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.
SUETONIUS, AD. 110.
(LN. Part 4, concerns the writings of Suetonius, and considers the questions his work throws up.)
[LN. Main characters mentioned in this text include. Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus. Emperor Claudius. Vespasian. Paulus Orosius, was a Gallaecian Chalcedonian priest, theologian and historian. Dr Lardner, Nathaniel, 1684 to 1768, English theologian. Philip Doddridge, 1702-1751 was an English nonconformist leader, educator and hymnwriter. William Paley, 1743- 1805, English clergyman, apologist, philosopher and Utilitarian. Josephus the Jewish-Romano historian. Justin Martyr, 100 to 165, Christian apologist. Antoninus Pius, 86 to 161, Roman emperor 138 to 161. Theophilus of Antioch, died around 183 to 185? Early writer on the gospels. St. Jerome, 347 to 420, he was a priest, confessor, theologian and historian.]
G. Suetonius Tranquillus, AD. 110, a Roman historian, in his life of Claudius, who reigned from AD. 41 to 54; says, that "he drove the Jews, who, at the suggestion of Krestus, were constantly rioting, out of Rome. [Judaeos impulsore Chresto, assidue tumultuantes Roma expulit.]
Orosius, a Christian writer of the fifth century, who quotes the passage, does not pretend to know whether it was the Christians or Jews who were thus expelled. Notwithstanding the absurdity of the supposition of this Chrestus being Christ, and of Christ heading riots in Rome; this passage has served its generation as Christian Evidence. Dr Lardner, however, admits that
"learned men are not satisfied that this relates to the Christians."
2. In his life of Nero, Suetonius says, that "The Christians, [Afflicti suppliciis Christiani, genus hominum superstitionis novae et maleficoe.] a race of men of a new and villainous, wicked or magical superstition, were visited with punishment." I hope it may not offend them, to hope that neither does this relate to Christians.
3. In his life of Vespasian, he says, "There had been for a long time all over the East, a notion firmly believed, that it was in the fates (in the decrees or books of the fates) that at that time, some which came out of Judea should obtain the Empire of the world."
This is as far as Paley, Doddridge, and other sophistical Christian Evidence manufacturers, find it convenient to quote the passage. The finishing would spoil their use of it - this it is,
"By the event it appeared that that prediction related to the Roman Emperor. The Jews, applying it to themselves, went into a rebellion." [Percrebuerat Oriente toto, vetus et constant opinio, esse in fatis, ut eo tempore Judea profecti rerum potirentur. Id de Imperatore Romano, quantum eventu postea patuit, predictum Judiae ad se trahentes rebellarunt. Cap. 4.]
Josephus himself calls this an ambiguous oracle, and admits its application to Vespasian only, though found in their sacred Scriptures. So, little will the passage serve the cause in which it has been enlisted.
There is no reasonable ground for thinking that by Chrestus, Suetonius meant Christus. Chrestus itself is a proper name for any good man. And by a most curious coincidence with the orthography of Suetonius, we find the earliest Fathers actually punning on the word; holding it as entirely indifferent whether they were called Christians, or Chrestians; giving equally absurd and riddle me three reasons for either the one name or the other, but never distinctly pretending to derive that name from any particular Christus, or Chrestus, who had had a real existence, and been the founder of their sect. The mere Iotacism or change of the long e into I, or I into e, often occasioned the substitution of the one word for the other.
1. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch; Acts xi. 26, that is, unquestionably, they assumed not the name themselves, but it was given them by the Gentiles, in whose sense of it, consequently, the real meaning of it is to be found.
2. Justin Martyr, in his account of the name, which he gives in his apology to Antoninus Pius, thus puns away all possible reference to the name of Christ as the founder of a sect. "We are called Christians. So, then we are the best of men (Chrestians), and it can never be just to hate what is (chrest) good and kind.
3. Theophilus of Antioch, after a long string of puns upon Christus, and Chrestus; thinks that Christus, and not Chrestus should be the word, because of the sublime significance of Christus, which signifies "the sweet, and agreeable; and most useful, and never to be laughed at article of pomatum.
"What use of a ship (he argues) unless it be besmeared? What tower or palace would be elegant or useful unless it were greased?" "What man comes into life or enters into a conflict, without being anointed? What piece of work could be considered finished, if it were not oiled?
'Qui entre dans vn moullin il convient de necessite qu'il s' ensarine'.
He that goes into the mill needs be, be-milled,
he that touches pitch needs be defiled.
All who fish get wet,
all men and women who live, will sin,
all, are defiled by living.
[Cotgrave. SV]
The air itself and every creature under heaven, is as it were anointed with light and spirit. Undoubtedly, we are called Christians for this reason, and none other than, because we are anointed with the oil of God. "
Tertullian, Clemens Alexandrinus, and St. Jerome, abound in the same strain. - Everywhere we meet with puns and conundrums on the name; nowhere with a vestige of the real existence of a person to whom the name was distinctively appropriate.
-o0o-
Next, part 5. Chapter XLV.
PLINY, 110AD.
(LN. Part 5 concerns Pliny the youngers supposed letter to Trajan about his unsureness of how to deal with the troublesome Christians and Rev. Taylors misgivings over its authenticity?)
[LN. Main characters mentioned in this text include. Pliny the younger, 61 to 113, served as an imperial magistrate under Trajan, and was also an author. Tacitus.]