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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Cherd, post: 8098308, member: 24754&quot;]I don&#039;t doubt the authenticity of Tacitus&#039; account, as compared to those of Josephus for instance. But, I don&#039;t really see it as proof of existence. First of all, the text was written nearly 100 years after Jesus would have died. And, it doesn&#039;t provide any information that wouldn&#039;t have been common knowledge with respect to the foundational beliefs of the religion.</p><p><br /></p><p>For instance, Tacitus could have obtained this much knowledge of Jesus&#039; existence in a 5 second conversation:</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Tacitus:</b> &quot;Hey, what are Christians?&quot;</p><p><b>Some person:</b> &quot;They are a religious group whose assumed messiah was crucified by Pontius Pilate&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p>Unless Tacitus had access to some since lost, reliable source of information, then what Tacitus wrote is of no more value in definitively concluding Jesus&#039; existence than if a person wrote those words today. It is all hearsay.</p><p><br /></p><p>But, like Donna said:</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>And, a lot of these would-be messiahs were crucified. So, we know that a Jesus-like person definitely existed, but we don&#039;t need Tacitus to make that determination.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>The question is:</b> Did a guy named Jesus with parents named Joseph and Mary and brothers and sisters named blah blah, born in Bethlehem on January 1st year 0, whose family fled from Herod to Egypt, who was baptized by John the Baptist, who gathered followers and disciples named blah blah, who gave the Sermon on the Mount, etc, etc, etc,.......actually exist?</p><p><br /></p><p><b>The answer is:</b> Maybe, but we don&#039;t know for sure.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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