attack Christianity; he simply ignores it. And, with our knowledge of the character of Josephus, the reason is not far to seek. He studiously avoids a topic to which, in the circumstances of the time, it would have been dangerous to allude. "Not only was he informed on these subjects; he was far too well informed of what the Christians had already and recently suffered . . . not to be on his guard against the imprudence of giving any testimony in their favour which might implicate himself in their misfortunes."[1]
To the same motive must be attributed the historian's reticence on the subject of a Messiah. The words addressed to the serpent: "It shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel,"[2] occasion no allusion to a future deliverer, nor yet the prophecies of Balaam; Jacob's blessing is omitted; the oracle which foretold the coming of a world-ruler out of Judæa is interpreted of Vespasian.[3] On the other hand, there are a few passages which suggest that Josephus did not regard the fulfilment of prophecy as closed with the destruction of Jerusalem, and that he may have entertained a belief in a Messianic era involving the downfall of Rome, of which he dared not speak openly. On Balaam he writes (Ant. IV. 6. 5 [125]): "From the accomplishment of all these things in accordance with his prediction one may conjecture what will happen in the future"; and again, in the interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar's dream (Ant. X. 10. 4 [210]): "Daniel also showed the king the meaning of the stone, but I have not thought proper to relate this, my duty being to describe past, not future, events," while curious enquirers are referred to the prophetical book.
In his public life as statesman and general Josephus scarcely deserves the hard names of traitor and renegade. Involved in early manhood in the rush of events arising
