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Originally Posted by jakejonesiv
The oldest extant manuscript of the "Testimonium Flavianum" contained in "Antiquities of the Jews (18.3.3)" of Josephus, is the Codex Ambrosianus F 128 Superior, eleventh century. The earliest MS. of the "Demonstratio" is the Codex known as the Medicean or "Parisinus
469," of the twelfth century, registered in the Catalogue of the Library of Paris, vol. ii. p. 65.
Reference: Josephus: the Main Manuscripts of "Antiquities", Roger Pearse. |
Just in case anyone regards these as 'late' -- these are normal sort of dates for the earliest manuscript (9th or 12th) of most texts from antiquity.
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There is no mention of the TF in the corresponding section of Wars with the Jews Book 2.
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A family of manuscripts of the
Jewish War does exist which contains the TF. Undoubtedly it was copied into the margin of some copy (people write all sorts of things in these) and then mistaken by a subsequent scribe for a part of the text forgotten by the copyist and placed in the margin (as happened all the time), and so transmitted that way.
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This means the earliest known mention is actually from Eusebius in "Ecclesiastical History (1.11)", "Demonstratio Evangelica (3.5)", and "Theophania." (The Theophania survives only in a Syric translation).
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I believe that it is unsound to argue from the date of the manuscripts in which something is preserved, tho.
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There no mention of it in the writings attributed to Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Cyprian, or Arnobius.
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Only Origen shows any familiarity with Ant. 11-20, tho, so the others may never have come across it, or had occasion to quote it.
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In the period of time between Eusebius and the earliest extant manuscripts of Josephus (11th century), we have the writings of Chrysostom and Photius that had copies of Josephus but make no mention of the Testimonium.
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There are very large numbers of people, tho, who do have copies of Josephus and do quote it. Photius does not discuss that passage of Ant.
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(Chrysostom first knows of Josephus in "Homilies on
the Gospel of St. Matthew", where the subject is the apocalyse of Matthew chapter 24.) This indicates the possibility that there were two manuscript
traditions at that time of Josephus, one that included the Testimonium Flavianum and one that did not.
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I'm afraid that the failure to mention it has to be very much stronger for this logic to work. Silence is never an argument, unless we have a quotation with it missing, you know.
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Obviously, the passage as it stands could not have been written by Josephus, who was not a Christian.
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"Obviously" is not obvious, unfortunately.
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In addition, if Josephus had written anything like this, he would have been guilty of treason against Rome.
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It seems unlikely that this is so.
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Nevertheless, it is more than a possibilty that the entire text of TF is an interpolation.
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It is a possibility, but scholarly opinion has moved in the other direction in the last century.
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Evidence that the whole TF is an interpolation was first noted in the 17th century.
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By Archbishop Ussher, if I recall correctly.
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Notice how the text without the TF moves from one calamity to the next. The passage breaks the continuity of the narrative concerning Pilate. To claim Josephus wrote any of it, one must beg that it is a digression.
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This is often said, but is unconvincing. The section that follows is likewise out of chronological sequence and plainly introduced because it is a fine story. Antiquities has rather a lot of this.
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It is Ken Olson's conclusion that "Christian scribes interpolated into our texts of Josephus. They accepted on Eusebius' authority that the Antiquities ought to contain such a text and "corrected" their texts according to the reading found in the Historia Ecclesiastica.
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It should be mentioned, tho, that Ken has been unable to convince anyone else of this.
All the best,
Roger Pearse
10-09-2006, 03:06 AM
