Josephus didnt know of Jesus

JOSEPHUS, DID NOT MENTION JESUS

The first century Jewish historian Josephus allegedly wrote the so-called Testament of Flavius in his book, Jewish Antiquities, which runs: “An end was put to this uprising. Now about the same time, a wise man called Jesus, if it be right to call him a man for he was a worker of wonderful works and a teacher of men who like to receive the truth. He won over to him many of the Jews and also many of the Gentiles. He was the Messiah or Christ. Pilate at the request of the chief men among us condemned him to crucifixion. When that happened those who loved at from the first did not abandon him because he appeared to them alive on the third day as the prophets of God had forecasted and not only that but ten thousand other things about him. The tribe of Christians called after him are not extinct even today. About this time another sad calamity put the Jews into great crisis and terrible disgusting things happened concerning the Temple of Isis in Rome.” It has solely been Christian copyists who have preserved Josephus's writings for us (page 43, The Marian Conspiracy) and understandably we can be suspicious about this Testament.

Even if Josephus wrote this we have testimonies from the New Testament itself that contradict him regarding when Jesus lived. The New Testament provides the best evidence that Jesus didn’t live at all. Much of the New Testament is older than his writings so it is what should be heeded if a conflict arises. This glowing reference to Jesus contradicts what he supposedly wrote in book 20 when he referred to James the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ.

Because Josephus was a Jew not a Christian and a supporter of the Roman Empire which didn’t tolerate Messiahs and considered allegiance to them to be treason against the divine Emperor in Rome this passage has been inserted or reworked by a Christian. The Romans sponsored his writing. If a Christian went to this trouble it would indicate that there was a need to fabricate evidence for the existence of Jesus. There can be no doubt that the passage is principally intended to bolster its main statement that there was someone called Jesus. The other details are just meant to back this up.

There is no need to suppose that any of this Jesus material is genuine. Arguments like that Josephus must have wrote that Jesus was a wise man for Christians didn’t use that terminology are silly. They are obviously very weak. Besides, we have all heard Christians say that Jesus was a good man so why wouldn’t they say he was a wise one? The passage really shouldn’t be discussed in attempts to prove Jesus lived for it proves nothing. How could Josephus praise a man as wise who, according to the gospels, caused a riot in the Temple showing contempt for Roman and Jewish law?

The testimony says that that Jesus won disciples and was crucified under Pilate and rose BECAUSE the prophets spoke of these and countless others things about him. THE TESTAMENT DOES NOT CLAIM TO BE A TESTIMONY. WHAT IT CLAIMS IS THAT YOU MUST CHECK OUT THE OLD TESTAMENT PROPHECIES TO SEE IF WHAT IT SAYS ABOUT JESUS IS TRUE!! This is critically important. It means that even if Josephus did write the Testament it still does not help in the case for a historical Jesus because it depends on human interpretative ideas about Bible prophecies. It is not history that is here but faith. This means that his later reference to James being the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ is put into a new context. It is not saying Jesus existed because he indicated before that that this was a matter of faith. The evidence is overwhelming. Josephus and Rome and the Jews did not know of a Jesus of history.

When were the forgeries supporting Christianity implanted into Josephus' opus? Nobody knew about them before 320 AD. If the interpolations were in the early versions of Josephus the early Christian defenders of the faith would have used them to support their religious stance. Eusebius was the first person to write about the longer one and he did it in that year in his Demonstration of the Gospel. Eusebius stated that lying to get people to believe in Christianity was to be commended which is why many believe he was the forger of the Testament.

Origen in his famous Against Celsus, recorded that Josephus did not receive Jesus as his Saviour, Lord and Messiah and was amazed when Josephus praised James who was unjustly executed and who Josephus regarded as the brother of Jesus. It would be more natural, as well, for Origen to be a billion times more amazed at what Josephus supposedly wrote about Jesus in the famous Testament of Flavius. It was not in the text in those days. When Origen was so gobsmacked in relation then his Josephus did not mention Jesus in nice terms at all.

Origen did not quote the Testament stuff about Josephus saying Jesus was the Messiah and rose from the dead to Celsus though he wrote a lot against Celsus to defend the faith against Celsus’ scepticism about Christianity’s’ claims meaning it did not exist in the works of Josephus in his time. Celsus rejected Jesus’ morals and Origen couldn’t even use Josephus to argue that Jesus had been stated by a non-Christian to have been a good man. Josephus never mentioned the man at all.

Justin Martyr, Tertullian and Cyprian who were big into defending the faith did not know that Josephus had any faith in Christ therefore their silence proves that he didn't. It must have been a Christian copyist who inserted the Testament. This Christian forger of the Testament did not know much about Jesus and had leanings towards the Christian tendency to deny that Jesus was a proper man but just God or an angel in a human body without a human mind or his words could be taken to mean that Jesus was just an apparition or an immaterial being. The interpolation was put in by somebody who did not believe that Jesus was God for that is too foundational a detail to leave out.

It is surmised that the Testament was not mentioned in the first few centuries because the existence of Jesus was not questioned by any important people or groups. That is another Christian lie.

The existence was questioned for example by Trypho the Jew Justin argued with for example but lets pretend the objection is right. The resurrection and the miracles were questioned as were the Messiahship and the divinity of Christ. The Christians had many very serious reasons then to use and cherish the text and they did not because it did not exist. They would not have known that it was a fake so its being a fake could not have put them off. The text would not be still extant if it had been recognised for the fraud it was.

In book 20 of Jewish Antiquities another reference to Jesus appears. This is the place where Origen and others used to read a glowing report about James which is currently rejected as an insertion. We now have a heavily doctored version which we will meet in a moment. This part of Josephus’ work was tampered with so we have no reason to trust its mention of Jesus.

“Ananus...called together the Sanhedrin and brought the brother of Jesus the so-called Messiah/Christ, James by name, together with some others. He accused them of breaking the Law and condemned them to death by stoning. But the experts of the Law who were more liberal were angry at this and secretly requested the king stop this from happening” (Jewish Antiquities, Book 20).

Calling James the brother of the Christ or the Lord was a title given to James by the early Church.

Josephus would not call Jesus the so-called Christ when it was not the Jews or the Romans were calling Christ but a tiny persecuted and obscure sect that never made the news.

Maybe Josephus was saying James brother of the so called Christ as in a sneer. That would mean the line can’t prove if Jesus was thought to have existed or not.

In Galatians 1:19, Paul says that he met James the Lord's brother. This seems to say that Jesus lived in the first century when his brother was still alive. But the most important thing to realise is that Paul told Philemon that Onesimus the slave was to be his blood-brother and not just a brother in the Lord so blood-brother among the early Christians didn’t always mean that you shared a parent. Josephus who also called James Jesus’ brother could have made a mistake due to this confusing practice. The practice probably had a lot to do with the universal accusations of incest that supposedly was rife among the early Christians.

Tacitus the Roman Governor of Asia supposedly wrote about Jesus in 112 AD. Tacitus makes it plain that the Christians were detested in Rome because they got blamed for the fire of 64 AD which some believed that Nero himself had started. How then could Josephus who depended on Romans to look after his publications and buy them for the Jews hated him have spoken so well of Jesus or of James his brother either? The official verdict in Roman law was that Christians had a murderous hatred of Rome.

There were countless Christian believers in the early Church who did not subscribe to the thought that a man died under Pilate by crucifixion and rose again from the dead in the first century. To them Jesus was a vision from Heaven. Some of them believed that the crucifixion and resurrection was an illusion.

Assuming Josephus thought Jesus was a real man, would Josephus then simply talk about a man who there was so much controversy about as if he were a real flesh and blood man? No. He would have had to give his reasons for saying Jesus was a man.

Josephus who wrote the intimate details of Jewish history down for the Romans ignored Christ. This indicates that he thought that Jesus never lived.

Josephus Unbound by Earl Doherty

http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/supp10.htm IT CANNOT BE OVERSTRESSED HOW IMPORTANT READING THIS SITE IS. One major point it makes is that Josephus would not have called James the brother of the so-called Christ for he never explained to his readers who would have been unfamiliar with the title Christ what a Christ was. Evidence from Origen and Eusebius who referred to a missing line from the place where this reference occurs indicates that tampering did happen here. Josephus might however not have meant that Christ was a man. James could have been the brother of a Spiritual Christ meaning that James was a spiritual being incarnate and literally the brother of this being but not a biological brother. Josephus speaks of this Christ in concrete terms not because he was a man but because many said they had visions of him so Josephus believed in his existence. I add another possibility. Perhaps brother of the so-called Christ was James' nickname? Perhaps it was a mock title given to him by his Jewish enemies? This could be poking fun at his honouring a non-existent Messiah. He was writing for some Jews though it was mainly Romans so it is possible. Josephus might not have been mocking James but stating his nickname as an irony. Josephus did do things like that at times. We have seen that he did not explain the nickname Christ.

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http://members.aol.com/FLJOSEPHUS/LUKECH.htm

This website explores how many of the phrases in the Testament have been plucked straight out of the Luke gospel. Since the site is Christian it argues funnily enough that Josephus took Luke's phrases to make the insertion. Josephus would not go to all that trouble but a forger would. The only motive a forger would have for doing that would be so that Luke's gospel would seem more authentic which was only an issue at the end of the second century and later until the canon was settled. The passage was meant for a generation that read the gospel unlike the generation Josephus was a part of. Josephus would have recommended the gospel had he been using it. Plagiarism like that would have been too out of character for Josephus.

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