One of the key pillars of the Jesus Myth Theory is that similarities between ancient stories point toward borrowing. Thus the virgin birth of Jesus must have been inspired by the supernatural births from surrounding myths. But is that really how it is?
I was recently reading the book Myth from respected classicist, G.S. Kirk. He doesn’t address the Jesus Myth (it was not important enough for him to talk about) but he shares something interesting.
In one chapter he examines the possibility that Egyptian myths influenced Greek myths. This is what he says:
“Inevitably a few resemblances to Greek myths (and Asiatic) can be found.” He then goes on to share those similarities. But then he goes on to show the deeper differences between the two mythical systems and concludes: “Egyptian influence on Greek mythological thought seems for these reasons to be negligible.” (p. 209)
This is important because it gives us a helpful guideline when comparing any mythical or religious system. Some similarity does not mean there must be dependence.
If Egyptian and Greek myths are too different to indicate influence, this is even more the case when it comes to the Christian story.
