This impending article from BAR popped into my reader this morning:
- Lawrence Mykytiuk, “Did Jesus Exist? Searching for Evidence Beyond the Bible,” Biblical Archaeology Review (January/February 2015)
It’s an excellent survey of the ancient non-biblical material that testifies to Jesus’ existence. It’s somewhat lengthy, and the footnotes are extensive (probably longer than the article) and important. As of today, the entire article is freely accessible.
Couple of things here I find of new interest.
1) Tacitus used the term “Chrestians” and the term “Christ” in the same paragraph.
Which might be a piece of data supporting the view that Sutoneus’ use of the term “Chrestus” is valid as synonymous with “Christ”.
2) There is a 10th century Arabic version of “Jewish Antiquities” he didn’t mention and it’s “testimonium” version is exactly what we would expect a non Christian Jewish historian to say about Jesus w/o the Christian interpolation, adding to the validity of the testimonium in it’s original form.
“TACIT CONFIRMATION”
Oh! (Couldn’t help himself, could he?)
Anyway, thanks for the link. A good chance for me to get up to date.
I suppose not! Glad you found it useful!