Geoff Hudson

I have some problems with these texts:

1. In the YLT, I see the words ‘not’ and ‘except’ as the clumsy additions of an editor to emphasise ‘Jesus’s’ merciful acceptance of the Gentile ‘Canaanite’ woman’s request to ‘heal’ her daughter. The editor wants to have Jesus widening his mission to Gentiles, and creates a scene in a Gentile region. He also exaggerates by having Jesus 'heal' the daughter remotely, whereas it is probably the woman herself who has the demons. The poor phraseology could have been picked up by the writer of the MG who uses simpler language. The MG has past historic tenses as distinct from the more vibrant, and possibly more original, present active of the YLT. If ‘not’ and ‘except’ are deleted from the YLT, then we are left with a non-exclusive statement, and Gentiles could be included.

2. The MG has lost the Jewish flavour of the ‘lost sheep of the house of Israel’. I see the lost sheep of the house of Israel as those impoverished, disabled and sick Jews who were excluded from the temple and rejected by the establishment High Priests and Essenes as impure. There were probably plenty of these poor people around in Judea for Jesus (John) to recruit. And the Essenes were the worst kind of control freaks one could imagine.

3. In both texts, it seems unlikely that Jesus (imo) John would have thought that this movement was limited to Jews only, particularly when there was a promise in Joel that God would pour out his Spirit on everyone. I think that Jesus (John) would have understood very well that the Spirit was ‘sent’ not only to the house of Israel, but to Gentiles also.

4. As Jesus (John) was supposed to be a lowly character, his use of the self-centred ‘I’ in the YLT seems incongruous. If as a prophet, he had said that the Spirit was ‘sent’ (a more appropriate use of ‘sent’) then he would be appealing to a higher authority, not his own. Claiming to be a prophet was risky, but someone claiming that purification could be had outside the temple was taking business away from the priests, and running the risk of being declared a false prophet with stoning for punishment (which is what I think happened to John).
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So for the above phrase, I consider the YLT more original. But that is not to say that you are not correct about other texts of the MG. I will certainly buy your book. The idea that medieval texts can contain more original phrases appeals to me. The editors could not have controlled all of the sources all of the time. Besides, there are two texts with no early provenance that I would like to think contain valid information. These are the Correspondence Between Paul and Seneca, and the Letters of Pontius Pilate to Seneca.

Geoff

galiel

Why did Jesus cross the border?
To turn the other cheek.

Baddaboom!

Oolon Colluphid

[Boro Nut] No, he shouldered a cross. [/Boro Nut]

Oolon

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hello, Geoff,

The above seems rather speculative to me.

<strong> While present active may indeed seem "more vibrant", this doesn't yet mean that it was more original.

Of course the Magdalene Gospel widely features past historic tenses throughout. To many people, this may seem like a later feature, but actually this is not necessarily the case. Because the ancient Aramaic gospels also often feature past tense in those passages where present tense is found in the canonical Greek.

<strong> But why should this necessarily represent "Jewish flavour", rather than a later literary embellishment?

<strong> But this is one interpretation only. There are also others.

<strong> But you should also keep in mind that any Gentile was always welcome to become a Jew. In ancient times, Judaism was more open to converts than was the case later.

<strong> But your arguments don't seem very persuasive to me. After all, according to the canons of Textual Criticism, the shorter reading is generally preferred as more original (Lectio brevior potior).

<strong> Thank you for your interest.

<strong> Well, I just don't know about these...

But, in any case, here's this story as preserved in the Gospel of Barnabas.

This gospel survives in a medieval Italian manuscript. It seems like it has many parallels with early Jewish-Christian writings, although it also has quite a few passages featuring some later Islamic themes, that seem to have been added up on top of a previous shorter text.

[quote]

THE GOSPEL OF BARNABAS.

<a href="http://www.bendigo.latrobe.edu.au/sae/arts/barnabas/Barncoloured.html" target="_blank">http://www.bendigo.latrobe.edu.au/sae/arts/barnabas/Barncoloured.html</a>

4. "And lo! a woman of Canaan with her two sons, who had come forth out of her own country to find Jesus. Having therefore seen him come with his disciples, she cried out: "Jesus, son of David, have mercy on my daughter, who is tormented of the devil!" Jesus did not answer even a single word, because they were of the uncircumcised people. The disciples were moved to pity, and said: "O master, have pity on them! Behold how much they cry out and weep!"

5. Jesus answered: "I am not sent but to the people of Israel."

[unquote]

So, in the Gospel of Barnabas, we also see the disciples begging Jesus to help the woman. And also, it can be noted that, just like in the Magdalene Gospel, Jesus' response there is more concise, and it doesn't feature the reference to the "lost sheep of the House Israel".

(Still, it seems like some later material had also been added to this version of the story; such as the detail that the woman was not travelling alone, but with her "two sons". Obviously, for a woman to travel alone was seen as inappropriate in the circles that preserved the Gospel of Barnabas for us. The same can be said about the reference to circumcision in this text.)

All the best,

Yuri.