Roger Pearse

As part of my commission to translate the fragments of Philip of Side (one of which is connected with Papias), I accidentally led the translator to suppose that I wanted a complete translation of a sixth century novel, the Religionsgesprach am Hof der Sasaniden or Religious dialogue at the court of the Sassanids. This also is now online in English. You can get the PDF from here.

This contains a version of the TF.

If people find any of this useful, do feel free to buy the CDROM of my collection of the fathers etc, available from here. Proceeds get spent on more translations.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

PhilosopherJay

Hi Roger,

Great stuff, as usual. Thanks.

The reference to the TF in this Religious Discussion at the Court of the Sassanids is fascinating. It is stated by Christian Bishops who are testifying about Jewish witnesses to Christ:
It is interesting that the text just quotes or paraphrases the first part of the TF.

Looking at the TF, in Eusebius' evangelical demonstratio we can distinguish three parts:


Part 1. Part 2.
Part 3.
Part 1. is about Jesus being a miracle worker to both Jews and Christians. This is interesting because Jesus actually performs very few miracles for non-Jews.

Part 2. is so close to the First Council of Constantinople Creed of 381 that we have to suspect that it comes from that time or later. Here is the section of the Constantinople Creed of 381 that resembles the TF:

The Nicene Creed of 325 just says
The best explanation for the near copy of the Constantinople Creed is that it was added to all the works of Eusebius around or after 381.

Part 3 (And from that time to this the tribe of the Christians has not failed.) is a trope that Eusebius uses often to express an excellent thing, something that has lasted from an ancient time to the present day.

In the paragraph after the TF in evangelical demonstration, Eusebius explains the TF this way:

We should note that the part of the TF that resembles the Constantinople Creed (Part 2) is missing from the analysis by Eusebius. This suggests strongly that it was not put in by Eusebius, but put in afterward. It is also missing from the "Religious Discussion text. This seems to confirm that Eusebius didn't put it in.

Eusebius is sourcing the idea that Jesus was a wonder-worker, with something "beyond the rest of mankind" (something divine about him who united Jews and Greeks. However he is sourcing the idea that he was the Messiah to the Acts of the Apostles. This is interesting. Can it really be an accident that Eusebius' analysis breaks the text into two parts and the where he breaks the first part is exactly where the TF in the Religious Discussion ends. It can be a coincidence, but it may also indicate that the first part of the text was prior to Eusebius and was transmitted to the Religious Discussion before Eusebius added the second part.

This should lead us to again break the TF into two parts: the part that the Religious Discussion knows and Eusebius says came from Josephus and the part from that Eusebius says comes from the Book of Acts, that Eusebius almost certainly added.

Part 1

Part 2
This was Christus. the divine prophets having foretold this, and very many other things about him. And from that time to this the tribe of the Christians has not failed." 77"

We can say from this evidence that there were three separate additions to the TF.

Part 1, when have been done by Eusebius or Eusebius may have found it inserted by somebody else. (It is the part found in the Religious Discussion text)

Part 2 is definitely an addition by Eusebius that he got from the Act of the Apostles.

Part 3. "he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried, and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures" is base on the Constantinople Creed was an addition made around 381, or later, probably half a century after Eusebius was dead.

Color coding it, we get
Red (Before Eusebius or Eusebius):
Green (Eusebius)
Blue (around time of the Constantinople Creed 381 or after)
And there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if indeed it is necessary to call him a man, for he was a doer of paradoxical works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure, and many Jews on the one hand and also many of the Greeks on the other he drew to himself. This man was the Christ. And when, on the accusation of some of the principal men among us, Pilate had condemned him to a cross, those who had first loved him did not cease to do so. For he appeared to them on the third day, living again, the divine prophets having related both these things and countless other marvels about him. And even till now the tribe of Christians, so named from this man, has not gone extinct.


Warmly,

Jay Raskin

PhilosopherJay

Hi all,

I was rethinking my position that the first part of the TF might not have been added by Eusebius. I would rather say that Eusebius probably did the Red part and published it, but added the Green part later. The Blue part is post-Eusebean material.

Color coding it, we get
Red (Eusebius):
Green (Eusebius later addition)
Blue (around time of the Constantinople Creed 381 or after)
One can conclude this based on a comparison of the Religious Discussion TF, which posits the TF in an extremely underdeveloped almost embryonic form, and the two explanation/analysis that Eusebius gives in the theophania and evangelical demonstratio just after citing the TF in those two work. They give us even less developed and more embryonic forms of the TF.

Religious Discussion TF:

Eusebius analysis from demonstratio evangelica:

Eusebius analysis from Theophania:

In both works, Eusebius makes three very similar arguments to prove the Jews slandered the apostles and Jesus was the Christ. We should look closely at these three arguments. They contain the secret mystery of how the TF was invented.

In both cases, notice that Eusebius begins by saying that if Josephus said X than we can deduce y. This is in the form of a logical proposition. After this, he then sites the Acts of the Apostles for a second argument and a history or record from Jerusalem about the early Jerusalem Church for his third argument.

demonstratio evangelica:
Argument 1. If as Josephus attests about Jesus:
a) He had many Jews and Greeks followers
then;
p) he must evidently have had some extraordinary power beyond that of other men.
r) must have done wonderful miracles
s) and unheard-of teaching?

Argument 2. From Acts of the Apostles
a) thousands thought He was that Christ of God, who had been preached of by the Prophets

Argument 3. And history also assures us that
a) there was a very important Christian Church in Jerusalem, composed of Jews,
b) which existed until the siege of the city under Hadrian.
c)The bishops, too, who stand first in the line of succession there are said to have been Jews,
d) whose names are still remembered by the inhabitants.


Eusebius theophania:
Argument 1. If, as Josephus affirms about Jesus
a) he was a doer of wonderful deeds
b) he had many Jewish and gentile followers
then
p) he possessed something excellent beyond the rest of mankind
r) He had made use of miracles
s) and astonishing deeds,
t) and of doctrines (till then) unknown?

Argument 2. From Acts of the Apostles
a) thousands thought He was that Christ of God, who had been preached of by the Prophets

Argument 3. It is also on record,
a) that there was a great Church of Christ at Jerusalem; which had been collected from among the Jews,
b) even to the times of its reduction by Hadrian.
c) The first Bishops too who were there, are said to have been, one after another, fifteen (in number), who were Jews;
d) the names of whom are published to the men of that place, even until now. {note Eusebius' "even until now" trope which is also in the TF.

Notice that in the demonstratio, the only thing he is saying that Josephus affirms about Jesus is
a) He had many Jews and Greeks followers

In the theophania, he is saying that Josephus affirms about Jesus
a) he was a doer of wonderful deeds
b) he had many Jewish and gentile followers

Eusebius has gone from affirming in the demonstratio merely that Josephus said that Jesus had many Jewish and non-Jewish followers, to saying in the theophania that Josephus has said that Jesus had many Jewish and non-Jewish followers and he was a doer of wonderful deeds. How has something that was a deduction in demonstratio become a saying by Josephus in the theophania?

Let us say you read a blog saying:
"Lady Gaga said 'money is evil,' therefore she must believe that poverty is good."
The next day you read a blog saying:
"Lady Gaga said, 'money is evil and poverty is good,' therefore she must like to see children starve."
The next day you read a blog saying:
"Lady Gaga said, 'money is evil and poverty is good and I like to see children starve.' therefore we should boycott her."

It is obvious that we are getting an expansion of errors with deductions being mistaken for quotes.

A real life example of this process of false quote attribution based on deduction happened during the presidential campaign of 2000.
The story is told here Al Gore was repeatedly falsely accused of saying that he invented the internet or was the father of the internet. The quote was a false deduction based on his saying that he "took the initiative in creating the internet," a quite true statement based on his Senatorial record.
Thousands of articles, and people on television and radio made fun of him for saying it and some questioned his sanity and/or his ability to tell the truth. The important thing is that false deductions from a statement ended up creating false quotations.

The TF is no more than a series of deductions made from the starting statement that Eusebius attributed to Josephus in the demonstratio that Jesus had many Jewish and Greek followers.

How did Eusebius develop this first statement. Was it something he read in Josephus? I seriously doubt it. This too seems simply a deduction on the part of Eusebius. He knew that Origin had said that Josephus did not believe that Jesus was the Christ. Eusebius probably reasoned that Josephus must have considered the possibility that he was the Christ because he had Jewish and Greek followers. In other words, Eusebius deduced that the only reason Josephus would deny that Jesus was the Christ was if Josephus had known about Jesus having many Jewish and Greek followers.

From deducing from Origin's statement that Josephus had denied Jesus was the Christ, the fact that Josephus must have said that Jesus had many Jewish and Greek follower, Eusebius next deduced the fact that Josephus must have said that he was a doer of wonderful deeds. How else could he have gotten so many followers?

This approach seems to raise the problem of how Eusebius could have quoted the TF in demonstratio and theophania and in both cases, in the very next passage contradicted them, by saying that Josephus only knew Jesus had many followers and later only knew that and he was a doer of wonderful deeds.

The answer is that the TF in these two works are interpolations themselves. It is possible that later writers took all of Eusebius' deductions about what Josephus wrote and assumed that Eusebius meant that Josephus had really written them. It is also possible that Eusebius mistook his own deductions as words that Josephus must have written and inserted them into his own works and the 18th book of Josephus. This appears on first glance to question Eusebius' sanity, but it is rather normal for people, when they wish to hear certain words from people, to become convinced that those persons have actually said them, even when they have said nothing of the sort.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Toto

I would think that the mere fact that Josepus was a Jew would be enough to show that he did not believe that Jesus was the Christ.

The "Al Gore invented the internet" meme has a different sort of history. A careless Wired reporter, Declan McCullough, reported that Gore "took credit" for the internet, and "created" can mean "invented" in some contexts. This fed into a concerted and deliberate Republican campaign to vilify Gore, based on lies about what he actually said and did. There was no natural growth or embellishment of this original mistake, and it was finally laid to rest by the engineers who invented the internet crediting Gore. This is a very shameful period of American political rhetoric and a failure of the marketplace of ideas.

PhilosopherJay

Hi Toto,

The creation of false quotes by Christians is a serious and ongoing fact. For example here is an article about how a Christian preacher named David Barton made up 13 false quotes that he attributed to the founding fathers of the United States. They were repeated throughout the Christian and conservative media on television, radio, newspapers, magazines and the internet. For example:
Although the man who faked the quotes admitted that they were "unsourced quotations" over 15 years ago, the quotes are still being circulated as real quotes. For example, here is the quote being used, yesterday, as sent to a local online Florida newspaper.

We cannot assume Eusebius was the David Barton of his time.

Rather Eusebius' own analysis in "theophania" and "demonstratio evangelica" and the text "Religious Dialogue at the Court of the Sassanids," appear to show the development of the TF. The similarity of part of it to the Constantinople Creed (381 CE) shows, I think, how Eusebius started the TF, but did not write all of the TF found in our one 11th century manuscript of "Antiquities." It was still being changed decades after his death and the Slavonic Josephus shows that it was still evolving a thousand years later.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay