Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
Continuing, with an interlude …. Study the historian before you begin to study the facts. . . . It is what is already done by the intelligent undergraduate who, when recommended to read a work by that great scholar Jones of St Jude’s, goes round to a friend at St Jude’s to ask what sort … Continue reading “Where does John the Baptist fit in History? — The Evidence of Josephus, Pt 6”
If the previous post was a repeat at least let me try to say something new with this one. I concluded the previous post with Joshua Efron’s final words on his case for the James passage being an interpolation: External evidence thus complements and strengthens the findings of internal criticism. This passage is an insertion, … Continue reading “Is Efron Also Among the Mythicists?”
A Jewish scholar, Joshua Efron, believes that the entire “stoning of James” passage — yes, that James who is said to be “the brother of Jesus who was called Christ” — in Josephus is a Christian forgery. Now Efron does get under the skin of a few scholars when he argues with a sometimes abrasive … Continue reading “Is the Entire James Passage in Josephus an Interpolation?”
Continuing Rivka Nir’s case for questioning the authenticity of John the Baptist in Josephus’s Antiquities…. (First post is here.) Nir informs us in The First Christian Believer, By the nineteenth and early twentieth century, historians were suggesting that this passage was a Christian interpolation. (p. 42) As a general rule, I like to follow up … Continue reading “Early Thoughts on Authenticity of the John the Baptist Passage in Josephus”
Josephus does, in Jewish Antiquities, have two passages on the emergence of Christianity and the persecution of its followers, involving Jewish jurisdiction, but both are suspected of being interpolations. (Efron 1987, p. 333) Warning: this post addresses a small section of a work by Jewish scholar, Joshua Efron, Studies on the Hasmonean Period, that was … Continue reading “6 More Reasons to Question Josephus’ “James the brother of Jesus” passage”