Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

StephenGoranson wrote: ↑Sat Aug 17, 2024 12:52 pm So you disagree with me and James C. VanderKam and numerous published others going back to at least 1532.
What do you, John2, consider a better etymology?

The way that 1QpHab, James and Paul use it, i.e., someone who observes the Torah.

I'd like to add another hypothesis, just for fun: John the Baptist = Teacher of Righteousness Herod Antipas = Wicked Priest Why not? Lay it out for me. I'll try. If the "root of planting" was Judas and Zaddok, twenty years later (when the Teacher arose) would coincide with John the Baptis...

StephenGoranson wrote: ↑Sat Aug 17, 2024 12:56 pm What does "the younger sort" have to do with the Teacher of Righteousness?

Good question. I hadn't thought of that. Nothing, I guess. But there are other reasons to see the Teacher as a Fourth Philosopher, and there are reasons to see Jesus as one. It's a matter of overlap, then.

StephenGoranson wrote: ↑Sat Aug 17, 2024 12:37 pm That some of "the younger sort" may be zealous is hardly unique to the "Fourth Philosophy" nor a help for chronology.

It's just one of the many points of similarity between the Fourth Philosophy and Christianity.

StephenGoranson wrote: ↑Sat Aug 17, 2024 12:32 pm
And the same James VanderKam wrote that too.

I disagree with anyone who thinks that "doers of the Torah" means Essenes.

Most of the "Herodian (50 or 30 BCE-68 CE) 418 manuscripts and 2 ostraca" are earlier than the first century CE. Even more of them are before John Baptist, Jesus and James. Including some mentioning Teacher and Priest, who must also be earlier. But the writings that mention the Teacher ha...

Another element of the Fourth Philosophy that fits Jesus is his age (Lk. 3:23: "Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry"; John 8:57: "'You are not yet fifty years old,' they said to him, 'and you have seen Abraham!'"). Cf. Ant. 18.1.1: "the in...

AdamKvanta wrote: ↑Sat Aug 17, 2024 8:30 am I'd like to add another hypothesis, just for fun:

John the Baptist = Teacher of Righteousness
Herod Antipas = Wicked Priest

Why not? Lay it out for me.

The majority of Qumran manuscripts are older than the first century CE. According to VanderrKam, the majority of the DSS are dated to the Herodian era: The conclusions reached by the editors and Cross have been tabulated by Brian Webster. Naturally, there are many uncertainties in such a list, but ...

And I should add, if Jesus was the Teacher, I wouldn't see that as Earth changing or validating Christianity, since I think both Jesus and the Teacher were kooks, of the sort Josephus describes in War 2:13.4 ("These were such men as deceived and deluded the people under pretense of divine inspi...