Stephen Carlson on Tacitus Annales 15.44 possible dependence on Josephus’ Testimonium Flavianum from Ant. 18.63-64:
http://hypotyposeis.org/weblog/2004/08/ ... onium.html
Taking Carlson’s case as read, here are some problems I have with it:
1) Carlson argues that Tacitus (and Pliny the Younger) moved in the same circles as Josephus in Rome after the war (i.e., the court of the Flavian emperors Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian) and points out the similarity between Tacitus Histories 5.13 and Josephus Jewish War 6.312-313 in describing the Judean prophecies or oracles that foretold the rise of Vespasian. He might have included this passage about Vespasian from their contemporary Suetonius as well:
When he consulted the oracle of the god of Carmel in Judaea, the lots were highly encouraging, promising that whatever he planned or wished however great it might be, would come to pass; and one of his high-born prisoners, Josephus by name, as he was being put in chains, declared most confidently that he would soon be released by the same man, who would then, however, be emperor. (Suetonius, Vespasian 5.6)
https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/ ... sian*.html
There is an important distinction, however, that Carlson fails to acknowledge. Suetonius, and probably Tacitus and Pliny, knew of Josephus as a defeated Jewish prisoner and may well have known of him later as a sycophant at the Flavian court. This does not mean they read his books.
Josephus acknowledges that he used Titus’ journals as a source, and Tacitus probably knew them as well, either directly or through Pliny the Elder’s now lost Continuation of the History of Aufinus Bassus. We do not need to posit a direct literary link between Josephus and Titus as they had common sources. It is very unlikely that Josephus’ account of the prophecies foretelling the accession of Vespasian in the Jewish War (written in the 70’s) was the first time the story had ever been told. It is a piece of Flavian propaganda that almost certainly circulated at the time Vespasian was campaigning for the throne. Nor it is likely that Josephus originated it. As we have accounts of other prophecies foretelling the rise of Vespasian, he more likely saw the advantage of jumping on the Flavian bandwagon. Suetonius description of Josephus is likely dependent on Flavian propaganda rather than on Josephus account itself. Unless Josephus invented his account of his own involvement later to include in the Jewish War, it would seem most likely that the Flavians would have taken advantage of propaganda value of the Jewish prisoner who foretold the accession of Vespasian at the time Vespasian was campaigning for the throne, alongside several other oracles and prophecies.
2) Tacitus tends to rely on pagan Latin authors as sources. We have no particular reason to think he would have read the work of a Jew writing in Greek. His passage on the origins of the Jews in Histories 5.2-5 shows no acquaintance with Josephus Antiquities. He recounts outsider accounts of Jewish origins and does not exhibit any knowledge of the Jews’ own account of their origins.
https://www.livius.org/sources/content/ ... -the-jews/
When I pointed this out to Carlson, he postulated that Tacitus had not read the Antiquities himself, but had sent a servant to find what he could on Christus and was relying on what the servant had extracted from the Antiquities.
3) The agreements between Tacitus Annales 15.44 and Josephus Antiquities 18.63-64 are not particularly striking. There is at least as much, and arguably greater, agreement between Tacitus and one passage from Justin Marty’s First Apology, which has the full name Pontius Pilate and the fact that non-Christians consider Christian beliefs madness (cf. Tacitus’ ‘mischievous superstition’ … ‘all things shameful’):
Our teacher of these things is Jesus Christ, who also was born for this purpose, and was crucified under Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judæa, in the times of Tiberius Cæsar; and that we reasonably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the true God Himself, and holding Him in the second place, and the prophetic Spirit in the third, we will prove. For they proclaim our madness to consist in this, that we give to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all; for they do not discern the mystery that is herein, to which, as we make it plain to you, we pray you to give heed. (Justin, First Apology 13)
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0126.htm
When I pointed this out to Carlson he responded, naturally, that Tacitus could not be dependent on Justin, who wrote later than he did. That was, in fact, my point. Justin was my control. The level of similarity Carlson finds between Tacitus and Josephus is not enough to show literary dependence as a similar level of similarity exists between Tacitus and Justin, between whom there is no literary dependence. (Carlson did not attempt to argue for Justin’s dependence on Tacitus, but I suppose someone could).
Carlson’s claim, ‘No other source can explain Tacitus so well, and Josephus has the added bonus of existing today’ is seriously overstated. We have no reasonable basis for believing that Tacitus’ source must be extant today, nor any reasonable basis for believing that no source now lost could explain Tacitus’ text so well.
I do not think Carlson’s case for Tacitus use of the Testimonium Flavianum has met the burden of proof necessary to be considered a probable hypothesis.
Best wishes,
Ken
PS I really should start a blog or a web page to keep my stuff on so I can just refer people to what I’ve written and I don’t have to repeat myself constantly (and so I can find it myself).