James The Least

Pretty interesting stuff from Hurtado about New Oxyrhynchus Manuscripts.

http://larryhurtado.wordpress.com/20...s-manuscripts/


P.Oxy. 76.5072 is an unidentifiable text relating an exorcism (probably by Jesus) and miscellaneous Jesus-sayings, the text palaeographically dated by the editors to the end of the 2nd century or early 3rd century CE. The editors label it “Uncanonical Gospel?”, the question mark intended to signal genuine uncertainty about what the larger text was from which this fragment (7×7 cm), probably from a codex, comes. Noting similarities to P. Egerton 2 & P. Oxy 1224, they also observe, “The similarities of language with the first three canonical gospels point to dependence upon the Synoptic story” (the exorcism). Identifable nomina sacra forms are υε (vocative form of υιος = “son”), and βαλεια (βασιλεια). The many ligatures and the “semi-cursive” nature of the hand suggest a text likely intended for private/personal usage.

P.Oxy. 76.5073 is a Christian amulet (palaeographically dated to late 3rd or early 4th century CE), containing Mark 1:1-2. It was used as a rolled up strip (25.2 x 4.5 cm) likely worn around the neck. Given the scarcity of extant manuscript evidence for Mark in the first three centuries, even this curious fragment is worth attention for text-critical purposes. The text witnesses to the opening line of Mark as “the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ” (i.e., without “Son of God”). Both “Jesus” and “Christ” are written as nomina sacra (ιηυ and χρυ respectively), and, interestingly, the Greek definite article precedes “Christ”. The editors judge this as reflecting a tendency in the period from which the manuscript comes to emphasize the messianic claim. The text also witnesses to the reading “Isaiah the prophet” (in v.2).

PhilosopherJay

Hi James the Least,

The inclusion of the definite article is interesting. Since the term "gospel" was actually a birth announcements of a King, and "Christ" meant king, a better translation might be:

The Birth Announcement of Jesus the King.

The gospel of Mark does not contain the Mary-Joseph birth, but begins with John. The Birth Announcement, in my opinion, clearly refers to the opening statement of John:

We must assume that the first line is also the title of the work "The Beginning of the Birth Announcement of Jesus the King."

This meant that the work was probably limited to the Birth Announcement. Therefore it probably originally ended at Mark 1.14 and 15

This would make the story only about the Birth Announcement. The title would then make perfect sense. Everything afterwards, starting with Jesus' adventures in Galilee at 1:16, is extraneous to the title and therefore was not in the original story.

The purpose of the story was to connect John's baptism and forgiveness of sins with Jesus' announcement of the Kingdom of God being at hand.

We may take it that Jesus' pronouncement of the Kingdom of God being at hand was well known to the writer's audience. This is Jesus' gospel - the birth announcement of the Kingdom of God.

What the writer has done is to invent a second birth announcement - John announcing the birth, so to speak, of Jesus himself - or at least his transformation into a holy man with the holy spirit inside him. This second birth announcement by John is meant to add legitimacy to the kingdom birth announcement of the preacher Jesus.

This leaves us with the Mark writer and his audience knowing that Jesus was a preacher in Galilee, not necessarily from Galilee, preaching the coming Kingdom of God. It is difficult to determine from this if he was a real preacher or simply a fictionally invented preacher

Also note that there might have been more to this short 15 sentence story then what ended up in the 4th century gospels. Possibly, there was more about the relationship of John and Jesus and Jesus in the Wilderness.


Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Vorkosigan

Thanks James, really appreciate the heads up.

avi

Thank you James. This is an interesting link to Larry Hurtado's Blog.

I am not able to follow this linguistic argument. What I understand, is that the ancient text writes YHWH, but not "kyrios", in harmony with DSS version of Deuteronomy. I cannot appreciate why a definite article in front of YHWH, should indicate that "in the parent textual tradition 'kyrios' was used".

We know that with, or without a definite article, the ancient "parent" textual tradition was YHWH, not "kyrios".

Kyrios is a deformation, introduced, not by Jews, but by Greeks. It is insulting to equate YHWH with a human, Kyrios.

I was delighted to learn that there is another reference to Mark 1:1 without "son of God", a phrase which I think originated with 4th century Roman empire. Is there an extant patristic author who comments on Mark 1:1, before the 4th century, to identify this concept, "son of god"?

mountainman

Heya avi,

Check out Joe's thread Son Control, "Mark's" Second Amendment. Is Mark 1:1 "son of god" an Addition?. I see you have posted there but Joe keeps introducing new material. I think the answer to your question is no.

Keep well.





εὐδαιμονία | eudaimonia

avi

Thanks Pete, for your encouragement.

Yeah, I can find no one before the end of the fourth century discussing Mark 1:1.

My other question, regarding the definite article preceding YHWH is perplexing.

Does Hebrew have definite and indefinite articles?

Chinese for example, has no article, of any kind.

Why should existence of a definite article signal that the "original text" composed by the 70 scholars, contained "kurios", and not YHWH? How does writing "the YHWH", instead of "YHWH" imply that the original text contained "kurios"?

Which Christian would substitute YHWH for "kurios"? That makes no sense to me.

mountainman

Who knows what will be turned up next?

Thanks.



εὐδαιμονία | eudaimonia