Christian Origins Blog

...actually will not be blogging here again

2008-02-21T15:26:00.000-08:00

I am retiring the blog format of the Christian Origins website. Instead, I will be contributing to the "Thoughts on Antiquity" coblogging site. Please feel free to contact me or comment here on what future direction the Christian Origins site may take. Thank you. I will continue also to maintain my personal "Darkling Thrush" blog.

may be blogging again here...

2008-01-11T05:12:00.000-08:00

with professional, academic prose...and will certainly be blogging more on The Darkling Thrush page with personal data.

What Would Be Worth Paying a Subscription?

2007-05-24T03:58:00.000-07:00

My father keeps pounding it into me that time spent worthwhile is time which others are willing to spend their money to compensate. In other words, idle study takes a back seat to business. While I have my differences with such an opinion, I am not opposed to developing a worthwhile product that people want to support.

I have asked similar questions in the past, but not quite framed this way: What kind of Internet resource would be worth paying a subscription to access?

My desiderata for such a resource would include:

A text of the New Testament with apparatus. This means that textual variants would be noted in an online format. To my knowledge, this is not done in a thoroughgoing way on a website, even now.
Texts from the Roman, Greek, Jewish, and Ancient Near East worlds that have interest on their own and that may shed light on the Bible. These texts should be both in English and in their original tongues.
Cross-references between texts to note connections (like the "e-Catena" and the Thomas commentary's parallels do in miniature).

Once done in an extensive way, and accepting the input of data from the user community, this last feature would soon set it apart from most any collection of texts, in print or online. Imagine a world where Eusebius is hyperlinked to Josephus, which is hyperlinked to scripture, which is hyperlinked in turn to later Christian commentators such as Eusebius and Clement of Alexandria, who links himself to pagan philosophers such as Plato, allowing one to travel seamlessly among the textual locations of the ancient world.

It would be cool, no? But worth paying to access? That is the question. The hypothetical subscription rate would be about $5 per month.

Rock On, G Thom!

2007-05-19T02:08:00.000-07:00

The Gospel of Thomas Collected Commentary graces the Internet once again. Note the new URL.

Let me know if you find any bugs in the transfer of the data or the software that runs it. I'd like to thank Mark Goodacre for his persistence in reminding me to save the site.

A Fish-Eye View of NT Studies

2007-05-18T02:57:00.000-07:00

Once stated, this view or approach to New Testament studies will probably seem sufficiently taken-for-granted as to be worth criticizing, yet it is the view that I take.

The enemy of the fish is the bird. The bird soars high and sees far; its visual acuity is above reproach. However, the subject matter is the lake itself; the warp and woof of its floor, the flora and fauna which inhabit various depths, and of course also the shores of the lake and its outline on the surface. What is visible to the bird are those shores and that outline, but the fish knows so much more about the lake. And, occasionally, a fish is tricked into thinking it can be a bird, and jumps above the surface to catch a glimpse...at which point it is gobbled up by some swooping aviator, hungry for a meal.

The fish, in my mind, is a specialist. The bird is a generalist. Where the analogy breaks down, is that there are no true birds; no New Testament scholar can actually fly so high as to take in the whole sweep of the field with an objective, all-encompassing eye. Not only are there no Renaissance men any longer, who know enough about every science to be considered competent; there are no men who can keep up with the vast and growing amount of material being generated about every aspect of New Testament study and associated critical thought.

What does this imply? I think it implies, first of all, to be cautious of a certain type of writer who would offer a grand unified theory of Christian origins (a GUTCO). This type of writer typically is a jack of all trades, master of none. They offer us a single principle to explain everything. It is all a Roman farce in order to persuade the Jews to put down arms; no, it is all modeled after the dying and rising gods of the mystery religions; no, it is the wholly inerrant Word of God set down by the apostles of Christ. One gets the usual impression of these writers that they stumbled on one particular thing that seemed to provide the insight, and then applied this insight to everything without regard for the fit.

What else? Well, is there anyone who might be able to provide a bird's eye view with some credibility? I suggest: no, not a single one. We need to look at the collected efforts of the various schools of fish within the lake to understand their surroundings, and piece together a topography of the lake that pays respect to the findings of each specialist in their own domain.

What this means in practice is that the generalist, even the generalist writing on the person and ideas of Paul in general, must take appreciation of, say, the several recent weighty commentaries that come down in favor of the plausible authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles to the apostle Paul. Not that he is necessarily going to follow their lead blindly, but at least he must be aware of the goings-on in the particular areas of study which would be relevant to his general interest. Yet very often, generalists rely on a kind of 'consensus reality' that has not yet been established, such as the inauthenticity of the Pastoral Epistles.

So the question I am led to consider, which I had not really been looking towards so much as just happened to dawn on me, if we as fish in the lake of NT studies cannot get a bird's-eye view, and if we at the same time wish to make some statements about the 'consensus realities' of the communities of fish in this lake...how would we go about doing so?

I don't suppose I have in mind some voting scheme such as was settled upon by the Jesus Seminar, as more likely a consensus scheme that would be found in a Quaker meeting, or even more appropriately, a Japanese business setting. I am told this description of the Japanese practice by an online poster:

People sign/acknowledge memos with a seal that stamps the symbols for their name on the page. The discussions goes round and round, in meetings and on paper, and the decision gets refined and revised. At some point there's a perceivable interval with no new input and a "final" memo goes round. People who agree with the decision sign it with their seal. People who disagree don't sign it. People who can live with it but don't support it may chose to sign it with the sen al sideways instead of right-side-up. Eventually there's a peer pressure point if the decision has a fair amount of support. It becomes more and more difficult for the final hold-outs as the memo keeps coming back around to them. If the person feels that "I disagree with this and think it's a mistake, but I'll support the group and do my best to make it work", then they may finally stamp the memo with an upside-down seal-stamp.

In short, can the unpapal conclave (cf. J. P. Meier) be anything other than a convenient fiction? Can we make it work?

Or are we, the fish, far too myopic in our range of vision to be able to, so to speak, see eye to eye on much of anything? In which case, what would be a better way to "introduce" students to the New Testament--a way better than the typical practice of instructing them (cf. almost any NT introduction) in dates, literary relationships, and further "assured conclusions" of scholarship?

Perhaps what students of the NT need, when getting their feet wet, much more than some bird's-eye view of the subject, are some practical lessons on swimming in the water and peering through the murk. In other words, some lessons on method.

It is from these musings that I am inclined to write more about "A Fish-Eye View of the New Testament," and therein, as a layman speaking to other laymen (and also a few peering fish), explain how it is that I have gotten along with the fish in the lake, learned from them, and occasionally seen some glimmerings in the muck that were not pointed out to me (though, it is likely, passed by unnoticed before the eye of one with, so to speak, bigger fish to fry). Since I am not one of the big fish myself, I pause to consider whether it should be called "a guppy's view" instead. Oh well. I like the "Fish-Eye" title nicely.

A New Bleme: Mention an underlinked (but brilliant) blogger

2007-05-17T23:28:00.000-07:00

On the slight chance that this blog has gotten into enough blogrolls over the years, despite having a less than prolific quality for quite some time, I venture to put out a new blog meme, or bleme if you will...

Find a blog that has low "authority" in Technorati (say: 20 or lower), and praise it.

My choice would be, with no doubt, Neil Godfrey's Vridar. For now going on seven months, Godfrey has been offering a steady output on the gamut of issues of interest to the scholar of Christian origins, always with an undoubtedly warm if wry smile. Few bloggers other than Godfrey make me realize my own tendencies to inhumanistic thought when confronted by the eminently humanistic writer. Bravo.

ECW temporarily down

2007-05-12T18:40:00.000-07:00

Until I resolve a problem with my host.

the religion of Peter Kirby

2007-04-26T21:58:00.000-07:00

I at present am in such a frame to explore the questions of religion, theology, and such and so as to separate them from the typical hard-nosed subject matter of this blog (that is, when I am posting to it), I have started a new blog (which will "soon" come to an end): The Darkling Thrush.

Book Notice: The Date of Early Christian Literature

2006-12-12T04:55:00.000-08:00

Equinox Publishing have announced that they will publish J.V.M. Sturdy's work Redrawing the Boundaries: The Date of Early Christian Literature posthumously. It is edited by Jonathan Knight and will be released in August 2007.

JAT Robinson's "Redating the New Testament"

2006-12-11T02:56:00.000-08:00

JAT Robinson wrote a book titled Redating the New Testament. As conceived, it is a first rate piece of liberal biblical scholarship, pushing the envelope and trying to tease the subject out to new heights of sophistication. Its method is simple: assume that everything in the New Testament derives from before AD 70, and then go bonking on the head all the arguments to the contrary. (Someone has, legally or not, placed the entire book online so that you can verify this description.)

There is no problem with Robinson qua Robinson. The problem comes when these hidebound conservatives footnote Robinson. They have understood neither where Robinson starts, how he operates, nor really where he ended up. They cite Robinson as, "scholar proves all of the NT dates before the destruction of Jerusalem!" Funny that, what began as an essay in creative thought, has ended up a footnote to decorate the dot at the end of a thousand ignorant apologetic arguments.

You see, Robinson published for the sake of stoking the fire and starting a conversation, and that he did successfully. Other scholars have posted their reviews, mentioned their own work, and continued on with the business of biblical scholarship. One scholar (whose name I am searching for now) was in the business of producing a manuscript on the dating of the New Testament, when he fell over dead. Others such as Raymond Brown are familiar with JAT Robinson's arguments, but are not persuaded.

I think we will never hear the end of JAT Robinson's supposed proof, but one could just as easily have expected JAT Robinson to have performed the reverse trick, and "proven" that all the New Testament dates after AD 70. I'm sure, if his patience were long enough, and if he knew how his work would be abused, Robinson would have enjoyed publishing that addendum to the original work.

Patristics Blog Carnival

2006-12-05T19:09:00.000-08:00

The first ever Patristics Blog Carnival is up. Check it out!

Dead Sea Scrolls online? the Open Scrolls project

2006-12-01T01:55:00.000-08:00

You may have heard of "the Open Scrolls Project" before, and you would know, then, that it hasn't done much to get off the ground. I believe that this is because the model of volunteer contributions of translation time is not the most efficient, because it puts an extraordinary burden on a few individuals (those who are able to translate Aramaic, Greek, and Hebrew) without due compensation.

I believe that a better model would be to establish a fund out of which the qualified translators can be paid for the service they render. Then, people would be able to contribute their money to this fund, with the expectation that even a little bit of money will result in some of the Dead Sea Scrolls being translated and transcribed--and available for free--that were not before.

I would hope that individuals interested in the result would be contributors, but also corporations that sell Bible software packages that do not currently include the Dead Sea Scrolls, since they would be reaping the financial rewards of the result. I would definitely contact them for their sponsorship, in addition to the public.

If you go to the website,

http://www.openscrolls.org/

You will see that I am currently looking for a few things to get off the ground:

First, I need two other people to serve on the Board of Directors for Open Scrolls, Inc. I would prefer people who have academic credentials (to compensate for my lack of such), but also an enthusiasm for the project. The Board of Directors may or may not be paid for their time, but would at least be able to recoup any expenses incurred.

Second, I need one to three people to serve as an editorial review for the work of translation. They would be responsible for quality control. They would be paid along with the translators. (Someone may serve on both the BoD and the editoral review, especially if they'd like to be paid. I myself won't be on the editorial review board.) The size of the editorial review board is a function of each person's available time; if we get one person with a lot of time, we may not need the other two.

Third, I need contacts for people wanting to be paid for the work of transcription and translation working off the photocopies in the "Discoveries in the Judean Desert" series (DJD). I could potentially use up to a dozen such people, subdividing out the actual work of translation and transcription.

Fourth, I could use the help of a web developer or web designer for the initial OpenScrolls.org website. This is not crucial; OpenScrolls.org will be a homebase for the distribution of the texts, but other channels will distribute the texts also. In a pinch I can do this work.

Fifth, I need the comments of people like you! What needs to be done so that this venture succeeds? You might know something I don't, so, enlighten me!

In particular...

What's the best license for the resulting transcription and translation? The main decision here is, should the result be fully public domain, or should the result by licensed under a "Creative Commons" or other open-type license? Please weigh in if you are familiar with the advantages and disadvantages. The main advantage (to me) of the latter, a license of some kind, is that you can control versioning (a modification has to be marked as a modification, etc.) and attribution (OpenScrolls.org and its translators must be credited).

What's the best way to solicit contributions? Maybe you know something I don't about the world of getting funding for research or educational projects, such as this one basically is.

thanks,
Peter Kirby

PS-- The Open Scrolls website is already ranking #14 or so for the term "Dead Sea Scrolls" in Google. I am certain that it will make it to the first page of the search results as soon as some serious content can be found there. It is, therefore, a very good spot to position the transcription and translation effort described above.

Early Latin Writings, and graphics wanted!

2006-11-26T00:59:00.000-08:00

This is a short blurb to reveal, first of all, that Chris Weimer (of the Thoughts on Antiquity blog) and I are working on a site called "Early Latin Writings." Yes, it's what you'd expect and more.

I am also polling places to see if I can find a person competent to design the graphical layout of the new site (which will also become the layout for the existing Early Jewish and Early Christian sites). The job does pay. If you are interested in designing the layout and graphical elements for these sites, shoot me an email at peterkirby@gmail.com -- thanks!

What do you name the next big thing?

2006-11-21T23:48:00.000-08:00

This is related to my earlier blog entry on "Free Bible Study".

I have also registered the following names for a website. Each name is a different context, direction, and branding that will largely define the culture that runs on top of the software (which would be the same in each case):

* FreeBibleStudy.com
* iBibleStudies.com
* ResearchTheBible.com
* ErrancyWeb.com
* TheBibleWars.com

OK, before you make your decision on the best name, wouldn't you like to hear what the software does? Of course you would.

The technical details include that it is a custom programmed modification of a content management system like Drupal. Features include...

1. Primarily content that is owned by poster, but also collaborative content.
2. Content generates a threaded commentary, which is always owned by respective users.
3. Content is tagged with keywords and with Bible verses for indexing.
4. Content is rated for quality and "dug" for the hot factor.
5. Content can plug in Bible verses and link to Bible resources.
6. Content is cross-linked to other content on nearby Bible material, similar keyword space, and perhaps in other ways--so you can continue finding content you like reading, commenting on it, and perhaps riffing off your own content along similar themes.
7. Various other ways technological for accessing content, such as search boxes and RSS feeds and aggregators and intelligent rating-based "stumbler" ability (users who liked this also liked...).

Here is more detail on the system.

"VerseLink"
VerseLink brings you to a dynamically created page with translations, original texts, links, Amazon books, possibly commentary, and a list of all the content items related to that verse or verses; as well as forward and back to browse adjacent verses and get context. The code [ John 4:16 ] will make a VerseLink. No VerseLink may exceed 50 verses or contain an entire biblical book. (This is to cooperate with the license for the electronic RSV and other modern copyright editions, which will be included.)

"Plug-In Verses"
The code [[ John 4:16 ]] will "plug in" the translation of John 4:16 along with VerseLink. This is not to exceed 10 verses, or the amount of 25% of the original words (not plugged-in) in the content item, whichever is greater, and in no case shall comprise an entire biblical book. To override the user's preferred Bible for display, use [[ John 4:16 | KJV ]].

"Comment-threading and Content Ownership"
Every content item will have threaded comments. The default is to make author-owned content to be discussed in comments and modified only by the owner.

"Collaborative Creation"
The alternative is to create a "collaborative" piece. This will get you exposure on the "collaborative" section of the homepage, but you relinquish control over the content. Collaborative sessions must be initially approved by an admin on criteria of worthiness, or they will be converted into regular owned content. (There is still comment-threading on collaborative creation items, and you always own your comments.)

"Content Digging"
If a user "digs" an item, it is a candidate for front-page placement. The items that have been "dug" the most over the preceding 7 days are displayed on the homepage. You can only "dig" any given content item once per user.

"Content Rating"
A user may rate any content on a scale of 1-10. These ratings will be adjusted along a percentile system, so rating high/low/middle evenly is the way to maximize your voting.

e.g., if you vote 10 times and you vote one of each of the 10 possible ratings, your votes will translate into 0.5, 1.5, 2.5 .. 9.5.

e.g., if you vote 5 times and you vote "1" twice and "10" three times, the tens represent the 40th percentile and will average out to 7's, while the 1's will average out to become 2's.

"Keyword Tagging"
Content is tagged with at least 2 keywords at creation. Keywords start life with a 0 relevancy rating, but they can be thumbs-upped or thumbs-downed, incrementing or decrementing the relevancy rating. The default search will ignore keywords with a relevancy of -3 or below, and may give greater weight to those with positive relevancy ratings.

Anyone can add keywords at any time, and they can only be thumbs-downed into obscurity, not deleted, except by administrators.

Example keywords: Contradiction, Interpolation, Error, History, Science, Morality

The more popular keywords will be shown to be browsed on the homepage, and all of them are accessible through search. (Search also takes advantage of full-text searching and keyword density, content ratings, dig history, inbound links, page views, click throughs, credit FICA score, and anything else it can get its hands on.)

"Bible-verse tagging"

This is the quantum-leap above ErrancyWiki (an existing site), and it is deceptively simple. Any content item could be tagged with one verse, but it could also be tagged with a couple verses far away from each other, with a passage and a stray verse somewhere else, with three long passages from three different parts of the Bible, or whatever. These tags are carefully made at creation (it's about the most important part, although it is optional) and modified only by admins. Searches on Bible verses will try to bring you results that match you most exactly, then more specifically (if you didn't ask for a single verse), and lastly more broadly.

Thank you for your input on what I should name the next big thing!

Did the gospels have any 'historical' intent?

2006-04-12T21:45:00.000-07:00

How do we normally determine whether something was written to be taken
as historical fact or as literary fiction?

First, we can look at the internal evidence. In a movie we often see at the
end that "this was based on a true story." In the preface the author often
says how he went about constructing the document. There are often
footnotes for a historical work. The scenes themselves can be riddled with
coincidences, ironies, jokes, and nonsense; or it can be dry as dust and
technical in nature. The author can write as though the significance of the
story lies in its literal truth or in its overall themes and entertainment
value. It can appear to be a rehashed well-known fictional cliche.

The synoptic gospels seem to fail prima facie under the internal evidence
test, especially when compared to modern-day nonfiction. There are no
explicit references to the particular sources used to substantiate any data
points in the synoptics. Only the Gospel of Luke has a preface, where the
author claims to be teaching in accordance with eyewitnesses and
traditioners, so that might account slightly against Matthew and Mark even
as it counts for Luke. The synoptic gospels are not dry at all--they are
delightfully colorful and passionately bring out themes and moral lessons.
But, still, I get the sense that the oultine is assumed to be true for the
reason that (a) well-known historical figures are named in reference not just
to chronology but to the central event, the crucifixion of Jesus at the hands
of Pilate and the high priest (and perhaps Herod in Luke). This may be
possible in a Forrest Gump sort of way, but it seems more straightforwardly
to be explained by the fact(oid) that the author wants us to see these as
having actually happened in a specific time and place. Especially with
Luke, who connects his gospel with the subsequent narrative of the early
church including a host of figures known from other Christian and secular
records. And (b) the evangelists seem to be building off of earlier tales
about a Jesus on earth. I once mentioned the fact that the author of Mark
often has stories set in Palestinian settings even though he is ignorant of
the accurate geography in significant ways, and thus these settings came
to him not from historicising geography but through tradition. The setting in
life for all the sayings attributed to Jesus do not seem to be the spur-of-the-
moment invention of the evangelist, yet they often were attributed to Jesus
before the evangelists. For example, it is possible that Mark unwittingly
retained a pericope that was formed by Christians who did not believe
Jesus was given proper tomb burial by Joseph of Arimathea. The Parable of
the Tenants is interpreted as referring to Jesus. In Mark 12:8, it is said, "So
they seized him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard." This
quite plausibly reflects an early tradition that those who arranged the
execution of Jesus also arranged his shameful burial. Calling it all the
author's own fiction, or even historicizing fiction, sounds good in the
abstract, but I have not seen it based on a detailed exegesis of what the
stories say in particular. So there is some disconfirming indications in the
internal evidence, but overall my guess would be that the authors thought of
these as being real events.

Second, we can look at the external evidence and context. There is plenty
of that for modern-day works, so much so that it is difficult to imagine an
ambiguous case without positing a future dark age. For example, modern
day novels are conveniently placed in a fiction section of the library. Movies
use different techniques than docutainment, and are shown on different
television channels. Books often come with reviews on the back cover.
And if there is any doubt, you can always just ask someone who is familiar
with the work: that book you read, is the author making it up or is he trying
to get at the truth? The answer is generally reliable.

On the external evidence criterion, even though we don't have the
immediate feedback we have with modern works, there is a lot of
confirmation for the taken-literally view and not so much for the "I've read
the gospels because I think they're good stories and not because they
contain the facts." For example, though Price once suggested that it refers
to the Kerygmata Petrou, most people see this as referring to the Gospel of
Mark in some form (found in Eusebius Hist. Eccl.):

[For information on these points, we can merely refer our readers to the
books themselves [[Dang!! -ed.]]; but now, to the extracts already made,
we shall add, as being a matter of primary importance, a tradition regarding
Mark who wrote the Gospel, which he [Papias] has given in the following
words]: And the presbyter said this. Mark having become the interpreter of
Peter, wrote down accurately whatsoever he remembered. It was not,
however, in exact order that he related the sayings or deeds of Christ. For
he neither heard the Lord nor accompanied Him. But afterwards, as I said,
he accompanied Peter, who accommodated his instructions to the
necessities [of his hearers], but with no intention of giving a regular
narrative of the Lord's sayings. Wherefore Mark made no mistake in
thus writing some things as he remembered them. For of one thing he
took especial care, not to omit anything he had heard, and not to put
anything fictitious into the statements.

One could hardly imagine more historicist sentiments, whether they tell us
the true author of GMark or not, Papias takes the book to be an attempt at
accurate remembrance, which has been criticized for not being in exact
order--which is not a usual criticism for allegories--and Papias even says
that the author didn't make up fictitious stories--we know that's not
completely true, but what do you expect, Papias is rhapsodic about the
historical value of Mark. And this is perhaps the earliest external evidence
we have for a gospel attributed to Mark (excepting other gospels using it).

What do others say? Justin Martyr says, "For the apostles, in the
memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels, have thus delivered
unto us what was enjoined upon them"--again the belief that the gospels
are recording tradition and not made up allegories off in the clouds. And
even Marcion, an enemy of Justin Martyr, seems to take the Gospel of the
Lord as being a record of Christ--or else why would it matter whether it says
that he were born or descended directly from heaven? The Epistula
Apostolorum, written before Justin Martyr wrote, takes the synoptics and
John to be historical. So we have Papias, gnostics, and anti-gnostics
treating the gospel narratives as being real events. Such is some of the
external evidence concerning how the gospels were received by their early
interpreters.

So, we hear the claim being made all the time that the gospel writers were
writing allegories or fictions--but what is the external and internal evidence
pointing to a completely non-literal take on the gospels? Without some
strong counterbalancing evidence, it would be reasonable to assume that
the gospel writers wanted their narratives to be taken as literally true (to
some degree). That doesn't necessarily prove a historical Jesus, but it
does affect the landscape of our discussions.

An Introduction to Historical Method

2005-08-27T18:17:00.000-07:00

I wrote a new article for Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_method

I thought it would be of interest to those who may be unfamiliar with some of the methods used by historians as told by historians working in a secular context.

The historical method comprises the techniques and guidelines by which historians use primary sources and other evidence to research and then to write history. The question of the nature, and indeed the possibility, of sound historical method is raised in the philosophy of history, as a question of epistemology. The following summarizes the guidelines commonly used by historians in their work, under the headings of external criticism, internal criticism, and synthesis.

External Criticism: Authenticity and Provenance

Garraghan divides criticism into six inquiries (A Guide to Historical Method, 168):

(a) When was the source, written or unwritten, produced (date)?
(b) Where was it produced (localization)?
(c) By whom was it produced (authorship)?
(d) From what pre-existing material was it produced (analysis)?
(e) In what original form was it produced (integrity)?
(f) What is the evidential value of its contents (credibility)?

The first four are known as higher criticism; the fifth, lower criticism; and, together, external criticism. The sixth and final inquiry about a source is called internal criticism.

R. J. Shafer on external criticism: "It sometimes is said that its function is negative, merely saving us from using false evidence; whereas internal criticism has the positive function of telling us how to use authenticated evidence." (A Guide to Historical Method, 118)

Higher Criticism

R. J. Shafer writes, "Determination of authorship and date involves one or all of the following: (a) content analysis, (b) comparison with the content of other evidence, (c) tests of the physical properties of the evidence." (A Guide to Historical Method, 120) Content analysis includes examinations of anachronisms in language, datable references, and consistency with a cultural setting. Comparison with other writings may involve palaeography, the study of style of handwriting, the study of stylometry and comparison of literary style with known authors, or something as simple as a reference to the document's author in another one of his works or by a contemporary. Physical properties include the properties of the paper, the consistency of the ink, and the appearance of a seal, as well as the results of radioactive carbon dating.

Lower Criticism

For more details on this topic, see Textual criticism.

Lower criticism is more frequently known as "textual criticism," and it is concerned with determining an accurate text in cases where we have copies instead of the original. Approaches to textual criticism include eclecticism, stemmatics, and cladistics. At the heart of eclecticism is that one should adopt the reading as original that most easily explains the derivation of the alternative readings. Stemmatics attempts to construct a "family tree" of extant manuscripts to help determine the correct reading. Cladistics makes use of statistical analysis in a similar endeavor.

Internal Criticism: Historical Reliability

Noting that few documents are accepted as completely reliable, Louis Gottschalk sets down the general rule, "for each particular of a document the process of establishing credibility should be separately undertaken regardless of the general credibility of the author." An author's trustworthiness in the main may establish a background probability for the consideration of each statement, but each piece of evidence extracted must be weighed individually.

Eyewitness Evidence

R. J. Shafer offers this checklist for evaluating eyewitness testimony (A Guide to Historical Method, 157-158):

1. Is the real meaning of the statement different from its literal meaning? Are words used in senses not employed today? Is the statement meant to be ironic (i.e., mean other than it says)?
2. How well could the author observe the thing he reports? Were his senses equal to the observation? Was his physical location suitable to sight, hearing, touch? Did he have the proper social ability to observe: did he understand the language, have other expertise required (e.g., law, military); was he not being intimiated by his wife or the secret police?
3. How did the author report?, and what was his ability to do so?
a. Regarding his ability to report, was he biased? Did he have proper time for reporting? Proper place for reporting? Adequate recording instruments?
b. When did he report in relation to his observation? Soon? Much later?
c. What was the author's intention in reporting? For whom did he report? Would that audience be likely to require or suggest distortion to the author?
d. Are there additional clues to intended veracity? Was he indifferent on the subject reported, thus probably not intending distortion? Did he make staements damaging to himself, thus probably not seeking to distort? Did he give incidental or casual information, almost certainly not intended to mislead?
4. Do his statements seem inherently improbable: e.g., contrary to human nature, or in conflict with what we know?
5. Remember that some types of information are easier to observe and report on than others.
6. Are there inner contradictions in the document?

Louis Gottschalk adds an additional consideration: "Even when the fact in question may not be well-known, certain kinds of statements are both incidental and probable to such a degree that error or falsehood seems unlikely. If an ancient inscription on a road tells us that a certain proconsl built that road while Augustus was princeps, it may be doubted without further corroboration that that proconsul really built the road, but would be harder to doubt that the road was built during the principate of Augusutus. If an advertisement informs readers that 'A and B Coffee may be bought at any reliable grocer's at the unusual price of fifty cents a pound,' all the inferences of the advertisement may well be doubted without corroboration except that there is a brand of coffee on the market called 'A and B Coffee.'" (Understanding History, 163)

Garraghan says that most information comes from "indirect witnesses," people who were not present on the scene but heard of the events from someone else (A Guide to Historical Method, 292). Gottschalk says that a historian may sometimes use hearsay evidence. He writes, "In cases where he uses secondary witnesses, however, he does not rely upon them fully. On the contrary, he asks: (1) On whose primary testimony does the secondary witness base his statements? (2) Did the secondary witness accurately report the primary testimony as a whole? (3) If not, in what details did he accurately report the primary testimony? Satisfactory answers to the second and third questions may provide the historian with the whole or the gist of the primary testimony upon which the secondary witness may behis only means of knowledge. In such cases the secondary source is the historian's 'original' source, in the sense of being the 'origin' of his knowledge. In so far as this 'original' source is an accurate report of primary testimony, he tests its credibilit as he would that of the primary testimony itself." (Understanding History, 165)

Oral Tradition

Gilbert Garraghan maintains that oral tradition may be accepted if it satisfies either two "broad conditions" or six "particular conditions," as follows (A Guide to Historical Method, 261-262):

(a) Broad conditions stated.
(1) The tradition should be supported by an unbroken series of witnesses, reaching from the immediate and first reporter of the fact to the living mediate witness from whom we take it up, or to the one who was the first to comit it to writing.
(2) There should be several parallel and independent series of witnesses testifying to the fact in question.
(b) Particular conditions formulated.
(1) The tradition must report a public event of importance, such as would necessarily be known directly to a great number of persons.
(2) The tradition must have been generally believed, at least for a definite period of time.
(3) During that definite period it must have gone without protest, even from persons interested in denying it.
(4) The tradition must be one of relatively limited duration. [Elsewhere, Garraghan suggests a maximum limit of 150 years, at least in cultures that excel in oral remembrance.]
(5) The critical spirit must have been sufficiently developed while the tradition lasted, and the necessary means of critical investigation must have been at hand.
(6) Critical-minded persons who would surely have challenged the tradition, had they considered it false, must have made no such challenge.

Other methods of verifying oral tradition may exist, such as comparison with the evidence of archaeological remains.

More recent evidence concerning the potential reliability of oral tradition has come out of fieldwork in West Africa and the Middle East. (See J. Vansina, De la tradition orale. Essai de méthode historique, in translation as Oral Tradition as History, as well as K. E. Bailey, "Informed Controlled Oral Tradition and the Synoptic Gospels," Asia Journal of Theology [1991], 34-54. Note also the Icelandic sagas, such as that by Snorri Sturlason in the thirteenth century, and A. B. Lord's study of Slavic bards in The Singer of Tales.)

Synthesis: Historical Reasoning

Once individual pieces of information have been assessed in context, hypotheses can be formed and established by historical reasoning.

Argument to the Best Explanation

C. Behan McCullagh lays down seven conditions for a successful argument to the best explanation (Justifying Historical Descriptions, 19):

1. The statement, together with other statements already held to be true, must imply yet other statements describing present, observable data. (We will henceforth call the first statement 'the hypothesis', and the statements describing observable data, 'observation statements'.)
2. The hypothesis must be of greater explanatory scope than any other incompatible hypothesis about the same subject; that is, it must imply a greater variety of observation statements.
3. The hypothesis must be of greater explanatory power than any other incompatible hypothesis about the same subject; that is, it must imply a greater variety of observation statements.
4. The hypothesis must be more plausible than any other incompatible hypothesis about the same subject; that is, it must be implied to some degree by a greater variety of accepted truths than any other, and be implied more strongly than any other; and its probable negation must be implied by fewer beliefs, and impled less strongly than any other.
5. The hypothesis must be less ad hoc than any other incompatible hypothesis about the same subject; that is, it must include fewer new suppositions about the past which are not already implied to some extent by existing beliefs.
6. It must be disconfirmed by fewer accepted beliefs than any other incompatible hypothesis about the same subject; that is, when conjoined with acceptedd truths it must imply fewer observation statements and other statements which are believed to be false.
7. It must exceed other incompatible hypotheses about the same subject by so much, in characteristics 2 to 6, that there is little chance of an incompatible hypothesis, after further investigation, soon exceeding it in these respects.

McCullagh sums up, "if the scope and strength of an explanation are very great, so that it explain a large number and variety of facts, many more than any competing explanation, then it is likely to be true." (Justifying Historical Descriptions, 26)

Statistical Inference

McCullagh states this form of argument as follows (Justifying Historical Descriptions, 48):

1. There is probability (of the degree p1) that whatever is an A is a B.
2. It is probable (to the degree p2) that this is an A.
3. Therefore (relative to these premises) it is probable (to the degree p1 x p2) that this is a B.

McCullagh gives this example (Justifying Historical Descriptions, 47):

1. In thousands of cases, the letters V.S.L.M. appearing at the end of a Latin inscription on a tombstone stand for Votum Solvit Libens Merito.
2. From all appearances the letters V.S.L.M. are on this tombstone at the end of a Latin inscription.
3. Therefore these letters on this tombstone stand for Votum Solvit Libens Merito.

This is a syllogism in probabilistic form, making use of a generalization formed by induction from numerous examples (as the first premise).

Argument from Analogy

The structure of the argument is as follows (Justifying Historical Descriptions, 85):

1. One thing (object, event, or state of affairs) has properties p1 . . . pn and pn + 1.
2. Another thing has properties p1 . . . pn.
3. So the latter has property pn + 1.

McCullagh says that an argument from analogy, if sound, is either a "covert statistical syllogism" or better expressed as an argument to the best explanation. It is a statistical syllogism when it is "established by a sufficient number and variety of instances of the generalization"; otherwise, the argument may be invalid because properties 1 through n are unrelated to property n + 1, unless property n + 1 is the best explanation of argument n. Analogy, therefore, is uncontroversial only when used to suggest hypotheses, not as a conclusive argument.

References

* Gilbert J. Garraghan, A Guide to Historical Method, Fordham University Press: New York (1946). ISBN 0837171326.
* Louis Gottschalk, Understanding History: A Primer of Historical Method, Alfred A. Knopf: New York (1950). ISBN 039430215X.
* Martha Howell and Walter Prevenier, From Reliable Sources: An Introduction to Historical Methods, Cornell University Press: Ithaca (2001). ISBN 0801485606.
* C. Behan McCullagh, Justifying Historical Descriptions, Cambridge University Press: New York, 1984. ISBN 0521318300.
* R. J. Shafer, A Guide to Historical Method, The Dorsey Press: Illinois, 1974. ISBN 0534108253.

kind thoughts,
Peter Kirby

The Secret Gospel, Reloaded

2005-08-23T17:59:00.000-07:00

From the mailbox: Dear Peter,

I am writing on behalf of The Dawn Horse Press to advise you of the May 2005 re-publication of "The Secret Gospel: The Discovery and Interpretation of the Secret Gospel According to Mark" by Morton Smith.

This quality paperback includes a foreword by noted author Elaine Pagels, as well as a series of photographs, and of course, Morton Smith's original text as published by Harper and Row in 1973, and again by The Dawn Horse Press in 1982.

The Foreword, Afterword, Table of Contents and Chapter One of the text are available for browsing online at our website dedicated to this book: http://www.thesecretgospel.com

Additionally, the book may be purchased from Amazon.com, or The Dawn Horse Press website by following either of the two links below.

The Dawn Horse Press

Amazon.com

Please feel free to contact us if you have questions. We also welcome the posting of any of the three links above on your website.

Sincerely,
Elaine Gruenke
Marketing Team, The Dawn Horse Press
Some may be interested in this, given the cost of owning the first edition.

Biblical Studies Carnival II

2005-08-18T05:20:00.000-07:00

Joel is away at the moment, so I will be hosting the second Biblical Studies Carnival here at Christian Origins. (Take a look at the first one.) Please select your favorite blog entry (or maybe two) from the past several months and send it to peterkirby on the gmail.com mailserver, or leave it as a comment to this blog entry. Thanks, and I hope you enjoy the second Biblical Studies Carnival!

Assimilation into Wikipedia

2005-08-18T05:15:00.000-07:00

It is finished. I have assimilated the contents of the good articles on Theowiki into the Wikipedia. The remaining Theowiki site will act as a portal into the Wikipedia and a center for editors to discuss articles on Wikipedia, related to religion, that need improvement. The first article chosen for improvement by Theowiki visitors is the one on the "Dead Sea scrolls".

Who ranks higher, a Don or Earl?

2005-08-12T19:51:00.000-07:00

Regardless of the answer to the title question, these two gentlemen have now each considerably expanded on the information available on the Internet concerning the second century apologists, particularly as relates to the historical Jesus debate. Check out Gakusei Don's essay and Earl Doherty's response.

SBL "Open Access" Get Together

2005-08-10T15:31:00.000-07:00

Tim Bulkeley blogs that he would like to see a get together of people interested in Open Access scholarship at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature. I would also, and at lunch after the biblioblogging session seems like a good time to me. I look forward to it.

Tim Bulkeley's Bible Dictionary

2005-08-08T03:39:00.000-07:00

Add this to the list of projects planned.

When reading this entry at Sansblogue, I noticed the reference to an open access Bible Dictionary project. I then found this entry giving a start on a list of a top 100 terms for a Bible Dictionary to have to be immediately useful.

I would add to the list, "Jesus." What would you add?

To my mind, the two projects with the highest priority are an Open Access Translation of Scripture (OATS) and an Open Access Bible Dictionary (OABD). The Bible translation might start with the Gospel of Mark (per The New Testament in Plain English), and the Bible dictionary might start with the list of a hundred that Tim distills.

What do you think should be prioritized in the Open Access Bible Scholarship pipeline?

Merge TheoWiki into Wikipedia?

2005-08-07T19:44:00.000-07:00

This is a suggestion that I've seen on Deinde and the NT Gateway, that the community is better served by improving Wikipedia than by having a dedicated wiki for religion studies and biblical scholarship. And so I am getting feedback from everyone, and especially from present and past contributors to TheoWiki, on whether we should roll the current information on TheoWiki back into Wikipedia and direct future efforts to improving the biblical and religion-oriented material on the Wikipedia. You can see the TheoWiki entry here where I announce the issue and solicit feedback. I am also soliciting feedback here on my blog (such as for those who aren't registered at TheoWiki), so please use the comment feature to leave your opinion.

Pros:

No duplication of efforts
Utilization of existing Wikipedia efforts
More visitors
More collaborators
More likely to endure

Cons:

Some articles might not be strictly "Neutral Point of View" and may not survive the Wikipedia review process.
Copying them over could be a lot of work.
What to do with this domain name / site?
Sentimental reasons

My opinion at present is that we should probably merge with Wikipedia. As to what to do with this domain name / site, I would probably just link the existing articles to their Wikipedia equivalents with no additional content. I would keep the site active, or at least the domain name, to prevent spammers from taking it. Other than that, I'd take suggestions for what to do with the site.

I will copy the entries over myself, unless others volunteer to help. Anyone is entitled to do so, as the content is GNU FDL.

We will just have to see whether the editors decide to edit the articles that are submitted.

The advantages are listed above. It would be a good thing to avoid fragmentation of efforts and to participate in a project that gets more exposure and has more momentum and staying power.

Thanks for your comments on this matter!

Open Access Translation (The OAT Bible)

2005-08-07T15:30:00.000-07:00

TLAs (Three Letter Acronyms) are popular for Bible translations, so I've come up with one. The "Open Access Translation" (OAT) Bible. It would be the first Bible to be translated with a Creative Commons license. The question is--which license? The question is whether we would want the translator to be able to add this to her CV, in which case we would have to go with a "No Derivatives-By Attribution" license, or whether we would want people to be able to modify the Bible for their own purposes. For the Open Scrolls Project, J. Davila suggested that I go with the "No Derivatives-By Attribution" license, and I agreed to this. This way, all the changes to be made to the Bible could be suggested on a single website, where they could be reviewed by the general editor(s) and the editor(s) for the particular biblical book. The main contributors to each book's translation would get credit and could know that their work would not be mangled. Nonetheless, the translation could be freely copied and printed at no charge if kept intact.

In order to make such a translation, three things are necessary, or at least desirable--volunteer translators, open access translation software, and some funding (to pay the general editor? to pay a modicum to all active translators? to promote the project and the result? to legitimate the effort?).

Active volunteer translators, and even moreso competent ones and excellent editors for quality control, will be the hardest to come by. Funding, therefore, could be a way to solve that problem. But who would do the funding?

The easiest part would be open access translation software--because I would be happy to write it.

An effort began recently to provide the New Testament in plain English, at The New Testament in Plain English blog (noted via the Better Bibles Blog). I would like to merge my efforts with this one. What I envision is two websites operating in parallel, one a blog site (such as the New Testament in Plain English blog) and the other the translation itself. On the translation site, there would be plenty of resources on the Greek and Hebrew and on existing translations--think the Bible Gateway and Perseus rolled into one. There would also be the editable text of the new translation itself. Editable, that is, by submission and then approval by the editors, selected for their qualifications. There would also be links back to the blog to the posts that discuss the textual problems of particular verses. These links to the blog would be created manually through the translation site or automatically by finding words such as "John 1:1" in the blog text. Of course, I am open to suggestions on how this might work better, or questions if I'm not clear about what I envision.

PS-- I'm not concerned about the "OAT" title. Feel free to suggest a better one.

Open Source Biblical Studies

2005-08-06T01:02:00.000-07:00

There have been rumblings in the blogosphere lately about "Open Source Biblical Studies." It's an idea that has me excited about the possibilities. See the posts by AKMA, Tim Bulkeley, Mark Goodacre, and Tim Bulkeley.

Tim says that his goals would include:

to identify projects that are underway
to identify what they need to really take off
to see if there are possibilities to rationalise, share or collaborate so that efforts are less dispersed
perhaps begin to identify priorities
and so, by focusing, to try to get some worthwhile projects really moving

A good outline. I will get the ball rolling by describing some of the projects I have started or have planned, and then I will mention some of the other projects of which I am aware.

My first project that was at all "interactive" is GospelThomas.com. This project allowed visitors to comment on the text. This received a positive response, almost entirely by casual readers instead of scholars or "earnest amateurs." In fact I haven't been able to keep up with the editing duties of screening the comments that are made, so a comment hasn't been published in several months. I would greatly appreciate anyone stepping up to the task of editing comments for me, and I can provide the password and address for the backend comment approval script.

Inspired by that project's success, I plan to do a similar thing for the whole Bible, at FreeStudyBible.com, as described in a recent blog entry here at Christian Origins. I would mention that Christian Origins is somewhat "open" in that I accept articles for consideration by anyone for presenting on this site.

Moderately successful has been the TheoWiki project, a Wikipedia-inspired site with the aim of covering religion studies, theology, and biblical scholarship. I knock on wood as I type this, but I haven't run into the vandalism problems predicted for the site very much. The only problem is that the site hasn't gotten as many active users--or users generally--as I would hope it does. Simply getting the word out about this site to profesors and students would be a coup. So I need help promoting the site. If there is to be any talk about a wiki-encyclopedia-style project concerning religion, my hope is that it could be merged with TheoWiki.

Not so successful has been the Open Scrolls Project. I attribute it to the fact that translation is serious work, and those capable of it have insufficient free time. For this reason I have come up with a Plan B, as detailed in a comment to Goodacre's blog. I have contacted someone in my area about doing a new translation of the Dead Sea Scrolls for pay. Unfortunately I am not wealthy enough to do this without eventual compensation in some form, so I plan to put the finished result on the "Early Jewish Writings CD" (first version to be published next month or so) and in paperback form. Depending on the translator's willingness to sign such a contract, I would like to release portions of this new translation to an open source license (free on the 'net) for every few sales of the book or CD-ROM. That way the translator gets paid and the stuff eventually finds its way online. (Stephen King once did something similar with a novel: when enough people had paid a small amount, he released the next chapter for free.)

Early Christian Writings and Early Jewish Writings have been, to my mind, a spectacular success. Which brings I will mention that the most successful projects to date (with the notable exception of ccel.org and software such as e-Sword) have been the result of yeoman-like efforts by individuals. So that brings me to discuss some of these efforts.

For selfless dedication of time alone, mention must be made of Roger Pearse. For some years now, he has been unassumingly building the largest collection of patristic writings not already found in the ANF/NPNF series here. I have helped him with some texts, as have others, but for the most part it has been his own labors.

I wonder whether the Distributed Proofreaders could be brought in to help with these kinds of efforts. They take the scanned texts provided by individuals, and then (here is the distributed part) have multiple volunteers each edit individual pages with reference to the scanned image. In this way the proofreading is done without a large burden on any one person, and with the final product being public domain. I have every reason to believe that DP would be enthusiastic about helping bring some of the more important books of biblical criticism online. In fact, they saw my Online Books page and contacted me about doing exactly that.

I would like to mention in passing that my planned FreeBibleStudy.com should have, in addition to the texts themselves and comments from visitors, the texts of public domain commentaries and dictionaries linked to the text of the Bible (eventually anyways).

The Project Gutenberg of theology has long been the Christian Classics Ethereal Library. For those who are interested in bringing old scholarship and translations online, they could provide a home to the finished product. In addition, of course, to Project Gutenberg itself. Mention could also be made here of Religion Online for bringing works to the web.

A good printed source for many of these books, most of them not online, is Good Book Scholarly Reprints. There's also Sola Scriptura Publishing. These are for pay.

In terms of bringing critical editions to light, mention must be made of the TC Ebind Index. Very handy. Now if only that could be transcribed...

I mean, how nice would it be to have a searchable Tischendorf online?

Another important project is The Online Critical Pseudepigrapha.

The two most notable freeware Bible software products are e-Sword and the Online Bible. They are quite popular, and one should consider releasing open source projects made for the web also as modules for these software packages.

Wikibooks could be a good site to use as the workshop for any collaborative efforts on producing a textbook like oh, say, an introduction to the Hebrew Bible (which is needed on the 'net).

Let me finish off this post with a quote from here, "The BTOL [Biophysics Textbook Online] is tied to a Society that already has an established community, regular meetings, newsletters, etc. We tap into all of this structure. For example, when a new article is posted we announce it in the Biophysical Society Newsletter. I would think that other fields might benefit from endorsement by an established society that already serves the field." SBL, are you listening?

That's all for now. If you have a blog, please blog on this subject. It deserves all the exposure it can get.