Josephus and other contemporaries on Jesus

[Succubus]

Since the topic came up in great detail in the Why believe the Bible? thread, I thought why not make a thread to cover this topic.

What are your opinions on Josephus' writings? Is the TF partially authentic or entirely fabricated?

What about the more elusive James reference?

And while we're at it why not go ahead and discuss others as well? Pliny, Justin, Clement, the Apostle Paul, etc.

I'm curious to hear views from both atheists and theists here on these writings as well. Let's compare and contrast our views and interpretations.

Did you miss this:

... I'm genuinely asking as I need to do more reading on the argument from silence regarding the Testimonium.

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Succubus
The Josephus Testimonium: Let’s Just Admit It’s Fake Already

From the same thread.

[Rev. Rye]

One crucial point: someone who identified as Jewish, and wrote about “Judean Antiquities” would not have included those passages in the Testimonium Flaviam that allude to Jesus’ divinity. And if he was somehow secretly convinced of Jesus’ divinity, I highly doubt he would have been so off handed about mentioning it.

There are very strong indications that at least parts of the Testimonium Flaviam were fabricated after Josephus’ time.

[vorlon13]

The Bible commands "Jesus" to be referred to as Immanuel. So Josephus is false since he does not mention an Immanuel.

[RoadRunner79]

First off, you need to understand what the word "contemporary" means.  It means living at the same time.  Josephus was born in 37 so at least one year after the terminus ad quem for any of your jesus stories since they demand that Pontius Pilate be prefect of Judaea which ended in 36.  Tacitus, Pliny and Suetonius were second century writers as was Justin Martyr.  Which Clement?  Clement of Alexandria was a 2d-3d century writer.  Clement of Rome is probably legendary.  Paul is the fly in the ointment since no one in the first century ever heard of him and his writings were put into circulation in the second century.  First, it seems, by Marcion and later by the proto-orthodox after they sanitized whatever the hell Marcion had published.  We do not have the originals and so we will probably never know.

Actual contemporaries of your godboy, Seneca the Elder, Seneca the Younger, and Philo of Alexandria never heard of any such person.

I would note the following argument from historyforatheists.com  Jesus Mythicism 3: “No Contemporary References to Jesus”

Of course, legitimate arguments from silence certainly can be made coherently and usefully in historical analysis and such arguments are often made by historians. It needs to be noted, however, that historians always use such arguments with caution and try to construct them with due care. This is because, as we will see, a poorly constructed and weakly supported argument from silence has no weight.

A valid argument from silence is not just noticing that something wasn't mentioned, but showing why it could not have been mentioned.   It's similar to Evidence of Absence in this manner, where it is not just that evidence is absent, but that it should not be. 

The article above has subtitles such as “Contemporary or STFU!”  which notes that the Carthaginian general Hannibal who had  a long and  famous career; that we have zero references to him from his life time.   It's not like now, where everyone has a long and extensive paper trail,  there where not newspapers covering the daily news, and many writers where paid, to write about specific people. 

The article also points out:

Take, for example, the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. This was a major catastrophe, resulting in the total destruction of two entire provincial Italian cities – Pompeii and Herculaneum – with a total population of up to 20,000 people and causing the death of many thousands of those inhabitants. Its impact would have been massive, with tens of thousands of refugees flooding surrounding areas and the local region devastated for years to come. Yet not only do we have no contemporary references to the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum, we actually have no direct references to the cities by name at all.

We have also lost a lot of literature from this period.  Sometimes only knowing of a certain writing or topic, by later reference.
The poorer forms of the argument from silence just vaguely point out that there are not writings from that time (it should also be noted, that they often insist on contemporary and during the life of Jesus, so this is a three year period).  There are some lists, which at least attempt to name some authors who may have been written about Jesus, which is at times laughable, with some lists having authors who died even before Jesus Ministry, or having people who while contemporary where not near (geographically) to Jesus ministry.
The article doesn't mention Seneca the Elder (cited above).   I assume (not because they don't know anything about him), but because he died at the age of 91 in 39 AD.   This would have put him in his mid eighties during the time of Jesus.   Which begs the question which work, do they think should contain Jesus.
For Seneca the Younger:  Lived from 4 BC to 65 AD he "was a prominent Stoic philosopher who wrote philosophy and tragic plays"  and if you look at his works, it is difficult to point to  a place where Jesus most certainly should have been mentioned. 
Philo is another common writer who is often mentioned.  

If there is a writer who generally gets brought up in this form of the Mythicist argument from silence it is Philo of Alexandria, so it is no surprise that Fitzgerald places emphasis on the supposed significance of his silence about Jesus. Philo was a Jew who lived in the right period (c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD) and who left an extensive corpus of writings, many of which are still extant. Fitzgerald notes, correctly that this theological writer produced many “philosophical treatises on Judaism”, but assures us that Philo also wrote “commentaries on contemporary politics and events of note affecting the Jews” (p. 37) This claim is not actually wrong, but as even a brief survey of Philo’s surviving works shows it does not give an accurate picture of the content of Philo’s work. Of the 43 or so works included in Charles Duke Yonge’s standard edition of Philo’s collected works, just two – Against Flaccus and the Embassy to Gaius – are anything other than theological or philosophical treatises. 

And of course they dismiss those who where closest to Jesus and the Christians, who where contemporary, and those shortly after who while hostile to the movement, do mention Jesus in a historical context.  In fact, if you like arguments from silence, no one is really found claiming that Jesus was a myth, until the 18th century.  Early sources certainly point to him as the reason and center of the Christian movement.

[Minimalist]

Oh, yeah. Tim O'Neil. That was that Jesus freak shithead who was here for a while acting like he knew everything. You know, RR, he wasn't very impressive in person and your regurgitated posting of his bullshit is even less so. He didn't last long.

Try again.

[Amarok]

Yay now Road will scream conspiracy 

"But they would have noticed "

"Erebus had to destroy or alter a billion made up copies " 

"Biblical criticism are recent therefore fuck the evidence " 

"He's just skeptical" 

Blah blah blah blah

---

 Tim O'Neil. 

 Tim O'Neil is a fucking moron 

Little Timmy being shown he knows nothing 
https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/9991

[Aegon]

Let's just assume that they are authentic for the sake of argument. It's still entirely meaningless. Written after the first two gospels, it's not a primary source, contains scant reference to Jesus and on top of all of that a historical basis for Jesus doesn't make a single shred of supernatural events of the Bible any more true to start with.

I've always found the debate over a historical Jesus pointless. If he was or not based on a historical person, God is no more real because of it. So whether Josephus wrote about Jesus doesn't change that the central character of the whole thing yaweh, is totally made up.

If anything, it makes perfect sense that there WAS a Jesus character to have inspired it all.

[Minimalist]

RR, and all the rest of them, love apologists because they make them feel all warm and fuzzy about their bullshit. They don't care if it's true just as long as they have something silly to believe in.

[chimp3]

Since the topic came up in great detail in the Why believe the Bible? thread, I thought why not make a thread to cover this topic.

What are your opinions on Josephus' writings? Is the TF partially authentic or entirely fabricated?

What about the more elusive James reference?

And while we're at it why not go ahead and discuss others as well? Pliny, Justin, Clement, the Apostle Paul, etc.

I'm curious to hear views from both atheists and theists here on these writings as well. Let's compare and contrast our views and interpretations.

Josephus was not a contemporary of the supposed Christ. He was born 4 years after the supposed death of supposed Jesus.

[RoadRunner79]

Oh, yeah. Tim O'Neil. That was that Jesus freak shithead who was here for a while acting like he knew everything. You know, RR, he wasn't very impressive in person and your regurgitated posting of his bullshit is even less so. He didn't last long.

Try again.

Actually the author is an atheist he just doesnt like when atheist do bad history (hence he doesn’t think much of mythicists or polemical new atheiests..... Attacking the source of the claims doesn’t help your argument one bit. You need to deal with the reasoning.