Toto

By "dated" I mean the best guess of mainstream academic scholars as to when the letter was written, based on the internal content of the epistles as a whole. No carbon dating is possible without an original manuscript.

mountainman

There is of course the Nag Hammadi text NHC 6.1
"The Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles".
C14 dated to c.348 CE (via gThomas).

In my estimation this:

1) is only superficially a "christian parable".
2) contains an ascetic allegory (the pearl).
3) contains anti-christian polemics/parody.

and was therefore written by a non-christian.

The title containing "12 apostles" and Peter
making a total of thirteen is contradicted in
the text, where "eleven apostles prostrated".

My analysis of this NHC 6,1 text
is called TAOPATTA

Best wishes,


Pete Brown

KrisK10

Toto,

Whether 1 Cor 15:5 intends a simultaneous appearance to a group or is a group report of individual appearances is not explicitly clear. Without going into the details, an intended simultaneous appearance seems slightly more likely to me. At the very least it's 50/50 chance for either. So basically, I'm just toying with what I think is the most difficult possibility.

As for the tradition in 1 Cor 15:5 being alive in the 30's (and 15:3-4, and possibly 15:6-7, with the exception of Paul's little comment) there is too much to go into to argue this here. I think you would agree with me though that there are plenty of skeptical scholars who would assign 1 Cor 15:5 to an early tradition in the 30's. I am treating this as a presupposition to my question.

Lastly, the identifiability of the 12 to the Corinths is not of import here. If 1 Cor 15:5 represents a tradition from much earlier, it would be the identifiability of the 12 to the Jesus Jews that lived then that would matter. In this case, how could a claim be made that 12 identifiable leaders in a new movement saw a simultaneous vision of a dead person, when in fact they didn't?

I believe it's relevant that we are looking at a second hand report, i.e. none of the 12 in the tradition (if 1 Cor 15:5 is a tradition) are themselves claiming they saw Jesus simultaneously with 11 other people. The tradition is making that claim for the 12. So I feel like there is some explanation along the lines of an urban legend growing, but I can't quite figure it out. I was hoping a comparative example might shed some light on things, but apparently there are no similar examples.

Kris

KrisK10

Pete,

Thanks for the ref from our previous discussion. I wish you the best in your analysis of that difficult work. I've come to the conclusion that there is no clear answer regarding group vs individual appearances intended in 1 Cor 15:5 based on Peter being part of the 12 or separate (13 total). I'll note briefly though that 1 Cor 15:7 seems very much in parallel with 1 Cor 15:5 (leader then group) and in the case of 1 Cor 15:7, James seems to be part of the "apostles", therefore it seems that Cephas was probably part of "the Twelve".

Kris

KrisK10

Malachi,

Sorry, I'd have to disagree that an interpolated 1 Cor 15:5 (and presumably 1 Cor 15:3-7) is "pretty easy to see". The absence of the 12 from the rest of Paul's writings is not significant unless you can identify a place where he should have mentioned them. I'm unclear on why overlap between the 12 and the apostles would favor an interpolation over Paul repeating an earlier tradition. We don't know either way if the Corinths knew who the 12 were or if they knew of that body of authority without knowing the men personally (the later would be all that was required for Paul to write what he did).

Kris

Toto

No, I would not agree that there are plenty of skeptical scholars who would assign 1 Co 15:5 to the 30's. Paul might be reporting an earlier tradition, but we don't know how much earlier, and we have no basis for picking the 30's, other than a desire to validate Christian stories.

I don't understand this. False claims are made all the time, even where the people can be identified - but these 12 are not even identified.

This may not be what you are looking for, but there are many current examples of Christian conservatives rewriting American history to turn the founding fathers into Evangelical Christians. The people are identifiable, the facts can be discovered, but the legends persist. People think that George Washington added "so help me God" to his oath of office; he most likely didn't. Conservatives claim that the founding fathers resorted to prayer when they wrote the Constitution; they didn't. These are convenient myths, not about supernatural occurences, but they have arisen because they fit someone's political need.

So you have a letter from Paul - allegedly - which has passed through several hands, and now contains a claim that Jesus appeared to the 12. You can't really date either the letter or this passage in the letter, you don't know who the 12 were. But you do know that some early Christians were concerned about establishing their credibility by linking themselves to someone who knew Jesus, an apostle or someone who got the revelation. Is there any reason to think that this is a "tradition" as opposed to an invented claim of authority?

Steven Carr

Perhaps they saw Jesus in an image in an object like a dirty window.

Or perhaps they saw Jesus travel into the sky and disappear into some clouds on his way to Heaven.

KrisK10

Toto, all good points, with several of your options being possibilities. Thanks to everyone else too for taking a stab at this tough problem. Happy New Year to you all.

Kris

Julian

Well, if you consider Paul's view on the 'pillars' as he regards them in Galatians, then it seems odd that he would ascribe importance to the group here. If I were to take Galatians as my guide to a Pauline view of the disciples, then I would think that he couldn't less about any appearances to them. That is, unless he is citing a strong tradition, i.e. stronger than his own disregard for them, in which case one would assume that the Corinthians would know about them. It sounds suspiciously like Gospel tradition to me, in other words, material that Paul doesn't seem to have any knowledge of elsewhere in his writings.

Julian

KrisK10

Julian,

Thanks for the additional ideas in favor of interpolation. As I said, seems like a possibility. It's odd though that if someone where going to add gospel material to Paul's 1 Cor 15, they would not add the discovered empty tomb.

Kris