The Secular Case

Few secular historical sources express compelling evidence of Yeshua Christ and His affect on believers.  Looking at two sources, we can read the interesting yet compelling manner in which they are recorded.  These defeat the argument of revisions made by zealous Christians hoping to rewrite history to compliment the faith.

Here Tacitus, the historian, writing about the Christian climate in Rome after that city's devastating fire:

“Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace.  Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.”

- Tacitus (Annals 15:44 ~65 AD)

Fifty years later we can read Pliny's report to his Emperor about Christians:

“They stated that the sum of their guilt or error amounted to this, that they used to gather on a stated day before dawn and sing to Christ as if he were a god, and that they took an oath not to involve themselves in villainy, but rather to commit no theft, no fraud, no adultery; not to break faith, nor to deny money placed with them in trust.  Once these things were done, it was their custom to part and return later to eat a meal together, innocently, although they stopped this after my edict, in which I, following your mandate, forbade all secret societies.”

- Pliny (letter to Emperor Trajan ~111 AD)