Ben C Smith

I do not see any necessary generation gap in the word paradosis. Paul uses the same word of material that he delivered to his very own still living converts only a few years before.

Ben.

BTW, you certainly know how to live it up on your vacations!

Gamera

What would constitute "proof" of eyewitness status of an author of a text from antiquity?

Thucydides says he's an eyewitness in a ms copied 1500 years after the event. Is that proof of his eyewitness status, because if it is, Paul's is a bit better as to the things he claimed he witnessed. At least the ms history of his texts aren't as grevious as what usually passes as historiography from antiquity.

Epistemologically there is no more cogent proof of what Tacitus says he knows than what Luke or Paul say they know.

spamandham

Two alternatives:

A. A first century author writes most of Luke and Acts

B. A mid-to-late 2nd century author writes most of Luke and Acts based on other sources he has available to him

How could we, sitting here at least 1900 years later, tell the difference between these two alternatives. Here are some ways:

1. the texts are mentioned in other texts of known dating. This would set a "no later than date"

2. the texts have later anachronisms in them that can not be adequately demonstrated as later modifications. This would set a "no earlier than" date.

3. the texts make reference to other texts of known dating. This would set a "no earlier than date".

There is textual evidence that Luke copied at least portions of his Gospel from another source (generally presumed to be Mark). This means we have no reason to prefer alternative A over B in regards to Luke/Acts, since it could have been written at any time after Mark, subject to constraints 1-3.

What am I missing?

Roger Pearse

Interesting; whereabouts? I wonder what Perseus says?

Live fast, die young, eh? :-)

Sitting over Ammianus Marcellinus as I am at the moment, the main risk is of chocolate poisoning.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

aa5874

Luke finishes Acts in 61? How did you arrive at that conlusion?

aa5874

Why is it true that Luke and Mark must be ca. 62-70? How do you come to these conclusions?

Roland

Even worse. Mark must have been written on Easter morning, since he records no appearances of the resurrected Jesus to any of the disciples later that day.

Ben C Smith

1 Corinthians 15.3 (for I handed down to you); 11.2 (the traditions just as I handed them down to you).

Death comes to everybody. If it comes to me in the bowels of a library somewhere, I shall die a happy man.

Ben.

Roger Pearse

But 99% of ancient literature is lost, which skews this whole approach. To take this measure would grossly misdate most of what remains. The 2nd century writer Hermias isn't mentioned at all before 1500, for instance. (This has been discussed extensively elsewhere here recently).

So long as they are substantive, certainly. This is one of the genuine methods, first appearing in Lorenzo Valla's book about the Donation of Constantine.

Certainly.

Surely, if that is all we know. But we also have extensive patristic testimony to its apostolic origin. It's even worth Marcion's while to fake it, ca. 140, so accepted is it.

Historical texts that do not contain mention of significant events that happen after they are written (significant to their theme) is another dating issue. Of course it isn't absolute; but the number of people who write histories up to their own times in antiquity is huge; the number who end their histories far in the past ... well, can anyone think of any offhand (Zosimus is a possible, but he may simply have died before covering the last 100 years).

Considering the importance of Peter and Paul to Acts, not mentioning their execution seems like such an omission. The absence of any mention of Roman persecution is also telling, considering the way in which the writer of Revelation refers to Rome as the "whore of Babylon", and the absolute change in the legal status of Christians that seems to follow AD 64 (even if we don't actually know how this happened or that it did happen in 64). The little matter of the Jewish state and its temple being chopped into hamburger, in fulfilment of the prophecies.

I know that some people will simply shout "argument from silence"; but this is a special case of that argument, applying solely to this situation and routinely used in scholarship, for obvious reasons. However it isn't absolute, of course; merely suggestive.

All the best,

Roger Pearse
(5pm: 6 more books to proof...)

aa5874

Now, Roger if 99% of ancient literature is lost, how do you determine which approach is skewed and which meausure results in erroneus dating?