No Stupid Questions

No. But physical proof is not the standard we use for determining someone's historical existence.

As an atheist I believe Jesus existed, I just don’t think he was the son of god or that he was resurrected.

It would have been far easier to start a religion around a real man with actual followers than if he was a figment of someone’s imagination.

What do you mean by physical proof?

Some history is known by digging up physical stones n bones. Some is known by digging up texts.

There are multiple texts dated to the 1st century that all corroborate the story that a person called Jesus was crucified around 33AD

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sources_for_the_historicity_of_Jesus

Physical proof? No. But if that's the criterion for proof that someone existed, then that mean 90% of historical figures can't be proven to have existed. We don't have the remains of Alexander the Great or any artefacts we can be sure are his. We have no remnants of Plato, none of his original writings remain.

Did a person name Jesus live sometime during the first century AD? Scholars are fairly certain of that. We do have textual evidence other than the bible that points to his existence.

It is highly unlikely that he was anything like the person written about in the bible. He was likely one of many radical apocalyptic prophets of the time.

We don't have too many details about his life but because of something called the criterion of embarrassment we have good reason to believe he was baptized by a man named John the Baptist and was later crucified. (i.e. most burgeoning religions seeking legitimacy don't typically invent stories that are embarrassing to their deity)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

I'm by no means an expert but I was briefly obsessed with comparative religion over a decade ago and I don't think anyone has given a great answer, I believe my answer is correct but I don't have time for research beyond checking a couple of details.

As a few people have mentioned there is little physical evidence for even the most notable individuals from that time period and it's not reasonable to expect any for Jesus.

In terms of literary evidence there is exactly 1 historian who is roughly contemporary and mentions Jesus. Antiquities of the Jews by Josephus mentions him twice, once briefly telling the story of his crucifixion and resurrection. The second is a mention in passing when discussing the brother of Jesus delivering criminals to be stoned.

I think it is reasonable to conclude that a Jewish spiritual leader with a name something like Jesus Christ probably existed and that not long after his death miracles are being attributed to him.

It is also worth noting the historical context of the recent emergence of Rabbinical Judaism and the overabundance of other leaders who were claimed to be Messiahs, many of whom we also know about primarily(actually I think only) from Josephus.

The thing is that compared to other historical people we kid of have similar evidence. Like we have records of Socrates existing and we have records of some Joshua existing.

The difference is that nobody claims that Socrates was a fantastical god being who defied death, which is a extraordinary claim, we just say he was a very smart guy, we se very smart guys on a daily basis, nothing special with that so we can just believe it and even if we are wrong it has no real life implications.

For the Joshua guy, that's quite a different story. The claims about him are extraordinary and need extraordinary evidence. But we only have normal evidence. If the claims about him were true it would contradict almost everything we think we know about the universe, how it behaves, etc.

So again, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

The new testament stories were written well over a hundred years after. That would be like someone today writing an account of the civil war based solely on stories.

As far as I know, we simply don't have directly contemporary, first-hand evidence of him. Even the most 'contemporary' accounts of him that still exist were written at least 50 years after he would have died, and those are quite cursory. Perhaps primary sources were lost--or intentionally destroyed when they didn't align with beliefs--or perhaps they never existed. There's not even much evidence for Pontius Pilate (I think one source mentioning that he was recalled to Rome and executed for incompetence?), and there should be, given that he was a Roman official.

People that study the history of the bible--as in, the historical bible, not the bible as a religious text--tend to believe that a historical Jesus existed, even if they don't believe that he was divine.

IMO, the most likely explanation is that Jesus was yet another in a long-line of false messiahs, and was summarily executed by Rome for trying to start yet another rebellion. Since cult members tend to be unable to reconcile reality with their beliefs, they could have reframed their beliefs to say that he was a spiritual messiah, rather than a physical messiah.

There's a bunch of old texts about a Jewish "prophet" called Jesus, who was gathering some followers. As far as I understand, there's no really reason not to believe the person existed.

Then again, all the Jesus lore, there's no reason to believe his miracles were real as those made no sense and there's no real proof besides those same texts written after Jesse's death

The question is typically described as "the historicity of Jesus". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

There are similar debates for other famous ancient figures.

The general academic consensus on Jesus (and many similar figures) is that they did exist and many of the details have been fictionalized.

There is no proof outside of the Bible and some other writings. Even those mentions seem to have occurred well after Jesus supposedly lived.

In terms of non-literary proof, there isn't anything credible.

There's more evidence that King David existed.

I have said this many times-

It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if there was a "real" Jesus. The Jesus of the Bible, the Jesus that is worshiped is an impossibility. A fiction. His life is full of details that defy basic biological and physical laws. On top of that, nothing he supposedly said was written down at the time, so we have no idea if what is recorded to have been his sayings in the Bible are things he actually said.

I always relate it to Ian Fleming having a schoolchum who's father's name was Ernst Stavro Bloefeld. So was there a real Ernst Stavro Bloefeld? Yes. Was he a supervillain fighting the world's greatest secret agent? No.

That's not the real question though. The real question is rather are there any "real physical proof" that Jesus had literally anything special that is in itself being the "son of God" or anything related to religion.

Anybody (sadly) can be crucified, especially during a period where it is trendy. Anybody can walk through part of the desert. Anybody can organize a meal, give a speech, etc.

Even if it's done exceptionally well, that does not make it special in the sense of being the proof of anything religious. We all have friends with unique talents, and social media helped us discovered that there are so many more of those around the entire world, but nobody in their right mind would claim that because Eminem can sing words intelligibly faster than the vast majority of people he is the son of "God".

I also read a book about a decade ago (unfortunately didn't write down notes about it so can't find the name back) on the history of religion, from polytheism to monotheism, and it was quite interesting. If I remember correctly one way to interpret it was through the lens of religions maintaining themselves over time and space, which could include growing to a sufficient size in terms of devout adepts. The point being that veracity was not part of the equation.

Nope. But that's also not as big a deal as a lot of folks make it.

Also, he's far from the only important(?) historical(?) figure we can't prove ever existed.

No, there's barely any physical evidence that anyone a few hundred years ago existed.

But if writing is enough, there are some. Tacitus basically said: "Nero blamed the Christians, followers of that Guy called Jesus who Pilatus executed a few decades ago."

Wikipedia at least says both his Baptism and crucifixion are not disputed by historians.

Girl gets married

Girl gets shitfaced and sleeps with someone other than her husband

Girl is pregnant!

Girl makes up some dumb shit to avoid jealous rage

Shit gets waaaaay out of hand.

There are many Jesus's in the world.

Christianity exists. Religions don't tend to spring up from nowhere. Every myth has its nugget of truth. Was there a preacher back then whose followers later spread around the world? Almost certainly. Where else could Christianity have come from?

Was he the son of god though? Was he capable of all the miracles the bible claims? Is the god he preached even real? There is no evidence that the answer to these three questions is anything but no I'm afraid.

if you found a corpse it would cause a lot of problems for the religion.