Historical evidence regarding Judas the Galilean

[maryhelena]

Peter,

There is no historical evidence for Judas the Galilean.

The Josephus story is reflecting, like the gMark story of Simon, from Cyrene, and his two sons, Alexander and Rufus, the historical events surrounding the life of Aristobulus and his two sons, Alexander and Antigonus. It is this history that is the backbone to the gMark story - and also the backbone to the Josephan story about Judas the Galilean and his two sons.

[Peter Kirby]

Josephus' Antiquities is the evidence regarding Judas the Galilean, and the genre doesn't allow whatever transposition you are talking about.

[Charles Wilson]

Now there was an actual historical Judas, who could be understood as a political messianic claimant. And there were actual historical people named James and Simon, who carried on his claim to kingship because they were his sons.

There is no historical evidence for Judas the Galilean.

I want to propose a middle ground between these 2 positions:

Mark 5: 25 - 26 (RSV):

[25] And there was a woman who had had a flow of blood for twelve years,
[26] and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better but rather grew worse.

Symbolism is an acquired taste but it is a short step to see that Mark can be seen alluding to "Physicians" <=> "Insurrectionists". Similar to "The Lunatic" who tries to dispossess himself of "Legion" and only gashes himself.
PK states that "...there was an actual historical Judas..." and therefore existence inheres in some manner to the name "Judas". Maryhelena is properly after Josephus but is left with the Hegelian Thesis that "If I cannot get to das Noumena, all I have left is Phenomena". The middle ground allows that Linguistic Analysis with on the ground materials is the best we can get to.

There may not have been a "Judas the Galilean" but that means that Mark is telling us that there were people who did fulfill that role. The Logic here tell us that whatever "6 CE" meant, the "Woman with the 12 Year Issue of Blood" found her health restored after 6 CE.

CW

[maryhelena]

Josephus' Antiquities is the evidence regarding Judas the Galilean, and the genre doesn't allow whatever transposition you are talking about.

Josephus is not evidence for the historicity of Judas the Galilean. Josephus wrote about a figure called Judas the Galilean. Just as the NT writers wrote about a figure called Jesus and another figure called Paul. Words in documents are not substitutes for historical evidence. Josephus is just as able to create fictional characters as any other writer. Mixing up historical figures with fictional figures - is that not what the OT and NT has done? Can this be ruled out when reading the writing of Josephus? The only way to do so is to provide historical evidence for any figure in Josephus that one wants to base any theory on. Otherwise one could find oneself simply creating yet more stories rather than identifying the actual historical elements in any given writing.

ficino recently put up this thread:

• Egyptian historical fiction - any parallels?
  
  If historical fiction was already well established in Egypt, does that shed any light on the context of writing of parts of the Bible
  
  http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... 895#p29895

[Peter Kirby]

Josephus' Antiquities is the evidence regarding Judas the Galilean, and the genre doesn't allow whatever transposition you are talking about.

Josephus is not evidence for the historicity of Judas the Galilean. Josephus wrote about a figure called Judas the Galilean. Just as the NT writers wrote about a figure called Jesus and another figure called Paul.

It's not the same thing. That's not how this works. That's now how any of this works...

This is why Neil Godfrey always reminds us that the study of genre precedes the study of the historicity of the individual items (or anything therein).

[Peter Kirby]

We actually have the historical names of more of the sons and grandsons, in that they all traced their ancestry to Judas.

Jewish War, 2.4.1
In Sepphoris also, a city of Galilee, there was one Judas (the son of that arch-robber Hezekias, who formerly overran the country, and had been subdued by king Herod); this man got no small multitude together, and brake open the place where the royal armor was laid up, and armed those about him, and attacked those that were so earnest to gain the dominion.

Jewish War, 2.8.1
AND now Archelaus's part of Judea was reduced into a province, and Coponius, one of the equestrian order among the Romans, was sent as a procurator, having the power of [life and] death put into his hands by Caesar. Under his administration it was that a certain Galilean, whose name was Judas, prevailed with his countrymen to revolt, and said they were cowards if they would endure to pay a tax to the Romans and would after God submit to mortal men as their lords. This man was a teacher of a peculiar sect of his own, and was not at all like the rest of those their leaders.

Jewish War, 2.17.8
In the mean time, one Manahem, the son of Judas, that was called the Galilean, (who was a very cunning sophister, and had formerly reproached the Jews under Cyrenius, that after God they were subject to the Romans,) took some of the men of note with him, and retired to Masada...

Jewish War, 2.17.19
A few there were of them who privately escaped to Masada, among whom was Eleazar, the son of Jairus, who was of kin to Manahem, and acted the part of a tyrant at Masada afterward.

Jewish War, 7.8.1
This fortress was called Masada. It was one Eleazar, a potent man, and the commander of these Sicarii, that had seized upon it. He was a descendant from that Judas who had persuaded abundance of the Jews, as we have formerly related, not to submit to the taxation when Cyrenius was sent into Judea to make one...

This book was written within 10 years of the war and talks of a person who was 'the son of that Judas' (Manahem) and another that was 'a descendant from that Judas' (Eleazar). It is a first person account of the historical events that left a record of a war in physical evidence. So, yes, there was a historical Judas the Galilean.

[maryhelena]

Josephus' Antiquities is the evidence regarding Judas the Galilean, and the genre doesn't allow whatever transposition you are talking about.

Josephus is not evidence for the historicity of Judas the Galilean. Josephus wrote about a figure called Judas the Galilean. Just as the NT writers wrote about a figure called Jesus and another figure called Paul.

It's not the same thing. That's not how this works. That's now how any of this works...

OK, Peter...

It's your choice. I don't take Josephus on face value. I'm interested in developing a theory on early christian origins that can be based on known historical figures. Thus, figures, in any writing, that can't be historically verified, are of no use in that endeavor. That is not to say that fictional characters have no use. They do or otherwise writers would not create them. Their use can help develop a story, add drama etc to the story - especially a historical work that has to deal with the dry facts of history. Their use cannot either provide historicity for the story nor for their historicity outside of the story. Modern day writers do the same. A movie that wants to tell about World War II adds the human element story - the fictional characters alongside any historical figures the movie wants to portray. I don't think there is anything new with this type of creative writing - the issue here is whether Josephus can be exempt from turning to creative writing to bolster and colour his historical work. I don't think there is any reason to grant exemption to Josephus. Why privilege Josephus and yet condemn the writer of Luke?

[Peter Kirby]

Split:
http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... f=3&t=1356

[maryhelena]

We actually have a historical name of one of the grandsons of Judas, here simply called the 'the son of Judas', in that they all traced their ancestry to Judas.

In the mean time, one Menahem, the son of that Judas, who was called the Galilean [...] took some of the men of note with him, and retired to Masada, where he broke open king Herod's armory, and gave arms not only to his own people, but to other robbers also. These he made use of for a guard, and returned in the state of a king to Jerusalem; he became the leader of the sedition. (Flavius Josephus, Jewish War 2.433-434)

We also know of another Eleazar son of Simon, who seems to be another grandson of Judas, by his son Simon.

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/artic ... 85-zealots
The whole army of Cestius, who had brought twelve legions from Antioch to retrieve the defeat of the Roman garrison, was annihilated by the Zealots under the leadership of Bar Giora and Eleazar ben Simon the priest. The Maccabean days seemed to have returned; and the patriots of Jerusalem celebrated the year 66 as the year of Israel's deliverance from Rome, and commemorated it with coins bearing the names of Eleazar the priest and Simon the prince (Bar Giora [?], or Simon ben Gamaliel as Grätz has it; "B. J." ii. 19, §§ 1 et seq., 20, §§ 1-5; Grätz, l.c. pp. 469-470, 509, 818-841).

So there are coins at least confirming the existence of this Eleazar ben Simon, the priest, in 66 CE. (Some coins give his patronym.)

Bell. Jud. IV
For Eleazar, the son of Simon, who made the first separation of the zealots from the people....

This book was written within 10 years of the war and talks a person who was 'the son of that Judas'. It is a first person account of the historical events that left a record of a war in physical evidence. So, yes, there was a historical Judas the Galilean.

The Simon coins are from the Bar Kochba Revolt not, as seems to be implied from the above quote, the revolt of 66 c.e.

• 
  
  JUDAEA. Bar Kochba Revolt. 132-135 CE. AR Zuz ­
  Denarius (3.61 gm, 1h). Undated year 3 (134/5 CE).
  "Shimon" in wreath / Lyre with three strings.
  Mildenberg 84 (O14/R54); Meshorer 272; Hendin 718.
  Good VF. Overstruck on uncertain type.

Bar Kochba Revolt coinage

The name "Shim'on" (likely referring to the leader of the Revolt, Shim'on (Simon) Bar Koseba) appears on all of the coins of the Bar Kochba Revolt except for a few types issued at the beginning of the Revolt with the name "Eleazar the Priest''.

First Jewish Revolt coinage

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... evolt.html

http://www.wildwinds.com/coins/greece/judaea/t.html

[Peter Kirby]

The original post was made in haste, and I had edited the reference out before the reply to it was posted.

Apparently the idea that some coins of the first Jewish revolt (and there seem to be some, but recent scholarship does not seem to support the idea that any of them had the names of specific men) bore the names of Simon (a first century one) and Eleazar the priest is part of 19th century scholarship.

The 19th century book:

https://books.google.com/books?id=4P84AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA193

A quote from the introduction to the same book written in a 1967 edition:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Kochba_Revolt_coinage
History of Jewish coinage, and of money in the Old and New Testament, Frederic William Madden, Pegasus Pub. Co., 1967, Introduction, "Madden's chapter IX, "Money Struck during the Second Revolt of the Jews," lists only those coins of "Simon Bar Cochab" which were overstruck on coins of the Roman emperors from Vespasian onwards, and which could not therefore fit in any way into Madden's scheme of the "Simon" or "Eleazar" coins allegedly of the First Revolt. He notes, of course, that some of the coins of Bar Cochab "appear to have been struck from the same stamp as those of Simon son of Gioras." His attribution of these coins to Bar Kochba follows that of Levy. The original group attributed to Bar Kochba numbered 10 silver pieces and one bronze piece in Madden's book of 1864; in 1881 they had grown to 43, including the tetradrachm with the star."