Cup found in Egypt in 2008 inscribed "Magician Through Chrestus"
It seems clear that the Roman historian Suetoneus (Claudius 25.4) did write, “Since the Jews constantly made disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he expelled them from Rome.”
It was recently discovered that Christian Scribes had Changed Chrestians to Christians in Tacitus' "History"
Unlike the Testimonium of Josephus or the Nero- blamed-Christians-for-the-fire statement of Tacitus, there appears to be no reason to suspect any interpolation in Suetonius.
Recently it was discovered that the earlier manuscript of Tacitus had Chrestians in the passage and it was changed to Christians by a later scribe. It seems obvious that a Christian scribe could not have made the mistake of writing Chrestians (Chrestianos) for Christians, so we must take it that Tacitus’ passage was probably authentic, but it has been interpolated. If Tacitus wrote Chrestians, then it is quite likely that he also wrote Chrest for Christ. The passage makes little sense as now recorded in wikipedia:
Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite punishments on a class hated for their disgraceful acts, called Chrestians by the populace. Christ, from whom the name had its origin.
It seems ridiculous to say that Chrestians (the good ones) came from Christ (the anointed one). It is like saying that the followers of Lenin are called Lenenists or the followers of Stalin are called Stalenists, or the followers of Jefferson are called Jiffersonians or the followers of Woodrow Wilson are called Welsonians. It is not an easy thing to get the letters “i” and “e” mixed up in this way. Nobody refers to the founder of Mormonism as Joseph Smeth when they mean Joseph Smith.
In order to make a joke out of the discrepancy, Tertullian writes in ad nationes, (circa 200 CE) “Even when by a faulty pronunciation you call us “Chrestians” (for you are not certain about even the sound of this noted name), you in fact lisp out the sense of pleasantness and goodness.” To the rhetorician Tertullian the thought never occurs that the Romans might be a better and more accurate source for the beginning of Christianity than the Christians themselves.
Once we accept this, then we have two Roman historians from between 110-120 C.E. mentioning not Jesus or Christ, but a man leading a Jewish rebellion named Chrestus.
Here are some more early references to Chrest or Chrestians. Here’s another interesting page on the use of the term “Chrestians”
I proposed a number of years ago that Tacitus originally wrote that Nero sent the Procurator Porcius Festus to put down the Christians/Chrestians.
Christian interpolators, misunderstanding, changed it to Pontius Pilate, and they changed Chrestus to Christ and Nero to Tiberius.
Thus the original read:
| Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite punishments on a class hated for their disgraceful acts, called Chrestians by the populace. Chrestus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty (i.e., Crucifixion) during the reign of Nero at the hands of one of our procurators, Porcius Festus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular. |
Note what Josephus (book 20:8.10) says about the procurator Porcius Festus whom Nero sent:
| 10. Upon Festus’s coming into Judea, it happened that Judea was afflicted by the robbers, while all the villages were set on fire, and plundered by them. And then it was that the sicarii, as they were called, who were robbers, grew numerous. They made use of small swords, not much different in length from the Persian acinacae, but somewhat crooked, and like the Roman sicae, [or sickles,] as they were called; and from these weapons these robbers got their denomination; and with these weapons they slew a great many; for they mingled themselves among the multitude at their festivals, when they were come up in crowds from all parts to the city to worship God, as we said before, and easily slew those that they had a mind to slay. They also came frequently upon the villages belonging to their enemies, with their weapons, and plundered them, and set them on fire. So Festus sent forces, both horsemen and footmen, to fall upon those that had been seduced by a certain impostor, who promised them deliverance and freedom from the miseries they were under, if they would but follow him as far as the wilderness. Accordingly, those forces that were sent destroyed both him that had deluded them, and those that were his followers also. |
It makes perfect sense for Tacitus to be talking about this “Chrest” who was killed around 59 according to Tacitus. The Christians reading the passage must have thought that Tacitus had heard the wrong story and took the liberty to correct him.
The sudden leap back from the time of Nero to the time of Tiberius and leap forward again is what is really disconcerting about the passage. Tacitus would have had to explain more about the suppression of the new superstition if it died out in the 30’s and started again in Rome around in the 60’s. (The Fire was in 64). If the outbreak of the superstition happened in the time of Nero, as Josephus reports, there would be no need to explain what happened. The death of the Christ by Festus would have upset the Jews in Rome. Nero could then place the blame for the fire on them.
If we just look at the history by Tacitus and Josephus and stop trying to fit it into the imaginary history of Eusebius, we can see things more clearly.
Philosopher Jay
Notes to Aphrodite 
Yes! You need to get this stuff out there big time. You have the power of the universal force of change and correction behind you.
There are some general problems with all histories of this period:
1. The scholarly agenda has been set by theists, specifically Christians, who created the fields of biblical scholarship and biblical archaeology, so that peer review is skewed.
2. This same phenomenon has occurred also in the study of Buddhist and Islamic origins.
3. Biblical texts have not been dated reliably and there is no desire to do so.
4. My own study shows that Buddhism, Christianity and Islam grew out of a singular and early philosophy – Pythagoreanism – and therefore studying each of these three religions in isolation cannot reveal the context.
5. Much of the history for these religions lies in the region termed Greco-India – the eastern satrapies of the Iranian empire conquered by Alexander – and archaeological study there is restricted.
As for what is regarded today as the orthodox history of Christianity, it is mired in a self-referencing series of assumptions I term ‘the glittering web’, centred on the idea that the books of the New Testament are historical in character, when they are literary, and that there was a historical Eusebius of Caesarea who wrote a Church history, when this character has no historicity at all.
There is no evidence-based history for either Buddhism, Christianity or Islam. I am trying to rectify this, though most scholars seem not to understand the need for it.
Hi John,
Your first three points, I quite agree with. Your fourth and fifth points sound interesting and I like the term ‘the glittering web’.
I agree that Eusebius’ “Church History” is a key problem here. It is the foundational history book that contains very little, if any real history. I am not sure that Eusebius himself was fictional. It is an interesting hypothesis worth exploring.
Chrestus is NOT a name for Christ. Chrestus was actually a very common name in Rome. This is, by no means, talking about christ.
your proposition certainly seems to make sense. thanks for sharing it!
Discrepancy: doesn’t Tacitus write how the cult was quelled for the moment but later spread to Rome and Josephus says the cult was utterly destroyed in Judea. They can’t be the same cult.
Hi DonnyT.
Good point. This does directly contradict the information we get in “Acts” that indicates the early Christian movement grew by leaps and bounds in Judea after the death of Jesus.
well, the problem with your thesis that the cult had been destroyed in Judea is that the Roman soldiers who were instrumental to the execution, and witness to the resurrection, of Jesus was spreading the cult into the Roman legions before Mary Magdalene discovered the empty cave. The cult of Christianity spread throughout the Roman empire via the soldiers of the legions before either Peter or Paul got to Rome, This was a bottom-up proliferation that the Roman upper classes were only vaguely aware before Melviad Bridge.
Also, doesn’t Seutonious’s lack of the word quodam suggest he was refering to a title and not an actual person?
This is a really interesting theory, but there’s a reason no one’s ever suggested this before – your core premise is wrong.
“Chrestians” is in fact an early term used to refer to Christians not only by Romans, but by Christians themselves. In the Codex Sinaiticus, all three references to Christians appear as Chrestianoi in the Greek. Christians also placed “Chrestians” and “Christians” alike on their own tombs in the 2nd-4th Centuries.
And “Chrestus” most definitely appears as an alternate spelling for “Christus” in references to Jesus in the 2nd Century (Antioch and Rome by Raymond E. Brown and John P. Meier, May 1983, pages 100-101). It would indeed be silly for a fallower of Stalin to be called a Stalenist, unless you transliterated “Stalin” into another language and it came out “Stalen.”
You have to take into account the rest of what Tertullian says in regards to this spelling: “But the meaning of this name must be set forth, on account of the error of the ignorant who by the change of a letter are accustomed to call Him Chrestus.” (Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries, VII)
Seutonius was definitely not referring to the nickname or given name of a local Jewish agitator named “useful one”: he tells us elsewhere that “foreigners” like Jews were not allowed to adopt such Greco-Roman names. Since these radical Jews were certainly not following someone who wasn’t Jewish, it must follow that “Chrestus” here is a reference to a Jew who was not present for these actual events (i.e. Jesus).
This is, by the way, the overwhelming consensus of mainstream scholarship, and not because of theists – because, rather, of the actual facts.
Your translation of Chrestians to “the good ones” is an incorrect misnomer. it means, “manageable or fit for use” (like a servant) It’s connection to virtuousness and goodness is akin to the ancient ideas of things being clean or unclean not a polarity of moral character as you are using it.
But what’s funnier is that you probably didn’t stop to think about two things… God never made water in the Bible… and Jesus was never anointed on the head with oils from the Rabbinic priesthood as King of all Israel, which means he is not the annointed (ie. not the messiah).
But I’m guessing your aren’t big on paying attention to facts, especially in the book you claim to know so well.
A. When God made the earth, it was covered in water. This is what “earth” is. Dry land isn’t seperated until Day 3. Additionally, “heavens” from Genesis 1:1 in Hebrew is “upper waters” — and the waters aren’t seperated until 1:9. Lastly, Psalm 104:6-9 clearly states God creating the water: “You covered it with the watery depths as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. But at your rebuke the waters fled, at the sound of your thunder they took to flight; they flowed over the mountains, they went down into the valleys, to the place you assigned for them. You set a boundary they cannot cross; never again will they cover the earth.” Scripture needs to be read as a whole.
B. Jesus was anointed at His baptism with the Holy Spirit, which was what the oil represented all those centuries.
So before being derisive to another, I suggest you investigate your own assertions which are clearly incorrect and incomplete.
What anyone fails to mention is that the Tacitus reference to the whole part about Pilate and chrest is that the earliest copy which has this reference in it is dated to the 11th century and only comes from one copy rewritten by monks in Monte casino, Italy. The strange thing is in other Tacitus copies earlier and from other locations like Germany do not have this passage in it or even have those books dated after 117 Ce. Nobody can verify what interpolations may have happened in the 1000 years of being in biased christian hands or even if it is a complete fabrication dated to around the fourth century. the other strange thing is that Procurators did not exist in Judea till around 44 CE and Tacitus knew this. SO WHY NOT SAY PREFECT, was the greatest roman historian so incompetent about basic roman history at that time. I am thinking just one more PIUS LIE after all those shrouds, fake relics, tombs, interpolations. Why do they have to LIE so much if they sell faith as the only way. Why even have so many apologists, is their god so weak he can no longer speak for himself like in the days of moses, the more you look into the historicity the more it looks and smells like a scam from day one.
Hi Jay,
I wonder if the sentence “It makes perfect sense for Tacitus to be talking about this “Chrest” who was killed around 59 according to Tacitus. ”
should be “It makes perfect sense for Tacitus to be talking about this “Chrest” who was killed around 59 according to *Seutonius (Claudius 25.4)*”
Regards.
According to what is supposedly a 134 CE letter of Hadrian to Servianus, Chrestians is also the name the followers of the PAGAN god Serapis (Osiris) called themselves.
Interesting, thanks.
Seutty was writing about a different culture than his own, one who he viewed poorly. Look at how many different English language spellings there are for ISIS, ISIl, even Eiil. And this in an era of modern publishing standards for spelling conventions that did not even exist at the time of the US Constitution let alone ancient Rome.
Is it suprising that a latinized cognate spelling for a more common Roman name would be a good choice for him? Remember that this new sect and its leaders were not important to him nor were conventional names in a dictionary for him to look up, assuming he would want to bother.
What’s that guy’s name? Oh, yeah, Chrestus, “useful,” like my brother’s, cousin’s third slave. Close enough for there likes.