Good points from John which I think conclusively answer beliefs some (not myself) Christians may have that moral ideas and equality were absent pre 30-33AD.I've appreciate both standpoints in this Blog! I think the source of Jesus' & Paul's beliefs has to be founded in OT theology due to their context which was most certainly Jewish?

(James Thompson, on "Atheism and the Good Life")

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The Quest for the Historical Jesus (Part I)

John Dickson

Academic tomes on Jesus often begin their account of previous scholarship with the great German scholars Hermann Reimarus and David Strauss and their attempts to apply the critical insights of the Enlightenment to the study of this central figure of Western history.

These writers stand in a long line of scholars known for their scepticism regarding traditional teachings about Jesus and their quest to separate historical fact from religious understanding of who Jesus was and what he did. But it would be wrong to think that historical questions about Jesus began to be raised only two centuries ago, as if our own Modern era, or Post-modern era, was the first to think critically about this topic. It is a conceit of every age to suppose that it has discovered the most important questions—and answers.
  it would be wrong to think that historical questions about Jesus began to be raised only two centuries ago
 
 

The quest for the historical Jesus really began as soon as he left the scene in AD 30.

The Ancient Quest

Even the author of one of the four New Testament Gospels shows an interest in searching out the facts rather than opinions about the man from Nazareth. The Gospel of Luke opens with these telling words:
  Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.  With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught (Luke 1:1-4).
 		 

Whatever else this is, it is the statement of someone committed to weighing earlier sources, gathering (eyewitness) testimony, researching thoroughly and then providing an orderly account of the most reliable data. Indeed, Prof. Richard Bauckham of Scotland’s famous University of St Andrew’s—famous for more than being Prince William’s alma mater—has recently shown that Luke’s declared interest in ‘those who from the first were eyewitnesses’ is strongly reminiscent of other historical writers in ancient times, including Polybius, Dionysis of Halicarnassus and the first century Jewish writer Josephus.

Bauckham identifies a host of ‘historiographic’ features in the Gospels, which underline for the modern historian just how keen these biblical writers were to preserve trustworthy testimony about Jesus, and eyewitness testimony in particular.  The idea that the Gospel writers were interested in ‘spiritual truths’ rather historical events is as false as it is out-of-date.
  we must not think that Christians all approached their sacred books with pre-scientific blind faith.
 
 

By the second century, the New Testament Gospels were widely read and revered by Christians all over the Roman Empire and beyond. Wherever there were Christians in this period there were Gospels, and wherever there were Gospels there were people becoming Christians. Despite this reverence shown to the Gospels, we must not think that Christians all approached their sacred books with pre-scientific blind faith. Intellectuals like the famous Origen of Caesarea (AD 185-253) were as meticulous in analysing the Gospels as anything we observe in modern scholarship. His approach is worth detailing.

Origen lived in a period of intense criticism of Christianity. While still a teenager his father was martyred for the Faith, an event that would have a huge impact on this young virtuoso. He threw himself into his studies, not only of classical subjects like Greek grammar, mathematics, rhetoric, history and philosophy but also of Christian theology. And when he turned to the Gospels themselves, as he did time and time again during his fifty-year academic career, he was relentless in his analysis.

Origen consulted as many manuscripts as he could find for each of the Gospels. He wanted to reconstruct the most accurate form of the text: today we call this Textual Criticism. He assessed the geography of the Gospels against his own personal knowledge of Palestine, something archaeologists are still doing. And perhaps most impressively, he carefully compared the four Gospels with each another, honestly noting the differences between them. He did not try to harmonize the accounts into one neat version of the Jesus story, as others had done. 

Instead, he wanted to discern each Gospel writer’s particular emphasis and editorial hand. Scholars today call this Redaction Criticism. Sometimes Origen made judgments about the details of the Gospels that would make contemporary fundamentalists a little queasy, but he remained a firm believer to the end, absolutely committed to reading the whole Bible as the Word of God. (His scholarship on the Old Testament was equally dazzling). It was precisely Origen’s faith in the God of Truth that fuelled his commitment to search for the truth about Jesus.
  Sometimes Origen made judgments about the details of the Gospels that would make contemporary fundamentalists a little queasy
 
 

We could devote many more pages to exploring the work of scholars in ancient and Medieval times who applied their significant intellectual powers to the analysis of the Gospels and Jesus. Among the stars of the story would be Eusebius of Caesarea (260-339), Saint Jerome (331–420), John Chrysostom (347-407) and Saint Augustine (354–430); and at the dawn of the modern period, Desiderius Erasmus (1469-1536) and Martin Luther (1483-1546).

With due respect to the towering figures of Medieval scholarship, I want to race forward to one of the most significant periods in human history—a period that would change forever how we study Jesus.

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