Stringbean

That would be of more benefit honestly...so far all I have seen is the game plan most god people use "Prove the BIBLE with itself!"

aa5874

Adam does not seem to understand that he has NOT provided ONE single non-apologetic source to corroborate any of his supposed witnesses.

When the veracity of a document is challenged Independent sources, non-apologetic sources, MUST FIRST be found to corroborate the text.

Adam has UTTERLY FAILED to provide any credible sources of antiquity for his Gospel witnesses.

Adam

I explained this in detail in my Post #335 (or the more readable version at Post #337):
"But I want to try to establish that a sort of burden of proof is on this other side, because my thread here is not just a provocation, but has arisen in response to atheists coming in to Christian websites and making arguments that I can show are not conclusive and are not legitimate to make once my case is understood."
I have shown that by setting aside biblical inerrancy, the texts of the NT show a likelihood of more eyewitnesses than the three usually claimed. This shows that one of them, Nicodemus, was accumulating sayings of Jesus in a way that cannot be trusted, but allow us to reinterpret gJohn without the exclusivism and self-glorification. That Jesus was a doomsday prophet also comes into question. A safe haven for Christians is established between Fundamentalism and skepticism. Yet it still allows them to be as fervent in their spiritual lives (as in the Charismatic movement) if that's how they interpret the NT. There is less need for hypocrisy or spiritual schizophrenia.

Implicitly, what is not in the eyewitness sections comes into question. The proof-texts for Roman Catholicism and Seventh Day Adventism are unsupported (what is in other portions of gMatthew or in the Redactor portions of gJohn--I have not detailed yet Teeple's Redactor verses in gJohn). We don't need to believe that the dead rose from tombs at Jesus's Resurrection.

If you define "spirituality" in a way that first requires abandonment of Christiantiy (as in various Eastern religions), my thesis would be a hindrance. Even here, my thesis better allows people if they wish to choose to combine Eastern spirituality with Christianity.

Sheshbazzar

In that you have used the interrogative, I will reply. (but that don't mean that you will posses the necessary knowledge base needed to be capable of understanding)
If you have viewed my profile, you will see what I have to say about my personal alignments.

Do you know what the word catholic means?
Should you really require me to explain to you how this word applies to all christians?
Are you yourself not a member of that 'catholic christian' religious faith?

Whatever.

'The Mother of Harlots' and whore of Babylon, only implies that this 'Mother' has daughters, all of them born of her fornications,
and that those daughters are all whores themselves;
All walk in the same traditions, and to get into bed with one leaves one just as defiled as getting into bed with any of the others.
You are of one flesh with whatever manner of woman you join yourself to.

"in the latter days ye shall consider it perfectly.".... אֹוי־לְך אֹוי אֹוי אֹוי׃ > Οὐαὶ οὐαὶ οὐαὶ !


ששבצר העברי׃




.

Adam

[Responding further to Vorkosigan’s helpful post #372] Gerd Theissen’s The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide (1996, trans. 1998) is 600 pages , and I was able to look at the whole book. He acknowledged that the Criterion of Difference Is powerful, but leaves us with too little to discuss, and assumes more than we know about the nature of earliest Christianity. In contrast many Jewish scholars have done a good job of continuing the old liberal tradition (7-9). (Put in that context, it’s not so bad that I continue that tradition.) The latest phase, the third quest, prefers to examine plausibility. He carefully distinguishes between old critical, liberal, collapse, new (second) quest, and third quest phases in the search for the historical Jesus (11-14). Theissen nevertheless considers literary relationships of the gospels. There were several editions of Mark (26). Luke was not written by a companion of Paul. But in spite of recognizing that there are several editions of Mark, he speaks of Luke omitting text from Mark. This is one of the (mistaken in this case) reasons that he cannot be sure Luke-Acts existed before 140 CE, the time of Marcion32-34). My thesis of course prefers that Luke-Acts be dated early, but in any case I contend that the content shows early date even If external testimony and comparison with Josephus cannot establish that the text did not continue to be redacted for a generation or so later.

In spite of all the books in his bibliographies, I never saw Teeple’s listed. Teeple was not a conventional academic, which apparently explains the omission, but this shows to me that academic credentials are not more important than scholarly insight. I still do not have even implicit evidence that Teeple has been read and refuted, because all the opinions I have seen are favorable or initial rebukes have been rescinded (Kysar). And Theissen himself acknowledges the basic recognition that the Passion and Semeia were sources and leaves open whether the dialogues also may have been (34)

Theissen believes gThomas is an independent source about Jesus (39). I can guess his reasoning for this. gThomas includes parables that that turn up not just in Q, but in gMark. (And Theissen (or his colleague Annette Merz) acknowledges that gThomas parallels both Q and Mark, 338.) That’s a possible interpretation, but it does not explain why so much of gThomas is paralleled in Q and gMark as compared with so little outside the Double Tradition of gMatthew and gLuke. I still say the evidence favors the Synoptic parallels in gThomas coming from a shared early text of Q. Thus gMark includes many passages from Q, leaving still the indication that narrative in the Triple Tradition also really came from Q. These portions of Mark are called the Twelve Source.

Theissen devotes a chapter to exploring counter-arguments to skepticism about the historical Jesus. He concludes it with text from G. A. Wells, apparently expecting that students can by now refute it (91,123). Along with Casey and Crossley, Theissen sees the Caligula Crisis of 40 CE as the likely origin of the Synoptic Apocalypse (100). He dates the Passion Narrative to the 40’s. The Apostle Matthew would have known Greek (101). He refers to M. Hengel’s Act and the History of Earliest Christianity for evidence that known people may have been gospel authors; Luke and John Mark.

Theissen shows that Jesus had extraordinary powers, but belief in miracles is related to the era observing them (289, 290, and 312). He finds the Marcan version (6:35ff) independent of John 6:15ff (294)
Theissen prefers the Johannine chronology of the Last Supper over the Synoptic version (427). Definitely a good book that I have learned from, but it does not refute my thesis (just a little re-thinking).

Horatio Parker

I see. So I'm feeding the beast....so that's it for me.

gdeering

Hi Adam,

I am coming down from the peanut gallery. I have read a lot of the thread (all?) since its inception. I have yet to see any backing up of any of your propositions.

The great thing about those with a Midrash concept (for instance) is that they can point to the OT to show specific quotes.

So I’m confused. Is there anything you can point to that says definitely - with out recourse to some other modern author - that there is an eyewitness in the synoptic Gospels?


Gregg

Adam

Hi, Gregg,
Have you gone to any of my links? I failed to link at the right time to my main article on the Synoptics:
http://megasociety.org/noesis/181.htm#Common

(As everyone knows, there are no explicit claims of eyewitness status for a major writing in the gospels, so you're not asking for that, I assume.) In the first six short paragraphs I show the occasion where and when Peter and Mark would have gotten together to write a gospel. Ancient authors say they wrote a gospel, but at this earlier time and place they could have written the earlier version (Ur-Marcus) that underlies gLuke as well.

It's more complicated than that, of course, The portion of gMark that underlies gLuke also includes the Twelve-Source from Matthew, another eyewitness (but not of the whole gospel of Matthew), but I won't restate the argument here that I state in the three succeeding paragraphs (but skip the second half of the opening paragraph that starts "The Gospel of Luke..")
Presumably the logic there is not compelling, as it apparently had not been seen by anyone before me.

Another eyewitness without citing a modern author (because it is original with me, as far as I know), see the concluding Appendix to this fourth of my articles in Noesis, where I show a Simon as eyewitness:
http://megasociety.org/noesis/181.htm#Resurrection

Adam

Here's my belated response to spin's #348 that required me to find Lucan parallels and compare the Greek.
The composition of the gospels on the Synoptic side nevertheless starts with the Passion Narrative best shown by Teeple’s “S” in John 18 & 19. This I call Layer 1 or Aramaic Ur-Marcus. About 44 CE this was expanded by Layer 2 to comprise what I call Greek Ur-Marcus, though it was likely at first in Aramaic. Upon later translation into Greek, the translator introduced some Latinisms that got copied in Luke in 62 CE (unless these were edited in during Layer 4.5, discussed below). Some examples are Mark 2:23 (Lk 6:1), “to make way”, using an ordinary Greek word for go with the prefix “dia”, more like “to go through”, and Mk 5:23 (Lk 5:41) “to the point of death”, “apethnesken”. These single-word Latinisms in translation do not prove that gospels are not early and not authentic. Spin’s other three example do not serve his purpose. Mark 3:6 is paralleled only in Mt. 12:14, and the two that have Lucan parallels don’t stand up either. Mark 15:1 “to hold a consultation” appears in Luke 22:66, but as a synonym in Greek. The world “modius” in Mark 4:41 for “bushel: does not appear in the Luke 8:46 parallel. There is also Mark 15:15, not paralleled in Luke.

The other early strata entering in gMark is from the Twelve Source. Even if layer 3 was written during Jesus’s lifetime, it could have been translated late enough that Latinisms entered. However, specific Latinisms appearing in equivalent locations would not be expected, because this Twelve Source is in both Mark and Luke, but not so exact in word use that one was copied from the other or from a common source. (But see below about Layer 4.5.) The same is true for the Q that is known to be in Mark, and this fact favors my contention that the Twelve Source is the narrative portion of Q. I speak of Q-Twelve-Source as a document that got translated independently for Mark and Luke.


However, it’s not that “simple”. Matthew and Luke have Q material that is virtually identical (Q2). It’s thus easy to think of Q2 as originating in Greek, but that fails to account for the contrasts between Mark and Luke. It would seem that Q2 was added in Aramaic to a Q1 text and added in Greek to another Q1 text. The former was used towards Mark (Layers 3 and) and the latter (or a copy of it) towards Matthew and Luke, the Aramaic being translated independently for each gospel.

As a result, there are four layers to the “early” version of Mark that Luke saw. All I Greek by this time, Layers 3 and 4 were of little use to Luke, having been already translated. But he did have them available to look at and copy in if he so chose. Layers 1 and 2 were copied from the now-Greek text of this Mark. But yet a detail—if the translator/editor of Layers 1, 2, 3, and 4 added anything (Layer 4.5) and it was added into Luke, it would appear to be any one of the other layers. Latinisms would be particularly likely to arise at this time, whether copied in to Luke or not. Whereas Latinisms in Layer 4 (as with Layer 3) should not be in both Mark and Luke, we cannot know what is Layer 4.5 as against what I Layer 4 (or any other layer). Similarly, if chiastic structure was introduced in Layer 4.5, we would not know that it was “cutting across” earlier layers.

Besides Layer 4.5 (is such existed), there as a considerable layer 5 added to Mark, identifiable by its presence in Matthew and not in Luke. Yet all these layers do not include all the possible Latinism in Mark. Many Latinism are only in Mark, and could have been added as a Layer 6. Yet through all the layers there seems to be just one man as translator/editor, so no evidence for the layers is to be found by inspecting just Mark and not comparing with the other two Synoptics.

spin

Looking forward to some actual evidence to justify the claim of an eye witness here, given the total lack of evidence given for the, umm, first eye witness.

Fascinating. You believed that, did you? The earlier parts? You mean those first written parts of John? I once believed the sun rose in the east.

Oh, joy of joys, really?

As in 2 Kgs 4:42-44? I guess it can't be. That was feeding just 100. Oral tradition didn't pick it up and run with it. It must have happened and got reported by an eye witness.

The famous "many source-critics".

Did you really? Wow, that's useful.

Another scalpel like assertion: "what seems to have happened". Untinged opinions are so helpful.

Another assertion based on assertions, such as "what seems to have happened...".

I know I shouldn't ask how one came to this notion. It must be divine knowledge. You need faith.

But then again perhaps not.

Here's that Aramaic-was-there-because-I-say-so assertion again. And it just so happened that it had to have ended up in Greek, because the gospels were written in Greek, so it must've been here.

I'm shocked. This assertion sort of follows from the precedent assertions in a descriptive manner of speaking.

The Aramaic-because-I-say-so assertion yet again.

Next evidenceless assertion.

So with this assertion we're going back prior to a couple of sentence ago. Serpentine.

Hmm, both had similar style. This wouldn't be an evidenceless assertion, would it?

Well, wow, W. Nicol was responsible for this assortment of verses. Who's s/he and how did the list get created? As is, this is just another assertion.

It's nice to find agreement on something, but that doesn't help to make that something any more tangible or supported.

Actually you didn't show anything above. You simply made assertions. And the extra stuff about “p-1” and “p-2” are simply obscure, not explained nor developed nor footnoted nor anything, so one cannot extract any meaning whatsoever from them.

Adam doesn't show that Teeple showed anything. And “P-Strand”, mentioned once in the o.p. where it is not explained, is another of those obscure therefore here meaningless tidbits.

So Andrew is mentioned a few times in this supposed layer!

As is Philip!

As is so often the case with apologetic datings the Muratorian Canon could have been dated early, here as in 170 CE, but could be much later, but we only hear the early date. The Muratorian Canon, at best a century and a half after the reputed events, has somehow become a worthy commentator of reality 150 years or more earlier. Scratch that as a meaningful piece of evidence. Andrew having penned something--it seems--depends on desires and late ascription.

Flappy, flappy butterfly logic.

Good for Teeple. Bad for Adam. As usually an opinion from someone and no argument or evidence.

No attempts to show Andrew was a real person, no attempts to show he was literate, no attempts to show he knew the language, no attempt other than the conjecture that because he is mentioned in a few verses Teeple identified and in the Muratorian Canon he must have written something.

Hands up all you kiddies who think Adam has coughed up the goods and made a reasonable case for authorship of his hypothetical second layer? Yes, I know: utter failure.

Nothing to justify the existence of a layer, be it attributable to this conjectured author or not, other than assertions derived from Teeple.

So nothing in the first two parts of Adam's presentation do we find for his confidence in there being these layers or for his eye witnesses. Conjecture and assertion are simply no means to derive useful conclusions.

Goalposts will obviously be moved again. "But spin hasn't dealt with my unpublished fifteen tome discourse on the necessity of layers and eye witnesses..."