The Secret Vault presents: The Christian and Pagan Creeds Collated. Rev. Robert Taylor, A. B. & M. R. C. S.
Christian Religion.
By the Rev. Robert Taylor, A. B. & M. R. C. S.
Contents part two. The Testimony of Pilate. A coincident Passage from Arnobius. Josephus, AD. 93. The Celebrated Inscription to Nero.
[LN. characters mentioned in this part of the chapter. governor Pontius Pilate. emperor Augustus. Tiberius. Vespasian. Diocletian. Maximinian. Nero. Suetonius and Tacitus. St. Matthew. crucifixion of Christ. Justin Martyr. Tertullian., Eusebius. Epiphanias. Chrysostom. Orosius. Ovid. John Albert Fabricius. Ittigius, Blondell, Le Clerc, Vandale, Bishop Warburton, Tanaquil Faber. Dr Samuel Chandler, Dr Nathaniel Foster, Mr. Henley, Mr. Bryant, [In his Vindiciae Flavianae, or a Vindication of the Testimony given by Josephus concerning our Saviour Jesus Christ, 1777.] the Abbe de Voisin, Abbe Bullet. Spanish historian, John de Ferreras. T. Flavius Josephus. Books. Jewish Antiquities by Josephus. Gruterus in the first volume of his Inscriptions. Life of Dr Lardner, by Dr Kippis.]
The Testimony of Pilate
In the same spirit of pious fraud, the Christian world had for ages been led to believe that the governor Pontius Pilate had sent to the emperor Tiberius, an account of the crucifixion of Christ; which indeed, had such a person ever existed, and such an event taken place, it is next to impossible to conceive that he should not have done. But, alas, this testimony too, has been swept away by the terrible besom of rational criticism; and is now left to lie with that of Lentulus, the Veronica handkerchief, and the Sibylline Oracles: among the number of apocryphal cheats and impositions, which served the purpose of imposing on generations which were more easily- imposed on, but are rejected with disdain and disgust by the increasing scepticism even of the most orthodox believers.
Our immediate grandfathers, were required to believe that Pontius Pilate informed the emperor of the unjust sentence of death which he had pronounced against an innocent, and as it appeared, a divine person; and that without acquiring the merit of martyrdom, he exposed himself to the danger of it, that Tiberius, who avowed his contempt for all religion, immediately conceived the design of placing the Jewish Messiah among the Gods of Rome; that his servile senate ventured to disobey the commands of their master; that Tiberius, instead of resenting their refusal, contented himself with protecting the Christians from the severity of the laws, many years before there were any laws in existence that could operate against them; and lastly, that the memory of this extraordinary transaction was preserved in the most public and authentic records, only those public and authentic records were never seen nor heard of by any of the persons to whose keeping they were entrusted, escaped the knowledge and research of the historians of Greece and Rome, and were only visible to the eyes of an African priest, who composed his apology one hundred and sixty years after the death of Tiberius.
This testimony was first asserted by that brave assertor, Justin Martyr; and as a snowball loses nothing by rolling, has received successive accretions in passing through the hands of Tertullian, Eusebius, Epiphanias, Chrysostom, and Orosius, till the warm handling of modern criticism has thawed away its unsubstantial fabric.
The faith of that great father of pious frauds, Eusebius, upon this testimony glows into a fervour of assurance, which on any other subject would look like impudence. For after having assured us on the testimony of Tertullian, that Tiberias was so convinced by the account that Pilate had sent him, of the resurrection of Christ, that he threatens death to any person who should but bring an accusation against the Christians, when certainly there were no Christians; and takes upon himself to inform us, that "it was the divine providence, that by way of management, injected this thought into the Emperor's mind, in order, that the word of the gospel, having got a fair starting, might run throughout the whole world without opposition." [LN., Tertullian, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, around 155 to 240AD, he was an early Christian author.]
The probability of the supposed occasion, was sure to bid for its ample supply of forgeries to be fastened upon it: - and as Ovid, having once got the names and circumstances of either real or imaginary personages, given as data, has invented imaginary speeches and epistles suitable for such personages, under such circumstances to have delivered, so Christian piety has supplied us with stores of epistles - not which Pilate wrote, but which he may be supposed to have written; which for all the authentication required in matters of faith, is authentication enough. None but unbelievers would wish for more.
John Albert Fabricius, [LN., 1668 to 1736 a German classical scholar and bibliographer.] has in his Codex Apocryphus, noticed five of these suppositious epistles - of which one, called the Anaphora or Relation of Pilate to Tiberius is in Greek, and of considerable length, as intended perhaps, if it had told, to pass for a gospel: the others, short and in Latin. I have given translations of them already in the 22nd number of the first volume of "The Lion."
The Anaphora relates the miracles of Christ as recorded in the Gospels; but supplies one or two additional, as credible as any of the rest. It does not exactly confirm the account which. St. Matthew gives us, and which no Christian can doubt, that "the graves were opened, and many dead bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many." [Matthew 27-52, 53.] But it entirely corroborates the story of the miraculous darkness at the crucifixion, which Mr. Gibbon handles with such galling sarcasm, merely because none of the contemporary historians and philosophers have condescended to notice it.
"There was darkness over the whole earth, the sun in the middle of the day being darkened, and the stars appearing, among whose lights the moon appeared not, but as if turned to blood, it left its shining." This additional circumstance of the moon being turned into blood, is no exaggeration, but is supported by the inspired testimony of St. Peter himself, who not only assures us that the moon was turned into blood, but that the whole universe, "Heaven above and earth beneath, presented one vast exhibition of blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke." [Acts 2-19] But as there must always be as good reason to believe in miracles of light, as in miracles of darkness, and the resurrection of our Saviour was surely as worthy an occasion for a display of fire-works as his crucifixion, Pilate assured the Emperor Tiberius, that "early in the morning of the first of the Sabbaths, the resurrection of Christ was announced by a display of the most astonishing and surprising feats of divine Omnipotence ever performed. At the third hour of the night, the sun broke forth into such splendour as was never before seen! and the heaven became enlightened seven times more than on any other day." "And the light ceased not to shine all that night." But the best and most sublime part of the exhibition, as (with reverence be it spoken) exemplifying the principle of poetical justice, and making a proper finale to the scene was, that "an instantaneous chasm took place, and the earth opened and swallowed up all the unbelieving Jews, their temple and synagogues all vanished away; and the next morning there was not so much as one of them left in all Jerusalem; and the Roman soldiers who had kept the sepulchre ran stark-staring mad. So truly may we say, righteous art thou, Lord, and just are thy judgments!
A coincident Passage from Arnobius
Yet this language ascribed to Pontius Pilate, is hardly less hyperbolical than that which the gravest and most rational of the Christian Fathers is constrained to use, when referring to the same subject. It would not bear the telling in the style of historical narrative. The calm and philosophical Lardner adduces this testimony of the no less philosophical and rational Arnobius, as evidence of the "uncommon darkness and other surprising events at the time of our Lord's passion and death." [Lardner, vol. 2, p. 255.] That evidence requires us to believe that, "when he had put off his body, which he carried about in a little part of himself, after he suffered himself to be seen, and that it should be known of what size he was, all the elements of the world, terrified at the strangeness of what had happened, were put out of order, the earth shook and trembled, the sea was completely poured out from its lowest bottom, the whole atmosphere was rolled up into balls of darkness, the fiery orb of the sun itself caught cold and shivered." [LN, Arnobius of Sicca, died around 330AD, was an early Christian apologist.] [Exutus at corpora, quod in exigua sui circumferebat parte, postqnam videri se passus est, cujus esset aut rnagnitudinis sciri, novitate reruoi exterrita mundi sunt elementa turbata, tellus mota contretnuit, mare funditus refusum est: aer globia iiivolutus.est tenebrarum, igneus orbis solis tepefacto ardore diriguit. - p. 32.] Our Christian Evidence writers are not able to adduce so much as a single author, friend or foe, Pagan or Christian, who has referred to these miraculous events in any way of which they themselves are not ashamed: not one who has related the story as if he believed it himself - not one, who, however in some passages he may seem to speak as an historian, has not in others abundantly indicated a double sense, and shown his own secret understanding, not only that no such events ever happened, but that no such person as he of whom they are related, ever existed.
Josephus, AD. 93
T. Flavius Josephus, a Jewish priest of the race of the Asmonean princes, was born at Jerusalem, taken prisoner by Vespasian in his wars, was present in his camp at the siege of Jerusalem, and wrote a work on the Jewish Antiquities, in twenty books, in the eighteenth of which, the third chapter, and third section, occurs the famous passage. This it is: -
"About that time appeared Jesus, a wise man, if indeed it be right to speak of him as a man, for he was a performer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew after him many of the Jews, as well as of the Gentiles. This same was the Christ. And though Pilate, by the judgment of the chief rulers among us, delivered him to be crucified, those who from the first had loved him, fell not from him, for to them at least, he showed himself again alive on the third day: this, and ten thousand other wonderful things being what the holy prophets had foretold concerning him; so that the Christian people, who derive their name from him, have not yet ceased to exist."
This passage was first quoted by Eusebius, who exults over it as if he had found a prodigious prize. His exultation itself only serving to awaken suspicion in every critical mind, that the passage is but another added to the long list of his own most audacious forgeries, as he immediately subjoins - "Wherefore, since this Hebrew historian hath of old delivered these things in his own writing, concerning our Saviour, what evasion can save those who invent arguments against these things, from standing convicted of downright impudence."
Yet for all this terrible defiance, the most unquestionably orthodox and best learned of the whole Christian world, have invented arguments against the validity of this passage, and have shown to absolute demonstration the certainty that Josephus did not write this passage, and the probability that Eusebius himself did.
Mr. Gibbon in his style of most significant double-throwing, has a note, admonishing us that "the passage concerning Jesus Christ was inserted into the text of Josephus, between the time of Origen and that of Eusebius, and may furnish us with an example of no vulgar forgery." [Decline and Fall, chap. 16.]
No vulgar forgery indeed! the cool calculating wickedness, the reckless impiety, the matchless impudence of this detected forgery, should indeed serve us as an example, how to trust and how to respect Christian testimony. Appended as this note is, to Mr. Gibbon's admission of the respect due to the celebrated passage of Tacitus; to what other sense can it be read than, as a hint that Mr. Gibbon had no mind to run first in the dangerous business of analysing the evidences of the Christian religion. That work must be left to Christians themselves, and as no Lardner has yet given us leave to take the same liberty with the passage of Tacitus, "the most sceptical criticism" is obliged to respect its integrity. But it will fall in its turn. The fate of the Sibylline oracle: of the forged admissions of Porphyry: of the correspondence of Christ and Abgarus: of the testimony of Phlegon: of the letter to Tiberius: of the monument to Nero: and of all other wicked devices that served the turn of imposing on the weakness of our forefathers but will serve no longer; awaits it. But a few years ago, and the author who had suggested a suspicion against the genuineness of the passage in Josephus, if he had happily escaped the horrors of a twelvemonths imprisonment, must at least have reckoned on having to sustain his full share of that abuse and hatred, with which the ignorant part of the world, which is unfortunately the greatest part, has generally rewarded the wisest and best men that ever lived in it. - But conviction has thus far forced itself upon the mind of the highest authority which Christians themselves can appeal to. Their own all-deciding Dr Lardner has pronounced this passage to be an interpolation. [I have published these arguments in my Forty-fourth, and also in my Ninetieth Oration, delivered before the Areopagus of the Christian Evidence Society, a few weeks before the commencement of the persecution which has afforded me leisure for these researches.]
It is rejected also by Ittigius, Blondell, Le Clerc, Vandale, Bishop Warburton, and Tanaquil Faber.
This latter author suspects that Eusebius himself was the author of the interpolation. What then must we think of Eusebius?
We have already seen that Eusebius is the sheet-anchor of reliance for all we know of the three first centuries of the Christian history. What then must we think of the three first centuries of the Christian history?
An author who would deliberately, and with his own hand, forge a testimony, and foist it into the writings of another who never did, and probably never would, have borne any such testimony; and then quote his own known lie, as a proof of the truth of the Christian religion, and deal out his anathemas against all who should presume to question it - What would he not have forged? What must not he himself have thought of the real nature and merits of a cause that needed to be supported by such means? It is curious to see, how even after the definitive judgment of such high and confessedly orthodox authorities, we are still occasionally pestered with puerile or petulant last dying struggles, to rescue this holy cheat from the sentence passed upon it -
For faith, fanatic faith, once wedded fast
To some dear falsehood, hugs it to the last.
We are required to give a wholly different reading to the passage; to introduce imaginary parentheses, to make arbitrary omissions; or egregiously to mistranslate it: and thus, forsooth to chisel it into a supposable possibility that Josephus might have written it.
Among the illustrious who have argued in this way, are Dr Samuel Chandler, Dr Nathaniel Foster, Mr. Henley, Mr. Bryant, [In his Vindiciae Flavianae, or a Vindication of the Testimony given by Josephus concerning our Saviour Jesus Christ, 1777.] the Abbe de Voisin, and the Abbe Bullet. But the learned biographer of Lardner, in his life affixed to the quarto edition of his works, justly concludes, "Of what avail can it be to produce a testimony so doubtful in itself, and which some of the ablest advocates for the truth of the Gospel, reject as an interpolation." [Life of Dr Lardner, by Dr Kippis, p. 23.]
Dr Lardner, after having thoroughly weighed all the arguments that could be adduced in its favour, strenuously defends his former opinion, that the passage is an interpolation. "It ought therefore to be forever discarded from any place among the evidences of Christianity." [Ibid. 23]
Dr Lardner's arguments against the passage, in his own words, are these:
1. "I do not perceive that we at all want the suspected testimony to Jesus, which was never quoted by any of our Christian ancestors before Eusebius. [His Answer to Dr Chandler.]
2. "Nor do I recollect that Josephus has anywhere, mentioned the name or word Christ, in any of his works; except the testimony above mentioned, and the passage concerning James, the Lord's brother. [Ibid]
3. "It interrupts the narrative.
4. "The language is quite Christian.
5. "It is not quoted by Chrysostom, though he often refers to Josephus, and could not have omitted quoting it, had it been then, in the text. [LN., John, Bishop of Constantinople, who died AD. 407, was called St. Chrysostom, or Golden-mouthed, from the charms of his eloquence - the author of the last prayer in our Liturgy.]
6. "It is not quoted by Photius, though he has three articles concerning Josephus.
7. "Under the article Justus of Tiberias, this author (Photius) expressly states that this historian Josephus; being a Jew, has not taken the least notice of Christ. [LN., Photios 1, around 810-20 to 893AD, he was an Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.]
8. "Neither Justin in his dialogue with Trypho the Jew, nor Clemens Alexandrinus, who made so many extracts from ancient authors, nor Origen against Celsus, have ever mentioned this testimony. [LN., Clemens Alexandrinus or Alexandria, called Titus Flavius Clemens, theologian, and writer.]
9. "But on the contrary, in Chapter 35. of the first book of that work, Origen openly affirms, that Josephus who had mentioned John the Baptist, did not acknowledge Christ.
Dr Lardner was anxious to have studied the defence set up for this passage by the Abbe Bullet, which it seems never came to his hands. Of this defence, the chief arguments, in its own words, are -
1. "That Josephus could not be ignorant that there had appeared in Judea, a charlatan, impostor, magician, or prophet, called Jesus, who had either performed wonders, or found the secret of persuading numbers to think so.
2. "That he ought to have taken some notice of Jesus and his disciples; and that
3. "Because Suetonius and Tacitus have done so.
4. "Because, he has given an accurate account of all the impostors, or heads of parties which arose amongst the Jews, from the empire of Augustus, to the ruin of Jerusalem.
5. "Because, the faith of history required that the existence of Jesus and his disciples should not be passed over in silence;" and
Hence it is inferred that Josephus must have written this passage: and it's not being found by any of the fathers before Eusebius, is to be accounted for, by the supposition (a pretty fair one) that Josephus himself might have published two distinct editions of his works, inserting the passage in that edition, which came to the hand of Eusebius, but omitting it in all others.
So, struggles conquered sophistry against victorious truth.
[LN. I had noted long ago that Josephus who had tasted life as an Essene, and a Pharisee and found neither right for him, goes to great lengths in his works to point out that Moses was the Messiah of the Jews, and they were not expecting anyone one else; it also comes to mind that the transfiguration episode in the New Testament makes little sense, for neither Elijah or Moses were anything like Jesus? Just a thought.]
The Celebrated Inscription to Nero.
As long as it would do - and criticism, afraid of losing its ears in the pillory, was constrained to whisper its discoveries in a corner, and vent its secret sentiment, in "curses not loud but deep," the evidences of the Christian religion, boasted of the celebrated inscription on a public monument, erected at the time of the events it recorded, and still preserved; ascribing to the emperor Nero, the praise of having purged the province of Spain, in which it was situated, from those who in his times, were labouring to inculcate a new superstition.
So that here were all the marks of genuineness which Mr. Leslie in his Short and Easy Method with Deists, maintains to be sufficient to demonstrate an utter impossibility of imposture, in any document in which they are found concurring. This celebrated inscription is published by the learned Gruterus in the first volume of his Inscriptions, p. 238, is copied by Dr Lardner from Gruter, [Lardner, vol. 3. p. 609.] and is by the learned Pagi, and other no less learned advocates of the evidences of the Christian religion, vindicated by arguments quite as learned, as ingenious and as convincing, as any that have hitherto been adduced for the equally veracious testimonies of Josephus and Tacitus. The inscription is,
NERONI CLAVDIO CAESARI AVG PONT MAX
OB PROVINC. LATRONIB.
ET HIS QVI NOVAM
GENERI HVM. SVPER
STITIONEM INCVLCAB.
PVRGATAM.
i.e. "To Claudius Caesar Nero Augustus Supreme Pontiff. In honour of the province having been purged from thieves, and from those who were endeavouring to teach the human race a new superstition." Subaudi - no better than thieves. I particularly wish to engage the reader's consideration to the homogeneity of character which this celebrated inscription presents, to the still more celebrated passage of Tacitus. Apply the one, an undoubted and unquestionable imposture, as a test of comparison to the other.
The example of this passage demonstrates these corollaries: -
1. That Christian forgers were very heedful to forge in keeping and character; and
2. That in falsely representing what their enemies might have been supposed to have said of them, they suited the supposition to the person; and
3. Rather overdid the representation for the better making sure against being suspected of being the authors of it themselves.
4. Reviling and decrying themselves, in rather stronger terms than their enemies would have been likely to use against them.
5. Thus they would contentedly be put on a level with thieves, and have their divine religion spoken of as something that ought to be purged out of society; for the sake of making the testimony, which they had forged themselves, the more plausibly seem to be, the testimony of their enemies.
6. They, holding it better to be spoken of in anyway than, not to be spoken of at all; and
7. The specific object and aim of the forgery, not being to represent what the character of Christianity was; (which they could easily and at any time vindicate,) but
8. To represent Christians and Christianity to have existed, when and where they did not exist, to have had an extent of prevalence which it had not, and to have been of a degree of consequence and notoriety, as distinct from any of the multifarious modifications of the ancient Paganism, from which in fact and truth it was neither distinct, nor distinguishable.
But this celebrated inscription has at length served its generation; and it is now no longer indictable at common law, to own the truth with respect to it, and pack it off with Josephus, Lentulus, Pilate, Phlegon, and all the whole noble army of martyrs. The distinguished Spanish historian, John de Ferreras, has escaped the inquisition, though he has ventured to own that he could not restrain himself from confessing, [A] "that it was even Cyriac of Ancona, who first foisted this bit of Christian evidence upon human credulity; and that it was from his brewing, that all the rest of them filled their vessels, but now happily any one may judge of it as he pleases."
[A] Je ne puis m'empecher d'observer que Cyriac d'Ancone fut le premier qui publia celte inscription, et que c'est de lui que les autres l'ont tiree; mais comme la foi de cet Ecrivain estsuspecte au jugement de tous les scavans, que d'ailleurs il n'y a ni vestige ni souvenir de cette inscription dans les places on l'ont dit qu'elle s'est trouvee, et qu'on ne scait ou la prendre a present, chacun peut en porter? jugement qu'il voudra. - Histoire general? D'Espagne, tom. 1, p. 192.]
This allowance has emboldened Mr. Gibbon, who shows in a note that he has read the passage of Ferreras, to fling stones at this inscription, and to say "it is a manifest and acknowledged forgery, contrived by that noted impostor, Cyriacus of Ancona, to flatter the pride and prejudices of the Spaniards." [Gibbon, chap. 16.] He would have said as much of the passage of Tacitus, had he but found another John de Ferreras, to pioneer his way through the brake. [LN., Gibbon, Henry, 1737 to 1794, member of Parliament, English historian.]
Similar Inscriptions.
While the lie would do, nothing was so common or so natural as that it should be often overdone. The advocates for Christianity once meeting a little success in this way, would turn every mile-stone on the roads into a monument of Christianity. More than a copy would be more than the worth of these to the emperors Diocletian and Maximinian. They rest like that to Nero, on the faith of Baronius.
1. DIOCLET. JOVIUS. MAXIMI. HERCULEI. CAESS. AUGG. AMPLIFICATO PER. ORIENTEM. ET. OCCID. IMPER. ROM. ET. NOMINE CHRISTIANORUM. DELETO. QUI. REMP. EVERTEBANT;
and
2. DIOCLETIAN CAES. AUG. GALLERIO. IN ORIENTE ADOPT SUPERSTITIONE CHRISTI. UBIQV. DELETA CULTU DEORUM PROPAGATO.
Procopius mentions a Phoenician inscription upon two famous pillars near Tangiers, which was,
"We are they who fled from the face of Joshua the robber, the son of Nun"
Thus, have we not only forged writings, but pretended monuments that never existed, to record events that never happened. So reckless, so desperate, so audacious are the tricks that have been resorted to, to give to Bible Skin-ology, an appearance of historical fact; that is, to bring heaven and earth together.
-o0o-
Next Chapter 45. part 3. Tacitus
(LN. Part 3, concerns the infamous tract on Nero's cruelty to the so-called Christians, who he apparently blamed for the burning of Rome, Rev. Taylor rightly argues that it is a forgery?) Contents: Tacitus, AD. 107. The Celebrated Passage. The facts of the case are these-.