Mountain Man

Then what was the name of that village? And this whole argument over Nazareth is a good example of derailing. The existence, or not, of Nazareth does not prove the bible to be accurate. BFD, they got the name of an old village right. It proves nothing except that the writings took place long after the alleged events and places of the bible.

Mountain Man

Please stay on topic. The discussion is not about whether or not people lived in the area or not. Writing something long after any alleged accounts, and naming cities, proves nothing.

Mountain Man

The only thing you've proven is that you have no archeological evidence that supports the bible. Naming a city is not proof.

RPS

I don't have the resources to evaluate who's right even if I were an archeologist. Note though what Carrier says specifically re Nazareth:

"So also for Nazareth, which was not the tiny hovel it is often made out to be. A Jewish inscription from the 2nd or 3rd century confirms that Nazareth was one of the towns that took in Jewish priests after the destruction of the Temple in 66 A.D. (would priests deign to shack up in a despised hick town?), and archaeology confirms it may have had a significant stone building before then (perhaps the synagogue that Luke attests to being there in Lk. 4:16), while it definitely had grain silos, cisterns, ritual immersion pools, cave dwellings and storerooms, a stone well, and a significant necropolis cut from the rock of Nazareth's hill, all in the time of Jesus. Likewise, considerable quantities of imported pottery and lamps from the first century have also been found there. This was no mere hamlet, but a village inhabited by hundreds experiencing significant economic success."

From a footnote to the article:

"See: 'Nazareth,' Avraham Negev & Shimon Gibson, eds., Archaeological Encyclopedia of the Holy Land, new ed. (2001); and B. Bagatti, Excavations in Nazareth, vol. 1 (1969), esp. pp. 233-34, which discusses four calcite column bases, which were reused in a later structure, but are themselves dated before the War by their stylistic similarity to synagogues and Roman structures throughout 1st century Judaea, and by the fact that they contain Nabataean lettering (which suggests construction before Jewish priests migrated to Nazareth after the war), as well as their cheap material (cancite instead of marble); pp. 170-71 discusses Aramaic-inscribed marble fragments paleographically dated around the end of the 1st century or early 2nd century, demonstrating that Nazareth had marble structures near the time the Gospels were written (even if not before). Otherwise, very little of Nazareth has been excavated, and therefore no argument can be advanced regarding what "wasn't" there in the 1st century. Likewise, evidence suggests any stones and bricks used in first century buildings in Nazareth were reused in later structures, thus erasing a lot of the evidence.

"On an unrelated note: some have claimed that Luke's description of the town as built on a hill (4:29) is factually incorrect, but I have confirmed from photographs and archaeological reports that Nazareth was built down the slope of a hill, and many of its houses, storerooms, and tombs were cut from the rock of that hill (while the "brow" of that hill would likely have been cut or built up to provide a place for hurling the condemned, according to Mishnah law, Sanhedrin 6.4)."

Amaleq13

I'm not sure when in 2005 Mr. Carrier wrote that article but I do know he had this to say in one of our threads on July 18, 2005:

"Now for where I have changed position: as shall be made clearer below, I am even more certain than ever before that Mark neither intended to make such a historical claim (that Jesus was really born at a real Nazareth) nor would any such claim have been historically true--i.e. I am now more convinced than I was before that a Nazareth attribution more probably than not served a symbolic purpose. I will have more to say about this in the future, possibly in a published article, but more likely in a book I am planning to work on for the next two years."

The full text can be found here. If I understand him correctly, it really doesn't matter if a real Nazareth existed in the early 1st century because Mark wasn't using it literally anyway. Again, if I understand him correctly, he considers the archeological evidence to be too ambiguous to allow an affirmative conclusion. Nazareth may have existed in the early 1st century.

Ruhan

I find the claim regarding less intriguing than the claim about the lack of evidence for a period of Jewish enslavement in Egypt. Judaism, Christianity and Islam all refer to this period and if all archaeological evidence refutes this claim, then surely this must be the smoking gun which pulls the carpet from underneath all three religions' feet?

Surely the story of Asmosis driving the Hyksos out of Egypt in 1570 BC which the story of Moses was most probably based on is a much better example of archaeology supporting an alternative narrative than what is found in the Pentateuch/Torah? It also then forces us to reject any passages where reference is made to Moses and the Exodus. If these are rejected, then the whole cookie starts to crumble (so to speak).

Johnny Skeptic

Message to Praxeus: Why does it impress you that some of the Bible contains accurate archaeological and geographical claims. Any skeptic could accurately write about the archaeology and geography where he lived and traveled.

Steven Avery

Nazareth, or some very close Hebrew equivalent. I'll let the researchers did it up since the other Doherty post kept me busy this AM.

As for derailing, MM, oops, sorry, the skeptics can't have it both ways.

They raised this issue a while back (bad enuf) and suprisingly they really STILL bring up this puppy again and again in public forums. It's truly amazing.

The whole thing was a virtually worthless argument (Lowder is right) BEFORE the Caesarea inscription and various archaelogical finds. To see them continue on AFTER the Caesarea inscription should help folks thinking and considering to at least really smell some coffee in the morning.

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

RPS

I don't see how his words could be interpreted as saying anything other than that the evidence supports the existence of Nazareth at the time of Jesus -- there is no qualification in the statements about Nazareth at all. A real Nazareth does not require a real Jesus, of course, but that wasn't what was at issue. At issue was the bald assertion that Nazareth didn't exist in the early 1st C. Quite obviously, such claims are false and likely driven by ideology rather than evidence.

Vorkosigan

Lowder is wrong, alas. As a glance at Reed's Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus will show, there is no evidence of habitation at the site. The Caesarea inscription is late third or early fourth century (not 2nd or 3rd). In any case our own Ted Hoffman will soon make the definitive statement on this issue. Although I should add that now that some Christian school has taken over the Nazareth digs, I expect tons of historical evidence of Nazareth's existence to emerge.

As Lemche pointed out in a thread on the Bib Studies list yesterday, the problem of Nazareth is mirrored by the problem of Sepphoris, which certainly existed, but which the gospels are silent on.

Vorkosigan