dog-on

I see. Is this a similar type of accident that happens when your wife catches you in the act with another woman and you immediately say, "Honey, honest, it was an accident, it just kinda slipped in there, really!!!!!"

You have got to be joking...

Roger Pearse

You are welcome to read up on the subject of manuscript studies if you doubt me.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

aa5874

So, can you prove that the TF could have only been accidental if it was interpolated?

It is not necessary to know who forged the TF to make a determination that it was a forgery.

Josephus wrote commentaries on Jewish scriptures like Isaiah and Daniel and did not ever mention any prophecies or passages with respect to the Jesus of the TF.

Now, can you please indicate which words were accidentally removed or inserted at 18.3.3 of Antiquities of the Jews?

Roger Pearse

No indeed; nor that it was written by Martians. But in the absence of actual evidence of forgery, those who choose to claim "forgery" are stating as fact something which they do not know to be true.

You're welcome to your opinion.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

dog-on

I do not doubt you.

But I now seriously doubt the reliability of "Manuscript Studies" in general...

gdeering

Thanks for your reply. While this may be true for most cases, proving the amazing accuracy of copyists over time, the TF corruption is clearly not an accident. You may not find the arguments convincing - for instance if the gospel accounts were accurate why write so little - but for many who don't need the Testimonium Flavium to be true, there is enough evidence to support a case for forgery without a "smoking quill."


Gregg

aa5874

You cannot prove that most interpolations are accidents.

I challenge you to give any passage regarded as an interpolation of any writing of antiquity and prove it was done by accident.

spin

This is the process I argued for the James passage reference to Jesus. I call the process "creeping marginalia". As to the TF, I'd love to see a margin that would be able to hold the ~80 words. It's hard to see an inclusion the size of the TF being anything other than a deliberate modification of the text.

I usually don't talk about forgery in this sort of context. Forgery is really a modern approach to the issue and makes me suspect the proponent rather than the scribe. If a redactor felt that a text should have dealt with a particular topic and is inadequate as it is, would you call that which made the text adequate a "forgery"?


spin

mountainman

The British ancient historian Robin Lane-Fax cites Constantine as presenting fraudulent documentary proof in his "Oration" about the same time as Eusebius suddenly "finds" the testimonum in Josephus. The year is 324/325 CE. So there is not an absense of evidence of forgery and/or fraud at this precise time. We know to be true by the documentary evidence extant today in Constantine's "Oration" that the regime in which Eusebius played his part (very well) was manifestly in the business of fraud at that very time. The year 324/325 CE was not a good year for honesty in high and imperial places. And it only got worse the next year. And the next. And the next .... A gradual downhill slide from being a "brigand" to being "a ward irresponsible for his own actions". What was Eusebius to do? What he was told.

Roger Pearse

Erm, I didn't comment on that last issue. All manuscripts have copyist errors.

There is no certainty of corruption; if there is, there seems to be no evidence that it is not an accident.

All the best,

Roger Pearse