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I think you are reading too far between the lines. Ted cites from a book by Tom Hatina -- which is obviously true, right? -- and refers to the chapter written by Stan Porter without attributing authorship, but, as you are up to your usual tricks of insinuating people don't read their own sources, can you explain how you imagine Ted got the name of the chapter without noticing the fact that it was written by Porter?

Are you pushing for the claim that Mark's genre is ancient biography or are you merely kindly explaining your interpretation of Porter's conclusion? If the former then how do you account for the purely literary features in Mark? If the latter, what is your opinion on the issue, is Mark an ancient biography in your analysis?


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Ted Hoffman

Ben,
Note that what you have done is raise the bar of argument to nearly unrealistic levels. For example, the statement "All ancient biographies bore the name of the main character in the title," which you challenge me to standby (or drop), is a point I have already made very clearly and carefully. I wrote in one part:
I used the word most. Now you want to force me to use the word "all." This is plainly mischievous. Most murder cases have a body. But conviction for murder in the absence of a body is possible although historically, cases of that type are hard to prove.
Some of the statements are downright bizarre. For example: "All ancient biographies deal with the entire lifetime of the subject from birth to death." This statement (excluding the word "all") arises from the definition of what a biography is - and it is from Momigliano, Development of Greek Biography. It is not my creation. So the onus is yours to demonstrate that even though Mark has no birth details of Jesus, it is still a biography.

My case against Mark being an ancient biography is cumulative. The oddities against it being classified as such are many and varied. Some of the difficulties are huge, some are not.

There isn't "more" if more means a focused study effort. I am making general statements.
I am not. I am referring to a general trend. Are you denying all these things?
I think you understood fine.
I haven't investigated them. They are a general impression I have picked over time. Am I generally mistaken?

Depends on the amount of time you have in your hands, your search and retrieval skills and access to information sources and whether we have the cases you are looking for.
It also depends on what you mean by "dubious historicity". See, someone like Jesus, he is presented as a divine being, a saviour figure like Mithra. Unlike characters like Socrates.
Why not humor me and instead of asking many unhelpful questions, cite three examples of these alleged biographies.
Paul mentions Jesus. Recall the unnamed god who descended and died and was honored by being called Jesus? I don't need to repeat here that I dont regard the Pauline Christ as a flesh and blood man.
Beyond Matt and Luke, not everyone else depended on Mark. The rest acted as transmitters.
I would rather put it this way: "generally ancient biographies deal with subjects who are known from other sources apart from the biography itself" This also follows from the fact that the biographers often cited other sources as a style. Again, I am relying on scholars who have written on ancient biographies. Whether those alleged sources are authentic is another matter altogether.
I agree with that position but it cannot apply to Mark. Because when we are looking at Mark, with his reliance on the OT and miracles and implausible events like riding an untrained colt and pilgrims making a triumphal entry to Jerusalem for a stranger on a donkey, we are operating from the standpoint that everything in Mark is suspect until proven otherwise.
Would you agree with that stance?
Oops, my bad.
I don't have a list. I have given you some. I know that Ched Myers writes about them in Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark's Gospel (1988), p. 356. and so does Tolbert Mary Ann's Sowing the Gospel: Mark's World in Literary-Historical Perspective (1989), p. 272. I don't claim my list is comprehensive. I have never undertaken to study Mark. Others have and I am citing them. Is it your position that I should have a complete list before I mention the presence of doublets as an issue in Mark?
Fair enough.
What is the relevance of this? Or is it the same old, tired, overwrought, out-of-place, pedantry? Plus, the article contains what we have agreed is the "wrong kind of doublet." Because Nolan writes: "...doublet is a combination of two terms which are to all intents synonymous" (The Classical Quarterly, New Series, Vol. 28, No. 1, (1978), p. 23) - trick question for Gibson, now, did I also pull that out of my ass?
For someone who follows a discussion so pedantically, it is ironic that you missed that junction. You concentrated too much on the waves and missed the tide.

I am sorry you don't read very well. But that is your problem. Work on it.
Plus, its available online. This is daft pedantry.
Does this mean that Dr. Gibson for all his tiresome pedantry does not know how to use Google?

Ben C Smith

You are correct about the wording. But it was not mischief, at least not intentional mischief. I simply worded all of my conditions the same way, not noticing that for one of them you had explicitly said most. My apologies.

I agree, and this particular Momigliano statement has made its rounds; it is famous. It has also been critiqued in the relevant literature on the grounds that ancient biographies can be found that lack any account of the birth of the subject (Agricola, for example) beyond his general place of origin (and Mark has that much; in Agricola Tacitus simply says that Agricola originated, ortus, at Forum Julii); at least one ancient bio can even be found that lacks any account of the death of the subject (the Evagoras). You listed the Evagoras among your examples of ancient biographies; did you not notice that it does not recount how the subject died?

No, this work has already been done; it is in the scholarly literature. I am not trying to get into a debate on the genre of Mark with you. I am pointing out that you are making claims that appear to betray an ignorance of the topic at hand.

I do deny most of them. But, more than that, what I deny is that many of them even have anything to do with genre. The matter of birth to death is at least excusable on this account; I can see why someone might (mistakenly) assume that an ancient biography should run from birth to death. But what about independent attestation for the subject of the biography? Is that anything whatsoever to do with genre? What is Mark, for example, supposed to do? Is he to assume that nothing is going to survive about Jesus except his own text? Is he then to shrug his shoulders and give up on writing a biography of him? Alas, I wanted to write a biography, but since only my bare text is going to survive, I cannot. (Besides, the ancients wrote biographies about Romulus and Moses, as well as about other figures of questionable historicity.)

Yes, I think you are. And I think you are mistaken precisely because you have not investigated them. If I made sweeping statements about a topic that I had investigated, even to the point of characterizing those statements as my (cumulative) case, doubtless I would be mistaken, too, and hopefully you would call me on my statements, as I am calling you on yours.

Actually, none of those categories is all that hard to research; indeed, I had already done the following research before even asking, most of it before we even had this conversation.

I already named two figures of questionable historicity who had ancient biographies written about them (Moses and Romulus); but you asked for three such, so let me add Theseus.

An ancient biography that fails to name the author is the Demonax. (How do we know, or think we know, who wrote it? Lines of evidence other than finding the name of the author in the text, same as with Mark.)

As an example of an ancient biography that deals with a subject known only from the biography itself I would have supplied the Demonax, again, but you yourself listed the Demonax as one of the biographies written about a person who was influential and independently attested:

Do you know something about the attestation for Demonax that I do not? As far as I can tell there are no references to Demonax independent of Lucian.

It may be the case that all ancient biographies bear the name of their subjects in the title. I am not aware offhand of any that do not (unless you count the compendia of biographical sketches such as Lives of the Prophets or Lives of the Philosophers, but those titles are not the same phenomenon as we have with Mark). However, we either do not have the original title of Mark (gospel according to Mark has been shown to be early but secondary) or we have it in Mark 1.1 (gospel of Jesus Christ), which does indeed name the subject. (This whole issue is thornier than I can go into here, of course. But these are the most relevant details.)

Read C. Talbert (What Is A Gospel?) on this score.

Ben.

Ted Hoffman

Ben,
I think we need to be clear on a few issues because I can see you are classifying legends and myths as ancient biographies. I understand a biography as an attempt to tell the story of a person's life and experiences. I also appreciate that ancient biographies permitted writers to treat famous people in a way that was similar to legend.

Myths on the other hand include folklore, fables, and animal tales like that of Romulus and Remus and are often symbolic stories of extraordinary events that take place outside of the everyday world (like Prometheus stealing fire from the gods to give to humankind) even though they can be placed on earth. Legends are traditional stories people or places and usually have fantastic or supernatural details.
I don't agree that the story of Romulus and Remus is an ancient biography. If it is an ancient biography, then this is mucky indeed. If you and like-minded scholars insist it is, then please tell us what is a legend and what is a myth.
And Demonax was written by Lucian who identifies himself clearly in the text; we don't know who wrote Mark. And Demonax is better compared to Diogenes and Socrates as compared to Jesus but you know that already.

Of course I haven't read a lot on Demonax, Agesilaus and other ancient biographies. But I have read what I have read and I think I can hold my own in this discussion. The myth of Romulus and Remus is up there with the myth of Oedipus, Theseus, Perseus, Zeus, Asclepius, Pelops and Jason. I am following the works of Alan Dundes, Otto Rank, Joseph Campbell and other folklorists, anthropologists and mythographers.

I didn't. I haven't read it. Is it also written based on a pre-existing text the way Mark uses the OT? It also has a savior figure who was regarded as the son of God?
There is such a thing as a biographical focus Ben. You are trying to employ a strict standard here that is not very balanced. Whereas in general, bios recount the life of an individual from birth to death, a text can be written on someone's life that only focuses solely on that persons life to make it a biography. Would you agree?
I haven't read Agricola. Is Agricola also written based on a pre-existing text the way Mark uses the OT? It also has a savior figure who was regarded as the son of God?
I readily agree that I have gaps of knowledge on the subject. However, so far, you have not dealt decisively with my arguments against Mark being an ancient biography. What you have done is try to erect a strict standard as a form of strawman against my cumulative argument. As you can see yourself, if we were to use your "all" standard, we would have to knock several of the ancient biographies from the list. Why don't we try something more, um, congenial?
He can cite a conversation with a certain contemporary King, general or high priest as a witness to what he is claiming. Unless everybody was dead by the time he was writing? No wonder we have dating issues!
Those are legends and myths Ben. Recall that the mother of the two boys who were raised by a she-wolf was the virgin priestess Rhea Silvia, who was impregnated, some say, by Mars, the god of war. Biography Ben? Is that how far we have come?
Instead of expending time and energy discussing how ignorant I am, let me make it simple. There is a very easy way of showing I am mistaken.

Cite a couple of texts (or cite even one) that is/are grouped under the genre biographies
by scholars. These texts should be:
a) Composed based on an earlier religious text (the way Mark Uses the OT) - i.e. contain some degree of hypertextuality that betrays that some scenes contained therein are not original.
b) Should be about a savior figure (a deity) who died and resurrected and generally did miraculous feats like raising the dead, healing the sick and multiplying food.
c) Authored anonymously and dated imprecisely.
d) Have a protagonist whose historical existence is not multiply attested.

You do this and I drop the argument. I have no qualms about admitting error.

Ben C Smith

Are you referring to Plutarch, Life of Romulus and Life of Theseus, and to Philo, Life of Moses? Are you denying for some reason that those are βιοι?

It is not the story of Romulus and Remus that is an ancient biography. It is the Life of Romulus that is an ancient biography. You know, the Life of Romulus written by Plutarch, the same Plutarch who wrote the Life of Alexander and the Life of Cicero and the Lives of 40+ other ancient figures. (You are writing almost as if you did not possess even a passing knowledge of the titles of the biographies written by the most prolific ancient biographer of all.)

The Demonax is available online. Please point out for me exactly where the author identifies himself as Lucian in the text.

Not to my knowledge, but other ancient biographies contain passages that are. (In other discussions of gospel genre on this board I have mentioned in this connection the death scene in the Life of Cato being based on the death of Socrates.)

No, not Evagoras, but other ancient biographies do. (Again, read Talbert.)

Ben.

Ted Hoffman

Ben Wrote:
He [Ben] was actually referring to Plutarch's Life of Romulus and Philo's Life of Moses above, not the story of Romulus (which starts from birth to death of Romulus) and NOT the story of Moses (which starts from birth to death of Moses).
For thinking that he was talking about the latter [which differ significantly], he now tells me:
Okey dokey. My bad. Isn't De Vita Mosis more of Philo's interpretation of Biblical text presented in biographical form? Isn't it merely an aretalogy meant to appeal to skeptical Hellenistic readers? And isn't the Romulus story just a legend even when penned by Plutarch? Is everything written in form of a biography ipso facto a biography? The fact that a writing has biographical elements cannot (I follow R.A. Burridge here) itself make it a biography (or does it?). We cant pretend that we don't know that De vita Mosis was Philo's attempt to reconcile Judaism and Hellenism.

Tell me Ben, how do you, and like-minded scholars define a Biography? I have presented my definition, which you dispute. What is yours?
By saying that he had written of Sostratus elsewhere (not extant anymore), he was identifying himself. At any rate, that was my reasoning. How do we know he wrote Demonax?

Is my falsification requirement too steep? Or is it perhaps too uneducated?
I will read Talbert as soon as I can. I have no copy and its not in my Library.

Ben C Smith

Are you willing to apply this reasoning elsewhere? If the author of Demonax is identifying himself as Lucian by mentioning his work on Sostratus (no longer extant), is the author of Acts identifying himself as Luke by mentioning his previous volume (still extant)?

Good question.

How do we know Mark wrote the Gospel of Jesus Christ? He does not name himself in the title or in the text. How do we know Lucian wrote Demonax? He does not name himself in the title or in the text. Are we not forced to use indirect evidence in both cases? Do you see my point, especially as it relates to your claim that ancient biographers identified themselves in their texts?

Ben.

Ted Hoffman

Ben,
Mark is just a name given to the author of Mark. There are no internal Markers to identify the author as Mark. The author of Acts cannot be identified with certainty but many are agreeable that its the same author who penned Luke because in Luke 1:1-4 the author is making a presentation to Theophilus and in Acts 1:1-3, the presentation (presumably) continues.

Can you please respond to my questions now? Or do you feel you have adequately debunked my argument that Mark is NOT an ancient biography?

Ben C Smith

Not exactly true. It is a name derived from external evidence (the fathers) and from the manuscript titles; it is not arbitrary (just a name).

It is true that there is nothing in the text to identify the name of the author, and that we would have no inkling of the name of Mark without external evidence and the manuscript titles. Is this not true of Demonax, too?

Yes, but does that mean we can identify this author as Luke? Does the reference to Sostratus in Demonax, which you used as your authorial identification, mean that we can identify that author as Lucian?

One thing at a time! I have not even claimed that all of your claims are unfounded (in fact I even provisionally agreed with one of them, remember?). But it has been a struggle so far just getting you to drop even the most superfluous of your claims (such as authorial self identification, which is a no brainer, or at least should have been as soon as I mentioned Demonax; and there are plenty of others that do not name their authors, as well, which I can produce for you if you persist in this claim).

Do you drop your claim that Mark cannot be a biography because the name of the author does not appear in the text or title? Please let me know so that we can move on to the next claim(s).

Ben.

Ben C Smith

Was the following paragraph a part of your post from the start? I feel quite certain that everything after my bad was not in the post that I was responding to. I think I would have noticed a reference to Burridge:

Nor can we pretend that you did not get these ideas from an online review of a book by Loius H. Feldman:

Philo's Portrayal of Moses in the Context of Ancient Judaism presents the most comprehensive study of Philo's De Vita Mosis that exists in any language. Feldman, well known for his work on Josephus and ancient Judaism, here paves new ground using rabbinic material with philological precision to illuminate important parallels and differences between Philo's writing on Moses and rabbinic literature.

One way in which Hellenistic culture marginalized Judaism was by exposing the apparent defects in Moses' life and character. Philo's De vita Mosis is a counterattack to these charges and is a vital piece of his attempt to reconcile Judaism and Hellenism. Feldman rigorously examines the text and shows how Philo presents an aretalogy similar to that of a mythical divine and heroic figure, by glorifying the birth, education, and virtues of Moses. Feldman demonstrates that Philo is careful to explain in a scientific way those portions of the Bible, particularly miracles, that appear incredible to his skeptical Hellenistic readers. Through Feldman's careful analysis, Moses emerges as unique among ancient lawgivers.

Philo's Portrayal of Moses in the Context of Ancient Judaism mirrors the organization of Philo's biography of Moses, which is in two books, the first, in the style of Plutarch, proceeding chronologically, and the second, in the style of Suetonius, arranged topically. Feldman's book discusses the life of Moses chronologically and in the third chapter examines his virtues topically. Feldman compares the particular features of Philo's portrait of Moses with the way in which Moses is viewed both by Jewish sources in antiquity (including Pseudo-Philo; Josephus; Graeco-Jewish historians, poets, and philosophers; and in the Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha, Samaritan tradition, Dead Sea Scrolls, and rabbinic tradition) and by non-Jewish sources, notably the Greek and Roman writers who mention him.

Louis H. Feldman is the Abraham Wouk Family Professor of Classics and Literature, Yeshiva University. He is the author and editor of over sixteen books, including Josephus's Interpretation of the Bible and most recently Judaism and Hellenism Reconsidered.

Ben.