The Historicity of Crucifixion
2021-09-02
The crucifixion of Jesus Christ fits historically with the types of torture used in the ancient world. Here are some other references of crucifixion in the ancient world. This is a work in progress.
Tertullian, Early Christian Author (ca. 155 AD – ca. 220 AD)
Crucifixion was sometimes executed on trees:
Infants have been sacrificed to Saturn publicly in Africa, even to the proconsulship of Tiberius, who devoted the very trees about Saturn's temple to be gibbets for his priests, as accomplices in the murder, for contributing the protection of their shadow to such wicked practices. (Apologia, IX, 1, translated by Collier, https://www.tertullian.org/articles/reeve_apology.htm)
Concerning the shape of the cross:
For this same letter TAU of the Greeks, which is our T, has the appearance of the cross, which he foresaw we should have on our foreheads in the true and catholic Jerusalem (Adversus Marcionem, III, 22, translated by Evans, https://www.tertullian.org/articles/evans_marc/evans_marc_08book3_eng.htm)
Seneca the Younger, Roman Stoic Philosopher (ca. 4 BC – AD 65)
Concerning the misery of crucifixion:
There he is, praying for that which, if it had befallen him, would be the most pitiable thing in the world! And seeking a postponement of suffering, as if he were asking for life! I should deem him most despicable had he wished to live up to the very time of crucifixion: "Nay," he cries, "you may weaken my body if you will only leave the breath of life in my battered and ineffective carcase! Maim me if you will, but allow me, misshapen and deformed as I may be, just a little more time in the world! You may nail me up and set my seat upon the piercing cross!" Is it worth while to weigh down upon one's own wound, and hang impaled upon a gibbet, that one may but postpone something which is the balm of troubles, the end of punishment? Is it worth all this to possess the breath of life only to give it up? (13) What would you ask for Maecenas but the indulgence of Heaven? What does he mean by such womanish and indecent verse? What does he mean by making terms with panic fear? What does he mean by begging so vilely for life? He cannot ever have heard Vergil read the words: Tell me, is Death so wretched as that? He asks for the climax of suffering, and – what is still harder to bear – prolongation and extension of suffering; and what does he gain thereby? Merely the boon of a longer existence. But what sort of life is a lingering death? (14) Can anyone be found who would prefer wasting away in pain, dying limb by limb, or letting out his life drop by drop, rather than expiring once for all? Can any man be found willing to be fastened to the accursed tree,[6] long sickly, already deformed, swelling with ugly tumours on chest and shoulders, and draw the breath of life amid long-drawn-out agony? I think he would have many excuses for dying even before mounting the cross! Deny, now, if you can, that Nature is very generous in making death inevitable. (Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 101, 12-14, https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Letter_101)
Josephus, Jewish Historian (37 – ca. 100)
Crucifixion was the “most miserable death”:
When Bassus perceived that, he began to think of using a stratagem against the enemy, and was desirous to aggravate their grief, in order to prevail with them to surrender the city for the preservation of that man. Nor did he fail of his hope; (202) for he commanded them to set up a cross, as if he were just going to hang Eleazar upon it immediately; the sight of this occasioned a sore grief among those that were in the citadel, and they groaned vehemently, and cried out that they could not bear to see him thus destroyed. (203) Whereupon Eleazar besought them not to disregard him, now he was going to suffer a most miserable death, and exhorted them to save themselves, by yielding to the Roman power and good fortune, since all other people were now conquered by them. (Jewish War 7.203, 201-203, https://lexundria.com/j_bj/7.201/wst)
Mass crucifixions where people were crucified in different positions:
... as after they had fought, they thought it too late to make any supplications for mercy; so they were first whipped, and then tormented with all sorts of tortures, before they died, and were then crucified before the wall of the city. This miserable procedure made Titus greatly to pity them, while they caught every day five hundred Jews; nay, some days they caught more: yet it did not appear to be safe for him to let those that were taken by force go their way, and to set a guard over so many he saw would be to make such as great deal them useless to him. The main reason why he did not forbid that cruelty was this, that he hoped the Jews might perhaps yield at that sight, out of fear lest they might themselves afterwards be liable to the same cruel treatment. So the soldiers, out of the wrath and hatred they bore the Jews, nailed those they caught, one after one way, and another after another, to the crosses, by way of jest, when their multitude was so great, that room was wanting for the crosses, and crosses wanting for the bodies. (Jewish War Book 5, 11, 446, https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0148%3Abook%3D5%3Awhiston+chapter%3D11%3Awhiston+section%3D1)
Appian, Greek Historian (ca. 95 – ca. AD 165)
On crushing a slave rebellion, the remnant of 6,000 were executed by crucifixion:
He also crucified a Roman prisoner in the space between the two armies to show his own men what fate awaited them if they did not conquer (The Civil Wars, Book I, 119, https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Appian/Civil_Wars/1*.html#119)
They divided themselves in four parts, and continued to fight until they all perished except 6000, who were captured and crucified along the whole road from Capua to Rome(The Civil Wars, Book I, 120, https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Appian/Civil_Wars/1*.html#120)
Archaeological Evidence
There is one case found where a body was recovered north of Jerusalem with a nail through the heal. The man’s name was Jehohanan, the son of Hagakol. The body dates from the first century A.D., after Jesus’ crucifixion. (See, for example, Joe Zias, Crucifixion in Antiquity: The Evidence, https://mercaba.org/FICHAS/upsa/crucifixion.htm)