A part of the reason that some people doubt the historicity of Jesus is because of some concerns about the historical value of the New Testament. It is Scripture and therefore not history.
I can imagine a Jesus Mythicist arguing that just as most Christians would doubt the historical value of the Book of Mormon, so Mythicists doubt the historical value of the New Testament. The two books should be put in the same category.
Or should they?
For the unfamiliar with the Book of Mormon, it claims to be the record of the experiences of the descendants of Jews who travelled from their home to somewhere in the Americas. They established huge, advanced cities, but eventually killed themselves off. The indigenous people of the Americas are descendants of some of those survivors. Joseph Smith, Jr., claimed to have discovered these tablets and to have “translated” them in the nineteenth century.
While there are many sincere Mormons and the movement has grown significantly, they focus more on experience than history. This is not meant to be an attack on the Latter-day Saints. One can have a faith without a firm historical foundation.
One of the problems with the Book of Mormon is that there is not archaeological evidence for the advanced societies described in the book. Not only that, Mormons are divided over where the events took place. Was it in North, Central, or South America?
And then there is the history of the Book of Mormon itself. There is no trace of it between the events it describes and its discovery in the 1800s. Add to that, there is no version of the Book of Mormon in its original language for us to examine.
We are in a far different situation with the New Testament. We know exactly where the events described there took place.You can visit the remains of those cities today. Unlike the Book of Mormon, the New Testament describes people we know existed from other sources. We know that the New Testament was written within sixty years of the events (some much earlier) and we have fragments from less than a hundred years from the events.
Again, I’m not trying to attack Mormons but I am trying to say that compared to the Book of Mormon, the New Testament is much stronger historical ground.
Being considered Scripture and used by people of faith does not mean that a text automatically lacks value for history.
