Stuart wrote: ↑Fri Jul 12, 2019 3:29 pm
Ben C. Smith wrote: ↑Fri Jul 12, 2019 3:09 pm
Stuart wrote: ↑Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:56 pm
Ben C. Smith wrote: ↑Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:54 pm
Stuart wrote: ↑Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:46 pmWhat I am saying is the ability of a Jewish person to convert a Greek or Latin is pretty low compared to their ability to convert a Jew or Semitic person, simply on the basis of having more in common with them.
Many missionaries today work to convert a handful of locals and then train them as junior missionaries, so to speak, in great part for this exact reason.
But, to return to my main question, how do you know that Stephen was not a Jew?
Why would he be a Jew?
Because Jews could bear Greek names (or Roman names, or other kinds of names). Your framing of the question in this way means that you are
assuming that the name points to nationality. How do you know that was always or even typically the case? It appears very definitely not to have been the case in Egypt (which is where most of the most relevant kinds of evidence are preserved); how do you know it would have been the case elsewhere?
Why would a Jew take a pagan name when becoming Christian? What Christian hero would there have been in generation zero who was pagan?
Why does it have to be an assumed name? Why does he have to be named after a Christian hero? Why can it not be his birth name?
Well, we are talking Achaia and Asia. Neither is known for Jewish settlement, zero archeological evidence, unlike say Alexandria, where the evidence is indisputable.
Your argument so far requires there to be close to zero Jews in such areas. For, if Jewish missionaries could convert fellow Jews but not gentiles, and if Stephen is the convert of a Jew, then Stephen must be a Jew. The only way to eliminate this as an option is to suggest that there were too few Jews to make finding them feasible. Apparently you do this by stating that we have zero archaeological evidence for Jews settling in these areas.
I will focus on Asia for convenience:
Tituli Asiae Minoris II 612 (Tlos in Lycia, circa late century I):
Πτολεμαῖος Λευ̣-
κίου Τλωεὺς κατεσκεύασεν ἐκ
τῶν ἰδίων τὸ ἡρῷον ἀπὸ θεμελίων αὐ-
τὸς καὶ ὑπὲρ τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ Πτολεμαίου βʹ
τοῦ Λευκίου ὑπὲρ ἀρχοντείας τελου-
μένας [sic] παρ' ἡμεῖν Ἰουδαίοις, ὥστε αὐ-
τὸ εἶναι πάντων τῶν Ἰουδαίων καὶ
μηδένα ἐξὸν εἶναι ἕτερον τεθῆναι
ἐν αὐτῷ. ἐὰν δέ τις εὑρεθείη τινὰ
τιθ̣ῶν, ὀφειλέσει Τλοέων... τῷ δήμῳ....
Monumenta Asiae Minoris Antiqua VI 264 (Akmonia in Phrygia, circa late century I):
τὸν κατασκευασθέ[ν]τ̣α ο[ἶ]κον ὑπ̣ὸ̣
Ἰουλίας Σεουήρας ❦ Π̣. ❦ Τυρρώνιος Κλά-
δος ὁ διὰ βίου ἀρχισυνάγωγος καὶ
Λούκιος Λουκίου ἀρχισυνάγωγος ❦
καὶ Ποπίλιος Ζωτικὸς ἄρχων ἐπεσ-
κεύασαν ἔκ τε τῶν ἰδίων καὶ τῶν συν-
καταθεμένων καὶ ἔγραψαν τοὺς τοί-
χους καὶ τὴν ὀροφὴν καὶ ἐποίησαν
τὴν τῶν θυρίδων ἀσφάλειαν καὶ τὸν
[λυ]πὸν πάντα κόσμον, οὕστινας κα[ὶ]
ἡ συναγωγὴ ἐτείμησεν ὅπλῳ ἐπιχρύ-
σῳ διά τε τὴν ἐνάρετον αὐτῶν δ̣[ι]ά̣θ[ε̣]-
σ̣ιν καὶ τὴν π̣ρ̣ὸς τὴν συναγωγὴν εὔνο̣ι̣ά̣ν
τε και σ̣[που]δήν.
Monumenta Asiae Minoris Antiqua IV 90 (Synnada in Phrygia, century I or II):
[{τὸν δεῖνα} ἀ]ρχισυν̣[άγωγον —?—]
[υἱὸν Ἰου]λίου Ἀρ[τέμωνος —?—].
E. Mary Smallwood, The Jews Under Roman Rule, page 507: In Smyrna a Hadrianic inscription listing citizens who had made benefactions to the city includes among the donors "former Jews," presumably Jews who had acquired Greek citizenship at the price of repudiating their Jewish allegiance and were advertising their rise in the social scale.
There is also literary evidence:
1 Maccabees 15.16-23: 16 Lucius, consul of the Romans unto king Ptolemy, greeting: 17 The Jews' ambassadors, our friends and confederates, came unto us to renew the old friendship and league, being sent from Simon the high priest, and from the people of the Jews: 18 And they brought a shield of gold of a thousand pound. 19 We thought it good therefore to write unto the kings and countries, that they should do them no harm, nor fight against them, their cities, or countries, nor yet aid their enemies against them. 20 It seemed also good to us to receive the shield of them. 21 If therefore there be any pestilent fellows, that have fled from their country unto you, deliver them unto Simon the high priest, that he may punish them according to their own law. 22 The same things wrote he likewise unto Demetrius the king, and Attalus, to Ariarathes, and Arsaces, 23 And to all the countries and to Sampsames, and the Lacedemonians, and to Delus, and Myndus, and Sicyon, and Caria, and Samos, and Pamphylia, and Lycia, and Halicarnassus, and Rhodus, and Aradus, and Cos, and Side, and Aradus, and Gortyna, and Cnidus, and Cyprus, and Cyrene.
From Cicero, For Flaccus 28: As gold, under pretense of being given to the Jews, was accustomed every year to be exported out of Italy and all the provinces to Jerusalem, Flaccus issued an edict establishing a law that it should not be lawful for gold to be exported out of Asia. And who is there, O judges, who cannot honestly praise this measure? The senate had often decided, and when I was consul it came to a most solemn resolution that gold ought not to be exported. But to resist this barbarous superstition were an act of dignity, to despise the multitude of Jews, which at times was most unruly in the assemblies in defense of the interests of the republic, was an act of the greatest wisdom. [Jewish Encyclopedia, L. Valerius Flaccus: Proconsul of Asia Minor in 62-61 B.C. He is notorious in the history of the Jews for having seized for the public treasury the Temple money intended for Jerusalem; thus, at Apamea, nearly 100 pounds of gold through the Roman knight Sextus Caesius; at Laodicea, more than 20 pounds through L. Peducaeus; at Adramyttium, an unknown sum through the legate Cnaeus Domitius; at Pergamon, a small sum, as probably not many Jews were living there at that time. Accused of extortion during his term of office, Flaccus was defended by Cicero (59), himself opposed to the Jews. Cicero justified Flaccus in reference to the Temple money by using a clever oratorical device to show that his edict, to the effect that no money should be sent out of Asia, was a law general in its application, and that the subordinates of Flaccus, who were all men of good repute, had proceeded openly and not in secret (Cicero, "Pro Flacco," § 28). The outcome of the suit is not known. It is not likely, however, that Flaccus was punished.]
From Philo, Embassy to Gaius 33: Nevertheless, though he was well acquainted with the disposition of the emperor, and how implacable and inexorable he was in his anger, he still had himself some sparks of the Jewish philosophy and piety, since he had long ago learnt something of it by reason of his eagerness for learning, and had studied it still more ever since he had come as governor of the countries in which there are vast numbers of Jews scattered over every city of Asia and Syria; or partly because he was so disposed in his mind from his spontaneous, and natural, and innate inclination for all things which are worthy of care and study. .... For in all the particulars in which men are enjoined by the laws, and in which they have it in their power to show their piety and loyalty, my nation is inferior to none whatever in Asia or in Europe, whether it be in respect of prayers, or of the supply of sacred offerings, or in the abundance of its sacrifices, not merely of such as are offered on occasions of the public festivals, but in those which are continually offered day after day; by which means they show their loyalty and fidelity more surely than by their mouth and tongue, proving it by the designs of their honest hearts, not indeed saying that they are friends to Caesar, but being so in reality. .... So that if my native land is, as it reasonably may be, looked upon as entitled to a share in your favor, it is not one city only that would then be benefited by you, but ten thousand of them in every region of the habitable world, in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa, on the continent, in the islands, on the coasts, and in the inland parts.
Josephus, Antiquities 14.7.2 §110-113: 110 And let no one wonder that there was so much wealth in our temple, since all the Jews throughout the habitable earth, and those that worshiped God, nay, even those of Asia and Europe, sent their contributions to it, and this from very ancient times. 111 Nor is the largeness of these sums without its attestation; nor is that greatness owing to our vanity, as raising it without ground to so great a height; but there are many witnesses to it, and particularly Strabo of Cappadocia, who says thus: 112 "Mithridates sent to Cos, and took the money which queen Cleopatra had deposited there, as also eight hundred talents belonging to the Jews." 113 Now we have no public money but only what appertains to God; and it is evident that the Asian Jews removed this money out of fear of Mithridates; for it is not probable that those of Judea, who had a strong city and temple, should send their money to Cos; nor is it likely that the Jews who are inhabitants of Alexandria should do so neither, since they were ill no fear of Mithridates.
You may dispose of the literary evidence if you please (though I have no idea why one would do that instead of evaluating it critically), but I doubt the number of Jews in Asia was as negligible as you seem to think.
As for the hiring of locals, that is modern, and it also assumes a generation or generations of missionary ground work.
Is it? Does it? How do we know this? (Also, I never mentioned hiring; I mentioned converting and training.)