Josephus (Jewish historian), Tacitus (Roman historian), Pliny the Younger (Roman politician), Phlegon (freed slave who wrote histories), Lucian (Greek satirist), Celsus (Roman philosopher), Mara Bar Serapion (prisoner awaiting execution), Suetonius, and Thallus.
We have other sources too which come after the first 150 years of his death, making his existence so well attested that it cannot be denied.
James F. Mcgrath is an Associate Professor of Religion and Clarence L. Goodwin Chair of New Testament Language and Literature at Butler University. As he says on his blog in response to the abundance of sources:
“To suggest that these various authors and sources independently invented a historical Jesus, or that despite their divergent views they conspired together to do so, is (to put it charitably) less plausible than the explanation of this state of affairs accepted by all scholars and historians teaching at accredited institutions.”
· Mendell also notes that Tacitus was concerned for maintaining his integrity as a historian.
In the Annals, the work with the paragraph on Jesus, Mendell cites 30 instances where Tacitus uses specific phrases “to substantiate a statement or to present a statement for which he does not care to vouch” [ibid., 205].
Mendell also notes that “In Books 11-16 of the Annals (the Jesus cite is in 15) Tacitus “concerns himself with the evidence and source references to a greater extent than in the earlier books.” He relies on other historians, a bronze inscription (11.14), reports or memoirs (15.16), personal testimonies (15.73), and physical evidence (15.42).
There are indications of searches for first-hand (15.41) and written (12.67, 13.17) evidence [Mende.Tac, 207]. Thus, the cite on Jesus comes in the middle of one of Tacitus’ most carefully-documented works. reporting a conspiracy of Piso to assassinate Nero, Tacitus acknowledges the difficulty of accurate knowledge of such conspiracies, indicates where his knowledge is uncertain, and does not use even one of Pliny’s quotes as positive evidence because he considers it to be “wholly absurd” (15.53) [ibid, 209].n short, Tacitus was a very careful historian – he would certainly not trust a source that he held in such disdain as he did Christians, and he would carefully check material that came to him, even from his friends.nally, let us add that there was no need for Tacitus to get his information from Pliny – he had plenty of Christians in his own province of Asia where he was governor, if not more Christians than Pliny, and he was probably aware of Trajan’s edict concerning Christians, which we will discuss below.
Tacitus had no motive to investigate his information on Christ. He may have accepted information from Christians uncritically.
