Julian

Sure, it could have been written down. That doesn't mean gospel, though. It could, but it could also just be a letter. Maybe graffiti. Maybe a list of liturgical utterances used in gatherings. Maybe a logion (using my definition of one, i.e. similar to GThomas). Even GThomas talk about being chosen and how special that is, so the concept seemed to have been fairly universal.

BTW, according to numerous reviews, it seems that Koester wrote the definitive (so far) text on Barnabas in 1957. At $50 I feel no strong urge to buy it, though. The title is "Synoptische Überlieferung bei den apostolischen Vätern."

Julian

Amaleq13

We've had this discussion before and Andrew offered some helpful information in this post.

I still can't find the original post that convinced me it was a mistake to assume logia just meant a list of sayings. I could have sworn it was Rick Sumner who made the argument but he, apparently, has not made a single post with the word. :huh:

andrewcriddle

Sorry by well known during the reign of Hadrian I meant that we have evidence of knowledge of Matthew or Luke from several writers some early in Hadrian's reign some later.

As to the time for propagation my impression is that in the Ancient World propagation would be much much slower than with modern printing. And would be even slower with a small marginal and not particularly wealthy group like the early 2nd century Christian church.

Do we have any figures for comparable material ? My impression is that for most ancient works there is a substantial gap between their date of publication and the earliest surviving work to mention them.
Answered by Ben
IMO the differences in emphasis between Mark on the one hand and Matthew and Luke on the other indicate that there has been a number of years theological development between Mark and Matthew/Luke.

On a general point, Julian, IIUC you accept a traditional dating for Paul's epistles. You seem on your dating to be left with Paul writing before say 65 and then all the Gospels written well after 100 CE but very shortly after each other. I don't find this gap prima facie plausible.
IMO Matthew and Luke are both dealing in different ways with the fact that the destruction of Jerusalem did not lead on more or less directly to the final Apocalypse and the coming of the kingdom of Heaven. I don't find this in Mark.

One could explain this by suggesting that Mark wrote late but preserved reasonably accurately traditions from 70 CE and before without significant modification. However, if Mark is a strongly creative writer, then I find the absence of concern about the delay of the parousia after the fall of Jerusalem a problem with dates for Mark much after 70 CE.

Andrew Criddle

Sheshonq

1. No one was addressing you in the first place.

2. In the second place, you are being anally-retentive and over literal. The phrase "here is your task" is just shorthand for saying to Gamera "if you want to invoke probability into a discussion about the dating of P52 and other manuscripts, then these are the steps needed to do that."


If you want to rule something out, then you need to prove that of the small number of early copies, none are the original, since an original must have existed somewhere. In point of fact, all you really need to show is that the earliest dateable copy is actually a copy, and not the original. All mss. that date later than that candidate manuscript can safely be assumed to be copies (because the copy can never chronologically precede the original).

Another misinformed person trying to invoke a probability argument?

I am not required to offer evidence - you are not reading carefully. I am not making an argument; I am critiquing someone else's argument. I am outlining the requirements to invoke probability into this discussion. I don't care if you (or Gamera) follow the requirements or not. But if you fail to do so, then any attempt to invoke probability is busted. And statements like your above "it actually isn't very likely" are circular, if you

(a) don't know when the autograph was written and
(b) don't know the number of copies dating from that particular date range.

Which doesn't change the problem: you cannot use the presence of 2nd century copies to invoke a probability argument that the autograph was a 1st century work.

Nor does it remove the need to validate that you don't have an original among the body of alleged copies.

Not odd at all. Of course the autograph precedes the copies, but there is no requirement that it precede by decades or centuries.

Interesting claim. I'm not aware that any comprehensive examination of the lag between copy and original has ever been done. Before you present this claim as something we should accept, you'll need to provide such evidence.

Not buying any red herrings today, thank you. No requirement exists that an autograph be extant. You are fabricating a requirement out of thin air.

It is quite different, and your attempt to avoid the issue fails.

Unlikely that you know how to form a syllogism, and doubly unlikely that you'll represent my position correctly while attempting to do so. Let's watch:

I am not required to offer evidence. It was Gamera who insisted that many copies were made; I used his assumption to prove a point. But the hypothetical scenario immediately above (proximity of original to copy) still stands whether there are a million copies, or just 1 copy.

Indeed, given how off track your first objection is, I have to wonder if you actually read the thread before responding, or if you just decided to descend from on high and give mortals the benefit of your (alleged) wisdom.

Another red herring? So quickly after the first one? Nothing in my example scenario (or in my post) requires that all copies ever created at any time in history *must* spring from the first group of copies.

Since your preceding assumptions consisted of a strawman followed by a red herring, it's hardly surprising that your conclusion is a bloody mess as well.

As for P52: I have no idea if it is contemporary with the original. It might be; I could make an argument that it was. However, it might even *be* a scrap of the original. I don't know. But that's just the point: I don't know, and therefore I'm not willing to try and pin the date down.

It is people like Gamera and yourself that seem to have some burning, irrational need for the original to be a 1st century product. I have no such agenda to push. The problem is that neither of you has done a very good job of supporting that 1st century date. If you (or anyone else) want to claim that:

(a) P52 is a copy, and
(b) the original dates to the 1st century

then you (or anyone else) is going to have to demonstrate that with something slightly more convincing that circular reasoning. And part of that effort must be some way to rule out the possibility of the earliest alleged copy from being the actual autograph.

Another interesting claim. However, as I said I'm not aware of any comprehensive examination of the lag between original and first copies has ever been done. So like your previous attempt, you'll need to present proof here before such a claim will persuade anyone.

1. Ha. Says the man whose opening gambit to me consists of I would insert a chili in his anus and watch him do the same. You want civil discourse? Physician, heal thyself.

2. I'm glad you brought up the topic of evidence. I await your evidence of a comprehensive examination of the time lag between original and copy for ancient manuscripts. Oh, and just to save us some time: please make sure that the evidence you present contains none of the circularity that I've seen so far.

Ben C Smith

I cannot decide exactly why you are using these hedges (could have). There is always room for caution, of course, and it is possible that this was a saying that was not written down but Barnabas thought it was. (That for a long time was my way out of having to admit that Barnabas knew a text with those words in it.) Is that why?

Agreed. (But there is, of course, only one extant candidate for that phrase, right?)

Could be.

Graffiti introduced with an it is written? I seriously doubt it.

Maybe.

Sure, but the actual words used look a lot like Matthew 22.14, right?

I know. Major expense. Koester, IIUC, thinks that Barnabas is misremembering a saying as some kind of scripture.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

Not orthodox. But conservative, sure.

Ben.

Toto

Mod warning: OK, enough. No more talk about chili peppers. All of you

Toto

Roger Pearse has withdrawn from this thread.

Toto

Some off topic banter has been moved here. Further clean up may be in the works.

patcleaver

I agree.

It would be great if we found an early version of Mark from say ... 100 BCE.

All the text, that allows us to date the document (such as the names Pontius Pilot, Herod, references to the Jewish Wars) could have been added to correct a later revision. Mark was probably an evolving document that was regularly revised until the 5th century.

Paleography by visual examination has not been reliable for dating ancient copies. Paleography based only on visual examination of mere fragments is very unreliable for dating these documents. Until they are carbon dated, we are really just guessing about how old they are. Even when carbon dated, we will only know how old the papyrus is.