Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Lena Einhorn wrote:For the sake of expediency (and promoting simplicity), I shall put the segment from the Slavonic Testimonium and Josephus's two segments on "the Egyptian" underneath each other (can't figure out how to do it side-by-side)
You have to use tables:

Slavonic Testimonium
Antiquities 20.169-172
[/b]
War of the Jews 2.261-263
[/b]
But it was his habit rather to remain in front of the city on the Mount of Olives; and there he also [freely] gave cures to people. And there 150 servants and a multitude of people joined him, seeing his power [and] how by word he did everything he wished.

They bade him enter the city, kill the Roman troops and Pilate and reign over these. But he did not care [to do so]. Later, when news of this came to the Jewish leaders, they assembled to the chief priests and said, “We are powerless and [too] weak to oppose the Romans, like a slackened bow. Let us go and inform Pilate what we have heard; and we shall be free of anxiety; if at some time he shall hear [of this] from others, we shall be deprived of [our] property, ourselves slaughtered and [our] children exiled.”

And they went and informed Pilate. And he sent and killed many of the people and brought in that wonder-worker. After inquiring about him, Pilate understood that he was a doer of good, not of evil, [and] not a rebel nor one desirous of kingship, and he released him.
There came out of Egypt about this time to Jerusalem one that said he was a prophet, and advised the multitude of the common people to go along with him to the Mount of Olives, as it was called, which lay over against the city, and at the distance of five furlongs.

He said further, that he would show them from hence how, at his command, the walls of Jerusalem would fall down; and he promised them that he would procure them an entrance into the city through those walls, when they were fallen down.

Now when Felix was informed of these things, he ordered his soldiers to take their weapons, and came against them with a great number of horsemen and footmen from Jerusalem, and attacked the Egyptian and the people that were with him. He also slew four hundred of them, and took two hundred alive. But the Egyptian himself escaped out of the fight, but did not appear any more.
But there was an Egyptian false prophet that did the Jews more mischief than the former; for he was a sorcerer, and pretended to be a prophet also, and got together thirty thousand men that were deluded by him; these he led round about from the wilderness to the mount which was called the Mount of Olives,

and was ready to break into Jerusalem by force from that place; and if he could but once conquer the Roman garrison and the people, he intended to domineer over them by the assistance of those guards of his that were to break into the city with him.

But Felix prevented his attempt, and met him with his Roman soldiers, while all the people assisted him in his attack upon them, insomuch that when it came to a battle, the Egyptian ran away, with a few others, while the greatest part of those that were with him were either destroyed or taken alive; but the rest of the multitude were dispersed every one to their own homes, and there concealed themselves

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Lena Einhorn
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by Lena Einhorn »

Tried .... I couldn't figure it out ...
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maryhelena
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by maryhelena »

The Slavonic comparison with Antiquites and War is not the wonder-doer story - the Slavonic version of War has it's own Egyptian story. The Slavonic wonder-doer story, the Slavonic Testimonium, is set in the time of Pilate - it's Egyptian story is set in the time of Felix.


"Jewish War" and Its Slavonic Version: A Synoptic Comparison: H. Leeming, K. Leeming. page 275/6Antiquities 20.169-172War of the Jews 2.261-263
Among them was an Egyptian, a magician who had adopted the guise of prophet. Gathering 1.000 dupes he led them into the desert as far as the Mount of Olives, whence he intended to get into Jerusalem by stealth, to seize the Roman guards and rule as king.

And Felix had news of this and met them with one thousand Romans. A battle took place and he defeated them.

Only the Egyptian escaped with 50 [men]
There came out of Egypt about this time to Jerusalem one that said he was a prophet, and advised the multitude of the common people to go along with him to the Mount of Olives, as it was called, which lay over against the city, and at the distance of five furlongs.

He said further, that he would show them from hence how, at his command, the walls of Jerusalem would fall down; and he promised them that he would procure them an entrance into the city through those walls, when they were fallen down.

Now when Felix was informed of these things, he ordered his soldiers to take their weapons, and came against them with a great number of horsemen and footmen from Jerusalem, and attacked the Egyptian and the people that were with him. He also slew four hundred of them, and took two hundred alive. But the Egyptian himself escaped out of the fight, but did not appear any more.
But there was an Egyptian false prophet that did the Jews more mischief than the former; for he was a sorcerer, and pretended to be a prophet also, and got together thirty thousand men that were deluded by him; these he led round about from the wilderness to the mount which was called the Mount of Olives,

and was ready to break into Jerusalem by force from that place; and if he could but once conquer the Roman garrison and the people, he intended to domineer over them by the assistance of those guards of his that were to break into the city with him.

But Felix prevented his attempt, and met him with his Roman soldiers, while all the people assisted him in his attack upon them, insomuch that when it came to a battle, the Egyptian ran away, with a few others, while the greatest part of those that were with him were either destroyed or taken alive; but the rest of the multitude were dispersed every one to their own homes, and there concealed themselves.

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
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Lena Einhorn
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by Lena Einhorn »

maryhelena wrote:
The Slavonic comparison with Antiquites and War is not the wonder-doer story - the Slavonic version of War has it's own Egyptian story. The Slavonic wonder-doer story, the Slavonic Testimonium, is set in the time of Pilate - it's Egyptian story is set in the time of Felix.
OF COURSE it has it's own story about "the Egyptian"! We are talking Josephus here! The story of "the Egyptian" comes from Josephus!
That's not the point. The point is that we are looking at the Testimonium Flavianum, a section of Josephus's text (in this case -- the Slavonic TF -- in War of the Jews), which almost everyone agrees was not written by Josephus, at least not in its current form.The TF is added (or at the very least augmented) by others.

I wonder why the similarities don't spark your curiosity.
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maryhelena
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by maryhelena »

Lena Einhorn wrote:
maryhelena wrote:
The Slavonic comparison with Antiquites and War is not the wonder-doer story - the Slavonic version of War has it's own Egyptian story. The Slavonic wonder-doer story, the Slavonic Testimonium, is set in the time of Pilate - it's Egyptian story is set in the time of Felix.
OF COURSE it has it's own story about "the Egyptian"! We are talking Josephus here! The story of "the Egyptian" comes from Josephus!
That's not the point. The point is that we are looking at the Testimonium Flavianum, a section of Josephus's text (in this case -- the Slavonic TF -- in War of the Jews), which almost everyone agrees was not written by Josephus, at least not in its current form.The TF is added (or at the very least augmented) by others.

I wonder why the similarities don't spark your curiosity.
The wonder-doer in the Slavonic Josephus story is not a revolutionary. This figure is not interested in a fight with Rome. Consequently, there is no similarity between the actions of the wonder-doer and the actions of the Egyptian.
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
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FransJVermeiren
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by FransJVermeiren »

Giuseppe wrote:To Frans:
I have yet to read your book next days but I know from Internet that your view about Paul is that he believed in a coming Christ, not in a Christ already crucified in the past. And therefore any occurrence of 'Jesus' in the epistles would be late interpolations. A question that my future reading of your book will raise is surely the following: what is your view about the possibility (a probability according to Richard Carrier, indeed) that at time of Paul the name 'Jesus' was fully expected as name for the Messiah? This would make your thesis one with no need of assuming that kind of interpolation, I think.

Obviously, I am curious of knowing your view about the mention of a Christ already crucified in the epistle to Hebrews (assumed before the 70 CE) and how this may be an obstacle for your thesis. But I bet that this evidence will be addressed in your book.

Thanks in advance.
The suggestion of ‘Jesus’ as name of the messiah is elegant, but I don’t think it is correct. In my book I extensively defend the position that Paul was the propagator of a future unnamed Essene messiah. I will touch only two points here. The second one I researched only recently, so you won’t find it in my book.

1. Nestle-Aland (Greek-English New Testament) shows that the word ‘Jesus’ has been added to the text of the Pauline letters at least 7 times. So now the text reads ‘Jesus Christ’ or ‘our Lord Jesus Christ’ while the comparison of all early versions makes Nestle-Aland conclude that originally the text had ‘Christ’ or ‘our Lord Christ’ instead. There would have been no need for this if Paul used the name ‘Jesus’ for a future messiah.

2. In my opinion 1 Cor 5, verse 5 gives a fine view on the working method of the copiers/editors of the Pauline epistles.
“… you are to deliver this man to satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.”

The footnotes show that there are four textual variants of ‘in the day of the Lord Jesus’.

They go as follows:
• In the day of the Lord
Εν τῇ ἡμερᾁ του κυριου

• In the day of the Lord Jesus
Εν τῇ ἡμερᾁ του κυριου Ιησου

• In the day of the Lord Jesus Christ
Εν τῇ ἡμερᾁ του κυριου Ιησου Χριστου

• In the day of our Lord Jesus Christ
Εν τῇ ἡμερᾁ του κυριου ημων Ιησου Χριστου

The ‘day of the Lord’ (or ‘day of revenge’) is a key concept in the Essene Dead Sea Scrolls, and in short it describes the day when Jahweh will come to put an end to the oppression of the Jews, to harshly punish their enemies (in an atmosphere of war and all kind of calamities) and to bring His messiah to power to rule over a liberated and prosperous Israel. So the Lord in this concept is Jahweh, not an unnamed Christ nor Jesus the messiah. Paul uses this concept time and again in his letters, and in my opinion he always uses it in its original Essene, eschatological sense. Which means that all the words at the end of the sentence following ‘kuriou’ (bold and underlined) are later accretions, ‘Jesus’ as well as ‘Christ’. Note also the future tense, so Paul looks forward to the future great day of the Lord.
www.waroriginsofchristianity.com

The practical modes of concealment are limited only by the imaginative capacity of subordinates. James C. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance.
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MrMacSon
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

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maryhelena wrote:
  • ... The Slavonic wonder-doer story, the Slavonic 'Testimonium', is set in the time of Pilate - it's Egyptian story is set in the time of Felix.
Yes, the the Slavonic 'Testimonium', is set in the time of Pilate, as are other texts: notably the NT-gospels, of course (but not the Pauline epistles*(?!)), and an often touted passage in Annals 15.44 -
  • "... Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called 'Chrestians' by the populace. 'Christus', from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea ..."
To me, the scenario with the Slavonic 'Testimonium' invokes the proposition of Jay Raskins that the Annals passage [15.4] could have initially been about Nero and one of Nero's procurators (eg. Festus, but it could have been Felxi, or Florus), and was 'doctored' to be about Tiberius & Pilate to both instigate the core of the Christian story. It is essentially a time-shift, too.

I proposed a number of years ago that Tacitus originally wrote that Nero sent the Procurator Porcius Festus to put down the Christians/Chrestians.

Christian interpolators, misunderstanding, changed it to Pontius Pilate, and they changed Chrestus to Christ and Nero to Tiberius.

Thus the original read:

Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite punishments on a class hated for their disgraceful acts, called Chrestians by the populace. Chrestus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty (i.e., Crucifixion) during the reign of Nero at the hands of one of our procurators, Porcius Festus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.
https://jayraskin.wordpress.com/2011/04/04/294/
  • [It is also noticable that Annals 15.44 refers incorrectly to Pontius Pilate by the mid 1st-century title of procurator, instead of his then correct title of prefect (praefectus).]
I have truncated Ben's table to highlight the suggestion something similar has also happened with the Slavonic 'Testimonium' -
Ben C. Smith wrote:
Slavonic Testimonium
Antiquities 20.169-172
[/b]
War of the Jews 2.261-263
[/b]
.

They bade him enter the city, kill the Roman troops and Pilate and reign over these. But he did not care [to do so]. Later, when news of this came to the Jewish leaders, they assembled to the chief priests and said, “We are powerless and [too] weak to oppose the Romans, like a slackened bow. Let us go and inform Pilate what we have heard[??]; and we shall be free of anxiety; if at some time he shall hear [of this] from others, we shall be deprived of [our] property, ourselves slaughtered and [our] children exiled.”

And they went and informed Pilate. And he sent and killed many of the people and brought in that wonder-worker. After inquiring about him, Pilate understood that he was a doer of good, not of evil, [and] not a rebel nor one desirous of kingship, and he released him.
.
.

.

Now when Felix was informed of these things, he ordered his soldiers to take their weapons, and came against them with a great number of horsemen and footmen from Jerusalem, and attacked the Egyptian and the people that were with him. He also slew four hundred of them, and took two hundred alive. But the Egyptian himself escaped out of the fight, but did not appear any more.
.

.

But Felix prevented his attempt, and met him with his Roman soldiers, while all the people assisted him in his attack upon them, insomuch that when it came to a battle, the Egyptian ran away, with a few others, while the greatest part of those that were with him were either destroyed or taken alive; but the rest of the multitude were dispersed every one to their own homes, and there concealed themselves

* Do the Pauline texts provide any internal indications of time-period?

.
Lena Einhorn
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by Lena Einhorn »

MrMacSon wrote:
"It is also noticable that Annals 15.44 refers incorrectly to Pontius Pilate by the mid 1st-century title of procurator, instead of his then correct title of prefect (praefectus)."
That is one of the three (that I am aware of) suspicious aspects of Annals 15.44.
The other two are:
a) Christus is a theological term, which means "the anointed" ("messiah"). If Tacitus had used official Roman records, he ought to have called him by a proper name, i.e. “Jesus ben Joseph,” or something similar.
b) early Christian writers do not refer to this text.
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

Post by Ben C. Smith »

MrMacSon wrote:Do the Pauline texts provide any internal indications of time-period?
Only broadly and indirectly:
  • On the terminus post quem side of things, S. C. Carlson has pointed out that Corinth was razed to the ground some 146 years before Christ and was not refounded until 44 years before Christ. About 77 years before Christ Cicero wrote in Tusculan Disputations 3.53: ...magisque me moverant Corinthi subito aspectae parietinae quam ipsos Corinthios, quorum animis diuturna cogitatio callum vetustatis obduxerat ("and the ruins of Corinth suddenly moved me more than [they moved] the Corinthians themselves, whose souls had become callous by frequent [and] longstanding reflection"). This would seem to date the Corinthian epistles to after the refoundation of the city of Corinth. Andrew Criddle has pointed out that the way in which Paul in his epistles to Corinth refers to Achaea and Macedonia as distinct regions, with Corinth a prominent place in Achaea (refer to 2 Corinthians 9.1-2, for example), is more likely if it is written after Augustus appears to have split southern Greece from Macedonian administrative control to establish (or re-establish) the province of Achaea with the refounded Corinth as its capital 27 years before Christ.
  • On the terminus ante quem side of things, some verses (1 Corinthians 10.18; 2 Thessalonians 2.4; Romans 9.4) appear to presume that the temple is still standing, its sacrificial system still running. Furthermore, Paul frequently mentions Jerusalem as a viable destination with a functioning church (Romans 15.19, 25-26, 31; 1 Corinthians 16.3; Galatians 1.17-18; 2.1); these mentions seem to fit in better with the situation in Judea before 70 than with the situation after the Jewish revolt. Similarly, Galatians 1.19 makes the author a contemporary of James (the just), whom Hegesippus, Josephus, and several other sources date to before the fall of the temple (in 70). Nevertheless, other indications in the letters seem to presuppose the destruction of Jerusalem; chief among these is the probable interpolation in 1 Thessalonians 2.14-16, but some also see the destruction as forming the background to parts of Romans 9-11, for example.
  • Only a bit more precisely, 2 Corinthians 11.32-33 would seem to date the autobiographical episode described in those verses, at least, to the reign of Aretas III (from about 9 years before Christ to 40 anno domini).
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MrMacSon
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Re: Time Shift scenarios and the New Testament texts

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Lena Einhorn wrote:
MrMacSon wrote:
"It is also noticable that Annals 15.44 refers incorrectly to Pontius Pilate by the mid 1st-century title of procurator, instead of his then correct title of prefect (praefectus)."
That is one of the three (that I am aware of) suspicious aspects of Annals 15.44.

The other two are:
  • a) Christus is a theological term, which means "the anointed" ("messiah"). If Tacitus had used official Roman records, he ought to have called him by a proper name, i.e. “Jesus ben Joseph,” or something similar.

    b) early Christian writers do not refer to this text.
Yes.

Regarding (a): I have seen commentary that the fires in Rome in the 1st century -the fire in Nero's time and another great fire ~ 84 AD/CE- would have destroyed many official Roman records.

Regarding (b): the only thing of note in early Christianity is a similar passage in Sculpitius Severus's Chronicle/Sacred History circa 425 AD/CE. Arthur Drews argued (in The Witnesses to the Historical Jesus) that it seems more likely that the passage in Severus's Chronicle/Sacred History was used to doctor Annals 15.44. I wonder if both texts were doctored later: -ie. at the same time.

Apparently Jerome refers to 30 books of Tacitus (suggesting he is referring to Tacitus's Histories and Annals), but there does not seem to be any other known reference to Annals before the separate discoveries of groups of books in separate monastery libraries/scriptoria the 14th/15th centuries.
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