The First Century Void

[Amarok]

All of your objection to the facts RR

[Minimalist]

There's no conspiracy, Tiz.  There is exactly one manuscript of Tacitus' Annales.  Carrier does not even think this excision happened in antiquity.  More likely some monk in a fucking monastery during the Middle Ages was annoyed by Tacitus' discussion of whatever he wrote about for the years 20-32.  If he failed to mention anything about the godboy one can see how an addled, xristard monk could be upset enough to eliminate that section.

One nutty monk doth not a conspiracy maketh.

[Cyberman]

Make, not maketh. Unleth you have a lithp, and not even then.

Thorry

[Minimalist]

Thuck on it.


Cassius Dio and the disappearing histories.

A similar mysterious gap exists in the Roman History of Cassius Dio:
all the years from 6 to 2 BCE are gone. There is evidence from remarks elsewhere
that Dio discussed Herod's death in this period.  A Christian would
have expected Dio to discuss the slaughter of the innocents and the miraculous
star and other amazing events surrounding the birth of Jesus, and Dio's
silence on all of these might have been just as embarrassing as the silence
of Tacitus. That this loss might be no accident is suggested by the fact that
it is quite thorough-even subsequent epitomes exclude it-combined with
the coincidence of date: the gap beginning exactly two years before Herod's
death, in accordance with Mt. 2. 16, and ending two years after it for good
measure (there being at the time some uncertainty among Christians as
to when exactly Herod died). What about Dio's treatment of the year 30?
Yes, something is mysteriously missing around there, too. In the middle of
volume 58, covering the years 29 to 37 CE, we have a reference to an event
(in 58.17.2) that was evidently described in a section that had to have been
deleted somewhere between 57.17.8 (the year 15) and 58.7.2 (the year 30).
Might it have been a section also mentioning Judean affairs, whose silence
was again considered too embarrassing to retain?

OTHJ - pg. 304

This is two.  There are more to come.

[Minimalist]

In spite of xtian scribes zealously protecting much of Philo's writings there is this anomaly.

Another strange loss are certain volumes of Philo of Alexandria. Despite
Christians having saved vast quantities of the writings of Philo, the ones
that would most have occasion to mention Jesus or Judean affairs under
Pontius Pilate are missing or mangled. According to Eusebius, Philo wrote
five books about his embassy to Caligula (after the year 36) and the events
precipitating it, only two of which survive. 34 What happened to the other
three? We know they covered three other subjects, each a major persecution
of Jews under Tiberius: one volume on Pilate (in Judea), another on Sejanus
(at Rome), the ones we have (on Flaccus in Egypt; then one on Caligula),
and a final volume showing what happened to Caligula after all this.JS All
of these may have embarrassingly omitted mention of any Christians at
Rome (such as was claimed in the apocryphal but popular Acts of Pilate) or
in Jerusalem or Alexandria. But the most important volume would have
been the one on Pilate's persecution of the Jews in Judea. Christians would
surely expect that volume to mention Pilate's execution of Jesus in some
respect; but as it probably did not, again its si lence would have been as
embarrassing as all the others surveyed so far.3


Carrier   304-05  OTHJ

Three examples.  We can add Justus of Tiberias' History of the Jews which the Bishop of Constantinople, Photius, read in the 9th century but dismissed because in spite of living in first century Palestine he failed to make any mention of jesus.  It seems that Photius' comment was the kiss of death and the work was allowed to vanish.  A pattern is developing.

[RoadRunner79]

Tacitus

Cassius Dio

Philo - Tiberias

I'm not sure how long this was going to be; perhaps you still have some reason or argument that ties all these together, but I'm starting to notice a pattern.

• Tacitus - We are also missing Books 7-10, Parts of 5 and 6 as mentioned as well as 11 and 16.   In all, we are missing about 1/2of Tacitus works
  
• Cassius Dio - We have most of Cassius's works, but not intact (most are fragmented)  We have about 1/3 of his works.
  
• Philo is interesting.  We have a lot of his writings because he wrote a lot.  As you mentioned, the book on Pilate is one of those that are missing.  I have seen an estimate that as much as 1/4 of Philo's works are missing.  Philos works are also interesting, because what we do have comes along three lines.  There is some overlap, but most of it comes from Armenian translations, along with the Greek and Latin versions.  But each line contributes to what we do have, where the others do not.
  
• Tiberias - All of his works (I believe 2 that we know of) are lost.  Do you have a reference to Photius's comment that I can read it in context?
  

Not quite related (This is about the destruction of library of Alexandria) It goes into some detail, about the process in keeping these manuscripts.  That they where fragile and required repair or replacement.  That even with slave labor, it was costly and a luxury to maintain a library in this time.  They where caught in the middle of wars, hardship, fires, and looting.  They required constant financial patronage. 

Papyrus scrolls decayed and fell apart from use, suffered damage from mice and other vermin and, in a period where artificial light tended to be from open oil lamps, were in constant danger from fires, great and small.  The Mouseion , like all ancient libraries, needed a large staff to undertake the constant and unending task of repairing, replacing and recopying books and these staffs, even when made up of slaves, were expensive to maintain.

https://historyforatheists.com/2017/07/t...lexandria/


To a large extent, I think that it is fairly extraordinary that we have what we do.

[Fake Messiah]

No wonder there was 1st cent void when Jesus was busy in Americas christening Mayans and visiting Garden Of Eden and Adam's first altar and Adam's first city - and Mormons have "evidence" to back it all up, you can't deny it.

[Dropship]

..One of Richard Carrier's most compelling arguments, the utter failure of any first century Greco-Roman writer to mention anything about xtianity..

Huh? Paul wrote big chunks of the New T and he was a Roman citizen (with joint Jewish citizenship)..
Anyway think POLITICS..
When Christianity began snowballing in popularity after Jesus's execution, the snooty priests said- "Oops, better not let on it was us who killed him! Quick, SHRED all the documents implicating us or we'll have a Jesusgate scandal on our hands!
We'll try to airbrush him out of history and crack down on christians, then people will soon forget all about him"

[RoadRunner79]

..One of Richard Carrier's most compelling arguments, the utter failure of any first century Greco-Roman writer to mention anything about xtianity..

Huh? Paul wrote big chunks of the New T and he was a Roman citizen (with joint Jewish citizenship)..
Anyway think POLITICS..
When Christianity began snowballing in popularity after Jesus's execution, the snooty priests said- "Oops, better not let on it was us who killed him! Quick, SHRED all the documents implicating us or we'll have a Jesusgate scandal on our hands!
We'll try to airbrush him out of history and crack down on christians, then people will soon forget all about him"

I don't think that you have any evidence to support that.... also easier said than done.

[Cyberman]

..One of Richard Carrier's most compelling arguments, the utter failure of any first century Greco-Roman writer to mention anything about xtianity..

Huh? Paul wrote big chunks of the New T and he was a Roman citizen (with joint Jewish citizenship)..
Anyway think POLITICS..
When Christianity began snowballing in popularity after Jesus's execution, the snooty priests said- "Oops, better not let on it was us who killed him! Quick, SHRED all the documents implicating us or we'll have a Jesusgate scandal on our hands!
We'll try to airbrush him out of history and crack down on christians, then people will soon forget all about him"

Oh, Dropshit, you really should be on the stage!

There's one leaving in ten minutes.