to Peter,
Peter Kirby wrote:Bernard Muller wrote:Even the Ascension of Isaiah is difficult to consider obscure, especially when Andrew Criddle has recently presented evidence here that it was quoted in the 2nd/3rd century text Acts of Peter as being words of a "prophet.
But what are the odds that AoI (even in a version chosen by mythicists) would be available in the 30's or 40's or 50's (or at least representative of early Christianity beliefs then)?
How does one calculate such a figure
in reality, and not simply in your views?
So what are your odds in your views? with evidence, please.
BTW, according to Irenaeus' Against Heresies, Book 1:
5, 2
He created also seven heavens, above which they say that he, the Demiurge, exists. And on this account they [Heretics]
term him Hebdomas, and his mother Achamoth Ogdoads, preserving the number of the first-begotten and primary Ogdoad as the Pleroma. They affirm, moreover, that these seven heavens are intelligent, and speak of them as being angels, while they refer to the Demiurge himself as being an angel bearing a likeness to God
That would explain why those 2nd century heretics would find a fully Jewish 'Ascension of Isaiah' to their liking and as a text fit for their Christian Gnostic/Docetic interpolations, as I demonstrated here:
http://historical-jesus.info/100.html.
Carrier dates the AoI between 64 AD and early second century, and more precisely at about the same time than the book of Revelation (around 95 AD) (OHJ, page 37, footnote 2), well after the time of Paul and earliest Christians, and most likely after some of the gospels were available (Carrier sets gMark before gMatthew, in the 70's or 80's, and gMatthew itself in the 80's or 90's: OHJ, page 266).
And then I do not agree with such an early dating for AoI, or such a late dating for the gospels, but that's another matter.
Cordially, Bernard