Did Jesus of Nazareth
actually exist?

[Part 3]

We are putting together the historical evidence for the existence of our Lord Jesus Christ. Some people, like Bertrand Russell in his book Why I am not a Christian, have questioned the very existence of Jesus Christ, stating that "it is quite doubtful whether Christ ever existed at all". However, it is interesting that none of the people who propagate the "Christ-myth" theories, as they are called, are historians!

So far we have looked at documents that specifically mention Christ or Christians. However many there are, we would wish for more, but the Romans were not very good at keeping archives. It was an empire which preferred to build roads and bridges, rather than write records. They were soldiers who kept the peace and raised taxes, rather than preserve documents. However, a number of ancient writers do refer to Roman documents which mention Jesus Christ. Even though those manuscripts have not yet been discovered, and may never be found, it is evidence that they did at one time exist.

Justin and Tertullian and the birth of Jesus

In Luke 2:1-5 we read:

In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) And everyone went to his own town to register. So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.

Both Justin, in Apology 1.34, written about AD 150, and Tertullian, in Against Marcion 4.7,19, believed that the record of the above census, including the registration of Joseph and Mary at Bethlehem, would be found in the official archives of the reign of Augustus. They referred any of their readers who wished to be reassured of the facts of Jesus' birth to these archives. Whether they, themselves, had consulted and seen such documents, we do not know. However, it shows that such documents did exist at that time, and that what was recorded in them did support the account given by Luke.

Justin Martyr - Defence of Christianity But the words "They pierced my hands and my feet" are a description of the nails that were fixed in His hands and His feet on the cross; and He was crucified, those who crucified Him cast lots for His garments, and divided them among themselves; and that these things were so, you may learn from the "Acts" which are recorded under Pontius Pilate.

Justin and Pontius Pilate

A number of ancient writers believed that Pilate did send a report to Rome, documenting the trial and execution of Jesus. In his Defence of Christianity to the Emperor Antoninus Pius, Justin referred the emperor to Pilate's report (Apology 1.35). One interesting part is given below.

Justin would hardly have referred the emperor to a report which did not exist! Thus this is further historical evidence as to the existence of Jesus Christ, and to him being executed under Pontius Pilate. However, this is not the only reference in Justin to Jesus Christ and the "Acts" of Pontius Pilate. Later he says:

That He [Christ] performed these miracles you may easily be satisfied from the "Acts" of Pontius Pilate. (Apology 1.48)

Thus it seems that Pilate not only wrote about Christ's trial and execution but also mentioned His miracles. It would be interesting to know what he wrote but those documents have never been found. None the less, we are acquiring a lot of evidence which those who hold to the 'Christ-myth' theories seemingly ignore.

Police Records?

However, there is another reason that may explain the lack of records pertaining to Christ and Christianity in the annals of ancient Rome. From the standpoint of imperial Rome, Christianity was not very important. More than that, for the first hundred or so years of its existence, Christianity was considered a somewhat obscure and disreputable superstition, and those practising it were classed as criminals. If it found its way into the official records at all, these would most likely have been the police records! And there is some evidence to suggest that a number of important people were charged with the crime of becoming Christians, as mentioned by F F Bruce in The New Testament Documents: Are they reliable?

The New Testament Documents: Are they reliable? The "foreign superstition" with which, according to Tacitus (Annals 13.32) Pomponia Graecina, the wife of Aulus Plautius, the conqueror of Britain, was charged in AD 57, was probably Christianity. Christianity, too, seems to have been the crime for which the Emperor Domitian had his cousin Flavius Clemens executed and the latter's wife Flavia Domitilla banished, AD 95 (Seutonius, "Life of Domitian" 15.1; Dio Cassius, "History" 67.14). When the accused were distinguished enough, the police records became part of the stuff of history. The probability that both Pomponia and Flavia Domitilla were Christians is supported by the evidence of early Christian cemeteries in Rome. See F F Bruce, "The Spreading Flame", pp 137, 162.

Such police records would not have been seen as important historical documents, such as some of those mentioned above, and so it should not surprise us that they disappeared and became "the stuff of history". Many may even have been destroyed.

None the less, what little evidence we do have shows us that even as far back as AD 57, the wife of the conqueror of Britain knew of Jesus Christ. He was much more than a figment of her imagination. He was a real thorn in the flesh to the first century Romans, and that makes Him an historical figure of stature.