Ben C Smith

I do not think the vowel makes any difference at all here. Vowels are added, dropped, and changed all the time. They are the most expendable and morphable part of any language of which I am aware.

I was unclear. I certainly think that the -t ending was the original (archaic) ending, whatever else may be the case.

What I meant was that the evidence for the tsade is late.

However, Albright did predict that Nazareth would have been spelled with that tsade even before the discovery of the Caesarea inscription, so my mind is not made up on that.

Only if you do not know what the name meant. (More on that below.)

Did the synoptic tradents do this kind of investigating, in your opinion? (The jury is still out for me on how ardently they investigated their facts, but this kind of explanation coming from you is a little surprising, I admit.)

This brings up an interesting point. What did it mean, in your judgment?

And let us suppose for a moment that you are correct, and Matthew had no idea what the term Nazarene meant. Why, in your view, did he connect this term with the town of Nasareth instead of with the sect of the Nazoraeans?

Ben.

Clivedurdle

Hang on, is there a further confusion here, around nazoreans and nazarites? Why would there be any connection between these? (And why is there no consistency of spelling anywhere?)

http://essenes.net/asoka.html

spin

Sorry, not so fast. Hebrew doesn't act link Indo-European languages. The form Nazara would belie an underlying NZRH in order to have a final vowel manifested. One doesn't go around dropping syllables at will. Gennhsar is a one-off form found in a Greek translation of 1 Maccabees. We cannot give the form any currency, as it appears once in all the Greek corpus of Judaic texts. It may easily have been an ad hoc transliteration.

The name of the sea in Hebrew is Kinnereth, while I think Gennesareth is only attested to in christian literature. I don't know what exactly was being referred to in 1 Macc 11:67. It refers to the water [udwr] of Gennesar, indicating that it was close enough to the plain of Hazor for an army to march there in the morning, which would have been quite a march from the sea of Galilee.

Also the sea of Kinnereth is always translated as Qalassa in the LXX, so why water [udwr] in 1 Macc if it referred to the sea of Kinnereth? Joshua according to the book fought a battle at the water [udwr] of Merom (11:7) and Merom was nowhere near a sea. Jos 4:18 talks of the water of Jordan.

I think you'll also need to show that the waters of Gennesar are indeed those of the sea of Galilee.

The Peshitta is happy that there's a tsade. Why should the town suddenly change names from NZRT to NCRT? The zayin and the tsade are two clearly defined letters in Hebrew and frequently differentiate meaning, ie you can have two words whose only difference is that one has a zayin, the other a tsade. So a casual change from one to the other seems inconceivable.

The Peshitta is good evidence.

I'd leave out the notion of synoptic by this stage. We're at a later level in the gospel development, so there is no useful meaning to "synoptic" here. I think you'll see that Nazareth is neither in the synoptic core nor in Q.

The explanation I gave was definitely a conjecture to explain what happened between the presence of Nazara and of Nazareth in the developing tradition. Have you got a better suggestion given the data?

The term from which it came [NZR, I can't justify NCR] can as a verb mean "dedicate, devote, consecrate, separate" and as a noun "consecration, crown". If you look at Lev 15:31, "you shall separate [NZR] the children of Israel from their uncleanness...". Zec 7:3 has a priest use the verb, so the notion of a group who separate themselves to maintain purity may be behind the term Nazarene. Perhaps more importantly, Lev 21:12, dealing with the (high) priest, talks of "the crown [NZR] of anointing [M$XT] oil of god", linking NZR to the notion of anointing, ie messiahship.

The evidence as I see it is that the writer already had Nazara from the evolving tradition -- and I have argued that there is a good case for supposing 2:23 had Nazara. Luke has it as well in the body of his gospel, so it was part of the current tradition. The connection between Jdg 13:5 and Nazara fitted Matthean practice, using Hebrew bible to clarify christian tradition.


spin

jgibson000

O good grief. :banghead: Are you entirely credulous?? Have you lost all ability whatsoever to judge the worthiness of what (remaining true to your "research" practices) you dig up on the internet?

JG

Ben C Smith

Point well taken. So let me instead bring in Numbers 34.11, in which the LXX form of Chinnereth is Chenara, with the final vowel retained.

(Not that it matters much now that I have turned my attention to Numbers 34.11 as a closer analogy, but according to the map I have access to Hazor was less than 15 miles from the northern shore of Galilee. I am not sure 1 Maccabees 11.67 implies that the army arrived in the morning; it says only that early in the morning the army marched to the plain of Hazor. Furthermore, given that Hazor and Gennesaret are so close to each other, it seems likely that even if two different bodies of water are in mind the names would be etymologically connected.)

Inconceivable seems too strong, but I agree that the tsade to zeta transliteration is the best objection to the linking of Nazarene with Nasareth.

It too is much later than Matthew, Mark, and Luke.

In all three synoptics, but not in the synoptic core? Do Matthew, Mark, and Luke then independently attest to it?

I guess I am fuzzy on the details of your reconstruction. I gather the following so far:

1. Jesus was called a Nazarene because he belonged to a set-apart religious sect.
2. Some Greek went investigating the origins of the term Nazarene and found a Galilean village called Nasareth. A new hometown for Jesus was born.
3. Someone else did a back-formation on the term Nazarene and came up with Nazara instead of Nazareth. Now Nazara has to equal Nazareth in subsequent tradition.
4. Matthew had no idea what Nazarene meant, but was happy to call Jesus a Nazoraean.

Are there some details you could flesh out here? For example, what connection, if any, do you see between the Nazarenes and the Nazoraeans? Did Mark or Luke know what the term Nazarene meant? Did John? And what did Julius Africanus mean by απο τε Ναζαρων και Κωχαβα κωμων Ιουδαικων? Is that the real Nazareth, or is that a back-formation too?

I guess I am again confused. What is the trajectory here? (I am not trying to be difficult; I just do not see which elements you are claiming came first, and which were derived from previous elements.) Are you saying that Matthew inherited a tradition with Nazarene, another tradition with Nazara, and yet a third tradition with Nazareth? I am still not sure what reason you are offering for someone in the tradition having connected Nazarene with Nasareth instead of with Nazoraean. Maybe it would become clear if it were laid out in sequential steps.

I am tempted to agree with Matthew 2.23 having Nazara.

I am likewise tempted to agree with that connection. I think that, whatever the origins of Nazara, Nazareth, Nazoraean, or what have you, the evangelists intended to link those words to ideas or words from the scriptures.

Ben.

S.C.Carlson

What is this "synoptic core"? Ur-Markus?

Stephen

spin

Simply the materials that the synoptic gospels share amongst themselves, what Matt and Luke support in some way of Mark.

(If Marcan material isn't supported by the others then that material is up for review. As there is evidence that gospels got developed, there's no reason to assume Mark didn't.)

If Ur-Markus means something like that, then, yeah.


spin

spin

Simple inconsistency in the translation. Just look at the other three references to "Chinnereth". It certainly doesn't suggest any change in the name of the place, does it?

I think "water of Jordan" refers to a river/stream, just as "water of Merom" does, and, by analogy, "water of Gennesar".

As to the morning, they made their march to the place, engaged in a battle with various complications, then they chased the enemy as far as Kadesh, several miles further, where they encamped.

But this is unimportant here.

I don't think single points take precedence over them together. The argument based on LXX evidence for loss of the -t is not encouraging, as that evidence never leaves the pen of the translator and makes it into common usage. You'd still need to explain it with something more substantial than the assumption that things can get lost.

I was just responding to your question about prior to the finding of the Caesarea evidence for the name Nazareth.

The gospels as we have them do, but obviously they have them well after the start of the process of gospel writing, ie it is late in the development of the gospel tradition, so the current state of the gospels merely attests to the evolution of the tradition.

Well, the term Nazarene existed before the first gospel.

You're racing ahead. The gospel of Mark was written.

Nazarene as a term needed explaining, as it was obscure to the audience. 1st-Matt removes it.

Someone else guesses that it must have been a gentilic, so Nazara was born as Jesus's hometown and incorporated into the tradition. (This is how both 2nd-Matt and Luke gets it.)

Someone (perhaps 2nd-Matt, but I think it more likely earlier) brought the Jdg 13 material into the tradition, from which the LXX nazeiraios provided the form nazwraios. (I think Lk 2:23 also alludes to Jdg 13:7 as stated earlier in the thread.)

Here's when some eager beaver found not Nazara, but NCRT, and Nazara was surplanted by Nazareth, though Nazara still continued to linger on.

I hope the above has cleared up this.

1st-Matt had long before removed Nazarene. 2nd-Matt was responsible for Nazara, which included 2:23 and the birth narrative before it, as well as 4:13.

Luke in turn in some second writing had the birth narrative added with its bright spanking new "Nazareth" all over the place, though not to be seen in the main body of the gospel. I'd guess that the hometown rejection scene had already been moved to 4:16ff, otherwise I'd have guessed that the writer would have corrected Nazara to Nazareth.

There is nothing to suggest that the Marcan writer knew "Nazorean". As to his knowing the significance of nazarhnos, I don't think we can tell for sure and I don't think it matters. It was part of the inherited tradition.

Luke omitted nazarhnos twice, corrected it once and left the fourth perhaps through fatigue. That shows the writer unhappy with nazarhnos.

The writer uses the term.

Nazara was part of the tradition, despite the fact that Nazareth had been the preferred form for a while.

This is how it comes to me (remembering that at different places the tradition was in different states):

1. The term Nazarene came first.
2. Mark was written using Nazarene and indicating Jesus lived at Capernaum.
3. 1st-Matt redacted Mark (perhaps incorporating of Q material), removing Nazarene from Mark as obscure.
4. Elsewhere the form Nazara developed from Nazarene and was incorporated into the tradition.
5. Interest in the possible nativity of Jesus brought the births of Samuel and Samson, the latter providing the source for nazwraios, and the vague Nazirite connection.
6. 2nd-Matt's received tradition leads to the birth narrative and other additions including the use of Nazara and the connection with Jesus being called a Nazorean.
7. At some later point in the Matthew community 21:11 with Nazareth was inserted into the text after the triumphal entry.

I can imagine a lot of speculation going on behind the scenes (which would have included ideas based texts like on Isa 11:1 and NCR, "branch" referring to David in Jewish communities). Eisenman is big on this.


spin

S.C.Carlson

OK, your definition of "synoptic core," if it is correspond with an actual historical entity (rather than a textual manipulation), presupposes the existence of an Ur-Markus -- but not just any Ur-Markus, one without Nazareth in it, to which Matthew 2:23 and Mark 1:9 independently added a mention of Nazaret.

Even if Ur-Markus ever existed (currently a minority position among source critics), it is still simpler to hold that Nazaret at Matt 2:23 derives from the mention in Mark/Ur-Markus 1:9, moved forward to the end of the infancy account to handle one last OT proof text citation.

Stephen
Stephen

spin

Nazareth in Mk 1:9 is not attested to by Mt 3:13. It seems like a marginal comment which made its way into Mark. Mt 2:23 probably read Nazara instead of Nazareth and there is some early evidence for this, besides the fact that 4:13 presupposes Jesus being at Nazara before he can move to Capernaum. The only certain reference to Nazareth in Matt is 21:11 which is an addition to the end of the triumphal entry either by the Matthean writer or by a later writer. Mt 21:10-11 is only there to use the name "Jesus the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee".

I'm not arguing for a new entity that you call Ur-Markus.

I'm arguing that Mk 1:9 is problematical in that the text clearly indicates that Jesus has a home in Capernaum, which would need explanation if the writer has already indicated that Jesus was from Nazareth. That 1:9 is a problem should be apparent when the parallel in Mt doesn't feature the name, It merely says Jesus came from Galilee, which would make more sense in Mk as well, given the Capernaum claim to being home to Jesus.

And if you really think that Matt had Nazareth from Mk 1:9, why does 4:13 have Nazara and why is there doubt in the early text tradition that 2:23 had Nazareth?

The simplest analysis from the text is that the writer(s) of Matt knew nothing of Nazareth. Nazareth in 21:11 is the latest stage in the development when Nazareth had gained acceptance. And Luke only has Nazareth in the nativity story.

Scribal hands show such confusion as to the terms. One manuscript seems to have replaced them all with nazaraQ, which seems like a good compromise in hindsight, doesn't it?


spin