Was Jesus Real?
An interesting question that sometimes pops up in casual conversation is if certain historical characters were actually real people or are they fiction. King Arthur and Robin Hood immediately come to mind, especially considering how many films about both exist for us to watch and enjoy. In the sphere of Christianity, there is much discussion among historians and lay people over whether the characters from the Bible really existed. In this article, I am going to focus on Jesus’ historicity.
Before writing, I conducted an informal survey involving dozens of people asking whether Jesus was a real or fictional person. I was surprised at how many thought no such person ever walked the Earth. That result pushed me to research a more formal survey to get a more scientific answer to my question. Such a survey was carried out by the Church of England in 2015. It found that ‘40% of adults and 46% of young people in England either don’t believe, or aren’t sure, that Jesus was a real person who lived on earth.’ [1] That sobering result led directly to this article being written.
In order to prove that Jesus was a living, breathing person and not just some archetypal fiction, we have to look outside of the Bible and other religious literature. They are all biased, making them useless for our purposes as we need objective, non-Christian sources to be historically accurate. Fortunately, several such sources exist for us to examine.
We will start with Flavio Josephus, a Romano-Jewish military leader and historian. Born in 37 AD, only several years after Jesus’ crucifixion in 30 or 33 AD, he grew up as a contemporary of those who had known Jesus and witnessed the events around him, including his execution. ‘He was around when the early church was getting started, so he knew people who had seen and heard Jesus.’ [2] In his book Jewish Antiquities, written in 93-94 AD, Josephus mentions Jesus twice.
The first is the longer of the two and it is a bit controversial. It reads ‘Now, there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works – a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was Christ; and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him, for he appeared to them alive again the third day, as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him; and the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.’ [3]
The controversy is that most historians believe that Christian scribes added to this passage, embellishing it in favor of the religion. However, they also believe that there is a core regarding Jesus that is original to Josephus, therefore making it a valid source in determining if he existed. [4]
In Book 20 (200) of Jewish Antiquities, Josephus wrote ‘…so he assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James…’ Here we have a side mention of Jesus in relation to his brother stated in a total matter-of-fact manner. Josephus was in no doubt that Jesus existed in the recent past.
Moving on to Tacitus, a Roman senator and one of the ancient world’s greatest historians who was born in 56 AD, we have another mention of Jesus and Christians in relation to Nero and the Great Fire of Rome of 64 AD written around 116 AD. Because persistent rumors blamed Nero for the fire, he took strong measures to deflect the blame on an innocent, defenseless and identifiable group of people. ‘But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.’ [5] Tacitus used the name Christus, which is a Latin version of the word Christ. Again, this is a direct reference to Jesus as a living person.
The next piece of evidence comes from Pliny the Younger, a judge, author and governor born in 61 AD. While Governor of Bithynia (in northern Turkey on the Black Sea coast) in 112 AD, he wrote a letter to Emperor Trajan regarding the Christians. In it he said ‘…on a fixed day they used to meet before dawn and recite a hymn among themselves to Christ, as though he were a god. So far from binding themselves by oath to commit any crime, they swore to keep from theft, robbery, adultery, breach of faith, and not to deny any trust money deposited with them when called upon to deliver it. This ceremony over, they used to depart and meet again to take food…’ [6] It is important to look at the phrase ‘as though he were a god,’ because it means his followers saw him as a god instead of a man, thus once again confirming Jesus’ presence on the Earth.
The final piece of historical evidence we are going to consider comes from the writings of Lucian of Samosata, a 2nd century AD Syrian-Greek non-Christian novelist, satirist and rhetorician. In his satire The Passing of Peregrinus, in which the main character takes advantage of the generosity of Christians, Lucian gives us one of the earliest depictions of early Christians written by a non-Christian. There are two passages from the piece which are important for us to consider:
‘…they revered him as a god, made use of him as a lawgiver, and set him down as a protector, next after that other, to be sure, whom they still worship, the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced this new cult into the world.’ [7]
‘The poor wretches have convinced themselves, first and foremost, that they are going to be immortal and live for all time, in consequence of which they despise death and even willingly give themselves into custody; most of them. Furthermore, their first lawgiver persuaded them that they are all brothers of one another after they have transgressed once, for all by denying the Greek gods and by worshipping that crucified sophist himself and living under his laws. Therefore, they despise all things indiscriminately and consider them common property, receiving such doctrines traditionally without any definite evidence.’ [8]
Even though Lucian did not use the name Jesus or Christ, it is completely obvious who he is referring to as the topic of these passages is the behavior and beliefs of Christians in 2nd century AD Rome. Historians find these lines to be a persuasive piece of evidence in proving that Jesus was a real person, and we should as well.
There are two other Romans whose writings some cite as additional proof. They are Mara bar Serapion, a Stoic philosopher from the Roman province of Syria, and Roman historian Seutonius. Their pieces are not included here because they are too vague in who they refer to, thus opening them up to too much doubt. The majority of historians reject them for this very reason.
Considering all of the abovementioned, it can be said with complete confidence that Jesus was a real man and not some sort of archetypal fictional character used to promote a new religion and philosophy. The fact that such historical heavyweights as Flavius Josephus, Tacitus, Pliny the Younger and Lucian of Samosata wrote about him very clearly from a non-Christian point of view is convincing enough, but 3 out of the 4 doing so within 80 years of the crucifixion after growing up among people within living memory of Jesus’ time and activities on the Earth cements the case once and for all.
Sources
Josephus, Flavius. Jewish Antiquities. London, UK: Wordsworth Editions, 2006.
Lucian of Samosata : The Passing of Peregrinus (tertullian.org)
Microsoft Word – Lecture_02 Pliny_Trajan_Galerius.doc (sjsu.edu)
Talking-Jesus-dig-deeper.pdf (talkingjesus.org)
The Bible Says Jesus Was Real. What Other Proof Exists? – HISTORY
The Internet Classics Archive | The Annals by Tacitus (mit.edu)
