I agree that Nazareth is a huge problem for mythicism. It does seem to suggest that the authors were manufacturing ways to tie their infancy stories into knowledge about a real person.
@RustyWalker Here's a preview of something I'll be turning into a video: Consider the following hypothetical scenario. An author decides to tell a story about a character named Luis Mierda del Toro, who was born as pauper and grew to be a person of fame. He gives few details of this character's early life and family, focusing instead on his adulthood and rise in stature with the intent of passing this fictional character off as real. A second author runs with the story of Luis, effectively plagiarizing the earlier tale and adding information that was not present in the earlier tale. This author writes that Luis, though a pauper, was actually descended from a family of some importance and renown from the city of Madrid. He notes that Luis himself was born in Madrid and carefully lays out, in great detail, the lineage of Luis, going back many generations, in an effort to establish the credibility of the story. Then, he thinks to himself, "you know, "lineage" sounds like, 'línea," and for no good reason, decides to make a pun about Luis being a known resident of La Línea (which despite being argued as fictitious as Luis, is a real place). He simply cannot resist the urge to include this pun and thereby create tension in the narrative that is easily avoidable. Later, a third author, having read both of the previous two stories, decides to plagiarize both and write an adaptation of his own, complete with his own version of Luis' family tree. Then, for no good reason, writes that Luis had traveled from La Línea to Madrid because he had to register to vote there (despite this being untrue and there being no such legal requirement...and both Luis and La Línea allegedly being fictional anyway, rendering the inclusion of such a journey pointless, as the author could simply write Luis in Madrid from the start; and such an ommission would reduce the tension in the narrative, making it more credible). If this convoluted, incoherent mess of an explanation for the development of the narrative of Luis Mierda del Toro seems like it is overreaching and implausible (though possible), it should. Yet, this is essentially the Jesus mythicists' argument. A more reasonable explanation is that Luis was a real person known to be a resident of La Línea and the authors being constrained by that fact, yet wanting to reconcile this with their need to place him in Madrid in their narratives. The point here being that authors being constrained by established fact makes more sense that making a purely fictional account overly complicated without need--particularly if the goal is for people to believe it. The same is true of the development of the narrative surrounding Jesus. A more reasonable explanation is that Jesus was a real person known to be from Nazareth (a place for which there is archeological evidence to support its existence) and the authors being constrained by that fact, yet wanting to reconcile this with their need to place him in Bethlehem in their narratives (linking him to the overtly referenced prophecy). And for non-Spanish-speakers, "Mierda del Toro" means "bullshit," which is exactly how I feel about this stupid idea.
You're overlooking a far simpler explanation. Some form of Christian religion already existed for decades before the writing of Matthew. The Christians may have already been calling Jesus a "Nazarene" as part of their tradition. Thus, the writer of Matthew wanted to work the Nazarene element into his story. This doesn't require Jesus to have actually been a Nazarene; it was just already in the Christian mythology.
@dwaneanderson8039 That's literally my argument--that the authors were not freely fabricating their narratives like mythicists argue. It's far simpler for them to have been constrained by preexisting data--effectively trying to force a square peg into a round hole.
This is easily my favorite example of mythicists' invocation of pesharim because rather than accepting the far less convoluted fact that Matthew 2:23 probably refers to a nonexistent scripture as a means to reconcile an actual historical figure with tradition, an unjustified leap in logic is made to link the passage in Isaiah 11:10. But, because _that_ passage doesn't work with a straightforward reading, _either,_ *another* unjustified leap in logic is then made to presume that this is some sort of word play despite archaeological evidence that Nazareth did exist as a small village contemporaneous to the time when Jesus was held to have lived. This invocation is especially amusing to me because 1) the far clearer and less ambiguous link between Micah 5:2-5 and Matthew 2:1 renders the "Nazareth" detail unnecessary for an ahistorical figure, and 2) the tenuous "netzer" argument actually _undermines_ the writer's credibility, as--presuming a complete fabrication with no historical figure as its basis--the narrative would benefit from the _omission_ of the passage. The fact that mythicists are so attached to this idea that the author of the book of Matthew was reliant on an archaic, cryptic pun that even his contemporaries might struggle to understand to establish his theology is hysterical.
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I agree that Nazareth is a huge problem for mythicism. It does seem to suggest that the authors were manufacturing ways to tie their infancy stories into knowledge about a real person.
@RustyWalker
Here's a preview of something I'll be turning into a video:
Consider the following hypothetical scenario.
An author decides to tell a story about a character named Luis Mierda del Toro, who was born as pauper and grew to be a person of fame. He gives few details of this character's early life and family, focusing instead on his adulthood and rise in stature with the intent of passing this fictional character off as real.
A second author runs with the story of Luis, effectively plagiarizing the earlier tale and adding information that was not present in the earlier tale. This author writes that Luis, though a pauper, was actually descended from a family of some importance and renown from the city of Madrid. He notes that Luis himself was born in Madrid and carefully lays out, in great detail, the lineage of Luis, going back many generations, in an effort to establish the credibility of the story. Then, he thinks to himself, "you know, "lineage" sounds like, 'línea," and for no good reason, decides to make a pun about Luis being a known resident of La Línea (which despite being argued as fictitious as Luis, is a real place). He simply cannot resist the urge to include this pun and thereby create tension in the narrative that is easily avoidable.
Later, a third author, having read both of the previous two stories, decides to plagiarize both and write an adaptation of his own, complete with his own version of Luis' family tree. Then, for no good reason, writes that Luis had traveled from La Línea to Madrid because he had to register to vote there (despite this being untrue and there being no such legal requirement...and both Luis and La Línea allegedly being fictional anyway, rendering the inclusion of such a journey pointless, as the author could simply write Luis in Madrid from the start; and such an ommission would reduce the tension in the narrative, making it more credible).
If this convoluted, incoherent mess of an explanation for the development of the narrative of Luis Mierda del Toro seems like it is overreaching and implausible (though possible), it should. Yet, this is essentially the Jesus mythicists' argument.
A more reasonable explanation is that Luis was a real person known to be a resident of La Línea and the authors being constrained by that fact, yet wanting to reconcile this with their need to place him in Madrid in their narratives. The point here being that authors being constrained by established fact makes more sense that making a purely fictional account overly complicated without need--particularly if the goal is for people to believe it.
The same is true of the development of the narrative surrounding Jesus. A more reasonable explanation is that Jesus was a real person known to be from Nazareth (a place for which there is archeological evidence to support its existence) and the authors being constrained by that fact, yet wanting to reconcile this with their need to place him in Bethlehem in their narratives (linking him to the overtly referenced prophecy).
And for non-Spanish-speakers, "Mierda del Toro" means "bullshit," which is exactly how I feel about this stupid idea.
You're overlooking a far simpler explanation. Some form of Christian religion already existed for decades before the writing of Matthew. The Christians may have already been calling Jesus a "Nazarene" as part of their tradition. Thus, the writer of Matthew wanted to work the Nazarene element into his story. This doesn't require Jesus to have actually been a Nazarene; it was just already in the Christian mythology.
@dwaneanderson8039
That's literally my argument--that the authors were not freely fabricating their narratives like mythicists argue. It's far simpler for them to have been constrained by preexisting data--effectively trying to force a square peg into a round hole.
This is easily my favorite example of mythicists' invocation of pesharim because rather than accepting the far less convoluted fact that Matthew 2:23 probably refers to a nonexistent scripture as a means to reconcile an actual historical figure with tradition, an unjustified leap in logic is made to link the passage in Isaiah 11:10. But, because _that_ passage doesn't work with a straightforward reading, _either,_ *another* unjustified leap in logic is then made to presume that this is some sort of word play despite archaeological evidence that Nazareth did exist as a small village contemporaneous to the time when Jesus was held to have lived.
This invocation is especially amusing to me because 1) the far clearer and less ambiguous link between Micah 5:2-5 and Matthew 2:1 renders the "Nazareth" detail unnecessary for an ahistorical figure, and 2) the tenuous "netzer" argument actually _undermines_ the writer's credibility, as--presuming a complete fabrication with no historical figure as its basis--the narrative would benefit from the _omission_ of the passage.
The fact that mythicists are so attached to this idea that the author of the book of Matthew was reliant on an archaic, cryptic pun that even his contemporaries might struggle to understand to establish his theology is hysterical.