Acknowledgments
I must firstly thank Carole M. Cusack for constantly encouraging me to simply go wherever the evidence leads. She should know better!
Thanks also go to Hector Avalos for his generous feedback over the years and for inspiring so many to boldly oppose unjustified consensuses.
I also extend gratitude to ahistoricists Acharya S, who inadvertently prompted my interest in this topic, Robert M. Price, who carried the mythicist view on his not inconsiderable shoulders for so long, Neil Godfrey, who has a real knack for finding obscure and important references, and Richard Carrier, who has done more than anyone thus far to argue that Jesus probably did not exist as a historical person.
I wish also to acknowledge the groundwork for such highly critical scholarship on the New Testament laid by the Dutch Radicals, and the Old Testament (or Tanakh) minimalists, such as Thomas L. Thompson, Niels Peter Lemche, and Philip R. Davies.
James Crossley also gets a nod for publicly recognising that I am on to something here, and for kindly writing the book’s foreword. A mensch among mensch.
Finally, I wish to thank Rod Nicholls at Brill. He was supportive throughout, understood that this was a matter for logicians as well as for biblical historians, persuaded suitably qualified experts to offer fair and constructive reviews, and managed to convince one of the world’s leading academic publishers to accept a manuscript endorsing so controversial a thesis.