There are a lot of Sunday-school assumptions most people make about the Bible and actual history of Christianity; or else they disregard the Bible and history in lieu of unsubstantiated theories concerning 'God's Will' to justify what fails to corroborate. There are quite a lot of cop-outs that I've run into that people want to cling to, which is well and good, but don't presume to call it fact or history - it is neither - it is simply what believers chose to believe.
There were a few marked things I noticed when reading the new testament through after having delved into the apocrypha: Jesus was a jerk. The myth of this Buddha-like personage of peace and forgiveness fails to appear on the pages where the man himself plays a speaking role. He's angry, he's mean; he berates and insults his friends and his family, he disregards non-Jews. The tone he uses is not of prediction, but of ordering his followers to do things they don't want to do, and they beg him or assert that they won't do it (he intends to purposely 'fulfill' old testament scripture, as was the trend in the day - to force God's hand to act in favor of his people). I'm actually quite surprised I've only seen one other person make note of this, because it's quite blatant... I honestly think that most people who actually read Matthew, Mark, or Luke glaze over the words and just recite their own happy narrative mentally.
The second is the distinct difference between what comes out of Jesus' mouth in the 'synoptic' gospels and what Paul and his followers make of him and his 'teachings' after he dies (assuming he didn't use a stunt double on the cross). This, again is so noted by historians who aren't playing to a church paycheck, that two distinct movements are usually defined: the followers of Jesus, and the followers of Paul or Christianity. There is argument over whether the Gospel of Thomas is the missing source X used in compiling the gospels, but it may be the closest reference to the actual teachings of Jesus. I just stumbled on this page while writing this blog, entirely by accident; I was actually looking for a specific quote on another point I planned to discuss, but, the universe flows...
http://www.voiceofjesus.org/paulvsjesus.html
What I was looking for were specific quotes from the early Greek-Roman philosophers, the concepts of which impacted the perception and definition of the Western concept of the Christian God more thoroughly than the definitive pages of the old testament. This website describes the evolution of where Greek thought influenced Christian ideology, which I suppose is better:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/god-west/
Which begs the question: if God is universal, then would it matter who's pre-Christian ideas of God were later enveloped into Christian mythology? But it does, logically. If God were universal, the Jews would not need to be the chosen people, then nothing is substantial at all about Jewish history, theology or their prophecies... without those, then Jesus is not a prophetic figure of any sort of substance (any more than any other culture's), because there's no longer a basis for him to be 'chosen'. Either way, Jesus means nothing to non-Jews, or those unwilling to abide Jewish law, history, mythology, and prophecy. Without the Jewish struggle, there was no cry for redemption or salvation beyond the apocalyptic attitude it developed from Zoarastrianism, embraced from being occupied by foreigners... what are Jewish struggles to Hellenists and Romans? Nothing if you don't convert them to the likes of the time's contemporary mystery/resurrection cults built on Hellenic traditions (populated by people alienated from their homelands amid the sea of the Roman Empire, looking for somewhere to belong) which included the confession of sins, baptism, initiation, being subject to the service of a 'savior' god, as well as a 'sacred marriage' which united a savior god/goddess (which Paul changed to the Church). The non-uniqueness of Christianity is not an indication of its universal 'correctness'... it is an indication that it is simply not special. Except perhaps to say that the man for whom it is named did not actually start the religion.
