What is known about Christ from non-Christian sources? The answer is, "not much". However I think there are enough references to be sure that he really existed, was a Jewish teacher, was crucified, and had disciples following him. There's nominally some evidence for the miraculous darkness at his crucifixion reported in the Gospels, but since the report comes through a Christian, it is not qualified as independent. I have taken all but the first set of quotations from McDowell. He is a somewhat controversial writer, as he represents the fundamentalist end of Christianity. However his book is a convenient list of quotations that are commonly cited. I've included most of the list, to give you a feel for what are typically cited. The problem with these quotations is that it's hard to know which ones actually represent independent knowledge, and which simply summarize Christian claims. Tacitus and Lucian are non-Christians who accept certain basic facts about Jesus. However this doesn't necessarily mean they actually checked Roman records from Palestine. Romans might quite reasonably accept Christians' claims that Jesus was crucified, since there would be no plausible motive for inventing that. I would guess that the Jewish sources are more likely to be based on real historical knowledge, simply because the traditions are from a group that was around in Palestine at the time. At any rate, we can tell what Jews and Romans accepted as fact some decades after the events, but we can't really tell how carefully they had investigated. Josephus (a Jewish historian) in Jewish Antiquities, finished ca. 93-94. Refers briefly to the trial of James, "the brother of Jesus who is called Messiah". There is another and longer reference to Jesus in this document, containing a brief description of Jesus, as "a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of people", crucified by Pilate, and source of Christianity. However because it has an explicit acceptance of Jesus as Messiah and of his resurrection, almost all scholars believe that this passage is a Christian interpolation. There are some scholars who believe that the core of it is original, and Christians added only the parts acknowledging Jesus as Messiah and the reality of resurrection. There is virtually no doubt about the passage referring to James. (source: John Meier, Bible Review, June 1991) Tacitus (a Roman historian), in 112, refers briefly to Nero's persecution of Christians. "Christus, the founder of the name, was put to death by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius; but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time broke out again..." Annals XV, 44, from McDowell, Evidence that Demands a Verdict. Lucian of Samosata, a Roman satirist of the 2nd Cent., alluded to Christ as "... the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced this new cult into the world. ... Furthermore, their first lawgiver persuaded them that they were all brothers one of another after they have transgressed once for all by denying the Greek gods and by worshipping that crucified sophist himself and living under has laws." The Passing Peregrius, from McDowell, op cit. Suetonius, a Roman historian, 120 "As the Jews were making constant disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he expelled them from Rome." Life of Claudius, from McDowell, op cit. Pliny the Younger wrote a letter in 112 describing Christians and asking the Emperor what to do about them. However references to Christ are clearly in the context of their belief about him, so this does not constitute any independent confirmation. Thallus, a Samaritan-born historian. McDowell says that he mentioned Christ in 52 AD. However his works are no longer extant, so we have only citations of it by others. I haven't seen any quotations of his mentions of Christ. The following does, however, support the Gospel accounts of Jesus' crucifixion. Julius Africanus, a Christian writing about 221, says, talking about the darkness that fell when Christ was crucified, "Thallus, in the third book of his histories, explains away this darkness as an eclipse of the sun -- unreasonably, as it seems to me." (It is unreasonable because the crucifixion was at Passover, which is based on the lunar calendar and requires a full moon. When there's a full moon, the moon is at the opposite side of the earth from where it has to be for an eclipse.) This has been cited by several Christian apologists as independent evidence. However it's available only through quotations by a Christian writer, so I would be reluctant to claim it as completely independent. Julius Africanus seems (from other accounts) to have been less credulous than many of his time, and to be willing to debunk at least some unjustified Christian claims. But he is still a Christian source. Phelgon, another first-cent. historian, is also quoted by Africanus as saying "during the time of Tiberius Caesar an eclipse of the sun occurred during the full moon." Phelgon's comment (presumably the same one) is also referred to by Philopon. from McDowell, op cit. Mara Bar-Serapion, in a letter to his son sometime after 73 AD, refers to the deaths of Socrates, Pythagoras, and Christ: "What advantage did the Jews gain from executing their wise King? It was just after that that their kingdom was abolished. ... Nor did the wise King die for good; He lived on in the teaching which He had given" from F.F. Bruce, "The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable", quoted in McDowell, op cit. [The following is taken nearly verbatim from McDowell. I do not know enough about the Jewish documents cited to be able to comment, but the comments from Klausner add sufficient credibility that I'm willing to include them. I'd welcome comments from knowledgable Jewish readers.] The Talmud refers to Jesus several places, typically as "Ben Pandera", where Pandera is sometimes taken to be the name of a Roman soldier who was Jesus' illegitimate father. It may also be a play on words, since the Greek word for virgin is "parthenos". In the Baraila: "On the eve of Passover they hanged Yeshu (of Nazareth) and the herald went before him for forty days saying (Yeshu of Nazareth) is going forth to be stoned in that he hath practiced sorcery and beguiled and led astray Israel. Let everyone knowing aught in his defence come and plead for him. But they found naught in his defence and hanged him on the eve of Passover." (Babylonia Sanhedrin 43a). Yeb. IV 3; 49a: "R. Shimeon ben Azzai said [concerning Jesus]: 'I found a genealogical roll in Jerusalem wherein was recorded, Such-an-one is a bastard of an adulteress'". Klausner (a modern Jewish scholar) adds: "Current editions of the Mishnah add: 'To support the words of R. Yehoshua' (who in the same Mishnah, says: What is a bastard? Everyone whose parents are liable to death by the Beth Din). That Jesus is here referred to seems to be beyond doubt. ..." An early Baraita, in which R. Eliezer is the central figure, speaks of Jesus by name. The brackets are within the quote. Eliezer speaking: "He answered, Akiba, you have reminded me! Once I was walking along the upper market (Tosefta reads 'street') of Sepphoris and found one [of the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth] and Jacob of Kefar Sekanya (Tosefta reads 'Sakkanin') was his name. He said to me, It is written in your Law, 'Thou shalt not bring the hire of a harlot, etc.' What was to be done with it -- a latrine for the High Priest? But I answered nothing. He said to me, so [Jesus of Nazareth] taught me (Tosefta reads, 'Yeshu ben Pantere'): 'For of the hire of a harlot hath she gathered them, and unto the hire of a harlot shall they return'; from the place of filth they come, and until the place of filth they shall go. And the saying pleased me, and because of this I was arrested for Minuth. And I transgressed against what is written in the Law; 'Keep thy way far from here' -- that is Minuth; 'and come not nigh the door of her house' -- that is the civil government". The above brackets are found in Dikduke Sof'rim to Abada Zara (Munich Manuscript, ed Rabinovitz). Klausner comments "There can be no doubt that the words, 'one of the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth,' and 'thus Jesus of Nazareth taught me,' are, in the present passage both early in date and fundamental in their bearing on the story; and their primitive character cannot be disputed on the grounds of the slight variations in the parallel passages; their variants ('Yeshu ben Pantere' or 'Yeshu ben Pandera,' instead of 'Yeshu of Nazareth') are merely due to the fact that, from an early date, the name 'Pantere,' or 'Pandera,' become widely current among the Jews as the name of the reputed father of Jesus." The quotes are from Klausner, "Jesus of Nazareth". Path: igor.rutgers.edu!rutgers!headwall.Stanford.EDU!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!paladin.american.edu!auvm!NIHCU.BITNET!JEK From: JEK@NIHCU.BITNET Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia Subject: Re: Historical sources Message-ID: Date: 29 Apr 94 08:53:59 GMT Sender: CHRISTIA@ASUACAD Lines: 181 Approved: NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU * Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU Comments: ******************************************************** Comments: * The following "Approved" statement verifies header * Comments: * information for gateway passage. No approval of the * Comments: * content is implied. * Comments: ******************************************************** Tena Roepke asks: > Can anyone give me some "quick and easy" historical > sources outside the scripture which talk about Christ? A > discussion has arisen on my campus as to whether or not the > life and resurrection of Christ is a "well-documented > historical event." For those who have faith and a trust in the > scriptures, this is no problem. For others, the scriptures > provide no documentation at all. Can anyone give me some > suggestions of where to turn to find historical references they > might accept? 1) THE NAZARETH INSCRIPTION An inscription found at Nazareth, probably dating from the time of the Emperor Claudius, is cited as evidence that the Emperor was aware of the dispute between those who said that Jesus of Nazareth had risen from the dead and those who said that his disciples had stolen the body. I copy the translation given in _(Eerdman's) Handbook to the Bible_, (ed. David and Patricia Alexander, 1973, Lion Publishing Company, Berkhamsted, Herts., England and Eerdman's Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA) p 53. > ORDINANCE OF CAESAR > > It is my pleasure that graves and tombs remain undisturbed in > perpetuity for those who have made them for the cult of their > ancestors, or children, or members of their house. If, however, > any man lay information that another has either demolished > them, or has in any other way extracted the buried, or has > maliciously transferred them to other places in order to wrong > them, or has displaced the sealing or other stones, against > such a one I order that a trial be instituted, as in respect of > the gods, so in regard to the cult of mortals. For it shall be > much more obligatory to honour the buried. Let it be absolutely > forbidden for anyone to disturb them. In the case of > contravention I desire that the offender be sentenced to > capital punishment on charge of violation of sepulture. The Emperor Claudius, around the year 49-50, expelled the Jews from Rome (Acts 18:2) because (says Suetonius) they were fomenting disorder at the instigation of one Chrestos. It seems plausible that there were disputes in Rome between Jews who believed that the body of Jesus was missing from the tomb because he had risen, and Jews who believed that it had been stolen. When these diputes caused public disorder, Claudius (or his deputy) made inquiries, expelled both sides from the city (after the manner of a parent who, when two children are fighting over a toy, takes it away from both of them for the time being), and then ordered a stern decree against grave-robbing to be promulgated at the places where the disturbance had begun. Presumably these would include at least (1) Jerusalem, where the alleged corpse-snatching had taken place, and (2) Nazareth, the home town of the alleged corpse. This is, of course, partly conjecture, but plausible conjecture. It may be that the emperor issued an empire-wide decree for reasons totally unconnected with Christianity, and that the fact that the only surviving copy of the decree turned up in Nazareth is sheer co-incidence. But, other things being equal, a hypothesis that does not involve co-incidence is to be preferred. You will notice that the inscription does not give a year or the name of the emperor. If I remember aright, Jack Finegan and Theodore Blinzler give reasons for dating it in the reign of Claudius and around 50. Ethelbert Stauffer proposes an earlier date. The history of the stone, given in Finegan, is a bit peculiar: As I understand the matter, it first surfaced in the possession of a private collector and archaeology buff who has left us no record of how he got it, but who was the possessor of much other first-rate material of undoubted genuineness. In his collection, it was marked simply as, "From Nazareth." Is this grounds for suspecting forgery? My judgement is that if we had the names and affidavits of the archaeologists who claimed to have found it _in situ_, there would be a small but non-zero chance of forgery, and that their anonymity makes the chance a little larger, but still small. Anyone clever enough to forge an inscription that passes expert inspection would probably be clever enough to fake the finding. But I am no expert. I mention the history of the find to be honest, but my impression is that the inscription experts are agreed on the genuineness, and increasingly on the date. (I am tempted to say: "No serious Bible scholar today doubts that the inscription is a genuine decree of an early emperor -- possibly Tiberius but probably Claudius.") You will find references in the works of Jack Finegan (so spelled). Try his ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT or his NEW LIGHT ON THE ANCIENT EAST. 2) THE DOMINUS FLEVIT INSCRIPTIONS Several of the tombs in the DOMINUS FLEVIT catacombs outside Jerusalem bear inscriptions like, "Jesus, have mercy," and "Jesus, remember me in the resurrection," inscriptions thought to date from the 40's or late 30's, and indicating the presence in Jerusalem from a fairly early date of a community that believed in resurrection and in the power of someone named Jesus to see the believer safely through death and beyond. See Finegan again. 3) THE TALMUD The Talmud describes Jesus as one who "practiced magic and led Israel astray." I take it that this refers to his alleged acts of healing and other alleged miracles, acknowledging that he had convinced some observers that he had special powers. The Talmud also records a dispute over whether it is permissible for a Jew to allow someone to attempt to heal him in the name of Jesus. That persons were attempting healings in the name of Jesus suggests a belief that Jesus had himself been a healer. See the references in Ethelbert Stauffer (Jesus: GESTALT UND GESCHICHTE, Bern 1957; JESUS AND HIS STORY, Knopf, New York, 1960) and perhaps in Ian Wilson's JESUS: THE EVIDENCE. 4) THE FLAVIAN TESTIMONY The writer Flavius Josephus has two references to Jesus: (a) He tells us that the priests took advantage of an interregnum between Roman governors in 62 to put to death James, the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ. The reference is casual and in passing, and does not seem likely to be a forgery. (b) In an earlier and much more controversial passage, he gives a capsule account of Jesus as a worker of marvels who was put to death and rose. Josephus is unlikely to have believed anything of the sort, and it is usually supposed that the passage as we have it was written by a Christian. Now an editor does not often insert a passage that is simply invented, but will often "improve" a passage that he finds unsatisfactory. And it is unlikely that Josephus would refer to James as the "brother of Jesus the so-called Christ" if he had not mentioned Jesus earlier. Accordingly, it is usually supposed by both Christians and non-Christians that Josephus here wrote a paragraph about Jesus, which some Christian editor has "improved." The placement of the paragraph is significant. It comes right next to a story about a chaste and devout woman who was tricked into spending the night at a pagan temple and there sleeping with a man under the impression that he was the god of the temple. The connection of the story with the history of the Jews, Josephus's alleged subject, is a bit tenuous, but it makes perfect sense if we suppose that he was using it to introduce the story of a gullible Galilean virgin who was tricked into sleeping with a man under the impression that he was angelic or divine, and whose son grew up to become a wandering faith-healer who was executed by the Romans for claiming to be the Messiah, and whose followers are still disturbers of the peace..... Conclusion: It is probable that Josephus' History as originally written contained at this point a reference to Jesus, with a skeptical interpretation of the story of his virgin birth, and an account of his public career to match. That he debunks the belief in the virgin birth and in subsequent miracles implies that the belief was there and sufficiently prevalent to be worth debunking, but whether Josephus is early enough to count as independent evidence is another matter. ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** Some persons think it a major argument against Christianity to say that all our information about Jesus comes from a single source, the New Testament. I don't think it is. In the first place, the New Testament is a collection of documents, and represents several strands of evidence collected for the reader's convenience in a one-volume anthology. In the second place, I ask what contemporary evidence we have for the assassination of Julius Caesar besides the letters of Cicero to Atticus, and later (mostly much later) writings by persons who had almost certainly read Cicero. Again, the only record we have of the Anglo-Saxon invasion of Britain is a single document, the HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH AND PEOPLE by the Venerable Bede. One could take the existence of the English people as evidence for the invasion, and similarly take the existence of the Christian community as evidence for the life of Christ. A relevant question is: how accurate are the New Testament documents where they can be checked? For a partial answer, I suggest four essays, which you can obtain by sending the four messages (all together or one at a time) GET INFANCY PART1 GET INFANCY PART2 GET JOHN PART1 GET JOHN PART2 to LISTSERV@ASUACAD. Yours, James Kiefer