I have updated the Who’s Who among Mythicists and Mythicist Agnostics page.
The original intent of the page was to test the claims by a number of New Testament scholars that the questioning the historical existence of Jesus was motivated by anti-Christian bias and generally a reaction against prior negative experiences with extreme fundamentalist cults. Hence I have divided the page into different religious backgrounds and given prominence where I can to the background of each name and their current attitude towards Christianity, if known.
The names listed in the table are a mix of scholars of various backgrounds and lay people. I have included both names associated with academically rigorous arguments alongside others that are less so. Hopefully my colour coding, bolding and hyperlinks will enable interested readers to quickly identify which is which.
I am sure there must be names I have overlooked. I encourage anyone who sees omissions to bring me up to date.
Neil Godfrey
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I think you could list Ellegard under “Jesus was someone else” since he identified him with the Teacher of Righteousness. You could also put me under that list as well since I have made extensive arguments about why Jesus can be identified with Honi the Circle Drawer. I have made a request that you review my theory before and was told you would do it at some later point in time.
http://www.lost-history.com/christianity_is_older.php
Jeff Q.
Neil, if I may put myself forward for your list. I published my book “The Rock and the Tower” towards the end of 2016. It is large but only the first volume of what will probably be three. The book argues for “the shaman paradigm”: that Jesus was not a physical man but a “visitor from heaven” who was believed to have appeared through the medium of a shaman. The book goes through the candidates for the shaman and identifies her as Mary (the Virgin and the Magdalene, for they are two titles for the same person).
My background is that my parents were nominally Anglican but in reality not religious – we never went to church. I became a Christian as a child and have remained one ever since, but have never belonged to a denomination. My first encounter with the mythical Jesus was Freke and Gandy’s Jesus Mysteries, and I progressed from there to Earl Doherty, who has been my major influence among modern authors.
A stronger influence though has been the Gospel of Thomas. My books show how this represents the original, spiritual, Christianity and how Thomas has influenced the four gospels. Very recently I have published a new book on the structure of Thomas called The Thomas Code.
Stephen
(My blog is at splaurie.com)
Sorry if this is off-topic, but in following the links in your post, I looked at your library at LibraryThing which led me to create my own account there. Do you know how to import a list from a Kindle account? The options and FAQ on the site are proving entirely worthless to me.
Not as far as I am aware. I usually import records from the library or online services they list on librarything. Anything in my kindle collection I mark as a kindle book in my librarything.
Thanks, Neil. I guess I’ll just keep manually typing them in.
There is an “Add Books” function that allows you to directly enter the bibliographic records direct from other sites, including Amazon itself and the Library of Congress.
Apologies to above authors I omitted. I have added you now.
I have also added Paul George, author of Jesus of the Books, in which he argues the link between the Jewish War of 66-70 and the forging of Christianity.
Mike Lawrence, British author of “Astonishing Credulity” and “Contra Ehrman” (available on Amazon) can be added to the Did Not Exist List. Mike also runs NOTORIUK which advocates the separation of Church and state in the UK. He’s also been interviewed by Mythicist Milwaukee.
Much of Mike’s work aligns with Paul George’s and the focus on the Jewish Wars as a major catalyst for Christianity.
Thanks for the update. I will update the table but it will take me some time to complete. Meanwhile, any other additions or corrections — do let me know.