Reddit reviews Miracles in Greco-Roman Antiquity: A Sourcebook for the Study of New Testament Miracle Stories (The Context of Early Christianity, 1)

That's a poor excuse and you know it. Hellenism, asides from the very minor Epicureans (who were long dead even by Late Antiquity), never held this view in any way. Infact, as stated, it would directly go against the ancient theory of sacrifice (do ut des) common among Indo-European groups. I can even go further and say that not only was this immanent view completely integral to ancient Graeco-Roman religion, but it was a basis of the real life attempt at reforming the religion by Emperor Julian. Must I repeat the thing I already posted from Emperor Julian's "A Letter to a Priest"? Or do I need to talk about theophanies, manifestations of the divine, in the Ancient World? The divine Emperor Julian experienced a theophany on the spring of 363 CE when taking the route to Mount Kasios to bear witness to the early dawn and give worship and provide a sacrifice to Zeus. The sun rose, and in broad daylight, Julian received an epiphanic vision from Zeus, and “saw the God and after seeing him… received advice” (Libanius, Or.18.172). It is here that Zeus, “[as] one of the immortals descended from heaven, took [Julian] by the hair, spoke to him, and after listening to [Zeus’] answer [Julian] departed” (Libanius, Or.18.172).

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Want a book about how the divine would directly engage with humans? Here, have one on miracles in the ancient world. Better yet, I think you should read primary resources. Go read Arcana Mundi: Magic and the Occult in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A Collection of Ancient Texts by Georg Luck, it has a great many collections of primary resources translated, many of which involve how Ancient Hellenes understood theophany and their interactions with the divine. None of which involved "non-caring Gods."

The miracles in the NT are pretty common miracles during that time period. Healing the blind, raising people from the dead, wine miracles, etc. were miracles known to be performed by other divine beings/heroes/sons of gods.

A good book I recommend on this subject is Miracles In Greco-Roman Antiquity: A Sourcebook for the Study of New Testament Miracle Stories by Wendy Cotter

Resurrection of a dead woman by the son of god/hero Hercules in Euripides' Alcestis:
>Admetos:
And do I see my wife, whom I entombed?
Herakles:
Be sure of it, but I am not surprised that you are diffident. 1130
Admetos:
May I touch her, may I speak to her as my living wife?
Herakles:
Speak to her; you have all you have desired.
Admetos:
Dearest [most philê] of women, do see I again your face, your person? This exceeds all hope: I thought I would never see you again.
Herakles:
You have her; may no god be envious to you. 1135
Admetos:
O generous son of great Zeus! May you be blessed [have a good daimôn] and may the father who sired you
protect [sôzô] you! You alone restored her to me. How did you bring her back to the light from the realms below Herakles:
I fought with the one who lords it over the shades.
Admetos:
Where did you join this contest [agôn] with Death?
Herakles:
I lay in wait, and seized him at the tomb.

Aeschylus raised from the dead by the son of god Dionysus:

Jeffrey Henderson, Aristophanes: Frogs, Assemblywomen, Wealth
>Dionysus chooses Aeschylus, and Pluto tells him that he may
take Aeschylus with him back to Athens... the resurrection of
Aeschylus from the dead is both pessimistic and optimistic: if there
were no longer any living poets who could inspire the Athenians to
greatness, at least the works of Aeschylus lived on, and might
inspire the Athenians to recapture the virtues that had made their
city preeminent in his day.

Wine miracles performed by Dionysus:

Pliny the Elder, The Natural History of Pliny, of Pliny, Volume 5
>According to Mucianus, there is a fountain at Andros, consecrated to Father Liber[Dionysus], from which wine flows during the seven days appointed for the yearly festival of that god, the taste of which becomes like that of water the moment it is taken out of sight of the temple.

Reading Dionysus: Euripides’ Bacchae and the Cultural Contestations of Greeks, Jews, Romans, and Christians by Courtney Friesen
>A juxtaposition of Jesus and Dionysus is also invited in the New Testament Gospel of John, in which the former is credited with a distinctively Dionysiac miracle in the wedding at Cana: the transformation of water into wine (2:1-11). In the Hellenistic world, there were many myths of Dionysus' miraculous production of wine, and thus, for a polytheistic Greek audience, a Dionysiac resonance in Jesus' wine miracle would have been unmistakable.

Dionysos by Richard Seaford
>Early in the fourth gospel Jesus transforms water into wine at the wedding feast at Cana (2.1–11), on which the fourth gospel comments that Jesus performed this as the first of the ‘signs’ (miracles) and manifested his glory. Opinion is divided on the
relationship of this episode to the miraculous production of wine by Dionysos in numerous rituals and stories (Chapter 2), which include making water seem like wine(Plutarch, Life of Lysander 28.4). One view denies any relationship. Another derives the episode (however indirectly) from the Dionysiac stories.
A third view (somewhere in between the other two) regards the episode as in some sense a response – at least for some of the hellenized community for whom the gospel was written – to the implicit challenge represented by the cult of Dionysos, a challenge that may conceivably also underly the claim made by Jesus later in the fourth gospel that ‘I am the true vine’ (15.1). Dionysos too was identified with the vine.

Instructions for the Netherworld: The Orphic Gold Tablets By Alberto Bernabé Pajares, Ana Isabel Jiménez San Cristóbal
>In a sense, drinking wine entails drinking the god: thus, Cicero (Nat. deor., 3, 41) does not consider it an exaggeration that some should believe they were drinking the god when they brought the cup to their lips, given that the wine was called Liber. Among figurative representations, we may cite an Italic vase in which
Dionysus is carrying out a miracle: without human intervention, the wine pours from the grapes to the cups... Wine, a drink related par excellence to the mysteries of Dionysus, must have formed an essential part of the initiatory ceremonies that the deceased carried out during his life...

The son of god Asclepius was known for healing blind men and raising people from the dead:

Resurrection in Mark's Literary-Historical Perspective
By Paul Fullmer
>In his poetic exposition of the roman festal calendar, The Fasti, Publius Ovidius Naso ('Ovid') recounts a popular narrative about the bodily resurrection of Hippolytus[by Asclepius]. The pre-Christian date of The Fasti is indicated in part by Ovid's letter of dedication to the emperor Augustus written in 8 C.E. Other indications in the work itself suggest that Ovid's recensions continued until his death around 18 C.E. So the bodily resurrection recounted in Ovid's Fasti predates the ministry of Jesus and the rise of Christianity, having been written before 18 C.E.

Pausanias, Description of Greece 2. 26. 1 - 7 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue 2nd Century A.D.)
>Presently it was reported over every land and sea that Asklepios was discovering everything he wished to heal the sick, and that he was raising dead men to life.

Inscriptiones Graecae, 4.1, nos. 121-122,[2nd half of 4th c. B.C.], Epidaurus 9 in Edelstein 1. 223 and 231-232
>A man came as a suppliant to the god[Asclepius]. He was so blind that of one of his eyes he had only the eyelids left - within them was nothing, but they were entirely empty. Some of those in the temple laughed at his silliness to think that he could recover his sight when one of his eyes had not even a trace of the ball, but only the socket. As he slept a vision appeared to him. It seemed to him that the god prepared some drug, then, opening his eyelids,
poured it into them. When day came he departed with the sight of both eyes restored.

Pindar, Pythian Ode 3. 5 ff (trans. Conway) (Greek lyric C5th B.C.)
>Long ago he [Kheiron (Chiron)] nursed gentle Asklepios (Asclepius), that craftsman of new health for weary
limbs and banisher of pain, the godlike healer of mortal sickness... For a lordly bribe, gold flashing in the hand, even this man was tempted to bring back to life one whom the jaws of death had seized already.

The use of spittle for healing:

The Theological Intentions of Mark's Literary Devices: Markan Intercalations, Frames, Allusionary Repetitions, Narrative Surprises, and Three Types of Mirroring By Dean B. Deppe
>Spittle was employed foremost as a healing ointment in the ancient world. Pliny refers to spittle as a medical remedy ten times throughout his Natural History. An interesting parallel to this Markan passage is the comment that saliva can calm mental illness if placed behind the ear with one's finger (28,5,25). Similar to Jesus' healing of the blind man in 8:22-26, Suetonius in his Life of Vespasian 7:2-3 narrates that "the god declared that Vespasian
would restore the eyes if he would spit on them". Likewise, the remedy of spittle played a role in the battle between the Egyptian gods Horus and Seth. When Horus' eye became injured, spit was applied to heal his sight. Specifically referring to a Jewish background, Van der Los comments that

>"In Judaism spittle was regarded as highly medicinal..."

The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice by Robert K. Ritner
>The power transmitted by such purifications may also cure and resuscitate. Examples of "medical" spitting are common throughout the funerary literature, being
used within mythological contexts to cure baldness and weak vision, injuries of the shoulders, arms and legs, wounds from animal bites, and even instilling breath
in a newborn child. Within these texts, the use of curative spittle is not limited to the primary gods, but may be applied to-and by- the
divinized deceased:

>May you spit on the face of Horus for him so that you may remove the injury which is upon him....

>Compare also the Abydos stela of Ramses IV, 1.20 (Kitchen 1983b, p.24/2): "O Horus, I have spit on your eye after it was taken by it's
conqueror."

> Yeah, that he had raised people from the dead, calmed storms with a word, fed 5000 people with 5 loaves of bread, and came back from the dead after a public execution, appearing to 500 people, some of whom were still around if you wanted to ask. That seems like more than the exaggerations and distortions we see in Herodotus, Tacitus, or Thucydides. And, again, this was all written with access to eyewitnesses. I think it's more than just typical ancient historiography, it's either true or it's nuttery.

Again, claims of miracles were common. I suggest you read Miracles in Greco-Roman Antiquity. And Herodotus provided very unusual exaggerations of history. And ancient history used exaggerations like that a lot. I suggest you ask /r/AcademicBiblical about these concerns, because it is to my knowledge that they are unfounded.


>his apostle John certainly believed Jesus taught he was God

What are you talking about? When did John the Apostle say this?

>He does, however, acknowledge that he is the Son of God, the messiah

The idea that Jesus claimed messiahship or divinity is "naive and ahistorical." (Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity)