Vorkosigan

No, it's methodology. It seems like comedy to the uninitiated.

ROFL. You're right. It IS comedy.

Juliana, can I transpose any two Greek letters that look alike to form any words that I want? Or do I only get to do that when it takes me in the direction of Julius Caesar? See the problem here? It's great to have epiphanies, but they can be misleading. That's why it is crucial to develop rules so that your insight is buttressed by logic and evidence, because knowledge is intersubjective. Otherwise it is like an LSD experience, beautiful only to the one experiencing it.

Also, in Mark 8:34, do you think Jesus was advising people to carry his stakes and palisades? If it is on p249 of Carotta's book, there's no reason why you can't summarize it. If you don't feel like typing, simply foto the page with a digital camera and post the link/image here.

Also, can you summarize Carotta's argument for why we should not accept midrashic creation off of Psalm 22 as virtually all scholars do for the details in the Crucifixion scene?

Juliana, can you show me the passages in Mark where Galatia is being referred to?

Much of Carotta's text is online. Here is a chapter/excerpt that shows some of the problems with Carotta's view. Mark was originally written in Latin. Let me show you some of the problems with this chapter. Randomly:

• Detailed examinations of the oldest manuscripts—especially the bilingual Latin/Greek—have shown that with Mark the Greek text in fact is dependent on the Latin.[248] And there is still more: the deviations between the readings in the Greek manuscripts are explained best if they are seen as different versions of translation of the Latin text. [249] Also the fact that the Church Fathers—demonstrably Clement, Irenaeus and Justin—cite the Latin Mark, which they translate ad hoc into Greek, speaks for the priority of the Latin version.

First off, scholarship accepts that Mark was originally composed in Greek. If you want to confront and change that, you will need some powerful argument. So when I check the citation, what do I find? Citation [248] is from a book by Harris written in (drum roll) 1893! Citation [249] is from Couchoud -- a familiar name -- written in 1926. So we see the pattern we have seen elsewhere -- that Carotta picks and chooses to make his case. He does not demonstrate familiarity with a range of scholarship, nor does he present any potent argument to support his case. Century-old scholarship is unacceptable. He does argue that the Latinisms in Mark constitute a case for it being originally written in Latin, but that case is not anywhere accepted today.

Carotta goes on to say:

• It has been observed for some time now that the Gospels contain miraculous healings that appear to be simplified reports of those Vespasianus had performed in Egypt, where according to Tacitus the emperor healed a blind man and a man with a withered hand[passage omitted]

Actually, the idea that the healings are "simplified" versions of the Vespasian incident is laughable. The healings are easily demonstrated to parallel the core of the Elijah-Elisha tales in 1 & 2 Kings, and Andrew Criddle and I just tussled over that in a recent thread which I welcome you to resurrect and read. Numerous authors have written on the derivation of the healings, from Gundry to the Jesus Seminar to Robert Price. Carotta shows no familiarity with any of the conclusions of this scholarship. You will note that Carotta's absurd claim goes uncited, probably because no one believes it but him. if you want to overturn the accepted view, you gotta bring big guns.

Carotta then claims:

• Moreover the Gospel contains the core of a speech, reported by Plutarchus, in which Tiberius Gracchus bemoaned that the appropriation of public land by the aristocrats had rendered the farmers landless and the poorest of people.
  
  
  Speech of Tiberius Gracchus:
  
  
  ‘The wild beasts of Italy have their holes and their hiding places but the men who fight and die for Italy enjoy only the light and the air. Homeless, they roam restlessly with wife and child. Our rulers lie when they call on the soldiers to fight for the graves and shrines of their ancestors. Because none of these Romans can point to a paternal altar or an ancestral tomb. But rather, they fought and died to bring wealth and luxury to others. They are called masters of the world and they have not a single clod of earth that is their own.’[251]
  
  Matthew:
  
  ‘And Jesus saith unto him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have their nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.’[252]

Carotta seems unaware that this saying has parallels -- much better ones than the one above -- in the Cynic tradition, as do many other sayings in the Gospel literature. Witty sayings like this, called chreia, were common in antiquity -- Mark has twenty or so, as I recall. Again Carotta does not interact with any of the scholarship on this saying, and refute the several positions held on it by scholars. Why is that?

Carotta writes:

• Also, because the same Mark writes a vulgar Greek without the use of the later Hebraisms and Septuagintisms of Matthew and Luke, and uses popular Aramaisms instead, the track leads us to the Roman veterans in Syria, either to those of the Colonia Iulia of Heliopolis (Baalbek) or to those who were settled by Herodes in Caesarea, Galilaea, Samaria and Decapolis. Namely, they were the ones who had originally spoken the Latin of the legionaries, and were settled in rural areas where they inter-married with the local population that still spoke Aramaic, whereas the official language of the Empire was Greek by this time.[257]

This demonstrates a cosmic illiteracy on the part of Carotta. Far from being without "Septuagintisms" Mark tracks the Septuagint word for word on many, many occasions. For example, the Gospel opening:

Here is my herald whom I send on ahead of you
Idou, apostello ton aggelon mou pro prosopou sou

is taken directly from the Greek of the Septaugint version of Exodus:

Idou, apostello ton aggelon mou pro prosopou sou

In Mk 1:3 the first 13 words track the septaugint exactly. Mk 1:6 copies phrases from Kings to describe JBap.

I could go on and on. Suffice to say that Carotta doesn't know what he is talking about.

But in case you want to claim that I misunderstood Carotta, he reiterates this point later when discussing Jesus mythicism:

• no Gospel was ever written in Aramaic,
  the Greek of the presumably most ancient Gospel in particular, that of Mark, is filled with Latinisms whilst the citations from the Jewish scriptures only emerge in abundance in Matthew.

Mark is filled with citations of the Jewish scriptures (about 150 in 660 verses in some counts). This does not count the use of Jewish scriptures as parallels for structuring, nor the allusions to other jewish writings such as Maccabees and Tobit, as well as inclusions of oral lore (possibly). Mark is a thoroughly Jewish gospel.

But then we go on to:

• The apostle Paul writes in his second letter to Timotheus:
  
  ‘The cloak that I left at Troas with Carpus, when thou comest, bring with thee, and the books, but especially the parchments.’[258]
  
  Here the King James Bible uses ‘parchment’, which is called membranae, ‘thin skins’, in the Greek original—a striking use of a Latin borrowed word.

Carotta is busily attempting to prove that Latinisms indicate the text was originally latin in origin. But Mark was composed in Greek, for it tracks the Septuagint. But that is neither here nor there -- note how Carotta refers to 2 Tim as a book written by Paul. Anyone got a problem with that? Not Carotta!

This next selection is picked entirely for style:

• Did the itinerant preaching and miracle working members of the early Christian communities—with the passage of time and the persistent fine-tuning of the copies of the copies—turn the exemplary fatherly chief commander into one of themselves, a Church Father made in their own image? From the divine founder of the Empire to the proclaimer of the Kingdom of God? Did they gradually convert Divus Iulius, the God of the Roman veteran colonies in the East, into the Jesus of their communities which had found shelter there? Did they become the creators of their creator until they themselves finally became Lords over their Lord?

Catch the Erik Von Daniken style of argument-by-unanswered-questions? There's a lot of that in Carotta.

Note Carotta's beliefs on Gospel dating:

• Contrary to the later canon, which places Matthew in the first and the most ancient position,[301] scholarship mostly considers the Gospel of Mark, the shortest, to be also the most ancient. The given dates are between 40 and 60 AD and that is why it is called the protoevangelium; it served as source for both the other synoptics. Matthew and Luke are independent of each other, and both first wrote after the Jewish war that ended in 70 AD. Where either of them, or both of them, correspond with Mark they are obviously using Mark, but where they correspond with each other but not with Mark, they are following a lost logion source (‘Q’—theory of the two sources); or, according to another opinion, they are following the oral tradition. In addition they use oral special material (Sondergut). John is independent of the synoptics; if and to what extent he used written sources is a matter of controversy.

There is no way on God's green earth that Mark, who is thoroughly familiar with the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, dates from prior to 70. That position is held only by religious conservatives. His thumbnail also contains another inaccuracy, as "John" is at least three people. It is arguable whether John is independent.

Another issue here is Carotta's dependence on old scholarship, a certain sign of incompetence. In this chapter he interacts entirely with Loisy, Couchoud, and others of a bygone era. His Catholic Introduction to the NT dates from 1973. Apparently Carotta is in a time warp where work from within the last decade has not yet penetrated.

My favorite part of this is the conclusion:

• The one, Divus Iulius—an indubitable historical figure—is as God, nonexistent: all writers mention him; but there is no religion, no liturgical texts, no hagiography, no legends.
  
  The other, Jesus—an absolutely doubtful historical figure—is existent only as God: no chronicler mentions him; but there is a religion, even several, and there are liturgical texts, hagiographies and legends.

Well, you've never seen them together, have you? So they must be the same person.

The next chapter has more comical stuff in it. I won't bore you, but don't miss this brilliant argument on Gjohn and the Civil War:

• The Gospel of John first presents John the Baptist within a clash between light and darkness:
  
  ‘And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.’[358]
  
  The context is the argument between Jesus and the Baptist, or more specifically between their followers, which once more is taken up and stated more precisely in Jn. 3:22.
  
  The theme of the struggle between light and darkness forced itself on Caesar and Pompeius with fateful features the evening before the battle of Pharsalos.
  
  ‘As a light from heaven flew from Caesar’s camp to that of Pompeius and went out there, the Pompeians thought it was a sign of glorious triumph over their enemies, while at the same time Caesar predicted he would attack and wipe out the power of Pompeius.’[359]
  
  Pompeius might have won if the darkness had comprehended the light. Now, however, the light shone in the darkness: Caesar won.

:rolling: :rolling: :rolling:

I especially like this explanation of baptism:

• Well, inspection in Latin is lustratio, which actually means ‘cleansing’, ‘lustration’, but in military language it stands for ‘inspection’ because of the acts of ritual cleansing and expiatory sacrifices that accompanied it. Along with the lustratio, the inspection of soldiers, went the inspection of weapons, the armilustrium, the ‘cleansing of weapons’ in the sense of ‘ceremony of purifying the arms’. The word lustratio comes from luo, ‘to wash’ and in the second instance means ‘atone’, which finds its Greek pendant in the loutrón, meaning ‘wash’, ‘bathe,’ and comes from the corresponding verb louô, also ‘to wash’, ‘to bathe’. In the Christian sense these words became ‘baptism’, respectively ‘baptize.’ The transition from ‘inspection of soldiers with cleansing of arms’ (the Latin lustratio) to ‘baptism of repentance’ (the Greek loutrón) came about through the common concepts of ‘washing’ and ‘purifying’. The same meaning is also found in the other Greek word alternatively used for louô, baptizô, which in the Christian sense is also translated with ‘to baptize’ (probably because it comes from baptô, which means ‘to dunk’). Before becoming baptism, baptisma, too, simply meant washing: a further excellent literal translation of the Latin word lustratio, the inspection. And the fact that baptism was originally seen as the reception into the army of Christ is certainly not contradictory to this idea.

Is Carotta aware that there is a long history of ritual bathing in Judaism (HINT: what is a mikvah)?

It's OK to perform all these operations on words in two languages. It is not okay to do so without explaining why all other scholars are wrong, and without providing powerful evidence to overturn the consensus, and without dealing with the scholarship.

I can't resist...there's just so much badness here. Here Carotta analyzes the Pericope Adultera as a Caesar story.

• The pendant for the adulterous wife of Caesar is the pericope of the adulteress; this pericope is not found in the synoptic Gospels, but exclusively in John.
  
  It may appear improper for us to use this pericope, but it is well known that it only landed in John because it was deleted elsewhere: Where exactly, the textual critics do not know. We can only say that we are lucky to have it at all, for again and again, attempts have been made to remove this ‘foreign body’ from John, ultimately for so-called purely formal reasons, because it does not fit the style of this particular Evangelist. Augustine delivers the real reason: the leniency Jesus demonstrates towards the adulteress might be misunderstood![432] Even in the bible text used today, it is only referred to in parentheses or with a preceding question mark, meaning it is mentioned with reservation:

Carotta appears not to know that this pericope IS found in the Synoptics, in Luke. He tries to pretend that the reason it is rejected is because of its theology, but the reality is that even the ancients knew it wasn't an authentic part of the gospel.

Need we say more? He doesn't know basic stuff, plays games with words, cites scholarship that is decades out of date, doesn't interact with modern scholarship, etc. You're wasting your time, Juliana, with Carotta. It could well be that he really has discovered something amazing. But you'll never be able to demonstrate it because he didn't do his homework.


I'll save an analysis of Mark 2 & 3:16, which he discusses on the above page, for later as the coup de grace.

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

Had to stick this howler in here. Carotta discussing the Parable of the Sower as some event from Caesar's life:

• ‘Hearken; Behold, there went out a sower to sow: And it came to pass, as he sowed, some fell by the way side, and the fowls of the air came and devoured it up. And some fell on stony ground, where it had not much earth; and immediately it sprang up, because it had no depth of earth: But when the sun was up, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up, and choked it, and it yielded no fruit. And other fell on good ground, and did yield fruit that sprang up and increased; and brought forth, some thirty, and some sixty, and some an hundred.’[458]
  
  Here he has almost everything together: the rocky ground without deep soil—like the gaps in the tile floor; the impossibility of growing roots there and that the palm should have withered; that plants without light suffocate—whether under thorns or under the temple roof. And in spite of this they shot up as if on good land. Perhaps not one hundred percent, as on fertile land, but still sixty, or thirty percent.

Earth to Carotta: The thirty, sixty, and hundred on the end of this parable are not PERCENT but -FOLD! Jesus is talking about fantastic multiplication, not reduced output.

:rolling: :rolling: :rolling: :rolling:

Yes, you were right Juliana. It IS comedy.

Vorkosigan

Aquitaine

Hmmm... You say that it IS found both in the synoptics AND in John? But that really isn't true, is it?

Yes, it is sometimes found in Luke, but not very often. And, AFAIK, it is either in John, OR in Luke, but not in both places. (??)

Revised Standard Version (1946). 7:53-8:11 given in the margin, with the note, "Most of the ancient authorities either omit 7.53-8.11, or insert it, with variations of the text, here or at the end of this gospel or after Luke 21.38." Since 1971 the section is printed as ordinary text, with the note, "The most ancient authorities omit 7.53-8.11; other authorities add the passage here or after 7.36 or after 21.25 or after Luke 21.38, with variations of text."

Augustine was aware the passage was not universally found in the copies then extant. He tried to account for this by a conjecture: "Certain persons of little faith, or rather enemies of the true faith, fearing, I suppose, lest their wives should be given impunity in sinning, removed from their manuscripts the Lord's act of forgiveness toward the adulteress, as if he who had said, Sin no more, had granted permission to sin" [De Adult. Conj., ii. 6, 7.]

Is Augustine ancient enough for you? But he doesn't seem to be saying the pericope is inauthentic at all...

??

It seems you are so gleeful in your attacks, that you are overlooking the facts. And all the while ignoring that you have hastily formed your obviously strong opinions WITHOUT actually reading anything but excepts of his book.

There is no doubt that Carotta is hacking away at the trunk of a huge tree of scholarship. But if the tree bears bad fruit, must you first waste time addressing each and every leaf? Of course not. Carotta has found a new aspect of the history of the gospels. He proves that the tree YOU are sitting in bears bad fruit. So of course, you don't like the idea and attack his discovery.
But the tree has to go, and just because the last 100 years of NT scholarship sits in those branches, doesn't mean he has to address each and every mistaken notion that scholars have gone over time and time again for decade after decade.

Vorkosigan

Hey...no kidding. But, as they say, the devil is in the details, isn't it? If Carotta had mentioned Luke, that would have been great, eh?

LOL. We were talking about CS Lewis and this pericope a while back. Listen to the wisdom of Peter Kirby:

• Eusebius of Caesarea knew of this pericope as belonging not to John but to the apocryphal Gospel of the Hebrews. Eusebius writes, "And he [Papias] relates another story of a woman, who was accused of many sins before the Lord, which is contained in the Gospel according to the Hebrews." (Hist. Eccl. 3.39.15)
  
  Bruce M. Metzger writes, "The evidence for the non-Johannine origin of the pericope of the adulteress is overwhelming. . . . No Greek Church Father prior to Euthymius Zigabenus (twelfth century) comments on the passage, and Euthymius declares that the accurate copies of the Gospel do not contain it." (A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, pp. 219-220)
  
  Metzger also writes, "Signficantly enough, in many of the witnesses which contain the passage it is marked with asterisks or obeli, indicating that, though the scribes included the account, they were aware that it lacked satisfactory credentials." (Textual Commentary, p. 221)
  
  This has been known for centuries. It is Remedial Text Criticism 21. I guess Lewis wasn't there on the day they talked about the pericope adultera.
  
  best,
  Peter Kirby

For Lewis, substitute "Carotta." This pericope is a good test. If someone claims it is authentic, pay them no attention.

Name any ignored facts.

Let's get a replay on the parable of the sower:

• * And in spite of this they shot up as if on good land. Perhaps not one hundred percent, as on fertile land, but still sixty, or thirty percent.

PERCENT! How much more second-rate crap must I put up here?

But don't worry! Carotta is a target-rich environment. If these aren't enough, I can easily find more.

LOL. He doesn't address any leaf, let alone each and every one. There are several alternatives of which he seems completely unaware.

Right. That must be my motivation. I couldn't possibly be motivated by concern for the truth, the joy of discovery, and a deep interest in the texts.

Ummm...he could at least address one. Any one.

The tree won't go, Aq, unless the ax is put to it. Punching the air is useless.

Vorkosigan

andrewcriddle

Since the 'Gospel of Barnabas' is generally regarded as a late medieval work its relevance to early Gospel tradition is somewhat tenuous.

Andrew Criddle

JoeWallack

JW:
From the excerpts I've seen here this book seems to be in the direction of proof-texting, only/primarily considering evidence for its conclusion and not/scarcely considering evidence against its conclusion. That's how Christianity got started in the first place. In addition to the fine examples here that Vork has pointed out, the first Gospel, "Mark", is an apology as to why Jesus was rejected by his generation. He was Unexpected. See:

Randel Helms, "Who Wrote The Gospels"

and

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=122958

(ironically also largely rejected by JW's generation).

Also consider the use of parables. "Mark" explains that Jesus used parables to confuse his generation. Now, compare these two examples to Jewlius. Was he rejected by his generation and did he speak primarily in parables?:

"Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears
Keep listening, but do not comprehend;
keep looking, but do not understand.�
Make the mind of this people dull,
and stop their ears,
and shut their eyes,
so that they may not look with their eyes,
and listen with their ears,
and comprehend with their minds,
and turn and be healed."

Doesn't really work, does it? (Maybe Bede and Sumner can improve it).

I think what can be established though is some similar Treatment of Jewlius and Jesus by contemporary authors. Randel Helms (just can't say his name enough and for God's sake if you want to understand the Christian Bible read Helms and not Liars for Jesus like NT Wrong) points out in "Gospel Fictions":

That a few years before the supposed birth of Jesus the Provincial Assembly of Asia Minor passed a resolution in honor of Caesar Augustus:

"Whereas the Providence that has guided our whole existence and which has shown such care and liberality, has brought our life to the peak of perfection in giving to us Augustus Caesar, whom it filled with virtue for the welfare of mankind, and who, being sent to us and to our descendents as a saviour, has put an end to war, and has set all things in order; and whereas, having become visible...and whereas, finally that the birthday of the god has been for the whole world the beginning of the gospel concerning him, (therefore let all reckon a new era beginning from the date of his birth)."

Sound famiLiar dear Reader? Pause for Christians to re-read Isaiah 52:15. Oh yea, this isn't a Christian Forum. Helms reference is:

"Documents For The Study Of The Gospels" pp. 13-14"

Actually I hate it when authors just refer to other books and not the Source but I believe with a perfect Faith that we can take Helm's Word as Gospel.

All this being said I still applaud the authors effort to attempt to find a Source for the Christian Bible stories. Since the only thing we can be certain of regarding the Christian Bible is that the basic Impossible story is Impossible, any author who Starts with the Assumption that the CB is primarily Fiction is ahead of mainstream Christian Bible scholarship and while the effort by Christian Bible scholarship tp provide evidence for a Historical story is more over developed than Arnold Swarzenegger's muscles and smile, efforts to provide evidence for a Fictional story historically are more under developed than George Bush's Iraq exit strategy.


Joseph

CYNIC, n.
A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be. Hence the custom among the Scythians of plucking out a cynic's eyes to improve his vision.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Errors...yguid=68161660

http://hometown.aol.com/abdulreis/myhomepage/index.html

Juliana

Vorkosigan,

I want to quickly come back to your unsavory rant (is there a major defect behind this, or is this the usual tone amongst you wanna-be scholars?).
The reason why there haven't been many reviews in English yet is not that
"nobody who knows their shit is going to waste their time reading his tripe, let alone reviewing it. And because his book goes into the mythicist pile, everyone who identifies as a mythicist is smeared with its flatpetered, ham-handed, thumb-fingered, cheap-trash, trailor-park-outside-of-Roswell scholarship."

The reason is simply that they "hate and fear" this work as one Amazon reviewer put it. For if Carotta is right they have a little problem if only having to admit that their labors have been mostly in vain. But, don't worry, Carotta's work won't go away because of your insults and it may take some time (as with most epochal discoveries) but then people like you will not look very good. (Maybe you will then be among the first to say: See, I knew it all along, that's what I've always said, Jesus was Caesar).

Again, why don't you read the book completely as any decent scholar would do and then write a review scholarly pointing out all the faults you think there are and publish it (and I don't mean spitting out some misinformed rants on single points on a discussion board like this).
Wouldn't that give a great boost to your reputation if you indeed landed the coup de grace and once and for all refuted Carotta's thesis?

But you don't do that and any intelligent reader perfectly senses why.
If you had better manners it might even be a good idea to contact the author himself directly and confront him with your objections. But you don't do that either because you're afraid and your vanity doesn't allow you to consider that you possibly are wrong. The way you are presenting a certain view of things here as basic or agreed on scholarship is simply dishonest, because the facts of the matter lie differently.

What is your main point, perfectly in accordance with current political correctness? Jesus, even if he didn't exist must have been a Jew at all costs, just to consider he wasn't is blasphemy, let alone suggesting he was a Roman.
In order to maintain this modern dogma some so-called scholars do not even flinch from distorting the scriptures.

Let's take a look at one example, on page 70 Carotta writes:

"Even more striking is that the place has the same name: Capitol. In
Mark, of course, it is translated: the place of a skull. The Romans derived
Capitolium from caput. The tale is that an Etruscan king, Olus
(i.e. Aulus Vulcentanus) was killed and buried there, and that the Capitoline
temple and hill received its name after his skull was later found:
‘the head of Olus’—caput Oli—Capitolium.143
That Golgotha is the translation of place of skull and not vice versa
is evident in Luke, who only has ‘the place of skull’ and says that the
place was ‘called’ this way (and not translated), as well as in John, who
says explicitly that the place was ‘said’ the ‘place of a skull’, which
‘means’ Golgotha in Hebrew.144"

"[144] Lk. 23:33: […] ton topon ton kaloumenon Kranion […]; Jn. 19:17: […] ton legomenon Kraniou Topon, o legetai Ebraisti Golgoqa […]; Matthew does not contradict this, because both times he says ‘called’: 27:33: topon legomenon Golgoqa, o estin Kraniou TopoV legomenoV […].
This passage gives us the opportunity to clearly see how ideologically biased the work of latter-day bible translators is. As late as the beginning of the 17th century the King James Version translates Jn. 19:17 (v. s.) verbatim:
‘[…] tòn legómenon Kran�*ou Tópon, (h)ó légetai (H)ebraïstì Golgothá […]’—‘[And he bearing his cross went forth into a place] called (tòn legómenon) the place of a skull, which is called (légetai) in the Hebrew Golgotha’.
But by now word has got around that légô sometimes must also be understood in the sense of ‘to mean’, which would advise to translate the second ‘called’—légetai—as ‘means’. Accordingly one would have to write (the rest of sentence remaining the same):
‘[And he bearing his cross went forth into a place] called (ton legómenon) the place of a skull, which means (légetai) in the Hebrew Golgotha.’
This, however, apparently is intolerable for the orthodox scholars and actually one has turned up who does not just attenuate the testimony like e. g. the KJV but outright distorts it. The Worldwide English (New Testament) (WE) plainly reverses the terms and makes it:
‘[They took Jesus and led him away. Jesus went out carrying his own cross. They went to a place] that the Jews called Golgotha. That means “the place of the skull bone�.’
Thus out of the name’s Hebrew translation they make the name itself, and out of the Greek name they make its explanation. Why?—one wonders. The answer is very simple: in order to maintain and reinforce the fiction that the Hebrew name is the original one, and with it to pseudo-scripturally support the delocalization of the whole story from Rome to Jerusalem by an again distorted translation of the Greek text. The thing about it is that they are not even liars: they really believe it is the correct translation. Their ideological glasses sit so firmly on their noses that they do not even notice anymore how they twist the meaning of the text right round. Misrepresentation has become second nature to them. And in order to guard their contorted minds against doubts they distort the letter—without feelings of guilt. After all, the spirit prevails over the letter, doesn’t it?
In order to guard against misunderstandings: We do not think that (h)ó légetai (H)ebraïstì Golgothá must absolutely denote ‘which means in the Hebrew Golgotha’. The established meaning of légetai is ‘(it) is said’, like of legómenon it is ‘the so-called’, ‘as the saying goes’. ‘Tòn legómenon Kran�*ou Tópon’ could thus be translated as ‘according to legend called place of skull’—which leads us back to the saga of the caput Oli, ‘Skull of Olus’, found on the Capitoline hill (cf. text p. 70) and which suggests that the continuation of the sentence (h)ó légetai (H)ebraïstì Golgothá, conceals a prior (h)ó légetai Rômaïstì Kapitôlion, ‘which is called in the Latin Capitolium’, representing its bowdlerizing misspelling.
Thus, at the same time it would be shown, though, that our latter-day bible translators still have the ‘right’ wrong attitude of mind: they are doing nothing else but continuing the concealment of the ‘Julian’ origin of the Gospel which already occurred in the old manuscripts behind an allegedly ‘Judaic’ one."

Vorkosigan wrote:
"Here Carotta is claiming that the Crucifixion of Jesus is actually a parallel to the burning of Caesar on the funeral pyre."

This again is either a misunderstanding or more likely a deliberate distortion.
Do you have problems reading correctly? Did you know that a wax effigy of Caesar was shown to the people hanging on a tropaeum (T-shaped) cross. How about a little source studying of authors like e.g. Suetonius and Appianus.

And your misrepresentations just go on and on and I don't have the time now to adress them all, frankly I don't feel like it very much either because of your discussion style and diction (see above).

Let me finally just quote another passage from Carotta's work, which may cast doubt on Jesus' Jewishness.

p. 163
"The reports in the rabbinic literature are mostly polemic, hence they presuppose Christian literature and, on top of this, they are very vague.[323] For example Jesus is thought to be ‘the bastard son of the Roman soldier Pantheras’. It is easy to see that that Pantheras is a metathesis of parthenos, Greek ‘virgin’. So it could originally have meant: ‘the bastard son of Parthenos’, i. e. of the parthenos—the ‘virgin’. What is interesting is what remains: the Roman soldier. The rabbinic tradition seems to be based on a source that retains the memory of a Jesus who was born a Roman and who was the son of a legionary.
Which means that the Jews, the people which Jesus is supposed to descend from—even supposed to descend from the royal House of David—only knew Jesus very late and only from the Christians. And if they did take any notice of him, he was thought to be of Roman origin.

The negative attitude towards Christianity and the denying of Jesus remained constant in Judaism throughout all the centuries until the modern age. Right up to today authoritative Jewish theologians hold Christianity to be a product from the late Hellenistic period, foreign to Judaism.

Another opinion of Jesus did not arise in Judaism until after the Enlightenment. Jesus began to be discovered as a Jew, especially in Zionist circles. This connected with guilt feelings on the Christian side after World War II, especially with protestants who are inclined to Old Testament thinking anyway, and it led to the emphasizing of the Jewishness of Jesus as a reaction against ecclesiastical anti-Judaism."

On page 161:
"Hence it is not surprising that the so-called heretics, i.e.—those Christians who were a thorn in the side of the developing Judaizing Church, thought along radically Paulinist lines and unanimously opposed the increasing Judaization of Christianity and the Gospel: probably for this reason they were excommunicated.
Marcion, who regarded the cruel and national-egoistic God of the Jews as the opposite of the mankind-saving Christ, did not accept that the Jewish scriptures should become the Old Testament of the Christians. He also rejected the Judaizing additions in the New Testament which were alien to him. He did not recognize large passages of Luke, effectively leaving scarcely more than what appears in Mark, nor did he recognize the pseudo-Pauline epistles."


Of course you don't mention these and many other points because you're ideological glasses simply fade them out. Jesus must be a Jew. Period.
All your effusions are basically variations on John 4:22.

Amaleq13

Could you be more specific with regard to this accusation? His references to the general consensus of scholars appear to be accurate as far as I can tell.

There is no evidence for any earlier source for this late attempt to disparage Jesus. Carotta's "seems" is really, at best, "could" or "might" because it is unsubstantiated speculation. These is no indication these Jewish texts are independent and they are clearly in response to existing Christian claims. Given assertions of a virgin birth, the obvious rejoinder would be to assert illegitimacy as the "real" explanation. Carotta's use of these late sources is no more credible than the use of them by Christians to defend the historicity of the Gospels.

GakuseiDon

Juliana, it is an interesting topic. Some questions:

Are you saying that mainstream scholars "fear" Carotta's work because they secretly know that it is true?

Why hasn't Carotta had his work published in peer-reviewed journals?

Finally, do you have any reviews (outside Amazon) that you can point me to?

Vorkosigan

You won't deal with what I actually wrote. You just pile on insult after insult.

Because to point out all the faults and errors would be a waste of time. Bottom line: anyone who thinks the last line of the parable of the sower is about a reduction in size doesn't know anything. But I'll finish later today with Carotta's comments about Mark 2 and 3.

No, because his work is trash. Refuting it wouldn't get me any points.

You're cute. You accuse me of being a naysayer and prejudiced, and now you accuse me of having bad manners?

Please identify any errors in my assessment of the scholarship. Please. Anyone reading this can see that you are quite unable to.

Juliana, have you paid any attention to a word I've said? I don't believe in Jesus, and I certainly don't believe he was a Jew.

Hey, Juliana! This is exact passage was dealt with in my review. Simple. TE Schmidt (Schmidt, T.E. 1995. Mark 15:16-32: the Crucifixion Narrative and the Roman Triumphal Procession. New Test. Stud. vol 41, 1995. pp1-18.) has already dealt with this issue. The writer of Mark presented the Crucifixion as a mock Roman-procession. I suggest you do something Carotta didn't do, and read scholarship written after 1950. Do you think Carotta is presenting something new here?

Instead of accusing me of dishonesty, why don't you study what Carotta wrote:

• If now the words of the first verse are read from the same viewpoint as in the second, it is conspicuous that MURA—myra—is nearly identical in lettering to PURA—pyra—meaning ‘pyre’, and that MUR—myr—can be confused with PUR—pyr—‘fire’ (think of e.g . ‘pyre’, pile to be burned, ‘pyromaniac’, incendiary, ‘pyrotechnic’, fireworks, or ‘pyrite’, firestone). OXU—oxy—also means ‘sour’, but originally ‘sharp’—and together with verbs of movement or action it takes on the meaning of ‘quickly’. Now, if we combine oxy and elaben, it takes on the sense of: ‘was promptly’, ‘took quickly’, ‘grasped the opportunity’. Both verses of Mark can now produce a coherent meaning: ‘…and while the pyre caught fire, they quickly assembled stakes, posts, slats and palisades, placed them around it, tore up their garments and threw valuable pieces on it…’

Here the Crucifixion is compared to Caesar's funeral pyre.

If you want people to respect your point of view, by all means do not insult them, belittle them, or accuse them of dishonesty. You will note that I have not insulted you personally.

If you can, please explain why Carotta thinks the pericope of the woman taken in adultery is a caesar story, although everyone knows it dates from a later period. Please explain why he thinks the parable of the sower is about a PERCENT change rather than a -FOLD growth.

This information dates from centuries after Jesus' time. The Talmud also reports that he died prior to Caesar's death (neat trick that, eh?). See something like GRS Mead, Did Jesus Live 100 BC?.

Correct. Which makes their information worthless, Juliana.

See? Here is what I mean. Marcion recognized 10 epistles. At least three of those are known to be Psuedo-Pauline. Every time Carotta makes a claim it is wrong, wrong, wrong. And this is basic. A 10-second search on the net will inform you of this.

Juliana, do you even know what I believe? here's what I just wrote on Thompson's The Messiah Myth

"The battle over the proper context for Jesus has been one of least-recognized but most profound of the various struggles among New Testament exegetes. After WWII exegetes began to strongly emphasize the Jewishness of Jesus. Laudably, this was partly in response to the "Aryan Jesus" of 19th century scholarship, that eventually found its apotheosis in Nazi doctrines. However, it was also in response to the arguments of scholars from the schools of myth and comparative religions, who had argued in the period prior to the Second World War that Jesus resembled similar figures of the ancient Near East and Mediterranean. By reinforcing the Jewishness of Jesus and delinking him from the surrounding cultures, New Testament scholars sought to protect him from the assaults of the comparative religions school."

Believe it or not, Juliana, I know this stuff better than Carotta does. Obviously!

Vorkosigan