huckelberry wrote:Symmachus, I thought that was a very helpful explanation, thankyou.
I have heard some people bridging the distance between mythic Jesus and first century Judaism by proposing everybody in those days were wanting a dying rising god. Like the morning follows the night they were popping up everywhere. Very dubious to my ears. I noticed Johannes bruskly dismissed that idea. I do not know if it invites more consideration.
The idea was really a product of its time. It doesn't have much support these days. It was promoted by an unholy alliance of rationalists who were influenced by Sir James Frazer, the pioneering anthropologist, and Christian theologians who liked the idea that a resurrected god was part of our common religious inheritance.
There's a PhD there for an aspiring young member of Cassius' history of ideas programme.