wordy

I have a poor memory is not the Hebrew seen as written by somebody else?
so them maybe had an agenda with how they present things?

TedM

Hi Bernard,

Very good contribution to the issue! I don't know if you and Earl have 'discussed' this in the past, but I am more than willing to hold off on my own latest response (which I haven't even begun) for Earl to respond to what you have written.

Ted

EarlDoherty

Bernard, please....

First of all, Carrier is wrong. It is not clear cut in that way. He is simply offering the general rule or practice. Paul Ellingworth, who is a professional translator and unquestioned Greek scholar, has labeled the grammatical structure ambiguous and that it could have a past sense (he rejects it because it could be taken to mean that Jesus had never been on earth), and he in turn appeals for corroboration for that opinion to Blass and Debrunner. (Why Carrier was not aware of this--or Bernard, for that matter--I cannot say. And I would point out, IIRC, that this quote from him comes from 2002, in his review of The Jesus Puzzle. In that same review, he questioned my meaning attached to another Greek word, and I was able to point out that such a meaning is clearly offered in Bauer's Lexicon.)

Second, in Bernard's first two paragraphs above, he makes erroneous statements. In the two other contrafactual passages from Hebrews which he quotes, he says that "the imperfect tense is used twice in a present context." But it is not a present context, as a simple reading of those passages makes clear. Every translation I am aware of uses past tense verbs in English to render both sides of this conditional structure. (I don't know what he means by "conditional clause missing".) And the meaning is clearly in a past sense. The overall effect may extend into the present, into the time of the writer, but that does not make the actual thought as expressed, a present tense one. Jesus 'arose' as the new high priest in the order of Melchizedek in the past, when his priesthood took effect with his sacrifice in heaven. Scripture has merely revealed that past mythical event in the writer's present.

Much the same goes for the second passage, both of which I present in JNGNM (note 87), as support for my reading of 8:4. Muller has not discredited that, and certainly not through statements which are clearly erroneous.

And just because we can find other contrafactual structures in the literature which employ the imperfect tense and are in fact understood in a present sense, does not mean that 8:4 (or the two supportive examples) have to be in that category as well. As I've said, and as Ellingworth has said, the structure can, in some circumstances, be ambiguous, and resolving that ambiguity has to be done through the avenue of analyzing the passage and other factors in the document.

Finally, my thinking on this passage was not as fully honed in The Jesus Puzzle as it later became. I find it unfortunate now that it sounded as though I allowed for a present sense, though with a past application which rendered the implication of 8:4 the same as I now argue it, and for similar deductive reasons. I would question, even fault, Muller for doing the same that GDon had a habit of doing: appealing to a 13-year-old book as though it were the last word, and not bothering to investigate later versions. I would consider it a fault on my part if 13 years (or nine, if you want to take it to the publication date of Jesus: Neither God Nor Man) did not result in a more advanced case or even, in a few instances, a change of mind.

(I may have a chance in a day or two to take a closer look at other parts of Muller's post, though my impression is that there is nothing much more to say.)

Earl Doherty

Sheshbazzar

Yes aa, I agree with you that the Jezus of the NT was entirely mythical.
In fact I do not accept that there ever was even any actual person that even inspired the NTs fabricated tall tale.
There was no Jezus of Nazareth, the character is entirely a religious invention. Was I clear enough on that aa?

But is was those 'copies of Apologetic sources which state that the JEWS KILLED Jesus.'
which have caused countless thousands of very real Jews to be robbed, terrorised, persecuted, murdered, and executed by the Christians that bought and believed into this fabricated lie.

Jezus wasn't real but those poor unjustly accused and massacred Jews were very real.
And it is very real actual history what the Jews have had to suffer because of these famous Christian lies.

And for all that, as I pointed out, The NT text does not at all support this lie, that it was the Jews that killed Jezus.

According to the NTs actual Gospel story THE JEWS ABSOLUTELY DID NOT KILL OR PIERCE JEZUS.

And only latter evil lying men -who either did not know, or believe The NT record- make the claim that they did.

Bernard Muller

I did some digging and, yes, it seems that Carrier might be partly wrong, according to this webpage.
I quote from it:
A) Present Contrafactual Conditions: The imperfect indicative stands in the protasis of present contrafactual conditions. The imperfect indicative with ἄν stands in the apodosis.
B) Past Contrafactual Conditions: The aorist or imperfect indicative stands in the protasis of past contrafactual conditions. The aorist or imperfect indicative with ἄν stands in the apodosis.
So Ellingworth is right when he wrote about ambiguity.

However, the author of 'to the Hebrews' indicated to us how he handled past contrafactual condition:
Heb4:8 Darby "For if Jesus had brought them [Israelites of the Exodus] into rest,
[aorist, supposition set in the (relative) past (= before the epistle was written)]
' he would not have spoken [imperfect] afterwards about another day."
He had the aorist tense and not the imperfect tense for a past contrafactual condition.
But in Heb 8:4-5a, this author used the imperfect tense. That means he was thinking about a present contrafactual condition. Consequently, the traduction as "if he had been on earth" is not probable here, for that author and in this epistle.

EarlDoherty

Bernard, your own previous posting contradicts your claim here. Hebrews 7:11and 8:7 are past contrafactual conditions (you erroneously labeled them present) and yet the writer uses the imperfect tense, not the aorist. And if you had bothered to more closely read one of my previous posts, you would have seen my own suggestion as to why the writer used the imperfect in 8:4--because one side of the contrafactual comparison extended into the present, in that the statement that there were/are priests already on earth is a situation that existed in the past (when Jesus was not on earth) but also continues into the present, since the temple cult was still in operation at the time of the writer. I spent some time explaining to Ted that one can combine a present sense with a past one if one is comparing an ongoing generality with a past specific. However, as far as I know (I haven't read the entire Greek literature of the ancient world), a contrafactual statement must use the same verb tense in both halves, not split them up.

But all this is rather moot. Even if you were to convince yourself by grammatical considerations that the imperfect in 8:4 places the thought in the present, you have done nothing to cope with the argument that in that case a present sense makes no sense, is an illogical non-sequitur, and creates all sorts of problems and contradictions in the writer's arguments. You haven't even begun to address any of that.

And thanks for supporting myself and Paul Ellingworth in the grammatical ambiguity of 8:4. Doesn't that make your whole argument collapse? (Jake, too, take note. It would seem that grammarians do not style a past sense in the imperfect as an "exception" but simply an alternative.)

Earl Doherty

Bernard Muller

If Heb 8:4a is a present contrafactual case (as Carrier & I are thinking and because of 8:4b "there being [Greek present tense] those who offer [Greek present tense] the gifts according to the law"), then the apodosis ("he would not even be [imperfect] a priest") is set in the present (relative to when the epistle was written). Therefore the "if" clause (protasis), also refers to the same time period, and no other.
If the author wanted to imply Jesus was never upon the earth (despite 7:14!), he would have used the aorist as he did in Heb 4:8, therefore changing the "if he were" to "if he had been" (or "if he was").

EarlDoherty

Please, Bernard, do not try to rope Carrier in on a piece of ignorance he would not endorse. The words "being" and "offer" do not, grammatically, serve as a present tense. They are present-tense participles whose function is to line up with the tense of the main verb, in this case "en". They adopt the time sense of that main verb. If the main verb can be understood in a past sense (so Ellingworth's admission of ambiguity), so are the participles. And even if you wanted to parse the grammatical relationship between verb and participles differently, I have made the point that even a present sense understanding for the participles would be valid because the activity referred to is ongoing into the present. (That, in fact, as I have stated before, is probably the reason why he chose the option of using imperfect tenses to stand for a past contrafactual situation.)

I'm sure it's nice to be able to know what words an ancient author would have had to choose, Bernard, but the fact is that the words he chose were perfectly able to reflect a past sense (as has been argued here ad nauseum, while you yourself have previously acknowledged the ambiguity of the structure). And you still refuse to address the whole other dimension of this question, that a present understanding would be problematic and illogical, and create contradictions within his scenario.

Earl Doherty

EarlDoherty

I would like to suggest to the mods that aa and Chili be shipped off to their own board. Give them a 'world to bustle in' by themselves and eliminate a lot of the clutter on this one.

Stephan, will you second that motion?

Earl Doherty

Bernard Muller

to Doherty:
How do you know Carrier does not endorse anymore Heb 8:4 as a present contrafactual case?

In JNGNM, you said that considering Heb 8:4 as a present contrafactual would be the general rule. Considering it as past contrafactual is an exception. Then it takes you no less than six pages in order to make your case for the exception, before finally declaring Heb 8:4 is a smoking gun for Jesus never being on earth.
Do you think someone (from the original intended ancient audience) listening (most early Christians and others in these times were illiterate) to a reading of 'Hebrews' or even reading it, would (very quickly for the listeners!) go through your very own long analytic process in order to arrive at your conclusion? Do you think the author was expecting that from his audience, discarding the general rule in favour of an exception?
And if the author wanted to imply "Jesus was never on earth", why did he write, among other things, Heb 7:14?

It is interesting to see how the author defined the present at Heb 8:6:
"and now he hath obtained a more excellent service, how much also of a better covenant is he mediator, which on better promises hath been sanctioned,"
For him the present starts right after the sacrifice. That fits very well with Heb 8:4 as a present contrafactual.