Jeffrey Gibson

Ah, I see. The Greek was missing the font cue and didn't come through. It should read εἰρηνοποιός.

Jeffrey

Jeffrey Gibson

You have been nowhere near "on topic" since the modern question of the historicity/reality of the devil, god, and angels is absolutely irrelevant to, and has no bearing whatsoever, on the question of whether according to Matthew and Luke the "temptation" they report Jesus experiencing "in the wilderness" involved enticement to sin and centered in determining the depth of Jesus' resolve to follow the path of the εἰρηνοποιός -- which are the major questions I'm intent to deal with in my article.

Instead of pointing out issues that are irrelevant for answering these questions, perhaps you'd grace us with your informed opinion on, say, whether the case I make for πειράζω not being used in Koine to signal "enticement" is sound, or whether the expectation of Messianic behaviour outlined in Pesikta Rabbati was indeed current in the first century, or whether Mt. 4:1-11//Lk. 4:1-13 do not present the Jesus' WT as a recapitulation of the testing that Deuteronomy 6-8 tells us Israel was subjected to after the Exodus.

But you haven't actually read the article, have you.

Jeffrey

Toto

I could guess that, but even then it seems that something is missing - the rest of the sentence doesn't scan. Did the "font cue" blank out a few more words?

There is an obvious missing font at the top of page 56 - "Jesus was not a qeio/j a0nh/r "

Jeffrey Gibson

Hmm. Will have to look.

Here's the sentence in context:

Far more plausible in my view is the claim that the reason we have the story of Jesus' WT explicated in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke in the form and fashion we do, is that the Matthean and Lukan versions of the WTS are grounded in the fact, widely known in, and frequently proclaimed by "the church", that during his ministry, and especially in his passion, Jesus was not only subjected by "adversaries" who proclaimed their own insight into the ways and purposes of God to tests of faithfulness, but that these tests always focused in some fashion, if not explicitly, on the question of whether God actually demands, as Jesus thought and declared he did, that to be a true Israelite, one must follow even unto death the path of the εἰρηνοποιός and show mercy and compassion to those his adversaries (among whom his disciples sometimes numbered) deemed enemies of Israel. Thus, the particular shape that the "church" gave to the source of Mt. 4:1-11//Lk. 4:1-13 is due to the setting out in fixed fashion not some unconstrained imaginings of early followers of Jesus about what they thought Jesus must done/ undergone when he was alone in the wilderness, but a programmatic summary of memories of actual events in Jesus' life.

Got it. Thanks.

Jeffrey

patcleaver

Since I have been specifically named and asked by Jeffrey Gibson not to comment on his presuppositions, I feel absolutely compelled to do so. Belief in the historical Jesus requires dozens of presuppositions that there is no evidence for, but I am only going to mention a few that seem particularly relevant to his article. as follows:
1. Jeffrey presupposes that the Jesus character portrayed in the gospels is historical.
2. Jeffrey presupposes that the historical Jesus underwent a temptation event.
3. Jeffery presupposes that the historical Jesus correctly told his apostles about his temptation event.
4. Jeffery presupposes that the apostles correctly repeated to others the story of Jesus' temptation event.
5. Jeffery presupposes that the others correctly repeated to still others the story of Jesus' temptation event.
6. Jeffery presupposes that after unknown times of repetition to still others, the still others correctly repeated the story of Jesus' temptation event to anonymous authors we call Mark, Matthew and Luke.
7. Jeffery presupposes that during these repetitions that the story of Jesus' temptation was accurately translated from Aramaic into Greek.
8. Jeffery presupposes that the anonymous authors correctly reported the story of Jesus' temptation event - even though the stories are different.
9. Jeffery presupposes that the story of Jesus' temptation event has been reliably copied (not incorrectly copied or intentionally interpolated) as it was copied dozens of times before the 5th century.
10. Jeffery presupposes that the meaning of the temptation event can be understood by critical analysis of the meaning of the Greek Text in view of the Jewish Scriptures and rabbinical expectations.

Not only does Jeffery not present any evidence or arguments to support the legitimacy of any of these presuppositions, he does not even explicitly mention these presuppositions so that his facts and arguments can be fairly judged.

Even though there is almost no chance that any of these presuppositions could be correct, I will discuss the last one assuming for arguments sake that the others are true.

We allegedly have a Aramaic speaker named Jesus reporting some temptation event to Aramaic speaking apostles who repeat it to others and so on, and then the story is eventually translated and written down in Greek. It is not reasonable to believe that any analysis of the Greek text can be used to accurately determine the meaning of the original Aramaic story. For example, the selection of the Greek word πειράζω is not particularly meaningful because it might have just been a poor choice for a translation from an Aramaic word that itself was a poor choice of words for what really happened in the temptation event.

Words usually have a variety of meanings, and your argument that πειράζω usually means tested and not tempted is simply speculation, unless you have a large number of unambiguous sample uses of that word and words with similar meanings - which we do not have. You have shown that πειράζω might mean tested, even though all the translations of the gospels that I am aware of translate it as tempted, but we all know that all those translations are simply propaganda anyway.

We have no idea what Aramaic word or words that the Greek word πειράζω was intended to translate, and we have no idea how well that Aramaic word or words captured the gist of what actually happened in the temptation event.

We have no reliable evidence that Jesus was a Scholar of the Jewish Scriptures. Your analysis of temptations in the Jewish Scriptures can have no bearing whatsoever on understanding the nature of temptation event that actually happened even if it was a vision or dream.

If the event were purely fictional then the author of Mark must have been a Scholar of the Jewish Scriptures and your analysis might explain what the author meant by the event. However, if the event were true in some way, then it would have been sufficiently unique, compared to the events reported in the Jewish Scriptures, that your analysis would simply be speculation.

Similarly, the expectation of Messianic behavior outlined in Pesikta Rabbati (not mentioned in your article) is only relevant if Jesus was aware of them and incorporated them in his story or vision; or if Mark was aware of them and he was writing fiction. You have not presented any evidence or made any arguments that either of those things could be true.

Belief in Historical Jesus is intended by apologists to be a roadblock to critical analysis of his words and deeds in the New Testament.

Toto

patcleaver - Jeffrey does not make the assumptions you list. You could at least read the article or the other posts in this thread before writing that long post.

youngalexander

if

patcleaver

:blush: :blush: :blush: :blush: :blush: :blush:

If your right, that he does not depend on the presuppositions that I listed above, then thanks for the correction, and I apologise to Jeffrey. I wish Jeffery had responded because if I am wrong, then he should shoot me down in flames by pointing out why I am wrong.

I only scanned the article and read the conclusion. I was at least partially depending on others which I should not have done. I will carefully read it and offer corrections.

Jeffrey Gibson

If??? You mean you wrote all that you wrote without having actually read what I wrote and, more importantly, without actually knowing whether or not I did what you -- in what can only be called one of the most extreme instances of jack assed pomposity and presumptuousness I have ever seen on this board -- accused me of doing?

Let me get this straight. You are asking for a courtesy from me that you couldn't be bothered to extend towards me?

Why one earth should I?

Besides that, all that is necessary to show that you are wrong in everything you -- notably, by your own admittance, without any warrant whatsoever -- presupposed I presupposed (pot meet kettle) is in the article that you did not read.

And one question, Pat. Now that we know how you approach the things you critique, why should anyone here ever take seriously anything you claim about matters NT (let alone linguistic)?


Jeffrey

patcleaver

the above is good reason to think that you are presupposing an HJ in your article.

There are parts of your article that sounded to me like you are presupposing that Jesus actually existed.

The only reason that I think that I may have been incorrect is that Toto said that you did not presuppose HJ. Toto's assurance is really the only reason that I am reading it. I am half way through it, and I will give you a more educated critique when I finish reading it.