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Apr. 20, 2005 Publius Cornelius Tacitus (circa 56-117 AD) was the famous Roman historian who composed the "Annales" (Annals), concerning principally the reign of the Emperor Tiberius (lived 42 BC--37 AD; reigned 14 AD--37 AD). This book contains the second mention, outside the Bible, of Christ, whom Tacitus calls 'Christus'. The first mention was that of Josephus, which I discussed in another article, "Josephus Gives His Testimony on Jesus". Below is Tacitus' reference. "Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, 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. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired." In the seventies, when I was studying Latin as a pastime, I read Tacitus' Annals, and said to myself that this passage confirmed the historicity of Jesus. Unfortunately, I was studying Latin, not history, and didn't realize at the time that the Annals appeared only in 116 AD, around 85 years after the supposed time of the crucifixion. So the value of the passage as 'testimony', as some Christians call it, is very tenuous, since Tacitus could have gotten his information from Christian sources, who in turn would have gotten the information from the Gospels. In Tacitus' day, the anthology called the New Testament had not yet been gathered together, much less translated into Latin, but, of course, Tacitus, as a wealthy Roman of equestrian rank, would have known Greek, and could have read Matthew or Luke himself in that language, though this is unlikely, because he would probably have considered it beneath himself to read such tracts, just as John Paul II would hardly have condescended to read Linda Goodman's "Sun Signs" or L. Ron Hubbard's "Dianetics". If Tacitus had read Matthew or Luke in Greek, though, he would have found Pilate entitled 'hegemon', the Greek equivalent of Latin 'praefectus' or English 'governor'. The fact that Tacitus calls Pilate 'procurator' instead of 'praefectus' does suggest that Tacitus did not get his information straight from the Gospels. Christians have seized upon this discrepancy as a pretext to argue that Tacitus must have had sources independent of the Gospels, even conjecturing that he used Roman police records. This is unlikely though, for police records would probably have called him Jesus rather than Christ. After all, 'Christ' was a nickname. For comparison, one might consider that today's police would probably record that they had arrested Antonio Accardo, for example, rather than Big Tuna Accardo. Also, police records would probably have gotten Pilate's title right. At any rate, no police records have ever been found. The fact that Tacitus' source remains unknown does not constitute evidence that it was independent of the Gospels however. It could very easily have been the case that Tacitus got his story from the oral or written words of a Christian, who himself was relying on his recollection of the version in Mathew or Luke that he had heard or read. Such a source might easily have called Pontius Pilate a procurator instead of a prefect, just as today someone might call Julius Caesar an emperor, when in reality he was dictator and consul. Wherever Tacitus got his information, his book appeared much too late to constitute dependable evidence for the historical existence of Jesus. The most one could conclude from reading the Annals is that Tacitus didn't prove that Jesus didn't exist. For proof that Jesus couldn't possibly have existed, at least in the familiar guise in which we apprehend him, we must turn to the New Testament, with its contradictions, miracle stories and unworkable moral structure. ------------ About the author Thomas Keyes: I have written two books: A SOJOURN IN ASIA (non-fiction) and A TALE OF UNG (fiction), neither published so far. I have studied languages for years and traveled extensively on five continents. Email: udikeyes@yahoo.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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