Was the story of Jesus inspired by Emperor Augustus? The clever trick early Christians used to convert ancient Rome

Stories of a remarkable birth, promises of salvation and the announcement of “good news” surrounded Rome’s first emperor. Classicist Tim Whitmarsh argues that early Christians adapted elements of this imperial language to explain the significance of Jesus

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Published: October 16, 2026 at 4:00 PM

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It’s an ancient story. A child is set to become a king. But when those in power learn of his coming, they attempt to orchestrate his death. The child escapes, his future greatness apparently beyond the reach of those who would rather see him dead.

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This is a narrative arc that, of course, harkens to Herod’s attempt to kill the infant Jesus. But it’s also the origin story of Rome’s first – and arguably greatest – emperor: Augustus.

Painting of men and women outside a roman building

Imperial splendour frames the infant Jesus in Jean-Léon Gérôme’s 1855 painting. Tim Whitmarsh argues that early Christians drew on language associated with Augustus to convey Jesus’s significance | Credit: Getty Images

For classicist Tim Whitmarsh, speaking on the HistoryExtra podcast, this resemblance is resonant enough that it could be deemed intentional. If the early Christians could present Jesus as a figure comparable to Augustus, would that help them to explain why the religious figurehead was worth replacing the old Roman gods with? It’s an argument that relates specifically to how Jesus was described and understood, rather than comparing the two men’s life biographies.

“Augustus and Jesus are clearly very different figures in terms of their backgrounds and in terms of the message that they're projecting,” he says. “But I think the way in which Jesus was, if you like, ‘packaged’ in the first century was designed to gel with elements of Roman propaganda around the figure of Augustus himself.

A new order rooted in the past

Augustus was born in Rome in 63 BC, roughly six decades before Jesus. Originally named Gaius Octavius, he rose to power during the civil wars that followed Julius Caesar’s assassination. In 27 BC, he received the title Augustus, marking the conventional beginning of his reign as Rome’s first emperor. He ruled until AD 14.

Painting of men in robes

Conspirators surround Julius Caesar in Karl von Piloty’s depiction of his assassination. The ensuing civil wars opened the way for Augustus to become Rome’s first emperor | Credit: Getty Images

In the context of the traditions and norms of the Roman Republic, this was a move that required some PR. Romans associated kingship with tyranny, and their Republic had traditionally distributed authority among magistrates and the Senate. Augustus concentrated power in his own hands while presenting himself as the restorer of established institutions.

“Augustus creates this paradoxical relationship with the past, whereby the Roman Republic is both fulfilled in the figure of Augustus, who's returning to the Republic, but also in a sense radically changed by it,” Whitmarsh explains.

“So you've got this sense of simultaneously re-rooting the Roman Empire in tradition but also transforming it.”

Painting of man washing the feet of another man

Jesus washes his disciples’ feet in this painting by Garofalo, placing humility at the heart of authority. His message differed profoundly from Augustus’s, despite parallels in the language used to proclaim his importance | Credit: Getty Images

The Christian claim about Jesus had a comparable structure. His followers understood him through Jewish scripture and expectations, while proclaiming that his life, death and resurrection had brought something new: an expansion on the past, while still seeking to derive validation from it. Both the Roman Empire and the new Christian religion rooted themselves in one transformative individual who sought legitimacy, in some regard, from an older, respected past.

Birth stories with striking parallels

This narrative work begins with the birth stories. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke, written in the first century AD, describe Jesus’s beginnings through divine announcements and a prophetic fulfilment of his future significance.

“There are surprisingly similar stories told about Augustus,” says Whitmarsh.

In his Life of Augustus, the Roman biographer Suetonius reports on a portent that announced that a king would be born for the Roman people. The alarmed Senate decreed that no male child born that year should be allowed to live. However, senators with pregnant wives prevented the decree from being formally registered: each hoped that the predicted ruler might be his own son.

Now think back to the stories of the Bible. In Matthew’s account, Herod, Rome’s client king in Judaea, learns that a child has been born who is described as king of the Jews. He orders the killing of boys aged two and under in Bethlehem and its surroundings. Jesus survives because Joseph, warned in a dream, takes him and Mary to Egypt.

“[Augustus’s birth story] is so eerily close to the story in Matthew of the Massacre of the Innocents that it seems to me unlikely that the Massacre of the Innocents was not, in a sense, reflecting on that.”

The imperial language of “good news”

Another link between the two figures’ narratives is an inscription linking Augustus’s birthday to the beginning of the year.

In 9 BC, the Roman governor of Asia, Paullus Fabius Maximus, proposed a calendar reform adopted by the province’s Greek cities. Asia here means the Roman province in western modern-day Turkey.

Under the arrangement, the year would begin on 23 September, Augustus’s birthday. Copies of the relevant texts survive from several places, most famously Priene. They show how provincial institutions incorporated loyalty to the Roman emperor into the organisation of everyday life as a symbol and method of devotion.

The accompanying praise presented Augustus as a saviour who had ended war and brought order. His birthday marked the beginning of benefits for the world, expressed through the Greek word euangelia: “good news”.

“This euangelia is taken up by Christians to mark the Gospel.”

Mark begins his account by announcing the “good news” of Jesus Christ. Paul’s earlier letters also use this language.

Jewish culture also plays an interconnected role here. In Jewish scripture, Isaiah describes the announcement of good news concerning God’s deliverance of his people. Greek versions of those scriptures gave early Christians a vocabulary through which to express their hopes.

Early Christians seem to have been drawing from the Jewish roots of their religion, while also referencing the history of Roman imperial rule. These dual origins shouldn’t be surprising – Christianity explicitly emerged from Jewish life within a Roman imperial world.

Painting of men sat in the roman senate in white robes

Cicero denounces Catiline before the Senate in Cesare Maccari’s imagining of republican Rome. Augustus later concentrated power in his own hands while presenting himself as the restorer of Rome’s traditional institutions | Credit: Getty Images

So for Whitmarsh, the evidence suggests that the early Christians were consciously adapting Jesus’s story to align with familiar archetypes of authority, even if the details of their claims differed profoundly from those made for Augustus.

“We're not being told that Jesus is Augustus,” he says, “but they're using the same language and the same tropes, if you like, to establish Jesus as a radically new figure who also roots us in the past.”

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Tim Whitmarsh was speaking to Spencer Mizen on the HistoryExtra podcast. Listen to the full conversation.

Authors

James OsborneSenior content producer

James Osborne is a senior content producer at HistoryExtra

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