mountainman

The team of academics who worked on the National Geographic controlled project to present gJudas to the world generally favored a 4th century date, and some of the reasons they favored a 4th century date I have mentioned above - the salienbt one being the close correspondence between the Codex Tchacos, containing gJudas and the Nag Hammadi Codices dated to the mid 4th century.

You must be aware that the basis of the mainstream dating for gJudas is reliant upon the testimony of Irenaeus.

aa5874

Dating by Paleography is NOT reliant on statements made by sources outside the Texts to be dated.

I am NOT AWARE that the application of a Palegraphic examination of gJudas requires the testimony of Irenaeus.

Now, to augment my point, when you stated that gJudas was DATED as early as c220 CE by C 14 then Irenaeus would have claimed gJudas was written long BEFORE that time period.

mountainman

Palaeographical assessment is reliant upon comparanda - comparing other textual sources and scripts. The palaeographic dating assessment for gJudas inclines towards a 4th century date - see below. The explicit reference to gJudas in the presumed 2nd century Irenaeus is being used to date gJudas to the 2nd century. For Christ's sake read the reports.



Palaeographical assessment of gJudas includes the comparanda of the Coptic Nag Hammadi codices securely dated to the mid 4th century. This explains the fact that the gJudas research team prefered a date for gJudas in the 4th century, despite the C14 dating.



I reject the inference that the mention of the gospel of Judas in the so-called 2nd century source "Irenaeus" is not forged or fabricated. You have elsewhere argued that "Irenaeus" has been corrupted by the church. I am making this corruption explicit.

My deduction is that these references to the heretics (no names are mentioned) and to the books of the heretics (many books are mentioned such as gJudas) were fabricated in the 4th century when the real historical conflict was happening between the orthodox canon followers and the heretical gnostic non canon followers. The heresiologists retrojected the Nicaean war of books into their pseudo-historical narratives.

When, and only when, at Nicaea, Constantine floated the "Canonical Constantine Bible" his OPPONENTS, whom we now refer to as the GNOSTIC HERETICS, with great dissident erudition (having the Constantine Bible and perhaps some of the writings of Eusebius before them) , reacted by the authorship of the non canonical gospels and acts. See "Leucius Charinus".

aa5874

So, the very C 14 dating which you seem to rely on still did NOT exclude gJudas from the 3rd century.

You seem to fail to understand that once an acceptable method of dating places gJudas in the 3rd-4th century it is extremely difficult to argue that
the Jesus story was unknown before Constantine.

Without the relevant DATA then you simply have NO argument.

mountainman

It is not extremely difficult. We know Constantine published the Bible containing the Jesus story c.325 CE. The dating of gJudas to the 3rd-4th century does not precude the possibility that it was authored in the 4th century after Constantine published the Bible Jesus story c.325 CE.

This possibility conforms to the general observation that the non canonical material is subsequent to, and a derivative of, the canonical material. The argument, consistent with this evidence, is that both sets of literature appeared very late, that's all.

aa5874

Again, once gJudas is DATED by an acceptable method of dating to the 3rd-4th century then NO argument can be conclusive that gJudas was written in the 4th century AFTER 325 CE.

You must understand the significance of the ACTUAL DATE given to the Text.

You simply cannot make any real case with the C14 dating of gJudas C 3RD-4TH century.

The evidence support MY argument 100% that there was NO Jesus stories in the 1st century and before c 70 CE.

That is PRECISELY what I PREDICTED.

Duvduv

If there are no conflicting versions of the text concerning the age of Jesus until Claudius according to Irenaeus, then the only logical conclusion is that whoever wrote about the subject was NOT the same person who wrote about the existence of the four gospels, epistles and Acts elsewhere in Against Heresies, but an earlier writer reflecting ideas about Jesus that existed BEFORE the emergence of the NT texts that have Paul end his life before the destruction of the Temple, mention of his not having visited Jerusalem for 14 years, and a long overall career.

Yet it surprises me that the later redactors didn't immediately realize that the whole discussion about a HJ living into his fifties under Claudius directly affects the timeline involving Paul's preaching and death before the destruction of the Temple according to dating based on Acts and the epistles.

mountainman

The argument I am making is hypothetical not conclusive. Hypothetically christian demographics in the 1st and 2nd and 3rd centuries were zero.



Did you know that ...

1. The final report for the C14 test has not been published since 2005.
2. Preliminary report shows some problems (See Peter Head's report).
3. Preliminary date via C14: 220 to 340 CE. (Papyrus harvest date)
4. A fragment dated 333 CE was conveniently ignored.

A case may be made that most of the Greek gnostic gospels and acts were all authored during the period 325-336 CE as a literary reaction to the Imperial government of the Roman Empire running with the Canonical Jesus Story as its "Holy Writ". Vaticanus and Alexandrinus may be exemplars of the 50 "quasi-canonical" Constantine Bibles.

Subsequently, these Greek (to be known as non canonical) texts were searched out and destroyed and their preservers executed. Finally some were smuggled 400 miles up the Nile to be translated to Coptic and preserved in a series of codices that include the Nage Hammadi Codices AND the Tchacos codex containing gJudas. These were eventually buried for fear of discovery. They were known as the apochrypha - the "hidden books".



Yes it does.

But the investigation is not yet over. For example I have never seen you address the evidence of the non canonical Jesus stories, when they were written and why, and by whom and where, and how they relate to the canonical Jesus stories. Who the fuck was Leucius Charinus?

My bet is that there was no Jesus story in the top 40 charts until Constantine turned up in Rome and paraded Maxentius's head through its streets on a pike, before he sent it off to Africa as a stern warning.

Duvduv

Mountainman , one of the most noteworthy aspects of the non-canonical texts is that they rely on the historical outline found in the canonical texts, I.e. involving assorted disciples, the Virgin Mary, Pilate. They don't seem to wander off the basic known framework. Now if neither the official religion (Arian or Orthodox) nor their opponents veered away from the basc framework, why would this be so?
Why would these other texts remain so attached to the basic storyline?

aa5874

Well, it is still a very weak argument. Whenever an argument is made it should be SOLIDLY supported by the evidence.



Again, you MUST get evidence FIRST--DATA FIRST before you attempt to argue. That is basic.


It is all over until NEW DATA is found. It is unheard of that ALL and every piece of information is required to resolve a matter.

Once there is enough DATA then that is sufficient.

We have the DATED Texts by Paleography and C 14 and it can be seen that there is a BIG BLACK Hole for Jesus, the Disciples and Paul in the 1st century BEFORE C70 CE and that is ENOUGH.

As soon as the DATED TEXTS are reviewed then I will do likewise.

As of now, the DATED Text support the theory that the Jesus cult was INITIATED in the 2nd century.

This means the Entire Canon is chronologically and historically bogus.