3. What are these “events” that did not make it into the Bible?  Are you talking about documents such as the Gospel of Thomas or the “Gospel” of Judas or the dozens of other gnostic works from the second and third century?   Sure, there are bizarre things in there like Jesus as a baby talking or turning clay birds into living birds.  The early church never accepted this stuff.  Period.  What is interesting is even the gnostics who listed the books of the Bible did not have the nerve to put the Gospel of Thomas on their list.  For example there is the Muratorian fragment–a list from the second century by a Gnostic false teacher who was rejected by every single important church father.  Even this guy did not include any of these other supposed “gospels” in his list.  Even the Gnostics did not have the nerve to try to claim that their documents belonged in the New Testament canon for good reason.  I challenge anyone to produce a single document from anyone in the first thousand years of the church who included any of these gnostic works in their canon of scripture.  There is literally zero evidence to support the contention that the mainstream Church accepted this stuff.  If there were any evidence of this, I am sure I would have seen it by now.  What we have is works like Against Heresies by Irenaeus in the late second century in which he calls out many of the false teachers, mentioning some of their heretical writings (including Judas, Thomas) and explaining why these books were heretical.

Besides, none of these false writings were even written until the mid second century.  There is no reasonable scenario by which a reasonable person would accept that these documents, including their false accounts of miracles, are valid or reliable.  They did not confuse the early church and they should not confuse anyone now if they are thinking clearly about the evidence.

By the way, there is no story, even in the heretical documents, of Jesus slaying children.  You should check out your facts.

4. Anyone who makes this statement has obviously not looked at the evidence.  If you would say that we have a fairly limited amount of relevant material from non-Christian sources, then your statement would be something we could take seriously.  Besides, the statement assumes that Christians–including those who knew Jesus and those who knew those who knew Jesus are to be totally discounted.  This idea is ridiculous.  So, we are saying that just because someone is a Christian, their testimony is completely irrelevant?  But never mind that, here are some of the quotes from early writers about Christianity concerning the Church, Chrisitans, and Christ. Is there any reason to believe Luke is lying?  Is there any reason to believe very early church fathers such as Papias were lying?  What is the reason to believe that they were lying?   I will admit that the sources are not vast, but there certainly are several.

1. Tacitus, Roman historian  (AD 56-118)(about AD 115 concerning Nero in AD 64);

Not all the relief that could come from the man, not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the gods, availed to relieve Nero from the infamy of bbeing believed to have ordered the conflagration, the fire of Rome.  Therefore, to squelch the rumor, Nero created scapegoats and subjected to the most refined tortures those whom the common people called ‘Christians,’ [a group] hated for their abominable crimes.  Their name comes from Christ, who, during the reign of Tiberius, had been executed by the procurator Pontius Pilate.  Suppressed for the moment, the deadly superstition broke out again, not only in Judea, the land which originated this evil, but also in the city of Rome, where all sorts of horrendous and shameful practices, from every part of the world converge and are fervently cultivated.

Annals 15.4

(note:  Tacitus has it wrong.  He was prefect, not a procurator acc to the Pilate inscription from Caesarea Maritima.  Also note:  The Annals have lost the years 29-32 which most likely also mention Jesus as this passage seems to look back to his earlier mention of Jesus)

Tacitus probably reports from second hand information regarding Christians in Rome and in Asia Minor where he served AD 112

2.  Flavius Josephus (AD 38-100) Writing about AD 94 under Domitian.  Concerning events he had indirect knowledge of.  Josephus was a Pharisee.  Jewish historian who was a turncoat, switching from the Jewish rebel side to Rome to serve under Nero and Vespasian.  Josephus is a relatively reliable historian.

The “Testimonium Flavium” (Antiquities 18:3.3)

About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man.  For he was one who wrought surprising feats and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly.  He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks.  He was the Messiah.  When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of the highest standing amongst us, had condemned him to be crucified, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him.  On the third day he appeared to them restored to life, for the prophets of God had prophesied these and countless other marvelous things about him.  And the tribe of Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared.

Agapius, an Arab Christian in 9^th century probably quotes the original, leaving out the parts in parenthesis.  Note the passage reads grammatically well without the parts in parenthesis.

There is little doubt that Josephus wrote the passage as it presents Jesus in a light Christians would never accept.

Note:  Josephus also reports the martyrdom of “James, the brother of Jesus who was called the Christ”   (Antiquities 20:20)

3.  Babylonian Talmud  (late first or second century AD)  Babylonian Sanhedrin43a-b

On the eve of the Passover they hanged Yeshu and the herald went before him for forty days saying [Yeshu] is going forth to be stoned in that he hate practiced sorcery and beguiled and led astray Israel

It is taught: On the eve of Passover they hung Yeshu and the crier went forth for forty days beforehand declaring that “[Yeshu] is going to be stoned for practicing witchcraft, for enticing and leading Israel astray. Anyone who knows something to clear him should come forth and exonerate him.” But no one had anything exonerating for him and they hung him on the eve of Passover. Ulla said: Would one think that we should look for exonerating evidence for him? He was an enticer and G-d said (Deuteronomy 13:9) “Show him no pity or compassion, and do not shield him.” Yeshu was different because he was close to the government

Here Jesus is accused of sorcery, in obvious parallel with the charge leveled in Matthew 12:22-23.

    Babylonian Sanhedrin107b  Jesus practiced magic.   tHul2:22-23  Healings done in the name of Jesus.

So we have confirmation of the crucifixion of Jesus and indirect confirmation of his working of public miracles—only charging that the miracles were worked by Satan, not God.

4. Seutonius about AD 120  Very reliable historian wrote concerning the times of Claudius about AD 50

“As the Jews were making constant disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he Claudius) expelled them from Rome”

5.  Lucian of Samosata  Social commentator and critic of Christianity

The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day—the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account…  You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains the contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and life after his laws.        (Lucian The Death of Peregrine 11-13)

6.  Pliny the Younger  AD 112  Writing to Emperor Trajan.

Those who denied that they were or had been Christians, when they invoked the gods in words dictated by me, offered prayer with incense and wine to your image, which I had ordered to be brought for this purpose together with statues of the gods, and moreover cursed Christ — none of which those who are really Christians, it is said, can be forced to do — these I thought should be discharged. Others named by the informer declared that they were Christians, but then denied it, asserting that they had been but had ceased to be, some three years before, others many years, some as much as twenty-five years. They all worshiped your image and the statues of the gods, and cursed Christ

7.  Celsus  (mentioned in Origen Contra Celsus 1:38 and 2:48).   A Greek philosopher and bitter critic of Christianity.  He accepted that Jesus worked miracles, but contended that he did so by the power of Satan.

8.  Mara bar Sarapion

The pagan philosopher Mara bar Sarapion wrote a letter to his son in which he mentions Jesus as the wise king of the Jews. Mara was a Syrian Stoic.  In the late first century he describes the fall of Jerusalem as the gods’ punishment for the Jews having killed Jesus. Mara includes Jesus as one of three wise men, along with Socrates and Pythagoras, who were killed and whose deaths were met with divine retaliation. Jesus is not named in the letter but referred to as the Jews’ “wise king.” Mara refers to Jesus as primarily a lawgiver, with no mention of his resurrection.

9.  Thallus  We know of Thallus only from a third century Christian historian named Julius Africanus.  Thallus wrote a three-volume treatise of world history in the 50s AD.  In discussing the darkness at the time of the resurrection of Jesus, Julius Africanus mentions that in the 3^rd book of Thallus’ history, he mentions the darkness and calls it an eclipse of the sun.  Africanus believes that Thallus is wrong—that there was no eclipse at that time.  Whether or not this source proves the darkness at the time of Jesus’ crucifixion is debatable, but it does support the idea that even non-Christians were aware of the resurrection as early as the 50s AD—at about the time the first book of the NT was written.  It also supports the claim, not necessarily of the darkness having occurred, but of the darkness having been claimed and believed by the Christians. 

The number of Pagan sources for Jesus Christ among contemporaries or within 100 years:  9

The number of Pagan sources for Tiberius among contemporaries or within 100 years:  9 (or 10 if you count Luke.

John Oakes