> The writer of Spiderman used NYC as a setting, but he gave no illusions that he considered himself to be writing history
So the strength of evidence should be weighted based on whether the author is trying to appear sincere? If marvel comics behaved as if they thought spiderman was real, then the evidence in the comics would suddenly be as convincing as all this common-knowledge judean minutiae you're so impressed by?
> the Church Fathers attribute Mark to Mark
Okay, so, a bunch of guys who never met Mark chose not to undercut their authority by discussing whether there could be elements of forgery in a gospel.
Then your points continue with two repetitions of the criterion of embarrassment (which seem to be based on the assumption that the book of mark was somehow commissioned by the apostles?!), an irrelevant note about two other gospel writers which had nothing to do with identity of the author, and then you wrap up your list with "absence of evidence is evidence of absence".
And none of that typing would do a thing to contradict the opposition position, "It's just a collection of anecdotes by an unknown author, and whoever wrote it, or a very nearby scribe, just slapped a name on for a reason that some random guy on the internet doesn't understand." If the very first author had written and said "Look at this thing Mark wrote", it would have fallen out the same way. It's just not compelling.
That's why I agree with what wikipedia says, with footnotes, "Most scholars also reject the tradition which ascribes it to Mark the Evangelist, the companion of Peter, and regard it as the work of an unknown author working with various sources including collections of miracle stories, controversy stories, parables, and a passion narrative." But I get that you disagree. Knock yourself out.
> So I beg to differ that "there is almost zero overlap."
You forgot "Jesus is male" and "his mother is a jew". The opposition claim is that the nativity stories were independently manufactured in order to fulfill a checklist of purported prophecies. Pointing out that they work off the same list is hardly helpful. You might as well point out the similarities between the sherlock stories of Benedict Cumberbatch and Robert Downey Jr. There is, as I said, almost zero overlap in the events of the story, but those few check-marked factoids are certainly among those few points of overlap.
> Here are some factors that show that Matthew could easily have been the author of Matthew
Ah, okay, could easily have been. Or could have been a contemporary, or a later jew, who the hell knows. You sure don't, you just point out ways in which it could be, and convince yourself "The evidence is heavily in Matthew's favor." Again, you believe whatever you want to, you're not even pretending to be impartial.
Once again, I'll side with the majority of scholars, but thanks for all the extraordinary amount of effort you've put in to weakly defending a minority position.
> One doesn't need the Internet to know the truth. One doesn't need newsprint to know the truth about a story. Why, even newsprint can be FAKE NEWS
wtf are you going on about? Remember, I'm accusing you of being unable to glean the lewinsky story from only non-mass-media primary sources, i.e. personal interviews or hand-written letters, enough to write an authoritative account. The rest of this paragraph is unhinged and has nothing to do with what I said.
> No, an abundance of references. For instance, in just the first 15 verses of Luke...
-1.1 It's true that we have a plurality of records about Jesus' life
sigh. Calm down. No, it's not true that we have a plurality of records about Jesus's life. We have 4, with a great degree of plagiarism, all written long after his death, by anonymous authors (although I certainly admit that some uncredentialed randos on the internet dispute the majority opinion on this topic). The rest of your screed is on exactly the level of my spiderman analogy. All you're proving is that Luke wasn't written by someone from another culture, centuries later. Background details are not what anybody is disputing, nor are they enough to make the controversial parts of the story true.
It's fine that you have a zealot's minority opinion, I really have no objection to you believing whatever you want to believe. But I don't trust you, because you are contradicting the majority of educated scholars, and because your argument is presented sloppily, with repetition and irrelevant side notes. The fact that you can draw such confident conclusions that contradict the scholarly consensus by using every-f***ing-single verse of Luke, as if scholars had never read them, is not something that makes you sound more credible.
And, again, to be abundantly clear - f***ing fine, I don't give a shit. Clearly this is something you feel passionately about. You said your piece, and unless you started with your weakest argument, I doubt any additional rambling on this topic is going to be more convincing. The community walking by now has enough information to form their own opinions about whether you've justified your claims. Thanks for contributing.