Is Josephus a forgery?

There has been an ongoing debate among scholars as to the authenticity of the "Testimonium" in the Antiquites. Louis Fldman, the dean of Josephan scholars, counts more than eighty studies of this problem from 1937 to 1980. Part of the issue is the earliest manuscripts are copies from the eleventh century, making textual criticism ineffective (Van Voorst 2000, pg 88). We turn instead to historical criticism. Arguments for the authenticity include: The passage "wise man" is not one would expect from a Christian interpolation, because it is not at all a common Christian one. Same is true for "worker of amazing deeds." Christians would have avoided the word "pleasure" in "teacher of people who accept the truth with pleasure." Also "those who had first loved him did not cease" is characteristically Josephan in style." On the other hand statements like "if indeed it is right to call him a man" looks like a Christian scribe's correction and there are also problems with the phrase "the Christ." Also "for on the third day he appeared to them alive again" is filled with Christian content (VanVoorst 2000, pg 91). The doubts about wording, have led some interpreters to reject the entire passage as interpolation. However because of just as strong counter arguments that over half of the passage is authentic Josephan content, a neutral reconstruction is proposed which removes the suspicious content:

There are several reasons that the neutral reconstruction is accepted including a quote from Agapius's Universal history, a tenth century Christian which suggests he knows a version of Josephus that contains the Testimonium in a form that tends to resemble the neutral reconstruction. It is supported by a roughly parallel presentation (held to be genuine), of John the Baptizer (Ant. 18.5.2 $ 116-9)(Van Voorst 2000, pg 97,98). And also is corroborated by Josephus' mentioning of James, the brother of Jesus (Van Voorst 2000, pg 83).