Steven Carr

I was looking at this.

I didn't follow it at the time, and wondered why Doherty pulled out.

Doherty wrote in one email.

'Considering that baptism was the foremost ritual in the Christian movement, that John was presumably a looming figure in Christian tradition, that he had supposedly baptized Jesus himself, perhaps Brian would like to venture an opinion on why such an event, or any aspect of it, cannot be found anywhere in the Christian record outside the Gospels, before Ignatius in the early second century.'

Brian responded :-
'Gospel of Hebrews'

Gospel of the Ebionites 4 John fell down before him (Jesus) and said: “I beseech thee, Lord, baptize thou me.” But he prevented him and said: “Suffer it; for thus it is fitting that everything should be fulfilled.”

Gospel of the Nazreans 2 Behold, the mother of the Lord and his brethren said to him: John the Bpatist baptizes unto the remission of sins, let us go and be baptized by him. But he (Jesus) said to them: Wherein have I sinned that I should go and be baptized by him? Unless what I have said is ignorance (a sin of ignorance)

Yet again I find it curious that a man that claims to be as well read as Earl, and who is prepared to drop names like the Didache, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Odes of Solomon, and the epistle of James, wondering aloud why there is no mention of the baptism of Jesus in these documents.

CARR
But surely Doherty was talking about 1st century documents, not these later Gospels.

----------------------------



Doherty wrote 'The exact content of Q can never be firmly established, but the generally accepted parts do not include John's baptism of Jesus. In fact, the opening of Q presents a preaching John who never clearly refers to a Jesus at all. Brian brings up John's deference to Jesus in the phrase, "I am not fit to unfasten his shoes." But let's take a look at the context of that in both Mark and Q.'



Trafford responded 'And how badly does Earl miss this opportunity to comprehend the embarrassment of the baptism of Jesus (first given to us in “Q” if you believe Earl, Mark if you believe most everyone else):

CARR
But Doherty said clearly that there was NO baptism in Q. How can we believe Earl when Earl said there was a baptism in Q, when Earl said the exact opposite?


CARR
http://www.cygnus-study.com/pageq.shtml has a reconstruction of Q , which does not mention any baptism of Jesus.

Whether or not this reconstruction corresponds to any document is not the issue here. What the issue is is that people who posit Q, posit a document which does not have Jesus baptised.

TRAFFORD wrote 'The theoretical “Q” has Jesus being baptized by John, and since Q is accepted as an early pre-Gospel tradition, it moves us much closer to the eye witness accounts that would have been the probable source of these sayings.'

CARR
But the theoretical Q doesn't....

It appears both sides were talking past each other. Doherty would say one thing, and Trafford would respond as though he had said something else.

Vinnie

That is a howler if I've ever seen one! Three questions:

How sure are you that all serious Q proponents do not think Q contained a baptismal account?

*cough* Meier *cough* Streeter *cough* Harnack *cough* Grundmann *cough* Shurmann *cough* Hoffman *cough* Jacobson *cough* Polag *cough*

I need some Halls. THis cough is terrible

Many Q scholars accept that there was a baptismal account in there bwteen the preaching of John and the temptation of Jesus.

How sure are you that Q never included a baptismal account?

What arguments led to your conclusion?

I'll post all the relevant arguments later and some cites from John Kloppenborg and John Meier who find themselves on opposite sides of the spectrum here.

Vinnie

Steven Carr

I was going by Burton Mack's translation of Q which does not include a baptism account, and by Doherty which says it does not. After all, it was Doherty debating.
see http://www.cygnus-study.com/pageq.shtml for a translation.

Q is that of Matthew and Luke, which is not attested by Mark.
As Mark attests to a baptism, Q , by definition, does not.

How can Q contains a baptism, if Mark does not , as Q is NOT the triple tradition?.

I stand corrected however, but I am curious how Crossan knows Q contained a baptism, when my understanding of Q is that it can not. Is this speculation on Crossan's part? Tell me more.

Q seemed to me to be used by Doherty as an anti-attestation device.

As Q is what is not attested by Mark, Luke and Matthew, anything attested by those Gospels can be refuted by Doherty by saying 'Look! Q does not attest them.'

Indeed, by the definition of Q, the more attestation something has in the Gospels, the less it appears in Q.

Makes it a useful tool for somebody saying that multiple attestation means little....

-------------------------------

There is a message at

http://www.didjesusexist.com/mark/01-48.txt

which says
'Typically, despite noting the underlying
mythological framework, and noting the contradictions in the sources (no baptism in Q, for example) Crossan nevertheless maintains that "baptism by John is one of the surest things we know about them both."

So does Crossan say there is a baptism in Q , or not?

Doctor X

For what it is worth I have been told that Mack thinks Mark may have used Q. He does not stress this at all--I do not remember it at all in his book on Mk, but it has been a long time since I read it.

Anyways, it seems clear that Lk and Mt "soften" the Mk account--the spirit does not lead Junior at the end. Both expand the whole "I am in this desert" story. Does that mean no baptism tradition exists in Q? That is a question for more knowledgeable people than me. Q will always be a "reconstruct"--unless someone finds it behind Olan's toilet or something!--and it is hard to argue "what" was or was not in it. One can make a "reasonable" argument that, say, the baptism was not a major parts since it is a "sayings source" rather than a "narrative source" and if major baptism sayings existed, Mt and Lk would have used them.

That involves a great deal of assumptions. "What" was in Q that was not quoted by Mt and/or Lk will remain speculation.

--J.D.

Vinnie

We have to remember that these are just two viewpoints amidst thousands and thousands of other viewpoints. I would also say that you were using Mack's "reconstruction and translation" given that there is no extant text of Q. Its not only an translation as if we had the original text in front of us.

This is a very naive definition of Q. Have you ever heard of Mark//Q overlapps? Well these do not fit within this definition and lots of scholars think there were Mark//Q overlapps. In fact, I would think Doherty would and I am pretty sure Mack does.

Q -- more accurately-- accounts for the double tradition material. It is by no means strictly limited to it though.

Not sure I get the question? At any rate, a baptism account in Q would be a Mark // Q overlapp.

It is my understanding that Crossan does not think Q contained a baptismal account because he stated exactly that in The Historical Jesus. In fact, he relied on Kloppenborg's treatment which I will get to later:

Crossan: "Notice to begin with that the Sayings Gospel Q, which is much more interested in John's preaching than John's baptizing, has apparently no mention at all of Jesus' baptism (Kloppenborg 1988:16)" The HJ p. 233-234

I won't comment on Doeherty untill I get through my free copy of his book compliments of PK. Full review is forthcoming

Crossan does NOT think Q had a baptism account but he still believes that baptism by John is one of the most surest things we can know about the historical Jesus.

I'm not at home right now. I'm out getting ready to watch the new Alias. I started drafting a response to whether Q had a baptism account today and I'll finish it tonight and post a link to it.

Vinnie

Vinnie

Made a new thread so this one can stay on topic

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...threadid=66973

Vinnie