Freethought & Rationalism Archive

cass256 · 10-03-2005, 04:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin

But then when we talk about Hebrew you mightn't mean the same as me. Is this a useful comment as well?

well, yes, because you seem to know there were more than one type those languages. Up until I ran across this forum, I had no idea the difference between Hebrew and Aramaic was meaningful. I thought it was like the difference between british english and American English, or Carribean English. You can't always tell they are all English but they owuld write similar.. Accent, and some various local differences in words make the difference. I'm now thinking that it is not so with Aramaic. Can you understand one if you know the other? like Sanish in Spain, or Puerto rico, or mexico being closer than Spanish and the Portugese language.. Yet similar enough if you know Portugese.

Quote:

We don't know if the writer knew either language. He just mentions Hebrew. How do you get beyond that?

that is why I can't take it for granted it was hebrew. If he didn't know Hebrew, he could have thought Aramaic was hebrew just by the looks of the word. You can interchange the letters, no? greek looks greek. Aramaic and Hebrew look the same to me in Hebrew letters.

Quote:

We are working with a literary text. You shouldn't reify the characters. The name given in the text for the character is Ihsous. Why go beyond the text without evidence to do so?

for the sole reason that some group of nuts took the text and added it to other "texts" which were written about a Hebrew man. I wouldn't call him Heyzoos, even if I met him in mexico, if I knew he was Hebrew.

Quote:

Lived in Galilee and IIRC I said either Aramaic or Greek.

what is IIRC? my mind has turned to mush.

I know when I see it i'll kick myself.
I know it is not the second republic of China, but my mind wants that to be what it is.

Quote:

All very interesting, but all in never-never-land, because it is all beyond the available evidence.

Sigh. That's the task before you.

spin

I know, but I was born under a sign that seems to have my mind going for what if's and never never land.... you don't know what you're asking of me!!! :banghead:

Toto · 10-03-2005, 04:59 PM

IIRC = If I Recall Correctly

Pilate · 10-03-2005, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Can you cite an example of "Logos" being used in Aramaic? I don't necessarily mean the literal Greek word, I mean can you cite any Aramaic example of "the word" being used in any manner which is similar or analogous to the Philonic use of logos (which Philo himself took from Greek philosophy).

John's use of logos is so fundamentally Greek and Alexandrian that it would seem to put to bed any question of Aramaic origin for GJohn starting with very first line.

Diogenes,
Here is a clue:“…words, which it is customary to call angels.�? Philo, On Confusion of tongues Examine it, and you make up your own mind.
To Senior Substratum flipper:
as you may obsevre this IS not AN opinion. It is a fact. you expect Diogenes (etymology: genes=born, from Dias=Zeus; here you learned something again Gurito) to accept your assertions.
Gurito vieho tienes miedo porque no saves que dices! Agara so dictionario Espaniol por comprender esto. Correo circulos vuelva a tu. Lets have some facts muchacho? We are tired of your assertions. :snooze:

cass256 · 10-03-2005, 05:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

IIRC = If I Recall Correctly

Thank you again. That one I didn't know, and now glad I asked. I would have run words through my head all evening long. The illiterate Irish Republican catholics will just have to get their own abreviation.

spin · 10-03-2005, 05:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pilate

I told you folks, you need me around here to get "a second opinion." You want to compare opinions? Look in the previous postings how differently from me edit answered the questions of cass. (You will miss my point of view, when I get finally tired of this "scorn and bash" system of yours, or when you throw me out. Whichever comes first.)

He cannot read Greek, and Josephus wrote those statements in Greek. Folks, don't let the nurse perform surgery on your brain. Go to a doctor. Spin stick to what you know. Spino, havlas Espaniol? Esta es una comodia Pilateestee. Comprende amigo? No tengo hora por appeliar con sus gauchos. Qiero un taco!!! Por favor! Tira su dictionario Griego en la basura. Tu no puede explicar, lo que tu no comprende.

Non c'e' niente che hai scritto che richiede una risposta. Perche' non scrivere qualcosa che vale una considerazione?

spin

spin · 10-03-2005, 05:25 PM

I'm sorry, I can't respond to much in your post cass256.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cass256

that is why I can't take it for granted it was hebrew.

But you can't get beyond it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cass256

If he didn't know Hebrew, he could have thought Aramaic was hebrew just by the looks of the word. You can interchange the letters, no? greek looks greek. Aramaic and Hebrew look the same to me in Hebrew letters.

The writer could have been mistaken. How do you get to decide?

spin

judge · 10-03-2005, 06:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Can you cite an example of "Logos" being used in Aramaic? I don't necessarily mean the literal Greek word, I mean can you cite any Aramaic example of "the word" being used in any manner which is similar or analogous to the Philonic use of logos (which Philo himself took from Greek philosophy).

John's use of logos is so fundamentally Greek and Alexandrian that it would seem to put to bed any question of Aramaic origin for GJohn starting with very first line.

How can "logos" be an exclusive Greek concept when it is used thousands of times in the LXX as a translation of the original Hebrew word "dabar?" (the cognate of the Aramaic "miltha/memra")

We have looked at these quotes before but once again.

From the intertestamental book of wisdom

Quote:

"All things were lying in peace and silence. . .(during the first Passover in Egypt) when thy almighty Logos (sic) leapt from thy royal throne in heaven into the midst of that doomed land like a relentless warrior. . . his head touching the heavens, his feet on earth." (18.14ff)

On the mediatorship of the word from the Encyclopaedia Judaica

Quote:

Like the Shekinah (comp. Targ. Num. xxiii. 21), the Memra is accordingly the manifestation of God. "The Memra brings Israel nigh unto God and sits on His throne receiving the prayers of Israel" (Targ. Yer. to Deut. iv. 7). It shielded Noah from the flood (Targ. Yer. to Gen. vii. 16) and brought about the dispersion of the seventy nations (l.c. xi. 8); it is the guardian of Jacob (Gen. xxviii. 20-21, xxxv. 3) and of Israel (Targ. Yer. to Ex. xii. 23, 29); it works all the wonders in Egypt (l.c. xiii. 8, xiv. 25); hardens the heart of Pharaoh (l.c. xiii. 15); goes before Israel in the wilderness (Targ. Yer. to Ex. xx. 1); blesses Israel (Targ. Yer. to Num. xxiii. 8); battles for the people (Targ. Josh. iii. 7, x. 14, xxiii. 3). As in ruling over the destiny of man the Memra is the agent of God (Targ. Yer. to Num. xxvii. 16), so also is it in the creation of the earth (Isa. xlv. 12) and in the execution of justice (Targ. Yer. to Num. xxxiii. 4). So, in the future, shall the Memra be the comforter (Targ. Isa. lxvi. 13): "My Shekinah I shall put among you, My Memra shall be unto you for a redeeming deity, and you shall be unto My Name a holy people" (Targ. Yer. to Lev. xxii. 12). "My Memra shall be unto you like a good plowman who takes off the yoke from the shoulder of the oxen"; "the Memra will roar to gather the exiled" (Targ. Hos. xi. 5, 10). The Memra is "the witness" (Targ. Yer. xxix. 23); it will be to Israel like a father (l.c. xxxi. 9) and "will rejoice over them to do them good" (l.c. xxxii. 41). "In the Memra the redemption will be found" (Targ. Zech. xii. 5). "The holy Word" was the subject of the hymns of Job (Test. of Job, xii. 3, ed. Kohler).

Diogenes the Cynic · 10-03-2005, 06:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pilate

Diogenes,
Here is a clue:“…words, which it is customary to call angels.�? Philo, On Confusion of tongues Examine it, and you make up your own mind.

Could you be more specific as to chapter and verse?

Quote:

To Senior Substratum flipper:
as you may obsevre this IS not AN opinion. It is a fact. you expect Diogenes (etymology: genes=born, from Dias=Zeus; here you learned something again Gurito) to accept your assertions.

Where did you get the idea that I'm getting anything from spin? My knowledge of Philo (and Greek, by the way, I can read Greek) is my own.

judge · 10-03-2005, 06:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

John's use of logos is so fundamentally Greek and Alexandrian that it would seem to put to bed any question of Aramaic origin for GJohn starting with very first line.

It may be a mistake to attribute too much to greek civilisation. Even the story of the trojan horse is probably borrowed from Assyria.

(Lorimer, H.L. 1950. Homer and the Monuments. London: Macmillan & Co. pg. 522, Anderson , J.K. 1970. “The Trojan Horse again.�? Classical Journal 66:22-25. pg. 22, Luce, J.V. 1975. Homer and the Heroic Age. London: Thames and Hudson. pg. 138 and Powell, Barry B. 1997. “From Picture to Myth, From Myth to Picture.�? In: New Light on a Dark Age, Susan Langdon, ed. Columbia and London: University of Missouri Press, pg. 184).

J.K. Anderson:

Quote:

"That the Wooden Horse of the poets was suggested by tales of how the kings of Assyria took cities by means of great wooden monsters filled with armed men I do not doubt. The sack of eastern cities, far greater and more formidably fortified than the Ionian towns of whose mud-brick defenses Old Smyrna provides an example, must have provided material for many winter's tales in late eighth-century Greece."

(Lorimer pg. 522. Also Anderson pg. 22 and Luce pg. 138):

Quote:

"The Trojan Horse was based on some perverted notion of a siege-machine, a thing unknown in the Bronze Age as detailed Egyptian representations of besieged towns show and first vouched for by Assyrian reliefs of the 9th century. Siege-engines were undoubtedly an invention of Assyria and it is presumably from that quarter that a rumour of them found its way to Ionia either directly or via Cyprus."

Toto · 10-03-2005, 06:59 PM

judge - funny but when I try to locate your sources, I find that this:

The Horse in Early Greek Myth

has the two quotes that you use - but then goes on to refute them.

Quote:

Siege machines did exist in the Bronze Age Near East's and they were not an invention of the Assyrians in the ninth century. From studies of Near Eastern fortifications and from documentary sources, scholars have shown that fortifications throughout the Near East underwent a series of defensive changes from the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age in order to meet the increasingly sophisticated advances in siege warfare (Yadin 1963:16-27, 65ff). Outer walls, glacis, and moats were a counter-response to moveable towers, breach mines, and rams. Siege machines were used by the Egyptians, the inhabitants of Mari, the Assyrians, the Hittites, and the Hurrians in the Middle and Late Bronze Age.

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10-03-2005, 04:59 PM	#302
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	IIRC = If I Recall Correctly

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