Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Steven Carr · 09-02-2012, 09:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Luke says that Jesus was born during the census of Quirinus, which has a known date of 6-7 CE.

Luke doesn't date this census.

You do.

Luke doesn't. He puts it in the days of Herod.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Luke also clearly intimates that Jesus was baptized in the year he dates the beginning of John the Baptist's ministry,

No he doesn't.

That is a fact.

A fact only confirmed by your inability and the inability of all readers of the Gospel to find a word in the text to back up your imaginative claim.

As I said, Luke can data JtB exactly, but he is vague on the census and totally unclear about when Jesus was supposed to have been baptised.

aa5874 · 09-02-2012, 09:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steven Carr

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Luke dates Jesus' birth and baptism.

Based on Ehrman, "there is no way this can be historically correct". There was no worldwide (or even empire-wide) census in the days of Augustus......--See "Did Jesus Exist?" page 184.

There is NO way that gLuke can be considered a Credible source.

It is most laughable that the author of gLuke attempted to date a non-historical event--the conception of Jesus by the "overshadowing" of a Ghost and a Virgin.[b] See Luke 1[b]

But Luke didn't attempt to date the birth of Jesus except in the vaguest way.

The author did name a specific event--a worldwide taxation during the reign of Augustus when Cyrenius was governor. See Luke 2

If there was a such a worldwide taxation then it could be vague. ALL people of the world who participated in the taxation should have remembered when it happened.

There is a problem--the author of Matthew did NOT "remember" that the Son of the Ghost was born during the worldwide taxation by Augustus.

Diogenes the Cynic · 09-02-2012, 09:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steven Carr

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Luke says that Jesus was born during the census of Quirinus, which has a known date of 6-7 CE.

Luke doesn't date this census.

You do.

This is just sophistry. He dates it to a real historical census. We know when the census happened and so did Luke. Whether Jesus was ever born or not, that census still happened in 6-7 CE. He expected his audience to already be familiar with it. It almost caused a war, after all.

Quote:

Luke doesn't. He puts it in the days of Herod.

No he doesn't. He dates the conception of John the Baptist to Herod, not Jesus. Luke's dating of the Nativity to the census of Quirinius is a hard date.

As I said, Luke gives a hard window of 27-36 CE for the career of Jesus. This is undeniable.

Steven Carr · 09-02-2012, 10:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steven Carr

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Luke says that Jesus was born during the census of Quirinus, which has a known date of 6-7 CE.

Luke doesn't date this census.

You do.

This is just sophistry. He dates it to a real historical census. We know when the census happened and so did Luke. Whether Jesus was ever born or not, that census still happened in 6-7 CE. He expected his audience to already be familiar with it. It almost caused a war, after all.

Quote:

Luke doesn't. He puts it in the days of Herod.

No he doesn't. He dates the conception of John the Baptist to Herod, not Jesus. Luke's dating of the Nativity to the census of Quirinius is a hard date.

As I said, Luke gives a hard window of 27-36 CE for the career of Jesus. This is undeniable.

He dates the conception of John the Baptist to Herod, not Jesus's?

How long was the gestation period of John the Baptist? Luke has the fetus JtB meet the fetus Jesus.

That puts the conception of JtB and the conception of Jesus pretty close together, in my view.

I apologise.

Luke does give a date for the birth of Jesus - a date that he got wrong, putting the census in the days of Herod.

So his sources did not allow him to date any event in the life of Jesus, except for a fictitious tale (which may be entirely his own invention and not from any source at all)

Strange how the *fiction* is dated, but not the stuff which is supposed to be historical.

Diogenes the Cynic · 09-02-2012, 10:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steven Carr

How long was the gestation period of John the Baptist? Luke has the fetus JtB meet the fetus Jesus.

Popular misconception, but not actually true. Read it again. Luke nowhere says that Mary was already pregnant when she went to see Elizabeth. Luke then has JBap growing to adulthood, then tells his Nativity. contrary to popular belief, Luke does not say Jesus had yet been conceived in Luke 1. The Angel only tells her, "you will conceive," not that she already has.

PhilosopherJay · 09-02-2012, 11:38 AM

Hi Jiri,

Good stuff. Thanks.

This is the kind of envisioning in the imagination that I think Luke is talking about in the 1.2.

I have been looking at examples in Liddle-Scott-Jones lexicon and the first one from Herodotus already presents us with a great problem. Herodotus used the expression "αὐτόπτης" to describe a trip to Elephantine in Egypt. It usually does get translated as "eyewitness" or "see for myself." However, the information that he gives is apparently so off that some historians think he is lying about actually making this trip or the word was put in later.

Quote:

ἄλλου δὲ οὐδενὸς οὐδὲν ἐδυνάμην πυθέσθαι. ἀλλὰ τοσόνδε μὲν ἄλλο ἐπὶ μακρότατον ἐπυθόμην, μέχρι μὲν Ἐλεφαντίνης πόλιος αὐτόπτης ἐλθών, τὸ δὲ ἀπὸ τούτου ἀκοῇ ἤδη ἱστορέων.

Quote:

"I was unable to learn anything from anyone else, but this much further I did learn by the most extensive investigation that I could make, going as far as the city of Elephantine to look myself, and beyond that by question and hearsay."

Notably if we consider that the translation "to look myself" is wrong and he only envisioned Elephantine from his extensive investigation and questioning and hearsay, we can satisfy both those historians who claim he must be telling the truth and those who claim he lied.

In the beginning of his book II, he says, "I got much other information also from conversation with these priests while I was at Memphis, and I even went to Heliopolis and to Thebes" Curiously he does not mention going to Elephantine here or anywhere else.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solo

FWIW, I believe Luke more or less gave out the interpretation of the first verses in a story of Jesus preaching at Nazareth:

4:16 And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and he went to the synagogue, as his custom was, on the sabbath day. And he stood up to read;
4:17 and there was given to him the book of the prophet Isaiah. He opened the book and found the place where it was written,
4:18 "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
4:19 to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."
4:20 And he closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant (hypēretēs), and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him (πάντων οἱ ὀφθαλμοὶ ἐν τῇ συναγωγῇ ἦσαν ἀτενίζοντες αὐτῷ).4:21 And he began to say to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."
4:22 And all spoke well of him, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth; and they said, "Is not this Joseph's son?"

In Luke's idiom the "eyewitnessing" relates to visionary, inner sight, or the mind's eye which possess the ability to receive the oracular "truths" revealed by the holy spirit. Luke camouflages this by relating the inner psychic events as stories where the spirit is personified as Jesus of Nazareth. You may recall that the two (proto-Pauline) disciples who encounter risen Jesus on the road to Emmaus before the news reaches the disciples, first do not "recognize" Jesus because their eyesight was manipulated (24:16 But their eyes were kept from recognizing him). Also important in reading Luke's intents an the coding of "eyewitnessing" is Acts 1:9-11:

And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.

What Luke is describing here is a classic posture known as Oculogyric Crisis, in which the subjects eyes are rolled and fixed into a upward gaze. This would not be an external event but physical effects of visionary states.

Best,
Jiri

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Hi Jay - I stumbled on this, although I have not completely digested it. It is a review of Bauckham.

Re-thinking ‘eyewitnesses’ in the light of ‘servants of the word’ (Lk 1:2)

Are the autoptai ‘eyewitnesses’?

An immediate reaction to a text that requires us to envisage ‘eyewitnesses ... of the word’ is to present us with the question of what is meant here. Even Origen asked himself that question in the third century. How can one see a sound, he pondered.23 (This brain-teaser arises, incidentally, from the fact that Origen has recognised something he cannot ignore: the idiomatic and semantic connection in the Greek between ‘eyewitnesses’ and ‘word’ that we have just argued.) His response comes from his own database of biblical text.

If the expression has biblical precedent, it must carry theological weight. He recalls Exodus 20:18 reporting that the people saw the sound of thunder and trumpet. This fact invited his theological reflection: what the Israelites were caught up in was the voice of God delivering the written Law, whereas something greater than the Law was here in Luke: the Word of God made flesh. In his further comment Origen admits to the ambivalence of ‘word /logos’ at this point of the preface, allowing that it designated either Jesus the Word or the logos as the message taught.

The latter option fits with the phrase ‘servants / hypēretai of the word’ because Luke himself applies hypēretēs along with martys to Paul as a title bestowed upon Paul by the heavenly Christ (Acts 26:1624). It is also a title Paul assumes for himself and fellow evangelists (1 Cor. 4:1). hypēretēs is, in fact, a term with a well established place in bureaucratic usage for minor officials.25 On the other hand, to comprehend how ‘autoptai of the word’ might work we need to look further afield.

Bauckham himself observes that ‘[t]he English word”eyewitnesses”, with its suggestion of a metaphor from the law courts, is a little misleading.’26 The Greek term has no forensic reference. Bauckham draws on Alexander’s work for a fuller understanding of the Greek term in ancient historiography27 but, although noticing Galen’s use of the term in reference to medical autopsy, appears not to want to go beyond considering the term as ‘firsthand observers of the events’. The same sources that provide this use, however, also provide instances of people seeing for themselves after the event, as in visiting foreign locations where events had happened in the past.

. . .

Duvduv · 09-02-2012, 12:19 PM

In this regard I wonder about something else.
The extent to which the timing of the gospel stories had to fit into the period prior to the destruction of the Temple AND still leave enough time for the events of a fellow called Paul also prior to the destruction of the Temple in order to "show" that this destruction had to have been a punishment for the refusal of Jews (or at least Jewish leaders) to accept the teachings about the Christ.

This timing is far more appropriate for the Jesus story than the time associated with the wife of Jannaeus in the first century BCE.

And of course as the alleged early source, good old Justin can never prove the historical events from anything he ever heard either from the Old Man or any other source who would have known people who had been alive a century earlier. Rather he "proves" all events from prophetic scriptures. Even when the sources behind the so-called Memoirs of the Apostles do not have anything to add about all this, and certainly not about the window of time allowing for someone called Paul to have done his thing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diogenes the Cynic

Luke says that Jesus was born during the census of Quirinus, which has a known date of 6-7 CE. Luke also clearly intimates that Jesus was baptized in the year he dates the beginning of John the Baptist's ministry, i.e the 15th year of the reign of Tiberias, which would be either 27 or 29 CE, depending on whether Luke is counting from when Tiberias became a coregent with Augustus, or sole regent after Augustus died.

You say that doesn't explicitly say that Jesus was baptized that same year, which I think is a specious protestation. At the very least, Luke gives a terminus a quo for beginning of Jesus' ministry. Furthermore Luke, like the rest of the Gospels, Tacitus and Josephus places the crucifixion during the Prefecture of Pilate, which ended in 36 CE. So Luke gives a total window of 27-36 CE for the ministry/crucifixion Jesus.

Luke does say Jesus was "about 30 years old" when he started his ministry, which would push that date out to 36 CE, the last year of Pilate and, interestingly, the year that Josephus implies John the Baptist was killed. Luke appears to be following Josephus for both the dates of the census and for JBap. That does seem to push the ministry/crucifixion further out than the conventional estimate. Luke may be writing fiction, but he's using real dates.

Solo · 09-04-2012, 02:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi Jiri,

Good stuff. Thanks.

This is the kind of envisioning in the imagination that I think Luke is talking about in the 1.2.

I have been looking at examples in Liddle-Scott-Jones lexicon and the first one from Herodotus already presents us with a great problem. Herodotus used the expression "αὐτόπτης" to describe a trip to Elephantine in Egypt. It usually does get translated as "eyewitness" or "see for myself." However, the information that he gives is apparently so off that some historians think he is lying about actually making this trip or the word was put in later.

Quote:

ἄλλου δὲ οὐδενὸς οὐδὲν ἐδυνάμην πυθέσθαι. ἀλλὰ τοσόνδε μὲν ἄλλο ἐπὶ μακρότατον ἐπυθόμην, μέχρι μὲν Ἐλεφαντίνης πόλιος αὐτόπτης ἐλθών, τὸ δὲ ἀπὸ τούτου ἀκοῇ ἤδη ἱστορέων.
"I was unable to learn anything from anyone else, but this much further I did learn by the most extensive investigation that I could make, going as far as the city of Elephantine to look myself, and beyond that by question and hearsay."

Notably if we consider that the translation "to look myself" is wrong and he only envisioned Elephantine from his extensive investigation and questioning and hearsay, we can satisfy both those historians who claim he must be telling the truth and those who claim he lied.

In the beginning of his book II, he says, "I got much other information also from conversation with these priests while I was at Memphis, and I even went to Heliopolis and to Thebes" Curiously he does not mention going to Elephantine here or anywhere else.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Hi Jay,
I think the problem here is not as much with translation but understanding the context of "eye-witnessing" in the narrative of Luke. It does not help to go to Herodotus because he is not dealing with the kind of supra-reality that Luke has in mind. In analogy, it would not help us to analyze engineering specs of early telephony to figure out Kafka's hero hearing voices of angels in the receiver when he gets the switchboard of The Castle.

Look at the symbolism in the story of the two men meeting Jesus on the road to Emmaus. They don't recognize Jesus because their eyesight was manipulated (24:16). Their hearts burn within them when Jesus "was explaining the scripture to them" (24:32) but even though he quotes to them passages concerning himself (24:27) they do not have a clue it is him. When they finally recognize him at the table he instantly vanishes. They go check it with the disciples. As they recount to them the story of their encounter, Jesus materializes. But the disciples frighten and suppose it's some kind of a mental event. Wow ! Who would have suspected that ? But no, wait ! The apparition has hands and feet and... as a final proof, appetite ! Obviously the question arises : what does "eye-witnessing" mean within that sort of narrative ?

Best,
Jiri

PhilosopherJay · 09-04-2012, 03:23 PM

Hi Jiri,

Yes, exactly. There's also this eyewitnessing scene where Peter, John and James fall asleep and see Jesus meeting Moses and Elijah:

Quote:

Luke 9:28-36:

28 Now about eight days after these sayings he took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. 29 And as he was praying, the appearance of his countenance was altered, and his raiment became dazzling white. 30 And behold, two men talked with him, Moses and Eli'jah, 31 who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was to accomplish at Jerusalem. 32 Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, and when they wakened they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. 33 And as the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, "Master, it is well that we are here; let us make three booths, one for you and one for Moses and one for Eli'jah" -- not knowing what he said. 34 As he said this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. 35 And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, "This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!" 36 And when the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silence and told no one in those days anything of what they had seen.

This would be called imagining, envisioning, or dreaming nowadays. It is the type of eye-witnessing or self-seeing that Luke seems to have in mind when he uses the term in the prologue.

Good point about Kafka. In his "Amerika," the statue of Liberty carries a sword instead of a lantern. As I recall the geography is pretty screwed up too, there are mountains in his New Jersey. Kafka is giving us a dream America, not the America found in history books.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solo

{snip}

Hi Jay,
I think the problem here is not as much with translation but understanding the context of "eye-witnessing" in the narrative of Luke. It does not help to go to Herodotus because he is not dealing with the kind of supra-reality that Luke has in mind. In analogy, it would not help us to analyze engineering specs of early telephony to figure out Kafka's hero hearing voices of angels in the receiver when he gets the switchboard of The Castle.

Look at the symbolism in the story of the two men meeting Jesus on the road to Emmaus. They don't recognize Jesus because their eyesight was manipulated (24:16). Their hearts burn within them when Jesus "was explaining the scripture to them" (24:32) but even though he quotes to them passages concerning himself (24:27) they do not have a clue it is him. When they finally recognize him at the table he instantly vanishes. They go check it with the disciples. As they recount to them the story of their encounter, Jesus materializes. But the disciples frighten and suppose it's some kind of a mental event. Wow ! Who would have suspected that ? But no, wait ! The apparition has hands and feet and... as a final proof, appetite ! Obviously the question arises : what does "eye-witnessing" mean within that sort of narrative ?

Best,
Jiri

tanya · 09-05-2012, 04:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philosopher Jay

Good point about Kafka. In his "Amerika," the statue of Liberty carries a sword instead of a lantern. As I recall the geography is pretty screwed up too, there are mountains in his New Jersey. Kafka is giving us a dream America, not the America found in history books.

http://www.newjerseyscenic.com/nj_mountains.html

Jay, one of the real strengths of your posts, is the thoughtfulness they provoke. Wonderful thread, with great comments from Steven, Jiri, and Duvduv. Thank you Jay, well done, as usual. I hope you will let us know further, your investigations of "eyewitness" in other ancient Greek literature.

As for aChristian's notion that Luke traveled with Paul, isn't that idea coming from the discredited letter 1Timothy?

The suggestion that Luke may have relied on Josephus, (thanks Diogenes!) made me wonder about Philo. Why did none of the gospel writers quote him? Why do we not conclude that Philo too, was created later, maybe third or fourth century, as has been suggested for other ancient authors? Is your passage from Luke with αὐτόπται found in our oldest extant copy of Luke, P75, dating from early third century? Some of the later versions inserted or changed the text from the gold standard, i.e. Sinaiticus, for example, "but deliver us from evil", αλλα ρυσαι ημας απο του πονηρου from 11:4 .

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