Author: Matthew Frisbee

Celsus was a Greek philosopher and one of the earliest outspoken critics of Christianity. Fortunately, his work survives despite the lack of original manuscripts, preserved through the 3rd-century Christian scholar Origen in his detailed rebuttal, Contra Celsum. In The True Doctrine (178 AD), Celsus acknowledges that Jesus existed but seeks to discredit him, portraying him…

Lucian of Samosata was a Syrian-Greek satirist and writer during the second century AD. Famous for his sharp wit and eloquent satire, Lucian’s works often targeted and mocked philosophers and emerging religions, including Christianity. In The Passing of Peregrinus (165 AD), Lucian ridicules the Cynic philosopher Peregrinus Proteus, who, at one point, converted to Christianity.…

Mara bar Serapion (late 1st–early 2nd century AD) was a Stoic philosopher from Syria who wrote a letter to his son while in prison somewhere between ~73-150 AD. His work is preserved in a single Syriac manuscript in the British Library (Add. 14658). Unlike Roman historians such as Tacitus or Suetonius, Mara was not writing…

Suetonius (c. 69–122 AD) was a Roman writer and official best known for The Lives of the Caesars, a series of imperial biographies. His work is not “history” in the modern sense. Instead of a strict chronological account, Suetonius arranged material thematically, collecting anecdotes, gossip, and moral judgments to illustrate the character of each emperor.…