Tyro

The argument from silence seems to be discussed in this thread, but perhaps it is better if it is discussed in a separate thread. So: Does it matter to the existence of a fact that it is not mentioned by people who would have mentioned it?

Toto

Do you think there is anything else to say about the abstract issue of the argument from silence? Obviously, there are times when it is a valid argument, and times when it is not, depending on the probability that the alleged fact would or would not have been mentioned.

Calculating the probabilites gets you into Bayes Theorem.

Steven Carr

For example, Acts does not mention the death of Paul.

Does this silence increase the probability it was written before Paul died?

Shaelyn

From what I understand, dating of the earliest originals we have found suggests that no part of the bible was written prior to about 80 CE. Since the average life expectancy then was 40-something, it follows that it is very unlikely any of the original twelve fellas were alive at the time of their writing.

andrewcriddle

One general point, is that I am uneasy in principle about the argument that statement X in writer A is a later interpolation because other ancient writers do not mention or allude to statement X.

Where the other writers are explicitly referring to writer A their silence about X may well be significant, but otherwise I don't think that the absence of references to X in other writers is good evidence that X was originally absent from the writings of A.

Andrew Criddle

Solo

Hi Andrew,

what you say again would depend on the context, would it not ?

I raised 1 Cor 14:23 (augmented by 14:11, 14:14) recently in which Paul speaks of a 'hypothetical' event of a whole congregation speaking in tongues and outside observers commenting. But surely these comments speak volumes about Paul's 'silence' on the Pentecost event in Luke's Acts 2. Would you not say ?

In other words, is it probable that Paul spent two weeks with Cephas in Jerusalem and he did not know that an event such as he imagines not only occured but was thought of as the church'es consecration by Christ ?

Best,
Jiri

andrewcriddle

Hi Jiri

I think you may be misunderstanding what I was trying to say.

Assuming FTSOA that Paul's silence in 1 Corinthians is evidence against the historicity of the Pentecost event as described in Acts 2, it is not IMO evidence that the passage in Acts 2 is a later interpolation in the original text of Luke-Acts.

(This thread is a sort of spin-off from a discussion as to whether or not the fact that, apart from Tacitus, all claims that Nero blamed Christians for the Great Fire of Rome are late and go back directly or indirectly to our present text of Tacitus is evidence that the passage about Christians in Tacitus is a later interpolation in the original text.)

Andrew Criddle

Doug Shaver

I'd say it depends entirely on the cogency of the argument that (a) they would have mentioned it and (b) had they done so, some documentation of their mentionings would have survived long enough for us to have become aware of them.

Petergdi

This is a serious misunderstanding of life expectancy. In the pre-modern world (which included many poorer countries until quite recently) life expectancy followed a bathtub curve. The end-of-life part of the curve was not much different than it is today. The biggest factor pushing the average low was high infant mortality. Midlife mortality was also several times higher than it is now.

Look at the oldest good actuarial data we have, from London 1728-1750:

Out of 602747 deaths recorded in London between 1728-1750
- 218810 were under age 2.
- 270353 were under age 5
- 291653 were under age 10
- 310154 deaths were under age 20
- 474179 deaths were under age 50

-43268 deaths were over age 70
-16277 deaths were over age 80
- 2513 deaths were over age 90
- 200 deaths were over age 100

If you were 20, you had a 14.8% chance of living to at least 70, a 5.6%chance of living to at 80 or more and a 0.85% chance of living to 90 or more.

Statistics from http://www.kabele.org/papers/dodsonms2.pdf

Peter.

DCHindley

The problem with arguments from silence, IMHO, is that we have to impute motive to an author, or worse yet impose our own - modern - expectations on ancient sources. To suggest that IF this or that OCCURED, then such and so a source or author CERTAINLY would have mentioned or alluded to it, smacks of special pleading.

Take the case of Acts. It follows events through the late 50's or even early 60's AD. However, it doesn't even so much as have a peep to say about the attempt by Gaius (Caligula) to erect his statue in the Jewish temple at Jerusalem. Both Josephus and Philo describe the situation, which almost broke out into an open rebellion, so it is certainly a fact. Yet for whatever reason he (or she) had, the author does not mentioned it or even alluded to it.

A modern reader might say to him or herself "Surely he SHOULD have mentioned such a dramatic event in Jewish affairs, if only to mock those silly Jews for their inability to see that Jesus Christ had rendered the temple obsolete almost a decade earlier!" Yet, for whatever reason the author had, he/she did not mention it or even allude to it. Even 2 Thessalonians 2:3, whether the letter is authentic or not, could be taken to allude to it.

All writers, including historians (if that is what the author of Acts was trying to be), select a subset of the available data or evidence that s/he feels makes the most "sense" out of the events. That interpretation or explanatory framework will unavoidably reflect the author's ideology to some extent. To the author of Acts, the statue affair was irrelevant to his purpose for writing.

Sometime a cigar is just a cigar.

DCH