Mythicism, the claim that the gospel stories were not based on an actual human being, is what happens when bad scholarship meets conspiracy theory.
Simply using normal historical methods leaves no real doubt to the vast majority of biblical scholars and historians that the gospel stories were based on an actual historical person named Jesus.
Mythicism claims appear to have been created and promoted by people who combine some of the legitimate textural criticism of the bible by actual scholars with exaggerations of the similarities between the gospel stories and other religions by non-scholars. It is contradicted by the timeline that biblical scholars have compiled of when the gospel books of Mark, Mathew, Luke, John and the letters attributed to Paul were written and the number of Christian communities that were being established in the first few decades after Jesus was killed.
If historians can affirm there was a Jesus, doesn’t that support the supernatural claims in the gospel stories?
When applying the same historical method that affirm the gospel stories are based on a real historical person, the supernatural claims contained in the stories cannot be affirmed as factual history anymore than conflicting supernatural claims in other ancient stories can.
For example, the claim that Jesus’s followers believed they witnessed him casting out demons is plausible because this was a common belief at the time and continues to be believed by eye-witnesses today. So historians could say it is plausible or probable that his followers made and believed this claim. But because science has failed to find any supernatural evidence for spirit possession, and has more verifiable naturalistic explanations for the phenomena, historians can’t assert as fact that Jesus or any other historical figures actually did cast out demons or other supernatural entities.
Jesus’s followers also claimed to have witnessed him healing the sick, which was also a common belief at the time and also continues to be believed today by eye-witnesses. So historians could also say that his followers probably made and believed this claim. But because science has not found any verifiable evidence for supernatural healing, historians can’t assert as fact that Jesus or other such people actually did supernaturally heal the sick in the past.
Jesus’s followers claimed to have had visions of him after he was killed by the Romans. The idea that people have visions of departed loved ones or spiritual or religious figures is also a common one from both ancient world history and modern times. So historians could say that at least some of his followers probably believed they had visions of Jesus after his death. But because there is no verifiable scientific evidence to support this phenomena, historians can’t assert as fact that his follower actually did see or hear Jesus after his death.
So while there is a convincing body of historical evidence that the gospels stories were in fact based on a real person, none of the supernatural claims in the stories can be asserted as fact using the standard historical method.
Points: The claim that the historical method can affirm that there was no historical Jesus and the claim that the same method can affirm the supernatural stories of the gospels as history are not supported by the evidence according to the vast majority of relevant scholars.
Note: The reason why there are more Christian apologetic arguments in this section is because in countries like the United States they are far more common than those of other religions.