Vorkosigan

I've started this thread to discuss another proposal on The Other Jesus Reference in Ant. 20.200. I placed both my comments here for easy reference.

Peter Kirby stimulated this with the following comment:
A search of the ante-Nicene Church Fathers, the extracanonical writings, and the New Testament will produce no instance in which James is identified as "the brother of Jesus" (let alone "the brother of Jesus called Christ"). It is thus not likely to be a phrase to come naturally from a Christian pen when identifying James.

I replied:


<shakes head>
<wipes eyes>
<sound of gears grinding in head>

Here's the whole passage:

• 1. AND now Caesar, upon hearing the death of Festus, sent Albinus into Judea, as procurator. But the king deprived Joseph of the high priesthood, and bestowed the succession to that dignity on the son of Ananus, who was also himself called Ananus. Now the report goes that this eldest Ananus proved a most fortunate man; for he had five sons who had all performed the office of a high priest to God, and who had himself enjoyed that dignity a long time formerly, which had never happened to any other of our high priests. But this younger Ananus, who, as we have told you already, took the high priesthood, was a bold man in his temper, and very insolent; he was also of the sect of the Sadducees, who are very rigid in judging offenders, above all the rest of the Jews, as we have already observed; when, therefore, Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done; they also sent to the king [Agrippa], desiring him to send to Ananus that he should act so no more, for that what he had already done was not to be justified; nay, some of them went also to meet Albinus, as he was upon his journey from Alexandria, and informed him that it was not lawful for Ananus to assemble a sanhedrin without his consent. (24) Whereupon Albinus complied with what they said, and wrote in anger to Ananus, and threatened that he would bring him to punishment for what he had done; on which king Agrippa took the high priesthood from him, when he had ruled but three months, and made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest.

Peter, I've always believed this to be a marginal gloss, and now you've gone and made me think about this again.

Josephus does not identify "James." He identifies "the brother of Jesus" whose name happens to be James. Further on in the passage, he refers to two other Jesus,' one the son of Damneus who was made high priest (outlined above) and a couple of sections on, Jesus son of Gamaliel who follows him in that position.

It seems to me that the marginal gloss must be the messiah comment, and not the entire "Jesus" comment. What if the original text read "The brother of Jesus, whose name was James.." -- in other words, an ordinary bloke named James -- and the Jesus reference is to Jesus Damneus. Although the reader would need to get to the end of the section to see the connection, what if James is the son of Damneus as well and the brother of that Jesus, and the High Priesthood goes to that family as compensation for the unfortunate death of James.

Just tossing out an idea. I'm sure it has been hashed out before -- what's the answer?

Later, I posted:

Actually, I realized while I was fighting the 5:00 traffic here in Taichung today that I hadn't followed my line of thought far enough. I was thinking the reference was awkward because the reference to Jesus occurs before the reference to Jesus son of Damneus. But of course, I speculated while eating fumes, the interpolator evicted the patronymic, and substituted "called messiah" and the rest was fiction...er...history. The original passage read:

...brother of Jesus son of Damneus, James by name....

which then neatly connects it to the reference further down in the same passage.

Vorkosigan.

Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan writes:

Actually, I realized while I was fighting the 5:00 traffic here in Taichung today that I hadn't followed my line of thought far enough. I was thinking the reference was awkward because the reference to Jesus occurs before the reference to Jesus son of Dameus. But of course, I speculated while eating fumes, the interpolator evicted the patronymic, and substituted "called messiah" and the rest was fiction...er...history. The original passage read:

...brother of Jesus son of Dameus, James by name....

which then neatly connects it to the reference further down in the same passage.

I liked your original hypothesis better.

The thing that I liked about your original hypothesis is that it could explain the strange way in which James is identified, unparalleled in ancient Christian literature. Not knowing that Josephus was referring to a Jesus later on, actually thinking that it was the Jesus of Christian fame, a scribe would have scribbled in the margin 'tou legomenou Christou'. Then, a later scribe would come along, thinking that the marginal note indicated a part that belonged in the text, and would insert the phrase into the body of the passage. No deliberate falsification required.

The thing that I don't like about the new hypothesis is that it requires a deliberate modification of the passage that is not fully explained. One thing that is not explained is why the scribe would think that this could be his Jesus - it explicitly said otherwise - while this is no problem for the original hypothesis. Another thing that is not explained is why the scribe would go for this odd way of referring to James when he was already altering the passage and could have used a more traditional idiom. Another thing that is not explained is that it is unclear what the interpolator gained from the modification, while on the original hypothesis it was just a mistake.

As to whether Josephus could have identified someone through a brother that was not identified earlier on, I have argued that this is plausible with reference to Pallas in Wars of the Jews 2.247.

So, King Arthur, do you know of any evidence that would discredit Vorkosigan's original hypothesis?

best,
Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan

Now that you've explained my original hypothesis to me, I like it better too! I introduced the deletion to cover the awkwardness problem by having the brother come first, but you've plausibly solved that problem.

Vorkosigan

[ July 27, 2002: Message edited by: Vorkosigan ]</p>

King Arthur

There were lots of Jesuses. There are at least two more High Priests after the 'son of Damneus' who are named Jesus.

The proposal is interesting, however, to take out the "one who is called Christ", leaves us with an ambiguous Jesus. Josephus seems to usually identify whom he is talking about the first time, not the second. So, the reference would have probably been "brother of Jesus son of Damneus, whose name was James" if what you are saying is true.

This is an interesting proposal, for sure. This would mean that the brother of one (falsely?) accused of "breaking the law" was later made High Priest. Turn about is fair play, I suppose.

Your guess is as good as mine on this one.

Peter Kirby

I have sent Ed Tyler a copy of Vorkosigan's proposal, and he responded back.

Tyler writes: Josephus refers to a total of at least 12 men named Jesus, and he therefore uses some sort of tag to distinguish each. (See Paul Winter's "Excursus II: Josephus on Jesus and James" in The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, ed. Emil Schürer--revised edition Geza Vermes, 1987, p. 430ff.) So Vorkosigan's proposed reading is not in keeping with Josephus' practice. Neither, of course, is the proposal that Josephus wrote a very lengthy passage in which the various relationships of the men involved are not made explicit until the very end. Josephus characteristically establishes his identifications immediately. He certainly would not say "the brother of X, whose name was Y" and then skip a few pages before telling just you who "X" is. In short, Vorkosigan's proposal is special pleading almost from beginning to end.

Tyler quotes Van Voorst: "Thus Josephus distinguishes this Jesus from the many others he mentions who had this common name. Moreover, the very reason the identifying phrase 'the brother of Jesus called Christ' appears at all is for the further identification of James, whose name was also common." (Jesus Outside the New Testament, p. 84)

Tyler writes: So it appears that Vorkosigan's notion that Josephus does not actually identify "James" is incorrect. Looking over Smyth's and Goodwin & Gulick's Greek grammars, I see that Van Voorst is certainly correct regarding the "identifying phrase" part of that quote.

The word order in a sentence is not indicative of which thought is identifying the other; in English as in Greek, the appositive phrase can be the unknown that is being fleshed out with the phrase that comes before it: "The chairman of the board, one Scott Sidler, said..." I think that this is equivalent to "One Scott Sidler, the chairman of the board, said..." with regards to which phrase provides the distinguishing characteristic of the person, although the latter phrasing puts less emphasis on the relationship between Scott's office and his speaking. But, myself, I don't see how it matters that the brother phrase identifies the name of James or that the name of James identifies the brother phrase, or if this distinction is even meaningful. I would say that they work in tandem to point to a person; this is true whether or not the 'called Christ' part has been added. (I also don't buy into Doherty's idea that the so-called "pride of place" given to the brother phrase indicates interpolation.)

best,
Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan

Originally posted by peterkirby:
I have sent Ed Tyler a copy of Vorkosigan's proposal, and he responded back.

Tyler writes: Josephus refers to a total of at least 12 men named Jesus, and he therefore uses some sort of tag to distinguish each. (See Paul Winter's "Excursus II: Josephus on Jesus and James" in The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, ed. Emil Schürer--revised edition Geza Vermes, 1987, p. 430ff.) So Vorkosigan's proposed reading is not in keeping with Josephus' practice. Neither, of course, is the proposal that Josephus wrote a very lengthy passage in which the various relationships of the men involved are not made explicit until the very end. Josephus characteristically establishes his identifications immediately. He certainly would not say "the brother of X, whose name was Y" and then skip a few pages before telling just you who "X" is. In short, Vorkosigan's proposal is special pleading almost from beginning to end.

"Special pleading from beginning to end." I think that's unduly harsh. "Special pleading" is ridiculous; I was merely throwing out something think about.

Second, his characterization is incorrect. The "Jesus" I've pointed to is in the same passage, and connected to James by the sequence of events, not "a few pages" as if it were miles away.

Third, the connection I've posited explains why the position of High Priest went to Jesus Damneus.

Fourth, in his comments on introductions Tyler is actually providing support for my other, stronger suggestion, that somebody excised "Jesus Damneus."

Fifth, the most common identifier Josephus uses in his zillions of Jesus-s is "son of" or "brother of." For example, in that passage, Jesus is introduced as the "son of Damneus." It would hardly be out of character to introduce someone as 'the brother of Jesus, James by name' since that is his most common intro method!

Tyler quotes Van Voorst: "Thus Josephus distinguishes this Jesus from the many others he mentions who had this common name. Moreover, the very reason the identifying phrase 'the brother of Jesus called Christ' appears at all is for the further identification of James, whose name was also common." (Jesus Outside the New Testament, p. 84)

Of course, this reasoning works either way. The "brother of Jesus" works fine as an identifier if "Jesus" is indentified as well further on down! Further, I've postulated that "james" is in there to identify which brother of Jesus was arrested and condemned. In other words, Tyler has understood it backwards, and through Christian lenses. The important thing about that passage in my proposal is not "James" but "the brother of Jesus." By seeing everything in light of the "James" Tyler has allowed scholarly biases to overrule his critical faculty; he has unconciously assumed that Josephus is talking about James the Just and viewed everything from that angle.

I should add that I'm pretty sure Tyler is an atheist, but his presuppositions are still Christian.

[b]Tyler writes: So it appears that Vorkosigan's notion that Josephus does not actually identify "James" is incorrect.

Tyler must have misunderstood something. In fact I said Josephus DID identify James -- as the brother of Jesus Damneus!

The word order in a sentence is not indicative of which thought is identifying the other; in English as in Greek, the appositive phrase can be the unknown that is being fleshed out with the phrase that comes before it: "The chairman of the board, one Scott Sidler, said..." I think that this is equivalent to "One Scott Sidler, the chairman of the board, said..." with regards to which phrase provides the distinguishing characteristic of the person, although the latter phrasing puts less emphasis on the relationship between Scott's office and his speaking. But, myself, I don't see how it matters that the brother phrase identifies the name of James or that the name of James identifies the brother phrase, or if this distinction is even meaningful. I would say that they work in tandem to point to a person; this is true whether or not the 'called Christ' part has been added. (I also don't buy into Doherty's idea that the so-called "pride of place" given to the brother phrase indicates interpolation.)

I agree totally. The grammar is nuetral between the two phrases, the importance of either derives from context. The trick is locating the proper context. Scholarship prior has simply assumed that Josephus was talking about James the Just, and arguing whether anyone would have interpolated "brother of Jesus, the so-called messiah" in there. After seeing Tyler's misreadings and misunderstandings, it is clear that I've identified the proper context. James is merely an ordinary bloke of no distinction, whose importance is that he is a brother to Jesus Damneus, the next High Priest. The confusion of names is a coincidence, as Tyler's quote notes, "James" was a common name.

Vorkosigan

Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan writes: Fourth, in his comments on introductions Tyler is actually providing support for my other, stronger suggestion, that somebody excised "Jesus Damneus."

I did not send anything about the suggested excisement-replacement hypothesis, only about the original hypothesis of marginal addition. I thought that we had agreed that marginal gloss is the stronger hypothesis, but I guess that agreement was short-lived.

If you are back to arguing for an excisement hypothesis, I would like to know what you think of my comments on such a hypothesis and the superiority of the marginal note hypothesis.

I am starting to think this: the replacement hypothesis is discredited for the considerations that I adduce, while the marginal note hypothesis can be argued against on the grounds advanced by Tyler. But if both hypotheses have evidence against them, then we are left with the idea of authenticity.

Plus, after all, no evidence has been advanced against authenticity and in favor of a Jesus Damneus hypothesis - only the suggestion of an arguably plausible alternative. Although I also think that Tyler was unduly harsh with his 'special pleading' remark, I think that the idea behind it is that the normal procedure starts with the authenticity of a given text, which can be controverted only be evidence against it; starting with skepticism or an assumption of inauthenticity would be a 'special' approach.

Tyler said that he was in the process of moving in and that he would be away from his books for a while such that I should contact him again concerning this only after a couple weeks.

best,
Peter Kirby

Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan writes: Tyler must have misunderstood something. In fact I said Josephus DID identify James -- as the brother of Jesus Damneus!

The misunderstanding of Tyler is perhaps understandable. Tyler was reacting to this comment:

Josephus does not identify "James." He identifies "the brother of Jesus" whose name happens to be James.

It seems that you were drawing a distinction between identfying the brother of Jesus with the name of James and identifying a man named James with his brotherhood to Jesus, preferring the former as representing Josephus. What do you actually mean?

best,
Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan

[QUOTE]Originally posted by peterkirby:
[QB]Vorkosigan writes: Fourth, in his comments on introductions Tyler is actually providing support for my other, stronger suggestion, that somebody excised "Jesus Damneus."

I did not send anything about the suggested excisement-replacement hypothesis, only about the original hypothesis of marginal addition. I thought that we had agreed that marginal gloss is the stronger hypothesis, but I guess that agreement was short-lived.

No, but if Tyler is arguing that the whole name should have been given, my response would be that it was indeed, but then taken out....

If you are back to arguing for an excisement hypothesis, I would like to know what you think of my comments on such a hypothesis and the superiority of the marginal note hypothesis.

Dead on. I liked your analysis better. Never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. My response simply said: Oh yeah? well I've got one in my pocket for that objection too! As I said above.

I am starting to think this: the replacement hypothesis is discredited for the considerations that I adduce, while the marginal note hypothesis can be argued against on the grounds advanced by Tyler. But if both hypotheses have evidence against them, then we are left with the idea of authenticity.

I didn't think Tyler had any grounds, other than scholarly procedure -- strong grounds, but not insurmountable -- to knock it down. Otherwise, the only evidence for authenticity is procedure, and it stays in on a technicality.

The fact is that in the writings of the period before the gospels and Josephus, there is little evidence that James was actually the physical brother of the man executed for preaching or being a peasant nationalism, or because Pilate or Herod were feeling cranky. Why is this insufficient to challenge the authenticity of the passage?

Plus, after all, no evidence has been advanced against authenticity and in favor of a Jesus Damneus hypothesis - only the suggestion of an arguably plausible alternative. Although I also think that Tyler was unduly harsh with his 'special pleading' remark, I think that the idea behind it is that the normal procedure starts with the authenticity of a given text, which can be controverted only be evidence against it; starting with skepticism or an assumption of inauthenticity would be a 'special' approach.

I see. &lt;growl&gt;

Josephus does not identify "James." He identifies "the brother of Jesus" whose name happens to be James.

It seems that you were drawing a distinction between identfying the brother of Jesus with the name of James and identifying a man named James with his brotherhood to Jesus, preferring the former as representing Josephus. What do you actually mean?

I thought it was clear. The key point is that Josephus is explaining why Ananus lost the priesthood and Jesus Damneus got it, of all people. Ananus' error was, he arrested the brother of Jesus of Damneus, accused him of crimes, and then had him stoned in the most high-handed manner. In compensation for this outrage, Ananus takes the fall and Jesus of Damneus gets the High priesthood. Josephus is not identifying which James, he is identifying which brother(of Jesus Damneus). Really, fundamentally, he is just identifying a person, James. It's Joe Blow, who happens to be the brother of the future High Priest. His only role in history is to spur Agrippa to change High Priests.

Also, does the passage say that James was actually stoned to death? Or just bound over to be stoned?

• Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrim of
  judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done;

It seems to me that it is ambiguous, but I do not know Greek. Does the verb imply the sentence was completed?

Vorkosigan

[ July 28, 2002: Message edited by: Vorkosigan ]</p>

Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan writes: No, but if Tyler is arguing that the whole name should have been given, my response would be that it was indeed, but then taken out....

... and my response would be that this excisement hypothesis does not make sense, and we come back full circle to the idea of authenticity.

In order for the hypothesis to retain its plausibility, someone would need to show that either the arguments against marginal gloss have no merit or that the arguments against replacement have no merit. I think that you suggest below that Tyler's arguments against marginal gloss are either easy to demolish or non-existent, so I will discuss that below.

Vorkosigan writes:

Dead on. I liked your analysis better. Never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. My response simply said: Oh yeah? well I've got one in my pocket for that objection too! As I said above.

Basically, you are saying that you have something in one of your pockets. Tyler is saying that you have nothing in your left pocket (marginal gloss), and I am saying that you have nothing in your right pocket (excisement and replacement). Now you could agree with me and say that you actually have something in your left pocket (marginal gloss), or you could agree with Tyler and say that you actually have something in your right pocket (excisement and replacement). But you cannot say that to both of us. If you did, Tyler and I will meet up later, find out what you said to each of us, and deduce correctly that you have absolutely nothing in those pockets of yours.

The above is a statement of the framework and general procedure; I will actually be peeking into these pockets below. Actually, I will look at the right pocket right now and the left pocket below. That is, here I will repeat my statement against the replacement hypothesis:

"The thing that I don't like about the new hypothesis is that it requires a deliberate modification of the passage that is not fully explained. One thing that is not explained is why the scribe would think that this could be his Jesus - it explicitly said otherwise - while this is no problem for the original hypothesis. Another thing that is not explained is why the scribe would go for this odd way of referring to James when he was already altering the passage and could have used a more traditional idiom. Another thing that is not explained is that it is unclear what the interpolator gained from the modification, while on the original hypothesis it was just a mistake."

Of course, even though the excisement hypothesis comes up empty in my estimate, the marginal gloss hypothesis may remain plausible - except if there is evidence against it.

Vorkosigan writes: I didn't think Tyler had any grounds, other than scholarly procedure -- strong grounds, but not insurmountable -- to knock it down. Otherwise, the only evidence for authenticity is procedure, and it stays in on a technicality.

Tyler did not rely only on presumption of authenticity or the burden of proof, if he did at all. It was my interpretation of his 'special pleading' comment that Tyler was referring to such a scholarly procedure, but I now think that I may have misunderstood that comment. As I read him now, Tyler made two arguments against the marginal gloss hypothesis concerning 'called Christ'. These are both basically inductive arguments concerning the way in which we would expect Josephus to write and indeed most persons to write. So I now think that the mention of 'special pleading' - which I agree was harshly worded, especially given that you initially just floated the idea for discussion - is a reference to the standard writing practices of Josephus, the violation of which would be 'special'. Let me attempt to explain the two arguments of Tyler as I understand them.

Tyler writes: "Tyler writes: Josephus refers to a total of at least 12 men named Jesus, and he therefore uses some sort of tag to distinguish each. (See Paul Winter's 'Excursus II: Josephus on Jesus and James' in The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, ed. Emil Schürer--revised edition Geza Vermes, 1987, p. 430ff.) So Vorkosigan's proposed reading is not in keeping with Josephus' practice."

I would have to go to the university library to look up Schürer, but Tyler's claim here can be evaluated through some search of Josephus. I will quote the identifying references that are most relevant: mentions of other people named 'Jesus' in the last five books of the Antiquities.

Ant. 17.13.1. "Nor did this Eleazar abide long in the high priesthood, Jesus, the son of Sie, being put in his room while he was still living."

Ant. 20.9.4. "And now Jesus, the son of Gamaliel, became the successor of Jesus, the son of Damneus, in the high priesthood, which the king had taken from the other; on which account a sedition arose between the high priests..."

Ant. 20.10.1 "...at which time Jesus, the son of Josadek, took the high priesthood over the captives when they were returned home."

I think that it could be said that Josephus took some care in distinguishing between the different persons named Jesus at the moment that each came up in the narrative, as 'Jesus' is a relatively common Jewish name of the era. Failure of Josephus to wrote 'son of Damneus' when first mentioning Jesus tends to go against the normal procedure of Josephus.

Tyler writes: "Neither, of course, is the proposal that Josephus wrote a very lengthy passage in which the various relationships of the men involved are not made explicit until the very end. Josephus characteristically establishes his identifications immediately. He certainly would not say 'the brother of X, whose name was Y' and then skip a few pages before telling just you who 'X' is."

I don't think that the 'pages' reference was meant literally; we think Josephus wrote on scrolls anyway. The main point is that it is unusual for Josephus to leave the relationships of the key figures undisclosed until the end of a passage. Now, I suppose that this claim can be tested. All we would need is a different location in which Josephus said "the brother of X, whose name was Y" and then informed us as to who X was later on. I would also accept "Y, son of X" where X is identified later on. Or you can see what you dig up, and we will see whether it is a good analogy for what you suggest that Josephus may have done here.

So, these are the two arguments that Tyler made as I understand them. They did not concern scholarly procedure of accepting authenticity, although of course that is an important point in this discussion as well.

Vorkosigan writes: The fact is that in the writings of the period before the gospels and Josephus, there is little evidence that James was actually the physical brother of the man executed for preaching or being a peasant nationalism, or because Pilate or Herod were feeling cranky. Why is this insufficient to challenge the authenticity of the passage?

I don't think that this takes sufficient account of all the conditions for a successful argument from silence: the extensiveness and variety of the authors supposed to be silent, the surety of actual silence in the authors, the surety that the authors would have mentioned the fact if the fact were known, and the surety that the fact would be known if it were true. I think the last condition holds up well, as I think that Paul for one would have known that James were the brother of Jesus if it were true. I think that the second-to-last condition is arguable, as it is difficult to presage the kinds of things that a person should write, but in any case I do not see an overwhelming reason for the authors in question to mention the fact. The extensiveness and variety criterion is not met; the only documents written before the Antiquities that mention James are Paul and the Epistle of James (and possibly the Gospel of Thomas depending on its date), which gives us a base of two or three authors, given that the existence of authors who do not refer to James at all count for little. For the matter of the surety of silence, I do not want to get bogged down in a debate over the meaning of Gal. 1:19 in this discussion. But certainly a plausible if not undeniable meaning of this reference is that James was the brother of Jesus. So I do not think that we can say with any certainty that Paul did not refer to James with the meaning that James was the actual brother of Jesus. All in all, this argument is weak.

Moreover, even if this silence could be taken as evidence that James was not the brother of Jesus, I have trouble accepting arguments that discount the value of evidence because of evidence in the opposite direction. It is my opinion that each piece of evidence should be considered on its own merits. It is possible that the reference in Ant. 20.200 constitutes some evidence that James was the brother of Jesus called Christ. It is possible that the Epistle of James constitutes some evidence that James was not the brother of Jesus. But we should not use one set of evidence to discredit the other; each set of evidence should be evaluated on its own terms for its strength, and then a comparison should be made after such individual evaluation.

Vorkosigan writes:

Also, does the passage say that James was actually stoned to death? Or just bound over to be stoned?

"Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrim of
judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done;"

It seems to me that it is ambiguous, but I do not know Greek. Does the verb imply the sentence was completed?

From Niese: ...ton adelphon Iêsou tou legomenou Christou, Iakôbos onoma autôi, kai tinas heterous, hôs paranomêsantôn katêgorian poiêsamenos paredôke leusthêsomenous.

paredôke is aorist active indicative 3rd singular, meaning "he handed over" or "he delivered up"

leusthêsomenous is future middle/passive participle masculine accusative plural. The root word is leuô ("I stone").

From the Smyth grammar at Perseus, one meaning of the (circumstantial) participle in the future tense is:

So I think that leusthêsomenous can be transalated here as "for them [masculine] to be stoned." The 'them' is the implied object of the accusative participle.

So, my crib is, "he handed over for them to be stoned" or perhaps "he delivered up in order to stone them." This would read more smoothly rendered as "he handed them over to be stoned" or perhaps "he handed them over for stoning" ... which basically just tells you that the Whiston is a good representation of the Greek here, with his "he delivered them to be stoned."

If I made a mistake above, I am sure King Arthur or one of our other Greek scholars can correct me. Foreign language is not my forte.

Basically, the passage says that Ananus made arrangements for the death of these men by means of stoning. The passage does not imply in any way that the plans of Ananus in this regard were frustrated, but neither does it explicitly mention the actual death of these men.

Was there any particular reason that you asked?

best,
Peter Kirby