Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Jeffrey Gibson · 01-02-2008, 03:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MortalWombat

It also explains Mark's use of a round blocking stone for Jesus' tomb, the custom of which was not widely in use until after the destruction of Jerusalem.

This is a new one on me. Do you have a source for this claim about the use of round blocking stones?

Jeffrey

Jeffrey Gibson · 01-02-2008, 03:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Placing the gospel of Mark as post-Bar Kochba seems to tidy up a lot of lose ends. It explains the silence of the early fathers

An early father like Papias, you mean?

Jeffrey

Cege · 01-02-2008, 03:54 PM

My impression of the early dating basis has always been that the 70 ADE destruction of the temple in Jerusalem isn't mentioned or even hinted at in the NT. And that Clement referred to a gospel or two very early on, say 100 AD?

Toto · 01-02-2008, 04:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Placing the gospel of Mark as post-Bar Kochba seems to tidy up a lot of lose ends. It explains the silence of the early fathers

An early father like Papias, you mean?

Jeffrey

Yes - Papias (through Eusebius) talks about Mark writing something that does not match the description of the gospel that we know as "Mark." I would count that as a silence.

For the round tomb stone anachronism, see link

Quote:

There is another reason to doubt the tomb burial: the tomb blocking stone is treated as round in the Gospels, but that would not have been the case in the time of Jesus, yet it was often the case after 70 C.E., just when the gospels were being written. Amos Kloner, in "Did a Rolling Stone Close Jesus' Tomb?" (Biblical Archaeology Review 25:5, Sep/Oct 1999, pp. 23-29, 76), discusses the archaeological evidence of Jewish tomb burial practices in antiquity. He observes that "more than 98 percent of the Jewish tombs from this period, called the Second Temple period (c. first century B.C.E. to 70 C.E.), were closed with square blocking stones" (p. 23), and only four round stones are known prior to the Jewish War, all of them blocking entrances to elaborate tomb complexes of the extremely rich (such as the tomb complex of Herod the Great and his ancestors and descendants). However, "the Second Temple period...ended with the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 C.E. In later periods the situation changed, and round blocking stones became much more common" (p. 25).

Gamera · 01-02-2008, 05:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julian

Question for Andrew and Gamera. Given that the earliest hard date that we have is 120, why is it plausible the writings are form the first century? It takes very little time to write a book and get it reasonably distributed. Consider the increase of references that we see in the second century. Within a few decades of our first references we suddenly have lots. If the gospels were written in 70, then one would logically have expected to see the number of references be much, much higher by, say, 120CE. P52 could be just as easily from the end of the 2nd century, which would fit much better with our MS collection. By around 200 we start having more and more manuscripts, yet we have none from the early part of the 2nd century or earlier (excepting P52). The problem with the dating is that there is a very unscholarly tendency to place a writing at the earliest point with in a terminus post/ante quem window. For example, since GMark could have been written as early as 70 and was probably written before 120 (I know, these years can be disputed, just go with me here) then scholars tend to automatically place the text around 70. There is, of course, no reason to do this other than a bias to place the material as early as possible for increased veracity.

I have been toying with the idea of graphing out the MSS in terms of dates and continue the trend backwards. If one can assume that more MS finds means greater proliferation, and that proliferation increases with time in some regular manner (excepting an expected jump post-Constantine) then one can work the numbers back to a single point in time. A point in time that would have better support that the current theories.

Julian

Look, I sympathize with your healthy bias against early dating. I think there has been an inherent unexamined impulse with scholars to want to date mss as early as possible. It's just more interesting to have an old text than a young one. That's why early Beowulf scholars got it all wrong and dated the text much too early by modern standards.

Having said that, I think I gave the reasoning. Assuming P52 is more or less accurately dated, then it is more likely than not that p52 is not a holograph. That's because there is only one holograph and a lot of copies of John. The odds of having the holograph, therefore, are diminishingly low. Similarly, as more copies are made, there tend to be proportionately more copies that are younger. Thus, if you have a copy, it is more likely to be younger than older. The odds on getting the first copy, or one of the first copies of a holograph are low. The odds are higher that any particular copy is of a later date than the first copies.

Add this to other factors, such as textual criticism, the fact that the synoptic gospels appear to be related (and hence had some common source prior to their creation), and church tradition, and a first century dating of the gospels seems pretty likely. That's the best we can do in this case (as with most ancient mss)

Julian · 01-02-2008, 05:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gamera

Look, I sympathize with your bias against early dating. I think there is an inherent impulse with scholars to want to date mss as early as possible. It's just more interesting to have an old text than a young one. That's why early Beowulf scholars got it all wrong and dated the text much too early by modern standards.

Just out of curiosity, when would you date Beowulf? I am reading it right now to brush up on my anglo-saxon which has deteriorated to the point of uselessness, so I am trying to get some fluency back.

Quote:

Having said that, I think I gave the reasoning. Assuming P52 is more or less accurately dated, then it is more likely than not that p52 is not a holograph. That's because there is only one holograph and a lot of copies of John. The odds of having the holograph, therefore, are diminishingly low. Similarly, as more copies are made, there tend to be proportionately more copies that are younger. Thus, if you have a copy, it is more likely to be younger than older. The odds on getting the first copy, or one of the first copies of a holograph are low. The odds are higher that any particular copy is of a later date than the first copies.

I agree with all this although P52 could be reasonably dated with a wide range. Putting it at 125 seems to indicate a bias similar to that affecting MS dating. Anyways, a google search turns up many views.

Look at it this way, hypothetically. If you have 100 copies of something in the year 1000, 50 copies in 950, 25 in 900, 12 in 850, 6 in 800, and 1 in 750, then it wouldn't be reasonable to date the autograph to, say, 600. More reasonable would be between 700 and 750. If you look at our christian MSS then you land somewhere in the 2nd century, although I haven't worked out the specific math due to extreme laziness. Putting them in the second century also helps contextualize writings such as the Didache and GThomas.

Quote:

Add this to other factors, such as textual criticism, the fact that the synoptic gospels appear to be related (and hence had some common source prior to their creation), and church tradition, and a first century dating of the gospels seems pretty likely. That's the best we can do in this case (as with most ancient mss)

You will note that when I talked about the gospels, I looked at them as a unit because they are related. In other words, whichever shows up first would establish a date. If it wasn't Mark then we could step back a bit. However, the fact that they are related does not in anyway require them to be moved to a time significantly earlier. Church tradition counts for nothing in this case since it is obviously so corrupt, incoherent, and falsified (or, at least, gullible) so as to be completely unreliable. I will tentatively accept Papias as a reference to gospels, so don't think that I discard everything. I accept the Papias reference because it is a reference to a plausible text. What the text implies would fall somewhat out of this scope, so no implied comment should be inferred. I am not sure about Ignatius yet, I suspect that the dating is too early.

I find a first century date for the gospels more and more unlikely, the more I think about it.

Julian

Sheshonq · 01-02-2008, 05:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gamera

Having said that, I think I gave the reasoning. Assuming P52 is more or less accurately dated, then it is more likely than not that p52 is not a holograph. That's because there is only one holograph and a lot of copies of John.

I have no particular bias either way here, but I think there's at least a handful of mistakes in your logic.

1. You cannot invoke probability here until you know when the other copies were made. You might very well have a piece of the autograph.

2. You also need to know how *many* copies were available at this point in time. If there were only two copies made and in circulation at that point in time, then the chance of P52 being part of the autograph are 1 in 3 - and that's assuming that you can date the copies to some time before P52's dating.

3. Assuming you clear the above two hurdles, you still have a problem. Even if P52 is a copy and not the autograph, that still doesn't get you to a 1st century autograph. The copy that P52 came from could have been made the same year as the autograph was penned down. You're assuming some amount of time elapsed. That may or may not be true.

Quote:

The odds of having the holograph, therefore, are diminishingly low. Similarly, as more copies are made, there tend to be proportionately more copies that are younger.

No. That depends entirely upon when the total number of copies were made. Let's simplify this to show why you're wrong - assume a hypothetical document (not GJohn):

AD 100 - original
AD 105 - 30 copies
AD 120 - 5 copies

There are more copies floating around in AD 120 than there were in AD 105 or AD 110. But the average age of the copies is still older, not younger, than AD 120.

Quote:

Thus, if you have a copy, it is more likely to be younger than older.

No. That depends upon the age distribution of the copies.

Jeffrey Gibson · 01-02-2008, 05:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

An early father like Papias, you mean?

Jeffrey

Yes - Papias (through Eusebius) talks about Mark writing something that does not match the description of the gospel that we know as "Mark." I would count that as a silence.

For the round tomb stone anachronism, see link

Quote:

There is another reason to doubt the tomb burial: the tomb blocking stone is treated as round in the Gospels, but that would not have been the case in the time of Jesus, yet it was often the case after 70 C.E., just when the gospels were being written. Amos Kloner, in "Did a Rolling Stone Close Jesus' Tomb?" (Biblical Archaeology Review 25:5, Sep/Oct 1999, pp. 23-29, 76), discusses the archaeological evidence of Jewish tomb burial practices in antiquity. He observes that "more than 98 percent of the Jewish tombs from this period, called the Second Temple period (c. first century B.C.E. to 70 C.E.), were closed with square blocking stones" (p. 23), and only four round stones are known prior to the Jewish War, all of them blocking entrances to elaborate tomb complexes of the extremely rich (such as the tomb complex of Herod the Great and his ancestors and descendants). However, "the Second Temple period...ended with the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 C.E. In later periods the situation changed, and round blocking stones became much more common" (p. 25).

Thanks.

But is it the case that Kloner's claim that after 70 CE round blocking stones became "much more common" than they were prior to that date justifies, as RC seems to think it does, his absolute denial that would have been any round tomb blocking stones on tombs in the time of Jesus? After all, that there were no round tomb blocking stones used prior to 70 CE is not what Kloner says.

Jeffrey

Ben C Smith · 01-02-2008, 06:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julian

Within a few decades of our first references we suddenly have lots. If the gospels were written in 70, then one would logically have expected to see the number of references be much, much higher by, say, 120CE.

Why do you think this?

Attestation is capricious.

How would your expectations work for the epistle to Diognetus? It is obviously ancient, yet no author at all refers to it until nearly modern times.

IOW, why is it so improbable that the gospels went through a period of relative quiet before catching on?

Ben.

Toto · 01-02-2008, 06:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

...
Thanks.

But is it the case that Kloner's claim that after 70 CE round blocking stones became "much more common" than they were prior to that date justifies, as RC seems to think it does, his absolute denial that would have been any round tomb blocking stones on tombs in the time of Jesus? After all, that there were no round tomb blocking stones used prior to 70 CE is not what Kloner says.

Jeffrey

Don't jump the gun and assume Carrier's thinking.

Only 4 round tomb blocking stones have been discovered that were used before 70, and those were used on highly unusual, large tombs for important officials ("elaborate tomb complexes of the extremely rich"), not a tomb such as that of Joseph of Arimathea.

Please note that this is one element in a long counter to arguments made by Christian apologists, that the gospel stories are inherently plausible. Some proponents of historicity try to explain this anomaly away, and Carrier decides that their attempts are not successful. But his conclusion is:

Quote:

Even so, there is nothing decisive about this. There could still be a core truth about a tomb burial, with the details being added out of the imaginations of the authors or their sources, as often happened when even reliable historians described scenes in such vivid detail. There was a kind of acceptable license when painting scenes this way, provided the historian did not contradict any known facts or propose the implausible. So the fact that the story was told in terms familiar to the writers, though historically inaccurate, would not entail that the story did not originally involve sliding a square stone instead. But the incongruity would still lend some support to an overall case against the authenticity of the story, since Glenn Miller's claim to the contrary is not well founded.

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01-02-2008, 03:54 PM	#13
Cege Senior Member Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: 36078 Posts: 849	My impression of the early dating basis has always been that the 70 ADE destruction of the temple in Jerusalem isn't mentioned or even hinted at in the NT. And that Clement referred to a gospel or two very early on, say 100 AD?

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