Roman coin showing Emperor Trajan
Whenever I tell people the New Testament is the best record we have of Jesus’ life, his teachings and his character, almost without fail someone asks for evidence for Jesus outside the Bible because they don’t feel(?) the Bible is reliable. To me such request is akin to saying, “Teach me what Abraham Lincoln was like, but I don’t want to read anything written by his close friends.”
Nevertheless, there are well-known (in the academia, anyway) references to Jesus in the ancient writings. In the preserved works of Roman history, documenting day-to-day events of the empire, all written by Roman officials (who, at the time were hostile to Christians and Christianity) we see examples that support the Bible accounts of Jesus and of early Christians.
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