Freethought & Rationalism Archive

stephan huller · 07-15-2012, 01:44 AM

Why is it a futile exercise? You keep saying that Josephus wrote in the first century and I keep asking you to actually read the material in front of your nose. Since you seem incapable of actually digesting new information that contradicts your point of view here is C H Turner's analysis of the same material:

Quote:

The existence of a chronographer of the tenth year of Antoninus Pius (AD 147-148) has been assumed in explanation of the curious coincidence that both Clement of Alexandria (once) and Epiphanius (once) employ this year as a term in chronological calculations. The latter interrupts his series of bishops of Jerusalem, after the twentieth bishop Julianus, with the note 'all these down to the tenth year of A. Pius,' Haer. lxvi 1. The former tells us that ' Josephus reckons from Moses to David to the second year of Vespasian 1179 years, and from that to the tenth of Antoninus seventy-two years,' Strom, i 21 147; and as the mention of this this last date cannot come either from Josephus, who wrote half a century before it, or from Clement himself, who wrote half a century after it, it is a reasonable supposition that it is borrowed from some other intermediate writer, who will also have been the source of Epiphanius. This lost writer is conjectured by Schlatter l, following von Gutschmid, to be identical with the Judas mentioned above ; but something more than mere conjecture is wanted before we can accuse Eusebius of mistaking the tenth year of of Severus for the tenth of A. Pius. With better judgement, Harnack suggests Cassianus was the author, we have seen that Eusebius knew nothing of him ; if Judas, we must conclude that Eusebius knew next to nothing of a book which ex hypothesi he dated fifty years too late.[Journal of Theological Studies 1900 p. 193 - 194]

stephan huller · 07-15-2012, 01:49 AM

Yes C H Turner tries to get around what Clement clearly says by saying 'it can't be our Flavius Josephus.' This is what you are doing but clearly Hegesippus is the Latin rendering of the Greek name Josephus. The point is that OUR TEXTS of Josephus don't have this passage and were made to look like they were written by someone in the first century but if you look at the Latin translations of Hegesippus (= Jewish Wars) you will clearly see the author (= Josephus) is speaking about another Josephus carrying out various actions in the first century IN THE THIRD PERSON. I don't know why I have to keep explaining the obvious. Our texts of Josephus weren't simply preserving a first century text with Christian bits (= Testimonium Flavianum) added to them. They were wholly reworked in the second, third and fourth centuries. This was a constant revision, over and over and over again until you end up with a whole bunch of ridiculous material that no first century Aramaic speaking Jewish rebel commander would ever compose (= Jewish Antiquities).

stephan huller · 07-15-2012, 01:53 AM

This is so fucking frustrating. No one wants to deal with what the sources actually say. C H Turner has his agenda. The people at this forum have their own respective agendas. To some extent that's just human. But at least show respect to the actual surviving material. You can't just wave a magic wand and argue that Clement's 'Jewish history' of 'Flavius Josephus' isn't the original ancestor of our material that passes under the same fucking name. Yes, it's inconvenient to accommodate pre-existing beliefs to scientific 'facts' but that's what supposed to separate 'freethinkers' like us from dogmatic religious morons. I see no evidence that dogmatism is restricted to religious believers.

maryhelena · 07-15-2012, 01:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

Why is it a futile exercise? You keep saying that Josephus wrote in the first century and I keep asking you to actually read the material in front of your nose. Since you seem incapable of actually digesting new information that contradicts your point of view here is C H Turner's analysis of the same material:

Quote:

The existence of a chronographer of the tenth year of Antoninus Pius (AD 147-148) has been assumed in explanation of the curious coincidence that both Clement of Alexandria (once) and Epiphanius (once) employ this year as a term in chronological calculations. The latter interrupts his series of bishops of Jerusalem, after the twentieth bishop Julianus, with the note 'all these down to the tenth year of A. Pius,' Haer. lxvi 1. The former tells us that ' Josephus reckons from Moses to David to the second year of Vespasian 1179 years, and from that to the tenth of Antoninus seventy-two years,' Strom, i 21 147; and as the mention of this this last date cannot come either from Josephus, who wrote half a century before it, or from Clement himself, who wrote half a century after it, it is a reasonable supposition that it is borrowed from some other intermediate writer, who will also have been the source of Epiphanius. This lost writer is conjectured by Schlatter l, following von Gutschmid, to be identical with the Judas mentioned above ; but something more than mere conjecture is wanted before we can accuse Eusebius of mistaking the tenth year of of Severus for the tenth of A. Pius. With better judgement, Harnack suggests Cassianus was the author, we have seen that Eusebius knew nothing of him ; if Judas, we must conclude that Eusebius knew next to nothing of a book which ex hypothesi he dated fifty years too late.[Journal of Theological Studies 1900 p. 193 - 194]

my bolding

And Stephan, lets keep this civil please - I don't appreciate you attacking my intellect.

maryhelena · 07-15-2012, 02:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

Yes C H Turner tries to get around what Clement clearly says by saying 'it can't be our Flavius Josephus.' This is what you are doing but clearly Hegesippus is the Latin rendering of the Greek name Josephus. The point is that OUR TEXTS of Josephus don't have this passage and were made to look like they were written by someone in the first century but if you look at the Latin translations of Hegesippus (= Jewish Wars) you will clearly see the author (= Josephus) is speaking about another Josephus carrying out various actions in the first century IN THE THIRD PERSON. I don't know why I have to keep explaining the obvious. Our texts of Josephus weren't simply preserving a first century text with Christian bits (= Testimonium Flavianum) added to them. They were wholly reworked in the second, third and fourth centuries. This was a constant revision, over and over and over again until you end up with a whole bunch of ridiculous material that no first century Aramaic speaking Jewish rebel commander would ever compose (= Jewish Antiquities).

Stephan, what if "Josephus" is simply a pseudonym? That is my position, for what it's worth...................:devil1:

Sure, we don't have first century texts of Josephus - nor the gospel Jesus story. Which means one can come up with all sorts of strange ideas re what the original Josephus manuscripts did or did not contain. Same with the gospel Jesus story.

However, debating words that are in our preferred translation/manuscript will not produce any historical data. For that we have to get beyond mere words (after all, words are often inadequate vehicles to convey ones desired meaning) and search for historical evidence. Coins, archaeological findings etc. With that basic grounding - then we can go and try and decipher what the words in the manuscripts are endeavoring to transmit.

For Agrippa I and Agrippa II we have the Herodian coins. That the Josephan writer has given us tall tales re these two historical figures is only of interest re trying to establish a motive for doing so. The tall tales do not negate the evidence from the Herodian coins re the historicity of these two figures.

stephan huller · 07-15-2012, 02:21 AM

Clement says 'Flavius Josephus' wrote a 'Jewish history' which contained a chronology which went down to the tenth year of Antoninus Pius. Epiphanius used the same source which contained the same reference to 'the tenth year of Antoninus Pius' at least once with respect to the episcopal list of the Church of Jerusalem (which ends there). Most scholars say that the author of Epiphanius's souce is Hegesippus. The source is called the Hypomnemata in Five Books.

Shaye Cohen argues that Josephus wrote a hypomnema which formed the basis to our existing five books of Jewish Wars (in Latin and other early versions). Do the math. http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/he..._00_eintro.htm

Clement mentions Flavius Josephus
Epiphanius uses Hegesippus
Hegesippus is just a Latin (corrupt) rendering of the Greek Josephus
our texts of Josephus were developed by the synergoi in the second century. I am not sure that even Shaye Cohen would object to all of these formulations.

maryhelena · 07-15-2012, 02:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

Clement says 'Flavius Josephus' wrote a 'Jewish history' which contained a chronology which went down to the tenth year of Antoninus Pius. Epiphanius used the same source which contained the same reference to 'the tenth year of Antoninus Pius' at least once with respect to the episcopal list of the Church of Jerusalem (which ends there). Most scholars say that the author of Epiphanius's souce is Hegesippus. The source is called the Hypomnemata in Five Books.

Shaye Cohen argues that Josephus wrote a hypomnema which formed the basis to our existing five books of Jewish Wars. Do the math.

Clement mentions Flavius Josephus
Epiphanius uses Hegesippus
Hegesippus is just a Latin (corrupt) rendering of the Greek Josephus
our texts of Josephus were developed by the synergoi in the second century. I am not sure that even Shaye Cohen would object to all of these formulations.

And if we turn to the Pauline letters - how many are deemed to be original to 'Paul'? Others are disputed. So, with the writing of Josephus - someone wants to continue a Josephan cycle and writes under the name of Hegesippus....Just an idea I'm throwing your way....

Stephan, it's not manuscripts and debating words that is going to get us very far in searching for early christian origins. People write what they believe to be accurate. People also make stuff up. We can't base our search for early christian origins on people's ideas. Ideas come and they go. One man's 'truth' is another man's heresy. We have to work from something more stable and grounded than ideas. Historical, archaeological findings. Without that as a basis one is blowing in the wind with ones interpretation of words found in copies of copies of manuscripts.

stephan huller · 07-15-2012, 02:41 AM

But the fact that Clement testifies that Josephus's history of the Jews was written in the second century has to be acknowledged. That is the point of this thread. From there the question of whether Drusilla the Jewish princess has any legs is severely weakened especially given the presence of Simon Magus in the narrative.

maryhelena · 07-15-2012, 02:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

But the fact that Clement testifies that Josephus's history of the Jews was written in the second century has to be acknowledged. That is the point of this thread. From there the question of whether Drusilla the Jewish princess has any legs is severely weakened especially given the presence of Simon Magus in the narrative.

Lets have the quote, Stephan, where Clement "testifies that Josephus's history of the Jews was written in the second century".

I suggest that that is your interpretation of Clement.

maryhelena · 07-15-2012, 08:09 AM

OK - here is take 2 on the Drusilla and Felix marriage.

The article on Cleopatra Selene, on the Tyndale House website has some interesting details:

http://www.tyndalehouse.com/egypt/pt...lene_ii_fr.htm

1) Cleopatra Selene was probably married to Juba II around 20/19 b.c. or even earlier:

[T2]Coins are known up to year 48, which matches this chronology perfectly. The only dated coin for Juba before year 23 is dated to his sixth year = 20/19 (J. Mazard, Corpus Nummorum Numidiae Mauretaniaeque no 357), and shows Juba on one side and Cleopatra Selene on the other. It is therefore argued that this must be the year of the marriage.

D. W. Roller, The World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene 86, notes that this date makes Selene about 20 and Juba nearly 30 at the time of the marriage, and that in 25, when Juba II left Rome to become king, both were already of marriageable age (15 and 25). He therefore proposes that they were married before they left Rome, and suggests that the coin marks the fifth anniversary of the marriage. This is perfectly possible, thuogh it cannot yet be proved.[/T2]

2) Three children are thought to be from this marriage. A son that probably died. Another son, Ptolemy. A daughter, unnamed - but would possible have been named Cleopatra not Drusilla.

[T2]Given Selene's insistence on advertising her Ptolemaic connections and the name of her son, "Cleopatra" seems to me a much more likely name than "Drusilla" for this daughter.[/T2]

3) Cleopatra Selene’s son Ptolemy possibly born around 10 – 5 b.c.

[T2]D. W. Roller, the World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene, 256, estimates a birth-date of c. 13-9 BC on the assumption that he would have been born before Selene turned 30. This is a little earlier than my estimate, but not out of line with it.[/T2]

4) Ptolemy married:

[T2]He probably married a queen [Julia] Urania[/T2]

5) Daughter.

[T2]Ptolemy was probably the father of Drusilla...[/T2]

The article then goes on the consider the problems involved re Drusilla and Felix.

The unnamed daughter of Cleopatra Selene would be born, unless there was reproductive problems, shortly after her marriage to Juba II. Possibly prior to her 30th birthday in 10 b.c. (giving her 10 years of marriage at that stage). So, anywhere from 20 b.c. to 10 b.c. Cleopatra Selene could have given birth to a daughter.

The Roman procurator Felix is given a birth date of between 5 and 10 c.e. (Wikipedia) Thus a marriage to a daughter of Cleopatra Selene would mean that this daughter was at the very least 20 years older than Felix. A most improbably marriage.

Wikipedia names the daughter of Ptolemy, son of Cleopatra Selene, as Drusilla of Mauretania: Birth in 38 c.e.

[T2]She was the daughter and only child born to the Roman Client Monarchs Ptolemy of Mauretania and his wife, Julia Urania. [/T2]

Drusilla of Mauretania, born in 38 c.e., would only be about 14 years old if she was married to Felix in 52 c.e. He would be, born between 5 – 10 b.c., around 43 years older than her.

Thus, it would seem that both these proposed marriage to a Mauretanian princess for Felix would be unrealistic.

The problem, then, comes back to Josephus. The Josephan story would place the birth of the daughter of Agrippa I, Drusilla, in 38 c.e. (being 6 years old at the death of her father in 44 c.e.) Again, we have a young bride of 14 years old and a husband about 43 years her senior. Again, the plausibility of this marriage is doubtful - as it would be for Drusilla of Mauretania.

[T2]Antiquities: Book 19 Chapter 9

1. AND thus did king Agrippa depart this life. But he left behind him a son, Agrippa by name, a youth in the seventeenth year of his age, and three daughters; one of which, Bernice, was married to Herod, his father's brother, and was sixteen years old; the other two, Mariamne and Drusilla, were still virgins; the former was ten years old, and Drusilla six.[/T2]

On top of all that dating for the children of Agrippa I, we have Josephus saying that Drusilla had already been married by the time she married Felix! 14 years old and on her second marriage....

Whatever the motive for the Josephan storytelling, it’s historical accuracy is indeed questionable.

If Tactius has been reading Josephus re a marriage of the daughter of Agrippa I to Felix around 52 – 58 c.e., he most probably thought Josephus had mixed up Agrippa’s Drusilla with the Drusilla of Mauretania - both being born in the same year. Since Agrippa’s daughter would only be 14 years old in 52 c..e. - likewise the Drusilla of Maurentania - then Tactius decides to run with the unnamed granddaughter of Cleopatra and Marc Antony. (the age of the great granddaughter, Drusilla of Maurentania, being too young to have married such an older man as Felix). Tactius goes with the older woman with the young man rather than the older man and the very young woman.

And all because of Josephus and his storytelling....i.e. his historical re-constructions of Herodian history.

The dating of the granddaughter and the great granddaughter of Cleopatra and Marc Antony rule out a marriage of either of them to Felix.

It’s the Josephan storytelling re Agrippa I, and hence the dating of Agrippa I, and of his daughters, that is the issue here - not the possibility of a marriage itself between Drusilla and Felix. Re-set that Josephan ‘history’ to an earlier time frame and this Drusilla and Felix marriage can become a possibility. i.e. re-setting the Agrippa I history would suggest that his daughter, Drusilla, and Felix would be born around the same time - they would be contemporaries.

( a link to an old thread re the problems surrounding Agrippa I ...

http://www.freeratio.org/showthread....65#post6453665)

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07-15-2012, 01:49 AM	#82
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	Yes C H Turner tries to get around what Clement clearly says by saying 'it can't be our Flavius Josephus.' This is what you are doing but clearly Hegesippus is the Latin rendering of the Greek name Josephus. The point is that OUR TEXTS of Josephus don't have this passage and were made to look like they were written by someone in the first century but if you look at the Latin translations of Hegesippus (= Jewish Wars) you will clearly see the author (= Josephus) is speaking about another Josephus carrying out various actions in the first century IN THE THIRD PERSON. I don't know why I have to keep explaining the obvious. Our texts of Josephus weren't simply preserving a first century text with Christian bits (= Testimonium Flavianum) added to them. They were wholly reworked in the second, third and fourth centuries. This was a constant revision, over and over and over again until you end up with a whole bunch of ridiculous material that no first century Aramaic speaking Jewish rebel commander would ever compose (= Jewish Antiquities).

07-15-2012, 01:53 AM	#83
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	This is so fucking frustrating. No one wants to deal with what the sources actually say. C H Turner has his agenda. The people at this forum have their own respective agendas. To some extent that's just human. But at least show respect to the actual surviving material. You can't just wave a magic wand and argue that Clement's 'Jewish history' of 'Flavius Josephus' isn't the original ancestor of our material that passes under the same fucking name. Yes, it's inconvenient to accommodate pre-existing beliefs to scientific 'facts' but that's what supposed to separate 'freethinkers' like us from dogmatic religious morons. I see no evidence that dogmatism is restricted to religious believers.

07-15-2012, 02:21 AM	#86
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	Clement says 'Flavius Josephus' wrote a 'Jewish history' which contained a chronology which went down to the tenth year of Antoninus Pius. Epiphanius used the same source which contained the same reference to 'the tenth year of Antoninus Pius' at least once with respect to the episcopal list of the Church of Jerusalem (which ends there). Most scholars say that the author of Epiphanius's souce is Hegesippus. The source is called the Hypomnemata in Five Books. Shaye Cohen argues that Josephus wrote a hypomnema which formed the basis to our existing five books of Jewish Wars (in Latin and other early versions). Do the math. http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/he..._00_eintro.htm Clement mentions Flavius Josephus Epiphanius uses Hegesippus Hegesippus is just a Latin (corrupt) rendering of the Greek Josephus our texts of Josephus were developed by the synergoi in the second century. I am not sure that even Shaye Cohen would object to all of these formulations.

07-15-2012, 02:41 AM	#88
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	But the fact that Clement testifies that Josephus's history of the Jews was written in the second century has to be acknowledged. That is the point of this thread. From there the question of whether Drusilla the Jewish princess has any legs is severely weakened especially given the presence of Simon Magus in the narrative.

07-15-2012, 08:09 AM	#90
maryhelena Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: England Posts: 2,527	OK - here is take 2 on the Drusilla and Felix marriage. The article on Cleopatra Selene, on the Tyndale House website has some interesting details: http://www.tyndalehouse.com/egypt/pt...lene_ii_fr.htm 1) Cleopatra Selene was probably married to Juba II around 20/19 b.c. or even earlier: [T2]Coins are known up to year 48, which matches this chronology perfectly. The only dated coin for Juba before year 23 is dated to his sixth year = 20/19 (J. Mazard, Corpus Nummorum Numidiae Mauretaniaeque no 357), and shows Juba on one side and Cleopatra Selene on the other. It is therefore argued that this must be the year of the marriage. D. W. Roller, The World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene 86, notes that this date makes Selene about 20 and Juba nearly 30 at the time of the marriage, and that in 25, when Juba II left Rome to become king, both were already of marriageable age (15 and 25). He therefore proposes that they were married before they left Rome, and suggests that the coin marks the fifth anniversary of the marriage. This is perfectly possible, thuogh it cannot yet be proved.[/T2] 2) Three children are thought to be from this marriage. A son that probably died. Another son, Ptolemy. A daughter, unnamed - but would possible have been named Cleopatra not Drusilla. [T2]Given Selene's insistence on advertising her Ptolemaic connections and the name of her son, "Cleopatra" seems to me a much more likely name than "Drusilla" for this daughter.[/T2] 3) Cleopatra Selene’s son Ptolemy possibly born around 10 – 5 b.c. [T2]D. W. Roller, the World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene, 256, estimates a birth-date of c. 13-9 BC on the assumption that he would have been born before Selene turned 30. This is a little earlier than my estimate, but not out of line with it.[/T2] 4) Ptolemy married: [T2]He probably married a queen [Julia] Urania[/T2] 5) Daughter. [T2]Ptolemy was probably the father of Drusilla...[/T2] The article then goes on the consider the problems involved re Drusilla and Felix. The unnamed daughter of Cleopatra Selene would be born, unless there was reproductive problems, shortly after her marriage to Juba II. Possibly prior to her 30th birthday in 10 b.c. (giving her 10 years of marriage at that stage). So, anywhere from 20 b.c. to 10 b.c. Cleopatra Selene could have given birth to a daughter. The Roman procurator Felix is given a birth date of between 5 and 10 c.e. (Wikipedia) Thus a marriage to a daughter of Cleopatra Selene would mean that this daughter was at the very least 20 years older than Felix. A most improbably marriage. Wikipedia names the daughter of Ptolemy, son of Cleopatra Selene, as Drusilla of Mauretania: Birth in 38 c.e. [T2]She was the daughter and only child born to the Roman Client Monarchs Ptolemy of Mauretania and his wife, Julia Urania. [/T2] Drusilla of Mauretania, born in 38 c.e., would only be about 14 years old if she was married to Felix in 52 c.e. He would be, born between 5 – 10 b.c., around 43 years older than her. Thus, it would seem that both these proposed marriage to a Mauretanian princess for Felix would be unrealistic. The problem, then, comes back to Josephus. The Josephan story would place the birth of the daughter of Agrippa I, Drusilla, in 38 c.e. (being 6 years old at the death of her father in 44 c.e.) Again, we have a young bride of 14 years old and a husband about 43 years her senior. Again, the plausibility of this marriage is doubtful - as it would be for Drusilla of Mauretania. [T2]Antiquities: Book 19 Chapter 9 1. AND thus did king Agrippa depart this life. But he left behind him a son, Agrippa by name, a youth in the seventeenth year of his age, and three daughters; one of which, Bernice, was married to Herod, his father's brother, and was sixteen years old; the other two, Mariamne and Drusilla, were still virgins; the former was ten years old, and Drusilla six.[/T2] On top of all that dating for the children of Agrippa I, we have Josephus saying that Drusilla had already been married by the time she married Felix! 14 years old and on her second marriage.... Whatever the motive for the Josephan storytelling, it’s historical accuracy is indeed questionable. If Tactius has been reading Josephus re a marriage of the daughter of Agrippa I to Felix around 52 – 58 c.e., he most probably thought Josephus had mixed up Agrippa’s Drusilla with the Drusilla of Mauretania - both being born in the same year. Since Agrippa’s daughter would only be 14 years old in 52 c..e. - likewise the Drusilla of Maurentania - then Tactius decides to run with the unnamed granddaughter of Cleopatra and Marc Antony. (the age of the great granddaughter, Drusilla of Maurentania, being too young to have married such an older man as Felix). Tactius goes with the older woman with the young man rather than the older man and the very young woman. And all because of Josephus and his storytelling....i.e. his historical re-constructions of Herodian history. The dating of the granddaughter and the great granddaughter of Cleopatra and Marc Antony rule out a marriage of either of them to Felix. It’s the Josephan storytelling re Agrippa I, and hence the dating of Agrippa I, and of his daughters, that is the issue here - not the possibility of a marriage itself between Drusilla and Felix. Re-set that Josephan ‘history’ to an earlier time frame and this Drusilla and Felix marriage can become a possibility. i.e. re-setting the Agrippa I history would suggest that his daughter, Drusilla, and Felix would be born around the same time - they would be contemporaries. ( a link to an old thread re the problems surrounding Agrippa I ... http://www.freeratio.org/showthread....65#post6453665)

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