Answer on Acts (to Dick Harfield)

Factuality of the Bible: answering Earnest Farr · Guestpost · answering Dick Harfield · Answer on Acts (to Dick Harfield)

On Quora, I posed a question, which was answered by Dick Harfield. This answer is quote on the previous post. However, here I will requote parts in answer. Why here, why not commenting on quora below his answer? Because he stopped further comments, after I had already given answers on the Pentateuch, the books of Ruth, Esther and Daniel. Separately, instead of making just one reply to the answer by Harfield. So, he stopped me, who had posed the question, to comment under his answer to it. Hence, I was unable to add the answer on Acts there, and I add it here instead.

Acts

Acts of the Apostles used to be regarded as an accurate and reliable history of the early church, At the beginning of the twentieth century, Sir William Ramsay stated:

Luke is a historian of the first rank; not merely are his statements of fact trustworthy...this author should be placed along with the very greatest of historians.

Which would not preclude that he was a historian after the ideal of historians in his day.

New Testament scholars have reviewed the evidence and no longer hold that to be the case, generally regarding the book as propaganda rather than actual history.

For such, he cites Bart D. Ehrman and Richard Carrier, known (to others as to me) to be biassed against Christianity.
He also cites Uta Ranke-Heinemann and Thomas Kazen, whom I did not know prior to this and cannot pretend to know how they are perceived by others.

Acts contains some errors that can be demonstrated to be inaccurate.

O ... K ... this is a very far cry from non-historic, fictional.

As my claims is not just historicity, but inerrancy, I still need to adress the allegations, but not in order to defend the verdict of Sir William Ramsay.

A well known historical error has Gamaliel speak of the rebel Theudas, whom the first-century Jewish historian Josephus assigns to the time of the procurator Cuspius Fadus (44-46 CE) several years after the death of Gamaliel. Acts of the Apostles also places Theudas before Judas the Galilean, who “arose in the days of the census” which had occurred decades earlier.

A minimalist could answer, Gamaliel actually named Judas the Galilaean, but the awareness of the more recent and prominent Theudas prompted St. Luke to misquote Gamaliel. Not that exact wording of quotes was not held as a part of historical accuracy, the actual words (as long as the gist was not twisted) were fashioned by the rhetoric art of the historian to the taste or presumed such of his audience. This is why Caesar asks "you too, Brutus?" or "you too, son?" and asks it in Latin or in Greek depending on what historian reports. However, even so, it would on this minimalist view have been a blunder.

But I am not a minimalist. I consider it quite possible that one devious move against Christianity by the Jews (and completing it in Josephus' time) was historic revisionism to "prove" Christianity historically wrong.

For instance, St. Paul had spoken of Melchisedec as "a king of gentiles", some text versions may have had (I think this is how I recall it) "a gentile" even.

Subverted if Melchisedec was Shem, right? But according to the chronology for Genesis 11 that Josephus had learned as a child, close to LXX chronology, he couldn't be.

However, with the new chronology he learned as an adult, Shem could be that and Jews could claim that Melchisedec was Shem and St. Paul was wrong.

the father of Abraham, who accordingly was the tenth from Noah, and was born in the two hundred and ninety-second year after the deluge;

Josephus is giving LXX chronology in the sum. 292 years from Deluge to birth of Abraham. But look at his motivation:

for Terah begat Abram in his seventieth year. (70)
Nahor begat Haran when he was one hundred and twenty years old; (120)
Nahor was born to Serug in his hundred and thirty-second year; (132)
Ragau had Serug at one hundred and thirty; (130)
at the same age also Phaleg had Ragau; (130)
Heber begat Phaleg in his hundred and thirty-fourth year; (134)
he himself being begotten by Sala when he was a hundred and thirty years old, (130)
whom Arphaxad had for his son at the hundred and thirty-fifth year of his age. (135)
Arphaxad was the son of Shem, and born twelve years after the deluge. (12)

Now, does this actually add up to 292?

70 + 120 + 132 + 130 + 130 + 134 + 130 + 135 + 12 = 993

Now, 993 years is very different from 292 - couldn't Josephus count?

Probably forgot to check - or deliberately made a gaffe to give a hint about the earlier text tradition.

His detailed genealogy is given with the ages he recalled from childhood, when he had learned the Scriptures. His sum is the one Jews had agreed on.

So, it is possible that Josephus was also giving a wrong chronology on this issue, for similar reasons - someone (not necessarily himself, could well be a synagogue he felt he had to obey) wanted to prove St. Luke wrong. But hear me out, it is also possible that ... something else totally than fraud involving Josephus ... exonerates St. Luke from even minor error.

Internal evidence demonstrates that the author of Acts relied on Josephus’ account in Antiquities of the Jews, but misreported the chronology because of the roundabout prose in Antiquities.

St. Luke was a Greek and a physician. No one ever dreamed of disputing this claim by pretending his mastery of Greek was faulty. So, was the prose of Antiquities too roundabout even for St. Luke? Perhaps it's rather the modern commenter who bungles Josephus. Some late 20th / early 21st C. opponents of mine bungle my prose.

Acts can also be checked for accuracy by comparing its account with Paul’s epistles. Bart D. Ehrman writes, in The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings:

In virtually every instance in which the book of Acts can be compared with Paul's letters in terms of biographical detail, differences emerge.

I am given no concrete instance, but in case others would give you such, I turn with confidence to Testify for sorting that kind of "contradiction claims" out. That team may bungle ecclesiology, bungle some parts of Christian morality (notably the ban on all contraceptive practises), but they (including the youtuber behind Testify) are fairly used to dealing with the type of claim Bart Ehrman makes in better detail than I could.

https://www.youtube.com/@TestifyApologetics

Richard Carrier says, in On the Historicity of Jesus, that the author of Acts

rewrites Homer several other times.

I am breaking off the quote, because I intend to actually take each item on, to the best of my understanding of what they mean.

Paul's resurrection of the fallen Eutychus is based on the fallen Elpenor.5

Since to the best of my memory of Homer, Elpenor was not resurrected, I fail to see the connection.

A quick look at wiki tells me Elpenor just fell to his death.

Tell a mortician all about how every death attestation involving a broken neck after a fall is fake, because it plagiarises Elpenor!

The visions of Cornelius and Peter are constructed frorn a similar narrative about Agamemnon.6

A quick look at wiki tells me:

Agamemnon then received a dream from Zeus telling him to rally his forces and attack the Trojans in book 2.

Book (or Song) two:

Stanley Lombardo's preview doesn't involve book II ... Alexander Pope, then. Even the summary at the top of book II, before translated verses, would explain why this didn't come to my mind as a comparison:

Jupiter, in pursuance of the request of Thetis, sends a deceitful vision to Agamemnon, persuading him to lead the army to battle, in order to make the Greeks sensible of their want of Achilles.

Neither Peter nor Cornelius was deceived by his vision. But is there a detail that can give some kind of understanding to what Carrier is claiming?

“Canst thou, with all a monarch’s cares oppress’d,
O Atreus’ son! canst thou indulge thy rest?[78]
Ill fits a chief who mighty nations guides,
Directs in council, and in war presides,
To whom its safety a whole people owes,
To waste long nights in indolent repose.[79]
Monarch, awake! ’tis Jove’s command I bear;
Thou, and thy glory, claim his heavenly care.
In just array draw forth the embattled train,
Lead all thy Grecians to the dusty plain;
E’en now, O king! ’tis given thee to destroy
The lofty towers of wide-extended Troy.
For now no more the gods with fate contend,
At Juno’s suit the heavenly factions end.
Destruction hangs o’er yon devoted wall,
And nodding Ilion waits the impending fall.
Awake, but waking this advice approve,
And trust the vision that descends from Jove.”

I think even I have had dreams which prompted me to act quickly or to wake up. Is this claim also a plagiarism of the Iliad?

Paul's farewell at Miletus is constructed from Hector's farewell to Andromache.7

The farewell at Miletus is in Acts 20:18 - 38.
The farewell of Hector is in Book VI.

The common theme is, "I will die, take care when I'm gone" so, I suppose no soldier who went to war ever and first took farewell of a loved one or a group of loved friends was ever real, since all of them are plagiarising Homer, according to Carrier.

Are there commonalities beyond the theme? I couldn't actually look that far, right now. Possible. And if St. Luke actually did make St. Paul's words a bit closer to Hector's than they actually were, see above, about "tu quoque fili?" vs "kai su Broute?" - historiography regarded speeches as a somewhat freely decorable art.

The lottery of Matthias is constructed from the lottery of Ajax.8

The lottery of Matthias goes back to the Urim and Thummim that God provided Aaron with, back in the Bronze Age.

And the lottery of Ajax is also took place (at least according to Homer, but why doubt it?) in the ... tada! ... Bronze Age.

A story of a lottery being a plagiarism of a story about a lottery when there is a Bronze Age connection to both, that's like a story of a phone call is a plagiarism of a story of a phone call. Carrier carries a certain lack of common sense with panache.

Peter's escape from prison is constructed from Priam's escape from Achilles. 9 And so on.

Priam excaped from Achilles by pleading. Peter doesn't.

Uta Ranke-Heinemann, in Putting Away Childish Things, also finds parallels to Greek mythology:

In the third of the legendary accounts in Acts, Jesus is supposed to have remarked to Paul as he lay on the ground, “It hurts you to kick against the goad” (25:14).

This is a quotation from the Bacchae by Euripides (d. 406 BCE). The only peculiar thing is that Jesus should quote a Greek proverb to Paul while speaking Aramaic ("in the Hebrew language").

St. Luke was arguably familiar with Bacchae.

The Aramaic proverb Our Lord actually used being exchanged (if so) for a Greek proverb is not even a problem for inerrancy, as long as they both mean the same thing. Then, there is a question whether it was really back then a proverb, or if it was back then just a quote.

However, let's see a bit more of lady Uta's astonishment.

The really strange thing is that with both Jesus and Euripides we have the same “familiar quotation” and the same situation. In both cases we have a conversation between a persecuted god and his persecutor. In The Bacchae the persecuted god is Dionysus and his persecutor is Pentheus, king of Thebes. Just like Jesus, Dionysus calls his persecutor to account, “You disregard my words of warning . . . and kick against necessity [literally 'against the goads'] a man defying god.” Jesus even uses the same plural form of the noun (kentra) that Euripides needs for the metre of his line.

The plural form kentra can obviously be put down to St. Luke being familiar with Bacchae.

But the closer parallel can also have been willed by God, as a further proof, that unlike other deities in Greek tragedies, Dionysus does not represent demonic activity.

Moses was demonised by Egyptians, they had to cease that and divinised him, then removed the story to another country, where Pentheus replaces Pharao.

Let's now take farewell (somewhat less drastically than Hector and St. Paul), from Uta.

Thomas Kazen says, in ‘The Christology of Early Christian Practice’, originally published in Journal of Biblical Literature, 2008:

When dealing with Luke’s descriptions of practice in the early Jesus movement in the first chapters of Acts, we find ourselves both earlier and later in time than with Paul. Earlier, because the narrative concerns the earliest post-Easter followers of Jesus in Jerusalem; later, because the narrative is shaped [written] toward the end of the first century.

St. Luke was obviously able to access narratives from early post-Ascension events from sources that had given him Gospel events.

While it would be naïve to take Acts as a historical report of early Christ-believers in Jerusalem, it would be equally simplistic to read Luke’s narratives as representing general Christian practice and belief in his own time and environment.

Yeah, right ... taking a thing at face value is not the default, to be argued against in case one disagrees, but "naïve" - Candace Owens had a remark about people with PhD's "believing their own magic" ...

Rather, we should regard these descriptions as revealing what some late-first-century Christians, such as the author of Acts, thought about practice and belief in the earliest Jerusalem community of Christ-believers during the thirties.

Thomas Kazen does not try to argue why St. Luke is supposed to write this "late first century" - except that he thinks his own guess of what went on in the thirties is better than St. Luke's account, which must therefore also be a guess, and obviously, as St. Luke didn't have his degrees, a worse one!

When I taunt people like Dick Harfield with having "Science" as their religion, I mean, among other things, that as I treat Catholicism and the Bible as a whole, where I can't cherrypick away things I doubt, Dick Harfield (and similar minded men) are treating "Science" - hence they will put Thomas Kazen's pretty obvious guesswork and Richard Carrier's obvious nonsense on par with the Periodic Table of Mendeleyev.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Vigil of St. Andrew
29.XI.2022

Vigilia sancti Andreae Apostoli.

"and all Jerusalem with him"

Nativity Narrative Revisited · "and all Jerusalem with him"

Matthew 2: [1-3] When Jesus therefore was born in Bethlehem of Juda, in the days of king Herod, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem. Saying, Where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east, and are come to adore him. And king Herod hearing this, was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.

In a book* from 2012, a man known then to such Catholics as I would consider "displaced souls" as "Pope Benedict XVI" seems to have hinted against the historicity of Matthew 2:3.

I say "seems to" - namely if there is nothing upcoming on the video by Bro. Peter Dimond after 11:54 and also nothing beyond this paragraph on p. 102 by his book.

Now, there are three levels of problems which a non-believer could try to find with this verse, and I propose to deal with them to show that they do not invalidate the historicity of the Gospel.

First, the one hinted at on that paragraph from p. 102, and shown at this time signature of the video**

The first "difficulty" evoked by Ratzinger was about why the Magi spoke of "king of the Jews" when Jews would have spoken of "king of Israel" - the solution is common with the Titulus on the Cross, the Magi, like Pilate, were Gentiles and they were speaking empirically about the de facto stretch of the realm. Or, they were speaking of "king of Judah" and underlining the Davidic nature of Christ's Kingship, lacking to Herod. Anyway, the phrase "king of the Jews" clearly made sense on both occasions involving a Gentile or more, so poses no problem for historicity of either passage.

But the idea of a parallel between the passages is pushed to a dangerous point where the mention of "all Jerusalem" being unquiet was given as having no sense if this was real history, so, my first task is to establish it has, from the Bible comment by Haydock and the commenter A.

Ver. 3. Through fear of losing his kingdom, he being a foreigner, and had obtained the sovereignty by violence. But why was all Jerusalem to be alarmed at the news of a king so long and so ardently expected? 1. Because the people, well acquainted with the cruelty of Herod, feared a more galling slavery. 2. Through apprehension of riots, and of a revolution, which could not be effected without bloodshed, as the Romans had such strong hold. They had also been so worn down with perpetual wars, that the most miserable servitude, with peace, was to the Jews an object rather of envy than deprecation. A.

The next questions are, what does "all Jerusalem" mean, how did "all Jerusalem" know, and why do the Jews not report this in their histories? Because here, Haydock and commenter A. are silent.

St. Matthew was a Levite, was therefore educated as a scribe, and to him, if all religious and political notables of Jerusalem were troubled, that could be resumed as "all Jerusalem" being so. It's like speaking of "all New York" if you mean all of the posh areas, and leave out individual exceptions, but also Bronx.

Anna and Symeon, these Old Testament Saints, were obviously not troubled. But they were not very typical of Jerusalem.

Luke 2: [25] And behold there was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel; and the Holy Ghost was in him. ... [36-37] And there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser; she was far advanced in years, and had lived with her husband seven years from her virginity. And she was a widow until fourscore and four years; who departed not from the temple, by fastings and prayers serving night and day.

In other words, for the reasons stated in the Haydock comment to Matthew 2:3, most people were unlike these two, most people were more apprehensive than hopeful about the eventuality of the promised Messiah arriving. And these most people of Jerusalem are what St. Matthew summarily calls "all Jerusalem" - a very often used turn of phrase and so far not yet out of fashion.

How did "all Jerusalem" know? Given we deal with important people, the obvious answer is networking. It was not immediately when Herod started to worry that all worried with him, but with the delay it took them to hear the news and sympathise with the "legitimate concerns" of their leader. It is very probable that this atmosphere was what made the childkilling in Bethlehem possible.

Political experts are saying that such and such a religious fanaticism is a legitimate hasard for the peace or wellbeing of the world - well, most people will agree with them, I'd say from my experience as such a "religious fanatic" as they would no doubt stamp me if I were better known and if they realised it is no good to try to change my mind, I'm not planning to bond with father figures offered me, and review positions of mine along with such "wiser men" than myself ...

This hysteria made the child killing politically, as one would say earlier on "morally" possible. Not that it was a moral, that is a morally good act, but that the act resonated with a hysteric morality that had been shaped by Herod's worries.

And final question - why do the Jews not speak of this in their stories?

Well, they have blotted out most of the memory of Our Lord Jesus the Christ from their collective memory, and attached remainders to the memory of another man, Yeshu, disciple of Joshua ben Pekhariah, and this composite memory is of course a blasphemy against Our Lord, but the details concerning only that disciple need not be, if such another man existed. I think he did and that his historically best known identity would be Odin.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Our Lady of Mercy
24.IX.2022

* Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives Relié – 21 novembre 2012
Édition en Anglais | de Pope Benedict XVI (Auteur)
https://www.amazon.fr/Jesus-Nazareth-Pope-Benedict-XVI/dp/0385346409

** The Secret Intentions of Benedict XVI's new book: "The Infancy Narratives"
5th Dec. 2012 | vaticancatholic.com
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jCHEL6CSCc

"Pillars of the Earth"

Stef Heerema made a video, shortening a webinar on salt in diverse shapes.

Destruction of Sodom, Magmatic Origin Salt Giants and the Castile demolishes need for deep time
26th of Aug. 2022 | Stef Heerema
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4flwhCEUag

This picture is from a screenshot at time signature 10:04 of the video, and these salt pillars are actually part of the Netherlands, it's just that they are covered by something else that makes the Netherlands much flatter:

The picture is not made up by Stef Heerema or any other Fundamentalist, it is sourced from TNO - Geological Survey of the Netherlands. A standard Scientific source.

Who was it who said that "pillars of the earth" in the Bible proved a false world view in the hagiographer? Not me, and still less after this one!/HGL

Did The LORD "originally have a wife called Ashera"?

IV Kings 21:7 He set also an idol of the grove, which he had made, in the temple of the Lord: concerning which the Lord said to David, and to Solomon his son: In this temple, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name for ever.

So, yes, unlike what some on a livestream were saying to a random objector to Catholicism - there actually was an Asherah idol in the temple.

But the thing is, the culprit was not Solomon but Manasses.

Check out verses 1 to 3 in the same chapter:

Manasses was twelve years old when he began to reign, and he reigned five and fifty years in Jerusalem: the name of his mother was Haphsiba. And he did evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the idols of the nations, which the Lord destroyed from before the face of the children of Israel. And he turned, and built up the high places which Ezechias his father had destroyed: and he set up altars to Baal, and made groves, as Achab the king of Israel had done: and he adored all the host of heaven, and served them.

Now, I think Ezechias was around the time of Romulus - but King David was in times between the Fall of Troy and the founding of Rome.

The documents we have in the four books of kings (or two books, one of Samuel, one of Kings, or four books again, two of Samuel, two of Kings) do not say that the Asherah idol originally was part of the temple, but that this came as an intrusion, just as it would be totally erroneous to pretend St. Peter was venerating Pachamama back before Nero had him crucified, just because an intruder was doing so very recently, and arguably fairly close to the dark chapters of the Apocalypse.

But some people like to cherry pick some line of a document and ignore the rest.

I told the person he (or she?) was preferring fantasy novels on religious history over the actual documents. But it is true that this particular false goddess actually at one point was idolised in the Temple of the true God.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Eve of Holy Cross
13.IX.2022

Did Helcias and Saphan Invent the Torah?

somewhere else: Did Helcias and Saphan Invent the Torah? · Great Bishop of Geneva!: What About the Scroll of the Law that was Mislaid?

They found it. If you are reading NIV instead of Douay Rheims, you are probably spelling it Hilkiah and Shaphan.

The text is II or IV Kings, chapter 22 (we who prefer saying IV Kings use II Kings for what some others call II Samuel).

DRBO : 4th Book of Kings (2 Kings) Chapter 22
https://drbo.org/chapter/12022.htm

2 Kings 22, New International Version (NIV)
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Kings%2022&version=NIV

[8] And Helcias the high priest said to Saphan the scribe: I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord: and Helcias gave the book to Saphan, and he read it. [9] And Saphan the scribe came to the king, and brought him word again concerning that which he had commanded, and said: Thy servants have gathered together the money that was found in the house of the Lord, and they have given it to be distributed to the workmen, by the overseers of the works of the temple of the Lord. [10] And Saphan the scribe told the king, saying: Helcias the priest hath delivered to me a book. And when Saphan had read it before the king, [11] And the king had heard the words of the law of the Lord, he rent his garments. [12] And he commanded Helcias the priest, and Ahicam the son of Saphan, and Achobor the son of Micha, and Saphan the scribe, and Asaia the king's servant, saying: [13] Go and consult the Lord for me, and for the people, and for all Juda, concerning the words of this book which is found: for the great wrath of the Lord is kindled against us, because our fathers have not hearkened to the words of this book, to do all that is written for us.

Challoner comments:

[8] "The book of the law": That is, Deuteronomy

And that is credible from context, as Deuteronomy 28 spells out misfortunes for disobeying the law.

Was this a coup de théatre with a newly produced book falsely given antiquity from Moses' time?

The holy faith says, this is not so. But supposing it were, it would arguably be to add the curses in Deuteronomy 28:[15] But if thou wilt not hear the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep and to do all his commandments and ceremonies, which I command thee this day, all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee. - and following verses up to the end of the chapter.

And if so, the answer of the prophetess was also a coup de théatre ... meant to scare people into following the law, even if it was basically too late.

I find it even humanly speaking more credible, someone found a book, it involved a curse which recent events had triggered, and it was delayed ...

But the idea that all of the Torah was faked on this occasion, like they had never had any Torah before - it was referenced in Joshua's, probably Samuel's and Solomon's times.

[25] And Samuel told the people the law of the kingdom, and wrote it in a book, and laid it up before the Lord: and Samuel sent away all the people, every one to his own house.
[1 Kings (1 Samuel) 10:25]

Haydock comment:

Ver. 25. Before the Lord. It seems that the ark was therefore present. This record of Samuel is lost, so that we cannot determine what laws he prescribed on this occasion. C. --- Josephus (vi. 5.) says that he wrote and read in the hearing of all, and in the presence of the king, what evils would ensue under the regal government; and deposited the writing in the tabernacle, that the truth of the prediction might be ascertained. He probably alludes to the denunciation of tyranny, which had been made C. viii. and which he says Samuel repeated on this occasion. But the prophet would also take a copy of the law of the kingdom, prescribed by Moses, (Deut. xvii.) and deliver it to Saul, that he might make it the rule of his conduct, and not imitate the wicked customs of tyrants. H. --- The whole process of this memorable event he would also write down, (M.) as we read it at present in this chapter, placing it in the proper order, as a continuation of the sacred history which Moses and Josue had commenced; and like them, depositing the sacred volume beside the ark, or in the tabernacle. See Jos. xxiv. 26. H.

So, for Samuel's time, we only have probable. But we have clear references to the law from other times, as said.

Stating that the Torah was invented by Helcias and Saphan would imply they started a steamrolling cascade of forgeries on forgeries. It would be technically easier to achieve a faked moonlanding (pictures and all) for Apollo 11 than for this to be true, there are so many more who would have needed to be in on it.

So, no, it was inherited. Those hiding it away - probably from Athalia, though I have that from Bible Pix and not from the Bible text - or dropping it had people know of it already in Joas' time, when he succeeded Athalia's usurpation.

[12] And he brought forth the king's son, and put the diadem upon him, and the testimony: and they made him king, and anointed him: and clapping their hands. they said, God save the king.
[4 Kings (2 Kings) 11:12]

Challoner comments:

[12] "The testimony": The book of the law.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
St. Stephen of Hungary
2.IX.2022

Psalm 21 / 22 "pierced my hands" or "like a lion my hands"

Discussion refusing to get into the historic Jewish-Christian blame game:

Pod For Israel - NEVER BEFORE HEARD Theory about Ps. 22 - DON'T MISS THIS!
25th July 2022 | ONE FOR ISRAEL Ministry
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8UxP74NnPU

In this episode of Pod For Israel, Anastasia an Dr. Seth Postell discuss with us a groundbreaking discovery in understanding Psalm 22.

Case in point about unintentional changes. Should have been:

In this episode of Pod For Israel, Anastasia anD Dr. Seth Postell discuss with us a groundbreaking discovery in understanding Psalm 22.

Ketef Hinnom scrolls

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketef_Hinnom_scrolls

Gabriel Barkay is interviewed on this video (starting before time signature 48:52 where I am right now).

Sifting The Evidence: The World of the Bible (Parts 1 and 2) | Dr. Chris Sinkinson
7th May 2022 | Vision Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsQeZssBNbo

He considers the texts on the scrolls as Biblical. The divergences could then be considered as textual variants./HGL

Nativity Narrative Revisited

Nativity Narrative Revisited · "and all Jerusalem with him"

Here is a video, I'd have loved to put at least two comments below:

Fact-checking the Bible | David Ellis Dickerson
6th June 2018 | TED Archive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MnCjpw7iBI

There is a problem with this approach, namely "Les commentaires sont désactivés. En savoir plus" ... that's why this article is here, and not on Assorted Retorts.

But the description before my "comments", here, from under the video:

In this hilarious talk, David Ellis Dickerson shares his experience writing wholesome Bible trivia for the Emmy-winning TV show “American Bible Challenge,” a show that split its contestants into teams who answer questions that draw from the Old and New Testaments. Writing these questions was, to say the least, challenging.

And now, for my three "comments"

I

4:34 "why in the world would you have a census that required people to go back to their ancestral homeland, when the whole point of a census is to found out where you are now, so we can get your tax money?"

Let's see what the text says on the terms of the census:

Luke 2:3 And all went to be enrolled, every one into his own city.
sec. Lucam 2:3 et ibant omnes ut profiterentur singuli in suam civitatem.

And I'm pretty sure, Nestle Aland also has the Greek for "into his own city" and not "into his fathers' city" ... so, what happened?

I see exactly two options. Feel free to use the word "heard" instead of "read" in the following. I doubt pronvincials were offered papers explaining the orders.

A) St. Joseph read the terms as written in a Roman context, and applied them according to a Hebrew one by infamiliarity with the Roman one;
B) St. Joseph read the terms as written in a Roman context, and applied them according to a Hebrew one in order to circumvent the order.

There is basically no possibility that St. Joseph was simply applying the order as it was meant. I'll come back to an acquaintance's theory which contradicts this, but apart from his theory, no. If it was a tax census, St. Joseph made a pilpul on the terms of a legislation to circumvent it, like Pharisees (the generation contemporary to Our Lord!) did to the law of God, but he just did it to the law of Caesar.

Now, a simple question is, why not simply stay in the city where you have a house?

Let's take a modern census. You have a flat in Paris where you live ten months of the year, and a house in Bretagne where you live part of the time that you are free. Your call to income declaration happens to come when you are for some reason in the vacation house. Should you send it to the proper Municipalité in Bretagne, or to the proper Arrondissement in Paris? Well, if you spend ten months in the Paris flat, it's safe to say the Paris flat is your "principal homestead" meaning where your declaration goes, even if you are in Bretagne where you write it.

No state in the world would find it more reassuring to make your census declaration go to the office of whereever you happened to be right when and where you heard the order, whoever you were and whatever your particular circumstances. I am sure France would not go like this:

• "thank you dear police for delivering me from the kidnappers, would you kindly help me to get to Paris, I will send you money later?" - "no, you have only to tomorrow to do your income declaration, you must do it here"
• "ah how nice to see my children again, picking them up from the summer camp - how about the train to Paris?" - "excuse me sir, have you already made your income declaration?" - "no" - "well, all of you need to stay here until that is done" - "but my business is in Paris!" - "doesn't matter!"
• "ah, fine to sign a contract with you maestro, see you again in Paris" - "well, I think tax officials over here would prefer you to stay over night to make your declaration of income ..."
• "so, I'll be late to leave in my taxable income declaration in Lille, on monday" - "no, you must do it now, here in Marseilles" - "but I was just over for a prolonged business trip" - "still, the priority is putting in the declarations on time!" - "but I don't have any money or assets here, they are all in Lille!" - "no problem, we don't really want your money, we want the census, that's all!"

So, even in very modern circumstances - I'll take these parodies of a uchrony to refer to a reality without internet or fax - where one is is not always where one should make the census or declaration.

But ... if you change your work and get a work in Bretagne, near your house, instead, that suddenly becomes your principal homestead. It's a thing that can very normally change over a life. You are a citizen of France (if you are), not a citizen of Paris or of a municipality of Brittany.

Now, not all countries work quite like this even now. I think, if you move from San Francisco to New York City, while you are either place a citizen of the Federation, you are also for some time (I think) still a citizen of California before you do the paperwork to become one in New York State. But I could be mistaken. Perhaps those who moved to New York City on September 5th last year, could no longer vote for (or against, not checked which I would) Gavin Newsom on September 14 last year. Perhaps they would need to do no paperwork except on adresses to vote for or against Kathy Hochul this year. But I think there would be a case for some paperwork between voting Governors of California and voting Governors of New York State, beyond just registering the adress change ...

Certainly, in the Holy Roman Empire, you could be a citizen of the 343:rd state (Liechtenstein, now a sovereign state without an army) even if you were residing in Vienna (currently an enclave in Nether Austria, residence of Emperors back then). Within the Holy Roman Empire, an entity like Liechtenstein or Austria (smaller and bigger than present so named state) or Salzburg (not yet part of Austria!) or Bohemia (quasidependent on Austria) would in a very clear sense be your city. If it involved any kind of voting (most didn't as to the supreme government of it, but typically one would be voting on some subordinate level), that was where you could vote.

But taxes? Well, I have a feeling even if Mozart was a citizen of Salzburg, he may have paid taxes in Vienna when he lived there or in Prague when he lived there, unless his incomes were below poverty level ...

But the old and pagan Roman Empire, to get back to the actual business at hand? Well, here we are speaking partly of artisans and partly also of landowners. If you were a citizen of Mantua, you probably had land in Mantua. You may be in Rome for some subordinate monetary business, but it was in Mantua you had your land, so, even if you lived in Rome all year round, you went to Mantua ... except, again, neither Romans, nor Mantuans, actually paid taxes. Provincials did. Citzens didn't. The concept of citizens paying taxes actually is from later on when some late Emperor made all pronvincials citizens, not sure if it was under the Antonines or even later. By then, getting taxes at all needed citizens to pay taxes, no one left inside who wasn't a citizen (or a slave) and no one outside who could be forced to pay taxes.

Now, in St. Joseph's day, Galilee was already a Roman Province. Judaea was semi-sovereign, like Puerto Rico, with Herod as its quasi-sovereign king. By going from Galilee to Judaea, St. Joseph managed to do tax evasion, at least on this first occasion of the census. On arrival in Bethlehem, no mention there was any Roman census official to actually take up St. Joseph's name and status.

We can nearly see the scene ... "so long, farewell, auf Wiedersehn, good by-ye" ...

St. Joseph : "excuse us, we need to go on a journey"
Roman Centurion : "but you surely are going to make your census, aren't you?"
St. Joseph : "well, the rule says to go to your own city" (meaning province / "state" in the Roman Empire, in the original sense) "and I am going to my own city" (Jewish sense : city of my ancestors).
Roman Centurion : "off you go, and God speed your journey"

Perhaps it was even a less problematic than that (as with von Trapps not actually walking over Alps to Switzerland, but taking a train to Italy - note that it is my reconstruction that I compare to Hammerstein and the Gospel that I compare to "The von Trapp family singers"), since Seppora where St. Joseph would perhaps have been an associate at carpentry, was hiring lots of labour from afar, and St. Joseph could have been simply residing (not as a citizen) for his limited time's work (which was going to get different after Egypt, see Matthew).

II

The point about Matthew and Luke, he admits there is no straight contradiction, even if that requires some "narrative twiggling."

That the Bible is messy, sure. We know the full content of Christmas story, Nazareth to Bethlehem for Nativity, from Luke, Bethlehem, to Temple, to Bethlehem, to Egypt to Nazareth, from Matthew, but full sequence figured out, from tradition, counting these as two parts of same story.

III

7:38 "... because if you saw the whole thing raw and uncut, you would never trust it blindly again - thank you!"

Well, I am not trusting it blindly, I am just trusting it more after I have seen the issues than before!

Thank you!

PS, an afterthought, instead of going to my earlier friend's theory on the matter ... the wording in the Gospel, would it be the official one from Rome, or would it be the one as accessible to St. Joseph, to Our Lady and to Our Lord over His blessed childhood?

In a modern setting, this would coincide. The governmental body would invest in a printing press that would then print out as many examples of the official order as they thought were needed, and some beyond that and would also make sure the post office distributed it to every citizen's or sometimes every resident's mailbox. Now, postal offices were invented about 1500 - 1600 years later, by Turn und Taxis in the Holy Roman Empire, printing presses (using movable type in Latin letters) were invented c. 1450 years after this event, while papyrus was available from Egypt and cheaper than the later prevailing parchment, it was still more expensive than our paper, and especially writing by scribes was more costly than printing, so, this was impossible.

St. Luke is giving us the order as available to the Holy Family, that is as a Roman official, perhaps a centurion, pronounced it in Seppora or Nazareth proper when conveying the order. He might have been tired, angry, wanted to joke around with the locals by being impressive, or whatever. We cannot be sure he used the exact words of Caesar's order (though "own city" would be correct, for reasons stated, more like "all the world" would be a simplification or intimidating brag). And St. Luke is not claiming to be a historian of Roman administration (though the words on Quirinius cannot be an error), he's claiming to be a biographer of Our Lord. Therefore, the wording of the order he is giving, inerrantly, is the one accessible at that occasion to the Holy Family./HGL

Where is the First Person if Moses and some Disciples wrote Torah and Gospels?

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : Bart answered ... · Continuing with Leo Yohansen · With Leo Yohensen, Snappy Version · Leo Yohansen is Back · somewhere else : Apostles and St. Irenaeus · Where is the First Person if Moses and some Disciples wrote Torah and Gospels? · Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : Also under the video with GMS and Leo Yohansen

Silent Reading is a fairly recent invention.

I think it was St. Augustine who got surprised at St. Ambrose bending over a book, not voicing anything, but still apparently attentive and so apparently reading.

I have this from C. S. Lewis, and I forget which work. And it's so long ago, it could be the reverse, but the roles of the two people (bishop Ambrose teaching rhetoric to an as yet pagan Augustine) suggest I got it right.

Now, what has silent reading have to do with this? This: in a narrative read by a silent reader (after c. 380 AD), the reader may imagine the first person as speaking directly to him. But prior to this, standard procedure of reading was asking a slave to read to you, aloud.

You would not imagine the slave as actually the first person narrator.

Even if a priest read a certain text in Church, or earlier on in the Temple or the Tabernacle, during the Old Testament, you would not imagine the Cohen as Moses, especially if the first Cohen Gadol was Moses' brother Aaron, and you would not imagine the Christian priest as St. Luke watching St. Paul raise the dead boy or as The Beloved Disciple.

The use of first person in any kind of narrative was rare.

In the case of Augustus Caesar, steles were raised with his self account in the first person, very few are left, one very complete one being in modern day Ankara, back then Ancyra, therefore the text is known as Monumentum Ancyranum. Probably having the priest to Augustus (who was deified) read from the Stele did not work very well for imagining Augustus speaking. And the show being bad was called off in more than one place.

So, what was the solution? Moses wrote of himself in the third person, so did Julius Caesar, and so did the Beloved Disciple. This way, when someone else was reading the story, aloud to you, you did not need to be able to imagine that someone as the narrator speaking to you of his own life - the authors imagined how someone else would sound when speaking of them.

One of the first longer accounts in he first person was speech number 1 by Libanius. Speeches by orators were typically (first time over at least) performed by the orator himself who had written them. Except when the first person of the speech was their client, back in Athens - and the orator was coaching the performance of the client before he spoke on his own behalf (but not without all the aid of an orator).

The persons who claim, the lack of first person in Torah and Gospels, as well as Acts, prove the authors are not Moses, actual disciples, or St. Luke, are simply handicapped in cultural history. And for one, haven't read Julius Caesar's Gallic Wars or even Asterix, where Goscinny ridicules this "speeking of himself in the third person" as if it were a personal foible of Caesar.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Ember Wednesday after Epiphany*
12.I.2022

* No Ember days after Epiphany, I misplaced the Ember days after As Wednesday ... my bad.