John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

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

John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Giuseppe »

Before myself, Georges Ory had that idea:


Now, until this passage John had not yet been mentioned by Josephus who, we recall, had also not named the Samaritain messiah (for whom he certainly had no admiration).

Immediate thereafter, §2 continues with the account of the just and pious man who baptized peacefully and was beloved by the multitude. The paragraph ends virtually the same way it began: “So the Jews believed that the destruction of this army…” This paragraph is the only one in which the surviving Greek versions of Josephus mention John the Baptist by name.19

On the face of it, we here have an interpolated paragraph bracketed by a repetition.20 A Christian evidently wanted to insert an account of the forerunner of Jesus together with praise in his regard. He did so in order to combat the preceding passage (regarding the unnamed Samaritan upstart, XVIII.4.1) which he felt included perfidious material regarding John.21 The interpolator needed to show that John was not an agitator but a peaceful and good prophet. In this way Josephus—a historian who viewed the Samaritans as troublemakers—is made to contradict himself in his own writing.

http://www.mythicistpapers.com/2012/09/ ... -ory-pt-6/ (my bold)

In the his article, Georges Ory had to build a complex theorema to connect John the Baptist with the Samaritan Prophet.

But there is a recent scholar article (dated 2000) that makes even more easily the connection of John with Samaria:

John the Baptist, The Wilderness and the Samaritan Mission

The article can be read entirely here:
https://books.google.it/books?id=v-t5Dw ... on&f=false

The point of the article is that the wilderness where John baptized was probably in Samaria, not in Judea.

Hence, even if John was historical and even if he was not the Samaritan Prophet condemned by Josephus, the Christian interpolator was obliged to distance more explicitly two figures working in the same place: Samaria.

By interpolating Josephus.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
davidmartin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:51 pm

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by davidmartin »

which agrees with the clementine's where John was Simon's forerunner, presumably all in Samaria
Josephus hardly likes to spill the beans but its kind of obvious his 'robbers' and 'rebels' are covering up much broader stuff he omits. but he does i think like to be accurate about places and dates.
Giuseppe
Posts: 13732
Joined: Mon Apr 27, 2015 5:37 am
Location: Italy

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Giuseppe »


Referring to the historicised mystery of the descent of the Dove at the Baptism, Celsus puts the argument into the mouth of his Jew (i. 48), that there is no testimony for this except the word of one of those who met with the same punishment as Jesus. To this Origen replies that it is a great blunder on Celsus's part to put such an argument into the mouth of a Jew, for
"the Jews do not connect John with Jesus, nor the punishment of John with that of Jesus."

Now in the first place it is to be observed that Celsus says nothing about any "John," and in the second that Origen gives us clearly to understand that the Jews denied that John the Baptist, who was a well-known historical character, had anything to do with Jesus. This is an important piece of evidence for those who believe that the Baptist element, which does not appear in the "common document," was a later development. Can it be that Celsus had in mind some early form of the Baptism story, in which some other than John the Baptist played a part?

http://gnosis.org/library/grs-mead/jesu ... 0/ch7.html

Origen believed that Jesus was the Christ. He used these names as interchangeable. Hence he could say with equal right:

"the Jews do not connect John with Christ, nor the punishment of John with that of Christ."

In other terms, the Jews denied that John was the Jewish Messiah or had any connection with him.

If John was not the Messiah of the Jews, was he the Taheb of the Samaritans and, as such, without any connection with the Jewish Messiah as reported by Origen?
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
User avatar
MrMacSon
Posts: 8798
Joined: Sat Oct 05, 2013 3:45 pm

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by MrMacSon »

There are likely to have been several characters in and place in or attributed to the first century that were confused with or evolving out of others.

Lena Einhorn has noted
The...messianic leader named by Josephus, Theudas (A.J. 20.97-99), shares distinct characteristics with John the Baptist: like John, Theudas gathered his followers by the river Jordan, and, like John, he was arrested by the authorities, and they “cut off his head, and carried it to Jerusalem”. Curiously, although the names of dignitaries may differ, comparing the New Testament accounts with Josephus’ accounts of the mid-40s to early 50s in several respects appears to be more productive than a comparison with his accounts of the 30s: It is in this later period, not the 30s, that Josephus describes the activity and crucifixion of robbers (absent between 6 and 44 C.E.), a conflict between Samaritans and Jews, two co-reigning high priests, a procurator killing Galileans, an attack on someone named Stephanos outside Jerusalem, and at least ten more seemingly parallel events. Importantly, these are parallels that, judging by Josephus, appear to be absent in the 30s.
^second paragraph here http://lenaeinhorn.se/articles/jesus-an ... n-prophet/

The Livius site has noted
Several persons were inspired by the idea that the Messiah was someone like Moses. One may think of John the Baptist, the Samaritan prophet, an Egyptian prophet (52-58 CE), an anonymous prophet about 59 [and Moses of Crete in 448]. https://www.livius.org/articles/religio ... ike-moses/
Giuseppe
Posts: 13732
Joined: Mon Apr 27, 2015 5:37 am
Location: Italy

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Giuseppe »

MrMacSon wrote: Fri Sep 13, 2019 3:44 am
Lena Einhorn has noted
The...messianic leader named by Josephus, Theudas (A.J. 20.97-99), shares distinct characteristics with John the Baptist:
according to Georges Ory, the passage about Theudas in Josephus was written by a "copyist" as result of a confusion of Theudas as a distinct person from the Samaritan Prophet when really they coincided.

Let us for a moment consider a passage some pages later. This is Josephus’ paragraph concerning Theudas, the charlatan ostensibly captured and decapitated ten years later under Cuspius Fadus (44-46 CE):
During the period when Fadus was procurator of Judea, a certain impostor named Theudas persuaded the majority of the masses to take up their possessions and to follow him to the Jordan River. He stated that he was a prophet and that at his command the river would be parted and would provide them an easy passage. With this talk he deceived many. Fadus, however, did not permit them to reap the fruit of their folly, but sent against them a squadron of cavalry. These fell upon them unexpectedly, slew many of them and took many prisoners. Theudas himself was captured, whereupon they cut off his head and brought it to Jerusalem. These, then, are the events that befell the Jews during the time that Cuspius Fadus was procurator.

(Ant. XX.5.1)

The paragraph relates neither to the end of the preceding discussion [which deals with Izates, king of Adiabene]—understandable enough, for we have a new chapter—nor, however, to the discussion which follows. It gives the impression of being ‘suspended in air’ and is intrusive at the beginning of a new discussion. Chapter 5 would normally begin with the second paragraph:
“The successor of Fadus was Tiberius Alexander, the son of…”

Also, the first paragraph hardly sums up
“the events that befell the Jews during the time that Cuspius Fadus was procurator,”

as Josephus claims at the end of the above citation.

At the same time, the above passage would perfectly complete Book XIX which in fact terminates by relating that Cuspius Fadus became procurator of Judea with the mission of chastising the inhabitants of Sebaste and Caesarea and removing troops in order to reduce friction (9.2). As it happened, Fadus was mollified and the troops “obtained leave to remain in Judea. These men, in the period that followed, proved to be a source of the greatest disasters to the Jews by sowing the seed of war in Florus’ time. For this reason Vespasian, on coming to the throne, as we shall shortly relate, deported them from the province.” However, the promised continuation is missing. Instead, Book XX immediately begins with four paragraphs which have nothing to do with our subject, and the fifth paragraph begins in the way we have described above.

It appears that a copyist supplemented Josephus with material he thought lacking by inserting a preliminary paragraph. He was under the mistaken impression that Theudas lived at the time of Fadus. The paragraph he added neither adds to nor takes away from what we already know.

Later, Ory finds a strong clue of the connection between Theudas and the Samaritan Prophet:


Under the name “Jesus” in his Lexicon, Philip of Side reports that the synagogue of Tiberias preserved a certain Book of Theudas about a Samaritan Christ. The book relates that Christ was elected High Priest by the Jews. Now, there exists a tradition (Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. III.31.3) according to which
“John, who rested on the bosom of our Lord, was a priest who bore the sacerdotal plate [petalon pephorekws], martyr and teacher…”

It is not surprising that the same legend [regarding the High Priesthood] attaches to Theudas as also to John-Dositheus, given that these are one and the same “Christ.”

(my underline)
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
User avatar
Ben C. Smith
Posts: 8994
Joined: Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:18 pm
Location: USA
Contact:

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Ben C. Smith »

MrMacSon wrote: Fri Sep 13, 2019 3:44 amThe Livius site has noted
Several persons were inspired by the idea that the Messiah was someone like Moses. One may think of John the Baptist, the Samaritan prophet, an Egyptian prophet (52-58 CE), an anonymous prophet about 59 [and Moses of Crete in 448]. https://www.livius.org/articles/religio ... ike-moses/
My own tentative typology is as follows:
  • A prophet (like Moses or Elijah): the Samaritan (promised to reveal treasures hidden by Moses on Gerizim), an anonymous prophet under Festus (promised signs and wonders in the desert), Jonathan the weaver (promised signs and wonders in the desert), Jesus ben Ananias (? imitator of the prophet Jeremiah).
  • A king (like David): Hezekiah the bandit (?), Judas the Galilean (?), Simon of Peraea (?), Athronges (a shepherd who assumed a diadem and led a band of men against the Romans), Menahem (appeared in the temple dressed in royal garments), Simon bar Giora (appeared before the Romans dressed in purple).
  • A priest (like Aaron or Melchizedek): Banus (?), John the baptist (? promoted a cheap and easy purification rite).
  • A warrior (like Joshua): Theudas (promised to part the Jordan), the Egyptian (promised the walls would fall).

4Q175 (4QTestimonia), lines 1-30:

[Prophet:] 1 And **** spoke to Moses saying: [Deuteronomy 5.28-29] «You have heard the sound of the words of 2 this people, what they said to you: all they have said is right. 3 If (only) it were given (that) they had /this/ heart to fear me and keep all 4 my precepts all the days, so that it might go well with them and their sons for ever!» 5 [Deuteronomy 18.18-19] «I would raise up for them a prophet from among their brothers, like you, and place my words 6 in his mouth, and he would tell them all that I command him. And it will happen that /the/ man 7 who does not listen to my words which the prophet will speak in my name, I 8 shall require a reckoning from him.» ....

[King:] 9 And he uttered his poem and said: [Numbers 24.15-17] «Oracle of Balaam, son of Beor, and oracle of the man 10 of penetrating eye, oracle of him who listens to the words of God and knows the knowledge of the Most High, who 11 sees the vision of Shaddai, lying down and with an open eye. I see him, but not now, 12 I espy him, but not close up. A star has departed from Jacob, and a sceptre /has arisen/ from Israel. He shall crush 13 the temples of Moab, and cut to pieces all the sons of Sheth.» ....

[Priest:] 14 And about Levi he says: [Deuteronomy 33.8-11] «Give to Levi your Thummim and your Urim, to your pious man, whom 15 I tested at Massah, and with whom I quarrelled about the waters of Meribah, /he who/ said to his father {not} 16 {...} and to his mother ‘I have not known you’, and did not acknowledge his brothers, and his sons he did not 17 want to know. For he observed your word and kept your covenant. /They have made/ your judgments /shine/ for Jacob, 18 your law for Israel, they have placed incense in your nose and a whole offering upon your altar. 19 Bless, ****, his courage and accept with pleasure the work of his hand! Crush /the loins/ of his adversaries, and those who hate him, 20 may they not rise!» ....

[Warrior:] 21 .... At the moment when Joshua finished praising and giving thanks with his psalms, 22 he said [Joshua 6.26] «Cursed be the man who rebuilds this city! Upon his firstborn 33 will he found it, and upon his youngest son will he erect its gates!» And now an accursed /man/, one of Belial, 24 will arise to be a [fo]wler’s tr[ap] for his people and ruin for all his neighbours. And 25 [...] will arise [to b]e the two instruments of violence. And they will rebuild 26 [this city and ere]ct for it a rampart and towers, to make it into a fortress of wickedness 27 [in the country and a great evil] in Israel, and a horror in Ephraim and Judah. 28 [... And they will com]mit a profanation in the land and a great blasphemy among the sons of 29 [Jacob. And they will shed blo]od like water upon the ramparts of the daughter of Zion and in the precincts of 30 .... {in} Jerusalem.

ΤΙ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ
User avatar
Ben C. Smith
Posts: 8994
Joined: Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:18 pm
Location: USA
Contact:

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Giuseppe wrote: Fri Sep 13, 2019 5:09 am Later, Ory finds a strong clue of the connection between Theudas and the Samaritan Prophet:


Under the name “Jesus” in his Lexicon, Philip of Side reports that the synagogue of Tiberias preserved a certain Book of Theudas about a Samaritan Christ. The book relates that Christ was elected High Priest by the Jews. Now, there exists a tradition (Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. III.31.3) according to which
“John, who rested on the bosom of our Lord, was a priest who bore the sacerdotal plate [petalon pephorekws], martyr and teacher…”

It is not surprising that the same legend [regarding the High Priesthood] attaches to Theudas as also to John-Dositheus, given that these are one and the same “Christ.”

(my underline)
I do not understand this reference. What lexicon? Is there another Philip of Side? "Of his writings, however, only scant fragments have survived, these being merely of an average character."
ΤΙ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ
User avatar
Ben C. Smith
Posts: 8994
Joined: Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:18 pm
Location: USA
Contact:

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Ben C. Smith wrote: Fri Sep 13, 2019 8:18 am
Giuseppe wrote: Fri Sep 13, 2019 5:09 am Later, Ory finds a strong clue of the connection between Theudas and the Samaritan Prophet:


Under the name “Jesus” in his Lexicon, Philip of Side reports that the synagogue of Tiberias preserved a certain Book of Theudas about a Samaritan Christ. The book relates that Christ was elected High Priest by the Jews. Now, there exists a tradition (Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. III.31.3) according to which
“John, who rested on the bosom of our Lord, was a priest who bore the sacerdotal plate [petalon pephorekws], martyr and teacher…”

It is not surprising that the same legend [regarding the High Priesthood] attaches to Theudas as also to John-Dositheus, given that these are one and the same “Christ.”

(my underline)
I do not understand this reference. What lexicon? Is there another Philip of Side? "Of his writings, however, only scant fragments have survived, these being merely of an average character."
It appears that René Salm has no idea what Ory is referring to, either:

Unfortunately Ory offers no references for these provocative resources: the “Lexicon” of Philip of Side (ca. 400 CE) and the tantalizing “Book of Theudas.” This French of this passage is given here: Philippe de Side rapporte dans son Lexique au nom de Jésus que la synagogue de Tibériade conservait un Livre de Theudas, Christ Samaritain, où il était dit que le Christ avait été élu Grand-Prêtre par les Juifs. The reader who can offer further information is kindly invited to contact me.—R.S. [Link.]

ΤΙ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ
Giuseppe
Posts: 13732
Joined: Mon Apr 27, 2015 5:37 am
Location: Italy

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Giuseppe »

It is probably the same source used by Greg Doudna to argue (partially) that the historical Jesus was the Jesus son of Saphat (Vermeiren's view).


“On the Priesthood of Jesus” aka “the Confession (or, Apology) of Theodosius”, is a 7th-8th CE story of Jesus being selected and registered as a priest following debate concerning Jesus’s paternity and genealogical qualifications, which, however, were satisfied. Nuvolone and Adler suppose there was a prior Jewish source of obscure origins underneath the story in its present form. In this story, Jesus being a priest is claimed to have been verified in the writings of Josephus. Again, it seems as if some ancient exegete has read a Revolt-era priest Jesus as Jesus Christ. Also, the character Theodosius in the story tells of his discovery that no other name appears after the name of Jesus in a written registry of priests kept by the Jews in the temple until it fell to the Romans. Theodosius concluded that Jesus was the final priest after which “kings and priests have ceased in Israel”.

(my bold)
https://vridar.org/2019/05/15/alan-kirk ... ment-93107
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
User avatar
Ben C. Smith
Posts: 8994
Joined: Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:18 pm
Location: USA
Contact:

Re: John the Baptist was interpolated in Josephus to distinguish him from the Samaritan Prophet

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Giuseppe wrote: Fri Sep 13, 2019 8:42 am It is probably the same source used by Greg Doudna to argue (partially) that the historical Jesus was the Jesus son of Saphat (Vermeiren's view).


“On the Priesthood of Jesus” aka “the Confession (or, Apology) of Theodosius”, is a 7th-8th CE story of Jesus being selected and registered as a priest following debate concerning Jesus’s paternity and genealogical qualifications, which, however, were satisfied. Nuvolone and Adler suppose there was a prior Jewish source of obscure origins underneath the story in its present form. In this story, Jesus being a priest is claimed to have been verified in the writings of Josephus. Again, it seems as if some ancient exegete has read a Revolt-era priest Jesus as Jesus Christ. Also, the character Theodosius in the story tells of his discovery that no other name appears after the name of Jesus in a written registry of priests kept by the Jews in the temple until it fell to the Romans. Theodosius concluded that Jesus was the final priest after which “kings and priests have ceased in Israel”.

(my bold)
https://vridar.org/2019/05/15/alan-kirk ... ment-93107
Why is it probable that a book about a Samaritan Christ is the same as a book about the priesthood of Jesus? I still do not understand; I need more.
ΤΙ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ
Post Reply