The Testimonium Flavianum.

⁶³ And there is about this time [A] Jesus, [B] a wise man, if indeed it is necessary to say that he is a man; for he was [C] a doer of miraculous works, a teacher of men [D] who receive true things with pleasure, [E] and many Jews, [F] and also many of the Greek element, he led to himself; this man was [G] the Christ. ⁶⁴ And, when [H] on the accusation of the first men among us [J] Pilate [I] had condemned him to a cross, [K] those who had first loved him did not cease; for he appeared to them [L] on the third day [M] living again, [N] the divine prophets having said both these things and myriads of other wonders [O] concerning him. [P] And even until now the tribe of Christians, named from this man, has not been lacking.

^19b And they said to him: The things concerning [A] Jesus the Nazarene, who became [B] a prophet man [C] able in work and word before God [E] all the people, ²⁰ and how [H] our chief priests and rulers delivered him up [I] unto a judgment of death and crucified him. ²¹ [K] But we were hoping that it was he who was about to redeem Israel, but indeed, along with all these things also, [L] it is the third day since these things happened. [....] ²⁵ And he himself said to them: O fools, and slow of heart to put faith in all the things that the prophets spoke! ²⁶ Was it not necessary for [G] the Christ [γ] to suffer these things and [M] go into his glory? ²⁷ And, beginning from Moses and from [N] all the prophets, he interpreted for them in all the scriptures the things [O] concerning himself.

[G] Christ, [P] the author of the name, [α] while Tiberius was emperor [I] had been inflicted with punishment [β] by the procurator [J] Pontius Pilatus, [K] and though repressed for the moment [D] the deadly superstition again erupted, [E] not only in Judea, the origin of the evil, [F] but even in the city where all atrocious and shameful things from everywhere converge and are celebrated.

⁹ [B¹] That all these things would happen, I say, [C¹] our teacher foretold, who is both son and apostle of God the father and master of all things, [A¹] Jesus [G¹] Christ, [P] from whom also we have been named Christians. ¹⁰ Whence we also become assured of all the things taught by him, [B²] since as many things as he foretold in advance would happen do in fact appear as happening, which is the work of God, to say a thing before it happens and thus to show it happening as it was foretold. ¹¹ It were possible, therefore, to stop and also add nothing on top of these things, reckoning that we are worthy of just and true things; but rather, since we know that it is not easy to concisely change over a soul held down by ignorance, we desired to add a few things, on behalf of persuading [D] lovers of the truth, realizing that it is not impossible, when the truth has been set forth, to make ignorance flee. [....] ³ That [A²] Jesus [G²] Christ became [C²] the teacher of these things for us and was born for this, [I] the one crucified [J] under Pontius Pilate, who was [β] procurator [E] in Judea [α] in the times of Tiberius Caesar, and that [K+M] it is with reason that we honor him, having learned that he is the son of the actual God himself and holding him in second place, and the prophetic spirit in third order, we will show.

³ But it is possible for you, having taken care with your own hands, with your own eyes to see [N¹] clarified in the prophetic foretellings all [C¹] the wondrous miracles, embraced together and testified by the divine gospels, of our savior [A¹] Jesus [G¹] Christ himself, as well as his divine and ever virtuous [C²] teachings concerning true religion. ⁴ How necessary, too, it is to wonder when they distinctly preach both the new way of religion announced by him [E¹+F¹] to all men and the call of his disciples and the teaching of the new testament, ⁵ yes, on top of these things also the faithlessness and contradictions of the Jews against him, [H] the attacks by the rulers, the envy of the teachers, the betrayal by one disciple, the schemes of enemies, the charges of sycophants, the condemnations by the justices, the dishonorable insults, the extraordinary scourgings, slanderous abuse, above all [I] the disgraceful death, and on top of these things his wondrous silence, his gentleness and patience, and his immense endurance and forbearance. ⁶ And all these things [N²] the most ancient oracles of the Hebrews present outright concerning one who would come at some point in the last times and [γ] suffer such things among men, and plainly through what things they held such anticipation, testifying [M¹] to the living again after death, from the dead, of the one made clear, [K] the appearance to his disciples, the gifting of the divine spirit unto them, [M²] his return to the heavens, his seating on the throne of the kingdom his father, [M³] his glorious second advent which is to happen again at the consummation of this life. [....] ⁸ But it was not for these divine men to establish things in gloom by their foretellings, nor did their foreknowledge extend only until the distressing things, for rather, having changed over to joy again, [N³] they preached beforehand to all men together tidings of good things at the advent of Christ, evangelizing that instead of the casting away of one nation [E²+F²] every nation and race of men might have knowledge of God, and flight away from demons, and surcease of both ignorance and deceit, and a flaring up of both light and religion, and that the disciples of Christ filled all the world with his teaching, that their gospel, a certain new and strange way of religion, might be preached [E³+F³] unto all men, and that churches of Christ are standing together through them among all the nations, and that across the whole inhabited earth [P] the people of the Christians will be named after one man, and that the attacks of rulers and kings from time to time against the church of Christ have no strength to take it down, as it is made mighty by God. [....] ¹⁰ Those who have been enabled somehow, not by a human but by the divine spirit, to see from a myriad times before what was going to come to light long ages afterward, are they not worthy to be believed also concerning the teachings with which they instructed their students? How well I realize, therefore, that it is usual for all those who have been accurately taught that our Lord and savior [A²] Jesus [G²] is truly himself the Christ of God to persuade them to suppose first that they have believed about him not otherwise than in accord with the prophetic testimonies [O] concerning him, and then this very thing, even to propose to all those with whom they might get into a debate that it is not easily, by demonstration, that the proposition is able to be believed.