The True Core Of The Jesus Myth | Christopher Hitchens @ FreedomFest (1)

saying that in my book I say that there's no reason it's also believed that the so-called Jesus of Nazareth ever existed but here's what I say about Socrates the original collision between our reasoning faculties and any form of organized faith this is my book though it must have occurred before in the minds of many is probably exemplified in the trial of Socrates in 399 BC it does not matter at all to me that we have no absolute certainty that Socrates even existed the records of his life in his words are secondhand almost but not quite as much as are the books of the Jewish and Christian Bible and the hadiths of Islam philosophy however has no need of such demonstrations because it does not deal in revealed wisdom now as it happens we do have some very good descriptions of the life of Socrates that make his existence to me plausible but it doesn't matter to me at all whether he was real or not what matters is that someone advanced his method of reasoning his testing of evidence against experience his commitment to a certain kind of dialectical honesty and that if it hadn't been him it would have been someone else and that's what's precious to me and that he never said you've got to believe in everything I say or go to hell or heaven because and here's why you've got to agree with me because my mother never went to bed with anybody and that proves the truth of what I say or that I taught by the way it looks at I must have looked very dead when they took me down from the cross but I didn't die and that proves my point I'm willing to grant it all I'm willing to grant the Immaculate Conception first then the virgin birth then the resurrection and the Annunciation and the Assumption I want to grant all of it it doesn't prove the truth of the proposition that you should take no thought for the morrow the central doctrine of Jesus of Nazareth take no thought for the morrow no investment no thrift no care for your children that you should abandon your family not worry about construction about investment about anything just follow me ridiculous an immoral proposition that RCS Lewis so cleverly and I must say for him very honestly puts it means that the man must either have been a maniac a sick man an evil man or he must have believed that the world was coming immediately to an end and that he was commanded to announce this fact to the deluded Bronze Age inhabitants of Palestine because if he didn't believe that if he didn't believe he was divinely mandated then his words would not have been inaccurate or false they would have been wicked that's what you have to be talking about now there is on the historicity point there is only there only two reasons I think to suppose that the may have been the figure of some kind of deluded rabbi present at that time the first is the fakery of the story the faker itself proves something the the prophecy says this man must born in the house of David of David's lion in David's town means he must be born in Bethlehem Jesus of Nazareth is well known have been born in Nazareth in order to get him to Bethlehem a huge fabrication has to be undertaken a census is proposed by Caesar Augustus no such census ever took place the people of the region were not required to go back to their hometown to be registered that's never happened keury Gnaeus was not governor of Syria in that year as the Gospels say none of the story of the Nativity is true in any detail and not one of the Gospels agrees with each other on this fabrication but the fabrication itself suggests something if they were simply going to make up the whole thing and they'd never been any such person then why not just have him born in Bethlehem right there and leave out the Nazarene business so the very falsity of it the very fanatical attempt to make it come right suggests that yes the may have been a charismatic deluded individual wandering around at that time but which is most impressive to you the fantastic fabrications the unbelievably inane and inarticulate preachments or the inconsistencies in the story you could mention another thing about the resurrection most of the witnesses to this are women illiterate stupid deluded hysterical females of the kind who in a Jewish court at that time would have had about as much chance of being listened to as they would in an Islamic court today what religion that wants it's fabrication to be believed is going to say you've got to believe it because we have some illiterate hysterical girls who said they saw this no it's impressive to me it's impressive to me that the evidence is so thin and is so historical and is so feeble and is so obviously strenuously cobbled together because it suggested well something was going on there was some character and I don't want to therefore to profane those who think that no there must have been something and say no there was nothing this is not a whole cloth fabrication but it is a very human and very intelligible and very pitiable I think practice of fraud that may have worked on stupefied peasants in the Greater Jerusalem area but should really have no power to influence anyone in this room whereas the noble methods and words and systems by which Socrates reasoned will continue to illuminate our path for as long as we care about the only real gift we have which is our independent intelligence now I think that'll do for now but if you want to ask me yes I've run out of time but if you would care just to look at the chapter I've written about the the discovery the concession now by every Israeli archaeologist by the whole school now of Israeli archaeology that the entire story of the Exodus the captivity the wandering the conquest of Canaan rested is also a complete fabrication you will see a perfect a perfect collision between the two things that do allow us to make progress as scholars and intellectuals the way of evidence against interest and that the great school of Jewish archeology given every motive to find the contrary giving every motive and every chance in the Sinai and in the region to dig up and find what David ben-gurion the founding of the state called the title deeds of Zionism to come back empty-handed and say we admit it the this story has no basis of any kind whatever is is I submit to you something far more noble far more worthwhile far more honest far more courageous far more moral and far more Socratic than any of the nonsense that Dinesh just tried to pass off on you Thanks

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Keywords: The, True, Core, Of, Jesus, Myth, Christopher, Hitchens, FreedomFest, Freedom, Festival, Dinesh, D'Souza, Mark, Skousen, Atheist, Experience, Amazing, Atheists, Atheism, Magazine, Community, Freethinker, Religion, Evolution, Science, Reason, Richard, Dawkins, God, Delusion, Charles, Darwin, Secular, American, Humanists, Humanism, Sam, Harris, Christianity, Christians, Intelligent, Design, ID, Religious, Faith, Belief, Bible, Christ, Catholic, Young, Earth, Creation, Creationists, Creationism

Id: vMo5R5pLPBE

Length: 7min 26sec (446 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 11 2009