Flavius Josephus About Jesus?

[Jayhawker Soule]

It wasn't the first non earthly fabrication, ...

(Dogmatism run amok ... )

 

[dogsgod]

I have yet to see you rise above the level of inane. It would be remarkable were it not so pathetic.

ad hominem: Latin for "to the man." An arguer who uses ad hominems attacks the person instead of the argument. Whenever an arguer cannot defend his position with evidence, facts or reason, he or she may resort to attacking an opponent either through: labeling, straw man arguments, name calling, offensive remarks and anger.

 

[Oberon]

2 : to establish or verify the usage of


Attestation as in 2. To establish or verify the usage of the gospels. There are no known direct attestations to the gospels until Justin Martyr writes in 150CE.

Wrong. First, we have an actual fragment of the gospel of John which dates prior to 150CE. As for attestation of usage from other texts:

1. Matthew and Luke used Mark
2. Papias discusses the composition of Matthew and Mark in the first century
3. Clement, Polycarp, and Ignatius all reference the gospels, and all of these were active in the first century
4. The didache references Matthew


Finally, we have textual attestation. The number of texts of the gospels themselves is so great and so early there is no way they would have survived had they not been used from the beginning.

 

[dogsgod]

2. Papias

What Papias is referring to is questionable, were they the same as what we have today? Matthew is not a sayings gospel and commentary, but a narrative. Also, it's doubtful that the Matthew we have is a translation from Hebrew.

 

[dogsgod]

1. Matthew and Luke used Mark

If you want to use the authors themselves then go ahead and score a huge victory for yourself.

 

[dogsgod]

3. Clement, Polycarp, and Ignatius all reference the gospels, and all of these were active in the first century

Lay them out for us. Show us.

 

[dogsgod]

4. The didache references Matthew

Again, show us where.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

4. The didache references Matthew

Again, show us where.

Stop being so childish. Read.

 

[logician]

3. Clement, Polycarp, and Ignatius all reference the gospels, and all of these were active in the first century

Lay them out for us. Show us.

Even if true, it says nothing about the historicity of said gospels, as it would all be hearsay.

 

[dogsgod]

Even if true, it says nothing about the historicity of said gospels, as it would all be hearsay.

True, but this has more to do with whether or not the gospels played a significant role in the first century. I think not.

 

[Ben Masada]

No, because it isn't english. The grammar and syntax are wrong.

Everyone here can see how frustrated you have become to be attacking my ability to write in English because you cannot answer my questions.

No. Based on reading the relevant texts in original languages, as well as previous scholarship from which knowledge about ALL subjects is built. There is no text or event in history that is completely isolated. All texts are products of cultures and times, and all events occur within particular cultures and times. In order to understand the NT, and the historical Jesus, it is necessary to read all the relevant primary texts, not to mention previous scholarship of people who have already done that and come to certain conclusions.

No one is certain about anything written. Only Oberon. Relevant texts of human opinions!

This is true of any field, history, psychology, linguistics, biology, etc. People build off of the research and investigations of other experts who have gone before.

All opinions being built up from other opinions. There is nothing new under the sun. What we find today, it has been before. Then, you build your opinion on other people's opinions.

In Jesus research, this means being able to read not only the NT and OT in their original languages, but also all the other relevant texts (philo, josephus, the apocryphal literature, classical and hellenistic literature, etc). That allows one to be familiar not only with the culture whence came the NT texts, but also the nature of the texts themselves. And, additionally, it is important to read the research and inquiry of those experts who have gone before. They also studied the necessary data, and have come to conclusions based of that data. By reading previous scholarship, one comes in contact with the discoveries and ideas of other informed people.

NT! Look at him! The NT was written by Hellenistic Gentiles with a very poor knowledge of Jewish culture and customs. What kind of opinion you can build on such dunghill?

You have neither read the relevant primary texts, nor scholarship, nor is your methodology in approaching these texts remotely valid.

What you have read is only the rumination of other people, who perhaps knew even less than you do.

No, I mean the primary texts (the NT, Josephus, hebrew scriptures, intertestamental literature, qumran documents, Philo, classical and hellenistic histories, and so on). How can you possibly understand cultures and texts 2000 years old without having studied the cultures and texts?

And what is all that you have mentioned above if not the opinons of other people? Stop the cop-out man! There is nothing original.

No, I just mean your sentences aren't proper english. Spelling mistakes are one thing, but often enough your grammar and syntax is remarkably poor. Not that this is your fault. I imagine english isn't your first language, and your english is certainly better than my german and french.

Here, more insults and attacks from someone who is too frustrated for not knowing how to answer questions put to him.

 

[Oberon]

3. Clement, Polycarp, and Ignatius all reference the gospels, and all of these were active in the first century

Lay them out for us. Show us.

I don't have to. It's been done, and luckily for you, one such source which examines NT references in the Didache, in 1 Clement, in Ignatius, in Polycarp, and others, is publicly available from google books: The New Testament in The Apostolic Fathers.
You can download it for free and look for yourself.

Other (not publicily available) sources include those I have already cited as well as Trajectories through the New Testament and Apostolic Fathers.

 

[dogsgod]

Yes you do have to if you are making such claims. Show us the lines and match them with the gospels. Don't expect everyone else to go looking for these lines in order to support your claims. I want to see these lines taken from the gospels as you claim, and not just common maxims of the day that could just as well have been drawn from Proverbs, Genesis, or the Psalms.

 

[Oberon]

Yes you do have to if you are making such claims. Show us the lines and match them with the gospels. Don't expect everyone else to go looking for these lines in order to support your claims.

You don't have to go looking. It's all here, every line compared: The New Testament in the Apostolic Fathers. You provided links for your points, so I assume I can do the same, and at least mine is published by an academic press.

I want to see these lines taken from the gospels as you claim

Then check out the link, and it is all there.

 

[dogsgod]

I have no idea what lines you have in mind. You find them and copy and paste so we can compare them.

 

[Oberon]

I have no idea what lines you have in mind. You find them and copy and paste so we can compare them.

I can't copy and paste from that book. As for what "lines" I "have in mind," I have in mind numerous lines referenced in several texts. The book lists them by chapter. There is Barnabas, the Didache, 1 Clement, Ignatius, and Polycarp. In each chapter, their is a section on references from the gospel. I am talking about ALL of these references, and I have given you a handy link that includes not only a list but a discussion of all of them. All the work is done for you; you just have to read it.

From the results:

 

[dogsgod]

What I found on the Didache as it pertains to Matthew:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Matthew
In modern scholarship a new consensus is emerging which dates the Didache at about the turn of the 1st century. At the same time, significant similarities between the Didache and the gospel of Matthew have been found as these writings share words, phrases, and motifs. There is also an increasing reluctance of modern scholars to support the thesis that the Didache used Matthew. This close relationship between these two writings might suggest that both documents were created in the same historical and geographical setting. One argument that suggests a common environment is that the community of both the Didache and the gospel of Matthew was probably composed of Judaeo-Christians from the beginning, though each writing shows indications of a congregation which appears to have alienated itself from its Jewish background. Also, the Two Ways teaching (Did. 1-6) may have served as a pre-baptismal instruction within the community of the Didache and Matthew. Furthermore, the correspondence of the Trinitarian baptismal formula in the Didache and Matthew (Did. 7 and Matt 28:19) as well as the similar shape of the Lord's Prayer (Did. 8 and Matt 6:5-13) apparently reflect the use of resembling oral forms of church traditions. Finally, both the community of the Didache (Did. 11-13) and Matthew (Matt 7:15-23; 10:5-15, 40-42; 24:11,24) were visited by itinerant apostles and prophets, some of whom were illegitimate.H. van de Sandt (ed), Matthew and the Didache, ( Assen: Royal van Gorcum; Philadelphia: Fortress Press , 2005).

 

[Oberon]

What I found on the Didache as it pertains to Matthew:

Source?

"Among written sources used by the author [of the Didache] we find two quotations from the Old Testament...two from the New Testament (both from Matthew)...The two quotations from Matthew are , "Do not pray as the hypocrites, but as the Lord commanded inhis gospel, pray thus: "Our father who art in heaven..for thine is the power and the glory forever" (viii.2, from Matt. vi.6ff) and "Let no one eat or drink of the Lord; for to this also the saying of the Lord is applicable, "Do not give that which is holy to the dogs" (ix.5, from Matt. vii.6)" p. 50

Metzger, Bruce M. The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.

We have clear quotations from Mattew in this document. Now, if you want to argue that these quotes of Jesus are from oral tradition, and not Matthew, that actually supports your thesis even less. If it is true that oral tradition concerning Jesus' teachings was well controlled enough that the Didache, not to mention 1 clement (as you argued as well), have Jesus saying the same things that the gospels do INDEPENDENTLY of the gospels, then that means that the oral tradition was controlled enough to keep the sayings of Jesus fairly constant for 70+ years after his death. This being the case, we can add the Didache, as well as 1 Clement and the other early references to the gospels as independent evidence for Jesus.

After all, if multiple sayings of Jesus are attested to independently in sources outside the gospels, which didn't use the gospels, and which cohere with the gospels, not only does this support what I have argued all along (that the oral Jesus tradition was relatively controlled and reliable) but that we have other independent sources of Jesus.

So if you want to argue that the Didache and 1 Clement, not to mention Polycarp and Irenaeus, are all independent of the gospels, go ahead. It weakens your case far more.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

John S. Kloppenborg Verbin comments on the Didache (Excavating Q, pp. 134-135):

The Didache, an early second-century Christian composition, is also clearly composite, consisting of a "Two Ways" section (chaps. 1-6), a liturgical manual (7-10), instructions on the reception of traveling prophets (11-15), and a brief apocalypse (16). Marked divergences in style and content as well as the presence of doublets and obvious interpolations make plain the fact that the Didache was not cut from whole cloth. The dominant view today is that the document was composed on the basis of several independent, preredactional units which were assembled by either one or two redactors (Neiderwimmer 1989:64-70, ET 1998:42-52). Comparison of the "Two Ways" section with several other "Two Ways" documents suggests that Didache 1-6 is itself the result of multistage editing. The document began with rather haphazard organization (cf. Barnabas 18-20), but was reorganized in a source common to the Didache, the Doctrina apostolorum, and the Apostolic Church Order and supplemented by a sapiental meditation on minor and major transgressions (3.1-6) (Kloppenborg 1995c). In addition to this "Two Ways" section it is also possible to discern the presence of a mini-apocalypse related to someo f the materials that eventually found their way into Matthew 24-25 (Kloppenborg 1979).

The most obvious insertion in the Didache is a catena of sayings of Jesus (1.3-6) which interrupts the continuity between 1.1-2 and 2.2. The same hand that added 1.3b-6 (and the transitional phrase in 2.1) appears also to be responsible for a transition in 6.2-3 and for the introduction to the apocalypse (16.1-2), which like 1.3b-2.1 Christianizes the earlier document by affixing sayings designed to evoke the sayings of Jesus. It seems clear, then, that the composition history of the Didache involves at least two originally independent documents (Did. 1.1-2; 2.2-6.1; and Did. 16.3-8) which were combined with other materials by an editor into a church manual, and "Christianized" by the interpolation of sayings of Jesus.
​

 

[Dirty Penguin]

A. D. Howell-Smith writes about the Didache (Jesus Not a Myth, p. 120):



The simple Christology of Acts confronts us again in the so-called Teaching of the Apostles, a composite work, of which the first six chapters seem to be a Christian redaction of a Jewish document entitled The Two Ways, while the rest is the work of several Christian writers, the earliest belonging to the first century and the latest perhaps to the fourth. The Jesus mentioned in this book's account of the celebration of the Eucharist is just the "Servant" (Παις) of God, who has made known the "holy vine" of God's "Servant" David; nothing is said of the bread and wine being the body and blood of Jesus. The formula of baptism in the name of the Trinity, which is given in Chap. VII, must come from a later hand, though possibly earlier than Justin Martyr, who is familiar with it.