by [email protected] 51 Replies latest watchtower bible
Dear Earnest,
You wrote:
"I meant that there was no concrete evidence, no extant copies of the LXX containing the tetragrammaton, prior to the twentieth century."
True! But my point is that we do not have any testimony of the tetragrammaton ever being in the NT writings. I think that's significant. The findings of some fragments of a revised LXX do not offer any new information; they confirm what we already knew.
- Augustin -
Earnest,
I know that Talmud mentions the "Minim" and some "Divine Names" in books related to the Minim. But is it clear that the Minim = Christian people? (I haven't seen that stated as a common view.) I have never seen the Talmud mentioning that the Nazarenes used God's Name in their writings. So I would be very interested in the actual reference.
- Augustin -
Earnest,
In his interesting article "The Name of God: A Study in Rabbinic Theology" (HUCA 23 [1951], s. 579-604) by Samuel S. Cohon, you will find some very good arguments for identifying the "minim" with Jewish groups influenced by Gnosticism. We know that many Gnostics had a high interest in God's Name, especially the Greek (?) version IAW, which according to e.g. P. Shehan was the 'original' rendering in at least some parts of the LXX.
- Augustin -
Earnest,
Talmud does speak of "Names of God" in writings used by the "Minim". Now, from Qumran we know that at least some Jews had different "holy names" or "names of God". Could it be one of them?
- Augustin -
Hello Earnest
there are a number of rabbinical references in the Talmud which say that the writings of the Nazarenes (which almost certainly refers to the Christians) contain the divine name.
It would be much appreciated if you could post excerpts please.
Hi!
I have noticed that some refer to B. Ehrman's The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture as support for the theory that the NT has been tampered with. Now, Ehrman does not mention Howard's thesis in his book on the Orthodox Corruption of Scripture. I am sure Ehrman does not think the NT contained "YHWH" at all. (At least that's what he told me a few years ago... )
So long
- Augustin -
NWTetc (09-Jul-04 10:00 GMT) : I will say that my research notes (now 27+ years old) tell me that I checked 1 Corinthians 7:17 and it did contain a tetragrammaton in place of kurios (at the beginning) and did not contain a tetragrammaton in place of theos (at the end) as you asserted. So, according to my notes, the WT got it right the first time. Maybe I "slipped up" as you claim they did. I can't recall that detail now. I can only rely on my notes. However, I hope to have a microfiche copy of J7 in the next month. So, I can check it again. Which brings me around to why I found your explanation very, very interesting. My guess is that you have never seen a J-Docuement. So, someone else fed you that paragraph. What was your source? I want to know this very, very much.
Sorry, NWTetc, wrong on both counts. 1 Corinthians 7:17 (in J 7,8 ) does contain the tetragrammaton in place of theos (at the end), not in place of kurios (at the beginning), as I asserted. My undertanding that this was the case was initially based on the footnotes to 1 Corinthians 7:17.
Pre-1984 footnote on the name Jehovah in place of kurios (at the beginning) :
"Jehovah, J 7,8 (in accord with Romans 12:3, 2 Corinthians 10:13 and Hebrews 2:4); God, J 17 and Textus Receptus; the Lord, P 46 [Aleph]BACDVgSy p J 18 ."
Post-1984 footnote on the name Jehovah in place of kurios (at the beginning) :
"Jehovah, in accord with Romans 12:3 and 2 Corinthians 10:13; the Lord, P 46 [Aleph]ABCD; God, Sy h and Textus Receptus. "
Post-1984 footnote on God in place of theos (at the end) :
"God, P 46 [Aleph]ABCDVgSy p ; the Lord, Sy h and Textus Receptus; Jehovah, J 7,8,10 ."
So even though the NWT translators did not concur with the translators of J 7,8 that theos should be replaced with the divine name, its quite clear when comparing the two footnotes that they had initially mistaken the tetragrammaton to be in place of kurios, as you did.
You are also mistaken in your guess that I have never seen a J-Document as I then verified my conclusion by checking the J-Document at my local university library. If you are interested, I will scan the page on this thread for you to see for yourself.
Earnest (10-Jul-04 03:29 GMT) : I have sufficient confidence that the translators of the NWT would know the difference between the Gospel of Luke and the Gospel of John to accept that they would not mistake the two. Unfortunately I have had some difficulty in obtaining a copy of this rather obscure translation (published by the British Jews Society of Haifa in 1930) but have contacted the American Bible Society as they may still have it in their library. I will certainly relay their observations if they do, but it is not unusual for translations of the Gospels to show the parallel readings in the other Gospels.
I have had a reply from the American Bible Society which seems to bear out your conclusions. Our correspondence was as follows :
From: Earnest
...I wonder if you would confirm whether or not there are also passages of Luke in this Gospel. I am particularly interested whether it contains the 'Temptation in the Wilderness' passage in Luke 4, possibly as a parallel passage to the little John has to say, and whether the passage in Luke contains the tetragrammaton where it occurs in Jesus' quotations from the OT.
From: americanbible.org
...I have in front of me the book you are interested in. I do not read Hebrew, but it was not difficult to identify Jn 1:51 and I can assure you no parallel texts are quoted here or anywhere else in the book. I do not see the tetragrammaton anywhere on the page.
While I don't consider it a matter of great importance, I do find this rather perplexing because of the accuracy in providing the details of this translation, even saying that a copy of the translation (J 19 ) "is found at the library of the American Bible Society, New York city." Now if you are trying to provide non-existent evidence, you do not give readers such detailed information regarding your source. An interesting thing that I learnt from the American Bible Society is that J 19 is a translation by Delitzsch and edited by T.C. Horton. It is not Horton's translation. The NWT describes it as "arranged by T.C. Horton." So despite the assurance by the ABS I still feel there is something unusual about this translation, and have contacted the the 'British Jews Society' (now known as the 'Christian Witness to Israel') to see if I can obtain a copy. I will keep the board informed but it may be some time before I have opportunity to check this for myself.
Earnest
Augustin,
Thanks for your very pertinent observations. I need to do a little research regarding the rabbinical references as there is some support for the thought that Jesus used God's name, and want to just get it all together. I will share it in the next day or two.
I [Augustin] have noticed that some refer to B. Ehrman's The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture as support for the theory that the NT has been tampered with. Now, Ehrman does not mention Howard's thesis in his book on the Orthodox Corruption of Scripture. I am sure Ehrman does not think the NT contained "YHWH" at all.
When I said that "[Ehrman's book] most certainly convinced me that the idea that the divine name was intentionally replaced by kyrios in all copies of the Christian scriptures was not as far-fetched as I first considered it", I did not mean that Ehrman shared that thought, although I can see I could have been so understood. Ehrman provides what I found to be very convincing information that the text of the NT was tampered with in support of what eventually became the orthodox teaching of the church. The fact that this corruption of scripture took place, and was so widespread, helped me realise that it was quite feasible for the replacement of God's name with kurios to have taken place once the Church became gentile. Other phenomena like the nomina sacra and the universal use of codex instead of scrolls convinced me further that the copying of scripture in the post-Apostolic church was both well organised and controlled.
Earnest
I could just as easily conclude that based upon Erhman's work exposing the theological corruption evidenced in the existing mss, I feel encouraged in my opinion that Jesus was a woman. The fact remains that there is no support for the conclusion. This is the type of evidence that conspiracy theorist live on. "If it weren't for giant coverups and destroyed evidence, you'd see that my cherished opinion was right.
Earnest wrote:
An interesting thing that I learnt from the American Bible Society is that J 19 is a translation by Delitzsch and edited by T.C. Horton. It is not Horton's translation. The NWT describes it as "arranged by T.C. Horton."
[email protected] replied:
I went to the ABS in 1977 and held that J 19 in my hands. I thought I mentioned this, but maybe not. The fact is that the original (if there has been a change) J 19 was nothing more than the Gospel of John extracted from J 18 and "arranged" by T.C. Horton for his "The Gospel of John in Every Home Crusade" in the 1920s and 1930s. He extracted the Gospel of John from then popular Bible translations in many languages (French, German, Spanish, even Japanese, I think). Then he used emphatic type and underlining to spotlight what he felt were important points in John (like the I AM passages). These were put into a shirt pocket sized tract for free distribution from door to door to every home in America and many places overseas.
So, as far as the text is concerned, J 18 and J 19 are 100% identical -- except that J 19 is only the Gospel of John and J 18 is the entire NT. Whatever one says in John, the other one says exactly the same thing. it's the same text in different format ("arrangement"). Like the narrow column text in KIT and normal text in NWT -- they are the same thing -- just "arranged" differently.
I should have had that entire booklet xeroxed while I was there. But at that time they were charging me twenty-five cents a copy and I was so poor I skipped lunch. If you have a contact at ABS, that contact could xerox the entire thing and mail it to you for a couple of dollars or so. I've been planning to write and ask just that. Why don't you talk to your contact and have two copies made -- one for each of us. I will pay the cost for both. Deal?
I have never seen the new J 19 . I'm guessing, based on almost nothing. When the WT did the 1984 revision they may have decided to assemble a collection of J-Documents and could not locate this piece of ephemerae but found a later reprint of the same thing distributed by a Jewish evangelism group in Denver. I have tried to locate such a group but the (supposed) group seems to be defunct, as is Horton's campaign. Perhaps a JW in good standing (hint, hint) might be able to get the WT HQ to xerox a copy of the new J 19, and we can figure out what the situation is. Are both J 19 the same thing by different publishers, or are they independent works? Is the new J 19 just another extract from J 18 ? Who knows? Not me.
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