Toto

From the Jewish point of view, Orthodox or other, Josephus was a traitor.

Christians from early times adopted Josephus because they (mis)read him as describing god's vengeance on Isreal for rejecting Jesus. We still have his work because Christians saved it, sometimes including Josephus along with the canonical Bible texts.

James Brown

A gentleman I spoke to told me about Josephus' story, how he and several Israeli leaders fled Roman destruction to hide in a cave. They made a suicide pact and Josephus drew the short straw. He was supposed to kill the others, then himself--except after he had killed the others he surrendered to the Romans and sweet-talked himself into a plum post as historian.

I can see why Jews don't care for him, but how is he as an historian?

bacht

In his preface to Jewish Wars Josephus proposes to set the record straight, as other Greek writers didn't do it properly (in his opinion):

"...while some men who were not concerned in the affairs themselves have gotten together vain and contradictory stories by hearsay, and have written them down after a sophistical manner; and while those that were there present have given false accounts of things, and this either out of a humor of flattery to the Romans, or of hatred towards the Jews; and while their writings contain sometimes accusations, and sometimes encomiums, but no where the accurate truth of the facts; I have proposed to myself, for the sake of such as live under the government of the Romans, to translate those books into the Greek tongue, which I formerly composed in the language of our country, and sent to the Upper Barbarians"

It could be argued that this work was an attempt to exonerate his behaviour by presenting his career as part of larger historical forces

He later followed up with other works including the Antiquities of the Jews, a much longer survey of Jewish history

Toto

Since Josephus' work is about the only history of the period that has survived, it is hard to judge how accurate it is. There are some clearly a-historical incidents, such as Alexander visiting Jerusalem and sacrificing to YHWH because of the prophecy of Daniel, which had not been written at that time.

eheffa

Josephus didn't write about Christians...his interpolater did though.

-evan

Back Again

Oh man. I totally forgot about this gem. Any speculation as to the source of this myth...other than Josephus?

mountainman

Goldberg in The Coincidences of the Emmaus Narrative of Luke and the Testimonium of Josephus points out - among other things - that the interpolator of Josephus appears to be borrowing from Luke.

angelo

The Christian's also saved his works because of that questionable paragraph mentioning jesus, which was an interpolation. But still, the only mention of their hero in the first century. There is no other second hand mention of jesus.