Chris Weimer

Are you serious, judge? How on Earth could anyone conjust Eliyahu with Eloi is far beyond me, or just as bad understanding eli but not eloi!? If anything, the lack of understanding by the people shows that it was almost definitely written in Greek - any fool would have been able to easily say, "Hey, he's quoting Psalm 22". It be like today someone citing John 3.16 and people were like "Did he say God?" "I dunno, I think he might have said Dog..." Laughable at best.

yalla

judge
Thanks for that.
Seems to be a lot of confusion.
It also seems that you assume that both the author of "Mark'' and the author of "Matthew" were physically present at the scene.
Is that correct?

spin

Completely wrong interpretation, judge. You are not dealing with the evidence. The Greek Mk, if translated from the Syriac, gives the unaccountable form eloi, whereas the Syriac in both Mk and Mt have )yl. There is no way to account for Marcan "eloi" starting from the Syriac, therefore, once again, the Syriac cannot be the source. Mt working from the Marcan original has gone back to the LXX to get ina ti egkatelipes.

While the Greek Mt shows itself dependent on Mk and the LXX, the Syriac shows itself to be dependent on the Greek, for the translator of Greek Mt saw no necessity to translate the "Galilean" version into Syriac, deeming that the original was transparent, the same cannot be said for your hypothetical Aramaic writer of Mk, who has ")yl )yl why have you forsaken me", which translated is ")lhy )lhy why have you forsaken me". Naturally the "my" from )lhy ("-y") doesn't come from the given source, which just says, "god, god", but comes from the Greek source.


spin

judge

Possibly present, but I don't believe they were or weren't.

In fact don't the gospels suggest they would not have been present?

spin

In fact, judge, even the play on the name Elijah in Mt doesn't work in Syriac, demonstrating the fact that it is the Syriac which is a translation. hli is picked up by Mt to refer to Elijah, which is hlian in the context, where the connection is transparent, while )ly) doesn't have a clear connection with )yl. It was written in Greek and the word play was lost in Syriac.

spin

"Dingo", mate. He must have said "Dingo", Zoot's identical twin sister, Dingo. It's obviously a veiled reference to Monty Python and the Holy Grail. She was the naughty girl who turned the grail beacon on........


ipns

yalla

judge
But for the author of "Mark" to be aware that there was potential confusion concerning which dialect JC allegedly used he would have had to be present.
Otherwise he would have just gone with whatever he allegedly heard from whomever is supposed to have told him and not known there was possible confusion.
An Aramaic listener would have told him the Aramaic and a Galilean the Galilean.
He must have received 2 contradictory reports perhaps?
And decided to harmonise them without knowing which, if either, was correct?

I'm trying to work through your possible scenario.

Chris Weimer

You're a stronger man than I. Good luck chasing the golden goose.

Aspirin99

Spin, is there, then, any truth to the statement that Matthew is correcting Mark - either in spelling or in quotation?

spin

Mt has altered Mk.

Hebrew (Ps 22:2):

)ly )ly lmh (zbtny [the ) = aleph, (= ayin]

"eli eli lama azbatani"

Mk:

eloi eloi lamma sabaxQani [the x = chi, Q = theta]

Mt:

hli hli lama sabaxQani [the h = eta]

Syriac Mt & Mk:

)yl )yl lmnh $bqtny

The form sabaxQani is not Hebrew and is quite similar to the Syriac $bqtny, suggesting that Aramaic is the source of the form found in the gospels, not the Hebrew, so if Mt corrected Mk it doesn't seem to be from an active knowledge of Hebrew or else there was a confusion between Aramaic and Hebrew.

The removal of the second /m/ in the third word fits with the Hebrew which is marked in later custom to show that there was not a doubled consonant.

The removal of the /o/ from eloi and the changing of the first vowel from an epsilon to an eta reflects more the Hebrew long vowel, which we don't normally represent in English, but is there in the late Hebrew vowel indications (called "pointing").

I'd say that Mt has moved the phrase towards the Hebrew, while unaccountably leaving the last word (= "forsook me") in the Aramaic of Mk.

Sorry, I can't make it more decisive.


spin