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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   2840 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 12, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Why would they not just be historical figures? Do you think they didn't exist?

Let's say that for two out of the three of these figures, there is a lack of evidence outside of biblical literary traditions, which could well be apocryphal.

Which two? Judas obviously, but are you saying that there's external evidence for Paul, or Jesus?

Anyway, it's pretty implausible to me that Jesus or Paul would just be made up.

I'm fine with accepting that Saul of Tarsus is not only a historical figure, but that the legends about him are sufficiently close to what happened to that figure in reality (+/- miracles). I am fine with having a high likelihood of a historical Jesus, and that this man was an object of a cult following, though I find it unlikely that the historical Jesus would match the Jesus of Christian mythology to any reasonable degree. I doubt the existence of a historical Judas, he's too convenient as a one-stop-scapegoat literary character.

For the purposes of the game hydroacetylene proposed, I am primarily interested in the literary characters of Jesus, Paul, and Judas, and I would consider their historicity only because it makes the read-the-Bible-as-if-it-has-unreliable-narrator more plausible. They can then write some "tell it like it really was" books.

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