Columbia PhD in Ancient History says Jesus never existed

[alwayson]

How do Christians respond to Dr. Richard Carrier?

There are several lectures and debates with him on youtube.

[Mithrae]

Interesting that Thallus from your list of extra-Biblical references to Jesus, even references the darkness at the time of the crucifixion.

This comment by Thallus is not extant. It's known by a vague allusion in the work of 2nd/3rd century Christian writer Julius Africanus.

That work of Julius Africanus is not extant either. It is known by quotation in the work of 9th century Christian author George Syncellus.

Julius Africanus wrote:

• This event followed each of his deeds, and healings of body and soul, and knowledge of hidden things, and his resurrection from the dead, all sufficiently proven to the disciples before us and to his apostles: after the most dreadful darkness fell over the whole world, the rocks were torn apart by an earthquake and much of Judaea and the rest of the land was torn down. Thallus calls this darkness an eclipse of the sun in the third book of his Histories, without reason it seems to me. For....how are we to believe that an eclipse happened when the moon was diametrically opposite the sun?

Obviously, this is not a direct quote of what Thallus wrote.

So what did Thallus actually write? Without knowing what he wrote, all we've got is speculation, not evidence. However it seems that Eusebius quoted two non-Christian sources which made reference to some kind of darkness/eclipse which he (Eusebius) identifies with the gospel story. One of those sources he identifies as Phlegon - the other one is probably Thallus:

• Jesus Christ..underwent his passion in the 18th year of Tiberius [32 AD]. Also at that time in another Greek compendium we find an event recorded in these words: "the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell." All these things happened to occur during the Lord's passion. In fact, Phlegon, too, a distinguished reckoner of Olympiads, wrote more on these events in his 13th book, saying this: "Now, in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [32 AD], a great eclipse of the sun occurred at the sixth hour [noon] that excelled every other before it, turning the day into such darkness of night that the stars could be seen in heaven, and the earth moved in Bithynia, toppling many buildings in the city of Nicaea."

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ ... allus.html

Obviously if that first quote was from the work of Thallus, it is not a direct reference to Jesus' crucifixion. In fact as I briefly discussed with Catalyst earlier in the thread, both of those quotes appear to be in reference to the eclipse which NASA informs us passed over Bithynia (north-western Turkey) around midday in November 29CE.

[stubbornone]

Interesting that Thallus from your list of extra-Biblical references to Jesus, even references the darkness at the time of the crucifixion.

This comment by Thallus is not extant. It's known by a vague allusion in the work of 2nd/3rd century Christian writer Julius Africanus.

That work of Julius Africanus is not extant either. It is known by quotation in the work of 9th century Christian author George Syncellus.

Julius Africanus wrote:

• This event followed each of his deeds, and healings of body and soul, and knowledge of hidden things, and his resurrection from the dead, all sufficiently proven to the disciples before us and to his apostles: after the most dreadful darkness fell over the whole world, the rocks were torn apart by an earthquake and much of Judaea and the rest of the land was torn down. Thallus calls this darkness an eclipse of the sun in the third book of his Histories, without reason it seems to me. For....how are we to believe that an eclipse happened when the moon was diametrically opposite the sun?

Obviously, this is not a direct quote of what Thallus wrote.

So what did Thallus actually write? Without knowing what he wrote, all we've got is speculation, not evidence. However it seems that Eusebius quoted two non-Christian sources which made reference to some kind of darkness/eclipse which he (Eusebius) identifies with the gospel story. One of those sources he identifies as Phlegon - the other one is probably Thallus:

• Jesus Christ..underwent his passion in the 18th year of Tiberius [32 AD]. Also at that time in another Greek compendium we find an event recorded in these words: "the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell." All these things happened to occur during the Lord's passion. In fact, Phlegon, too, a distinguished reckoner of Olympiads, wrote more on these events in his 13th book, saying this: "Now, in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [32 AD], a great eclipse of the sun occurred at the sixth hour [noon] that excelled every other before it, turning the day into such darkness of night that the stars could be seen in heaven, and the earth moved in Bithynia, toppling many buildings in the city of Nicaea."

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ ... allus.html

Obviously if that first quote was from the work of Thallus, it is not a direct reference to Jesus' crucifixion. In fact as I briefly discussed with Catalyst earlier in the thread, both of those quotes appear to be in reference to the eclipse which NASA informs us passed over Bithynia (north-western Turkey) around midday in November 29CE.

"Thallus (Circa AD 52, eclipse of the sun) Thallus wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean world from the Trojan War to his own time. His writings are only found as citations by others. Julius Africanus, who wrote about AD 221, mentioned Thallus' account of an eclipse of the sun."

http://carm.org/non-biblical-accounts-n ... dor-people

In fact, Thallus is cited SEVERAL times by muliple authors, thus we can be reasonably certain that there was a Thallus and that he was accurately quoted by multiple sources.

Indeed, we see the same pattern here, the picking a choosing of evidence. The source I listed provides half a dozen sources of various degrees of certainty - just as a start - but rather than take a look at all of them and acknowledge that there is a consistency that supports Jesus ... we hold that we should disregard quotations of known authors because their original works are lost to antiquity ...

I wonder how much of our knowledge, with the burning of the Library in Alexandria, foe example, would thus be lost to history as unverifiable?

And that is why we must use a set of objective standards to weigh the evidence that is available to seek the larger truth.

It is, given the repeated citation of Thallus, far more reasonable to assume that he lived and produced works than it would be to assume that he was randomly mentioned by various authors. Thus, when quoted directly, he becomes another source of FURTHER verification, not a source in an of itself to prove alone.

Its merely confirmation of the prediction that, were Jesus alive, we should ... and indeed do, find references to him outside the Bible.

[historia]

Your comment highlights what I perceive to the major problem with the references to Jesus in Antiquities of the Jews, namely, why would Josephus use the term ‘Christ’ uniquely in reference to Jesus, especially if, as Origen records, he didn’t think Jesus was the Messiah?

As mentioned previously, the word ‘Christ’ only appears twice in all the extant writings of Josephus; both occurrences are in the Antiquities of the Jews; the Testimonium Flavianum 18.3.3 “He was the Christ� [ � χ�ιστὸς οὗτος ἦν] and 20.9.1. in a reference to the death of James, “Jesus the one called Christ�[ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ λεγομένου Χ�ιστοῦ].

Throughout the Septuagint the word ‘Christ’ is used where Mašíaḥ is used in the Tenach. It is applied to various kings and high priests. However, despite mentioning many high priests [included several called Jesus], and kings including David and Cyrus, Josephus never uses the term ‘Christ’ in relation to any of them. Why?

I think we can account for this fairly simply: By the time Josephus wrote Antiquities, Christians were using the term 'Christ' as a kind of proper name for Jesus. We see that development already in Paul's writings. Tacitus' remark that 'Christus' was the founder of the Christian movement attests to this as well.

Josephus is not calling Jesus the messiah (I take 'he was the Christ' in Antiquities 18 to be an interpolation), but rather apparently using a common designation for Jesus of Nazareth as "the one called Christ."

I have touched on this possibility in an earlier post. However while not dismissing the hypothesis in its entirety I perceive one or two problems.

Firstly, for Josephus to think, in common with Tacitus and Suetonius, that ‘Christus/Chrestus’ was Jesus’ name, we have to conclude that Josephus himself was ignorant of the significance of the title ‘Christ’? How likely is this? Is it possible that Josephus hadn’t read the Septuagint and as a consequence was unaware the translation of Mašíaḥ as χ�ιστὸς Christ?

To be clear, I'm not suggesting that Josephus thought 'Christ' was a personal name.

Rather, my point here is that, by the end of the first century, Christians regularly referred to Jesus simply as 'Christ'. It was originally a title, of course -- Jesus the Christ -- but 'Christ' came to function as a byname for Jesus already in Paul's time. So much so, in fact, that Tacitus, and likely other Romans, (mistakenly) took is to be a personal name.

Now, Josephus must have known that 'Christ' was (originally) a title; i.e., that Christians believed that Jesus was the Messiah. Nevertheless, it appears that "Jesus who is called the Christ" was a common way of referring to Jesus of Nazareth, so Josephus uses that same appellation here in Antiquities 20. In doing so, he is not, of course, endorsing the Christian view that Jesus really was the Messiah.

Conversely, if Josephus did recognise the significance of the term χ�ιστὸς how confident could he be that his intended audience were sufficiently unfamiliar with Christianity, or Judaism, or the Septuagint to be ignorant of the significance of the term ‘Christ’? And why would he take the risk of discovery?

I'm not sure I understand your point here. Would you mind elaborating?

[Goat]

Ah, so you mean "very near" in a relative sense. Still, while it may seem intuitive that older claims are better than newer claims, you are indeed committing a logical fallacy by making such an assumption.

So your position is the farther away from an event in time an observer is, the more accurate the account?

No, actually, it appears that his position is that thinking that things closer to the event are more accurate is so logically untenable that it SHOULD be dismissed as an uncategorizable fallacy.

You see is the magic of the Jesus Myth ... wherein anything that you don't want to acknowledge is dismissed as a logical fallacy whether it is or not.

I mean, how uncooth to think an Eseubius, dealing with the direct descendants of Jesus's Disciples and arguably operating from texts now lost to history would be more accurate in his assessments that someone 2,000 years removed from an event and bereft of many of the sources lost to antiquity!

We Christians are so illogical to make assumptions like that ...

You made some claims here, I would like to see you provide evidence for. Providing evidence does not mean 'Here is a link, go look', or 'google it'

Please show that Eusebius was 'dealing with the direct descendants of Jesus' disciples. Please show that a descendant of someone would know any better than anyone else.

Agh, so now we are into the 'make false allegations to the mods' phase are we?

No, we are in 'Please support your claims' mode'. Do you know what 'support your claims' means.

And yes, when asking for 'evidence' of extra-Biblical sources, a link to a cateloge of JUST SUCH DOCUMENTS is indeed evidence.

Well.. the problem with trying to 'prove the bible with the bible' is that here is a certain amount of circularity there. Do you know what circular reasoning is?

But, rather than admit he is wrong, an atheist will simply change the rules entirely for no particular reason.

Let's see... painting with a too broad a brush and an ad hominien

And now we have non-germane claims ... because clearly, I would not know my own grandfather better than some dolt 2,000 years from now ... that is just a silly claim that requires evidence - especially two thousand years from now to some conspiracy theorist who doesn't even think my grandfather existed!!!

Jesus Mythers. Can't prove anything to those who have embraced the absurd as a way of life.

I see. You refuse the back up a claim you make, but rather throw insults instead.

[Goat]

Interesting that Thallus from your list of extra-Biblical references to Jesus, even references the darkness at the time of the crucifixion.

This comment by Thallus is not extant. It's known by a vague allusion in the work of 2nd/3rd century Christian writer Julius Africanus.

That work of Julius Africanus is not extant either. It is known by quotation in the work of 9th century Christian author George Syncellus.

Julius Africanus wrote:

• This event followed each of his deeds, and healings of body and soul, and knowledge of hidden things, and his resurrection from the dead, all sufficiently proven to the disciples before us and to his apostles: after the most dreadful darkness fell over the whole world, the rocks were torn apart by an earthquake and much of Judaea and the rest of the land was torn down. Thallus calls this darkness an eclipse of the sun in the third book of his Histories, without reason it seems to me. For....how are we to believe that an eclipse happened when the moon was diametrically opposite the sun?

Obviously, this is not a direct quote of what Thallus wrote.

So what did Thallus actually write? Without knowing what he wrote, all we've got is speculation, not evidence. However it seems that Eusebius quoted two non-Christian sources which made reference to some kind of darkness/eclipse which he (Eusebius) identifies with the gospel story. One of those sources he identifies as Phlegon - the other one is probably Thallus:

• Jesus Christ..underwent his passion in the 18th year of Tiberius [32 AD]. Also at that time in another Greek compendium we find an event recorded in these words: "the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell." All these things happened to occur during the Lord's passion. In fact, Phlegon, too, a distinguished reckoner of Olympiads, wrote more on these events in his 13th book, saying this: "Now, in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [32 AD], a great eclipse of the sun occurred at the sixth hour [noon] that excelled every other before it, turning the day into such darkness of night that the stars could be seen in heaven, and the earth moved in Bithynia, toppling many buildings in the city of Nicaea."

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ ... allus.html

Obviously if that first quote was from the work of Thallus, it is not a direct reference to Jesus' crucifixion. In fact as I briefly discussed with Catalyst earlier in the thread, both of those quotes appear to be in reference to the eclipse which NASA informs us passed over Bithynia (north-western Turkey) around midday in November 29CE.

"Thallus (Circa AD 52, eclipse of the sun) Thallus wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean world from the Trojan War to his own time. His writings are only found as citations by others. Julius Africanus, who wrote about AD 221, mentioned Thallus' account of an eclipse of the sun."

http://carm.org/non-biblical-accounts-n ... dor-people

In fact, Thallus is cited SEVERAL times by muliple authors, thus we can be reasonably certain that there was a Thallus and that he was accurately quoted by multiple sources.

Indeed, we see the same pattern here, the picking a choosing of evidence. The source I listed provides half a dozen sources of various degrees of certainty - just as a start - but rather than take a look at all of them and acknowledge that there is a consistency that supports Jesus ... we hold that we should disregard quotations of known authors because their original works are lost to antiquity ...

I wonder how much of our knowledge, with the burning of the Library in Alexandria, foe example, would thus be lost to history as unverifiable?

And that is why we must use a set of objective standards to weigh the evidence that is available to seek the larger truth.

It is, given the repeated citation of Thallus, far more reasonable to assume that he lived and produced works than it would be to assume that he was randomly mentioned by various authors. Thus, when quoted directly, he becomes another source of FURTHER verification, not a source in an of itself to prove alone.

Its merely confirmation of the prediction that, were Jesus alive, we should ... and indeed do, find references to him outside the Bible.

Well, this is the problem.. the only thing we know about Thallus is that he talked about an eclipse.. and we got that from Julius Africanius. ... who was saying "No it wasn't"

We don't have what Thallus actually said. we just have the interpretation of an apologist who was trying to use Thallus to show there was 'darkness at noon'. .. and was trying to say that was the same incident as was recorded in the Bible.

Since we don't have Thallus' original work, but rather the interpretation of an apologist, that is second hand information from someone with a strong agenda.

Now, it would be MUCH more worth while the original thallus manuscript was discovered.. not filtered through an apologist who was pushing a viewpoint .

[stubbornone]

Ah, so you mean "very near" in a relative sense. Still, while it may seem intuitive that older claims are better than newer claims, you are indeed committing a logical fallacy by making such an assumption.

So your position is the farther away from an event in time an observer is, the more accurate the account?

No, actually, it appears that his position is that thinking that things closer to the event are more accurate is so logically untenable that it SHOULD be dismissed as an uncategorizable fallacy.

You see is the magic of the Jesus Myth ... wherein anything that you don't want to acknowledge is dismissed as a logical fallacy whether it is or not.

I mean, how uncooth to think an Eseubius, dealing with the direct descendants of Jesus's Disciples and arguably operating from texts now lost to history would be more accurate in his assessments that someone 2,000 years removed from an event and bereft of many of the sources lost to antiquity!

We Christians are so illogical to make assumptions like that ...

You made some claims here, I would like to see you provide evidence for. Providing evidence does not mean 'Here is a link, go look', or 'google it'

Please show that Eusebius was 'dealing with the direct descendants of Jesus' disciples. Please show that a descendant of someone would know any better than anyone else.

Agh, so now we are into the 'make false allegations to the mods' phase are we?

No, we are in 'Please support your claims' mode'. Do you know what 'support your claims' means.

And yes, when asking for 'evidence' of extra-Biblical sources, a link to a cateloge of JUST SUCH DOCUMENTS is indeed evidence.

Well.. the problem with trying to 'prove the bible with the bible' is that here is a certain amount of circularity there. Do you know what circular reasoning is?

But, rather than admit he is wrong, an atheist will simply change the rules entirely for no particular reason.

Let's see... painting with a too broad a brush and an ad hominien

And now we have non-germane claims ... because clearly, I would not know my own grandfather better than some dolt 2,000 years from now ... that is just a silly claim that requires evidence - especially two thousand years from now to some conspiracy theorist who doesn't even think my grandfather existed!!!

Jesus Mythers. Can't prove anything to those who have embraced the absurd as a way of life.

I see. You refuse the back up a claim you make, but rather throw insults instead.

Its called prima facie evidence Goat. If you think it isn't, please feel free to report it. But the idea that the Jesus Myth is supported solely by demanding that other people PROVE that something that happened yesterday is easier to remember correctly than something that was 2,000 years ago is patently dumb. And yet, for Jesus Mythers, it requires a proof ... one that will no doubt be dismissed as little more than Christian apologies ...

In the mean time, please make a relevant comment ... which you are free to actually support with evidence at any time.

Its amazing how Jesus Mythers always demand evidence, but never produce evidence ... get that a lot with conspiracy theories.

[Mithrae]

So what did Thallus actually write? Without knowing what he wrote, all we've got is speculation, not evidence. However it seems that Eusebius quoted two non-Christian sources which made reference to some kind of darkness/eclipse which he (Eusebius) identifies with the gospel story. One of those sources he identifies as Phlegon - the other one is probably Thallus:

• Jesus Christ..underwent his passion in the 18th year of Tiberius [32 AD]. Also at that time in another Greek compendium we find an event recorded in these words: "the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell." All these things happened to occur during the Lord's passion. In fact, Phlegon, too, a distinguished reckoner of Olympiads, wrote more on these events in his 13th book, saying this: "Now, in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [32 AD], a great eclipse of the sun occurred at the sixth hour [noon] that excelled every other before it, turning the day into such darkness of night that the stars could be seen in heaven, and the earth moved in Bithynia, toppling many buildings in the city of Nicaea."

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ ... allus.html

Obviously if that first quote was from the work of Thallus, it is not a direct reference to Jesus' crucifixion. In fact as I briefly discussed with Catalyst earlier in the thread, both of those quotes appear to be in reference to the eclipse which NASA informs us passed over Bithynia (north-western Turkey) around midday in November 29CE.

"Thallus (Circa AD 52, eclipse of the sun) Thallus wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean world from the Trojan War to his own time. His writings are only found as citations by others. Julius Africanus, who wrote about AD 221, mentioned Thallus' account of an eclipse of the sun."

http://carm.org/non-biblical-accounts-n ... dor-people

In fact, Thallus is cited SEVERAL times by muliple authors, thus we can be reasonably certain that there was a Thallus and that he was accurately quoted by multiple sources.

Indeed, we see the same pattern here, the picking a choosing of evidence. The source I listed provides half a dozen sources of various degrees of certainty - just as a start - but rather than take a look at all of them and acknowledge that there is a consistency that supports Jesus ... we hold that we should disregard quotations of known authors because their original works are lost to antiquity ...

Please read what I've written, and read what your source says. I said nothing about Thallus' existence or disregarding anything that is known about his work; and that CARM page clearly acknowledges the point which I made:
"Note that Julius Africanus draws the conclusion that Thallus' mentioning of the eclipse was describing the one at Jesus' crucifixion. It may not have been."

In other words we don't know what Thallus actually wrote; there is nothing to suggest that he ever mentioned Jesus, and there's no real suggestion that Thallus even said an eclipse occurred at Passover. But as I've suggested, it's quite likely that he was talking about the same eclipse and earthquake that Phlegon mentioned, and quite likely that Julius Africanus simply drew the same conclusion that Eusebius did. If that's the case then Phlegon/Thallus were not talking about an eclipse at Passover over Jerusalem; based on NASA's astronomical data the midday total eclipse passing over Bithynia occurred in November, and would have been seen from Jerusalem as a partial eclipse.

[stubbornone]

So what did Thallus actually write? Without knowing what he wrote, all we've got is speculation, not evidence. However it seems that Eusebius quoted two non-Christian sources which made reference to some kind of darkness/eclipse which he (Eusebius) identifies with the gospel story. One of those sources he identifies as Phlegon - the other one is probably Thallus:

• Jesus Christ..underwent his passion in the 18th year of Tiberius [32 AD]. Also at that time in another Greek compendium we find an event recorded in these words: "the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell." All these things happened to occur during the Lord's passion. In fact, Phlegon, too, a distinguished reckoner of Olympiads, wrote more on these events in his 13th book, saying this: "Now, in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad [32 AD], a great eclipse of the sun occurred at the sixth hour [noon] that excelled every other before it, turning the day into such darkness of night that the stars could be seen in heaven, and the earth moved in Bithynia, toppling many buildings in the city of Nicaea."

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ ... allus.html

Obviously if that first quote was from the work of Thallus, it is not a direct reference to Jesus' crucifixion. In fact as I briefly discussed with Catalyst earlier in the thread, both of those quotes appear to be in reference to the eclipse which NASA informs us passed over Bithynia (north-western Turkey) around midday in November 29CE.

"Thallus (Circa AD 52, eclipse of the sun) Thallus wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean world from the Trojan War to his own time. His writings are only found as citations by others. Julius Africanus, who wrote about AD 221, mentioned Thallus' account of an eclipse of the sun."

http://carm.org/non-biblical-accounts-n ... dor-people

In fact, Thallus is cited SEVERAL times by muliple authors, thus we can be reasonably certain that there was a Thallus and that he was accurately quoted by multiple sources.

Indeed, we see the same pattern here, the picking a choosing of evidence. The source I listed provides half a dozen sources of various degrees of certainty - just as a start - but rather than take a look at all of them and acknowledge that there is a consistency that supports Jesus ... we hold that we should disregard quotations of known authors because their original works are lost to antiquity ...

Please read what I've written, and read what your source says. I said nothing about Thallus' existence or disregarding anything that is known about his work; and that CARM page clearly acknowledges the point which I made:
"Note that Julius Africanus draws the conclusion that Thallus' mentioning of the eclipse was describing the one at Jesus' crucifixion. It may not have been."

In other words we don't know what Thallus actually wrote; there is nothing to suggest that he ever mentioned Jesus, and there's no real suggestion that Thallus even said an eclipse occurred at Passover. But as I've suggested, it's quite likely that he was talking about the same eclipse and earthquake that Phlegon mentioned, and quite likely that Julius Africanus simply drew the same conclusion that Eusebius did. If that's the case then Phlegon/Thallus were not talking about an eclipse at Passover over Jerusalem; based on NASA's astronomical data the midday total eclipse passing over Bithynia occurred in November, and would have been seen from Jerusalem as a partial eclipse.

Mith, you claimed it wasn't evidence, i corrected that .... not sure what the disagreement is about if you are conceding it is evidence?

[Mithrae]

Mith, you claimed it wasn't evidence, i corrected that .... not sure what the disagreement is about if you are conceding it is evidence?

Thallus wrote something... and we don't know what. That's not evidence.

Inasmuch as we can guess what he wrote, it was probably what Eusebius quoted alongside Phlegon:
"the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell."

We can easily see why the earthquake/eclipse combination would make Julius Africanus - quite rationally, and like Eusebius also - think of Jesus' death. Hence his comment:
"Thallus calls this darkness an eclipse of the sun in the third book of his Histories..."

But as it stands, our best guess as to what Thallus wrote turns out not to be evidence regarding Jesus, because we have the advantage of knowing that this eclipse over Bithynia/Nicaea occurred in November.

[Student]

Presumably he would have known of those changes under Claudius, period. But writing some 70 years later, the title 'procurator' would likely have meant more to his readers than the title 'prefect.' In fact writing a mere three decades after Claudius' reign Josephus also calls Pilate a procurator:
"Now Pilate, who was sent as procurator into Judea by Tiberius, sent by night those images of Caesar that are called ensigns into Jerusalem." (Jewish War 2.9.2)
Are we to suppose that Josephus also was hoodwinked, or merely that he was writing for his own period?

We don't know where Tacitus got his information from or how thoroughly he checked its accuracy. What we do know is firstly that he was a credible historian, and secondly that he viewed the Christian sect with hostility or contempt. So we have good reason to be suspicious of any suggestion that he'd simply take them at their word regarding their founder. Perhaps there were earlier written sources now lost to us; perhaps at some point he'd spoken with officials who'd served in Judea, or with respected Jewish sources. We do not know. But those who suggest that a credible late 1st/early 2nd century non-Christian historian should be simply waved away as parroting the claims of a sect he manifestly disliked carry about as much weight to my mind - pending some actual evidence, of course - as those who imagine him combing through musty vaults of official records to ascertain the facts.

Claudius did not dispense with the rank of prefect throughout the Roman Empire - procurators simply replaced prefects in Judaea. So Tacitus’ audience would have been perfectly well aware of what the rank of prefect entailed. Therefore there was no reason for Tacitus to condescend to the ignorance of his audience.

And why would Tacitus bother to ascertain anything more about these contemptible Christians other than what they so foolishly claimed of themselves. After all it was hardly worthy of merit to claim that your leader had been crucified – a punishment reserved for the lowest of the low, slaves, criminals and the scum of society. So there was no good reason other than for Tacitus to simply take them at their word to show how worthy of contempt they were.

As for Josephus, it is a falsehood to state ‘as fact’ that he wrote that Pilate’s title was procurator. Josephus wrote in Greek and used the generic term �πίτ�οπος (epitropos) which literally means steward, trustee, administrator.

That the term �πίτ�οπος (epitropos) was a generic term for ‘governor’ is evidenced by Philo who used the term for the governors of Egypt (a prefect), of Asia (a proconsul) and Syria (a legate).

Prior the discovery of the Pilate stone in 1961 it was assumed, thanks to Tacitus, that Pilate was a procurator. When Whiston translated AJ into English he followed Tacitus and applied the title, erroneously, to Pilate.

All good points, and I stand corrected. Should've checked Wikipedia first

So the questions we have are A> Did Tacitus know that the Roman governors of Judea before 44CE were prefects and B> Did he care? 70 years after that time, was it an important distinction?

I think we can safely infer, as implied earlier and as you've agreed, that he didn't delve into any vault of official records; not just because of Pilate's title, but moreso because 'Christus' is used as Jesus' personal name, and indeed because a non-citizen from Galilee may not have appeared in any official records - and surely not outside of Judea/Syria - in the first place.

You make a good point that reference to Jesus' crucifixion would merely be a further slur on Christianity - but it would still be rather a rather sloppy approach to some historical trivia involving a Roman official. Like I say, he might have merely repeated Christians' claims. Largely for that reason I'd say that his comments stand well behind Paul, Josephus and the gospels in terms of historical value regarding Jesus. But I don't think we have sufficient reason to dismiss their usefulness entirely; I don't think we can say with any high probability that Tacitus was simply repeating their claims.

Conversely we cannot say with any high probability that he was not!

If Tacitus was not repeating common knowledge about the Christians, from where or from whom did he gather his information? As you suggest it is unlikely he would have troubled himself with trawling through the records regarding such a contemptible group as the Christians.

For my part I doubt there were any official sources to quote. And Tacitus possible acquaintance with witnesses sufficiently close to the actual event of Jesus crucifixion would also be highly improbable given the major disruption caused by the intervening Jewish wars.

It's an interesting observation, but if you're suggesting that its use in Antiquities 20 is out of place, it seems that's a question which you'll need to answer. My point is that it's obvious why he would identify Jesus as "the one called Christ," if that's who he was talking about; at least some of his readers would likely understand the reference to Christians, even if there had been no such hint in an untampered original of the TF. So if we're going to speculate that it's out of place, we must first explain why Josephus did not use the term 'Christ' of David, Cyrus and Vespasian to see whether those same reasons should have excluded its use of Jesus also.

He had an obvious reason to identify this Jesus as the one called Christ. What do you propose as the reason he should not have done so?

Josephus had one very obvious reason not to refer to Jesus as the Messiah; he [Josephus] considered Vespasian to be the messiah and wrote Antiquities while under the patronage of the Emperor. He was hardly likely to jeopardise his standing with the Roman court by referring to some Jewish upstart as an alternative messiah.

Furthermore, Josephus considered Jewish apocalyptic messianic movements to have been the root cause of the destruction of Jerusalem. Consequently, when he writes of these popular uprisings [as he does on several occasions] he makes no reference to a messiah, or to their attendant messianic fervour. Instead he refers to these disturbances using the pejorative term ‘madness’ and to their leaders as brigands.

Consequently, while Josephus may have mentioned Jesus he is unlikely to have referred to him “the one called the Christ/Messiah� especially so if this messianic claimant had a significant popular following.
I believe therefore that the simplest explanation is that, rather than draw attention to the existence of alternative messiahs, Josephus did not use the term ‘Christ’ at all.

But as you've pointed out, he didn't actually call Vespasian Christ, nor explain that as a term which could describe Jewish apocalyptic uprisings. As far as the extant text of Josephus is concerned, the term Christ is associated only with Christians. Associating that term with Vespasian or with Jewish movements requires reading something more into the text. Josephus himself obviously would have known that 'Christ' applies to those movements, to the Jewish priests and kings, and to his portrayal of Vespasian - but he chose not to convey that to his audience.

So unless we presume on their part some knowledge of Jewish culture and translated terminology beyond what Josephus is giving them, we have reason to suppose only that they'd understand 'Christ' as reference to Christians - whether from general knowledge of Nero's persecution, or from a hypothetical unaltered original TF (or both).

In short, as far as we can tell, describing Jesus as the one called Christ would not have drawn attention either to Jewish movements or to Vespasian.

While not necessarily agreeing, I follow your line of reasoning. Certainly most gentiles e.g. in Rome, perceived ‘Christos’ to be Jesus’ name, rather than a title. Indeed Χ�ιστός [Christos] and Χ�ηστός [Chrestos] looked and sounded very similar. As a name, the use of the term could be quite innocuous.

However I keep coming up against what I perceive to be two basic problems.

Firstly, Origen’s assertion that Josephus did not believe that Jesus was the Christ.

This must surely preclude Josephus’ use of the expression ‘He was the Christ’.

And if we argue that Josephus’ use of the expression ‘the one called Christ’ was simply a reference to Jesus’ name and not an acknowledgement of the title, thereby permitting Josephus to use the term whilst not conceding that Jesus was the Christ, then perhaps we might level the same accusation at the authors of Matthew & John because they also use this expression of Jesus!

Consequently it should be evident that the expression ‘the one called Christ’ is sufficiently imprecise as to mean either the designation of a name or a title; neither use is precluded. Would Josephus use such an ambiguous expression in these circumstances?

Secondly, the use of the term ‘Christ’ would have drawn the attention of anyone familiar with the Septuagint such as members of the Jewish Diaspora or the Christian community. Both groups used the Septuagint and would have been familiar with the special use of the term ‘Christ’. Perhaps this is why the Jewish community in Rome was caused to riot by Suetonius’ ‘Chrestus’!

We can be sure that the presence of the term, whether interpolated or not, certainly excited later Christians!