stephan huller

1. No. Photius makes this explicit and no one says anything to the contrary.

2. No. Whoever or whatever Jesus was was limited to very few historical people i.e. the evangelist and the group he opposed who were headquartered at Jerusalem (see Weeden's analysis of Mark, the gospel and those associated with Simon Peter). Even the evangelist's direct knowledge of Jesus was likely questioned (cf. Peter's criticism of Simon Magus a.k.a. Paul in the Clementine literature)

3. I don't understand the question but I am not convinced that Josephus knew of Jesus.

This is a very murky area but remember only Moses and a handful of people associated with him had direct knowledge of God according to the traditional understanding of the Pentateuch. It would not have struck contemporary Jews as strange that only a handful of people had direct knowledge of the Most High.

And here's some more (informed) speculation. Justus was Jewish. We know that he combined Greek philosophy and Jewish scriptural exegesis (as was the all the rage in the period). Let's boil down the experience of the gospel to the direct apprehension of God (= Jesus) by a few chosen disciples. It would be unlikely that Justus would have included this in a chronology of the kings of Israel.

Toto

Justus was a contemporary of Josephus and wrote on the same subjects. He would be as likely to know about or write about Jesus as Josephus.

If Justus had written about Jesus, it is likely that his works would have been preserved by Christians.

TedM

Are you saying he should not be expected to write about Jesus because of the content--ie he was writing about kings and wars, and not about history of his times, religious figures, etc., or do you mean something else?

I"m referring to people like Justin, Jerome, etc.. the likelihood they would have mentioned Justus's commentary on Jesus if there was one.


I was referring to writers such as Plegon, or earlier. Were there some that should have known about Jesus and written about him if he had had been a figure known throughout the land of Palestine as some kind of religious rebel leader/teacher who possibly performed miracles, might we have expected some others (besides Josephus and possibly Justus) to have mentioned him?

stephan huller

My point is that Photius says he didn't make reference to Jesus so we should just leave it at that. My follow up point is that Jesus wasn't a king of Israel (only to evangelicals) so the list stopped at Marcus Julius Agrippa without referencing Jesus. The list goes from Moses to Agrippa and there seems to have been a recognition that the line would end (or did end) with Agrippa (he was childless).

If anyone has any discernment the implications of this Moses to Agrippa comparison would be obvious. It was certainly not lost on Origen nor the Jews who lived at the time of Justus. Just read Genesis 49:10

This literally says that the messiah will appear at the time of the last king but IMPLICITLY - since the messiah has to be the king, it is saying the last king will also be the messiah. This is the point of the Yosippon. It is also the reason why Judaism takes such a messianic interest in Hezekiah. But people are stupid.

I could talk til I'm blue in the face about this. It is universally recognized as a messianic proclamation. It has nothing to do with Jesus. It can't apply to him at all. Origen implicitly makes reference to the idea that Agrippa is this figure in several places. He says the Jews of his day claim the office of Nasi demonstrates that the line was perpetuated beyond Agrippa. Origen says 'yeah right.'

My point isn't that Justus COULD HAVE made reference to Jesus, microwave ovens, bath houses or anything else. Photius says he didn't. End of story.

However Justus was Agrippa's secretary for God's sake. Secretaries kiss the ass of their boss. That's how they keep being the secretary. The implication of the treatise is obvious especially when Origen says in the Commentary on Matthew that he has a Jewish history which says that Agrippa was the messiah of Genesis 49:10, Daniel 9:24 - 27 etc.

I don't understand how people don't see this. Nachmanides, the Talmud all say that the Jewish leadership flattered Agrippa and identified him as the messiah. Who was more influential in contemporary Jewish religious life than Agrippa's learned secretary? The rabbinic literature even says that the very term 'flattery' means heretical Christianity.

Anyway another lifetime people will get this I guess ...

TedM

Since Agrippa was the last king up to the time of writing (I think), why not instead of assuming it is a religious statement regarding the messiah, assume it was a history of the kings up to the present?

My main concern is one you have answered though: you are of the opinion that we should not have expected a mention of Jesus (had he lived) in the chronical because Jesus wasn't the king-messiah that Justus believed Agrippa was. And I guess you have no expectation for Justus to have mentioned a gospel-like Jesus in his book on the war either, it appears. If I've got it wrong, please correct. I'm just looking for opinions.

stephan huller

No to make clear, the principle argument in favor of Jesus not being in Justus's chronicle is that Photius makes this explicit. No Jesus. End of story. My sidebar argument is that Origen intimates (or at least most scholars who have written on the subject that I have read at least intimate) that Justus is the author of the Jewish historical chronicle that mentions that Agrippa was the messiah. Here is the reference:

I have had private correspondence with the author who admits (in writing too somewhere) that Justus is the probable source of this statement. The point being that it is best way of making sense of the evidence.

Where I take this one step further of course is that I suspect that Christianity developed Josephus to be a witness for Jesus as the messiah is because the Agrippa as messiah argument was already explicit (or perhaps implicit) in Justus. Josephus was forged as a counterweight to the opinion which Alexandrian Christianity, Judaism and Samaritanism all agreed in the age. This seems to be environment referenced by Hadrian in another disputed passage:

Who is the one figure which united Jews, Samaritans and Alexandrian Christians? My guess is that it was Marcus Julius Agrippa and this is why Jews and Alexandrian Christians (Clement, Origen etc.) all identified Agrippa as the messiah of Daniel.

Roger Pearse

This is an interesting statement on quite a lot of levels. I'm not sure that it is true. The role of chance in these things is much more powerful than people imagine.

Many, many texts must have mentioned Jesus. Yet only around 1% of all ancient literature has been preserved. From the second century, for instance, only a tiny portion of the works by the Christian fathers have survived. None of the works of Irenaeus survived in Greek, for instance.

So ... I'm not sure at all -- this is not denial so much as uncertainty -- whether we know that this is correct. Did the Christians make a conscious effort of preserve works that talked about Jesus? How did it work, if so? I imagine they kept and copied books that were of use to them.

It's obvious why the "Jewish War" would be preserved by Christian Rome; because it illuminates the whole period in which the crucial events took place. The same would apply to Justus, whether he mentions Jesus or not, and we can indeed see that it survived to ca. 900, as Photius uses it. But it obviously wasn't very much copied, so it clearly wasn't very interesting. And it didn't survive the sack of Constantinople in 1204 by the renegade army originally hired for the Fourth Crusade. Whereas we know that, by that time, the long passage in Josephus about Jesus was getting copied all over the place. Photius says Justus doesn't mention Jesus; by 900, such a mention would be of considerable interest; I think it can be presumed that Justus did not.

"Antiquities" only just survived, I think. Very long works have a much reduced chance of survival.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

stephan huller

Justus's work was also popular in Alexandria - Origen, Julius Africanus seem to attest to its use there. Clement seems to have had a copy of Pseudo-Hegesippus. The more intriguing question for me is whether Justus is one and the same with R. Zadok, the person Johanan b Zakkai saved from the holocaust in Jerusalem.

Minimalist

That sounds like wishful thinking, Roger.

Roger Pearse

A little out of context, your quote, when I was actually pointing out that we can't possibly have every text that mentioned him, when you look at what has survived.

But I'm not sure I see why you think so. Every figure who makes a splash will leave an imprint on contemporary literature. Luke 1:1 more or less says the same; but I was thinking of the vast quantity of second century texts which have perished, which most certainly mentioned him because ... they were written by Christians. 99% of literature is lost, remember.

All the best,

Roger Pearse