aa5874

You seemed to have not taken into account that the Hebrew Bible itself is filled with writings from so-called prophets.

There are about 16 books in the Hebrew Bible written by prophets and these do not include prophets like Elijah and Elisha who may have not written any works.

This a partial list of some of the prophets in Hebrew scripture.

1. Isaiah
2. Jeremiah
3. Ezekiel
4. Daniel
5. Hosea
6. Joel
7. Amos
8. Obadiah
9. Jonah
10. Micah
11. Nahum
12. Habakkuk
13. Zephaniah
14. Haggai
15. Zechariah
16. Malachi
17. Nehemiah
18. Elisha
19. Elijha
20. Gad
21. Nathen
22. Jehu
23. Shemiah
24. Oded
25. Samuel
26. Azur
27. Hananiah


It would appear Jews in general may have regarded themselves as endowed with some prophetic skills.

Perhaps, it was Josephus' so-called prophecy about Vespasian that saved his life.

But, it is an almost impossible tasks to try to prove that Josephus invented the Essenes when other writers did confirm their existence.

It must be noted that Josephus mentioned the Essenes in three different works at three different dates of writings without any fundamental differences in description.

There was ample time for other writers, perhaps like Apion, who could have pointed out that the Essenes were fabricated by Josephus. There is no written record to contradict Josephus' Essenes, only written records to confirm them.

mountainman

The Jewish-Italian historian Momigliano
on Josephus and Eusebius ...

p.25
"Jewish Hellenism. There were entire communities which, even though they considered themselves Jews and practiced the Jewish religion, spoke Greek, thought in Greek, and knew hardly any Hebrew of Aramaic. For at least seven or eight centuries Greek remained the alternative cultural language of the Jews. .....

"A Demetrius of the third century BC and an Eupolemus of the second century BC who wrote about Jewish history, were taken to be pagans by Josephus. Later Eusebius realised, we do not know how, that they were Jews. No doubt some Jews disguised themselves as pagans in order to be more effective in their propaganda - and some interpolated authentic pagan works, such as those by Manethro and Hecateus of Abdera, in order to counter counteract hostile comments by pagans. Other Jews were genuine synchretists who mixed pagan and Jewish elements freely."

p26
"Philo is another historian who cannot be classified either a Greek or a Jew."

p.27
"New discoveries are not likely to disprove the obvious conclusion that neither II Maccabees, nor Philo, nor Josephus were ever reabsorbed into the Jewish tradition. They remained operative only in Christian learning. II Maccabees, in spirit if not in form, is behind the Christian Acta Martyrum. Philo's conception of history is related to that of Lactantius' De Mortibus Persecutorum. More generally, Philo is the predecessor of the Christian Platonists.

Finally, Josephus is one of the writers without whom Eusebius
would not have been able to invent Ecclesiastical History."


The Classical Foundations of Modern Historiography
Arnaldo Momigliano
Sather Classical Lectures (1961-62)
Volume Fifty-Four
University of California Press, 1990

aa5874

And this is Josephus on his knowledge of Greek. Josephus claims that the Jewish nation does not encourage Jews to learn other languages.

Antiquities of the Jews 20

maryhelena

Well, so far the critics have been unable to adequately challenge Rachel Elior - and looks like she is pretty determined to stand her ground.....

maryhelena

Indeed, without Josephus there is no 'historical' evidence for Jesus of Nazareth, James or John the Baptist. So, rather than going along with the historical Jesus camp on this issue - i.e. by accepting that Josephus has said something or other about the gospel storyline but then endeavoring to circumvent or discredit what can be credited to him; the mythicist camp could view Josephus as supplying not historical evidence but supplying a historical veneer. A veneer, or cover, that needs to be scratched open.

If Rachel Elior is correct in her view that Josephus has invented the Essenes - i.e. that Josephus has given a historical veneer to Philo' philosophical Essenes - then there is every reason to hold Josephus suspect with regard to doing the same for the gospel storyline.

mountainman

A stronger mythicist argument might examine the motivations of Eusebius. Momigliano dressed his comments up with suits of heavy irony. The invention of the Essenes, and references to Jesus in a first century jewish history book services precisely the agenda of Eusebius - the first person to start citing fraudulent interpolated references from Josephus.

There are stronger political reasons to suspect that the
invention was inserted by the Josephan preserver Eusebius.
Eusebius had everything to gain from this subterfuge.
The extent to which Josephus was another Eusebian
literary pawn may not yet have been fully gauged.

maryhelena

Yes, most likely Eusebius had a role in the TF passage in Josephus - but I don't think it accomplishes a whole lot if one views Eusebius as the fall guy for everything in Josephus that is suspect for the mythicist position.

I think aa5874 said it well:
If one takes it that Josephus was a Jew - or even if one takes it that whoever wrote under that name - was familiar with the use of 'prophetic skills' - then, in Josephus, one is not, primarily, looking out for a purely political agenda. 'Prophetic skills' are used for interpreting political realities.

To assume that Eusebuis is the fall guy - that is to underestimate Josephus. And to read the writings of Josephus only from a historical/political perspective is to miss out on what interpretations, or evaluations, of history are being recorded alongside the historical realities.

Sure, Josephus was the Roman/Jewish historian - but to imagine that he was unable to work in his own agenda - whatever that agenda may have been - is not giving him much credit....

kcdad

True. Just as there is no historical evidence of the origin of our planet or historical evidence of Native Americans coming to the New World, or Historical evidence of the building of Jericho, the first city, no historical evidence of all of what we commonly accept as history... why is that do you wonder?

maryhelena

Agreed, but that does not stop some of us trying to dig around a bit to see if there is anything that can be discovered.....

Why no readily available evidence for things that we might question? One answer could be that we are, as a species, able to ask questions regarding our existence - many questions, few answers - but - searching for those elusive answers does keep our brains well oiled - hence, in the long run, keeps our species on its evolutionary track.

Makes me think of that song about "'will the last word ever spoken be 'why'". As long as questions are asked - someone, somewhere, will find the question so intriguing that they will spend themselves in searching for the answer....

kcdad

I think one of the problems is that we are not apt to ask WHY when the answer might upset the lifestyle we have grown accustomed to... we aren't apt to ask why when the answer might force us to change.