Who Was Jesus?: A Critique of the New Testament Record

by George Albert Wells

What do we know about the historical origins of Christianity? How reliable are the 27 books of the New testament? Is Jesus a historical or a legendary figure?In the last 150 years, scholars have established many facts about the New testament, facts still largely unknown to the general public or to most church members. They have shown that the letters of Paul are earlier than the gospels and that many of the gospel stories about Jesus were unknown to Paul, that the earliest New Testament gospel is Mark and that the other gospels draw upon Mark and a now-lost gospel scholars call Q, that none of the gospels is the work of an eye-witness, and that all the gospel writers were out of touch with events in Palestine.In "Who Was Jesus?," G.A. Wells presents a survey of critical scholarly findings on the New Testament, in each case explaining the "reasons" for the scholars' conclusions, and describing those issues where scholars still disagree. By lucidly recounting the principles on which New testament criticism is based, this book enables readers to make up their own minds, while gently pointing to Wells' radical conclusion that the totality of the evidence supports the hypothesis of an entirely legendary Jesus. In the author's opinion, the analyses of most critics have been inhibited by their theological preconceptions, so that they have failed to draw the disturbing conclusions warranted by their findings.

Genres: Atheism

231 pages, Hardcover

First published April 1, 1989

About the author

George Albert Wells (born May 22, 1926), usually known as G. A. Wells, is an Emeritus Professor of German at Birkbeck, University of London. After writing books about famous European intellectuals, such as Johann Gottfried Herder and Franz Grillparzer, he turned to the study of the historicity of Jesus, starting with his book The Jesus of the Early Christians in 1971. He is best known as an advocate of the thesis that Jesus is essentially a mythical rather than a historical figure, a theory that was pioneered by German biblical scholars such as Bruno Bauer and Arthur Drews.

Since the late 1990s, Wells has said that the hypothetical Q document, which is proposed as a source used in some of the gospels, may "contain a core of reminiscences" of an itinerant Galilean miracle-worker/Cynic-sage type preacher. This new stance has been interpreted as Wells changing his position to accept the existence of a historical Jesus. In 2003 Wells stated that he now disagrees with Robert M. Price on the information about Jesus being "all mythical". Wells believes that the Jesus of the gospels is obtained by attributing the supernatural traits of the Pauline epistles to the human preacher of Q.

Wells is a former Chairman of the Rationalist Press Association. He is married and lives in St. Albans, near London. He studied at the University of London and Bern, and holds degrees in German, philosophy, and natural science. He has taught German at London University since 1949, and has been Professor of German at Birkbeck College since 1968.

Reviews

[Steven H · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE PRIMARY "JESUS MYTH" ADVOCATE LOOKS AGAIN AT THE GOSPELS

George Albert Wells (born 1926) is an Emeritus Professor of German at Birkbeck, University of London. He also wrote books such as 'The Historical Evidence for Jesus,' 'Did Jesus Exist?,' 'The Jesus Legend,' etc.

He wrote in the Introduction to this 1989 book, "I have taken up Jesus's story at its end... for the reason that Christianity, from its inception, has attached more importance to his Resurrection than to the events of his life... My final chapter gives a detailed account of the two Biblical apocalypses---the book of Daniel in the Old Testament and the book of Revelation in the New. These have worked more mischief among the Christian fringe over the ages than all the remaining Biblical books together. After all this, we may ask, as so much of the New Testament evidence has proved both unreliable and inconsistent, whether we may reasonably doubt that Jesus is really any more than a legendary figure... Each of the four canonical evangelists has no hesitation in making Jesus say and do what is in fact representative of that evangelist's own theology... One may not unreasonably ask where all this leaves the historical Jesus." (Pg. 3-4)

He argues, "There is no mention of any miracle of Jesus even in the writings of the earliest Fathers (Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch and Polycarp of Smyrna...). Paul even comes close to actually denying that Jesus worked miracles when he insists that he can preach only 'Christ crucified'---a Christ who submitted to a shameful death, not a Christ of signs and wonders... It is no answer to say that the purpose of the epistles was not to present history." (Pg. 17)

He asserts, "The manner in which [Christian] apologists exaggerate the significance of non-Christian evidence which they take as pertaining to the events recorded in the gospels is well illustrated by [Gary] Habermas's statement that 'within 100 to 150 years after the birth of Christ approximately eighteen non-Christian ... sources from secular history mention... almost every major detail of Jesus' life, including miracles, the Resurrection, and his claim to be deity.' [Did Jesus Rise From the Dead?]. It is all the more striking that so many of the earliest Christian documents do not do the same, but say nothing of any item in his biography except his crucifixion and resurrection... And contrary to Habermas's suggestion, there is no early non-Christian evidence concerning the Resurrection." (Pg. 22-23)

Of the worldwide census of Luke 2, he comments, "There is in fact no evidence for a census of the whole Empire under Augustus. Obvious authorities, such as ... Dio Cassius, and Suetonius are silent on the matter, and the only witnesses who speak of such a thing are Christians, from the sixth century onwards... The census seems to be 'a purely literary device used by Luke to associate Mary and Joseph, residents of Nazareth, with Bethlehem.'" (Pg. 60-61)

About the story in Luke 2:41-51, he says, "The story that the twelve-year-old amazed the learned doctors in the temple records also Mary's lack of comprehension at the behaviour of her child (2:48-50). This blank failure to understand that the child was abnormal is not what one would expect from a mother who had been visited by an angel and told that he would be 'born of the Holy Ghost,' be 'great' and be given the throne of David to 'reign over the house of Jacob for ever...'" (Pg. 65)

He says in conclusion, "Throughout this book I have been able to draw on the views of serious Christian students of the New Testament whose work shows that it provides little basis for defensible religious belief. They have now themselves begun saying as much... Now that such statements are coming from Christians who have taken the trouble to make a thorough study of the evidence, is it not time to look elsewhere than in the Scriptures for guidance in our living, and to stop basing our decisions and choices on ancient fantasies?" (Pg. 187, 194)

Wells [as well as Doherty's 'The Jesus Puzzle'] is probably the best advocate of the "Jesus Myth" theory today, and his writings (which overlap considerably, unfortunately) are "must reading" for anyone studying this matter.