Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Biff the unclean · 11-27-2002, 11:27 AM

I've been noticing something strange about the year 325CE.
The oldest church building found (in Syria) dates from then.
The oldest bibles we have date from then. (There are some scraps that are claimed to be older but there is no accurate way to date them.)
325 is when the Christians first started to put paintings of Jesus in the Roman catacombs. Before then there are only paintings of the pagan Gods that it is claimed (the History Channel) were painted by the early Christians (!?!)
We have no copies of the works of the early church fathers that date before then.

What happened to the first 300 years of Christianity? Where is all their stuff?
If we don't have any artifact that dates before Constantine how can we know that the NT was written in 70CE?

Jayhawker Soule · 11-27-2002, 12:55 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Biff the unclean:
<strong>I've been noticing something strange about the year 325CE. ... The oldest bibles we have date from then. (There are some scraps that are claimed to be older but there is no accurate way to date them.)</strong>

How did you come to the apparently firm conclusion that the "oldest bibles" date from 325 CE while maintaining that there is no accurate way to date the "scraps"? Were the methods used to date the Chester Beatty Papyri different from those used to date Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus? Just curious.

Biff the unclean · 11-27-2002, 01:23 PM

Just personal observation. Could just be my lack of scholarship or general suspicious nature. But after the walking on water and coming back from the dead stories I'm taking everything I hear from these folks with a very large grain of salt.
Apparently the complete bibles came with dedications that allowed them to be dated.
The flakes and scraps were dated by the style of the handwritting on them. Comparing the style with other manuscripts--written by other scribes--of known date. A crap shoot at best, but hey, whose to tell if they are wrong?

Does anybody have any idea of where they get the 70 CE date for authorship of Mark? They seem so dead certain about it, yet I've never heard it mentioned how it was authenticated.

NOGO · 11-27-2002, 02:32 PM

How do we know?

Quote:

Matthew 24:21
"For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will.

Matthew 24 speaks about great tribulations which together with Luke's version of the same story points clearly to the Jewish-Roman war of 66-73CE.

Now, how do we know that this text dates from then?

This is what convinced me.

Note the word "now" as in "until now".
This is what is commonly called writer's perpective.

Writers sometimes leave hints of their perspective without actually wanting to do so. If a writer names a place and adds "on the other side of the river" then we know where the writer was at the time he wrote. The word "now" above is such a hint.

Basically it says to me that this writer put this prophecy in Jesus' mouth which would place it somewhere in 30CE but made a slip. He qualifies the prophecised tribulations as "now" instead of "then" (future) which would logically be what Jesus would have said if all this were true.

Even if you wish to believe that Jesus actually made the prophecy then the author of the text believed that the tribulations were occuring as he wrote.

It is simply unlikely that anyone in 325 CE would make such a mistake.

I am sure that there are other indications which places the text around 70 CE.

[ November 27, 2002: Message edited by: NOGO ]</p>

Biff the unclean · 11-27-2002, 03:17 PM

Huh? I don't get it.

If I wrote "For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will" (not putting the emphasis in on the word "now" because Matthew did not) this morning, it would in no way imply that there was tribulation going on right now. It would only say that in the future there would be worse tribulation than there ever was.

The character making this prediction is quite clear, there isn't any slip on the writers part. The word "now" tells you the character's perspective, not the writers.

offa · 11-27-2002, 03:35 PM

Offa; the great tribulation was the Roman incursion upon Jesus' holy temple in 33 CE. The one where there were six hours of extra darkness and the bodies of the saints were rolling around. Caiaphas' temple was another location and the Romans were allowed access whereas Jesus' temple at was spoiled by the very prescence of the Romans.
The "Little Apocalypses" are a part of the fundie imagination.

Kosh · 11-27-2002, 04:12 PM

John can be dated to no earlier than 90 ce because it contains instructions for what Jewish Christians should do if they're expelled from the synagogues, which occurred around 90 ce. From <a href="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com" target="_blank">Peter Kirby's excellent site</a>

Quote:

Kysar states concerning the dating of the Gospel of John: "Those who relate the expulsion to a formal effort on the part of
Judaism to purge itself of Christian believers link the composition of the gospel with a date soon after the Council of
Jamnia, which is supposed to have promulgated such an action. Hence, these scholars would date John after 90. Those
inclined to see the expulsion more in terms of an informal action on the part of a local synagogue are free to propose an
earlier date." (p. 919)

That site should answer a lot of your questions. Peter has put a tremendous amount of effort into it.

Biff the unclean · 11-27-2002, 04:53 PM

Just looking at what he says are the 5 or 6 earliest and I'm finding one assumption after the next. Everybody knows that Paul wrote them and everybody knows Paul was a real guy who lived at such and such a time is implied every time he uses the term "universal acceptance."
That doesn't tell me very much about how the dating was done. It says a lot about confusing faith with facts though.
What is being discribed are guesses based on religous belief.

Kosh · 11-27-2002, 06:24 PM

Peter Kirby is not a theist.

Sojourner553 · 11-27-2002, 06:35 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Biff the unclean:
[Does anybody have any idea of where they get the 70 CE date for authorship of Mark? They seem so dead certain about it, yet I've never heard it mentioned how it was authenticated.[]

70 AD is the earliest date that falls between the two Jewish wars with Rome (ie between 69 and 132 AD) See explanation below.

Quote:

According to the gospel stories, Jesus clearly foretells the destruction of the famous Temple in Jerusalem. For example, there is one scene in the
gospel of Mark, where Jesus' disciples are dmiring the magnificent Jerusalem Temple. Jesus then prophesizes:

"Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone upon another?" (Mark 13:2)

The other gospel writers have very similar scenes were Jesus predicts the destruction of the Temple.

Yet, Paul's letters (which can be reliably dated to around the 30-50's C.E.) NEVER refers to any belief that the Temple would be destroyed. Paul's writings, of course, are known to have been written before the Jewish-Roman war of 66-70
C.E....

Just as important, there is NO prophecy in the gospels that predict that the city of Jerusalem would be destroyed a SECOND time. This occurred
during the Roman-Jewish war of 132-5, after a second major revolt by the Jews was quashed by the Roman Empire.

As a result, most scholars today believe that the gospel of Mark was composed sometime AFTER 69 C.E. (before the first Jewish-Roman war), but BEFORE 132 C.E. (the second Jewish-Roman war).

Or to put this another way, the gospels were not composed BEFORE 70 AD (and not AFTER 132 AD).

<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/MARKBG.TXT" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/MARKBG.TXT</a>

<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/index.html" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/index.html</a>

Sojourner

[ November 27, 2002: Message edited by: Sojourner553 ]</p>

11-27-2002, 11:27 AM	#1
Biff the unclean Banned Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: an inaccessible island fortress Posts: 10,638	325 CE I've been noticing something strange about the year 325CE. The oldest church building found (in Syria) dates from then. The oldest bibles we have date from then. (There are some scraps that are claimed to be older but there is no accurate way to date them.) 325 is when the Christians first started to put paintings of Jesus in the Roman catacombs. Before then there are only paintings of the pagan Gods that it is claimed (the History Channel) were painted by the early Christians (!?!) We have no copies of the works of the early church fathers that date before then. What happened to the first 300 years of Christianity? Where is all their stuff? If we don't have any artifact that dates before Constantine how can we know that the NT was written in 70CE?

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11-27-2002, 01:23 PM	#3
Biff the unclean Banned Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: an inaccessible island fortress Posts: 10,638	Just personal observation. Could just be my lack of scholarship or general suspicious nature. But after the walking on water and coming back from the dead stories I'm taking everything I hear from these folks with a very large grain of salt. Apparently the complete bibles came with dedications that allowed them to be dated. The flakes and scraps were dated by the style of the handwritting on them. Comparing the style with other manuscripts--written by other scribes--of known date. A crap shoot at best, but hey, whose to tell if they are wrong? Does anybody have any idea of where they get the 70 CE date for authorship of Mark? They seem so dead certain about it, yet I've never heard it mentioned how it was authenticated.

11-27-2002, 03:17 PM	#5
Biff the unclean Banned Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: an inaccessible island fortress Posts: 10,638	Huh? I don't get it. If I wrote "For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will" (not putting the emphasis in on the word "now" because Matthew did not) this morning, it would in no way imply that there was tribulation going on right now. It would only say that in the future there would be worse tribulation than there ever was. The character making this prediction is quite clear, there isn't any slip on the writers part. The word "now" tells you the character's perspective, not the writers.

11-27-2002, 03:35 PM	#6
offa Regular Member Join Date: Aug 2000 Location: Monroeville, Ohio, USA Posts: 440	Offa; the great tribulation was the Roman incursion upon Jesus' holy temple in 33 CE. The one where there were six hours of extra darkness and the bodies of the saints were rolling around. Caiaphas' temple was another location and the Romans were allowed access whereas Jesus' temple at was spoiled by the very prescence of the Romans. The "Little Apocalypses" are a part of the fundie imagination.

11-27-2002, 04:53 PM	#8
Biff the unclean Banned Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: an inaccessible island fortress Posts: 10,638	Just looking at what he says are the 5 or 6 earliest and I'm finding one assumption after the next. Everybody knows that Paul wrote them and everybody knows Paul was a real guy who lived at such and such a time is implied every time he uses the term "universal acceptance." That doesn't tell me very much about how the dating was done. It says a lot about confusing faith with facts though. What is being discribed are guesses based on religous belief.

11-27-2002, 06:24 PM	#9
Kosh Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Orions Belt Posts: 3,911	Peter Kirby is not a theist.

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