beliefnet
A rational analysis of the available data
admittedly limited to the Gospels and some recently discovered Gnostic
writings, shows that the Nazarene cults centered on Jesus were popular
enough that a century after his death they were documented by literate
followers of the major cults centered on the male disciples. A year or
so after his death the cults were important enough that Saul was sent
out by the Romans (Jews?) to suppress them. After his famous incident
on the road to Damascus, Paul found it necessary to promote the leader
of these cults to his Christ, either as a political move to co-opt the
cults, or as a cynical move to debase the populist leader to a
conventional God. In either case it worked and Christ became conflated
with Jesus as "Jesus Christ." In any event it was necessary to
canonize the Gospels when Christianity became the official religion of
the Empire. Permitting a clandestine few to retain the populist,
humanist ideals of Jesus with the Holy Bible as their writ albeit a la
Jefferson a whole bunch of the NT was ignored. The Enlightenment may be
the flowering of these clandestine cults. The parallels between the
populist, humanist teachings of Jesus and the Enlightenment are apparent
to all who wish to look with an open mind.
beliefnet
A few fictional stories about Jesus
mainly Passion and birth related became incorporated in Paul's
Christianity, but that says nothing about whether or not there was a
real Jesus that preached in the early first century. The Passion
fiction was the reason the synoptic gospels were included in the canon,
but the inclusion of the earlier stories in the Synoptics suggests that
even in the 4th century the preacher was a significant historical
figure. While Christianity was the main Jesus cult in the 4th century
there were others that for political reasons had to be wrapped into the
package.
I find it
reasonable that there are two completely different Jesus histories in
the first century. The fictional God man of Christianity, and the
radical hippie who created the groupies that made the God man fiction
necessary.
