Toto

I have just finished reading the Infidels Book of the Month for August, by Alvar Ellegard, Jesus: One Hundred Years Before Christ. Ellegard discusses some disputes that we have had here in the past on dating the Gospels

First, in regard to the argument that there are fragments of Mark that can be dated to 50 C.E., or at least before 68, which was developed by Carsten Thiede, and is propounded by Nomad. (Incidentally, I have just re-read that thread, and I am not sure why Nomad thinks that he has any case at all.)

Ellegard demolishes Thiede’s arguments on pp185-186. He states:

1. Thiede’s arguments have been almost universally rejected by experts in New Testament manuscripts. Ellegard notes that he himself has written a book on the use of linguistic statistics to determine authorship, and he agrees with the skeptics. The fragments are too small – about a dozen not very clear letters, distributed over four lines of text – to allow any firm conclusions.

2. However, even if Thiede’s identification of the fragments as Markan is accepted, his conclusions do not follow. The fragments were discovered in Cave 7 at Qumran; that cave is unusual in that it, along with Cave 4, contains Greek manuscripts. But beyond that, all of the identified manuscripts from Cave 7 are in Greek. Thus it can be argued reasonably that Cave 7 has a different history from the other caves. It might well have been used as a hiding place by Christians after the Bar Kokhba rebellion – which hypothesis is supported by the fact that Thiede has found three other fragments in the cave which he identifies as belonging to 1 Timothy and 2 Peter, which scholars typically date well into the 2nd century.

3. Further, even if the passage is from Mark, it may be part of an early text that was used later by the compilers of Mark’s Gospel. The passage contains no distinctive words, and could fit a number of different contexts, or be part of a text about someone other than Jesus.

Now that that has been taken care of, Ellegard presents some interesting arguments for dating the Gospels to the second century. He dates some early Christian writings to around 50 C.E. or at least to the first century, including Paul and the pseudo-Pauline letters, 1 Clement (which he dates to 60 C.E.), the Pastor of Hermes, the Didache, Barnabas, the letter to the Hebrews, and the Revelation of John. He finds a consistency of style and language among these, and a view of Jesus that ignores all of Jesus’ human characteristics.

Ellegard speculates that the early Christians were a offshoot of the Essenes, based on some common features – referring to themselves as the Church of God, and their members as "Saints", the use of a calendar that differed from the Jewish lunar calendar, etc. The Essenes revered a Teacher of Righteousness, who had lived in the past; Ellegard theorizes that around 30 C.E. some members of the Essene community started to have visions of the Teacher, and these visions were the basis of the new religion. Paul also identified his visions with the Teacher, which would explain his references to Jesus as a man born of woman, but with no other details of a life that presumably was very close in time to his own. Ellegard believes that the early church was headed by James, Peter, and Jude, whose names were appropriated by the writers of the Gospels for Jesus’ disciples, but who had no more personal knowledge of Jesus than Paul did.

Ellegard sees the Gospels as fictional accounts written in the second century for the political purposes of the 2nd century church. He believes that they were inspired by Ignatius’ struggle against the Gnostics, and the Gnostic docetics in particular. He finds a different vocabulary in the documents he dates to the second century. The second century documents refer to "disciples" who knew Christ personally, where the first century documents talk about apostles, meaning only those who were preaching the new religion (Paul and Peter were both Apostles in this sense.) The second century documents use the word synagogue to refer to a building, while in the first century documents, it means only a gathering of people.

Ellegard postulates that Ignatius invented the historical Jesus. Ignatius is the first to mention the figures of Mary, the mother of Jesus, or to connect Pontius Pilate or John the Baptist with Jesus, in his letters dated around 110. The Gospel writers then expanded on this base to create historical novels, fleshing out Ignatius’ plot line. Ellegard therefore dates all of the Gospels after Ignatius.

This is an exceedingly brief overview. I recommend reading the book. Some parts of this theory may seem to be conjured up out of whole cloth, but that is probably inevitable given the gaps in real information. I can’t say that I am completely persuaded, but Ellegard’s theory does explain some things that are otherwise a puzzle. And his discussion of Gnosticism is worth the price of admission.

You might wonder how this fits in with the mythicist case put forward by G. A. Wells or Earl Doherty. Doherty’s site contains his review of Ellegard’s book, with a response by Ellegard, and a reply to that by Doherty. Doherty takes a more conventional view of dating the Gospels. He assumes that Ignatius picked up references to this historical Jesus from the different communities who developed the Gospel of Mark, so that Mark and Matthew precede Ignatius.

Kosh

How does this account for the many other
Gospels which simply weren't included in
the cannon? And if they were written at
the same time for such a specific purpose,
why the different versions and approaches?

Toto

I'm not sure what Ellegard would answer, but he would probably emphasize that there were a variety of flavors and sects of early Christianity in the first and second centuries, each with its own agenda. The gnostics produced a number of gospels which embodied what Ignatius thought were heretical ideas. It was necessary, therefore, to counter these with a different narrative.

It seems clear that the gospels were not written as eyewitness narratives, or attempts to write plain history. None of them are close enough to the presumed event. The standard explanation is that there were oral traditions of Jesus that were preserved, and it just took a while for someone to write them down. Ellegard rejects this. He says that if the early churches were so uninterested in the details of Jesus' presumed life on earth that no letter of Paul's mentions anything about Jesus life beyond a few bare ideas (like born of a woman), why would the communities have preserved any oral legends? I have also seen references to scholarly work on legendary development, but have not tracked them down.

Vorkosigan

Crossan has an excellent chapter on the problems with assuming that oral tradition could preserve much in The Birth of Christianity. He points out that modern studies of oral transmission show that legends quickly mutate, and new details are spontaneously added.

Michael

Nomad

Hmm... yet another example of trashing me personally without offering an argument of your own Toto? How extraordinary.

The thread is still active BTW, and anyone who wishes can comment as they wish. It is called 7Q5 and Redating the Gospel of Mark. My own conclusions, of course, are there for all to see, and those who care to actually read it will see that I admitted that I am not convinced, but think that the claims made by Theide are worth investigating.

What I did say, and you failed to note (go figure) is that I was not the one that was convinced by Theide's arguments. Those who are convinced include respected papyrologists like Jose O'Callagan, Hubert Hunger, and Orsolina Montevecchi (Honorary President of the International Papyrologists’ Association).

A couple of questions here:

1) Is Ellegard a papyrologist? Based on your post, I would have to say no.
2) Why do you make this particular argument in a new thread rather than the original? That thread is still active, and if you take a look, we actually covered off ALL of Ellegard's points.

A good argument, of course, but not decisive. The only way science ever changes is if and when SOMEONE stands up against the concensus, and offers better arguments. So this is not a good argument in itself.

Yes, we covered this off in considerable depth in that thread on 7Q5 Toto. As you will see, many smaller fragments have been safely identified in the past. From my post of January 05, 2001 12:43 AM:

Okay, first off many fragments are and have been identified without controversy or opposition that are of similar size, and containing approximately the same number of letters, so this doesn't really prove much.

The Oxyrhynchus papyrus XXXVIII 2831 was identified as being from Menander's comedy Samia eventhough it measures only 2.4cmX3.3cm and has only 19 letters on five lines. Fragment 7Q2 from the same cave in Qumran has only 21 letters on it, yet it is accepted as being from Baruch 6:43-44. P.Masada 721a is known to be from Virgil's Aeneid 4.9 with only 15 visible letters on it (yes, Virgil was read by the folks on Masada, cool eh?). (C.P. Thiede, EJ, pg. 44)

This argument is not decisive.

Two points:

A) The fragments Theide identified as being from 1 Timothy and 2 Peter are even more speculative than is identification of 7Q5 (I covered this off as well in my post of February 22, 2001 08:31 PM, in which I showed:

The author of this site comes down in favour (claiming that "the identifications proposed by Nebe for fragments 7Q4,1, and for 7Q8 can be regarded as certain as part of Enoch 103.

Lacking the expertise to challenge either Thiede or Nebe and Muro, I defer to any evidence others might uncover. That said, let me state that I cannot agree that Thiede and O'Callagan's arguments can be considered decisive, since I cannot locate their particular arguments or responses to Nebe and Muro's analysis.

It is fallacious to use a weaker argument to refute a stronger one.

B) We have no archaeological evidence that ANY of the caves at Qumran were used by anyone after they were abandoned in 68AD. On this basis, let's just say that speculation is not argumentation. Until evidence is produced that ANYONE used these caves after 68, it is a mistake to use such an unproven hypothesis to conclude anything.

And this was my own conclusion in that very thread. Quite frankly, we just don't know if 7Q5 is from Mark, UrMark, or something else. The investigation continues. What I do not understand is how you could have reread that thread and thought that I had not made this exact argument.

First, I know that you do not live or write in a vacuum Toto. I have presented numerous arguments for a first century dating of Mark, Matthew and Luke, and you fail to address any of them in this post. Is your silence (and presumably Ellegard's) meant to show that these arguments carry no weight?

Personally, I would rather see you actually address arguments, rather than merely asserting something new.

If he sees all of these works as ignoring ALL of Jesus' human characteristics, then he simply cannot read. On these very boards we have discussed this at length as well, and your continued assertions to the contrary do not constitute sound argumentation Toto. Here are just a couple of the threads where we see Paul discussing Jesus' human characteristics (all are still active):

Paul and the Bodily Resurrection of Jesus
Paul and the Birth of Jesus

I did not see you on either thread, so perhaps you did not read them. What I will say is that it would not be wise to accept Ellegard's theory without first acquainting yourself with what other scholars say (not to mention what the Bible itself says) on the matter.

Here I will thank our very own Bede for his summation in his article Refuting the myth that Jesus never existed:

The Non - Silence of Paul

The whole idea that Jesus did not exist started with the fact that Paul does not say very much about his life or ministry. It is instructive to first find out what he did say so here is a list. You can read the relevent snippet biblical text by holding your mouse over the red scripture references.

-Jesus was born in human fashion, as a Jew, and had a ministry to the Jews. (Galations 4:4)
-Jesus was referred to as "Son of God". (1 Cor. 1:9)
-Jesus was a direct descendent of King David. (Romans 1:3)
-Jesus prayed to God using the term "abba". (Galations 4:6)
-Jesus expressly forbid divorce. (1 Cor. 7:10)
-Jesus taught that "preachers" should be paid for their preaching. (1 Cor. 9:14)
-Jesus taught about the end-time. (1 Thess. 4:15)
-Paul refers to Peter by the name Cephas (rock), which was the name Jesus gave to him. (1 Cor. 3:22)
-Jesus had a brother named James. (Galations 1:19)
-Jesus initiated the Lord's supper and referred to the bread and the cup. (1 Cor. 11:23-25)
-Jesus was betrayed on the night of the Lord's Supper. (1 Cor. 11:23-25)
-Jesus' death was related to the Passover Celebration. (1 Cor. 5:7)
-The death of Jesus was at the hands of earthly rulers. (1 Cor. 2:8)
-Jesus underwent abuse and humiliation. (Romans 15:3)
-Jewish authorities were involved with Jesus' death. (1 Thess. 2:14-16)
-Jesus died by crucifixion. (2 Cor. 13:4 et al)
-Jesus was physically buried. (1 Cor. 15:4)

It turns out that careful analysis of the letters shows that Paul was not actually all that silent at all. The first reaction to all this from the Jesus Myther is to dispute that Paul wrote very many of these letters. But actually seven of his letters are completely undisputed letters and all associated facts about Jesus's life shown above are all from these. It is ironic that the pastoral epistles of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, that liberals insist are late (and date from after the synoptic Gospels), contain practically no details about the life of Jesus at all.

This is why you should not take assertions at face value Toto. If you would like to read a reasonably good book (written by an atheist, BTW) on how Paul talks about the historical Jesus, I would recommend:

Saint Saul: Skeleton Key to the Historical Jesus.

On the thread Jesus vs. Paul vs. Roman Catholocism - Major Differences In Theology? I addressed this as well, relying upon the foremost scholar on the Dead Sea Scrolls to demonstrate that the early Christians were not, in fact, Essenes.

Here is why scholars reject the hypothesis that Jesus, or the early Christians, were Essenes:

“The principal difference between (Jesus and Essenes) consisted in their overall outlook and distinctive emphasis on the Torah. The priestly Essenes, while insisting on inward conversion, laid particular stress on the rigorous performance of the minutiae of the biblical commandments, such as the purity, dietary and cultic regulations. Though asserting the permanent validity of the Torah, Jesus, the Galilean popular preacher, in the footsteps of the prophets gave definite priority to the innermost aspects of Mosaic piety. Whereas the rigorous system of Qumran was exclusive, keeping out outsiders, Jesus was keen to convey his spiritual insights to all and sundry who honestly approached him inspired by faith. The publicans and sinners, the friends and table-fellows of Jesus, would have received curt treatment from the leaders of the Dead Sea communities.
So quite apart from the improbability of contact between Jesus and the Essenes in Galilee where the presence of this sect is nowhere attested, the profound diversity of their respective religious perspectives renders unlikely that in his public career Jesus had anything to do with the Qumran movement.”
(Geza Vermes, The Changing Faces of Jesus, [Penguin Books: New York, 2000] pg. 257)

As ALL of the information on the historical Jesus (according to Ellegard) came from Ignatius and the Gospels, it would be extremely odd for Jesus' career to be so unlike the philosophy and teachings of the Essense community. It is worth noting as well that Vermes sees NO connection between Jesus and the Teacher of Righteousness. This should not come as a surprise, as no where in the Gospels or elsewhere in the New Testament is Jesus EVER called the Teacher of Righteousness.

I should also mention that we see no evidence in Paul's letters that he was excessively concerned with ritual purity, and other teachings from the Essenes. In fact, if one reads his letters, he appears to be very strongly opposed to such things (see for example, Romans 9:31-32; Ephesians 2:8-9; Galatians 2:10-11).

All of that said, I wouldn't mind finding out what Ellegard thought of Eisenman's equally curious belief that JAMES was really the Teacher of Righteousness! Perhaps the two could have a debate.

Now, before you go to far with this one, what are Ellegard's dates for the Teacher of Righteousness scroll?

Where? Please quote the letters where Paul identified Jesus as the Teacher of Righteousness.

I'm almost afraid to ask what evidence he has for this, but what the heck. What evidence does Ellegard have (besides his own ideosyncratic datings of the gospels)? After all, to rely upon his own self produced evidence would be pretty circular in his reasoning.

This is an especially bad argument (assuming Ellegard actually makes it). The only place the word "synagogue" appears in the New Testament, outside of the Gospels and Acts, is in Revelation, which you have told us he dates to the first century. Paul himself never uses it. Neither does Hebrews (in ANY context). This is why arguments from silence are not very persuasive, and when someone like Ellegard claims that they say something that they do not, it is even worse.

Additionally, as many of the other books Ellegard apparently dates to the 1st Century are dated by virtually all other scholars to the 2nd Century, we have another case of Ellegard manufacturing the evidence to fit his theory.

The simple fact is that after the destruction of the Temple in 70AD, Jews had to find a place to worship, and they did so in synagogues. Thus, the name is well known in the period of 70-100AD, exactly when most scholars date the Gospels. It should come as no surprise that 1st Century documents, like the Gospels mention the synagogue as the place where Jews assembled to worship and study the Torah. In fact, I have seen no evidence to suggest that they did not do this, even pre-70AD.

See how circular the reasoning is here Toto? First, Ellegard, alone amongst all of the scholars, dates all of the Gospels to the second Century, post Ignatius. THEN he argues that this shows that Ignatius is the FIRST person to portray Jesus as an historical person! Given that he clearly did not even read Paul, his argument looks even more weak then Doherty's. At least Doherty uses special pleading to try and explain how every single mention of the historical Jesus found in Paul's letters doesn't mean what it says. Ellegard does not even appear to do this much.

I have to ask. You reject Carsten Theide's theories. Have you read his book? Based on your post, you appear to reject Raymond Brown's, J.P. Meier's, E.P. Sanders', Donald Akenson's, J.D. Crossan's, Marcus Borg's, and Geza Vermes'. Have you read any of them?

One does not need to have read everything to form an opinion, mind you, but a good cross section of views does go a long ways towards protecting one from especially bad ideas.

Since Ellegard's datings are clearly made out of whole cloth (as are some of his especially bad arguments you have mentioned above), I would not put much, if any stake in his conclusions or findings. That said, I am glad that you do not find him persuasive.

One quick comment here, but G.A. Wells is no longer a mythicist. He accepts that Jesus really did exist.

Nomad

[ October 10, 2001: Message edited by: Nomad ]

Toto

Nomad: it is late, and I will get back to this tomorrow. Briefly to answer your direct questions, Ellegard is a linguist, not a papyrologist. I started a new thread because your thread on 7Q5 had not been posted to in a while, and seemed to have played itself out. You did not convince anyone else on the thread that there was anything to Thiede's arguments.

I have not taken the time to track down all of your arguments for dating the gospels to 50 A.D. I thought that the 7Q5 fragment was the main argument. I am not interested getting into a long debate over dating the Gospels, because I don't think that enough evidence exists to give them a definitive date. I am more interested in Ellegard's theories at this point.

I think that Ellegard's arguments are very speculative. His idea that the early pillars of the church and Paul identified their visions with the Teacher of Righteousness is made up out of whole cloth, as far as I can tell, as a way of explaining what would otherwise not make much sense. But it is still interesting to think about.

One technical point:

I wrote:
You took just the first sentence, and claimed that you had made the same argument. I think that you were arguing for the existence of ur-Mark, while Ellegard is arguing that the passage could be from another narrative completely. It's a very different argument.

More later.

Bede

Nomad,

The list of Paul's non-silence was originally supplied by Layman and I have used with permission.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Vorkosigan

Let's look at these:

-Jesus was born in human fashion, as a Jew, and had a ministry to the Jews. (Galations 4:4)

Of course, Paul thoughtfully refrains from telling us where and to whom Jesus was born, something he must have known had he actually met anyone who knew a historical Jesus.

And, as Doherty points out, his language is curious in this passage, using the verb for "arise from" rather than "born." In any case this could well be based on Paul's understanding of Isaiah 7:14.

-Jesus was referred to as "Son of God". (1 Cor. 1:9)

True of both spiritual and non-spiritual Jesus, so no proof of anything there.

-Jesus was a direct descendent of King David. (Romans 1:3)

Doherty says: The statement in Romans 1 is clearly offered as part of God’s “gospel of the Son found in the prophets,” not as a piece of historical information or tradition. The fact that the Messiah (Christ) would be ‘of David’s stock’ was stated several times in scripture, and this would appear to be the source of Paul’s statement and his attribution of this feature to Jesus. The phrase kata sarka can be (and is by a few scholars) translated as “in the sphere of the flesh.” In the Platonically-viewed universe of ascending spirit levels extending above the level of matter, this would include the lowest celestial sphere above the earth where the demon spirits were believed to reside and operate. They were the “rulers of this age” whom Paul—as Wells acknowledges (p.17)—identifies as the crucifiers of Jesus in 1 Corinthians 2:8. Thus the reference in Romans 1:3 does not have to be seen as implying a material substance for Christ or a career on earth.

Of course, Paul thoughtfully refrains from telling us where and to whom Jesus was born, something he must have known had he actually met anyone who knew a historical Jesus.

-Jesus prayed to God using the term "abba". (Galations 4:6)

• And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!"

Wow. I mean, this is just desperate. Paul knows the Aramaic for "father" which Jesus is likely to have spoken, being from Palestine. This is proof that Paul knows some Aramaic.

-Jesus expressly forbid divorce. (1 Cor. 7:10)

Not true. He allowed divorce in certain situations. So can't be a historical teaching of Jesus, so not evidence of knowledge of Jesus. This is what Turkel would call a Golden Duh.

-Jesus taught that "preachers" should be paid for their preaching. (1 Cor. 9:14)

Mt 10:8,10 and Luke 10:7 clearly indicate that Jesus intended preachers to make only a bare living, and SHOULD NOT be paid for their preaching. Paul in any case sometimes did not act as though he believed that preachers should be paid for their preaching. I believe in Corinth he made a living as a tentmaker and preached the gospel for nothing. I don't know whether this qualifies as a historical clue or not. It means that Paul knows a saying attributed to Jesus, assuming there is some connection.

-Jesus taught about the end-time. (1 Thess. 4:15)

• For this we declare to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, shall not precede those who have fallen asleep.

-Paul refers to Peter by the name Cephas (rock), which was the name Jesus gave to him. (1 Cor. 3:22) -Jesus had a brother named James. (Galations 1:19)

The two above are more complicated. If he really knows Jesus' leading disciple and Jesus' brother, why doesn't he know Jesus mother and other family, and no details of Jesus' life? The obvious conclusion is that whoever he knew under these names were not family and friends of a historical personage.

-Jesus initiated the Lord's supper and referred to the bread and the cup. (1 Cor. 11:23-25)

• For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread…

If Paul got this from a vision, then he didn't get it from any historical knowledge…..

-Jesus was betrayed on the night of the Lord's Supper. (1 Cor. 11:23-25)

depending on whether you translate "delivered up" as "betrayal" In Rom 8:32 god delivers his son up.

-Jesus' death was related to the Passover Celebration. (1 Cor. 5:7)

• Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed.

Hmmm…I don't see anything about the time of Jesus' death here. All he says is that Jesus is the paschal lamb, a clear example of a metaphor. A perfect time to mention crucifixion at passover under Pilate or in some historical year, but doesn't. If Paul knows Jesus' bosom pals, why no mention of the nearness of Jesus' death?

-The death of Jesus was at the hands of earthly rulers. (1 Cor. 2:8)

Now understood not to refer to temporal rulers; in any case, Jesus was not killed by the "rulers of the age" but by a particular Roman governor. If Paul knew that, why did he not say it? Obviously, Paul did not know it.

-Jesus underwent abuse and humiliation. (Romans 15:3)

• For Christ did not please himself; but, as it is written, "The reproaches of those who reproached thee fell on me."

This passage contains nothing about abuse and humiliation in any historical context. So cannot be used to justify Paul's historical knowledge. Indeed, it is so incredibly vague it could mean anything.

-Jewish authorities were involved with Jesus' death. (1 Thess. 2:14-16)

• 14 For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus which are in Judea; for you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews,
  15 who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out, and displease God and oppose all men
  16 by hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles that they may be saved--so as always to fill up the measure of their sins. But God's wrath has come upon them at last!

No mention of jewish authorities here. Jesus was not killed by jews, but by romans. Paul obviously does not know who killed jesus, so does not know of any historical jesus. Unless the NT gospels got it wrong…..that would be a shock. In any case this is widely seen as a later interpolation, because it appears to have a vague allusion to the destruction of the Jerusalem.

-Jesus died by crucifixion. (2 Cor. 13:4 et al)

When? Where? By who? It's obvious that Paul knew of no historical crucifixion, or he would have referred to it. Does he ever mention Jerusalem in conjunction with the Crucifixion?

-Jesus was physically buried. (1 Cor. 15:4)

1 Cor 15:4 actually says:

• that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures,

But there are no scriptures saying Jesus would rise on the 3rd day, so Paul cannot be referring to them (and he was not raised on the third day, but the second). Since all bodies were buried one way or another, there is nothing especially interesting in concluding that Jesus was buried after he died. Although technically speaking he was buried in the earth, but placed in an above-ground tomb. Indeed, one could argue that since Paul did not mention the tomb, he could not have known of the burial stories of Jesus. And thus, did not know the "real" Jesus. Being raised was something he knew about his messiah. Sort of odd that he doesn't put this in any time context either.

Further, in preceding verse Paul also says that Jesus' death forgave sins in accordance with the scriptures. Curiousity: what part of the OT is that in?

Paul never mentions Pilate, Mary, Golgotha, Nazareth, any of Jesus' miracles (except in the vague signs and wonders) or any other details of his legend. It is obvious that Paul doesn't know them.

Further, let's assume a couple of these things are correct. It is essentially meaningless. If I tell you I have been to the Taj Mahal, and that it is white, and is a temple, and is flanked by two giant castles and fronted by a huge onyx gate, and sits by a river, is located in hills outside of Delhi, and was built by Hindus, you'll wonder whether I've ever seen it, even if I get a couple of things right, because of the many errors and omissions in my discourse.

Similarly errors in Paul's conception of what Jesus said, as well as gaping holes in his knowledge -- strange for someone who met his alleged brother and disciples -- lead to the conclusion that Paul does not know any historical Jesus. Frankly I think he's making up a lot of it as he goes along, he's standing at the head of a long tradition of lyin' for the lord, after all.

Michael

Toto

Nomad: you have made a blustery and rather disorganized response. I will try to make some sense out of it.

1. Theide has made some very technical arguments about dating a few scraps of papyrus that have not convinced most of the qualified experts who have looked at his work. When it suits you, Nomad, you are happy to rely on expert consensus.

But I am not sure what your position actually is on this question. You say, "I admitted that I am not convinced, but think that the claims made by Theide are worth investigating", and in the next sentence, "I was not the one that was convinced by Theide's arguments". So what is it? Since you do not claim to be an expert papyrologist, how have you decided which experts to listen to, other than their results?

2. How do you deal with the question of all of the contents of Cave 7 being in Greek, and two other fragments identified with the second century located there? Was Theide's identifying them as 1 Tim and 2 Peter in error? If so, why rely on his identification of the presumed part of Mark? How sure are you that Cave 7 could not have been entered at a later time (not just occupied?)

3. The question of whether the fragment is ur-Mark or some earlier narrative incorporated into Mark: it is disingenuous of you to claim that you had already made that argument. Your argument is that Mark can be dated early enough that it can be accepted as eyewitness testimony. Ellegard's argument is that passages in Mark may have been incorporated from earlier documents, but we have no reason to believe that these were eyewitness testimony, or even that they were about someone named Jesus.

I don't want to rehash the arguments in your 7Q5 thread, which is why I referenced it (I should have made the link more explicit, I see.) I thought that everything you proposed there was thoroughly refuted.

Nomad:

You may read it that way if you choose. I do not have a database of your prior arguments and have not read everything your wrote. The world does not revolve around you. You could at least link to your prior arguments.

On Paul's view of the human characteristics of Jesus: Layman constructed a lawyer's brief for the idea that Paul assumed Jesus was a person (not a spirit). It was an obvious strain. My impression is that Paul used just enough vague language to leave the issue in doubt. Certainly Paul never mentioned the human details you find in the Gospels - the names of his parents, details from his childhood, the name of the Roman official who condemned him to death, his sayings, his travels, etc. Ellegard's decision to assume that "Jesus" lived in the remote past is one way of resolving the issue.

From the Amazon review of Akenson's Saint Saul: A Skeleton Key to the Historical Jesus: "Akenson's readings of Paul/Saul discern a faint vision of Yeshua, the follower of Yahweh, before he was made into Jesus and deemed a copartner with God" emphasis added.

From other parts of the review, I read that Akensen spends most of his book slamming the Jesus seminar, that he believes that Paul did not believe in a physical resurrection, that Paul refused to talk about a virgin birth because every pagan cult had a virgin birth and he didn't want to confuse Jesus with the pagans. Are you sure you want to rely on this book? I have added it to my Amazon book list.

More later on my next work break.

Nomad

Are you being serious here Toto? I will assume you misread what I wrote, even as you typed it again.

I am not convinced by Theide's argument, but believe that his arguments, and 7Q5 are worth more investigation. At the same time, some people are convinced by his arguments, and they happen to be papyrologists. What is unclear about this?

As I have said previously, Theide's arguments are not conclusive. I have consulted with, and read a wide range of material from a number of sources, and was especially astonished by the very weak arguments made against Theide by Stanton and others. I also showed why these arguments were especially bad.

All of that said, I rarely go against such an overwhelming consensus as exists currently on 7Q5. What I hope, is that as more evidence appears, especially from the find at Herculaneum, a more reliable and conclusive decision can be made about 7Q5. I said all of this in my posts from the original thread. You claim to have read it, yet seem unaware of my opinions. Perhaps you should read them with more care.

Since Greek was the dominant language of the region at least since Alexander the Great in the latter part of the 4th Century, this is not much of a surprise. Quite frankly, I do not see it as especially important in the identification of 7Q5, either for or against Theide's theories.

Yes. Check my quote again. It comes from Enoch, not the New Testament.

It is a fallacy to say that because a person is wrong about A, that they are also wrong about B.

I am positive. NONE of the fragments found in ANY of the caves have been dated to later than 68AD. Cave 7 is no different in this regard.

See again my argument from my post of January 4 where I replied to BobK on this exact question in some detail.

Now, what evidence do you have to refute this (as Ellegard is the one speculating on the matter, it is his obligation to offer some supporting evidence. The ability to speculate is not the same as the ability to make an argument)?

What have you been reading Toto? Before you make accusations that I am lying, it would be beneficial if you first read my posts.

From 7Q5 and Redating the Gospel of Mark (my response to John the Atheist of January 5):

Wallace was not necessarily convinced by this argument (as he said in his own response in JBL) "since Thiede hasn't shown parallels in a literary hand of a common morpheme such as a preposition. That's the real rub." (quoting his email to me).

At the same time, he does not dismiss Thiede's theory on the "T" replacing the "D", especially if the document is a part of UrMark. "As for whether this would be a Ur-Mark, I (Wallace) would think that that would be more likely than the actual Gospel, simply because the outside date is normally considered to be c. 50 CE"

Personally, I happen to agree with Wallace on this one, ESPECIALLY if 7Q5 is placed closer to AD50 than AD68.

From my response to faded_glory of the same date:

Actually, the evidence for UrMark (a basic outline of the travels and teachings of Jesus during His ministry), even without any physical fragments is pretty compelling, and could be coupled with the so called "Q" Gospel (a sayings Gospel) and Passion Narrative (basically the events of the Last Supper, through the prayer at Gethsemane, Jesus' arrest, trial, and crucifixion as found in the Synoptic Gospels) as the common thread that helps to link together the Synoptics.

From my reply to John the Atheist again on January 6:

I haven't had a chance to write to Wallace since the 4th when last he replied to me, but I am willing to accept that the fragment could very well come from other documents. Right now, I am most interested in whether or not it COULD come from Mark, or UrMark, and thus far Wallace has not ruled that possibility out.

Throughout the thread you will see time and again that I have drawn no final conclusions on the question, but enthusiastically support further research by qualified scientists on the identity of 7Q5.

Lots of things may, or may not, be true. The question, is what has the best evidentiary support and plausibility, as well as possibility. What offers the best explaination for history as we know it? Ellegards speculations do not even come close, so the consensus view continues to prevail.

Yes, well you think that anything I have to say is thoroughly refuted even before I post it, so this is hardly a surprise. For those with an open mind, my hope is that my ideas will at least cause them to think, and to research for themselves those things that interest them.

I did. I also know for a fact that you have seen my arguments for dating the Gospels to the first century. I admit that you have consistently refused to engage in those debates, and have catagorically rejected all of my arguments, but I cannot help you there.

Until someone offers a good reason why Paul would have had to mention any of these details, this is not even an argument. One might as well say that Paul included them in his now lost epistles. There is a reason arguments from silence do not carry much weight, and in this case, it is merely hypersceticism that leads one to conclude that Paul NEVER talked about the historical Jesus.

Like I said, take a look at Akenson's book. He was an atheist when he wrote it, and still is, so far as I know, so you need not worry about it trying to convince you that Jesus is God.

Yes it is, but it is a very bad argument, largely because the Gospels do happen to tell us so much about the historical Jesus. You might as well say that since Josephus never mentions Hanibal, then Hanibal never existed.

Yes. I think it is something you can read and not reject out of the gate. Please read it, and if you wish, we can talk about his ideas. I think you will learn a great deal from it.

Nomad