Shinobi

I have heard some people assert that there is evidence that Jesus
was a real person based on the records of some "Roman Documents".

When I asked them what documents, they had no answer.

Sounds like the closest thing to that is the tacitus and josephus writings, that
even if they aren't foregeries are still pretty vague on the details and seem to suggest more that christians existed, not really an actual Jesus.

Beware the "Roman Documents" defense.

WCH

Well, the passage in Josephus likely wasn't a forgery... and it does say some specific things about Jesus... in the form of recording rumour, of course. "It was said by some that he was the messiah" and all that. Tacitus is a forgery, though, and there are no others.

Btw, there is a doctored copy of the Josephus passage which adds a bunch of details and uses much stronger language, but the forgery is the added bits, not the entire paragraph.

fta

One Xian actually assured me that manuscripts of the Roman census under Quirinius still survive, and Baby Jesus's name is recorded in these! :rolling:

Actually, many scholars would argue that the reverse is true, i.e. the reference to Jesus in Josephus is a forgery but the reference in Tacitus is genuine. And some people would even argue that both passages are forgeries...

Jack the Bodiless

It might be a reference to the document discussed here:
Some responses:
Agator never clarified what he was talking about.

fta

Oh yeah, and the phony letter of Publius Lentulus of course.

Amaleq13

There are only doctored copies of Josephus that include a passage about Jesus and any attempt to claim that only the most blatantly Christian portions are interpolation while the remainder is genuine is speculative at best. That the page reads smoothly without any reference calls into question an need for speculative attempts at reconstruction.

Zeichman

I'm not sure why a Christian interpolator would be so dismissive of Christianity (...the tribe still exists to this day), while being overly zealous in other parts. I doubt we can reconstruct the whole passage, but I think debris of the original one have come through. I certainly wouldn't expect it to be any longer than the interpolated/surviving passage.

Amaleq13

I don't see how that reference can be considered "dismissive" but I also don't see how it can be considered authentic to Josephus since he never uses the term "tribe" to refer to religious groups anywhere else. Advocates of the Reduced Testimonium note that the vocabulary can be found elsewhere in Josephus but, given the context of those references, this seems to me to strongly suggest that is precisely where the original interpolator obtained the words. Otherwise, we have to believe that Josephus considered Jesus to have been as wise as Daniel and Solomon as well as capable of miracles just as amazing as those of Elias.

The original interpolator was more subtle but, IMO, no more capable of preventing his own beliefs from seeping into his efforts than the other.

Chris Weimer

Two things about possible Josephan reconstructions: I noticed this when evaluating the passage as a marginal gloss and removed the extraneous reading, but it still left me wondering...

1 - Is the amazing works original? Can we find this elsewhere in Josephus?

2 - He never says why he was condemned to the cross, although that passage may have been edited to reflect a semitic undertone, i.e. princial men among us the Jews thus portraying the Jews in a negative manner again, as is was there suggestion.

Amaleq13

The same phrase is used by Josephus to describe the miracles of Elijah.