Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Toto · 01-05-2013, 12:51 AM

Epistula Apostolurum on ECW: "Estimated Range of Dating: 140-150 A.D"

The basis for the dating appears to be how it fits the gnostic-Catholic struggles of the second century, as well as the fact "The Coptic version in ch. 17 places the end of the world at 120 years past Pentecost, while the Ethiopic version states that 150 years would pass. A likely explanation would be that the document was originally composed shortly before 150 C.E. and was revised by a redactor when the prediction didn't come to pass."

The earliest manuscript is a 4th century Coptic translation.

maryhelena · 01-05-2013, 12:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

The Jesus story was ALREADY known when Paul was a Persecutor.

:thumbs:

And Earl supports the idea that the gospel JC crucifixion story came from scripture.

Quote:

Earl, the gospel JC is a crucified figure. That figure does not exist in Q - ..................The crucified JC is the focus of the gospel story. Where did that crucifixion story come from?

here

Earl Doherty:

Quote:

Where did the crucified Jesus come from, if not from Q which had no crucifixion story? Simple. He came from scripture. Just where the epistles tell us it came from. Everything about the epistles' Jesus came from scripture, which is the only source they ever refer to in making any statements about him, whether personal characteristics, words he 'spoke', the 'events' of his death and rising, even his relationship to David or his connection with Abraham.

here

But notice the switch here. One second Doherty is answering the question of where did the crucified Jesus come from - he says scripture. And the next second Doherty has jumped to the Pauline epistles. Why? If the crucified JC can be interpreted from scripture - then the gospel writers were able to do just that without needing the Pauline epistles!

Surely, "What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.".....

Paul and the Pauline epistles are not needed for the gospel crucified JC story. The crucified Jesus gospel story preceded Paul.

my bolding

mountainman · 01-05-2013, 01:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Epistula Apostolurum on ECW: "Estimated Range of Dating: 140-150 A.D"

The basis for the dating appears to be how it fits the gnostic-Catholic struggles of the second century, as well as the fact "The Coptic version in ch. 17 places the end of the world at 120 years past Pentecost, while the Ethiopic version states that 150 years would pass. A likely explanation would be that the document was originally composed shortly before 150 C.E. and was revised by a redactor when the prediction didn't come to pass."

The earliest manuscript is a 4th century Coptic translation.

From ECC on the dating of the Epistula Apostolorum, Cameron writes:

Quote:

Originally Posted by ECC

The Epistula Apostolorum was composed sometime after the gospels of the New Testament and before the Coptic translation was made in the fourth or fifth century. The freedom in its use of traditions, the adaption of the gospels into regulations for church order, the way in which the creed's position is consolidated and used to combat its gnostic opponents, and the co-opting of the apostle Paul as a subordinate of the emerging "catholic" church - all of this suggests that this document was composed in the mid- to late second century.

The suggestion is an hypothesis. This text may not have been early at all and it appears to fit into the apochryphal basket, not the canonical basket.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Final paragraph of TEXT of Epistula Apostolorum

51 And when he had said this, and had finished his discourse with us, he said unto us again: Behold, on the third day and at the third hour shall he come which hath sent me, that I may depart with him. And as he so spake, there was thunder and lightning and an earthquake, and the heavens parted asunder, and there appeared

a light (bright) cloud

which bore him up. And there came voices of many angels, rejoicing and singing praises and saying: Gather us, O Priest, unto the light of the majesty. And when they drew nigh unto the firmament, we heard his voice saying unto us: Depart hence in peace.

Bright cloud warning! Jesus and the apostles often appear to have travelled around by means of bright clouds in the Gnostic Acts. The bright cloud appears to be a tell-tale give-away that someone was writing pulp fiction.

Historicists continually "suggest" early dates for all texts but without real manuscript evidence. The mass of tendrils of the manuscript evidence seems to commence from the 4th century onward.

The Gnostic-Catholic struggles from Nicaea onwards have been concealed but an argument may be made that there were very real struggles between the orthodox canon-following bishops appointed by the Boss, and the remnants of the Graeco-Roman-Egypto pagan priesthoods and the philosophical and academic schools of Plato at al. Epiphanius tells us that these people were classed as heretics. I think there is no compelling evidence to date this text earlier than the 4th century, when the Gnostics were forced to become monotheistic state "Chrestians"

aa5874 · 01-05-2013, 06:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Epistula Apostolurum on ECW: "Estimated Range of Dating: 140-150 A.D"

The basis for the dating appears to be how it fits the gnostic-Catholic struggles of the second century, as well as the fact "The Coptic version in ch. 17 places the end of the world at 120 years past Pentecost, while the Ethiopic version states that 150 years would pass. A likely explanation would be that the document was originally composed shortly before 150 C.E. and was revised by a redactor when the prediction didn't come to pass."

The earliest manuscript is a 4th century Coptic translation.

Again, those are PRESUMED dates. There is ZERO Provenance for the Epistula Apostolurum.

No 2nd century Apologetic writer ever mentioned the Epistula Apostolurum.

It is totally absurd and highly illogical to use a single unprovenanced source to argue that Peter/Cephas in the NT Canon is not Peter/Cepas in gJohn and Galatians.

All Apologetic writers that mentioned Peter/Cephas in Galatians do NOT Deny that Peter/Cephas is the same character in the Gospels.

aa5874 · 01-05-2013, 07:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gurugeorge

... in Paul, "Peter" and "Cephas" could easily be two different people (that there was still a tradition within the Christian cult that held them as two different people at least up till 160 CE is shown by the Epistula Apostolorum), and GMark be an early case of mistaken identity, with GJohn being a later example of the same.

You do not even realize that you have introduced an Apologetic source that DESTROYS your Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and DESTROYS your claim about the Apostles Peter/Cephas and James Not being Disciples of the supposed Jesus.

The Epistula Apostolorum Identifies the Apostles as DISCIPLES of Jesus and List the Names of John, James, Peter and Cephas as Apostles/DISCIPLES of Jesus.

Epistula Apostolorum

Quote:

1 The book which Jesus Christ revealed unto his disciples: and how that Jesus Christ revealed the book for the company (college) of the apostles, the disciples of Jesus Christ, even the book which is for all men........

2 We, John, Thomas, Peter, Andrew, James, Philip, Batholomew, Matthew, Nathanael, Judas Zelotes, and Cephas, write unto the churches of the east and the west, of the north and the south, the declaring and imparting unto you that which concerneth our Lord Jesus Christ: we do write according as we have seen and heard and touched him, after that he was risen from the dead: and how that he revealed unto us things mighty and wonderful and true.

The Apostles/Disciples of Jesus would meet Paul in the Epistula Apostolorum.

Epistula Apostolorum

Quote:

31 And behold a man shall meet you, whose name is Saul, which being interpreted is Paul: he is a Jew, circumcised according to the law, and he shall receive my voice from heaven with fear and terror and trembling. And his eyes shall be blinded, and by your hands by the sign of the cross shall they be protected...

Jesus, the Son of the Ghost was ON EARTH and born of MARY in the Epistula Apostolorum.

Epistula Apostolorum

Quote:

In God, the Lord, the Son of God, do we believe, that he is the word become flesh: that of Mary the holy virgin he took a body, begotten of the Holy Ghost, not of the will (lust) of the flesh, but by the will of God: that he was wrapped in swaddling clothes in Bethlehem and made manifest, and grew up and came to ripe age, when also we beheld it...

In the Epistula Apostolorum, Jesus was CRUCIFIED on EARTH by Pontius Pilate.

Epistula Apostolorum

Quote:

9 Concerning whom we testify that the Lord is he who was crucified by Pontius Pilate and Archelaus between the two thieves (and with them he was taken down from the tree of the cross, Eth.), and was buried in a place which is called the place of a skull (Kranion).

In the Epistula Jesus could NOT have been crucified in the heavenly realm because TWO THIEVES were crucified with Jesus.

The Epistula Apostolorum utterly DESTROYS the Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and DESTROYS any claim that the supposed Apostles Peter/Cephas and James were NOT the Apostles/Disciples of Jesus in the Pauline letters.

EarlDoherty · 01-05-2013, 10:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

Earl, unless your prepared to withdraw what you said in the post below - you very much need to allow your theories to go as far as they are able.

Quote:

The entire teaching, miracle-working and prophetic content of the Gospels is derived not from Paul, whose celestial Christ had nothing to do with such things, but from an imagined founder of the Q movement (that he was imagined and inserted into the evolving Q tradition at a later date I have fully argued). Even the death and rising dimension of the Gospel Jesus, which Mark added to the Q Jesus, cannot be firmly shown to be based on the Pauline Christ, though I suspect that the latter type of movement had some influence.

here

That statement leads to the very obvious conclusion that the gospel crucified JC story did not, in anyway whatsoever, need the Pauline epistles. Perhaps, Earl, you need to face that reality. A conclusion supported by Paul's own story that he persecuted the 'church of god' and that his JC was 'born of a woman' and of the 'seed of David'. That, Earl, is the conclusion your imaginary founder figure of Q leads to. With such an imaginary Q founder figure, you have no need to run rings around these two Pauline quotations. Paul is supporting your imaginary Q founder figure. An imaginary figure, a mythological figure, an ahistorical figure - a figure that can be 'born' any which way and from any lineage it's creators so devise.

Mh, you have made a connecting leap which is entirely unjustified. Just because Paul says that his JC was 'born of a woman' and 'of the seed of David' does not justify concluding that for this he is dependent on the "imaginary founder figure of Q." There are other sources for his ideas than the Q Jesus. For example, "of the seed of David" is declared by Paul to have been derived from scripture, not from traditions about an imaginary Q founder. And "born of woman" even if authentic (which there is some reasonable cause to doubt) does not have to refer to the birth of anyone associated with the Q movement. Where is your justification for this?

In fact, these two bare elements have to be set beside all the other traditions from an imaginary Q founder which should thereby have been available to Paul, namely the "teaching, miracle-working and prophetic" elements which are utterly missing from all the epistle writers, not just Paul. And if those Q elements were already included in a literary Gospel creation (such as you seem to be championing by placing the Pauline literature post-Gospels), then there is all the more reason why we should expect to find such traditions within the Pauline writings. Unfortunately, they are completely missing, there and everywhere else in the epistolary record.

And just because I allow for the possibility that the dying and rising dimension of the Jesus of the Gospels does not absolutely have to be derived from the Pauline Christ cult, does not make it the case that I am declaring it so. So please don't present your perception of my theories as though that is exactly what I am doing.

Earl Doherty

EarlDoherty · 01-05-2013, 11:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

Earl Doherty:

Quote:

Where did the crucified Jesus come from, if not from Q which had no crucifixion story? Simple. He came from scripture. Just where the epistles tell us it came from. Everything about the epistles' Jesus came from scripture, which is the only source they ever refer to in making any statements about him, whether personal characteristics, words he 'spoke', the 'events' of his death and rising, even his relationship to David or his connection with Abraham.

here

But notice the switch here. One second Doherty is answering the question of where did the crucified Jesus come from - he says scripture. And the next second Doherty has jumped to the Pauline epistles. Why? If the crucified JC can be interpreted from scripture - then the gospel writers were able to do just that without needing the Pauline epistles!

Surely, "What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.".....

Paul and the Pauline epistles are not needed for the gospel crucified JC story. The crucified Jesus gospel story preceded Paul.

my bolding

Just because the Gospels could theoretically have derived their crucifixion of Jesus from scripture, does not mean that they necessarily did! What kind of logic is being used here?

Conversation overheard on a bus: "I see you have a head of lettuce in your shopping bag, just like I do. That means you must shop at the same supermarket as me!"

But an examination of one of the shopping bags shows that it contains other items which the speaker's bag does not, despite the two shoppers' common tastes in some food. If the Pauline literature derived its dying and rising motifs from the JC story (IOW, as mh thinks, Paul comes after the Gospels and is basically based upon them) why do he and all the other epistle writers not show a knowledge of all the other elements of the JC story, the teaching, miracle-working and prophetic activities of the JC?

She has asked where the Pauline ideas came from? I answered: from scripture. (Supported by the fact that Paul actually declares this.) To counter by saying that the Gospels could have gotten their crucifixion from the same source, is not only a non-sequitur, it runs counter to what mh herself believes in. More deficient logic.

Earl Doherty

maryhelena · 01-05-2013, 11:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

Earl, unless your prepared to withdraw what you said in the post below - you very much need to allow your theories to go as far as they are able.

Quote:

The entire teaching, miracle-working and prophetic content of the Gospels is derived not from Paul, whose celestial Christ had nothing to do with such things, but from an imagined founder of the Q movement (that he was imagined and inserted into the evolving Q tradition at a later date I have fully argued). Even the death and rising dimension of the Gospel Jesus, which Mark added to the Q Jesus, cannot be firmly shown to be based on the Pauline Christ, though I suspect that the latter type of movement had some influence.

here

That statement leads to the very obvious conclusion that the gospel crucified JC story did not, in anyway whatsoever, need the Pauline epistles. Perhaps, Earl, you need to face that reality. A conclusion supported by Paul's own story that he persecuted the 'church of god' and that his JC was 'born of a woman' and of the 'seed of David'. That, Earl, is the conclusion your imaginary founder figure of Q leads to. With such an imaginary Q founder figure, you have no need to run rings around these two Pauline quotations. Paul is supporting your imaginary Q founder figure. An imaginary figure, a mythological figure, an ahistorical figure - a figure that can be 'born' any which way and from any lineage it's creators so devise.

Mh, you have made a connecting leap which is entirely unjustified. Just because Paul says that his JC was 'born of a woman' and 'of the seed of David' does not justify concluding that for this he is dependent on the "imaginary founder figure of Q."

But it allows for it. An imaginary Q founder figure allows for imaginary birth stories and imaginary stories about linage.

Quote:

There are other sources for his ideas than the Q Jesus. For example, "of the seed of David" is declared by Paul to have been derived from scripture, not from traditions about an imaginary Q founder. And "born of woman" even if authentic (which there is some reasonable cause to doubt) does not have to refer to the birth of anyone associated with the Q movement. Where is your justification for this?

Earl, I'm presenting your argument for an imaginary founder of the Q community. From that perspective it is possible for a storyline regarding the birth and linage of this imaginary founder to be created. An imaginary figure needs some dressing up - surely, can't be naked?

Quote:

In fact, these two bare elements have to be set beside all the other traditions from an imaginary Q founder which should thereby have been available to Paul, namely the "teaching, miracle-working and prophetic" elements which are utterly missing from all the epistle writers, not just Paul. And if those Q elements were already included in a literary Gospel creation (such as you seem to be championing by placing the Pauline literature post-Gospels), then there is all the more reason why we should expect to find such traditions within the Pauline writings. Unfortunately, they are completely missing, there and everywhere else in the epistolary record.

There is no reason to expect Paul to further the imaginary story about the imaginary Q founder figure. What he has done is indicate that the Jesus people, prior to his time, upheld such a figure. A figure 'born of a woman' and from the 'seed of David'. Paul's focus was elsewhere - in a cosmic crucified JC figure. A cosmic context, a spiritual or intellectual context, of neither Jew nor Greek.

Quote:

And just because I allow for the possibility that the dying and rising dimension of the Jesus of the Gospels does not absolutely have to be derived from the Pauline Christ cult, does not make it the case that I am declaring it so. So please don't present your perception of my theories as though that is exactly what I am doing.

Earl Doherty

My perception? Earl, I take your words for what they are saying. In this case, that you "allow for the possibility that the dying and rising dimension of the Jesus of the Gospels does not absolutely have to be derived from the Pauline Christ cult..."

Great! That allows for the gospel JC story to be a story that does not need any Pauline input. That position shoots down the argument, of some mythicists, that a Pauline cosmic crucified JC has been historicized as the gospel crucified JC.

The gospel JC crucified story is not a historicization of the Pauline cosmic crucified JC.

maryhelena · 01-05-2013, 11:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

Earl Doherty:

Quote:

Where did the crucified Jesus come from, if not from Q which had no crucifixion story? Simple. He came from scripture. Just where the epistles tell us it came from. Everything about the epistles' Jesus came from scripture, which is the only source they ever refer to in making any statements about him, whether personal characteristics, words he 'spoke', the 'events' of his death and rising, even his relationship to David or his connection with Abraham.

here

But notice the switch here. One second Doherty is answering the question of where did the crucified Jesus come from - he says scripture. And the next second Doherty has jumped to the Pauline epistles. Why? If the crucified JC can be interpreted from scripture - then the gospel writers were able to do just that without needing the Pauline epistles!

Surely, "What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.".....

Paul and the Pauline epistles are not needed for the gospel crucified JC story. The crucified Jesus gospel story preceded Paul.

my bolding

Just because the Gospels could theoretically have derived their crucifixion of Jesus from scripture, does not mean that they necessarily did! What kind of logic is being used here?

Conversation overheard on a bus: "I see you have a head of lettuce in your shopping bag, just like I do. That means you must shop at the same supermarket as me!"

But an examination of one of the shopping bags shows that it contains other items which the speaker's bag does not, despite the two shoppers' common tastes in some food. If the Pauline literature derived its dying and rising motifs from the JC story (IOW, as mh thinks, Paul comes after the Gospels and is basically based upon them) why do he and all the other epistle writers not show a knowledge of all the other elements of the JC story, the teaching, miracle-working and prophetic activities of the JC?

She has asked where the Pauline ideas came from? I answered: from scripture. (Supported by the fact that Paul actually declares this.) To counter by saying that the Gospels could have gotten their crucifixion from the same source, is not only a non-sequitur, it runs counter to what mh herself believes in. More deficient logic.

Earl Doherty

Earl, I've been dealing with your argument, not mine...:huh:

aa5874 · 01-05-2013, 11:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

... If the Pauline literature derived its dying and rising motifs from the JC story (IOW, as mh thinks, Paul comes after the Gospels and is basically based upon them) why do he and all the other epistle writers not show a knowledge of all the other elements of the JC story, the teaching, miracle-working and prophetic activities of the JC?..

Your question is really irrelevant because the author of Acts presented a story of Paul which clearly places Saul/Paul AFTER the Birth, Miracles, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus, After the preaching of the Jesus story by the Disciples and AFTER the Persecution of the Jesus cult---After the death of the supposed Stephen.

And further, in Acts, it is claimed Saul/Paul consulted with the disciples in Damacus before he preached the Jesus story. See Acts 9.19-20.

In Acts, Saul/Paul does NOT preach a Celestial Never on Earth Jesus.

These are the words of Paul in Acts.

Acts 13

Quote:

..... he raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he gave testimony , and said , I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfilall my will.

23 Of this man's seed hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus

24. When John had first preached before his coming the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel. 25And as John fulfilled his course, he said , Whom think ye that I am ? I am not he. But, behold , there cometh one after me, whose shoes of his feet I am not worthy to loose .

26Men and brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you feareth God, to you is the word of this salvation sent .

27For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not , nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him.

28And though they found no cause of death in him, yet desired they Pilate that he should be slain . 29And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a sepulchre.

30But God raised him from the dead

31 And he was seen many days of them which came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are his witnesses unto the people.

In the Canon itself it is actually claimed Paul preached that Jesus was SLAIN by people in Jerusalem and was placed on a tree and then buried after which he resurrected and was seen by his followers.

It is clear that there is NO story anywhere about Paul that he preached a Celestial Never on Earth Jesus.

The Celestial Never on Earth Jesus of Paul is a modern invention--completely unheard of in all antiquity by any source.

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01-05-2013, 12:51 AM	#161
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	Epistula Apostolurum on ECW: "Estimated Range of Dating: 140-150 A.D" The basis for the dating appears to be how it fits the gnostic-Catholic struggles of the second century, as well as the fact "The Coptic version in ch. 17 places the end of the world at 120 years past Pentecost, while the Ethiopic version states that 150 years would pass. A likely explanation would be that the document was originally composed shortly before 150 C.E. and was revised by a redactor when the prediction didn't come to pass." The earliest manuscript is a 4th century Coptic translation.

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