Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Zenaphobe · 07-04-2009, 08:52 PM

Matthew 27:51 (New International Version)

Quote:

51At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split.

Jesus dies and at that moment the temple veil is torn from top to bottom.

Wouldn't something of this significance have been the talk of the city and recorded as a part of Jewish lore?

Josephus recorded other events concerning the temple but this tearing of the veil did not find mention.

How should we understand the Gospel accounts concerning the veil? Did early Christians believe this was a literal event that just passed under everyone's radar?

The source of these musings http://books.google.com/books?id=hwg...esult&resnum=4

Transient · 07-04-2009, 09:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zenaphobe

Matthew 27:51 (New International Version)

Quote:

51At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split.

Jesus dies and at that moment the temple veil is torn from top to bottom.

Wouldn't something of this significance have been the talk of the city and recorded as a part of Jewish lore?

Josephus recorded other events concerning the temple but this tearing of the veil did not find mention.

How should we understand the Gospel accounts concerning the veil? Did early Christians believe this was a literal event that just passed under everyone's radar?

The source of these musings http://books.google.com/books?id=hwg...esult&resnum=4

Trouble is - you try sticking this sort of stuff up at tweb - all you will get is, apart from heaps of insults, "Blah blah - argument from silence!"
To a non-believer it adds up to something but to a believer it means nothing.

judge · 07-04-2009, 10:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zenaphobe

How should we understand the Gospel accounts concerning the veil? Did early Christians believe this was a literal event that just passed under everyone's radar?

We don't know that it passed under everyones radar. What we know is that Josephus writing many years later did not mention it.

Clivedurdle · 07-04-2009, 11:10 PM

Archaeology and seismology - those split rocks would still be there. And we have very detailed accounts of vesuvius...

yalla · 07-04-2009, 11:12 PM

I'm sure [?] I read somewhere once an account that the veil, torn I think, was paraded in Rome in 70 ish CE as part of Titus' victory parade.
But I can't find my source for that and I suspect I may have imagined it.

Anybody able to verify that or not?

Clivedurdle · 07-04-2009, 11:15 PM

What with an earthquake, the dead being raised and the sun darkening at noon there must be some external corroboration. That centurion must have written a report.

Self-Mutation · 07-04-2009, 11:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zenaphobe

Matthew 27:51 (New International Version)

Quote:

51At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split.

Jesus dies and at that moment the temple veil is torn from top to bottom.

Wouldn't something of this significance have been the talk of the city and recorded as a part of Jewish lore?

Josephus recorded other events concerning the temple but this tearing of the veil did not find mention.

How should we understand the Gospel accounts concerning the veil? Did early Christians believe this was a literal event that just passed under everyone's radar?

The source of these musings http://books.google.com/books?id=hwg...esult&resnum=4

Why would NON CHRISTIANS write about the tearing of the temple veil? They did not want Christianity to be true. They were executing and torturing Christians left and right trying to get rid of their religion.

Yeah, it makes total sense for them to write down the facts of a religion they desperately hated.

Toto · 07-05-2009, 01:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Self-Mutation

...

Why would NON CHRISTIANS write about the tearing of the temple veil? ...

Perhaps they would write about it if it happened?

But this seems to be a symbolic, literary device, not an actual event.

This essay by Mark Ulansky may be of interest: THE HEAVENLY VEIL TORN: MARK'S COSMIC "INCLUSIO"

Quote:

It has been debated for centuries which veil it was that Mark was referring to: was it the outer veil, which hung in front of the doors at the entrance to the temple, or the inner veil which separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple? [4] Many interpreters have assumed that it was the inner veil, and have understood the tearing of the veil to have been Mark's way of symbolizing the idea that the death of Jesus destroyed the barrier which separated God from humanity. Recently, however, favor seems to have shifted to the view that it was the outer veil, the strongest argument for which is that Mark seems to have intended the awestruck response of the centurion to the manner of Jesus' death (Mk 15:39) to have been inspired by his seeing the miraculous event of the tearing of the veil, but he could only have seen this event if it was the outer veil that tore, since the inner veil was hidden from view inside the temple. [5]

. . . According to Josephus, this outer veil was a gigantic curtain 80 feet high. It was, he says, a

Babylonian tapestry, with embroidery of blue and fine linen, of scarlet also and purple, wrought with marvelous skill. Nor was this mixture of materials without its mystic meaning: it typified the universe....

Then Josephus tells us what was pictured on this curtain:

Portrayed on this tapestry was a panorama of the entire heavens.... [7] [emphasis mine]

In other words, the outer veil of the Jerusalem temple was actually one huge image of the starry sky! Thus, upon encountering Mark's statement that "the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom," any of his readers who had ever seen the temple or heard it described would instantly have seen in their mind's eye an image of the heavens being torn, and would immediately have been reminded of Mark's earlier description of the heavens being torn at the baptism. This can hardly be coincidence: the symbolic parallel is so striking that Mark must have consciously intended it.

. . .

[7] JW 5.5.4 §§ 212-14. Trans. adapted from H. St. J. Thackeray, Josephus (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1979) vol. 3, p. 265. Josephus goes on to say that the astral iconography of the veil excluded "the signs of the zodiac," presumably in order to avoid any implication of astrology...

Christian commentators seem to prefer the symbolism of the inner veil.

rfmwinnie · 07-05-2009, 01:12 AM

There is an account in the Talmud or Mishnah of the veil ripping 40 years before Jerusalem was destroyed. But it had nothing to do with Jesus and had to do with the sins of the Jewish people. If Jesus died in 33 CE (which is what I was taught) this would be about 3 years after the veil ripped (if it actually did).

I can't find a link that isn't Christian related (although I did find some wacko sites!) I'll keep looking though - the Jewish story of the torn veil is very, very different than the Christian one.

Clivedurdle · 07-05-2009, 02:53 AM

Quote:

Babylonian

Is Judaism the child of Zarathustra? Is the Jewish Temple a Babylonian inspired idea?

And is Revelation actually a report of the tearing of the outer veil from Jewish eyes?

Maybe stars did fall as leaves from the tapestry.

Lightning hit The Forbidden City in 1421. Might an earthquake in Jerusalem, tearing the veil, have been the starting point of xianity?

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07-04-2009, 11:10 PM	#4
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	Archaeology and seismology - those split rocks would still be there. And we have very detailed accounts of vesuvius...

07-04-2009, 11:12 PM	#5
yalla Veteran Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: oz Posts: 1,848	I'm sure [?] I read somewhere once an account that the veil, torn I think, was paraded in Rome in 70 ish CE as part of Titus' victory parade. But I can't find my source for that and I suspect I may have imagined it. Anybody able to verify that or not?

07-04-2009, 11:15 PM	#6
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	What with an earthquake, the dead being raised and the sun darkening at noon there must be some external corroboration. That centurion must have written a report.

07-05-2009, 01:12 AM	#9
rfmwinnie Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Phoenix Posts: 1,494	There is an account in the Talmud or Mishnah of the veil ripping 40 years before Jerusalem was destroyed. But it had nothing to do with Jesus and had to do with the sins of the Jewish people. If Jesus died in 33 CE (which is what I was taught) this would be about 3 years after the veil ripped (if it actually did). I can't find a link that isn't Christian related (although I did find some wacko sites!) I'll keep looking though - the Jewish story of the torn veil is very, very different than the Christian one.

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