Apikorus

Steven's source says

The HAGAHOS HA'GRA explains that the source is the verse (Shmuel I 13:1) that says, "Ben Shanah Shaul b'Malcho u'Shnei Shanim Malach Al Yerushalayim" -- "Shaul was one year old when he became king (Ben Shanah Shaul b'Malcho), and for two years he ruled over Yerushalayim.

Well, that settles it. The plain sense translation of 1 Sam 13:1 is exactly as I claimed. The Vilna Gaon's interpretation is yet another attempt to rescue the text from its obvious corruption.

Anat

BTW how did Yerushalaim enter the text?

Steven Avery

And you are conceptually redacting if you try to "restore" the text. Granted, you don't even try, because you have no theory of what the text was before your supposed group of corruptions.

So in that sense you are right.
You avoid any redaction, and you avoid having a real theory of the text at the same time.

"defective" = I have no real theory of the text, however I am not happy with what it says, its a bit different than my norm.

Apikorus

You see? We can't completely avoid scribal error, even at this late stage! The MT says yisrael and not yerushalayim. Indeed, Saul never ruled over Jerusalem.

Ironically, Steven's source, in discussing a corruption in the MT, is itself corrupt.

pharoah

This is really sad. Anyone who offers or accepts this kind of apologetics can no longer be taken seriously. :wave:

Chris Weimer

Steven himself already has said in many places that he finds the Bible a priori without error. Anything he says about the Bible is automatically geared for its inerrancy.

Amaleq13

And any notion that this approach is logically flawed requires that the definition of "logic" be altered to fit that presupposition.

Steven Avery

Actually the truth is quite the reverse. I came to my positions on the identity of the NT text, and its perfection, in a process.

e.g. for a long time, even after I was a believer in Jesus as the Messiah, I thought the Johannine Comma was a spurious addition. Until I was challenged and really researched the issue. Similarly with many other aspects of my textual and apologetics position.

If a person comes to a position of a principled conviction as the result of factors that include careful research, it is simply erroneous and misleading to call that principled conviction "a priori".

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Chris Weimer

And what factors did you use to come to believe that Jesus was the Messiah? Certainly not the traditional Jewish factors.

Apikorus

For a long time, Bart Ehrman thought that the New Testament was the inspired word of God. Then he researched the issue, receiving his Ph.D. and ultimately becoming one of the leading American scholars of the New Testament. Today he identifies himself as agnostic.