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This is a list of the sources for Christ myth theory, any relevant qualifications, positions held, and publications.

Comtemporary

Pro

G.A. Wells (born 1926)
  • Education: Degrees in German, philosophy, and natural science. Phd, specialization unknown.
  • Relevant specialization: none
  • Relevant publications:
  • The Jesus of the Early Christians (Pemberton 1971)
  • Did Jesus exist? (Prometheus Books 1987)
  • The Jesus Myth (Open Court 1998)
  • Religious Postures: Essays on Modern Christian Apologists and Religious Problems (Open Court 1988)
  • The Historical Evidence for Jesus (Prometheus 1988)
  • Who Was Jesus?: A Critique of the New Testament Record (Open Court 1989)
  • The Jesus Legend (Open Court 1996)
  • Can We Trust the New Testament? (Open Court 2003)
  • Belief and Make-Believe (Open Court 2003)
  • Cutting Jesus Down to Size (Open Court 2009)
  • Basic position: At one time Wells doubted the existence of the historcal Jesus, though he acknowledged that such as a view is "is today almost totally rejected". He has since come to believe that Q is early evidence and now accepts a minimalistic historical Jesus.
  • Views of others: Graham Stanton regarded Well's arguments as the most sophisticated of the Christ myth theorists, though he rejected them. Michael Martin argues that Wells's argument is "sound", though it "may seem ad hoc and arbitrary" and "is controversial and not widely accepted". Robert E. Van Voorst, while noting that Wells was "probably the most able advocate of the nonhistoricity theory", has said that he advocated the theory "not for objective scholarly reasons, but for highly tendentious, antireligious purposes."
Michael Martin (born 1932)
  • Relevant specialization: philosophy of religion
  • Relevant publications:
  • Atheism: A Philosophical Justification (Temple University Press 1989)
  • The Case Against Christianity (Temple University Press 1991)
  • Atheism, Morality, and Meaning (Prometheus 2002)
  • The Impossibility of God (ed, Prometheus 2003)
  • The Improbability of God (ed, Prometheus 2006)
  • The Cambridge Companion to Atheism (ed, Cambridge University Press 2006)
  • Basic position: Martin argues that a strong prima facie challenge can be made to the argument for Jesus's existence, though he acknowledges that such a denial is "not widely accepted".
  • Views of others: Gary Habermas describes Martin as "[o]ne of the only scholars to follow G. A. Wells" and says that "Martin's theses fail to account for the available data at a very basic level." Habermas also draws attention to Martin's failure to accurately respresent the views of the scholars that Martin himself quotes in ostensible support of his views.[1]
Earl Doherty (born 1941)
  • Education: BA in ancient history
  • Position: none
  • Relevant specialization: history
  • Relevant publications:
  • "The Jesus Puzzle: Pieces in a Puzzle of Christian Origins", Journal of Higher Criticism (1997);
  • The Jesus Puzzle (Canadian Humanist Publications 1999);
  • Basic position: Doherty argues that Jesus never existed as a historical person; non-historical mystical speculations were progressively historicized and personified over time. He admits, though, that mainstream scholarship dismisses the thesis and that "[m]ost of their comment[s]... are limited to expressions of contempt."
  • Views of others: Ben Witherington has said that Doherty's efforts are "unhistorical and even anti-historical" and that "Mr. Doherty unfortunately is a mere polemicist. He has not done his historical homework, he clearly has not bothered to read the broad range of NT scholarship, and of course he comes at his study with a strong ax to gring." John Dominic Crossan has compared Doherty to a moon-landing skeptic.[2] Paula Fredriksen has said that Doherty "seems to be working very hard to create a straw man that he can then begin to knock down." Hector Avalos has stated that Doherty's case seems "plausible", but R. Joseph Hoffmann has said that Doherty's primary work, The Jesus Puzzle, is "qualitatively and academically far inferior to anything so far written on the subject."
Robert M. Price (born 1954)
  • Position: Professor of theology and scriptural studies at the unaccredited Johnnie Coleman Theological Seminary & professor of biblical criticism at the unaccredited Center for Inquiry Institute; fellow of the Jesus Seminar
  • Relevant specialization: New Testament
  • Relevant publications:
  • The Widow Traditions in Luke-Acts (Society of Biblical Literature 1997)
  • Deconstructing Jesus (Prometheus Books 2000)
  • The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man (Prometheus Books 2003)
  • The Da Vinci Fraud (Prometheus Books 2005)
  • The Reason Driven Life (Prometheus Books 2006)
  • The Pre-Nicene New Testament (Signature Books 2006)
  • Jesus Is Dead (American Atheist Press 2007)
  • The Paperback Apocalypse (Prometheus Books 2007)
  • Inerrant the Wind: The Evangelical Crisis in Biblical Authority (Prometheus Books 2009)
  • The Historical Jesus: Five Views (with other authors) (InterVarsity Press 2009)
  • Basic position: Price feels that the evidence for the existence of the historical Jesus is deeply ambiguous, at best, and that to postulate the existence of such a person is thus "arbitrary". Nevertheless, Price admits that New Testament scholars regard the Christ myth theory with "universal disdain".
  • Views of others: James D. G. Dunn has characterized Price's arguments as "sad"; Tony Costa has said that Price's work "is not a serious discussion of the issues among one’s scholarly peers but rather comes across as an extremely bitter rant"; Craig A. Evans has said that "[v]irtually no scholar trained in history will agree with Price's negative conclusions", and that his "work in the gospels is overpowered by a philosophical mindset that is at odds with historical research—of any kind."
Timothy Freke (born 1959) & Peter Gandy (writting together)
  • Education: Timothy Freke- BA in philosophy; Peter Gandy- MA in classical civilization
  • Position: none
  • Relevant specialization: Timothy Freke- none; Peter Gandy- history
  • Relevant publications:
  • The Jesus Mysteries (Three Rivers Press 2001)
  • Jesus and the Lost Goddess (Three Rivers Press 2002)
  • The Laughing Jesus (Three Rivers Press 2006)
  • Basic position: Freke and Gandy argue that Jesus never existed; Gnostic belief in a purely mythical Jesus was the original form of Christianity which was supplanted, suppressed, and then covered-up by the Catholic Church.
  • Views of others: When asked about Christ myth theory authors, including Freke and Gandy, Bart Ehrman replied: "This current craze that Christianity was a mystery religion like these other mystery religions-the people who are saying this are almost always people who know nothing about the mystery religions; they've read a few popular books, but they're not scholars of mystery religions. The reality is, we know very little about mystery religions-the whole point of mystery religions is that they're secret! So I think it's crazy to build on ignorance in order to make a claim like this." Likewise, when N. T. Wright was asked to debate either Freke or Gandy concerning their thesis on television, he replied that this "was like asking a professional astronomer to debate with the authors of a book claiming the moon was made of green cheese."
D. M. Murdock
  • Position: none
  • Relevant specialization: classical literature
  • Relevant publications:
  • The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold (Adventures Unlimited Press 1999)
  • multiple self-published books
  • Basic position: Murdock believes that there never was a historical Jesus; "Jesus" began as an amalgam of astrological symbolism and pagan myths which were later historicized.
  • Views of others: Even fellow Christ myth theory advocate, Robert M. Price has said Murdock "is quick to state as bald fact what turn out to be, once one chases down her sources, either wild speculation or complex inference from a chain of complicated data open to many interpretations... The Christ Conspiracy is a random bag of (mainly recycled) eccentricities, some few of them worth considering, most dangerously shaky, many outright looney."

Contra

Graham Stanton (1940-2009)
  • Relevant specialization: New Testament; Gospels, particularly Matthew's
  • Relevant publications:
  • Jesus of Nazareth in New Testament Preaching (Cambridge University Press 1974)
  • The Gospels and Jesus'' (Oxford University Press 1989)
  • Gospel for a New People: Studies in Matthew (T. & T. Clark Publishers 1992)
  • Gospel Truth? New Light on Jesus and the Gospels (Zondervan 1997)
  • Jesus and Gospel (Cambridge University Press 2004)
  • Basic position: "Today, nearly all historians, whether Christians or not, accept that Jesus existed and that the gospels contain plenty of valuable evidence which has to be weighed and assessed critically. There is general agreement that, with the possible exception of Paul, we know far more about Jesus of Nazareth than about any first or second century Jewish or pagan religious teacher."
  • Views of others:
Robert E. Van Voorst
  • Relevant specialization: New Testament
  • Relevant publications:
  • Jesus Outside the New Testament (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing 2000)
  • Reading the New Testament Today (2004)
  • The Jesus Legend: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition (co-author, 2007)
  • Basic position: "The theory of Jesus' nonexistence is now effectively dead as a scholarly question... The nonhistoricity thesis has always been controversial, and it has consistently failed to convince scholars of many disciplines and religious creeds... Biblical scholars and classical historians now regard it as effectively refuted."
  • Views of others:
Bart D. Ehrman (born 1955)
  • Relevant specialization: New Testament and early Christianity
  • Didymus the Blind and the Text of the Gospels (Society of Biblical Literature 1987)
  • The Text of the New Testament in Contemporary Research (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company 1995)
  • The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture (Oxford University Press 1996)
  • After the New Testament: A Reader in Early Christianity ( Oxford University Press 1998)
  • Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium ( Oxford University Press 1999)
  • The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings (Oxford University Press 2003)
  • Truth and Fiction in The Da Vinci Code: A Historian Reveals What We Really Know about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Constantine (Oxford University Press 2004)
  • Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why (HarperSanFrancisco 2005)
  • Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (And Why We Don't Know About Them). HarperCollins 2009.
  • Basic position: "I think the evidence is just so overwhelming that Jesus existed, that it's silly to talk about him not existing. I don't know anyone who is a responsible historian, who is actually trained in the historical method, or anybody who is a biblical scholar who does this for a living, who gives any credence at all to any of this."
  • Views of others:
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