the Christian Church Fathers with texts to 155 AD/CE

[Secret Alias]

Just to be fair Bernard. I don't think the objection is that you seem arrogant. It is like having a conversation with a fundamentalist but your fundamentalist streak isn't in your methodology but rather your shared psychological traits. No one enjoys 'discussing' an idea or an experience only to discover that the person you are sitting is only interested in bringing the conversation round to them. I am of course the last person to be giving advice to people or telling them how to behave at the forum. I am not easy to get along with and have a short fuse and more negative characteristics than anyone else at the forum. Nevertheless as you have brought it up I thought I would help clarify what is so annoying about that website.

We don't come to the forum to discuss you or your ideas per se. You aren't the center of anyone else's world but your own. Indeed I think everyone here comes to have their ideas and observations heard or shared so when you direct many of us (obviously some do not have this objection so I can't speak for everyone). At a forum which is overtly narcissistic your website and your relentless promotion of that site just seems to take that self-absorption to a new level. Maybe you are more honest about the 'me-first-ness' of the site as a whole. Maybe you draw attention to our own vanity and so we hate you for it. I don't know.

Now as I said I am the last person to give advice to anyone else about how to make friends at the forum. But as you were asking - even though the forum tends to be narcissistic you are least apologetic and most shameless about your being solely interested in yourself and your own fixed ideas. While I drone on and on and about an idea that came into my head while I was mowing the lawn just a minute ago you have established this shrine to your thoughts and attempt to entice people to pay a visit to this temple. I don't know which is worse. Arguments can go either way. I just thought I'd help explain its not your perceived arrogance but your narcissism that annoys people.

[Ulan]

Going back to the dating questions, I think that one hurdle we have to take is that the events during the Bar Kokhba revolt are to a large extent unknown. There is no chronicler to report on them. We cannot even tell for sure whether the Jupiter temple in Jersualem was built after the First Jewish War or during the founding of Aelia Capitolina. This makes it sometimes hard to decide which event is spoken of. It seems to be clear that, if any gospels existed during that time, they had not achieved any status of importance in the literature yet (they were not "scripture"). Only when the names of Jerusalem and Judea had been purged from the maps for good, gospels suddenly were at the center of discussion (mostly Marcion and Justin). So, funny enough, you could probably just cut out the period from the Jewish War to the Bar Kokhba revolt from Christian history and not lose much, although this is the period where the NT texts were most probably written according to mainstream scholarship.

[MrMacSon]

So, funny enough, you could probably just cut out the period from the [First] Jewish War to the Bar Kokhba revolt from Christian history and not lose much, although this is the period where the NT texts were most probably written according to mainstream scholarship.

We know a few events form the First Jewish War, and a few events from the Bar Kochba period but, true, we don't seem to know much in between.

The Olivet discourse is widely believed to refer to the destruction of the Temple by Titus in 70 AD/CE, and this is why Mrk is dated to ~70 AD/CE, but there are also references in the Olivet discourse to events following this (see Ben Witherington The Gospel of Mark: A Socio-rhetorical Commentary p. 340).

And there are valid arguments as to why the Olivet Discourse may be a reference to the Bar Kochba revolt.

In the Olivet discourse, Jesus' warns his followers that they will suffer 'tribulation' and persecution before the ultimate triumph of the Kingdom of God, but It is unclear whether the 'tribulation' Jesus describes is a past, present or future event.

And there are links to the OT books of Zechariah and Daniel.

Jesus warning the disciples about the Abomination of Desolation -"standing where it does not belong" - is generally considered to be a reference to two passages from the Book of Daniel.[9:27; 11:31] Modern scholars believe that Daniel was pseudepigraphically written in the mid-2nd century BC, and that, rather than being a genuine prophecy, the passage/s were a post-diction: written as a polemic against the shrine to Zeus set up in the temple in 168 BC by Antiochus IV Epiphanes, which had a pagan altar added onto the Altar of the Holocausts.

It's widely said that, similarly, the Olivet discourse is also post-event: that is why gMark is dated to the 70s AD/CE (ie. after the destruction of the Temple).

The setting on the Mount of Olives is thought by some scholars to be a quite deliberate echo of a passage in the Book of Zechariah which refers to the location as the place where a final battle would occur between the Jewish Messiah and his opponents.

There are various stories about Hadrian's actions before or at the start of the Bar Kochba revolt: some accounts say he was going to be magnanimous and rebuild the Jewish Temple, and announced that, but then got talked out of it. Under this account, it was Hadrian reneging on his promise that caused the Bar Kochba uprising.

It's said that after Bar Kochba rallied the people, and they massacred the famous 12th legion of the Roman army, Jerusalem was liberated for three years and Rabbi Akiva proclaimed Bar Kochba as the Messiah who was to deliver the Jewish people.

The Jews apparently set up an independent government. Coins were struck that commemorated the "First Year of the Deliverance of Israel." One coin showed the facade of the Temple, which suggests that Bar Kochba managed to partially rebuild the Temple.

The later historical work (Chronicon Paschale) describes Hadrian as the one who destroyed the Temple of the Jews. Some, therefore, assume that the Chronicon is not referring to completion of the destruction of what remained of the original Temple, but to Hadrian destroying a Temple that had been partially rebuilt by Bar Kochba. The Roman historian Dio Cassius said that Hadrian built his Temple to replace the one of the God of Israel, as if there had been a Temple to the God of Israel in Hadrian's time.

It's seems likely that Hadrian's final sacking of Jerusalem and Judea, and building his temple, was more the "abomination of desolation" than Titus's actions in 70 AD/CE.

The desolating sacrilege is best understood as a parallel to the erection of a statue of Zeus in the book of Daniel.

This makes it hard to imagine that the Synoptic Apocalypse Is referring to the initial destruction of the Temple: it seems to best fit either

• the Caligula Crisis (a proposal by Caligula to put a statue of himself or of Jupiter into the temple in AD 37–41: the reign of Gaius Caligula (37–41 AD) witnessed the first open break between the Jews and the Julio-Claudian empire); or

• the aftermath of the Bar Kochba Revolt: Hadrian erecting a statue of himself, Jupiter, and a Roman Temple where the Jewish temple once stood.

Many parts of the "Little Apocalypse" are less likely to have happened as early as to be reference to the Caligula Crisis (Messiah claimants, earthquakes, famine, significance of winter, etc.) -it more parallels things about and around the time of Bar Kochba.

Only when the names of Jerusalem and Judea had been purged from the maps for good, gospels suddenly were at the center of discussion (mostly Marcion and Justin).

Yes.

[Adam]

That the Caligula Crisis in 41 A. D. is the occasion of the Little Apocalypse (Ch. 13) is taught by the U. of Sheffield scholars Maurice Casey and James Crossley.

[MrMacSon]

That the Caligula Crisis in 41 A. D. is the occasion of the Little Apocalypse (Ch. 13) is taught by the U. of Sheffield scholars Maurice Casey and James Crossley.

Yes - 'The Date Of Mark's Gospel: Insight From The Law In Earliest Christianity' (Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series #266)
by James G. Crossley -

This book argues that Mark's Gospel was not written as late as c.65-75 CE, but dates from sometime between the late 30s and early 40s CE. It challenges the use of the external evidence (such as Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria) often used for dating Mark, relying instead on internal evidence from the gospel itself. James Crossley also questions the view that Mark 13 reflects the Jewish war, arguing that there are other plausible historical settings - for example the Caligula crises - going on to critically examine other arguments which place the writing of Mark as either around the time of the Jewish war, or at least after Paul's letters. 'The Date of Mark's Gospel' argues that the gospel makes numerous Jewish assumptions, particularly concerning law observance. before arguing more specifically that Mark assumes that Jesus fully observed biblical law, while Matthew and Luke had to make this explicit. Mark could only make such an assumption at a time when Christianity was largely law observant: and this could not have been later than the mid-40s, from which point on certain Jewish and gentile Christians were no longer observing some biblical laws (e.g. food, Sabbath).

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4066 ... k-s-gospel

And Crossley has written Jesus and the Chaos of History: Redirecting the Life of the Historical Jesus -

In Jesus and the Chaos of History, James Crossley looks at the way the earliest traditions about Jesus interacted with a context of social upheaval and the ways in which this historical chaos of the early first century led to a range of ideas which were taken up, modified, ignored, and reinterpreted in the movement that followed. Crossley examines how the earliest Palestinian tradition intersected with social upheaval and historical change and how accidental, purposeful, discontinuous, contradictory, and implicit meanings in the developments of ideas appeared in the movement that followed. He considers the ways seemingly egalitarian and countercultural ideas co-exist with ideas of dominance and power and how human reactions to socio-economic inequalities can end up mimicking dominant power. In this case, the book analyzes how a Galilean "protest" movement laid the foundations for its own brand of imperial rule. This evaluation is carried out in detailed studies on the kingdom of God and "Christology," "sinners" and purity, and gender and revolution.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2321 ... of-history

But I find assertions that Christianity was an established movement in the early-mid 1st century to be superficial.

Yes, "social upheaval" played a part in the development of Christianity, but reference to "historical chaos of the early first century" without reference to the chaos of the late first century and the early-to-mid 2nd century is head-in-the-sand stuff (especially when considering "seemingly egalitarian and countercultural ideas co-exist with ideas of dominance and power and how human reactions to socio-economic inequalities can end up mimicking dominant power").

While the Jesus story is set in the 1st century CE, it reflects at lot more than that - we know the story was developed over the subsequent two centuries and this means it is highly likely that it reflects events in those subsequent two centuries.

[MrMacSon]

.
Here's Crossley on dating Mark when he was asked

• "What are the best arguments for an early dating of Mark, which is something for which you are famous for advocating?" -

I think the best arguments are the cultural assumptions made by Mark that could not be assumed by Luke and Matthew. In particular, I think Mark can assume a time of general law observance before there was widespread challenges (40s onwards) and can present Jesus as obviously Law observant whereas Matthew and Luke, who also believed Jesus was Law observant, had to make it clear to the audience. I would say examples of this would be Mark’s handling of purity and food, Sabbath and divorce, which can then be compared with the ways Matthew and Luke handled the Markan material.

I wish Mark 13 -typically the passage for dating Mark- could be more helpful but, on the basis of Mark 13 *alone*, strong cases could be made for contexts anytime between 40-75CE.

http://www.skepticink.com/tippling/2013 ... scinating/

[Ulan]

I'm not sure that Crossley's argument works. Mark doesn't explain many things. That's one of the reasons why there are suggestions that the text may have been the "open" part of a mystery religion. Even if you don't find the latter likely, there's still the point that the "not explaining" is not unique to law observance.

[Adam]

deleted by Adam

[Ulan]

Oops, yes, Crossley. Sorry for that.

[MrMacSon]

I'm not sure that Crossley's argument works.

I agree. If academics are going to date Mark they need to address all the propositions, not just their pet one.

Mark doesn't explain many things. That's one of the reasons why there are suggestions that the text may have been the "open" part of a mystery religion.

That's interesting (to me, at least). Please elaborate.