Iskander

Ah! My education and so soon in this exchange!

Yes, I do understand the vacuous ramblings you so often indulge in this forum.

Kapyong

Gday,

Not so..

The COuncil of Nicea had NOTHING to do with choosing the books of the bible - they did not even discuss it.

But this urban legend is endlessly repeated on the 'net.
It never dies...


K.

spin

This is strange. My approach is to be as naively literal as I can and avoid all interpretations (but the one I find myself formulating from the text).

And I would be howling about testing any hypothesis based on so many unknown and/or uncontrollable variables.

That sounds like a dose of shit hitting the fan.

Are you a fan of Goscinny and Uderzo?

spin

It's very hard to judge tone on the internet. Levity just doesn't work in some instances. Simple insults, however, are pretty quick communicators.

avi

And, you may be correct, Kapyong, however, I seem to recall an appendix that I once saw in Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History, if I am not badly mistaken, listing the books suggested by Eusebius as worthy of inclusion in a Canon, for discussion by the participants at Nicea.

This would have been about three or four decades before Athanasius, who also attended Nicea, as I recall....

Nevertheless, this comment of Dr.Zoidberg is, at least to my way of thinking, irrelevant to the OP, which asks about the interpretation of text from a letter attributed to Paul, not the substance of the Canon.....Irrespective of the composition of the Canon, the four gospels, according to me, and not many others!!!, were known to Paul irrespective of whether or not he knew of other members of what evolved into the Canon. The OP references the gospels, not the Canon.

Thanks, Vivisector, your comment is both salient, and much appreciated.

How do you know when these documents were written? I claim that, neither you, nor anyone else, knows these dates. You have no evidence, according to me, of the date of authorship of any of the texts of the new testament. Conjecture and superstitious thinking, are not, in my opinion, useful in attempting to explore the evolution of Christianity.

When did Paul write his epistles? We don't know. I am suggesting, i.e. the purpose of this thread, that Paul, in fact, knew of the gospels, and therefore, his epistles were written late in the second century, AFTER the creation of the four gospels, which may, or may not, themselves, have evolved from either Diatessaron, or Memoirs of the Apostles, both of which existed in the middle to latter portion of the second century.

Since we do not know the dates, I am ignoring issues related to ostensible date of composition. Addressing my question does not require, in my opinion, any knowledge of any date of composition-->fortunate, since we know none.

Well, to repeat myself, that provision of "dating errors", prevents useful discussion. We cannot invoke "dating errors", when we have no idea about the method of establishing the date, in the first place. There exist no documents, or other objects, to signal existence of the gospels, prior to the Latin version of Irenaeus, a copy of a copy of a copy of a translation......

Making progress, here, in my estimation. I consider this a very helpful statement. Thanks.

I think it would be helpful, if you seek to discount the notion that "Cephas" and "the 12" appear in such close proximity to "according to the scriptures", to illustrate in some other passage of Paul's epistles, where he writes
xyz, and abc, and abc has nothing to do with xyz.

In other words, I doubt the validity of your conclusion. I simply don't know enough Greek, or Greek literature, to be able to accept or reject your assessment of the text.

If I have understood your idea, you wish to suggest that ancient writer Paul, was inclined to communicate obscurely (perhaps in code!), and that therefore, this business of "the twelve" and "Cephas", appearing in the text immediately following "according to the scriptures", has absolutely no connection, one with the other.

If I have understood you, then you are indicting Paul, for poor writing skills, is that correct? Are you suggesting then, that the recipient Corinthians, were so clever, that they understood that Paul meant the old testament when he wrote the words "according to the scriptures", but also understood that Paul was referring to mere oral tradition, not written gospel, when he referenced, IN THE SAME SENTENCE, "Cephas" and "the twelve".

May I ask, why, then, does Paul write "according to the scriptures" TWICE in these six verses? If he is simply attempting to draw attention to the previously written Jewish texts, why signal their prominence twice? Doesn't it make more sense, in the context of a NON-Jewish congregation in Corinth, reading or listening, as Paul's letter is being read to them, to think of a single entity, the gospels, as offering to these Corinthians an explanation of:
a. Jesus divinity;
b. Jesus' sacrifice;
c. Jesus' offer of life everlasting to those with faith;
d. affirmation of the historical validity of this wonderful "good news", by means of reference to "Cephas" and "the twelve"?

How could any writer, including Paul, convey those elements so succinctly, by introducing documents from the old testament, which, at best, offer vague prophecy regarding a forthcoming messiah, not a Jesus figure who was murdered by the Romans, as a sacrifice so that the heathen could attain everlasting life in paradise, without an obligation to obey the Jewish laws.

Another gem. Well written, Yes, I agree with you, that it will be very difficult for me to convince anyone of anything, especially concerning analysis of something as extraordinarily difficult as Greek literature.

I am obviously ill-suited to perform such an analysis, but I take your point to mean, contrarily that no one is properly able to perform such a study.

I don't have the answer to that question. A person would need, I would think, to have an intimate acquaintance with both Greek and the gospels and Paul's letters. About all I can do, in that setting, is raise the question, and observe the response.

Thanks again for your reply....

avi

Vivisector

Hey again, Avi,

Quickly ...

As regards the Greek, I'm not sure that will help us much - the Greek-into-English here is about as literal as one can hope for in the Christian canon.

Also, far be it from me to pass judgment on the writing skills of Paul. I feel quite confident that nothing I write will survive as long as his writings have survived.

I would suggest that Paul is relaying something in somewhat of a formula.

*1. Jesus died for our sins.
2. He was buried.
*3. He rose again.
4. He appeared to Peter.
5. He appeared to the 12.
6. He appeared tomore than 500.
7. He appeared to James.
8. He appeared to Paul.

There is obviously a chronological order here (though logic and absence of qualifiers such as "last" do not prohibit argument on the order of 4-7). I'm also suggesting, that to Paul's thinking, two of these items (1 and 3) can be derived by study and creative interpretation of the HB - but only these two. I think this is why he qualified those two as "according to the scriptures," and the way he did it might turn out to have been a rather economical way of making his points. Perhaps you can, but I can't immediately think of a better way of conveying both the chronology and the key fact that some steps (though not all) of this chronology were "according to the scriptures."

Cheers,

V.

aa5874

We are NOT playing by the NUMBERS any more. We are LOOKING for the evidence of antiquity or credible sources of antiquity.

No-one can WIN an argument by just claiming the MAJORITY is on their side.

Just state the credible sources that the so-called MAJORITY used and you will be surprised that the so-called MAJORITY have NOTHING, no credible sources.


That cannot be corroborated by any historical source at all.

Have you even read the PAULINE writings?

"PAUL" even claimed he FOUND out about the BETRAYAL or FOUND out about the "LAST SUPPER" from the RESURRECTED Jesus Christ.

1Co 11:23 - You actually cannot show one single passage in HB where Jesus Christ is mentioned.

But, "PAUL" claimed he NOW preached the FAITH he destroyed so if you assume "Paul" preached BEFORE the Fall of the Temple then it was KNOWN throughout the Roman Empire that Jesus Christ was LORD, the Son of God and a Woman, was BETRAYED in the NIGHT, did SUPP with his disciples, was crucified, Shed his blood, died, was buried, ROSE the third day and was SEEN ALIVE by OVER 500 people including the disciples.

Remarkably, "PAUL" KNEW MORE about the POST-RESURRECTION witnesses than the author of the SHORT-ENDING gMark.

And even more fascinating, "Paul" claimed that his Gospel was the ONLY gospel to be preached any other would be ACCURSED.


Complete NONSENSE.

The Pauline story is RATHER simple.

Jesus was betrayed, crucified, died, resurrected and ascended to heaven and "PAUL" SAW or heard from Jesus after he was BLINDED by some kind of bright light.

"PAUL" is AFTER the Jesus story was WRITTEN and KNOWN.

There is ZERO evidence that the NT or the Pauline writings are actual history. They are ALL UNCORROBORATED stories filled with MYTHOLOGY.

"PAUL" himself wrote or it can be found in the Pauline writings that Jesus MUST perform a non-historical event to REMIT the Sins of Mankind.

The NT Canon is NOT history or NO credible historical source of antiquity can show that "PAUL" LIVED.

Well, at least you ADMIT that you are just speculating after talking about the MAJORITY.

The Pauline writings CANNOT be DATED to the 1st century since NO external credible source can account for "Paul", the Pauline Epistles, the Pauline Churches, and the Pauline Gospels.

It cannot be EXPLAINED how the authors of the Synoptics did NOT copy a single verse from the Pauline writings when the authors of gMatthew, gMark and gLuke have perhaps over a hundred verses common to each other.

It cannot be EXPLAINED how Justin Martyr who mentioned the MEMOIRS of the Apostles which is similar to the Synoptics also did NOT mention any character called "PAUL", the MOST prevalent letter writer after the ASCENSION of the supposed Jesus.

A late "PAUL" EXPLAINS everything.

"PAUL" was the LAST to "SEE" and "HEAR" Jesus and was AFTER "Peter" had ALREADY preached the FAITH.

"PAUL" was DEAD LAST.

Doug Shaver

There is evidence. You don't find it credible.

Some people have made such claims. I never have.

Doug Shaver

Thank you. Next time I say something like that, I will qualify it accordingly.

Doug Shaver

That opinion is held by essentially every scholar who has examined all of the relevant manuscript evidence. With exceptions too few, and too obviously driven by ideology, to be worth commenting on, every expert with relevant qualifications agrees that the gospels were not written until sometime after Paul's death. From that datum, it follows that he could not have known anything about them.

That argument assumes, in the first place, that no Christian could have known anything that was in those stories before the gospels were written. Such an assumption is entirely unwarranted.

No. The word "gospel" is not univocal. The term "Paul's gospel" does not have either the same sense or the same referent as "the four gospels."

What Paul got from his reading of Jewish scripture was the "good news" of Christ's salvific death and resurrection. What he got by (initially) word of mouth from other Christians was information about the leadership of the Christian community in Jerusalem.

I think Paul would be quite amused to learn, if he could, that you think he intended to persuade anybody of anything like that.