dogsgod

I would appreciate some information regarding Acts 12:2 as an interpolation if anyone knows of any. R.G.Price offers some insight on his website but I can not find any other information on it.

Acts 12:2, He had James, the brother of John, put to death with the sword.

Acts 12:17, “Tell James and the other brothers and sisters about this,”

Verse 17 tells us something is amiss, we just read that James was executed and then Peter makes a reference to James as if it did not happen. James is mentioned a couple more times and the reader can not help but question who this James is. Removing Acts 12:2 solves the problem, the story makes all the more sense without it.

GakuseiDon

I haven't read RG Price's comments, but Acts has two Jameses (hmmm... is that the plural of 'James'?) I've added the passages below, including some surrounding text.

Acts 1
[13] And when they were come in, they went up into an upper room, where abode both Peter, and James, and John, and Andrew, Philip, and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon Zelotes, and Judas the brother of James.
[14] These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.
[15] And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, and said, (the number of names together were about an hundred and twenty,)

Acts 12
[2] And he killed James the brother of John with the sword.
[17] But he, beckoning unto them with the hand to hold their peace, declared unto them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. And he said, Go shew these things unto James, and to the brethren. And he departed, and went into another place.

Acts 15:
[12] Then all the multitude kept silence, and gave audience to Barnabas and Paul, declaring what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them.
[13] And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, Men and brethren, hearken unto me:
[14] Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name...
[19] Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God:
[20] But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood.
[21] For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath day.

Acts 21
[18] And the day following Paul went in with us unto James; and all the elders were present.

Here are the Jameses in the Gospel of Mark:

Mark 1
[19] And when he had gone a little further thence, he saw James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, who also were in the ship mending their nets.
[29] And forthwith, when they were come out of the synagogue, they entered into the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John.

Mark 3
[17] And James the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James; and he surnamed them Boanerges, which is, The sons of thunder:
[18] And Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Canaanite,

Mark 5
[37] And he suffered no man to follow him, save Peter, and James, and John the brother of James.

Mark 6
[3] Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended at him.

Mark 9
[2] And after six days Jesus taketh with him Peter, and James, and John, and leadeth them up into an high mountain apart by themselves: and he was transfigured before them.

Mark 10
[35] And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, come unto him, saying, Master, we would that thou shouldest do for us whatsoever we shall desire.
[41] And when the ten heard it, they began to be much displeased with James and John.

Mark 13
[3] And as he sat upon the mount of Olives over against the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew asked him privately,
[4] Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign when all these things shall be fulfilled?

Mark 14
[33] And he taketh with him Peter and James and John, and began to be sore amazed, and to be very heavy;

Mark 15
[40] There were also women looking on afar off: among whom was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses, and Salome;

Mark.16
[1] And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him.

Toto

I'm not sure what more information you can find.

This comment agrees with you.

I see you had a long exchange with Tim O'Neill at the notorious thread on RationalSkepticism, but I don't know what more you can say.

There is no manuscript variation at that point, but we do know that there were interpolations in the text, and this is a possible interpolation.

Toto

RG Price for reference.

I don't know what GDon's list of verses is meant to accompish. The gist of it is:

Acts 12:
1 It was about this time that King Herod arrested some who belonged to the church, intending to persecute them. 2 He had James, the brother of John, put to death with the sword. 3 When he saw that this pleased the Jews, he proceeded to seize Peter also. This happened during the Feast of Unleavened Bread. 4 After arresting him, he put him in prison, handing him over to be guarded by four squads of four soldiers each. Herod intended to bring him out for public trial after the Passover.

In verse 1, Herods arrests some Christians. In verse 2, he has James executed.

In verse 3, "when he saw that this pleased the Jews" - makes more sense if "this" refers to the arrests in verse 1, than if it refers to the execution of James. If the execution of James had pleased the Jews, the conclusion would be to also execute Peter, but Peter is only arrested.

He had James, the brother of John, put to death with the sword is the sort of marginal note that have been written on the edge of the scroll as some sort of comment or addition, and then copied into the text by a later scribe, quite innocently.

But I am not sure why this is controversial, either way, although I have not read through the RS thread. There were probably two or more men named James at the time.

R.G.Price's argument on the brother of Jesus issue is that the author of Luke-Acts never mentions a James as the brother of Jesus, and if James the leader of the Jerusalem group has actually been the literal brother of Jesus, he surely would have mentioned it.

GakuseiDon

N/A

That was my point.

Toto

You don't need to pull out a lot of Bible verses to show that there was more than one James at the time. I think Robert Eisenman might dispute the idea that there were two Jameses, because he thought that the gospel writers split characters up for their own purposes, but I'll accept two guys named James.

I do not have the patience to read through the entire RS thread to find out why an interpolation in Acts 12 would matter one way or another.

GakuseiDon

It's more to see how the Gospel of Mark (and the others, esp Luke) treats the Jameses as compared to Acts. For example:

Acts 1 [13] ... where abode both Peter, and James, and John ... [and] James the son of Alphaeus, and ... Judas the brother of James

So, we see the first pair, James and John, together; and we see a second pair, James the son of Alphaeus and his brother Judas.

Acts 12 [2] And he killed James the brother of John with the sword.

This would appear to be a reference to James and John in the 1 [13], though James and John weren't called brothers in 1 [13].

Now, in Mark 1, we have:

[17] ... James the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James; and he surnamed them Boanerges, which is, The sons of thunder:
[18] ... and James the son of Alphaeus...

So those are the two Jameses we see in Acts.

Next, in Mark 6 [3] Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us?

The James in Mark 6 [3] has a brother called "Judah", just like the second James in Acts. These are given as brothers of Jesus.

Mark's "James son of Alphaeus" may or may not be the "James son of Mary"; if not, then there are three James at least. The interesting thing here is that Mary is called "Mary the mother of James" rather than "Mary the mother of Jesus".

Toto

Given two or more James, still would you not agree that Acts 12:2 does not fit the flow of the narrative and might be an interpolation?

hjalti

Hmm... but doesn't it seem like he has him arrested so he can put him on trial and then executed?

GakuseiDon

I honestly can't say, but then again it's not that important an issue for me. I read RG Price, and he gives reasons about which James is being mentioned in various passages. I suppose it's possible it's an interpolation. But isn't the general opinion here that Acts isn't that reliable as history anyway?

It does seem that James and John were always mentioned as a pair. Papias apparently wrote:

If, then, any one who had attended on the elders came, I asked minutely after their sayings,--what Andrew or Peter said, or what was said by Philip, or by Thomas, or by James, or by John, or by Matthew, or by any other of the Lord's disciples

which suggests the sons of Zebedee.