Originally Posted by patcleaver

In response to your ignorant ad homonym remarks, I will respond when I get time. I noticed that you did not respond to my post, but just dumped something from some other place.

Originally Posted by patcleaver

Can I presume that you agree with whatever you did not respond to, mostly stuff in square brackets, such as the following:

[1.1 Even if Tacitus got his information from official records, we do not know that the official records that he accessed were reliable. He could have copied the information from some hearsay 2nd century report.]

[1.2 It is unlikely that Tacitus got this information, about the Crucifixion of Christus, from official records, because he did not say that he got this information from official records, but in other places where he got his information from official records, he tells us that he got the information from official records.]

[1.3 The official records would not have contained the name Christus. Jesus' Jewish name was Yeshua ben Yosef, and that is the name that would have been in the Roman records. Yeshua was a popular name in Judea and Pilot killed lots of criminals - there were likely dozens of Yeshua's that were killed under pilot. Christus was also a popular name - there may have even been a Yeshua Ben Christus killed who had nothing to do with Jesus of Nazareth. How would Tacitus know which record to check?]

[1.4 In the gospels, Jesus never went by the name Yeshua messiah, but always Yeshua of Nazareth. Even if he went by the name Yeshua the messiah, that name would not have been converted in meaning to Jesus Christ, but more likely simply transliterated to something that sounded like Yeshua the messiah.]

[1.5 Josephus tells us about several would-be messiahs who were killed by the Romans, but nobody fitting the description of Jesus of Nazareth. Tacitus could be talking about any would-be messiah that was killed by Pilot e.g. Jesus Bar Abbas.]

[1.6 The stories in the gospels about Jesus being killed by the Romans are not believable, so there could not have been any Roman records of his death. The most probable source where Tacitus could have obtained his information was the Christian urban legend of Christs crucifixion.

Originally Posted by FathomFFI

The quote from Tacitus in question will be found below:

The following is the first claim against Tacitus:


It should be noted that the quote above is complete assertion, and provides no evidence for support. It should also be noted that the assertion above screams an argument from silence, which is a logical fallacy, since the argument basis itself upon the absence of the purported Roman records which, like most ancient Roman records, could have been lost and/or destroyed by the ravages of time. That being said, I will list the in the assertion above:

1. "It is extremely improbable that a special report found by Tacitus had been sent earlier to Rome and incorporated into the records of the Senate, in regard to the death of a Jewish provincial, Jesus."

2. "The execution of a Nazareth carpenter would have been one of the most insignificant events conceivable among the movements of Roman history in those decades; it would have completely disappeared beneath the innumerable executions inflicted by Roman provincial authorities."

3. "For it to have been kept in any report would have been a most remarkable instance of chance."

Although there are 3 listed above, I will deal with # 2 for now.

The claim asserts that "the execution of a Nazareth carpenter would have been one of the most insignificant events... ." This statement completely contradicts the position that Jesus never existed, otherwise how could Jesus be a "Nazareth carpenter?" If he never existed, he could hardly be a carpenter. Therefore, to claim this as a reason as to why the Roman authorities would not have any record of the execution of Jesus is ludicrous and completely self-defeating. Since we know that the only record of Jesus being a carpenter comes from the Holy Bible, and the claims the Gospel record as a fabrication and Jesus did not exist, then to claim that the reason the Tacitus would not have read a previous record of the execution of Jesus is because he was an insignificant carpenter not worthy of note is very surprising and considerably amusing.

In short, it's utterly contradictory and totally ridiculous.

In order for the statement to be valid, one must admit to the existence of Jesus. If not, then I will await the explanation as to why they would use what they claim as a fabrication in the Gospel of Jesus being a carpenter to support their reasoning. The logical reasoning is completely invalidated, for you cannot use a a self-proclaimed fabrication to assert a possibility, truth, or a fact. If the Gospel record of Jesus being a carpenter is a fabrication as the they claim, then they cannot use a fabrication to quantify their reasoning as to why no Roman records existed for Tacitus to refer to. It is completely illogical. The following is an illustration of the faulty logic:

ASSERTIONS:

1. Jesus did not exist.
2. Jesus was a lowly Nazareth carpenter.
3. The Romans would not have kept a record of Jesus' execution because Jesus was a lowly Nazareth carpenter.

Question: If Jesus did not exist, how then could he be a Nazareth carpenter?

The logic simply falls apart under examination. If Jesus did not exist, he therefore could not be a Nazareth carpenter, and their reasoning as to why no Roman records existed for Tacitus was because Jesus was a lowly Nazareth carpenter is logically invalidated. The only way to validate this argument is to admit that the lowly Nazareth carpenter existed, which subsequently would mean that Jesus must have existed.

If they argue that "Assuming Jesus existed," then 'the execution of a Nazareth carpenter would have been one of the most insignificant events conceivable... ,'" then that assumption must come with evidence to support it. This means that in order to support the assumption, you must provide evidence to support the existence of Jesus.

Interesting twist, I must say. Either way you look at it, the argument is logically invalidated, and/or the assumption contradicts the RRS position of the non-existence of a historical Jesus.

In conclusion, according to the information available in # 1, the argument in its entirety is logically invalidated. The 3 claims I listed from their in # 1 all depend on Jesus existing to be validated. Since the position of them is that Jesus did not exist historically, then their argument in # 1 is logically and ideologically contradictory to their claims.

I now ask them to respond to this argument before I continue through the rest of their claims against Tacitus.

Originally Posted by patcleaver

"I wrote it in a 9th century handwriting style on some old paper that I collected and figured that everyone would be too stupid to figure it out."

Originally Posted by mens_sana

My problem is with that "if." If there was a trial, the accounts are certainly embellished. But must there have been a trial at all? After all, Jesus was neither a Roman citizen nor a "Tobiad." Perhaps a perfunctory "hearing" with summary execution?

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

I'm suggesting that Pilate would have wanted to carry out a full enough investigation to determine how far the accusations against Jesus were a private quarrel between religious fanatics and how far they were something that genuinely concerned him as Governor.

The process involved may well have been more perfunctory than the picture obtained by trying to harmonize the Gospel accounts, but that is another matter.

Andrew Criddle

Originally Posted by 1Ti 6.13 - 6.15

I charge you before God who makes all things alive, and in the sight of Christ Jesus who witnessed the good confession to Pontius Pilate- that you keep the commandment without spot and without blame until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ- for he in His own time will reveal who is the blessed and only Potentate (King); the King of kings and Lord of lords.

Originally Posted by jules?

Roman historical documents [why do I think of Galaxy Quest] would not say pilate condemned Jesus for proclaiming he was the true king and then say the small band of followers knew him as the messiah and that one day many would follow him even in Rome.

Originally Posted by Solitary Man

They don't. It said that Christ had been crucified by Pilate and that later Christianity spread even to Rome. You're adding a bit much to it.

Originally Posted by aa5874

They don't. The passage NEVER said Christus was crucified.

Originally Posted by Cesc

FathomFFI, I think Im in the JM camp but I dont have any knowledge to make an informed opinion about the whole matter. But hear my reasoning concerning this particular subject. For this I presuppose that Tacitus' Christ-passage is not a forgery.

Your arguments in the OP are good, I think.
But you have underlined 2 things as far as I understand (correct me if Im wrong):

1. Nobody at the time questioned that Jesus was a historical person (at least as far as Tacitus knew)

2. Tacitus wrote the passage not in order to tell a factual historical account about Christ or Christianity for which he cared little, but instead to tell a factual historical account about the (if I understand correctly) Fires of Rome. To which the Christ/Pilate detail had no relevance whatsoever.

Originally Posted by Cesc

So would you not agree with me at least to some extent that in writing this particular short passage concerning the Fires of Rome, Tacitus would not care or have any reason to suspect whether the Pilate execution was a true certain historical fact or not?

Originally Posted by Cesc

The way I see it as of this moment:

That was not the point of his writing it (point 2) and he had no reason to doubt it to begin with (point 1). So why would he even bother to look it up. He would have practically no reason to do so. He certainly didnt write the Annals to tell anything about the history of the Christian sect itslelf and without their role in the Fires of Rome he would most likely had no reason at all to write about this 'ridiculous' sect. He cared little, and as you point out his intended audience certainly cared little about it. They only cared about the Fires of Rome.

What Im saying is that the probability in that case will rise considerably that he was infact writing the Christ/Pilate story even though it was hearsay. Even though he states that he wants to be factually correct about his history writing. But the detail about Christ/Pilate does not fall under the category of his history writing. Only the role of the Christian sect in the Fires of Rome. So the Christ/Pilate detail would be completely irrelevant as far as Tacitus knew and he only mentions it to briefly explain what the Christian sect was about.

His statement that "Christ suffered the ultimate penalty under Pilate" was irrelevant to the overall passage. He was not trying to establish any historicity about the Christ/Pilate story at all, but instead the historicity of the persecution becuz it had relevance to the Fires of Rome. Why would he care one single bit about the historicity of the Christ/Pilate statement. Sure, its important to us now, but it wasn't at all to Tacitus (rather the opposite, it would seem to me).

It mattered little to him to be correct about the Christ/Pilate story, becuz that was not the point of the story, only a single short sentence about a sect he cared little for anyway, even disliked as I understand. And since, to begin with, he had no reason to doubt the historicity of this - to him - irrelevant execution of Christ/Pilate he would just accept it as fact, or he simply wouldnt care. If he had found out afterwards that it was merely an urban legend so he had been non-factual about Christ/Pilate, do you think he would have lost any sleep over that? Imo, only so far as if it had had any relevance to what he would consider "real history", which it supposedly wouldnt have.

He couldnt care less if he was being factual or not about Christ/Pilate becuz it was just a silly sect to him and he had no reason to even begin to suspect that perhaps Christ/Pilate was just an urban legend. Then why wouldnt he accept Christ/Pilate hearsay without blinking? He had no reason to suspect it was perhaps an urban legend and it was not important to him. He didnt care about that tiny detail and his intended audience wouldnt care either.

Do you see my reasoning and what do you think? Or anyone else?

Originally Posted by Tacitus' Annals

A disaster followed, whether accidental or treacherously contrived by the emperor, is uncertain, as authors have given both accounts, worse, however, and more dreadful than any which have ever happened to this city by the violence of fire.

Originally Posted by FathomFFI

To the moderately educated, it most certainly does say he was crucified.