Freethought & Rationalism Archive

FathomFFI · 06-22-2008, 07:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jules?

Cicero's alledged quote has been sidestepped because i presume you failed to find evidence.

Actually, the real truth of the matter is that the evidence has already been supplied, and it is you who is doing the sidestepping.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jules?

as for

Quote:

Tacitus' Annals
In the cases of Suilius Caesoninus and Plautius Lateranus, the extreme penalty was remitted.

both men were Roman citizens and with few exceptions crucifixion was reserved for slaves and revolutionaries so there for the evidence points to 'extreme penalty' simply meaning a severe/public [shameful] execution. Your other quote simple points out that extreme punishment can be taken to mean a savage death. I think you are trying too hard to push square pegs into round holes. For a so-called agnostic you seem a little too desperate. The principle issue in the quote is the nature and belief of early christians, the reason for why the were scapegoated, and whether or not they were known as christians in Neros time or Tacitus'. The four independent proofs of your saviour have been flogged to death over the last 2,000 years and the most anyone could rationally accept is they may contain elements of truth but may also be faked or tampered with.

Your answer lies within the bold type above. Despite both being Roman citizens, they were still candidates for the extreme penalty of crucifixion because their actions were traitorous against the emperor; a conspiracy in fact.

jules? · 06-23-2008, 06:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FathomFFI

Quote:

Originally Posted by jules?

Cicero's alledged quote has been sidestepped because i presume you failed to find evidence.

Actually, the real truth of the matter is that the evidence has already been supplied, and it is you who is doing the sidestepping.

Please redirect me to the evidence of Cicero's assertion as well as the passage from where it's taken. I am open to the idea that the phrase was reserved for trial and crucifxion although so far I can only deduce it meant public and therefore shameful execution.

But lets move on as it is quite possible that Tacitus reviewed archives and found a referance to Pilate crucifying a wannabe messiah sometime during his time in office.

Presuming this is the case why did Tacitus link this official referance to the origin of the Christians in Rome in 64?

gregor · 06-23-2008, 06:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FathomFFI

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

When a poster, especially one rabidly hostile to Jesus mythicism, comes across this sophomorically cocky and pretentious, I always believe that he ought to be taken down a peg.

We wish you well with that endeavor.

a mere 175 years after Justin Martyr penned his Trypho works

. . . perhaps the summer term has begun, as we can expect junior-level argument in the future.

FathomFFI · 06-23-2008, 08:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jules?

Quote:

Originally Posted by FathomFFI

Actually, the real truth of the matter is that the evidence has already been supplied, and it is you who is doing the sidestepping.

Please redirect me to the evidence of Cicero's assertion as well as the passage from where it's taken. I am open to the idea that the phrase was reserved for trial and crucifxion although so far I can only deduce it meant public and therefore shameful execution.

But lets move on as it is quite possible that Tacitus reviewed archives and found a referance to Pilate crucifying a wannabe messiah sometime during his time in office.

Presuming this is the case why did Tacitus link this official referance to the origin of the Christians in Rome in 64?

Cicero makes the comment regarding crucifixion as being the summum supplicium, "the extreme penalty" in his work entitled Against Verres, 2.5.169.

Regarding the link of Christus to the Christians in Rome in AD 64, Nero most likely crucified the Christians as a mock up of the crucifixion of Jesus, hence Tacitus' detailed description of those events:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tacitus' Annals

Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths .... were nailed to crosses .... who deserved extreme and examplary punishment ....

The capital punishment received by Christus was then being played out again against his followers, the Christians. The primary capital punishment for slaves and non-Roman criminals was crucifixion. For Christus to have received the capital punishment from Pilate, he would have been tried as a criminal, found guilty, and then crucified.

The translation of "extreme penalty" from the Latin is a quite ambiguous, but the precise rendering should be "capital punishment of death." Again, the primary capital punishment for slaves and non-Roman criminals was crucifixion, and that is why you see it translated to "extreme penalty" in Annals, because the extreme penalty on a capital offense for slaves and non-Romans was crucifixion.

If the Gospel accounts were even partially correct regarding the trial of Jesus, we see a consistency between them all that Jesus was regarded as "King of the Jews." That would be high treason against Rome, and crucifixion would be his death sentence.

Regards.

Toto · 06-23-2008, 08:49 AM

I haven't been able to confirm that exteme penalty refers to crucifixion, as opposed to the death penalty in general, even just the most extreme penalty.

From here

Quote:

At first most in the Senate spoke for the 'extreme penalty'; many were then swayed by Julius Caesar who spoke decrying the precedent it would set and argued in favor of the punishment being confined to a mode of banishment. Cato then rose in defense of the death penalty and all the Senate finally agreed on the matter. Cicero had the conspirators taken to the Tullianum, the notorious Roman prison, where they were hanged.

Plutarch

Quote:

For he shrank from inflicting the extreme penalty, and the one befitting such great crimes, and he hesitated to do it because of the kindliness of his nature, and at the same time that he might not appear to make an excessive use of his power and to trample ruthlessly upon men who were of the highest birth and had powerful friends in the city; and if he treated them with less severity, he was afraid of the peril into which they would bring the state. 7 For if they suffered any milder penalty than death, he was sure they would not be satisfied, but would break out into every extreme of boldness, having added fresh rage to their old villainy: and he himself would be thought unmanly and weak, especially as the multitude already thought him very far from courageous.

. . .

On the following day the senate discussed the punishment of the conspirators, and Silanus, who was the first to be asked to give his opinion, said that they ought to be taken to prison and there suffer extremest punishment. . . .

When, then, it was Caesar's turn to give his opinion, he rose and declared it to be against putting the conspirators to death, but in favor of confiscating their property and removing them to whatever cities of Italy Cicero might deem best, there to be put in fetters and closely guarded until Catiline should be defeated. 2 The proposal of Caesar was merciful and its author a very able speaker, and Cicero added no little weight to it. 3 For when he rose to speak himself,39 he handled the subject in both ways, now favouring the first proposal and now that of Caesar. All his friends, too, thinking that Caesar's proposal was an advantageous one for Cicero, who would be less subject to censure if he did not put the conspirators to death, chose the second proposal rather, so that Silanus also changed his position and excused himself by saying that even his proposal had not meant death: for "extremest punishment," in the case of a Roman senator, meant the prison. . . .

As for your statement:

Quote:

I'm not sure if it will dawn on you that Nero most likely crucified the Christians as a mock up of the crucifixion of Jesus, hence Tacitus' detailed description of those events.

This is not what I understand "mock up" to mean, and being burned to death as a human candle is not the same as crucifixion.

aa5874 · 06-23-2008, 09:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

I haven't been able to confirm that exteme penalty refers to crucifixion, as opposed to the death penalty in general, even just the most extreme penalty.

And in general the word "penalty" is not linked to the mode of death, "penalty" refers to the mode of punishment for an infringement.

For example, the penalty for murder, in some jurisdictions, is death, however, the death penalty is carried out by various means.

FathomFFI · 06-23-2008, 09:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

I haven't been able to confirm that exteme penalty refers to crucifixion, as opposed to the death penalty in general, even just the most extreme penalty.

"Extreme penalty" is merely a way of expressing the worst of all deaths occurred through Roman capital punishment. There can be no doubt that according to all that we know of it from ancient historians that it was indeed regarded as the extreme penalty.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

As for your statement:

Quote:

I'm not sure if it will dawn on you that Nero most likely crucified the Christians as a mock up of the crucifixion of Jesus, hence Tacitus' detailed description of those events.

This is not what I understand "mock up" to mean, and being burned to death as a human candle is not the same as crucifixion.

Tacitus describes it totally as a mockery. But you're correct, "mock up" were not the proper words to use. I had actually checked with dictionary.com for "mock up," and didn't read that the definition below the one for "mock up" only referred to "mock."

emporda · 06-23-2008, 09:46 AM

[QUOTE=FathomFFI;5408095]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jules?

Regarding the link of Christus to the Christians in Rome in AD 64, Nero most likely crucified the Christians as a mock up of the crucifixion of Jesus, hence Tacitus' detailed description of those events.

At that time Tacitus was 12 years old. Do you really believe he wrote that. He started writing about 20 years later, as a noble man from a family with political influence, he would not write anything about a disliked arsonist cesar.

FathomFFI · 06-23-2008, 09:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by emporda

At that time Tacitus was 12 years old. Do you really believe he wrote that. He started writing about 20 years later, as a noble man from a family with political influence, he would not write anything about a disliked arsonist cesar.

Like I have been saying all along, he researched and cross-referenced his sources to excavate the information.

FathomFFI · 06-23-2008, 10:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

I haven't been able to confirm that exteme penalty refers to crucifixion, as opposed to the death penalty in general, even just the most extreme penalty.

Here, this might help you.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Against Verres/Second pleading book 5

Then you might remit some part of the extreme punishment. Did he not know him? Then, if you thought fit, you might establish this law for all people, that whoever was not known to you, and could not produce a rich man to vouch for him, even though he were a Roman citizen, was still to be crucified.

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Agains...leading_book_5

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