Thanks. FWIW 'there are non-Christian historians that mention that there was this troublesome cult leader that fits Jesus' profile and that he was crucified' and 'Christianity grew out of the resurrection story' all sounds plausible to me (although I've _not_ studied it).
If I were considering it, I would explore the rest: the trouble with chains of deduction, however reasonable, is that the longer they are, even if each individual step is likely, ONE of them is likely to be flawed (I mean, contemporary governments do all sorts of things that don't _seem_ to make sense, I'm not sure 'obviously the government would have done X' is a watertight historical argument. But I'm only speculating, I don't know how specific the historical documents are.) But I have to admit, that's just a guess, I don't know the validity of all the sources.
no subject
If I were considering it, I would explore the rest: the trouble with chains of deduction, however reasonable, is that the longer they are, even if each individual step is likely, ONE of them is likely to be flawed (I mean, contemporary governments do all sorts of things that don't _seem_ to make sense, I'm not sure 'obviously the government would have done X' is a watertight historical argument. But I'm only speculating, I don't know how specific the historical documents are.) But I have to admit, that's just a guess, I don't know the validity of all the sources.