Gotcha. You think if you continue to weaken the claim it will become true or at least can't be disproven. You know the exact opposite of what you are supposed to do. We gather evidence and develop theories. You are taking an existing theory and lowering its explanatory power. We see the sales people of fake medicine do this all the time. At first it is a cure-all, within a generation or two the claims have shrunken to the point where no one can really say they aren't true.

Again your assuming that Jesus existence means that anything in the bible is correct. My point is that the two can be entirely disconnected. I am making no coatings about Mark, Luke or Paul in this line of argumentation. I am starting that the extraordinary part of the claim is his godliness, not his existence.

Which still doesn't match with the evidence because again Paul met a community that was widespread. Just a regular guy wouldn't have a cult survive his death. You overshot.

So we’re back to realm of speculation. If you’re going to frame it there,

Not really speculation. The evidence points to a con.

would it not make even more sense then if these two conmen, in order to lend their support credibility, went through the local scrolls and found a local dude that died a little while back and coopted his name for their narrative?

Given the overwhelming odds that both men were illiterates I wouldn't bet on that.

For all of your arguments against his existence you keep coming back to the bible as your source.

Because that is the only source. All we have after that is another generation later a guy saying what he heard from someone else about what this new cult believed. Hearsay.

You tie yourself in an oddly circular loop here, again arguing that Jesus either isn’t real and so the bible is wrong, or he is and the bible becomes the word of God.

Not at all. The only source we have shows evidence of a con. So I accept it as a con. Also can you show me where in the Bible that it says this book is the word of God? Exact passage please.

There’s a lot of room to move in between the two - including a dude from the area, name Jesus once existed.

Again you try to tactic of lowering the claim hoping to sneak it in. Me personally I like developing models that have more power to explain facts, not less. In your desire to keep your childhood Jesus friend you have now reduced him to one guy one time named Jesus somewhere in that area.

Follow the evidence.