Two Challenges about Josephus' 1st Century Description of Jesus

rakovsky · Apr 22, 2019

Josephus was a famous first century Jewish historian and the version of his Antiquities of the Jews that has come down to us has an apparently quite sympathetic passage on Jesus called the Testimonium Flavianum, which you can read here: Josephus' Account of Jesus: The Testimonium Flavianum
Teachers and Fathers of the Church repeatedly referenced Josephus' writings, particularly his writings on John the Baptist, Jesus, and James. And most scholars today believe that Josephus' Antiquities had some version of the Testimonium Flavianum.

(Question 1) If the surviving Testimonium Flavianum is legitimate, then how does one explain (A) Origen's negative characterization of Josephus' writing on Jesus and (B) the Arabic version?
I think that the surviving Testimonium Flavianum is legitimate for many reasons. Its ideas and phrases lines up so closely with Luke 24, suggesting that the author of the Testimonium wanted it to look like Luke 24, since I think that Luke's gospel was written before the Antiquities. All the surviving Latin and Greek copies of the Antiquities have the Testimonium Flavianum (T.F.), and Eusebius quoted the T.F. in the 4th century, which means that it was not a late medieval forgery. Josephus appears sympathetic to Christians and has a background that would predispose him to be so. He dedicated his book to Epaphroditus, which was probably the same one that Paul sent greetings to in Nero's household in a Biblical epistle. His passages on John the Baptist and on Jesus' brother James are sympathetic. He was a Galilean who was at least ambivalent about revolting against Rome (he surrendered and became an opponent of the revolt), and he says in his autobiography that he had been baptized by a hermit who lived in the wilderness named Banus. So I think that he was probably a secret Christian like Nicodemus. Some writers like the 18th c. translator of Josephus' works, William Whiston, over the centuries have considered Josephus to have been a Christian, but most scholars think that he wasn't because of Origen's characterization of Josephus.

If one believes that the T.F. is authentic, then how does one explain:
(A) Origen, writing around the beginning of the 3rd century, claimed that Josephus was not a Christian.; yet the surviving Latin and Greek versions of the Antiquities have the T.F. say that Jesus was the Christ?
In Luke 24, the two travelers tell the resurrected Jesus

how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to the judgment of death and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.

In agreement with this passage, the T.F. says:

He was the Christ. And when, upon an accusation by the principal men among us, Pilate had condemned him to a cross, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him.

Also in Luke 24, the travelers tell Jesus "Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place." Jesus responds to the two travelers, saying:

' Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?'
Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

In agreement with this part of Luke, the T.F. says:

He appeared to them spending a third day restored to life, for the prophets of God had prophesied these things and countless other marvels about him.

So it appears that the author of the T.F. presented Jesus explicitly as the Christ, particularly as the one of whom the Biblical prophets foretold.

But in contrast, Origen writes that Josephus was a non-Christian Jew. It's true that throughout his writings, Josephus does present himself as a Jew who believes in observing the Torah rules. But this passage makes Josephus look like a Jewish Christian, even if Torah-observant.

Here you can find Origen's writings about Josephus: Origen on Josephus.
In discussing Josephus' account of James, Origen wrote that Josephus didn't accept Jesus to be Christ:

And in such a way among the people did this James shine for his justice [C] that Flavius Josephus, who wrote the Judaic Antiquities in twenty books, [D] wishing to demonstrate the cause why the people suffered such great things that even the temple was razed down, [E1] said that these things came to pass against them in accordance with the ire of God on account of the things which were dared by them against James the brother of Jesus who is called Christ. [F] And the wondrous thing is that, although he did not accept our Jesus to be Christ, [B2] he yet testified that the justice of James was not at all small; [E2] and he says that even the people supposed they had suffered these things on account of James.
Origen, "On Matthew", 10.17

It's true that in Josephus' passage in Book XX of the Antiquities, which comes two volumes after the T.F., Josephus says that James is the brother of Jesus who is "called Christ". And Origen could take this to imply that Josephus didn't consider Jesus to actually _be_ the Christ. I guess you could argue that Josephus didn't necessarily mean to imply that Jesus wasn't Christ by using the phrase "called Christ". Josephus was writing for a gentile audience and so this could be a way of presenting foreign, Jewish concepts to them (eg. if he had used the phrase the "city called Jerusalem"). But regardless, what are we to make of the fact that the T.F. does directly call Jesus "the Christ"?

Origen's writing on Josephus poses some other problems. Besides that, Origen wrote that Josephus

wishing to demonstrate the cause why the people suffered such great things that even the temple was razed down, said that these things came to pass against them in accordance with the ire of God on account of the things which were dared by them against James the brother of Jesus who is called Christ. And the wondrous thing is that, although he did not accept our Jesus to be Christ, he yet testified that the justice of James was not at all small; and he says that even the people supposed they had suffered these things on account of James.

But Josephus' Antiquities as we have them don't state that the Temple was destroyed due to James' killing or that people thought that it was destroyed for that reason. At most, Josephus narrates James' killing in the context of the run up to the Temple's destruction and says that good citizens objected to James' killing. If the passage on James said what Origen claimed that it did, it's hard to see why our surviving version of it is silent on the point. Church authorities wouldn't have much motive to censor out what Origen claimed that it said. Are we to think that some time after Origen read the Antiquities in the early 3rd century, pagan Roman authorities censored such statements out of the passage on James in the Antiquities? This seems unlikely as well.

One explanation could that Origen could be mistaken about the Antiquities, either misremembering it or getting incorrect information about it through hearsay. So in fact Josephus could have called Jesus "Christ" and then Origen was mistaken about Josephus' beliefs. This is my best guess.

Peter Kirby suggests that Origen might have been confusing Josephus with the 2nd century Christian writer Hegesippus:

Origen has been said to be reading too much into Josephus. But that explanation is not sufficient, not least because we know that the very same kind of tradition to which Origen reacts exists in another writer (i.e., Hegesippus). Origen must be confusing a tradition not found in Josephus with the account of Josephus in book 20 of the Antiquities; alternatively, Origen may be getting his information from a source improperly attributed to Josephus. It is a curious fact that both exegetes from early third century Alexandria should make the same kind of error and one which leads us to wonder about the otherwise-unattested manuscript tradition of Hegesippus and/or Josephus that may have existed there. It seems vain to suppose they independently decided to misrepresent Josephus. Moreover, Origen had an opportunity to refresh his memory between the two works but still persists in stating so emphatically that Josephus said something that we cannot actually find in our manuscripts of Josephus.

Chasing Hegesippus

Also, how does one explain (B) that the Arabic version was so different than the surviving version of the T.F. and doesn't include such overtly Christian faith assertions?
The 10th century Arabic Christian writer Bishop Agapius described the T.F. this way in Arabic:

Similarly Josephus, the Hebrew. For he says in the treatises that he has written on the governance (?) of the Jews: 'At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. His conduct was good, and (he) was known to be virtuous. And many people from the Jews and other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and die. But those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after the crucifixion, and that he was alive; accordingly he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophets have recounted wonders.

That is, Bp. Agapius rendered the T.F. as saying only that Jesus was "perhaps" the Messiah.

Richard Carrier writes about this Arabic version:

Agapius was translating this passage from the Syriac Chronicle of Theophilus (or some other Syriac Chronicle closely akin), written in the 8th century, the exact same text copied by Michael the Syrian in the 12th century in his own Syriac Chronicle. And though we don’t have Theophilus, we can tell from Michael that Theophilus’s text was essentially identical to the known Greek text of Eusebius’s quotation of the Testimonium in his copy of Josephus (but for one key difference I’ll get to in a moment). Agapius was therefore taking liberties, and altering the text in some way that suited him. His translation was thus not reliable, but more like a crude and speculative interpretation.
...
But the Syriac quoted by Michael declares Jesus “was believed to be the Christ,” a softer assertion that perhaps maybe a Jew like Josephus might write. This same emendation appears in the Latin translation of Jerome, written just half a century after Eusebius. Note, however, that in both cases, Jerome’s Latin and Michael’s Syriac are quotations of the early 4th century Church History by Eusebius, and not of any manuscript of Josephus.

SOURCE: The End of the Arabic Testimonium • Richard Carrier
If Bishop Agapius was using a version of the T.F. handed down in Syriac, maybe he was skeptical about the version in his possession and changed it to match his expectations based on the idea that Josephus was not Christian. Otherwise, it's hard to see why he or those who passed the T.F. down to him would de-Christianize the passage on Jesus.

(Question 2) What do you make of the claim that depictions of Jesus in early Church literature, and particularly in Josephus' writing, as physically unattractive were not uncommon?

The Josephus Home Page's FAQ says:

There is an eighth-century document written by Andreas Hierosolymitanus, Archbishop of Crete, which quotes Josephus in the following fragment:

"But moreover the Jew Josephus in like manner narrates that the Lord was seen having meeting eyebrows, goodly eyes, long-faced, crooked, well-grown."
...
The word "crooked" used here is a translation of the Greek epikuphos, usually meaning "crooked, bent over." It could mean hunchbacked.

However, note this passage is simply attributed to Josephus by someone else; it does not appear in any manuscript of Josephus known to us; nor is it plausibly by Josephus, who almost never gives physical descriptions of people, only doing so when the information is essential to his story. It is highly unlikely Josephus would have considered Jesus' appearance relevant to the essential facts about him. Nor do the many authors who quote Josephus on Jesus prior to the eighth century, particularly Eusebius, say anything about this passage. So there is no reason to take it as authentic.
...
...the idea that Jesus was unattractive and possibly deformed seems not to have been uncommon in the early Christian church -- see Tertullian, Against Marcion iii. 17 -- and was associated with Isaiah 52:14 and other passages the first web site quotes.

SOURCE: Josephus Mail and FAQ

Against Marcion III, 17, referenced above, goes:

Whatever that poor despised body may be, because it was an object of touch and sight, it shall be my Christ, be He inglorious, be He ignoble, be He dishonoured; for such was it announced that He should be, both in bodily condition and aspect. Isaiah comes to our help again: "We have announced (His way) before Him," says he; "He is like a servant, like a root in a dry ground; He has no form nor comeliness; we saw Him, and He had neither form nor beauty; but His form was despised, marred above all men." Similarly the Father addressed the Son just before: "Inasmuch as many will be astonished at You, so also will Your beauty be without glory from men." Isaiah 52:14 For although, in David's words, He is fairer than the children of men, yet it is in that figurative state of spiritual grace, when He is girded with the sword of the Spirit, which is verily His form, and beauty, and glory. According to the same prophet, however, He is in bodily condition "a very worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and an outcast of the people." But no internal quality of such a kind does He announce as belonging to Him.
CHURCH FATHERS: Against Marcion, Book III (Tertullian)

Isaiah 52:14 says about the Lord's Servant (alluding to the Messiah): "As many were astonied at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men". Isaiah 53:2 says that "he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him."

One place in the gospels says that Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, which suggested to me that Jesus was tall, rather than hunchbacked.

Josephus' Antiquities, as they have come down to us however, don't describe Christ's physical features or depict him as unattractive. The only place in it that mentions Jesus is the T.F., and it's hard to think that the 8th century writer Abp. Andreas Hierosolymitanus got a copy of the Antiquities with this description of Jesus in it when the 4th century writer Eusebius repeatedly quoted Josephus' T.F. without such a depiction of Jesus being in it.

Peter Kirby has a theory that some Church fathers mistakenly referred to Hegesippus as Josephus, which you can find here: Chasing Hegesippus
So perhaps Abp. Andreas was referring to Hegesippus' writing. After all, (IIRC) Hegesippus had described James' knees as camel-like from kneeling piously and described James as unwashed due to asceticism. So he might describe Jesus in lowly terms too.

HTacianas · Apr 22, 2019

rakovsky said:
Josephus was a famous first century Jewish historian and the version of his Antiquities of the Jews that has come down to us has an apparently quite sympathetic passage on Jesus called the Testimonium Flavianum, which you can read here: Josephus' Account of Jesus: The Testimonium Flavianum
Teachers and Fathers of the Church repeatedly referenced Josephus' writings, particularly his writings on John the Baptist, Jesus, and James. And most scholars today believe that Josephus' Antiquities had some version of the Testimonium Flavianum.

(Question 1) If the surviving Testimonium Flavianum is legitimate, then how does one explain (A) Origen's negative characterization of Josephus' writing on Jesus and (B) the Arabic version?
I think that the surviving Testimonium Flavianum is legitimate for many reasons. Its ideas and phrases lines up so closely with Luke 24, suggesting that the author of the Testimonium wanted it to look like Luke 24, since I think that Luke's gospel was written before the Antiquities. All the surviving Latin and Greek copies of the Antiquities have the Testimonium Flavianum (T.F.), and Eusebius quoted the T.F. in the 4th century, which means that it was not a late medieval forgery. Josephus appears sympathetic to Christians and has a background that would predispose him to be so. He dedicated his book to Epaphroditus, which was probably the same one that Paul sent greetings to in Nero's household in a Biblical epistle. His passages on John the Baptist and on Jesus' brother James are sympathetic. He was a Galilean who was at least ambivalent about revolting against Rome (he surrendered and became an opponent of the revolt), and he says in his autobiography that he had been baptized by a hermit who lived in the wilderness named Banus. So I think that he was probably a secret Christian like Nicodemus. Some writers like the 18th c. translator of Josephus' works, William Whiston, over the centuries have considered Josephus to have been a Christian, but most scholars think that he wasn't because of Origen's characterization of Josephus.

If one believes that the T.F. is authentic, then how does one explain:
(A) Origen, writing around the beginning of the 3rd century, claimed that Josephus was not a Christian.; yet the surviving Latin and Greek versions of the Antiquities have the T.F. say that Jesus was the Christ?
In Luke 24, the two travelers tell the resurrected Jesus

In agreement with this passage, the T.F. says:

Also in Luke 24, the travelers tell Jesus "Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place." Jesus responds to the two travelers, saying:

In agreement with this part of Luke, the T.F. says:

So it appears that the author of the T.F. presented Jesus explicitly as the Christ, particularly as the one of whom the Biblical prophets foretold.

But in contrast, Origen writes that Josephus was a non-Christian Jew. It's true that throughout his writings, Josephus does present himself as a Jew who believes in observing the Torah rules. But this passage makes Josephus look like a Jewish Christian, even if Torah-observant.

Here you can find Origen's writings about Josephus: Origen on Josephus.
In discussing Josephus' account of James, Origen wrote that Josephus didn't accept Jesus to be Christ:

It's true that in Josephus' passage in Book XX of the Antiquities, which comes two volumes after the T.F., Josephus says that James is the brother of Jesus who is "called Christ". And Origen could take this to imply that Josephus didn't consider Jesus to actually _be_ the Christ. I guess you could argue that Josephus didn't necessarily mean to imply that Jesus wasn't Christ by using the phrase "called Christ". Josephus was writing for a gentile audience and so this could be a way of presenting foreign, Jewish concepts to them (eg. if he had used the phrase the "city called Jerusalem"). But regardless, what are we to make of the fact that the T.F. does directly call Jesus "the Christ"?

Origen's writing on Josephus poses some other problems. Origen wrote that Josephus "wrote the Judaic Antiquities in twenty books", but actually Josephus' Antiquities are in the form of twenty two books. One would have to suppose that two books of the Antiquities are forgeries for Origen to be correct on the point. Besides that, Origen wrote that Josephus
But Josephus' Antiquities as we have them don't state that the Temple was destroyed due to James' killing or that people thought that it was destroyed for that reason. At most, Josephus narrates James' killing in the context of the run up to the Temple's destruction and says that good citizens objected to James' killing. If the passage on James said what Origen claimed that it did, it's hard to see why our surviving version of it is silent on the point. Church authorities wouldn't have much motive to censor out what Origen claimed that it said. Are we to think that some time after Origen read the Antiquities in the early 3rd century, pagan Roman authorities censored such statements out of the passage on James in the Antiquities? This seems unlikely as well.

One explanation could that Origen could be mistaken about the Antiquities, either misremembering it or getting incorrect information about it through hearsay. So in fact Josephus could have called Jesus "Christ" and then Origen was mistaken about Josephus' beliefs. This is my best guess.

Peter Kirby suggests that Origen might have been confusing Josephus with the 2nd century Christian writer Hegesippus:

Also, how does one explain (B) that the Arabic version was so different than the surviving version of the T.F. and doesn't include such overtly Christian faith assertions?
The 10th century Arabic Christian writer Bishop Agapius described the T.F. this way in Arabic:
That is, Bp. Agapius rendered the T.F. as saying only that Jesus was "perhaps" the Messiah.

Richard Carrier writes about this Arabic version:

SOURCE: The End of the Arabic Testimonium • Richard Carrier
If Bishop Agapius was using a version of the T.F. handed down in Syriac, maybe he was skeptical about the version in his possession and changed it to match his expectations based on the idea that Josephus was not Christian. Otherwise, it's hard to see why he or those who passed the T.F. down to him would de-Christianize the passage on Jesus.

(Question 2) What do you make of the claim that depictions of Jesus in early Church literature, and particularly in Josephus' writing, as physically unattractive were not uncommon?

The Josephus Home Page's FAQ says:

Against Marcion III, 17, referenced above, goes:

Isaiah 52:14 says about the Lord's Servant (alluding to the Messiah): "As many were astonied at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men". Isaiah 53:2 says that "he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him."

One place in the gospels says that Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, which suggested to me that Jesus was tall, rather than hunchbacked.

Josephus' Antiquities, as they have come down to us however, don't describe Christ's physical features or depict him as unattractive. The only place in it that mentions Jesus is the T.F., and it's hard to think that the 8th century writer Abp. Andreas Hierosolymitanus got a copy of the Antiquities with this description of Jesus in it when the 4th century writer Eusebius repeatedly quoted Josephus' T.F. without such a depiction of Jesus being in it.

Peter Kirby has a theory that some Church fathers mistakenly referred to Hegesippus as Josephus, which you can find here: Chasing Hegesippus
So perhaps Abp. Andreas was referring to Hegesippus' writing. After all, (IIRC) Hegesippus had described James' knees as camel-like from kneeling piously and described James as unwashed due to asceticism. So he might describe Jesus in lowly terms too.

Josephus may or may not have mentioned something in passing about Jesus but it wasn't what we have today. We could go round and round about it forever and we would end up in the same place.

I've always been fascinated by the writings of Josephus for The Jewish War's striking similarities to the Revelation.

Moses Medina · Apr 22, 2019

*Following the discussion*

FireDragon76 · Apr 22, 2019

HTacianas said:
Josephus may or may not have mentioned something in passing about Jesus but it wasn't what we have today. We could go round and round about it forever and we would end up in the same place.

That's my understanding as well. Most scholars see Josephus as a typical non-Christian Jew of the first century whose writings were corrupted by some over-zealous scribe who manufactured a pious fraud.

I've always been fascinated by the writings of Josephus for The Jewish War's striking similarities to the Revelation.

I'm going to have to check that out since I'm largely Preterist on reading Revelation.

HTacianas · Apr 22, 2019

FireDragon76 said:
That's my understanding as well. Most scholars see Josephus as a typical non-Christian Jew of the first century whose writings were corrupted by some over-zealous scribe who manufactured a pious fraud.

I'm going to have to check that out since I'm largely Preterist on reading Revelation.

You'll have a ball with Josephus. Five months where men sought death but could not find it. Fire coming down from heaven in the sight of men. The sea turning to blood. Seven years of tribulation and after 1260 days, time and times and half a time, chariots and troops of soldiers running about among the clouds. Lightning and peals of thunder. A great earthquake and the city was torn into three parts. "And see that you hurt not the oil and the wine".

It's a riot.

ArmyMatt · Apr 22, 2019

that is one long OP.

can I ask what exactly are you asking?

RobNJ · Apr 22, 2019

ArmyMatt said:
that is one long OP.

can I ask what exactly are you asking?

Not having seen a question mark, anywhere in that overly long screed, I'm worried, that it might be the first part of much longer dissertation.

Presbyterian Continuist · Apr 23, 2019

RobNJ said:
Not having seen a question mark, anywhere in that overly long screed, I'm worried, that it might be the first part of much longer dissertation.

I don't know...I found it quite informative and interesting reading.

ArmyMatt · Apr 23, 2019

I should clarify, I agree that it was an interesting thread, I only thought there was a question based on the title.

~Anastasia~ · Apr 23, 2019

I think there are several questions and if looks interesting. This just isn't the week (Holy Week) for me to have time to really follow it. I'm trying to catch up since Saturday before everything rolls off my "alerts" feed ... and I'm starting to think I can't. But thank God for all the things happening this week!

rakovsky · Sep 18, 2019

HTacianas said:
Josephus may or may not have mentioned something in passing about Jesus but it wasn't what we have today. We could go round and round about it forever and we would end up in the same place.

I've always been fascinated by the writings of Josephus for The Jewish War's striking similarities to the Revelation.

Tacianas,
How would you know that Josephus' mention about Jesus wasn't what we have today? It seems that the common idea that we don't is based on Origen's description that I quoted.
And what similarities do you see to Revelation?

rakovsky · Sep 18, 2019

HTacianas said:
You'll have a ball with Josephus. Five months where men sought death but could not find it. Fire coming down from heaven in the sight of men. The sea turning to blood. Seven years of tribulation and after 1260 days, time and times and half a time, chariots and troops of soldiers running about among the clouds. Lightning and peals of thunder. A great earthquake and the city was torn into three parts. "And see that you hurt not the oil and the wine".

It's a riot.

This is pretty interesting. It sounds like since Josephus wrote in c. 75 AD and John is commonly considered to have written under Domitian's rule in 81-96 AD, that John took these images from Josephus' writing.
Is there an article or list that you have that lays out the similarities to Revelation that you got these from?
I found one here:
Josephus and the Book of Revelation (Nine Case Studies)

rakovsky · Sep 18, 2019

ArmyMatt said:
that is one long OP.

can I ask what exactly are you asking?

Fr. Matthew,
I want to please ask these questions about Josephus' writings:
1. If Josephus' Testimonium Flavianum that calls Jesus "the Christ" is authentic, then how does one explain (A) Origen's negative characterization of Josephus' views on Jesus? For example, Origen said that Josephus "did not accept our Jesus to be Christ", which conflicts with the Testimonium's depiction of Jesus. Also, if the Testimonium Flavianum calls Jesus the "Christ," how does one explain (B) the Arabic version of the Testimonium, which only says that Jesus "was perhaps the Messiah"?

I also want to ask:
2. What do you make of the claim that depictions of Jesus in early Church literature, and particularly in Josephus' writing, as physically unattractive were not uncommon? For example, do you believe that Josephus really did depict Jesus that way as Archbishop Andreas of Crete claimed Josephus did, or do you think that the archbishop found this depiction in another piece of literature like Hegesippus' writing and confused it with Josephus' writing? Do you think that Jesus actually did look unattractive physically?

ArmyMatt · Sep 18, 2019

so, with an earlier thread about senseless thread necromancy, we dig up a thread from 5 months ago...

rakovsky · Sep 18, 2019

About Jesus' appearance, Wikipedia says:

Tertullian states that Jesus's outward form was despised, that he had an ignoble appearance, and the slander he suffered proved the 'abject condition' of his body.[29] According to Irenaeus, he was a weak and inglorious man[30], and in the Acts of Peter he is described as small and ugly to the ignorant.[27]:439 Andrew of Crete relates that Christ was bent or even crooked[27]:412 and in the Acts of John he is described as bald-headed and small with no good looks.[31]

As quoted by Eisler,[27]:[pp. 393–394, 414–415] both [Abp. Andreas] Hierosolymitanus and John of Damascus claim that "the Jew Josephus" described Jesus as having had connate eyebrows with goodly eyes and being long-faced, crooked and well-grown. In a letter of certain bishops to the Emperor Theophilus, Jesus's height is described as three cubits (four feet six), which was also the opinion of Ephrem Syrus (320–379 AD), "God took human form and appeared in the form of three human ells (cubits); he came down to us small of stature." Theodore of Mopsuestia likewise claimed that the appearance of Christ was smaller than that of the children of Jacob (Israel). In the apocryphal Lentulus letter, Jesus is described as having had a reddish complexion, matching Muslim traditions in this respect. Jesus's prediction that he would be taunted "Physician, heal yourself"[32] may suggest that Jesus was indeed physically deformed ('crooked' or hunch-backed), as claimed in the early Christian texts listed above. Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and Ambrose considered lack of physical attractiveness in Jesus as fulfilling the messianic prophecy Suffering Servant narrative of Isaiah 53.[33]

The more mainstream, theological perspective, as expressed by Church Fathers Jerome and Augustine of Hippo, argued that Jesus must have been ideally beautiful in face and body. For Augustine he was "beautiful as a child, beautiful on earth, beautiful in heaven".
SOURCE: Race and appearance of Jesus - Wikipedia

But none of these are first century sources. At the earliest, we have Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, the Acts of Peter, and Celsus, all from the mid-2nd century or later, describing Jesus as physically unattractive. They would have gotten this information at best second hand, like in a situation of someone hearing this description from the apostle John and then telling Justin Martyr. ie.
John sees Jesus, John tells Person 2, Person 2 tells Justin Martyr Jesus' appearance.

On page 394 of "The Messiah Jesus and John the Baptist", Eisler quotes St John of Damascus in "On the Orthodox Faith", (De Fide Orthod., IV, 16), as saying: "Since moreover Josephus the Jew, as some say... in like manner narrates that the Lord was seen having connate eyebrows, goodly eyes, long-faced, crooked, well grown..."
(https://www.preteristarchive.com/Books/pdf/1931_eisler_jesus-and-john-according-to-josephus.pdf) But since St John of Damascus introduces his description of Jesus with "as some say", it puts into question whether Josephus actually wrote this or if only some people claim that Josephus wrote this about Jesus.

Richard Booysen compares physical descriptions of Paul and Jesus and finds them so similar that he hypothesizes that they were the same person:
The Physical Appearances of Jesus and Paul
The theory that they were the same person is pretty unlikely, but it's interesting that the descriptions have similarities.
Booysen quotes from the Slavonic version of Josephus' "Capture of Jerusalem" as describing Jesus as physically unattractive:

a man of simple appearance, mature age, dark skin, small stature, three cubits high, hunchbacked, with a long face, long nose, and meeting eyebrows, so that they who see him might be affrighted, with scanty hair (but) having a line in the middle of the head after the fashion of the Nazireans, and with an undeveloped beard.

But scholars typically consider the Slavonic version of Josephus' "Capture of Jerusalem" to be a medieval rewriting of the authentic "Wars of the Jews" by Josephus. My first guess was that there was a medieval rewriting of Josephus' Wars of the Jews, so when the 8th century Archbishop Andreas referred to Josephus as describing Jesus as having meeting eyebrows, long faced, and crooked (hunchbacked), which matches the description in the "Slavonic Josephus", the 8th century Abp. Andreas may have been referring to this version of Josephus. But scholars typically date Slavonic Josephus to the 10th or 11th century, so it seems unlikely that Abp. Andreas was citing Slavonic Josephus.

rakovsky · Sep 18, 2019

ArmyMatt said:
so, with an earlier thread about senseless thread necromancy, we dig up a thread from 5 months ago...

Fr. Matthew,
I like your sense of humor, but for me they are not really necromancy - I am going through the early Christian writings like Josephus' and made some threads about things that I didn't understand on them. Some of the threads I made a while ago, but I have kept track of them and still want to address the issues. I think it's really not so bad, but apologize if it's an inconvenience. I value your input because you have information and information that I don't or am unsure or confused about. You and others have been doing a good job addressing the issues on these kinds of threads.

ArmyMatt · Sep 18, 2019

rakovsky said:
Fr. Matthew,
I like your sense of humor, but for me they are not really necromancy - I am going through the early Christian writings like Josephus' and made some threads about things that I didn't understand on them. Some of the threads I made a while ago, but I have kept track of them and still want to address the issues. I think it's really not so bad, but apologize if it's an inconvenience. I value your input because you have information and information that I don't or am unsure or confused about. You and others have been doing a good job addressing the issues on these kinds of threads.

it's no real big deal or anything, but this thread hasn't been looked at for a long while. it'd be easier just to start something new.

rakovsky · Sep 19, 2019

For Question 1A, Origen might have misread the Testimonium that said "He was the Christ" as not being a Christian declaration, because: A. Tacitus or Suetonius also referred to a leader they named Chrestus without being themselves Christian. B. Josephus was Jewish and supported the Torah, and Origen could have assumed that this meant he wasn't Christian. C. The Latin version of the Testimonium says Jesus was "called Christ".

It seems unlikely that Origen missed the passage if it was there, because he comments on the known, sympathetic passage in the same volume, 18 on John the Baptist. It seems even less likely that he understood that the Testimonium was Christian but then deliberately kept silent about it, eg in order to avoid bringing it to the attention of Roman censors.

I am interested in forum users' ideas.

Lukaris · Sep 19, 2019

I have a collection of Josephus translated by 17th c. William Whiston which includes a fragment on hades which is clearly Christian. Scholarship says that this an error & that the writing is by Hippolytus. Whiston was insistent that it belongs to Josephus.

Discourse to the Greeks concerning Hades - Wikipedia

rakovsky · Sep 19, 2019

Sure, Lukaris.
To clarify, the Testimonium Flavianum refers to Josephus' passage on Jesus in volume 18 of his Antiquities of the Jews. Origen writes that Josephus, being a Jew, didnt consider Him to be the Christ. So my question is can we explain Origen's description of Josephus as nonChristian if the Testimonium is authentic.

Two Challenges about Josephus' 1st Century Description of Jesus

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