jgibson000

Well, leaving aside the equivocation, the fact of the matter is, they weren't so regarded by their subjects in this fashion, as your primary source for claiming so, Josephus himself notes. Otherwise none of the people, including the leading men in Judea and Galileee, whom Josephus notes as regarding Archelaus rule as illegitimate and as having on a number of occasions petitioned Rome to relieve them of Archelaus etc. would ever have thought they had a chance of having their suits heard, let alone, of succeeding.

But whether or not you accept this, please provide me with primary evidence that supports your claim about the tiles carrying with them the notion of "supreme" authority in any given region.

JG

Steven Avery

Yet when you claimed that Luke and Acts were different authors (to have an excuse to avoid dealing with the precise Roman titles of Acts) you gave no demonstration and made no such comment. And you waited three weeks to even give the excuse.

When you claim interpolations and non-redactions of convenience you never "demonstrate" them. You simply assume your own theory and try to move on from that point. With no comment as above.

On a fundamental issue like the Luke-Acts common authorship it is sufficient, or it should be sufficient and proper, to point out that we have very different views of the Bible text. I see the introductions themselves as virtually conclusive evidence augmented by tons of other evidences. Your mileage varies. And it is unlikely that either of us would change our position on such a side-discussion.

Not every argument about authenticity and authorship can be discussed in every thread and when there is a fundamental difference it should simply be stated clearly and other readers will be awares. (That is why your waiting three weeks for the Luke-Acts excuse was particularly noticed.)

And good moderators will understand this as well and hold all sides to similar standards of "demonstration" when they see that as appropriate.

And there will be many times that a fundamental difference should just be acknowledged and stated rather than made into a side-diversion.

Shalom,
Steven

jgibson000

No, he does not. And I challenge you to show me on the basis of the Greek syntax and grammar of the Josephan passage you appeal to as evidence that he does, just how he does.

I also challenge you to show me how a claim based on ambiguous "evidence" derived from Josephus about EQNARCHS and BASILEUS is relevant to your claim about the interchangeability of TETRARCHS and BASILEUS, especially when the very souce you appeal to in support of your clam, namely Josephus, explicitly shows in the very source you appeal to that he did not regard the titles and offices as interchangeable nor that one who was a TETRARCHS could, would, should, or ever was called a BASILEIUS.

JG

Steven Avery

These men with the "tiles" were the supremes within the region.
That is why the appeals went to Rome.

Why not answer the questions about who were the kings in the Josephus discourse (rather a fundamental and simple question).

And what exactly is your accusation against the NT text of Mark and Matthew.

Take your time and come up with a real answer.
I'm off to work and some chores.

Shalom,
Steven

spin

Where did I do that?

Amaleq13

I did and that is precisely how I, unlike yourself, correctly understood what was written.

Perceptive readers weren't.

jgibson000

Non Roman??? What do you mean non Roman?

It has not been shown to be false. Nothing that you've offered so far has done so.

But more importantly, the question is not whether it could or would have happened, but whether apart from Matthew and Mark, it ever did happen.

Please provide me with textual and/or epigraphical and/or numismatic evidence that it did.

Is that what I said? Please show me where I made such a claim?

And here is what you wrote:


to which my question that you quote was a response.


What limb? Did you or did you not, in giving the selective quotation above of Ant 17. 354, imply that what Josephus says in Ant 17. 354 was that the concern of the "discourse" he there mentions was nothing but kings and that he does not go on in the sections of 17.354 which you have not quoted to say that his discourse concerned other topics as well?

Because I haven't.

Caught in what? All I've been doing is showing that you've engaged in selective quotation to make make your point and that you keep dodging the question about whether Ant. 17.354 does or does not show that Josephus states and acknowledges that the concern of the "discourse" he refers to is not just kings but other topics as well.

Are you ever going to answer this question?

Because -- as you yourself note in the quote above -- that's not the issue. The issue is what it is that in Ant. 17. 354 Josephus says his discourse before Ant. 17. 354 "concerns". Is it just kings or not? And if it isn't, then how much weight can we really put on your claim that since Ant. 17 speaks about "kings" and speaks about the EQNARCHS Archelaus, then it can be used as evidence that ancients apart from Matthew and Mark did, or thought or knew that it was accurate to, call a TETRARCHS a BASILEUS?


Why don't you answer my questions about (1) whether or not Josephus says in the part of Ant. 17.354 that you haven't quoted that the concern of the discourse he refers is not limited to kings, but has a focus on other topics as well and (2) whether or not in your selective quotation of Ant. 17. 354 you did indeed imply that "kings" is what Josephus says is the only concern of his "discourse?

JG

Ben C Smith

Hi, praxeus.

I have become a bit lost in the sheer bulk of this discussion. Is there an instance of a tetrarch (or other similar nonkingly ruler) being called king in the historical texts of the era?

Thanks.

Ben.

jgibson000

FWIW, the fact is that apart from Matt. 14.9 and in Mark 6, there is no such beastie -- not even, so far as I can see after searching the text, in Cicero In Verr. despite what BDAG says -- nor in the inscriptions and the documentary evidence, nor on any extant coin of any Greco Roman ruler.

Notably, in the instances in ancient literature and in the corpus of inscriptions in which both BASILEUS and TETRARCHS do appear, there is always a distinction made between the titles.

Witness, e.g., the inscriptions about Antipas and Herod the Great from Cos.

Jeffrey Gibson

jgibson000

Hmm. It's been a few days now since you asked Steven this question. And yet he's made no reply.

What do you think the reason for this is?

Jeffrey