably coincidental that such a story *just* *happens* to blossom from the *very* cultural and historical milieu where such themes were prominent. That, I'd say, tells us just about everything we need to know. But again, feel free to take the C.S. Lewis approach of regarding Christianity as the "True Myth." For us skeptics, however, it doesn't quite cut the mustard.

"Jesus was different, in that Jesus' resurrection WAS historically real." There is not historical proof of the virgin birth or sometimes called the rape of the 13 year old girl. There is no proof he jumped out of the grave after 3 or 4 days. There is no proof the empty grave claimed to be his is actually his. There is no proof the Earth stood still when he died. There is no proof he turned water into wine. Where is no proof he walked on water. There is no proof he met the devil on a mountain. There is no proof he cast demons into a pig. There is no proof he was of .... Well you get the picture. The bible is not self proving. There might of been a person named Jesus that thought he was the son of god but hey that happens a lot.

I very much enjoyed this interview. This sews in me an understanding of Paul and the construction of the Christian religion. However, the mythic and supernatural packaging don't touch my Jesus, and the teachings that, even as a child, read to me as spiritual science and truth. In each gospel the resurrection account seems tucked in at the end (not many pages of writing). I think of it like this: when the rulers and elites kill a hero of the people; make a martyr from a freedom fighter, then the best message to give out is that your John Lennon or your Martin Luther King...are multiplied a thousand fold in the spirit of community, and more than that; John and Martin are coming back, like Jesus. The body dies (everybody does) but the spirit is indestructible, and the people who have lived in the light ascend into heaven; escaping this mortal coil for good. This all makes perfect sense unless you hold on to the idea that life is a meaningless material mush and that we can just do what the hell we like. Storytellers and poets are telling the truth.

@@paulchiuk Without the supernatural being true he is not a god. He is only a man and like many others of that period claimed to be the Messiah. He was not the only one killed during that time period claiming to be a god. Many people made important writing to guide peoples behavior without being a god. But there is not any proof it was actually his words anyway as they were recorded years after his death by others. It could all be fake. In addition, if the supernatural events are not true then any reference he made to knowledge of the supernaturla are just b/s or from a delusional mind. If the supernatural events are not true and they are not that pushes him out of the holly reigh.

LOL!

How sad that this is all you took from it.

That is not all I took from this discussion but it struck me as symbolic of the destructive force that is religion. Such a selfish act is also a betrayal of trust and I feel this women’s frustration and rage. Anyway thanks for the great work.

@@possumface2425 I owe you an apology. I mistakenly thought that was a dig at Dr. Miller. I see what you're saying now. Thanks for the comment, and please accept my sincere apology.

Got to prove it

@@Cuffsmaster Prove what? The man called Jesus who probably was a real person really died, but his story lived on, and in a sense, so did he. Ergo, the man appeared "again-standing" anastasis i.e. resurrected.

hun??

@@Cuffsmaster I don't think I'm anyone's hun. More like Adversary unless you understand and join me. Many are called. Few are chosen.

@@Son-Of-Righteousness sure buddy - take that long walk back to reality.

@@Cuffsmaster If you don't understand. It's you who's needing a long journey back to the TRUTH. I'm the son of man. The suffering servant of the Lord. The despised and REJECTED one. The chief builder the builders rebelled against and rejected. Your father Sol. Amen Ra. The reason you blind hypocrit fks say amen. Means "SO BE IT" because I'm the word made flesh. The king of kings.

Try to remember to swallow next time they bring you your meds.

Do we have any solid proof of that actually ever having happened? We have claims that it might have happened. Correlation is not causation.

@Anna Scott I'm not sure if there's anything concrete, but when I suggest to an atheist to try a statanic ritual for themselves, I'm told "no" out of fear. Which doesn't make sense to be afraid if God is not real.

@@rayrod4218 ya that’s a fair point. I was about to answer bad juju, and then was like wait… yeah you got me there.

@@rayrod4218 one hears stories and they never end well. Let’s put it that way.

@@rayrod4218 that’s enough for me to it. Whether it’s real or not.

How so?

Oh man, what was Dr. Richard Miller thinking!? 😂 I mean, the Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it!!! 😂😂😂

@@iwasjustintrance Oh dear..such a lack of critical thinking among mythicists. It's not "The Bible" I'm appealing to. I'm appealing to Paul. Good luck finding support for the idea that Paul's claim to have met the "Pillars" of the Church in Jerusalem didnt happen. That puts the origin of Christianity squarely on the shoulders of those first disciples of Jesus. So sad 😢

⁠@@thuscomeguerriero So sad, you clearly lack the critical thinking skills to understand the difference between a claim, and evidence for the claim. Paul CLAIMED to have spoken to the apostles, so that can be thrown out since he was speaking to illiterates in Corinth at the time who clearly didn’t think twice about his misuse of the Torah and Tenakh. The Synoptic gospels are anonymous. We don’t have any of the writings from any of the actual apostles. Not to mention that eye witness testimony,(including the so called 500 that Paul CLAIMED witnessed the risen Christ, of which we have no writings of), can be completely thrown out as hearsay. The evidence is shit to put it ever so lightly. 😮‍💨

@@UrMomsFavSnack one topic at a time my friend. Now..zero in here on this point. You're not going to find any support for the notion Paul didnt meet the so-called "Pillars" of the church (Peter, John, and James).. It's just not going to happen. Therefore, we have a first-hand witness in Paul to the men who were followers of Jesus from the beginning of his work. Therefore, this scholar is a bonafide baffoon if he believes the resurrection claims surrounding Jesus BEGAN anywhere outside of Judea..and more specifically outside of the proclamation of the disciples of Jesus themselves.

​@one thus come If Jesus was the "son of God", can you explain why he was a failed end times preacher?