Vorkosigan

There are also several other novels known from the centuries around this time, such as Tobit, Esther, etc. Maccabees also has many novelistic elements. In any case as participants in the med civilization, educated jews would have been familiar with the novels of the era.

I have no idea. But since Mark was not written by a Jew but a gentile, this isn't germane.

The debate over dates is not a debate over evidence, but a debate over interpretive frameworks. In any case there is internal evidence from Mark that it dates from the second century, which I argued for a while back. Here is the argument saved on my blog.

Right. And, as scholars are apt to point out, it also shows that Judaism was a thoroughly hellenized religious philosophy by the time we are talking about.

You have to admit, though, that the existence of Jews like Philo is strong evidence for the hellinization of Judaism.

I do not know where the "two powers in heaven" came from, but it was certainly an important belief in Judaism. As Segal pointed out in a paper here:

http://www.marquette.edu/maqom/

Paul has to apologize for many things, but he never apologizes for making Jesus a second god. This influence of the two powers in heaven is also shown by the use of Ps 110. That website has some good stuff on divine mediator figures in second temple judaism, well worth exploring.

Yes, but since I didn't claim that it was "paramount" among Jews, you don't have a case.

They are more like Greek romantic fictions, although their genre is rather hard to pin down. I think the observation of both Wills and Pervo that they resemble the folk biographies like the Life of Aesop also has merit.

LOL. You know, you should probably check my analysis of these two verses. You omitted one possibility that could easily get rid of this "error", BTW. I already know about the connection to Exodus, which is incorporated in my commentary. Go here:

http://users2.ev1.net/%7Eturton/GMark/GMark01.html

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

Hey, thanks! That's a really useful article. Too bad ya gotta pay.

Michael

rlogan

heh. Can't help yourself.

Jesus in "history" is just like the Israelites who colonized America in Mormon "history". Sure - all kinds of Mormon books talk about them.

I can't very well "erase" someone who isn't in legitimate history to begin with. Someone "inserted" into Josephus by unscrupulous power-mongers.

Maybe you can find examples of historians who quote the bible as a means of getting historical anchors for a bona-fide history paper they wrote. It just isn't done because it is a book chock full of myths.


Not at all. I missed the part where non-christian historians are preening about holding up the historical sky-daddy junior. Maybe you'd care to give me some examples.

Absolutely that the source should be inspected.

ynquirer

Of course, they would, but because those books were written in Hebrew specifically for them rather than what you say. I knew of them, yet I wouldn’t guess you bore them in mind when using the plural “novels.� I take especial note of the inclusion of one of the five Megillot, and as such canonical Tanakh both for Jews and Christians; the other two are deemed apocryphal. All in all, you here arise an issue of genre that you seem to simply in excess.

I beg your pardon? Your contention is that Jews were fond of Greek novels, and my question as regard evidence as found in tombs or other archaeological sites is only too relevant.

I feel sorry, but such statements as these are beyond my capacity of comprehension.

Very interesting, your blog. A good introduction by you and fine comments by learned contributors. Thought-fuel of excellent quality, thank you. Yet I can’t understand how you render so notoriously Jewish a theme as the temple destruction compatible with the claim that Mark was not written by a Jew but by a gentile. Is this not a conspicuous case of interpretive frameworks?

Hmm… “a thoroughly hellenized religious philosophy.� What the hell is this? Yahweh competing with Zeus in a Platonic dialogue to rule over the heavens?

Granted, but the main question is whether polytheism superseded monotheism, and the answer is no. Actually, Greek philosophy, and especially Platonism, was integrated precisely because it entails a creator for ideas, on which ideas both men and gods depend all together.

Therefore, the point would perhaps better stated by saying that Philo is strong evidence for the Judaization of post-Classic, Hellenistic philosophy – an intermediate step, by the way, in the process of its Christianization.


Again, a very interesting link. Segal’s article points at the merkabah mysticism, which is too unlikely a Jewish borrowing from Classical culture. (Segal himself expounds the same idea in his discussion of the Golden Ass.) As far as the Gnostic demiurge dwelling in the Samaritans is also mentioned, the Zoroastrian origin is still a possibility. Yet the interest of the main issue quite clearly surpasses that.

If Paul’s preaching is somehow connected to these very intricate, esoteric manifestations of Jewish mysticism, as suggested by Segal, it affords evidence adverse to the usual theories of the MJ, which find its origin in cultural and philosophical borrowing from the Greek civilization.

In particular, there seems to be no place in Jewish mysticism for such a mythological history either on earth or on earth-proxy layers of reality, as of the intermediary powers descending from David in the flesh, being crucified, being buried and etc.

A history like this may be found in Greek mythology, whose gods fertilize women and give rise to Heroes. But in the Jewish tradition, except for the singular story of the Nephilim (Genesis 6:4), there are no such exchanges. Lucifer and the rest of the angels are not born from women; when he rebels, he is punished, but he neither dies, nor is buried, nor resurrects. Everything happens in the heavens, and in the heavens alone, as well as the symbols are by no means earthly – like flesh, life, death, burial.

No, I don’t have a case, as you say. But thank you for clarification. It wasn’t that clear in your previous posts.

The Jews call such narratives “hagiographa.� I think the name is more appropriate than “Greek romantic fictions,� for reasons explained both above and below.

Thanks. I have read your analysis. It’s fine. The possibility I omitted (I conjecture) is Isaiah 40:9. I didn’t know of it but, sorry, it seems to me too feeble a nexus. I didn’t know about Helms’ mentioning Exodus 23:20 in 1997, either. There is nothing new under the sun.

What is most interesting, however, and Helms almost touches as well, is that Segal, in dealing with the “two power theology,� expressly mentions Exodus 23:21 as a key verse in the merkabah mysticism. It speaks of an angel/messenger that bears the name of God.

And guess – what? Exodus 23:20, the exact match for the central line of Mark 1:2, as evinced by Helms, just precedes the key verse Ex 23:21 and happens to speak of the same angel/messenger.

And if Mark speaks of the angel/messenger that bears the name of God, and precisely the writer conceals this connotation by hiding his quoting Moses either behind a seeming mistake or omission or even behind a smoke curtain provided by Isaiah 40:9, then the hidden quotation is a type of wink secretly addressed to a specific audience with exclusion of those who persecuted the mystics (the Pharisees, in all likelihood, first, the rabbinic authorities, for sure, later – according to Segal). If so, I am afraid, the case for the authorship failing on a gentile weakens dramatically.

I now have the explanation I was looking for. Thanks a lot.

Steven Avery

Which is one reason I gave you the URL to the Leland Haines article that uses the Professor Robinson material.

And.. if you really do want to go into depth, it is $3 out of real heavy-duty $5 minimum for articles of your choice from a good selection. (I had ordered the hard-copy journal from Professor Robinson before TREN had it, another way to go)

On similar textual issues
.. the next one is also one of the Professor Robinson articles, this issue he also had a big public dialog/debate about a year ago.

"Preliminary Observations Regarding The Pericope Adulterae Based Upon Fresh Collations Of Nearly All Continuous-Text Manuscripts And Over One Hundred Lectionaries" - $1.80

Some others..

Healing In The Atonement: Use Of Isaiah 53 In The New Testament

Have We Misread Matthew's Use of Isaiah 7:14?

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

Vorkosigan

I don't think you quite caught the argument. The text as it is usually read runs:

• 1: The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
  2: As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, "Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way;
  3: the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight -- " (RSV)

...but if we reposition it, it looks like:

• 1: The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God as it is written in Isaiah the prophet.
  
  2: "Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way;
  the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight -- "

Two complete and separate thoughts and BANG! the error disappears. But apparently the Greek doesn't work. *sigh*

Vorkosigan

Steven Avery

Your welcome.

The wider-than-usual support for the alexandrian reading on this verse is precisely why Professor Robinson wrote a detailed paper with indepth analysis on the verse.

http://www.bibleviews.com/authority-6.pdf
The Greek Text of New Testament Chapter 6 - Leland Haines

"Fee challenged anyone to show that two test passages in Mark (1:2 and 13:14) were not “Matthew/Mark harmonizations,� and that the “harder� Alexandrian reading was not the best text-type. We would like to review Robinson’s response to this challenge. His study shows the Byzantine harmonization can be defended."

'Hard case' discussions can often be very enlightening. Similarly, Vork uses a few of the 'hard case' Masoretic Text readings in order to attack the authority and accuracy of the Hebrew Bible. That is why such verses properly get extra attention, although one should always be aware of their special evidentiary nature.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

ynquirer

I did catch the argument the first time I read it, but thank you.

The problem the mention of Isaiah alone in Mark 1:2 poses is two-fold. On the one hand, the seeming misquotation of Isaiah since there is no such a verse in it as saying that a messenger is going to be sent; on the other, the fact that such a saying quotes Exodus 23:20 without citing the source.

The former problem you can more or less plausibly solve by merging verses 1 and 2, but the latter remains unsolved at all. The error disappears but the omission stands still. Half a solution, poor solution – that’s what I meant.

Vorkosigan

Now I see what you mean. The citation does sort of hang there, making an admittedly awkward versification. Perhaps it is the author directly addressing his readers...

I can't recall attacking the "authority and accuracy of the Hebrew Bible." I don't post on that topic at all; my focus is generally on early Christianity.

Vorkosigan

Apikorus

Methinks this was directed at yours, truly. The irony here is that as a Jew I confess a certain irrational affinity toward the Tanakh. Though I try to pursue an objective and analytical approach to the subject, I'm always happy to read about archaeological finds which overlap with and corroborate accounts in the HB. The view that the HB is unswervingly historical is of course comically unnuanced, but I believe that there is a significant historical core to the Deuteronomistic History, and that there is much to be gleaned from the prophetic texts and from the remainder of the HB as well.