Was Jesus Caesar?

by Prof. PAUL B. CLITEUR, Ph.D.professor at the

Universities of Leiden and Delft, The
Netherlands
translated by Tommie Hendriks

Just like many other philosophers I am an

admirer of Socrates. That Socrates did exist we
know because he is mentioned in Plato’s
dialogues as a historical figure. The
philosophically interested soldier Xenophon,
too, has written down his ‘memories’ of
Socrates. Furthermore in places there are
some references by other authors.

Let us assume that somebody writes a book

showing that Socrates never existed (by the
way, such books have been written, although
they have convinced only a few). The
references to Socrates in Plato and Xenophon
are either falsifications or wrong for some
other reasons. Does that make any difference
to me?

I don’t think so. Socrates remains a great

philosopher. His philosophy is no less
impressive when it is the philosophy of a
literary character. With a figure as Jesus Christ
things are different. If there is ample proof that
Jesus Christ did not exist, the Christian faith
will be hit in the heart. About 550 the core of
the Christian doctrine was formulated in the
Apostolic creed:

‘I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator

of Heaven and earth. And in Jesus Christ, His
only Son, our Lord; Who was conceived by the
Holy Ghost, born of the virgin Mary, suffered
under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and
buried; He descended into hell; the third day
He rose again from the dead; He ascended into
Heaven, is seated at the right hand of God the
Father Almigthty; from thence He shall come to
judge the living and the dead. (...)’

Well, surely I’m aware that people considering

themselves Christians question divers parts of
this credo. However, the question is how much
you may cross off and still maintain you are a
Christian. Often the historical existence of
Jesus is taken as a limit and I think this is
correct. If Jesus is just a fantasy character of
the Gospel writers, thus ‘invented’, then
Christianity is being hit in its very essence. In
particular his crucifixion and resurrection are
often put forward as historical facts which you
really have to believe, in order not to
completely unsettle Christianity. Notorious
people crossing off articles of faith like the
theologian H.M. Kuitert have therefore held
onto this sort of issues as long as possible.

Now, there are people who have defended that

Jesus never existed. The Hegelian Bruno Bauer,
for instance, did so already in 1850, and more
recently it is defended by one G.A. Wells.
However, a problem with this denial is that
then the cult around Christ is a mystery. How
could it have emerged?

That question is now being answered by the

polyglot, linguist and philosopher Francesco
Carotta. His thesis is that the cult around Jesus
is a continuation of the cult around Caesar. The
two cults could merge into one another by a
series of errors in writing, mistakes in the oral
tradition and other misunderstandings.

I admit: a spectacular thesis. But whoever

reads the overwhelming amount of material
Carotta brings up for this thesis will have to
recognize that he has not skated on thin ice.
For me this book is the key which opens up a
lot of mysteries around the spread of
Christianity in the Roman Empire.

Of course, the consequences of the Carotta

thesis are enormous. Around Christmas and
Easter we actually revere the figure of Caesar.
Also, we are not living in a ‘Christian culture’,
but a ‘Caesarian culture’. André Rouvoet leads
the CaesarUnion (ChristenUnie, a small
Christian political party in The Netherlands)
and Jan Peter Balkenende the Caesarian
Democratic Appeal (Christen Democratisch
Appèl, a big Christian political party).

Perhaps you should put it this way: our culture

has never been christianized. The ambitions of
Erasmus, Voltaire and other humanists to
constantly draw inspiration from the Classical
Culture (and not the Jewish-Christian one) is all
of a sudden receiving an enormous impulse
from an unexpected quarter. We were never
anything other than humanists.