Bernard Muller wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 9:03 am
I don't think the Didache should be on that list, because it was not written by any Patristic fathers. .
Cheers Bernard. I had wondered the same thing. But, as it has been framed as a [relatively] key early text, I thought it worth leaving in, at present anyway [eta: I've greyed the text for the Didache and the characters on the column to reflect your point].
I also wondered about including the Diatessaron or not.
I wondered if Diognetus/Diogenius/Diogenes[?] was that significant, but wanted to go as early as possible with 'likely concrete' or 'possibly significant' Fathers, or have him or others discussed as useful or not. There's also 'Hermas', 'pseudo-Barnabas', and Clement of Rome (who is associated with 1 Corinthians, of course; +/- others)
Bernard Muller wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 9:03 am
Of course, we cannot assume the patristic fathers had to allude to or quote or named all the NT texts they knew about. That was not the purpose of what they wrote.
Yes, a very good point. But This gives us a chance to see what groupings or patterns of Patristic Fathers might emerge.
.
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Bernard Muller wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 9:03 am
Papias alluded to gMatthew? I wonder about where is the evidence for that. .
Ben C. Smith wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 9:19 am
You know the evidence for it. The issue is whether or not our canonical Matthew is one of the Greek translations mentioned in the quotation. It is absolutely fine to argue that it is not; but on a general chart like this it would be positively disingenuous to overlook that passage or blithely assume in advance that it cannot refer to the text we know as Matthew. The possibility is very real.
What I am not sure about in this particular tabular system is the question mark symbol. Does it mean that it is questionable whether the father referred to the text at all (in which case it serves as a diluted X), or merely that it is questionable whether the father quoted it as authoritative (in which case it serves as a diluted O)?
If the former, I would be in favor of a question mark both for Matthew and for Mark in the Papias column ... there has to be something for both Matthew and Mark in that column. .
Bernard Muller wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 9:35 am Yes, I forgot about the logias of Matthew. But I think that should be marked in the column as a ? .
Cordially, Bernard
I will shortly put ?'s for both for Matthew and for Mark in the Papias column
Ben C. Smith wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 9:19 am
What I am not sure about in this particular tabular system is the question mark symbol.Does ? mean that it is questionable whether the father referred to the text at all (in which case it serves as a diluted X), or merely that it is questionable whether the father quoted it as authoritative (in which case it serves as a diluted O)?
I think we should say ? = it is questionable whether the father referred to the text at all ie. a diluted or soft X.
I will move ? above X in that top left cell / box
Maybe we could (or should) re-jig the definition of X?
Jax wrote: ↑
Nice table BTW. Would it help, I wonder, to list the NT material in the order that it might have been composed rather than the way it is listed in the cannon today?
Cheers. The Pauline's before the Synoptics? The Johannine books together? (gJohn, the 3 epistles of John, and Revelation?)
Michael BG wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 7:25 am
Nice table, I wonder if it can be used to come up with a date for when we can be 90% certain that each book was in existence.
Cheers
Jax wrote: ↑Sat Oct 21, 2017 8:28 am
Just looking at the data, I would guess no earlier than Origen.
Peter Kirby wrote: ↑Fri Oct 20, 2017 11:56 pm
Feels like some of this needs to be normalized a bit for the size of the source (e.g. Jude, Philemon, 2 & 3 John) when making some forms of arguments based on the relative known reference count. .
Cheers Peter. That may be worth us doing. I'd also like to consider a qualitative assessment of the references, too.
IMHO, I don't think we can safely assume we have the works of actual Patristic Fathers in the letter(s) attributed to "Apostolic fathers" like Clement (of Rome), Barnabas, Mathetes to Diognetus, Ignatius, and Polycarp. I would not even dare to attribute these books to hard and fast dates of composition. Justin Martyr, at least his Dialogue with Trypho, I'll accept as original to that person, but not the "Aplogies" he supposedly addressed to various Roman Emperors. Even then I am not sure whether the dialogue actually occurred, if it occurred at all, after the 1st Judean rebellion, or the uprising in Egypt and Cyrene, or the one under Bar Kochba. It may have been based on dialogues from the 1st war or Egyptian uprising, and recycled for a later conflict.
That they mention only bits and pieces of Matthew's (Gk) gospel and maybe something from the major letters of Paul, may just be the intent of the authors to remain true to the memories of these folks in the popular Christian consciousness, and not include intentional anachronisms. If we look hard enough, though, unintentional anachronisms probably do exist in them, if they are really the products of pious story-telling (myth making) and moral admonitions from later times and projected back.
Irenaeus, it seems to me, is the very first Christian father who exhibits knowledge of virtually every canonical NT book, and claims at least a minor association with Polycarp (sat at the man's feet, but I don't know if he was teaching adults as Irenaeus listened in, or was recounting stories for kiddies, or was even reading aloud from his published canons of NT sacred scripture). While I realize SA has his own take on the historicity of Irenaeus, I think that it is more likely that he did exist, right around the middle of the 2nd century.
Since it seems unlikely that the actual authors of the "Apostolic fathers" or even Justin were aware of most of the books that Irenaeus knew about, I'd have to put the dates of their composition before the books popularized by Irenaeus became commonly known. Earliest decades of the 2nd century?
I am guessing along with others, particularly David Trobisch, that Polycarp was the one to first publish sets of books for devotional use, from his hometown of Smyrna, Asia Minor, although I am not sure how many of the "big 4" collections this included (e = four gospels Mt, Mk, Lk & Jn; a = Acts of the Apostles & General letters i.e., James, Jude, John, but not of Paul; p = 13 letters of Paul +/- Hebrews; and r = Revelation of Jesus Christ to his Slave John), or whether the earliest editions of these sets of books were different than what ended up being preserved.
DCH
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Jax wrote: ↑
Nice table BTW. Would it help, I wonder, to list the NT material in the order that it might have been composed rather than the way it is listed in the cannon today?
Cheers. The Pauline's before the Synoptics? The Johannine books together? (gJohn, the 3 epistles of John, and Revelation?)
Yes, except I don't think that Revelation belongs with the Johannine material. It seems like it was produced very early.
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