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Christians think they have a unique event...Christ Rising from the dead. But, of course, that myth has been around for ages. Long before the sandal wearing hippie ever walked the dunes between Jerusalem and Galilee, rode an ass in Damascus or faced his fate on a cross planted atop a hill, mythical characters were rising from the dead.
So, really, what we have here is myth sharing. Clearly, since Jesus came after all these other resurrected characters from what amount to fairy tales, reason dictates the Jesus myth too is a fairy tale.
Now, of course, Christians will say those other resurrections are myths but the resurrection of Jesus was real. Of course, we know better. Fact remains, Jesus myth is just as contrived as the Osirus and Achilles myths. Is there any doubt?
Tryggve Mettinger argues in his recent book that the category of rise and return to life is significant for the following deities: Ugaritic Baal, Melqart, Adonis, Eshmun, Osiris and Dumuzi.
In ancient Greek religion a number of men and women were made physically immortal as they were resurrected from the dead. Asclepius was killed by Zeus, only to be resurrected and transformed into a major deity. Achilles, after being killed, was snatched from his funeral pyre by his divine mother Thetis and resurrected, brought to an immortal existence in either Leuce, Elysian plains or the Islands of the Blessed. Memnon, who was killed by Achilles, seems to have received a similar fate. Alcmene, Castor, Heracles, and Melicertes, were also among the figures sometimes considered to have been resurrected to physical immortality. According to Herodotus's Histories, the seventh century BC sage Aristeas of Proconnesus was first found dead, after which his body disappeared from a locked room. Later he found not only to have been resurrected but to have gained immortality.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resurrection
So, really, what we have here is myth sharing. Clearly, since Jesus came after all these other resurrected characters from what amount to fairy tales, reason dictates the Jesus myth too is a fairy tale.
Now, of course, Christians will say those other resurrections are myths but the resurrection of Jesus was real. Of course, we know better. Fact remains, Jesus myth is just as contrived as the Osirus and Achilles myths. Is there any doubt?