Subject: Re: Albert Sabin
From: lippard@skyblu.ccit.arizona.edu (James J. Lippard)
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In article <C5p660.36t@sunfish.usd.edu>, rfox@charlie.usd.edu writes...
>In article <1993Apr15.225657.17804@rambo.atlanta.dg.com>, wpr@atlanta.dg.com (Bill Rawlins) writes:
>>|> >|> 
>>|> However, one highly biased account (as well as possibly internally 
>>|> inconsistent) written over 2 mellenia ago, in a dead language, by fanatic
>>|> devotees of the creature in question which is not supported by other more 
>>|> objective sources and isnt  even accepted by those who's messiah this creature 
>>|> was supposed to be, doesn't convince me in the slightest, especially when many
>>|> of the current day devotees appear brainwashed into believing this pile of 
>>|> guano...
>>
>>       Since you have referred to the Messiah, I assume you are referring
>>        to the New Testament.  Please detail your complaints or e-mail if
>>        you don't want to post.  First-century Greek is well-known and
>>        well-understood.  Have you considered Josephus, the Jewish Historian,
>>        who also wrote of Jesus?  In addition, the four gospel accounts
>>        are very much in harmony.  
> 
>Bill, I have taken the time to explain that biblical scholars consider the
>Josephus reference to be an early Christian insert.  By biblical scholar I mean
>an expert who, in the course of his or her research, is willing to let the
>chips fall where they may.  This excludes literalists, who may otherwise be
>defined as biblical apologists.  They find what they want to find.  They are
>not trustworthy by scholarly standards (and others).
> 
>Why an insert?  Read it - I have, a number of times.  The passage is glaringly
>out of context, and Josephus, a superb writer, had no such problem elsewhere 
>in his work.  The passage has *nothing* to do with the subject matter in which 
>it lies.  It suddenly appears and then just as quickly disappears.

I think this is a weak argument.  The fact is, there are *two* references to
Jesus in _Antiquities of the Jews_, one of which has unquestionably at least
been altered by Christians.  Origen wrote, in the third century, that
Josephus did not recognize Jesus as the Messiah, while the long passage
says the opposite.  There is an Arabic manuscript of _Antiquities of the
Jews_ which contains a version of the passage which is much less gung-ho
for Jesus and may be authentic.
   There is no question that Origen, in the third century, saw a reference
to Jesus in Josephus.  There are no manuscripts of _Antiquities_ which
lack the references.

It is possible that it was fabricated out of whole cloth and inserted, but
I don't think it's very likely--nor do I think there is a consensus in
the scholarly community that this is the case. (I know G.A. Wells takes
this position, but that's because he takes the very small minority view
that Jesus never existed.  And he is a professor of German, not of
biblical history or New Testament or anything directly relevant to
the historicity of Jesus.)

Jim Lippard              Lippard@CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU
Dept. of Philosophy      Lippard@ARIZVMS.BITNET
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
