Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket case

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Solo
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by Solo »

andrewcriddle wrote:
Solo wrote:
.......................................................
There is however another important point to be made here. It is worth to remind ourselves that Paul's letters do not - except in this instance - propagate the idea, common in the later Pastorals and the Acts that the person of Paul generated interest among high officials and rulers. I would offer that the idea that Paul was proselytizing to a wide audience (not just to small groups of the spiritually mature, those who would be saints, etc.) itself points to a legendary portrait of the apostle which is of a later patristic provenance.

Best,
Jiri
Hi Jiri

I'm not sure that attempting to arrest you is a positive form of interest from high officials.

Andrew Criddle
I did not mean to imply 'positive' interest, Andrew. I meant any kind of interest Paul's activity would have generated with the higher authorities. Paul run-ins with the law, if it in fact was 'the law' and not just reactions to his strange and disruptive behaviour (Gal 4:14, 2 Cor 5:13), would have been, in my reckoning, with the lower echelons. The pertinent question here is, did Paul's missionary activity generate massive responses in the urban population - as was alleged later - or was it from the authorities POV just harmless noise from someone who obviously had some issues that was best dealt with by few lashes and sending the would-be prophet on his way.

Best,
Jiri
Solo
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by Solo »

spin wrote:
stephan happy huller wrote:I don't know why everyone is so afraid to speak about 'interpolation.' I think it is more embarrassing to argue for an immaculate text moving through time like the onyx monolith in 2001.
Woah there, boy. I'm happy to talk about interpolations when I think there is good textual evidence for them. Nobody can deny me of that. But here the best indicator is as Solo indicated that it appears as though tacked on at the end of the chapter, not in itself very persuasive. So, it could be an interpolation, but then again... who knows? Why not face the fact that it could be a bludner.
I also indicated the suspicious oath of the writer and the fact that you will not find another instance of a 'governor' or some other named hegemon taking interest in, or exception to, Paul's preaching in his authentic letters.

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Jiri
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by JoeWallack »

JW
Peter, can you split this Thread into two. I think there are two errors here:

1) Aretas was King of Damascus at the time described by 2 Corinthians 11:32.

2) Aretas had an Ethnarch in Damascus at the time described by 2 Corinthians 11:32.

An Apologetic technique (I'm not saying there are Apologists here but I'm also not saying there are not) is to try and combine possible errors into a single discussion so a defense of one error looks like a defense of the entire area. Of course statistically, to the extent there are possible errors, the odds are increased that there is at least one likely error. This is why at ErrancyWiki only one error is argued at a time.


Joseph

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Peter Kirby
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by Peter Kirby »

JoeWallack wrote:Peter, can you split this Thread into two.
I've got bad news for you, Joe. It ain't that easy.

I agree that there are at least 2 different harmonizations offered, but there is no easy way to separate the posts into 2 threads without destroying the sense of things. If the 2nd harmonization showed up as a tangent, it might be possible, but they've both surfaced and resurfaced within the same conversation several times, with lots of posts not being clear which harmonization they are speaking about.
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by andrewcriddle »

Peter Kirby wrote:
TedM wrote:[talking to spin] since it is 'most likely' that the Aretas in 2 Cor is Aretas III, the passage 'most likely' cannot have been authentic to Paul, since Paul didn't live at that time?
I'm kind of curious to know how we know the letter-writer Paul didn't live in the first century BC (before 63 BC). For the edifying purpose of knowing the reason that such a strange thing could not be true, not because I have seriously sought to argue that he did.
Corinth (an important site of Paul's activities) was deserted in the 1st century BCE until being refounded in 44 BCE.

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spin
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by spin »

andrewcriddle wrote:
Peter Kirby wrote:
TedM wrote:[talking to spin] since it is 'most likely' that the Aretas in 2 Cor is Aretas III, the passage 'most likely' cannot have been authentic to Paul, since Paul didn't live at that time?
I'm kind of curious to know how we know the letter-writer Paul didn't live in the first century BC (before 63 BC). For the edifying purpose of knowing the reason that such a strange thing could not be true, not because I have seriously sought to argue that he did.
Corinth (an important site of Paul's activities) was deserted in the 1st century BCE until being refounded in 44 BCE.
Saying that it was deserted is not accurate. It ceased to be "a significant urban center".* *
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by andrewcriddle »

spin wrote:
andrewcriddle wrote: Corinth (an important site of Paul's activities) was deserted in the 1st century BCE until being refounded in 44 BCE.
Saying that it was deserted is not accurate. It ceased to be "a significant urban center".* *
The Corinth of Paul's letters appears to have been an urban center, (With festivals involving meat sacrificed to Pagan Gods etc.)

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spin
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by spin »

andrewcriddle wrote:
spin wrote:
andrewcriddle wrote: Corinth (an important site of Paul's activities) was deserted in the 1st century BCE until being refounded in 44 BCE.
Saying that it was deserted is not accurate. It ceased to be "a significant urban center".* *
The Corinth of Paul's letters appears to have been an urban center, (With festivals involving meat sacrificed to Pagan Gods etc.)
One doesn't know the extent of the town that developed after the destruction. The second link only shows where the traces of road existed, which suggest the possibility of a bigger interim center whose existence was wiped with the new founding of Corinth as a Roman town.
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by Bernard Muller »

I do not think a city (Corinth) fully destroyed by the Romans, mostly in ruins since that time and not yet founded again would have an "oikonomos" of the city (Romans 16:23).
Cordially, Bernard
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Re: Ethnarch of King Aretas? the legendary Damascus basket c

Post by Peter Kirby »

It is an interesting, relevant, and cogent argument regarding Corinth (if not airtight), and I thank you for it.
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