Dating Paul's Epistles

[capnkirk]

What is the basis for the dating of Paul's epistles? Are these dates wholly dependent on implied Biblical references, like Acts? I haven't been able to find any extrabiblical corroboration; is there any?

Capnkirk

[Toto]

There is a recent thread on this precise topic somewhere. Bill is going to upgrade vBB tomorrow and we might have a chance of finding it after the index is rebuilt :)

Most scholars assume the basic historicity of Acts and date Paul's letters from there. But there are some real problems.

[Bernard Muller]

Capnkirk:
I manage to cover that, among other things, in two pages of mine:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/appb.html
Search on > 3.2.1 <
Going through it, you'll be invited to poke on that other page, which is actually my main page on the topic:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/appp.html

That does cover the Corinthian letters, which are actually more than two, twice three combined in one, for a total of six (plus at least one lost one).
Yes, I worked together with 'Acts' to get the dating & splits. I found there are concordance between 'Acts' and Paul's epistles, and also conflicts, all of them explained by Luke's agenda.

I also go over the dating of Galatians here:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/hjes3xx.html
Check the second half of that short page.

1Thessalonians written from Corinth in late 50 or early 51, Romans written also from Corinth in early 58.

The Philippians letter is at least three combined in one.

This is my dating:
1Th -->50-51 from Corinth
1Cor a --> early 53, from Ephesus
Php a --> early 53-54, from Ephesus
1Cor b --> 53-54, from Ephesus
1Cor c --> early 55, from Ephesus
2Cor a --> later in 55, likely from Ephesus
2Cor b --> later in 55, from Ephesus
Php b --> late 56/57, from Ephesus (in jail)
Philemon --> late 56/57, from Ephesus (in jail)
2Cor c --> late 57, from Macedonia
Galatians --> early 58, from Corinth
Romans --> early 58, from Corinth
Php c --> early 58, from Corinth

I also went through all the original Corinthians & Philippians letters, explaining the reason for the splits, and the very human motivation of Paul behind each parts of them (I got 9 pages on them where they are reconstructed word by word, plus the later interpolations).

Best regards, Bernard

[capnkirk]

Bernard,

Thank you for posting the three links; they have dates galore. Alas, I was asking for information concerning any extrabiblical sources for the dating of these various events.

For example, as Toto said, much of the dating is based on Luke's account in Acts (as your links tend to bear out), but Luke was writing 80 years after the fact. If that is the best dating we have, then as far as I am concerned, it is all a house of cards. It's not much different from calculating the age of the earth using the OT "begats".
http://users.pandora.be/eforum/emoticons4u/sad/1361.gif

[Attonitus]

Originally posted by capnkirk
What is the basis for the dating of Paul's epistles?

A paleographical dating of P46, containing Romans, 1 Thess, 1 Cor, 2 Cor, Gal, Eph, Phil, Col, and Hebrews (parcial) 200 CE. Previously, only speculations.

[Bernard Muller]

Capnkirk,
I would not agree about 80 years after the facts. I date 'Acts' at around 90, that is 40 to 30 years after the facts. But if you have already made up your mind, so be it.
About my dating of the gospels and 'Acts', I have that page:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/gospels.html

Attonitus,
If you do not read my pages, you'll never find how I got these dates. And how do you know these 200CE texts are the earliest? My basis for dating is mainly internal evidence.

Best regards, Bernard

[Attonitus]

Originally posted by Bernard Muller
Attonitus, If you do not read my pages, you'll never find how I got these dates. And how do you know these 200CE texts are the earliest? My basis for dating is mainly internal evidence.
Best regards, Bernard

Hi Bernard,

Capnkirk looks for an external evidence. P46 it is the fully text more earliest, and 200 CE it is the paleographical dating. Young Kyu Kim in 1988 dated P46 to the third quarter of the 1st century, but their work it is not generally accepted. I don't reject your exegetical work, I simply exposed a paleographical evidence.

All the best,

[Bernard Muller]

capnkirk:
If that is the best dating we have, then as far as I am concerned, it is all a house of cards. It's not much different from calculating the age of the earth using the OT "begats".

Not really, I struggled to get the dating right and I am confident each item has some solid basis. That's the first step.
The second one is to reach full cohesion/coherence, and everything fit very nicely.
I do not think your parallel with the OT is warranted. We are not looking at the same thing. And dismissing, by rhetorical means, work which took me several years is easy & cheap.

Best regards, Bernard

[redzrx]

I have read that when dating books/letters that they cannot give a definite year or date but can usually give the century that is written. Writing style (and history)is basically what they go by so accuracy is only within maybe 75-125 years either way.

you will also find that scholars may change there readings on dates or have critisism from other scholars if the dating is too precise so multiple scholar input is needed.

I do agree though that pauls letters were before the wall of the temple came a tumblin town.. I think Bernards estimates are in the ball park..

Mario

[spin]

We know that in the middle thirties Herod Antipas sent John the Baptist to Machaerus which was on the Nabataean border. John had been stirring trouble because of Herod's divorce from the daughter of the Nabataean king Aretas IV so that he could have a someone troublesome marriage to Herodias. The ensuing war brought Aretas north into Herod's territory, but the Romans intervened to drive him back. Aretas IV never had control of Damascus, though we know an ancestor did toward the end of Seleucid control of Syria. Aretas II was asked to become the ruler of Damascus around 85 BCE.

Now the only historical indication to come to light from Paul's letters is a reference to his flight from Damascus which was under the control of Aretas (2 Cor 11:32). If this is a factual indication it must mean Aretas II and Paul then lived around 85 BCE.


spin

[Bernard Muller]

Spin:
We know that in the middle thirties Herod Antipas sent John the Baptist to Machaerus which was on the Nabataean border. John had been stirring trouble because of Herod's divorce from the daughter of the Nabataean king Aretas IV so that he could have a someone troublesome marriage to Herodias. The ensuing war brought Aretas north into Herod's territory, but the Romans intervened to drive him back.

The middle thirties? Where do you get that dating?
The ensuing battle between Herod & Aretas did not have to, and did not, occur right about Herod divorce & remarriage. I put the later at 27 and the former in 36 (explanations in HJ-1b)
Furthermore, the Romans turned back half way. So Aretas was never defeated. The Roman army also never got into Aretas' territory, either just conquered or not, because it was advancing through Judea.

Aretas IV never had control of Damascus, though we know an ancestor did toward the end of Seleucid control of Syria. Aretas II was asked to become the ruler of Damascus around 85 BCE.

I know, no external evidence to support 2Cor11:32, but I think there is a good possibility Damascus was leased to Aretas in 37-40, in exchange of him vacating Herod's territories like Perea, never reconquered. And Caius was the new emperor. He certainly did not force Vitellius into continuing the campaign. It is likely an agreement was reached between Caius' men and undefeated Aretas, some kind of exchange.

Now the only historical indication to come to light from Paul's letters is a reference to his flight from Damascus which was under the control of Aretas (2 Cor 11:32). If this is a factual indication it must mean Aretas II and Paul then lived around 85 BCE.

Possibly a later Christian interpolation, I admit. I do not make much use 2Cor11:32 anyway, just that the return of Paul in Damascus from somewhere in Arabia (under the control of Aretas) would make more sense is Damascus got under the same ruler as the place where Paul disappeared for a while.

Best regards, Bernard

[spin]

Originally posted by Bernard Muller
The middle thirties?

Yup.

Where do you get that dating?

The connection between John the baptist's complaint and the date of Aretas's action. Aretas did not wait nearly a decade to attempt to take his revenge.

Furthermore, the Romans turned back half way. So Aretas was never defeated. The Roman army also never got into Aretas' territory, either just conquered or not, because it was advancing through Judea.

It was sufficient for the Romans to get involved. This forced the Nabataeans back. Just as Scaurus's involvement in 64 BCE drove them back.

I know, no external evidence to support 2Cor11:32, but I think there is a good possibility Damascus was leased to Aretas in 37-40, in exchange of him vacating Herod's territories like Perea, never reconquered.

This is not particularly reflective of Roman policy with regard to their clientele, especially when one initiates a crisis.

The divination against Vitellius AJ 18,5,3 indicated that Aretas IV was at Petra.

And Caius was the new emperor. He certainly did not force Vitellius into continuing the campaign. It is likely an agreement was reached between Caius' men and undefeated Aretas, some kind of exchange.

What makes it likely that the Romans knuckled under to Aretas when he had invaded a long-time Roman friend?

Possibly a later Christian interpolation, I admit. I do not make much use 2Cor11:32 anyway, just that the return of Paul in Damascus from somewhere in Arabia (under the control of Aretas)...

(Arabia had a different meaning then. Philip's tetrarchy included Arabs.)

... would make more sense is Damascus got under the same ruler as the place where Paul disappeared for a while.

The geographical term, Arabia, included territory rather near Damascus.


spin

[capnkirk]

Originally posted by Attonitus
A paleographical dating of P46, containing Romans, 1 Thess, 1 Cor, 2 Cor, Gal, Eph, Phil, Col, and Hebrews (partial) 200 CE. Previously, only speculations. Agreed. The earliest surviving manuscripts all, with the possible exception of P52 date to around 200 CE, based on paleographic analysis. Since both these documents were recovered from Egypt, it does demonstrate that Paul's letters and GJohn were available there in that time-frame.

It's a shame that no one will sacrifice a piece for C14 dating.

[rlogan]

Agreed. The earliest surviving manuscripts all, with the possible exception of P52 date to around 200 CE, based on paleographic analysis. Since both these documents were recovered from Egypt, it does demonstrate that Paul's letters and GJohn were available there in that time-frame.

It's a shame that no one will sacrifice a piece for C14 dating.

Ahh...

I was wondering about that very thing. Carbon 14 dating for P52. Yes, that would certainly settle some things.

[Vorkosigan]

It's a shame that no one will sacrifice a piece for C14 dating.

I don't think it would matter, cap'n. The time frame of the NT writings, about a century, is within the margin of error of the measurement.

[spin]

I don't think it would matter, cap'n. The time frame of the NT writings, about a century, is within the margin of error of the measurement.

Depending on the size of the piece and the how clean it is of carbon based contaminants, it could be helpful as showing that a particular fragment/text does, or does not, falsify an argument. A C-14 dating supporting the traditional dating of P52 would falsify the proposition that the gospels were a mid 2nd c. development -- and datings are more precise these days than they were a decade ago. A dating confirming the more recent analysis that P52 was late 2nd c. would put the ball in the court of those who want to argue that the gospels were older.


spin

[rlogan]

I don't think it would matter, cap'n. The time frame of the NT writings, about a century, is within the margin of error of the measurement.

Here's a little release on the Dead Sea Scrolls and radiocarbon vs. Paleographic dating. What you are saying Vork, seems to be so:

http://www.physics.arizona.edu/physics/public/dead-sea.html

(also: Only milligrams of a sample are needed for radiocarbon age dating by accelerator mass spectrometer technique)

Yeah, it could falsify things if the radiocarbon range didn't overlap one or the other hypothesis.

Hmmm. Edited to add - In that article some of the ranges are narrower. That might be what spin is saying about the quality of the sample.

[capnkirk]

Capnkirk,
I would not agree about 80 years after the facts. I date 'Acts' at around 90, that is 40 to 30 years after the facts. But if you have already made up your mind, so be it.Bernard,

I think that we are actually closer together than that (and, no I haven't yet made up my mind about it). The period that Acts allegedly covers is about 30 years...from the pentecost experiences in the early chapters to Paul's appearance before Festus near the end. My reference to 80 years (from the earliest 'events') only places Acts at around 110 CE, and that is someone else's figure (Mack's). Of course, if one were to accept Mack's thesis en toto, then any dating based on Acts would based solidly on thin air.

As for the earliest extrabiblical referencing to the gospels, Tacitus' entry in Annals (15.44), c 108-115 CE specifically references Christ's crucifixion by Pontius Pilate, implying that at least one of the Synoptics was in circulation by then (which, incidentally strains Doherty's dating pretty seriously). Tacitus also consistently refers to them in that passage as Xtians, implying that that term was in general use in the first and second decades of the 2nd century.

These are representative of the kinds of extrabiblical dating references I am asking about, and why I am asking you how you came up with some of the dates in the links you provided. I'm asking you to peel another layer off the onion, so to speak, and share some of your development with us.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[capnkirk]

We know that in the middle thirties Herod Antipas sent John the Baptist to Machaerus which was on the Nabataean border. John had been stirring trouble because of Herod's divorce from the daughter of the Nabataean king Aretas IV so that he could have a someone troublesome marriage to Herodias. The ensuing war brought Aretas north into Herod's territory, but the Romans intervened to drive him back. Aretas IV never had control of Damascus, though we know an ancestor did toward the end of Seleucid control of Syria. Aretas II was asked to become the ruler of Damascus around 85 BCE.

Now the only historical indication to come to light from Paul's letters is a reference to his flight from Damascus which was under the control of Aretas (2 Cor 11:32). If this is a factual indication it must mean Aretas II and Paul then lived around 85 BCE.The whole account of JBp is fraught with temporal inconsistencies. GMark claims that Herod Antipas was told that Jesus had raised JBp from the dead. This is the preamble that introduces the account of JBp's execution, so we are led to believe that JBp's execution took place before Jesus'. Yet there is fair extrabiblical evidence that the trouble that brought Aretas IV to Herod's territory came before JBp's execution.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[capnkirk]

capnkirk:

Not really, I struggled to get the dating right and I am confident each item has some solid basis. That's the first step.
The second one is to reach full cohesion/coherence, and everything fit very nicely.
I do not think your parallel with the OT is warranted. We are not looking at the same thing. And dismissing, by rhetorical means, work which took me several years is easy & cheap.Bernard,

My apologies; exegetical analysis is a very valuable tool for research of ancient documents. My comparison with the dating by virtue of "begats" was meant as a general observation relating to the limitations of exegetics, not its worthiness. Besides, I am not claiming that there are no extrabiblical date hooks, only that without them, only the sequencing of events may be reasonably checked, not specific dating. Though this is also a HB-specific example: Consider how erroneous early 20th century archaeologists' dating of specific Canaanite sites turned out to be (according to Finkelstein) because they relied on HB myth for their chronological anchors.

What I am currently trying to determine is just how much the currently accepted dates for Paul's letters depend on other NT references. The conflicting JBp references (per my previous post) serve to illustrate the endemic danger in relying on scripture as the foundation layer for date analysis.

[capnkirk]

Depending on the size of the piece and the how clean it is of carbon based contaminants, it could be helpful as showing that a particular fragment/text does, or does not, falsify an argument...Thank you spin and vork, The referenced article bears out that contamination levels presumed in the Qumran samples limited the accuracy of C14 analysis to about 5% (100 yrs), while the paleographic ranges for those same documents was consistently much narrower. If the same level of paleographic certainty applies to the scrolls found in Egypt, then we already have about the best dating we'll ever have.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[Toto]

The whole account of JBp is fraught with temporal inconsistencies. GMark claims that Herod Antipas was told that Jesus had raised JBp from the dead. This is the preamble that introduces the account of JBp's execution, so we are led to believe that JBp's execution took place before Jesus'. Yet there is fair extrabiblical evidence that the trouble that brought Aretas IV to Herod's territory came before JBp's execution.



Actually, Herod said the Jesus was JBap raised from the dead. Matt 14:1 says

At that time Herod the tetrarch heard the reports about Jesus, 2and he said to his attendants, "This is John the Baptist; he has risen from the dead! That is why miraculous powers are at work in him."

See also Was Jesus John the Baptist Raised from the Dead? (http://www.courses.drew.edu/sp2000/BIBST189.001/pricejj.html)

[Toto]

Bernard,

. . .
As for the earliest extrabiblical referencing to the gospels, Tacitus' entry in Annals (15.44), c 108-115 CE specifically references Christ's crucifixion by Pontius Pilate, implying that at least one of the Synoptics was in circulation by then (which, incidentally strains Doherty's dating pretty seriously). . . .

Doherty dates gMark to around 80. There is no strain.

[capnkirk]

Actually, Herod said the Jesus was JBap raised from the dead. Matt 14:1 saysEither way, this places Herod's divorce/remarriage and JBp's execution several years before Aretas IV's response to it, or conversely has JBp alive and well years after Jesus' execution. Neither choice is satisfying. Either the gospels are wrong or Aretas took his own good time to attack Herod.

P.S. Mark 6:14 is not so specific as GMatt. The wording there sounds like Jesus raised JBp from the dead, but in the light of GMatt, ambiguous might be a better term.

At this point, my only interest in the matter is to point out the problems in using the death of JBp to date Jesus' ministry, much less GMark itself.

Besides, my OP concerned the basis for the dating of Paul's epistles rather than the gospels.

[capnkirk]

Doherty dates gMark to around 80. There is no strain.I knew that Mack dates Gmark to 85-90 CE, but I thought Doherty argued for a much later date, like after 100 CE based on lack of extrabiblical mention until much later. Personally, 80-90 seems about right. I defer to your knowledge of Doherty as superior to mine.

[rlogan]

Here's the Tacitus passage:

"But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired."

http://classics.mit.edu/Tacitus/annals.11.xv.html

I don't find support for the written gospel here.

One does wonder what "abominations" he is referring to.

[Toto]

I checked Doherty. He seems to date Mark to "around 90" - he tends to accept Mack's dates.

Layman likes to argue that Doherty has a radically late dating for the gospels. Perhaps he planted that idea in your mind. Doherty does date the final redaction of Acts to a fairly late date - about 150, while the convention among liberal scholars is about 110. Presumably he would also date the final redaction of Luke to about that time, based on an expansion of Marcion's gospel (which might itself have been an edited version of an earlier gospel.)

[spin]

Either way, this places Herod's divorce/remarriage and JBp's execution several years before Aretas IV's response to it, or conversely has JBp alive and well years after Jesus' execution. Neither choice is satisfying. Either the gospels are wrong or Aretas took his own good time to attack Herod.

And you'd like to contemplate that Aretas took nearly ten years to vent his spleen? In those days he could easily have died before getting around to it.

Let's work on the assumption that Aretas who was born in 9 BCE had his daughter when he was twenty, ie 11 CE and she married Herod Antipas when she was 15, ie 26 CE, and according to Josephus "had lived with her a great while" (AJ 18.5.1), let's say to be miserly, over five years, ie at least 31 CE. . . Antipas went off and met Herodias in Rome and came back and divorced Aretas's daughter. We are already in 32 CE and we are starting to get to a more reasonable dating of John's death according to Josephus's indications.

P.S. Mark 6:14 is not so specific as GMatt. The wording there sounds like Jesus raised JBp from the dead, but in the light of GMatt, ambiguous might be a better term.

People were talking about who Jesus was. Some said he was Elijah, but Herod said, "John . . . has been raised". Mk is straightforward.

Besides, my OP concerned the basis for the dating of Paul's epistles rather than the gospels.

Did you like my dating of Paul's work based on his visit to Damascus at the time of Aretas II?


spin

[spin]

I checked Doherty. He seems to date Mark to "around 90" - he tends to accept Mack's dates.

Layman likes to argue that Doherty has a radically late dating for the gospels.

Perhaps Layman got that idea from me.


spin

[capnkirk]

Here's the Tacitus passage:

"But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired."

I don't find support for the written gospel here. While no specific gospel was mentioned, there is content here that becomes very difficult to explain the presence of without at least one of the gospels. The key phrase is the one highlighted above. Since the (chronologically) first NT author to feature Jesus' crucifixion under Pontius Pilate is GMark, Tacitus' reference places at least one of the gospels in the hands of Xtians in Rome at the time of Tacitus' writing. This may thus be the earliest extrabiblical reference to any of the gospels, albeit indirect (and dependent on the understanding that "the Passion" was created by GMark). Also Tacitus' use of the term "Christians" to describe the group speaks of its familiarity in Rome in Tacitus' time.

Anyway, I don't want to spend too much time on the gospels since my question was what sources do scholars use to date Paul's Epistles? And particularly, what extrabiblical sources?

[The Evil One]

Since the (chronologically) first NT author to feature Jesus' crucifixion under Pontius Pilate is GMark, Tacitus' reference places at least one of the gospels in the hands of Xtians in Rome at the time of Tacitus' writing.
I don't think there can be many scholars who would deny that at least one gospel was in circulation among Christian groups all over the place (inc. Rome) by c 108-115 CE which was the date you mentioned for Tacitus.

[capnkirk]

And you'd like to contemplate that Aretas took nearly ten years to vent his spleen? In those days he could easily have died before getting around to it.Spin,

I think you forgot who you were responding to...It wasn't me who put forth that idea. I was responding to it also. Note the last phrase of the pull-quote; we agree that this solution is most unsatisfying.

Let's work on the assumption that Aretas who was born in 9 BCE had his daughter when he was twenty, ie 11 CE and she married Herod Antipas when she was 15, ie 26 CE, and according to Josephus "had lived with her a great while" (AJ 18.5.1), let's say to be miserly, over five years, ie at least 31 CE. . . Antipas went off and met Herodias in Rome and came back and divorced Aretas's daughter. We are already in 32 CE and we are starting to get to a more reasonable dating of John's death according to Josephus's indications.What this analyses does is to cast doubt on the reason that Aretas IV attacked Herod. It may well be that it was a red-herring in the first place, an understandable excuse so to speak. That is the third possibility (that Aretus IV had entirely different reasons for his invasion, but needed political cover). Anyway, that's just a sidebar.
Did you like my dating of Paul's work based on his visit to Damascus at the time of Aretas II?No I don't, primarily because there are several more reasonable hypotheses. Mack's for example. If "the Passion" never happened, as Mack contends, then Luke's depiction of Saul's career under the High Priest in Jerusalem didn't happen either, thus unlinking Luke's account of Paul's experience with Aretas from Paul's brief, almost incidental mention of it. But Paul in his letters did claim to have persecuted Xtians before he was converted, which begs another question. If Paul's conversion was the profound event that Luke's account makes it, why then does Paul never speak about it except to say that he was converted? One would expect Paul to have FEATURED such a profound and supernatural experience which supposedly happened before witnesses.

This forces us to consider reacharacterizing Paul's conversion (as a much more mundane event, akin to contemporary conversions) and his life before conversion (to that of a fairly Hellenized Pharisee in or around Antioch who was in strong disagreement with Xtian groups there). We know that later Paul was imprisoned in Ephesus, and his passing reference to Damascus (in the process of bragging about the various authorities who had persecuted him on account of his faith) didn't even seem to count very highly in that list. It seems that Paul didn't place the import on that event that Luke later did, nor that we do now. Of course, the reason that we do now is because this is about the only thing that Paul wrote down that might give us a fairly secure date-hook.

The problem I have with dating Paul to Aretas II (who died in 96 BCE) is what else has to be revised subsequent to such dating, which, considering the current state of scholarship would be extremely unlikely.

[spin]

What this analyses does is to cast doubt on the reason that Aretas IV attacked Herod.

But what it doesn't do is change the dating for John the Baptizer, who harangued Herod Antipas for divorcing his Nabataean wife for Herodias. It must have been the middle 30s, therefore there is no reason to question Aretas IV's motives, which seem eminently plausible.

The problem I have with dating Paul to Aretas II (who died in 96 BCE) is what else has to be revised subsequent to such dating, which, considering the current state of scholarship would be extremely unlikely.

Sorry, I left off an "I": Aretas III, who was in charge of Damascus circa 85 BCE. There of course was no other time for an Aretas to have been in charge of Damascus. So either Paul is wrong or the common dating is.


spin

[Yuri Kuchinsky]

There's no proof that Paul wrote any of these letters. So this is the first question that needs to be dealt with.

It's possible that he wrote some parts of these letters, though...

Best,

Yuri.

[capnkirk]

But what it doesn't do is change the dating for John the Baptizer, who harangued Herod Antipas for divorcing his Nabataean wife for Herodias. It must have been the middle 30s, therefore there is no reason to question Aretas IV's motives, which seem eminently plausible.Spin,

I see THREE posibilities for error here, and I am undecided which one is correct:

The gospel references to JBp being executed before Jesus are incorrect. "Mark" screwed up.
The Jesus of the gospels lived later than is thought (after Pontius Pilate was recalled). Mark made a different error.
Mark was correct in dating JBp's death to early 30's. Aretas' stated reason for invading Herod was trumped up.

You have picked the second choice.

Sorry, I left off an "I": Aretas III, who was in charge of Damascus circa 85 BCE. There of course was no other time for an Aretas to have been in charge of Damascus. So either Paul is wrong or the common dating is.The consequences to the timelines for the whole period of the birth of Xtianity caused by the presence of Paul in Damascus in 85 BCE are just as problematic as prior to 96 BCE, so I think we can safely presume that Paul didn't precede the consensus Jesus-period by fifty or more years.

I have seen varying conclusions about Aretas IV re: Damascus, and I remember your position from an earlier thread. A thorough discussion of that topic would seriously derail this thread, so for the moment, let us just agree that any dating of Paul's letters based on this link is suspect. Besides, for that incident be definitive, one would have to take Luke's account in Acts as factual in defining Paul in Damascus at the beginning of his Xtian career. Without that, its value as a dating tool becomes more problematic without questioning the historicity of Aretas in Damascus. As it is, more than 10 years passes between the alleged Damascus event and the dating of Paul's earliest letters. That in and of itself seems more than passing strange.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[capnkirk]

There's no proof that Paul wrote any of these letters. So this is the first question that needs to be dealt with.

It's possible that he wrote some parts of these letters, though...Yuri,

Thank you for your post. While I agree that there are questions about the authorship of some of Paul's letters, and that some letters attributed to him are clearly not his, but I would respectfully request that we reserve that discussion for another thread.

At the moment my sole concern is to discover the scholarly basis for the currently accepted dating of Paul's letters to the Thessalonians, Corinthians, Galatians, Romans, Philippians Colossians, and Ephesians. While the dating of the Gospels has been debated endlessly, there seems to be no similar debate about Paul's letters...so much so that even the scholarly basis for the accepted dates seems extremely dificult to discover. Even on this thread, discussion has ranged all over the place while still failing to address the OP.

I might want to question some of those dates, but only AFTER I ascertain what basis the scholars have used to determine the currently accepted dates. This task has proven more difficult than I had imagined when I started the thread.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[Toto]

I was not able to get the search function to work last night, but I argued in a previous thread that Paul's references to Damascus were clearly not to be taken literally, and that Damascus was probably a code name for Qumran or some other city, and the escape symbolic for finding some loophole in the laws. The whole story of the escape from Damascus was part of a theatrical routine in which Paul is clearly playing the "fool" - going through various stock characters of the theater of his time. (See The Runaway Paul (http://www.findarticles.com/cf_0/m2399/2_92/54655583/p1/article.jhtml?term=))

The answer to the question in the OP is clearly that mainstream scholars date Paul's letters by reference to Acts, and by accepting the Christian legend (that has no Biblical or other support) that Paul died around 60 something CE. If Paul's letters were dated the way the gospels are, internal references would probably lead to a post-70 date. Leidman in The Fabrication of the Christ Myth argues for a post-70 date for most of Paul's letters (but he does not consider the possibility of interpolations.)

[rlogan]

Don't these two problems (gospel dating vs epistles) also closely relate to one another?

That is, if one believes he has pinned down the date for the written gospels, then one has an upper bound for the early epistles.

The reason why I questioned the Tacitus entry is that by the time of the epistles, Paul was preaching "Christ Crucified". True, that the entry has another layer of detail with Pilate. Some have challenged the use of the term "procurator" rather than "prefect".

In any case, is this an oral tradition or a written one? Is there a passion narrative predating Mark? There is debate on this point.

But if we challenge the gospel dating, then we have removed the 'lid" on daing the epistles.

I did not wish to derail the thread, but rather argue that the two are related in this way.

[capnkirk]

Don't these two problems (gospel dating vs epistles) also closely relate to one another?
That is, if one believes he has pinned down the date for the written gospels, then one has an upper bound for the early epistles.

The reason why I questioned the Tacitus entry is that by the time of the epistles, Paul was preaching "Christ Crucified". True, that the entry has another layer of detail with Pilate. Some have challenged the use of the term "procurator" rather than "prefect".

In any case, is this an oral tradition or a written one? Is there a passion narrative predating Mark? There is debate on this point.

But if we challenge the gospel dating, then we have removed the 'lid" on daing the epistles.

I did not wish to derail the thread, but rather argue that the two are related in this way.My whole point in continuing to pull us back to the OP was that it is very difficult to challenge scholars' dating of the epistles without knowing what their bases for such dating were. To do so is to set one's self up for a rude surprise from an unexpected direction...after you have spent considerable time and effort refuting something that you thought was real only to find out that it was your own straw dog. That is why it was worth the extra effort to try to find out just what their arguments were based on before proceeding to the kinds of questions that several on this thread have wanted to START with.

The points you make are valid points, like Pilate's title. A recently uncovered inscribed stone at Caesarea Marina records Pilate's title as Prefect, but rather than get lost in a discussion about whether Tacitus should have known this, or whether there might have been some oral tradition before GMark, there were more important issues to settle first.

Toto has confirmed my speculations concerning scholars' ability to date many of Paul's epistles to not just a year, but to a season, and to where he was when he wrote each one. The unanimity of opinion seen practically demanded a recognized body of underlying source material, as evidenced by those same scholars' inability to agree within a decade on the dating of the gospels speaks of a lack of similar source material. My question, plain and simple, was: What was it? Since after all my cajoling, no one has presented any better basis than Acts, I am ready to accept that, and proceed from there.

[Toto]

I have in my notes a reference to Henry Wansbrough An Introduction to the Pauline Letters (http://users.ox.ac.uk/~sben0056/paulineintro/paulineintro.htm) which discusses the dating problem and Acts and the Epistles (http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/hcc1/htm/i.XII.85.htm), which also discusses dating. They both rely on Acts, in particular the mention of Gallio, and do not mention any markers in Paul's letters, except to point out how the chronology can be fit to Acts.

[rlogan]

[QUOTE=capnkirkMy question, plain and simple, was: What was it? Since after all my cajoling, no one has presented any better basis than Acts, I am ready to accept that, and proceed from there.[/QUOTE]

A compact summary:


http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/epistles.html#6

Toto has already given the basic idea. Paul is said to have died in 64. Acts purports to provide external references that can be correlated to the epistles.

[spin]

Spin,

I see THREE posibilities for error here, and I am undecided which one is correct:

The gospel references to JBp being executed before Jesus are incorrect. "Mark" screwed up.
The Jesus of the gospels lived later than is thought (after Pontius Pilate was recalled). Mark made a different error.
Mark was correct in dating JBp's death to early 30's. Aretas' stated reason for invading Herod was trumped up.

You have picked the second choice.

I pointed out that the 3rd isn't relevant to the problem. Whatever Aretas's motive was for the attack, his daughter was of insufficient age to fit the time period of the 20s. She would have been just too young to fit the data. This leads us into the 30s which then makes the stated motive for Aretas's attack quite reasonable. (If I still haven't explained the idea clearly enough ask for clarification next time.)

I have seen varying conclusions about Aretas IV re: Damascus, and I remember your position from an earlier thread. A thorough discussion of that topic would seriously derail this thread, so for the moment, let us just agree that any dating of Paul's letters based on this link is suspect.

I don't agree at all. Our constructs for dating Paul are all quite spurious, so nothing should be discarded a priori.

Besides, for that incident be definitive, one would have to take Luke's account in Acts as factual in defining Paul in Damascus at the beginning of his Xtian career.

I don't accept that Acts is in any sense historically useful to the period it purports to represent

Without that, its value as a dating tool becomes more problematic without questioning the historicity of Aretas in Damascus. As it is, more than 10 years passes between the alleged Damascus event and the dating of Paul's earliest letters. That in and of itself seems more than passing strange.

All of it is passing strange, so why arbitrarily turf out data? Why not leave it all there in suspension until some historically reasonable approach can, if ever, come out of the quagmire?


spin

[capnkirk]

I pointed out that the 3rd isn't relevant to the problem. Whatever Aretas's motive was for the attack, his daughter was of insufficient age to fit the time period of the 20s. She would have been just too young to fit the data. This leads us into the 30s which then makes the stated motive for Aretas's attack quite reasonable. (If I still haven't explained the idea clearly enough ask for clarification next time.)I grant you that the 3rd choice is the least likely, but it deserves to be listed with the others if only to illustrate that it has been duly considered.
I don't agree at all. Our constructs for dating Paul are all quite spurious, so nothing should be discarded a priori.All I said was that dating Paul's epistles based on data that you have argued stridently was patently false (on a previous thread) should be considered suspect. I didn't suggest that it should be discarded a priori, but you have. Now you accuse me of doing so, when I clearly haven't. I'm confused. If I expected any argument from you on this issue, I expected that you would be arguing to discard it a priori.
I don't accept that Acts is in any sense historically useful to the period it purports to representI wasn't arguing that we should. I was arguing that having to take Acts as factual was another reason to be skeptical using it to date Paul and Aretas in Damascus.
All of it is passing strange, so why arbitrarily turf out data? Why not leave it all there in suspension until some historically reasonable approach can, if ever, come out of the quagmire?Now you seem to have flip-flopped again. I am continuing to point out reasons why Acts should not be considered useful in dating Paul's letters, and you are saying that we are wrongfully "arbitrarily turf(ing) out data", when I am neither being arbitrary nor am I turfing out data. All I have done is to add more reasons than you have already proffered to hold Acts suspect as an aid to historical dating. Slow down a little Spin; you're shooting at everything that moves, and I'm taking friendly fire.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[rlogan]

Capn:

I ran across this exchange between Peter Kirby and Steven Carr:

http://home.earthlink.net/~kirby/xtianity/martyrs.html

Carr argues that Paul was not martyred in the Neronian persecution because Clement does not write so. Ignatius does not state so. It isn't until Tertullian that explicit mention of Paul's execution is made.

Peter makes the inference based on Ignatius placing Peter and Paul in Rome, his certitude about the Neronian persecution, and the later legends beginning with Tertullian. He excuses Josephus not saying anything about it because it is not a local Jewish issue, so to speak.

Actually Capn - I'm not even convinced the "Apostle Paul" is real, in the same sense that "Jesus the Christ" as fictionalized in the gospels is not real.

But if there is this legend that he was executed in the Neronian persecution, and this is used as an upper bound on authorship of the epistles, then the question should be addressed.

[spin]

Starfleet to Enterprise:

I'm not arguing that one should date the Pauline corpus according to the dating provided by Aretas III's control of Damascus, but that is the only historical indication from within the corpus with which to date it and all the other methods you attempt to use have greater problems.


spin out

[capnkirk]

Starfleet to Enterprise:

I'm not arguing that one should date the Pauline corpus according to the dating provided by Aretas III's control of Damascus, but that is the only historical indication from within the corpus with which to date it and all the other methods you attempt to use have greater problems.Enterprise here:

So, what are we arguing about? I thought I was making essentially the same case, except that I was willing to then conclude that any dating based on Paul's Damascus reference should be considered basically unfounded, not discarded, but unfounded.

Still, going through the exercise on-thread serves to demonstrate the basis for such a conclusion to the lurkers and others who haven't questioned this before.

P.S. When you were offering your arguments back a couple of months ago, you named particular Roman officials who were unequivocally in charge of the area around Damascus at the time; could you please refresh my memory with those names?

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

[Attonitus]

Here's the Tacitus passage:

"But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired."

Sorry for my break, but the following block it is a evident christian interpolation.

"called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment,again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind"

Without this block the text makes full sense. As correctly states Darrell J. Doughty, neither Tertullian neither Irenaneus know this text, neither a persecution under Nero.

[Bernard Muller]

Capnkirk:
So, what are we arguing about? I thought I was making essentially the same case, except that I was willing to then conclude that any dating based on Paul's Damascus reference should be considered basically unfounded, not discarded, but unfounded.
I think you are basically right here, more so than the Greek does not say Aretas was in control of Damascus then:
This translation is close to the Greek:
YLT 32 In Damascus the ethnarch of Aretas the king was watching the city of the Damascenes, wishing to seize me, 33 and through a window in a rope basket I was let down, through the wall, and fled out of his hands.
I commented on one of my page:
Part of 32-33 (more so "of Aretas the king") or the whole is contested as interpolation because there is no external evidence that Damascus came under Aretas' rule at that time. However, it is not necessarily meant this etnarch had control of the city. Rather, he may have been just the representative of Aretas in it (still under Roman jurisdiction), who, with henchmen, could make arrest.
This appears in one of my backpage, about 2bCorinthians, and I do not use that in anyway to date the Pauline letters.

Essentially, the genuine Pauline letters (BTW, I do not consider 'Ephesians' as authentic) do not have any historical landmarks whatsoever in them. Paul does not give any indication when he wrote them as with reference to historic events or persons, but he gives clues/data about the sequencing, where they were written, some time lapses and even in which season.
In order to put the whole picture together, we have to use 'Acts', which does offer a few historic landmarks, more time intervals, etc.
'Acts' is partly fiction, so it has to be used with caution. Conflicts with Paul's letters or even the ending of GMark are solved by looking at the coloring & bias of 'Acts', which is also the latest text among the aforementioned, that is the one the most likely to be twisted & embellished above the others (GMark is very much embellished also, but I am referring only to the ending:the disciples disowning Jesus, dispersing and going to Galilee).

For anyone interested, I did more work on the issue:
Here, for the time of writing of Paul's epistles as relative to his third journey:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/appp.html#corinth3
To know about my splits of the Corinthians letters and why:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/appp.html#corinth1
Go to the top of that page to know how I determine the dating & sequence of Paul third trip:
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/appp.html
Finally, I cover what precedes for Paul's public life on that page (search on > 3.2 <):
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/appb.html

PS: I gave a series of arguments, based on evidence, about the delay between Herod Antipas' wedding with Herodias and the battle in 36CE.
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/hjes1x.html#delay

Best regards, Bernard

[Bernard Muller]

Attonitus:
As correctly states Darrell J. Doughty, neither Tertullian neither Irenaneus know this text, neither a persecution under Nero.

Dionysius of Corinth (circa.170) was very close to declare the persecution under Nero (54-68):
"... the churches that were planted by Peter and Paul, that of the Romans and that of the Corinthians: for both of them went to our Corinth, and taught us in the same way as they taught you when they went to Italy; and having taught you, they suffered martyrdom at the same time." (letter to the Romans).
Prior to that (95), dreadful mister 666 is likely a reference to Nero, believed reincarnated into Domitian (Revelation13:18)
Suetonius (115) also makes mention of Nero's persecution : "Punishment by Nero was inflicted on the Christians, a class of men given to a new and mischievous superstition."

Best regards, Bernard

[spin]

PS: I gave a series of arguments, based on evidence, about the delay between Herod Antipas' wedding with Herodias and the battle in 36CE.
http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/hjes1x.html#delay

I took the opportunity to look at what Bernard said about the "delay" as he calls what he dates in an a priori manner from 27CE when he claims Herodias became Herod Antipas's wife to 36 CE when Aretas IV avenged the unlawful divorce of his daughter by Antipas.

This consists in

1. inserting comments into Josephus to alter the narrative to suit Bernard's conclusions;

2. relying on the English translation of Josephus, "the first occasion of his enmity", to place the divorce chronologically before another reason for enmity; however, the Greek text doesn't support his conclusion, as there is no word in the Greek for "occasion" and probably should indicate that the divorce became the head/main/principal enmity between them; (AJ 18.5.1 = 18.113)

3. relying on the veracity of the story of Salome's dance (Mk6:19-28); and

4. the fact that Herodias "who was now the wife of Herod the tetrach" when Agrippa went to see them (AJ 18.6.2-3), after Josephus had just told us about the marriage. Josephus has inverted the order of events, but as not long afterwards Agrippa goes off to see the governor of Syria, Flaccus 32-35CE, but this causes no problem at all, for the war took place in 36CE. Herod Antipas marries Herodias in Rome and comes home attempting to hide the fact from his Nabataean wife, who conveniently leaves for Machaerus. This wife then proceeds to Petra to tell her father, who decides to go to war, starts the preparations for it, which require collection of food and supplies and then the wait for the appropriate season. Aretas had to have heard of the divorce at least by 35 CE perhaps even the year before, a situation which is evident from the circumstances found in Josephus.

In short I see no evidence for a "delay" between the divorce, once Aretas's daughter knew of it, and the war between Aretas and Herod Antipas. It is more likely that the war came relatively quickly (within two years) of the daughter finding out about the divorce.


spin

[Attonitus]

Attonitus:


Dionysius of Corinth (circa.170) was very close to declare the persecution under Nero (54-68):
"... the churches that were planted by Peter and Paul, that of the Romans and that of the Corinthians: for both of them went to our Corinth, and taught us in the same way as they taught you when they went to Italy; and having taught you, they suffered martyrdom at the same time." (letter to the Romans).
Prior to that (95), dreadful mister 666 is likely a reference to Nero, believed reincarnated into Domitian (Revelation13:18)
Suetonius (115) also makes mention of Nero's persecution : "Punishment by Nero was inflicted on the Christians, a class of men given to a new and mischievous superstition."

Best regards, Bernard

Hi Bernard,

Sorry by my careless writing. I only refer to this concrete persecution described by Tacitus.

Neither Tertullian, Suetonius, Dio Cassius, Pliny the Elder neither Eusebius know a persecution of the Christians associate with the burning of Rome. In the quote of Tacitus the reference to Christ "crucified under Pontius Pilate" is certainly a "hint of Christian theology", as well the curious comparison of those punishments suffered by the incendiary with those of the Crucified.

Regards,

[Bernard Muller]

Spin:
1. inserting comments into Josephus to alter the narrative to suit Bernard's conclusions;

Here it is:
So Aretas made this the first {occasion} of his hostility between him and Herod
[it does not seem Aretas & Antipas prepared for war then, just that the feud between the two kings started then]
` who had also some quarrel with him about their limits at the country of Gamalitis. So they raised armies on both sides, and prepared for war ."
I see Herod's repudiation of Aretas' daughter as the start of hostility between the two kings. Then later we have preparation of war. There is no urgency described here from the repudiation to the battle.
Another reason of animosity between the two, mentioned by Josephus (and myself) is Gamalitis:
My comment on that is:
This area was part of the tetrarchy of Philip. But after Philip's death (33-34C.E.), it is likely both Herod and Aretas lobbied for it (before its annexation to Syria). Consequently, this latter quarrel must have started then.

2. relying on the English translation of Josephus, "the first occasion of his enmity", to place the divorce chronologically before another reason for enmity; however, the Greek text doesn't support his conclusion, as there is no word in the Greek for "occasion" and probably should indicate that the divorce became the head/main/principal enmity between them; (AJ 18.5.1 = 18.113)

Because Josephus mentions later another cause for the quarrel, "first occasion" might be correct, rather than "main". Regardless, Josephus is clear that the war was not because of only one thing, but several ones.

3. relying on the veracity of the story of Salome's dance (Mk6:19-28);

The point is that this not-Christian story feature Salome as a girl. However Josephus said this girl got married to Philip, the tetrarch. This Philip died in 33-34. Then Salome, a widow, remarried. Whoever made the story was not thinking 35, but before 33.

4. the fact that Herodias "who was now the wife of Herod the tetrach" when Agrippa went to see them (AJ 18.6.2-3), after Josephus had just told us about the marriage. Josephus has inverted the order of events

Really. What do you mean? The episode with JB and the repudiation and the battle has been narrated earlier.
Here is the sequencing from Josephus' Antiquities, XVIII, VI, 2-3: the future Agrippa I visits Herod and Herodias "who was now the wife of Herod the tetrach". Then he is given a position in Tiberias which he occupies for some (unspecified) time. Then he goes and stays in Syria when his friend Flaccus is its president (32-35C.E.). The length of his sejourn here is not told. Then Agrippa sails to Rome when Flaccus is still ruling.
I note you assume the two unspecified durations are very short, but it could be easily years. Furthermore when Agrippa visits Herod & Herodias, the wedding might have occured years before.

, but as not long afterwards Agrippa goes off to see the governor of Syria, Flaccus 32-35CE, but this causes no problem at all, for the war took place in 36CE. Herod Antipas marries Herodias in Rome and comes home attempting to hide the fact from his Nabataean wife, who conveniently leaves for Machaerus.

According to Josephus, Ant., XVIII, V, 1, it is not specified Herod married Herodias while in Rome. Only an agreement which stipulated that Herod should divorce Aretas' daughter first. I think you are reading more here that I see:
"ABOUT this time Aretas (the king of Arabia Petres) and Herod had a quarrel
on the account following: Herod the tetrarch had, married the daughter of
Aretas, and had lived with her a great while; but when he was once at Rome,
he lodged with Herod, (15) who was his brother indeed, but not by the same
mother; for this Herod was the son of the high priest Sireoh's daughter.
However, he fell in love with Herodias, this last Herod's wife, who was the
daughter of Aristobulus their brother, and the sister of Agrippa the Great. This
man ventured to [B]talk to her about a marriage between them; which address, when she admitted, an agreement was made for her to change her habitation, and come to him as soon as he should return from Rome: one article of this marriage also was this, that he should divorce Aretas's daughter. So Antipus, when he had made this agreement, sailed to Rome; but when he had done there the business he went about, and was returned again, his wife having discovered the agreement he had made with Herodias, ..."
And Herodias also needed time to divorce her husband.
No royal marriage in Rome. More so the logical place for that would have been in Galilee, in front of all the Galilean VIPs and foreign dignitaries. Are you suggesting Herod married Herodias in secret, expecting his earlier wife to think she was the only one and still getting royal treatment?

SNIPPED

Best regards, Bernard

[rlogan]

[/B]

Without this block the text makes full sense. As correctly states Darrell J. Doughty, neither Tertullian neither Irenaneus know this text, neither a persecution under Nero.

Attonitus - I did find that discussion by Doughty:

http://www.courses.drew.edu/sp2000/BIBST189.001/Tacitus.html

That was very interesting, thank you.

I know there were threads discussing this in the past here. When the search function is fixed we can find those. I knew so little then that I would not have understood the significance.

The value to this thread is that the dating of the epistles relies on the assertion Paul was executed in the Neronian persecition.

[Bernard Muller]

rlogan:
The value to this thread is that the dating of the epistles relies on the assertion Paul was executed in the Neronian persecition.

I certainly did not use the Neronian persecutions to date the Pauline epistles. Who does?

From the referred site of Darrell J. Doughty:
Other ancient historians also refer to Nero's persecution of Christians (Suetonius, Dio Cassius, Pliny the Elder)

Pliny the Elder (died 79 CE)? Did he refer to Nero's persecution of Christians?
Can I get a quote?

Best regards, Bernard

[rlogan]

rlogan:
I certainly did not use the Neronian persecutions to date the Pauline epistles. Who does?

From the referred site of Darrell J. Doughty:

Other ancient historians also refer to Nero's persecution of Christians (Suetonius, Dio Cassius, Pliny the Elder)

Pliny the Elder (died 79 CE)? Did he refer to Nero's persecution of Christians?
Can I get a quote?

Best regards, Bernard

I already did give a cite above, Bernard. I think Toto did too.

Now - why did you cut out the remainder of the sentence above:

"but none of these associates the persecution of Christians with the burning of Rome."

That is rather the whole point of Doughty's piece. I think the readers need to surmize for themselves what Doughty is saying, because he makes other interesting points too.

"The silence in early Christian sources concerning this event is deafening."

I didn't say that [I]you[I] used the date 64 CE as an upper bound.

To your question about Pliny - Nowhere in his writings does he say Paul was executed in some Neronian persecution.

Best regards too Bernard.

[Bernard Muller]

to rlogan:
Sorry, I undertand your fine point about fire/no_fire mentioned about Nero's persecution of Christians.

rlogan's quote:
To your question about Pliny - Nowhere in his writings does he say Paul was executed in some Neronian persecution.

Agreed, but:
Bernard's quote:
From the referred site of Darrell J. Doughty:
"Other ancient historians also refer to Nero's persecution of Christians (Suetonius, Dio Cassius, Pliny the Elder)"

I do not care about Paul here. I want the reference from Pliny the Elder stating Nero persecuted Christians. Can anyone provide it to me? Frankly, I am doubtful (but I would like it!).

Best regards, Bernard

[rlogan]

to rlogan:
I do not care about Paul here. I want the reference from Pliny the Elder stating Nero persecuted Christians. Can anyone provide it to me? Frankly, I am doubtful (but I would like it!).

Best regards, Bernard

Please forgive Bernard. Still recovering from my lobotomy. Don't have a cite handy.

[spin]

I won't try to disentangle what Bernard did, as mentioned in my first point above, but merely point readers to his link (http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/hjes1x.html#delay) for people to decide whether he has merely tarted it up because of his a priori position that the war must have started long after the divorce.

As to my second point of relying on Whiston's translation of Josephus:

Because Josephus mentions later another cause for the quarrel, "first occasion" might be correct, rather than "main". Regardless, Josephus is clear that the war was not because of only one thing, but several ones.

He simply lists two grievances, the main one, ie the divorce, and a second one, which in itself wasn't sufficient cause for war.

On to the lovely story of Salome dancing for Herod Antipas, my third point:

The point is that this not-Christian story feature Salome as a girl. However Josephus said this girl got married to Philip, the tetrarch. This Philip died in 33-34. Then Salome, a widow, remarried. Whoever made the story was not thinking 35, but before 33.

Whoever "made the story up" had no constraints of being historical.

On my statement regarding Josephus's inversion of historical order:

Really. What do you mean?

Josephus talks of Flaccus after he talks of Vitellius. Clear sign of an inversion of historical order, which in fact should be a happy thing for your cause.

The episode with JB and the repudiation and the battle has been narrated earlier.

Yep, you've got it.

But the point is that he had narrated the marriage before the visit of Agrippa, so he mentions the marriage. It's not a statement you can make much mileage out of.

Here is the sequencing from Josephus' Antiquities, XVIII, VI, 2-3: the future Agrippa I visits Herod and Herodias "who was now the wife of Herod the tetrach". Then he is given a position in Tiberias which he occupies for some (unspecified) time. Then he goes and stays in Syria when his friend Flaccus is its president (32-35C.E.). The length of his sejourn here is not told. Then Agrippa sails to Rome when Flaccus is still ruling.
I note you assume the two unspecified durations are very short, but it could be easily years. Furthermore when Agrippa visits Herod & Herodias, the wedding might have occured years before.

Well, it might have, but it is particularly unlikely, as the divorce of his Nabataean wife is given as prime cause for the war which happened in 36 CE.

And incidentally the Greek text of 18.6.2 doesn't mention being married, just "living together" (synoikew).

According to Josephus, Ant., XVIII, V, 1, it is not specified Herod married Herodias while in Rome. Only an agreement which stipulated that Herod should divorce Aretas' daughter first. I think you are reading more here that I see:
"ABOUT this time Aretas (the king of Arabia Petres) and Herod had a quarrel
on the account following: Herod the tetrarch had, married the daughter of
Aretas, and had lived with her a great while; but when he was once at Rome,
he lodged with Herod, (15) who was his brother indeed, but not by the same
mother; for this Herod was the son of the high priest Sireoh's daughter.
However, he fell in love with Herodias, this last Herod's wife, who was the
daughter of Aristobulus their brother, and the sister of Agrippa the Great. This
man ventured to talk to her about a marriage between them; which address, when she admitted, an agreement was made for her to change her habitation, and come to him as soon as he should return from Rome: one article of this marriage also was this, that he should divorce Aretas's daughter. So Antipus, when he had made this agreement, sailed to Rome; but when he had done there the business he went about, and was returned again, his wife having discovered the agreement he had made with Herodias, ..."
And Herodias also needed time to divorce her husband.

What makes you think that?

No royal marriage in Rome.

Just a marriage agreement which had Herodias coming back to Judea "as soon as he should return from Rome".

More so the logical place for that would have been in Galilee, in front of all the Galilean VIPs and foreign dignitaries.

I have no problem with that. They were now living together, as per 18.6.2, for the agreement was that she would come to him as soon as he returned.

Are you suggesting Herod married Herodias in secret, expecting his earlier wife to think she was the only one and still getting royal treatment?

No, I'm suggesting that Herod Antipas tried to hide the marriage arrangement from his wife, as indicated in the citation you gave.

There seems to be no tangible case for the unnatural separation of nine years from the divorce proceedings and the war. The natural progress to war with all its preparations requires perhaps at least a year -- including the wait for the right season -- from the decision, so given travel time and time to make the decision, we could reasonably be looking at 34 CE for the marriage arrangement coming to the awareness of Aretas's daughter.


spin

[Bernard Muller]

rlogan:
Please forgive Bernard. Still recovering from my lobotomy. Don't have a cite handy.

Sorry to hear that!
Anyway, I made some research on Dio Cassius and Pliny the Elder, and none of them wrote about 'Christians'. Period.
Dio mentioned the big fire in Rome during Nero but no Christians there. He also wrote about two VIPs in Domitian's entourage (one being Domitilla) punished because they were "atheists" (which may mean Christians, according to some). But that's about it.
I think this Doughty is not a thorough scholar.

Best regards, Bernard

[Yuri Kuchinsky]

Yuri,

Thank you for your post. While I agree that there are questions about the authorship of some of Paul's letters,


No, capnkirk, there are questions about the authorship of all of Paul's letters.


and that some letters attributed to him are clearly not his,


And I'd say that all letters attributed to him are clearly not his.


but I would respectfully request that we reserve that discussion for another thread.

At the moment my sole concern is to discover the scholarly basis for the currently accepted dating of Paul's letters to the Thessalonians, Corinthians, Galatians, Romans, Philippians Colossians, and Ephesians.


Most scholars think that Colossians and Ephesians are not by Paul.

In any case, there's not all that much agreement among scholars about the dating of any particular letter...


While the dating of the Gospels has been debated endlessly, there seems to be no similar debate about Paul's letters...


Well, you see the Pauline scholarship just happens to be an especially dishonest branch of NT scholarship. It's like the cream of the crooks, so to speak.

So there's not much surprise that they don't like to debate this sort of stuff.


so much so that even the scholarly basis for the accepted dates seems extremely dificult to discover. Even on this thread, discussion has ranged all over the place while still failing to address the OP.

I might want to question some of those dates, but only AFTER I ascertain what basis the scholars have used to determine the currently accepted dates. This task has proven more difficult than I had imagined when I started the thread.

__________________
Enterprise...OUT.

If Paul didn't write any of these letters, then they should all be dated after 100 CE.

It's relly quite simple.

All the best,

Yuri

[rlogan]

Well, you see the Pauline scholarship just happens to be an especially dishonest branch of NT scholarship. It's like the cream of the crooks, so to speak.
:)


And I'd say that all letters attributed to him are clearly not his.


Say Yuri - I'm not even sure he existed. But maybe you'd care to buttress this with some interesting discussion? It speaks to the OP.



If Paul didn't write any of these letters, then they should all be dated after 100 CE.


I guess that's just a round number.

Hmph! I would like to be able to put my finger on the first "bulletproof" evidence of christians existing at all.

[Vorkosigan]

rlogan:


But that's about it.
I think this Doughty is not a thorough scholar.

Best regards, Bernard

Bernard, he meant Pliny the Younger. It's an understandable error. The article is excellent and full of interesting insights.

Vorkosigan

[Bernard Muller]

My quote earlier on this thread:
From the referred site of Darrell J. Doughty:
"Other ancient historians also refer to Nero's persecution of Christians (Suetonius, Dio Cassius, Pliny the Elder)"

Vorkosigan:
Bernard, he meant Pliny the Younger. It's an understandable error. The article is excellent and full of interesting insights.

Neither Pliny the Younger, nor Dio Cassius, nor Pliny the Elder referred to Nero's persecution of Christians. My opinion of Doughty's scholarship has not changed.

Best regards, Bernard

[Vorkosigan]

My quote earlier on this thread:
Vorkosigan:
Neither Pliny the Younger, nor Dio Cassius, nor Pliny the Elder referred to Nero's persecution of Christians. My opinion of Doughty's scholarship has not changed.
Best regards, Bernard

You are right. I thought he was talking about persecution of Christians in general. My bad.

[capnkirk]

For what it's worth, Burton Mack holds that:

...scholars have regularly tried to date this writing (Revelation) during one of the traditional "persecutions of the church". Nero's "persecution" in 64 CE doesn't work because: (1) it was not a persecution but an ad hoc, localized, scapegoating strategy that everyone understood to be the action of a madman, and (2) in any case was highly exaggerated by Tacitus, who reported it in order to discredit Nero. from (Who wrote the New Testament?)He also hints that in the second century, as the proto-orthodox, centrist faction of Xtianity was inventing the apostolic traditions, this well-known episode of Nero(nian) madness became just too perfect an event to resist attaching the martyring of Peter to. What with all the apostles' lives and deaths turning into mini-copies of GMark's account of the life of the christ (preaching, miracle working, persecution, and martyrdom), what could make a more perfect ending for the greatest disciple than to be martyred by crucifixion in Rome? This placing of Peter's death in Rome gave credence to the Roman church's claim to being first among equals by virtue of a line of apostolic succession straight back to Peter himself!

Still later, Paul's mythical martyrdom was added to reinforce the Roman church's claim. Both these legends were known when 'Luke' wrote Acts specifically to provide (the much needed) direct connection between Jesus' "disciples" and the apostles so as to establish authenticity to the claim that the authority of the church overseers (later called bishops) could be traced back to persons who knew Jesus personally.