On dating the Gospels late e.g. 120CE

[Stephan Huller]

But there was more than one book of Xenophon's memoirs. The same term appears in Eusebius's reference to Irenaeus's "elder" in Church History 5.8.8. Just finishing up my paper for the British Patristics conference.

[neilgodfrey]

But there was more than one book of Xenophon's memoirs. The same term appears in Eusebius's reference to Irenaeus's "elder" in Church History 5.8.8. Just finishing up my paper for the British Patristics conference.

You missed my previous post.

Do you have the references to the authors you have mentioned?

Stephan -- You've mentioned Ernst Haenchen, Craig Evans and William Petersen in relation to work on Justin's writings and sources. You've given us a link to Petersen but can you do the same or give us details of the relevant works of Haenchen and Evans? Thanks.

[Stephan Huller]

No I am just really, really mind blowingly busy and undisciplined.

[Adam]

Was this helpful in understanding the reason for the alignment to Hebrew over another language?
I hope this was more helpful.

Quite helpful if you can help settle a perpetual war going on here and among scholars.
Can you compare your facility with Carmignac's construction of Greek from the Hebrew with the late Maurice Casey's claim to having found the original Aramaic behind texts of Mark and Q? He listed instances of Aramaic translated back from our Greek texts, both regarding Mark and certain portions of (his "chaotic") Q.

[DCHindley]

I haven't seen this reading in Galatians 1:9. Do you have a reference?

There is an asterisk by the reading προειρηκα at http://nttranscripts.uni-muenster.de/An ... +start.anv , which signifies the original reading, but a note says that it was corrected to προειρηκαμεν, which is the "standard" (NA28) reading of Uncials 02 (Alexandrinus), 03 (Vaticanus) and P51 (OxyPap XVIII (1941) 1-3).

DCH

[Jayson]

Bernard,

I redrafted the dispersion model with the re-position of Corinth and Philippi, as well as added in icons annotating uncertainty where applicable.
New Model

[Bernard Muller]

hi Jason,
I still do not know how you found these areas of propagation of the gospels.
And what is the Zoroastrian influence in gMatthew?
Why do you think this Zoroastrian influence would not be felt in Antioch?

Cordially, Bernard

[Jayson]

Was this helpful in understanding the reason for the alignment to Hebrew over another language?
I hope this was more helpful.

Quite helpful if you can help settle a perpetual war going on here and among scholars.
Can you compare your facility with Carmignac's construction of Greek from the Hebrew with the late Maurice Casey's claim to having found the original Aramaic behind texts of Mark and Q? He listed instances of Aramaic translated back from our Greek texts, both regarding Mark and certain portions of (his "chaotic") Q.

Yes.
My comparison is that Casey is discussing (at least; where he starts his thought from) the concept of addressing what Jesus spoke, while Carmignac is addressing what language Mark was written in.

Those two concepts are rather different.
I also have some contention with the simplicity in which Casey converts the Gospels noted in Hebrew via early citations from Hebrew to Aramaic with nothing more than the thought, "There are plausible reports of lost Gospels written in a Hebrew language, probably Aramaic rather than Hebrew."

I understand his implication; that Aramaic was the common language of speaking and not Hebrew at the time; quite true.
However, we cannot dismiss outright by that event that this indicates no possibility, and therefore no requirement to show reasoning, for texts to be written in Hebrew at this time - especially with the DSS content in mind with some dating up into this relatively same time period and in Hebrew.

So I see the two as relatively compatible assertions.
There are clearly Aramaic phrases in Mark, that is how we can call it a four-language text, but regardless of the text having Aramaic in it, the copies we have transpose to Hebrew and not specifically Aramaic.
(I wish I could find the female linguist who recently did the same as Carmignac, as she stumbled into the same exact event but independently and for different motives - I only caught the event via a web clip of her discussing it at an archaeology conference and for the life of me I cannot recall her name.)

None of this challenges anything about what language a figure such as Jesus would have spoke; nor do any of these matters indicate that any text would inherently be in any language spoken by any representative figures akin to Jesus, or Jesus specifically.

For example; if the late dates are correct, which seems increasingly probable, then any text written would have been post-Diaspora and through traffic of peoples, not through transmission of direct witness or prescription.

[Stephan Huller]

DCH

Yes the terms are basically interchangeable. But still, we are talking about a 5th century or even 7th century text here.

[Jayson]

hi Jason,
I still do not know how you found these areas of propagation of the gospels.

Corinth and Philippi came from your observations.
John is placed into Anatolia due to a range of sympathies between the Anatolian culture and John, as well as the sympathies between John and Revelation, with Revelation quite noticeably focusing on Anatolia.

Matthew...

And what is the Zoroastrian influence in gMatthew?
Why do you think this Zoroastrian influence would not be felt in Antioch?

Matthew is aligned to Egypt, rather than Antioch, because of the early mentions of ascetic groups having texts akin to Matthew, yet shorter, and the traditional Matthew's content focusing quite directly on the notion that the "true" or "real" Messiah comes, not from Judah, but from Egypt.
This is a concept likely appreciated by Egyptian populations of Jews - especially those centered around the community and Temple built by Onias IV who never really got what he wanted (he wanted all Jews to leave Judah and move to Egypt where he claimed the true land of the Hebrew people was).

The Zoroastrian influence on Matthew is pretty fascinating.
It has the basic skeletal framework of many things which appear in Matthew.
(These are in rough order below, but not specifically strict chronological order - I was more writing these off the cuff as I thought of each comparison)

For instance:

• Zoroaster contains a rendition, or interpretation, whereby it is asserted that he was of virgin birth by a beam of light entering his virgin mother and was protected and cared for by Ahura Mazda (god of gods).
• His coming was also claimed as a prophecy since the beginning of time and that his coming marked the final era.
• After his birth, an outlined as evil ruler, Durasarun, attempts to have him killed because he had heard that this child was born to remove evil.
  
  Of note here, A. V. Williams Jackson (an Indo-European linguist of the early 20th century) wrote a survey of Zoroastrianism and in reaching description of Durasarun, conveyed to his reading audience the character as such:
  
  "The Turanian Karap Durasrobo (Durasarun, Duransarun) is the Herod of the day."
  Zoroaster, the Prophet of Ancient Iran, p.28
• Zoroaster lacks, dominantly, much remarking on his childhood, but instead heavily covers his birth, the evil ruler's attempt and failure upon his life and then leaps to his indoctrination, while wading in water, into his mission (more on the indoctrination below).
• He campaigns on compassion and justice, as well as damnation.
  
  For example of this tonality:
  Brilliant things instead of weeping will be for the person who comes to the truthful one. But a long period of darkness, foul food, and the word 'woe' - to such an existence your religious view will lead you, O deceitful ones, of your own actions.
  
  The person who is pure-in-heart towards me, I for my part assign to him the best things in my command, through Good Thought, but harm to him who schemes to harm us.
• Angra Mainyu offers Zoroaster the entire world as his kingdom if he would forsake his worship of Ahura Mazda.
• He starts his missions at around the same time frame of his life as Jesus, and spend the early part of his life studying the holy texts (in one of the limited views of childhood life, similar to Jesus' visit to the Temple when his parents lose him).
• At the onset of his missions he has a special event noted to him while wading in the river Daitya, whereby Bahman Ameshsaspand decended upon him as a beam of glowing light and lead Zoroaster to Ahura Mazda where he was taught the role of the divine orders and was bestowed the eternal spiritual fire of the divine.
• During this event, he learns how to use the holy word as a weapon against evil and becomes determined to use it as a beacon of light among the evil of the world; that by speaking the holy word alone, one could cause physical reaction upon evil.
• His cousin was his first disciple.
• The courtiers of King Vistasp plotted against Zoroaster and tried to entrap him (and did).
• Zoroaster did not want to change people from one religion to another, but considered his position to be a re-centering within the same religious structure - a reformation style.
• This is where it heavily deviates, as in the Jesus account, Jesus is tried and killed.
  In the Zoroaster event, Zoroaster is jailed and through a series of events he wins over the King and has those who wronged him punished.
• Matthew is the only text to note Magi showing up to aid in verifying the sanctity of Jesus; a clear address to Zoroastrian considerations.

Hopefully this is helpful.
Cheers,
Jayson