How did this thread start?

Wikipedia on Reception of Burton L. Mack:

Mack’s hypothesis presenting Jesus and the earliest Christians[broken anchor] within the frame of Greco-Roman Cynicism is controversial. While most scholars have recognised finding Jesus within the context of 1st century Judaism, Mack and other proponents go against the majority and argue that Jesus be understood in a Hellenistic context. Evangelical-scholar Craig A. Evans dismisses this theory in The Misplaced Jesus: Interpreting Jesus in a Judaic Context, saying: “The Cynic hypothesis will in time assuredly be consigned to the dustbin of ill-conceived hypotheses, but it will be useful nonetheless to appeal to it as our point of departure.”[3] Other scholars, such as John Dominic Crossan, affirms the confluence of Hellenistic and Judaic cultures in 1st-century Galilee as a potential source for the similarities between Christ and the Cynic philosophers-peasants of antiquity.[4] Crossan and Marcus Borg also agree with Mack’s view that the original teachings of Jesus of Nazareth were non-eschatological.[5][6]

Mack follows the lead of Kloppenborg in reconstructing Q in layers, focusing on Q communities. This sort of reconstruction has been criticised by a number of scholars such as Maurice Casey. On Jesus as a Cynic, Casey states that “When all the evidence is taken into account, supposed parallels of this kind show that Jesus was quite different from a Cynic philosopher, not that he was like one.”[7] Leif E. Vaage of Emmanuel College notes the similarities between the Q document and the texts of the Cynics, namely the Cynic epistles,[8] which contains the wisdom and ethical anecdotes used by Cynic preachers and illustrates their ascetic way of life focused on purity.[9]

Steefen:
The Cynic Epistles ? ? ?

I haven’t heard about that either.

Maybe I should attempt to do a YouTube video on Mack and The Cynic Epistles.

Video suggested by Robert:

This is probably a companion video: