It's a complex question to which there is no simple answer, but I think educated speculation tells much. In my little corner of the world I put it up to two primary factors: 1) It was a control strategy by Constantine in the 3rd century to legitimize Christianity, and followed up by the church to be used as a control mechanism. 2) It plays heavily on our psychological archetypes of fear of death and authority.

And it's not just this story... look at Islam.

@Hominid The book "The Closing of the Western Mind", by Charles Freeman told of how Constantine was a Roman Caesar who saw the power shift of the empire heading East. He also saw how the different religions of the empire were destroying it. He sought, as did our founders, to make no religion the central one and all would be treated equally. He did adopt some Christian ideas but he also remained true to his pagan beliefs. The stuff put out about him and the "sign of the Cross" is Christian propaganda used to gain power for their tribe.

Yes, what is it about all religions? @VictoriaNotes

I’m sure that’s part of it. @VictoriaNotes

I agree. I think the bible has is possibly based on a very small bit of truth.

One of many @ the time who probably preach against the hard times and was combined into one myth.

Irony, of all the great writers of the time jesus was never mentioned by any of them which makes on wonder why.

This is another issue that has been gone over several times. Historians have pretty much proven such a person did exist (see my comments here). Romans have many reliefs showing such a person leading some men. An important historian of the time (Josephus) added to the reality of the man.

As a fellow Brit, I'm sure you'll be aware of Gregg's the bakers' controversial Christmas ad campaign featuring a nativity scene in which Baby J was replaced with a sausage roll. Say "Lord Jesus" backwards...

Actually he's not - that's bad research you're referring to; the claim has been debunked. by historians.

@Hominid could you then send me the link to that? I would like to read that information.

Sure thing @SonderOpia! I was also taken in by the false history (...and so was the documentary "Zeitgeist". The source were two authors who write in the 1930s or so a book that misled lots of people. A good summary of the debunking is here: [ed5015.tripod.com]

@Hominid thank you for this information. I'm reading up on it and I'll take time to read up on it more. I should have studied it more before I posted it but thank you for catching that.

No problemo. Glad to help out! The Wikipedia link on the subject also explains how the theory was based on misleading research. It's not as in-depth as the first link, but still informative.

[en.wikipedia.org]

Me too.

Check out the timelines and people researched by Ralph Ellis.

@Issa Will do.

@Issa I looked into Ralph a bit and many of his theories are questionable with some reviewers claiming he's a conspiracy theorist. His books seem to me to fall somewhere between the show Ancient Aliens and Dan Brown's book The DaVinci Code.

One thing Paul, there is nothing wrong with Ancient Aliens which is firmly based upon historical records/accounts of the Sumerian civilization that many 'scholars' have validated. There is also nothing wrong with the DaVinci Code, that is strongly cemented within the Gnostic writings - which are valid and speak a lot about Jesus and his works and were rejected by Constantine at the council of Nicaea when he formulated the 'fake' and partial bible that you have obviously only read? As this website is not exclusively about 'scholarly' journal sources, I felt free to post and should be able to without it being disrespected. Also, you will not know the extensive detailed research that went into Ellis work until you actually read it. It is compelling, and I have been a Theologian, and studied this subject for a very long time. I am a psychologist too, and don't buy into just anything, but I am not on the side of disbelieving everything as an Atheist would either. The only problem that I have with Atheists is that they dismiss everything without giving any other research a chance without Atheist colored glasses of the attitude of needing to debunk everything off hand - which is a bit churlish in all honesty. Rise above it and read a new book - the Arthurian legends have validity as well as all of the historical references to people named Jesus in the 1st century. The legends of the person Jesus could have easily been HIDDEN in the Arthurian legends because at the time Rome was trying to destroy everything about any other valide 'leaders' of the day. By 4th century Constantine and the council of Nicea destroyed and hid very many of the writings which you say do not 'exist', because they killed countless people who were witness to any miracles. As a Yogi Master, Jesus had yogic powers, as I wrote in another post and there is much historical documentation to back that up too in India, and Tibet - IE healing, walking on water etc... You have to make a decision at some point in your life as to whether you will allow personal bias to eliminate any abilities you may have had to discover something new, or real - that is outside of your commitment to a total 'lack' of any belief. I responded to you respectfully, I did not consider the tone that you responded back to me as very respectful with your total dismissal of Ellis work because he may be a conspiracy theorist? You did not even read what I referenced before totally dismissing it. That was a very lazy and rude response. If you want others to listen to you then back up what you are saying that involved some real effort on your part, rather than dismissal just because....

@Issa If you think I disrespected you out of hand, that was not my intent. I apologize.

That said I'm not going to buy a series of books that I have no interest in reading. He should have won at least a Pulitzer by now if not a Nobel Prize for his findings.

What you call my atheist bias that I use to dismiss Ellis's work, I call a healthy, skeptical lack of faith.

That's the first time I've seen Gandhi spelled properly on this site!

@Jnei do you think @Admin will give extra points for correct spelling? Lol

@BeeHappy Maybe they should remove points for bad spelling and grammar.

@JackPedigo hahaha...