Earl Doherty

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Earl Doherty
Born 1941
Education B.A. in Ancient History and Classical Languages
Occupation Writer
Known for Research into the Christ myth theory
Influenced by G.A. Wells
Website
www.jesuspuzzle.com

Earl J. Doherty (born 1941)[1] is a Canadian author of Challenging the Verdict (2001), The Jesus Puzzle (2005) and Jesus: Neither God Nor Man (2009). Doherty argues for a version of the Christ myth theory, the view that Jesus did not exist as an historical figure.

Contents

[edit] Background

Doherty holds a B.A. in Ancient History and Classical Languages. He has a working knowledge of Greek and Latin, which he has supplemented with the basics of Hebrew and Syriac.[2]

[edit] The Jesus Puzzle

Doherty was introduced to the idea of a mythical origin of Jesus by, among other things, the work of G. A. Wells, who has authored a number of books arguing a moderate form of the "Christ myth" theory.[2]

Doherty has used the title "The Jesus Puzzle" for four different works. In 1997, the Journal of Higher Criticism published his article, "The Jesus Puzzle: Pieces in a Puzzle of Christian Origins."[3] In 1999, his book The Jesus Puzzle: Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ? was published by Canadian Humanist Publications.[4] He uses the title for a website where he publishes additional commentary and responses to reviews and criticisms of his work.[5] He also used the title for a novel which he provides for download on his website.[6]

In all four of these works, Doherty presents views on the origins of Christianity, specifically promoting the view that Jesus is a mythical figure rather than a historical person. Doherty argues that Paul and other writers of the earliest existing proto-Christian Gnostic documents did not believe in Jesus as a person who incarnated on Earth in an historical setting. Rather, they believed in Jesus as a heavenly being who suffered his sacrificial death in the lower spheres of heaven in the hands of the demon spirits, and was subsequently resurrected by God. This Christ myth was not based on a tradition reaching back to a historical Jesus, but on the Old Testament exegesis in the context of Jewish-Hellenistic religious syncretism heavily influenced by Middle Platonism, and what the authors believed to be mystical visions of a risen Jesus.

According to Doherty, the Jesus myth was given a historical setting only by the second generation of Christians, somewhere between the first and second century. Doherty claims that even the author of the Gospel of Mark probably did not consider his gospel to be a literal work of history, but an allegorical midrashic composition based on the Old Testament prophecies. In the widely supported two-source hypothesis, the story of Mark was later fused with a separate tradition of anonymous sayings embodied in the Q document into the other gospels; according to Doherty these became interpreted as the literal history of the life of Jesus. Doherty denies any historical value of the Acts of the Apostles, and refers to works by John Knox,[7] Joseph B. Tyson,[8], J.C. O'Neill[9], Burton L. Mack[10] and Richard Pervo[11] in dating Acts into the second century and regarding it as largely based on legend.[12] In 2009 Doherty self-published a revised edition of his book, with a new title of Jesus: Neither God nor Man.[13]

[edit] Reception

Although Doherty's treatment of the issue has made no impact on scholarly debate, his views have received attention on the Internet and among a few scholars. Among authors sympathetic to the view that Jesus never existed, Doherty's work has received mixed reactions. The Jesus Puzzle has received favorable reviews from skeptics Robert M. Price and Richard Carrier.[14] Frank R. Zindler, former editor of American Atheist, in a review of The Jesus Puzzle described it as "the most compelling argument against the historical Jesus published in my life-time".[15] George Albert Wells, who now argues a more moderate form of the Christ myth and who rejects Doherty's view that the mythical Jesus of Paul did not also descend to Earth,[16] has nonetheless described The Jesus Puzzle as an "important book".[17] R. Joseph Hoffmann considers that there are "reasons for scholars to hold" the view that Jesus never existed, but considers Doherty "A 'disciple' of Wells" who "has rehashed many of the former’s views in The Jesus Puzzle (Age of Reason Publications, 2005) which is qualitatively and academically far inferior to anything so far written on the subject".[18] Doherty has responded that his work owes very little to Wells.[19]

Writers who do not necessarily support the hypothesis that Jesus did not exist have found merit in some of Doherty's arguments. Hector Avalos has written that The Jesus Puzzle outlines a plausible theory for a completely mythical Jesus."[20]

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] References

  1. ^ Library of Congress authority file, accessed April 18, 2010.
  2. ^ a b Doherty, Earl. "The Jesus Puzzle: Main Articles - Preamble". http://www.jesuspuzzle.com/preamble.htm. Retrieved 2009-08-05. 
  3. ^ Doherty, Earl (Fall 1997). "The Jesus Puzzle: Pieces in a Puzzle of Christian Origins". Journal of Higher Criticism 4 (2). http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/jhcjp.htm. 
  4. ^ Doherty, Earl (2005) [1999]. The Jesus Puzzle: Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ?. Ottawa: Age of Reason Publications. ISBN 0-9689259-1-X. 
  5. ^ Doherty, Earl. "The Jesus Puzzle: Was There No Historical Jesus?". http://www.jesuspuzzle.com/. Retrieved 2009-07-02. 
  6. ^ Doherty, Earl (1999). The Jesus Puzzle: A Novel About the Greatest Question of Our Time. http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/novel.htm. 
  7. ^ Knox, John (1942). Marcion and the New Testament. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 
  8. ^ Tyson, Joseph B. (2006). Marcion and Luke-Acts: a defining struggle. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press. ISBN 978-1570036507. 
  9. ^ O'Neill, J.C. (1970). The Theology of Acts in Its Historical Setting. London: S.P.C.K.. ISBN 9780281023486. 
  10. ^ Mack, Burton L. (1996). Who Wrote the New Testament?: The Making of the Christian Myth. San Francisco, California: HarperOne. ISBN 978-0060655181. 
  11. ^ Pervo, Richard I. (2006). Dating Acts: Between the Evangelists and the Apologists. Santa Rosa, California: Polebridge Press. ISBN 978-0944344736. 
  12. ^ Doherty, Earl. "Jesus: Neither God nor Man". p. 470. http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/newadvert.htm. 
  13. ^ Doherty, Earl. "Jesus: Neither God nor Man". http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/newadvert.htm. 
  14. ^ Carrier, Richard (2002). "Did Jesus Exist? Earl Doherty and the Argument to Ahistoricity". The Secular Web. http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/jesuspuzzle.shtml. Retrieved 2009-06-23. 
  15. ^ Zindler, Frank R. (2000–2001). "The Christ Myth Revisited". American Atheist 39 (1). Archived from the original on Jan 08, 2008. http://web.archive.org/web/20080108150021/http://www.americanatheist.org/win00-01/T2/zindler.html. Retrieved 2009-06-23. 
  16. ^ Wells, G. A. (September 1999). "Earliest Christianity". New Humanist 114 (3): 13–18. http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/g_a_wells/earliest.html. Retrieved 2009-06-23. 
  17. ^ Wells, G. A. (2004). Can We Trust the New Testament?. Peru, Illinois: Open Court. p. 202. ISBN 0-8126-9567-4. 
  18. ^ Hoffmann, R. Joseph (2006). "Maurice Goguel and the 'Myth Theory' of Christian Origins". in Goguel, Maurice. Jesus the Nazarene: Myth or History?. translated by Frederick Stephens, with a new introduction by R. Joseph Hoffmann. Amherst, NY: Prometheus. pp. 15, 39 n. 31. ISBN 1-59102-370-X. 
  19. ^ http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/JesusProject.htm
  20. ^ Avalos, Hector (2007). The End of Biblical Studies. Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books. pp. 197. ISBN 978-1-59102-536-8. 

[edit] External links

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