The G Man

I'm having a hard time locating these in the Greek online. That may be evidence that it's time for me to pay for a subscription to TLG.

What I've managed to find in English...

De Abstentia IV, Porphyry

Demetrius, Plutarch

Poimandres, Corpus Hermeticum

Theon Smyrnaeus is truly obscure and the online Suda isn't user friendly enough for me to want to trawl through it. I'm not even sure to what "Schol. Aristoph. Ra." is supposed to refer (the Frogs maybe?).

Certainly the Plutarch and Porphyry only seem to refer to a conventional understanding of παραλαμβανω as the transmission of a human tradition (although without the Greek it's not 100% certain).

Only the Poimandres even hints at the meaning that Doherty wants to read. I presume this is the relevant bit...

But even this doesn't seem to be using παραλαμβανω to indicate specifically reception of a revelation. Rather the initiate is receiving - as in being taught - something within the context of a revelation which he is then to teach to others. Again, without the Greek, it's hard to be sure but this would look to fit the normal understanding of oral transmission.

S.C.Carlson

I've got a subscription to TLG. The reference would be to this part:
No other form of παραλαμβανω is found in this section.

(More on the others later when I have the time...)

Very close. That should be a scholiast on Aristophanes, Frogs.

Stephen

andrewcriddle

My English translation of Theon reads (slightly modified and abbreviated) Andrew Criddle

S.C.Carlson

The Greek for Plutarch, Demetrius, 26.1, is:

Τότε δ’ οὖν ἀναζευγνύων εἰς τὰς Ἀθήνας ἔγραψεν, ὅτι βούλεται παραγενόμενος εὐθὺς μυηθῆναι καὶ τὴν τελετὴν ἅπασαν ἀπὸ τῶν μικρῶν ἄχρι τῶν ἐποπτικῶν παραλαβεῖν.

Here is the corresponding translation (somewhat free) from the Internet Classics Archive:

But to proceed. Demetrius being about to return to Athens, signified by letter to the city that he desired immediate admission to the rites of initiation into the Mysteries, and wished to go through all the stages of the ceremony, from first to last, without delay.

Stephen

S.C.Carlson

It is to a commentary on Aristophanes' The Frogs. Though TLG does not have the Dindorf edition, it does have the Duebner edition, which puts it at line 745, not. 757. At any rate, here is the relevant portion, which my translation:

μάλ’ ἐποπτεύειν δοκῶ: . . . οἱ τὰ μυστήρια παραλαμβάνοντες, μύσται καλοῦνται. οἱ δὲ παραλαβόντες τὰ μυστήρια τῷ αὖθις ἐνιαυτῷ ἐφορῶσιν αὐτὰ καὶ ἐποπτεύουσι, καὶ ἐποπτεύοντες χαίρουσιν ἐπὶ τῷ πολλὰ πράττειν. . . .

I would translate it as follows:

I think I'm very much admitted to the highest mysteries: . . . those receiving the mystery are called initiates, but those who have received the mystery for another anniversary observe it and are admitted to the highest mysteries, and those who are admitted to the highest mysteries delight in doing many things. . . .

Stephen

The G Man

Thanks Stephen and Andrew!

My amateur assessment is that, of the five primary sources...

• Plutarch refers unambiguously to an exoteric participation in the rites of the mystery not the reception of revelation.
• The Suda and Porphyry could (just about) be read as referring to some sort of sacramental reception within the context of exoteric participation but not explicitly to a revelation. The best we can say here is that they are not incompatible with Doherty's claim but they don't favour it.
• Theon Smyrnaeus is similar but also emphasises the παραλαμβανω / παραδιδωμι symmetry which is a point against the 'revelation' interpretation.
• Poimandres is ambiguous. One the one hand, unlike the others it provides an inside view and certainly does not refer to the reception of a human transmission. On the other hand, it still emphasises transmission and it doesn't seem to be used as a term of art for the reception of the revelation itself.

Fair?

I've had time to think about think about the Price essay. I agree that there is a tension between Galatians 1:12 and 1 Corinthians 15:3 but I'm not at all sure it represents "a problem insurmountable for Pauline authorship". Could we not reconcile the discrepancy by placing the letter to the Corinthians prior to acrimonious meeting at Antioch where Paul is trying to validate his authority by placing himself within the Jerusalem tradition. With the Galatians, after a spat with the Jerusalem leaders, he no longer wishes to, or is unable to, establish his authority on that basis.

jgibson000

As does the fact that in addition to getting the title of the book he cites wrong, Earl has also misrepresented the date of its publication.

But more importantly, have you noted how it is actually Earl's "argument" about the meaning of PARALAMBANW in 1 Cor. 11:23 that is question begging?

His claim that Schweitzer's view

"that Paul is not here being influenced by Hellenistic usages and conceptions is to beg the question, since such an immunity cannot be proven. In fact, it goes against common sense, if only because Paul was himself a Diaspora Jew and could hardly have led a life insulated from Hellenistic thought and expression"


contains four premises

(1) that Paul was a diaspora Jew

(1) that PARALAMBANW had come to be established as a technical term in the mysteries prior to the second century CE ;

(2) that every Hellene, not to mention every Jew in the diaspora, was familiar with the technical language of the mysteries.

(3) that the meaning PARALAMBANW allegedly had in the first century within (some of) the Mysteries came to be the primary sense of that word outside of the Mysteries; and

(4) that even if this were so, diaspora Jews would have abandoned using PARALAMBANW with the technical sense it had in Jewish tradition.

But #1 assumes the truth and the historicity of Acts. There is nothing in the literature outside that of, or about, the mysteries that shows #2 to have been the case. The lexical evidence attesting to usage of PARALAMBANW stands decidedly against #3. And 1st century Greek Jewish literature shows that there was no such abandonment.

(I wonder if Earl can produce any instances of PARALAMBANW in writings by any other diaspora Jew in which PARALAMBANW is used in the sense he claims Paul employed it? After all, if Earl is right about the infulence of Hellenistic culture on Jews, then it would not be Paul alone who, when employing the word, would have used it in its alleged "mystery Religions" sense. All Jews writing in the diaspora would have done so, yes?)

So it seems that if anyone is begging the question, it is Earl in assuming as true what actually needs to be proven.

Jeffrey Gibson

Vorkosigan

This is not what Doherty said. He said that Paul could not have led a life insulated from Hellenistic thought and expression. Doherty's position is that essentially Paul must have run across that usage, not that everyone had to be "familiar." You've created a strawman by setting the standard higher than Doherty does.

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

Doherty:

However, it was a verb also used in the Greek mysteries and in religious
experiences generally, to refer to the reception of a revelation from a god. Paul himself applies it in both ways in a crucial passage in

Skip the mysteries. How is the verb used in other Hellenistic religious contexts?



Vorkosigan
*Sorry about all the extras, had a little trouble with the server today.

The G Man

Perseus has 1,178 instances of παραλαμβανω. TLG will undoubtedly have quite a few more than that. If there are specific examples to support Doherty's claim I'd love to see them. But if the specific claim about mystery religions doesn't stand up, I think the onus is now on those arguing in the affirmative to show some other religious context for such a use.

FoI did check the use in the Septuagint because, well, it's easy. It is normally used in the sense of taking or leading a person - Genesis 22:3, 31:23, 45:18, 47:2, Numbers 22:41, 23:14, 23:27, 23:28, Joshua 4:2, 2 Chronicles 25:11, Song of Solomon 8:2, Lamentations 3:2, Daniel 6:19. It is also used to indicate inheritance - Jeremiah 49:1-2, Daniel 5:31, 6:28 - and seems to have a more general usage in property law - Jeremiah 32:7. None of these contexts though are particularly religious.

However, I think that Stephen's pretty exhaustive investigation of the citation for the claim actually turned up some pretty strong evidence against Paul's usage of παραλαμβανω to indicate a revelatory experience. What was turned up was pretty good evidence for the παραλαμβανω / παραδιδωμι idiom. And this is precisely what we see in 1 Corinthians 11:23 and 15:3 which are the other two verses Doherty argues we should interpret as revelation. The second instance the case against Doherty is further strengthened by Paul's use of παραλαμβανω two sentences earlier in 15:1 to unambiguously mean the reception of the human transmission of a tradition.

Even in Galatians 1:12 αποκαλυψεως is not the direct object of παρελαβον; αυτο (referring to the το ευαγγελιον of the previous verse) is. This is perhaps similar to the Poimandres - oral transmission within the context of a revelation. But I still think if you were going to attribute the δι αποκαλυψεως to one verb rather than the other εδιδαχθην is the better candidate - by proximity, because παρελαβον is already qualified (by παρα ανθρωπου) whereas εδιδαχθην isn't and because of the alliteration.