Johann_Kaspar

Well, well, well.
Let us imagine...
However, obviously, my opinion based on how I see the facts, is that Bush set the fire [to the towers] and blamed it on Al Quaida who existed as an identifiable group at the time.

IMHO, messianists set the fire in Rome and they had very good reasons to do so.

Johann_Kaspar

Because they were jews, and because the word they would use is "messianist" not a Greek translation. Please, find the hebrew word for "ecclesia".
Otherwise: which witnesses? Greek, Latin? Or Hebrew? Yehoshua was an Hebrew, if he existed, not a Greek, nor a Roman.

MortalWombat

Regarding the reliability of Suetonius in historical matters:

If one accepts Suetonius' account of Nero starting the fire and blaming it on Christians, does that compel one also to accept his claim that the spirit of Augustus Caesar was seen ascending to heaven from the flames of his funeral pyre? Or his report that Vespasian healed a blind man and a lame man by touching them?

Amaleq13

As I understand it, the Romans were tolerant of religions as long as the members were willing to proclaim the Emperor a god. Christians wouldn't and that constituted rebellion.

Haran

However, he states that this is because there were conflicting reports, some that Nero did start the fire (or had it started while away, if that was the case). He also states that there were people keeping others from putting out the flames and starting more fires while claiming that they had "authority". He mentions, too, as you quoted, that people were unhappy because of the rumors that Nero sang on stage while the city was burning.

As I stated before, Suetonius and Tacitus may have had different sources. Also, Suetonius wrote after Tacitus and may have had better sources. I believe Suetonius knew (or at least knew of) Tacitus, so surely he knew of Tacitus' works. Yet, he states that Nero started the fire.

I must admit that I do not know how old or new the palace burned in the fire was. I do know that he immediately built another one after the fire which was also supposedly on a grand scale. Again, I'd like to ask for a source for this information, especially the archaeological information. How do they know which of Nero's palaces they are looking at?

Shows me that Tacitus was a good source. He was not able to determine at the time he wrote which reports were true, that Nero started the fire as some claimed or not. However, as I stated, wrote later and perhaps had better information. Probably knowing of Tacitus' work, he stated that Nero burned Rome anyway.

What audience? The Romans? You have mentioned that they were paid by the enemies of the Julio-Claudians. Don't forget that there was an intervening dynasty, the Flavians. By the time T & S were written, do you really believe there still would have been such hatred that these men could not have told the truth of what they knew?

Oh well. The debate is, what?, a century or so old now?, with scholars on both sides of the fence. Before that, did anyone question the accounts of T & S? I can only present what I've read, so I don't think I can go much further except to disagree. Thanks for the debate, though I don't think I'll have the time to continue it. It has rekindled my interest in Rome and the writers of that time period.

Haran

As has already been shown, Christians could be identified as separate from Jews. Probably many of both the Christians and Jews spoke Greek. It was the lingua franca of that age. There are accounts of the Roman emperors of this time period speaking Greek on occasion.

What is your evidence that the early Christians spoke Hebrew? Especially considering that there were apparently few who knew Hebrew at the time. Did you mean Aramaic?

Jesus, or Yehoshua/Yeshua/Yeshu if that is what you prefer, most likely spoke Aramaic. That does not mean that the Roman citizens living in the area that is modern day Turkey spoke Aramaic. If the early Christians wanted to reach those people, they would more than likely have used a more common tongue, Greek, just like you are writing to us in English.

Haran

Mea culpa. However, I already answered this. As I mentioned, the prevalent views among ancient writers were that the Christians were "atheists" who did not believe in the Gods. There were many bad rumors about Christians. They were also hated by idol makers' guilds and sellers of sacrifical meats and driven from cities at times because of them. I'll leave it to you to imagine why. I also suggested a book by a scholar who presents the views of these ancient writers. If you do not believe me, then perhaps the book will convince you.

Haran

Actually, Suetonius states in passing that:

"...an expraetor actually swore that he had seen Augustus' spirit soaring up to Heaven through the flames."

Are we simply to deny that something did happen, miracle or not? This is exactly where I think that some verge on hyper-skepticism. I am skeptical that Vespasian miraculously healed someone, but I do not see why I should deny that this event took place and that something happened to make others think this. Suetonius does not play the event up but merely states the facts. He simply says that Vespasian was eventually coaxed into trying to heal these two and that "it worked".

spin

Yes. He can't do what Suetonius did. There are conflicting reports so he cannot put the blame on Nero. We can see that there were obviously reports that Nero did it, as we can see from S. But T goes further than S. He knows of other information that either S doesn't or S disregards. Still, despite the extremely antagonistic view T has of Nero, he cannot come out with a "he did it".

This is of course as he was aiding the fight against the fire and making provision to look after those affected.

If he did, he was plainly oblivious to T's further information. Please, have a look at most analyses of Suetonius as a writer. He goes for the scandalous, the weird, the portentious.

It was finished a few months before the fire broke out, as I indicated last message,

2) He had finished, in the same year, his sumptuous palace, Domus Transitoria, which was destroyed in the fire

Get an archaeological guide for ancient Rome -- and you might check if it was actually finished when the fire got at it. I know that the few remains of it under the Domus Flavia are quite sumptuous.

(And I'll keep telling you, I'm in no position to cite any books whatsoever.)

That's right, but you and most xians in the world believe that he did start the fire. Why exactly? (If you want to repeat S, I'd like to see that you have at least dealt with him as a writer.)

How about a little perspicacity?

If you don't know the basic dynamics of Roman politics, I think you should find out. Then again, most introductions to serious volumes on both Tacitus and Suetonius will help you out. (Didn't anybody have to study them at school?)

I still don't understand why you disagree. You seem merely to prefer the worse of the two writers for a priori, or at least unstated, reasons. It doesn't make much sense to me.

What is happening in ancient Roman historical analyses should be a good indication of a generic treatment of historical data, how to work with texts and other data.


spin

spin

Do a comparison of S and T on one of the emperors and see how different the material is. See just what S "merely states as facts" and how many of those "facts" are found in T. You must get into how the writer works.


spin