Today we'll be discussing what non-Christian authors from the century after Jesus had to say about him. We'll begin with the classical authors—Greek and Roman men whom
Jews or Christians would refer to as Gentiles (non-Jews). We'll be talking about the four earliest ones:
Thallos (ca. 50 CE), Pliny the Younger (Book 10, Epistle 96 to Trajan,
ca. 112 CE), Suetonius (Lives of the Caesars: Claudius 25.3-5, ca.
120 CE), and Tacitus (Annals 15.44, ca. Bond discusses Tacitus and Suetonius and mentions Pliny the Younger briefly; we'll cover Pliny and Thallos more fully in class. As you read about these authors in Bond, keep track of what they say about Jesus, whether their comments actually speak about Jesus, and how reliable they are. On the question of reliability, consider how they got their information, as well as whom they got it from (eyewitnesses? secondhand? via torture?).
In addition to the Greek and Roman authors, there are also Jewish sources that mention Jesus. Of course, the New Testament is our most prominent Jewish source on the historical
Jesus, although the works within its covers span a wide spectrum of Jewish thought
and practice. But the question we want to ask today is whether any non-Christian
Jewish authors had anything to say about Jesus.
In fact four such sources
have been proposed: the Dead Sea Scrolls, Josephus (37-ca. 100 CE, the bust at left), rabbinic literature (ca. 200-600
CE), and the medieval Sefer Toledot Yeshu ("Book of the Life of Jesus").
Bond will discuss Josephus and one rabbinic work, the Babylonian Talmud. Out of all these Jewish writings, the most important
excerpt for the study of the historical Jesus is Josephus' Testimonium Flavianum ("the testimony of the Flavian" - Flavius was Josephus' adopted name), and Bond spends the most time on this testimony. As you read, evaluate the reliability of Josephus' comments about Jesus.
Bond mentions Jewish Rabbinic literature like the Babylonian Talmud, and since you may be unfamiliar with what Rabbinic literature is, some orientation may
help. After the Jerusalem Temple was destroyed in 70 CE, the priesthood could
no longer lead sacrificial worship in the manner prescribed in scripture. Rabbis
or teachers filled the leadership vacuum, reorienting Jewish life and thought
around their discussions of the Jewish tradition. Gradually, their discussions
were written down. The first book of such conversations and legal decisions was
the Mishnah, compiled around 200 CE. The term literally means "the second,"
that is, the second iteration of the Jewish Law after the Torah (Genesis through
Deuteronomy in the Bible).
Two later reflections on the same law were composed,
and both were named Talmuds ("teachings, studies"). They are named after where
they were composed, so we have the Palestinian Talmud or Yerushalmi,
composed in Palestine around 350–400 CE, and the Babylonian Talmud composed
in Babylon (contemporary Iraq) around 500–600 CE. These books are usually cited
by a small letter (m. for Mishnah, y. for the Yerusahlmi, b.
for Babylonian Talmud), followed by the Hebrew name of the tractate that's being
quoted and a number for the folio (such as b.Sanh. 43a for Babylonian Talmud, tractate on the Sanhedrin or council, folio 43a).
Pages 42-53 of the Bond chapter cover the gospels, their components, and later Christian sources. We won't discuss this material until next week, so just skim it for now or read it over the weekend for next week.
Today is our first scheduled quiz; it will cover readings and class prep questions from the first two and a half weeks of class. Study the following topics:
select one person from the first quest, one of the "disruptors" of the first quest, and one of the second or third questers; define the thesis of each about the historical Jesus, and for the second and third figure, compare and contrast them to the figure(s) you've previously mentioned;
be able to apply the criteria of historicity to a text; and
define the mythicist argument
Assigned Readings
Primary/Secondary:
Bond, The Historical Jesus 37-53; online class prep
Evans, Craig A. "Jesus and the
Dead Sea Scrolls." In The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years:
A Comprehensive Reassessment (ed. Peter W. Flint and James C. VanderKam; Boston:
Brill, 1999) 2.573-98.
The Digital Dead Sea Scrolls - in September 2011, Google Books finished digitizing the first five of the 950+ Dead Sea Scrolls manuscripts, selecting the best-preserved scrolls housed at the Shrine of the Book Museum (most of the rest are housed at the Rockefeller Museum in East Jerusalem). Here is the YouTube video promoting the effort.
The
Works of Flavius Josephus - William Whiston's 19th-century translation
of The Jewish War, The Antiquities of the Jews, his autobiography,
The Life, and some other works, hosted by the Wesley Center for Applied
Theology.
Josephus.yorku.ca
- Designed and maintained by Annette Yoshiko Reed and managed by Josephus scholar
Steve Mason of York University, this site is published in conjunction with the
Brill Josephus Project, which
will be republishing all of Josephus' works in new English translation.
Josephus: Posted without attribution at "The Works of Flavius Josephus,"
Wesley Center Online, Wesley Center for Applied Theology, online, http://wesley.nnu.edu/josephus/,
28 January 2003.
Today we'll be discussing what non-Christian authors from the century after Jesus had to say about him. We'll begin with the classical authors—Greek and Roman men whom
Jews or Christians would refer to as Gentiles (non-Jews). We'll be talking about the four earliest ones:
Thallos (ca. 50 CE), Pliny the Younger (Book 10, Epistle 96 to Trajan,
ca. 112 CE), Suetonius (Lives of the Caesars: Claudius 25.3-5, ca.
120 CE), and Tacitus (Annals 15.44, ca. Bond discusses Tacitus and Suetonius and mentions Pliny the Younger briefly; we'll cover Pliny and Thallos more fully in class. As you read about these authors in Bond, keep track of what they say about Jesus, whether their comments actually speak about Jesus, and how reliable they are. On the question of reliability, consider how they got their information, as well as whom they got it from (eyewitnesses? secondhand? via torture?). 
In fact four such sources
have been proposed: the Dead Sea Scrolls, Josephus (37-ca. 100 CE, the bust at left), rabbinic literature (ca. 200-600
CE), and the medieval Sefer Toledot Yeshu ("Book of the Life of Jesus").
Bond will discuss Josephus and one rabbinic work, the Babylonian Talmud. Out of all these Jewish writings, the most important
excerpt for the study of the historical Jesus is Josephus' Testimonium Flavianum ("the testimony of the Flavian" - Flavius was Josephus' adopted name), and Bond spends the most time on this testimony. As you read, evaluate the reliability of Josephus' comments about Jesus. 
Two later reflections on the same law were composed,
and both were named Talmuds ("teachings, studies"). They are named after where
they were composed, so we have the Palestinian Talmud or Yerushalmi,
composed in Palestine around 350–400 CE, and the Babylonian Talmud composed
in Babylon (contemporary Iraq) around 500–600 CE. These books are usually cited
by a small letter (m. for Mishnah, y. for the Yerusahlmi, b.
for Babylonian Talmud), followed by the Hebrew name of the tractate that's being
quoted and a number for the folio (such as b.Sanh. 43a for Babylonian Talmud, tractate on the Sanhedrin or council, folio 43a).