NOGO

I have never claimed that Matthew placed any kind of emphasis on the word now. In fact that would be totally contrary to my point. I am claiming that it was a non intentional slip. Nobody does a nonintentional slip and emphasizes the slip.

Let me go through it in detail ...

Mt 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.

"For then there will be ..."
This shows that the event pointed to is in the future at least as far as the speaker (Jesus) is concerned, 33 CE.

It follows that the rest of the sentence should have been as follows:

"such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until then, nor ever will after.

Remember we are still talking about a future event. Your statement

Biff: "It would only say that in the future there would be worse tribulation than there ever was."

cannot be simply because of the bit that comes after "nor ever will"

From the "now" perspective "nor ever will" means that there cannot be such an event in the future.

What the character (Jesus) is trying to say is that the event (the tribulations) that will occur at some time in the future will be unique. Nothing like it has occurred since the begining of the world and nothing like it will occur after. So the sentence from Jesus' perspective should have been as follows:

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

So the author started in the future as a prophecy and then slipped and spoke in the present "now, nor ever will" revealing his view that the Roman war which is alluded to in the story was the tribulations of the prophecy.

[ November 28, 2002: Message edited by: NOGO ]</p>

NOGO

In Mt24 Jesus is asked by the disciples when the temple will be destroyed. Jesus talks about the tribulations in answer to this question.

[ November 28, 2002: Message edited by: NOGO ]</p>

Biff the unclean

That would give an earliest date that the gospels could have been wriiten, but the upper date of 132 doesn't hold. Because they don't mention the second event doesn't mean that it didn't already happen, it just means that it wasn't mentioned.
In fact, if the authorship was in the far enough future (late 200s -- early 300's) the two events would have seemed to be part of the same context. The assumption is also being made that the authors were Jews, because the characters in the book were Jews. They could well have been Romans, for all we know.

We are still left with the problem of what happened to all the stuff from the first three centuries? Did they throw it all out and make nice fresh copies? Seems a funny thing to do for people who venerated relics as much as the Roman Catholic church does.

lpetrich

An alternative answer:

There was not much to be preserved before then, which was around when Constantine gave Xianity official support. But there are some Xian documents older than that date, however.

Sojourner553

None of the ORIGINAL manuscripts of the gospels have survived! The gospel stories were probably written on papyrus, which tends to rot after a century or two. There have been various FRAGMENTS discovered-- such as John Ryland's papyrus, dated from about the early to middle second century. This fragment is so small that it is about 1/2 inch square. Because it contains a fragment of a verse found in John, most scholars believe it to be a portion from the actual gospel of John. However, this is not absolute proof, as it might have been a piece of gnostic text--ie since it was discovered in Egypt, and it is known that gnostic Christians were active there at a very early date.

The oldest bibles that HAVE survived (which date from the FOURTH century C.E.), were written on expensive vellum--ie animal skins which are
more durable. Both the Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus bibles are believed to date from the middle of the fourth century, when Christianity achieved official status during the reign of Constantine, and therefore could afford the expensive vellum.

Sojourner

[ November 28, 2002: Message edited by: Sojourner553 ]</p>

Biff the unclean

Well that sounds good.

But you then have to ignore all the many papyrus documents that survived pre-325CE that were on other subjects than the NT.
You also have to ignore the Nag-Hamadi trove of Gnostic Bibles written on papyrus but dated slightly after 325 CE. They are fine, quite readable, thank you.
You have to also ignore that John Ryland's half inch scrap of papyrus used a dating method that amounts to saying 'gee the writing on this thing looks old, doesn't it?'
We do not know that Christian Gnostics were active in Egypt at this earlier date because that information also comes to us from post 325 CE and not from the earlier period.
That year is like a "firewall"

When you date manuscripts by the context of their text or the style of their lettering all you get is the earliest possible date, not the date it was written. Example; I now write the phrases "oh, you kid," and "twenty-three skiddo." We now know that what I'm writing couldn't have been written before the nine teen twenties. But it doesn't mean it actually was written in the nine teen twenties. In fact it's written in a different century.
The dating method is as inaccurate as can be, it's an educated guess at the very best.

Sojourner553

If you know of any, I would be interested.

My understanding is that papyrus rots -- and therefore the material has to be copied over and over again over the centuries; else written on a more durable material (like vellum) that lasts longer.

Sojourner

Biff the unclean

Well the bibles from the Nag-Hamadi survived, they are on papyrus.
The Metropolitain and the Brooklyn museum have large collections of papyrus scrolls in their Egyptology collections.
No, it doesn't rot unless it gets wet. Calf skin does the same. Papyrus is acid free, it lasts forever.
And many of the post 325 bibles are on papyrus .
Since there aren't any bibles from before 325 CE how do you know what they were written on? Is that what happened to them? You have them all!!

Another question.
Constantine wasn't a Christian. His troops were made up of the legions from Gaul and his late fathers legions from Britian. They weren't Christians.
Eusebius-who was a Christian-says that Constantine saw a flaming Chi Ro in the sky and heard Jesus say Hoc vince
Why would Pagan troops care about this?

Bede

Biff,

The 'fire wall' was the great persecution of Domitian around 300AD. He ordered all Christian scriptures destroyed and you know what they say about Roman efficiency. The persecution was particularly fierce in Egypt where nearly all early papyrus we have were found. Thus what would have survived is most likely to have been lost in the persecution. Perhaps another Nag Hammadi awaits discovery, though.

Also, papyrus is delicate and cannot stand up to repeated use. It simply wears out fast and has to be replaced by new copies. The papyrus that has survived was ironically stuff thrown out before it wore out - it has nearly all been discovered on rubbish dumps in Egypt where the dry climate preserved it.

If you are asking, did Constantine destroy all existing scriptures to write new ones, the answer is no. There is no evidence for this. Also, there is a lot on the NT on papyrus before 300AD. Details <a href="http://www.kchanson.com/papyri.html" target="_blank">here</a>.

Yours

Bede

<a href="http://www.bede.org.uk" target="_blank">Bede's Library - faith and reason</a>

NOGO

If you accept my arguement then nobody would have made such a slip after the war on the destruction of the temple. So Matthew 24 was written somewhere between 66 to 73 CE possibly stretching it to 80 but not much beyond since it says that immediately after the tribulations the end of the world would take place. You may want to stretch it beyond the second Jewish/Roman war (132-135CE)but I think it is really pushing it.

This does not mean, however, that the rest of the GMt was also written between those dates. It is however a good assumption.