Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

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If Jesus died around 30AD, and if Tacitus was born in 56AD, then Tacitus could not have been a personal witness to anything Jesus ever said or did, could he.

That means that if Tacitus says anything about what happened to Jesus, we can only reasonably conclude that it's hearsay.

Also, if Tacitus does not name the person who told him those Jesus stories, then it's also anonymous hearsay.

Tacitus wrote NOTHING about Jesus of Nazareth.

Read every apologetic writings from the 2nd century and it will be seen that NO apologetic writer knew of Tacitus Annals with Christus.

Even Eusebius when writing "Church History" used the forgeries in Josephus and there is no mention whatsoever of Tacitus Annals with Christus.

Tertullian mentioned Tacitus' writings but did not claim that he wrote about Jesus.

In the Apology, Tertulian accused Tacitus of being a Liar so had a perfect opportunity to show that Tacitus mentioned Jesus even though he did not believe in him.

Tacitus Annals with Christus would have been a very significant piece of evidence for Christians in the same way they used the forgeries of Josephus.

Christian writers NEVER used Tacitus Annals with Christus to corroborate Josephus for hundreds of years.

Keep beating up those strawmen.

When will you two engage with the debate about plausibility and try to demonstrate what is wrong with what the HJ people are actually saying?

These strawmen aren't fooling anyone.
 
It is extremely easy to detect forgeries and interpolations in Apologetic writings.

The fundamental sign that a passage is a forgery can be easily traced because the forgery generally appears to be a very significant piece of information but somehow was unknown and never used for hundreds of years.

The "TF " is a good example to use when looking for forgeries.

No Apologetic writer BEFORE Eusebius used the "TF" as evidence that the Christ had already come.

It is even worse for Tacitus' Annals with Christus.

Eusebius appears to have used the "TF" c 325 CE--or about 220 years after it should have been written.

Tacitus Annals with Christus was forged no earlier than after Sulpitius Severus Sacred History or no earlier than the start of the 5th century --about 300 years AFTER Tacitus was dead.
 
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It is extremely easy to detect forgeries and interpolations in Apologetic writings.

The fundamental sign that a passage is a forgery can be easily traced because the forgery generally appears to be a very significant piece of information but somehow was unknown and never used for hundreds of years.

The "TF " is a good example to use when looking for forgeries.

No Apologetic writer BEFORE Eusebius used the "TF" as evidence that the Christ had already come.

It is even worse for Tacitus' Annals with Christus.

Eusebius appears to have used the "TF" c 325 CE--or about 220 years after it should have been written.

Tacitus Annals with Christus was forged no earlier than after Sulpitius Severus Sacred History or no earlier than the start of the 5th century --about 300 years AFTER Tacitus was dead.

You are overlooking earlier Church fathers like Origen, Hegesippus, Papias and Clement, who all claimed that Josephus gave a negative assessment of Jesus.

As soon as The Church controls the information, that bit disappeared from Josephus.

How do you explain this?
 
Why have you not corrected Foster Zygote's blatant mis-representation of my position?
You just did a fine job of it yourself, in the snipped part of your post. My rates are pretty good, though, if you'd like me to defend you full-time. Or even part-time. I'm not picky right now.
 
Wait, what ? In response to Elagabalus' post about Joe Smith, IanS pops a neuron and laments "Oh, good grief ... not the same old claim that Paul's three words in a c.200AD Christian copy (P46) must have meant that someone called James was certainly the family brother of a miraculous Jesus.", and you think it doesn't matter if the claim comes from the poster he was replying to ?

Of course it matters. If you say "hi, Belz..." and I say "Aw, not another pedophilia supporter", I think it would matter to you and everyone involved in the conversation if you, in fact, had never made any claim of the sort.
I'm not certain of what you're trying to say, but I'll apologize anyway for what I said.
 
You are overlooking earlier Church fathers like Origen, Hegesippus, Papias and Clement, who all claimed that Josephus gave a negative assessment of Jesus.

As soon as The Church controls the information, that bit disappeared from Josephus.

How do you explain this?

Which Jesus did Josephus give a negative assessment:

Jesus son of Ananus

Jesus son of Sapphias

Jesus son of Damneus

Jesus son of Sie

Jesus son of Gamala

Jesus son of Thebuthus

Jesus son of Phabet

Jesus son of Josadek
 
Which Jesus did Josephus give a negative assessment:

Jesus son of Ananus

Jesus son of Sapphias

Jesus son of Damneus

Jesus son of Sie

Jesus son of Gamala

Jesus son of Thebuthus

Jesus son of Phabet

Jesus son of Josadek

Jesus, the less important Brother of James The Just.
 
Jesus, the less important Brother of James The Just.

Jesus, the less important Brother of James the Just?? There is no such character in the works of Josephus.

Which book of Josephus mentions James the Just?

James the Just is NOT even in the NT.

James the Just in Apologetics was NOT even the brother of Jesus Christ.

1. See Chrysostom's Commentary of Galatians 1.19.[/b]

2. See Jerome' De Viris Illustribus.

3. See Rufinus' Preface to the Recognitions.

4. See the Fragments of Papias.

5. See Eusebius Church History
 
If Jesus died around 30AD, and if Tacitus was born in 56AD, then Tacitus could not have been a personal witness to anything Jesus ever said or did, could he.

That means that if Tacitus says anything about what happened to Jesus, we can only reasonably conclude that it's hearsay.

Also, if Tacitus does not name the person who told him those Jesus stories, then it's also anonymous hearsay.

Huh? Yeah, your blatant distortion is quite deliberate ............... OBVIOUSLY, IF TACITUS SPECIFIES WHEN HE GETS STUFF FROM HEARSAY, THEN THE STUFF WHICH ISN'T HEARSAY COMES FROM FIRST HAND. HIS BIRTH DATE IS

I R R E L E V A N T .

-- Duh.

Stone
 
Jesus, the less important Brother of James the Just?? There is no such character in the works of Josephus.

Which book of Josephus mentions James the Just?

James the Just is NOT even in the NT.

James the Just in Apologetics was NOT even the brother of Jesus Christ.

1. See Chrysostom's Commentary of Galatians 1.19.[/b]

2. See Jerome' De Viris Illustribus.

3. See Rufinus' Preface to the Recognitions.

4. See the Fragments of Papias.

5. See Eusebius Church History

The Antiquities... Book 20 chapter nine.
 
Again, there is no character called James the Just in Antiquities of the Jews 20.9.

Plus, James the Just was NOT the brother of Jesus in apologetic sources.

Maybe it was somewhere else, but the early church historians that I mentioned all complained that Josephus gave too much credit to James, and not enough to Jesus.

You still haven't dealt with this point. It is because you can't.
 
Maybe it was somewhere else, but the early church historians that I mentioned all complained that Josephus gave too much credit to James, and not enough to Jesus.

You still haven't dealt with this point. It is because you can't.

You have not even quoted what those "early" church historians wrote.
 
Maybe it was somewhere else, but the early church historians that I mentioned all complained that Josephus gave too much credit to James, and not enough to Jesus.

You still haven't dealt with this point. It is because you can't.
You've got to be careful with dejudge. First he said that there was no Apostle James, brother of The Lord. True. Now, that some of the sources do not mention James The Just. An inattentive reader might imagine he's saying there's no James in the sources. He's not, but you've got to read the small print.
 
You've got to be careful with dejudge. First he said that there was no Apostle James, brother of The Lord. True. Now, that some of the sources do not mention James The Just. An inattentive reader might imagine he's saying there's no James in the sources. He's not, but you've got to read the small print.

I noticed that. I wonder why people need to be dishonest if their position is sound?
 
Huh? Yeah, your blatant distortion is quite deliberate ............... OBVIOUSLY, IF TACITUS SPECIFIES WHEN HE GETS STUFF FROM HEARSAY, THEN THE STUFF WHICH ISN'T HEARSAY COMES FROM FIRST HAND. HIS BIRTH DATE IS

I R R E L E V A N T .

-- Duh.

Stone



Ha, ha ... oh, dear ... Well that does indeed appear to be about the standard of the pro-HJ arguments here :rolleyes:.

Obviously you will not understand the following, but just for the record -

- if Tacitus was not even born until after Jesus had died, and he then writes about what Jesus did without quoting that from a named traceable informant, then what he is writing is by definition “hearsay”. And in his case, where he gives no indication of any named eye-witness to what he says about Jesus, it’s also anonymous hearsay.


http://www.thefreedictionary.com/hearsay
Hear·say
1. Unverified information heard or received from another; rumor.
2. Law Evidence based on the reports of others rather than the personal knowledge of a witness and therefore generally not admissible as testimony.

The fact that in other general statements within his writing (ie not specifically in the few brief sentences where he makes mention of Jesus) Tacitus may say that he is taking trouble to avoid “hearsay”, does absolutely nothing to change the fact that if he is giving details of Jesus which he himself could not possibly know and which he obtained from some other unknown unnamed person/persons, then that is “hearsay”.

Example (for the sake of anyone else who does not understand this) - if I’m giving witness “evidence” (i.e. testimony) in a court, and I start my statement by saying “I will never tell you any hearsay” and then I proceed to say “the defendant shot the victim, and I know that, not because I saw any such thing, but because someone else said that they saw the shooting”, then that is “hearsay”, and it does not matter at all that I began by saying that I would not be telling hearsay stories … it would just be an example, as it is with Tacitus, of claiming that the story was not hearsay, when in fact it most certainly was hearsay.
 
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pakeha

Thank you for that video the other day, I lol'd.

On Tacitus, and whether he got his information from providentially preserved buisness records, or from Christians, or from prosecutors of Christians, or from something he heard on the street, or ..., much comes down to authorial intention. Is the purpose of the remark to explain what happened in the past (Tacitus would then be telling us that there was an HJ killed under Pilate) or is the purpose solely to explain the meaning and usage of the word Christian?

I think the latter, and if the latter, then if Tacitus got his information from an educated native speaker who had used the term (Hey, Popinius, I heard you say the word christian just now; 'sup with that?), then Tacitus gets his information first hand. It is irrelevant to the meaning and usage whether the Christian story is true; the term stems from the story being told, an uncontroversial fact.

If I were asked to explain the term satanic, I might well simply recite

The term derives from the name of an angel who led one third of the angels in an unsuccessful revolt against God, since which time, Satan has been making trouble for God by making trouble for people.

I know that this is the usage first-hand, because I am a member of the linguistic community that uses the word this way. In explaining the term, I have not wiggled onto the hook for the accuracy of Satan's resume. Hell, it might have been half the angels for all I know.
 
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