Adam

“Going over like a lead balloon” would seem to be the apt analogy, to be expected here for my Post #450. I’m pretty exposed in my main thesis, so I’ve been exploring whether I have much support. I have not been finding anything for seven written eyewitness records, but I am finding lots of acknowledgment of written sources and eyewitness testimony. The current fashion is the discovery of notebooks used when listening to rabbis in the time of Jesus. The following notable scholars fall somewhere in this grouping. Starting with Goodspeed in 1959:


Richard Bauckham. Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony (or via: amazon.co.uk). Eerdmans, 2006. “Such notebooks were in quite widespread use in the ancient world (2 Tim 4:13 refers to parchment notebooks Paul carried on his travels). It seems more probable than not that early Christians used them” (p. 288).

Samuel Byrskog. Story as History, History as Story: the Gospel Tradition in the Context of Ancient Oral History (or via: amazon.co.uk). Brill, 2000. Oral and written transmission are not mutually exclusive alternatives and do not follow the logic of first oral and then written

Paul Rhodes Eddy and Gregory A. Boyd. The Jesus Legend: a Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Traditions (or via: amazon.co.uk). Baker Academic, 2007. They cite other scholars, not mentioned here due to space, who believe that some of the traditions may have been written down.

---. Lord or Legend? (or via: amazon.co.uk) Baker, 2007. I discovered this book belatedly. It's written for the laity. It's a clarification of their more academic book, noted in the previous entry. Definitely get it.

E. Earle Ellis. “New Directions in Form Criticism.” In Ellis, Prophecy and Hermeneutic in Early Christianity: New Testament Essays (or via: amazon.co.uk). Mohr, 1978. Pp. 237-53. E. Earle Ellis comes up with several factors that indicate that “some written formulations of Jesus’ teachings were being transmitted among his followers during his earthly ministry” (p. 243).

---. “The Synoptic Gospels and History.” In Authenticating the Activities of Jesus (or via: amazon.co.uk). Ed. Bruce Chilton and Craig A. Evans. Brill, 1999. Pp. 49-57.

Harry Y. Gamble. Books and Readers in the Early Church: A History of Early Christian Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk). Yale, 1995. There is, then, at least a strong circumstantial probability that collections of testimonies [proof texts] were current in the early church and should be reckoned among the lost items of the earliest Christian literature” (p. 27)

Birger Gerhardsson. Reliability of the Gospel Tradition (or via: amazon.co.uk). Hendrickson, 2001. Gerhardsson’s point is clear. Would Jesus' disciples fail to take notes on at least a few things?

Edgar J. Goodspeed. Matthew: Apostle and Evangelist (or via: amazon.co.uk). John C. Winston, 1959. This book has no link to amazon.com, but I recommend it if you can find it.

Peter M. Head. “A Further Note on Reading and Writing in the Time of Jesus.” Evangelical Quarterly 75 (2003) 343-345. The emerging picture suggests that the production of written records would have had a place in the cultural milieu of the Galilean disciples of Jesus” (p. 345).

Werner Kelber. The Oral and the Written Gospel (or via: amazon.co.uk). Fortress, 1983. The Q tradition, other saying collections, anthologies of short stories, parables, miracles, and the like could well have existed in written form” (p. 23).

Saul Lieberman. Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (or via: amazon.co.uk). The Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1962. Now the Jewish disciples of Jesus, in accordance with the general rabbinic practice, wrote the sayings which their master pronounced not in a form of a book to be published, but as notes in their . . . codices [plural of codex or early book], in their note-books (or in private small rolls).

Alan R. Millard. Reading and Writing in the Time of Jesus (or via: amazon.co.uk). NYUP, 2000. This is not to say the Evangelists began to compose the Gospels in Jesus’ lifetime, but that some, possibly much, of their source material was preserved in writing from that period, especially accounts of the distinctive teachings and actions of Jesus. (pp. 222, 223-24)

James M. Robinson. “A Written Greek Sayings Cluster Older than Q: A Vestige.” Harvard Theological Review 92 (1999) 61-67. “The history of the synoptic tradition is no longer dependent only on the forms of oral transmission, but now has a series of written texts bridging much of the gulf back from the canonical [Biblical] gospels to Jesus” (p. 61).

Graham N. Stanton. Jesus and Gospel (or via: amazon.co.uk). Cambridge, 2004 So in all probability some kind of notebook was used for Scriptural excerpts which were prominent in early Christian preaching and teaching.(p. 182)

This bibliography is given at the end of this article
. http://bible.org/seriespage/did-some...80%99-ministry
And the earlier portions at this site list the relevant portion in each citation. The annotations above are transferred in from that earlier write-up.
I was first looking for a scorned scholar, Carsten Peter Thiede, to perhaps find someone putting out a strong thesis like I do. Ironically I grew interested in this primary opponent, Graham Stanton, but found he is just like me in taking a strong stand in the middle, flaying Fundamentalists and skeptics alike. He’s in the above list.

Toto

2 Timothy is almost universally recognized as a second century forgery.

"May have been"

...

Your fuller statement:

(3) E. Earle Ellis comes up with several factors that indicate that “some written formulations of Jesus’ teachings were being transmitted among his followers during his earthly ministry” (p. 243). Some of these factors include the education of Jewish children, particularly in the synagogues that were located in Israel’s villages. “The picture of Jesus’ followers as simple, illiterate peasants is a romantic notion without historical basis. Unless it can be shown otherwise, it must be assumed that some of the disciples and / or their converts were capable of composing written traditions” (p. 243).

How deftly but incorrectly the burden of proof is shifted...


Yes, surely Jesus' disciples would have taken notes, and just as surely these notes would have been carefully preserved by later followers . . . so what would you conclude from the fact that we have no evidence of such notes?

Robinson makes this breathtaking statement because "A scribal error has turned up in Q."

This is getting painful. You've got nothing.

If you assume a historical Jesus who had followers as described in the gospels and that the gospels are basically historical, then some of this would all follow - but you don't give us any reason to make this assumption.

Vorkosigan

Adam, there is no "middle". When you talk about "the middle", you are making a sociological rather than scholarly judgment. Your "middle" is located far to the right, sociologically speaking.

Don't think about the middle. There are only things that have good methodological support, and things that don't.

Vorkosigan

Doug Shaver

Being in the middle is great for politics. In scholarship, it doesn't count for squat.

Elena

Here we are. Now your motive is clear. Why didn't you say it earlier? The problem is that there is nothing to refute. We cannot refute "you", we can only refute arguments. But you have none. Who are you to decide what is legitimate when you are not able to understand 2+2=4? Like spin pointed it out, you are making unsupported assertions. You have no argument, not one and you come to tell us about our "favourite anti-xian arguments". It looks like you have no idea what an argument looks like. Spin is making fun out of you, while you are here only motivated by xian propaganda.

And why only 7 eyewitnesses? One for every day of the week? Why not 12? One for every month! I guess you are forgetting Pontius Pilatus. He was a well placed eyewitness. And his wife too. And god, did he not witnessed what happened to his beloved son?

Adam

The "Middle" can be timidity, Vork,
But in my case it's philosophical. I don't make your a priori assumption that there is no supernatural nor the Fundamentalist assumption that the Bible is inerrant. Without your assumption, the gospels appear to be early and from written eyewitness sources. With your preconception we have no eyewitnesses, with Fundamentalists we get three, but with my scholarly investigation I find seven.

TO: Elena
I have limited myself to written eyewitness records from the four canonical gospels, based primarily on internal evidence. Other names come from pseudonymous gospels, but none seem to be genuine.

Elena

Do you see often warriors taking notes in the field? In any case it is not so much about taking notes as about keeping the record. We know that all available texts concerning Jesus were deeply edited if not forged. And translated.

Elena

It is not a priori. It is a posteriori. And nothing to do with "assumption".There is a rational way of thinking and there is an irrational one ("not in accordance with reason; utterly illogical"). Chose your way.

Elena

Because the four canonical gospels "seem to be genuine"? It looks like you don't understand how they were edited, translated, forged... You take everything at face value. John wrote john... when this gospel contradicts almost everything what the others are saying. Do you know the original matthew? Do you have a way to decide who wrote which chapter? Who for instance added the 2 first chapter of matthew?

Huon

It seems more probable than not ... is not a proof.
Yes, but it is not proof of anything.
other scholars who believe ...
no proof, opinion
the early church, when exactly ?
If you say so ...
illiterate fishermen
could : opinion
opinion
opinion
Please, show these written texts ?
in all probability ...