Connecting him with Jesus in that manner tarnishes the divinity of Jesus. Baptism is supposed to cleanse of sin, Jesus is supposed to have been without sin, so what’s the baptism for? If Christians had made up the story it would’ve been Jesus baptising John.
He wasn’t divine yet. That wouldn’t come along until about 2-3 centuries later with the rise of the Trinity ideas. Which themselves look like an import from Hellenism creating the Celestial Jesus of the 4th gospel.
To the monotheistic people being conned by James the idea of Jesus being divine would have been abhorrent. Even Paul didn’t go that far. Plus Jewish Temple law was clear that forgiveness offerings, as well as ritual immersion had to be done even if the person has no sin to be forgiven. See for example the Talmudic arguments about the mentally disabled.
That’s why Christian sources aren’t taken as gospel. But that wasn’t even what I was referring to…
What the? Do you know what gospels mean?
Tacitus, for one. I know I know “decades later”
If you knew then why mention him? I asked for contemporary evidence not hearsay multiple times removed. I will not accept less.
but the guy is generally reliable
The majority of people I know are generally reliable. Does that mean that they are always always correct about hearsay multiple times removed?
and had access to Roman state archives,
What archive did Tacticus bring up that says anything about Jesus? I want to know the author, the date, the location of the document, and the witnesses who vouched for it.
have to contend with Tacitus as secondary sources. You wouldn’t nowadays discount someone writing about, dunno, Churchill, would you, for reasons of them doing it “decades later”?
If they were using hearsay multiple times removed I would. Also, Churchill existence isn’t exactly a big claim.
With Tacitus being the guy he was if Jesus had been made up he would’ve said so
How did you establish that?
and certainly didn’t have much love for Christians.
Judaism had a long list of martyrs at the time. It is no way the insult the Bible literalists crowd make it out to be.
Now, can you please show me evidence? Not what some guy said after playing 80 years of telephone.