Toto

But why else would someone claim that Aramaic sources by themselves are proof of any early source???

Sheshbazzar

You fergot to put your Christian glasses on Solo.

Christian teaching strongly associates Biblical sacrificial death with its protagonist.
The first sacrificial death in the Bible, was YHWH himself sacrificing an innocent animal, to provided a skin (Gen 3:21) to cover the nakedness of Adam and Eve, shedding innocent blood on earth to provide 'cover', and to and 'atone' for the sin of Adam.

And in the Abraham and Issac story, (Gen 22) YHWH again provides the substitutionary lamb, and its shed blood that substitutes for the blood and the life of Issac.

In NT theology Christ is the Lamb;

John 1:29 The next day John saw J-S coming toward him, and said, "Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!

1 John 2:2 And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.

1 Peter 1:18-19 Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.

There are many other verses of both the 'Old' and 'New' Testaments that show this substitutionary blood sacrifice theme.
Christianity did not invent it, they only ran with it.

And no, I am not supporting that these stories are records of any actual physical historical events, or ever happened any literal historical sense.
They are all only parts of an ancient redemption mythos, one from the beginning created by humans, to give people hope, that no matter how bad their acts may be, that if they turn and repent ('be sorry') That there has already been a blood sacrifice made 'from the foundation of the world' that would 'cover' for them.

Anthropologically, This 'doctrine' seems to have arisen out of a compassionate human reaction to how ancient peoples used to express their needs to appease their gods, or to provide their 'best' and ultimate sacrifice, that being their own first born son (the one naturally expected to provide for them and protect them in their old age)
The sacrifice of such a son also indicating to their gods that they were putting all their trust in them to be there to provide for them, and hence were willing to 'give up' that security provided by having a son.

It seems that it was an idea that evolved to console the guilt-ridden persons and to persuade ancient societies to forgo the practice of sacrificing their children to appease gods anger.




.

Solo

Sheesh, what's the point of quoting me stuff that comes after Mark ? Mark himself provides no reference in the OT to the Son of Man "going" and someone "delivering him up/ handing him over". He does not because it is not there. It is something that Paul read into the Old Testament. Mk 14:21 transparently references Rom 4:25 "[Jesus] who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification."

Best,
Jiri

stephan huller

Is John 8:58 in the Peshitta, Old Syriac, Sahidic (and I believe Armenian, Georgian) a translation of the Hebrew exemplar behind Exodus 3:14 LXX? Jesus says enah iythay = Hebrew anochi yesh or is he just translating the LXX into Syriac? Why then doesn't the LXX show up in the Greek or Latin?

Solo

What does this have to do with Mark using the Son of Man as a christological title ? What is Mark quoting from in 14:21 :

"For the Son of man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! It would have been better for that man if he had not been born."

When I suggest that it is Rom 4:25 (8:32) people look at me as if I fell from the moon. If I said this is Mark's is analepsis his own text (8:31) people would think I am crazy. An yet this is what Mark does in 9:12 as well, and for good measure with Elijah (cover for the Baptist) in 9:13.


Best,
Jiri

Sheshbazzar

You did write 'after a lifetime of study of the NT' did you not?
There is nothing in what you wrote indicating that by 'a lifetime of study of the NT', you meant a lifetime of study limited to only the book of 'Mark'.

The theme of blood sacrifice as being a propitiation for sin is a major theme of both 'old' and 'new' Testaments.
Looking at The 'Old' Testament 'through Christian glasses' from the Christian perspective these earlier examples all pointed towards One who would become the ultimate blood sacrifice that would 'atone' not just for sins of one repentant person at a time, time after time, but once, by one sacrifice for the sins of the repentant of 'the whole world', for all time.

While it is true that the Christianity retrojects its developed theology upon the 'Old' Testament' writings, it still nonetheless also true that this theme of blood sacrifice for sin is at least as old as Genesis.

Now I am not a Christian, and have no desire to 'convert' you, so I'm not about to spend hours providing and arguing all of those verses that are used by Christian Theologians to establish that there was ONE predicted who was going to die in a redemptive act for all.
If some Christian wishes to defend that premise I'll leave doing so to them.

.

Adam

Is the case at issue whether all the gospels were composed in Aramaic? That's not my contention. I acknowledge that all the M additions to Matthew and the additions to Mark and the Q2 additions were entered in Greek. I also acknowledge that where Mark and Luke have much word-by-word agreement, then that Greek Ur-Marcus was probably composed in Greek in Mark. The Signs Gospel in John was composed in Greek. Aside from these, however, can anyone make a good case that any sources were written originally in Greek?

All the above-listed Greek origins may be closely related. There is a "Synoptic style" used for statistical comparisons to gJohn. As I wrote in

Significance of John,Post #30:
This same author (or scribe) likely wrote or translated the entirety of gMark as well. (45 years ago I failed in my attempt to find stylistic differences within gMark.) He may have written Q2 as well.

What I am driving at is shifting the burden of proof. I'll stipulate to the above being originally in Greek, but can anyone prove that the other five of my eyewitnesses to Jesus wrote their records in Greek. I'm holding to Aramaic originals for my thesis as posted in #1, #18,#38, #52, #74, #132, and #144, and #170, less the above-stipulated #18, #52 (not that it was not originally Aramaic, but its verbal parallels with Luke render this unprovable), #144 (not a source, editorial additions in Greek in John), and the #561 deletions from Post #74 in

Gospel Eyewitness

Casey similarly avoids claiming any gospel, even Mark, was all written in Aramaic. He argues for sources (a concept Vorkosigan and spin still cannot understand).

Sheshbazzar

If they were first written in Sabaean or Swahili, to be regarded as historical accounts, it would still require credibility for what was written, and that is what they are lacking in any language.

I can set in at the local courthouse and listen to plenty of testimony that lacks credibility. No matter how accurately it is recorded it does not transform into a factual historical accounting merely by being recorded.

The Bible is composed of religious fiction piled upon religious fiction. The people believed the religious fictions that came before, and like their fathers, following the norms of their primitive and superstitious society, they made up and added their own fictions.
They made their religion into a highly imaginary and phantasmagoria art-form, one where the superficial tales were not about real history, but only contrived and decorated containers for their ancient social symbolisms and metaphors.

Solo

Casey accepts the priority of Mark. So, in assessing Jesus putative Messianic self-consciousness you cannot simply assume that the developped Christology of John was available to Jesus to place himself into in the earliest gospel. Show where Mark's sacrificial theme in 14:21 "SoM goes as it is written of him" relates to anything written of "The/A Son of Man" in the OT. (The only eligible verse from Ketuvim would be "one like son of man" in Daniel 7:13-14, but it does not speak of any atoning death). I don't care about "the Lamb", or the "Messiah", or "the suffering servant". I was commenting on Casey's assessment of Mark's "son of man" and specifically on the silliness of Jesus (in the imagined Aramaic tradition) attaching Pauline-messianic vistas to himself via the common idiomatic 'bar(e)nash(ā)'.

This is all talking past the point, Sheesh. It does not address my concerns in the least.

Best,
Jiri

Solo

I was not addressing your contention, Adam. Quite frankly, if you want to write a book, by all means write a book. I can guarantee you no-one in their right mind is going to collate your scattered posts on this board.

Best,
Jiri