spin

There has been nothing "major" about the apologetic attempts to relocate Herod's death. They seem to be based on whatever means possible be they coherent or not at bringing to question a fairly universally accepted scholarly position for purely inerrantist reasons. By deliberately ignoring the inclusive datings that were used by Josephus one can quibble on up to a year regarding his data and the doubt that that causes for people not knowledgible in what's going on may have apologetic effect, but if the quibbling is done knowingly it is dishonest, and, if not, it is misinformed.

The nativity thread has almost no content in it. Richard Carrier, being a professional in the field of history, has some idea how to construct an academic paper and I don't think apologetics provides any tools to be able to comment meaningfully in the world of scholarship.


spin

Steven Avery

All the detailed evidence we have seen (two sources gave dates and history, Carrier gave none) contradicts the glib and unsupported statement of Richard Carrier about the Megillath Ta’anith which he used to defend the 4BC date. Thus this is clearly a significant evidence. And it relates to a difference of about 3 years, not one. It definitely calls for further examination and explanation as one major evidence.

In fact it would be nice if someone (sans adding spin) would summarize the issues in the dating of the death of Herod in a reasonably short outline form. It has not been a major study on my part however when I saw the dubious Scroll of Fasting 'evidence' presentation of Richard Carrier I became interested. My own view at this time is comfortable with both dates however this clearly has various effects on New Testament chronology.

What would be outlined would be -

Josephus
a) basic claim of 4 BC
b) manuscript issue 20 or 22
c) questions within Josephus, e.g. general accuracy, sources

Then specific outline of -

d) eclipse
e) Megillath Ta’anith
f) New Testament
f) other .. if any

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

spin

If you would like to introduce some new relevant evidence, please do so. If you are back with reheats, as you see no-one is impressed. The eclipse has not been shown to be of any real relevance. Nothing that has been said has changed the Quirinius property registration/census data, so we are dealing with a time necessarily approximately ten years after the death of Herod or at least eleven years after the date of Jesus's birth according to Matt. Number fudging will not change this. The new testament source has been shown to be in error elsewhere (specifically the Lysanias error and spewing undigested internet apologetics won't change the fact). Rehearsing your hangups over Richard Carrier is not going to change the data -- besides, there is already a thread on that subject for you to get cathartic over. I would really sometimes appreciate it if you could come to a thread and contribute something to it.


spin

Steven Avery

Apparently you had great difficulty reading my post, which was concise and clear. I was simply asking for a review of the Herod's date of death evidences.

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin The eclipse has not been shown to be of any real relevance.

Again, if someone does a review of the eclipse discussion it would be helpful, in the context of the date of Herod's death. I have seen a lot of discussion but not in a clear summary form.

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin Nothing that has been said has changed the Quirinius property registration/census data

And that issue was not at all a subject of my request.

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin so we are dealing with a time necessarily approximately ten years after the death of Herod

Again this is a different issue than what I was discussing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin (specifically the Lysanias error..)

Sorry, spin.
Your private interps don't carry a lot of weight unless -
a) they are really solid and clear and hit every issue and/or
b) they are given to some of the scholars in the field for their consideration and response

This one fails on both a and b so the most you can claim is that "you think" (as you originally put it in a more cogent moment) that there is a Lysanias error. End of story.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

spin

I gather you have difficulty comprehending all what you wrote.

How about you provide one, while attempting to show its relevance. I've already dealt with it.

Perhaps you could find someone who sill respond specifically to your request. What you ask for doesn't necessarily reflect the response you need.

I'm sure you realize that what you discuss and what others discuss are often not the same thing in a thread.

You are in no position to judge (a) because once again you don't know the evidence and are only willing to read that which agrees with your desired outcomes. Your appeal to "some of the scholars in the field" is merely an excuse not to have to deal with the evidence.


spin

jgibson000

Why don't you be the one to be "helpful" and do this "review" yourself?

JG[

JoeWallack

JW:
I finally received a copy of Jerry Vardaman's Chronos Kairos Christos II (say that fast 5 times) which apparently could only be found in the auction of Gleason Archer's estate on EBull. Beyer's complete article is on pages 85-96 with no indication that it was intended for any purpose other than this book. There is no mention of any SBL connection probably because they threatened to [sic] their Jewish lawyers on Beyer and Vardaman if they mentioned the SBL's name. For the most part the complete article does not add much information to what has already been presented in this Thread. Beyer's article is indeed Significantly Incomplete and therefore insufficient evidence on which to base any opinion on the likely original of the offending date. This was previously given as a summary of Beyer's report:

Regarding the intended scope of Beyer's investigation this is what he claimed:
"For the most part, twentieth-century investigations into the chronology of Herod the Great bypass an examination of the primary evidence itself-the earliest available manuscripts and published editions of Josephus' Antiquities. These documents have a history all their own, creating a chronicle of a chronicle, one that I have researched down to the most relevant minutiae."

Beyer says he went to the British Library in 1983 and to the Library of Congress in 1994. This is what he found as previously mentioned here:

Beyer has a table which identifies all the texts he looked at. 8 are Manuscripts with the earliest one being 12th century and 2 being 13th century. Beyer has no indication of whether the Manuscripts or the early Prints are Greek or Latin.

Beyer lists 9 Texts with 5 being Manuscripts and the earliest being 15th century.

As a result of his examination Beyer concludes that the first printed edition in Greek was 1544 and that was the source of the change from "twenty-second" to "twentieth".

Richard Carrier's criticism as previously posted here:

JW:
The previously provided summary of Carrier's related criticisms still look to be spot-on as my examination of Beyer's examination shows that Beyer has completely Ignored the following considerations:

My own Summary of the deficiencies in Beyer's report, after reading the complete version, are as follows:

1) He did not identify any scope limitation yet he only looked at Texts in 2 Locations (both English).

2) He completely Ignores the Textual evidence of Texts he did not look at.

3) Other than age, he Failed to consider qualitative factors in Texts, such as Exemplars used, copying verses eclectic, language (Greek versus Latin) and the general level of errors in the Text.

4) He Ignores why the consensus of modern authority is that "twentieth" is likely original.

Now that I have researched down to the most relevant minutiae Beyer's investigation I can say with confidence that the only future media attention it is likely to receive will be a satire of the old SNL bit, Really Bad Opera, called Really Bad Bible Scholarship, hosted by Dr. Gibson doing his best Dan Akroyd imitation and part of a double feature with Nazaroo's PA debacle.



Joseph

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

Steven Avery

Nice post, Jeffrey. Typical.

Perhaps, as I indicated, I am not up to speed on the eclipse information and the back-and-forth and thought someone who is would share some of the basics and issues. And so far I don't feel it is a primary issue in my own studies of Luke and historicity and the Nativity date.

Which is why I placed a request for a helpful outline. As an assistance to myself and others reading the thread who might not be directly involved in reading and studying the eclipse info. The Megillath Ta’anith (Scroll of Fasting) info I did share about upthread.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Steven Avery

You are simply wrong. It is clear that you are emphasizing certain evidence in sub-issues that only have, overall, a minor impact on the question of Lysanias, which has been our major dialog. And those I followed reasonably well, even in their sub-level position. You would like every minor sub-sub-issue (e.g. the possibility that an inscription could be Augustus instead of Tiberius) to become the major focus simply because overall Luke is clearly on the ball on his historicity and any case that he is wrong on Lysanias by 50+ years has a very high bar of disbelief.

Now you have discussed upthread some issues about Luke's overall usage of titles and the vaporized cases where he was accused of false historicity. That is more primary than your sub-issue focus. So I will try to come back to those issues shortly. Most of this (and Carrier) I put aside for a bit, mostly because of the more pressing time-related dialogs on probability and the tomb of Jesus, some public, some private.

btw, I link these two (Lysanias and the Nativity) because they are the two real accusations against Luke, post-vaporization. And I would heartily agree that if Luke is wrong by 5-10 years about the birth of Jesus he could be wrong by 50+ years about Lysanias and vica versa. There is a package deal element. On the other hand if Luke is a solid historian overall, as very strongly indicated, then he is should be interpreted properly and respected on these two issues as well and an appeal to a supposed error on one is of nil effect in the discussion of the other.

As to the evidence on the Nativity if there is something you really think I do not know of import, share away.

Oh also I have gotten used to the spin methodology. After you made a big brouhaha out of the virtual nothing of selective use of corrupt Vaticanus to be "directly derived from the Hebrew" to be "the Greek" to be the external window to somehow understand Judges 13 to somehow understand Isaiah .. from that experience I learned that your methodology of analysis tends to be simply a joke. Find some virtually irrelevant detail and pretend that it is "the issue". And plod ahead resisting any attempt to apply a sound methodology.
Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

jgibson000

So for one it might be nice if you'd get up to speed -- and do this, again for once, before you post on a topic you admit you don't know all that much about.

How nice. And yet you still expect us to take seriously what you say on it.

In any case, will you allow us to use the same excuses that you do when we don't post what you ask us to?

JG