spamandham

Why is this difficult to reconcile, when paleography from the *late* 2nd century also matches p52? There is no reason whatsoever that p52 could not be *late* 2nd century from what is presently known.

andrewcriddle

The paleographic rang is say 94-184 CE with a mean of 139 CE. Although the experts prefer the lower end of this range I quite agree that P52 could well be after 150 CE. However the composition of John is certainly earlier and probably a number of years earlier than the date of P52.

In practice we do not often find manuscripts of works probably written (on paleographic grounds) before the work itself was composed. P52 does IMO make a date of composition for John later than say 140 CE unlikely.

Andrew Criddle

Toto

The digression into how long people lived has been split to here

spamandham

Although I agree that 140 is a good reasonable guess, we can not eliminate an even later date (or earlier for that matter) based solely on p52 paleography, because there is a late 2nd century paleographic match to p52, and because paleography is by it's nature much less accurate than other hard forms of dating due to its dependence on a manuscript record that is 99% missing. +- 100 years* is the typical error bar for paleographic dating, which is of limited utility for our present discussion.

With luck, someone will eventually come up with a nondestructive way of measuring c14, and we can put these questions to rest. But until then, we are stuck dealing with a wider range than anyone really likes.

* Journal of the Epigraphical Society of India, K.V. Ramesh, Vol. 3, pp 161, "Where paleography is the lone consideration in suggesting a date for an early inscription which contains no other sort of supplementary internal evidence, the suggested date must always be taken to represent the date so suggested + or - 100 years"

Steven Avery

Hi Folks,

And if the issue is the dating of John, then you also have to consider this very salient internal evidence.

John 5:2
Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool,
which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches.
In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered,
waiting for the moving of the water.
For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool,
and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling
of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.

This has been discussed here a couple of times and, as one poster said.

"even scholars that consider the canonical version of John to be the latest completed concede that internal evidence (eg pools at Bethesda) indicates some of the content must be significantly earlier."

In addition to the threads here discussing this (best by test) there was also a net back-and-forth between Daniel Wallace and Andreas Köstenberger, with, to my surprise, the former taking the more sensible position. Note that Daniel Wallace was stuck with the modern version name corruption, nonetheless his basic argument was quite strong.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

spamandham

The author is speaking of this legend in the past tense.

Doug Shaver

Why? Or do I have to find the original thread to find out?

I don't see why it is improbable that a second-century writer would have known about the pools at Bethesda, especially if they had the reputation suggested by this anecdote.

bacht

Okay, so if John's gospel is 1st C how do we explain the high Christology? The story he presents differs significantly from the synoptics which describe Jesus in either adoptionist language (Mark) or as sired by God on a human mother (Matthew & Luke). John presents Jesus as the Logos, the eternal Son of God, pre-existent and co-regnant with the Almighty. This seems a long way from a non-descript preacher/magician executed for sedition as per the biographical gospel.

sschlichter

your question is riddled with presumption about Christology in the 1st century. there is nothing adoptionist about Mark.

Steven Avery

Hi Folks,

True, the times with the angel (before Jesus healed the man with infirmities) were in the past, at the time of authorship.

And the pool with five porches called Bethesda in the sheep market exists in the present, at the time of the writing of John. Check your history as to how the pool and porches were faring post-70 AD.

Agree with sschlichter on the Christology question.

And be aware of the circularity.

"We date John to the 2nd century as there was no high Christology in the 1st. There was not a high Christology in the 1st century, as the 1st gives us no high Christology writings."

Shalom,
Steven Avery