Now, at first glance, at least four of the five reasons make sense:
1. No first century secular evidence whatsover exists to support the actuality of Yeshua ben Yosef.
2. The earliest New Testament writers seem ignorant of the details of Jesus' life, which become more crystallized in later texts.
3. Even the New Testament stories don't claim to be first-hand accounts.
4. The Gospels, our only accounts of a historical Jesus, contradict each other.
The last point, "Modern scholars who claim to have uncovered the real historical Jesus depict wildly different persons" is really not a reason to doubt Jesus' existence. Rather, we must question these scholars' agendas. But that is a task for another day.
I'd like to take a look at Ms.Tarico's recitation of the Myther's claims one by one:
To the first point, that there is no first century secular evidence supporting Jesus'existence: of course there isn't. Geographically, politically, and sociologically, there would be no discernible reason for anyone during the period of 4-6 BCE to 29-33 CE to have made note of Jesus.
First, the province of Judea was unimportant to the Roman Empire. Second, an itinerant rabbi with a few followers tramping around a relatively small part of that unimportant province would scarcely have attracted the attention of anyone influential enough to have had their writings preserved. Thirdly, there is the problem of the Temple. If (and it is a stretch) the Temple elite had written about Jesus at all, including correspondence, trial transcripts, or a receipt for Judas' thirty pieces of silver, those records disappeared when the Temple, and Jerusalem itself, was destroyed in 70 CE.
All that being said, there are three mentions of Jesus in late first- and early second-century secular sources. Josephus, in his Antiquities of the Jews, apparently makes brief reference to Jesus in two places. The first is Antiquities 20, 9, 1, and is disputed by very few scholars as original to Josephus: "...Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrim of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others…"
A longer passage, in Antiquities 18, is widely believed to have fallen victim to Christian interpolation and even forgery. Still, scholars widely agree that there was an authentic nucleus to that more disputed passage.
Then there's Tacitus, who was no fan of Christianity. Writing on the subject of the Great Fire of Rome, he wrote in his Annals, Book 15, chapter 44, "Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular."
Even Bart Ehrman, who Tarico and Sosa quote (out of his context), says, "Paul knew Jesus' brother, James, and he knew his closest disciple, Peter, and he tells us that he did, If Jesus didn't exist, you would think his brother would know about it, so I think Paul is probably pretty good evidence that Jesus at least existed,"
Paul brings us to Tarico's second point, that the earliest Christian writers didn't know the details of Jesus' life. In fact, she claims, "…he never calls the twelve apostles Jesus’ disciples; in fact, he never says Jesus HAD disciples –or a ministry, or did miracles, or gave teachings… The leaders of the early Christian movement in Jerusalem like Peter and James are supposedly Jesus’ own followers and family; but Paul dismisses them as nobodies and repeatedly opposes them for not being true Christians!"
Interesting, isn't it, that if Paul thought so poorly of them, he would still defer to the Apostles. Oh, and Paul did refer to them as "apostles," as evidenced in this passage from his (almost universally accepted as genuine) letter to the church at Galatia (v. 17-20): "I did not go up to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before I was, but I went into Arabia. Later I returned to Damascus. Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to get acquainted with Cephas and stayed with him fifteen days. I saw none of the other apostles—only James, the Lord’s brother. I assure you before God that what I am writing you is no lie." (emphasis added)
Later, when a dispute arises in Antioch concerning circumcision, it is Paul and Barnabas who come before the "Apostles and elders" in Jerusalem (See Acts 15).
Now, to the issue of Paul knowing bupkus about the life of Jesus, we don't know what he knew. The nine Epistles generally thought to be genuinely written by Paul (Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon) are not meant to be historical treatises. Romans is concerned with theology, the letters to the Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians and Thessalonians are a mixture of theology and discussion of issues specific to those churches, and Philemon is an entity unto itself, at once delivering a slave to his master and begging for his life to be spared.
Since few, if any, of the other Epistles are thought to be written by the Apostles, I don't know which other "earliest Christian writers" Tarico refers to.
I'd like to look at Tarico's third and fourth points (that the Gospels don't claim to be eyewitness accounts, and anyway they contradict each other) together.
These are thorny issues, because (except for the Gospel of John, the single non-synoptic Gospel), it's true: none of the writers claim to have "been there." And yes, there are points (details, mostly) where the Gospels don't line up lockstep (and in the case of John, fly wildly off in another direction).
Who wrote the Gospels? We don't know, sorry. As for when, though, the likelihood is that all were completed before the end of the first century CE. I can only speak for myself in arguing for an early (mid- to late-first-century, the Synoptics prior to 70 CE) authorship, though many (generally more conservative) scholars would agree. I have spoken about this in sermons, and will be glad to recount them in a blog post if there is interest.
However, as it regards the existence of the person of Jesus, this "contradiction/authorship" argument simply doesn't hold up. Take, for example, one of the links Tarico provides to discredit the Gospels: in an effort to discredit the events of the Resurrection, "Father Dan" reveals that it is in the details, rather than the events, that most Gospels differ.
Someone came to the tomb on Sunday morning, either before or shortly after dawn. She or they found the tomb empty. The risen Jesus first appeared to someone, or to several someones.
Further, all four Gospels agree that Jesus was crucified. That in and of itself would be an astounding development if Jesus were simply a myth. Bart Ehrman says, "The Messiah was supposed to overthrow the enemies – and so if you're going to make up a messiah, you'd make up a powerful messiah, You wouldn't make up somebody who was humiliated, tortured and the killed by the enemies."
So, look: let's discuss Jesus' divinity, his miracles, his ministry, what if anything his death and resurrection mean for humankind. But if you want to suggest that Jesus never existed in the first place... as we say in the South, that dog won't hunt.
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