Jesus: Mything in Action, Vol. II

The Complete Heretic's Guide to Western Religion #3

by David Fitzgerald

About the
David Fitzgerald’s award-winning 2010 book Ten Christian Myths That Show Jesus Never Existed At All pointed out the top ten fatal flaws of Christianity’s origin story. Now, Mything in Action presents the most compelling new findings in Jesus Myth theory and critically examines its controversial reception by biblical scholars, the extent and reliability of our sources for Jesus, and reveals the surprising history behind Jesus’ evolution.

In this
Mything in Action, vol. II (chapters 13 – 18) discusses the changing Jesus from even before the earliest Christians, to Paul, to the Book of Hebrews, to the Gospels and the construction (and deconstruction) of the Gospels; how Jesus is presented in the rest of the New Testament; and examines the historical sources for Jesus outside of the Bible.

Genres: Religion, History, Nonfiction, Atheism, Christianity, Philosophy

303 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 20, 2017

About the author

David Fitzgerald is a writer and historical researcher who has been actively investigating the Historical Jesus question for over ten years.

He lectures around the country at universities and national secular events and is best known for his book Nailed and The Complete Heretic's Guide to Western Religion series.

He is also the co-author of the science fiction trilogy Time Shards with his wife, Dana Fredsti.

Reviews

[Nancy Conner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Five stars!

Fascinating in scope and precision. If you like to debate the historicity of Jesus, add this book to your arsenal

[Beauregard Bottomley · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Book of Hebrews is by far the best philosophically written book in the NT. Fitzgerald lets me know what Hebrews was about. As one reads anything we bring our preconceived notions with us, Hebrews concerns imaginary celestial realms and feelings and coheres only if the reader ignores an earthly Jesus, but most readers assume Mark’s and Matthew’s earthly Jesus since the NT is non-chronologically presented.

When I read the New Testament cover-to-cover the one thing that stands out is the philosophical naivety of Paul’s letter as they get contrasted with the Book of Hebrews. Paul’s and the author of Hebrews’ Jesus is not of this world and what most readers do is impose earthly things on their celestial ramblings because they assume the Gospels’ Jesus is the way for understanding. It was Paul and Hebrews that originally created Jesus not the Gospels. The Gospels made Jesus of this world through bringing him out of the celestial back down to earth. They needed Paul but ignored his version of Jesus.

Paul’s creed in 1 Corinthians has Jesus rose ‘according to scripture.’ He is not referring to Gospels since they had not been written and he is fabricating a risen Jesus from stories he had read and confirmed by visions ‘not of this world.’ Without Paul there would never have been the Book of Acts and Acts is fantasy.

Acts is fan-fiction. It’s probably the most perniciously harmful book ever written. Fitzgerald demonstrates what I had already suspected. Peter and Paul contra to Acts are at odds and Paul’s authentic letters disagree with what Luke has him say in Acts. Acts is necessary to ground Paul’s imaginary celestial certainties into reality. Funniest line in the Bible is when Jesus says ‘it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks’ in Acts.

Paul’s letters came first and the Gospel writers later. The Gospel writers fabricate narratives to make things seem earthly. John’s Gospel is of this world but fabricates a Jesus on steroids, and Luke is the author of Acts and is well practiced with fan-fiction writing.

I’m currently reading ‘The Resurrection of Jesus’ by Michael Licona and he seamlessly weaves Acts into his story thus falsely adding credence to his edifice of sandcastles in the air. Paul is a lunatic when viewed through his own writings. Hebrews re-enforces Paul’s celestial imaginations.

Fitzgerald makes a compelling case that Jesus’ myths were originally of a heavenly variety. The original myths got reformatted and their meaning got retranslated such that the reader loses sight of what the original author meant.

Reread the Book of Hebrews with a celestial non-earthly presupposition and its obvious what the best written philosophical book in the NT was saying. Paul’s eight authentic letters (Fitzgerald says seven) when read with the absence of the nonsense of Acts show a Jesus not of this world.

The one part of the story I still can’t understand if Jesus was totally fabricated who was Paul attacking when he writes about his own shame in persecuting the early Christians? I’m hoping the third volume in this series answers that question.

[Tanja Berg · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book explains how Jesus changes throughout the gospels as authors and authorities edit them. It also shows how Acts and the letters from Paul where the earliest christian texts, not the gospels. Much of the New Testament is forged, many of the stories are added and christian scholars pretty much agree on this. Many people had stakes in tweaking the stories to their benefit.

[Scott Holstad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic! Superb! I gain more and more respect for David Fitzgerald with every book I read of us. This book is absolutely devastating to the Christian tradition, historical beliefs, myths they've propagated throughout the centuries up to and including what most of them believe today. Of course, most have never actually read their Bibles -- preferring instead to read from "devotionals" or to listen to whatever their pastor is talking about -- but if any were to actually be brave enough (most I know would never dare) to read this book, along with the others in the series, and see for themselves not only the inconsistencies and discrepancies, but the outright fiction, myths and lies, I would hope a number of more intelligent ones among them would discard their brainwashing and join the rest of society in the twenty-first century rather than cherry picking their way through an ignored Old Testament, in which their god proves to be the greatest homicidal maniac ever written about, as well as ignoring the many comments attributed to this Jesus, not of peace and love, but of the sword, death, the destruction of families and the like, and discard a book written by virtually prehistoric violent narcissists as well as the fables of literal authorship of the gospels, their total contradictions, the two inexplicable "creations" and start relying more on reason, logic and science. As I write this, the global coronavirus pandemic is ravaging the world and more and more Americans are turning away from their useless, mythological god who is not saving them, but if he exists is killing them, to science, the actual reason why so many people are being and will be saved from needless, avoidable deaths while idiots keep going to their church, infecting each other, others in society and killing who knows how many. I know most evangelicals and fundies will NEVER read a book like this (I have family members who never would no matter what), but if only some would, their lives could be changed for so much the better. Highly recommended, as is the entire series!!!

[Jc · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am reviewing this set (2010 Nailed: Ten Christian Myths That Show Jesus Never Existed At All; 2017 The Complete Heretic's Guide to Western Religion Book 2: Jesus: Mything in Action Vol. 1-3) as one book, as the four volumes actually constitute one extended essay (with Nailed as the introductory chapter). I found Fitzgerald’s Mything works to be a masterpiece: a very complete overview of all the major issues with the theological theory that “Jesus of Nazareth” not only was “the Messiah” aka “the Christ,” but an actual historical individual. This set of works thoroughly addresses the problems with this view, and explores in detail the “Christ Myth Theory” that the historical person Jesus did not even exist in Palestine or anywhere. The fourth and final volume I was unsure about, as I found its subtitle a bit worrying: “The Gospel According to H.G. Wells.” However, this turned out to be my favorite volume. “Wells” certainly was the perfect cap to the entire series. It traces, in a very readable way, what is known of the first few centuries of Christianity, including some of the background Jewish, Greek, and Roman history which allowed for its development. After reading the earlier volumes (all of which were well researched and well put together), the final volume brings it all together and tries to explain why a cornucopia of loosely related Middle Eastern cults finally coalesced into what the world, after the 4th century, came to know as orthodox christianity. All told, these four volumes are a must read for anyone who takes seriously the history and origin of christianity and related religions – believer or not. I certainly hope that Fitzgerald is able to continue his Complete Heretic’s Guide series. His effort to put together this thorough guide is an important addition to the serious, academic examination of the origins and meaning of what became christianity.

[Alfred St · Rating 4 out of 5]

On point

Finely detailed look at all the available sources to make the case that Jesus was truly a fictional character.
Jesus being pure fiction was already my belief and this historical work confirmed it.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

Continuing with excellent research and straightforward writing. I'm learning quite a bit.

[Cali · Rating 5 out of 5]

All the things many people dont want to see or hear. I loved it.

[Eli · Rating 5 out of 5]

Epic breakdown of all the relevant historical sources surrounding what we know about Christ. Finished in one day.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE SECOND VOLUME OF THE “MYTHING IN ACTION” BOOK SERIES

Author David Fitzgerald wrote in the first chapter of this 2017 book, “Even if [Christians] accept that the Gospels aren’t direct eyewitness testimony, many believers insist that nevertheless, they ultimately go back to original eyewitness testimony handed down through oral tradition decades later… the early Christians took great care to reverently preserve the truth and had institutions in place to safeguard the gospels from any kind of monkeying around with their scriptures. This is nonsense for starters; there is no evidence for the existence of any such institutions in early Christianity---and plenty of evidence against. If nothing else, the contradictory Gospels being so radically different from each other is enough to show that early Christians had no such fact-checking operation in place… On the contrary… Jesus scolds his disciples for being clueless, missing the point of his teachings, being slothful… Yet these dim, lazy disciples are supposed to be the same ones who carefully memorized all these stories about how incompetent they were?” (Pg. 22-23)

He acknowledges “only Pilate has physical evidence (a partial limestone inscription from Caesarea Martima, now in Jerusalem’s Israel Museum) or any extrabiblical corroboration from ancient historians… Pilate was a real person---although the Pilate we see in the Gospels is just as fictitious a character as any of them. And once we get to Acts, even the fictional Pilate is no longer on the scene; he’s only mentioned as a side note in speeches by Christians echoing Luke’s Gospel… [But] if Pilate was actually around for the aftermath of the crucifixion and the trials and tribulations of the early Christians, it’s very odd that he never shows up in any of the incidents described in Acts.” (Pg. 80-81)

About the absence of information about Jesus in the New Testament epistles, he observes, “how could a writer manage to completely avoid EVER ONCE mentioning any details about [Jesus’] life and character? How could he so completely fail to ever cite, or have to debate things Jesus actually said and did? Are we really to take seriously the notion that the historical Jesus never said or did anything relevant to resolving any of the early church disputes? Or that supported the teachings in those letters?... No matter how you slice it, the silence of these letters is VERY IMPROBABLE…” (Pg. 138)

He continues, “the only one that even comes close to anything we see from Jesus’ teachings in the Gospels is disapproval of divorce… this would be the closest [Paul] ever comes to quoting something we see Jesus saying in the gospels. On the other hand… he never claims to be quoting a teaching of the earthly Jesus … and in light of the continual way he refers to his Lord Christ as a supernatural spirit, there’s no reason to think he’s operating any differently here… It’s special pleading to turn around and insist that in this case he somehow knew what a historical Jesus said. He had no need of a historical Jesus to learn commandments from.” (Pg. 147-148)

Of Robert E. Van Voorst’s book, ‘Jesus Outside the New Testament,’ he comments, “Van Voorst never seems to question the total lack of corroboration for any of the more spectacular and historically dubious gospel features like Jesus’ cleansing of the temple or his triumphant entry into Jerusalem, to say nothing of earthquakes, angelic appearances and any mass resurrection of long-dead Jewish saints. And in the one case where he does try to substantiate one of the Gospels’ supernatural claims (the darkness at the Crucifixion), the evidence he cites is not just flimsy; it doesn’t even say what he wants…” (Pg. 212-213)

Of the passage purportedly about Jesus in Josephus’s ‘Antiquities,’ he argues, “there is so much wrong with this little paragraph that it’s problematic to think any of it is authentic to Josephus. To start with, it barely relates to the rest of the chapter… the paragraph following … starts by saying, ‘About the same time also another sad calamity put the Jews into disorder.’ … What sad calamity? Josephus just gave us a commercial for Jesus, not a sad calamity. This opening line skips over the Testimonium entirely and points to the previous section. THAT passage, where Pilate sets his soldiers loose to massacre a large crowd of Jews… certainly fits the bill as a sad calamity, but no versions of the Testimonium do… There are many other strong indications that the entire passage is an interpolation, including its non-Josephan vocabulary, non-Josephan phrasing and misuse of typically Josephan terms.” (Pg. 250-251)

He continues, “Perhaps the major giveaway is that the Testimonium does not appear UNTIL THE 4TH CENTURY. From the year 94 to the year 324, there is no mention of this passage anywhere… Josephus’ histories were immensely popular and pored over by scholars… Origen in particular relied extensively on Josephus… For example, in his treatise ‘Contra Celsum’… Origen tries to convince this skeptical Roman opponent Celsus that the miraculous events of Jesus’ life really happened… [Origen] turns to Josephus’ ‘Antiquities of the Jews’ to offer proof for John the Baptist and James. But they he adds that (as a Jew) Josephus didn’t believe Jesus was the Christ and criticizes him for failing to discuss Jesus in that book! Though the [Testimonium] would have been his ace in the hole, all he can offer as proof for Jesus is that there are so many Christian churches who are all witnesses of his divinity… And no one else seems to have heard of the Testimonium … until the 4th century… when the notoriously untrustworthy Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea begins quoting it repeatedly.” (Pg. 254-255)

This book will be of keen interest to Atheists and other skeptics of traditional Christianity.

[Victor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Real easy to follow, well presented arguments.
The argument for a mystical Jesus is verry compelling!
I still believe that there was a galilean apocalyptic preacher that inspired the myth,but he had very little to do with the sunday school/bible taught to me.

[Steven · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another amazing installment in this series. Putting all of this research from so many sources into one so well organized book is a god send.

For anyone who is interested about Jesus in any way, it's a must read.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very thorough well-researched and -written

This is a very will-researched and well-written book in the "Mything" trilogy. I'm looking forward to reading the third book. Fitzgerald's writing is inspiring me to read the New Testament thoroughly.

[Guilherme · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poucos temas são tão delicados quanto a historicidade de Jesus Cristo e os relatos bíblicos associados a ele. Em Jesus: Mything in Action — obra dividida em três volumes — David Fitzgerald apresenta uma defesa abrangente da “Teoria do Mito de Cristo”, que propõe que o personagem Jesus, tal como é tradicionalmente conhecido, não foi uma figura histórica real, mas uma construção mitológica posterior.

Fitzgerald articula sua tese com base em uma revisão extensa da literatura acadêmica sobre o Novo Testamento, analisando as lacunas históricas, as contradições nos evangelhos e o contexto religioso do mundo antigo. Ao longo do texto, ele examina criticamente os principais argumentos pró e contra a existência histórica de Jesus e conclui com uma espécie de “viagem no tempo” pelas origens e transformações do cristianismo primitivo.

Trata-se, sem dúvida, de uma leitura provocadora — e, para alguns, até desconfortável. No entanto, a escrita é clara, bem-humorada e rigorosa, e o autor demonstra amplo domínio do material que apresenta. O resultado é uma obra instigante, que convida à reflexão crítica tanto crentes quanto céticos.
.
"O problema não é a falta de evidências da existência de Jesus — é a abundância de evidências de que ele nunca existiu."

[Jeff Powers · Rating 4 out of 5]

While not as mind blowing after reading Fitzgerald's other works. This is still a fascinating continuation from the first volume. Doing the same for the remaining books of the New Testament. This content is a bit drier, but still fascinating. And since this, along with the other 2 volumes, were intended as a single book, it is difficult to judge it as a solo effort.

[Nate Keith]

This was one thing to me that you don't need any of these issues and

The depth to be at least one more season with salt in your room for me and I'll come to

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not bad, and I learned a few new things.