Historians of old -i.e. Josephus

by AgentSmith 8 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  AgentSmith

  Recently I have been reading some research that refers to Josephus and some Roman scribes that reported about Jesus and his activities. There are reportedly, thousands of writings (The bible excluded) that confirm that Jesus in fact existed. I was wondering, how many of these writers were there at the time, or was in direct contact with Jesus. Or did these historians follow him around for a bit? How much information is available from these writers.

  I know it is a vague question, but if it confirms Jesus' ministry, than doubt is further reduced. They would have had nothing to gain by reporting miracles and wonders performed by a Jewish citizen, in a Roman controlled area. It must have made real waves if scribes in Rome recorded it. Not so?
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  IP_SEC

  There are reportedly, thousands of writings (The bible excluded) that confirm that Jesus in fact existed.

  This gets the overstatement of the year award. The very few that exist are almost undoubtably interpolation and the rest are straw grasping by believers.
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  fahrvegnugen

  Even if you accept the few references as genuine, they wouldn't prove anything other than that Jesus existed. None of the historians claimed to have even had contact with Jesus--let alone followed him around.
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  Leolaia

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus
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  wherehasmyhairgone

  Yes thousands of references to Jesus is HUGLY exaggerated.

  There are a few point of the possibility of weather Jesus exisited, and bear in mind this search for evidence is based on a human man Jesus and makes no reference to any divine origins.

  I need to find some references for this but for now, there were actually a couple of jesus mention around the christian Jesus time that were prophets, which surprised me.

  A historical Writer called Philio ( i think) was writing about Jewish history and theology from around 20 CE onwards to mid first century and never mentions Jesus!. So here you have a historian alive when Jesus was meant to live, living in the same area, so would have been around to see the Big finale, yet seemed to have missed the whole thing.

  The Josephus work is generally accepted by scholars as a later addition by some over zealous christians, writing style and wording is very different from Josephus and the way he describes Jesus would be such a foreign concept to him being a Jew ( from what i remember )

  I would humbly point you to this site, which lays out some very good ground work for the case against Jesus ever to have lived, weather you accept all of it or not, there are some very strong argument based on evidence

  http://www.rationalrevolution.net/articles/jesus_myth_history.htm#1.

  There are a number of books around on discussing Jesus and weather we really did live, i have read most of them, and while they all run along the same lines of little to evidence that he every exisited, what stood out to me, was the way the bible from john on wards talked about Jesus, certainly the way Paul spoke of him, Paul would have been around during the life of Jesus, yet never knew him? considering the zeal in which Saul (Paul) went after his followers, it struck me that Paul always referenced Jesus as a heavenly spirit not a man on earth when he was around.

  steve
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  Leolaia

  I would not stress the case of Philo of Alexandria at all....his writings were mostly allegorical interpretations of the Torah and whatever he wrote of historical interest (such as In Flaccum) mainly pertained to the situation in Egypt. I would also not stress the non-mention of Jesus in contemporaneous classical sources as an argument for Jesus' non-existence. Very little remains from what was originally written in the Roman Empire still remains, particularly concerning administrative documents. Jesus was not a public figure who would appear on a monumental inscription (as Pontius Pilate does), and from the Roman point-of-view he would have just been a Jewish troublemaker among many. Similarly, there is no reference to John the Baptist outside of Josephus, which again is not surprising as many other popular figures in Judea attracted no attention by pagan writers. Instead what attracted their attention was the later Christian movement and the references to Christ in these sources (e.g. Tacitus, Pliny, Lucian, etc.) reflect Christian influence and sources, not independent evidence of Jesus from their own secular sources. That is what makes Josephus' apparent reference so important. Yet there are solid grounds for suspicion against the authenticity of the Testimonium Flavium in at least its current form.
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  JCanon

  There is another aspect of this related to the Templars. You know they have this "cover story" that they are looking for Mary Magdalene's relatives and all that, but MM has always been connected with John. John was "the one whom Jesus loved" (if you get my drift) but was never to die. In "The DaVinci Code" part of the search for the relatives was also for all these documents that were being protected as well, so part of the search for the "Holy Grail" was also for these alleged original documents. And certainly, if Christ and the Christians were smart, why wouldn't they have preserved some sacred records among themselves? Safeguarded in secret for later times. I think that's reasonable.

  Thus I think that background has kept things at bay as far as how far off the limb they actually go for say dismissing Jesus as a true character since some of the people who knew Jesus are allegedly still alive, per the Bible:

  Matthew 16: 28 Truly I say to YOU that there are some of those standing here that will not taste death at all unt first they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.”

  John 21:” 21 Accordingly, when he caught sight of him, Peter said to Jesus: “Lord, what will this [man do]?” 22 Jesus said to him: “If it is my will for him to remain until I come, of what concern is that to you? You continue following me.” 23 In consequence, this saying went out among the brothers, that that disciple would not die.

  Also, 1 Thess 4: 15 For this is what we tell YOU by Jehovah’s word, that we the living who survive to the presence of the Lord shall in no way precede those who have fallen asleep [in death];

  Sometimes it is not a matter of whether something is actually true or not, but whether or not something is believed. If the Templars believed that John and others were still alive and maintain genealology and other documents then that would generate a secret search for them, even if that search is masked with a cover story about the search for the holy grail or Mary Magdalene, something they know is not true. So there is that aspect that tempers whether or not one would accept just the gospel testimony about Jesus if you happen to believe say John and Paul, the primary contributors to the NT were surviving from the 1st century and maintaining some of the original documentation, even shepherding for the most part the final Bible itself, one of the advantages of surviving through the centuries.

  So for some it's purely a matter of what records survive or that can be dug up, for others it's a bit more complex.

  As far as my personal take on Josephus, I think what is said about Jesus was added. I think Josephus if anything was a secularist Jew and would have understood opposition to Christianity was important, since it is also clear that he understood about the Persian revisionism and how that might help to dismiss Jesus as the promised messiah. I think Josephus' policy would have been that no mention whatsoever was the best way to oppose and invalidate the significance of Christ, which would have been quite significant during his time near the turn of the 1st Century AD. Further, there is plenty of evidence that Josephus' works were redacted; we know this because we have more than one version of his works and can make comparisons. So I think Josephus was very much aware of the Christian cult, understood it's impact on Judaism but avoided giving it historical validity himself. Later someone else added a reference to his works about Jesus. Consideration of Josephus should always be in the context of his political motives of Jewish secularism, which clearly influences his point of reference.

  JC
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  Hellrider

  JCanon:

  John was "the one whom Jesus loved" (if you get my drift)

  Yeah,yeah JC, sure we do...
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  Awakened07

  I don't know... I find it strange that Jesus isn't mentioned in more secular sources either way. I mean - here's a guy not only claiming to be the Son of God (I'm sure there were several of those), but he healed sick and raised dead etc. One scripture says several more books could have been written on everything he did (if I'm not mistaken). In my current understanding of the universe, people who can actually perform miracles in front of several hundred witnesses aren't a dime a dozen. I mean - maybe back in those days there were several who claimed to be miracle workers (as today), but someone who actually could cure for instance lepers on the spot "while you wait"? And they saw all this happening before their eyes? I think if I had been an illiterate person back then witnessing that, I would have done all I could to learn to read and write only to be able to write that down! I mean - look at the kind of press David Blaine, David Copperfield and Derren Brown gets - and they're all illusionists! What if someone - no matter what faith he was from - could perform the kind of miracles Jesus did - today? And people could check and double-check the validity of it? What kind of press would such a guy get today? "Meh." "Yaawn..." ??

  OK - so it can be said that writers back then would have given credence to Jesus and his followers if they had acknowledged his miracles, and they (or their rulers) didn't want that. But no mention of him and his miracles even in personal letters between romans or others? Just to explain what was going on? No roman soldier witnessed Jesus' fantastic miracles and wanted to share? Sorry if my argumentation seems childish - I'm not good with big words and elegant sentences. But I think I may have a valid point somewhere in there. I don't know.