The House of David

"all your cities lie in dust"

Sunday, June 30, 2002

The Court of International Criminals


From Drudge, this is the latest on the International Antizion^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HCriminal Court. It will, we are assured, absolutely not be used against anyone for frivolous purposes. No, not like this time, so many ages ago.

The microsecond one of our troops is hauled before that body and subjected to a non-English legal system, will be roughly the nanosecond before the US bails out of that body and the UN as well. And not a picosecond too soon.


posted by Zimri on 23:11 | link |

The uses to which careless words are put


Kathleen Parker loves atheists... who know their place.


posted by Zimri on 22:36 | link |

WHOA!


So I go and look at my site counter... and ask... "why the HELL is it up 200 points from last night?"

Guess who just gave me a link.

I'm not sure I quite qualify as a "Christian blogger" so much as a "Christian-baptised, strict-secularist, agnostic-leaning, bible-scholar blogger". After all, there aren't too many self-defined Christians who end up having to argue against both Matthew and Luke to make a theological point. But I do understand that if someone defines himself as the "Insta-" something, he'll have to keep things as quick as possible, hence the abbreviation. I do hope this does not throw off the Christian visitors to this site.

Seriously, thank you, Glenn. I'll find something to argue with you about some other time.


posted by Zimri on 14:41 | link |

The sword of Constantine


As promised, a defence of Romans 13 against Romans 12:

Telford agrees that a Christian must support Caesar when Caesar enforces the law. But he also says that Christians ought not to "serve two masters" by signing up with Caesar.

That works fine when you are a 10% minority under an enlightened Caesar like, say, Philip the Arab. It works less well when 90% of the nation is Christian. Suppose the nation is invaded by heretics who proudly deny the Gospels and wield the sword, as happened in, say, Christian Syria and Egypt circa 650 CE. In theory, the heretics ought to look about them, learn from the example of the peaceful Christians about them, and convert (or else drift away). Giving the lie to that theory, we have majority-Muslim populations in Syria and Egypt, and their Christian populations are being persecuted out of existence. If God has made a promise to protect those of His flock who will not protect themselves, He has failed them utterly.

Unless, of course, God made no such promise, which is my argument.

Telford counters, irrelevantly, that Syria and Egypt fell due to centuries of state-enforced orthodoxy, weakening both state and church. (At least, irrelevantly for this essay. It would fit very well with my other essays.) In this instance, I am not talking about why the Byzantine state lost the initial battle. I am talking about why the Byzantine church lost the long-term war. Why did the Islamic conquerors not convert to Christianity after the conquest? (Hence the double emphasis, above, on the phrase "about them".) One reason may be that Muslim regimes consistently enforced their will on Christians who "refused to stop witnessing and building churches". As for a well-trained population of pacifist resisters, if the ruler is tyrant enough, he can starve or slaughter the foot-draggers into oblivion like so many Tibetans. "Christian pacifism" does not work. If it is "pragmatist" to say something as obvious as 2+2=4, then so be it.

Moving from macro-spirituality to micro-, Telford also asks, "But that means a Christian who in Caesar's service is effectively out of service, unable to reconcile sinners to God, until the shift is over. Is policing really the best use of this person's time?" It depends on the person's talents, obviously, but on that assumption I would argue "yes". Deterring sinners from sinful acts may not reconcile a non-Christian to God, but it can certainly prevent fellow Christians from sinning and thereby apostasising from God.

Starting with Augustine, mediaeval Christian thinkers have recognised the twin problems of the defencelessness of (NT-defined) Christianity, and the unholiness of combat. They have accordingly found a number of ways to separate the unclean business of Caesar from the holiness of Christ. It is largely due to their efforts that we are able to live in a country which accepts the division of church and state, and which incidentally also protects all forms of Christianity... as Syria and Egypt manifestly failed to do.


posted by Zimri on 14:06 | link |

The Bill of Rights: 416 against, 3 in favour, New York neutral


Sasha writes (link from Pej, tangentially):

I am ashamed to tell you that the three dissenters in the 416-3 House vote to support the Pledge of Allegiance were all from my fair city. Nydia Velazquez, Gary Ackerman and Jerrold Nadler think that New Yorkers, being the Godless heathens that we are, don't care about the Pledge.

Time to "fact check her ass", as the expression goes. I will be using the NY Post article to which she linked, alone, for this purpose.

First, these three did not refuse to support the Pledge in principle - just the current one, that defines the US as a Christian Republic in defiance of the Constitution.

Second, the article only gives the reasons for two of these - Ackerman and Nadler - and their shared explanation was that the resolution was pure grandstanding and a waste of Congress's time. We could probably extend this to Velazquez too. These three never claimed that New Yorkers did not care about the Pledge. Although, granted, they probably thought they were splitting the difference between their hard-left and centre-left constituents.

Which brings us to error #3: these three did not have the guts to vote against this silly proposal. They voted "present". Weasels. The real three heroes are these (from Amygdala/GF, who hates being called Amygdala/GF).

I admit I wish those three New Yorkers had given an honest answer, not just huffing about "feel-good" non-legislation. Even if everyone in a given Congressional district demanded the words be replaced with the Muslim shihadah, their Congressman, if he were honest (ha!) would still have to turn them down. This is because the men and women in Congress take an oath to a higher authority than their constituents' whims. That authority is, of course, the Constitution.


posted by Zimri on 12:41 | link |

Eminem's exegesis of Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29


All I see is sissies in magazines smilin'.

Whatever happened to whilin' out and bein' violent?

What ever happened to catchin' a good old-fashioned passionate ass-whoopin',

And gettin' your shoes, coat, and your hat tooken?

Marshall Mathers


posted by Zimri on 02:29 | link |

Round two-and-a-half with Telford


Telford Work and I have been having a friendly Scriptural tennis-match over whether a Christian may join an army in the cause of a just war. Previously, Telford had corrected some faulty assumptions in the previous essay, and as a result I was obliged to go back and change it. I am pleased he took my challenge seriously enough to post a second reply to it.

My thesis as of now relies on two "proof texts", one from the hypothetical "sayings source" commonly called "Q"; and the other from Paul. Concerning the former, Telford does not dispute my exegesis of Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29 as standalone passages. Rather, he disputes whether they should stand alone at all:

  • (a) a hypothetical text
  • (b) supposedly overturned by the gospel writers themselves
  • (c) against the pro-violence traditions of both their Jewish Lord and their own Jewish people
  • (d) Christians should embrace violence in self-defense.

Am I the only one who thinks this is, er, a bit of a stretch?


First, Q being hypothetical is hardly an argument against Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29's provenance as part of an independent tradition. Telford already accepts that both Matthew and Luke are emendations of Mark. Take Matthew, for instance. Matthew has Matt 5:39-40 and Mark does not. We have two options. One is that Matthew made up the quote. The other is that Matthew got it from somewhere else. Evan Powell would have us believe that Matthew got it from Luke; Kloppenborg Verbin and the majority of scholars hold to the Q hypothesis. But even if Matthew got it from Luke, we should then have to ask where Luke got it. Ultimately we are stuck with Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29 and the question of how it ended up in canon, in two different contexts. The option of having the Holy Spirit grant to either Luke or Matthew the quote in a post-resurrection vision exists, but if so, why did these evangelists not write a gospel about that, the way so many gnostic authors did? The easiest way out, Q or no Q, is that this quote was part of the Christian tradition before Matthew and Luke caught it. But then we have a gap, in which this quote was meandering through Christendom with no controls.

Telford sees controls in "the dominant traditions of remembrance that circulate in the churches founded by Jesus' apostolic eyewitnesses" and thence "the Church that "controlled" the original traditions (cf. 1 Cor. 11:23-26, 1 Cor. 15:3-7) circulated the gospels they found adequate to those traditions". Note that that relies on an a priori assumption that the New Testament (and, for the sake of argument, the chain of Apostolic Fathers up to Augustine) represent the only legitimate apostolic traditions of Christianity. But this chain of orthodoxy was never "the" church, but a narrow after-the-fact selection of many churches, as described in The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture by Bart Ehrman. Back then, the churches often worked independently of each other. As Mark and John 1-20's contrary treatment of Peter shows, the churches even fought against each other on occasion. I prefer to see controls in extraneous witnesses to this period.

For many sayings, these witnesses exist, but not always in writings considered "orthodox" by a modern reckoning. For example, there were many more than two Gospels in the first two centuries of Christian tradition. But Matthew and Luke, with the Didache 1:3-5 following Matthew, were the only ones following Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29. No other source yet found makes any mention of this quote independently of Matthew and Luke. If you took two out of a group of, say, thirty, what are the chances you would get a representative sample? On many issues, Matthew and Luke provide a decent control group, particularly in witnessing the text of Mark, and also in the occasional parallel with Thomas and even oral tradition as noted by the orthodox church fathers, including James, Clement, and Irenaeus. But not here.

So the best solution remains, to look at Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29 by itself. And by itself, it is a lot more defiant than these two evangelists think it is.

As for being overturned by the gospel writers themselves, it wouldn't be the first time either Matthew or Luke did it to a source of theirs. Matthew overturned Mark on at least one occasion. Compare Matthew 12:30 with Mark 9:40: is it that whoever is not against us is for us, or that whoever is not for us is against us? Are Christians an inclusionary or exclusionary sect? Luke for his (or her) part disagrees with Mark (and Matthew) on the order of events in the Passion. Mark does not mention Herod, for instance, who is a vital part of the Lukan Passion (23:7-15).

That both Matthew and Luke turned against traditions of "their own" Jewish people is hardly a stretch either, as many a rabbi will be eager to tell you. Matthew took so many pains to distinguish his beliefs from those of other Jews that one could almost call his book an Antitheses Gospel (Matt 5:17-48). Luke's sequel, Acts, made clear that Christianity wasn't even aiming to be a heresy within Judaism, but a Gentile religion outside it. The anti-Jewish heretic Marcion went so far as to make Luke the sole Gospel of his church, and scrapping the Old Testament entirely (defended in a book called "Antitheses").

As for the last point, I didn't actually conclude (d) from those three points and in fact do not endorse a blanket form of (d). The point of bringing up the defiance aspect of Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29 was just to point out that Jesus taught his disciples to be humble, but not to be slapped around (as it were). The exact method of retaliation was left unstated in those two gospels - unsurprisingly, given their pacifist leanings. It was Paul who filled in that particular gap, and Paul wrote long before they did.

The real question here is with Paul, and that will have to await another post.

UPDATE: Explanation of statement that there were no controls to Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29.


posted by Zimri on 02:11 | link |

Saturday, June 29, 2002

Lies, lies, lies


I was in the alt.bible newsgroup last night. I thought I might share an exchange I had with a certain "Glencoe". Although, no-one has yet bothered to prove me wrong on this score.

To give some background, there is a lot of propaganda being spewed on both sides of the Israel and Palestine dispute. The worst propaganda of course comes from the Arab and Iranian governments, denying the very humanity of the Jewish people. But Israeli apologists, sadly, have been telling lies as well; in their case to deny the Islamic claim to a Palestinian heritage. I noticed two of these last night and I will post them here for you now:


  • 5. Jerusalem is mentioned over 700 times in the Tanakh, the Jewish
  • Holy Scripture, but not even once in the Koran.

That is because Jerusalem is assumed in the Qur'an. The sura 17, al-Isra, deals with Jewish history and does indeed touch on Jerusalem. I will leave aside verse 17:1 and its attendant traditions for the time being (I do not happen to believe Muhammad flew on a Pegasus).

17:2-8 is a capsule history of Israel. 17:2 starts with God saying "We" gave Moses the Scripture and "made it a guidance for the Children of Israel". Then, in 17:4, God reminds the reader that "We" decreed the Israelites would do mischief - "twice" - and become "arrogant".

17:5 details the "first" time. "Slaves of ours [God's] given to terrible warfare... entered the very innermost parts of your homes". And then 17:6 has God "give you [Israel] a return of victory". That refers to the conquests of Assyria, Babylon, or both conflated; as told in 2 Kings.

But then 17:7 has the "second promise", in which the enemies "enter the mosque as they had entered it before".

This brings into play a singular "mosque" of Israel that had been violated twice. That could only refer to the Temple in Jerusalem.

I conclude that al-Isra 17:2-8 started out as a sermon of the double invasion of Assyria and Babylon into Judah, 701 and 598 BCE, a common theme in Diaspora apocalypse. Exemplars include the "Animal Apocalypse" of 1 Enoch, and possibly Daniel. It was then changed - slightly - into a sermon on the fate of the Jews following the double Temple destruction, Assyria-Babylon and Rome, 598 BCE and 70 CE. This would be the tack of 2 Baruch and 2 Esdras.

This shows that the Muslim holy book did mention the Temple and Jerusalem, obliquely. Islam has its genesis in post-Temple Judaism and Christianity, so we would expect a Temple mention in the Qur'an somewhere.

What it does not do, though, is prove that this part of the Qur'an was intended for an audience in Judaea. The al-Isra sermon could have been preached anywhere there was a Jew or a Christian.

The case for Muhammad being based in Judaea is stronger, though:


  • 6. King David founded the city of Jerusalem. Mohammed never visited
  • Jerusalem. Jews pray facing Jerusalem, while Muslims pray with their
  • backs toward Jerusalem.

First, David did not found Jerusalem; "Urusalim" was standing at least in the time of the 18th Dynasty Pharaohs, who wrote of it often while they were trying to conquer and defend the place. But that is a minor point.

The earliest Muslims did pray toward Jerusalem, based on archaeological digs in ancient mosques. According to Sebeos, chapter 30, Islam began when the Jews garnered some Arab allies, then led by Muhammad, and rebelled against Rome. It was much later that the Muslims turned away from Jerusalem, under the influence of Arabising caliphs, and toward western Arabia (which is not exactly far from Jerusalem, come to that).

It is very possible Muhammad did reach Jerusalem. This, in spite of Islamic tradition, not relying on it. But Sebeos denies Muhammad was the one to usurp the Temple, blaming that event on Muhammad's successors.

Jesus did go so far as to preach at the Temple, but Christians have never attempted to replace the Temple (although they did set up churches close to it). That proves that the current Muslim claim to the Temple Mount cannot be based on al-Isra alone.

But it is equally dangerous to assert that Muslims have no basis at all in Palestine. To me, that sounds like a leadup to expulsion.


posted by Zimri on 21:36 | link |

Champagne time


Just passed visit #1000, of which about half of those have come in the last couple of weeks. Admittedly it's largely a result of my longstanding policy of being an utter site pest to more popular and better authored blogs, like the Vodka- and Pejman-Pundits. And I also look at my own blog after each post I publish, just to see if the layout got f#qked in some way by my DIY, PDQ, FUBAR attitude to HTML, as has happened before. But even taking that into account I appreciate those of you who have followed some link on your own over here, and those who've gone so far as to provide an official link of your own.

YHWH and His Ashera' Bless And Keep You,

The House of David


posted by Zimri on 20:42 | link |

And now, the Christian response to Hauerwas


The Midwest Conservative Journal chimes in - link from Reynolds. He agrees with Hauerwas that a Christian must be willing to die for the gospel. But he disagrees vehemently that "Christians must be ready to ... indeed have their children die" for it.

MCJ attempted a line-by-line Fisking of Hauerwas's stance, which succeeded in showing up Hauerwas's arrogance but not Hauerwas's error. What is needed is a reasoned, Biblical case for defending one's neighbour against attack, rather like CS Lewis's Why I Am Not A Pacifist, except that Lewis was there arguing from worldly reason rather than biblical reason, which stem from slightly different assumptions.

In earlier posts, I hadn't provided a Christian case against Hauerwas, because I was waiting for a Christian with more faith than I have to come up with one. I believe, though, that such a Christian case does exist, partly based on the Bible. And no, the Bible is not contradicting itself in this case.

For the sake of argument, we will disregard the proof text which Erwin de Castro, B.J. Oropeza, and Ron Rhodes offer: "Prior to His crucifixion, Jesus revealed to His disciples the future hostility they would face and encouraged them to sell their outer garments in order to purchase a sword (Luke 22:36-38; cf. 2 Cor. 11:26-27)". Telford Work and the HarperCollins Study Bible p. 2003 agree that this was a "symbolic arming" only. Jesus was not in Luke 22:36-38 supporting the principle of self-defence; any more than he was against self-defence in Luke 22:49-53, when chastising Peter for fighting off the arrest posse. In both cases, Jesus was instead demanding the Scripture be fulfilled.

It is actually the apparently-pacifist proof texts, "turn the other cheek" and "take my shirt, too" (Matt 5:39-40 // Luke 6:29), that show the way. These two are matched to different contexts in Matthew and Luke, hinting at a common origin in a sayings gospel that preceded both. Matthew was very probably a pacifist ("take up the sword, die by the sword" - Matthew 26:52), and as mentioned above Luke was uneasy about defencive violence too. Accordingly, if one assumes the Q hypothesis, both Matthew and Luke misunderstood this saying when they placed it in context.

Taken by themselves, these twin sayings have a somewhat different interpretation in first-century occupied Judaea (and in the modern inner city) than they do in a suburb. In a Jennings special on the Historical Jesus, back in Y2k A.D., John Dominic Crossan said that being slapped on your cheek was a symbol of shame. In this case, assuming a right-handed population, you would be slapped on the same cheek. To turn the other cheek to such an assailant would force the assailant to strike you as an equal - to start a fight, in other words. It is in this spirit of resistance that Jesus talks back when the High Priest slaps him in John 18:22-23 (as pointed out here). Ditto the "take my shirt" comment - removing one's own shirt in front of an aggressor is an internationally recognised challenge. The message is clear: if one insults you, your response is to call him on it.

The New Testament does not explain explicitly what the Christian is to do if the assailant accepts the challenge, but Paul's Epistle to the Romans, chapter 13, strongly hints at an answer: one should call for the "governing authorities", who, since the Roman age of Paul, have been no strangers to arms:

1Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. 4For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. 6This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God's servants, who give their full time to governing. 7Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.

And if the sword, why not the sword? Ron Rhodes again: "Moreover, it is significant that although given the opportunity to do so, none of the New Testament saints - nor even Jesus - are ever seen informing a military convert that he needed to resign from his line of work (Matt. 8:5-13; Luke 3:14)." Jesus does not call for vigilante justice, for the days of the Judges when "everyone did what was right in his own eyes". But he also does not deny Caesar's right to call for arms to protect the common-weal. Far from it (Mark 12:17).

The Christian is enjoined to self-defence for himself and for his neighbour for a very simple reason - and this reason is at the heart of MCJ's argument. Hauerwas excepted, most Christians understand that they may be wrong about their interpretation of the Gospel. The apostles passed down their traditions accurately enough, and even - as in the case of Matthew and Luke against Mark - provided their own interpretation of previously-recorded traditions. But later, there arose groups of apostles' disciples, each of which mistook its teacher's words for the words of Christ. In this way, schools of thought arose that held their interpretation above those of other sects. We know them as "heresies".

The true Christian ought to fear that he too may be a heretic. The true Christian should certainly die for his faith, but must never allow his faith to endanger his neighbour. Admittedly here we get into personal opinion, but I suspect God would be more merciful to a heretic who has made a mistake, but not acted upon it; than to a heretic who has forced others to die for that mistake.

So too, must the Christian love his enemies, but how does it help even the enemy if we do not try to convince the enemy to repent? Are we really doing a favour to the people of Iran, who say they hate us, by leaving them alone to their tyrants?

Ultimately, this world contains two sides. One side consists of America and Israel, and the other side of criminals who profess to hate them and who promise to destroy them. Christians should consider which side best fits the mind of God. Jesus is reputed to have said, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends", in John 15:14. But I fail to see where Jesus says he must lay down his life to spite his friends.


UPDATE: Thanks go out to Telford, for showing that Luke's Gethsemane encounter is no support to my cause. Also, shoutz to Midwest Conservative Journal for linking back, which is as clear a case of going the "extra mile" for someone who elsewhere disagrees as I've yet seen.


posted by Zimri on 15:29 | link |

Trekkies rejoice!


Trailer for ST:X here! It's even-numbered Trek, so it's bound to be good.

Plus, it looks like Jean-Luc is... doing something not normally associated with Trekkies...

UPDATE: I was a little bastard and forgot to post the link to the site I found that from. Ipse Dixit. I spent most of last night thinking up captions for the Arafat pic on the site and totally forgot to edit the link. D'ohhhh...


posted by Zimri on 02:21 | link |

More links in the "At last" file


Remember shell?

She has a blog now.

The sound you just heard was thousands of male blog-watchers falling backward.

UPDATE: Or maybe that was me falling off my chair when I saw the reciprocal link. Thanks shell!

UPDATE II: New word: blogle (v.) [blô-gul] To ogle the blogs of others.


posted by Zimri on 01:13 | link |

Friday, June 28, 2002

At last, some anti-theocratic bloggers


Just when I was ready to condemn the entire blogosphere as a nascent Emirate of Blogistan, along comes Robot Dawg to save the day. And Tapped, and Rosenberg, and Atrios, and Writer of Fortune.

Praise the gods. Oops... can't say that... there goes my citizenship.


posted by Zimri on 19:02 | link |

Thursday, June 27, 2002

Open letter to Pyra


Dear Sirs,

I signed up for your fine "Blogger" web-logging tool a couple of months ago, and I've been very impressed with its ease of use. I've made it something of a habit of mine, off and on, to post my opinions on the 'Web.

However, I've noticed that other people can use this tool, too, to publish their opinions. Some of these opinions, although it pains me to say it, are at variance with the position of the elected branches of the United States polity.

As a free citizen, I would not dream of disputing their right to post whatever they want. "As Voltaire said", as the cliché goes. I will not, therefore, name names; besides, even I have been known to dispute with a policy position here and there. But there are some avenues open to Pyra that can at least direct the blogosphere's minds toward the simple American virtues of patriotism, faith, and liberty.

I propose that Pyra add, to the "publish" button in the "edit your blog" screen, a little splash screen that plays a recording of the Pledge of Allegiance, overlaying a rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, with the words of the pledge scrolling by on the background across a waving 50-star flag graphic. Other patriotic themes may or may not be added. The important thing is that this splash screen not be closed, minimised, or hidden by other forms in the desktop. A "cancel" button should of course be provided, in case the user wishes to cancel the publication of his or her post.

Now, some naysayers may cavil that this is annoying. But they are free to cut the sound, turn off the monitor, and take a restroom break during this time. Or, they can use this time for quiet reflection, as has been suggested for Virginia public schools. As the inestimable VodkaPundit puts it, those people need to relax. Besides, there is nothing stopping these users from editing their HTML by hand and posting their worthless blather by FTP. And anyone who objects to the "under God" phrase is probably an Islamic fundamentalist anyway.

It is crucial, during this time of uncertainty and terror, that Pyra stand with America. We must set an example to the world, that we support freedom for everyone except our own citizens.


Patriotically yours,

The House of David


posted by Zimri on 17:27 | link |

Where's Adil?


With a tip o' the hat to Airstrip One.


posted by Zimri on 00:51 | link |

Woohoo!


A Hamas footsoldier blew himself up today... right up off the floor of Congress, that is. The Congressional Black Caucus went for Hilliard. The actual voters went for Davis. How... uppity of them.

The CBC's message of anti-Semitism, racial grievance, and entitlement might work in the welfare-check-collecting precincts (of any ethnicity), but there's this little cult we like to call the "middle class", also known as "taxpayers", to which many Blacks already belong and which many more will join, insh'allah. Claims that this growing majority are "selling out" will just bore them, and ultimately piss them off.

I bet Cindy McJihad is running scared right about now.


posted by Zimri on 00:22 | link |

Wednesday, June 26, 2002

Across the fruited cultural landscape


So I'm trolling through blogs, starting at Instapundit, and that leads me to Volokh:

...but others might be quite troubled by courts forcing the rejection or bowdlerization of important parts of the American cultural heritage (much more important than the "under God" in the Pledge, which has only been around since 1954).

Now these items can be distinguished from the "under God", perhaps precisely because of their cultural and historical significance. But will they be?

We have indeed seen a slippery slope towards more and more extirpation of religious symbolism from American civic life (or at least that part that's conducted by the government). It started with the school prayer decisions (1962 and 1963) -- which I think are quite right. It went on to the Ten Commandments (1980), creches (1989), and graduation prayers (1992). Now it goes on to part of the Pledge of Allegiance, even though in the creche case the Court suggested that the Pledge of Allegiance would be treated differently.


Many if not most cultural traditions are good, particularly those associated with Scotland, England, and the US. I am personally quite fond of common law, free markets, free speech, and electoral republicanism, to name some examples. But America has other cultural traditions that are less impressive.

America's Congress defied its own Constitution in 1954, as Volokh mentioned, in establishing Christian-defined monotheism as the state religion. But America has defied its Constitution before, or at least allowed its component states to make a mockery of it. I am specifically referring to the Jim Crow laws, and the racist culture that grew up around them in the early 1900's. Those laws were eliminated in the mid-1960's, but the culture remained. Hence the rise of "affirmative action" and "political correctness", which were set up - let's be honest - to dispossess and to indoctrinate American citizens of European descent in favour of others (who need not even be citizens). This program has successfully relegated racism to the margins of White culture, while making non-White political leaders far more powerful in contrast.

At the time of writing, the campaign against racism has underperformed in some areas, and in others has overreached. My worry is that some of those enforcing the campaign against Christianity will likewise overreach. For instance, it is (rightly) considered bad form for me to hang a poster proclaiming "White Pride" in my cubicle, as I hope it would be if another co-worker posted "Black Pride". But one of my over-half-dozen bosses (who isn't White) has a "Praise Jesus" sign in his office. Suppose someone cries foul? Is "Praise Jesus" a hostile message to Jews and others uncomfortable with Christianity? Most importantly - Is there money in it if I sue?

Racism is nothing compared to that. Rare is the racist who consciously defines good and evil relative to his race. Those who do are sociopaths ("evil", in less enlightened days). Deep down, more racists either know they are wrong, or else can be easily convinced of it. Therefore a racist can be converted or destroyed with no compunction. But the nature of the Judaean spinoff religions is that their believers do define morality relative to what is pleasing to God. It literally takes an Inquisition to change their minds.

The anticrusade against religious indoctrination is long overdue, but those waging it must be careful lest they inflame the opinions of the masses. Or bankrupt the economy in a flood of accusations.


posted by Zimri on 18:40 | link |

The Demagogue-In-Chief


El Presidente thinks it "ridiculous" that it might be unconstitutional to demand that schoolchildren take an oath, every morning before their classmates and teacher, to a monotheistic deity; and to associate this oath with loyalty to this country. So does James Taranto, who also believes in upholding the power of the Cross as a memorial to an attack that killed hundreds of Jews.

Dubya disappoints me. Earlier he had mentioned atheists positively. He could have taken this opportunity to explain that religious bigotry was precisely what we are fighting against. But apparently he does not consider a non-monotheist's patriotism to be on the level of a monotheist's.

I have, in the past, vigourously attacked The Secular Web Newswire for its anti-Bush bias. Lately the SW have been giving Bush credit where it's due, for which I applaud them. I won't be defending Bush on this particular demagoguic misstep.


posted by Zimri on 18:13 | link |

Sunday, June 23, 2002

What would Pilate do?


I found this from InstaPundit. A theologian by name of Stanley Hauerwas is saying that a true Christian's reaction to al Qaida attacks ought to be nothing, except perhaps complete disengagement from the world economy that keeps our prices low and our living standards high.

Glenn Reynolds said, Hauerwas was "profoundly idiotic -- and worse yet for a philospher (sic), incoherent and contradictory". Reynolds, as seems to be too often the case, doesn't explain which part was incoherent, nor which ideas contradicted which other ideas. "Idiotic", I'm going to construe as a generic insult.

In fact, Hauerwas is being consistent in his belief that a Christian must be prepared to die for his or her faith. A Christian is a citizen of the City of God first and of the US second (at best). As a Johannine might put it, if one dies in Christ, one will live forever in Christ. Mohammed Atta et al. were doing the Christians in the WTC a favour - and as for the non-Christians in that tower, well, their death is tragic for their loved ones, but perhaps their current sufferings in Hell can serve as a warning to the rest of us.

The rest follows inductively. Say we had intelligence that al-Qaeda were plotting an attack on Seattle, but all we currently know about this attack is the location of the ringleaders - somewhere deep in enemy territory, say Sudan. A secular American, who views one's own life and country as sacred, will instinctively wish to protect Seattle, even to the point of invading Sudan. But a citizen of the City of God will not risk killing others and damaging his own soul.

Hauerwas is offering the example of Pilate. This is not an insult - to a true Christian, this is a compliment. We moderns generally consider Pontius Pilate a prime weasel for washing his hands during the trial of Jesus, symbolising his transfer of responsibility to the Jews - when in fact the execution was a Roman affair from top to bottom. But we have forgotten that in the ancient tradition, Pilate was considered a Christian: see The Acts of Pilate.

Reynolds the Elder instinctively understands Hauerwas better than Glenn: "no one could be a good enough Christian to satisfy Stanley". But in "suggesting that such demandingness misconstrued the point of Christianity", his dad is, again, not defining his terms.

Reynolds wants Christianity to be a crusading faith that converts people to righteousness by the sword, if need be. Historically, Christianity firstly has been a missionary faith that converts by persuasion, and secondly has been more interested in conversion to Christianity than to righteousness.

Reynolds has not come close to refuting Hauerwas on this score. Either pundit is free to call me an idiot. I'm just a blogger, and not a popular one at that. But if Reynolds wants to pop off at a professional theologian, he needs to do some homework first.

As for Hauerwas, he's no idiot. He's just insane.


posted by Zimri on 01:59 | link |

Saturday, June 22, 2002

Speaker for the Dead


I have just read this (link from Protein Wisdom). It turns out a Mr Bethel gave a sermon about Mrs Bethel's uncle, who died an unrepentant sinner. Mrs Bethel had no problem with the sermon, but the other worshippers did, and beat Mr Bethel's ass for it.

Protein Wisdom chose to use this event to make a snide comment about CAIR and its inability to handle honest opinions. P.W. was admittedly gratuitous; this story has nothing directly to do with CAIR. But it cuts to the reason CAIR act in this way. It is about what PJ O'Rourke called the "Whiffle Life", the current American feeling of entitlement to a pain-free world, rather than a just one.

A long time ago, in a college campus far, far away, the author of the "House of David" had a girlfriend whom he actually cared about. The girlfriend's friends were computer geeks, by and large, and those friends got the author back into science-fiction. One of these books was "Ender's Game" by Orson Scott Card and, later, the girlfriend kind of indirectly introduced this blogger-to-be to its sequel, "Speaker for the Dead".

This book was not really about the future any more than was "Ender's Game". It was instead about the truth: what was true about a man's life, and how his story should be told during his funeral.

Back then I was subject to mood swings and did not feel that death would be altogether a bad thing. I was Christian, and more-or-less serious about it, so I was assured by others that I was headed for heaven. Even so I did not care overmuch whether I would be bound for heaven or hell. If there was to be a judgement, I only wanted to be judged justly.

As a result "Speaker for the Dead" struck a deep, deep chord in me. When I read it, I knew I wanted a Speaker to read my funeral oration. No pious lies for me, thank you. Let everyone know the truth - all of it - now that it cannot hurt me anymore. Maybe others could learn from my (many) mistakes, and know not to make them.

Pastor Bethel might be brutally honest, but at least he's... brutally honest. And it sounds like he cares about what "sin" means, and pays attention to his own services. He has a standing offer to read the homily at my funeral.


posted by Zimri on 22:54 | link |

Wednesday, June 12, 2002

I have a home


Saw Eric Raymond first on Instapundit, and now Dan Beste is on the case. Since I'm in the mood to blog tonight, no matter how sheep-like I end up looking, I'll add to the list of links. Count me in as an Engineerist. Thank you Corsair for the link.


posted by Zimri on 23:03 | link |

Well, THIS is a relief


From townhall.com, Michelle Malkin - a fellow immigrant - lets us know that we have a precedent for revoking citizenship from naturalised - that is, non-native - citizens who declare war on this country. She calls it the "Holtzman amendment to the Immigration and Nationality Act", intended for Nazi war criminals who naturalised to hide from the Nuremburg laws. We even have an organ of bureaucracy for this purpose: "The Justice Department has a special unit, the Office of Special Investigations (OSI), whose sole focus since 1979 has been the denaturalization and deportation of Nazi-era war criminals."

She's not just blowing smoke. She's talking about "8 U.S.C. 1251(a)(19)", a real piece of legislation with its own history of jurisprudence. Also see it in action here.

If I have a critique, it is that this would not fix John Walker Lindh, nor Jose Padilla. For them you need treason trials.


posted by Zimri on 22:54 | link |

Last Drudge rip-off... for now


I'm pleased to see Slim is still selling lots and lots of records. Go buy another one for Mom.


posted by Zimri on 22:23 | link |

And while we're at it


Sack her too. She is either in charge, and responsible; or she is not in change, and ineffectual. (Reminds one of Arafat doesn't it?)


posted by Zimri on 22:22 | link |

The Ashcroft Trilemma: messiah, menace, or moron?


Also on Drudge, we have this: "EXCLUSIVE: SPIELBERG SIDES WITH BUSH ON FBI PRECRIME; FILM WARNS OF FUTURE GOVERNMENT ROLE; DREAMWORKS EXEC CALLS ASHCROFT 'SCARY'... DEVELOPING... "

Those are two opinions. The Royal Court of George II offers a third (also found on Drudge): Ass-croft's an out-and-out fool, scaring the crap out of everyone when Padilla hadn't found so much as one of those old radium wristwatches.


posted by Zimri on 22:19 | link |

Paranoia on Drudge


Say it ain't so, right? But this is far, far more insidious than the usual scare headlines leading to terror warnings that end up going... nowhere.

This latest paranoid slander is aimed at a target I just can't ignore. He dared to dis... the Scooby Doo movie.

The front page of The Drudge Report has, as a second link, "SCOOBY DOOBIE DOOBIE: Movie Drops Drug Subtext...". We're supposed to fear that they made it all PC. In fact, the refs are still there... but hidden... just like the cartoon. In other words, the makers of the film did exactly the right thing.

Matt's obviously been hanging around in that van too long. He would've got away with it, too, if it hadn't been for us lousy bloggers.


posted by Zimri on 22:08 | link |

Senate endorsement, Texas


The House of David will step into politics one more time, and endorse whatever Republican is running against Ron Kirk. I don't particularly care who.

I don't like the Texas GOP either - they are far too anti-secular - but I prefer their brand of religious nuttery to that of Hamas. A vote for Ron Kirk is a vote for Hamas and therefore a vote against Judaism and democratic America.

It is also a vote against the Black community. Get Kirk in and he will ensure a rosy future for anti-Semitism in Black and Democratic politics for at least six years. Not sure if you've noticed, but evangelicals and libertarians are very pro-Judaism - more so than some Reform Jews, I might add - and instinctively turn against anything an anti-Semite might propose. That traitor Cynthia McKinney is already turning moderate Whites off the Black struggle, and this just from the House. Imagine the damage Kirk can do in the Senate.

If secularists and Blacks are that dead set against the party of, er, Abraham Lincoln then I suggest the Libertarian ticket as a protest vote. For everyone else, vote Republican. Keep this clown out of Washington by the largest margin possible.


posted by Zimri on 21:34 | link |

Album review you probably won't find on the Daily Dish


My hero Andrew Sullivan has on occasion taken a break from his eclectic blogging schedule to give us oblique reviews of the Pet Shop Boys and New Order. In the spirit of diversity, I'll tackle mine own favourite pop star (after Neil Tennant and Peter Hook), a cute slender blond guy who listens to Dido and enjoys the company of butch macho men and Elton John.

I'm referring, of course, to The Eminem Show by Marshall Mathers III, aka "Slim Shady".

I'm assuming you know the story already. My copy comes with a DVD that has Eminem explain that The Eminem Show refers to his life, as it appears (or used to appear) every day in the papers. Accordingly this is his most personal record, more so even than The Marshall Mathers LP, to which I'll be comparing it. (His first efforts, up to The Slim Shady LP, were little more than bratty attempts to get the listener's attention, although funny ones.)

This CD is in a way a mirror of the last one, down to the last skit from Ken. "White America" parallels "Kill You" as a mockery of this country, in the place of his family - wait for the conclusion to see why. "Sing For the Moment" attempts to replace "Stan" as a sampling of another song used to ponder the artist's responsibility. "Cleanin Out My Closet" is this album's "Kim", an angry rant this time aimed at his parents. "When The Music Stops" showcases D-12 and "Say What You Say", Dr Dre. And I'm still waiting to bump to "Without Me" like I did to "The Real Slim Shady" two years ago...

It's a little more hit-and-miss this time. We get more speeches on the perils of stardom... and since we've heard it before, one's hand starts reaching for the "Next" button in the car stereo. Three in particular smack of rapper braggadocio, which I suppose is inevitable for this most profitable rapper. You may as well skip "Soldier", "Say What You Say", and "'Till I Collapse"; not even Dre and Nate Dogg can save those last two. And I agree with the critics that "Drips" is just awful, largely because of that charlatan Obie Trice. Boy, when I was your age, The Marshall Mathers LP 's only true dud was "Remember Me?"! - although I admit I also used to skip D-12's boring "Amityville" and "Under the Influence", in the day before the Devil's Night.

On the plus side, what's good is better.

The drug use is (mostly) absent. Some pot and booze, as if that counted, and other references that are never favourable. The penultimate sketch is perhaps too ambiguous, pantomiming Em's daughter catching her father doing coke. But maybe that's supposed to make you think. We're adults and don't need our morals spelled out for us... right?

The homophobia that made it hard to sing along to the last one - remember "Criminal"? - is, thankfully, completely absent. Oh, sure, there are a couple of throwaway "fag" comments that aren't aimed at gays anyway. And there's still a Ken Kaniff skit. But Ken is a side of Em's personality, as you'll know if you've seen the "Slim Shady Show". There's a cheap DVD, there's slimshadyworld.com, and there's even a segment of the show in the DVD in the album, so you have little excuse for not knowing about it now. Em can even joke about the rumours about him and Dre, which he couldn't do last time (as seen in the ICP disses... heh).

So Steve Berman is at last free of Em's harem of homosexuals and Vicodin - free forever, in fact, but I won't give too much away. Where some critics may have a point is on the topic of misogyny. I already mentioned that Em made a huge mistake in not kicking Obie's ass out the studio door, and this will come back to haunt him. The critics have also (ignorantly) complained about the brilliant "Superman", in which Em lets us know what he thinks about shallow groupies. And there are other comments sprinkled around, like the lyric "no such thing/ like a female with good looks who cooks and cleans", which has a sort of Oscar Wilde-ish subversive air in this age, but are just not true (but then, I have a better momma than he does...). He clearly loves his daughter and one hopes he can make a good woman out of her, particularly when she grows up to be a teenager (like he still is, really).

And there's a social conscience, at last. Eminem's firstly realised that his words have consequences, and raps about that on some memorable tracks, like - well, most of them. "Square Dance", although a little too long, is a standout, in that he warns that the draft is coming back. Some critics have been whining that he doesn't say whether he supports the Fourth World War or not, but he doesn't have to. It's important just to let our teenagers know that the world outside is about to come to them. He reports, you decide.

All in all, I recommend buying this one. Don't download select tracks like you did with Devil's Night. As with the other two albums, too many of these songs are rap classics for you to waste your time on that. This album is a very close second place in the Eminem library, and that means it's in the top ten (twenty at most) rap albums of all time. And even Sully should be able to rap along to this one.


posted by Zimri on 19:26 | link |

And more...


So much new shit goin' down in tha Ho.o.D. that I had to restructure the Reli Index. The PB22220 and Visionary Gospel pages detailed below have undergone some more work. And there's yet another project, to handle the emendments that turned the source(s) of John into John. In effect John is a visionary gospel too.


posted by Zimri on 18:12 | link |

Saturday, June 08, 2002

The fitful resurrection of the House of David


I've ducked back into Bible-land. This time I've been trying to made head or tail of Papyrus Berolinensis 22220.

My first priority was just deciding what it was. It has gospel material, but the focus is on dialogues and visions... much like the gnostic Gospel of Mary. I had to make up a new genre-tag, the "visionary gospel" to take this sort of thing into account, and a new project to explain it.

While I was at it I also tossed in the Secret Booke of James the Apostle from JC Wilson's unforgivably out-of-print Mysterium. I know, the Secret Booke is structured as an epistle, so it's not a perfect match. But then, nothing is a perfect match, and "visionary gospel" fits the Secret Booke much better than "sayings gospel" did anyway.

But back to P.B. 22220. There's another new project here. Its job is just to fill in what the editors of PB22220, being sensible and wise folk, chose to leave for the Internet.

I go back to whence I came. If you want to follow me, follow.


posted by Zimri on 20:44 | link |

Monday, June 03, 2002

Glenn Reynolds says I'm an idiot


Not intentionally, of course. The comment was obliquely directed at children's author Philip Pullman, who has the audacity to criticise the much-loved Christian propagandist CS Lewis. But for my own proto-blog look at Lewis's mendacity and/or illogic, as seen in the very conclusion of the Gospel of Narnia, feel free to enter the cowshed.

As for Instapundit's background link - dealing with Philip Pullman as the anti-Lewis - that much will have to await another essay, because I haven't yet finished the series. I will just sum up what Lewis's "cowshed parable" taught me. First, Lewis was writing propaganda for the faith. Second, this propaganda was aimed at pre-adolescents. Third, it mocked the evidence of one's own senses versus - literally - blind obedience to Lewis's assumptions. Fourth, the logic was awful. In short, Lewis made a career out of peddling lies to children.

This leaves aside Lewis's racism; not one "darky" redeems the ranks of his southland Calormen, where even Tolkien had the Sons of Bòr. It also leaves aside Lewis's authoritarianism - that fantasy ideal of Narnia, like Iraq, does without that messy business of electioneering. I'd rather be considered an "idiot", thank you very much.


posted by Zimri on 22:28 | link |

Saturday, June 01, 2002

Studies in Afrocentrist historiography


Another proclivity I have indulged during my "vacation" was reading books. Most recently I've acquired two on the intersection of ancient African history and modern anti-Black racism. The first is Mapping Human History by Steve Olson, and the second The Rescue of Jerusalem by Henry Aubin. The first discusses genetic differences between human races and how these differences can track a map of male and female migrations down the ages; the first five chapters thus deal with the first human continent, Africa. The second looks at the evidence for the lifting of the Assyrian siege of Jerusalem, 701 BCE, at which time the Nubian prince Taharqâ was campaigning in Judah on behalf of its king Hezeqiah. Both are relevant to the academic "Afrocentric" movement.

Supporters of Afrocentrism would call it a movement to research fairly aspects of the history of subsaharan Africans. The Afrocentrist starts out with the (accurate) assumption that our ancient-history books are grounded in the scholarship of the late 1800's and early 1900's. He further notes that the historians of that time were Germans, English, and French, citizens of countries which were just then setting out on an adventure of colonialism, and that these historians in particular not only did not know of African achievements but hated actual living Africans. He concludes that books of African history need to be re-written from an African perspective.

But some - like Martin Bernal - have not kept themselves to African history but have attempted to re-write European history too. Most classicists have been debunking Bernal's assertions, notably Mary Lefkowitz in Not Out of Africa and, more comprehensively, with other contributors in Black Athena Revisited. If this book represents a middle ground, it seems to be that Bernal could be right where the evidence doesn't exist, that Bernal is not as bad as the racist scholars of the past, and that therefore Lefkowitz etc. are wrong (closet-racist?) to attack Bernal's work so vehemently.

I do not agree with that assessment. I think the facts are what matter; interpretation and theory come later. In fact, what better argument could there be for an Afrocentrism that meets the standards of objectivity?

Olson and Aubin are writing Afrocentric history. But from an objective standpoint, we need to know if they are writing good history.

Start with Olson. His Africa section is not structured as history, but as moral exhortation: that human races have a lot in common, and that racism has no grounding in science. The first five chapters are largely made up of homilies to that effect, bringing up such diversions as Charles Murray's Bell Curve. Nor is this sermonising confined to Africa; in a section on the Near East he takes a swipe at the American Pledge of Allegiance: "a state's need to broaden the allegiance of its people". It is unfortunate that he could not impose more discipline on his work, because it is extensively endnoted, and there must be some fine gems in the referenced material that did not make it into the book. Luca Cavalli-Sforza calls "this book... an excellent antidote against bigotry". It is better described as a bromide; it may treat the symptoms temporarily, but unlike a true antidote will not fix their cause. It is also likely to be violently rejected by those not already disposed to accept it. Accordingly I cannot recommend this book for the scholar interested in African origins (but I might photocopy the bibliography for him or her).

Aubin, on the other hand, does impose the necessary discipline. He deals with the evidence first, and only at the end does he look into why our history books do not match the evidence. The primary sources are Assyrian records and modern archaeology; Egyptian records are thin on the ground but these also exist. Later on, there is the Bible: as it stands, 2 Kings carries three sources hashed together, of which two are likely primary as well; and Isaiah 1-39 carries heavily-edited oracles originally intended to dissuade Hezeqiah from resisting Assyria. The last source is Herodotos, whose Histories here depend on northern Egyptian vulgate history, the sort taught in Delta schools circa 450 BCE. At this time Egypt was under the overlordship of the 25th Dynasty, a house of subsaharan Africans from Kush (also "Nubia").

The sources agree on the important details. Judah called on the Kushites for help. The Kushites gave it. Assyria took all Judah but did not take Jerusalem. At some point Kush/Egypt marched against Assyria. Assyria then reached terms with Judah and did not return until the turn of the next Assyrian tyrant. Finally, under that tyrant (Esarheddon), Assyria came back, invaded Egypt, burnt down Thebes, and installed the pliant 26th Dynasty which went on to ravage Kush.

Where these sources disagree is what happened when Kush met Assyria - or even if it happened. Assyria claims there was a battle before the siege and that its army fended off the attack, taking some Egyptians hostage (but not Kushites). The Bible (followed by John Calvin!) claims that an Angel of the Lord wielded a sword against the beseigers, that 185,000 soldiers died, and that the army fled upon hearing that the Kushites were coming to finish the job. Herodotos's sources told him that the invaders faced a plague of mice, and then fled before the Kushites.

Before the middle of the 19th century, majority opinion was with Calvin and the Bible; the Assyrians suffered a disaster during the siege and when Kush arrived, decided to pack their bags. But then came the rise of racism in European scholarship, which accented the disaster (plague, by cross-referencing Herodotos's mice with Biblical mouse/plague references elsewhere) over Kushite involvement. Unflattering portraits of Kushites and Egyptians were found in the Bible, however out of context, "proving" that the 25th Dynasty were like the craven and meddlesome 26th, who really had let Judah down when the Babylonians came.

Aubin on the other hand wants the pendulum to swing the other way. He points out that the mouse story derives from a culture that did not associate mice with plague, but with the will of Egyptian gods. The angel meanwhile represents the threat of war; or perhaps thirst. There is in short no real evidence for a plague, but plenty of evidence for Kushites scaring the kilts off Assyrians.

To sum up, Olson's book represents not history but the use of history to serve an end. Its digressive style and moralising tone make any attempted extraction of fact an arduous task. Aubin, on the other hand, has written a fine work of history, and one that is a joy to read. Where Olson seeks to lead by exhortation, Aubin leads by example. Accordingly Olson's work will not help the state of history-writing to the degree of Aubin's - nor, I submit, will it so help race relations.


posted by Zimri on 17:30 | link |

It's been awhile


My apologies for the nearly month-long absence - and perhaps deeper apologies for choosing to come back. Other events have overtaken me, none of which are blogger-related. Sometimes I feel that I'm just not meant for this form of editorialising. But then the "Post to The House of David" field pops up and suddenly I get this... need.

One such event - which led to both the absence and the return - is this one. I've expanded what I alluded to below (slightly prematurely) into a coherent theory of how the four Gospels came to be. I believe they amount to a new Synoptic Problem.

The classic Synoptic Problem lies in trying to explain why Mark, Matthew, and Luke agree with each other word for word; John is thought to be somewhere off in Gnostic territory and is usually ignored for this purpose. The old-time S.P. is infamous in the Three Amigos sense, and is immediately apparent to anyone who has followed a one year course in Greek with a cursory flip through the New Testament. The usual solution to this problem is that Mark came first, and then Luke and Matthew "used" Mark. The problem that leads to is that Luke and Matthew agree in other matters against Mark, like usually-expanded variants of some parables, sayings, and anecdotes, and inclusions of much, much more, but we don't need to get into that here.

The important issue for my purposes is that, assuming Markan priority, Matthew seems to be an expanded revision of Mark, and Luke seems to be a paraphrase. For example, the Anointment scene in Simon's house. In Mark and Matthew, Jesus says "the poor will always be with us but you will not have me" and considers it a prequel to the Passion, but in Luke the event deals with a woman's redemption and is not at all linked with the Passion.

The classic Synoptic Problem is tricky enough to deal with, so few have looked at John's relation to all this. John Dominic Crossan, author of Who Killed Jesus?, thinks John knew all three synoptics but wrote something different from all of them. Evan Powell, author of the criminally neglected The Unknown Gospel, decided that Mark was written as a reaction to John. This really amounts to a tacit acknowledgement of a feature I would like to make public: in which Mark and Matthew agree with John.

But it's more than that. Where Mark and Matthew are agreeing with John, they agree against Luke, including in the example I gave above. Plus, where they agree, Mark does it to downplay, co-opt, or even (Mark 14:55-60 v. John 2:19) contradict John. Lastly, the agreements better suit a Gospel attributed to John that is shorn of the elements that link it with the Epistles attributed to John.

I am convinced that this is a "deutero-synoptic" problem. My solution is a variation of Powell's: there was a pre-Mark and a pre-John, each written against one another, more specifically for and against Saint Peter, respectively. Luke was based on pre-Mark. Then someone took pre-Mark and revised it against pre-John, making something much more like Mark Mark. Matthew then came about as a revision to Mark and John as a revision to pre-John. Pre-John has only been found in fragments - the Egerton fragments. Mark meanwhile came close to not surviving at all.

Last time I posted on this subject, I confess that I didn't have the evidence to merge all potential pre-Johns, including Egerton, into one coherent Gospel. I had jumped at a hunch. I needed time to explain why that hunch should be likely. So that is one reason I have not been blogging, a pretty major one actually.


posted by Zimri on 14:40 | link |

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