Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

Ben Smith in another thread and Hopper in an important recent article, both referred to the TF in Josephus as similar to early Christian creedal affirmations and hence probably inauthentic.

IMO creedal is not the best word. The TF does not particularly resemble early creeds (narrow sense).

There is however (again IMO) an important point being made. The TF in Josephus is not there as part of an account of the history of Judea under Pontius Pilate, or even as an account of the life of Jesus. It has instead the function of providing an explanation of the origins of Christianity and the relation of Christianity to Judaism. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared. is an essential part of the TF. So is the reference to Jesus having Greek as well as Jewish followers. Some of the resemblances of Tacitus on Christ to the TF come from the similarity of purpose. Tacitus is writing about Christians and needs to briefly explain Christian origins.

If the above is correct, does it point against authenticity ? I'm not sure. It partly depends on whether Josephus, writing for interested Romans at the end of the reign of Domitian, would have had the need and/or desire to clarify the relation of Christianity to mainstream Judaism.

Andrew Criddle

andrewcriddle wrote:Ben Smith in another thread and Hopper in an important recent article, both referred to the TF in Josephus as similar to early Christian creedal affirmations and hence probably inauthentic.

IMO creedal is not the best word. The TF does not particularly resemble early creeds (narrow sense).

There is however (again IMO) an important point being made. The TF in Josephus is not there as part of an account of the history of Judea under Pontius Pilate, or even as an account of the life of Jesus. It has instead the function of providing an explanation of the origins of Christianity and the relation of Christianity to Judaism. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared. is an essential part of the TF. So is the reference to Jesus having Greek as well as Jewish followers. Some of the resemblances of Tacitus on Christ to the TF come from the similarity of purpose. Tacitus is writing about Christians and needs to briefly explain Christian origins.

If the above is correct, does it point against authenticity ? I'm not sure. It partly depends on whether Josephus, writing for interested Romans at the end of the reign of Domitian, would have had the need and/or desire to clarify the relation of Christianity to mainstream Judaism.

Hi, Andrew. Thanks for this.

I think the term credal/creedal (ah, those English spelling variants) is proving to be a stumbling block, so I am happy to eschew it in favor of something else. The point is that Antiquities 18.3.3 §63-64, the Testimonium as a whole, has something of the look and feel of the kind of preaching summary one somewhat commonly finds in Christian texts which are presenting a Christian case to pagans or Jews. Examples include some of the speeches in Acts, as well as the texts from Eusebius, Justin, and Luke that I list here: http://www.textexcavation.com/anatestimonium.html. Common features include a (sometimes very brief) summary of the dominical career, a statement to the effect that it fulfilled the Hebrew scriptures, and a reference to the death and resurrection; the name of Pilate also tends to loom large for some reason (this is true in the real creeds, as well).

Depending on exactly which textual variants (if they may be called that) you imagine as part of the original form of the Testimonium (whether you consider that original to be genuinely Josephan or not), one may have to make allowances for words being made fit to be spoken by Josephus. (IOW, a Christian would have no need to say that Jesus was believed to be the Christ, if we were to adopt that reading from Jerome, but he or she might have good reason to attribute such a circumspect statement to the pen of Josephus, for the sake of verisimilitude.)

The version offered by the textus receptus, however, requires no such finessing, in my opinion. The entire thing looks like a Christian could have composed it; nothing stands out as impossible or even improbable for a Christian writer. To simply assume that the less confessional or nonconfessional parts come from Josephus is exactly that: an assumption (this is what Meier does, essentially). To actually argue for it, I would like to muster the textual variants, and was at one time quite eager to do so, using (in the main) Tacitus, Luke, and Agapius. But, if the Testimonium actually bears a closer resemblance to Justin and Eusebius (not to mention Luke!) than to Tacitus, why would Tacitus count as a witness to the text of Josephus? And, if Agapius derived his truncated version of the Testimonium from chroniclers who ultimately depended on Eusebius, why would his testimony count for anything Josephan? What remains, then, seems to be the preaching summaries. (No need to posit a direct textual connection; the overall theme and tendency is what matters.)

I would be happy to reconsider the evidence from some other point of view, but right now it simply looks to me like the entire passage is just a version of these preaching summaries.

Ben.

I'm not sure that the issue, in the context of the authenticity debate, is so much that the Testimonium Flavianum is so precisely a creed that it could only have stood in the shadow of Nicaea and Chalcedon, as it is that the outline of the brief narrative does tightly cohere with the Christian bullet points (which by itself does not prove Christian authorship), yet Josephus himself universally fails to make any notice of his countrymen in this fashion, i.e., just noting some of the neutral-to-positive(-to-actually-blasphemous) things about him, while providing no information on how this might tie into the political context and bigger picture, while providing no shading or nuance about his character, while providing no background about the motivation for the 'accusation' made against him (which we might expect reading his other accounts of peripheral characters in his history), while providing no explanation for his reader about the Jewish customs and beliefs that would be relevant to any more-theologically-oriented account, and while providing no real sign of why this person should have been mentioned in this particular point in the narrative at all. No single aspect here is dispositive, but the overall picture is disquieting, and it becomes more so when comparing the passage against (A) other passages from Josephus on marginal or seemingly-messianic figures [Livius has a nice list of some] and (B) other passages from Christians on the figure of Jesus. To which--Josephus or a Christian--should we assign the pattern of thought found in the Testimonium here?

This is not a simple argument from the idea that Josephus could not possibly give neutral or positive story about a Jesus of Nazareth (although it does seem to beggar belief, given that Josephus, if he wrote about Jesus, must have known that he was called Christ--reason enough alone to throw the works at him verbally). If that were the basic germ of this line of inquiry, this argument has since outgrown its husk. Josephus proves that the can write a 'positive' account (e.g., on John the Baptist or Honi the Circle-Drawer) while not forgetting himself and creating an encomium that doesn't fit with his patterns and aims as a historian. Both of these other accounts, for example, situation these characters in the immediate political context and developments. In a passage on Pilate, in the larger scheme of Josephus' picture of him as a relatively vicious and incompetent man in office here, how can Josephus have forgotten to remark on which way (good or bad, even) this story reflects on Pilate, who is in fact Josephus' main subject?

It would be as if we found a passage on James 'the Just' at Ant. 20.9.1, telling of his greatness, his exploits, and how he was remembered after his death, where Ananus son of Ananus were completely eclipsed and exists only to provide him a martyrdom. It is, essentially, absurd. Josephus would be no writer of whatever you want to call it--a summary statement of belief about Jesus, a creed, an encomium, an encyclopedia entry, whatever--for the founder of the Christians. Josephus would express an opinion, other than merely _just_ the implied opinion of genuine approval. The problem is not, therefore, so much that Josephus here is upbeat about Jesus, so much as it is that he has been completely silenced, as "Josephus" has failed to give us anything, anything at all, that would tip his hand and reassure us that the Jewish historian were truly speaking his mind here, something Josephus rarely fails to do, especially in this sort of context. (That is, outside of the sweaty efforts of desperate scholars to squeeze out something neutral or negative here or there in this truly glistening, christened passage.)

Josephus' Testimonium and Mara ben Serapion's Syriac letter appear completely unlike the _actual_ early non-Christian mentions of Jesus, such as Tacitus and Lucian, and for good reason. They're both, in all probability, compositions made by Christians in the fourth century AD, pretending to be different people in the first century and pulling it off poorly.

Hi andrewcriddle,

Why would it matter to Josephus if there were still Christians around? If there were a lot of Christians around in 92 C.E., every reader would have known about them. It would not be necessary to point out that they were still around. If there were just a few Christians around, the observation is trivial. It would be like saying Huey P. Newton was a popular black theorist who started the Black Panther movement in the 1960's. He was shot down in Oakland in 1989. The Black Panthers are still around. In this case the author would be suggesting that killing the man did not kill the movement, but the author does not tell us what was the movement, so the writing could only be aimed at people who already knew what the Black Panther Party was. In the same way, the TF does not tell us what the Jesus movement was after Jesus died, so it would only having meaning to people who already knew about Christianity after Jesus.
The statement that Christians have not disappeared would really have meaning in the time of Eusebius, as the Emperor's Diocletian Edicts against the Christians were designed to make them disappear. It would be a reminder that the emperor had failed to make the Christians disappear.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

andrewcriddle wrote:Ben Smith in another thread and Hopper in an important recent article, both referred to the TF in Josephus as similar to early Christian creedal affirmations and hence probably inauthentic.

IMO creedal is not the best word. The TF does not particularly resemble early creeds (narrow sense).

There is however (again IMO) an important point being made. The TF in Josephus is not there as part of an account of the history of Judea under Pontius Pilate, or even as an account of the life of Jesus. It has instead the function of providing an explanation of the origins of Christianity and the relation of Christianity to Judaism. ared. is an essential part of the TF. So is the reference to Jesus having Greek as well as Jewish followers. Some of the resemblances of Tacitus on Christ to the TF come from the similaAnd the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disapperity of purpose. Tacitus is writing about Christians and needs to briefly explain Christian origins.

If the above is correct, does it point against authenticity ? I'm not sure. It partly depends on whether Josephus, writing for interested Romans at the end of the reign of Domitian, would have had the need and/or desire to clarify the relation of Christianity to mainstream Judaism.

Andrew Criddle

jayraskin wrote:Hi andrewcriddle,

Why would it matter to Josephus if there were still Christians around? If there were a lot of Christians around in 92 C.E., every reader would have known about them. It would not be necessary to point out that they were still around. If there were just a few Christians around, the observation is trivial. It would be like saying Huey P. Newton was a popular black theorist who started the Black Panther movement in the 1960's. He was shot down in Oakland in 1989. The Black Panthers are still around. In this case the author would be suggesting that killing the man did not kill the movement, but the author does not tell us what was the movement, so the writing could only be aimed at people who already knew what the Black Panther Party was. In the same way, the TF does not tell us what the Jesus movement was after Jesus died, so it would only having meaning to people who already knew about Christianity after Jesus.
The statement that Christians have not disappeared would really have meaning in the time of Eusebius, as the Emperor's Diocletian Edicts against the Christians were designed to make them disappear. It would be a reminder that the emperor had failed to make the Christians disappear.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Hi Jay

The issue is whether there was confusion about the status of Christians. i.e. were people unclear whether Christians were one of the Jewish groups like Sadducees and Pharisees or were they a quite separate religion/ethnic group ? There seem to have been controversies in Domitian's reign about who was liable to pay the Fiscus Judaicus tax which may have drawn attention to such issues. (The TF indicates that although Jesus was a Jew his followers from the beginning were as much Gentiles as Jews.)

IF this is the context of the TF it would indicate an early date, whether or not as early as Josephus.

Andrew Criddle

jayraskin wrote: The statement that Christians have not disappeared would really have meaning in the time of Eusebius, as the Emperor's Diocletian Edicts against the Christians were designed to make them disappear. It would be a reminder that the emperor had failed to make the Christians disappear.

It could have meaning if it was referring to another sect of Christians ie. Christians/Chrestiani following another god, such as a pagan one.

Hi andrewcriddle,

From “Jews and Gentiles in the Early Jesus Movement: An Unintended Journey” by Abel Mordechai Bibliowicz, pg. 200:
Furthermore, I have posited that since the legitimacy of the Pauline-Lukan “orthodoxy” could not be based on the acknowledgment of an adversarial takeover of the Jesus movement, it was necessary to obscure and conceal the demotion of the descendants of the founding fathers. This deletion may have emerged out of the desire to project a consensual transfer of leadership and of legitimacy from Jesus’s disciples and followers to the ascending Pauline orthodoxy. Whether Eusebius’s deletion of this theologically embarrassing phase from his “Historia Ecclesastica” was conscious or reflects an already authoritative tradition, his telling of the origins of the faith became the foundational myth of the new religion. Thus, it seems possible that Eusebius wrote at a time (three hundred years after Jesus’s death) when the fusion and the confusion between Jews within the Jesus movement and Jews without was already an ingrained tradition, and that this misperception was retrojected onto past events.
****
We should be careful to not take Eusebean retconning as actual history.

Warmly,
Jay Raskin

andrewcriddle wrote:

jayraskin wrote:Hi andrewcriddle,

Why would it matter to Josephus if there were still Christians around? If there were a lot of Christians around in 92 C.E., every reader would have known about them. It would not be necessary to point out that they were still around. If there were just a few Christians around, the observation is trivial. It would be like saying Huey P. Newton was a popular black theorist who started the Black Panther movement in the 1960's. He was shot down in Oakland in 1989. The Black Panthers are still around. In this case the author would be suggesting that killing the man did not kill the movement, but the author does not tell us what was the movement, so the writing could only be aimed at people who already knew what the Black Panther Party was. In the same way, the TF does not tell us what the Jesus movement was after Jesus died, so it would only having meaning to people who already knew about Christianity after Jesus.
The statement that Christians have not disappeared would really have meaning in the time of Eusebius, as the Emperor's Diocletian Edicts against the Christians were designed to make them disappear. It would be a reminder that the emperor had failed to make the Christians disappear.
***



Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Hi Jay

The issue is whether there was confusion about the status of Christians. i.e. were people unclear whether Christians were one of the Jewish groups like Sadducees and Pharisees or were they a quite separate religion/ethnic group ? There seem to have been controversies in Domitian's reign about who was liable to pay the Fiscus Judaicus tax which may have drawn attention to such issues. (The TF indicates that although Jesus was a Jew his followers from the beginning were as much Gentiles as Jews.)

IF this is the context of the TF it would indicate an early date, whether or not as early as Josephus.

Andrew Criddle

Peter Kirby wrote:providing no background about the motivation for the 'accusation' made against him (which we might expect reading his other accounts of peripheral characters in his history)

"It is curious that Josephus, while so detailed in his explanation of why John was executed, is totally silent on the precise reason why the Jewish leaders accused Jesus before Pilate and why Pilate decided to crucify him (Ant. 18.3.3)."
-- John P. Meier
("John the Baptist in Josephus: Philology and Exegesis," Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 111, No. 2 [Summer, 1992], pp. 225-237 [p. 236 n. 29])

Good point Peter.