Amaleq13

Please follow IIDB procedures by reporting this alleged attack instead of cluttering up a thread with prohibited complaints about moderation.

Toto

Another comment:

followed by some good comments from Sean, includingI didn't know that Internet Infidels was so important to Ben Witherington's readers. And I don't think the poem rises to irony. It reminds me a lot of former Attorney General John Ahscroft's musical efforts.

I will always remember Witherington for his defense of the James Ossuary, and his suggestion that DNA evidence from the bone fragments in it could be matched with DNA blood samples from the Shroud of Turin to show that it once held the biological brother of Jesus.

Sauron

He also made some pretty boneheaded statements regarding God "trickling out these artifacts (like the ossuary) to build our faith". And apparently he doesn't understand how C14 dating works, either. Small details, I know...

Ben C Smith

Advising against reading Ehrman is, IMVHO, very bad advice, agree or disagree.

Ben.

Toto

Steven: Please go back and read the thread that you cite. It was noted there that the originator probably was confused by Ehrman's statement that there is no commentary on that passage before the middle of the 12th century.

Please don't be so quick to accuse others of fraud or other sins when you can't even get details like that right. Should I assume that you have been blinded by your own ideological stance?

Steven Avery

Actually Greek fathers, however that is defined (some are translated, some are bilingual, there is no Chinese wall .. ) is one common method. Whether the very limited specific statement of convenience is even accurate I would have to research, I have seen similar claims go down in flames on examination. (Johannine Comma definitely, maybe 1 Timothy 3:16).

eg. Jerome clearly commented on the Pericope, and was quite fluent in Greek, and even translated from Greek manuscripts (and included the Pericope in the Latin Vulgate, for which he utilized the 'fountainhead', early Greek manuscripts, as well as early Old Latin manuscripts). Yet Jerome is not technically a "Greek father". You see, Toto, there are many tricks in the sleight-of-hand verbiage.

And please notice how you lost that snippet (Greek fathers). That is the idea of the Ehrman-esque deceptive presentation (however, he is not the only one, eg. similar is done by Daniel Wallace and the late Bruce Metzger, Ehrman's teacher).

So even your partially proper correction is a great example of the results of the deceptive style of writing of Bart Ehrman. The 'devil is in the details', the crafty word-parsed formulations, and especially the details and not-so-details omitted.

The result is clearly deceptive and deceitful since the goal is to give an impression not unlike that received by the poster. Hiding piles of manuscript and early writer evidence (oh, internal evidence too). Trying to make the Pericope look like a late middle-ages invention to the unwary, against literally piles of evidence (manuscripts in multiple languages - including many Greek manuscripts in the same period being referenced - as well and many early church writers).

This type of deception we run into frequently when folks who read these presentations come back and speak the intended sense that was manipulatively implied. (By the combination of unusual classifications combined with large-scale omissions).

Otherwise, thanks on the heads-up.

Ehrman on the Pericope

Deceptive and deceitful, surely.
Fraudulent .. can pass (definitionally viable, but a charged word).

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Roller

Is that a reference to De Jonge's paper on the Comma?

Steven Avery

Hi Roller,
No, the comparable comment on the Comma ..

"No Greek father ..."

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Roller

Do we also have Greek mss (prior to Codex Britannicus) with the Comma in it?

Steven Avery

Dunno the Greek manuscript dates offhand, some manuscripts may have some contention, and there are some indications that manuscripts existed that are now non-extant.

However none of that was the thread.
We have Greek writer references (and lots of other evidences).

Shalom,
Steven Avery