Originally Posted by yalla

I'm having trouble chasing down your Josephus references re Cana and Emmaus, there does not seem to be a 1.86 for Life and I can't follow your reference for Wars either. Probably my fault.

Originally Posted by Newton's Cat

Mark is different from the other three gospels inasmuch that it (as we have it today) was constructed from an earlier text that was rearranged, altered, and added to by someone who wasn't very careful about accuracy - and was unaware of some of the subtleties of the original text. Matthew, John, & Luke took their cue from this fraudulent (deliberate) work. To understand the origins of Christianity one must perceive the fact that Mark (as we have it today) was THE textual vehicle upon which Christianity was founded - a single individual was responsible for founding the CULT that became Christianity. This individual's starting point was the non-Christian writings of someone who had Helenistic rather than Jewish leanings - writings which were highly critical of many aspects of contemporary Judaism.