mountainman

Let's just agree that C14 dating will detect the true
date of an ancient forged handwriting whereas the
less-precise and less-scientific process of handwriting
analysis will not detect this.

Quite obviously spin, I am quite prepared to be instructed by specialists
such as yourself and Jeff in this issue once the data becomes available.
I can only go on what I can get hold of, and reserve opinion on anything
which is shown to be contentious in regard to its translation.

At the moment we have the words "fiction" and "fabrication".
There words are critical, but are they contentious? Surely you
must advise me.

I attempted to examine the use by Wright of the word "myth"
in the treatise, and it appears relativley frequently. I can only
assume that Wright was translating another source word here,
in a consistent fashion.

Elsewhere, in another thread, relevant to this issue I responded
with a list of issues relevant to Julian's treatise ...

To answer this question properly we have to understand that there
are a number of issues critical to the text, which are not in the text.

1. Julian did not write this. Julian's original 3 books are burnt,
presumed lost.

2. These words from Julian are reconstructed from Cyril's refutation
of only part of the work - was it the first book only, of Julian's.

3. Julian wrote at a very unique time of political history.
It was time immediately after a successive 40 year term
in which christianity had just become the state religion,
and he was the first voice to be able to speak about it.

4. Cyril also wrote at another unique time of political history.
It was a time after which christianity had already re-obtained
its political position as the state religion, and was in power,
and kicking hard against all and sundry, as history will have it.

5. The reasons that Julian wrote, and that Cyril wrote, are different.
They had different things to say. Different sponsors. IMO
Bullburner sponsored himself, Cyril by the basilica-crew.

6. Cyril admits Julians 3 books were causing many people to turn
away from christianity, that they were to be regarded as particularly
dangerous, that they had shaken many believers, that they
contained invectives against Christ and that they originally also
contained such matter as might contaminate the minds of Christians.
(All this via W.Wright's intro).

jgibson000

This is assuming what needs to be proved, if by "fiction" you mean "made up" and if you think that "fiction" applies to the claim that Jesus existed.

Here are some other texts from Julian in which Julian uses the word you say means "fiction" in the sense of "made up".

Can you tell me whether Julian's usage bears your claim out, let alone whether the antecedent of the word is actually the historical Jesus and not just certain specific claims about Jesus (whom Julian knows to have existed) that the Gospel writers and Paul (whom Julian viewed as having existed and as having produced writings in the 1st century) had made?

εγκώμιον εἰs τὸν αὐτοκράτορα κωνστάντιον 1.19
περὶ τῶν τοῦ αὐτοκράτοροs πράξεων ἢ περὶ βασιλείαs 10.14
περὶ τῶν τοῦ αὐτοκράτοροs πράξεων ἢ περὶ βασιλείαs 20.7.
πρὸs ηράκλειον κυνικὸν περὶ τοῦ πῶs κυνιστέον καὶ 4.20
Epistulae 89b.347 s: 5

No. I think, as is clear, that you do not know what the semantic range of the word translated by Wright as "fiction" meant in Julian's time and what its reference was.

Because it's your job, not ours.

Jeffrey Gibson (and since you think the letters after Wright's name mean something, let me note that I am) D.Phil. (Oxon.)

spin

So we wait for mountainman to pick up the pieces of his sorry saga and bounce back with another bout of denial, still unable to say what exactly Julian means by "fabrication" or even the exact Greek word.


spin

mountainman

We wait for spin (and others) to acknowledge the question:
Are political issues important to textual criticism in the case of Julians Galilaeans

A simple yes would have sufficed me, and a simple acknowledgement
of the list of six issues which appear to me directly related to the
treatise of Julian here being argued by all parties.

However a statement that they are not relevant
is an admission of a lack of objectivity in this instance,
or hopeless credulity with respect to (ancient) history.

spin

Conclusion: mountainman cannot say what Julian says the fabrication actually is.


spin OAO

mountainman

The claim is that the fabrication had a number of modules.

(1): Texts bound within the "Constantine Bible" 331ce

The Hebrew literature was hijacked into the primary module.
The Hebrew literature was an innocent bystander.
The NT fiction was then bound thereto after Nicaea.


(2): Text support, service manuals, tools, horror stories, etc.

Enter Eusebius, chief minister of propganda.
Right hand man at the Supremacy Party.

Ecclesiastical History of all things before the Nicaean Boundary Event.
In Preparation for the bullshit: services in basilicas, ettiquete

Eusebian Canon Tables: Quick reference to Matthew Mark Luke and Ahab.
Who said what to whom, and when, and why, and how many
agreed at the time.

The Eusebian derived Martrologies, horror stories (fiction) distributed
by a malevolent and despotic regime to create unrest in the elite
of the time --- those who could read it.