rlogan

On the internet I ran across this guy who has written "The True Authorship of the New Testament". Five bucks for a copy of his masterpiece. I wondered if anyone here has read it or knows anything about the guy.

I ascertain the basic line is that the Roman Piso family wrote the gospel precursor to Mark, and that one purpose was to hijack the Jewish religion.

That is a somewhat cunning story line, but everything I see about this material suggests loony fringe or hoax.

It would be such a sweet story if Paul had been an agent provocateur of Rome.

I don't know how far the guy carries this and its less than five bucks to see if anyone here has looked into this cute little diversion...

Toto

It's a hoax.

See if this link works, or cut and paste, or google "abelard reuchlin" hoax


http://members.shaw.ca/chatfunk/The ... is a hoax.htm

Heurismus

I've seen it too

Affirm total hogwash, another myth-cycle in the making, squash it dead before it harms. Or, kiss its arse for its charms.

Cheers ToTo

rlogan

Yowza.

hey Toto - that link you had provided a link to this guys discussion board.

Here's one of his new proofs:

'The deliberate misspelling of 'stone' in Flavius Josephus' Jewish Wars. This is where Josephus writes his passage about a stone which is being hurled over the wall by the Romans at the Jews on the other side. He says, "The stone cometh!" However, he deliberately misspells the word 'stone' and makes it 'son'.'

Devastating.

Roman Piso. Misunderstood Genius

RTS

I'm curious about the amount of research any of you have done into this theory, and if you have researched this extensively to formulate an informed conclusion that it's a hoax, could you please cite some detailed specifics as to why you have concluded it such besides a quote that appears to be a small blurb taken out of context. Also, Toto's link appears to be a dead link.

From my first perusal of this material, it appears this guy RomanPiso is quiet confident in his research (to the point of arrogance). He claims he reads Koine Greek and has analyzed the source documents in the original Greek.

The idea of a person or family within the Roman aristocracy originally authoring the source documents that eventually became the Bible seems quiet plausible to me. But I don't know if we'll ever be able to identify who really wrote the texts of the New Testament (it surely was NOT Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Agreed?). If you really think about it and consider the fact that the Roman Empire was at war with the Jews at about the same time the books of the Bible were written (70 C.E. to approximately 140 C.E.) this aspect of the hypothesis makes a little bit of sense.

Personally, I will reserve judgment until read more of this theory and cross-reference some supportive or refuting evidence. I've never been one to make hasty, uninformed judgments.

Toto

Try this link to the google cache

Vorkosigan

Neither is Toto.

Toto

I looked into this a while back, and I know someone who wasted a lot of time on it. Unfortunately, I don't recall all the details, but it was a hoax.

RTS

From the article:

"When I first posted this website I was fairly certain that Abelard Reuchlin was actually Nelson Johnson, the author of the website where I first encountered this hoax. Since then, it has been made fairly obvious by several factors and items of evidence that this is likely not the case. I cannot say that he is not for certain, but I also can no longer state that he is."

This first sentence of this linked article doesn't instill much confidence in this person's accuracy of judgment or research. Think maybe if he was wrong about who this Abelard Reuchlin is, then maybe he's wrong about it being a hoax?

He further expounds: "Within three minutes of reading this obvious fabrication, the entire hoax came into clear view."

Wow! So much for objective, well informed reviews. 3 minutes? Okay. I'm sure his priori beliefs, lack of objectivity and his lack of informed research has clouded his conclusions.

In all honesty, this link strikes me as a disgruntled Christian believer's attempt to create a "he said he said" argument to discredit this theory.

As I said, I personally will reserve judgment until I research this further. This link IMHO carries little weight as refutation.

RTS

After reading this link again, it is obvious this is a disgruntled Christian who has built his argument upon unsupported opinion, straw-man arguments, and ad hominem attacks.

He cites the “Ossuary of James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus� as supportive argument stating essentially: because a fraud like the Ossuary can be easily perpetrated this is absolute proof the Piso Theory is a hoax. *GONG #1*

Then he cites an expired URL to a discussion forum as proof of deception when in actuality the forum exists with a new URL. *GONG #2*

Then he states: "The fact is, there is virtually no evidence anywhere that a person or family by the name of Piso ever existed."

There is enormous historical evidence the Piso family DID exist. The name is very well represented in history. Julius Caesar's wife was a PISO. The Pisos are mentioned as consuls to the Empire many, many times in history and they were major players in the "Pisonian Conspiracy" against Nero. This IS historical FACT. *GONG #3*

He then creates a Straw-Man argument concerning the Piso name: "Let me provide an example for you. The name “Piso� itself is probably derived from “Pico�, that mystic noble of Kabbalah fame, which can also be spelled “Picho� and pronounced peesho. “Arius� is etymologically related to “Pierre�, as in Pierre/ Peter Abelard. Calpurnius is a Latin name with an inherent meaning of secret, hidden or mystery, the same meaning of the Latin word cabalistica."

And then admits: "Actually, this example is not all true, but do you see how easy it is to put together a believable fabrication?"

This is his proof of a hoax? He basically states because any story can be fabricated, this story of the Piso Theory is false. What he is actually saying is everybody is too stupid to discern between any fabrication unless it is admitted to by the deceiver. HA! What an insult to everybody! *GONG #4*


I wish to revise my conclusion about this link. I find this link to be totally void of a convincing argument and conclude it carries ZERO weight as refutation.