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History's Hinge - 'Ain Jalut

[Solomon]

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/G93ciQDjcI0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/G93ciQDjcI0</a>
In this video Anne the archaeologist explains the early origins of christianity, how it was copied from other religions (also called "demonic mimicry" by christians) and gives very good information about a few of these other gods.


A portion of a 4th century CE (A.D.) mosaic from New Paphos, Cyprus showing the god Dionysus as the "divine child" _with a HALO about his head_ being presented by Hermes (who has wings on his head and feet) to the Nymphs for safe-keeping and a bath which is being poured from a vase into a tub. Note the bluish HALO worn by the blonde nymph Begonia to the viewer's right. In Greek Orphic myths the infant was born of an earthly mother, Semele, and of Zeus, who intended to make him a ruler of the earth. Hera, seeking the child's life, was successful in getting the 12 Titans to murder the child and then eat him. Zeus in revenge, vaporized the Titans and from their ashes made mankind.  Thus man has the divine "good" of a god in him (Dionysus) and evil flesh or body (of the Titans). The presentation of the Christ child by Mary in later Christian art parallels somewhat this rendering of Dionysus as the "divine child" born of a heavenly father and earthly woman. (For the below photo, cf. figure 3. p. 193. Lawrence Becker & Christine Kondoleon. The Arts of Antioch: Art Historical and Scientific Approaches to Roman Mosaics and a Catalogue of the Worcester Art Museum Antioch Collection. Worcester, Massachusetts. The Worcester Art Museum. 2005. ISBN 0-691-12232-6)


A closeup of the above scene (cf. Plate 1 opposite p. 152. Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy. The Jesus Mysteries. New York. Three Rivers Press. 1999. ISBN 0-609-80798-6)

[Diving Doc]

For a fact there are parallels in the form of the artwork presentation, without a doubt.

Doc

[Solomon]

The parallel I use to try and understand what was happening in Judea in the period leading up to the First Jewish Revolt is continental Europe under Nazi occupation. In this scenario, the Maquis, or Resistance, can be seen as the Sicarii of Judea.


From Ekron (around modern Gaza/Ashqelon), one of five Philistininan cities with a probable period of King Saul/King David. With an ivory handle, the cutting edge is on the concave side and may have a T-spine. Could this be an early sicae?
Discussed in "Biblical Archeology Review" Vol. 32: 2, March/April 2006, pp.7-8


Early Sarmatian (200?100 BCE) iron dagger with curved blade.
Josephus 'Jewish Antiquities' wrote that the was a local development, similar in size to the Persian akinak, and with a curved blade likew that of the Roman sicae.


Thacian 'Sica' 1st century BCE.

Sicarii:
Sicarii (Latin plural of Sicarius 'dagger-' or later contract- killer) is a term applied, in the decades immediately preceding the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE, to the Jewish Zealots, (or insurgents) who attempted to expel the Romans and their partisans from Judea:

    "When Albinus reached the city of Jerusalem, he bent every effort and made every provision to ensure peace in the land by exterminating most of the Sicarii." ?Josephus, Jewish Antiquities (xx.208)

The sicarii even resorted to murder to obtain their objective. Under their cloaks they concealed sicae, or small daggers, from which they received their name. At popular assemblies, particularly during the pilgrimage to the Temple Mount, they stabbed their enemies (Romans or Roman sympathizers, Herodians, and wealthy Jews comfortable with Roman rule), lamenting ostentatiously after the deed to blend into the crowd to escape detection. Literally, Sicarii meant "dagger-men".

The victims of the Sicarii included Jonathan the High Priest, though it is possible that his murder was orchestrated by the Roman governor Felix. Some of their murders were met with severe retaliation by the Romans on the entire Jewish population of the country. On some occasions, they could be bribed to spare their intended victims. If the narrative of Barabbas is not an invention to create a parable, even convicted Sicarii were occasionally released on promising to spare their opponents, though there is no evidence for this practice outside the Gospels, which are largely in accord on this point. Once, Josephus relates, after kidnapping the secretary of Eleazar, governor of the Temple precincts, they agreed to release him in exchange for ten of their captured comrades.

At the beginning of the Jewish Revolt (66), the Sicarii, with the help of other Zealots, gained access to Jerusalem and committed a series of atrocities, in order to force the population to war. In one account, given in the Talmud, they destroyed the city's food supply, so that the people would be forced to fight against the Roman siege instead of negotiating peace. Their leaders, including Menahem ben Jair, Eleazar ben Jair, and Bar Giora, were important figures in the war, and Eleazar ben Jair eventually succeeded in escaping the Roman onslaught. Together with a small group of followers, he made his way to the abandoned fortress of Masada, where he continued his resistance to the Romans until 73, when the Romans took the fortress and found that most of its defenders had committed suicide rather than surrender.

In Josephus' Jewish War (vii), after the fall of the Temple in 70 CE, the sicarii became the dominant revolutionary Jewish party, scattered abroad. Josephus particularly associates them with the mass suicide at Masada in 73 and to the subsequent refusal "to submit to the taxation census when Cyrenius was sent to Judea to make one" (Josephus) as part of their religious and political scheme as resistance fighters:

    "Some of the faction of the Sicarion...not content with having saved themselves, again embarked on new revolutionary scheming, persuading those that received them there to assert their freedom, to esteem the Romans as no better than themselves and to look upon God as their only Lord and Master" (quoted by Eisenman, p 180).

In the name of Judas Iscariot, the apostle who betrayed Jesus, the epithet "Iscariot" is read by the majority of scholars as a Hellenized transformation of sicarius. The suffix "-ote" denotes membership or belonging to - in this case to the sicarii. This meaning is lost when the Gospels are translated into modern Hebrew: Judas is rendered as "Ish-Kerayot," making him a man from the townships. Robert Eisenman presents the general view of secular historians (Eisenman p 179) in identifying him instead as "Judas the Sicarios". Most of the consonants and vowels tally?in Josephus, Sicarioi/Sicariōn; in the New Testament Iscariot. (Eisenman 1997 pp 179 etc)


Zealots and Sicarii
Around this time, the Jewish community was wracked with inner strife and religious conflict. False messiahs abound and religious fraud was also common. There seemed to be a growing problem with bandits (Greek lestes = bandit, brigand, terrorist, guerilla, or freedom-fighter). Clashes were also reported between Jews and Samaritans after the murder of a Galilean (Jew). Atrocities were also committed by the Sicarii. The word sicarii is a Latinized term for the Arabic-Semitic word 'askar, which means 'soldiers'. Under their cloaks the Sicarii  concealed sicae, or small daggers, from which they received their name. The Romans considered this an assassin's weapon. At popular assemblies, particularly during the pilgrimage to the Temple Mount, the Sicarii  stabbed their enemies or, in other words, those who were friendly to the Romans, lamenting after the deed and thus escaping detection. Judas Iskariot may well have been a Sicarii. The other main Jewish group of insurgents were the Zealots, who attempted to expel the Romans and their partisans from Judea, even resorting to murder to obtain their objective. Another disciple, Simon 'the Cananaean' (a code-word for Zealot) may have belonged to that group, as may have James and John, who were nicknamed 'sons of thunder'. Even Peter could have originated in such a group, for he could have been one of the Bar Jonim ('Those outside the Law').

[Solomon]

Herod the Great, 37 BCE, AE 8 prutah, 6.8 g, 7/8", O: Tripod (example right), ceremonial bowl (lebes) above, date LT (Year 3) and monogram TP in field 1 and "of King Herod" around in Greek R: Military helmet facing, wreath featuring acanthus leaf around, cheek pieces and straps, (helmet examples below) star above flanked by two palm branches.

If one sees the Resistance to the Nazis as a parallel to the Sicarii resisting the Romans, then who in Judea is represented by Petain of Vichy France, or the Quislings of Norway?

Herod the Great:
Hordos (Hebrew: הוֹרְדוֹס, hoɾ?os; Greek: ἡρῴdης, hērōdēs; trad. English: Herod), also known as Herod I or Herod the Great, was a Roman client-king of Judaea (c. 74 BC ? c. 5, 4 or 1 BC in Jerusalem). The details of his biography can best be gleaned from the works of the 1st century AD Jewish historiographer Josephus.

Biography
Herod the Great arose from a wealthy, influential Idumaean family. The Idumaeans, successors to the Edomites of the Hebrew Bible, settled in Idumea, formerly known as Edom, in southern Judea. When the Maccabean John Hyrcanus conquered Idumea in 130?140 BC, he required all Idumaeans to obey Jewish law or to leave; most Idumaeans thus converted to Judaism.

According to some, archaeological evidence suggests that king Herod identified himself as Jewish, although according to Jewish law, he would not be considered as such. He was the second son of Antipater the Idumaean, founder of the Herodian dynasty and his wife Cypros, a princess from Petra in Nabatea (now part of Jordan). The family rubbed shoulders with the great in Rome, such as Pompey, Cassius, and in 47 BC his father was appointed Procurator over Judea, who then appointed his son governor of Galilee at the age of 25.

After his father was poisoned in 43 BC, allegedly by a tax-collector, Herod had the murderer executed. After returning from a campaign, he was offered the betrothal to the teenage princess Mariamne (sometimes spelled Mariamme) from the former Hasmonean dynasty who were the titular rulers of Judaea. Although he was legally permitted to have more than one wife, he banished his first wife Doris and her 3-year-old son, also named Antipater, and married Mariamne (known as Mariamne I).

In 40 BC Antigonos and the Parthians invaded Judea, and Herod fled Jerusalem to Rome for the first time. There he was elected "King of the Jews" by the Roman Senate[1]. However Herod did not fully conquer Judea until 37 BC. He ruled for 34 years.

Here are extracts from a review of a study by Robert Eisenman.

Robert Eisenman's JAMES THE BROTHER OF JESUS: A Higher-Critical Evaluation
Extracts:

1. To anticipate the thrust of the book as a whole, let it be said that Eisenman first draws a portrait of the early community of James as a nationalistic, messianic, priestly, and xenophobic sect of ultra-legal pietism, something most of us would deem fanaticism. As Schweitzer said of the historical Jesus, this is an embarrassment and a disappointment to those who expect the original gospel to look refreshingly modernistic. Eisenman shows how "Jewish Christianity" was part and parcel of the sectarian milieu which included Essenes, Zealots, Nazoreans, Nazirites, Ebionites, Elchasites, Sabeans, Mandaeans, etc., and that these categories were no more than ideal types, by no means actually segregated one from the other like exotic beasts in adjacent, well-marked cages in the theological zoo. Over against this sort of "Lubavitcher Christianity," Eisenman depicts Pauline Christianity (plus its Hellenistic cousins Johannine, Markan, Lukan, etc., Christianities) as being root and branch a compromising, assimilating, Herodianizing apostasy from Judaism. Greek Christianity gives the Torah, and Jewish identity, the bum's rush, just like those allegorizing antinomians Philo argued against, just like Josephus. The Pauline Christ, a spiritual redeemer with an invisible kingdom, is of a piece with the christening of Vespasian as the messiah by Josephus.

2. We read that a young man named Saul was playing coat checker for the executioners of Stephen and, his taste for blood whetted, immediately began to foment persecution in Jerusalem and Damascus. This has been drawn, again, from the lore of James as well as Josephus. The clothing motif was suggested by the final blow to James' head with a fuller's club, while just after his own account of James' death, Josephus tells of the rioting started by a Herodian named Saulus in Jerusalem!

3. In the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem to "cleanse" the Temple which had become a "robber's den," can we not recognize the entry of messiah Simon bar-Giora into the city at the invitation of the priesthood to "cleanse" the Temple of rival freedom fighters? And (as Eisenman and John Dominic Crossan both note) is not the mute flogging of Jesus by priests and Roman Procurator for predicting the Temple's doom suspiciously similar to that of Jesus ben-Ananias? Jesus' mockery as a king during a visit of a Herodian "king" sounds remarkably like the Carabas incident reported by Philo in Against Flaccus (again, Crossan notes this), which also echoes Barabbas, as if it needed pointing out. The attempt by the crowd to force Pilate into condemning Jesus by threatening to report his delinquency to Caesar recalls the actual complaint against Pilate made by Samaritans after he butchered the partisans of the Samaritan Taheb on Mount Gerizim, a deed which actually did result in Pilate's recall to Rome. Jesus' execution as King of the Jews reminds us of Simon bar-Giora's in Rome.

4. Equally shocking to some will be Eisenman's suggestion that Josephus' Herodian Saulus, active during the siege of Jerusalem, was none other than Saul of Tarsus! As Hyam Maccoby recently reminded us (in The Mythmaker), our conventional assumption that Paul died by Nero's command rests only on sketchy and manifestly legendary material in 1 Clement (an anonymous digest of hortatory lumber of unknown date) and the Acts of Paul. We don't really know what may have happened to him. Similarly, Eisenman comes close to identifying Simon Peter with Simeon bar-Cleophas who is said, like Simon Peter, to have been crucified, but much later than Nero's reign.

5. ANOTHER point on which Maccoby and Eisenman coincide is their willingness to take seriously the Ebionite charge that Paul was never a real Jew to begin with. Maccoby shows quite extensively in his Paul and Hellenism that the Pauline Epistles give precious little evidence of having been written by a Jew, what with their anti-Semitic outbursts, their Mystery Religion affinities, their Gnosticizing exegesis, and their utterly non-Jewish view of the Torah as a burden. Eisenman enhances his case by adducing the evidence for Paul's Herodian background, something we really do not have to read too far between the lines to see, given his Roman citizenship, his kinship to one Herodion and to the household of Aristobulus. If this is what the Ebionites meant, that Paul was as little a Jew as Herod the Great despite his pretense, then we have a scenario more natural than that which the Ebionite charge might otherwise imply: the idea of Paul as some sort of Greek pagan entering Judaism superficially and from without. As Eisenman notes, Paul protests that he is a Hebrew, an Israelite, even a Benjaminite, but he avoids calling himself a Jew! And Eisenman suggests that, given the strange fact that "Bela" appears both as a chief clan of Benjamin and as the first Edomite king, "Benjaminite" may have been a kind of Herodian euphemism for their oblique relation to Judaism.

Eisenman cites the Talmud's notice that the Rechabites (=Nazirites) used to marry the daughters of the High Priests. Though Eisenman does not make the particular connection I am about to make, this Talmudic note suggests to me a new and more natural way of understanding the Ebionite slur that Paul had converted to Judaism only because he was smitten with the High Priest's daughter and wanted to curry favor with her father to win her hand. Now think of Acts' account of Paul's unsuccessful ruse, feigning Nazirite allegiance by paying for the purification of four of James' zealots (Acts 21:23-26), which backfired on him and led to (as F. C. Baur recognized) rioting by James' "zealots for the Law" (not some vacationing Jews from Asia Minor, as Luke would have it) over Paul's attempt to profane the Temple (vv 27-30). As this use of money to pay for the four men's purification rites seems to be a variant version of the presentation, and rejection, of the Collection (cf. Rom 15:31), we may suspect that this final rebuff of Paul as a would-be Nazirite, this decisive rejection of Paul's attempt to curry favor with the party of James, has been figuratively rendered in later Jamesian (i.e., Ebionite) propaganda as Paul's frustrated attempt to do what Nazirites did, marry the daughter of the High Priest! Why choose this particular metaphor for Paul as a false prophet? Because of the resonances of the suitor as a seducer (of Israel), a deceiver and false prophet (cf., 2 Cor 11:1-5, where Paul turns precisely the same charge back on the Jerusalem "super-apostles").

As for Eisenman's pegging of Paul as the Lying Spouter who repudiated the Law and betrayed the new covenant, the enemy of the Righteous Teacher of Qumran, a motif that runs throughout the book, I will observe only that the coincidences between Qumran rhetoric and the New Testament vestiges of anti-Paulinism are at least as convincing as those conventionally accepted as proof for Matthew's targeting Paul at several points in his gospel. Eisenman does threaten to obscure his own case here by overkill, citing lots of terminology shared by Paul and Qumran, sometimes used in different senses, and insisting that they reflect mutual ridicule and refutation, but the major instances are striking. And certainly the tagging of Paul, James, and Ananus in the Scrolls is far more natural than the wild shots in the dark whereby conventional Qumran scholars sought to identify the major Scrolls characters with this or that Hasmonean figure. (Admittedly there are rare references here and there to named first-century BCE figures, but Eisenman does not hold that every single scroll is a product of the first century CE. How could he, when his point is that Jamesian "Christianity" was an evolutionary growth from a pre-existent "Essene" species?)

[Solomon]

In my view, the New Testament gospels, much of Saul/Paul and some other books are the work of Greco-Romans, to discredit the Zionist movement of Judea which resisted Herodian rule and fought Rome so mightily. This collection of documents is, therefore, an example of black propaganda and a perversion of history. In this scenario, the antihero is personified by Judas.

Judas Iscariot
Judas Iscariot (died April AD 29?33, Hebrew: יהודה איש־קריות Yəh?ḏāh ʾ?-qəriyy?ṯ) was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve original apostles of Jesus, and the one who betrayed him.

Etymology of "Judas Iscariot"
In the Greek of the New Testament, Judas Iscariot is called Ιούδας Ισκάριωθ (Io?das Isk?riōth) and Ισκαριώτης (Iskariṓtēs).

"Judas" is the Greek form of the common name Judah (יהודה, Yeh?d?h, Hebrew for "praised"). In English translations of the Bible is also found the name Jude, however there is no such distinction in the original Greek or in the Latin Vulgate translation. King David united the Kingdom of Israel and King Solomon built the First Temple, however the kingdom split into two in 928 BC, namely the northern kingdom Israel and the southern Kingdom of Judah. In 722 BC, the Assyrian King Shalmaneser V conquered Israel and renamed it Samerina (Samaria). In 586 BC, the Babylonian King Nebuchadrezzar II conquered Judah, destroyed the First Temple, and exiled the "Judeans" to Babylon. Cyrus II of Persia conquered Babylon in 539 BC and granted the Judeans the right to return and to rebuild their Temple (Second Temple). For this reason Isaiah 44:25-45:4 proclaimed Cyrus to be anointed. Hence, to make a long story short, Judah, Judean, and Jew are almost synonymous. Technically, for the context of the New Testament, Judean is correct, as the Roman Emperor Augustus created Iudaea Province (6-64 , 73-132 AD) in Latin which is generally translated into English as Judea, hence its people were called Judeans.

What Iscariot signifies is unclear, other than its Greek suffix -otes, like English "-ite" or "-ian". No territory "Iscaria" has ever existed. A birthplace is sometimes offered at the Karioth that is mentioned only once, in a long list of cities in the time of Joshua (Joshua 15:25), concerning which The Classical Gazeteer tactfully remarked "of uncertain position" [1]. Karioth is not mentioned in any text of the centuries before or after Judas Iscariot. (Compare Cana and Arimathea.)

There are two major theories on the meaning of this name, each of which must satisfy certain expectations in order to be credible:

    * The first of the two main etymologies, which is the one accepted by the majority, and credited to Jerome, derives Iscariot from Hebrew איש־קריות, ?-Qr?y?th,1 that is "man of Kerioth", the Judean town (or, more probably, collection of small towns) of Kerioth, not otherwise related to any person or event in the New Testament, nor mentioned in any document of the period, but referred to in the book of Jeremiah. In a similar vein, קריות may be simply the plural of קריה "small city," in which case we have something like "of the suburbs", i.e. it may be the case that Judas Iscariot is nothing more specific than the Jew from the suburbs. As Aramaic was the main language of the time, and all other New Testament characters have Aramaic surnames and nicknames, this Hebrew Judaean name could have marked out Judas as different from the Galilean disciples.

    * In the second main etymology, "Iscariot" is considered to be a transformation by metathesis of the Latin sicarius, or "dagger-man". The Sicarii were a cadre of assassins among Jewish rebels intent on driving the Romans out of Judea. It is possible then, that this Latin name might have been transformed by Aramaic into a form more closely resembling "Iscariot". But many historians maintain that the sicarii only arose in the 40's or 50's of the 1st century, so Judas could not have been a member. Brown, Raymond E. (1994). The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave: A Commentary on the Passion Narratives in the Four Gospels v.1 pp. 688-92. New York: Doubleday/The Anchor Bible Reference Library. ISBN 0-385-49448-3; Meier, John P. A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus (2001). v. 3, p. 210. New York: Doubleday/The Anchor Bible Reference Library. ISBN 0-385-46993-4. While Judas may or may not have actually been a sicariote, the term may have been used for him pejoratively. Therefore, if Judas is largely synonymous with Judean and if Iscariot means Sicarius, then Judas Iscariot would mean Judean Assassin.

In more fringe etymologies theory suggests that "Iscariot" could also be derived from the Aramaic sheqarya' or shiqrai, indicating a person who is a fraud; "the false one" would usually be written as ishqaraya. It could also have been derived from the Hebrew sachar. It also has been theorised that Iscariot could mean deliverer, derived from the Hebrew sakar (Hebraist Joel M. Hoffman's table of Hebrew and Greek names is helpful for understanding this sort of etymology). One factor arguing against "Iscariot" deriving from Judas' betrayal of Jesus is the reference in John 6:71 to Judas as son of Simon the Iscariot. In light of this, Iscariot appears to be a family name, or at least something that could be applied also to his father, which would make these fringe theories unlikely.

Because of Judas' role in betraying Jesus Christ, the name Judas ? which was common during the time of Jesus - has almost entirely fallen out of use as a name among Christians, though its Hebrew equivalent Yehuda remains common among Jews, and the etymologically equivalent name Jude is not unknown among Christians.

Judas and anti-Semitism
Some scholars of the New Testament suggest that the name "Judas" was intended as an attack on the Judaeans or on the Judaean religious establishment held responsible for executing Christ. The English word "Jew" is derived from the Latin Judaeus, which, like the Greek Ιουδαίος (Ioudaios), could also mean "Judaean". In the Gospel of John, the original writer or a later editor may have tried to draw a parallel between Judas, Judaea, and the Judaeans (or Jews) in verses 6:70-7:1, which run like this in the King James Bible:

    6:70 Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? 6:71 He spoke of Judas Iscariot the son of Simon: for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve. 7:1 After these things Jesus walked in Galilee: for he would not walk in Jewry, because the Jews sought to kill him.

In Greek, the earliest extant language of the Gospels, the words Judas ? Jewry ? Jews run like this: Ιούδας (Ioudas) ? Ιουδαία (Ioudaia) ? Ιουδαίοι (Ioudaioi). In Latin, the language of the Catholic Vulgate Bible, they run Judas ? Judaea ? Judaei. Whatever the original intentions of the original writers or editors of the Gospel of John, however, there is little doubt that the similarity between the name "Judas" and the words for "Jew" in various European languages has contributed powerfully to anti-Semitism. In German the same words run Judas ? Jud?a ? Juden; in Spanish Judas ? Judea ? jud?os; and in French Judas ? Jud?e ? juifs.

Over time Judas came to be seen as the archetypal Jew. He was said to have red hair, which was proverbially called "Judas-colored", and the ancient stereotype of Jews was that they had red hair too: in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice the Jewish money-lender Shylock is said to have been portrayed with red hair on the Elizabethan stage. Judas' betrayal of Christ for money was also seen as a typical piece of Jewish venality and avarice.

A few modern critics of European culture assert that in paintings and art of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, while the other apostles are portrayed as powerfully built Northern Europeans, Judas was given stereotypically Jewish characteristics. Specific examples of such portrayals in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, however, are hard to come by.

A more modern example, however, can be found in John Fiester's monument clock, the Apostolic Clock. Judas is half the height of the other eleven apostles, hunched over, and possesses an exaggerated nose. The notes provided at the Hershey Museum, where it is on display, claims the artist made Judas shorter because he considered him to be less of a man than the other apostles, not because of anti-Semitism.

[Solomon]

Bronze prutah, Hendin 465, F, Jerusalem mint, 2.109g, 13.0mm, obverse Hebrew inscription, Yehudah the High Priest and the Council of the Jews, surrounded by wreath; reverse double cornucopia adorned with ribbons, pomegranate between horns; reverse 3/5 off center

The Resistance movement did not begin with the Romans, but with the Greeks.

The Hasmonean Dynasty
(142-63 BCE)
As part of the ancient world conquered by Alexander the Great of Greece (332 BCE), the Land remained a Jewish theocracy under Syrian-based Seleucid rulers. When the Jews were prohibited from practicing Judaism and their Temple was desecrated as part of an effort to impose Greek-oriented culture and customs on the entire population, the Jews rose in revolt (166 BCE). First led by Mattathias of the priestly Hasmonean family and then by his son Judah the Maccabee, the Jews subsequently entered Jerusalem and purified the Temple (164 BCE), events commemorated each year by the festival of Hanukkah.

Following further Hasmonean victories (147 BCE), the Seleucids restored autonomy to Judea, as the Land of Israel was now called, and, with the collapse of the Seleucid kingdom (129 BCE), Jewish independence was again achieved. Under the Hasmonean dynasty, which lasted about 80 years, the kingdom regained boundaries not far short of Solomon's realm, political consolidation under Jewish rule was attained and Jewish life flourished.

Hasmonean
The Hasmonean Kingdom (Hebrew: Hashmonai) in ancient Judea and its ruling dynasty from 140 BCE to 37 BCE was established under the leadership of Simon Maccabaeus, two decades after Judah the Maccabee defeated the Seleucid army in 165 BCE.

Etymology of "Hasmonean"
The family name of the Hasmonean dynasty originates with the ancestor of the house, Ἀσαμωναῖος Asamoneus or Asmoneus (see Josephus Flavius, Jewish Antiquities: [1]; [2]; [3]), who is said to have been the grandfather of Mattathias, but about whom nothing more is known.

History
The leadership of the Hasmoneans was founded by a resolution, adopted in 141 BCE, at a large assembly "of the priests and the people and of the elders of the land, to the effect that Simon should be their leader and high priest forever, until there should arise a faithful prophet" (I Macc. xiv. 41). Ironically, the election was performed in hellenistic fashion.

Recognition of the new dynasty by the Romans was accorded by the Senate about 139 BCE, when the delegation of Simon was in Rome.

When Jonathan the Maccabee fell into the power of Diodotus Tryphon, Simon, his brother, assumed the leadership (142 BCE), and after the murder of Jonathan took the latter's place. Simon, who had made the Jewish people semi-independent of the Seleucid Greeks, reigned from 142 to 135 BCE. In February 135 BCE, he was assassinated at the instigation of his son-in-law Ptolemy.

Simon was followed by his third son, John Hyrcanus, whose two elder brothers, Mattathias and Judah, had been murdered, together with their father. John Hyrcanus ruled from 135 to 104 BCE. According to his directions, the government of the country after his death was to be placed in the hands of his wife, and Aristobulus I, the eldest of his five sons, was to receive only the high-priesthood. Aristobulus, who was not satisfied with this, cast his mother into prison and allowed her to starve there. By this means he came into the possession of the throne, which, however, he did not long enjoy, as after a year's reign he died of a painful illness (103 BCE).

Aristobulus' successor was his eldest brother, Alexander Jann?us, who, together with his two brothers, was freed from prison by the widow of Aristobulus. Alexander reigned from 103 to 76 BCE, and died during the siege of the fortress Ragaba.

Alexander was followed by his wife Alexandra, who reigned from 76 to 67 BCE. Against her wishes, she was succeeded by her son Aristobulus II. (67-63 BCE), who during the illness of his mother had risen against her, in order to prevent the succession of the elder son, Hyrcanus.

During the reign of Alexandra, Hyrcanus had held the office of high priest, and the rivalry between him and Aristobulus brought about a civil war, which ended with the forfeiture of the freedom of the Jewish people. Judaea had to pay tribute to Rome and was placed under the supervision of the Roman governor of Syria. From 63 to 40 BCE the government was in the hands of Hyrcanus II as High Priest and Ethnarch, although effective power was in the hands of his adviser Antipater the Idumaean.

In the early years of Hyrcanus and Antipater's rule, Aristobulus and his elder son Alexander made several efforts to regain the throne which were defeated by Roman intervention. When, in 50 BC, it appeared as though Julius Caesar was interested in using Aristobulus and his family as his clients to take control of Judea against Pompey's puppets Hyrcanus and Antipater, supporters of Pompey had Aristobulus poisoned in Rome, and executed Alexander in Antioch.

After Caesar's victory in the Civil Wars, Antipater and Hyrcanus were able to gain Caesar's favor by giving him aid in his Egyptian campaign. This led Caesar to ignore the claims of Aristobulus's younger son, Antigonus, and to confirm Hyrcanus and Antipater in their authority. Although Hyrcanus was still officially in control, Antipater continued to increase his power, appointing his sons to positions of influence - Phasael became Governor of Jerusalem, and Herod Governor of Galilee. This led to increasing tension between Hyrcanus and the family of Antipater, culminating in a trial of Herod for supposed abuses in his governorship, which resulted in Herod's flight into exile in 46 BC. Herod soon returned, however, and the honors to Antipater's family continued.

After Caesar's death in 44 BC, unrest and confusion spread throughout the Roman world, including to Judaea. In this atmosphere, Antipater the Idumean was assassinated in 43 BC by a rival, Malichus. However, Antipater's sons managed to kill Malichus and maintain their control over Judea and their father's puppet Hasmonean, Hyrcanus.

However, the Parthians invaded Syria in 40 BC, and decided to support the claims of Antigonus, son of Aristobulus, to the Judean throne. When Phasael and Hyrcanus set out on an embassy to the Parthians, the Parthians instead captured them. Antigonus, who was present, cut off Hyrcanus's ears to make him unsuitable for the high priesthood, while Phasael was put to death.

Antigonus, whose Hebrew name was Mattathias, bore the double title of king and high priest for only three years, as he had not disposed of Herod, the most dangerous of his enemies. Herod fled into exile and sought the support of Mark Antony. The struggle thereafter lasted for some years, as the main Roman forces were occupied with defeating the Parthians and had few additional resources to use to support Herod, but after the Parthians' defeat, Herod was victorious over his rival in 37 BC. Antigonus was delivered to Antony and executed shortly thereafter. The Romans assented to Herod's proclamation as King of the Jews, bringing about the end of the Hasmonean rule over Judea.

Antigonus was not, however, the last Hasmonean. The fate of the remaining male members of the family under Herod was not a happy one. Aristobulus III, grandson of Aristobulus II through his elder son Alexander, was briefly made high priest, but was soon executed (36 BC) due to Herod's jealousy. His sister, Mariamne was married to Herod, but fell victim to his notorious jealousy. (Her sons by Herod, Aristobulus and Alexander, were also executed by their father). As for Hyrcanus, he was released by the Parthians in 36 BC and returned home, and at first treated by Herod with respect, being granted a place in the palace. As the last remaining Hasmonean, he was too dangerous a potential rival for Herod, but he too fell victim to Herod, executed on trumped up charges of bribery and treason in 30 BC.

It is worth noting, however, that the later Herodian rulers Agrippa I and Agrippa II both had Hasmonean blood, as Agrippa I's father was Aristobulus, son of Herod by Mariamne I.

List of Judaean Rulers
Follows is the list of Hasmonean leaders, kings, queens, and high priests beginning with Mattathias, with the dates of their individual rule:

Leaders of the Macabees
1. Mattathias, 170 BC ? 167 BC
2. Judas Maccabeus, 167 BC ? 160 BC
3. Jonathan Maccabeus, 153 BC ? 143 BC (first to hold the title of High Priest)
4. Simon Maccabeus, 142 BC ? 141 BC (promoted to prince by Rome)

Princes of Judaea
5. Simon, 141 BC ? 135
6. Hyrcanus I, 134 BC ? 104 BC

Kings and High Priests of Judaea
7. Aristobulus I, 104 BC ? 103 BC
8. Alexander Jannaeus, 103 BC ? 76 BC
9. Salome Alexandra, 76 BC ? 67 BC (Queen of Judaea)
10. Hyrcanus II, 67 BC ? 66 BC
11. Aristobulus II, 66 BC ? 63 BC
12. Hyrcanus II, 63 BC ? 40 BC (restored)
13. Antigonus, 40 BC ? 37 BC
14. Herod I, 37 BC ? 4 BC

Tetrarchy
15. Herod II, Ethnarch of Judaea, 4 BC ? AD 6
? Herod Antipas, Tetrarch of Galilee, 4 BC ? AD 39
? Herod Philip, Tetrarch of Ituraea and Trachonitis, 4 BC ? AD 34
16. Agrippa I, King of Iudaea 41 ? 44
? Agrippa II, Tetrarch of Chalcis, 48 BC ? 53
? Aristobulus II, Tetrarch of Chalcis, 57 ? 92

Reputation of the dynasty
While the Hasmonean dynasty managed to create an independent Jewish kingdom, its successes were rather short-lived, and the dynasty by and large failed to live up to the nationalistic momentum the Maccabee brothers had gained.

Jewish tradition holds that the claiming of kingship by the later Hasmoneans led to their eventual downfall, since that title was only to be held by descendants of the line of King David. The Hasmonean bureaucracy was filled with men with Greek names, and the dynasty eventually became very Hellenised, to the annoyance of many of its more traditionally-minded Jewish subjects. Frequent dynastic quarrels also contributed to the view among Jews of later generations of the latter Hasmoneans as degenerate. A member of this school is Josephus, whose accounts are in many cases our sole source of information about the Hasmoneans.

[Solomon]

John Hyrcanus,134-104 B.C.E. Lepton, Meshorer O AE Lepton. Palm branch upright flanked by four lines of Hebrew "Yehohanan the High Priest and Council of the Jews". Rv. Lily. Meshorer Group O3

Earlier, we read that Herod the Great arose from a wealthy, influential Idumaean family. This is the root cause of the conflict that led to the First Jewish Revolt and became the prime motive for the New Testament. Let us see how that conflict came about.

John Hyrcanus
John Hyrcanus (Yohanan Girhan) (reigned 134 BCE - 104 BCE, died 104 BCE) was a Hasmonean (Maccabeean) leader of the 2nd century BCE. Apparently the name "Hyrcanus" was taken by him as a regnal name upon his accession to power.

Life and work
He was the son of Simon Maccabaeus and hence the nephew of Judas Maccabaeus, Jonathan Maccabaeus and their siblings, whose story is told in the deuterocanonical books of 1 Maccabees and 2 Maccabees, and in the Talmud. John was not present at a banquet at which his father and his two brothers were murdered, purportedly by his brother-in-law Ptolemy. He attained to his father's former offices, that of high priest and king (although some Jews never accepted any of the Hasmoneans as being legitimate kings, as they were not lineal descendants of David).

Achievements
John Hyrcanus apparently combined an energetic and able style of leadership with the zeal of his forebears. He was known as a brave and brilliant military leader. He is credited with the forced conversion of the Idumeans to Judaism, which was unusual for a Jewish leader; Judaism was not typically spread by the sword. He also set out to resolve forcibly the religious dispute between the Jews and the Samaritans; during his reign he destroyed the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim (although their descendants still worship among its ruins), which served further to deepen the already-historic hatred and rivalry between the two groups. Many historians believe that the apocryphal book of Jubilees was written during his reign; some would suggest even at his behest. Some writers, particularly Christian ones, have dated the division of Judaism into the parties of Pharisees and Sadducees to his era; most Jewish writers and some Christian ones suggest that this split actually well predates him. Some historians would go so far as to identify him, as a priest, predominantly with the Sadducee party, which was closely associated with the Temple worship and the priestly class.

Peak and decline of the kingdom
John Hyrcanus represented in some ways the highest point of the Hasmonean Dynasty. The restored Jewish "kingdom" approached its maximum limits of both territory and prestige. Upon his death, his offices were divided among his heirs; his son Aristobulus succeeded him as high priest; his wife as "Queen regnant". The son, however, soon came to desire the essentially unchecked power of his father; he shortly ordered his mother and his brothers imprisoned. This event seems to mark the beginning of the decline of the Hasmonean Dynasty; in just over four decades they were removed from power by the Roman Republic and none of them ever began to approach the level of power or prestige that had pertained to John Hyrcanus or his predecessors.

Edom
Edom (Hebrew: אֱדוֹם, Standard Edom Tiberian ʾĔḏ?m ; "red") is a name given to Esau in the Hebrew Bible, as well as to the nation purportedly descended from him. The nation's name in Assyrian was Udumi; in Syriac, ܐܕܘܡ); in Greek, Ἰδουμαία (Idouma?a); in Latin, Idum?a or Idumea.

The Edomite people were a Semitic-speaking tribal group inhabiting the Negev Desert and the Aravah valley of what is now southern Israel and adjacent Jordan. The region has much reddish sandstone, which may have given rise to the name "Edom". The nation of Edom is known to have existed back to the 8th or 9th Century BCE, and the Bible dates it back several centuries further. Recent archeological evidence may indicate an Edomite nation as long ago as the 11th Century BCE, but the topic is controversial. The nation ceased to exist with the Jewish-Roman Wars.

The Edomites
The Edomites may have been connected with the Shasu and Shutu, nomadic raiders mentioned in Egyptian sources. Indeed, a letter from an Egyptian scribe at a border fortress in the Wadi Tumilat during the reign of Merneptah reports movement of nomadic "shasu-tribes of Edom" to watering holes in Egyptian territory.[1]


Map showing kingdom of Edom (in red) at its largest extent, c. 600 BCE. Areas in dark red show the approximate boundary of classical-age Idumaea.
Post-Biblical Times
Edom is mentioned in Assyrian cuneiform inscriptions in the form "Udumi" or "Udumu"; three of its kings are known from the same source: Ḳaus-malaka at the time of Tiglath-pileser III (c. 745 BCE), Malik-rammu at the time of Sennacherib (c. 705 BCE), and Ḳaus-gabri at the time of Esarhaddon (c. 680 BCE). According to the Egyptian inscriptions, the "Aduma" at times extended their possessions to the borders of Egypt.[30] After the conquest of Judah by the Babylonians, the Edomites were allowed to settle in the region south of Hebron. They prospered in this new country, called by the Greeks and Romans "Idumaea" or "Idumea", for more than four centuries.[31] At the same time they were driven by the Nabat?ans from their ancestral lands to the south and east.

During the revolt of the Maccabees against the Seleucid kingdom, II Maccabees refers to a Seleucid general named Gorgias as "Governor of Idumaea"; whether he was a Greek or a Hellenized Edomite is unknown.[32] Some scholars maintain that the reference to Idumaea in that passage is an error altogether. Judas Maccabeus conquered their territory for a time in around 163 BCE.[33] They were again subdued by John Hyrcanus (c. 125 BCE), who forced them to observe Jewish rites and laws.[34] They were then incorporated with the Jewish nation.[13]

The Hasmonean official Antipater the Idumaean was of Edomite origin. He was the progenitor of the Herodian dynasty that ruled Judea after the Roman conquest. Under Herod the Great Idumaea was ruled for him by a series of governors, among whom were his brother Joseph ben Antipater and his brother-in-law Costobarus.

Immediately before the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, 20,000 Idumaeans, under the leadership of John, Simeon, Phinehas, and Jacob, appeared before Jerusalem to fight in behalf of the Zealots who were besieged in the Temple[35]

After the Jewish Wars the Idumaeans ceased to be a separate people, though the geographical name "Idumea" still existed at the time of St. Jerome.[13]

Edomite religion
The nature of Edomite religion is largely unknown. As close relatives of other Levantine Semites, they may have worshipped such gods as El, Baal, Asherah, and possibly even YHWH. A national god named Kaus (possibly analogous with the Moabite god Chemosh) is known from personal names and from an altar inscription discovered near Mamre.

Identification with Rome
Later in Jewish history, the Roman Empire came to be identified with Esau and "Edom". In medieval rabbinic writing, "Edom" is used to refer to the Byzantine Empire and Christendom in general (cf. the use of "Ishmael" to refer to the Islamic world).

[Solomon]

This NT account places sicarii among the people of Jesus at the same time as Judas the Sicarius is said to have betrayed him. If this account was anything other than black propaganda, this might be confusing.

The Gospel of Mark is anonymous and written in Greek "sometime between the late 60s or the early 70's" - that is, after the First Jewish Revolt.


Gesthemane

Mark 14
Just as he was speaking, Judas, one of the Twelve, appeared. With him was a crowd armed with swords and clubs, sent from the chief priests, the teachers of the law, and the elders.

Now the betrayer had arranged a signal with them: "The one I kiss is the man; arrest him and lead him away under guard." Going at once to Jesus, Judas said, "Rabbi!" and kissed him. The men seized Jesus and arrested him. Then one of those standing near drew his sword and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear.

"Am I leading a rebellion," said Jesus, "that you have come out with swords and clubs to capture me? Every day I was with you, teaching in the temple courts, and you did not arrest me. But the Scriptures must be fulfilled." Then everyone deserted him and fled.

Here is the historical Judas:

Judas of Galilee
Judas of Galilee or Judas of Gamala led a violent resistance to a census imposed for Roman tax purposes by Quirinius in Iudaea Province around AD 6. The revolt was crushed brutally by the Romans. These events are discussed by Josephus in Jewish Wars, (Book 2, Chapter 8, Section 1 and Chapter 17, Section 8), and in Jewish Antiquities Book 18. Judas is also mentioned by Gamaliel, a member of the Sanhedrin, in a speech related in Acts 5:37. Gamaliel offers him as an example of a failed Messianic leader.

Josephus in Antiquities Book 18 states that Judas, along with Zadok the Pharisee, founded the Zealots, which he calls the "fourth sect" of first century Judaism (the first 3 are the Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes). Josephus blames the Zealots for the Great Jewish Revolt and destruction of Herod's Temple. They preached that God alone was the ruler of Israel and later urged that no taxes should be paid to Rome.

Judas led an assault on a Roman garrison at the kings armory in Sepphoris, then the capital of Galilee (7 km from Nazareth). Josephus does not relate the death of Judas, although he does report (Antiquities 20.5.2 102) that Judas' sons James and Simon were executed by procurator Alexander in about 46 AD, several years after R. Gamaliel's statement.

JUDAS OF GALILEE : The leader of a Jewish insurrection against the Romans, mentioned in Acts v. 37. According to Josephus (Ant., XVIII., i 6; War, II., viii. 1; cf. Ant. XX, v. 2; War, II., xvii. 8), when the taxing of the Jewish people in the governorship of Quirinius (q.v.) under Augustus aroused strong opposition, a certain Judas, born in Gamala but generally called "the Galilean," with the a Pharisee named Zadok, organized an insurrection which was based on religious motives. The taxation emphasized the loss of Jewish independence under Roman rule and of their theocracy. The two sources (Gamaliel in Acts, and Josephus) agree in viewing the insurrection from a religious standpoint, though differences of another sort appear. Gamaliel reports the destruction of Judas and of his following, of which Josephus says nothing. The latter connects the outbreak with the fermenting zealotism manifested later, in the outbreak under Gessius Florus, and he is corroborated in this by the prominent part taken by the sons of Judas in that outbreak. Of this nothing is manifest in the speech of Gamaliel. The chronological datum is the relation of the insurrection to the taxing, put by Zahn in 4-3 B.C. (Neue kirchliche Zeitschrift, iv. 1893, 633-654, and Einleitung in das Neue Testament, ii., Leipsic, 1900, 395 sqq.). The differences in the two accounts prove that the author of Acts was here independent of Josephus and drew from other sources.
(K. SCHMIDT.)
BIBLIOGRAPHY: DB, ii. 795-796; EB, ii. 2628-30; JE, vii. 370-371; Sch�rer, Geschichte, i. 420-421, et passim, Eng. transl., I., ii. 4, et passim.

Rebel with a Sword? Enter the Nazarenes:
    "And it was in Gessius Florus's time that the nation began to grow mad with this distemper ... and to make them revolt from the Romans."
    ? Josephus, 18.1.6

As the 1st century unfolded a radical arm of the Essenes, the Zealots (?zealous for the law?) and bands of assassins, known as Sicarii, actively resisted Roman occupation by aping the guerilla tactics of the Maccabees two hundred years earlier. They were part of a widening resistance movement.

Rome's removal of Archelaus and imposition of direct rule in 6AD precipitated a 'tax revolt'. Notable among the rebels was Judas the Galilean ? son of the Ezekias murdered by Herod the Great a generation earlier. His followers appear to have been a particular band of fanatical Gaulonites. 4th century Bishop Epiphanius (Panarion 18-19) confirms that a sect was operating in the Bashan (the Golan Heights and east of the Sea of Galilee) and Galaaditis (the western Decapolis) called the Nasaraioi (variations on the name include "Nazorei" and "Nazarenoi"). Evidently they were orthodox Jews who had who broken away from temple sacrifice. The precise factional divide between Zealots and Nasaraioi is far from clear. Probably it depended upon the charisma of individual leaders at any given time.

The Nazarenes actually get a mention in the New Testament:

    "For we have found this man a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes"? Acts 24.5

Judas himself appears to have been a member of a curious family dynasty of rebels who continued to lead a resistance movement at least until the defeat of 70 AD. Certainly, a century of ruthless exploitation by Rome, added to the fearsome exploitation by the priesthood and the Herodian aristocracy, created conditions which made civil war and rebellion inevitable.

[Solomon]

It's easier to rewrite history when those you write about and their supporters, are dead. This is specifically true for the Zealots, the Sicarii - those that fought to protect their faith from the pollution of alien influences.

INTRODUCTION TO THE SCROLLS FROM THE JUDEAN DESERT
The many excellent introductions to the Scrolls give the details of the further discoveries over the next decade or so, but the upshot was that a total of eleven caves near the Wadi Qumran were found to contain fragments of ancient scrolls, probably all placed there by the same people at the time of the Great Revolt against Rome in CE 68-70, when Jerusalem was besieged and finally destroyed by the Romans. Since the 1950s, numerous other scrolls and manuscripts have been recovered elsewhere in the Judean Desert, including finds at the Nahal Hever, the Wadi Murabba'at, Masada, and Jericho. The most recent confirmed manuscript find of which I am aware was in 1993.

Dead Sea scrolls
Date and contents
Similar written materials have been recovered from nearby sites, including the fortress of Masada.

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS AND OTHER HEBREW MSS PROJECT
Neither in this panel, nor elsewhere in the exhibition is it stated that scrolls of the same nature were afterwards found in Masada, at the southern end of the Dead Sea (early 1960's). (In the 1970's the lengthy Temple Scroll was brought to light, although the exact place where it was hidden has never been identified with certainty.) Also missing from the exhibition is any reference to the discovery of Hebrew manuscripts in the 3rd and 8th centuries A.D. "near Jericho", as related by Origen (3rd Century) and by the metropolitan of Elam Timotheus (8th Century). In addition, the exhibition fails to mention the autographic Copper Scroll discovered in Cave III, with its detailed descriptions of Temple treasures and of scrolls hidden away in specified locations of the Judaean Wilderness. These elements together demonstrate the untenability of the Qumran-Essene theory. Their suppression from the exhibition contradicts the initial promise of the exhibition (see Introduction above) and misleads the public. The omissions in their combination highlight the fact that nowhere in the exhibition is mention made of the view that the Scrolls derive from Jerusalem libraries sequestered in the caves in preparation for the Roman siege on Jerusalem.

Other Texts
Other texts, not related to the Qumran scrolls, have been found in the area around the Dead Sea. At Masada other scrolls were found, including manuscripts of Sirach and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice. In the caves at Wadi Murabbaat, c.11 mi (18 km) S of Qumran, many documents were found concerning Bar Kokba's army, as well as more biblical manuscripts. Other documents from the Bar Kokba era were discovered in caves S of En Gedi. These findings, written in Greek, Aramaic, and Nabataean, included biblical fragments, psalms, various legal documents, and a lost Greek translation of the minor prophets. The oldest documents, found at a site 8 mi (13 km) N of Jericho, were left by Samarians massacred by Alexander the Great in 331 B.C

Masada

Masada (a romanization of the Hebrew מצדה, Metzada, from מצודה, metzuda, "fortress") is the name for a site of ancient palaces and fortifications in the South District of Israel on top of an isolated rock plateau on the eastern edge of the Judean Desert overlooking the Dead Sea. Masada became famous for its significance in the First Jewish-Roman War (Great Jewish Revolt), when a siege of the fortress by troops of the Roman Empire led to a mass suicide of the site's Jewish defenders when defeat became imminent.

History
According to Flavius Josephus, a first-century Jewish Roman historian, Herod the Great fortified Masada between 37 and 31 BCE as a refuge for himself in the event of a revolt. In 66 CE, at the beginning of the First Jewish-Roman War (also called the Great Jewish Revolt) against the Roman Empire, a group of Jewish rebels called the Zealots (kana'im, "zealous ones", commanded by Elazar ben Ya'ir (who may have been the same person as Eleazar ben Simon), who objected to Roman rule of Judea (as the Roman province of Iudaea, its Latin name) took Masada from the Roman garrison stationed there. In 70, they were joined by additional Zealots and their families who were expelled from Jerusalem by the other Jews living there shortly before the destruction of Jerusalem (and the Second Temple), and for the next two years used Masada as their base for raiding and harassing Roman and Jewish settlements alike.

In 72, the Roman governor of Iudaea, Lucius Flavius Silva, marched against Masada with the Roman legion X Fretensis and laid siege to the fortress. After failed attempts to breach the wall, they built a circumvallation wall and then a rampart against the western face of the plateau, using thousands of tons of stones and beaten earth. Josephus does not record any major attempts by the Zealots to counterattack the besiegers during this process, a significant difference from his accounts of other sieges against Jewish fortresses, suggesting that perhaps the Zealots lacked the equipment or skills to fight the Roman legion. Some historians also believe that Romans may have used Jewish slaves to build the rampart, whom the Zealots were reluctant to kill because of their beliefs.

The rampart was complete in the spring of 73, after approximately two to three months of siege, allowing the Romans to finally breach the wall of the fortress with a battering ram on April 16. When they entered the fortress, however, the Romans discovered that its approximately 1000 defenders had set all the buildings but the food storerooms ablaze and committed mass suicide rather than face certain capture or defeat by their enemies (which would probably have led to slavery or execution). Because Judaism strongly discourages suicide, however, the defenders were reported to have drawn lots and slain each other in turn, down to the last man, who would be the only one to actually take his own life. The storerooms were apparently left standing to show that the defenders retained the ability to live and chose the time of their death over slavery. This account of the siege of Masada was related to Josephus by two women who survived the suicide by hiding inside a cistern along with five children and repeated Elazar ben Yair's final exortation to his followers, prior to the mass suicide, verbatim to the Romans.

[Solomon]

Jesus, the son of Ananias, was a plebeian and a husbandman, who, four years before the Jewish war against Rome begun in 66 CE, went around Jerusalem prophesying the city's destruction. The Jewish leaders of Jerusalem turned him over to the Romans, who tortured him. The procurator Albinus took him to be a madman and released him. He continued his prophesy for more than seven years until he was killed by a stone from a catapult during the Roman siege of Jerusalem during the war.

(Summarized from Book 6, Chapter 5, Section 3 of the historian Flavius Josephus' The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem)

The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem
Flavius Josephus
Translator:  William Whiston
(I have altered the layout of the last section to make it more readable.)

A false prophet was the occasion of these people's destruction, who had  made a public proclamation in the city that very day, that God commanded them to get upon the temple, and that there they should receive miraculous signs of their deliverance. Now there was then a great number of false prophets suborned by the tyrants to impose on the people, who denounced this to them, that they should wait for deliverance from God; and this was in order to keep them from deserting, and that they might be buoyed up above  fear and care by such hopes. Now a man that is in adversity does easily comply with such promises; for when such a seducer makes him believe that he shall be delivered from those miseries which oppress him, then it is that the patient is full of hopes of such his deliverance.

3. Thus were the miserable people persuaded by these deceivers, and such as belied God himself; while they did not attend nor give credit to the signs that were so evident, and did so plainly foretell their future desolation, but, like men infatuated, without either eyes to see or minds to consider, did not regard the denunciations that God made to them. Thus there was a star resembling a sword, which stood over the city, and a comet, that continued a whole year. Thus also before the Jews' rebellion, and before those commotions which preceded the war, when the people were come in great crowds to the feast of unleavened bread, on the eighth day of the month Xanthicus, [Nisan,] and at the ninth hour of the night, so great a light shone round the altar and the holy house, that it appeared to be bright day time; which lasted for half an hour. This light seemed to be a good sign to the unskillful, but was so interpreted by the sacred scribes, as to portend those events that followed immediately upon it. At the same festival also, a heifer, as she was led by the high priest to be sacrificed, brought forth a lamb in the midst of the temple. Moreover, the eastern gate of the inner [court of the] temple, which was of brass, and vastly heavy, and had been with difficulty shut by twenty men, and rested upon a basis armed with iron, and had bolts fastened very deep into the firm floor, which was there made of one entire stone, was seen to be opened of its own accord about the sixth hour of the night. Now those  that kept watch in the temple came hereupon running to the captain of the temple, and told him of it; who then came up thither, and not without great difficulty was able to shut the gate again. This also appeared to the vulgar to be a very happy prodigy, as if God did thereby open them the gate of happiness. But the men of learning understood it, that the security of their holy house was dissolved of its own accord, and that the gate was opened for the advantage of their enemies.

So these publicly declared that the signal foreshowed the desolation that was coming upon them. Besides these, a few days after that feast, on the one and twentieth day of the month Artemisius, [Jyar,] a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared: I suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it, and were not the events that followed it of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals; for, before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armor were seen running about among the clouds, and surrounding of cities. Moreover, at that feast which we call Pentecost, as the priests were going by night into the inner [court of the temple,] as their custom was, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said that, in the first place, they felt a quaking, and heard a great noise, and after that they heard a sound as of a great multitude, saying, "Let us remove hence."

But, what is still more terrible, there was one Jesus, the son of Ananus, a plebeian and a husbandman, who, four years before the war began, and at a time when the city was in very great peace and prosperity, came to that feast whereon it is our custom for every one to make tabernacles to God in the temple, began on a sudden to cry aloud:

"A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds, a voice against Jerusalem and the holy house, a voice against the bridegrooms and the brides, and a voice against this whole people!"

This was his cry, as he went about by day and by night, in all the lanes of the city.

However, certain of the most eminent among the populace had great indignation at this dire cry of his, and took up the man, and gave him a great number of severe stripes; yet did not he either say any thing for himself, or any thing peculiar to those that chastised him, but still went on with the same words which he cried before.

Hereupon our rulers, supposing, as the case proved to be, that this was a sort of divine fury in the man, brought him to the Roman procurator, where he was whipped till his bones were laid bare; yet he did not make any supplication for himself, nor shed any tears, but turning his voice to the most lamentable tone possible, at every stroke of the whip his answer was:

"Woe, woe to Jerusalem!"

And when Albinus (for he was then our procurator) asked him, Who he was? and whence he came? and why he uttered such words? he made no manner of reply to that he said, but still did not leave off his melancholy ditty, till Albinus took him to be a madman, and dismissed him.

Now, during all the time that passed before the war began, this man did not go near any of the citizens, nor was seen by them while he said so; but he every day uttered these lamentable words, as if it were his premeditated vow:

"Woe, woe to Jerusalem!"

Nor did he give ill words to any of those that beat him every day, nor good words to those that gave him food; but this was his reply to all men, and indeed no other than a melancholy presage of what was to come.

This cry of his was the  loudest at the festivals; and he continued this ditty for seven years and five months, without growing hoarse, or being tired therewith, until the very time that he saw his presage in earnest fulfilled in our siege, when it ceased; for as he was going round upon the wall, he cried out with his utmost force:

"Woe, woe to the city again, and to the people, and to the holy house!"

And just as he added at the last: "Woe, woe to myself also!" there came a stone out of one of the engines, and smote him, and killed him immediately; and as he was uttering the very same presages he gave up the ghost.


Why the Almighty Caused Jerusalem and His Temple to be Destroyed:
   The omens fall into interesting groups. The star and comet always accompany momentous events; one recalls the comet presaging the death of Julius Caesar and the star at the birth of Jesus of Nazareth.The other omens are associated with Jewish festivals. The next six signs that are described occur within days of each other, in an unspecified year, but probably in the early 60s. Just before the Passover celebration three of these signs occur together, and just after it the chariots in the air appear. Fifty days after this same Passover, on Shavuot (Pentecost), the earthquake and strange sounds occur. And Jesus ben Ananias first makes his appearance at the festival of Sukkot.

    One notes that Passover is a spring festival, and Sukkot an autumn one, suggesting that these all occurred within the same year, which, by the clues given (Albinus as procurator, the duration of Jesus' lamentation), would have been 62. As it happens, Josephus was most likely in Rome in that year, not in Jerusalem (see the Chronology), so he is forced to report these signs at second hand.

     Students of the New Testament cannot fail to have noticed parallels in these passages with events surrounding Jesus of Nazareth. The fantastic events occurring at the Passover bring to mind those related at the death of Jesus thirty years earlier, also at a  Passover, when the curtain of the Temple was split in two, and the earth shook (Matthew 27:51). At the following Pentecost the apostles have a vision of Jesus and begin to speak in tongues, while at Josephus' Pentecost sounds and voices are heard -- there are auditory miracles  in both texts.

    The sad story of Jesus son of Ananias related by Josephus has a number of parallels with the New Testament, the first of which is the coincidence of a man named Jesus prophesying against the Temple. As the name "Jesus" (Joshua) is one of the most common held by men in Josephus' works, it should not be taken as significant in itself. But one wonders if the tales of the two Jesuses became intertwined by their tellers, with elements of one story creeping into the narrative of the other. For this hypothesis one notes several parallels.

    *     Woe to the people - Matt. 23 "Woe to you, scribes and pharisees!" (The Greek word translated as "woe" is "aiai" in Josephus, "ouai" in Matthew.)
    *     Prediction of the Temple Destruction - Matt. 24:2, which is associated with the "woes".
    *     The leaders of Jerusalem bring the doomsayer to the Roman governor - Matt. 27:2. As an aside -- Whiston mistranslates this section to refer to "our rulers," not "the rulers."  Readers who have studied my article on Josephus' account of Jesus will recognize this important point. Josephus does not use the first person here, despite Whiston (why did he do this?); see rather the Loeb edition for the Greek "hoi archontes" and Thackeray's correct translation.
    *   The governor interrogates him, but the accused says nothing to defend himself. (Matt. 27:13-14)
    * The accusation as unclear in Josephus' story as in the New Testament.  The grounds here are simply said to be " supernatural impulse." What crime is that for the leaders?


Deconstructing Jesus:
Finally, Price asks if we can be certain even of the fundamental fact that Jesus was linked with first century Palestine and specifically with the Roman governor Pontius Pilate. He thinks that this is "more apparent than real" [p. 241]. The atmosphere surrounding Jesus' entry into Jerusalem, the details of his arrest and execution, are suspiciously similar to events of the later Jewish War and the fall of Jerusalem in 70. Josephus records the woes pronounced on the city by Jesus ben-Ananias leading up to that war, and the 'cleansing of the Temple' by the revolutionary Simon ben-Giora who expelled the brigand Zealots from the holy place just before the fall of the city. Pilate's uncharacteristic behavior at the trial of Jesus also sounds like a garbled reworking of an episode involving Pilate in Samaria, as recounted by Josephus, with all the elements reshuffled to create the trial scene in the Gospels.

Other Josephan episodes concerning revolutionary Messiahs ("Joshua Messiahs," i.e., figures with characteristics of the biblical Joshua) in the course of the troubled first century bear striking resemblances to the messianic Jesus of the Gospels. Josephus' accounts of men like Theudas and the unnamed Egyptian establish the current concept of a Joshua Messiah -which is, directly translated, "Jesus Christ." Is the Gospel figure of that name, asks Price, a fictional rendering of such an "available" anticipated figure? Is Jesus' caution against false messiahs in Mark 13 a reflection of the proliferation of such a concept/expectation? How will the people know when the real one comes along? (How will we know to extract a real Jesus Christ from all this myth and expectation?)


Solomon

[Solomon]

Messianic claimants (10)
The Egyptian prophet (between 52 and 58 CE)
Sources: Flavius Josephus, Jewish War 2.259-263 and Jewish Antiquities 20.169-171; Acts of the apostles 21.38.

Story: According to Flavius Josephus, there were many people during the governorship of Festus

    who deceived and deluded the people under pretense of Divine inspiration, but were in fact for procuring innovations and changes of the government. These men prevailed with the multitude to act like madmen, and went before them into the wilderness, pretending that God would there show them the signals of liberty.
    [Flavius Josephus, Jewish War 2.259]

He continues with the following story.

    There was an Egyptian false prophet that did the Jews more mischief than the former; for he was a cheat, and pretended to be a prophet also, and got together thirty thousand men that were deluded by him; these he led round about from the wilderness to the mount which was called the Mount of Olives. He was ready to break into Jerusalem by force from that place; and if he could but once conquer the Roman garrison and the people, he intended to rule them by the assistance of those guards of his that were to break into the city with him.
    [Flavius Josephus, Jewish War 2.261-262]

In his Jewish antiquities, Josephus retold the story. The number of followers seems to be less exaggerated and the prophet's threat to use violence are ignored.

    about this time, someone came out of Egypt to Jerusalem, claiming to be a prophet. He advised the crowd to go along with him to the Mount of Olives, as it was called, which lay over against the city, and at the distance of a kilometer. He added that he would show them from hence how the walls of Jerusalem would fall down at his command, and he promised them that he would procure them an entrance into the city through those collapsed walls. Now when Felix was informed of these things, he ordered his soldiers to take their weapons, and came against them with a great number of horsemen and footmen from Jerusalem, and attacked the Egyptian and the people that were with him. He slew four hundred of them, and took two hundred alive. The Egyptian himself escaped out of the fight, but did not appear any more. And again the robbers stirred up the people to make war with the Romans, and said they ought not to obey them at all; and when any persons would not comply with them, they set fire to their villages, and plundered them.
    [Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 20.169-171]

Comment: Like Theudas, the Egyptian prophet took Joshua (the man who made the walls of Jericho fall; Joshua 6.20) as an example. The Roman governor was rightly alarmed: like Joshua and Moses, the Egyptian claimed to lead the Jews to a promised land without enemies. This was clearly a messianic claim, even though Josephus does not mention it. The nameless Egyptian may have called himself 'king Messiah', because Josephus uses the Greek verb tyrannein ('to be sole ruler') in the first quotation. It should be noted that the Mount of Olives was regarded as the place where God would stand on the Day of Judgment, fighting the battle against Israel's enemies (Zechariah 14.4).


Egyptian Prophet
Acts 21:38
"Art not thou that Egyptian, which before these days madest an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers?"

Eusebius (325)
(Regarding the Egyptian of Acts 21:38) "A greater blow than this was inflicted on the Jews by the Egyptian false prophet. Arriving in the country this man, a fraud who posed as a seer, collected about 30,000 dupes, led them round by the wild country to the Mount of Olives, and from there was ready to force an entry into Jerusalem, overwhelm the Roman garrison, and seize supreme power, with his fellow-raiders as bodyguards. But Felix anticipated his attempt by meeting him with the Roman heavy infantry, the whole population rallying to the defense, so that when the clash occurred the Egyptian fled with a handful of men and most of his followers were killed or captured." (pp. 96-97)

"These works, that were done by the robbers, filled the city with all sorts of impiety. And now these impostors and deceivers persuaded the multitude to follow them into the wilderness, and pretended that they would exhibit manifest wonders and signs, that should be performed by the providence of God. And many that were prevailed on by them suffered the punishments of their folly; for Felix brought them back, and then punished them. Moreover, there came out of Egypt about this time to Jerusalem one that said he was a prophet, and advised the multitude of the common people to go along with him to the Mount of Olives, as it was called, which lay over against the city, and at the distance of five furlongs. He said further, that he would show them from hence how, at his command, the walls of Jerusalem would fall down; and he promised them that he would procure them an entrance into the city through those walls, when they were fallen down. Now when Felix was informed of these things, he ordered his soldiers to take their weapons, and came against them with a great number of horsemen and footmen from Jerusalem, and attacked the Egyptian and the people that were with him. He also slew four hundred of them, and took two hundred alive. But the Egyptian himself escaped out of the fight, but did not appear any more. And again the robbers stirred up the people to make war with the Romans, and said they ought not to obey them at all; and when any persons would not comply with them, they set fire to their villages, and plundered them.
(Book XX, Chapter VIII, Section 6)

Johann Philip Schabalie (1635)
"Josephus informs us that an Egyptian false prophet led 30,000 into the desert, who were almost entirely cut off by Felix, the Roman procurator.  And that in the reign of Claudius, "the land was overrun with magicians, seducers, and imposters, who drew the people after them in multitudes into solitudes and deserts, to see the signs and miracles, which they promised to show by the power of God. 
Josephus, Antiq. lib. 20, c. viii., ? 6" (p. 409)


Solomon

[Solomon]

THE JESUS PUZZLE
Was There No Historical Jesus?
Earl Doherty

Supplementary Article No. 10
JOSEPHUS UNBOUND
Reopening the Josephus Question

[Extracts]
1. The whole tenor of his writings in regard to the Jewish War is an open condemnation of the revolutionary movement which led up to it, beginning with Judas the Galilean (in 6 CE), together with the immediate machinations of the Roman governor Gessius Florus who, as Josephus presents it, deliberately enticed the nation into war.

?It was in Gessius Florus?s time that the nation began to grow mad with this distemper (that is, the revolutionary movement begun with Judas) . . . and who occasioned the Jews to go wild with it by the abuse of his authority? (Antiquities 18.1.6).

Earlier in 18.1.1, he condemns men like Judas, who ?laid the foundations of our future miseries.? Right after an account of his third agitator of the people, an ?Egyptian false prophet,? Josephus describes another ?inflammation? of the ?diseased body? (meaning the movement for revolt): the activities of a marauding Zealotic band agitating for rebellion against Rome.

He comments,
?and this till all Judea was filled with the effects of their madness. And thus the flame was every day more and more blown up, till it came to a direct war? (Jewish War 2.13.6).

There is no hint of any role for James? death here or anywhere else in Josephus? analysis of the causes of the conflagration. Nor do I think, superstitious or not, that Josephus, as a competent and sophisticated historian, would have been guilty of such a naive concept, one that involved so great an imbalance between cause and effect.

2. And what of the phrase ?a doer of wonderful works?? Or even translating this as the less starry-eyed ?startling works?? This in Josephus? mind would put Jesus into the same class as those popular agitators like Theudas the magician who promised to divide the river Jordan so that his followers could cross over it, or the unnamed Egyptian who claimed that his command would knock down the walls of Jerusalem. Would Christian or any other reports filter out the healings (which Josephus might conceivably accept as believable or laudatory) from Jesus? reputed miracles over nature, or his Gospel prophecy that the walls of the Temple would tumble?

[Bart]

This is very interesting, thank you for presenting it. I do not understand your final question, would you be able to rephrase it please? Thanks!

- Bart

[Solomon]

Thank you, Bart. The period of the First Jewish Revolt is, I think, important. Certain events seem to have shaped history and the world we live in now; this is one of them and I have begun, with my recent posts to this board, to explore it.

I think also that there are lessons to be learned today from both the beliefs and actions of people at that time, their consequences, the manner in which they were reported and how people have regarded them since. In my own experience, I have observed that when tested, falsity fails. My view of the world today is that we are being challenged severely on a number of fronts and largely as a consequence of actions based on such falsities. If ever there were a time when we most need empirical truth, it is now. I am not optimistic that this will succeed, but I feel bound to make an effort.

The question you refer to, Bart, was, of course, posed by Earl Doherty, the author of the piece I quoted. For the full context I would therefore refer you to it. The question is within:
Authorship of the Testimonium Flavianum
18. Could Josephus have written the reconstructed Testimonium?
"This leads me to the most significant set of arguments against the validity of the reconstructed Josephus original. Could Josephus under any circumstances have written even the reduced version?"

We have made reference elsewhere on this forum to Josephus, notably in this context:
Archaeologists Challenge Link Between Dead Sea Scrolls and Ancient Sect
Josephus

There is no contemporaneous record for the existence of the Jesus of the New Testament and with good reason. The best that can be done is to use later records to try and indicate historicity. In this, the documents bearing the claimed authorship of Josephus are vital.

In the above piece, Doherty argues:

...the whole tenor of the Josephan ?original? does not ring true for Josephus!

Did he have reports of Jesus' teachings, all of which he perceived as laudable? That is difficult to envision.

Thus we are justified in concluding that it is impossible that Josephus could have referred to Jesus as ?a wise man.?

Could the historian have presented this Jesus in even a "neutral" way, could he have regarded him in any other light than just another detestable fanatic?

Final Conclusion

Although it may well be that we owe Josephus? survival through the Middle Ages to the unknown Christian interpolator who gave us the Testimonium, it is time to release Josephus from his Christian captivity?and from the bonds of those who continue to claim him as a witness to the existence of an historical Jesus. But if the weight of argument would impel us to acknowledge that Josephus seems to have made no reference at all to Jesus, what implications do we draw from this?

Here is a Jewish historian who was born and grew up in Judea shortly after Pilate?s tumultous governorship, with its presumed crucifixion of a Jewish sage and wonder worker, a man whose followers claimed had risen from the dead and who gave rise to a vital new religious sect. Here is an historian who remembers and records in his work with staggering efficiency and in voluminous detail the events and personalities and socio-political subtleties of eight decades and more. Can we believe that Josephus would have been ignorant of this teaching revolutionary and the empire-wide movement he produced, or that for some unfathomable reason he chose to omit Jesus from his chronicles?

Destroying the credibility of the Josephus references inevitably places a very strong nail in the coffin of the historical Jesus.

This is my view also.

Solomon

[Bart]

I get the sense that someone later played Scrabble with historical texts, recreated and placed events in the worst turbulent times, for the purpose of creating a new history or belief system/ religion. The result would be nearly undeniable historical events, enough so that certain 'facts' could not be disproven, allowing one the choice to believe or not.

- Bart

[Solomon]

It makes my blood run cold, Bart, when I consider how this all came about and where it leaves us. To take my analogy of Nazi Occupied Europe further:

The Big Lie: The phrase was used (on page 51) in a report prepared during the 1939-45 war by the United States Office of Strategic Services in describing Hitler's psychological profile:

    His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.

Solomon

[Bart]

Thank you, that is much more understandable. It is indeed a relevant point to consider. It is telling that other chroniclers of the era likewise make no mention of the man or the movement either. A specific focus on the Jews and their history certainly ought to have made mention. If it is known that Josephus did not intentionally leave out other important figures of the era,  then the conclusion drawn, and the view held, would be  reasonable.

- Bart

[Sovereign]

Papyrus fragment of Gospel of St Mark. 3rd century CE

Gospel of Mark
Solomon:
Sicarii at Gesthemane
"This NT account places sicarii among the people of Jesus at the same time as Judas the Sicarius is said to have betrayed him. If this account was anything other than black propaganda, this might be confusing.

The Gospel of Mark is anonymous and written in Greek "sometime between the late 60s or the early 70's" - that is, after the First Jewish Revolt."


Gospel according to Mark
"By modern New Testament Scholars the Gospel according to Mark is considered as the oldest of the existing gospels. It is dated to around 70 CE, because of the nature of its reference to the destruction of Jerusalem in chapter 13.

In Mark we hear that Jesus says that the temple of Jerusalem will soon be destructed. It is assumed that Mark can have included these prophecies to bring weight to his gospel, since this actually happened, in 70 CE. This is our most important way of dating Mark. Beyond this, the dating is not founded in any traditional historical sources, but is reconstructed on the base of secondary sources.

Early tradition claims that the gospel was written in Rome. This is connected to the notion where John Mark wrote down from the narration of disciple Peter. But this is highly doubtful as the John Mark was a Jew, and there are clear indications in the text that the author of the gospel was not Jewish."

Whoever and whatever early Christians were, there can be no dispute that they were Jewish. If the author of Mark is not Jewish - and the text is written in Greek - then I for one am certain that the text is fraudulent.


FORGERY IN THE GOSPEL OF MARK?
(A summary of an extract.)
The original ending of Mark:
Some of the oldest copies of the Gospel of Mark, the Sinaitic (circa 370 CE) and Vatican (circa 325 CE), end at Mark 16:8.  Papyrus-45 (a.k.a. P-45) is an even older version of Mark, but it is incomplete; none of its text from Mark 16 has survived. Various additions after Mark 16:8 appear to have been added later by unknown Christian forgers. One addition was quoted in the writings of Irenaeus and Hippolytus in the second or third century CE.

The most ancient full manuscripts of Mark end mid-sentence with Mark 16:8. A variety of endings appear in later manuscripts:

The Longer Ending: This consist of verses 9 to 20, and is the ending found most often in Biblical translations.

The Shorter Ending: One Old Latin manuscript, the Codex Bobiensis, has survived from circa 400 CE. It contains a "shorter ending" in place of the "long ending."

The Freer Logion: This is an apparent forgery in which a copyist inserted text between Mark 16:14 and 16:15. It has been found only in one Greek manuscript, Codex Washingtonensis (a.k.a.  Codex W) which dates from the late 4th or early 5th century CE. It has been preserved in the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

References:
   1. "Mark, Chapter 16, New American Bible," Footnote 2 at: http://www.usccb.org/nab/
   2. Mohamed Ghounem & Abdur Rahman, "Gospel of Mark?," at: http://www.geocities.com
   3. R.E. Brown, et al., "The New Jerome Biblical Commentary," Pearson PTP, (Reissued 1989). Read reviews or order this book safely from Amazon.com online book store
   4. Jim Snapp II, "The Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20," at: http://www.waynecoc.org/MarkOne.html
   5. C.M. Laymon, Ed, "Interpreter's One Volume Commentary on the Bible", Abingdon Press, Nashville TN (1991), P. 670-671
   6. Jamieson et al, "The New Commentary on the Whole Bible", Tyndale, Wheaton IL (1990), P. 155-157
   7. J.R. Kohlenberger III, "Precise Parallel New Testament", Oxford University Press, New York NY, (1995)
   8. "Mark 16:19-20 - Authentic and Inspired," The Revival Fellowship at: http://www.trf.org.au/mk16.htm


AUTHORSHIP
All early tradition connects the Second Gospel with two names, those of St. Mark and St. Peter, Mark being held to have written what Peter had preached. We have just seen that this was the view of Papias and the elder to whom he refers. Papias wrote not later than about A.D. 130, so that the testimony of the elder probably brings us back to the first century, and shows the Second Gospel known in Asia Minor and attributed to St. Mark at that early time.

ORIGINAL LANGUAGE, VOCABULARY, AND STYLE
It has always been the common opinion that the Second Gospel was written in Greek, and there is no solid reason to doubt the correctness of this view. We learn from Juvenal (Sat., III, 60 sq.; VI, 187 sqq.) and Martial (Epig., XIV, 58) that Greek was very widely spoken at Rome in the first century. Various influences were at work to spread the language in the capital of the Empire. "Indeed, there was a double tendency which embraced at once classes at both ends of the social scale. On the one hand among slaves and the trading classes there were swarms of Greek and Greek-speaking Orientals.


Authorship of Marks Gospel
Who was Mark who Wrote the Gospel?

The text of the Gospel According to Mark does not specifically identify anyone as the author. Not even ?Mark? is identified as the author ? in theory, ?Mark? could have simply related a series of events and stories to someone else who collected them, edited them, and set them down in the gospel form. It wasn't until the second century that the title ?According to Mark? or ?The Gospel According to Mark? was affixed to this document.

A number of people in the New Testament ? not only Acts but also in the Pauline letters ? are named Mark and anyone of them could potentially have been the author behind this gospel. Tradition has it that the Gospel According to Mark was written down by Mark, a companion of Peter, who simply recorded what Peter preached in Rome (1 Peter 5:13) and this person was, in turn, identified with ?John Mark? in Acts (12:12,25; 13:5-13; 15:37-39) as well as the ?Mark? in Philemon 24, Colossians 4:10, and 2 Timothy 4:1.

It seems unlikely that all of these Marks were the same Mark, much less the author of this gospel. The name ?Mark? appears frequently in the Roman empire and there would have been a strong desire to associate this gospel with someone close to Jesus. It was also common in this age to attribute writings to important figures of the past in order to give them more authority.

This is what Christian tradition has handed down, however, and to be fair, it?s a tradition that dates back pretty far ? to the writings of Eusebius around the year 325. He, in turn, claimed to be relying upon work from an earlier writer, Papias, bishop of Hierapolis, (c. 60-130) who wrote about this around the year 120:

      ?Mark, having become Peter?s interpreter, wrote down accurately whatever he remembered of what was said or done by the Lord, however not in order.?

Papias' claims were based upon things he said he heard from a "Presbyter." Eusebius himself is not an entirely trustworthy source, though, and even he had doubts about Papias, a writer who evidently was given to embellishment. Eusebius does imply that Mark died in the 8th year of Nero?s reign, which would have been before Peter died ? a contradiction to the tradition that Mark wrote down Peter?s stories after his death. What does ?interpreter? mean in this context? Does Papias note that things were not written ?in order? to explain away contradictions with other gospels?

Even if Mark did not rely on Peter as a source for his material, there are reasons to argue that Mark wrote while in Rome. For example Clement, who died in 212, and Irenaeus, who died in 202, are two early church leaders who both supported a Roman origin for Mark. Mark calculates time by a Roman method (for example, dividing the night into four watches rather than three), and finally, he has a faulty knowledge of Palestinian geography (5:1, 7:31, 8:10).

Mark's language contains a number of "Latinisms" ? loan words from Latin to Greek ? which would suggest an audience more comfortable with Latin than in Greek. Some of these Latinisms include (Greek/Latin) 4:27 modios/modius (a measure), 5:9,15: legi?n/legio (legion), 6:37: d?nari?n/denarius (a Roman coin), 15:39, 44-45: kenturi?n/centurio (centurion; both Matthew and Luke use ekatontrach?s, the equivalent term in Greek).


The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark, Dennis R. MacDonald. Book Review
I'm pleased to introduce Dennis R. MacDonald, John Wesley Professor of New Testament at the Claremont School of Theology and author of the recent book The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark. Professor MacDonald has agreed to take time out of his schedule to talk to us about his book and his research into the origins of the New Testament. To quote from the publisher's description of The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark:

    In this groundbreaking book, Dennis R. MacDonald offers an entirely new view of the New Testament gospel of Mark. The author of the earliest gospel was not writing history, nor was he merely recording tradition, MacDonald argues. Close reading and careful analysis show that Mark borrowed extensively from the Odyssey and the Iliad and that he wanted his readers to recognize the Homeric antecedents in Mark's story of Jesus. Mark was composing a prose anti-epic, MacDonald says, presenting Jesus as a suffering hero modeled after but far superior to traditional Greek heroes.

    Much like Odysseus, Mark's Jesus sails the seas with uncomprehending companions, encounters preternatural opponents, and suffers many things before confronting rivals who have made his house a den of thieves. In his death and burial, Jesus emulates Hector, although unlike Hector Jesus leaves his tomb empty. Mark?s minor characters, too, recall Homeric predecessors: Bartimaeus emulates Tiresias; Joseph of Arimathea, Priam; and the women at the tomb, Helen, Hecuba, and Andromache. And, entire episodes in Mark mirror Homeric episodes, including stilling the sea, walking on water, feeding the multitudes, the Triumphal Entry, and Gethsemane. The book concludes with a discussion of the profound significance of this new reading of Mark for understanding the gospels and early Christianity.

Austin writes:

I'd like to start out by asking a couple of general questions; others with questions or comments should feel free to jump in at any time.

1. Why do you think that no one has written about this relationship before? If some of the parallels are so obvious, surely they must have caught someone's attention?

    DRM: Perhaps later in the discussion I will be able to give some evidence that ancient readers saw the relationship of these stories to Homer, but I'll restrict myself briefly to the history of recent scholarship. There is no one cause of this scholarly oversight. One cause surely is the desire by many traditional Christians to view the Gospels as historically reliable. For these people, the notion that Mark wrote alternative mythologies would be heretical. Most critical scholars of the New Testatment, like myself, were schooled in a method called formcriticism that seeks to trace units in the gospels (or other Jewish or Christian narratives) to antecedent stages of transmission. So, for example, some scholars would argue that a particular tale was based on a misunderstood historical event; another may suggest a genesis in early Christian preaching, or magical practices, or popular legends. The origin of these stories, then, come from antecedent traditions, not from a creative author interacting with classical Greek models.

    This is not to say that I am alone in comparing the Gospels to other ancient literature; indeed, this has been done repeatedly for at least fifty years. What sets my book apart is that it compares the earliest Gospel (Mark) with Greek epic, not with Jewish books, including the Jewish scriptures, not with contemporary Greek prose. Another reason for the oversight of the Homeric epics is, of course, widespread ignorance about the Iliad and the Odyssey in our culture, including biblical scholars.

    By the way, the oversight should not be too surprising in light of the significant differences between the gospels and epic. Homer's writings are poetic, written in a language barely recognizable by many later Greek readers, polytheistic, violent and somewhat naughty.

2. I imagine that your thesis must have upset some people...what sort of reception has your book received, both in academia and among general readers?

    DRM: Well, I suppose no author thinks her or his book gets as much response as it should, but that has been my experience. I am gratified that some readers have called it a watershed in the study of the Gospels; I think it should be. Most scholars in the field seem intent on avoiding it, for if I am correct, nearly everything written on early Christian narrative is flawed. Conservative Christians, of course, have not been overjoyed, but some evangelical types recognize that I am not arguing that Mark took over these stories from Homer uncritically. Indeed, he often rewrote the stories to show that Jesus was superior to the likes of Odysseus, Hector, Achilles. One unanticipated use of my work has been by atheists who use it to show that the gospels are not historical. I think most of us have known that for a long time. My work shows, however, that the author of the earliest gospel knew he was not writing history and expected his readers to recognize it as a fictional alternative to the dominating fictions of Greek religion.

That is an interesting point. If the author *expected* people to see the work as basically fictional and serving a religious (or political, or social) purpose, then that should change how we read the Gospels. Today, people writing "history" are doing something very different from what authors in the ancient world had in mind when they wrote "history" or narratives. But everyone seems to forget that.

Considering your work on how other early Christian and Jews works may have made use of ancient Greek literature... do you suppose that one of the changes which scholars need to consider is that early Christianity (and perhaps even Judaism of the time) rely much more heavily upon Greek influences than has been assumed? I know that scholars have long noted many ways in which Greek philosophy impacted early Christianity, but perhaps because of Greek mythology, the impact was larger than previously thought.

Perhaps Christianity owes more to Athens than to Jerusalem? Or at least, more than we realize.

    DRM: YES! Scholars long have recognized potential influence of Greek philosophy on the New Testament, especially on Pauline letters, but the influence of Greek mythology, especially Homeric poetry, has gone unrecognized. I have litte doubt that behind the mass of early Christian narratives, both in and outside the New Testament lies a mimetic (imitative) substratum awaiting exploration. I find a new potential parallel almost every month, especially in the so-called apocryphal Acts of the Apostles.

Do you feel that such parallels suggest that the intended audience for these works was primarily Roman/Greek/Gentile? How would Jewish audiences reacted to such parallels... would they have simply not noticed? Might they have been upset at a supposedly Jewish Messiah being compared to Greek gods and heroes?

    DRM: Austin, my work merely confirms conclusions made by others that Mark's primary audience was Greek-speaking and gentile. Jews are spoken of as others and, more important, rather basic Jewish practices need to be explained to the reader. What is more, the explanations sometimes are off the mark (sorry for the unintended pun) making it likely that the author himself was gentile. That said, it also is true that the author has a rather sophisticated knowledge of the Septuagint (Greek Bible) and may expect some of his readers to recognize biblical allusions.

    No, if Jewish readers saw what Mark was doing I doubt they would have been particularly upset. Several Jewish poets had imitated Homer and so did the author of the Book of Tobit, in my opinion. What probably made them more upset was Mark's claim that Jesus was a Messiah but not a son of David, that it was Jewish authorities, not Romans, who killed Jesus, and that Jesus was superior to all Jewish antecedents.

As I understand it, Jews and Christians were not so strongly differentiated in the first couple of centuries - graveyards are identical while churches and synagogues are very similar in style and decoration. Would the writing of such documents have helped to split Christianized Jews from other Jews in the community?

    DRM: I doubt that Homeric influence on early Christian writings played anything other than a modest role, if any, in the split between Christians and other Jews. Judaism of the period was so diverse and so many other issues were more important that such imitations, if noticed at all, would have had little to contribute. On the other hand, I think it interesting that Mark and Luke/Acts, the books most laden with Homeric influence, also are stridently anti-Jewish.

3. Do you think that any other early Christian documents besides Mark were written to emulate Homer or other ancient literature?

    DRM: Indeed they did. My first book, Christianizing Homer, demonstrated imitations of Homer, Euripides, Sophocles, and Plato by the author of the Acts of Andrew (ca. 200). I have published several articles on Homeric imitations in the Book of Tobit (Jewish), the Gospel of Luke, and the Acts of the Apostles. I also see similar imitations in other Christian apocryphal texts. I think we are at the beginning of breaking the code of ancient religious narrative.

What is your opinion of the work of the Jesus Seminar? Does it, as is claimed, produce a consensus among scholars about what is most likely true and original, free of later mythologizing?

Or are the critics right when they say that it is more anattack on conservative and fundamentalist readings of the Bible, motivated more by theological disagreements than by objective scholarship?

    DRM: Your questions are appropriate but difficult to answer. First, any claim to produce a consensus is overstated. The most one might claim is that this self-selected group of critically trained scholars have dicussed and voted on the likely authenticity of information about Jesus in early Christian texts. This is, in fact, what is usually claimed, but sometimes seminar members claim more--especially some of the organizers.

    The Seminar itself is not monolithic religiously; indeed, some of the members are quite traditional, including more than a few ministers and priests. Some of the members, however, are bitter to traditional Christianity and their scholarship and rhetoric occasionally reflect that bias. This is by no means the case for everyone.

Blair writes:

Thank you for taking the time to come here and discuss your book.

I only have two immediate questions. First, is Mark the only gospel that emulates the Odyssey and the Iliad or do the other gospels attempt to do the same?

    DRM: Matthew and John, in my view, have some connections with so-called topoi of Greek poetry but they apparently do not imitate the epics as thoroughly as Mark. Luke, on the other hand, imitates Homeric epic repeatedly. For example, compare the story of the recognition of Jesus by the disciples on the road to Emmaeus that ends the gospel with the ending of the Odyssey, where Laertes recognizes Odysseus by the scar on his leg. I've published several articles on Homeric imitation on the Acts of the Apostles (including the shipwreck in ch. 27 and the famous "we-passages"), and I'm now working on a book on Acts showing that Peter's prison break in ch. 12 and Paul's farewell in ch. 20 are strategic and profound imitations of passages in the Iliad.

Second, if Mark was intent on emulating these stories then how does that affect Christianity, and more specifically, Jesus himself.

    DRM: How will my work effect contemporary Christianity?

    For the most part churches seem to survive, even thrive, quite oblivious to biblical scholarship. I expect the same will be true of my work. That said, if I am correct, I would think the following conclusions would follow.

    1. We need a new appreciation of early Christianity as a multicultural phenomenon, borrowing both from Jerusalem and Athens, as you aptly put it.

    2. The church needs to accept its own mythology as a mythology. Myth is not falsehood; in fact, myth is how religions express their highest values. In addition to appreciating myth, the church should learn to appreciate aesthetics as a theological enterprise: to value creativity, art, and literature. Too often theologians and others have conversed with science and history ignoring myth, art, and creativity.

    3. The church needs to accept the fact that we can know amazingly little about the historical Jesus. One implication of my work is to shrink the already slender information about Jesus that can be critically recovered.

    4. I would hope that my work would promote conversations between Christians and adherents of other religions without prejudice.

Who is your intended target for your book?

    DRM: I thought it necessary to pitch the book for two audiences: first for scholars so that the documentation and argumentation is sufficient to avoid disdain, but second for the generally literate reader familiar with comparative approaches to narratives. I don't know if I've succeeded, but I'm delighted the book is already used in some college literature courses.

    Sure, I think some people will fear "putting Jesus and Zeus on an equal pedestal," but this response surely is superficial. The differences are substantial and significant: what we need is a comparative attutide to religious fiction. By the way, "religious fiction" probably produces fewer misunderstandings than "mythology."

    I, myself, have been a member of the Jesus Seminar, and I still go to meetings now and then, but my approach is almost 180 degrees to theirs. I don't think we need Christianity based on history but not myth (even without God), but a Christianity conscious of its own "religious fictionality," but also open to scientific and historical findings.

Can we be sure that the gospel(s) are emulating Odyssey or Iliad or should we dig deeper and see if all three are emulating a previous work or a cultural clich??

    DRM: It is to treat this question that I have developed my criteria for mimesis: (1)accessibility, (2) analogy, (3) density, (4) order, (5) distinctive traits, and (6) interpretability. The most important of these is distinctive traits, the presence of features not found in oral traditions or literature conventions generally, features that bind two texts into a hermeneutical, chemical reaction. Authors ancient and modern use such distintive traits to alert the reader to compare the next with the target. Favorite flags are proper nouns, locations, titles, unusual words or phrases, or inversions. I don't deny the use of general conventions in the composition of early Christian narratives, but many such narratives raise flags that point to well-known literature models.

For the layperson in the church, do you think there is a distinctive path they should take in order to reach the point where they can make such comparative approaches? I know there is no specific path, because each of us kind of makes it up as we go along, but we all seem to flow in the same general direction. Is there a generalized approach?

    DRM: I am writing two books now: one more scholarly than the other, but both intended to be more accessible. One I am calling "Does the New Testament Imitate Homer?" which will analyze only three stories, all in Acts. I hope that by dealing with stories about the apostles I will avoid the debates about Jesus and that by dealing with only three stories somewhat more completely, I will make my case in more detail.

    The second book might be called Homer for the reader of the New Testament (Greek epic for dummies?). Here I plan to work my way through both the Iliad and the Odyssey, providing new prose translations of seminal passages and providing notes, bibliography, etc. I know the Homeric epics are long, difficult both in Greek and in English, loaded with historical and literary difficulties, and, in large measure, inaccessible to all but the expert. I want to provide a reference guide to address this. If anyone has an idea how best to do this, I'm all ears. I'm just now designing this work.

Keepwe writes:

I'm pleased to be able to say that I had read the book even before it was assigned as homework for the assistant moderators and it was very interesting. I think you've definitely made the idea plausible. A question though: have you ever done a null test for spotting parallels? That is, have you ever sat down with another randomly chosen text, Moby Dick, say, and conscientiously looked for parallels to Homer?

    DRM: Keepwe, great question. As you know, in the book I use six criteria for evaluating parallels between any two works: accessibility of the model, parallel imitations, density of parallels, order of parallels, distinctive traits, and interpretability. I would use these criteria on any putative parallels.

    But that is not precisely to your point. Take your example, I fully expect that in Moby Dick, a sea adventure of epic proportions, one may find lots of parallels to the Odyssey (as one can in Ulyse's Gold or O Brother, where Art Thou?). When one writes a sea adventure one is likely to use literary motifs and props characteristic of the genre. This, in my view, is not necessarily mimesis. If the author wishes the reader to recognize the echoes with Odysseus by using distinctive devices or motifs not generally found in sea adventures, one then is more likely to make the case for imitation. There is a slippery slope from quotation to allusion to echo, with many intermediary points. This ambiguity may be frustrating, but it makes reading exciting.

    If you have an idea about how to test this method further with your nul reading, I'd love to hear about it.

Susannah writes:

Why didn't Mark have Jesus married as Odysseus was? And if Mark invented so much about Jesus, then what was the purpose of doing that in the first place?

    DRM: Susannah, I presume Mark did not have Jesus married because Jesus was not married. Mark didn't invent Jesus!

    Mark's purpose in creating so many stories about Jesus was to demonstrate how superior he was to Greek heroes. Few readers of Mark fail to see how he portrays Jesus as superior to Jewish worthies, such as David or Moses or Elijah. He does the same for Greek heroes. In other words, the earliest Evangelist was evangelizing.

    One example: at the end of the Iliad Hector is buried and remains so. The death of Jesus shares many traits with the death of Hector, but by the end of the gospel he has been raised from the dead, unlike Hector. Virtually every narrative in Mark with parallels to Homer shows such emulation tilted in favor of Jesus. He is more compassionate, more powerful, wiser, and more innured to suffering than the likes of Odysseus.

You say that Jesus was a real person, but that Mark created stories about Jesus to prove that he was superior to the Greek heroes. What I'd like to know is, what was there about Jesus in the first place that made Mark want to mythologise him at all? Jesus was obviously worthy of being mythologized at least in Mark's eyes, but why? What was so special about Jesus that made Mark want to do this?

And another point: was the claim to be the Son of God just another example of mythology or did Jesus actually claim that?

    DRM: Let me begin with your second question. I know of no critical New Testament scholar who holds that Jesus understood himself as the Son of God, unless what he meant by Son of God was child of God or, better, agent of God, like a prophet. It is somewhat more likely that he spoke of himself as the Son of Man, but there is reason to question that as well.

    Jesus must have been a remarkable teacher, a charismatic presence, and a religious innovator. But it probably was his unjust execution by the powers-that-were that propelled his reputation, much like the death of Martin Luther King, Jr. made of him a hero larger than life. In addition, rumors of sightings of Jesus after his death generated the notion that he had been exalted or raised, rather like the deification of Heracles after his death. The combination of Jesus' teachings, charismatic presence, and tragic death surely was powerful religious chemistry.

What I'd like to know is, why did it take so long for a gospel to be written about Jesus? One would think that something would have been written about him at the time rather than 60 years later. To me that seems to suggest that his impact on society at the time wasn't so great, and that only later, perhaps for political reasons, was he turned into a hero.

    DRM: The time span between Jesus' death and Mark is about 40 years. It is likely, however, that some of Jesus' sayings were recorded somewhat earlier, as in Q (the likely hypothetical source behind Matthew and Luke other than Mark).

    Your assessment of the growth of Jesus' popularity probably is correct. The Roman/Jewish historian Josephus knew of Jesus and the movement around him, but does not give it much significance. The same is true of other Roman historians prior to the end of the second century CE (e.g., Suetonius and Tacitus). Jewish sources from the period also say little concerning Jesus. Even so, the expansion of Christianity in Europe in the 50s and 60s is quite impressive (Paul's mission, for example).

Rob writes:

Professor MacDonald -- I hear you to be arguing that while Mark wants his book to be read in light of Homer, he particularly wants Jesus to be seen as *greater* than Homer's heroes. Perhaps I'm getting too caught up in wordings, but how much of Mark's argument concerned "greater" and how much concerned "different" ( e.g., echoing Deutero-Isaiah's suffering servant -- does that have an equivilent in Homer?)?

    DRM: Rob, no. You are not quibbling over words; the distinction between greater and different is important. In the lingo of intertextuality one might call greater "transvaluation" that implies a denigration of that which is imitated. One then might call different from "revaluation" which does not imply a denigration. I think both are happening in early Christian imitations of Homeric epic, though I am not sure the authors would have been alert to the differences. For example, in several respects Jesus is LIKE Odysseus: wise, able to endure great hardship, a friend of the divine, etc. To be sure, Jesus is different from Odysseus, but there is no implied critique of Odysseus here. In other respects, however, Jesus is greater than Odysseus: he can calm the sea, he does not blind a savage but exorcises him, he does not inflict violence but endures it.

    It would be interesting to compare the suffering servant tradition with the Odyssey, but I've not tried it. I'm suspicious for several reasons: suffering is a universal problem, as our Buddhist friends quite rightly point out.

Apollonius writes:

Is it not ironic that during Homeric times the Greek world was still narrow and uncharted, and yet the Iliad and Odyssey are full of adventure in a very physical sense, whereas by the time of Mark, when the world was wide and even humbler folk could travel the whole Mediterranean, Jesus is portrayed as someone who never strayed far from his native land?

    DRM: Well, I guess there is an irony here, but two things should be said. First, Jesus doesn't travel far and wide in Mark because Jesus himself did not travel far and wide. Again, Mark is not inventing Jesus or all of the traditions about him. Second, while it is true that travel in the Roman Empire was more common than in Homer's day, it would be a mistake to think of Homer's world too narrowly. References to amber suggest travel to northern Europe; references to Ethiopians in the east and west suggest awareness of a larger world; references to Egypt and perhaps the Black Sea are impressive; the story of the Laestrygonians speaks of a land where the sun never sets and the Cimmerians live where the sun never shines, suggesting knowledge of the far north. Furthermore, parallels between the epics and stories from India and especially the middle east evidence broad cultural contact.

Rundarren writes:

The thesis of your book is so fascinating. I gotta read it soon. I must admit my ignorance of Homeric epics, but I'm familiar with Mark--I've even read it in the Greek original. If your hypothesis is correct, which it seems likely, how do you suppose the author has blended and balanced together the writing of the gospel with Homeric and Old Testament patterns? Because it seems to me that the author was very conscious of some Old Testament patterns in the formulation of the gospel. For example, the number of healing stories (12 Jews and one gentile - Mark 7:26 - healed), of names of men Jesus called (12 apostle and Levi), and of loaves of bread (12 total loaves in the two feedings and one in the boat, where the feedings are reviewed - Mark 8:14-21) are exactly the same - thirteen - which seems too coincidential for it to represent anything other than an allusion to some Old Testament symbol, perhaps the 13 actual tribes of Israel, that is, the 12 (lay) tribes and the (priestly) tribe of Levi. Also, the narrative pattern in Mark 3:7-19 seems to allude to Moses and the exodus story perfectly: 1) the coupling of two Greek terms unique in Mark, 'anachorein' (to withdraw - 3:7) and 'plethos' (multitude - 3:7, 8) to describe Jesus withdrawing to the sea with a special crowd following him seems to allude to the exodus of Moses and the Hebrews to the Sea of Reeds, 2) the fact that Jesus, in a boat, used the sea to escape from the crowd (3:7-9) seems to allude to the Hebrews using the parted sea to escape from the Egyptian army, 3) the utterance of the unclean spirits "You are the Son of God!" to Jesus (3:11) seems to allude to the doxology of the Hebrews immediately after the destruction of Egyptian army by the sea, and 4) Jesus going up the mountain and appointing twelve apostles (3:13-19) seems to allude to Moses going up Mount Sinai to make a covenant with Yahweh for the "twelve" tribes of Israel. These examples of Old Testament allusions are but a few of many, many Old Testament allusions that are apparent in Mark. So how would you explain how the author could possibly consciously structure the writing of the gospel based on the story and symbolic patterns in BOTH Homeric epics and the septuagint?

    DRM: What a wonderful question! I agree entirely. Mark is an equal opportunity imitator. Mark's indebtedness to the Septuagint (the Hebrew Bible in Greek) is profound, extending well beyond the explicit citations. I hope someday someone will write a commentary that takes into account all of the literary influences, including, in my view Homer and at least one play of Euripides I have not yet studied sufficiently.

    So let's say Mark borrows from the LXX and from Greek literature. This would conform to the widespread practice of eclecticism, of imitating several works at once. The idea is this: one way of composing a narrative superior to one's primary model is to use other models as well, as many as five models, according to rhetoricians. The example (sexist by our standards) was a sculptor assigned to make a statue of Helen, the most beautiful of Greek women. No one mortal woman would have all the desireable traits, so the sculptor asked the city for five models, from which he took features eclectically to produce his statue. In the case of Mark (and Luke-Acts) there was a religious reason for doing so: to claim the literature, religion,and traditions of Jews for interpreting Jesus. Ancient rhetoricians would have recognized Mark's blending and approved of it formally.

Thanks to Professor MacDonald for taking the time to talk to us and for writing such an interesting book. I encourage people to take a look at, because it provides a different perspective on origins of the Gospels.

[Solomon]

The above cross-references to much else here, though to this in particular:
Villa of the Papyri: Piso and Seneca
Here is a serious attempt to seek the origin of the New Testament.  The author sees the inspiration coming from the pen of the Roman philosopher, statesman, dramatis, Lucius Annaeus Seneca (often known simply as Seneca, or Seneca the Younger).

Seneca's longest play, Hercules on Oeta, portrays the death and deification of Hercules. The hero is betrayed by those close to him, but, free from his mortal body, his celestial spirit conquers death ? in essence, a resurrection. Given the distrust held by Stoics for those who grasp for power, it is more than possible that Seneca wrote a drama in which a low-born, counter-hero ? a Stoic no less ? suffers the same Noble Death. It could then have been plagiarised for the "Passion Week" of the Jesus saga.

Solomon

[Sovereign]

The Gospel of Mark
This anonymous gospel was the first to be written, between 60 and 80CE, by a Roman convert to Christianity. It was copied word-for-word and used extensively by Matthew and Luke, as their primary source although they edited some details. Nevertheless, the gospel author didn't meet Jesus, wrote in Greek, not Hebrew, and was not a Jew. It is unlikely that Mark knew any Jews. There was no-one to correct his blunders about Jewish life, such as misquoting the 10 commendments, attributing God's words to Moses, and having Jews buy things on the Sabbath.
The Gospel of Mark has undergone many changes and there are several ancient versions. The oldest versions of Mark all end at Mark 16:7.
The Gospel of Mark contradicts the other gospels on many points and contains internal inconsistencies, some of these were later fixed by Matthew and Luke when they made their own copies of Mark. Half way through the second century the Christian proto-orthodox had come to call it 'Mark', although the author is unknown.

Origins of the Gospel of "Mark"
The author of Mark wrote in a form of 'Latinized' Greek after (or shortly before) the destruction of the Temple in 70CE, which he mentions. He must have been born 30-50CE. He wrote in either Rome or Syria. The Latin-Greek is similar to the written language of Rome, and 'sense of persecution' also hints that Mark wrote in Rome, where Nero was the worst for persecuting Christians . "Mark" was Written before Matthew and Luke (c. 100), who both use Mark as a source. It was the most extensive source for the other gospels, and there are only about 30 verses that were not copied or used by the authors of Matthew and Luke. Despite this, Mark did not actually meet Jesus nor speak the same language as him.

The Gospel of Mark was written anonymously was not known as a Gospel of 'Mark' for over a hundred years. When Christians came to name the Gospels, they picked 'Mark', who they thought should be a disciple of Peter, who in Greek mythology was associated with the Egyptian god Petra, the gate guardian of Heaven.

As a Roman, Mark directed his writings at a Roman audience. He feels it is required to explain Jewish customs, and does not bother to explain Roman culture to his readers. Yet he did not extensively understand Jewish culture, and his gospel once even misquotes the 10 commandments! He commits other errors that no Jew (no long term friend of Peter) could have committed such as having Jews buy things on the Sabbath, of quoting Moses instead of God, and confusing other things. Many such things are described on this document by Steven Carr, attached to the end of this page.

Contents of the Gospel of Mark
The gospel of Mark does not describe the history of Jesus, or his virgin birth. These parts of the New Testament's stories were added by Matthew, 30 years later, who assimilated other myths into the legends.

[Solomon]

Let's be absolutely clear on this:

1. Two of the three Synoptic Gosepls - Matthew and Luke of the New Testament in the Bible - are based on the other, Mark.

2. Mark is an anonymous document written in Greek, by a Gentile, probably in Rome.

3. Mark uses themes from Greek Homeric epics (amongst others).

4. Mark contains numerous errors and internal inconsistencies.

5. The author did not know the biblical Jesus.

In my view, this destroys the religious credibility of Mark completely. In doing so, it also destroys that of the other two synoptic gospels. That leaves the New Testament - and Christianity - with nothing very much of historicity.

The Emperor has no clothes.

Happy Christmas!

Solomon

[Administration]

Mandaeism
Mandaeism or Mandaeanism (Mandaic: mandaiuta), or in Islamic terms Sabianism (Arabic: صابئية), is a blanket term for the religion of the Mandaeans (Classical Mandaic mandaiia, Neo-Mandaic Mandeyānā), who are the followers of Mandā d-Heyyi (Mandaic manda ḏ-hiia "Knowledge of Life").

They consider Adam, Noah, and John the Baptist as prophets, but not Abraham, Moses, Jesus, or Muhammad. Mandaeism is a monotheistic religion with a strongly dualistic worldview.

Mandaeism is practised primarily in southern Iraq and the Iranian province of Khuzestan, as well as among a small diaspora population in Europe, Australia, and North America.

Mandaean beliefs
Before attempting a description of the essential beliefs and fundamental tenets of Mandaeism, it is important to recognize that it is the religion of the Mandaean people, and any description of Mandaeism ultimately requires a description of their way of life. Unlike other religions such as Christianity or Islam, Mandaeism is not based upon conformity to religious creeds and doctrines. In fact, the only requirement to be a Mandaean is that one is born to a Mandaean mother. Furthermore, Mandaean theology seems unsystematic; topics such as eschatology, the knowledge of God, the afterlife, and so on are not addressed in a systematic manner. Even though the corpus of Mandaean literature is quite large, and contains much information regarding each of these issues and many more, a single basic guide to Mandaean beliefs and doctrines for the lay person does not exist (akin to the Nicene Creed, the Five Pillars of Islam, or Maimonides' Thirteen Principles of Faith). Additionally, few Mandaeans outside of the priesthood are familiar with this corpus.

Mandaeans do not recognize Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad; like Christians and Muslims, however, they acknowledge John the Baptist, whom they revere as one of their greatest teachers. They also have a hierarchical clergy, practice frequent baptism, and hold public worship on Sundays. They believe in peace above all else.

Fundamental tenets
According to E.S. Drower in the introduction to The Secret Adam, the Mandaean Gnosis is characterized by nine features, which appear in various forms in other gnostic sects:

   1. A supreme formless Entity, the expression of which in time and space is creation of spiritual, etheric, and material worlds and beings. Production of these is delegated by It to a creator or creators who originated in It. The cosmos is created by Archetypal Man, who produces it in similitude to his own shape.
   2. Dualism: a cosmic Father and Mother, Light and Darkness, Right and Left, syzygy in cosmic and microcosmic form.
   3. As a feature of this dualism, counter-types, a world of ideas.
   4. The soul is portrayed as an exile, a captive: her home and origin being the supreme Entity to which she eventually returns.
   5. Planets and stars influence fate and human beings, and are also places of detention after death.
   6. A saviour spirit or saviour spirits which assist the soul on her journey through life and after it to 'worlds of light'.
   7. A cult-language of symbol and metaphor. Ideas and qualities are personified.
   8. 'Mysteries', i.e. sacraments to aid and purify the soul, to ensure her rebirth into a spiritual body, and her ascent from the world of matter. These are often adaptations of existing seasonal and traditional rites to which an esoteric interpretation is attached. In the case of the Naṣoreans this interpretation is based upon the Creation story (see 1 and 2), especially on the Divine Man, Adam, as crowned and anointed King-priest.
   9. Great secrecy is enjoined upon initiates; full explanation of 1, 2, and 8 being reserved for those considered able to understand and preserve the gnosis.

Mandaeans believe in marriage and procreation, and in the importance of leading an ethical and moral lifestyle in this world, placing a high priority upon family life. Consequently, Mandaeans do not practice celibacy or asceticism. Mandaeans will, however, abstain from strong drink and red meat. While they agree with other gnostic sects that the world is a prison governed by the planetary archons, they do not view it as a cruel and inhospitable one.

Mandaean scriptures
The Mandaeans have a large corpus of religious scriptures, the most important of which is the Genzā Rabbā or Ginza, a collection of history, theology, and prayers. The Genzā Rabbā is divided into two halves ? the Genzā Smālā or "Left Ginza" and the Genzā Yeminā or "Right Ginza". By consulting the colophons in the Left Ginza, Jorunn J. Buckley has identified an uninterrupted chain of copyists to the late 2nd or early 3rd c. C.E. The colophons attest to the existence of the Mandaeans during the late Arsacid period at the very latest, a fact corroborated by the Harrān Gāwetā legend, according to which the Mandaeans left ancient Israel after the destruction of First Jewish Temple in Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 b.c., together with the Jews exiled to Babylon, and settled within the Arsacid empire. Although the Ginza continued to evolve under the rule of the Sassanians and the Islamic empires, few textual traditions can lay claim to such extensive continuity.

Other important books include the Qolastā, the "Canonical Prayerbook of the Mandaeans," which was translated by E.S. Drower. One of the chief works of Mandaean scripture, accessible to laymen and initiates alike, is the sidra ḏ-iahia, the book of John the Baptist, which includes a dialogue between John and Jesus. In addition to these works, there are also many other religious texts such as ritual commentaries, which are generally only consulted by the members of the priesthood. The language in which the Mandaean religious literature was originally composed is known as Mandaic, and is a member of the Aramaic family of dialects. It is written in a cursive variant of the Parthian chancery script. The majority of Mandaean lay people do not speak this language, though some members of the Mandaean community resident in Iran (ca. 300-500 out of a total of ca. 5,000 Iranian Mandaeans) continue to speak Neo-Mandaic, a modern version of this language.

Chief prophets
As indicated above, John the Baptist (Mandaic iahia iuhana) is recognized by the Mandaeans as well as Christians and Muslims, but is accorded a higher status in Mandaeism than in either of the other two communities. There exists a widespread (but erroneous) belief that the Mandaeans consider John the Baptist to be the founder of their religion, analogous to Jesus within Christianity. In fact, they maintain that he was merely one of their greatest teachers; according to their beliefs, Mandaeism was the original religion of Adam.

Mandaeans maintain that Jesus was a m?iha kdaba or "false prophet,"" who perverted the teachings entrusted to him by John. The word k(a)daba, however, derives from two roots in Mandaic: the first root, meaning "to lie," is the one traditionally ascribed to Jesus; the second, meaning "to write," might provide a second meaning, that of "book;" hence some Mandaeans, motivated perhaps by an ecumenical spirit, maintain that Jesus was not a "lying Messiah" but a "Book Messiah", the "book" in question presumably being the Christian Gospels. This seems to be a folk etymology without any support in the Mandaean texts.[3]

Likewise, the Mandaeans believe that Abraham, Moses, and Muhammad were false prophets, but recognize other prophetic figures from the Noahide monotheistic traditions, such as Nuh (Noah), his son Sam (Shem), and his son Ram (Aram), and consider the latter three to be their direct ancestors, in addition to Adam, his sons Hibil (Abel) and ?itil (Seth), and his grandson Anu? (Enosh).

Influences
According to the Fihrist of ibn al-Nadim, Mani, the founder of Manichaeism, was brought up within the Elkasaites (Elcesaites or Elchasaite) sect. The Elkasaites were a Christian baptismal sect which may have been related to the Mandaeans. The members of this sect, like the Mandaeans, wore white and performed baptisms. They dwelled in east Judea and northern Mesopotamia, whence the Mandaeans claim to have migrated to southern Mesopotamia, according to the Harran Gawaitā legend. Mani later left the Elkasaites to found his own religion. In a remarkable comparative analysis, Mandaean scholar S?ve-S?derberg demonstrated that Mani's Psalms of Thomas were closely related to Mandaean texts. This would imply that Mani had access to Mandaean religious literature. This leads to the question of just how close the origins of the Elkasaites, the Manichaeans, and the Mandaeans are to one other.

Other associated terms
Within the Middle East, but outside of their community, the Mandaeans are more commonly known as the Ṣubba (singular Ṣubbī). Likewise, their Muslim neighbors will refer to them collectively as the Sabians (Arabic الصابئون al-Ṣābiʾūn), in reference to the Ṣabians of the Qur'an. Occasionally, the Mandaeans are also called the "Christians of St. John" (a misnomer, since they are not Christians by any standard), based upon preliminary reports made by members of the Barefoot Carmelite mission in Basra during the 16th century.

Other groups which have been identified with the Mandaeans include the "Nasoraeans" described by Epiphanius and the Dositheans mentioned by Theodore Bar Kōnī in his Scholion. Ibn al-Nadim also mentions a group called the Mughtasila, "the self-ablutionists," who may be identified with one or the other of these groups. The members of this sect, like the Mandaeans, wore white and performed baptisms.

Whether it can be said that the Elkasaites, the Mughtasila, the Nasoraeans, and/or the Dositheans are to be identified with the Mandaeans is a separate question. While it seems certain that a number of distinct groups are intended by these names, the nature of their sects and the connections between them are less than clear.

[Administration]

Iraq's Mandaeans 'face extinction'
The Sabian Mandaeans - one of the oldest religious groups in the world - are facing extinction, according to its leaders.

They claim that Islamic extremists in Iraq are trying to wipe them out through forced conversions, rape and murder.

The Mandaeans are pacifists, followers of Adam, Noah and John the Baptist.

They have lived in what is now Iraq since before Islam and Christianity.

More than 80% have been forced to flee the country and now live as refugees in Syria and Jordan.

Even there they do not feel safe - but they say western governments are unwilling to take them in.

Victim voices
There are thought to be fewer than 70,000 of the Sabian Mandaeans spread across the world - only 5,000 are left in Iraq.

Nine-year-old Selwan likes watching cartoons and playing football.

But he is too scared to leave his flat. The other children tease him.

He has burns all down the side of his face and on 20% of his body.

He was kidnapped by Islamic militants who forced him to jump into a bonfire - because he is Mandaean.

Now his family lives in a tiny flat in a slum in Damascus.

I meet Luay. He is too scared to be identified and does not want to use his full name.

He was dragged off the street by armed men and forcibly circumcised - a practice not allowed in the Mandaean religion.

He is 19 and is now unlikely ever to find a bride from his own faith.

Worse, he was forcibly converted. That means in the eyes of those same extremists if he now declares himself Mandaean he is apostate.

That makes him a traitor to Islam, who may be murdered. He says he will not be safe in any Muslim country.

'Convert or die'
Then there is Enhar, raped by a gang of masked men in front of her husband - because she would not wear a veil.

Mazen used to be a prosperous jeweller. Now he lives in a cramped flat, with his wife and children. Water drips through the ceiling.

His legs are peppered with machine-gun wounds, he can barely walk.

Shoaki wears a Manchester United hat and shows me the scars where a gang beat and cut him with a knife - he watched his brother murdered in front of him.

Mandaean elders use words like annihilation and genocide - they believe Islamic militants, both Sunni and Shia, offer them two choices - convert or die.

"Some will not consider us people of the book... they see us as unbelievers, as a result our killing is allowed," says Kanzfra Sattar, one of only five Mandaean bishops left worldwide.

[Administration]

Johannite
The Johannites are a sect of Gnostics who reject Jesus Christ, and instead posit that the true savior of the world (sent to fulfill Old Testament prophecy) was in fact John the Baptist, as he was performing baptisms before Jesus' birth.

Some descendants of the original adherents to this doctrine are the Mandaeans, a group of Assyrian Gnostics who claim existence before John, claiming to be followers of the original Adamic religion. They believe that Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad were all false prophets.

The Johannites
(1) The Mandaeans

    "O People of the Book, you follow no good until you observe the Torah and Gospels (Jesus) and that which is revealed to you by your Lord (Koran). Surely those who believe and those who are Jews and those who are the Sabeans, and the Christians, whoever believes in The One God, and the last day and does good. . . they shall have no fear nor shall they grieve."
         - Koran 5: 68-69

Background
"The followers of John the Baptist are a people called 'Mughtasilah', which means, 'Those Who Wash Themselves'....Today we call these people the Sabeans. The Sabeans include an order called the Mandaeans. They are to be considered Children of the Books, and as such, are to be considered holders of the Word of God."
     - "Way #10: The Messiah Projects: Jesus, Son of Isis"

The Mandaeans are "a small [not more than 20,000 adherents] but tenacious community which dwells in Iraq, follow an ancient form of Gnosticism, which practices initiation, ecstasy and some rituals which have been said to resemble those of the Freemasons."
     - Arkon Daraul, Secret Societies

The Mandaeans "take their name from 'Manda' which means secret knowledge."
     - Christopher Knight & Robert Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the Secret Scrolls of Jesus

The Mandaeans, often called the Christians of Saint John, trace their origins to Palestine followed by exile to Harran, a center of gnosticismg, and then south to Mesopotamia.

"...During the first three centuries A.D., there were certain Mandaean or Johannite sects, especially in the region of the Tigris-Euphrates basin, who honored John [the Baptist], not Jesus, as their prophet. Indeed, one of these sects still exists. According to its thinking, John was 'the true prophet', while Jesus was 'a rebel, a heretic, who led men astray, betrayed secret doctrines.'"
     - Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The Messianic Legacy

"The Mandaeans of southern Iraq...are Nasoreans who were driven out of Judah whose migration can be accurately dated to AD 37; it therefore seems almost certain that the man that persecuted them was Saul (alias Paul) himself."
     - Christopher Knight & Robert Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the Secret Scrolls of Jesus

"...Paul arrives as the first Christian missionary in Corinth and in Ephesus, only to discover to his amazement that there seemed to be churches already there. On making inquiries he discovers that they are the Church of John the Baptist. He believed that the Ephesians and Corinthians would, therefore, be delighted to discover that he represented Jesus Christ, the one prophesied to come after John. Not so; they had never heard of such a prophecy."
     - Lynn Picknett & Clive Prince, Turin Shroud - In Whose Image? The Shocking Truth Unveiled

    "While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples and asked them, 'Did you receive the Holy Spirit when [or after] you believed?'
    They answered, 'No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.'
    So Paul asked, 'Then what baptism did you receive?'
    'John's baptism,' they replied.
    Paul said, 'John's baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.' On hearing this, they were baptized into [or in] the name of the Lord Jesus."
         - Acts 19:1-5

"In Acts 19:1-7 Luke refers to a group whom Paul met in Ephesus who knew only John's baptism of repentance. But since they are said explicitly to be 'disciples' (a term Luke always uses to refer to followers of Jesus) this passage provides very slender support for the existence in the first century of groups who saw John rather than Jesus as the Messiah."
     - Graham N. Stanton, The Gospels and Jesus, The Oxford Bible Series (1989), paperback, p. 167

"Elements of the languages indicate that the community is of Jewish origin. One of the texts of the Mandeans tell about a flight of a group called 'Nasoreans', from areas that probably were in today's Jordan, to the Mesopotamian region, in the times of the Jewish wars following the destruction of Jerusalem in year 70 AD. The Mandeans appears first to have gained a strong position in Babylon, but lost this with the appearance of the Sassinids in year 226. In the time of Mani, there have been contacts between him and the Mandeans, resulting in both love and hate."

"With the arrival of Islam in Iraq, in 636, the Mandeans were considered as the third 'people of the book', as the mysterious Sabians of the Koran. But the Mandeans still faced a difficult relationship with Islam, and Muhammad is in their writings called the 'demon Bizbat'. The Mandeans moved from the cities to the marshlands in Southern Iraq. It is first in modern times that the Mandeans have moved back to the cities, especially Baghdad and Basra, where they now work as gold and silver smiths, and as iron smiths and boat builders. Mandeans are also found in medium-sized towns between Baghdad and Basra. Some small groups of Mandeans even live in Iran, in cities like Ahvaz and Shushtar in the south-western corner of the country."
     - Tore Kjeilen, Encyclopaedia of the Orient

[Solomon]

Coordinates: 32?42′07″N, 35?18′12″E
Modern-day Nazareth is nestled in a hollow plateau some 1,200 feet (350m) above sea level, located between 1,600 foot high hills that form the most southerly points of the Lebanon mountain range.[1] It is about 25 km from the Sea of Galilee and about 9 km west from Mount Tabor.

Earliest History & Archaeological Evidence
Archaeological research has revealed a funerary and cult center at Kfar HaHoresh, about two miles from Nazareth, dating roughly 9000 years ago (in what is known as the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B era).[2] The remains of some 65 individuals were found, buried under huge horizontal headstone structures, some of which consisted of up to 3 tons of locally-produced white plaster. Decorated human skulls found have led archaeologists to believe that Kfar HaHoresh was a major cult center in that remote era.

B. Bagatti (the principle archaeologist at the venerated sites in Nazareth) has unearthed quantities of later Roman and Byzantine artefacts,[9] attesting to unambiguous human presence there from the 2nd century CE onward.

In the mid-1990s, shopkeeper Elias Shama discovered tunnels under his shop near Mary?s Well in Nazareth. The tunnels were eventually recognized as a hypocaust (a space below the floor into which warm air was pumped) for a bathhouse. The site was excavated in 1997-98 by Y. Alexandre, and the archaeological remains exposed were ascertained to date from the Middle Roman, Crusader, Mamluk and Ottoman periods.

Non-biblical textual references to Jewish or Judaean settlement in the area do not occur until around 200 AD, when Julius Africanus, cited by Eusebius (Church History 1.7.14), speaks of Nazareth as a village "of Judea", and in the same passage tells of desposunoi, or relatives of Jesus, who came from Nazareth and nearby Cochaba and kept the records of their descent with great care. Also, an alleged martyr named Conon, who died in Pamphylia under Decius (249-251), declared at his trial: "I belong to the city of Nazareth in Galilee, and am a relative of Christ whom I serve, as my forefathers have done" (Clemens Kopp, Die heiligen St?tten der Evangelien [The Holy Places of the Gospels], Friedrich Pustet, Regensburg, 1959: page 90)..

In 1962, a Hebrew inscription found in Caesarea, dating to the late 3rd or early 4th century, mentions Nazareth as one of the places in which the priestly family of Hapizzez was residing after Bar Kokhba?s revolt (132-135 CE).

[Solomon]

Plastered skull from the PPNB site of Kfar Hahoresh

Archaeology: Volume 56 Number 6, November/December 2003
Pre-Christian Rituals at Nazareth
by David Keys

Archaeological investigations near Nazareth--Jesus' boyhood home--have revealed that the area was a major cult center 8,000 years before the time of Christ.

Excavations at Kibbutz Kfar HaHoresh, less than two miles from the town center, have so far unearthed strangely decorated human skulls and evidence for unusual, complex burials. "This is the first example in the Levant of a purely religious complex from this remote period," says excavation director Nigel Goring-Morris of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. "This is a totally new type of site." The cult center seems to have serviced the religious needs of villagers a few miles away.

So far the remains of 65 people have been unearthed--but hundreds more are expected to be found as excavations continue. Many of the remains were interred as part of complex rituals. One partly disarticulated, headless man had been laid to rest on top of a pile of 250 aurochs (wild ox) bones, while at least four children were buried with fox mandibles. Several other individuals were interred with what may have been heirloom flint tools. Archaeologists at HaHoresh have also discovered a remarkable prehistoric "work of art": 50 human bones seemingly arranged in the shape of an animal, possibly an aurochs or a wild boar. This image was constructed, it seems, to mark the burial place of around a dozen people.

Three specially enhanced human skulls have also been discovered. Each of them had been deliberately defleshed after death and overlaid with lime plaster modeled to form facial features. Two of the skulls had then been painted red--one with red ocher, the other with a red pigment that must have come from quarries far to the north in what is now central Turkey. Red pigment, presumably signifying the blood of life, is known to have been painted onto corpses or skeletons in many ancient societies, probably as a form of sympathetic magic designed to help the deceased achieve life after death.

The discovery of several lime kilns at the site suggests that the plaster used for the skulls and for sealing many of the graves was manufactured on-site. Ten thousand years ago these burials must have been an extraordinary sight, for the white plaster grave surfaces--some covering up to 850 square feet--had been deliberately burnished by mourners or devotees to such an extent that the graves probably shimmered in the sun. Some burials were overlaid with up to three tons of plaster.

Even at this early time, 400 generations ago, society may well have been quite rigidly stratified. While at least a quarter of the population of the area at the time were thrown into village rubbish pits left in abandoned houses after death, others appear to have been taken to Nazareth, where their remains were treated with due deference.

? 2003 by the Archaeological Institute of America
www.archaeology.org/0311/newsbriefs/nazareth.html


Archaeology & Anthropology Field School at Kfar HaHoresh
Kfar HaHoresh is a small, 9,000 year old site nestled in the Nazareth Hills of Lower Galilee, Israel. The Early Neolithic cultures of the region are the earliest agricultural societies in the world. The Kfar HaHoresh excavations reveal it is a unique mortuary and cult centre serving neighbouring lowland village communities.

Finds include many human skeletons and secondary burials sealed under lime-plastered surfaces. Spectacular remains include human skulls with the facial features modelled in lime-plaster. One was found with an otherwise complete but headless gazelle carcass. Other unique associations of human and animal remains are also documented at the site. These provide evidence for the emergence of differential status.

Abundant chipped stone, ground stone tool and exotic (mineral, sea shell) finds attest to extensive exchange networks. The animal remains from cult contexts and for food are numerous - although most were hunted, some may relate to incipient animal domestication. There is evidence for extensive lime-plaster manufacture at the site; an experimental program of this early pyrotechnology is being conducted on-site.

[Solomon]

Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls

Pope OKs opening of St. Paul's tomb
Investigators to remove plug from stone coffin, insert probe

Eighteen months after the sarcophagus believed to have once contained the remains of St. Paul the apostle was positively identified by Vatican archaeologists, Pope Benedict XVI has given his approval to plans by investigators to examine the interior of the ancient stone coffin with an optical probe, according to a German Catholic paper.

As WND reported in 2005, the sarcophagus was discovered during excavations in 2002 and 2003 around the basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls in south Rome.

"The tomb that we discovered is the one that the popes and the Emperor Theodosius [A.D. 379-395] saved and presented to the whole world as being the tomb of the apostle," said Giorgio Filippi, a specialist with the Vatican Museums.

The excavation was conducted after the administrator of St. Paul's basilica, Archbishop Francesco Gioia, received inquiries about the location of the apostle's tomb from thousands of pilgrims visiting during the Jubilee Year of 2000.

Over the centuries, the basilica grew over the small church built at the burial site early in the 4th century. While the authenticity of the site � or at least, the authenticity conferred by the actions of Theodosius � was not in doubt, repeated enlargements and rebuildings, as well as a fire in 1823, meant the exact location of the sarcophagus was lost for many years.

"There has been no doubt for the past 20 centuries that the tomb is there. It was variously visible and not visible in times past and then it was covered up. We made an opening (in the basilica floor) to make it visible at least in part," Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, archpriest of the basilica, told Reuters last year.

An initial survey of the basilica enabled archaeologists to reconstruct the fourth century building's original shape.

The Vatican team found the sarcophagus during a second excavation under the basilica's main altar.

Under the altar, a marble plaque is visible, dating to the 4th century, bearing the inscription "Apostle Paul, martyr."

Surprisingly, said Filippi, "nobody ever thought to look behind that plaque," where the Vatican team found the sarcophagus.

"We tried to X-ray it to see what was inside but the stone was too thick," said Montezemolo.

Since the rediscovery of the tomb, measuring approximately eight feet long, four feet wide and 3 feet high, archaeologists have cleared away centuries of debris and plaster that surrounded the site. According to Kath.net, investigators have been given permission to remove a plug with which the coffin has been sealed so an endoscopic probe can be inserted and images of the contents captured.

"Absolute proof that it holds St. Paul's bones is impossible," Leonard Rutgers, an archaeologist at the University of Utrecht who visited the excavation, told Archaeology magazine in April.

St. Paul's remains were removed from the original burial site in A.D. 258, according to documentary evidence, reburied in another part of Rome, and then moved back to the site of the basilica when it was built over the original church in the late fourth century.

"So they were schlepping these bones around a lot," says Rutgers. "It's hard to say if the remains in the sarcophagus itself belong to the saint. But it is still a significant late-fourth-century burial."

The Bible does not state how Paul died. Many scholars believe he was beheaded in Rome in about A.D. 64 during the reign of Roman Emperor Nero. The "apostle to the gentiles," as he described himself, was the most prolific of all the New Testament writers.

Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura � known in English as the Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls or St Paul-without-the-Walls � is one of five churches considered to be the great ancient basilicas of Rome. The Roman Catholic Church counts among them St. John Lateran, St. Lawrence outside the Walls, St. Mary Major, and St. Peter's. Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, named in 2005, is the current archpriest of this basilica.

History
The basilica was founded by the Roman Emperor Constantine I over what was believed to be the burial place of Saint Paul, where it was said that, after the Apostle's execution, his followers erected a memorial, called a cella memoriae, over his grave. This first edifice was expanded under Valentinian I.

In 386, Emperor Theodosius I began the erection of a much larger and more beautiful basilica with a nave and four aisles with a transept; the work including the mosaics was not completed till the pontificate of Leo I. In the 5th century it was even larger than the Old St. Peter's Basilica. The Christian poet Prudentius, who saw it at the time of emperor Honorius, describes the splendours of the monument in a few, expressive lines. As it was dedicated also to Saints Taurinus and Herculanus, martyrs of Ostia in the 5th century, it was called the basilica trium Dominorum ("basilica of Three Lords").

Under Gregory the Great (590-604) the basilica was again extensively modified: the pavement was raised, in order to place the altar directly over Paul's tomb. A confession permitted the access to the Apostle sepulchre. In that period there were two monasteries near the basilica: St. Aristus's for men and St. Stefano's for women. Services were carried out by a special body of clerics instituted by Pope Simplicius. In the course of time the monasteries and the clergy of the basilica declined; Pope Saint Gregory II restored the former and entrusted the monks with the care of the basilica.

As it lied outside the Aurelian Walls, the basilica was damaged the Saracen invasions in the 9th century. In consequence of this Pope John VIII fortified the basilica, the monastery, and the dwellings of the peasantry, forming the town of Joannispolis (Italian: Giovannipoli: it existed until 1348 when an earthquake totally destroyed it.

In 937, when Saint Odo of Cluny came to Rome, Alberic II of Spoleto, Patrician of Rome, entrusted the monastery and basilica to his congregation and Odo placed Balduino of Monte Cassino in charge. Pope Gregory VII was abbot of the monastery and in his time Pantaleone of Amalfi presented the bronze doors of the basilica maior, which were executed by Constantinopolitan artists. Pope Martin V entrusted it to the monks of the Congregation of Monte Cassino. It was then made an abbey nullius. The jurisdiction of the abbot extended over the districts of Civitella San Paolo, Leprignano and Nazzano, all of which formed parishes; the parish of San Paolo in Rome, however, is under the jurisdiction of the cardinal vicar.


The Holy Door

The graceful cloister of the monastery was erected between 1220 and 1241.

From 1215 until 1964 it was the seat of the Latin Patriarch of Alexandria.

On 15 July 1823 a fire, started through the negligence of a workman who was repairing the lead of the roof, resulted in the almost total destruction of the basilica. Alone of all the churches of Rome, it had preserved its primitive character for 1435 years. The whole world contributed to its restoration. The Viceroy of Egypt sent pillars of alabaster, the Emperor of Russia the precious malachite and lapis lazuli of the tabernacle. The work on the principal facade, looking toward the Tiber, was completed by the Italian Government, which declared the church a national monument.

The basilica was reopened in 1840, but it was reconsecrated only fifteen years later at the presence of Pope Pius IX with fifty cardinals. On 23 April 1891 an explosion at Porta Portese destroyed the stained glasses.

On 31 May 2005 Pope Benedict XVI ordered the Basilica to come under the control of an Archpriest. That same day he named Archbishop Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo as its first archpriest.


Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, Archpriest of Rome's Basilica of St. Paul's Outside-the-Walls, shows the passageway through which one side of St. Paul's stone coffin is visible
Photograph by Alessandra Tarantino/AP

Excavation of the tomb of St. Paul
The chronicle of the Benedictine monastery attached to the basilica mentions, in regard to this rebuilding, the finding of a big marble sarcophagus on top of which were two slabs with the words "Paulo Apostolo Mart(yri)" (To Paul the Apostle and Martyr). However, unlike other sarcophagi found at that time, this was not mentioned in the excavation papers.

On 6 December 2006, it was announced that Vatican archaeologists had discovered, beneath the altar, a sarcophagus that may perhaps contain the remains of the Apostle. A press conference was held on 11 December 2006[4] gave more details of the work of excavation, which lasted from 2002 to 22 September 2006, and which was begun after pilgrims to the basilica during the Jubilee year of 2000 expressed disappointment that the Apostle's tomb could not be visited or touched. A decision is pending on whether to examine the inside of the sarcophagus to see if it contains human remains. In fact, the sarcophagus has not yet been extracted from its position, so that only one of its two narrow sides is visible.

A curved line of bricks indicating the outline of the apse of the Constantinian basilica was discovered immediatedly to the west of the sarcophagus, showing that the original basilica had its entrance to the east, like Saint Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. The larger 386 basilica that replaced it had the Via Ostiense (the road to Ostia) to the east and so was extended westward, towards the river Tiber, changing the orientation diametrically.