spin

All the ones you've touted here. (See archives.)


spin

Malachi151

I took some advice and went to the archives. I'd like to comment on this thread:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...33#post3017033

etc., etc.

This is the basis of the the "Aramaic supremacy" argument, i.e. "Jesus and his followers couldn't speak Greek, so doesn't it make more sense that the eye witness accounts of his existence were written in the language of Jesus and his community?"

Of course, if one realizes that the gospels weren't written by people living in and around Judea any time near when Jesus supposedly lived, but rather that they are fictional accounts written by diaspora Jews from places like Alexandria, Athens, and Rome, then this isn't such an issue....

Malachi151

This doesn't do much for me. This is, also, an Aramaic translation of something NOT WRITTEN IN ARAMAIC ORIGINALLY! lol.

The issue is, if Mark were originally written in Aramaic (which would have the be the case here, and which no one from the early history has ever said or gave any reason to believe) then why would that author write originally, in several places, something in Aramaic and then give a translation into a different dialect of Aramaic?

This just does not seem like any reasonable way to write the story originally, you write it in one dialect of Aramaic for an Aramaic audience of a different dialect, and then you give translations? Can you see how tried that is?

That's like saying that I wrote a story in "Australian English", about an American person, and then when I quote that person I have him speak American English, and then I provide a translation to Australian English.

I mean, get real.

And furthermore, why wouldn't this person have simply written the entire gospel in same dialect that Jesus supposedly spoke in the first place, thus eliminating the need for translation between dialects?

To add to this, we have the fact that Mark and Matthew BOTH clearly quote and reference from the Septuagint, because they also quote and reference the mistranslations in the Septuagint.

So, here is what you have to overcome:

1) All of the early fathers say that Mark, Luke, and John were written in Greek, and they say that Matthew was supposedly written in Aramaic, but they all really only know of Greek versions, and their claim that Matthew was in Aramaic is for the same reason that modern Christians claim, to make it closer to being "believable".

2) All of the earliest fragments of the gospels are in Greek.

3) The Matthew and Luke both copy word for word from Mark or a common source with Mark, meaning that they all had to have been written in the same language, meaning that you need to prove that they were all three written in Aramaic, not just any one of them.

4) Mark and Matthew both have Jesus say things in Aramaic, and then say "which means" and translation into the same wording that is used by the rest of the gospel, and in some cases the Greek "translations" are word for word copies from the Septuagint.

So, what again is the evidence that they were written in Aramaic? Its "the language Jesus spoke" so it must be?

spin

Yep, so's this:

The two versions in the Peshitta read:
The only difference is the transparent means of referring to god. This fudging that one is a translation of the other is ridiculous. The only meaningful explanation for these two extremely similar forms is that they were derived from the Greek source, the second form being a translation from the Greek.

It's interesting that the one "kept" by Mk is basically the same as the translation given in the Peshitta, not the original as preserved in the Peshitta, which one would expect if Mk was translated from the Peshitta.

Even more fun is the Mt version which is obviously derivable from the Mk version (the only difference being the Hebrew version of Ps 22:1), but the Peshitta of Mt 27:46 merely gives )YL )YL LMN) $BQTNY, the original found in Mk 15:34, yet without a so-called translation. A Mt derived from Mk fits into all the linguistic evidence from a comparison between the two Greek gospels. A Mt derived from the Peshitta is much more difficult to argue for.

The parsimonious approach says Greek Mk is the source of Greek Mt. The historical approach says as the earliest documents are in Greek they have a better prospect of being the primary language for the texts.


spin

Roger Pearse

This may mislead some people. Here's what I know: others may know more about Syriac versions of the bible than I do.

There are no "Aramaic speaking church fathers" who have left works in that language. The Peshitta is in Syriac.

But Syriac is the Aramaic dialect of Edessa, of course, a literary language from the 2nd-13th centuries, and in a minor way later than that. (The decline follows the Arab invasions in the 7th century).

The Syriac fathers are all rather later than the Greek fathers. Indeed the remains of Syriac prior to the 4th century -- the age of Ephraim Syrus and Aphrahat -- are limited. I'm afraid that I don't know much about biblical quotations in that period. The peshitta Old Testament is a second century production, possibly some of it of Jewish origin, if I understand correctly?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Yuri Kuchinsky

Well, you're wrong, Malachi.

For example, Eusebius gives us the following testimony,

Church Fathers' Witnesses on the original language of the Gospel according to Matthew
http://www.angelfire.com/id/nasrani/pb/HebMatthew.html

[quote]

And he (Hegesippus) wrote of many other matters, which we have in part already mentioned, introducing the accounts in their appropriate places. And from the Syriac Gospel according to the Hebrews he quotes some passages in the Hebrew tongue, showing that he was a convert from the Hebrews, and he mentions other matters as taken from the unwritten tradition of the Jews. (Historia Ecclesia, Book IV, Chapter 22)

[unquote]

And so, Eusebius is talking here about some specific "passages in the Hebrew tongue". This is clearly a lot more than second-hand testimony.

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky

Dear Malachi,

You clearly know very little about the ancient Semitic gospel manuscripts. Because they don't quote and reference from the Septuagint. Rather, they quote Semitic versions of the Tanakh.

Again, this is not the case with the Old Syriac Aramaic gospels, for example. Being in Aramaic, they don't have to translate the Aramaic words of Jesus, and they don't.

So what you're doing is using the Greek text to criticise the Aramaic text as inadequate. Rather, you should read the Aramaic text first, and then criticise it.

Regards,

Yuri.

Malachi151

[QUOTE=Yuri Kuchinsky;3882819]Well, you're wrong, Malachi.

For example, Eusebius gives us the following testimony,

Church Fathers' Witnesses on the original language of the Gospel according to Matthew
http://www.angelfire.com/id/nasrani/pb/HebMatthew.html

That's one I haven't seen before, but as I said, there is no problem with there having been an Aramaic or Hebrew translation of Matthew from the original Greek, and I wouldn't be surprised if some people saw an Aramaic version and thought it was an original.

Ultimately, however, this is again a friend of a friend tale, written by a 4th century church historian....

Malachi151

So says the person who claims that they were written in Aramaic The problem is that mistranslations in the Septuagint are reflected in the gospels, most notably in the virgin birth story of Matthew.

Well, that's not going to happen. I was addressing the Aramaic text that was presented here.

The exact same device is used in both Mark and Matthew, so you have to argue that Mark was written in Aramaic first, and Matthew was copied from Mark in Aramaic (presumably), and then both were translated into Greek, and both translations were basically the exact same, since the Greek version of Mark and Matthew still essentially mirror one another, and that both translators decided to use the "Aramaic" - which means "Greek" device in all the exact same places. (Perhaps they were both translated by the same person in parallel?), and that furthermore, no one ever had any knowledge of the original Aramaic Mark....

Err....

judge

Syriac is a form of Aramaic