Reasons to date Mark after Bar-Kochba: Hadrian as Antiochus

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Post Reply
Giuseppe
Posts: 13732
Joined: Mon Apr 27, 2015 5:37 am
Location: Italy

Reasons to date Mark after Bar-Kochba: Hadrian as Antiochus

Post by Giuseppe »

Some scholars
memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=7007
have claimed recently (2016) that the cause of the Revolt of Bar-Kochba was really the threat of a Roman emperor who was going seriously to hellenize the Jews by building a Roman colonia - a ''pagan shrine - just in Jerusalem, before the Revolt. Hadrian was really a second Antiochus Epiphanes, from this point of view.

Therefore Jerome was right to interpret him as ''the abomination of desolation''.


Therefore when Mark wrote:
14 “But when you see the abomination of desolation standing where it should not be” (let the one who reads understand), “then those in Judea must flee to the mountains! 15 The one who is on his housetop must not come down or go inside to take anything out of his house, 16 and the one who is in the field must not turn back to pick up his cloak. 17 And woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing their babies in those days! 18 But pray that it will not happen in winter. 19 For in those days there will be tribulation of such a kind as has not happened from the beginning of the creation that God created until now, and never will happen. 20 And if the Lord had not shortened the days, no human being would be saved.[k] But for the sake of the elect, whom he chose, he has shortened the days.
the exhortation to flee, to abandon Jerusalem (to join with the Jewish rebels), is a direct reaction to the costruction of Aelia Capitolina before the war. Therefore Mark was exhorting to rebel against the Romans (and their evil attempt to hellenize Jerusalem), and not simply to a passive resistance. Incidentally, we see that according to Witulski, the two witnesses of Revelation are just Bar Kochba (!) and his high priest.

In addition to this, there is the Argument from Temple: when the Gospel Jesus claims explicitly that the Temple will not be used never more again, then that Gospel Jesus is surely post-Bar-Kochba, ''when it became clear the temple was not being rebuilt anytime soon''.


An example of the application of this Argument can be shown by Goodacre.
In Mark Goodacre’s book, Thomas and the Gospels: The making of an apocryphal text, he proposes a mid-second century date for Thomas. In the conclusion to Chapter 9 he gives his rationale:
“The dating of the Gospel of Thomas to the 140s makes good sense of a book that witnesses to the destruction of the temple (Thom. 71) and apparently presupposes the Bar Kokhba revolt (Thom. 68)…”
So he gives two supports for the date apart from the supposed dependence on the Synoptics. The first justification, saying 71
Jesus said, "I shall throw down [this] building, and no one will be able to build it
Goodacre argues this dates from after the failure of Bar Kokhba when it became clear the temple was not being rebuilt anytime soon.
While Thomas 68 says:
Jesus said: “Blessed are you when they hate you and persecute you, and they do not find a place in the place where they persecuted you.” (Thomas 68)
The idea behind this interpretation is that the “place where they persecuted you” means Jerusalem. So those who “do not find a place” in the “place where they persecuted you“, means the Jews who were expelled from Jerusalem after 135 AD.

Now, also in Mark Jesus predicts ''future'' persecution in the synagogues.
9 “But you, watch out for yourselves! They will hand you over to councils and you will be beaten in the synagogues and will have to stand before governors and kings because of me, for a witness to them. 10 And the gospel must first be proclaimed to all the nations. 11 And when they arrest you and hand you over, do not be anxious beforehand what you should say, but whatever is given to you at that hour, say this. For you are not the ones who are speaking, but the Holy Spirit.
(Mark 13:9-11)

And always in Mark (11:14), Jesus makes an explicit recall to the future impossibility of a reconstruction of the temple.
Then he said to the tree, "May no one ever eat fruit from you again." And his disciples heard him say it.
It is a veiled reference to the temple, ok, but it is even so still a clear reference to Temple (I assume the reader knows the reason).
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Post Reply