TACITUS: NERO AND THE CHRISTIANS
Cornelius Tacitus, born circa A. D. 52-55, senator under reign of Vespasian, A.D. 112- 13 was proconsul, or governor of Asia. Annals circa A.D. 116 – “So far, the precautions taken were suggested by human prudence; now means were sought for appeasing deith, and application was made to the Sibylline books… Therefore, to scotch the rumor, Nero substituted as culprits, and punished with the utmost refinements of cruelty, a class of men, loathed for their vices, whom the crowd styled Christians. Christus, the founder of the name, had undergone the death penalty in the reign of Tiberius, by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate, and the pernicious superstition was checked for a moment, only to break out once more, not merely in Judaea, the home of the disease, but in the capital itself, where all things horrible or shameful in the world collect and find a vogue. Josh McDowell, He Walked Among Us, pgs. 48 & 49
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