Does Church Father Papias Prove the Gospels Existed in the First Century?

Does Church Father Papias Prove the Gospels Existed in the First Century?


Hot off the presses! A brand-new article on the value of Church father Papias, adapted from "Who Was Jesus?" Enjoy!

As always, feel free to like, share and comment - and to post wherever you see a discussion of Papias as providing evidence for the gospels in the first century.

Oldest New Testament Out of Egypt into Cyberspace

In a move reflective of the power of technology, the oldest New Testament Bible will be placed online for all the world to examine. Of course, this is great news for students of Bible manuscripts. One fascinating fact about this archaeological gem is its origin in Egypt.

The New Testament manuscript in question is the Codex Sinaiticus, distinguished from earlier manuscripts by virtue of its completeness, containing all the canonical texts along with the Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas, the former of which has been shown to have a provenance of Alexandria, Egypt. Along with the Codex Vaticanus, the CS is the oldest intact manuscript, dating to around 350 AD/CE.

Importantly, the Codex Sinaiticus was discovered and evidently written in Egypt, a locale vastly overlooked in studies of Christian origins. It is my contention, in fact, that without factoring in Egyptian religion and mythology, the study of Christian origins will always be incomplete and faulty, because it is unquestionably out of Egypt that Christ was called, so to speak, as a mythical rehash largely of the Egyptian gods Osiris and Horus.

"Out of Egypt have I called my son."
--The Gospel of Matthew (2:15)

In reality, the Sinai Peninsula, where this text was found in the oldest Christian monastery, St. Catherine's, was the only established land route to Israel, possessing numerous important Egyptian sites, including a massive fortress and temple to Horus at Tharo/Tharu. In this location, countless thousands of travelers passed between the two nations over a period of several millennia. Indeed, much interchange between cultures occurred in this very region. It is no wonder, therefore, that this site would be a sacred hot spot for the establishment of what turns out to be a Jewish-Egyptian hybrid, i.e., Christianity.

In my forthcoming book Christ in Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection, I demonstrate the correspondences between the Egyptian and Christian religions in well-documented detail, using primary source material as well as the works of highly credentialed scholars in relevant fields. Those who are interested in a preview of my book Christ in Egypt may wish to read my "Companion Guide to ZEITGEIST, Part 1," which contains a number of chapters from CIE.

Oldest New Testament Bible heads into cyberspace
By Dave Graham Mon Jul 21, 12:50 PM ET

BERLIN (Reuters) - More than 1,600 years after it was written in Greek, one of the oldest copies of the Bible will become globally accessible online for the first time this week.

From Thursday, sections of the Codex Sinaiticus, which contains the oldest complete New Testament, will be available on the Internet, said the University of Leipzig, one of the four curators of the ancient text worldwide.

High resolution images of the Gospel of Mark, several Old Testament books, and notes on the work made over centuries will appear on www.codex-sinaiticus.net as a first step towards publishing the entire manuscript online by next July.

Ulrich Johannes Schneider, director of Leipzig University Library, which holds part of the manuscript, said the publication of the Codex online would allow anyone to study a work of "fundamental" importance to Christians.

"A manuscript is going onto the net which is like nothing else online to date," Schneider said. "It's also an enrichment of the virtual world -- and a bit of a change from YouTube."

Selected translations will be available in English and German for those not conversant in ancient Greek, he added.

Dating from around 350, the document is believed by experts to be the oldest known copy of the Bible, along with the Codex Vaticanus, another ancient version of the Bible, Schneider said....

The project, launched in cooperation with the Russian National Library, the British Library and Saint Catherine's Monastery, also details the condition of the Bible, believed to have been written by early Christians in Egypt.

"I think it's just fantastic that thanks to technology we can now make the oldest cultural artifacts -- ones that were once so precious you couldn't show them to anyone -- accessible to everyone, in really high quality," said Schneider.

(editing by Ron Popeski)

Ancient Tablet Evidence of Jesus Myth?

An ancient Hebrew tablet is creating a stir after certain scholars identified it as containing a pre-Christian account of the awaited Jewish messiah's death and resurrection after three days. If this artifact is genuine, from the era claimed, and actually says what is asserted, the discovery clearly demonstrates that the idea of a messiah, savior or divine redeemer dying and rising after three days existed decades before the alleged advent of Jesus Christ. This dying-and-resurrecting motif is one of a number that various writers and scholars have claimed demonstrate Jesus to represent not a "historical" personage but a mythical concept found in religious ideologies and mythologies long prior to the so-called Christian era.

A recent article in the New York Times expresses caution concerning the find, as it has not been conclusively proved to be from the era in question, some years to decades prior to the common era, or to discuss what it is alleged to relate. However, the article also concludes that if the tablet is truly what it is purported to be, then:

"Resurrection after three days becomes a motif developed before Jesus, which runs contrary to nearly all scholarship."

The idea of this motif existing before Christ "runs contrary to nearly all scholarship," except for that of "Jesus mythicists," including in my books, The Christ Conspiracy, Suns of God, Who Was Jesus? and Christ in Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection.

In fact, if genuine, this tablet would constitute not "prophecy" of Christ's alleged advent but a primary source for a BLUEPRINT used in the creation of the fictional Jesus character - a theme I repeatedly address in my work. Indeed, the educated Jews of the Diaspora, including the very important Egyptian city of Alexandria, were undoubtedly well aware of the ubiquitous story of the god Osiris, "Lord of Resurrections," who was said to have died and been resurrected after three days, as stated in ancient Egyptian texts that predate the alleged time of Jesus by hundreds to thousands of years. It may well be that the Jewish priesthood in Judea - a mere stone's throw from their many brethren in Egypt - were also quite knowledgeable of this highly important god and his resurrection, which promised hope to hundreds of millions of Egyptians over a period of several thousand years, long prior to the purported time of Jesus Christ. If so, we would logically expect from their own religion-making efforts just such writings as are alleged to be found on this extraordinary tablet.

New York Times
July 6, 2008

Tablet Ignites Debate on Messiah and Resurrection
By ETHAN BRONNER

JERUSALEM — A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.

If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.

The tablet, probably found near the Dead Sea in Jordan according to some scholars who have studied it, is a rare example of a stone with ink writings from that era — in essence, a Dead Sea Scroll on stone.

It is written, not engraved, across two neat columns, similar to columns in a Torah. But the stone is broken, and some of the text is faded, meaning that much of what it says is open to debate.

Still, its authenticity has so far faced no challenge, so its role in helping to understand the roots of Christianity in the devastating political crisis faced by the Jews of the time seems likely to increase....

Given the highly charged atmosphere surrounding all Jesus-era artifacts and writings, both in the general public and in the fractured and fiercely competitive scholarly community, as well as the concern over forgery and charlatanism, it will probably be some time before the tablet’s contribution is fully assessed....

Ms. Yardeni, who analyzed the stone along with Binyamin Elitzur, is an expert on Hebrew script, especially of the era of King Herod, who died in 4 B.C. The two of them published a long analysis of the stone more than a year ago in Cathedra, a Hebrew-language quarterly devoted to the history and archaeology of Israel, and said that, based on the shape of the script and the language, the text dated from the late first century B.C....

"This should shake our basic view of Christianity," [Knohl] said as he sat in his office of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem where he is a senior fellow in addition to being the Yehezkel Kaufman Professor of Biblical Studies at Hebrew University. "Resurrection after three days becomes a motif developed before Jesus, which runs contrary to nearly all scholarship. What happens in the New Testament was adopted by Jesus and his followers based on an earlier messiah story."...

Mr. Knohl said...[the tablet] strongly suggested that a savior who died and rose after three days was an established concept at the time of Jesus....