The Christian Forger and the Emmaus Narrative

[Secret Alias]

Most importantly there is at least some scholarly consensus that the statue of Hippolytus was originally placed in the Pantheon library of Julius Africanus:

It was Frickel who originally suggested to Guarducci that the Statue had stood originally in the Pantheon Library, though he persisted in believing that it was a statue of Hippolytus himself, as a monument to an alleged filo- cristianesimo.16* Africanus took a statue of a male or female philosopher originally not Hippolytus but attributed to him when his list of works were placed upon the plinth.164 Africanus then added the Paschal and Tables, since their inscriptions "spill over on both sides of the lower edge of the Chair." But I find it frankly incredible, and for reasons that I have already given, that those Tables could have had any significance outside the community which needed them to calculate the date of its celebration of Easter.166 (2A 2.4).

Like Guarducci, Frickel had to rely not simply on a Synkretismus in the time of Severus Alexander, but also to an alleged Christenfreundlichkeit that we have challenged.167 Frickel nevertheless believed that the Statue had been removed during the next reign under the persecutor Maximinus the Thracian to the place where Ligorio claimed to have found it on the via Tiburtina.168

Guarducci, as we saw in 1 B, endeavoured to undermine Ligorio's reliability, and so believed that the Statue had always stood in the Patheon Library. But she now went further and tried to specify precisely how the Statue would have fitted into the internal architecture of such a Library. The roughness of the back of the Statue, and the catalogue of works on the plinth indicates to her that the Statue was set into a wall alongside of which was a capsa (which she translates armadio or "cupboard")169 which was set into the wall itself and which contained the scrolls.170 Thus one could read on the plinth the catalogue of the works that the adjoining capsa contained.https://books.google.com/books?id=Jg3Xr ... 22&f=false

[FransJVermeiren]

According to Nestle-Aland, Luke 24:12 is an interpolation. Below I will discuss verse 13, but I will start with verses 14-19a, which in my opinion is the original layer of this narrative together with verse 28-31a.

14 … and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15 While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. 16 But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17 and he said to them, “What is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk?” And they stood still, looking sad. 18 Then one of them, named Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” 19 And he said to them, “What things?”

The core of my theory is that Jesus was a victim of the siege of Jerusalem, was executed at the very end of it, survived his execution, and returned to Galilee as soon as possible (he had been one of the leaders of Tiberias at the outbreak of the rebellion). As a victim of the famine during the siege Jesus’ face had prematurely aged (one of the symptoms of severe starvation) and so he was not easily recognizable. This is attested also in other passages in the Gospels, just like his remarkable appetite.
So maybe on his way home (or on arriving home, see below) Jesus met two acquaintances who did not recognize him after his severe starvation, and pleading ignorance he wanted to know if they were already informed about what had recently happened in Jerusalem. From their answer it is clear that they are already informed. That’s why they are looking so sad.

Then about Emmaus in verse 13:

* eg. Jewish War 4.1.3

• 3. "But Vespasian removed from Emmaus, where he had last pitched his camp before the city Tiberias, (now Emmaus if it be interpreted, may be rendered A warm bath, for therein is a spring of warm water, useful for healing), and came to Gamala; yet was its situation such that he was not able to encompass it all round with soldiers to watch it. But where the places were practicable, he set men to watch it, and seized upon that mountain which was over it."

MrMacSon’s quote of Josephus in this context is quite astonishing, because the Greek word for Emmaus is not in Josephus’s text: it mentions ʼΑμμαθους and he locates it near Tiberias, so this is clearly Hammath, that until this day is famous for its warm baths. But Ammathus/Hammath/Hamat was not interesting for the redactor of Luke, or even inconvenient as he wanted to veil the real course of events. Above SecretAlias has convincingly showed that Emmaus on the other hand was interesting for its connection with the messiah and the Maccabees.

The following is only a lightweight speculation, but maybe the story began as follows: On his way home, coming from Jerusalem and reaching his home town Tiberias from the south, in Hammath Jesus met two acquaintances he knew from before the war, but who did not recognize him after his severe starvation…

[FransJVermeiren]

The Emmaus narrative: Jesus’ first meeting with acquaintances on arriving home

After my short contribution above, below I will try to give a more in-depth elaboration of the Emmaus narrative in the light of my chronological theory.

The Emmaus story is a famous but also bizarre New Testament passage.
What is so strange about it?
• The town of Emmaus is located north-west of Jerusalem, in a region that is totally out of Jesus’ field of action. We only see Jesus north of Jerusalem (in Galilee of course, crossing Samaria on his way to Jerusalem, in Ephraim in the north of Judea) and east of it (in Bethany and Jericho).
• This location of Emmaus makes it quite improbable that Jesus would meet acquaintances or followers there.
• The distance between Jerusalem and Emmaus is 60 stades in most manuscripts, but 160 in others.
• The story is told only in Luke.
In my opinion this last element is not an argument against historicity but in favor of it. One of the main characteristics of the gospel of Luke is that it partially rehistorizes the oldest gospel, and I believe this fragment is an excellent example of this rehistorizing approach.

I think we should also take a look at the spelling of Emmaus because this element might yield some important information. The city on the road from the plains to Jerusalem that is commonly identified with Luke’s Emmaus is mentioned several times in Josephus, in War as well as in Antiquities. In War it is consistently spelled as ʼΑμμαους, in Antiquities we find ʼΑμμαους as well as Εμμαους. (Maybe the Emmaus spelling in Antiquities is deliberately introduced by a Christian copyist in an attempt to attune Josephus with Luke. This attuning seems be at work also in the Loeb translation: ten times ʼΑμμαους is translated as Emmaus!) Besides Ammaus in Judea, Josephus also mentions the small town of ʼΑμμαθους in Galilee, also in War and Antiquities. In Antiquities XVIII:36 ʼΑμμαους and ʼΑμαθους are variant readings for this Galilean village.
This Galilean village of Ammathus (Hebrew Hammath) was a small Jewish settlement on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, famous for its hot springs. It already existed for centuries when around 20 CE Herod Antipas had a new town built just north of it that he made his capital. He did not call this new city ‘New Hammath’ but he dedicated it to the Roman emperor Tiberius and therefore named it Tiberias. The distance between Hammath and Tiberias is 2,5 km or 16 stades (16*157 m).
As Jesus had nothing to do with the Judean town of Ammaus/Emmaus, I believe Luke slightly changed the name of the Galilean village of Ammathus/Ammaus into Emmaus because of its interesting connection with the Maccabees and the messiah, and also because this slight distortion of its name served as camouflage, obscuring things for the uniformed reader.

One more point we should consider is the fact that the gospel of Luke is a Jerusalem-centered writing. I believe that this fragment is a good illustration. If Luke is in fact talking about Hammath south of Tiberias, it would be strange that he mentions the long distance between Jerusalem and this Galilean village. When Luke connects Jerusalem and nearby Emmaus, he seems to give the distance from Jerusalem to a nearby town that Jesus is heading for. But maybe it is the other way around. Maybe Luke gives the distance between Hammath and the nearby town Jesus is approaching. So I believe that in fact Luke doesn’t talk about Jerusalem → Emmaus, but about Hammath → Tiberias. Jerusalem is mentioned in verse 13, 18 and 33. This is the result of Luke’s homogenization of the place names as part of his Jerusalem-centered approach. Probably the original sequence was Tiberias (v.13) – Jerusalem (v. 18) – Tiberias (v. 33).

In A Chronological Revision of the Origins of Christianity I have identified Jesus son of Saphat in Josephus with the Jesus of the Gospels. Jesus was the leader of the Essenes of Tiberias in the period of the war against the Romans. Below I will reconstruct the Emmaus story against that background.

In September 67 CE Jesus and his followers fled to Jerusalem at the capture of Tarichaeae, after they had moved there from Tiberias. After a 3 years stay as a refugee in Judea and after finally becoming a victim of the siege of Jerusalem, Jesus longed to return home (see Mk 14:28). After the survival of his execution he escaped to his beloved Galilee. On approaching his home town Tiberias, near Hammath Jesus encounters two sad men who are discussing the horrible recent events that had befallen Jerusalem. They do not recognize Jesus, which may be surprising at first sight, but which is comprehensible when considered more closely. Jesus has been displaced for 3 years, and his countenance had severely aged from starvation. Maybe Jesus had also disguised himself (for an example from that era compare with Josephus, Life 47). Jesus feigns not to know what has happened, maybe because he is cautious and wants to assess the situation first. When the men tell him what happened, Jesus replies with quotes from the Scriptures. As an Essene priest he knew the scriptures well, and his journey home had taken enough time to reflect on the recent events in the light of relevant passages of the Tenach. Maybe he quoted from Isaiah, the favorite book of the Essenes: “For I have heard a decree of destruction from the Lord God of hosts upon the whole land.” (28:22) When the two give a sign of hospitality by asking him for supper, he accepts the invitation. Jesus is recovering from starvation, so the offered meal is welcome. At the start of the meal Jesus plays his role as a priest and blesses the bread. From that gesture the two recognize him, despite his appearance and/or disguise. Jesus continues his journey, and the two men hurry to Tiberias to tell their relatives and friends the spectacular news that Jesus has survived the hell of Jerusalem and is arriving home again.
(Shortly afterwards Jesus is reunited with his friends. See John 21.)

[FransJVermeiren]

At the end of the post above I mentioned the connection I suspect between the Emmaus narrative and John 21. Searching the internet I found the following:

The appearance which occupies the whole of John 21, whatever its origin and status, has some resemblances with Luke’s Emmaus story, even though it is concerned with Galilee and not Jerusalem – the mention of seven disciples, two of them unnamed, the human details of the disciples fishing, the fire and the breakfast, the extended and leisurely form of the narrative.

Evans (C.F.), The Resurrection and the New Testament, p.118

I believe there is more, much more. I hope to report on that soon.

[FransJVermeiren]

The Emmaus narrative (Luke 24:13-35), John 21:1-13 and Luke 24: 36-42: the report of Jesus’ first day back home

In my previous post Evans notices some resemblances between Luke’s Emmaus story and John 21 despite the two different territories in which the stories play. Earlier I argued that the Emmaus narrative is not a Judean but a Galilean story. If both stories play in Galilee, similarities would be all the more plausible. Maybe the two fragments are not only connected spatially, but also temporally as the first story plays in the evening and the second in the morning. If so, we might be witnessing what happened the evening when Jesus arrived home, followed by the events of the next morning. In Luke the Emmaus narrative is immediately followed by one of Jesus’ apparitions. If we also connect this paragraph to the former two stories, we see one powerful unity arising. Concretely the sequence is as follows:
• Luke 24: 13-35
• John 21: 1-13
• Luke 24: 36-42 (John 21:13 overlaps with Luke 24: 36-42).

In the following reconstruction I replaced Jerusalem by Tiberias twice (Luke 24:13 and 33), I changed the distance from 60 or 160 stades to 16 (Luke 24:13) and replaced ‘the eleven’ by ‘his friends’ (Luke 24:33). It might not be a coincidence that the changes I suggest are concentrated in verse 13 and 33. In John 21:11 I eliminated the ‘153 fishes’, because this is clearly a mythologizing interpolation. Verses stemming from the Christian forger are removed and are indicated in the text as follows: /(verse number(s)/. I determinedly translated the Greek word κυριος in John 21 as ‘master’ instead of ‘Lord’.

Luke 24
/verse 12 is left out in Nestle-Aland as an early addition/
13 Two of them were on their way to the village called Hammath, sixteen stades from Tiberias 14 and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15 While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. 16 But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17 and he said to them, “What is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk?” And they stood still, looking sad. 18 Then one of them, named Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” 19 And he said to them, “What things?”
/20-27/
28 They drew near to the village to which they were going. He appeared to be going further, 29 but they constrained him, saying, “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent.” So he went in to stay with them. 30 When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them. 31 Now their eyes were opened and they recognized him. 32 They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?” 33 And they rose that same hour and returned to Tiberias; and they found his friends and those who were with them.
/34/
35 Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

John 21
1 After this Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he revealed himself in this way. 2 Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together. 3 Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat; but that night they caught nothing.
4 Just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the beach; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5 Jesus said to them, “Children, have you any fish?” They answered him, “No.” 6 He said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in, for the quantity of fish. 7 That disciple whom Jesus love said to Peter, “It is the master!” When Simon Peter heard that it was the master, he put on his clothes, for he was stripped for work, and sprang into the sea. 8 But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, about ninety meters off.
9 When they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish lying on it, and bread. 10 Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” 11 So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish; and although there were so many, the net was not torn. 12 Jesus said to them, “Come, and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the master.

Luke 24
/36/
37 They were startled and frightened, and supposed that they saw a spirit. 38 And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do questionings arise in your hearts? 39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have.”
/verse 40 is left out in Nestle-Aland as an early addition/
41 And while they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate before them.


This story recounts Jesus’ arrival in his home region, his conversation with two acquaintances who do not recognize him, their hospitality, their recognition of Jesus when he acts as a priest like in earlier days, after which they go and inform the inner circle of Jesus’ friends. This happens on day one. The next morning Jesus goes to the shore of the Sea of Galilee and finds his friends fishing there. Jesus gives instructions on where exactly to throw out their nets, and after a good catch he is recognized by his friends. Jesus says to his companions they should not doubt: he is nog a ghost but a man of flesh and blood. Jesus has brought bread with him. Reunited they eat the bread and some freshly caught fish for breakfast.

The middle part of the story seems to have been eliminated from Luke and used in John. When we place it back between the Emmaus story and the apparition story in Luke 24, an impressive unity arises that reports on Jesus’ return home. We can date this story in September 70 CE.

Again we see clear points of connection with Jesus son of Saphat in Josephus. The man ‘with a copy of the laws of Moses in his hands’ in Josephus (Life 135) also acts as a priest here. The ‘ringleader of the party of the sailors’ in Josephus (Life 66) shows himself here as an expert fisherman who instructs his companions on where exactly to throw out their nets. The ‘chief magistrate of Tiberias’ in Josephus (Life 271 and 294 for example) is correspondingly addressed here as κυριος.