Won't The Real Slim Shady Please Rise Up?

The same people who claim to be a "historicist" about Jesus
claim to be mythicists about Santa Clause, Dracula, and Wonder Woman.

And yet, they have heard of Saint Nicholas of Bari, Vlad the Impaler, and (at least vaguely) about the two women the creator of Wonder Woman based her on.

So much for consistency. 

Meanwhile, I admit.
I think "there was a guy"
But the reason I think so
is not merely because any 1st or 2nd century Jesus-cultists, fiction writers, or fan-fiction writers wrote stories about a Super-Jesus.


If I lived in that place and time,
and
if I were literate enough,
and
if were clued-in enough about the power of gullibility,
and
if I was a Jew who realized "the messiah" is religious fiction,
or
if I were a local outsider with mafia ambitions,
and
if I were informed enough about the power-vacuum that was created by discordant Jewish sects who waited for a messiah,
and
if I realized just how much power a skilled-enough story teller has in an era where Fact Checking isn't a thing, and where critical thinking is pretty much absent within fundamentalist religions, ...


I might create some foundational story about
The Epic Adventures of Super-Jew!

And I might base it largely on locally prevalent hopes, tropes, and superstitions.

I might try to re-invent what the messiah was supposed to be and do.

I might realize that the seed I'm planting could take many years to root and even longer to bear fruit.

I might realize anyone who goes looking for eye witnesses or other corroborations won't be able to find any because I made it all up.

But then I might realize I only need the gist of the story to circulate long enough that it outlives the alleged characters in the story.

That way, it gains power as legend
and outlives anyone's ability to debunk it.

And then the real power-play can begin.

I might have died before that tree bore useful fruit.
But some other like-minded mafia-hopefuls might recognize and seize the opportunity I had created.

An opportunity to disarm the Jew-cult enemies of Rome.

An opportunity to either
unite and rule
or
dissolve and replace
the rival Jewish sects.

An opportunity to fill the vacancy of that power vacuum
with one man's new vision
and his "God-given authority".

I would just need to create the legend of a KING;
a King who could crown me
but then leave the stage before anyone could question him about it.

Motive and opportunity;
the two crucial elements that fully and realistically explain why anyone would create the legend of a Super-Jew;
a complex composite figure found nowhere in physical reality.

And yet,
I still think "there was a guy".

Why do I think so?

Two reasons.

1. Every fictional character ever created drew from real elements of real people's lives.
Even SpongeBob drew from character traits, hobbies, jobs, etc of real people.

In fact, humans are literally unable to "imagine" anything from scratch.
We always build fictional entities and fictional situations
entirely from real stuff we've seen and heard about.


2. The writers were NOT very skilled (by today's standards).
And yet, a vividly true-to-life character bleeds through the otherwise poorly written pages.

Jesus,
as a profoundly mentally ill figure.

His mental illness was probably caused by
and definitely shaped and worsened by
unqualified parents (which, to be fair, was all parents)
and his religious-fundamentalist upbringing.

He eventually loses his battle with mental illness.
That's why he dies.

That, I think, ( I don't "know". I only suppose) is
"the man behind the legend";
the kernel of truth;
the wireframe that the otherwise fictional character was grafted onto.

The legend's creators lacked the talent to write such a true-to-life

emotionally dysregulated,

self-medicating,

sometimes peacefully Zen,

sometimes pacifist,

sometimes thoughtfully and calmly pro-violence,

sometimes irrationally violent,

sometimes artfully articulate,

sometimes incoherent,

highly intelligent,

manic depressive,

schizophrenic (He had a profound relationship with the voices in his head. They functioned as a surrogate and upgraded "real Father"; who just happened to be the primary deity of his religion.
He used that to justify an external locus of identity. This also allowed him to be simultaneously ultra-self-important and ultra-humble. It also excused him from taking any personal ownership and responsibility for his life and choices)

religious-fundamentalist,

closeted somewhere on the LGBT spectrum,

fashionably racist,

atypically progressive,

paradoxically-authoritarian,

iron-age hipster,

wandering hobo ...

with severe unresolved Daddy Issues.


At the best of times, he was a Beautiful Loser.

At the worst of times, not so beautiful.

He died with nobody and nothing.

He did have a few men who loved him; more than perhaps their culture would allow.

But that's why they couldn't just stand around and watch him get pressured by the voices in his head
into violently un-alive-ing himself.

He didn't even really leave a legacy;
except that he had value and impact for the few people who loved him. 

Other people would have to build something larger than that in his name;
over a span of years and centuries,
and for their own purposes.

Ironically but inevitably,
the more of that legacy-building happened, 
the less it was really about him. 

In life, he could never just pick one way to be.
His inner storm prevented that.

He flowed dramatically between personalities and values.

Perhaps only with his last breath
did he realize
he just can't have it all.
Nobody can;
except in poorly written fiction.