Considering nearly identical* "rules for living" were around before the 10 Commandments, and that many different societies around the world came up with these rules independently, why would you even think that a fictionalized account of how the Hebrews arrived at the same rules means that Jesus or Moses were frauds or fantasies?
*Aside from the first couple of commandments, the rest are simply common sense measures to allow people to live together peacefully.
If the story of how the 10 commandments came about is a fictionalized account, then how do you know where the fiction ends and the factual begins?
It's a little like the Dan Rather Memo's.
Yes, America, these are forgeries, but they preserve the truth.
"why would you even think that a fictionalized account of how the Hebrews arrived at the same rules means that Jesus or Moses were frauds or fantasies?"
Because both claimed they were direct revelations from the God, not myths or legends. But I'm intrigued by your "*Aside from the first couple of commandments, the rest are simply common sense measures to allow people to live together peacefully."
Why, if there is noone to ultimately answer to, should anyone worry about "living peacefully" with neighbors? That is a principle for the weak to live by, not the strong and clever. If I have the most powerful navy, why not impose "gunboat" diplomacy on lesser nations? If I have the most powerful army, why not impose my will on weaker peoples? If I'm stronger than my neighbor why not take his wife, car, house and money? The existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre says that "If God is dead, everything is permitted." In other words, if there is no supreme being to lay down the moral law, each individual is free to do as he or she pleases. Without a divine lawgiver, there can be no universal moral law.
If we are just random "accidents", products of chemicals, why should we care about anything but ourselves and why should we speculate about origins, purpose or being?