Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

MrMacSon Authenticity is an issue, but reasonable as a premise for engaging with a poster who accepts these writings. I am open to the possibility that there was a Claudian-era Roman rabble-rouser called "Chrestus." If there was, then it sounds like his admirers were rough trade. Who know...

Bernard I won't labor these points too much more, but I'll play another round. Josephus named Jesus called Christ as an identifier for James, because that Jesus was known by his audience (around 90 CE) as the alleged founder of a new religion. So, in your view, Tacitus was wasting a similar audienc...

Bernard But actually, some not important persons started (or rather triggered the start) of important things, not by what they were, but what they did or happened to them (and by only one event). I already cited Rosa Parks and Gavrilo Princip. I can also mention the arrest of a street vendor in Tun...

Stefan You and I seem to be in close enough agreement about the Death of John being integral to a unified composition, which is the key immediate issue. I can't see us going to the mat over the difference between "the only scene which isn't 'directly' about Jesus" and "one of several...

Bernard (with respect to Josephus and whose brother James is): it's not tenuous and there is no evidence it has been doctored or interpolated. Only two or three words are in dispute (that is, the striking coincidence that Josephus' Greek-language consultants chose the same phrase as Matthew did for...

Hi, Stefan I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic here, but if not, then could you explain to me briefly why and how you see Mark as 'Malaprop Mark' in comparison to the narrative of JtB in Mark 6? I am a great admirer of Mark and what he (?) accomplished. Malaprop Mark tried to allude to what is, i...

I think the OP is a nice example of the early stages of hypothesis development. Several dimensions of uncertainty are raised, each of which rewards attention. But that would be a long post, and life is short. Is the terminal question the intended focus of the post? And since I have to ask, I trust I...

After what I think was Hurtado's weakest point, I'd like to look at what I take as his second weakest point, from his follow-up post: The scholarship that I point to has been shaped by the critical impulses from the Renaissance and “Enlightenment,” all texts, whether biblical or Christian or whateve...

We might also think about the debaters' weaker points. In the comments, Hurtado says: I’m told that CArrier was allowed to select those who reviewed the work. So he would naturally have chosen people already supportive of his view. Who they were? Only the publisher and CArrier know. It is routine fo...

pavurcn A priori we can assume "teaching" included accuracy. You could. I don't know anybody who disputes that an adequate technology was available, which was practiced for some things. The question is whether or not the technology was applied in Jesus' case. I don't think we can come to ...