Spinkos tourney, 2nd round: The historical existence of Jesus

I don't think there's any serious historian who doubts the existence of Jesus .... We have more evidence for Jesus than we have for almost anybody from his time period. ~Prof Bart Ehrman, University of North Carolina I will start out by presenting a selection of extrabiblical and biblical sources. Taictus First we should note who Taictus was. He was an early Roman historian who hated Christians. His trustworthiness and accuracy is affirmed and agreed upon by many other historians. Syme, regarded as one of the foremost of Tacitean scholars, lauds praises on Tacitus saying, ""the prime quality of Cornelius Tacitus is distrust. It was needed if a man were to write about the Caesars." He adds [ibid., 281, 282] that Tacitus "was no stranger to industrious investigation" and his "diligence was exemplary." There were some minor inaccuracies in his Anals, but this could be due to the fact that he died before he could complete them and thus did not finish and proof read them. http://www.tektonics.org... http://en.wikipedia.org... In is Anals we find him reference Jesus. Unfortunately, one third of his known writings have been lost, including sections from 29-32 AD which could have referenced Jesus's trial. http://en.wikipedia.org... "But not all the relief that could come from man, not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the gods, availed to relieve Nero from the infamy of being believed to have ordered the conflagration, the fire of Rome. Hence to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the guilt, and punished Christians, who were hated for their enormities. Christus, the founder of the name, was put to death by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius: but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time broke out again, not only through Judea, where the mischief originated, but through the city of Rome also, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind." http://www.infidels.org... We have no forseeable reason for Tacitus to be wrong in his writings. His historical reliability and great contempt for the Christians, alleviates any objections of untrustworthyness or biass. Josephus Josephus was a 1st century historical recorder of Jewish history, who provided crucial recordings about the First Jewish-Roman War. His credibility can be verified by his very accurate archaeological data and general accuracy in his works. He mentions Jesus many times, one example of which is below, from his Antiquities, Book XVIII. http://centuryone.com... "But the younger Ananus who, as we said, received the high priesthood, was of a bold disposition and exceptionally daring; he followed the party of the Sadducees, who are severe in judgment above all the Jews, as we have already shown. As therefore Ananus was of such a disposition, he thought he had now a good opportunity, as Festus was now dead, and Albinus was still on the road; so he assembled a council of judges, and brought before it the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ, whose name was James, together with some others, and having accused them as law-breakers, he delivered them over to be stoned" http://www.holybiblesketchpad.com... The Talmud "On the eve of the Passover Yeshu was hanged. For forty days before the execution took place, a herald went forth and cried, "He is going forth to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostasy. Any one who can say anything in his favor, let him come forward and plead on his behalf." But since nothing was brought forward in his favor he was hanged on the eve of the Passover." It's important to take note that when it says "hanged" we are not to take that in today's meaning of the word, as in, hanged by a rope. Back then it was very common for Romans to hang violators by the tree, or cross. We can further derive that the Talmud is talking about Jesus by the reference about the Eve before Passover, which is the supposed time of Jesus's crucifiction. These two similarities make it undoubtable that the Talmud is talking about Jesus. http://carm.org... Lucian Lucian, a Roman politician, was a great opposer of Christianity but acknowledges that Jesus did exist and was crucified. ""The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account. . . . You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains the contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws. All this they take quite on faith, with the result that they despise all worldly goods alike, regarding them merely as common property." [previous source] I will probably mention some more people in the next round, but as I am running out of time, I'll hand it over to the con.