Notable Omissions  of Jesus

It is often argued that no mention of Jesus or the events of the New Testament can be found in any of the numerous contemporary and near-contemporary records of the day, and that this serves as evidence against the existence of the Jesus of the gospels.


Philo (20 BCE - 40 CE)
By far, the most notable omission is Philo's. Philo was a Hellenized Jew who lived in Alexandria, Egypt. He visited the Temple in Jerusalem, and corresponded with family there. He wrote a great many books on religion and philosophy which survive to this day, and mentioned many of his contemporaries. His main theological contribution was the development of the Logos, the "Word" that opens the Gospel of John. Yet Philo not once mentions Jesus, anybody who could be mistaken for Jesus, or any of the events of the New Testament. His last writings come from 40 CE, only a few years after the end of Pontius Pilate's reign, when he was part of an embassy sent by the Alexandrian Jews to the Roman Emperor Caligula.


Plutarch (ca. 46 - 127)
Plutarch wrote, about the same time as Josephus, about contemporary Roman figures, oracles, prophesies, and moral, religious, and spiritual issues. A figure such as Jesus, whom the Gospels portray as interacting with Roman figures, making prophecies, and giving sermons on novel religious and spiritual issues, would have been of great interest to him.


 Justus
Justus of Tiberias wrote, at the end of the first century, a history of Jewish kings (who the gospels state Jesus had interactions with). Justus' history does not survive, but Photius, who read it in the 9th century, stated that it did not mention "the coming of Christ, the events of His life, or the miracles performed by Him".


 Josephus (ca. 37 - ca. 100)
Main article: Josephus on Jesus
For those who reject the authenticity of both the Testamonium Flavanium and the xx.9 reference to James, Josephus would belong on this list. Naturally, those who accept the authenticity of one or the other, in whole or in part, see Josephus as providing evidence for an historical Jesus and thus would object to Josephus's inclusion. As the only first-century non-Christian to perhaps write of Jesus, the two brief mentions to be found in Antiquities of the Jews (written ca. 94) are the subject of often-heated debate.


 Others
There are a number of other sources that survive from the period in which it would be reasonable to find mention of Jesus, though in no particular case would one be surprised to find mention of Jesus lacking.

These include: Pliny the Elder, who wrote, in 80 CE, a Natural History that mentions hundreds of people, major and minor; Juvenal, Martial, Petronius, and Persius, Roman satirists who favored topics similar to Jesus's story;[citation needed] Pausanias, whose massive Guide to Greece includes mentions of thousands of names, including minor Jewish figures in Palestine; Epictetus and Aelius Aristides, who both recorded events and people in Palestine;[citation needed] and the letters of Fronto (who is known to have delivered a speech attacking Christian rituals).

Other writers and historians of the time who did not mention Jesus include Dio Chrysostom, Aulus Gellius, Lucius Apuleius, Marcus Aurelius, Musonius Rufus, Cassius Maximus Tyrius, Arrian, Appian, Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, Lucius Annaeus Florus, and Marcus Annaeus Lucanus.


Christian Mythology