Is Jesus nothing more than a copy of popular myths woven into his story?

Detailed Answer:

I first heard this challenge from a person with possibly the highest IQ I have come across. He was a visiting physician, who routinely made rounds to initiate interesting discussions, and he chose the perfect topic for me. 

When he heard of my belief in Christianity, he asked why would I believe in a fictitious character, clearly copied from earlier pagan myths written before Jesus was even born. He then gave me examples, which I later found were the same lines used in the popular internet movie Zeitgeist, pseudo-academic books such as Christ in Egypt: The Jesus-Horus Connection and Pagan Origins of the Christ Myth, and the documentary film Religulous, in which Bill Maher confronts unprepared Christians, here is part of the transcript:

Bill Maher: But the Jesus’ story wasn’t original.

Christian man: How so?

Maher: Written in 1280 B.C., the Book of the Dead describes a God, Horus. Horus is the son of the god Osiris, born to a virgin mother. He was baptized in a river by Anup the Baptizer who was later beheaded. Like Jesus, Horus was tempted while alone in the desert, healed the sick, the blind, cast out demons, and walked on water. He raised Asar from the dead. “Asar” translates to “Lazarus.” Oh, yeah, he also had twelve disciples. Yes, Horus was crucified first, and after three days, two women announced Horus, the savior of humanity, had been resurrected. 

The physician presented his point with complete confidence, and then waited for my response, and I still remember what I said almost verbatim because his challenge did sound very solid. I said, “Wow, sounds like an excellent argument! However, since I already know the mountain of evidence supporting the historical accuracy not just of Jesus, but also of his resurrection, and against any opposing claims, I’ll bet it won’t take me long to find the inaccuracy in your excellent sounding points.”

The next day, I waited for the physician to make his rounds to the physics office, and then commented I found what I expected, and kept my response to just two points, because most deep discussions can wander too wide and miss making the serious points needing to be made. I will provide the two points below, but after those, I will provide a few other answers, so you can choose points meaning the most to you. 

Where did you get your information, and why did you believe it?

Ask the person to show the original myth, and the specific sections supposedly copied. The one who makes a claim bears the burden of proof, and in this case, the claims were taken from the extremely unreliable and scholarly-rejected sources noted above.

For the challenge to be reasonable, one needs to: (1) present primary sources for the supposed copied myth, (2) show the sources came before the time of Jesus, (3) show the many similarities to aspects about Jesus , (4) clearly, without having to stretch the imagination to make things similar, (5) demonstrate the causal connection, meaning give evidence the biblical writers actually used the pagan myths to create aspects of Jesus, and most importantly, (6) there better not be good evidence the accounts about Jesus were fact – because historical events are judged by evidence – only after showing no fact supports the biblical accounts accuracy can one then speculate on where the biblical writers stole their material (otherwise you commit an error in logic known as a non-sequitur, or even the genetic fallacy).

To keep it simple, just ask the person to show you the documentation to support their claims, a primary source (meaning the actual myth account supposedly copied from) or a statement from a scholarly secondary source with a footnote that can be checked. Make sure the sources being quoted come from scholars with a PhD in a relevant field, such as a person who teaches Egyptology at the university level. Don’t let them slip past this, not only is it essential to their case, but also – it doesn’t exist.

The actual historical scholarship, those whose career and PhD is in the appropriate field(s) to study this topic, have come to a conclusion a long time ago. 

• Historian Michael Grant: “To sum up, modern critical methods fail to support the Christ-myth theory. It has ‘again and again been answered and annihilated by first-rank scholars’. In recent years ‘no serious scholar has ventured to postulate the non-historicity of Jesus’—or at any rate very few, and they have not succeeded in disposing of the much stronger, indeed very abundant, evidence to the contrary.”

 

• Professor of ancient history Paul Maier: “The total evidence is so overpowering, so absolute, that only the shallowest of intellects would dare to deny Jesus’ existence. And yet this pathetic denial is still parroted by ‘the village atheist,’ bloggers on the internet, or such organizations as the Freedom from Religion Foundation.” 

 

• The most academically comprehensive work is a massive study by Tryggve Mettinger, titled The Riddle of Resurrection. Swedish scholar, professor at Lund University and member of the Royal Academy of Letters, History, and Antiquities of Stockholm, Mettinger concludes even though some myths of dying and rising gods may predate the Christian era, the claims made regarding Jesus of Nazareth are distinct from them in three critical ways. 

Wikipedia defines a primary source as an artifact, document, diary, manuscript, autobiography, recording, or any other source of information that was created at the time under study. It serves as an original source of information about the topic. In this case, the person needs to show the original myths, and the specific sections they claim is copied.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formal_fallacy; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_fallacy

Michael Grant, Jesus: An Historian’s Review of the Gospels (New York: Collier Books, 1992), 200.

“Did Jesus Really Exist,” an article on www.4Truth.net.

First, Jesus was an actual person, whose life events happened in history at a precise topographical location and time on earth.  

Second, the mythical “resurrected” deities were invariably tied to the seasons of the agricultural cycle, “dying” and “rising” repeatedly every calendar year, while Jesus’ resurrection was a one-time event entirely unrelated to seasonal changes or associated meaning. 

Third, Jesus died as a sacrifice as a coverage of our sins, this atonement is without precedence in any other accounts.

Mettinger sums up the evidence this way:

“There is, as far as I am aware, no prima facie evidence that the death and resurrection of Jesus is a mythological construct, drawing on the myths and rites of the dying and rising gods of the surrounding world. While studied with profit against the background of Jewish resurrection belief, the faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus retains its unique character in the history of religions.

 

• Another well-respected expert in this field is Dr. Edwin Yamauchi, who has studied 22 languages, has written numerous peer-reviewed books and articles, and makes a correct and brutal observation about the people making the claim that aspects of Jesus were just copied from earlier stories: those who are making the copy-cat charge don’t have the languages, don’t study the original sources, don’t pay attention to the dates, and frequently quote ideas that were popular in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries but have already been refuted.
• The world’s leading skeptical New Testament expert, Professor Bart Ehrman, observed in his Huffington Post article:

“Few of these mythicists are actually scholars trained in ancient history, religion, biblical studies or any cognate field, let alone in the ancient languages generally thought to matter for those who want to say something with any degree of authority about a Jewish teacher who (allegedly) lived in first-century Palestine. There are a couple of exceptions: of the hundreds — thousands? — of mythicists, two (to my knowledge) actually have Ph.D. credentials in relevant fields of study. But even taking these into account, there is not a single mythicist who teaches New Testament or Early Christianity or even Classics at any accredited institution of higher learning in the Western world. And it is no wonder why. These views are so extreme and so unconvincing to 99.99 percent of the real experts that anyone holding them is as likely to get a teaching job in an established department of religion as a six-day creationist is likely to land on in a bona fide department of biology.”

Tryggve Mettinger, The Riddle of Resurrection—”Dying and Rising Gods” in the Ancient Near East (Stockholm:  Almqvist & Wiksell International:  2001), 221.

Ibid.

Ehrman in another article openly asks: 

“What is driving the mythicist’s agenda? Why do they work so hard at showing that Jesus never really lived? I do not have a definitive answer to that question, but I do have a hunch. It is no accident that virtually all mythicists (in fact, all of them, to my knowledge), are either atheists or agnostics. The ones I know anything about are quite virulently, even militantly atheist … so too mythicists who are so intent on showing that the historical Jesus never existed are not being driven by a historical concern. Their agenda is religious and they are complicit in a religious ideology. They are not doing history, they are doing theology.”

To the brilliant physician, who challenged me with the copy-cat claim, I noted it was interesting how certain he, Bill Maher, Zeitgeist producers, or others making the copy-cat claim appeared to be, when it was obvious none of you were either aware of, or included what the actual scholars concluded. The scholarly consensus, regarding the claim Christianity copied from pagan myths, is that this idea is unwarranted and annoying, as these statements have been comprehensively refuted long ago. 

Awkward silence was only broken when I asked what he would say if he found himself, after his life ended, standing before an Almighty and loving Creator that he rejected. He confidently declared something to the effect of, “I am glad you reject me now as I wouldn’t want to be with a God who didn’t make himself clear to me.” 

I observed we now had direct evidence he was not using his great intellect regarding his beliefs, but was led by emotion, as anyone standing before an Almighty Creator would not be talking trash, but logically would be in abject terror. Unfortunately, the discussion abruptly ended, and the physician never brought up beliefs again. 

The Gospel accounts do not allow myth as an option.

Read the Gospel accounts yourself. It will be clear what is being read fails to meet the myth criteria. Myths arise from some mirky past, unknown or unspecified origin, and do not come with historical verification of numerous specific details from multiple, and even hostile sources, which is in contrast with the Gospels.  

Ehrman, Bart. “Did Jesus Exist,” Huffington Post. Updated May 2012.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/did-jesus-exist_b_1349544

Bart Ehrman, “Did Jesus Exist,” The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth, pp. 337-38. As cited in: https://chab123.wordpress.com/2012/09/01/bart-ehrman-on-why-there-are-jesus-mythers/

https://www.britannica.com/topic/myth: myth, a symbolic narrative, usually of unknown origin and at least partly traditional, that ostensibly relates actual events and that is especially associated with religious belief. It is distinguished from symbolic behavior (cult, ritual) and symbolic places or objects (temples, icons). Myths are specific accounts of gods or superhuman beings involved in extraordinary events or circumstances in a time that is unspecified, but which is understood as existing apart from ordinary human experience.

In fact, belief in core facts about Jesus were already in place before the Gospels were even written. Scholarship determined these Christian beliefs regarding Jesus’ divinity were already in creedal belief statements within months to a year of Jesus’ death. Creeds are brief, easy to memorize statements, allowing the oral, word-of-mouth, mostly non-literate culture of the time to share their beliefs accurately. 

An example of one of these creedal statements was given by the apostle Paul: 

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles”. (1 Corinthians 15:3-7)

There was no time for the writers to become so disconnected from the actual events, allowing for the addition of myths, the creedal statements even made their way into the New Testament, allowing scholars to recognize the core beliefs about Jesus were in place within months of his crucifixion.    

Another way the biblical writers themselves made copies of myths not an option was through direct statements. For example, directly addressing the myth issue, 2 Peter 1:16 states, “For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” 

More than once the biblical writers challenged the audience of the time to “check for yourselves”. Paul, when pulled before a local king to plead his case, discusses the resurrection and his experience with Jesus, and the king said Paul must be insane, to which Paul replied, “The king is familiar with these things, and I can speak freely to him. I am convinced that none of this has escaped his notice, because it was not done in a corner.” (Acts 26:1-26) Mythicists do not speak to the audience of the time, who were able to check the accuracy of the claims, in this way. 

The physician, researcher, and fellow Gospel writer Luke stated: “Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught. (Luke 1:1-4)

There are only a number of possible options as to what actually happened to Jesus after the crucifixion. This topic is covered in detail in blogs and videos about Jesus on the website, however, when the biblical writers state, “For we did not follow cleverly devised stories . . . but were eyewitnesses”, they do not give us the option of myth, now either their account is true, or it is a lie, but myth, or copies of myth is not an option.

Even if there were similarities, anyone believing the biblical account of Jesus is not true because of these similarities are committing an error in thinking

To assume the Christian accounts given by the Gospels are inaccurate because similar accounts were recorded earlier is an error in logic known as a non-sequitur (it does not follow). Even if those similarities actually existed, it does not follow that the Christian accounts were false, you would first have to know the Christian claims were false, then you could attempt to show how these false claims came to be. You must examine the historical merits of the Gospel accounts themselves before you draw your conclusions on whether they are accurate or not.

An example of this occurred with Morgan Robertson’s novel from 1989 titled, The Wreck of the Titan: Or, Futility. This was a fictional story containing the following elements:

• • The story revolves around a ship, named Titan,
  • The largest vessel afloat,
  • Displacing 45,000 tons,

• Claimed to be unsinkable,

• The ship was driven by 3 huge propellers,
• On a transatlantic cruise,
• Between England and New York, 
• In the middle of the night in April,
• Was moving forward at 25 knots,
• Then struck an iceberg and sunk,
• Since the number of lifeboats on the ship was half of what was needed for…
• Its 3,000-person capacity,
• More than half of its passengers perished.

 

Fourteen years after this work of fiction was published, an actual event occurred on April 15, 1912, involving the following elements:

• The event revolves around a ship named the Titanic,
• The world’s largest luxury liner,
• Displacing 45,000 tons,
• Driven by triple screws,
• Departed on a transatlantic voyage, 
• From England to New York,
• In the middle of the night in April,
• Steaming ahead at 25 knots,  
• The Titanic collided with an iceberg and sunk,
• Since the number of lifeboats on that ship was half of what was needed for…
• Its 3,000-person capacity,
• More than half of its passengers perished.

 

In the same way, using Zeitgeist or Bill Maher logic, you cannot trust the eye-witness accounts of the Titanic sinking because clearly it is a myth copied from earlier fiction. Even if the alleged similarities actually existed, we would still have to judge the accuracy of historical claims of Jesus of Nazareth on the historical facts to determine the veracity or falsehood of the claims.

 

Check for Yourself

You can look up the primary source documents and artifacts where these pagan myths came from, and judge for yourself each claim of similarity with the Gospel accounts.

Doing my own research, I found inaccurate claims in just about every claimed similarity, except some being unwarranted stretches or misunderstandings. For example, if December 25th was used by earlier pagan beliefs, so what? The Bible never gives a date for Jesus’ birth, it was more likely in April, early Christians simply came up with a Christian-related reason to celebrate the pagan holiday. 

Another funny claim was Mithras being born of a virgin. Mithras was born out of a rock, I didn’t realize rocks had genitals and could be virgins, seems a stretch to claim Christianity copied the virgin birth from that.   

Here is a link from former cold case detective, Jim Warner Wallace, who handled claims of copying from Osiris. Here is a link to Inspiring Philosophy’s coverage of each of the claimed copied pagan sources. It is better to do your own research, but if you have a source doing reliable research, then you can find refutations of every one of the alleged pagan myth copying claims.