Talk:Josephus on Jesus/Archive 7

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Article mentioned in Fiji Times letters page twice

I thought the editors of this page might be interested in noting that, in the March 11 and March 26 editions of Fiji Times (Suva), available on the NewsBank databank, in the "Your Fiji Your Voice" (3/11) and "Your Fiji Your Say" (3/26), an individual named Richard Marr specifically mentions this article in regards to a theory that the New Testament was written by, apparently, the "Calpurnis" family. Prominent mention is given to the booklet "The True Authorship of the New Testament" by the Abelard Reuchlin Foundation, The RomanPisoForum website, and the website http:www.livius.org/jo-jz/josephus/josephus.htm. So far as I can tell, none of those sources would qualify as reliable as per WP:RS, and there would be serious questions as to whether their opinions would necessarily meet WP:WEIGHT as well. Some, such as myself, might take these statements as perhaps indicating that one or the other of the above groups might be using this article to promote their theories. I think this comment from the 11th letter is particularly interesting, quoted verbatim from the databank:

"... I will now for the first time disclose the "truth" behind the writing and composition of the New Testament. I hope this will put an end on this matter and readers could do the same by either purchasing the book or go to Internet. The address: The True Authorship of the New Testament - by Abelard Reuchlin Foundation, PO Box 5652, Kent, wa 98064, USA, The RomanPisoForum Website, and http://www.livius.org/jo-jz/josephus/josephus.htm etc., also Josephus on Jesus from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Lastly, because there is a money reward from the Abelard Reuchlin Foundation, if you can disprove the booklets' thesis that the Calpurnis family wrote the New Testament, I prefer you do that."

I don't know whether the Wikimedia Foundation would be eligible for the award, FWIW. John Carter (talk) 23:18, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for this piece of information. It does raise some serious questions about some of the relevant facts not in this article (the 62 vs 69 CE problem being the elephant in the room the article avoids like a politician running for office).--BruceGrubb (talk) 18:35, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Does a search for "69 AD" in the article provide any results? History2007 (talk) 12:57, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Is this reference in the "Arguments challenging authenticity" section where it should be? No.

Furthermore, I pointed out in Talk:Josephus_on_Jesus/Archive_3#The_History_of_the_subject_matter "Boyd and Eddy in The Jesus legend on page 189 admits that Eusebuis, Hegsippus and Clament of Alexandria all tell the same tale regarding the fate of James which differs significantly from Josephus. These three people all agree that James was thrown from a battlement, then stoned, and finally clubbed to death by laundrymen c70 CE while Josephus simply has him stoned c64 CE."

In fact, the James the Just article has this piece of Hegesippus: "threw down the just man... [and] began to stone him: for he was not killed by the fall; but he turned, and kneeled down, and said: "I beseech Thee, Lord God our Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.""

But the ending of the paragraph where the 69 AD appears claims "The account of Josephus also differs from that of the New Testament in that while Josephus states that James was stoned, Christian tradition holds that he was thrown from the top of the Temple." WHERE in the New Testament does it say James brother of Jesus was stoned to death in 69 CE? Can't be Acts because that ends with Paul still alive (ie before 67 CE). So where is the passage regarding the death of James that gives us a date, hmm? Nevermind mind the tradition has him stoned as well!--BruceGrubb (talk) 02:42, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Ok, so you found the item now. It should have really said "Christian tradition" instead of the New Testament, that is all. I added a clear source for that anyway. But the long and short of it is that Josephus has differences from both the NT and Christian tradition, as the article clearly states - yet scholars generally see the differences as signs authenticity.

So, the variations from Christian accounts are usually not taken by scholars as a sign of the lack for authenticity in this and the other cases, because a Christian interpolator would have aimed to achieve harmony with the Christian sources. So when there are differences between Josephus and Christian sources, scholars see them as indications that the Josephus material is not interpolated, for an interpolator would have aimed for harmony not divergence. History2007 (talk) 07:46, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

This is a logical fallacy that assumes that a Christian interpolator would have taken such care. Putting aside the wild variances of the non-canonal gospels with regards to the details Irenaeus in c180 CE demonstrates that the crosschecking of their views with historical facts was NOT a strong suit of Early Christians. In Against Heresies, 2:22:5 he argued that Jesus had lived to at least the age of 50 and in Demonstration (74) stated "For Herod the king of the Jews and Pontius Pilate, the governor of Claudius Caesar, came together and condemned Him (ie Jesus) to be crucified."

The anachronisms in that one sentence in Demonstration are staggering:

1) The "King of the Jews" title here cannot refer to Herod Antipas as his actual title was Tetrarch of Galilee and Perea)

2) Due to expressing the desire for Tiberius to hurry up and die so his friend Caligula could become emperor Herod Agrippa I was thrown in prison and not released until 37 CE when Caligula came to power. By that time Pontius Pilate had been replaced by Marcellus.

3) While Herod Agrippa I did come to Judea as governor in the final year of Caligula's rule (c40 CE) he answered to Prefect Marcellus who in turn answered to Tetrarch Herod Antipas.

4) Due to Herod Agrippa I's advice Claudius became Caesar in 41 and as a reward a year later Marcellus and Herod Antipas were replaced by Herod Agrippa I who was also given the title "King of the Jews".

This type of evidence deep sixes the whole "harmony" argument. Again given there was supposedly a version Josephus with NEITHER passage clear into the 15th century shows something wonky. In fact we know that Jerome (c. 347-c.419) had a weird variant of Josephus that "asserted that at the Lord’s crucifixion there broke from the temple voices of heavenly powers, saying: ‘Let us depart hence.’" which conforms to none of the canonal Gospels.--BruceGrubb (talk) 08:10, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, I must confess I am failing here Bruce. I just do no know how to explain this. Just do not know how to do it. I was going to quote:

• Louis Feldman: "Few have doubted the genuineness of the passage on James, and, indeed, if it had been a Christian interpolation, it would, in all probability, have been more laudatory of James." (ISBN 3-11-009522-X page 823)

But then I thought I had said that type of thing more than a few times here. Then I thought of quote another book:

• "The fact that the Josephan account differs so dramatically from the traditional Christian narrative suggests that this passage is not a Christian interpolation" (page 189)

But then I though why bother, Bruce knows page 189 of that book so well, so I must be confused. Do you want to guess which book that is Bruce?

So although I am obviously failing to explain things here, reading the books you know so well yourself (say page 189) may help clarify issues that I am incapable of elucidating. Thanks for your help in pursuing those issues. History2007 (talk) 09:50, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

The relevant information on 189 is as follows: "from Eusebius, Hegesippus, and Clement of Alexandria, we learned that early Christians believed James was first thrown from the battlement of the Temple by scribes and Pharisees. They then began to stone him but were stopped by a priest. Finally, James was clubbed to death by laundrymen. In contradiction to this, Josephus says simply that James was stoned to death by order of the high priest Ananus. Moreover, according to the Christian tradition, James was killed just prior to Vespasian’s siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE. According to Josephus, he died before the Jewish War broke out, around 62 CE. The fact that the Josephan account differs so dramatically from the traditional Christian narrative suggests that this passage is not a Christian interpolation." (Eddy and Boyd, The Jesus Legend, 189.)

One must remember that Eddie and Boyd are arguing against "an increasingly common view among New Testament scholars today is that historical research can indeed disclose a core of historical fact about Jesus, But, they argue, the Jesus we find at this historical core is significantly different form the legendary view presented in the New Testament." and for the idea that the Gospel account is largely accurate. (pg 25). In short they are arguing for what they admit is a fringe view!

Eddy and Boyd present a non sequitur in that they say the majority of the material says Eusebius, Hegesippus, Clement of Alexandria and early Christians held that James was killed c69 CE by being thrown from the battlement, being stoned, and finally beaten to death is evidence that the Josephus passage which has James being stoned to death in 62 CE is somehow not an interpolation. How does that work? The argument Remsburg and Drews presented over a century ago and is continued to be argued today by scholars like Wells and Price (as well as people like Kenneth Humphreys) is that this contradiction is evidence FOR interpolation NOT against.

The view Remsburg, Drews, Wells, Price, Humphreys, and many others all more or less presented for over more than 100 years is that Josephus originally said "Festus was dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the Sanhedrim of judges and brought before them the brother of Jesus, whose name was James, and some others; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned" and that some well meaning Christian copyist seeing this and not knowing of the chronistic problems assumed this was a reference to James the Just and added a gloss resulting in this:

"Festus was dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the Sanhedrim of judges and brought before them the brother of Jesus (1), whose name was James, and some others; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned"

(1) who was called Christ

And later another Christian copyist simply wove the gloss into the text resulting in the version we have today.--BruceGrubb (talk) 10:23, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

So are you saying that the last sentence that you did not bold in the text you typed from Eddy and Boyd's book above, i.e. "The fact that the Josephan account differs so dramatically from the traditional Christian narrative suggests that this passage is not a Christian interpolation." is not relevant?

Anyway, to make a long story short, what I said above was that "the variations from Christian accounts are usually not taken by scholars as a sign of the lack for authenticity in this and the other cases," and you just confirmed that by typing the sentence from page 189 of E&B - except that you did not use a bold font for that part. So, for modern scholars, the differences are usually not indications of the lack of authenticity, but indications of the lack of interpolation. That is very straightforward.

Now, given that I was getting very tired of this, I looked up Wells' book to settle it. His page 55 argument does not make the point directly, but says it in the context of Origen. Then I went to add that to the article and realized it was already there in the arguments against section: "G. A. Wells has stated that the fact that Origen seems to have read something different about the death of James in Josephus than what there is now, suggests some tampering with the James passage seen by Origen". But anyway, we can just repeat something like that next to E&B statement, although Wells does not directly make that argument. But Drews, Rembsberg etc. are certainly not usable, as stated many, many times before. I do not see what the big deal is now any more, given that E&B reference is confirmed and the Wells statement was already in the article in the context he used it. So I think we just move on, now that the Wells statement is added once more to the Variations section as well. I also added Kostenberger who says the same thing as E&B and also Vermes says that compared to the Christian accounts: "the sober picture of Josephus appears all the more believable". Modern scholars generally view the differences as indications of the lack of interpolation, as reflected in the "scholarly consensus" about the authenticity of the passage. And the minority view presented by Wells is also mentioned in the article - and it turns out that it was there even before we started this marathon discussion. And I now expanded what Wells said about it, in the place it was in the article before, so it is clearly stated that Wells thinks that way. But in any case, you can not call the E&B statement a non sequitur via a "personal declaration". It represents the view of most scholars who see the passage as authentic, as several references in the article indicate. History2007 (talk) 13:12, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Possible Merger of the Authenticity of the Testimonium Flavianum wiki article with this one

Just by chance I came upon the Authenticity of the Testimonium Flavianum article on wiki. I have reviewed the page and I noticed that their are arguments on that article that do not come up on this one which discusses the same subject, I think it might be best to either merge the arguments into the authenticity section that doesn't repeat the same argument of this article or commit to the reverse. I am not really familiar with the process of how to nominate a page for merger with another but if someone can do it or inform me of whether or not we should merge a section of this article with that one or vice versa that would be great. Reason and Logic shall always prevail (talk) 23:56, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

On the archives of this talk page that was discussed some time ago and agreed to be moved in here. I had separated that out before, but I will just redirect it, given that the material there has all been included here now. Thanks for the reminder. History2007 (talk) 23:59, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

FWIW

Jerome made the following claim: "Josephus, himself a Jewish writer, asserts that at the Lord's crucifixion there broke from the temple voices of heavenly powers, saying: 'Let us depart hence'." [1] This is not found in our current manuscripts of Josephus and is further evidence of Christian interpolation.

Housekeeping. Lung salad left this on my JoJ user sub-page, so I am moving it here before I have the page deleted. Ignocrates (talk) 18:27, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

A better source for that statement is in Wikisource, since the Cath-encyclopedia source is just printing the original text of Jerome Letter 46 sans analysis. In that letter Jerome is referring to the Jewish Wars chapter VI. But as Raymond E. Brown states in the Death of the Messiah (ISBN 0385494491 pages 1114-1117) Jerome associates the destruction of the Temple with the crucifixion of Jesus years before at which time "its guardian angels have forsaken it" leaving the Temple vulnerable. Thus Jerome associates the rending of the Temple veil with Jerusalem being surrounded by an army, etc. and leaves "a confusing time gap between the events" in that he implies that the destruction of the Temple was a result of the death of Jesus, given that grace had departed from the Temple at the crucifixion. So that is really an analysis of Jerome's view of the Jewish Wars rather than an analysis of the Antiquities of the Jews. As the article clearly states, the general scholarly consensus is that there is no reference to Jesus in the Jewish Wars and hence Jerome's Letter 46 that refers to the Jewish Wars has no impact on the analysis of "Josephus on Jesus". History2007 (talk) 20:44, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

No need to explain. I just wanted it off my user page. Ignocrates (talk) 23:20, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

No worries, I was not going to charge anything for the explanation. History2007 (talk) 23:52, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

Explanation requested from Bruce Grubb

Bruce I am requesting that you explain this recent edit which you performed on this article. The edit is titled "major clean up" but I think an explanation by you is certainly required in view of past discussions.

The background is as follows:

• In this edit a "failed verification" tag on the statement: "An argument against the authenticity of the reference in the James passage is that 'Jesus son of Damneus' may have been the person Josephus was referring to in that passage. The argument is that since Jesus son of Damneus became High priest by the requirements of Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 he would have been annotated and would have been referred to as 'the annotated one' i.e. 'christ' in lower case" was removed. That statement was sourced to page 228 of Steve Mason's book. The tag existed since page 228 of Mason's book does not include that statement, or the argument regarding "Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1" and you had been directly informed of that before several times, and you participated in those discussions.

• The same statement was added again, and was yet partly sourced to the same page 228 of Steve Mason's book, partly left with no source, but a passing reference was made to "Recent amateur research" in that context with no explanation or source at all.

• In this next edit you added a reference to the (by now well known) page 189 of Eddy and Boyd's book which has been discussed several times on this page. As we all know, given the long discussion with you regarding that specific page of Eddy and Boyd it absolutely does not refer to the "Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1" issue.

It thus appears that the argument regarding "Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1" is not supported by the sources added, and hence does not justify the removal of the "failed verification tag". None of the sources that follow that statement include that argument, as has been discussed on this talk page several times (and I mean several times as explained below) - and your past comments refer to those discussions.

Hence you do need to provide an explanation for this.

To clarify the relevant issues, here are some detailed facts:

• You first suggested the Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 argument in this edit in February 2012, and you sourced it to page 228 of Mason's book. I accepted that from you on good faith, stated that Mason was a fully WP:RS source and mentioned that I recalled seeing the same argument somewhere else. I also noted that it was a weak argument and needed to be added at the end of the section, for there are stronger arguments that challenge authenticity.

• In March 2012 I checked Mason's book and I informed you that the Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 does not appear within his book, page 228 or elsewhere that I could see. In this thread on this talk page (titled Discussion of Mason's book, page 228) I informed you that the Mason reference fails verification and that the other place I had recalled seeing it was a blog.

• On March 19 2012 you accepted that the material does not actually appear in Mason's book, and stated: "What the blog next does is takes the pieces Mason presented and puts them together in a different way" and that "Though it doesn't mention it the Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 part also comes from Mason as shown above. Mason provides all the pieces; all the blog does is put them together".

• The discussion continued and it became clear to everyone involved that Mason without the blog can not support the issue and only (Mason+blog) could support it. But it was also accepted by everyone involved that the blog was by some amateur person with no scholarly training and was clearly not WP:RS.

• The statement was kept in the article with a "failed verification tag", and in this thread I specifically asked you for 3 values X, Y and Z and on April 9 2012 asked you:

"Which Book title= X, ISBN= Y, Pagenumber= Z states that: "Jesus son of Damneus became High priest by the requirements of Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 he would have been annotated and would have been referred to as 'the annotated one' i.e. 'christ' in lower case.'?"

• You never responded to that and the statement remained with the "failed verification tag".

• In a separate discussion, page 189 of Eddy and Boyd's book was also discussed at length on this talk page, but it does not refer to Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1.

• On April 30 2012 you removed the "failed verification tag", and sourced the statement to page 228 of Mason's book again and made a passing reference to "amateur research" without specifying what the amateur research was.

In view of the above, I think you certainly need to provide an explanation here Bruce as to how this type of editing amounts to a "major clean up" as stated in your edit summary. I look forward to hearing from you. History2007 (talk) 14:07, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Bruce Grubb, I noticed that you made a spelling edit to the article after this message, but did not respond to this message. I am formally requesting that you explain your addition of "incorrect sources" to the article as discussed above. Else I will move to have your changes reverted altogether. I will now mark your changes as having failed verification again, and will leave you a message on your talk page. History2007 (talk) 09:13, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Do you deny the following is an exact quote from Mason? "First, the word "Christ" (Greek christos) would have special meaning only for a Jewish audience. In Greek it means simply "wetted" or "anointed." Within the Jewish world, this was an extremely significant term because anointing was the means by which the kings and high priests of Israel had been installed. The pouring of oil over their heads represented their assumption of God-given authority (Exod 29;9, 1 Sam 10:1) The Hebrew word for "anointed" was mashiach, which know usually as the noun Messiah, "the annonted [one]."--BruceGrubb (talk) 21:29, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

What seems to be missing is the connection to Jesus son of Damneus. Does Mason make this connection? If not, who does? Huon (talk) 21:57, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

No, Mason absolutely (and I mean absolutely) does not make that statement or the connection. The blog does. The terms Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 do not appear on page 228 of Mason's book. And I do not need to tell you that. Bruce stated (as above) "What the blog next does is takes the pieces Mason presented and puts them together in a different way" ... "Mason provides all the pieces; all the blog does is put them together". So he clearly admitted that Mason does not state it and the blog does. And the reference to "the amateur research community" in the last edit he made seems to be to the blog. And the Richard Gibbs reference he added is self-published again. This is just Amateur adventure games now. Just laughable. But let us laugh and some fun with it. It will not last long. Bruce is about to get on a train to blockland now. No one can add these types of failed references to Wikipedia and not get blocked or banned. I am sure of that. History2007 (talk) 22:57, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

History2007, you do not WP:OWN this article. As noted in the internet archive (the text only version is somewhat of a mess) the 1866 The Imperial Bible-Dictionary was published by Blackie and Son (which had an educational text division) and includes a Professor of Theology from Presbyterian College among its authors.

And that source clearly and directly states "Because the high-priest was emphatically the anointed one at the first institution of the taliernacle worship, he is therefore called "the priest, the Christ" (Heb. hamaschiach, Gr. b lepevs 6 -xpiarbi, Lo. iv. 3) It even admits the name Christ "was capable of being applied, and actually was was applied, in the earlier parts of the Scripture, to a variety of persons"

So much for self published claim. You can hem and haw but your empty threats of blockage ring hollow when you ignore such sources as The Imperial Bible-Dictionary to IMHO POV push.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:44, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually I did not delete your edits, just marked them as unverified, so there is zero issue of ownership here. And your source for Richard Gibbs is self published. I will mark that as such and leave you a message. History2007 (talk) 23:48, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Mason mentions "So it would make sense of Josphus to say, "This man had the nickname Christos", and he could do so without further explanation." It would be like calling a really smart person by the nickname "professor" while "Professor" would be a title.

"Prophets were "christ," priests were "christ," and kings were "christ,..." (Burdette, Dallas R. (2008) Legalism to Freedom Page 10)

"In those days only a king and a priest were anointed." John Paul II The Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortations of John Paul II quoting from Arthur James Mason's 1893 The relation of confirmation to baptism

"Dionysus is a savior god, titled Christos ("anointed one"),..." (Franklin, Anna; Paul Mason (2001) Lammas: celebrating fruits of the first harvest Page 240)

Johann Peter Lange's 1879 A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures references "anointed one" (ie christos) High Priest Onias III while also talking about Jesus the "anointed one" (ie Christos)

"The high-priest is called 'the anointed priest' (Lev iv 3)" (Kitto, John (editor, 1881) The cyclopaedia of Biblical literature, Volume 2 pg 109)

"For David the king, and Aaron, the high priest, are also called Christ for it is customary to make kings and priests by anointing." Schaff, Philip; Henry Wace (1899) A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church: Socrates, Sozomenus: Church histories. 1890

"The high priest, as we have seen, was a type of Christ." Meyrick, Frederick; Richard Collins, Cave A. (1882) Leviticus Page 129

"Because the high-priest was emphatically the anointed one at the first institution of the taliernacle worship, he is therefore called " the priest, the Christ" (Heb. hamaschiach, Gr. b lepevs 6 -xpiarbi, Lo. iv. 3)" (Fairbairn, Patrick (1866) The Imperial Bible-Dictionary pg 307)

So we see that there is Christ the title and christ the nickname and Mason flat out admits the passage can be read the second way. As for the connection between the term christ and High priest...see the above.--BruceGrubb (talk) 22:41, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

No, that is not the case at all. Not at all. Let me say it again: not at all. Page 228 of Mason's book absolutely (and I mean absolutely) does not make a statement about Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 as your edit claims. The blog that you kindly called the "amateur research community" states that - but you did not provide a reference to "amateur research community ", did you? But why do I even need to tell you that? You had stated yourself (as above) "What the blog next does is takes the pieces Mason presented and puts them together in a different way" ... "Mason provides all the pieces; all the blog does is put them together". So why do I need to tell you that? And by the way, the reference you added for Richard Gibbs is self published... Sorry to have to tell you to read WP:SPS, but I have a feeling you have seen that page before. I will remove the self-published source, mark your edit as failed verification and leave you a message to that effect. History2007 (talk) 23:09, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually Mason does mention "(Exod 29:9; 1 Sam 10:1)" on p. 228, just as BruceGrubb cited him above. I haven't read the book itself, but Google Books' snippet view showed me those very lines. Maybe there was a change between the first edition and the 2003 second edition? Of course I agree that "amateur research" raises all kinds of red flags; we should not employ it. Huon (talk) 23:18, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Mason does not relate them to "Son of Damneus". That is what I meant. The blog makes that connection. Check that again please. History2007 (talk) 23:30, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

OK,let me repeat so that we agree on the problem: Mason does mention Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1, but he does not claim that Josephus' "anointed one" is Jesus the son of Damneus? I am not convinced any of BruceGrubb's list of citations above makes that connection; if no reliable source makes that very argument about the son of Damneus, we are using unreliable sources or we are engaging in original synthesis, neither of which we should do.

As an aside, I'm a little sceptical about the age of the scholarship cited in that entire paragraph. Quite a few of those sources are a hundred years old. Is that still the state of the art? Huon (talk) 00:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, that is the case. Mason does not relate Exodus 29:9 and 1 Samuel 10:1 to "son of Damneus", as Bruce had clearly admitted before. But then if you read his last edit carefully, it says:

• This along with Mason's statement that the passage could be read "This man had the nickname Christos" was picked up by the amateur research community to justify their previously stated idea.

• "with the amateur community citing Mason as a reference supporting this interpretation."

So he has now placed the amateur community in there with no clear indication of who the amateur community is. He no longer uses Mason as a direct reference, but bounces the claim from the wall of the amateur research community. So in fairness, he no longer uses Mason alone, just uses (Mason + the amateurs) as his source without saying who the amateurs are. In the above, he had previously also accepted the amateurs as the blog we mentioned before.

And regarding your comment "is that still state of the art", no, not at all. As had been discussed on this talk page major developments have taken place since the 1920s and the dearly departed who wrote those material were unaware of many items (say the 1970s material discovered by Shlomo Pines) and hence they may have changed their minds. If you recall I joked that Bruce needed to contact Arthur Drews through a channel to see what he thought now in view of modern scholarship...

Most of Bruce's sources are either vague, self-published or predate the Model-T. Way to go WP:RS... History2007 (talk) 00:23, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I should note that I advised Bruce on his talk page to avoid self-published sources and the "amateur research community" and someone else (John Carter) mentioned there that they have had similar issues. Given this deletion, Bruce is aware of that. I asked him to remove the self-published source he had added. History2007 (talk) 00:48, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

"The Bible uses the term "christ" or "messiah" for a variety of figures, including all of the high priests and kings of ancient Israel." (Wright, Stuart A. (1995) Armageddon in Waco University of Chicago Press pg 296)

(regarding Eusebius) "In a characteristic typological reading he asserts that Moses himself was the first to recognize the glory of the name of Christ because he applied this title (in Greek as in the Hebrew, mashiah means simply "the anointed one") to the High Priest." (Yerushalmi, Yosef Hayim (1993) Freud's Moses Yale University Press pg 91

Marshall D. Johnson's 1989 The Purpose of the Biblical Genealogies Cambridge University press ISBN:9780521356442 pg 120 on gives a nice outline of the problem in OT regarding the term messiah in the classic sense and in its more modern reading.

Here we have TWO MODERN UNIVERSITY PRESS books that show that "christ" could and was used in reference to high priests and a third that explains what is going on in the OT. All the old material shows is this connection has been around for a ridiculous long time. As for the self published they seem to be going 'ok you accept a possible christ-high priest connection over here but why are you ignoring it with regards to Josephus'? It is a kind of elephant in the room when you sit down and think about it.--BruceGrubb (talk) 01:30, 2 May 2012 (UTC).

Step 1: You remove the self-published item you added Bruce, then we see what remains. History2007 (talk) 01:37, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Beyond that, the author of Freud's Moses is clearly making a gigantic, and incorrect, leap. Of course the High Priest was called the "anointed" - he was ANOINTED as the priest just as many pastors or lay people today are "anointed" physically when they take their position. Beyond that, 1) the word quoted above, "Mashiah", means simply "anointed" and nothing more, 2) conversely, "ANOINTED ONE" in Hebrew is Ha-Mashiach, and 3) besides that, Jesus Christ in Hebrew is Yeshua Hamashiach. All these words come from the root verb "mashach" which means "to anoint". So clearly Bruce's author is VERY wrong. If the book can't cover the topic correctly, I'm not sure why it should be considered anything more than fringe. Ckruschke (talk) 19:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)Ckruschke

In any case, those types of issues are now being discussed at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#Requesting_a_topic_ban_for_User:BruceGrubb regarding Bruce's use of self published sources, original research, etc. History2007 (talk) 19:20, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I have now read Mason, and while I thought History2007's scorn undue before, I now understand his reasoning. BruceGrubb ist twisting Mason's points beyond recognition. The passage about the word "Christ" that he cited is indeed from Mason, but it's not about the James passage at all but about the Testimonium Flavionum, where Mason argues that Josephus usually explains Jewish terminology to his readers; that he doesn't do so in that case is an indication that someone tampered with Josephus' words. Mason explicitly says that the use of "Christ" in the James passage does not offer the same problem; it's a nickname by which the relevant Jesus can be identified. I haven't seen Mason mention Jesus son of Damneus at all; he shows no doubt whatsoever that the James passage indeed refers to the Biblical Jesus. From what I infer from Mason (though he does not explicitly say so because he does not even mention it), he would strongly disagree with the "son of Damneus" theory, for the following reasons: Firstly, if in that context "christ" were to denote a high priest, we would once again be lacking Josephus' usual explanation of Jewish customs for his non-Jewish readers. We know that Jewish high priests were anointed; I doubt that would have been common knowledge among Romans - at least not more so here than for the Testimonium. Secondly, if "son of Damneus" and "Christ" are both nicknames used to uniquely identify the same Jesus, it would be counterproductive to alternate using them. To me it seems much more likely that Josephus would refer to James as another son of Damneus than to refer to him as the brother of a Jesus who was called christ except that Josephus doesn't call him christ when he speaks of him.

As an aside, Mason also mentions the idea that James wasn't really Jesus' brother and that it might be a figurative meaning, just to dismiss it with prejudice.

In summary, Mason is used out of context to support a position he does not hold (and which he would probably strongly disagree with), and he also contradicts one of our century-old references. This is original synthesis of the worst kind. Huon (talk) 20:20, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for the effort in reviewing the source and the information, which seems to confirm History2007's original statement. I am myself less concerned about his contradicting a centuries-old reference or two, because, well, some of them might have been rather less than biased themselves. But that in no way justifies an editor engaging in SYNTH to support a contention. John Carter (talk) 20:31, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

That Mason contradicts the 1912 scholarship is, in my book, a point against the 1912 scholarship, not against Mason. At the very least it does not inspire confidence that those old texts still are considered up to date and relevant. It is, of course, entirely independent of the "son of Damneus" issue. Huon (talk) 20:55, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Right, the other issue just comes from the blogs. And that is the insinuation in the way it is worded in the article now, as "amateur research". History2007 (talk) 21:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks Huon for looking into it. I guess one could have guessed it by the fact that "blog/amateur research" was always added as a vague qualifier, but in any case, now the "failed verification tag" can be justified after all. But the real test was the X=... Y=... Z =... question that never received a reply from Bruce regarding any other books that could confirm that. Equations do speak louder than words. But anyway, let us be done with this Marathon discussion of Mason. History2007 (talk) 20:49, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

In any case, the material is now again tagged as original research and failed verification. History2007 (talk) 10:18, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I will just note here that after a discussion at WP:AN, Bruce Grubb was topic banned from Christianity related articles, broadly construed, and hence should no longer edit this article. History2007 (talk) 18:54, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Under the circumstances, it would then be reasonable to remove any material that individual added to the article that failed verification and/or was tagged as OR. That editor obviously will not be able to return to the article in the light of the ban. John Carter (talk) 19:11, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

It is already tagged, and the original version sat there tagged for a long time anyway and no source was added. So, will do. History2007 (talk) 19:17, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I have removed all the original synthesis which was used to support the "son of Damneus" theory without actually mentioning Jesus the son of Damneus. Some rather ancient sources remain; I have no idea whether they are still state of the art (I rather doubt that) or whether they are fringe sources. Huon (talk) 19:23, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

They were Model-T era, outdated material. Some even predated the Model-T. I think we have already added all modern arguments against authenticity that we could find to that section. If these were still considered, they would have shown up in one the many books we searched and referenced. History2007 (talk) 19:26, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Self-published section on the Egyptian

A new section on the Egyptian was added in this edit by the author of a self-published book (Createspace) on that topic. It includes a passing reference to Evans' book, but I checked page 358 of Evans' book and that page does not refer to Josephus, it just discusses King of the Jews without relating it to Josephus. The entire section seems based on the self-published book and I have seen no modern and serious scholarship that supports those self-published claims. I tagged the section accordingly. History2007 (talk) 01:35, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, whoever posted the above is misinformed. The main quote of the section comes directly out of the Evans books. See "Jesus and His Contemporaries: Comparative Studies" By Craig A. Evans at page 75. You can read this specific page in books.google. Pray tell what self-published book are you referring to? Don't be cryptic. What book? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jjray7 (talk • contribs) 03:42, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

The self-published book I referred to, is of course your own book, on your own website, now reference 141 in the article. Is that not clear? That website and that book and all statements that are based on it are not WP:RS. Your next step is: delete that website because it can not be used in Wikipedia - rest assured that I am informed about the use of self-published books and websites. They can not be used. As an aside, your book seem to be subject to a simple application of WP:Fringe in that according to its summary it is "supporting a shocking theory, that Jesus was the grandson of both Herod the Great and the last Hasmonean king"... That is pure WP:Fringe and not in any way mainstream scholarship. I think you know that already. Once that reference is deleted, we will see how much of that section can be attributed to Evans. And as I said that page of Evans does not seem to mention Josephus. Now, please delete your own website reference, then we will talk further. History2007 (talk) 07:24, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

There is no reference to "the Egyptian" in Herodian Messiah. None. Here is my email address: jjray7 (at) gmail.com. Give me your smail address and I will send you a copy of the book so you may verify this for yourself. Every point in the section added to the wiki on "Josephus and Jesus" is easily defensible from the standpoint of history. Give me your objections to the entry as to where you think there has been a misstatement of fact in the entry as your claim that the entry relies entirely on a self-published book is completely erroneous. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jjray7 (talk • contribs) 12:17, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

History2007, I believe you confused Evans and Brandon in your comment: It's pages 77-78 of Evans, where he cites p. 358 of Brandon. Evans does mention Josephus in detail on pages 75-76 where he discusses the Egyptian, but Brandon's page 358 does not mention Josephus. Issues of self-published sources and WP:FRINGE aside, that section also strikes me as rather off-topic. This article is about Josephus on Jesus, and unless there is a reliable source claiming that Josephus meant Jesus when he wrote of the Egyptian (Brandon and Evans make no such claim), Josephus on the Egyptian is irrelevant to the article's topic. Huon (talk) 12:28, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Huon, the point is that several authors and scholars (I can list more if you like) have noticed the connection between Jesus as a messianic figure who performs miracles and other similar figures of the 1st century CE mentioned by Josephus. They do not say Jesus = 'the Egyptian', nor does the wiki entry make that claim, but their point is that the story of these individuals as found in Josephus help to give greater context in understanding the historical Jesus. Josephus gives the most detailed account of 'the Egyptian' out of the group. If you want this section moved to its own wiki entry, I'm fine with that.Jjray7 (talk) 13:42, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I did think he meant page 358 of Evans' book. I guess I misread that. But in view of the above that makes no difference to the irrelevance of this section within this article. So there are a few issues now:

• Why is the personal website of Jjray7 still sitting pretty in this article, given that no defense was provided against its being self-published. Jjray7 please either provide a statement as to why that is not a self-published website, or remove it before your next post here. Those types of self-published items may not be used as references unless they talk about themselves - which this does not.

• The parallels drawn between Jesus and other messianic figures are well known. But why bring it up in this page with these types of rock bottom references like Einhorn? That type of argument has been made by serious scholars such as Ulrich Luz and is a really, I mean really well known theological topic - which however, does not relate to this page.

• Regarding the valid question Huon raised: "Does Josephus say that Jesus was the Egyptian?" the answer is a solid "no". That section itself already says that according to Josephus the "Egyptian incident occurred while Antonius Felix was prefer of Judea, which is roughly 20 years too late to be Jesus." That statement is actually correct, yet unsourced again, and also irrelevant to this page given that Jesus is certainly not the Egyptian by any measure in any scholarly publications. Evans, for instance, specifically says (page 75) that the Egyptian was around the year 56, and given that elsewhere Evans says that Jesus died before the year 36, Evans does not equate Jesus and the Egyptian. Evans is a solid scholar, he would not make that kind of claim.

• The sourcing situation here is heading downhill pretty fast now. Apart from Jjray7's self-published website the source by Lena Einhorn is really not WP:RS on this topic, by any measure. Its summary says it is a book "written by a filmmaker, not a theologian". It is a non-scholarly book of almost no significance to modern scholarship. Jjray7, a frank question here: why not use books by serious scholars who teach at Harvard, Oxford and those types of places instead of Einhorn type references by film makers. These are not WP:RS and not encyclopedic. This new gem of a book you added claims that "Jesus and Paul were one and the same"! Hello? Are we in WP:Fringe territory yet?

I suggest that section should be removed from this article on multiple grounds of serious lack of relevance and promotion of fringe views. History2007 (talk) 15:06, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

History2007, you are entering into the territory of defamation. "This new gem of a book you added claims that "Jesus and Paul were one and the same"! Hello?" The book does not say that. That's another garbage statement. You have have already incorrectly disparaged me in two instances. Why you feel the need to rampage against a book not related to the post in question is beyond me. Again, I'll be happy to send you the book so at least your attacks can be accurately sourced. Jjray7 (talk) 17:22, 24 May 2012 (UTC)— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jjray7 (talk • contribs) 16:41, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

First of all, it's Einhorn's book which advances the hypothesis that Jesus and Paul are one and the same, and that indeed makes WP:FRINGE relevant. I don't think Einhorn, as a medical doctor and filmmaker, is an authority on 1st century historiography; therefore her work is hardly a reliable source on Josephus' writings on Jesus.

Secondly, while Einhorn's book does discuss other messianic figures of the 1st century, she does not do so in the context of Josephus' writings on Jesus; she does not allow us to draw parallels between Josephus' coverage of Jesus and of the Egyptian without engaging in original research.

Thirdly, the "Jesus as 'the Egyptian' of Josephus" website is indeed self-published; I don't see why it should be considered a reliable source.

Fourthly, as I said before, Brandon and Evans also do not bring up the Egyptian in connection with Josephus' writings on Jesus. We therefore do not have a single reliable source connecting the Egyptian to Josephus' writings on Jesus, and discussing the Egyptian in this article is either off-topic or original synthesis.

For these reasons I have reverted Jjray7's addition. Huon (talk) 17:17, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with that revert. History2007 (talk) 17:32, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I also consider the removal of the material to be completely justified. John Carter (talk) 23:59, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

"Origen may have seen a copy of the Testimonium and not commented on it for there was no need to complain about its tone"

Compare this with Fitzgerald;

"Origen in particular relied extensively on him; his own writings are filled with references to Josephus. But it is obvious Origen had never heard of the Testimonium.

When his skeptical Roman opponent Celsus asks what miracles Jesus performed, Origen answers that Jesus‘ life was indeed full of striking and miraculous events, “but from what other source can we can furnish an answer than from the Gospel narratives?” (Contra Celsum, 2:33) In the same book (1.47), Origen even quoted from Antiquities of the Jews in order to prove the historical existence of John the Baptist, then adds that Josephus didn’t believe in Jesus, and criticizes Josephus for failing to mention Jesus in that book!

And no one else seems to have heard of the Testimonium for 300 years either – It is never quoted until the 4th century, when the notorious Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea begins quoting it repeatedly. And where did Eusebius get his copy of Antiquities of the Jews? He inherited it from his master… who inherited it from Origen! No matter how you slice it, the Testimonium sticks out like the complete fraud it is."

If Fitzgerald is accurate then this argument appears highly notable and necessary to include in the article. Hopefully this is a new development in the field. If not I'd ask what other salient research is not mentioned in this article. 124.148.164.7 (talk) 16:27, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I assume you refer to this essay by this David Fitzgerald. Is that so? If so, where was that essay published? His book was self-published by Lulu, so the book can not be used, FYI. History2007 (talk) 16:42, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Agree with History2007. I would ask the IP to read WP:SPS. While it is in some rare cases possible to use self-published sources, such as those volumes published by Lulu, it is extremely rare that we would do so, and then only in rather unusual circumstances. The one exception I can think of is when Lulu published the three books of the Meqabyan in English translation a few years ago. I think it might not be unreasonable to include a few quotes from that book in our article Meqabyan, particularly if there might be a dearth of other recent translations and if, perhaps, the translation has received some approval from the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. But except in very rare cases similar to that, the opinions of self-published authors and their works do not meet wikipedia policies and guidelines, including WP:SPS, WP:WEIGHT, WP:RS, and the like. John Carter (talk) 18:54, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, that is a correct arguument for excluding Fitzgerald. I really did not even want to spend keystokes talking about Fitzgerald, but now that we are discussing him, I would mention that Fitzgerald does not bring anything new to the party - it is a rehash of previously published items. The article already includes the statement: "although twelve Christian authors refer to Josephus before Eusebius in 324 AD, none mentions the Testimonium. Given earlier debates by Christian authors about the existence of Jesus, e.g. in Justin Martyr's 2nd century Dialogue with Trypho, it would have been expected that the passage from Josephus would have been used as a component of the arguments." in the External Arguments section. So IP 24.148/etc. you can stop wondering about "missing salient research" - believe me, we have researched this topic. History2007 (talk) 21:17, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

All substantial points conceded. Yes thats the Fitzgerald. "Origen (Contra Celsum 1.47 and Commentary on Matthew 10.17), who certainly knew Book 18 of the Antiquities and cites five passages from it, explicitly states that Josephus did not believe in Jesus as Christ." Feldman (William Harbury et al., ed., The Cambridge History of Judaism vol. 3 (1999) pp. 911 - 912) Origen "knew Book 18" and explicitly stated "that Josephus did not believe in Jesus as Christ". However Goldberg proposes the original read perhaps "They reported he appeared to them spending a third day alive again, and accordingly, that he was perhaps the Messiah, ...". This allows for Origin's version to show disbelief in Christ and for a later version to be "changed" to have Josephus personally identifying Jesus as the Christ.

You are all doing a pretty good job at something that WP usually fails dismally at - controversial history. Well done. 124.148.164.7 (talk) 01:28, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. As an aside the fact that Josephus did not consider Jesus to be Christ points to authenticity, for an interpolating monk would have been laudatory, as the references state. Anyway, do believe me that all of this started because some IP in Kansas complained about one quote in this page, and we all went down this road via the Wiki-butterfly effect... And the IP in Kansas has not been heard of since....History2007 (talk) 02:56, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Overbearing Christian Propaganda?

Wow! History reveals that ancient Christian scribes and aspiring authors thought nothing of fabricating spurious articles promoting Christendom (e.g., the Acts of Paul and Thecla, which included a talking lion who needed to be saved), and it is painfully obvious that the normally long-winded Josephus -- who used up five times as much space to recount the seduction of the beautiful Paulina -- could not possibly have written the modern-day "Testimonium Flavianum." But despite its having been forced in there with a shoe-horn, we are supposed to believe that Josephus would have devoted only the equivalent of three English sentences to any topic, to say nothing of what, if true, would be the most momentous event in recorded history? Res ipsa loquitur!

The intro to this topic is egregiously over-sold, and probably by the intellectual equivalent of the guy who wears the multi-colored wig and paints John 3:16 on his chest and stands in the end zone of football games. I would suggest something more neutral, such as this:

"Modern scholars generally regard the oblique Josephun reference to Jesus in The Jewish War as probably authentic, as contrasted to the more famous Testimonium Flavianum of Antiquities of the Jews, widely suspected as having been tampered with or even fabricated by an over-zealous Christian copyist."

If it is to be seen as credible, Wikipedia cannot be an appropriate forum for proselytization, whereas the more zealous Christians see the bathroom as a proper forum for same. Let the clash of argument in the body of the article speak for itself. Bouldergeist (talk) 17:35, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Our coverage of the Testimonium Flavianum in the lead is well-supported by academic sources and I believe it does a good job in summarizing the academic consensus while acknowledging that the consensus is hardly unanimous. It also seems more neutral to me than the loaded terms "tampered" or "over-zealous". As an aside, I doubt Josephus, if he wrote a nucleus for the Testimonium, would have considered the event anything but the execution of a minor troublemaker. As a further aside, what do you mean by the "oblique reference in The Jewish War"? Huon (talk) 17:57, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

I think what "the oblique Josephun reference to Jesus in The Jewish War" means is that Bouldergeist is confused about the issues and thinks it was in the Jewish War. There is no reference to Jesus in the Jewish War, of course. And the last section of the article has a detailed discussion of just that! And the scholars who argue for authenticity and are cited in the article include Geza Vermes, Louis Feldman, Zvi Baras, etc. None of them is Christian. So that point is also moot. History2007 (talk) 18:08, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Geza Vermes was a Roman Catholic priest! Maddy O'Hair, he was not. And yes, I mis-spoke, and stand corrected.

Still, I blanch at the word "overwhelming," and "and to have the highest level of authenticity among the references of Josephus to Christianity." As there are only two purported references and the "Testimonium" is of highly dubious authenticity, it appears on its face to be an attempt to mislead. Bouldergeist (talk) 15:03, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Geza Vermes gave up Christianity in 1957. What I said was that he is not a Christian. And that is correct. So he can not be considered a Christian scholar given that he specifically left the Church. And needless to say, the dean of the Josephan scholars, i.e. Louis Feldman is also not a Christian. So your point is moot, as I said. But he is a respected scholar. The term "overwhelming" is supported by the article, of course if only you read it. E.g. "According to Robert E. Van Voorst the overwhelming majority of scholars consider both the reference to "the brother of Jesus called Christ" and the entire passage that includes it as authentic." Baukham also states: "the vast majority have considered it to be authentic". Feldman's states that "few have doubted the genuineness of this passage", etc. I will add that to the reference anyway, to address future questions. As for your "it appears on its face to be an attempt to mislead", you just breached WP:AGF. So stop that. History2007 (talk) 15:16, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

I would be very surprised if many (if any) of the editors who have worked on this article have a strong (if any) Christian bias. I am surprised by these repeated interventions from editors claiming the article promotes a Christian POV, since it fairly lays out the mainstream scholarly position and notes the discomfiture of Christian apologists who endeavoured to interpolate references to the divinity of Christ in later transmissions. History2007, I admire your perseverance and patience in explaining all this, over and over again.... Eusebeus (talk) 05:56, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Actually as the "oblique Josephun reference to Jesus in The Jewish War" comment that started it indicated, some of these comments are made without reading the article or studying the subject. However, they do, in a way, help avoid future comments, e.g. reference 7 in the article (added as a response) now has a summary of the statements, so it may avoid a similar comment later, or if a similar comment is made again, one can just point to reference 7 without undue debate. We should, however, look for a source that says Vermes, Feldman, Baras, Setzer, etc. are not "biased Christian scholars" and somehow add that somewhere. But I am not sure how. In fact I am only guessing that Zvi Baras is a Jewish scholar, given that he has no Wikipage, and that type of item if we figure out how to add it will avoid these types of WP:I just don't like it comments that may be made without reading the article. History2007 (talk) 14:01, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

I don't think a reference on the lack of bias would help. Firstly, it's rather off-topic for this article, and secondly, I expect that whoever attests their lack of bias would just be accused of bias himself. (I recently happened upon Richard Carrier endorsing Robert E. Van Voorst on non-Biblical sources for Jesus, and Carrier is probably as safe from accusations of pro-Christian bias as one can be, but unfortunately that's not a reliable source but just a blog post, and I'm not sure how much of an expert Carrier himself is. As a further aside, I was amused to note that Carrier linked to this very article without criticizing it - he seemed to have no problems with its "overbearing Christian propaganda".) Huon (talk) 15:00, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, Carrier is not a WP:RS source in general, for his own material does not usually get published in scholarly journals. However, he is the standard bearer for a few of the atheist groups. His endorsement of Van Voorst does not, therefore, go far in academia. But as you said, it may be an amusing intuitive marker that the accusations of bias here are not justified. In fact, this article ended up drawing on so many sources (as shown in the detailed arguments section) that it is a comprehensive review now, and has addressed what scholars at large have agreed on. History2007 (talk) 15:42, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Just because Josephus spent a lot of time on Paulina doesn't mean he has to spend as much on everything else. For example, he spends about the same amount of time talking about John the Baptist whom he notes was very famous in his (John the Baptist's) day. And for Josephus, Jesus would not have seemed like a world-changing event, nor would he have liked to admit of Christianity as one even with the popularity it had (which wasn't as much as the next century). And the Acts of Paul and Thecla: 1) were not meant to be taken as history by the author but instructional like the Shepherd of Hermas, and 2) do not prove that the entire Testimonium Flavianum (and the James reference) are a forgery. The only overzealous one seems to be you.

Jesus son of Damnaeus

For the record I wanted to clarify a few things here. The scholars you used History2007 are references to the passage of James the brother of Jesus which only mentions Jesus supposedly as "the brother of called Christ." Now while my opinion aside here, this is not referring to the Testimonium Flavianum. Now passage mentioning Jesus in the Jewish War is actually the Slavonic Version of the Testimonium, which suffice to say is covered in the article and no one regards as authentic. However I wanna point out to people that if looked at the entire paragraph for which Josephus gives and the Jesus he mentions after is actually a Jesus son of Damnaeus because in all honesty, he makes no differentiation between the Jesus of the Testimonium Flavianum and Jesus son of Damnaeus. Now of course I have gone through much of the scholastic literature and nobody ever even bothers to engage in this criticism (those arguing for authenticity). I just wanted to put forth this ahead and wonder if anyone could find this argument in the scholastic literature and then add it. But I see nothing regarding Christian apologetics in this article and I see it as a fairly good review of the subject.Reason and Logic shall always prevail (talk) 23:32, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, but: Huh? I just skimmed our coverage of the Testimonium, and it relies heavily on Feldman, Baras and Vermes, just as History2007 said. I also remember a discussion with User:BruceGrubb on the Damneus line of reasoning; compare for example Talk:Josephus on Jesus/Archive 6#Another source, Talk:Josephus on Jesus/Archive 6#Testpage and Explanation requested from Bruce Grubb still on this page. The short version is that the Damneus theory has not been seriously proposed for about a century; therefore no modern scholar bothers with explicitly rejecting it, either. Furthermore, Feldman argues that the "Jesus who was called Christ" in the James passage refers to the Jesus of the Testimonium (who certainly isn't the "son of Damneus" Jesus), thereby implicitly rejecting the Damneus hypothesis. Huon (talk) 00:27, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

The son of Damnaeus issue is already dealt with in the article: "The works of Josephus refer to at least twenty different people with the name Jesus, and in chapter 9 of Book 20, there is also a reference to Jesus son of Damneus who was a High Priest of Israel but is distinct from the reference to "Jesus called Christ" mentioned along with the identification of James." And the Slavonic Version is of no value whatsoever, as the article states. These issues are already handled in the article. History2007 (talk) 08:50, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you all for pointing that out. My point for bringing the whole "Son of Damnaeus" issue up was to express my own personal thought on the matter. I also never did see it in the article in the past so I assumed nobody added it. But apparently I was wrong, thanks for that History2007. Huon, thanks for clearing that up for me on the discussions being had about the issue of the "son of Damnaeus" argument, do you know of any literature that actually deals with why they don't buy it or is that within the discussion as well? I ask for my own personal reasons and not because I plan to add this to wikipedia. Reason and Logic shall always prevail (talk) 04:36, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

Given that it is for your own personal interest, I can give you a few reasons, having thought about it after those discussions. As Huon said, several scholars such as Feldman see the reference in Book 20 as the 2nd reference and the TF reference in Book 18 as the first reference to "Jesus called Christ". Given that according to the TF the Jesus called Christ was crucified under Pilate who certainly lost power in the year AD 36 (and Feldman and others view the crucifixion reference in the TF as authentic) then the Jesus called Christ could not be walking around some 25-30 years later at the time of Albinus around AD 62-69, etc. and become the High Priest of Israel. So that is already implied by Feldman's reasoning and would make the equality of the two Jesus references as called Christ and son of Damnaeus impossible. The other reason (and there are sources for this on its own, but does not relate to here) it is clear from Josephus that Ananus (who killed James) continued to bribe Jesus the son of Damnaeus as well as Albinus to look the other way as he continued to plunder and add to his own wealth. You do not try to curry favor with the High Priest of Israel if you have just killed his brother! Thirdly, from an overall historical perspective, it is well known from other Roman sources distinct from Josephus that by around AD 60 there was a noticeable "Christian community" within Rome itself which could be distinguished from Jews and the Romans saw them as distinct. These people could not possibly be the followers of Jesus the son of Damnaeus, the high Priest of Israel around the same time in the 60s. And the list of problems with the assertion of that equality goes on and on once you think about it and dig into it. However, there is a clear WP:RS source that the two are distinct and that is enough for the article, and the rest is really beside the point here. So I will stop. History2007 (talk) 07:25, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

Unlike History2007 I'm no expert on the subject, so take everything I say and don't back up with a reference with a grain of salt, but I believe there are additional problems with the identification of "Jesus who was called Christ" with "Jesus son of Damneus" I inferred from my reading of Mason (though Mason does not explicitly mention the "son of Damneus"): Firstly, Josephus needs to add nicknames or descriptions to his Jesuses to disambiguate them because there are several, not just these two. Referring to the same Jesus by two different nicknames would be counterproductive. Secondly, Josephus tends to explain Jewish cultural background to his Roman readers. If "who was called Christ" referred to the son of Damneus' office as High Priest, Josephus would likely have added an explanation to that effect. If it's just an identifying nickname, no such explanation is necessary. So even if we're willing to ignore the Testimonium and to believe that James' brother didn't care about James' execution, James' brother is still unlikely to have been the son of Damneus. Huon (talk) 10:33, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

Those two are "internal arguments" that are also logical. What I had provided above were "external arguments" that relate to other sources and timelines. So one can even separate these arguments The question of Josephus having a Roman audience (as well as a partial Jewish audience) is addressed also in Mason's other book written with Edmondson: "Flavius Josephus And Flavian Rome" as well as elsewhere such as in Van Voorst. Anyway, once it is carefully explored, there are really multiple reasons (both internal Josephan arguments and external items) why Jesus the son of Damnaeus is certainly not the one called Christ whose brother James was killed by Ananus in the 60s. In fact it would be quite illogical for the two to be the same, as explained above. And there is really more and more, but we have said enough, yet I should probably mention that the existence of a "Christian community" before AD 60 continues to be reconfirmed, e.g. by the 20th century discovery of the Delphi Inscription which further establishes the Chronology of Paul and the existence of an early Christian community in the AD 50s. Hence the historical timelines for the equality of these two references to Jesus, one as called Christ, the other the High Priest of Israel in the 60s are far apart. But I think we have said enough on this now, and the article has a reference that says they are different people, as does the Wiki page on Jesus son Damnaeus. And I just looked again and Painter's book also says the two are different, so I added that reference too, so it should be clear now. History2007 (talk)

In this article the outright lie claiming "...highest level of authenticity among the references of Josephus to Christianity" is thoroughly dishonest, and obviously the wishful thinking of some Christian WP editor. Someone please answer this: How does reference to "Jesus son of Damneus" relate to Christianity in any way? Is Jesus son of Damneus in the Bible? (Answer: NO.) It only shows -- if the "christ" claim was in fact original -- that many men of the time were referred to as the Hebrew messiah. Please make this article honest on the subject. 98.117.215.225 (talk) 00:17, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

That "outright lie" is sourced to Feldman&Hata, Van Voorst and others, all of whom agree the passage is authentic, and for all I can tell, none of them consider it a reference to Jesus son of Damneus. In fact, the "son of Damnenus" theory is a fringe theory that most of them probably don't discuss at all (Feldman&Hata, for example, don't even mention Damneus once in their entire work). So in summary multiple reliable sources (including sources by non-Christian authors) agree that the "christ" claim was in fact original, that it refers to the Biblical Jesus, and even declare that the academic consensus. That's what we report. How would introducing unsourced fringe theories make the article more honest? Huon (talk) 01:27, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

The lie comment does not even deserve an answer, of course. But the comment that Josephus did not refer to Christianity is just uninformed, given the "And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day" in Book 18. And the reference to the death of James is a clear reference to early Christianity given that James was involved in the early Church in Jerusalem. As for info in Josephus not being in the Bible, well that is the whole point. Josephus is an independent, non-Christian source. History2007 (talk) 07:18, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

Please read the entire paragraph in Josephus, Book XX, 9:1, which ends "when he had ruled but three months, and made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest." Josephus is talking about Jesus SON OF DAMNEUS in this paragraph (who also happened to have a brother named James), not Jesus son of Joseph and Mary. And you cite Van Voorst as valid reference? Van Voorst is a professor at Western Theological Seminary which is affiliated with the Reformed Church in America. Tell me his opinion is unbiased and freethinking. Strobel is no better. You might want to read Robert Price and Bart Ehrman instead. And User Huon, how can you call Jesus son of Damneus "a fringe theory" when it's right there in Josephus? Geĸrίtzl (talk) 21:26, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

No one disputes Jesus the son of Damneus is mentioned by Josephus, but is the son of Damneus the same Jesus as the one who is called Christ? Please present reliable sources that say James' brother Jesus who was called Christ is Jesus the son of Damneus. I'm not aware of any written in the last 60 years or so. Unless you can do so, it seems a fringe theory because no one has proposed it for more than half a century, with multiple authors claiming James' brother is the Biblical Jesus and thereby rejecting the "son of Damneus" theory.

Regarding Van Voorst: I'm aware of his employer. I'm also aware he's a highly acclaimed academic whose work has been praised across the board; he has even received an endorsement from atheist and mythicist Richard Carrier. So apparently even those who disagree with him accept him as a knowledgeable scholar. We currently don't cite Price or Ehrman, and for all I heard Price is a little dubious - what work by Ehrman on this topic do you suggest? By the way, we also cite Louis Feldman on the James passage, and he's hardly a die-hard Christian apologist. We don't cite Strobel at all. Huon (talk) 21:58, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Actually any attempt by a Wikipedia user to read Josephus and interpret it is WP:OR as has been discussed for ever. In fact, this dammned issue has been discussed on this talk page for ever and a day. If you look through the archives (and in fact also a couple of thread above here) you will see that User:BruceGrubb discussed it for a long time and in the end no references to support the theory could be found beyond a blog. And the way you would know Damneus is a fringe theory is that multiple references (including Louis Feldman who is no apologist) state that the overwhelming majority of scholars hold that the reference is to Jesus of Nazareth. So the reverse is far out fringe. This has been discussed again, and again and again on this talk page. History2007 (talk) 07:17, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

You've got to love the selective skepticism of atheists. 184.153.187.119 (talk) 03:21, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Some atheists perhaps, but others find embarrassing these "make Jesus disappear" fringe theories. --Pekoebrew (talk) 06:29, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

In any case, what people may personally think either way is a WP:Forum issue and not really related to Wikipedia article. History2007 (talk) 09:13, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Agreed; this entire little block can go away, as far as I'm concerned. By the way, your efforts on this article are top-notch and appreciated. --Pekoebrew (talk) 19:18, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. History2007 (talk) 19:28, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Josephus on James different from the New Testament?

"Some of the arguments for and against the authenticity of the James passage revolve around the similarities and differences between the accounts of Josephus, Origen, Eusebius and the New Testament. Although Josephus' account of the method of death of James differs from that of the New Testament, this is seen as an indication that the Josephus account is not a Christian interpolation."

The Wikipedia article seems to think that the James killed in Acts 12:2 is the same as the one talked about by Josephus. But in Acts, it is James, brother of John, the son of Zebedee that is killed, whereas Josephus talks about James, brother of Jesus. The two are not the same. Can this error be corrected? Cornelius (talk) 09:10, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

This article links to James the Just, and says it is most likely him that Josephus refers to, because that is what the sources say. It does not refer to James, son of Zebedee. The fact that it should have said "Christian tradition" instead of NT was discussed on talk before, was supposed to have been corrected and was forgotten. I fixed it now. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 09:51, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Hyperbolic language

This article has clearly been written by Christians with an agenda. Historians and scientists do not use terms like "The overwhelming majority," or "Almost all" when discussing the acceptance of certain facts. It is widely known that many of the writings attributed to Josephus regarding Jesus were plagiarized, being added in later to lend credibility to a historical Jesus. References to Christian historians with an agenda are not evidence of fact — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sheldon W. Helms (talk • contribs) 17:11, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Actually your "widely known" statement is the hyperbole, also shows misunderstanding of the word "plagiarized". The mainstream view is that Josephus' primary reference to Jesus (the "Testimonium") was a Christian alteration of a Josephus original. That it was entirely made up is a fringe theory, mostly promoted by those whose agenda is to make Jesus disappear from history. By the way, this is an atheist telling you this. --Pekoebrew (talk) 23:23, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

I agree completely with Sheldon W. Helms. This article is hyperbole and thoroughly dishonest, taking Van Voorst and foisting it even beyond that apologist's claims. Shame. And just sickening. Geĸrίtzl (talk) 01:11, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Your personal feelings are your own, of course. But personal feelings are not policy-based. Whatever is discussed needs to follow Wiki-policy. Do you have a large number of scholars who disagree with Van Voorst, Feldman, etc. If so, let us see their books, their scholarly background etc. But please do note that blogs, etc. are not applicable, per Wikipedia policy. You need WP:RS sources for your statements. And please also note that there is a long section on arguments that challenge authenticity. Before presenting your sources do make sure they are not already there in the article. And please note that over 6 weeks ago (19 Oct 2012) you made a statement on this talk page about Jesus son of Damneus and were asked about your sources. But you have presented no sources yet. Sources can be discussed of course in a policy-based context, but I am not sure what can be done with personal opinions. History2007 (talk) 01:31, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Van Voorst is clearly a reliable source. Gekritzl, if you have any doubts in that regard, feel free to raise the issue at the reliable sources noticeboard, but sincle he's a scholar publishing with reputable publishers, they'll only confirm his relaibility. For what it's worth, even Richard Carrier endorses Van Voorst despite disagreeing with his conclusions. For "dishonest" I'd like a more thorough explanation. Where exactly are we "foisting" something beyond Van Voorst's claims? Huon (talk) 01:30, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

If we had a penny every time Van Voorst, Feldman etc. were discussed on WP:RSN. They have been there time after time and passed again and again. And as you said Louis Feldman is not a Christian and is considered the leading Josephan expert and he agrees with Van Voorst. Claudia Setzer is also non-Christian and she says the same. The fact is that this has been discussed again and again and again. History2007 (talk) 01:34, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Have you checked what exactly Van Voorst, our source for the "overwhelming majority", says on p. 83 of his book? We cite Bauckham: "[T]he vast majority have considered it to be authentic" - is that citation wrong? And we cite Louis Feldman, who is not just a scholar but pretty safe from accusations of Christian bias as saying that authenticity of the James passage has been "almost universally acknowledged" - again, do we misquote or quotemine him? If it's widely known that the Josephus' writings on Jesus were plagiarized, please present a reliable source that says so - not just that they were plagiarized, but that the fact is widely known and accepted. Otherwise, Wikipedia aims for verifiability, not truth. Huon (talk) 18:50, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

And I think Shel needs to read the unending talk page archives too... This has been discussed by multiple users with respect to WP:RS/AC, etc. and that statement has been affirmed. By the way, plagiarized would not have been the right word anyway, it would need to be interpolated. But I think I know what he is trying to say. In any case, no WP:RS sources for his statement. History2007 (talk) 19:17, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Sheldon and Gekritzl. Van Voorst and Louis Feldman's hyperbolic statements should not be used. Just present the facts. Merigar (talk) 18:21, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

And what would the "facts" be? And who determines them? FYI, per WP:V Wikipedia does not use "facts" but WP:RS references. These are scholars in the field, Louis Feldman being the leading Josephan scholar, and their statements are fully usable in Wikipedia. This is a straightforward, policy based issue, not a question of editor opinion of facts. History2007 (talk) 19:33, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

FAQ link

I think it would be a good idea to have a FAQ link at the end of this page that leads to past talk discussions, so new readers can see those with greater ease. History2007 (talk) 20:12, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

I'd second that. The debate about this subject is in many ways more interesting than the subject itself.NBeddoe (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:05, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Done now. But the idea of FAQs is to answer questions beforehand, to save time on debate. History2007 (talk) 17:36, 12 May 2013 (UTC)