Nomad

First, as you will note from my opening two posts, I have not claimed that Paul did, in fact, write these letters. As I have researched this question, I have looked first at how probable it is that they date to the 2nd, as opposed to the 1st Century, and I have concluded that based on the evidence, a 2nd Century dating is extremely unlikely.

Second, you are correct that textual critical methods do serve as a tool in studying ancient documents. In fact, it is textual criticism that demonstrates that one of your arguments, namely that 1 Corintians 14 contains later interpolations, is in error.

That was why I was surprised that you would fall for such sloppy argumentation.

In any case, thank you again for your feedback. It was appreciated. I hope to get to the concluding essay shortly, but as my father-in-law is expected to come home from the hospital today or tomorrow, and will be staying at my house during his recovery, it may still take me a few days to get it completed.

Be well,

Nomad

P.S. To Toto. Do you have an actual argument to make? If so, please offer it and I will address it as well. Thank you.

Toto

I addressed two questions to you in the last two paragraphs of my post. Are you avoiding them?

The first was how you can get around 1 Timothy 5:18. The writer claims to be quoting scripture, and we have no other obvious scriptural references to "The laborer deserves his wages" than Luke 10:7. Do you claim that this is in the Septuagint? Or that scripture has some other meaning here?

The second was how a woman could pray and prophesy while keeping silent in church and learning only from her husband in the privacy of her home. Area you assuming that the woman in question would keep silent in church, learn from her husband, and then pray and prophesy - where? It makes no sense, and it makes no sense for Paul to allow one and forbid the other.

Toto

Here's a comment by Robert Price on the issue of interpolations in Paul's epistles (on 1 Cor 15, but it is relevant):

Apocryphal Apparitions: 1 Corinthians 15:3-11 as a Post-Pauline Interpolation

Nomad

First, even if Luke was written before 1 Timothy, it was not considered to be Scripture until very late in the 2nd Century. As I said in my reply to Micael, the Scripture being referenced here is the LXX, and specifically the Torah (Deuteronomy 25:4).

Second, as the phrase "the labourer deserves his wages" is found only in Luke, and no where else int he Gospels, few scholars would treat it as an actual saying of Jesus. It does not meet any of the criteria for authentification of the saying. On this basis, it would be difficult to establish that Jesus ever said this, let alone that the author of 1 Timothy knew about it.

People pray and prophesy outside of church all the time.

Nomad

Toto

Nomad: This is non-responsive. If the writer of 1 Tim says he is quoting "scripture", and then cites something you claim was not recognized as scripture until the late 2nd century, is this not an argument that 1 Tim was written in the late 2nd century? What am I missing here?

Even more so if it was not an actual saying of Jesus.

And people may pray and prophesy outside of church, but what is the point of Paul forbidding it inside church and allowing it outside church?

Toto

More on Pauline interpolations:

<a href="http://www.bibletexts.com/versecom/1co14v33.htm" target="_blank">Textual Commentary on 1 Corinthians 14:33-36</a>

This web page contains excerpts from critical commentary on this verse. The case for interpolation is based on more than mere difficulties:

Nomad

The author of 1 Timothy DOES quote Scripture. It is called the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible/OT), and the specific passage he cites is Deuteronomy 25:4 "You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain." I canot make this any simpler for you.

This question makes no sense to me. One can pray both inside, and outside of a church, but in this case, Paul tells us that he forbids women to do so inside of a church.

As for his reasons, the most logical is that Paul is extending the prohibition (that already existed) of women to speak in the Jewish synagogue to that of the early Christian church. Paul was, after all, a Jew. At the same time, there was no prohibition against Jewish women praying and prophecying outside of a synagogue.

Nomad

Nomad

The problem with the article, of course, is that it violates the first rules of textual criticism. In this, the person making the case for interpolation is typically expected to point to textual variations in early MSS where the suspect passage is removed or edited. In this particular case, there is nothing, as ALL of the Greek manuscripts (in fact, ALL of the MSS period) contains this particular passage. What is especially noteworthy is the fact that P46 and P32 (c. 150 and 200 AD respectively, the two oldest MSS containing 1 Corinthians) contain this passage, yet neither of them has 1 or 2 Timothy. Thus, to argue that it was added later to make it conform with the passage in 1 Timothy is little more than special pleading.

The only real argument put forward is that the verse "[T]his self-contained section upsets the context: it interrupts the theme of prophesy and spoils the flow of thought."

What the critic fails to note is (a) this "interruption in thought" is a common feature in Paul's letters as he often heads off on tangents, and (b) an interruption in itself is not a strong enough reason to posit interpolation. The ancients lacked modern literary conventions like punctuation and especially parenthesis to separate thoughts. Thus, an author could, and often did, insert parenthetical thoughts into the text. This is, in fact, a rule, not an exception in ancient manuscripts, and applies equally to all ancient authors, not just Christians.

The only hard textual evidence available to the critic is that verses 34 and 35 (but not verse 36) are sometimes found after verse 40 (instead of verse 33) in some manuscripts. In these cases it is most probable that the scribe is trying to make the text flow more smoothly without changing what was actually contained in his original manuscripts (again this is not an uncommon practice). In any case, this does not really help Leitch’s case, as he also argues that “v 37 does not link up with v 36, but with v 33a”, and in all cases, verse 36 is found prior to verse 37. Perhaps that is why he never offered the textual argument at all, as it does not support his claims. In any case, as this variant is not the norm, and it is not the case in P46 or P32, and Most importantly, in NONE of the manuscripts is the full text removed completely or even edited. Thus, the textual grounds for claiming interpolation are non-existent.

Once again, the criteria we should look for is variant texts and manuscripts in which the passage is removed or altered substantially. As there are no variant texts anywhere in which the passages are actually eliminated or edited, and the proposal of a "suspected interpolation" tends to serve the interests of the scholar proposing them (i.e. he/she is typically relying upon special pleading to help prove that Paul never prohibited women from being ministers), we should regard such proposals with great suspicion.

One final question to Toto if I may. Are you arguing that Paul was a misogynist or not? If you side with the critics, and claim that this passage is an interpolation, AND that the Pastorals did not come from Paul himself, any case for a charge of misogyny case collapses completely. You simply cannot have it both ways, so I would like to know which side you have chosen. For me, I accept that Paul was a 1st Century Jew who practiced his religion much as did other Jews. Women did not speak in the synagogues (in fact, they were prohibited from doing so), even as they were allowed to pray, and even to prophecy outside of those synagogues. Thus, given the cultural context of his times, I do not think that these passages should surprise us in the least. On the other hand, his willingness to praise women publicly, and especially to call them equal before God was quite revolutionary for his times. In fact, it fits the pattern established by Jesus Himself, who was not afraid to be seen with women (including ones of suspected ill repute), and to commend them publicly, even though He never included them among his closest disciples (like the Twelve for example).

Nomad

Vorkosigan

NOMAD: The author of 1 Timothy DOES quote Scripture. It is called the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible/OT), and the specific passage he cites is Deuteronomy 25:4 "You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain." I canot make this any simpler for you.

1 Timothy 5:18 (NIV)
For the Scripture says, "Do not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the grain,"[1] and "The worker deserves his wages."[2]

Nomad,

The point Toto has made twice now is that the second line is from the NT. My original point, echoing many critical scholars, is that this passage reflects a growing idea that the NT is as "scriptural" as the Torah. This idea does not appear evident in the authentic Pauline corpus.

You twice responded to this by saying that the FIRST quote is from the Torah. No kidding. However, it is the second quote that concerns us. It is found in Luke, and seems to be originally from Q.

It is highly probable that the writer of this letter is citing a written document, since he refers to it as "scripture" in linking it to the Torah passage. Thus does not imply oral transmission. Since the only written record we have the saying in that form is Luke (there is a possibly related saying in Matthew), it must be later than those two documents, unless you wish to argue that the writer of 1 Tim knew Q (which would be true if Luke also wrote the Pastorals). This would make 1 Tim later than Luke, at least early second century, as Luke used Josephus, who came out in the 90s.

Regardless of what particular interpretation you adopt, the writer of 1 Tim obviously thought of the NT as scripture -- he links it to the Torah. Since this evolution began to take place only after the publication of the gospels in the late first and second century, that is a second piece of evidence in this passage (in addition to the probable date of the cite) that this document probably dates from later than the first century.

Note that you have said "I have concluded that based on the evidence, a 2nd Century dating is extremely unlikely."

Not "improbable" but "extremely unlikely." Yet your case rests on no positive evidence. Both of your opening posts are largely attacks on the established position that the Pastorals are forgeries. What positive evidence can you put forth that they were written in the first-century? I have already demonstrated that corroborating details may be found in other Pauline forgeries, so that bit of evidence will not fly, and arguing that tradition supports Pauline authorship is weak at best.

Nomad writes

The reason that this cannot point to a 2nd Century dating, however, is that these words are found in other 1st Century documents. Specifically the word DIDASKALIA is found in Matthew 15:9, Mark 7:7, and other Paulines (Romans 12:7, 15:4, Ephesians 4:14, Colossians 2:22).

As Toto pointed out, the particular critical argument for these words does not rest on whether they are found in 1st century writings, but how they are used. The argument is that the word "faith" is used differently in the Pastorals than in the authentic Pauline corpus. Among other words.

Finally, I personally think you're subjecting our bipedal locomotor appendages to transient acceleration. I think you do want to support a claim that Paul wrote those letters. True?

Michael

[ March 03, 2002: Message edited by: turtonm ]</p>

Toto

Nomad: you cannot avoid what is in black and white:

1 Tim 5:18
For the Scripture says, "Do not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the grain,"[2] and "The worker deserves his wages."[3]

The NIV footnotes these two separate quotations as

[2] 5:18 Deut. 25:4
[3] 5:18 Luke 10:7

I.e., scripture says A and B. A is from the Torah, B is not. Do you have some Clintonian interpretation of the word "and"? How can this be simpler?

You ask whether I consider Paul to be a misogynist or not. I haven't taken a position on that, and I'm not sure that the question can be answered with any degree of certainty, since we only know Paul through letters which have been heavily edited by the later church. It is clear to me that a lot of modern Christians prefer an interpretation which absolves Paul and the early church from the charge of misogyny. They prefer to think that the early church was egalitarian, and it was only later that the heavy hand of church bureaucracy restricted women's role.

I am not sure why you reject this approach since you claim not to be a fundamentalist. The idea that textual criticism is confined to examining variations in received texts is rather restrictive.

Paul was a Jew of his time, but he was a Hellenized Jew who was alleged to have been a Roman citizen. However misogynist, I would assume that he would be consistent.