acts 15 has an interesting backstory (and textual history) that has been touched on elsewhere so here i will only say, the purpose of the section, and much of the book, is to re-envision the history of the early days of xtianity.
the deep schisms, (some might say even different origins) are made to appear superficial and inconsequential.
this theme contiues with the choice of two 'prophets' from jerusalem traveling back to antioch to share with paul and barny, named judas (yes another one) and silas.
Very creative. However, the adversative particle δέ would seem to differentiate Paul and Barney's actions from that of Judas and Silas.
I have to accept that those whose first language was Greek would have understood the matter better than me using lexicons. They saw a problem. However, if you are correct, then we have a text written poorly and confusingly, not sure how that is a superior outcome to accepting a scribal glitch.
youtube play from 15:55. clip only lasts a few minutes but excellent reasoning.. https://youtu.be/fk9a8tpfydq?si=i5fvlpt94917mavy.
p.
Tabor has a nice easy going nature that is enjoyable to listen to. He's written on subjects many leaving the WT might find interesting.
acts 15 has an interesting backstory (and textual history) that has been touched on elsewhere so here i will only say, the purpose of the section, and much of the book, is to re-envision the history of the early days of xtianity.
the deep schisms, (some might say even different origins) are made to appear superficial and inconsequential.
this theme contiues with the choice of two 'prophets' from jerusalem traveling back to antioch to share with paul and barny, named judas (yes another one) and silas.
In the same vein as the OP, we see two stories of Christians who had not heard of Christian baptism. Ponder that. These converts to Christianity knew ONLY the OT and yet became Christians in some sense. They never read Paul's works nor the Gospels and they practiced an Essenic Jewish baptism as John had. The writer of Acts includes these early 'Christians' as immediately adopting the "more correct" Proto-Orthodox version of Christianity.
24 Now a certain Jew named Apollos, an Alexandrian by race, [a]an eloquent man, came to Ephesus; and he was mighty in the scriptures. 25 This man had been [b]instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in spirit, he spake and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, knowing only the baptism of John: 26 and he began to speak boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more accurately. 27 And when he was minded to pass over into Achaia, the brethren encouraged him, and wrote to the disciples to receive him: and when he was come, he [c]helped them much that had believed through grace; 28 for he powerfully confuted the Jews, [d]and that publicly, showing by the scriptures that Jesus was the Christ.
Acts has name dropped a number of famous/infamous persons as part of this program of revisionism and does so here again. Apollos, someone otherwise known only from 1 Corinthians as a kind of rival to Paul is effectively rehabilitated into the proto-Orthodoxy.
In the next chapter again in Ephesus we get another story of Christians who had been baptized as Essenes and had seemingly implausibly never heard of the 'holy spirit'.
19 And it happened that while tApollos was at Corinth, Paul passed uthrough the inland1 country and came to Ephesus. There he found some disciples. 2 And he said to them, v“Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said, “No, wwe have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” 3 And he said, x“Into what then were you baptized?” They said, “Into yJohn’s baptism.” 4 And Paul said, y“John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people zto believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus.” 5 On hearing this, athey were baptized in2 the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 And bwhen Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and cthey began speaking in tongues and dprophesying. 7 There were about twelve men in all.
It's easy to conclude that Christian roots lay in Hellenized Jewish circles who had extrapolated the Christ story from OT and related texts. IMO these passages seem to preserve an early tradition consistent with this model of Christian origins while at the same time subsuming this form of Christianity into the fold of orthodoxy 80-100 years later.
i thought it would be fun to take a brief look at various gospels in use by christians of the first few centuries ce.
one each week.
a few weeks back i posted regarding the egerton gospel which i cleverly misspelled edgerton gospel.. for now consider the oxyrhynchus gospel 840:.
As Phizzy mentioned the Oxyrhychus hoard has a number of relevant texts. Here is the Oxy 1224:
Fragment 1: recto
139
01 [ . . . ] in everything
02 [ . . . ]. Truly,
03 [I say to you . . . ]
Fragment 2: recto, col. ii
1[73]
01 It weighed me down. And [approach-]
02 ing [i]n a vis[ion], Jesus [said,]
03 "Why are you dis[cour]aged? For not [ . . . ]
04 [y]ou, but the [ . . . ]
05 [ . . . ]
Fragment 2: verso, col. i
174
01 [ . . . ] "you [sai]d, although you are not answer-
02 [ing. What then did] you [re]nounce? W[h]at
03 [is] the ne[w] doct[rine] [that they say]
04 [you] te[ach, or what is the] new [b]a[ptism]
05 [that you proclaim? Ans]wer and . . .
Fragment 2: verso, col. ii
[175]
01 When the scribes an[d Pharisees]
02 and priests sa[w hi]m,
03 they were angry [that with sin]ners
04 (right in the middle of them) [he was reclining.]
05 But when Jesus heard, he said,
06 "Those who are [healthy ha]ve [no need]
07 [of a physician . . . ]
Fragment 2: recto, col. ii
[1]76
01 [ . . . a]nd p[r]ay for
02 your [ene]mies. For the one who is not
03 [against yo]u is for you.
04 [The one who i]s far away [today], tomorrow
05 will be [near you] and in
06 [ . . . ] the advers[ary]
07 [ . . . ]
As would be expected the text is fragmentary. It was part of a book form papyrus collection with page numbers. Again it is impossible to be dogmatic but ranges of date of composition are 50-150CE,similar to the canonical gospel forms. There are some obvious similarity of thought, yet with significant divergent material, suggesting another independent stream of tradition.
todays watchtower is very interesting on many levels.
they know that millions are disappointed.. https://www.jw.org/finder?srcid=jwlshare&wtlocale=e&prefer=lang&docid=2023681.
i also found it interesting they talk about brother fred franz and show his picture.
Mikejw....Out in the middle of the sea, optimism keeps your arms and legs swimming until 'something' positive happens. Believing you can walk on water is something very different.
The key distinction is the denial of reality.
can anyone give me a rundown or send me to a thread on the robert hendriks thing?
he was recently 'dismissed' from bethel and was pid (public information department?
) i'm not even sure i have this right..... thanks much.
I never heard of the guy, having left too long ago. I was curious to see if he was being wiped from the website. It appears so. I found only 1 reference to him from 4 years ago. No videos.
can anyone give me a rundown or send me to a thread on the robert hendriks thing?
he was recently 'dismissed' from bethel and was pid (public information department?
) i'm not even sure i have this right..... thanks much.
Wasn't that 7 years ago?
the story of judas iscariot in the gospels provides the reader with a fascinating picture of how the plot and details of the narratives were gleaned from the ot and embellished in different ways.
the evangelists and the tradents that preceded them looked to the ot (and other affiliated literature) for information on what happened to jesus, employing a haggadaic method of biblical interpretation similar to how rabbis and authors of pseudepigraphs in the second temple era expanded the brief stories of the patriarchs in genesis with reams of new detail and legendary episodes -- through the means of exegesis aimed to penetrate beyond a plain reading of the text to "fill in the blanks" of what must have happened.
the authors of the gospels also scoured through the ot to discover what was supposed to happen to jesus and wrote their stories accordingly.
I'm afraid I still didn't bring some of this home. IF we understand a protoGospel (UrMark?) to have been produced by a second/third generation Christian to flesh out and expound upon what previous Christians had left unsaid, in the same spirit of the birth narratives and infancy Gospels. Paul's silence (apart from a few interpolations) regarding any extended earthly stay and teaching of Christ, left a void that was filled by this new narration compiled almost entirely from OT typology and Homeric literature, set in the recent past under Romans. In many ways this resembles the Essenic methods of exegesis (I will not call it Midrash). Later recensions of this story continued to fill in the voids using the OT analogy and add a flavor of historicity (Luke's use of Josephus e.g.).
Mind you there was no one direction for these influences, for a famous example, what one writer felt was anti-Docetic (brothers) another later Catholic objected to.
In sum, there is no reason to object to the abundantly evident conclusion that Judas Iscariot is a literary creation. He plays a role entirely consistent with the method and objective of the writer, a method and objective continued by later redactors of the story.
the story of judas iscariot in the gospels provides the reader with a fascinating picture of how the plot and details of the narratives were gleaned from the ot and embellished in different ways.
the evangelists and the tradents that preceded them looked to the ot (and other affiliated literature) for information on what happened to jesus, employing a haggadaic method of biblical interpretation similar to how rabbis and authors of pseudepigraphs in the second temple era expanded the brief stories of the patriarchs in genesis with reams of new detail and legendary episodes -- through the means of exegesis aimed to penetrate beyond a plain reading of the text to "fill in the blanks" of what must have happened.
the authors of the gospels also scoured through the ot to discover what was supposed to happen to jesus and wrote their stories accordingly.
I realize the impression I left P.S. was one of obfuscation. And in her impression was I was ignoring her retort. So, though she has left the conversation, I wish to respond to few of her comments.
The mythology of the gospels aside, the rabbi known as Jesus of Nazareth was destined to crucifixion, no matter what as the priesthood of the time had no sympathy for messianic pretenders that publically embrassed them while creating powerful movements consisting of sympathic followers. Rome likewise did not appreciate anyone calling themselves "king"....
This argument pretty much ignores the larger thesis, the questionable historicity of Jesus and events described as occurring to him. The earliest evidence suggests that the "rulers" described as crucifying Jesus were thought of, not as Romans, but cosmic, spirit rulers who in fact do not recognize the Christ at all. And who if they had would not have unwittingly done God's will. Paul, even in the form we have today, retains this idea. The ascension of Isaiah too describes the efforts to disguise the Christ and the duping of these spirit rulers. If anyone wishes this can be discussed further, but for now, this is why I do not find the objection raised by P.S. persuasive.
Another character, like Judas Iscariot, handing him over as a betrayer is an invention? Unlikely. Judas is actually just the name "Jude," which was slightly changed so as not to confuse it with the name of the brother of Jesus who is also named Jude. (John 14:22) There is also the prophet named Judas Barsabbas mentioned in Acts 15:22-33.
Again here we have an argument from the standpoint of historicity as well as not appreciating the layered nature of these traditions. The addition of Jesus' "brothers" has been discussed at length elsewhere, and in short may have been a part of a larger effort to "disprove" the popular docetic arguments of the day. It created a family for Jesus and therefore he was not merely an appearance of a man. Tertullian argues in such a way, he denies the perpetual virginity of Mary for this reason. Considering that Docetic Christianity posed a threat to the burgeoning orthodoxy, it not surprising that we find elements included in the text that would not have been there earlier when the Docetics formulated their Christology. The confusing mess of Jameses illustrates the evolving nature of these traditions. James the Less, James the Greater, James the Just, James "brother of the Lord" (Galatians, as opposed to Apostle with whom tradition later conflates), James the son of Joseph but not Mary (Gospel of James) James the brother of the high priest Jesus of Josephus etc. It is my view that this confusion/conflation of Jameses combined with the Pauline spiritual usage of the words "brother/s of the Lord" enabled this anti-docetic development. Suddenly Jesus of Nazareth has brothers and sisters. It is the same with Jude/Judas/Judah. Here is a character in some texts an Apostle in others a brother, tradition often conflates the two. The names of the Apostles, likely props to equate the new Israel with the 12 tribes, are inconsistent and suggestive of alternate traditions. (2 James, 2 Johns, 2 Judases created by taking the Gospels together) IOW, there weren't 2 Judases in the original list.
Sorry about the duplication, I was distracted and ran out of time.
the story of judas iscariot in the gospels provides the reader with a fascinating picture of how the plot and details of the narratives were gleaned from the ot and embellished in different ways.
the evangelists and the tradents that preceded them looked to the ot (and other affiliated literature) for information on what happened to jesus, employing a haggadaic method of biblical interpretation similar to how rabbis and authors of pseudepigraphs in the second temple era expanded the brief stories of the patriarchs in genesis with reams of new detail and legendary episodes -- through the means of exegesis aimed to penetrate beyond a plain reading of the text to "fill in the blanks" of what must have happened.
the authors of the gospels also scoured through the ot to discover what was supposed to happen to jesus and wrote their stories accordingly.
I realize the impression I left P.S. was one of obfuscation. And in her impression was I was ignoring her retort. So, though she has left the conversation, I wish to respond to few of her comments.
The mythology of the gospels aside, the rabbi known as Jesus of Nazareth was destined to crucifixion, no matter what as the priesthood of the time had no sympathy for messianic pretenders that publically embrassed them while creating powerful movements consisting of sympathic followers. Rome likewise did not appreciate anyone calling themselves "king"....
This argument pretty much ignores the larger thesis, the questionable historicity of Jesus and events described as occurring to him. The earliest evidence suggests that the "rulers" described as crucifying Jesus were thought of, not as Romans, but cosmic, spirit rulers who in fact do not recognize the Christ at all. And who if they had would not have unwittingly done God's will. Paul, even in the form we have today, retains this idea. The ascension of Isaiah too describes the efforts to disguise the Christ and the duping of these spirit rulers. If anyone wishes this can be discussed further, but for now, this is why I do not find the objection raised by P.S. persuasive.
