Chaucer

Josephus was a 25-26 year old aristocratic Jew, quite unsympathetic toward Christians, and a member of the dominant priestly elite. In 63 AD he had just returned from a successful diplomatic mission to Rome and was taking his first steps in political life when the most significant political event of his young life took place - the High Priest was deposed. And he tells us in his Antiquities, chapter XX, that the thing that triggered this momentous upheaval in the small world of his caste was the execution of an older contemporary of his: James "brother of that Jesus nicknamed Messiah".

So Josephus is not talking about some vague rumour of someone that he's merely heard about. He's describing a set of events which would have been momentous and which he witnessed when he was a young man. And the person James whose execution triggered them was not some vague figure that Josephus merely thought existed. James was a contemporary of the young Josephus who lived in the same fairly small city of 50-80,000 people. And Josephus matter-of-factly informs us that this James had a brother called Jesus "nicknamed Messiah". Josephus mentions this in a way that indicates this Jesus was more famous than his brother James (Josephus identifies others by reference to more famous brothers elsewhere).

So Josephus didn't just think James and Jesus were historical people - he was in a position to know this. In fact, as ancient sources go, this is about as close to first-hand testimony as it gets.

The three references and quotes of Josephus's phrase in Origen also show that "nicknamed Messiah" is not an interpolation. That's why scholars (as opposed to bumbling amateur bloggers and self-published hobbyists) all accept that it's genuine.

And it refers to Jesus.

The three references to this passage, with direct word-for-word quotation of the key phrase, are in Origen Contra Celsum I.4, Contra Celsum II:13 and in Commentarium in evangelium Matthaei X.17. In each case he directly quotes the phrase used in Josephus: "αδελφος Ιησου του λεγομενου Χριστου" ("the brother of that Jesus nicknamed Messiah"). It takes some seriously contrived hoop-jump to explain away these three clear references to the passage, with the phrase in question directly quoted, in writings which are more than half a century before Christians were in any position to be interpolating anything at all.

Now personally, after having done a fair amount of reading up on the latest professional scholarship myself, I don't credit the notion that Jesus was somehow God herself, nor that Jesus restored the stone-dead to life, nor that he changed water to wine, etc., etc. But we do have a distinctly consistent body of texts among the non-Biblicals, like Josephus's Antiquities XX, like Tacitus, like Pliny, like Suetonius, etc., none of which come from believers, and each of which gives us a consistent picture of a strictly normal human being only, a relatively obscure genuinely historic and strictly human figure who did nothing supernatural at all and who was nailed by the Romans for stirring up trouble.

That is the Jesus whom the documentary evidence points to as the most plausible. And that is the Jesus -- the strictly human Jesus -- whom the widely atheist/skeptic sector of the secular professional academic scholarly community of today takes to be the most likely individual, entirely historical, to have stirred up trouble and been executed during the reign of Tiberius.

Anyone here who carelessly-on-purpose conflates this consensus among academic largely skeptic professional scholars for

A) a strictly human Jesus, based on a consistent body of secular evidence of a strictly human Jesus in the pagan chronicles and letters,

with

B) the hybrid magic man believed in by fundies reading Scripture only

is being totally dishonest.

Got that?

Again, Origen cites Josephus's entirely autobiographical Antiquities XX reference to James no fewer than three times. Origen refers to Josephus's autobiographical account of James in Origen's Contra Celsum I.4, Contra Celsum II:13 and in Commentarium in evangelium Matthaei X.17.

Furthermore, these pre-Constantine references of Origen's to Josephus's Antiquities XX put Josephus's autobiographical Antiquities XX account of James in a totally different class from the questionable Antiquities XVIII, with Josephus's third-hand account of Jesus only, with its textual variants from "He was the Messiah" in an 11th-century ms. to no such claim and a strikingly noncommittal tone in a 10th-century Syriac version of the same Antiq. XVIII passage. Not to mention the fact that the earliest outside reference to Antiq. XVIII is found in Eusebius from a time after Christianity was no longer underground.

Contrast that with the straightforward textual history for the autobiographical account of James in Josephus's Antiquities XX: no textual variants for any version of that passage at all, and the earliest outside references -- three separate ones! -- from Origen, when Christianity was still underground. So don't confound these two Josephus passages. It only wastes our time. Once again, Josephus moved in the same circles that witnessed Ananus's execution of James in the early 60s c.e. It was a big part of Jos's young adulthood in Palestine. He was a witness to James's execution, and he knew who James was. Jos's early eyewitness description of James in Antiq. XX is duly confirmed in three separate places in Origen well before Christianity was anything but a powerless minority sect.

Chaucer

ApostateAbe

<inappropriate image that does not contribute to a rational discussion removed>

Chaucer

Understatement, to say the least!

Cheers,

Chaucer

Diogenes the Cynic

Any thoughts on why James was executed? Josephus doesn't really say.

Toto

Richard Carrier has submitted a paper for peer review that demonstrates that the phrase "called Christ" (which is identical to a phrase in the gospels) is a later interpolation, and that Origen is not quoting Josephus when he uses that phrase.

But, for the sake of argument, suppose Josephus did identify James as having a more famous brother named Jesus who was called Christ. Is there any way of connecting this person, known in Jerusalem in 63 AD as the brother of an important Jewish official, with a putative Galilean peasant wisdom teacher who was crucified around 30 CE? I've never understood how this was supposed to work.

PhilosopherJay

Hi Chaucer,

I guess that batch of bad acid that was going around at Woodstock is still going around.

According to these three uses of Josephus as a proof text for the historicity of Jesus, Josephus blamed the burning of the temple on the killing of James. Unfortunately we have nothing like that in our current copies of Josephus. It doesn't prove the existence of Jesus or James, but proves that Christians made attempts at forgery in Josephus before the TF.

I think it is curious that Eusebius also uses Josephus as a proof text for the historicity of Jesus three times. Since Eusebius inherited the library containing the works of Origen, it is fairly easy to see this as Eusebius' first attempt at forgery. The TF was his second.

Eusebius is pushing the importance of James because he wants to show the continuity of the Church of Jerusalem. A mention of James in Josephus was important for his Church History to work as propaganda. This was obviously easier than inserting a whole paragraph (the TF). It just involved erasing a few words and putting in James, brother of the Lord - total time: about one minute, thirty seconds.


Eusebius goes so far as to give the exact quote in book 2 of his Church History:


Warmly,

Jay Raskin

aa5874

Something is radically wrong with the HJ theory put forward those who claim that Antiquities of the Jews is authentic when they are also SIMULTANEOUSLY asserting that HJ was NOT Christ and was an OBSCURE preacher.

It is just mind-boggling that someone would go all out to show that Antiquities of the Jews is about Jesus who was CALLED the Christ when HJ was NOT the Christ.

The very same Origen who made references to "Antiquities of the Jews" 20.9.1 used the passage to CORROBORATE the Jesus of Faith in the NT.

In gMatthew, Jesus was described as a Holy Ghost and Origen in his "Commentary of Matthew" made reference to Antiquities of the Jews as a source for the very same Jesus of gMatthew.

In fact, Origen claimed that Jesus called Christ in Antiquities of the Jews is the same Jesus in Galatians 1.19 of the NT CANON.

Reality Check: Christian writers who used Antiquities of the Jews also claimed Jesus called Christ was God Incarnate, born of the Holy Ghost and was the Creator.

This is Origen in De PrincipiisOrigen in "Against Celsus" 1.32 It is virtually impossible that Josephus could have claimed Jesus called Christ was an ordinary man because Origen would have attacked Josephus and called him an inventor just as he attacked Celsus.

Origen used Antiquities of the Jews to corroborate Jesus of the NT and REJECTED Celsus who claimed Jesus was an ordinary man.

Reality Check:Origen accused Celsus of falshoods when he claimed Jesus was an ordinary man with a human father but did NOT accuse Josephus of such a thing

Origen in "Against Celsus" 1.32 "Antiquities of the Jews" 20.9.1 is about the Jesus of FAITH and the Church writers used it to corroborate their Jesus the Holy Ghost Child.

EarlDoherty

It shows no such thing. The three quotes of "nicknamed Messiah", as you put it, have nothing to do with Antiquities 20. All three are supposedly references to a now-lost verse somewhere else in Josephus about the death of the Christian James being the cause of the fall of Jerusalem. And that lost reference cannot possibly be authentic to Josephus, as even half a brain's thought will establish, not the least because there is no way Josephus would subscribe to such an idea, or publish it as the view of Jews without qualification if he didn't. Besides, the very idea contradicts the way Josephus presents the death of the James (whoever he was) described in Antiquities 20. That lost reference has to be a Christian interpolation, and since Origen is led to make no reference whatever to a supposedly companion "nicknamed Christ" in Antiquities 20, we can be pretty sure that the latter did not yet exist. That makes the first appearance in Josephus of "brother of Jesus, called Christ" in a passage which is clearly an interpolation.

Origen does not in any way witness to a "brother of Jesus, called Christ" in Antiquities 20, let's be clear on that, and his silence witnesses quite the opposite. The first witness to that passage in Antiquities 20 is...(wait for it)...Eusebius! What are the odds?! The 'historian' who provides the first witness to the Testimonium Flavianum is the same who first gives us the death of James as brother of Christ at the hands of Ananus! Prior to Eusebius, every Christian commentator is silent on the two extant references to Jesus allegedly authentic to Josephus.

I guess only us bumbling amateur bloggers and self-published hobbyists noticed all this.

Earl Doherty

Steven Carr

'For in the 18th book of his Antiquities of the Jews, Josephus bears witness to John as having been a Baptist, and as promising purification to those who underwent the rite. Now this writer, although not believing in Jesus as the Christ, in seeking after the cause of the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple, whereas he ought to have said that the conspiracy against Jesus was the cause of these calamities befalling the people, since they put to death Christ, who was a prophet, says nevertheless— being, although against his will, not far from the truth— that these disasters happened to the Jews as a punishment for the death of James the Just, who was a brother of Jesus (called Christ),'

Notice that Origen knows exactly where Josephus writes about John the Baptist , but gives no source for his writing about 'James the Just' ( a phrase which does not appear in Josephus), and Origen also copies out a bit of Matthew 1:16 to explain who James the Just was - του λεγομενου Χριστου

When Chaucer claims Origen 'cites' Ant. 20, what he meant to write was that Origen never cites Ant. 20.

No blame attaches to Chaucer. It is an easy mistake to make. Anybody can read the passage and see '18' and misremember it as 20.

Incidentally, Origen uses Ant. 18 to refute claims that John the Baptist never existed. 'I would like to say to Celsus, who represents the Jew as accepting somehow John as a Baptist, who baptized Jesus, that the existence of John the Baptist, baptizing for the remission of sins, is related by one who lived no great length of time after John and Jesus.'

Rather curiously, Origen fails to rub Celsus's nose in any other passage from Ant. 18 that had to do with the existence of somebody.

I wonder why Origen passed up this opportunity to slam-dunk Celsus and give Apostate Abe another chance to cry 'Owned'.

ApostateAbe

Earl Doherty, I want to understand you correctly, not get the wrong idea. You are saying that this passage from Origen here...

Flavius Josephus, who wrote the "Antiquities of the Jews" in twenty books, when wishing to exhibit the cause why the people suffered so great misfortunes that even the temple was razed to the ground, said, that these things happened to them in accordance with the wrath of God in consequence of the things which they had dared to do against James the brother of Jesus who is called Christ. And the wonderful thing is, that, though he did not accept Jesus as Christ, he yet gave testimony that the righteousness of James was so great; and he says that the people thought that they had suffered these things because of James.

...has nothing to do with Josephus's Antiquities 20 here:

Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done; they also sent to the king, desiring him to send to Ananus that he should act so no more, for that what he had already done was not to be justified; nay, some of them went also to meet Albinus, as he was upon his journey from Alexandria, and informed him that it was not lawful for Ananus to assemble a sanhedrin without his consent. Whereupon Albinus complied with what they said, and wrote in anger to Ananus, and threatened that he would bring him to punishment for what he had done; on which king Agrippa took the high priesthood from him, when he had ruled but three months, and made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest.

You are saying that Origen is actually referring to a portion of Josephus that is now lost. Is that what you are saying?

If not, then correct me. If so, then explain your reasons of how you know. Because Origen wrote that Josephus wrote that James had a connection to the fall of Jerusalem but Josephus actually didn't write that?