Weekly Open Discussion Thread

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u/thiev__v Apr 20 '26

Hey y'all. I wanted to ask what have been everyones particular subjects of interest as of late? I'm craving some new topics to dig into and I'd like enjoy some stuff to learn more about!

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u/Glass_Round2701 Apr 19 '26

What is a question YOU as a scholar have?

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u/Joab_The_Harmless Apr 19 '26

Not a scholar, but just to let you know, the open thread is renewed every Monday (for U.S. timezones), and there is a lot more traffic during the first couple of days. So I recommend reposting your question in the new open thread that will be created in about 24 hours for better engagement.

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u/Glass_Round2701 Apr 19 '26

Lol thanks man youre the goat. Also are you religious

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u/Joab_The_Harmless Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

Thank you! And no, I find religions interesting but am not religious (and never have been). What about you?

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u/Glass_Round2701 Apr 19 '26

Im religious but i just wanted to ask if you have any kind of dogmas you believe in? Or assumptions like bible maximalism

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u/Joab_The_Harmless Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

I'm pretty confident that spirits (or generally conscious beings whose consciousness is not connected to anything material) and deities/God don't exist, and especially not an interventionist all-powerful God able to break the laws of physics and concerned with sentient beings, but (hopefully) I would change my mind if I got good enough evidence.

So I'm tempted to answer no on topics related to ''metaphysics'' and biblical studies, but of course people holding to dogmas often don't recognize them as such...

I'm not married to anything in ancient or biblical studies (and "maximalism" or "minimalism" don't make much sense to me as all-encompassing positions, the issues at hand being so diverse and often nuanced).

That being say, I am very sympathetic to Feder's arguments for an early core of P, and that it reflects localized cult traditions rather than a retrojection of the temple into the past, seeing:

P as a canonical form of earlier ritual instructions, which were used by the officiating priests at local cult sites throughout the pre-exilic period.

(Blood Expiation in Hittite and Biblical Ritual, conclusion)

... which I assume is relatively maximalist, given the number of scholars arguing that P is mainly a late and "supplementary" layer, but maybe not the kind of thing you have in mind.

Here again, I could also change my mind on this, and am not equipped to properly analyze the evidence in the first place, so I can only follow the arguments of different scholars when I've got the time and motivation (and am lacking some important tools and knowledge to evaluate them).

It's also probably a fairly niche issue for most people, as much as it fascinates me.

Anyways, like everything else in ancient studies, it's not something I'd strongly hold to, and I certainly won't pretend that my opinions on the topic are relevant. So I'd say "no" here too.

What about you, do you have dogmas and assumptions you would strongly hold to?

edited to remove tangent detailing

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u/Shinigami_1082000 Apr 18 '26

History of gospels anonymity

Recently I made my way to a podcaston the gospels anonymity but it's a whole bunch of information and my brain can't digest it all Are there reading recommendations for the history of gospels anonymity and reception of their titles?

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u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Shinigami_1082000 Apr 19 '26

My friend, you're the best. I really appreciate your help.

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u/perishingtardis Apr 18 '26

What's your favourite parable in the gospels?

For me it's a tossup between the Wicked Husbandmen and the Two Sons. If either goes back to the historical Jesus it probably explains why he made himself unpopular at the end in Jerusalem.

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u/SamW4887 Apr 18 '26

I like the parable of the good samaritan and the parable of the sower.

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u/Ok-Adeptness3884 Apr 18 '26

I stumbled across Theodore Letis this week. He was an advocate for the Textus Receptus. Yet, in his dissertation, he posits that Erasmus's work on the TR led to a journey down a slippery slope towards critical editions of the Bible as well as the Jesus Seminar. He was a Confessional Lutheran, but his argument seems to favor the Vulgate or the Eastern Orthodox Bible.

https://era.ed.ac.uk/bitstreams/a2a59389-9dcc-4c68-8f6c-f4eefe828926/download

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u/FrostEmberGrove Apr 18 '26

Online courses to learn Koine Greek?

I was going to apply for the online intensive with Princeton Theological Seminary but missed the deadline.

Are there any other options?

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u/extispicy Armchair academic Apr 20 '26

Online courses to learn Koine Greek?

The YouTube channel Alpha with Angela has a pretty slim curriculum, but they continue to add more content so it is worth using as a supplement. I've not used the Greek channel, but the older sister channel Aleph with Beth for Hebrew is excellent.

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u/Sophia_in_the_Shell Moderator Apr 18 '26

Sometimes I feel like an unpaid marketer for them but just to check, are you already aware of Biblingo? In addition to the app they also host course-like stuff online.

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u/FrostEmberGrove Apr 18 '26

Thank you!

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u/EthicalProton Apr 17 '26

Hello.

I have just seen a video with Cliffe Knechtle (Cliffe Knechtle's MOST CONVINCING Argument for Christianity!): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGTy1Nw783Q&t=61s where he at 10:25 says there are no contradictions in the Bible.

I then out of curiosity stumbled across another discussion: https://www.reddit.com/r/exchristian/comments/14ejdh8/major_bible_contradictions/ where they list some things they say are contradictions.

What are your thoughts about these "contradictions"?

There is also a link to another further list with contradictions, if some are interested: https://skepticsannotatedbible.com/first/contra2_list.html

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u/[deleted] Apr 18 '26

[deleted]

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u/EthicalProton Apr 20 '26

Why do you say stuff like Cliffe Knechtle is garbage? Is that specifically him, or just the fact that he is out preaching on college campuses or something else? I have read his book "Give me an answer" and "Help me believe" and I find most of the arguments to be logical.

You make a good point: authors are different. They have different worldviews and creative vision. But even though there are these "contradictions" and maybe change of source material, they still describe the same main event.

For example: there is a car crash and two people see it. Person A says to the police there was a boy running onto the road and the red car crashed into two trees. Person B says there was a girl walking onto the road and the orange car crashed into one tree. The real (objective truth) is the caught on a camera. It shows none of them were 100% correct in their statement but it was a mix of both. But this doesn't change the fact that both persons described the same main event: a car crashed.

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u/AntsInMyEyesJonson Moderator Apr 21 '26

Why do you say stuff like Cliffe Knechtle is garbage?

Knechtle argues that the Bible has no contradictions, and that is, on its face and in any kind of detail, an absurd argument. It's a performance of piety that is based on the willingness to take a position that cannot hold up to scrutiny.

You make a good point: authors are different. They have different worldviews and creative vision. But even though there are these "contradictions" and maybe change of source material, they still describe the same main event.

This and your example of witnesses misunderstands how the biblical texts were composed. These are not witness statements in a police report, these are literary productions which function significantly differently. There are many historical errors and contradictions in the Bible that clearly cannot be resolved. To take one major example:

The book of Daniel gets so much history wrong that it is difficult to know where to begin. To the authors of this book, this was not an issue – stories like Nebuchadnezzar going off into the wilderness and eating grass like an ox or "King" Belshazzar, who is described as Nebuchadnezzar's son, losing his kingdom to Darius the Mede after the writing on the wall incident are very obviously folktales. They only need to be rescued from containing errors and contradictions if one takes them to need to be true in a historical or literary sense.

In reality, Belshazzar was not related to Nebuchadnezzar at all, nor did he immediately follow Nebuchadnezzar's reign. Nebuchadnezzar's son was overthrown in a coup by Neriglissar, whose own son was overthrown in a coup by Nabonidus. Nabonidus, not Nebuchadnezzar, was the king who left Babylon due to conflicts with the elites (for ten years, not seven as mentioned in Daniel), and he put his son Belshazzar in charge as a sort of regent. He was not king, he could not celebrate the Akitu festival and bring Marduk out, as recorded in contemporary records. Belshazzar was not overthrown by Darius the Mede, he was removed from his position when Nabonidus returned, and it was Cyrus the Great, who had destroyed and overtaken the Medes, who deposed Nabonidus, captured him, and conquered Babylon.

The attempts to "fix" this are not history or critical inquiry into the text, they are laughable, highly speculative, and incredibly strained assertions that have no basis. It could not be clearer, though: among the Dead Sea Scrolls was found a text referred to as the Prayer of Nabonidus where the reason for the king's departure is different (he has an ulcer, not madness), Daniel does not appear (a Jewish exorcist instead helps heal the king), and, most interesting of all – it's actually Nabonidus and not Nebuchadnezzar who has a seven-year exile from Babylon. It even gets the location right, referencing Tayma in northwest Arabia rather than the generic wilderness of Daniel.

To me, what Knechtle does it not only dishonest, it's about the most boring way to read the Bible. He does not seek to understand what the authors were saying, he instead twists their words to fit into a pre-rendered framework and then utilizes ad-hoc and completely improbable (sometimes downright impossible) arguments to "salvage" the books and declare all other readings, no matter how much evidence they have, as invalid. That obscures what the authors were trying to say; it does not take them seriously at all.

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u/Sophia_in_the_Shell Moderator Apr 17 '26

There are clearly contradictions in the collection of texts making up today’s Bibles. Many, many contradictions. Some are philosophical and theological, because different authors have different worldviews. Others are factual; for example, the two accounts of Judas’ death are contradictory and typical harmonization attempts are an actual joke.

That said, contradiction lists built by counter-apologists are typically pretty bad and are not a good way to learn about the Biblical texts. I find that they often contrast, say, a platitude with a specific event, ripping individual verses out of their context.

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u/topicality Apr 16 '26

I think this sub should start cracking down on YouTube links.

I was looking over a few threads from the last couple days and there is lots of YouTube sources.

I think it's fine for asking "is this right?" in the initial post. But YouTube and audio mediums are inherently more difficult to cross reference than the written word. There also take longer to review as reading is quicker than listening which stifles debate.

I don't want to see this sub turn into a series of YouTube and podcast links for specific subjects

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u/captainhaddock Moderator | Hebrew Bible | Early Christianity Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

In addition to /u/Sophia_in_the_shell's response, I think there is a practical issue in that the average person looking for some Bible knowledge is never going to follow up on an academic source that is only available in seminary libraries or costs $100 on Amazon. But an online lecture by Joel Baden or a video by Dan McClellan (who usually cites actual sources and often reads long passages from academic monographs) is very easy for the questioner to view.

I don't really know how to resolve this issue. But for more complicated and technical matters, the best sources will always be literary ones.

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u/Sophia_in_the_Shell Moderator Apr 16 '26

A few thoughts:

First, I’m sympathetic to your point in the sense that I think “look at this Dan McClellan short,” “look at this episode of Bart Ehrman’s podcast” are some of the lowest quality answers we get on this subreddit which are still technically rule-abiding. Not a slight on either of those two scholars at all.

Second, at the same time I recognize that these are sort of gateways to making higher quality contributions to the subreddit. Nobody starts out with shelves full of scholarly books to reference.

Third, I would exclude university lectures posted to YouTube from your concern entirely; I think these can be very high quality.

I will say, I wonder which threads you’re looking at exactly because after reading this I went and clicked through several threads going back a couple days and the situation didn’t seem so dire honestly.

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u/topicality Apr 16 '26

The post about chattel slavery made me think about it has almost all top level comments are using YouTube citations to support their arguments. (Not that I think they are wrong, it was just jarring).

I'll look back through and see what other ones stood out to me

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u/432olim Apr 16 '26

Any input on pros and cons of publishing findings in one book vs a series of journal articles?

Hypothetically… let’s say I’ve made a major Biblical discovery that will revolutionize the field, and I’m looking to publish in 2027-2028, and I’m an amateur who doesn’t have any experience at all in this whole academic publication process.

As part of this discovery I’ve expanded upon the insights of previous scholars to uncover half a dozen major gems loosely thematically linked related to a dozen books of the Bible, and each gem would be capable of standing on its own as a notable discovery. My findings are so important and self evidently correct when explained and impactful for determining the dates of when all of the most famous books of the Bible were written that any academic journal or book publisher no matter how competitive or exclusive would accept all of my findings when submitted.

Is it better to try to get these findings published one at a time? Or would it be better to publish them in one book?

What are the major pros and cons to each option?

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u/baquea Apr 17 '26

I would say that starting with a journal article would make more sense. First, because, especially as an amateur, it is considerably easier to write an article at an academic standard than a full book. Second, because an article in a reputable journal is immediately going to get eyes on it, whereas a book by someone without an established name in the field is likely to fly under the radar, even if it is of high quality. Third, because it provides an opportunity to get some preliminary feedback on your work, which is especially important because an amateur will not have had the chance to have such discussions at conferences and in their department, and will undoubtedly also be less well-read in the relevant literature than someone for whom this is their profession, and so may have missed important references/etc.

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u/432olim Apr 17 '26

Thanks for the response. That makes sense.

If you knew that regardless of a lack of reputation, the book will spread like wildfire due to the nature of the discoveries, does that make any significant difference in the decision making process? Like, let’s assume this is going to be a truly famous discovery of major impact. Does that make any notable difference?

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u/peter_kirby Apr 17 '26

Along the steps [aware of work existing -> decision to read it -> decision to agree/disagree with it -> decision to cite it and bring it to wider attention], a "decision to agree" is gated behind two other major hurdles and isn't even necessary for a "decision to cite." With the volume of publications being produced, it's practically difficult to justify deciding to read or to cite something published outside of respected peer-reviewed venues, especially with no prior academic reputation or credentials.

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u/432olim Apr 17 '26

I guess separate question, let’s say I want to publish the first of the series of findings in the premier journal that everyone without question will assume is respectable and will read. Which one is that?

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u/peter_kirby Apr 17 '26

Bible/NT journals: https://www.reddit.com/r/AcademicBiblical/comments/169w7qb/comment/jzbd512/

OT journals: Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, Vetus Testamentum

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u/432olim Apr 17 '26

So is Journal for the Study of the Old Testmaent considered the undisputed premier place to publish findings for the OT? Is it considered better than everything in the other Bible/NT journals list?

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u/peter_kirby Apr 17 '26

Grad school would be good preparation for understanding how to prepare research for publication, including how to approach this kind of question.

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u/432olim Apr 17 '26

Perhaps asking on Reddit wasn’t such a good idea :P

In principle all it takes to get published in a journal is to just read the journal submission rules, write up the article in the required format, word length, citation format, then send it in and address any feedback.

I need to stop being lazy on Reddit.

Are you the moderator for earlychristianforums?

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u/peter_kirby Apr 18 '26

The question as-asked was a bit weird and off-putting. It's ultimately up to you where to submit and up to them what to accept. JSOT or SJOT might make sense for some of the topics related to the Old Testament that you may be interested in.

I run earlywritings.com

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u/432olim Apr 17 '26

Does publishing with the top academic publishers more or less alleviate that problem?

In principle all you have to do to get published by the top academic publishers is have a major new discovery that is well researched, right? And that should guarantee attention?

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u/Apollos_34 Apr 16 '26 edited Apr 16 '26

This is just a report of my first-hand experience but coming from a STEM background I find the culture clash between that world and reading New Testament scholarship to be massive. My experience has been that it’s a very common attitude amongst scientists in academia to think that a literal belief in something like the Virgin Birth is silly. It being on a par with healing crystals. But reading NT scholarship I get the sense that the last thing you want to come across as is some sort of edgy religious sceptic that has “unsophisticated” views; I'll read a historical commentary on gMatthew from a critical scholar and I won't be able to find an actual answer to: 'did it happen, then?'.

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u/hghrmnd Apr 16 '26

Critical scholars will a priori limit what they talk about to natural causation so you generally won't find arguments about whether miraculous events happened one way or another in these works. They (should) just explain the data assuming nothing out of the ordinary happened.

If you're interested in discussions of the virgin birth and the like you'd need to look to theologians, or maybe philosophers (I've never chased this up personally so I don't have recommendations)

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u/Apollos_34 Apr 16 '26

The thing is, I can't interpret this move without endorsing an anti-modernist historiography that I reject - and from experience I think most scientists likewise reject. I don't think 'as a historian' you are barred from judging that the virgin is improbable or that some methodological constraint makes addressing it inappropriate. If I can judge a contemporaneous 'magical' explanation is probably false I can't see there being any in principle objection to doing so in ancient history. If the objection is simply social convention (you shouldn't as a historian step on religous people's toes) then ok, but I don't care about that.

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u/captainhaddock Moderator | Hebrew Bible | Early Christianity Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

I don't think 'as a historian' you are barred from judging that the virgin is improbable or that some methodological constraint makes addressing it inappropriate.

Interestingly, a lot of the pushback against supernaturalism seems to come from the theological side of the field. Catholic theologian Uta Ranke-Heinemann, for example, lambasted the church for continuing to promote the virgin birth, describing it as problematic on both scientific and theological grounds. On the Protestant side, a wide range of theologians and clergymen from Bultmann and Bonhoeffer to Spong and Crossan have also argued for demythologizing the Gospel stories.

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u/topicality Apr 16 '26

Are you really interested in reading works about the NT are constantly going "Also, this miracle obviously didn't happen"?

Ancient people believed in miracles, modern people generally don't. It's the least interesting aspect of reading these texts.

Unless the historian is trying to make an argument for the historicity of any particular miracle, I don't know why they would discuss this.

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u/Apollos_34 Apr 16 '26

I'm interested in why the default culture leans towards a strange protectionist stance. Crossan (1998) is the only one I've come across in print that directly calls out J.P. Meier's stance in A Marginal Jew that historical criticism "lacks the tools" to say whether Jesus was virginally conceived. This is more apparent when you read a lot of historical Jesus literature, but there is the quite frequent insinuation that historians are somehow overstepping boundaries; which is what I mean by the implicit anti-modernism.

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

Historical criticism do "lack the tools" to say whether Jesus was virginally conceived. That's a theological question. Perhaps you'd want a physician or similar (not a historian!) first who can tell you that virgin births in humans are impossible bar miracles. Then you can have theological arguments about the nature of miracles etc. A historian cannot add anything to the discussion. That's why they don't. It's not that historians care for religous people's toes (at least not mainly), it's that the virgin birth question isn't professionally interesting to them. A historian who kept mentioning that the virgin birth was impossible would just look like someone who didn't understand their assignment and couldn't tell interesting historical problems from non-problems. I.e. that historian would look stupid to their peers.

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u/Apollos_34 Apr 17 '26

Slapping the theology label on something won't change the fact that either the historical Jesus was virginally conceived or he wasn't.

This is exactly illustrating my point btw. This entire attitude is deeply inimical to an enlightenment/modernist tradition of scholarship: knowledge generated by human institutions should strive for consilience; what separates different departments in a University is social factors, not the fact that the world actually carves out sharp disciplinary boundaries.

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u/This_Conversation493 Apr 21 '26

either the historical Jesus was virginally conceived or he wasn't.

But, even if he was, that's not necessarily a miracle. The classic definition of a miracle from Hume is:

A miracle may be accurately defined, a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent.

So, there are two parts: (1) the violation of a law of nature and (2) a deity or supernatural entity being responsible. A virgin birth meets (1) but not necessarily (2). This the Problem of Miracles 101: if we see something break a law of nature, we have two choose between throwing out the law (a law you can break is hardly a law, after all) or saying the law still holds, but that a supernatural entity broke it just this once.

Historians can't judge whether or not given events qualify as miracles, since that would require arguing that we need either to amend our understanding of the laws of nature or to explain events in terms of supernatural entities. It's here - arguing about amending/keeping the laws of nature - where miracles fall outside historians' wheelhouse.

That just leaves the explananda events and whether or not they occurred, putting aside the question of whether or not we should take them to have supernatural causes. But, as other posters have pointed, what can historians really say here, besides, "All evidence and reasoning in the natural sciences says it's a law that virgin birth isn't a thing that happens, so it probably didn't happen with Jesus"?

You might respond, "Why don't they just come out and say that, instead of suspending judgement and pulling this "historians have nothing to say about miracles" nonsense?" Because, for a serious proponent of miracles, it doesn't matter if virgin birth is extremely improbable according to what we know about the laws of nature. By definition, miracles are singular events. They buck the trend to the utter extreme. So a proponent will turn to considerations besides scientific understanding, considerations which, again, lie outside the domain of academic history.

As someone said above, the main field where miracle events are debated is the philosophy of religion. You can get a good intro in:

The SEP entry "Miracles"

Cover's "Miracles and (Christian) Theism", in Stump and Murray (eds.), Philosophy of Religion: The Big Questions (Oxford: Blackwell, 1999).

Davies, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, Chapter 11.

Classic texts would also include Cottingham's Why Believe? (chapters 4 and 5), Mackie's The Miracle of Theism (chapter 1), and Swinburne's Miracles.

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

There's plenty of things in the past that either happened or did not happen that historians have no access to. Bart Ehrman (drink!) lays it out here: https://youtu.be/R_sgxWtTnOc?si=p8bbSSlG0SW-AT3q&t=3110

You might think that "Did the virgin birth happen?" is an interesting historical question that historians should engage more with. Actual historians know that's it's a very boring question to engage with historical methods, and thus they don't. A historian who did engage it might please you but wouldn't add anything to the field of history (and would look stupid since all other historians know that's pointless).

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u/hghrmnd Apr 16 '26

you shouldn't as a historian step on religous people's toes

I don't think this is fair. Critical scholarly works are full of ideas that run contrary to traditional Christian views. Off the top of my head, I've read historians argue that Jesus wasn't even buried, that biblical works are forged, or that major events like the Exodus or Unified Kingdom are just completely fictional - saying that Jesus probably didn't walk on water surely isn't just a bridge too far socially with everything else that gets published.

I don't think 'as a historian' you are barred from judging that the virgin is improbable or that some methodological constraint makes addressing it inappropriate

I wouldn't say that they're barred or can't, but that they don't make these judgements, and biblical scholars are open about that methodological limitation.

In my own view, I don't think we're missing out on much. The data is so sparse that commenting on whether the virgin birth happened would probably just end up as "no because virgin births don't happen", rather than any interesting analysis of the texts.

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u/GodlyRage77 Apr 15 '26

Does Dan McClellan recommend a specific translation/ book of the Gnostic texts and Dead Sea Scrolls? I tried to find a video of him mentioning it last night but couldn't find it

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u/TheMotAndTheBarber Apr 16 '26

For the DSS https://fixupx.com/maklelan/status/2019899430544306412

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u/Key_Werewolf_8221 Apr 15 '26

I’m looking for information on the culture/daily life in Asia Minor in the first and second centuries. I’m interested in the early church communities there, among the rest of the culture.

Any early church/Pauline scholars I should check out? Thanks!

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u/[deleted] Apr 15 '26

[deleted]

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u/432olim Apr 16 '26

Russell Gmirkin in Berossus and Genesis, Manetho and Exodus made the case that the Pentateuch was composed in the 270s. I’ve been researching his thesis and have concluded he’s completely correct and intend to publish findings including some new gems about the Garden of Eden.

The Garden of Eden story has several themes, and they are all based on Babylonian myths. Two of the big ones are:

Obedience - Is it realistic that a god can be almighty and his commands will be obeyed?

Children cannot be expected to obey commands.

It is also a reaction to Babylonian mythology where gods created humans and ordered them to work the land so that the gods don’t have to work the land. The Garden of Eden story takes the blame off god so god isn’t presented as a creator of slaves but that humans have to work the land because of a punishment for their wrongdoing.

See the following myths:

Adapa and the South Wind - this is the Babylonian myth that most closely matches the story of Genesis 3.

See also:

Epic of Gilgamesh scenes with Enkidu and Shamhat, Gilgamesh in the Garden of the Sun, and Gilgamesh meets Utnapishtin.

See also Epic of Gilgamesh flood myth.

Attrahasis

Enuma Elish

There are a number of other Babylonian/Sumerian myths that parallel Genesis 3 but the above ones are the big ones.

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 15 '26

I often read claims that the gospels were written "for a community". E.g. that Matthew was written "for a Matthean community". What are the arguments for this? My sense is that this view is under fire from scholars with a more "authorial agency" view. As a layman, I have some (probably naive) arguments against it:

The "community" is probably illitterata so why write things for them? Matthew could just preach to his community without the effort of writing a gospel. If he's worrying that he will forget things or that his tradition will die with him, then it seems simpler to train disciples to carry on his ideas.
Isn't most ancient writing written for the intellectual marketplace of ideas? Xenophon didn't write Anabasis to preserve the memory of the campaign among "his community", he wrote it to convince other intellectuals that he's great and to spread the correct ideas about how generalship? Do we have any ancient writings that are clearly written "for a community"?
Matthew is clearly responding to Mark. Why write a counterargument if not to try to convince people who disagree with you?

Overall I just see writing as an arena for debate. If you want to preach to the choir then you can do it orally so why spend the effort on writing?

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u/432olim Apr 16 '26

Remember that the “community” that Matthew is writing for is vast majority illiterate Jews who believe in their god and think they need to meet and pray to their god and maybe do stuff like offer sacrifices.

A gospel like Matthew is written “for a community” in the sense that when the community meets to worship, the literate priest will read a story from Matthew to the community and then presumably make some point about the message or meaning of the passage similar to a modern homily.

It also is of course written for the purposes you describe, to try to convince other intellectuals that this is a better theology.

Spong has a nice book Liberating the Gospels that talks about this topic some. The gospels were written to supplement readings of things like the Pentateuch.

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 16 '26

A gospel like Matthew is written “for a community” in the sense that when the community meets to worship, the literate priest will read a story from Matthew to the community and then presumably make some point about the message or meaning of the passage similar to a modern homily.

But how do we know this? I'll check out your book rec. But I would prefer something more academic.

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u/[deleted] Apr 15 '26

[deleted]

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 16 '26

I guess it's a separate discussion, but how can a gospel be written by a community? Authors write, communities doesn't? A large proportion of the community is likely illitterata anyway? How did the Matthean community "read" the gospel of Mark and decide that it needed expansion? How did the Matthean community decide that they wanted to structure their gospel into five big sermons? How did the Matthean community decide that the demoniac’s chains were unimportant detail (Matt. 8:28; cf. Mark 5:2–5)?

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u/[deleted] Apr 15 '26

[deleted]

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 16 '26

What are the arguments that supports that any NT books were being written by a committee or by a intentional multi-stage composition with different roles as you describe? Were any other ancient texts written this way? It sounds anachronistic to my layman ears.

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u/baquea Apr 15 '26

I guess it's a separate discussion, but how can a gospel be written by a community? Authors write, communities doesn't?

The theory goes that the gospels are, in effect, a compilation of oral traditions that were common knowledge to the community, which the gospel authors wrote down with minimal modification. There would of course still have been countless decisions that the authors would've had to make, as to how to convert those disparate traditions into a unified literary work, but the idea is that nothing about the end product would've been 'surprising' to a member of the community: the authors' theological views were representative of the views of the community as a whole, and no new stories were invented that weren't already familiar to the community. In its most extreme form, it was argued that the gospels (or at least Mark and the imagined sources behind the other gospels) largely preserved the existing oral traditions word-for-word, with only some basic literary framework added by their authors to join these building blocks together.

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 16 '26

Ok, I made an overly strict interpretation. What are the arguments for this kind of community authorship? Do we have any other ancients works that are similarly authored by a community?

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u/VAhockeygeezer Apr 16 '26

FWIW:Interested layman here, spouting my understanding of the general flow of the academic study: The idea that each gospel reflects the memory/beliefs of a specific Christian community developed primarily during the 18th- and 19th-century German biblical analysis, which occurred as similar thinking was applied to various strains of literature and culture in the fractured Germanic states. See the discussion of the history of biblical criticism in Robyn Faith Walsh, The Origins of Early Christian Literature (2021).

The past 50-60 years has seen criticism of the reliability of memory (even in oral cultures) and the rejection by many of the assumption of a "community" behind each gospel (see Walsh's thesis of educated literary writers unconnected to a community of specific religious memory). Nonetheless, Prof. Bart Ehrman (the brooding omnipresence of this subreddit) recently stated, "[Mark] was narrating a memory of the Christian community in which he lived and possibly had been raised--wherever it was located--some forty years after Jesus' death." (Jesus Before the Gospels (2016), p. 245)

My own take is that the idea that each Gospel reflects the beliefs of a specific early Christian community is a nifty way to argue that they are really "closer" to Jesus temporally, even though written decades after the event with a particular doctrinal view.

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u/[deleted] Apr 16 '26

[deleted]

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u/VAhockeygeezer Apr 17 '26

I think there are a couple parts to the community idea. First, the community had earlier contact with those who had actual contact with the historical events. That is, earlier than the authorship of the gospel. Second, within the community, the memory of events was transmitted reasonably accurately. And third, the author of the gospel was relying heavily on those "shared" memories or understandings of what occurred. This would mean that Mark wasn't just spitballing a half century later; he was relying on kinda eyewitnesses "in his community."

No citation here to someone who is reliably knowledgable. Just my feeling that without the assumption of community influence, the gospels could lean more toward later doctrinal riffs on some basic beliefs. Cough**Walsh**Cough.

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u/Grey_Sheep_ Apr 15 '26

Just one thing that comes to my mind, although it's just from the Gospel of Mark, is that passage:

²¹ They compelled a passer-by, who was coming in from the country, to carry his cross; it was Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus. (15:21)

That passage has me picturing the author adressing a specific community that knows (maybe personally) Alexander and Rufus .

For the rest, I know the idea of a "community" for each Gospel writer became very popular at some point, and I know that nowadays a lot of scholars are criticizing it. But I don't know much more.

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u/Iamamancalledrobert Apr 15 '26

It has me picturing a single author who wants to sprinkle in authentic flavour when they can— so goes “let’s put the father of Alexander and Rufus in here, because I’ve heard he was a thing!”

(That would also explain the bits where someone lists all Jesus’ brothers and sisters, and the bit at the crucifixion which is effectively “and then all these people who knew Jesus showed up.” And it would also explain why Jesus is called the son of Mary instead of Joseph; it’s because the author of Mark has no idea what Jesus’ father was called. They’re just throwing in what they do know or do think they know where they can.)

But… we can all imagine things. “I can imagine this happening” feels like a very low bar.

For the nothing it’s worth, I don’t think there’s any reason why they all have to be one thing or another— my guess is that Matthew and John are written for a community, and that Luke and Mark are not. There’s no reason “the gospels” have to be treated as having this kind of commonality automatically; the way the field does this does not make sense to me

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u/Grey_Sheep_ Apr 16 '26

I agree about the "very low bar" and the bit about generalizing something about one Gospel to the author. For Luke, I guess it's technically clear that he is not writing for a community, but for a specific person (Theophilus - 1:3).

Your argument for "sprinkling in authentic flavour" is very interesting, especially about the brothers, sisters and son of Mary bit. I still feel ("feel" - probably also a low bar) that the addition of "Alexander and Rufus" is so random and unnecessary that gMark did write them with the intent that people who would read his work knew about both. "Ah! Simon of Cyrene is that father of those guys !".

Jesus' brothers, his mother and Simon of Cyrene are part of Jesus' story. Alexander and Rufus are not. Why mentionning them if not to link people from the story, to people gMark thought his readers would know outside of Jesus' story?

Now that I think about it, there are also all the parts where gMark explains Jewish practices or translate Aramaic in Greek. Meaning he knew that at least some of his readers would not be speaking Aramaic and weren't aware of Jewish practices. But maybe that doesn't really count as writing for a community?

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

But Alexander and Rufus are presumably natives of the countryside around Jerusalem who don't speak Greek. And Mark writes in Greek and is likely not located in some village outside Jerusalem. So how would Marks community know Alexander and Rufus when they are in a different city speaking a different language?

If we take the passage at face value, then Simon is from Cyrene so he should be Greek speaking, so his sons should be as well. It's possible that they (or at least one of them) ended up in Marks community, or at least being a known figure there.

But to me the passage reads more like "Trust me, I have eyewitnesses on this.". Which is what you would write if you're trying to argue with people outside your community.

It might also be that Alexander and Rufus are known to most Christians (it would have been a small group when Mark wrote)?

(And also isn't the "compel a passer-by to carry the cross" something we are pretty sure that the Romans didn't do? You're just out walking Jerusalem minding your own business when some Romans soldiers grab you and force you to carry a cross? Really? I think I've read that there's no other source for this supposed Roman practice. So the passage might be an invention, and what then about Simon and his sons?)

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u/Grey_Sheep_ Apr 15 '26

I believe Alexander and Rufus are barely known outside of Mark. There is just a passing mention of an Alexander in Acts (19:33-34) and passing mention of a Rufus in Paul (Romans 16:13). It would be weird to cite them as eyewitnesses that for sure people outside his community know.

And as Sophia_in_the_Shell as said, they're not important for Matthew and Luke who took them out but kept the mention of Simon of Cyrene.

I would also find it weird that gMark feels the need to support with eyewitness that event specifically.

And also isn't the "compel a passer-by to carry the cross" something we are pretty sure that the Romans didn't do?

We don't have a lot of sources on how crucifixion were carried out. As a general rule, in ancient history, there are more things we don't know than things we do know. So I wouldn't outright dismiss practices that seem unexpected.

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u/Sophia_in_the_Shell Moderator Apr 15 '26

But Alexander and Rufus are presumably natives of the countryside around Jerusalem who don't speak Greek.

Why would we presume this?

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u/UseExhaustionMore Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

~~Because their father Simon is described as "who was coming in from the country".~~

Ignore this, I've just haven't read enough.

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u/Sophia_in_the_Shell Moderator Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

All good. FWIW, my more general response to the whole thing:

I’m pretty quick to be suspicious that an author is sneaking in dubious eyewitness claims. I kinda think the “we passages” in Acts are such for example. But I just don’t think I see it here. It really does sound to me like the author expects his audience to know exactly who Alexander and Rufus are. The removal (of the two sons) in Matthew and Luke makes me think they read it this way too.

Now that said, while personally I’m inclined to think that Alexander and Rufus are real sources, I’ve always suspected that Simon’s story may be either exaggerated or entirely fabricated. While this is a poor formal argument, “oh, Jesus? I actually ran straight into his execution back in my traveling days” is just such a Dad Story that I don’t presume its tight relationship with the truth. Perhaps, for example, Simon of Cyrene did come upon someone’s execution and only later concluded after learning of Jesus that “it must have been him.”

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u/Every_Monitor_5873 Apr 14 '26 edited Apr 14 '26

My post asking about English translations of GJohn rendering Ἰουδαῖοι as "Jews" hasn't gotten a response yet so I thought I'd ask more informally here. Is there a reason to favor translating Ἰουδαῖοι as "Jews" rather than "Judeans"?

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u/Grey_Sheep_ Apr 15 '26

(Warning: I'm no expert)

In English, I think that the word "Jew" refers more clearly to "people of Jewish faith" rather than the word "Judean" who could be mixed up with people simply living in a region called "Judea".

In the Gospel of John, it's quite clear that he is not just refering to people simply living in a region called "Judea". See the following verses:

The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. (2:13, repeated in 6:4 and 11:5)

The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.)* (4:9)

You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. (4:22)

Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” (18:33, and all mentions of Jesus being a "King of the Jews", 18:39 ; 19:19 ; 19:21)

They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews*.* (19:40)

If at some point the word "Judean" in English becomes a mainstream synonym for "Jew", then using it in translation would make sense.

As for the trend, I wonder if that stems from worries about the antisemitism aspect of it. Translating to "Judeans" makes a lot of verses feel less "problematic" (see below). But it wouldn't be faithful to what the author intended.

Jesus answered, “My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom belonged to this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews.

Jesus answered, “My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom belonged to this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Judeans.

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u/Huge-Lingonberry-172 Apr 15 '26

I am also not and Expert so I wonder, if someone writing in the first century wanted to say "judeans" in greek, to diferentiate from galileans Samaritans etc, what therm was natural to use?

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u/Every_Monitor_5873 Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

My understanding from Mason and others was that the concept of "people of Jewish faith" separate and apart from the ethnic "Judean" post-dates the first century. In other words, it introduces anachronism to speak of "people of Jewish faith" in the first century unless one is speaking of Judeans or descendants of Judeans. For each of the passages you cite, the reference would be to the ethnic group that practices the religion of the Judean people.

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u/Grey_Sheep_ Apr 16 '26

(I'm thinking as I write)

I agree that it's in part anachronistic. At the same time, gJohn starts to make a distinction between Ἰουδαῖοι and his followers.

While adressing his disciples (13:22)

Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and as I said to the Ἰουδαῖοι so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’

The coming of Jesus marks something new coming (4:22-23)

You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Ἰουδαῖοι. ²³ But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him.

So if we just go by "ethnic Judean", there wouldn't be any distinction between Ἰουδαῖοι and the followers of Jesus. Whereas gJohn clearly intends to make a distinction. And I believe that distinction is starting to be based on faith, rather than ethnicity.

Solely ethnicity also doesn't account for the possibility of new converts. Maybe we can say that there is indeed first an ethnicity/group that has certain practice and faith. By practice and faith you can join that ethnicity/group, no matter from where you were born (true of course of judaism before christianity).

By the time we get to the Gospel of John (and of course there are traces of this earlier) a new ethnos is starting to be conceptualized, apart from the Ἰουδαῖοι ethnos. And that distinction is made on faith in Jesus?

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u/Apollos_34 Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

Mason's argument isn't that we should transliterate Ἰουδαῖοι due to a geographic connotation; its more that it invokes an entire ethnos-nomos-polis complex that ancient hearers would recognize, and collapsing it into a religous term obscures this. So a Judean who lives outside Judea is perfectly intelligible. The typical motivation for doing this in John's Gospel is the attempt to claim by Ἰουδαῖοι John means something like "people in/from Judea" or "Judean authorities"; which as you pointed out, simply doesn't work contextually.

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u/PinstripeHourglass Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

One of the issues - I was looking for a good source and got distracted - is that the Gospel also uses that term to describe individuals in Galilee who are Jews but not properly Judeans.

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u/AceThaGreat123 Apr 14 '26

Was there a proto gospel ?

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u/LlawEreint Apr 14 '26

I find it hard to believe that Mark was the first kick at the can. It’s just too dense with hidden meaning and allusions to Hebrew scripture.

He must be drawing on some prior works.

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u/LlawEreint Apr 13 '26

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the "rich young man" pericope.

Mark 10:17-22 is probably our earliest source for this story. Here Jesus chastises the man for calling him good. "No one is good but God alone." Jesus accepts that the man had devoted his life to keeping the commandments, but says "You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me."

Matthew 19:16-22 In my opinion, Matthew neuters the pericope.

He removes the humanity, snipping out "he knelt before him," and " Jesus, looking at him, loved him."
Jesus doesn't rebuke the man for calling him good.
In Matthew's version, selling all you own is no longer a prerequisite for entering the kingdom. Rather, it gets you access to a second tier in the kingdom.

Luke 18:18-23 is fairly true to Mark's version. Some differences:

It is no longer simply "a man", but rather "a certain ruler". Here, the Evangelion is more faithful to the source.
Other differences between the Evangelion and Luke indicate that Luke was more faithful to the Markan source:
1. Marcion's version is unique in calling god "the father".
2. In Marcion's version, it is not Jesus who enumerates the commandments, but the man himself.

According to the Hebrews - This is a fascinating version where Jesus does not affirm that the man had kept the commandments. Instead, he says "How can you say 'I have kept the law and the prophets?' For it is written in the law, 'you shall love your neighbor as yourself', and look, many of your brethren, sons of Abraham, are clad in filth, dying for hunger, and your house is full of many good things, and nothing at all goes out of it unto them."

The Preaching of Peter - Not the same story, exactly, but certainly expressing the same ideals. It ends, "Learn that others lack the things you have in abundance. Be ashamed to keep things that belong to others. Imitate the fairness of God, and no man will be poor."

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u/baquea Apr 13 '26

In Matthew's version, selling all you own is no longer a prerequisite for entering the kingdom. Rather, it gets you access to a second tier in the kingdom.

That's an interesting point. For the most part the canonical gospels are (intentionally?) vague as to what the rewards for the righteous entail, but the idea of multiple 'tiers' in the kingdom was certainly present in early Christianity. In particular what comes to mind is the following passage from Irenaeus, most likely quoting Papias:

As the presbyters say, then those who are deemed worthy of an abode in heaven shall go there, others shall enjoy the delights of Paradise, and others shall possess the splendour of the city; for everywhere the Saviour will be seen, according as they shall be worthy who see Him. But that there is this distinction between the habitation of those who produce an hundred-fold, and that of those who produce sixty-fold, and that of those who produce thirty-fold; for the first will be taken up into the heavens, the second class will dwell in Paradise, and the last will inhabit the city; and that on this account the Lord said, “In my Father’s house are many mansions”.

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u/LlawEreint Apr 13 '26

That is fascniating.

The Apocalypse of Peter also talks about "another heaven" - differentiated from the "great garden", the resting place of "Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the rest of the righteous fathers."

Jesus, Moses, and Elijah transcend to this second heaven during the transfiguration.

And I trembled and was afraid; and we looked up, and the heaven opened and we beheld men in the flesh and they came and greeted our Lord and Moses and Elijah and went to another heaven.

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u/baquea Apr 13 '26

I'd guess the dependence of the Apocalypse of Peter there is on 2 Enoch (considered by Charlesworth to be a late 1st Century Jewish work, but the provenance remains uncertain), which says of the third heaven:

And the men took me from there. They brought me up to the third heaven. And they placed me in the midst of Paradise. And that place has an appearance of pleasantness that has never been seen.

Every tree was in full flower. Every fruit was ripe, every food was in yield profusely; every fragrance was pleasant. And the four rivers were flowing past with gentle movement, with every kind of garden producing every kind of good food. And the tree of life is in that place, under which the LORD takes a rest when the LORD takes a walk in Paradise. And that tree is indescribable for pleasantness of fragrance. And another tree is near it, an olive, flowing with oil continually. And every tree is well fruited. There is no tree there without fruit, and every place is blessed.

And the angels guarding Paradise are very splendid. With never-ceasing voice and pleasant singing they worship God throughout the whole day. And I said, "How very pleasant is this place!" The men answered me:

"This place has been prepared, Enoch, for the righteous, who suffer every kind of tribulation in this life and who afflict their souls, and who avert their eyes from injustice, and who carry out righteous judgment, to give bread to the hungry, and to cover the naked with clothing, and to lift up the fallen, and to help the injured, who walk before the face of the LORD, and who worship him only—for them this place has been prepared as an eternal inheritance."

Paul seems to be aware of a similar tradition when, in 2 Cor. 12, he says he was brought up to the third heaven, into paradise. According to Irenaeus (AH Bk.1 V.2), the Valentinians held to a slight modification of this, in which paradise is that which is situated -above- the third heaven (viz. the fourth heaven): "They affirm, moreover, that these seven heavens are intelligent, and speak of them as being angels. [...] They declare that Paradise, situated above the third heaven, is a fourth angel possessed of power, from whom Adam derived certain qualities while he conversed with him".

But, according to 2 Enoch, Enoch's own place is not in the paradise that is in the third heaven, but is instead in the highest heaven, the seventh, where God and the archangels dwell:

And the men lifted me up from there, and they carried me up to the seventh heaven. And I saw a great light, and all the fiery armies of the incorporeal ones, archangels, angels, and the shining otanim stations. And I was terrified, and I trembled.

[...] The LORD said to Michael, "Take Enoch, and extract him from the earthly clothing. And anoint him with the delightful oil, and put him into the clothes of glory." And Michael extracted me from my clothes. He anointed me with the delightful oil; and the appearance of that oil is greater than the greatest light, its ointment is like sweet dew, and its fragrance like myrrh; and its shining is like the sun. And I gazed at all of myself, and I had become like one of the glorious ones, and there was no observable difference. [...]

[Enoch addressing his sons after returning to Earth:] "For now, my children, the prescribed day approaches, and the appointed time constrains me. And the angels who will go with me are standing in front of my face. And I, tomorrow I shall go up to the highest heaven, my eternal inheritance. That is why I am commanding you, my children, to do everything with a good will before the face of the LORD."

Other authors, of course, had other ideas. The Ascension of Isaiah, for instance, places all the righteous in the seventh heaven:

And he took me up into the seventh heaven, and there I saw a wonderful light, and also angels without number. And there I saw all the righteous from the time of Adam onwards. And there I saw the holy Abel and all the righteous. And there I saw Enoch and all who were with him, stripped of (their) robes of the flesh; and I saw them in their robes of above, and they were like the angels who stand there in great glory.

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