Now that I check my archives, I think I started posting some variation of this hypothesis on Crosstalk2 (XTalk) as far back as 2007, not just a year or so ago.Ben C. Smith wrote:Would you mind walking me through it? What was the scoffing comment exactly?DCHindley wrote:You mean, that it was created in consequence of a misinterpretation of a marginal gloss in 20:200, which actually was a scoffing comment on the very different portraits of the HP Ananus (sp?) in Ant 20 (reckless and power mad) compared to the one in War 4 (the best thing that ever happened to mankind), which some Christian(s) thought MUST refer to the figure of James, and who immediately jumped to the conclusion that the James of the account MUST have been their shadowy James the Just, and thus making it necessary to introduce Jesus Christ into the narrative, picking Ant 18?
The facts are these:
Ant 20:199ff, portrays Ananus, son of Ananus, as "a bold man in his temper, and very insolent" who was relieved of his High Priesthood on account of his recklessness.
However, in War 4:315-320, this same Ananus was praised to the sky:
The Idumeans did not just kill Ananus, but also one Jesus. This was the early stages of the Revolt of 66-74 CE. The Provisional Revolutionary Government, under the control of Ananus, and Jesus his 2nd in command, had been wrangling with the Zealot party for control of the Temple precincts. The zealots called on the Idumeans to help their cause, but Ananus ordered the city gates shut. The Idumeans were PISSED!4.5.2 315 and for the other multitude, they [i.e., the Idumeans] esteemed it needless to go on with killing them [i.e., the common people], but they sought for the high priests, and generally went with the greatest zeal against them;
4:316 and as soon as they caught them they slew them, and then standing upon their dead bodies, in way of jest, upbraided Ananus with his kindness to the people, and Jesus with his speech made to them from the wall.
4:318 I should not be mistaken if I said that the death of Ananus was the beginning of the destruction of the city, and that from this very day may be dated the overthrow of her wall, and the ruin of her affairs, whereon they saw their high priest, and the procurer of their preservation, slain [by the Idumeans] in the midst of their city.
4:319 He was on other accounts also a venerable, and a very just man; and besides the grandeur of that nobility, and dignity, and honour of which he was possessed, he had been a lover of a kind of equality; even with regard to the lowest of the people;
4:320 he was a prodigious lover of liberty, and an admirer of a democracy in government; and did ever prefer the public welfare before his own advantage, and preferred peace above all things; for he was thoroughly sensible that the Romans were not to be conquered. He also foresaw that of necessity a war would follow, and that unless the Jews made up matters with them very dexterously, they would be destroyed;
Both Ananus, and his 2nd in command Jesus, gave speeches to the Idumeans from the city walls, trying to dissuade them by insults and by reason. The account of Jesus goes thusly:
I would propose that a reader or listener of a recitation of Ant 20, who was/were also familiar with War 4, when they got to the account now called sections 199ff, called to mind War 4:318-320, and noticed the diametrically opposed pictures of Ananus in these two accounts. There might have then been a short discussion of this disparity among listeners, and the reader jots in the margin, scoffing,"Can this man (referring to Ananus) be the just man on account of whose death the city was destroyed?" In another hand, someone had written "It would have been better to have attributed the city's demise to Jesus [referring to the high priest 2nd in command to Ananus, whose speech followed that of Ananus in War 4]."238 Accordingly, Jesus, the oldest of the high priests next to Ananus, stood upon the tower that was opposite them [i.e., the Idumeans], and said thus:- […]
270 Thus spoke Jesus, yet did not the multitude of the Idumeans give any attention to what he said, but were in a rage, because they did not meet with a ready entrance into the city. The generals also had indignation at the offer of laying down their arms, and looked upon it as equal to a captivity, to throw them away at any man's injunction whomever.
Somehow this same mss later came into the possession of the master of Origen of Alexandria. Origen, being the chief literati in the household, happens to read it and he takes the reference to be not Ananus, but the Jacob the brother of Jesus who was one of the most notable of those being prosecuted. He also assumed that the Jesus being referred to in the second sentence was Jesus Christ, not the priest Jesus the 2nd in command of the PRG!
There were old traditions and rumors swirling about the Christian community in Alexandria, regarding a figure called James, who was said to be a brother of Jesus, their Christ. That was when Origen had an epiphany of his own! "I must have, in my very hands, Josephus' own copy, where he expanded upon what he had written!" The second sentence had him stumped for a moment, though, but he finally reasoned "'This must be the opinion of a fellow Christian!"
He immediately amends the text to add the words "the one called Christ", curled into a fetal position with the manuscript tucked by his bosom, and slept a deep sleep for about two days. Hence originated, in my humble opinion, Origen's statements about Josephus attributing the destruction of Jerusalem to the death of James the brother of Jesus, AND the one where he muses "it would have been better to attribute the destruction to the death of Jesus!"
This insertion of "the being-said Christ" made the invention of an account about Jesus necessary, and perhaps Ken Olson is correct that it was Eusebius who came up with the TF.
I am also tending to think that the stories about James the Just from Hegesippus were also developed from the same accounts of both Ananus and Jesus his 2nd in command in War 4, although I think Hegesippus wove his amusing and edifying narratives from various sources and was well aware he was embellishing accounts with extraneous material. In other words, Hegesippus, as an historical source, is not an especially good one as he is not writing history, but edifying stories for his own times.
Sorry, but I was attending a college graduation party for a friend's daughter a little while ago, so am pretty spent.
Now, to curl up with my favorite manuscript and sleep for 2 days ...
DCH
