Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

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Ulan
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Re: Vaticanus and Sinaiticus

Post by Ulan »

gryan wrote: Thu Jun 30, 2022 7:31 am I see from various web sources that you base your dating on stained pages and torn pages.

Have any professional textual critics responded to your hypothesis with a refutation?
Not really, as there isn't anything to refute. The whole endeavor started with not understanding what an internal color reference in a photograph means, and the rest has already been dealt with in the 19th century.
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JoeWallack
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The Argument For The Argumentum

Post by JoeWallack »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNB13C735rQ

JW:
Apologists posture that there is very little support in the Greek for 16:8 as original. But as the following article indicates there is significant support for 16:8 in the Greek argumentum. Behold Ecc!:
Mark’s Endings in Context: Paratexts and Codicological Remarks by Mina Monier ORCID
Abstract
This article addresses the problem of the perception of Mark’s endings as expressed in its manuscript tradition. I will argue that, unlike the modern standardized image, manuscript evidence offers a complex phenomenon in which the endings were perceived in diverse ways that move across the threshold that separates a text from paratexts. Further, the manuscripts show an influence between the endings and their associated paratexts. I will show this phenomenon by examining (i) the hypotheses before the Gospel, (ii) marginalia that engaged Mark 16, and (iii) postscripts after the Gospel. In conclusion, the article recommends revisiting the standard perception of the “endings” within their larger paratextual ecosystem.

...

In Latin manuscripts, we find that the term is translated as argumentum, which captures the meaning in a way better than the modern English term hypothesis, as it includes the elements of summarising the plot as well as arguing and offering a statement that proves the work’s worth

...

Each argumentum starts with a single line that defines the name and identity of the evangelist, followed by an orderly account of Jesus’s life according to that Gospel. These four argumenta use the same wording for the main stages of Jesus’s life, including the resurrection: Ἠγέρθη [or αναστάς in some witnesses to the Matthean argumentum] ἐν τριημέρω, followed by the post-resurrection details. In the case of Mark’s argumentum, we have an ambiguous ending: “(He) was raised in three days, and an angel descended preaching the women, in order for them to bring tidings to the disciples.”6 In narrating the events, this argumentum tells us that an angel, not the youth (νέανισκον) of Mark, descended (καταβάς) to the women, an act that is not in Mark’s narrative but is similar to the scene in Matt 28:2. Because of the oddity of the report, the copyist of GA 191 (52v) smooths the inconsistencies by replacing καταβάς with φανεῖς. The ending as narrated in the argumentum does not tell us anything about the women’s reaction, or whether they successfully carried out the angel’s instruction. According to the Gospel’s Short Ending, the women actually failed to carry out the angel’s instruction: they frantically ran away telling no one anything “for they were afraid (16:8).” Yet, despite the fact that the author of these four argumenta was attentive to the details of the endings in the argumenta of the other three Gospels (being ready to report details like the tearing of Jesus’ garment), he did not report any of Mark’s endings. It is difficult to imagine that he simply dismissed the women’s anticlimactic reaction as a detail that is unworthy of highlighting. Did the women scuttle in silence and fear in the author’s version of Mark? It is not clear which ending of Mark the argumentum author had access to. His Markan argumentum also tells us nothing about the events found in the Long Ending. In the argumenta to the other three Gospels, the author highlights Jesus’s post-resurrection apparitions, the basic remarks of his commandments to the disciples, and his ascension (in Luke). It is implausible that ignoring Jesus’s apparitions and ascension in Mark’s argumentum is due to considering them as insignificant details.

...

5 The witnesses I found to have this attribution are GA 195 1006, 1422.
CSNTM
GA 195 Minuscule 11th Century
Eleventh-century minuscule of the Gospels with commentary on parchment; 277 leaves; 1 column; 24 lines per column. For recent digital images, visit BML Online.

Joseph

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Skeptical Textual Criticism
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JoeWallack
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Two Out Of Three (were pretty bad Textual Critics by Skeptical Standards)

Post by JoeWallack »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5hWWe-ts2s

JW:
A Case against the Longer Ending of Mark
The general direction of travel in the manuscript evidence as we have it for Greek, Sahidic, Latin, Syriac, Christian Palestinian Aramaic, Armenian, and Georgian, moves from an original, shorter Mark towards incorporating a version of Mark with the Longer Ending.

In other words, the Greek manuscript evidence, and the evidence within these six linguistic areas, works in the opposite direction to that proposed by James Snapp (and others). In short, it is not evidence that an original long form of Mark was subsequently edited down, but is in fact evidence for the opposite: the earliest form of Mark known in these areas ended at Mark 16:8, and this was subsequently supplemented with one or more of the available additional endings.
JW:
Simply and concisely put. Too simply and concisely:

1) The Direction of Change criterion is being referred to here. The Difficult Reading Principle is a theoretical criterion while The Direction of Change Criterion is an observational one.

2) The Head Evangelical notes that the Direction of Change in the Manuscript category favors 16:8 but fails to note the same phenomena in the Patristic and Internal categories thus not mentioning another important criterion, Coordination of Categories.

3) The Direction of Change criterion indicates what is happening and The Difficult Reading Principle helps explain why theoretically.
To the extent you can also explain how and when the change occurred you add weight. Here we do have evidence for the how and when.
Eusebius (you say Eusebias, I say Eusebs) (in)famously states that part of the freedom that Jesus has given you is that you are free to choose which
Markan ending you want in your Manuscript and the only rule you can not change is believing there is not any error in the original manuscripts:

Eusebius of Caesarea Gospel Problems and Solutions

Jerome echoes Eusebius (Origen was the 3rd great Early Church Textual Critic, and the greatest by Skeptical standards, and shows no awareness of the LE) and as they were considered by Christianity as the two great Textual Critics of the early Church, we have the how. They were also both c. 4th centuryish so we also have the when. Thus the Coordination criterion indicts Christianity infagrante derelicto of fiduciary duty by evidencing the theoretical and observational evidence for 16:8 as original.



Joseph

I read it somewhere. I wrote it down and then read it. - Eusebius

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davidmartin
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Re: Apologists Now! God I Love the Sound of Psalms in the Morning.

Post by davidmartin »

gryan wrote: Thu Jun 16, 2022 3:08 am "It is perfectly reasonable to say that two Marys came from the same place, Magdala. There is then no difficulty in saying that one of them was the Magdalene who, in Matthew, came to the tomb late on the sabbath; and then again that the other, also a Magdalene, came there early in the morning, in John, and that she is the one of whom it is stated in Mark (according to some copies) that 'he had cast seven devils' out of her, and also presumably the one who heard the words 'Do not touch me' –but not the one in Matthew, about whom, even if she too was certainly from Magdala, the divine scripture makes no such derogatory statement."
yes you can disagree with this based on an understanding of editorial freedom/personal recollection
But also in the Syriac it's much clearer Mary didn't come from any place called Magdala, but was called 'The Tower'. That's why she is called 'the magdalene'
How likely is it that more than one person get's given the same nickname?!

I think that the reason for problems around Mark's ending is that originally, as in John, Jesus appears to Mary first and possibly Mary only - so John preserves what once was in Luke (and maybe Mark) - and there was controversy in this area!
That is why Origen responding to Celsus says "Now it is not true that He showed Himself only to one woman" as Celsus was saying
That was the widely believed story

I think the tension was that on the one hand Jesus appearing to Mary first is awkward, but so is Jesus appearing to say Peter first because from what we know of the Ebionites they claimed Peter and James as their founders and it's most likely that in their gospel accounts Jesus appears to them first. This is not acceptable either, they mustn't be in agreement with their accounts. What can the proto-orthodox do?

The solution was found back in the earlier form where yes Mary is the first but crucially her witness is not believed. This unbelief stands for all non-orthodox views attributed to other apostles and it weakens accounts made in their name. So they need Mary after all and the original telling of the story comes back in via this route
But short Mark preserves an earlier time before Mary's testimony changed from being a liability to an asset, but in this hypothesis even this is a change from the original telling which is more like John's. It's unfortunate that there isn't any evidence of a different ending found in Luke to back up this idea but I bet that a proto-Luke existed where Mary actually encounters Jesus first

After all, the longer ending to Mark admits Mary saw Jesus first which is assumed to have been taken from John's account - but John never says Mary's testimony was not believed. This is a summation I think of what was once in the earlier ending of Luke which probably simply had Jesus giving Mary a message and disappearing
gryan
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Re: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

Post by gryan »

@davidmartin

Thanks! Interesting arguement.

FYI, to whom it may concern, the above quotation is not from me. It is an explanation of a far out interpretation made by Eusebius:
viewtopic.php?p=138742#p138742
StephenGoranson
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Re: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

Post by StephenGoranson »

davidmartin: "But also in the Syriac it's much clearer Mary didn't come from any place called Magdala, but was called 'The Tower'. That's why she is called 'the magdalene'"

SG: Are you claiming that the Syriac cannot be read properly as a gentilic, from Magdala?
(Or that a double meaning is possible?)
davidmartin
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Re: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

Post by davidmartin »

SG
hope i'm not wrong on this
In Syriac it's ܡܓܕܠܝܬܐ
MGDLYTA Magdalitha
No Magdala here, since tower is masculine what I read was the TA feminine ending has been added to make 'toweress'
Like with Maria of Clopas it's
ܡܪܝܡ ܗܝ ܕܩܠܝܘܦܐ - Maria that of Qlopa the ܗܝ ܕ is 'that of'
Mary Magdalene is ܡܪܝܡ ܡܓܕܠܝܬܐ with none of these prepositions, makes it read like Maria [the] Toweress


Gryan
yes indeed
something as remarkable as a female first witness, i'm proposing that belongs to the earliest strata and setting that in stone
this means John is the closest to it, Matthew follows using an unknown source, then Luke and Mark last
But the problems with Mark's endings in this area seem to point to an alternative account

Since I believe in Lukan priority it had to have once been in Luke for Mark to display ambiguity in this area, but unfortunately Luke's ending doesn't have any manuscript variants or anything from Marcion to hint at this
So I ain't got much to support the theory I will admit that! I'm sort of hunting for some clues about variants in Luke that i've missed

But here's an anomoly in the Syriac I did find
Luke 24 "but also women from us amazed us they early went to the tomb and when they did not find his body they came to us saying we saw angels and they said about him that he is alive and also women from us went to the tomb and found it just as the other women had said"
The concordances say "Some of those who were with us" was John and Peter
But in the Syriac these are other women!
As yet I haven't properly researched this, but if that's right, it's strange. 2 sets of women going to the tomb?
StephenGoranson
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Re: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

Post by StephenGoranson »

david martin:
Even Joan E. Taylor (PEQ 146.3 [2014] 205-223) began (205) "Traditionally Mary Magdalene's name is assumed to indicate the place she came from."
And Elizabeth Schrader and Joan E. Taylor (JBL 140.4 [2021] 751-773) acknowledge, on page 773, "...Mary's provenance is one possible interpretation...."

As I commented elsewhere, the relevant questions apparently include whether Magdalene has a double meaning and whether or not the tower [of faith, or suchlike] interpretation is or is not a retrojection.

https://languagehat.com/?s=magdalene
Kunigunde Kreuzerin
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Re: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

Post by Kunigunde Kreuzerin »

StephenGoranson wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 5:46 am And Elizabeth Schrader and Joan E. Taylor (JBL 140.4 [2021] 751-773) acknowledge, on page 773, "...Mary's provenance is one possible interpretation...."
Abstract from jstor

While it is common today to refer to Jesus's disciple Mαρία[μ] ή Mαγδαληνή as Mary “of Magdala,” with Magdala identified as a Galilean city named Tarichaea, what do our earliest Christian sources actually indicate about the meaning of this woman's name? Examination of the Gospel of Luke, Origen, Eusebius, Macarius Magnes, and Jerome, as well as evidence in hagiography, pilgrimage, and diverse literature, reveals multiple ways that the epithet ή Mαγδαληνή can be understood. While Mary sometimes was believed to come from a place called “Magdala” or “Magdalene,” the assumption was that it was a small and obscure village, its location unspecified or unknown. Given the widespread understanding that Mary Magdalene was the sister of Martha, it could even be equated with Bethany. However, Jerome thought that the epithet was a reward for Mary's faith and actions, not something indicative of provenance: Mary “of the Tower.” No early Christian author identifies a city (Tarichaea) called “Magdala” by the Sea of Galilee, even when they knew the area well. A pilgrim site on ancient ruins, established as “Magdala” by the mid-sixth century, was visited by Christians at least into the fourteenth century, and thus the name is remembered today. In view of the earlier evidence of Origen and Jerome, however, the term ή Mαγδαληνή may be based on an underlying Aramaic word meaning “the magnified one” or “tower-ess,” and is therefore best left untranslated.

StephenGoranson
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Re: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid For. Confirmation 16:8 Original

Post by StephenGoranson »

If "best left untranslated," then best not to translate, neither as "from Magdala" nor "tower"?
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