Plato and the Pentateuch

Discussion about the Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, pseudepigrapha, Philo, Josephus, Talmud, Dead Sea Scrolls, archaeology, etc.
Secret Alias
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by Secret Alias »

How many priestly families came over from Judea/Samaria? 50? 100? There must have been a very small subset of priestly families who would have left with Ptolemy. Philo was related to most of these families in one way or another. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Re ... frontcover
Secret Alias
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by Secret Alias »

The "Seventy" weren't plumbers, or farmers or fishermen. They were exclusively from among the priestly families.
Last edited by Secret Alias on Mon Mar 20, 2023 2:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Secret Alias
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by Secret Alias »

Josephus doesn't even their names:
But it does not seem to me to be necessary to set down the names of the seventy [two] elders who were sent by Eleazar, and carried the law, which yet were subjoined at the end of the epistle
Secret Alias
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by Secret Alias »

Again let's imagine the 70 in 270 BCE.

It's impossible Philo wasn't related to most of them.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by neilgodfrey »

StephenGoranson wrote: Mon Mar 20, 2023 6:11 am I have read much of RE Gmirkin's publications and online writing. Even if I were to read every single word, REG has already declared, here on Feb. 13, 2023, a fallback position: that I have an "...inability to recognize or follow an argument."
From that point of view, apparently, many others have such inability, too.
Again, if someone does not accept REG's c.273-272 model, does that necessarily mean that they did not understand it?
No, reading some of his work but ignoring the work where he sets out the datasets for analysis and then saying you disagree with his analysis of the datasets is simply being dishonest.

If someone does not accept REG's c.273-272 model, it does not necessarily mean they have not understood it. But if they have read it and understood it then they will be able to offer an honest reason why they do not accept it. They will not need to resort fo vague assertions, blatant misrepresentation, ad homina and excuses for not reading the evidence set forth.
ABuddhist
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by ABuddhist »

Secret Alias wrote: Mon Mar 20, 2023 2:12 pm Again let's imagine the 70 in 270 BCE.

It's impossible Philo wasn't related to most of them.
Being related to them is no guarantee that Philo knew what their roles had been. I mean, my family had a long tradition that an ancestor was nobility from a certain country, but research disproved this claim. Similarly, Philo's belief that his relatives had translated the Pentateuch into Greek from an original Hebrew need not have reflected reality. And Philo, unlike a family member in my family, did not research such a claim's accuracy.

Besides, Gmirkin rejects the claim that 70 were involved with the Pentateuch, if I understand correctly.
Secret Alias
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by Secret Alias »

If his family were involved in the production of the LXX he would know if it was translated or an original exemplar. Whether or not he was willing to reveal the truth to his readers is another question. This invites the possibility of a conspiracy to keep the truth from others which is or isn't likely. That has to be determined. But surely Philo knew whether or not it was a translation when he told his readers it was a translation.
ABuddhist
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by ABuddhist »

Secret Alias wrote: Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:01 pm If his family were involved in the production of the LXX he would know if it was translated or an original exemplar. [...] But surely Philo knew whether or not it was a translation when he told his readers it was a translation.
You assume these things. But why? Do you assume that all traditions which you have about your family's achievements from centuries ago are always accurate?
Secret Alias
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by Secret Alias »

You understand how priestly families function? They have a specific role within the community. They ARE the community. Philo identifies a memorializing event for the translation of the Pentateuch. That means it was a BIG event. A foundational event in the Alexandrian community. Did Philo's community "remember" who translated the Pentateuch, how it was translated, when it was translated. Yes. Yes. Yes. It's not the same as remembering what the family ate on a particular night or what movie they saw. These must have been anxious times. The Alexandrian Jewish community had a new existence before itself.
StephenGoranson
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Re: Plato and the Pentateuch

Post by StephenGoranson »

Though not everything Philo wrote may be reliable, he surely was interested in Bible, and may be said to have done some research, including, according to On Providence 2.64, a visit to Jerusalem.

One need not read every single word written by, say, L. Ron Hubbard, to determine that he was not writing science (despite the name, Scientology). Similarly, I have read several defenses of the c.273-272 Alexandria "model" by RE Gmirkin. If anything, his extending the list of Greek authors and Greek texts that were supposedly absorbed in Alexandria in a "crash course" makes the proposal even less probable.
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