Horrible things in the bible

[Minimalist]

Again, it is completely possible that Pliny was writing about Chrestus not Christos and some well-meaning monk in the middle ages decided to correct his spelling. Except the Chrestiani were real and we have textual evidence of them prior to 37 AD.

If I were an apologist I'd seize on that. Then we wouldn't have to explain why Pliny was so ignorant of christians - given his family and station, and why the official order was one of measured and tolerant jurisprudence, rather than bloodthristy eradication - given the rest of the "history" that I, as an apologist, would be looking to sell.

And few xtians will bother with Pliny in depth although not because of that comment. A paragraph earlier he had noted:

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.

That is anathema to jesus freaks because they have this whole martyr mythology that they developed later and the idea that some of them would save their own skins by "cursing Christ" does not fit in with that image. So they are usually content to say that Pliny and Suetonius knew of xtians and ignore the problematic aspects of both references. They prefer Tacitus, which is a much later forgery and makes them feel all warm and fuzzy about their bullshit.