Our primary source for the years preceding the Jewish Revolt is a historian of the Flavian court named Josephus. Our primary sources for the life of Jesus are the four Gospels of the Christian Scriptures. The two intersect on many details, but not on the life of Jesus. Except in two places, which are disputed.
If we take Josh MacDowell's Evidence that Demands a Verdict as the furthest right wing on this debate, then everyone agrees that the most famous of these mentions, Antiquities 18.3.3, is at least corrupted. It is so pro-Christianity that scholarship has taken to calling it the "Testimonium Flavianum". This won't be the paper to argue over that section's merits; I will assume only that it is corrupted.
Antiquities 20.9.1 on the other hand contains a mere phrase, that describes a James (who is murdered) as the brother of "Jesus called Christos".
Biblical scholar Robert E Van Voorst claimed in Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Evidence, "the overwhelming majority of scholars hold that the words 'the brother of Jesus called Christ' are authentic
," that is, authentically Josephus (p 83).
I was unimpressed by this assertion, because Van Voorst provided no definitions for "overwhelming" nor "scholar", and (needless to say) no firm statistics. He did not rely on this consensus, though, but also attempted to show independently that we ought to give this second Testimonium the benefit of the doubt. This site will primarily address his arguments, providing new arguments were necessary.
Van Voorst claimed that a "Christian interpolator would have used laudatory language
". By
contrast, he pointed out (accurately) that "Josephus's words
'called Christ' are neutral and descriptive
". From there, van Voorst
claimed that Josephus used those words to distinguish between this Jesus and
the dozen other Jeshuae that crowd his books. Even this Jesus is only
a prop to distinguish a Jacobus (English "James") the Just from the
many other Jacobi in Judaea. Both Jeshua and Jacob were common Jewish
names, unsurprisingly given that both were Biblical heroes.
This would have been a reasonable argument, had the phrase "called
Christ" any precedent in Jewish or Gentile literature. Van Voorst
argued that "called Christ" "reflects Jewish usage
", not Christian,
but his examples - tellingly - come from Christian literature. He
cited Matthew 1:16 (from the genealogy) and Matt 27:17,22 (Pilate's words) - also John 4:25 (Samaritan woman).
"Called Christ" wasn't even used by most Christians. John 4:25 was not intended in the ironic sense of Jesus being called Christ by a nonbeliever, but merely translates the Aramaic term "Messiah". Matthew on the other hand is a revision of Mark, and Matt 27:17,22 alters Mark 15:9,12 from "King of the Jews" to "Jesus called Christ". Matthew did not alter "King of the Jews" in Mark 15:2 == Matt 27:11, nor Mark 15:26 == Matt 27:37. "Called Christ" is Matthew's alone of the NT, and intended for Pilate's speech only.
In addition, it is known that Josephus and Luke have much overlap and possibly some connection. In the case of the Testimonium Flavianum, it appears more likely that Luke 24 was working off Josephus or the raw Testimonium. (Note the characteristic addition of "Moses and the prophets" a la Luke 16:19-31, not found in the TF. Also see Goldberg.) Luke did not use the term "called Christ" as did Matthew, despite that Luke would have had no reason to omit it. Either "called Christ" did not occur in Luke's copy of Josephus - at least where it referred to Jesus - or else "called Christ" did not occur in the sources common to Luke and Josephus.
Following the Gospels, "called Christ" is next cited by Origen as a quote from Josephus: Commentary on Matthew 10:17 and Contra Celsum 1:47, 2:13. Unfortunately Origen did not give the location, and also claimed that this passage stated that James's death caused the calamity of the war (see Doherty). Either this is yet another interpolation, this time lost to posterity; or else Origen took a Christian meme and erroneously attached it to Josephus. Neither raises confidence in the integrity of Antiquities 20.9.1.
So there is direct evidence only that "called Christ" was used by Christians in speeches put into the mouths of non-Christians. There is no evidence that "called Christ" was actually used by Jews or Romans. And the first witness to "called Christ" as a quote from Josephus is a misquote.
In addition, Kelly Wellington has pointed out (via email) that outside those two Jesus passages, Josephus avoided the term "Christ" in his books. Josephus was certainly aware of his peoples' hunger for charismatic leadership: he viewed it as a pernicious fantasy, the conqueror Vespasian being the true king of Judaea (Wars 6.5.4). But he didn't call the Judaean pretenders Christs, even second-hand.
Within the two Jesus passages, the term "christos" appears without translation. The Jewish understanding is implied in Antiquities 18.3.3, but in a part of the Testimonium which even McDowell will not defend: "He was the Christ
". 20.9.1's mention is therefore bereft of context - "Jesus called the Oily
" (a Galilean John Gotti?).
Nor is this a case of material lost in translation; Josephus wrote the Greek version of
his works himself.
Josephus saw his Graecophone audience as ignorant enough of Judaism to require a full accounting of Jewish history, including renditions of David and Goliath, Esther, and the Exodus. Wellington told me, "to introduce a new term, and one which is fraught with considerable potentially incendiary meaning but largely known ONLY to members of the Jewish cult or the newly developing Christian cult, without offering a definition for his gentile, Greek-speaking audience, seems highly unlikely
". That he did not provide one hints that he did not need to, i.e. that he was not the one who used the term.
An alternative hypothesis to Van Voorst's majority opinion is that this second pericope is just another TF, this time based on Matthew, or perhaps church-order tales (passion plays? miracle stories?) also available to Matthew but not to Luke nor Mark.
I don't know if any part of this second pericope of Josephus is authentic Josephus. I also can't prove my alternate hypothesis beyond a reasonable doubt. But I can say that given the undeniably corrupted state of the primary TF, we cannot trust the current text of Josephus to give an accurate account of Jesus. (I can also say that the evidence is mounting against its supporters. I look forward to van Voorst's next book, "Get Rich by Investing In Internet Startups".) In history, that is enough to disqualify it.
Any thoughts? e-mail me :^) zimriel@sbcglobal.net
The first version of this project was written at lunch 26 March 2001 as a UseNet post. 14 April, got it WWW-worthy. 24 April, received VERY helpful email from Kelly Wellington. "The Teflon Messiah" owes its theme to it. 8 September, it's "Flavianum" not "Flavinium". D'oh!