Illiterate men.

[FallentoReason]

I met up with a Christian friend today at university. Long story short, I took us on a tangent to what we were discussing about the Bible and I decided to see what his responses would be with some of the 'inconsistencies I happened to stumble upon'.

I told him that Jesus and his disciples were all illiterate, which explains why Jesus never wrote anything. For the disciples this meant that we could confidently say that, yes, Church tradition did infact label the Gospels and we don't actually know who wrote them, but we can speculate that the 4 disciples passed on their accounts to people who could write. I didn't want to go all out and state that the disciples never took part in the writing of Gospels because of what we know historically about the writings.

Anyways;
1) he says that Jesus could actually read because it says in the NT that he read scripture.

2) he talked about this: John 21:20,24,25 Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved...This is the disciple who is bearing witness about these things, and who has written these things, and we know that his testimony is true. Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

So;
Q1) Is this credible within the pages of the NT? Jesus is meant to come from the lowest of the low. How does he gain the resources to get an education?

Q2) The implication is that the author mentions that John wrote down everything else except this ending, because the author refers to himself as someone apart from John. What can we say historically about the Gospel of John and how it came to be? Is the anonymous author giving credit to John for his own work, by making it seem like he only added the last portion that says John wrote everything?

[Creed of Heresy]

A1 [delicious steak sauce]: Well a vast majority of his life is a complete blank. Like...decades of his life is completely unwritten about. He could have studied during this time. The bigger question is why are the majority of the details of supposedly the life of the son of god so poorly recorded by his own disciples? Why do we know more about the life of Egyptian Pharaohs who have no effect on the world and who had no real effect on the world and yet we know next to nothing about Jesus as a person?

A2: ...No idea. XD

[fuckass365]

If he can miracle his ass across the ocean he can miracle himself an education.

[Drich]

Q1) Is this credible within the pages of the NT? Jesus is meant to come from the lowest of the low. How does he gain the resources to get an education?

First to answer the original question why was nothing written down. I asked who to say nothing was? It was a massive undertaking and extremely expensive to not only get writing materials but to store said writings in such away as to be preserved. One had to know people, and unless you were a scribe or Pharisee yourself it would be most likely your efforts would have been lost. That is why in that culture in that time the oral tradition of verbally passing down accounts were held in such high regard. Remember there is nearly a 70 year gap between the events that had taken place until the newly form church had the resources to record and story the written works of the remaining apostles.

The answer to this question:
There is a story of Christ as a young child being lost by His parents for 3 days, and was found teaching the rabbis in the synagogue. Apparently He did not have a need for a formal education.

Q2) The implication is that the author mentions that John wrote down everything else except this ending, because the author refers to himself as someone apart from John. What can we say historically about the Gospel of John and how it came to be? Is the anonymous author giving credit to John for his own work, by making it seem like he only added the last portion that says John wrote everything?

There are 3 other works accredited to John aside from the gospel account. writing style and subject matter coupled with how he identifies himself all point to a singular authorship. That said it was not uncommon for men like John to use a Scribe to record what he himself could not.

[FallentoReason]

Thanks for your response Drich. I always look forward to reading what you have to say.

Firstly, to avoid confusion between my beliefs and what the members of the forum see as my beliefs, I just want to state that within this thread the framework that I am using to deal with the ideas at hand is one that is entirely within the pages of the NT. That is, by agreeing or disagreeing with arguments I am not implying that I believe that to reflect history (with all due respect Drich ). Now, onwards!

First to answer the original question why was nothing written down. I asked who to say nothing was? It was a massive undertaking and extremely expensive to not only get writing materials but to store said writings in such away as to be preserved. One had to know people, and unless you were a scribe or Pharisee yourself it would be most likely your efforts would have been lost. That is why in that culture in that time the oral tradition of verbally passing down accounts were held in such high regard.

Ok, this is reasonable.

Remember there is nearly a 70 year gap between the events that had taken place until the newly form church had the resources to record and story the written works of the remaining apostles.

How does this fit in with the fact that the Apostles were all martyred? I'm not entirely familiar with the approximate dates of their deaths. So, did the canonical authors actually die after the 70 year gap, enabling them to make the Gospels?

There is a story of Christ as a young child being lost by His parents for 3 days, and was found teaching the rabbis in the synagogue. Apparently He did not have a need for a formal education.

Even nowadays I highly doubt that a child has the ability to fast track their mental capabilities. Even less probable for this to happen within the span of 3 days.

There are 3 other works accredited to John aside from the gospel account. writing style and subject matter coupled with how he identifies himself all point to a singular authorship. That said it was not uncommon for men like John to use a Scribe to record what he himself could not.

Ok, for this one let me step out of the framework I defined and talk about history as I currently know it. What do you think about the possibility that Revelations was the first book written, even before the Gospels? Does that change anything?

---

A1 [delicious steak sauce]: Well a vast majority of his life is a complete blank. Like...decades of his life is completely unwritten about. He could have studied during this time. The bigger question is why are the majority of the details of supposedly the life of the son of god so poorly recorded by his own disciples? Why do we know more about the life of Egyptian Pharaohs who have no effect on the world and who had no real effect on the world and yet we know next to nothing about Jesus as a person?

A2: ...No idea. XD

I guess with Pharaohs it was part of the culture to treat them like gods pretty much and annotate their history down on the walls of pyramids and stuff..

[Doubting Thomas]

I say it's all just a made up story so the authors of the gospels could make Jesus do or be anything they wanted. We might as well be arguing whether or not Huckleberry Finn was literate or not.

[Mister Agenda]

If there was a singular Yeshua the Gospels are based on, he would seem to have been considered a rabbi, which implies some learning, although it could have been by oral tradition. Even if he were illiterate, it doesn't seem unlikely that there would be one or two literate men among the disciples. They weren't ALL fomer fishermen.

Very little can be known for certain of these people, but I don't think there's a good case that the entire group was illiterate.

[FallentoReason]

I say it's all just a made up story so the authors of the gospels could make Jesus do or be anything they wanted. We might as well be arguing whether or not Huckleberry Finn was literate or not.

What I'm after in this thread is a better understanding of the internal consistency of the NT. It would be like analysing Star Wars and making sure that there's no contradictions that say Darth Vader was Luke's father but at the same time they also mentioned he actually wasn't. This fact is independent of whether it's real or not.

Of course the NT is somewhat different in nature because it I meant to be a collection of non-fiction work. Essentially I want to see how far the NT can be pushed until things start interfering with history from the point of view of Bible scholars.

---

If there was a singular Yeshua the Gospels are based on, he would seem to have been considered a rabbi, which implies some learning, although it could have been by oral tradition. Even if he were illiterate, it doesn't seem unlikely that there would be one or two literate men among the disciples. They weren't ALL fomer fishermen.

Very little can be known for certain of these people, but I don't think there's a good case that the entire group was illiterate.

I guess for the authors of the canonical Gospels, we can say Matthew was most likely able to write as he was a tax collector. Luke was a physician but I don't know if back then that meant you also had the ability to read and write. Mark I'm not sure what his background was and John I also don't know what his background was...

[Minimalist]

1) he says that Jesus could actually read because it says in the NT that he read scripture.

It says in Star Wars that Luke Skywalker had a light saber.

(Hint: That's fiction, too.)


Anyway, there have been books written on the subject - (expensive books, btw)

http://www.powells.com/biblio?isbn=9780674033818

How many people could read and write in the ancient world of the Greeks and Romans?

No one has previously tried to give a systematic answer to this question. Most historians who have considered the problem at all have given optimistic assessments, since they have been impressed by large bodies of ancient written material such as the graffiti at Pompeii. They have also been influenced by a tendency to idealize the Greek and Roman world and its educational system.

In Ancient Literacy W. V. Harris provides the first thorough exploration of the levels, types, and functions of literacy in the classical world, from the invention of the Greek alphabet about 800 B.C. down to the fifth century A.D. Investigations of other societies show that literacy ceases to be the accomplishment of a small elite only in specific circumstances. Harris argues that the social and technological conditions of the ancient world were such as to make mass literacy unthinkable. Noting that a society on the verge of mass literacy always possesses an elaborate school system, Harris stresses the limitations of Greek and Roman schooling, pointing out the meagerness of funding for elementary education.

Neither the Greeks nor the Romans came anywhere near to completing the transition to a modern kind of written culture. They relied more heavily on oral communication than has generally been imagined. Harris examines the partial transition to written culture, taking into consideration the economic sphere and everyday life, as well as law, politics, administration, and religion. He has much to say also about the circulation of literary texts throughout classical antiquity.

The limited spread of literacy in the classical world had diverse effects. It gave some stimulus to critical thought and assisted the accumulation of knowledge, and the minority that did learn to read and write was to some extent able to assert itself politically. The written word was also an instrument of power, and its use was indispensable for the construction and maintenance of empires. Most intriguing is the role of writing in the new religious culture of the late Roman Empire, in which it was more and more revered but less and less practiced.

What frequently gets missed is that there are degrees of literacy, even today. We have functional illiterates....we call them high school dropouts... who can write their name and maybe read a traffic sign or two but if you handed them an actual book they would use it for a door stop.

[Undeceived]

Q1) Is this credible within the pages of the NT? Jesus is meant to come from the lowest of the low. How does he gain the resources to get an education?

This is a good journal on the topic:
http://www.craigaevans.com/evans.pdf

We have no reason to believe Jesus did not know how to read. He was called 'Rabbi' and rabbis are usually well educated. If he was not literate he at least memorized the Torah and much of the prophets' writings, else no one would take his words seriously. Most Jewish children had the opportunity for school, at least (http://www.scribd.com/doc/2958111/jewish...ient-times). Carpentry was not "lowest of the low," it was middle class. As for the disciples, they were likely literate too. Matthew was a tax collector, and as such was required to keep records. Luke is interpreted to have been a physician by the Greek medical terms he commonly uses (http://www.victorshepherd.on.ca/Sermons/Luke.htm ) and by Paul's reference to "the beloved physician" in Colossians 4:14. Mark's profession is not known, though his later occupation is what matters--he was bishop of Alexandria from 43-62AD, which obviously would require literacy. John was a fisherman, so his status remains up in the air.

The other disciples, in case you're curious: http://bibleseo.com/gospels/jesus-discip...ccupation/

To my eyes, the whole argument of whether Biblical characters were illiterate is rather pointless. At best you get a 50/50 maybe. But saying, "the disciples may have been illiterate, therefore they couldn't have written their respective books" is like me saying, "I may not have gone to work on Monday. Therefore I did not get any work done." That, technically speaking, is a bad argument. I could have just as easily gone to work on Monday, in which case I did get work done. You don't know. Critics who make this type of argument are only trying to dupe the less-discerning populace over to their side, or pretend that everyone in the ancient world was an idiot. If literacy was anywhere, it was the Roman Empire, and particularly, a Jewish state full of scribes.
Found quotations that would indicate high literacy: http://thriceholy.net/literacyf.html

Q2) The implication is that the author mentions that John wrote down everything else except this ending, because the author refers to himself as someone apart from John. What can we say historically about the Gospel of John and how it came to be? Is the anonymous author giving credit to John for his own work, by making it seem like he only added the last portion that says John wrote everything?

The phrase "the disciple whom Jesus loved" or, in John 20:2, the "Beloved Disciple" is used five times in the John's Gospel, but no where else. It is commonly thought that John referred to himself in the third-person because he didn't see his name worthy or formal enough to be part of the text. John is the only disciple not mentioned by name, and the other gospels fill in, so the phrase is surely in reference to him. I don't follow your logic, though. By never mentioning his name, an anonymous author is not giving credit to John. If anything, the author is avoiding giving credit at all, which would fit with John's humble writing style. Also, the gospel's closing words go, "It is this disciple who testifies to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true" (21:24). It can then be said that the author intends the reader to know that John did indeed author the words we call the Gospel of John. That leaves only two doors: blatant dishonesty on the part of church fathers or John being the true author.