Nazareth and the Historicity of Jesus

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
ficino
Posts: 745
Joined: Fri Oct 25, 2013 6:15 pm

Nazareth and the Historicity of Jesus

Post by ficino »

So far for me, a stumbling block against mythicism, and a pebble on the scale weighting toward "Jesus was an actual guy," is the problem of Nazareth. I know that Nazoraios is obscure. Still, why invent a biography giving a Galilean origin to an original divine angel/god, and then later have to correct that by inserting a birthplace in Bethlehem? Though I'm not a fan of the Criterion of Embarrassment, I can't yet fathom why it's plausible to think that inventors of a biography gave the messiah an origin in Galilee and apparently only later (i.e. between gMark and gLuke/Matthew) other inventors grafted on a Bethlehem layer. Pretty poor if invention from whole cloth; understandable if a real Galilean origin had to be fudged.
Stephan Huller
Posts: 3009
Joined: Tue Apr 29, 2014 12:59 pm

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by Stephan Huller »

At least this is a reasonable objection. It is worth noting that Ephrem implies the Marcionite reading was 'Bethsaida' rather than Nazareth in Luke:
After these things, he came to his town and was teaching them on the Sabbath in their synagogues. Was there not another people, or another land apart from that of the Jews? But in order that Marcion's lie be refuted, it said after this, He entered the synagogue as was his custom, on the Sabbath day. What was the custom of him who had come just now? He had come to Galilee, and had begun to teach, not outside of the synagogue, but within it, he [came] to talk to them about their God. Otherwise it would have been in order for him to proclaim to them outside of their synagogue. He therefore entered Bethsaida among the Jews. It does not indicate that they said anything to him other than, Physician, heal yourself. They seized him and brought him to the side of the mountain. It is not likely that the word [he] had spoken to them was leading them to anger. For, if he had been speaking to them concerning the Creator, and [if] this was why they had given the response, They seized him that they might cast him down, why then did it not record in other places that it was like this too? That the people of the town hated him, there is this testimony: A prophet is not accepted in his home town. [Ephrem Commentary 23]
The material that follows has long been known to epitomize Jesus's supernatural status - he either 'passes through' the crowd (because his body was immaterial) or 'flew' above them.

Here's a thought. Let's keep track of the differences between Ephrem's text and our Luke. Ephrem says that the place of the encounter was Bethsaida not Nazareth. This narrative clearly forms the beginning of the Marcionite gospel (and probably Ephrem's text as well).

When Ephrem says "[he] was teaching them on the Sabbath in their synagogues" - this must have been the first 'sabbath' in the gospel.

When Ephrem says "was there not another people, or another land apart from that of the Jews" of course there was - there were Samaritans in Galilee. But the immediate context is Lk 4:15 "He was teaching in their synagogues."

When Ephrem says "He had come to Galilee, and had begun to teach, not outside of the synagogue, but within it, he [came] to talk to them about their God" - the Marcionite gospel would seem to have had Jesus preaching outside the building.

When Ephrem says "But in order that Marcion's lie be refuted, it said after this, He entered the synagogue as was his custom, on the Sabbath day. " The Marcionite text had Jesus descend from heaven, standing outside the building rather than within. Rather than picking up an Isaiah scroll and reading Isaiah 62 as I have noted in my previous thread it had something like:

And in the fifteenth year, in the reign of Tiberius Caesar, the word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zacharias, there was Jesus coming to his baptism [saying] "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord"

When Ephrem says "He therefore entered Bethsaida among the Jews. It does not indicate that they said anything to him other than, Physician, heal yourself."

Yet in our text it is Jesus who says this about the Jews:
Jesus said to them, “Surely you will quote this proverb to me: ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ And you will tell me, ‘Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum.’” “Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy[g] in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.” All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff. But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.
In other words, the original Marcionite text not only was transformed as a Diatessaron which got into Ephrem's hands but Ephrem's and Marcion's text agreed against our gospel of Luke.

Notably here, the Jews not Jesus say "Physician, heal yourself." They then try to push Jesus off a cliff but either Jesus passed through them or flies above them, sending them crashing into the valley below (I can demonstrate why this was so later).

But the point here is that the original gospel didn't have Nazareth here. It was Bethsaida and I think the Marcionite narrative was broken up and spread all over the first few chapters of Mark. For instance, why would the Jews have said 'Physician heal thyself?' to Jesus standing within a synagogue on a Sabbath? I think John has been brought to a mikveh on the Sabbath eve (hence the name i.e. the 'collection of waters' that accompanied Creation cf Gen 1:10) in order to be purified and healed. Jesus comes down to the place of the immersion and tells the individual to 'rise.' It is now the Sabbath the Jews complain that it is the Sabbath. The discussion now proceeds to the rest that we see here (i.e. Ephrem ignores all that has taken place in the synagogue. Perhaps even what followed was also in this narrative too:
They were amazed at his teaching, because d his words had authority. 33 In the synagogue there was a man possessed by a demon, an impure spirit. He cried out at the top of his voice, 34 “Go away! What do you want with us, Jesus ['of Nazareth' not present in Tertullian's citations against Marcion]? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” 35 “Be quiet!” Jesus said sternly. “Come out of him!” Then the demon threw the man down before them all and came out without injuring him. 36 All the people were amazed and said to each other, “What words these are! With authority and power he gives orders to impure spirits and they come out!” 37 And the news about him spread throughout the surrounding area
Bethsaida = 'house of demons' = temple of Jerusalem. The gospel probably started at Jerusalem which explains why we read at the beginning of John:
In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” 17 His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.” 18 The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” 20 They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” 21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body. 22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.
The fact that Jesus's threat against the temple is remembered at the end of the gospel necessarily means it must have been at the very beginning of the text. Notice that the Jews in the Jewish 'house' speak of Jesus 'destroying them.' Just a thought.
Charles Wilson
Posts: 2098
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:13 am

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by Charles Wilson »

ficino wrote:I can't yet fathom why it's plausible to think that inventors of a biography gave the messiah an origin in Galilee and apparently only later (i.e. between gMark and gLuke/Matthew) other inventors grafted on a Bethlehem layer. Pretty poor if invention from whole cloth; understandable if a real Galilean origin had to be fudged.
1. Closer, ever closer. There was a Galilean origin and it resolves into a Story of a Mishmarot Service Group, "Immer", which lived in "Upper Galilee" and went to Jerusalem to do Temple Service after the Group "Bilgah".

2. "Nazoret" and variations comes from "Nat'sar" for "Guard". The Story is about a young child who comes down to us as "Peter". Peter is a guard, watching for trouble as a Coup against Herod is plotted.

3. This comes to us through a written Story, most easily seen in Mark. The word plays are visible in the words, not necessarily in the spoken language. "Immer" is identical with "Immar" in Hebrew and is lost as a word play in Greek. "You must be born again..." is an idiom, possibly going back to Sumer and it is lost on Nicodemus, who is a "Ruler of the Jews".

4. Latinisms show from time to time in Mark, showing a writer conversant in Latin who places the Latin formulations that are in his head into the text. I'm currently examining this - "There were couches spread, all around...". This may change an aspect of the Thesis I offer.

5. Jay Raskin may have the best material on "Why Pilate?..." with his examination of the Story of Mary, which gets wiped from the text at an early rewrite.

In short, "Many hands make light work" but readin' and writin' leave linguistic trails and if you are ordered to create a new country (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html See: "Novorosiyya") or tell how the Great Leader swam the Yangtze, you create what you were ordered to create although the number of writers who could compose such nonsense during that period 2000 years ago may leave tracks

6. If you pull the Captured Stories and order a rewrite for a new religion, you may get an idiom you don't understand made into a religious point that is an embarrassment when found. By the time of the discovery, however, it may be Transvalued to such an extent that it doesn't matter.

CW
Last edited by Charles Wilson on Fri Aug 29, 2014 1:40 pm, edited 2 times in total.
User avatar
MrMacSon
Posts: 8798
Joined: Sat Oct 05, 2013 3:45 pm

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by MrMacSon »

ficino wrote:So far for me, a stumbling block against mythicism, and a pebble on the scale weighting toward "Jesus was an actual guy," is the problem of Nazareth. I know that Nazoraios is obscure. Still, why invent a biography giving a Galilean origin to an original divine angel/god, and then later have to correct that by inserting a birthplace in Bethlehem? Though I'm not a fan of the Criterion of Embarrassment, I can't yet fathom why it's plausible to think that inventors of a biography gave the messiah an origin in Galilee and apparently only later (i.e. between gMark and gLuke/Matthew) other inventors grafted on a Bethlehem layer. Pretty poor if invention from whole cloth; understandable if a real Galilean origin had to be fudged.
because several versions of various Christ/messiah/preacher/Jesus stories were eventually merged to create THE story ??
Last edited by MrMacSon on Fri Aug 29, 2014 1:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
neilgodfrey
Posts: 6161
Joined: Sat Oct 05, 2013 4:08 pm

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by neilgodfrey »

ficino wrote:So far for me, a stumbling block against mythicism, and a pebble on the scale weighting toward "Jesus was an actual guy," is the problem of Nazareth. I know that Nazoraios is obscure. Still, why invent a biography giving a Galilean origin to an original divine angel/god, and then later have to correct that by inserting a birthplace in Bethlehem? Though I'm not a fan of the Criterion of Embarrassment, I can't yet fathom why it's plausible to think that inventors of a biography gave the messiah an origin in Galilee and apparently only later (i.e. between gMark and gLuke/Matthew) other inventors grafted on a Bethlehem layer. Pretty poor if invention from whole cloth; understandable if a real Galilean origin had to be fudged.
Your argument seems to assume that the "invention" of the HJ was the work of a conspiratorial cadre of writers all in one room for a few days setting it all out in a narrative from the start. But the earliest evidence we have points to a "riotous diversity" of origins, not a tightly controlled plot of a single band.

There are more realistic alternatives. Galilee is a theological metaphor as is recognized by a good number of mainstream scholars who assume the historicity of Jesus. It is set against the metaphor of Jerusalem. HJ exponents have no problem believing that the historical geography took on a theological symbolism. Mythicism would step back from this conclusion and move closer to the Occam solution -- discarding the unnecessary baggage of the extra hypothesis.

Matthew makes it explicitly clear why Galilee was rich in such theological symbolism -- Isaiah 9. Kelber showed just how symbolic the geography was even within Galilee and its surrounding areas itself and his concepts have been magnified by several scholars since. Galilee was where Jews and gentiles were bonded together by Jesus as he criss-crossed the Sea. The literary and theological function of the geographical setting is not widely disputed as far as I am aware.

Add to this other indications (not taken up by Carrier as far as I am aware but I have yet to finish his book) that among early Christians there were those who taught that the heavenly Jesus, in the appearance of a man, did descend to earth for a short time (a close analysis of Luke's gospel has suggested as much to some scholars).

It was only later when birth narratives were introduced that a place of birth became a question to be addressed. Somehow it had to be fitted in to the general parameters of the accepted narrative. Matthew came up with the first attempt (if we don't accept he derived it from the debates floating around in the time of Justin or earlier forms of the Infancy Narrative of James) but no-one was compelled to accept his version as "gospel" so Luke offered "better" solution according to his lights.
vridar.org Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
User avatar
MrMacSon
Posts: 8798
Joined: Sat Oct 05, 2013 3:45 pm

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by MrMacSon »

Stephan Huller wrote:But the gospel wasn't fiction. Mythicists make this leap but there is no evidence that any ancient Christians thought this was anything other than an actual encounter with an angel (or later the Christ, son of David). Not the same thing
Sure, I can appreciate they didn't think it was fiction. I am calling it fiction by rigid, modern 'standards' - perhaps "meme-myth", 'meme-fiction", "supernatural-meme-myth", or even "celestial-meme-myth", would be more appropriate for what they were interacting with or holding on to.

You demonstrate your point well in your recent post -
Stephan Huller wrote:At least this is a reasonable objection. It is worth noting that Ephrem implies the Marcionite reading was 'Bethsaida' rather than Nazareth in Luke:
After these things, he came to his town and was teaching them on the Sabbath in their synagogues. Was there not another people, or another land apart from that of the Jews? But in order that Marcion's lie be refuted, it said after this, He entered the synagogue as was his custom, on the Sabbath day. What was the custom of him who had come just now? He had come to Galilee, and had begun to teach, not outside of the synagogue, but within it, he [came] to talk to them about their God. Otherwise it would have been in order for him to proclaim to them outside of their synagogue. He therefore entered Bethsaida among the Jews. It does not indicate that they said anything to him other than, Physician, heal yourself. They seized him and brought him to the side of the mountain. It is not likely that the word [he] had spoken to them was leading them to anger. For, if he had been speaking to them concerning the Creator, and [if] this was why they had given the response, They seized him that they might cast him down, why then did it not record in other places that it was like this too? That the people of the town hated him, there is this testimony: A prophet is not accepted in his home town. [Ephrem Commentary 23]
The material that follows has long been known to epitomize Jesus's supernatural status - he either 'passes through' the crowd (because his body was immaterial) or 'flew' above them.

Here's a thought. Let's keep track of the differences between Ephrem's text and our Luke. Ephrem says that the place of the encounter was Bethsaida not Nazareth. This narrative clearly forms the beginning of the Marcionite gospel (and probably Ephrem's text as well).

When Ephrem says "[he] was teaching them on the Sabbath in their synagogues" - this must have been the first 'sabbath' in the gospel.

When Ephrem says "was there not another people, or another land apart from that of the Jews" of course there was - there were Samaritans in Galilee. But the immediate context is Lk 4:15 "He was teaching in their synagogues."

When Ephrem says "He had come to Galilee, and had begun to teach, not outside of the synagogue, but within it, he [came] to talk to them about their God" - the Marcionite gospel would seem to have had Jesus preaching outside the building.

When Ephrem says "But in order that Marcion's lie be refuted, it said after this, He entered the synagogue as was his custom, on the Sabbath day. " The Marcionite text had Jesus descend from heaven, standing outside the building rather than within. Rather than picking up an Isaiah scroll and reading Isaiah 62 as I have noted in my previous thread it had something like:

And in the fifteenth year, in the reign of Tiberius Caesar, the word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zacharias, there was Jesus coming to his baptism [saying] "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord"

When Ephrem says "He therefore entered Bethsaida among the Jews. It does not indicate that they said anything to him other than, Physician, heal yourself."

Yet in our text it is Jesus who says this about the Jews:
Jesus said to them, “Surely you will quote this proverb to me: ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ And you will tell me, ‘Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum.’” “Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy[g] in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.” All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff. But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.
In other words, the original Marcionite text not only was transformed as a Diatessaron which got into Ephrem's hands but Ephrem's and Marcion's text agreed against our gospel of Luke.

Notably here, the Jews not Jesus say "Physician, heal yourself." They then try to push Jesus off a cliff but either Jesus passed through them or flies above them, sending them crashing into the valley below (I can demonstrate why this was so later).

But the point here is that the original gospel didn't have Nazareth here. It was Bethsaida and I think the Marcionite narrative was broken up and spread all over the first few chapters of Mark.

For instance, why would the Jews have said 'Physician heal thyself?' to Jesus standing within a synagogue on a Sabbath? I think John has been brought to a mikveh on the Sabbath eve (hence the name i.e. the 'collection of waters' that accompanied Creation cf Gen 1:10) in order to be purified and healed. Jesus comes down to the place of the immersion and tells the individual to 'rise.' It is now the Sabbath the Jews complain that it is the Sabbath. The discussion now proceeds to the rest that we see here (i.e. Ephrem ignores all that has taken place in the synagogue. Perhaps even what followed was also in this narrative too:
They were amazed at his teaching, because d his words had authority. 33 In the synagogue there was a man possessed by a demon, an impure spirit. He cried out at the top of his voice, 34 “Go away! What do you want with us, Jesus ['of Nazareth' not present in Tertullian's citations against Marcion]? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” 35 “Be quiet!” Jesus said sternly. “Come out of him!” Then the demon threw the man down before them all and came out without injuring him. 36 All the people were amazed and said to each other, “What words these are! With authority and power he gives orders to impure spirits and they come out!” 37 And the news about him spread throughout the surrounding area
Bethsaida = 'house of demons' = temple of Jerusalem. The gospel probably started at Jerusalem which explains why we read at the beginning of John:
In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” 17 His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.” 18 The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” 20 They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” 21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body. 22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.
The fact that Jesus's threat against the temple is remembered at the end of the gospel necessarily means it must have been at the very beginning of the text. Notice that the Jews in the Jewish 'house' speak of Jesus 'destroying them.' Just a thought.
Last edited by MrMacSon on Fri Aug 29, 2014 2:30 pm, edited 4 times in total.
Stephan Huller
Posts: 3009
Joined: Tue Apr 29, 2014 12:59 pm

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by Stephan Huller »

As a further to the discussion (I don't know if I can call it a 'discussion' if I am responding to my own post) earlier about the significance of the change from 'Nazareth' to 'Bethsaida' at the beginning of the gospel (or the beginning of the gospel later called 'according to Luke'). I think I can make a strong case that 'Bethsaida' meant 'the temple of Jerusalem' according to the original Marcionite interpretation. If anyone is interested here is the basic logic of that assumption.

Irenaeus makes clear in explaining the Marcionite gospel that according to their text the descent was into Judea not Galilee:
Irenaeus notes, according to this text "Jesus being derived from that father who is above the God that made the world, and coming into Judaea in the times of Pontius Pilate the governor, who was the procurator of Tiberius Caesar, was manifested in the form of a man to those who were in Judaea, abolishing the prophets and the law, and all the works of that God who made the world." [AH 1.27.2]


The Gospel of John as noted above preserves the initial entry into the Jerusalem temple. Now let's deal with Bethsaida. What was the original Hebrew spelling? The Gospel of Baal Shem Tove preserves the form בית שידה
אי לך בוֹרוֹזוֹאים ואי לך בית שידה שאם בצור וסדום לעז טִירָאוֹ דֵיטֶיר אוֹ סְדוֹמָה נעשו האותות שנעשו בכם היו חוזרות בתשובה בזמן ההוא בשק ואפר

Woe to you and woe to you Beth Saida, for if in Tyre and Sodom, that is, Tirao deter or Sidomah, the signs had been done which were done in you, they would have turned in repentance at that time in sack cloth and ashes. [Shem Tob 11.21]
But שידה was the specific name of the demon that Solomon is said to have captured and employed in the temple. So then בית שידה the restored 'demon house' for the opening of the Marcionite gospel changes all that. This demonstrates how close the form of the Gospel of John was to the Marcionite gospel.

Now for those who care about Secret Mark I hope you can see that the very same thing that was done to the resurrection of the youth in Bethany in John chapter 10 was carried out from the hostile visit to בית שידה in the Marcionite gospel.

Let's start with the Talmud and see where everyone get's the idea that שידה means 'demon.' It all comes from a discussion of a disputed passage in Ecclesiastes:
I got me sharim and sharoth, and the delights of the sons of men, shidah (שידה) and shidoth (וְשִׁדּוֹת) [Eccel 2.8]
Gittin 68 a - b attempts to explain what the hell this means. The passage is usually translated into English as:
I acquired male and female singers, and a harem as well—the delights of a man’s heart
But as we will see from the gemara שידה is placed within the context of Solomon building the Jewish temple with the aid of demons. The reader will have to excuse the terse language of the Talmud. That's just the way the rabbinic texts are. We jump right into a discussion of the disputed terminology:
'Sharim and Sharoth', means diverse kinds of music; 'the delights of the sons of men' are ornamental pools and baths. 'Shidah and shidoth': Here [in the school of Babylon] they translate as male and female demons. In the West [i.e. the school of Tiberias] they say [it means] carriages.

R. Johanan said: There were three hundred kinds of demons in Shihin, but what a shidah is I do not know (or alternatively "'the real mother of the demons I do not know").

The Master said: Here they translate 'male and female demons'. For what did Solomon want them? — As indicated in the verse, And the house when it was in building was made of stone made ready at the quarry, [there was neither hammer nor axe nor any tool of iron heard in the house while it was in building];[I Kings VI, 7] He said to the Rabbis, How shall I manage [without iron tools]? — They replied, There is the shamir [i.e. a fabulous worm which could cut through the strongest stone] which Moses brought for the stones of the ephod. He asked them, Where is it to be found? — They replied, Bring a male and a female demon and tie them together; perhaps they know and will tell you. So he brought a male and a female demon and tied them together. They said to him, We do not know, but perhaps Ashmedai the prince of the demons knows. He said to them, Where is he? — They answered, He is in such-and-such a mountain. He has dug a pit there, which he fills with water and covers with a stone, which he then seals with his seal. Every day he goes up to heaven and studies in the Academy of the sky and then he comes down to earth and studies in the Academy of the earth, and then he goes and examines his seal and opens [the pit] and drinks and then closes it and seals it again and goes away. Solomon thereupon sent thither Benaiahu son of Jehoiada, giving him a chain on which was graven the [Divine] Name and a ring on which was graven the Name and fleeces of wool and bottles of wine. Benaiahu went and dug a pit lower down the hill and let the water flow into it [i.e. from Ashmedai's pit by means of a tunnel connecting the two] and stopped [the hollow] With the fleeces of wool, and he then dug a pit higher up and poured the wine into it [i.e. so that it should flow into Ashmedai's pit. and then filled up the pits]. He then went and sat on a tree.

When Ashmedai came he examined the seal, then opened the pit and found it full of wine. He said, it is written, Wine is a mocker, strong drink a brawler, and whosoever erreth thereby is not wise, [Prov. XX, 1] and it is also written, Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the understanding. [Hos, IV, 11] I will not drink it. Growing thirsty, however, he could not resist, and he drank till he became drunk, and fell asleep. Benaiahu then came down and threw the chain over him and fastened it. When he awoke he began to struggle, whereupon he [Benaiahu] said, The Name of thy Master is upon thee, the Name of thy Master is upon thee. As he was bringing him along, he came to a palm tree and rubbed against it and down it came. He came to a house and knocked it down. He came to the hut of a certain widow. She came out and besought him, and he bent down so as not to touch it, thereby breaking a bone. He said, That bears out the verse, A soft tongue breaketh the bone [Prov. XXV, 15]. He saw a blind man straying from his way and he put him on the right path. He saw a drunken man losing his way and he put him on his path. He saw a wedding procession making its way merrily and he wept. He heard a man say to a shoemaker, Make me a pair of shoes that will last seven years, and he laughed. He saw a diviner practising divinations and he laughed. When they reached Jerusalem he was not taken to see Solomon for three days. On the first day he asked, Why does the king not want to see me? They replied, Because he has overdrunk himself. So he took a brick and placed it on top of another. When they reported this to Solomon he said to them, What he meant to tell you was, Give him more to drink. On the next day he said to them, Why does the king not want to see me? They replied, Because he has over-eaten himself. He thereupon took one brick from off the other and placed it on the ground. When they reported this to Solomon, he said, He meant to tell you to keep food away from me. After three days he went in to see him. He took a reed and measured four cubits and threw it in front of him, saying, See now, when you die you will have no more than four cubits in this world. Now, however, you have subdued the whole world, yet you are not satisfied till you subdue me too. He replied: I want nothing of you. What I want is to build the Temple and I require the shamir. He said: It is not in my hands, it is in the hands of the Prince of the Sea who gives it only to the woodpecker, [lit., 'Cock of the prairie'] to whom he trusts it on oath. What does the bird do with it? — He takes it to a mountain where there is no cultivation and puts it on the edge of the rock which thereupon splits, and he then takes seeds from trees and brings them and throws them into the opening and things grow there. (This is what the Targum means by nagar tura). [lit., 'One that saws the rock': the rendering in Targum Onkelos of the Hebrew [H] generally rendered by hoopoe; Lev. XI, 19.] So they found out a woodpecker's nest with young in it, and covered it over with white glass. When the bird came it wanted to get in but could not, so it went and brought the shamir and placed it on the glass. Benaiahu thereupon gave a shout, and it dropped [the shamir] and he took it, and the bird went and committed suicide on account of its oath.

Benaiahu said to Ashmedai, Why when you saw that blind man going out of his way did you put him right? He replied: It has been proclaimed of him in heaven that he is a wholly righteous man, and that whoever does him a kindness will be worthy of the future world. And why when you saw the drunken man going out of his way did you put him right? He replied, They have proclaimed concerning him in heaven that he is wholly wicked, and I conferred a boon on him in order that he may consume [here] his share [in the future = that there may remain no share for him to enjoy in the hereafter]. Why when you saw the wedding procession did you weep? He said: The husband will die within thirty days, and she will have to wait for the brother-in-law who is still a child of thirteen years. [i.e.before he can give her halizah (v. Glos.) and enable her to marry again] Why, when you heard a man say to the shoemaker, Make me shoes to last seven years, did you laugh? He replied: That man has not seven days to live, and he wants shoes for seven years! Why when you saw that diviner divining did you laugh? He said: He was sitting on a royal treasure: he should have divined what was beneath him.

Solomon kept him with him until he had built the Temple. One day when he was alone with him, he said, it is written, He hath as it were to'afoth and re'em,6 and we explain that to'afoth means the ministering angels and re'em means the demons.7 What is your superiority over us?8 He said to him, Take the chain off me and give me your ring, and I will show you. So he took the chain off him and gave him the ring. He then swallowed him,9 and placing one wing on the earth and one on the sky he hurled him four hundred parasangs. In reference to that incident Solomon said, What profit is there to a man in all his labour wherein he laboureth under the sun.10

And this was my portion from all my labour.11 What is referred to by 'this'? — Rab and Samuel gave different answers, one saying that it meant his staff and the other that it meant his apron.12 He used to go round begging, saying wherever he went, I Koheleth was king over Israel in Jerusalem.13 When he came to the Sanhedrin, the Rabbis said: Let us see, a madman does not stick to one thing only.14 What is the meaning of this? They asked Benaiahu, Does the king send for you? He replied, No. They sent to the queens saying, Does the king visit you? They sent back word, Yes, he does. They then sent to them to say, Examine his leg.15 They sent back to say, He comes in stockings, and he visits them in the time of their separation and he also calls for Bathsheba his mother. They then sent for Solomon and gave him the chain and the ring on which the Name was engraved. When he went in, Ashmedai on catching sight of him flew away, but he remained in fear of him, therefore is it written, Behold it is the litter of Solomon, threescore mighty met, are about it of the mighty men of Israel. They all handle the sword and are expert in war, every man hath his sword upon his thigh because of fear in the night.16

Rab and Samuel differed [about Solomon]. One said that Solomon was first a king and then a commoner,17 and the other that he was first a king and then a commoner and then a king again.

6. Num. XXIV, 8. E.V., 'the strength of a wild ox'.
7. So Targum Onkelos.
8. That you should be a standard of comparison for Israel.
9. Al. 'it' (the ring).
10. Eccl. I, 3.
11. Ibid. II, 10.
12. Al. 'his platter', v. Sanh. (Sonc. ed.) p. 110 and notes.
13. Ibid. I, 12.
14. I.e., if Solomon were mad, he would show it by other things as well.
15. Because a demon's legs are like those of a cock, v. Ber. 6a.
16. Cant. III, 7, 8.
17. That is to say, that though he was restored to his kingdom, he did not rule over the unseen world as formerly, v. Sanh. loc. cit.
Let's recap what is being said here. The story about Solomon using demons develops out of a discussion of what the term שידה means. The answer is clearly that they are the demons associated with Solomon's building of the temple. The demons were not only captured to build the temple but also to live there. The temple was thus a 'demon house' = בית שידה although the term is never explicitly used.

The same idea is found in other very early Jewish texts including the Testament of Solomon which is usually dated from the first to third centuries.

Yet it is one thing to argue that the early Jewish tradition had this association with 'demon house' בית שידה but what of the Christian tradition? It is well established that the idea was shared by a key and very early Nag Hammadi text which I have long argued to be Marcionite. David A. Fiensy (Jesus the Galilean: soundings in a first century life) notes:
The references to demonic assistance in building Solomon's temple would seem to be from the Jewish traditions in the foundational text of the Testament of Solomon. In the first place, the same traditions are found in the Talmud.b. Gittin 68 a-b. In the second place, when this tradition surfaces in a Christian source, a Gnostic text from Nag Hammadi, it becomes a very negative characteristic of the temple. This text affirms that the temple's being built by demons makes the temple, evil and satanic. see the testimony of truth 70:4 -10 [p. 133]
And the passage in question identifies the Jewish temple as a demon house in exactly the same manner as the Jewish tradition:
They are wicked in their behavior! Some of them fall away to the worship of idols. Others have demons dwelling with them, as did David the king. He is the one who laid the foundation of Jerusalem; and his son Solomon, whom he begat in adultery, is the one who built Jerusalem by means of the demons, because he received power. When he had finished building, he imprisoned the demons in the temple. He placed them into seven waterpots. They remained a long time in the waterpots, abandoned there. When the Romans went up to Jerusalem, they discovered the waterpots, and immediately the demons ran out of the waterpots, as those who escape from prison. And the waterpots remained pure thereafter. And since those days, they dwell with men who are in ignorance, and they have remained upon the earth.

Who, then, is David? And who is Solomon? And what is the foundation? And what is the wall which surrounds Jerusalem? And who are the demons? And what are the waterpots? And who are the Romans? But these are mysteries ...
... (11 lines unrecoverable)
... victorious over [...] the Son of Man [...] undefiled ...
... (3 lines unrecoverable)
... and he [...] when he [...]. For [...] is a great ...
... (1 line unrecoverable)
... to this nature ...
Yes the text becomes fragmentary but already with what is available to us it should be obvious that Christians who undoubtedly used the Marcionite gospel would have identified the Jewish temple as 'bethsaida' because it was a demon house.

I will explain how the Marcionite narrative must have looked like in subsequent posts here but let me not one last thing. The reason why Solomon is associated with Ecclesiastes and Eccles. 2.8 in particular is because ancient people thought Solomon was its author. Note also that the context of the sentence appears in a description of the building of the temple:
I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired שִׁדָּה וְשִׁדּוֹת, and a harem as well—. I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me. [Ecclesiastes 2:5 - 10]
According to the contemporary interpretation then Solomon is the speaker and he is making reference to enslaving demons in the pools beneath (beside?) the temple.

In other words, if we take things back to the gospel narrative, Jesus descends to Jerusalem from heaven stands inside the temple probably after an attempt to ritually immerse a lame man in a mikvah. It must have been during this original encounter in the temple that Mark chapter 14 still refers to (albeit now claiming it was all a misunderstanding or lie):
Then some stood up and gave this false testimony against him: 58 “We heard him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with human hands and in three days will build another, not made with hands.’” 59 Yet even then their testimony did not agree.
Last edited by Stephan Huller on Fri Aug 29, 2014 7:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
Peter Kirby
Site Admin
Posts: 8020
Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2013 2:13 pm
Location: Santa Clara
Contact:

Re: Richard Carrier on gMark parallel with Jesus ben Ananias

Post by Peter Kirby »

ficino wrote:So far for me, a stumbling block against mythicism, and a pebble on the scale weighting toward "Jesus was an actual guy," is the problem of Nazareth. I know that Nazoraios is obscure. Still, why invent a biography giving a Galilean origin to an original divine angel/god, and then later have to correct that by inserting a birthplace in Bethlehem? Though I'm not a fan of the Criterion of Embarrassment, I can't yet fathom why it's plausible to think that inventors of a biography gave the messiah an origin in Galilee and apparently only later (i.e. between gMark and gLuke/Matthew) other inventors grafted on a Bethlehem layer. Pretty poor if invention from whole cloth; understandable if a real Galilean origin had to be fudged.
A truly fair-minded person appreciates both the pros and cons of any conundrum. Cheers.

(thread split out from another sprawling thread)
"... almost every critical biblical position was earlier advanced by skeptics." - Raymond Brown
Charles Wilson
Posts: 2098
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:13 am

Re: Nazareth and the Historicity of Jesus

Post by Charles Wilson »

1. Thanx, PK, for including my Post in this Split-Off-Thread.

2. Do we need to start a Catalogue Thread on "Location Word Plays"?

A. "Bethsaida". I believe that it is a short bus trip from the Temple to "Bezetha" => "Beth-Zatha" => "Bethsaida". Titus set up camp above the Temple and used Bezetha as a staging area.
B. "Nazareth". From "nat'sar", meaning "Guard" or "Watcher", as in "Watch, I tell you for you never know the hour...". See: http://biblehub.com/hebrew/5341.htm

C. The Big Two, "Golgotha" and "Gabbatha". Remember, even the Catholics don't know where "Golgotha" is: "...These affirmations all bear the mark of fitness; but until documents are produced to confirm them, they must inevitably fall short as proof of facts...". There is, as far as I know, no "Mosaic /Tessellated Tile" in Jerusalem. There is in Caesarea. So perhaps there is a word play on these 2 names (Hint: "Galba-Otho")

D. "Dalmanutha". In Vic Alexander's very fine Aramaic Translation, he translates "Dalmanutha" as "land of oppression". As in, "Dalmanutha, Land of Oppression. OH! That's where the Pharisees live!" Perfect.

CW
ghost
Posts: 503
Joined: Wed Oct 30, 2013 9:12 am

Re: Nazareth and the Historicity of Jesus

Post by ghost »

The nativity was inserted later because not much is not known about Caesar's childhood, so they replaced it with his adoptive son's.
Post Reply