Josephus and Jesus

by jhine 52 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  Larsinger58

  Please give this evidence for the Historical Jesus. Lots of writers with those two words in the Title of their books may be interested in your offerings.

  You know, Josephus' works were definitely open to redaction. One version notes that Jerusalem fell five years before the last deportation and another just four years. So someone is making their own corrections of his work. The Bible indicates that Jerusalem fell in year 19 and the last deportation was year 23, so the 4-year reference was likely the original reference.

  Josephus, though, knew quite well about the revisions of the NB Period and provided the original length of reign for Ewil-Merodach at Ant. 10.11.2:

  When Evil-Mcrodach was dead, after a reign of eighteen years, Niglissar his son took the government,

  There is a 26-year difference between the secular records from the Persian Period and the Bible/Josephus. We know from the Bible that Nebuchadnezzar II ruled for 45 years rather than just 43, so that takes care of 2 years. We also know directly from the Bible that Darius the Mede ruled for a full 6 years before abdicating to Cyrus; that amounts to 8 years. So there are 18 more years to make up for. We can calculate by deduction that Nabonidus ruled for 19 years instead of 17 years because the period from year 6 to the first of Cyrus is a period of 20 years. Darius the Mede ruled for 6 years so that leaves 14 years + 5 which is 19 years. So that takes care of 10 years of the 26, leaving 16 years elsewhere. Evil-Merodach is only accorded 2 years of rule so if you add the 16 years to his rule then he would have ruled for 18 years, which is precisely how long Josephus is claiming he ruled in this instance. Later on, of course, in Against Apion, this changes to just 2 years. So there is plenty of evidence for redactions.

  So you have to look at each reference, I suppose.

  In the meantime, I don't think there is any secular records that survive that would directly give us a historical confirmation for Jesus. But, who is to say the Jews along the way didn't destroy some of those records? They deny the Christ. So we can't say some actual records were not suppressed or destroyed.

  Case in point, is the year of Jesus' birth in 2 BC. This contradicts the popular dating for the death of Herod in 4 BC based spuriously on an eclipse event mentioned by Josephus. In the meantime, Josephus plays both sides of the fence when it comes to Herod because the length of Herod's rule was reduced by 3 years and added to the reign of his son, Archaleus. The Bible notes that a census was taken when Quirinius was first governor over Judea, meaning that he was governor twice. But Roman records show him governor only once though for the period of 3-1 BC who was governor is left blank! So who is suppressing that information? Obviously, the governor between 3-1 BC was none other than Quirinius!

  So while that is not directly showing the "historicity" of Jesus, it does show agreement with Herod ruling at the same time Quirinius was governor in 2 BC when a census was taken. Quirinius became governor again in 7 AD and took another census over which there was some controversy.

  So, while Jesus might not have any direct "historicity," some of the things people point to that are considered contradictions to what history we do have, such as the census by Quirinius are now being cleared up that adds validity to the accuracy of the gospels. Here's a youtube video which shows where the governorships are all listed except for that critical period of 1-3 BC. This would suggest that if there was some historical reference in the secular records, it likely and could easily have been suppressed by anyone who did not want to expose the revisionism or the historicity of Christ.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TepIl6_CkTY

  Of course, a general rule of thumb is that most secular records that survive are war-oriented. When blood is spilled, people set up a monument. That combined with those destroying records. Case in point, the rule of Solomon. Nothing really survives about him specifically. But the invasion during his reign by Shishak survives in Egyptian records. The time of Solomon was one of peace, so not much is said. Later, we have the confrontation at Karkar in Assyrian records, subjugation of King Jehu kneeling before Shalmaneser and references to various other kings like Hezekiah and Jehoiachin in Assyrian and Babylonian records. Thing is, some people who find no corroborating records in the secular records presume that's a reason to doubt the biblical record, when it is not! Just because you have no surviving records in China or in Compton that mention Jesus doesn't mean he never existed or everything the gospels claim he did didn't happen. Thus while you may not be able to confirm the historicity of Jesus beyond the gospels, you can't disprove him either. It has to be a matter of faith.

  But the second coming occurred on December 25, 1992 and the elect are seeing modern miracles, so the historicity of Jesus is a moot point now.
• 

  Searril

  I know this might sound funny, but Mary is pretending to be a witness! I met her at a Kingdom Hall.

  Then why does nobody else know about this?

  If Mary is still alive and 2 millenia old then how is it that no great grandparents, then grand parents, then parents, and now children ever stopped and wondered why this super-dubette looks the same now as she did 80-100 years ago?

  Honestly, you scare me. People who imagine such elaborate delusions need help. I'm not saying this to shame you. It's like any other disease that requires medical professionals to treat. You should get yourself help before you or innocent people get hurt.
• 

  mP

  Lars: When you going to answer the question about your lineage from King David!?!?!
• 

  mP

  Lars:

  What in the world do the templars got to do with Josephus and Jesus ?

  I recall a recent thread where you quote Josephus and now you say he cannot be trusted and so on. WHich isit ? DO you say he is honest when you like what he says and call him a liar when his text is problematic ? Thats just pathetic. Image i did the same with my bank, i accept the deposits but demand the withdraws are lies and invalid. What a joke.
• 

  Larsinger58

  Searill: Honestly, you scare me. People who imagine such elaborate delusions need help. I'm not saying this to shame you. It's like any other disease that requires medical professionals to treat. You should get yourself help before you or innocent people get hurt.

  Hi Searill. You know, likely it does sound a bit scary. And maybe me being delusional is the only place you can go with this. I can't blame you. BUT... apart from my personal involvement, the Bible does note that some who were alive in Jesus' day would not die until he returned, which meant they would live down through the ages over 1900 years. So now it is not a matter of believing my "delusions" but rejecting the Bible.

  Now, when Paul was first pointed out to me via holy spirit, I at first was confused. That's because somewhere in the back of my mind I thought he had been stoned to death and had died. So I rushed home and checked the scriptures and found this at 2 Thess 3:15-18:

  15 For this is what we tell YOU by the Lord's word, thatwe the living who survive to the presence of the Lord shall in no way precede those who have fallen asleep [in death]; 16 because the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a commanding call, with an archangel’s voice and with God’s trumpet, and those who are dead in union with Christ will rise first. 17 Afterward we the living who are surviving will, together with them, be caught away in clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and thus we shall always be with [the] Lord. 18 Consequently keep comforting one another with these words."

  Now direct and simple. There were two groups among the Christians of the 1st Century. Some who would die and then be resurrected just before the Lord returns, and some select who would not die at all but live and "survive" down to the second coming. When Jesus was talking with Peter he told him how he would die. Then Peter asked about John and Jesus told him if he wished he would never die:

  John 21:20 Upon turning about Peter saw the disciple whom Jesus used to love following, the one who at the evening meal had also leaned back upon his breast and said: “Lord, who is the one betraying you?” 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. However, Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but: “If it is my will for him to remain until I come, of what concern is that to you?”

  Now Peter knew there were two classes, those who would die and be resurrected and those who would not die. Jesus had told Peter what would happen to him, that is, that he would die. So all Peter was asking was what about John? Would he die or would he live on? Jesus told Peter it was really none of his concern but clearly stated, "If it is my will for him to REMAIN UNTIL I COME..."

  So the context back then was that there were two groups: the dying group and the living group. Peter was part of the dying group and the above text more or less confirms that John would be in the living group. When you contrast this scripture with 1 Thessalonians, you understand that Paul was including himself in the "living" and "surviving" group.

  The question before Paul was who would get to heaven first? Would the living group get to heaven first before the resurrected, or visa versa? Paul explained that ALL would be changed to spirit form together, but that those who had died would first rise and then ALL would be changed together. Now this is why the WTS is totally in the dark about this. They teach that some since 1914 when they die, if faithful, go right up to heaven. WRONG! No one goes to heaven before anyone else. So how does this work? Well, those who are resurrected are resurrected back into the flesh first. The only way for ALL together to be changed from physical to spirit is when all of them are in the flesh. So you see, Christ returns in the flesh himself and rules for 1000 years with all the other resurrected ones. Then after the 1000 years and after Satan is killed, then JUDGMENT DAY takes place, where all the elect judge everyone who ever lived, both righteous and unrighteous. Then, after that is over, then is when the elect get their heavenly reward. This is what the Bible teaches.

  But as you can clearly see and as I discovered, Paul defnitely includes himself in the "living" and SURVIVING group. Interesting he uses the word "survive" because this is an extraordinarily long time before Christ would return in the flesh, that is, some 2520 years from the fall of Jerusalem. Whether you think that date is 607 BCE as the witnesses, or 587 BCE or 529 BCE, all those dates 2520 years later occur in the 20th Century!

  Now, I get to see Paul and John and Mary, of course, because they wanted to see me back in the flesh and it's a perk for being the physical body of Christ at the 2nd coming. That's MY excuse for having seen all three of them and confirming none of those three ever died.

  Now, you don't have to believe me. But if you reject the scriptures, it's another matter. Even so, the doubters were not meant to be able to understand or believe these things. As Acts says:

  ACTS 13:41 "Behold it, you scorners, and wonder at it, and vanish away, because I am working a work in your days, a work that you will by no means believe even if anyone relates it to you in detail."

  So if Jehovah does not want you to believe this, then you won't be able to. Plus, all this is top secret. Why should these people who come from the 1st Century be pawns of the media? They would hi-jack God's purpose for them, so it is very secret and private and if it does get out, most people can't believe it, so it's just special knowledge of the chosen, like myself.

  But, again, the Bible does confirm that there clearly were two groups in the 1st Century Christians, one who would die and be resurrected and ones who would keep living and "surviving" down to our times, and among them are John and Paul.

  Can't really blame you for not believing this, it takes a lot of faith or you have to experience meeting them in person. But it is Biblical! It is what the Bible teaches. So I'm not making this up.
• 

  Larsinger58

  mP: Lars: When you going to answer the question about your lineage from King David!?!?!

  NEVER! And don't ask me again!!!!

  Just kidding. Um, Christ comes through the line of king David and Judah at the 1st coming. But at the 2nd coming, he comes through the line of Joseph via his younger son, Ephraim. The sons of Joseph were half Egyhptian. Thus you have another fulfillment of: "Out of Egypt, I called my son." So my lineage is that of Joseph, which means I'm part Egyptian. If you saw my relatives you'd see how exotic they look.

  Now just as some backgroun, 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes are required to fulfill the Abrahamic covenant. Since the 12 tribes did not exist nor could have survived down to our time, it was necessary to reestablish and reconstitute the 12 tribes using individuals from the 1st Century who had lineage records proving which tribe they were from. Thensay 200 years before 5the 2nd comintg these individuals who survived down to our time along withi John and Paul would marry into the modern indigenous populations and have very large family, possibly even multiple wives so that by the time Christ arrives, each tribe would have a pool of descendants to select a worthy 12,000 from each tribe.

  Read Genesis 49 where it clearly notes that the scepter would not depart from the tribe of Judah until Shiloh comes. Shiloh is another reference to Jesus Christ at the second coming. When he arrives, that is, ME, then the kingship shifts from the tribe of Judah to the tribe of Joseph. Thus the vision of Joseph of how the other 11 brothers would bow down to him is being fulfilled now. The 12 tribes of Israel, that now exist again, though in secret, all bow to me since I'm the Christ, but also to Joseph, since I have ancestry from Joseph, just as the bible prophesied.

  Interestingly, since Jesus Christ still has the legal right to be king via David, we are both combined. I will not be ruling out of Jerusalem, however, but out of Honolulu. When Jesus told the evildoer, "truly I tell you today, you will be with me in PARADISE," Jesus must have seen into the future and knew that this person would be part of his administration out of Honolulu, which is "paradise."

  I know this is way over your head, but I like to type.....
• 

  Larsinger58

  mP:Lars: What in the world do the templars got to do with Josephus and Jesus ?

  I recall a recent thread where you quote Josephus and now you say he cannot be trusted and so on. WHich isit ? DO you say he is honest when you like what he says and call him a liar when his text is problematic ? Thats just pathetic. Image i did the same with my bank, i accept the deposits but demand the withdraws are lies and invalid. What a joke.

  Well, at this level, that is, a discussion group, I take the position of an analyst. I compare different quotes with the Bible. Some of them match and some of them do not.

  But also, because of so much revisionism, often cryptic references to the original event is camouflaged in some weird story so that the "insiders" can piece the true history together. We find this in Herodotus but also Josephus. So Josephus provides details that you have to reinterpret. You can't take it for face value. For example:

  If you take Josephus for face value, he shows that Nehemiah was active during the reign of "Xerxes, the son of Artaxerxes," and then presents the story of Esther as factual, but occurring during the reign of Artaxerxes I, the son of Xerxes! Now he quotes from the original version from the LXX which, indeed, shows Esther is married to Artaxerxes I. But this was later changed in the Hebrew version where Artaxerxes was changed to ""Ahasuerus" which most clearly apply to Xerxes. This was necessary since the canonical "Esdras" (Ezra/Nehemiah) clearly shows Nehemiah active during the reign of Artaxerxes I.

  So at first, we see that clearly Josephus is totally unreliable, right? We also know the Book of Esther is non-inspired and non-historical since it contradicts the canonical books of Ezra/Nehemiah. But there's another layer! You see, Nehemiah was always represented in Jewish folklore as what we could call a "flaming queen." When he asks the handsome Artaxerxes to return home, he is depicted as sitting on the King's lap and batting his eyes at the king. Elsewhere he is flailing his arms around like the gay characters were see in some modern sitcoms! So flamboyant gay characters were always funny. When there is revisionism, though, often a single character is broken into two characters. In this case, the story of Nehemiah, which had to be suppressed during the reign of Artaxerxes since Artaxerxes and Xerxes were actually the same king, was divided into two characters, that of the beautiful Queen Esther and that of Mordecai, the prime minister. Mordecai was based on Nehemiah's Babylonian name: Marduka. The infatuation Nehemiah had with the handsome Artaxerxes was sanitized by a female character, the beautiful Esther. But it's the same story. Nehemiah gets bad news from home and wants to go home to save and help his people. Same with Esther. Part of the plot was to get the king in a good mood, place wine before him and then drop his sadness on the king. Nehemiah does this -- Esther does this. Somewhere down the road we find the Jews armed against their enemies. In the true historical version, the Jews are armed while they rebuild their walls. In Esther, this gets exaggerated to a self defense battle between the Jews and Persians. But its the same story.

  But Josephus KNOWS THIS! He knows that the double character of Esther and Mordecai are really adaptations of the suppressed history from Ezra/Nehemiah! You see, Nehemiah returned from Babylon with Zerubbabel. When the history was revised, the Persians added some 51 years to this part of the timeline so for Nehemiah to live down to the time of Darius II, he'd have to be approaching 150 years of age! So his role as the cupbearer to Xerxes, who is also Artaxe4rxes, was suppresed and the folkloric versions of Nehemiah surfaced, originally in the context of Artaxerxes, but then changed to Ahasuerus when the canonical books of Ezra/Nehemiah resurfaced!

  In other words, Josephus is not technically lying when he dates the story of Nehemiah in the context of Xerxes! That's because Nehemiah, indeed, served under Xerxes since Xerxes and Artaxerxes I were the same king! Likewise, when he tells the story of Esther in the context of Artaxerxes, that looks like unreliable history when read as face value. But since the story of Esther and Mordecai are really cryptic adaptations of the story of Nehemiah, placing them under Artaxerxes is not incorrect.

  See how complicated it gets?

  So Josephus had to deal with the politics of the day. He knew that if he was to get published and survive he had to try to agree with the politics and be "politically correct." But at the same time, he wanted to allude to the truth of Jewish history when he could. So he played both sides of the fence.

  In other words, you can use Greek records and archaeology to prove that Xerxes and Artaxerxes were actually the same king. But that brings up to the question as to whether Josephus knew this or not? The ansewr is: YES, he did! But he had to be politically correct to survive and thus insinuate some events in history that actually happened.

  So whether Josephus is "reliable" or not often boils down to who you interpret what he says and how much actual history you are actually aware of.
• 

  2+2=5

  So Mary is alive attending meetings pretending to be a JW. Sounds reasonable. Did you immediately recognize her, and there was a beautiful reunion? Or did you get to talking and it was like . . .wait a minute . . . I'm Jesus, your Mary. . . . It's been too looong! Warm embrace . . . . hang on the songs starting, talk more after the meeting.

  When she recognized you did she yell out "Jesus Christ!". That would be awkward, JWs can be a judgmental lot.

  Just sounds like such a good story, I would love a few details.
• 

  jhine

  mp ,

  yes I was ,in my original post, paraphrasing because I was quoting from the book that i am reading , the author of which is is well versed in all of the ancient writings , he is an ex bishop , So I wondered why he would take the reference to James as to mean the brother of Jesus Christ when these objections of yours would obviously negate that meaning . So I have just read the passages concerned from Antiquities 20.1 onward . It seems that you did a bit of a hatchet job and the parts you left out put a different spin on the whole thing .

  Yes two OTHER men named Jesus are mentioned , neither with fathers named Joseph , both of whom are given the job of high priest . As you pointed out Jesus was a very common name and clearly these are two seperate people from the Jesus named as Jame's brother , the one who is called Christ .

  I have also , though I admit briefly , looked at the evidence that Josephus was tampered with and it seems that scholars agree that where Josephus mentions Jesus directly it is highly likely that some tampering went on later by Christians, the passage ,without one or two alterations is authentic and that JOsephus does mention Jesus and His cricifixion .

  I have not yet had time to look at these other mentions , though I will as soon as poss . Others may like to look for themselves at

  Tacitus Annals 15 .44

  Plyny the Younger Epistles x 96 and Letters

  Babylonian Talmud

  Lucaian The Death of Peregrine

  you did catch me off guard I admit by asking for these references , I only meant to answer the question as to Josephus in the first place and I have done my best in the time I have got at the moment ( I now have to dash to Asda to get a birthday pressie for my Grandaughter )
• 

  Phizzy

  From my aged faulty memory, the "mention" by Josephus of Jesus and the his death is not in the form of recording an historical event, but reporting what the followers of Jesus claimed. ??

  So, of no more value in the search for proper proof than the Gospels themselves.