What did Pliny the younger say about Christ?

Pliny the Younger, the Roman governor of Bithynia and Pontus (now in modern Turkey), wrote a letter to Emperor Trajan around 112 A.D. and asked for counsel on dealing with the early Christian community. (Read the full text of the letter here.) The letter (Epistulae X.96) details an account of how Pliny conducted trials of suspected Christians who appeared before him as a result of anonymous accusations and asks for the Emperor’s guidance on how they should be treated.

In the letter, Pliny writes this about the 112 A.D. Christians:

They asserted, however, that the sum and substance of their fault or error had been that they were accustomed to meet on a fixed day before dawn and sing responsively a hymn to Christ as to a god, and to bind themselves by oath, not to some crime, but not to commit fraud, theft, or adultery, not falsify their trust, nor to refuse to return a trust when called upon to do so.

Pliny the younger has no interest in the theology of the Christians. As a polytheist he doesn’t acknowledge their god as the one true God, but thinks it’s just “a god” among many.

But who is the God that he says the Christians are worshiping?

Jesus Christ.

Also notice that he is just quoting what the Christians he himself has met has explained to him that they are doing: Meeting before dawn, signing worship songs to Christ, takingnoaths to not sin. This is how a 112 A.D. Christian would describe what goes on in their meetings.

This is evidence that the early Christians worshipped Jesus as God.

Also see “What did Ignatius say about Jesus” for the testimony of the disciple of the apostle John and the most prominent Christian teacher in 108 A.D.