THE TRANSFIGURATION – BALONEY!

by Dansk 13 Replies latest jw friends

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  Dansk

  Hooberus

  I logged on to http://www.tektonics.org/tekton_02_02_02.html and came across this:

  We will examine and dispose of the common arguments for dating the Gospels late, and for rejecting their traditional authorship. With this, I will also offer two caveats:

  1. Authorship and date are important; but equally important, if not more so, is whether what is in the Gospels is true.
  Regardless of who wrote the Gospels and when, if they reflect reality correctly, then it points to their being written by eyewitnesses, or having eyewitnesses as their source. Thus, even if the traditional authorship and earliest dates are disproved - and it is my contention that the arguments against them are inadequate - it matters very little, we may surmise, who wrote them and when.

  The author here is giving circular reasoning by stating that "while authorship is important" and then stating "even if the traditional authorship and earliest dates are disproved - and it is my contention that the arguments against them are inadequate - it matters very little, we may surmise, who wrote them and when."

  The website author, further down, states:

  "If the Gospels are anonymous, why is there no other surviving tradition of another author for the Gospels? Second-century testimony is unanimous in attributing the four Gospels to the persons that now carry their name. This suggests that they received their titles early; for if they had not, there would have been a great deal of speculation as to who had written them - "a variation of titles would have inevitably risen," as had happened with the apocryphal gospels. [Thie.EvJ, 15]; see also [Heng.Mark, 82] It is rather harder to believe that the Gospels circulated anonymously for 60 or more years and then someone finally thought to put authors on them -- and managed to get the whole church across the Roman Empire to agree!"

  The comment in bold is completely untrue. For example, the Protevangelion or Gospel of James was in use at least 25 years before the four Gospels were. http://reluctant-messenger.com/book_james.htm

  Tischendorf assigns it to the first thirty years of the 2 nd Century, Justin Martyr quotes from it and Origen says that it was everywhere well known about the close of the 2 nd Century (Keeler, 1881). Some of the passages in this book, along with other similar earlier works, are identical to those of the Gospels.

  And, actually, Second Century testimony was NOT unanimous in attributing the four Gospels that now carry their name. The first writer to mention all four Gospels by name was Irenaeus: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/irenaeus.html

  "Irenaeus of Lyons wrote his Against Heresies c. 175-185 CE. His work is invaluable to modern scholarship in the attempt to recover the content of Gnostic teachings in the second century. Irenaeus also provides the first explicit witness to a four-fold gospel canon."

  It was only AFTER Irenaeus, in the 3 rd Century, that the Gospels we have now were accepted by the early Christian Fathers as being written by the names of those who carry authorship. While on the subject, look up good biographies on Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian. They were, IMHO, a trio of bandits!!

  Hooberus, once again you use an apologist’s site for your "proof". Show me unbiased archaeological and historical evidence to back up your position.

  Mary,

  I said: Don’t you think it strange that after witnessing a major faith-strengthening event John shouldn’t even mention it?

  You replied:

  Not necessarily. After all, there is absolutely no mention in the New Testament about the Fall of Jerusalem in 70CE even though the writers would have obviously known all about it as they were living at that time and in the place it happened.

  Erm, I think you're proving my point here! Any event of such magnitude - and especially one that backs up the prophecy of the Messiah, Jesus - would surely be written down. The fact that it is not is testimony to the fact that much in the NT is spurious.

  As I respectfully asked of Hooberus I ask you, likewise, to provide evidence from sources other than the Bible and apologists.

  Best wishes,

  Dansk
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  Gamaliel

  Mary,
  

  It's an interesting point, but I can provide some of the reasoning of most current Biblical scholars:

  Paul died before 70 and then Peter, James and John listed as pillars at Jerusalem very likely died before 70. If they were say, over 30 years old in 30 CE as Jesus should have been, then they should have been over 70 in 70, and would have been living through a harsh revolutionary period for Judea and Galilee. Josephus says it was the death of James that ultimately brought on the siege of Jerusalem in 66-70. (This James was Jesus brother, an "unbeliever" scoffing at Jesus in the days before Jesus died, but the leader of the Christian Church in Jerusalem a few days later --overshadowing any potential apostle by the same name)

  For many reasons, very few scholars today believe that any of them except Paul wrote anything that's in the NT. Even if they were completely literate and wanted to, the Transfiguration promise about "some not seeing death" before Jesus parousia would make the idea of writing a Gospel unimportant, even a ludicrous display of lack of faith in the promise of an imminent parousia. If you look closely at the end of John, you can also see evidence that the first writer of John had already died and someone had to add an excuse about why he didn't live to see the parousia as Jesus had promised him. (This had become an issue for ridicule in 2 Peter.) Someone tacked on an excuse a-la-JW-generation logic that twists the probable wording of the promise slightly, even though the promise of survival until Jesus' parousia had already been quoted several times in the Gospels. Since it relates to the Transfiguration under discussion, I'll quote it:

  It's John 21:20-23 KJV, Peter's death is foretold in v. 18,19 possibly an indication that Peter had already died by the time of this writing.
  

  "Then Peter... seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved [now traditionally identified as John]...Peter..saith to Jesus...and what shall this man do? Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?...Then went the saying abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die."

  Verse 23 makes the big point of defending that Jesus had said the word "if" even though we know that at the Transfiguration, and several other occasions in the Gospels, Jesus had already made promises of some faithful not dying, cutting the days short, the generation not passing away, etc. This may in fact be the best explanation of why there is no mention of the Transfiguration in John. Because John had been assigned authorship of the book and the real author knew that Peter, James and John were already dead. It was even necessary to add this "apology" in the last chapter to explain why John died and Jesus still isn't here yet.

  Any writings collected for NT purposes after 70 would have to be thought of as having been written before 70, from an apostle's hand, to have much authority for teaching, setting things straight, disciplining, etc. The best that a post-70 Gospel could do would be to mention the fall of Jerusalem -- but only in words spoken by Jesus in prophecy about it. To claim to also have seen the prophecy fulfilled would be to admit that the prophecy was written well after Jesus spoke it. That would weaken the authority of the document. There probably were Gospels like that, but they could not have the same usefulness, and would have been superfluous. Besides, it was already a literary convention of the times to give a document more authority by putting it in the mouth of an historic person of authority. "Daniel" had done it, as had most parts of the Books of Moses, Ecclesiastes, most of the "Apocrypha" all of the "Pseudipigrapha" probably a few of the supposed letter by Paul, and most if not all the other Pastoral "letters." Mentioning the fall of Jerusalem was a sure way to get your document dismissed as unworthy. Therefore the Gospels that didn't make that mistake were saved and assigned to apostles and their secretaries or companions.

  In the early 100's Papias (per Eusebius) evidently toured Judea and Galilee to get stories straight from those who had once seen the apostles first-hand. A brilliant idea, but nearly all his stories (except one) were scoffed at and he was then branded as a man of simple mind. For me, this fact fits exactly as one would expect based on the types of theological changes (necessary for church survival) that a good critique of the NT text could also lead one to believe in. The books accepted into an orthodox NT were already too far removed from the Judean/Galilean experience of the apostles. Luke is already dependent (evidently) on Josephus for some of his facts about the times, and on Mark as source material. Note how the Gospels trivialize the knowledge and understanding of the apostles themselves, and even have Jesus brother James scoff as if Jesus is crazy. This was no doubt a reflection of the pro-Pauline Christianity that won out over the Ebionites and Jerusalem church that Paul fought against. (Get that from comparing the way Paul makes fun of James, Peter and John in Galatians, contradicting Luke's attempt at whitewashing the argument in Acts 15 etc.)

  As you can see this can go on and on and on. I'm not advocating it's belief, just showing the theories of many (or most) modern scholars, who believe they have a ton of evidence in addition to this that also fits these theories.

  Gamaliel
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  Dansk

  Gamaliel,

  That was a great post. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

  Dansk
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  Gamaliel

  Thanks Dansk,

  I usually go on so long in threads of that type that I fear no one reads them. It's funny how the JWs, due to their eschatology, are probably a lot closer to living the issues of the 1st century church than we ex-JWs would like to admit. They had the generation to redefine, they had a WWI/1914 equivalent in 70CE which, no doubt, even tempted some to say that he had returned but invisibly to them -- perhaps in the wilderness, or in the "inner chambers," or perhaps he has gone to the privy -- oh wait, wrong episode!

  Anyway, I hope you've had a chance to read Helms. I haven't actually seen anyone cover in any detail why the Transfiguration isn't in John, but as you can probably tell, I borrowed tidbits from all over to come up with my own theory above.

  Amazing progress there Dansk. And to think that such a short time ago you were probably giving public talks. Wouldn't it be fun to give one now?

  Gamaliel