Cold Case Christianity

[MrMacSon]

Today I studied the 2015 (37(5) p. 56) Journal for the Study of the New Testament. From the book review of Peder Borgen's 'The Gospel of John: More Light from Philo, Paul, and Archaeology' -- "Borgen sees much more similarity between John and Paul and even supposes that the Gospel of John could have been written before 70 CE, merely using oral traditions about Jesus (pp 290=92). (reviewer Jutta Leonhardt-Balzer)

Yes, I've seen references to other people noticing the similarities between the Pauline texts and the 'Gospel according to John'.

re -

and, on pg. 53, Jonathan Berner likewise argues for an early John in his 'Aposynogogos and the Historical Jesus in John: Rethinking the Historicity of the Johannine Expulsion Passages'* - he

• "challenges the idea promoted by J. L. Martyn that the passages referring to people being made aposynagogoi (Jn.922124316Z) allude to a petition known as the birket ha-minim, added to the synagogue prayers supposedly c. 85CE"

What is 'Jn.922124316Z'?

---

* http://www.brill.com/aposynagogos-and-h ... jesus-john

• "In Aposynagōgos and the Historical Jesus in John, Jonathan Bernier utilizes the critical-realist hermeneutics developed by Bernard Lonergan and Ben F. Meyer to survey historical data relevant to the Johannine expulsion passages (John 9:22, 12:42, 16:2). He evaluates the major two contemporary interpretative traditions regarding these passages, namely that they describe not events of Jesus’ lifetime but rather the implementation of the Birkat ha-Minim in the first first-century, or that [ii] they describe not historical events at all but serve only to construct Johannine identity. Against both traditions Bernier argues that these passages [iii] plausibly describe events that could have happened during Jesus’ lifetime."

[MrMacSon]

.
Aposynogogos is discussed here, too -

Handbook of Early Christianity: Social Science Approaches (2002) by Anthony J. Blasi, Paul-André Turcotte, Jean Duhaime; Rowman Altamira: 802 pages.

[outhouse]

Plus

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorshi ... nine_works

Historical criticism rejects the view that John the Apostle authored any of these works.

So that only leaves what? apologetic biased rhetoric.

This goes against his early date as well

John was considered the last to be written. Most scholars today give it a date between 90 and 100,[6] though a minority suggest an even later date.[46] The Fourth Gospel may have been later also because it was written to a smaller group within the Johannine community, and was not circulated widely until a later date.[47] However, claims for authorship much later than 100 have been called into question due to Rylands Library Papyrus P52, a fragment of the gospel found in Egypt that was probably written around 125[48][49][50] as well as by the recent work of Charles Hill.[51] Hill gives evidence that the Gospel of John was complete and in use between 90 and 130, and of the possible use of uniquely Johannine gospel material in several works which date from this period. These works and authors include Ignatius of Antioch (c. 107); Polycarp (c. 107); Papias' elders (c. 110-120); of Hierapolis' Exegesis of the Lord's Oracles (c. 120-132). Hill holds that many early historical figures did indeed reference the Gospel of John.[51]

[perseusomega9]

Today I studied the 2015 (37(5) p. 56) Journal for the Study of the New Testament. From the book review of Peder Borgen's 'The Gospel of John: More Light from Philo, Paul, and Archaeology' -- "Borgen sees much more similarity between John and Paul and even supposes that the Gospel of John could have been written before 70 CE, merely using oral traditions about Jesus (pp 290=92). (reviewer Jutta Leonhardt-Balzer)

Yes, I've seen references to other people noticing the similarities between the Pauline texts and the 'Gospel according to John'.

re -

and, on pg. 53, Jonathan Berner likewise argues for an early John in his 'Aposynogogos and the Historical Jesus in John: Rethinking the Historicity of the Johannine Expulsion Passages'* - he

• "challenges the idea promoted by J. L. Martyn that the passages referring to people being made aposynagogoi (Jn.922124316Z) allude to a petition known as the birket ha-minim, added to the synagogue prayers supposedly c. 85CE"

What is 'Jn.922124316Z'?

* http://www.brill.com/aposynagogos-and-h ... jesus-john

• "In Aposynagōgos and the Historical Jesus in John, Jonathan Bernier utilizes the critical-realist hermeneutics developed by Bernard Lonergan and Ben F. Meyer to survey historical data relevant to the Johannine expulsion passages (John 9:22, 12:42, 16:2). He evaluates the major two contemporary interpretative traditions regarding these passages, namely that they describe not events of Jesus’ lifetime but rather the implementation of the Birkat ha-Minim in the first first-century, or that [ii] they describe not historical events at all but serve only to construct Johannine identity. Against both traditions Bernier argues that these passages [iii] plausibly describe events that could have happened during Jesus’ lifetime."

I haven't read any of Bernier's works except his blog, he strikes as giving way too much credit to the apostolic fathers and traditional interpretation of the NT text.

[Adam]

Thanks for the supplementation.
I'll look next Sunday when I'm in Republic of Davis (UCD) to look for those mysterious numbers--I thought I had simply transcribed them (John 922124316Z) in my notes.

[Ben C. Smith]

Thanks for the supplementation.
I'll look next Sunday when I'm in Republic of Davis (UCD) to look for those mysterious numbers--I thought I had simply transcribed them (John 922124316Z) in my notes.

"John 922124316Z" looks like a garbled rendition of John 9.22; 12.43; 16.2. And John 12.43 looks like a mistake for John 12.42. Those would be the three Johannine verses in which ἀποσυνάγωγος appears.

Ben.

[Adam]

Excellent headachy copyist skills, Ben. Thank you. Here's what I actually transcribed into my notes: "Jn. 9:22 12:42 16:2" fatally omitting the commas in my haste there at the library.

[Adam]

Now it begins. And begins badly. After skipping over 80 pages of Criminology 101, J. Warner Wallace ("Jim", not to be confused with the liberal Christian "evangelical" Jim Wallis of Sojourners) turns to the Bible with all the "wrong" name-dropping for supposed eyewitnesses. "Peter identified himself as a 'witness of the suffering of Christ' (1 Pt. 5:1) and as one of many 'eyewitnesses of His majesty' (2 Pet. 1:16-17). The apostle John...(80) identified himself as 'the disciple who is testifying to these things and wrote these things. (John 21:24)" Wallace next lists some more acceptable evidences, but is he "out" after failing his first three strikes?
So I Peter 5:1 might be from Peter, but it's so embalmed within a papal encyclical that it does not speak to us as the primitive testimony Wallace has been championing. Virtually no one believes II Peter was written by Peter. Most scholars don't accept John 21 as part on the original John (thus supposedly by John), and even those that do will make an exception of John 21:18-25 as from a Redactor.
Just saying. I'll keep an open mind, but clearly he's not into critical scholarship. He says something about seminary--from BEFORE or after he was an atheist? I'll find out. (He does admit to some Christian training in his youth--I'm getting suspicious of his public persona.

[winningedge101]

2 Peter is a forgery.

[Adam]

Yes, apparently so.
Glad to hear from you, and to find that you are not as uncritical as I had thought. That makes the following easier.
Yes, yesterday I received Cold Case Christianity, 2013, a clever and helpful book to read. However the courtroom scene in the movie is not played out in the book at all. He never attempts Higher Criticism to extract the facts from the gospel texts covering the same events. The skeptic's case is always heard, but always overcome by his not-that-unique apologetic. The most "radical" part of the book is his Lower Criticism. In the standard disputes he always sides with the Alexandrian or Neutral texts as against the Western texts such as D (never mentioned). He does trumpet Sinaiticus as the authority, and consequently rejects Mark 16:9-20, Luke 22:43-44, John 3:16 (just kidding!), John 5:4, Acts 15:34, and I John 5:7. These are "artifacts", not evidence worthy to present on trial.
Blurbs at the front testify to the Christian witness of this book, but omitting any of these (some famous) names from the "end-credits", sort of an annotated bibliography follows at the end that chapter-by-chapter provides further resources from the likes of Daniel Wallace, Craig Evans, Craig Blomberg, William Lane Craig (though the philosophy he saves for his other book), and Richard Bauckham. He does not do any first-hand research on sorting out eyewitness sources within the gospels, as the movie God's Not Dead 2 had led me to believe. He does not admit any written underlying sources, he's just conventionally non-KJV conservative. Apparently both in the book and in lectures videotaped he is not allowed the leeway he took advantage of in the movie to stray off the Fundamentalist bandwagon.
There is no index, so take notes if you want to use this book for research. Not that you likely would, there is so little that anyone on this forum could learn. Denizens of any other blog would learn a lot, however, and I recommend it for lessons in straight thinking (abductive reasoning he calls it) of forensic analysis.