By Will Hall, Baptist Message executive editor
ALEXANDRIA, La. (LBM) – In the last dozen years or so, there has been a slight uptick of attacks on the historical existence of Jesus by a very small circle of “Jesus Myth” theorists.
However, overwhelmingly, historians and New Testament researchers alike (the vast majority of whom are secularists or atheists) consider such “New Atheist” views as a fringe position — specifically because of the extrabiblical evidence documented by non-Christians in ancient records.
Yet this same majority of modern academicians also reject the assertion that Jesus is God, and they deny the biblical record about His miracles and His resurrection.
ANCIENT EVIDENCE
Flavius Josephus was a first century historian who was a Roman citizen of Jewish decent. In his “Antiquities of the Jews” (circa A.D. 93), he mentioned Jesus twice, describing Him first as “a wise man … who performed surprising deeds” and “won over many Jews and … Greeks.” Moreover, he called Jesus “the Christ” whom “Pilate condemned … to a cross,” and he wrote that Jesus was “restored to life.” In Josephus’s second reference, he mentioned the trial of “James, the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ”.
Tacitus was a Roman historian who wrote about Jesus in “The Annals” (about A.D. 116) in reference to Nero’s persecution of Christians: “Nero fastened the guilt [about the fire that destroyed Rome] and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate, and a most mischievous superstition … broke out not only in Judea … but even in Rome … .”
Pliny the Younger was the Roman governor of Bithynia-Pontus (modern-day Turkey), and he exchanged letters (A.D. 112, or thereabout) with Emperor Trajan about how to deal with Christians. He described how he interrogated Christians “a second and third time, threatening them with punishment; those who persisted I ordered executed.” Then he observed that “those who are really Christians” could not be forced to curse the name of Jesus or worship the image of Caesar. He described Christianity as a “superstition” and a “contagion” that “has spread not only to the cities but also to the villages and farms.”
Even the Babylonian Talmud, the central text of Rabbinic Judaism, which dates to A.D. 500, mentions Jesus in part: “On the eve of Passover they hanged Yeshu the Nazarene … because he practiced sorcery and instigated and seduced Israel to idolatry.
NOTE: “Yeshu” is the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew “Yeshua.”
A MIRACLE MOVEMENT
Despite the lack of non-biblical documentation about His miracles, there is enough circumstantial evidence for neutral observers to concede that it is at least reasonable for people to believe that Jesus’ resurrection and the miracles He performed have a basis in fact as well as faith.
The New Testament documents the surge in numbers of the Church almost immediately after Jesus’ resurrection:
— On Pentecost 3,000 new believers were baptized (Acts 2:41) and the number grew daily (Acts 2:47), just days after Jesus had ascended into Heaven following 40 days during which He preached daily in the city where He had been crucified (Acts 1:3). Importantly, not only did the city witness the miracle of His bodily resurrection just prior to Pentecost, but they had seen many believers who had been raised from the grave, too (Matthew 27:52-53).
— Then just weeks later, 5,000 came to salvation after hearing the apostles preaching about Christ and His resurrection Acts 4:1-4).
— Only a month or so after that, multitudes of men and women (perhaps tens of thousands) were saved after the apostles performed miraculous healings in the manner of Christ (Acts 5:12-16).
Even Pliny the Younger noted that early Christianity surged in numbers (like a “contagion”) despite active persecution of adherents by Rome, and Tacitus agreed.
But there also are extra-biblical records that align with the supernatural events that took place on the day of Jesus’s death. The Bible reports that there was darkness in Jerusalem from noon to 3 p.m. while Jesus was on the cross, and an
earthquake when He died.
— Two decades after the crucifixion, the historian Thallus wrote about that same darkness but attributed it to an eclipse.
— Meanwhile, about 80 years after Thallus, the historian Phlegon from Tralles (modern Turkey) also wrote about darkness that cloaked the region about the date when Jesus was crucified, and he noted that there was an earthquake, too.
— More recently (2012), geologists studying sediment core samples around the Dead Ses found that sometime during A.D. 26-36 (which encompasses the date of Jesus’ death), an earthquake had shaken the area.
THE COVENANT CONNECTION
The term “New Testament” means “new covenant,” the sacred promise by God established by the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Consequently, those who oppose the authority of God attack the historicity of the New Testament to undermine this covenant with humanity and the hope it holds for those who believe.
Yet, 2,000 years after His miracles and resurrection stirred the hearts of men and women to declare Him “Lord,” the New Testament continues to draw millions to faith by its historical and theological record that points to Jesus as the Messiah and the Son of God.
“Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God” (Romans 10:17).
Moreover, despite ardent opposition by the hard-hearted, He will continue to draw the lost to Him because he was “lifted up from the earth” on the cross (John 12:32-33) and because men and women continue to hear the Good News that He also was lifted up from the grave.
