dejuror wrote:We know that Tacitus' Annals 15.44 with Christus is a forgery because the passage was NEVER used in antiquity to prove Jesus Christ existed.
Is that how your completely impoverished logic works? Just because someone in antiquity never mentioned it, it automatically means it's a forgery?
Would you like to enlighten us all on a couple of things here:
1. Why would anyone in antiquity be expected to quote 15:44?
2. How does an argument from silence automatically make it a forgery?
Let's see some more of that impoverished logic of yours. We could all use a good laugh.
Tacitus' Annals was supposedly composed c 110 CE but up to at least 300 years later [up to the 5th century] NO Apologetic source which wrote about the History of the Church acknowledge Tacitus' Annals with Christus.
Why would any Christian want to quote a passage that calls Christians and their beliefs as being a "mischievous superstition, hateful of mankind, criminals, etc?
Eusebius' Church History used the Forgery called the "TF" in Antquities of the Jews 18 by Josephus.
And can you provide any evidence whatsoever that the TF was a forgery? Can you? Really? Let's see you provide one single stitich of physical evidence that demonstrates the TF was a forgery, dejuror.
Come on, show us all how "brilliant" you are. Produce the evidence. mythter.
Mods, are you watching? This is what I mean by "intellectual dishonesty." He claims forgery without a stitch of evidence, and it is EVIDENCE that is required to make a positive claim of forgery.
HE ISN'T STATING AN OPINION, BUT MAKING A POSITIVE CLAIM WITH ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT IT AND THAT IS INTELLECTUAL DISHONESTY.Here is the standard definition of intellectual dishonesty:
"
Intellectual dishonesty is the advocacy of a position known to be false. An argument which is misused to advance an agenda or to reinforce one's deeply held beliefs in the face of overwhelming evidence contrary."
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.p ... dishonestySince he has absolutely no evidence to support the positive claim of forgery in regards to both Tacitus and Josephus, yet he is making positive claims without that evidence and positive claims in the face of actual historical evidence,
THEN THAT IS WHAT INTELLECTUAL DISHONESTY IS!HE IS KNOWINGLY USING FALLACIOUS UNSUPPORTED ARGUMENTS FROM SILENCE TO MAKE POSITIVE CLAIMS. THAT IS INTELLECTUAL DISHONESTY.
Sulpitius Severus in "Sacred History" 2 mentioned a passage that is similar to Tacitus' Annals 15.44 but the passage with CHRISTUS is MISSING.
And yet you totally fail to mention that Sulpitius Severus mentions "Chestus," an already conclusively historically proven variation of Chritus/Christ.
See Mods? See how easy it is to demonstrate intellectual dishonesty? He intentionally omits critical information that he already knows exists, and will utterly destroy his position. He knows that in the time of Sulpitius Severus the earliest Christians were Jews, and it has already been demonstrated with historical evidence
ad nausium in this thread that Chestus is a variation of Christus.
Sacred History 2.29
..... it happened that Rome was destroyed by fire, while Nero was stationed at Antium. But the opinion of all cast the odium of causing the fire upon the emperor, and he was believed in this way to have sought for the glory of building a new city. And in fact, Nero could not by any means he tried escape from the charge that the fire had been caused by his orders.
He therefore turned the accusation against the Christians, and the most cruel tortures were accordingly inflicted upon the innocent.
Nay, even new kinds of death were invented, so that, being covered in the skins of wild beasts, they perished by being devoured by dogs, while many were crucified or slain by fire, and not a few were set apart for this purpose, that, when the day came to a close, they should be consumed to serve for light during the night.
It is most fascinating that Tacitus' Annals 15.44 with Christus is being used TODAY as an extremely significant piece of non-apologetic evidence when in antiquity it was NEVER EVER used by any existing Church Historian.
And yet this intellectually dishonest query fails to acknowledge the following:
Very few would assert that this passage is a forgery, for the evidence is strongly in favor of the genuineness of this passage. The passage is in perfect Tacitean style; it appears in every known copy of the Annals, and the anti-Christian tone is so strong that it is extremely unlikely that a Christian could have written it, or ever wanted to quote it.
Indeed, the Tacitean polemic against Christianity is so strong that it was one of two things Tacitus was condemned for in the sixteenth century - the other being that he wrote in bad Latin [Dor.Tac, 149], and it is even said that Spinoza liked Tacitus because of his anti-Jewish and anti-Christian bias [Momig.CFou, 126].
This is not to say that there are not those whom we may encounter who will suggest that this passage is an interpolation. Some will suggest that because no church father quotes the passage early in church history, it must have been added later.
No church father, however, would have willingly quoted such a negative reference to Jesus and the Christians; moreover, indications are that Tacitus wrote for a very limited audience of his peers. The Annals may not have gotten into the Church's hands at an early date.
So, the idea that this passage is an interpolation is no more credible than the idea held in the 19th century that Tacitus' entire works are fifteenth-century forgeries.
The forgery called the "TF" in Antiquities of the Jews" was the ONLY Non-Apologetic "evidence" that Jesus existed.
Tacitus' Annals 15.44 with Christus was manipulated or corrupted some time AFTER Sacred History 2 or some time AFTER the start of the 5th century.
More intellectually dishonest bullshit.
Mods get your fucking heads wrapped around this shit because
YOUR LACK OF INTELLECTUAL HONESTY on this forum is glaringly fucking obvious.
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