spamandham

Evidence for a later dating of John, based soley on John 1.

Now some Pharisees who had been sent questioned him, "Why then do you baptize if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?"

This is an anachronism that presumes that Christianity is already widespread. As I understand it, baptizō implies initiation specifically into Christianity. Jews did ritual bathing of course, but this term is specific to Christianity. Pharisees would not be asking such a question of John, and an early writer would know that.

When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, "What do you want?" They said, "Rabbi" (which means Teacher), "where are you staying?"

This is another anachronism from a later time period. This term is used exclusively in the NT (according to my search using the BLB). It;s possible that it was a term in common use in John's cult, but a more plausible explanation is that it is influenced by Rabbinical Judaism.

Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus. 41The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, "We have found the Messiah" (that is, the Christ). 42And he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, "You are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas" (which, when translated, is Peter[j]).

Is it not obvious that this is a later writer trying to make sense of Paul's chicken scratch?

Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."

There is no Jesus of Nazareth son of Joseph anywhere in the law or the prophets. Why would the earliest Christian writer state such an absurdity that is easily proven false...unless the various parts of this statement were already well known by early Christians, who had come up with novel interpretations of the Jewish scriptures to support it. Again, this indicates a late writing after all the storyline had already congealed and scriptural arguments to support it had long since been concocted.

Then Nathanael declared, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel."

Rabbi again.

maryhelena

Anachronism? From the links I have previously given in this thread - I did not notice that anachronisms are anything like a major stumbling bock re-dating GJohn early. I do understand that the gospels we have today, all of them, are not immune to later updates, layering of the storyline. If one insists on dating by anachronisms all one is doing is dating a later development and in no way cancels out an earlier date for an original version of the gospel. Being stuck on anachronisms could well amount to a failure to see the more older elements within the storyline. As the following quotes indicate:

aa5874

You cannot ignore anachronisms.

When dating any written text any anachronism found must be a major factor in determining the date of writing. You cannot just cancel out anachronisms.

The Gospel of John as found canonised is fundamentally later than the canonised Synoptics.

The "failed prophecies" of the Synoptic Jesus are not found in gJohn.

The author of gJohn corrected flaws in the Synoptics, for example, the body of Jesus was wrapped with a hundred pound of spices, a mixture of myrrh and aloes, just before burial of the body according to Jewish tradition.

The Synoptics show that the spices were to be applied at least two days after his burial which is not according to Jewish tradition.

This is an indication that gJohn was written after the Synoptics.

The author of gJohn wrote about a controversy about the origin of Jesus based on prophecy. There was no prophecy that Jesus would be from Nazareth but from Bethlehem. This is another indication that gJohn was after the Synoptic Jesus of Nazareth.

John 7.40-43 The author of gJohn appears himself to be confused about how Jesus was said to be from Nazareth contrary to scripture.

You simply cannot discard the evidence that shows gJohn is late so that you can claim it is early.

spamandham

The only thing we can reasonably date are the texts we actually have. We can *guess* that maybe there was an earlier version upon which what we have was based, but that's an exercise in creative writing.

If we're going to guess our way to reality on this topic, I would guess that the Christianity started well before the 1st century, perhaps as early as ~200 BCE. But at this point I could never demonstrate such a thing, it just seems most plausible to me, since new religious movements only rarely poof into existence from nothing, but instead usually build on pre-existing ideas and evolve.

mountainman

Some texts have been C14 dated - which is a little more than a "reasonable dating". C14 is not "guesswork". Critical texts, such as the Gospel of Thomas have been C14 dated to 348 CE!!! Yet not only are the C14 dates are being totally ignored, they are being "improved upon by guesswork" by HJ-Challenged academics who illogically insist the texts were all preserved from centuries past.

The burial of the Nag Hammadi codices is like the modern concept of a "time capsule". Have you ever heard of a "time capsule" being prepared with a whole stack of "memorabilia from centuries past" being put in it? I have never heard of this. It is far more reasonable to **guess** that the writings contained in the Nag Hammadi codices were all authored immediately prior to their preservation by burial --- sometime in the early to mid 4th century.

Politically - at face value - they are very simply explained as a reaction to the state version of christianity which as common knwledge will have us perceive was forcefully thrust upon the empire by "The Boss" at a very specific date c.325 CE.

Tell that to Eusebius who wrote to us about the "official version". If what you "guess" has any element of historical truth to it, why did Eusebius lie through his teeth? And what could this "unofficial christianity" possibly have been if not as something related to the ancient greek and Graeco-Roman concepts of religion / philosophy extolling the virtues of Pythagoras, Plato, The Logos and the "Holy Trinity of Plotinus". It must have been a Greek thing, since the conversion was aimed fairly and squarely at the Greek speaking populace of the Roman empire. There is adequate provision for the existence of the "Greek mystery religions" and the "Apostolic Lineage" of the Greek philosophers who subscribed to the "Acadamies" and "Assemblies" (Ecclesiastica) of the Plato, Pythagoras and the Greek sages and authors. What was the Second Sophistic doing?

Craigart14

Paul says there were believers and that he was sent to Damascus to arrest them, thereby setting the narrative pattern for modern evangelicals, who often insist they were atheists before they found Jesus. It usually means they just didn't know or care much about religion, but the conversion from atheist to Jesus freak makes a better story. Thanks, Paul.

Craig

spamandham

Pete, it's one thing to say Eusebius whole cloth created Christianity as ordered by Constantine. This is an a priori plausible premise. But it's quite another to say that gnostics essentially did the same thing, only this time in at risk of their own live in opposition to Constantine. What could possibly motivate such action if not for ingrained beliefs predating the official religion?

Sure it's *possible* that this was some kind of bizzare counteraction to Constantine's new religion, but considering how flippant the Greeks were with deities, it's hard to imagine anyone half embracing the official religion but in a heretical way that would get you killed. I don't see how the Nag Hammadi library helps your case...it seems to detract from it instead.

andrewcriddle

The passage about John the Baptist in Josephus is probably a parallel.

Andrew Criddle

mountainman

Ingrained traditional beliefs about Hermes, Plato, Asclepius etc had just become essentially illegal, since it had been decreed that "Religious privileges were reserved for Christians". The editor of the Nag Hammadi Codices is generally conjectured to be Pachomius. Pachomius is generally thought to have been a "Chrstian" because Dear Jerome said he was baptized before he left Alexandria to dwell in the desert for many years with a known ascetic teacher.

Pachomius is known to have had "a VISION" in the year 324 CE which prompted him to leave Alexandria and travel just about as far up the Nile as you'd want to get. I think that vision relates to the appearance of Constantine's army and the destruction of the architecture and the torture of the priests and the philosophers. See Ammianus on Constantine's destruction of the giant obelisk in Egypt. People fled, just like the Dalai Lama fled the Chinese invasion of Tibet. Pachomius headed out to the "diaspora". Thousands followed him. I dont think they were "christians" at all. I think they were greek priests and academics who had been made redundant by Constantine.

Searches were being undertaken by the orthodox for "heretical books" and someone decided that the Nag Hammadi Codices were "too hot" to keep in the local monastery (which was not christian IMO - see above). Thus the books were taken out and hidden.

They decided that resistance was futile.
They tried and hey failed.
The Greek civilisation went under the Christian waves of soldiers.

The Interpretation of Knowledge: NHC 11.1

Text commences ... (13 lines missing) ...

they came to believe by means of signs and wonders and fabrications. The likeness that came to be through them followed him, but through reproaches and humiliations before they received the apprehension of a vision they fled without having heard that the Christ had been crucified. But our generation is fleeing since it does not yet even believe that the Christ is alive. .

Further section is cited ...

And he was crucified and he died - not his own death,
for he did not at all deserve to die because of the church of mortals.
And he was nailed so that they might keep him in the Church.