The Tale Got Better With the Telling

[Drich]

Then, "Make is So."

Everyone take out your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 13.

Mark 13:1-2 And as he went out of the temple, one of his disciples saith unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here!
And Jesus answering said unto him, Seest thou these great buildings? there shall not be left one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

This is a reference to, at the earliest, the Jewish uprising and sacking of Jerusalem in 70 CE. At the latest, the Bar Kochbar revolt of the 2nd century. Since 70 CE is the earlier date, conventional apologists use this as the date of publication for the Gospel of Mark. Fringy apologetics tries to push the date even earlier but must account for the "little apocalypse" in Mark 13.

To cite Robert Price, "The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man" p32

No one denies that Mark 13 …has the immediate destruction of Jerusalem in its sights, so apologists admit Mark must have been written in the general neighborhood of 70 CE.

Most apologists do, at least. Skeptics claim the apocalypse is a reference to the Bar Kochbar revolt and places the date of publication c 130.

Can I continue with my analysis of the order of the NT books and what they indicate?

So?
I am assuming you lead with your strongest evidence. If that is the case then may I ask Who cares what robert Price thinks in the face of
Evidence that defines the known time line of authorship?

[DeistPaladin]

So?
I am assuming you lead with your strongest evidence. If that is the case then may I ask Who cares what robert Price thinks in the face of
Evidence that defines the known time line of authorship?

Robert Price is only providing support for my primary reason for thinking (as many other scholars do) that 70 CE is the earliest date for the Book of Mark, because of Mark 13.

I'm curious as to why some apologists feel justified in pushing the date earlier than the one indicated by scripture.

[Minimalist]

Most apologists do, at least. Skeptics claim the apocalypse is a reference to the Bar Kochbar revolt and places the date of publication c 130.

The Bar Kochba revolt has the additional support in the fact that the city really was LEVELED at that time in order for the Romans to build Aelia Capitolina on top of the ruins.

Xtians HATE facts more than they hate fucking SIN!

[Aiza]

http://www.errantskeptics.org/Dating-Revelation.htm
Shows a long list of various estimations, none of which are prior to the Epistles-- none of them are prior to the Gospels!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Revelation#Dating
Has a wikipedia article on dating, and mentions most scholars go for the 95 date.

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/
Has a date range of 90-95 (Revelation is also known as the Apocalypse of John)...

There is no way you can say the Apocalypse of John prior to the Epistles (!), or Mark, and its after most estimations of Luke+Matthew as well.

[Angrboda]

From http://www.errantskeptics.org, cited by Astro as an authority on dating John:

Can we say with absolute certainty that every single born again Christian has a guardian angel? No! Can we say with absolute certainty that every single born again Christian does not have a guardian angel? No! We can say with absolute certainty, however, that angels do have a mission to care for people who are born again. It really does not matter if we have one individual angel assigned to us or if all the angels are responsible for carrying out God’s instructions to take care of us. The most important thing for us to realize is that God loves us and thus we are not alone.

Thanks, but I prefer to get my history from people who aren't wearing tinfoil hats.

[Aiza]

From http://www.errantskeptics.org, cited by Astro as an authority on dating John:

Is 'Astro' another one of your attempts at a burn? (Don't answer that...)

Seriously though, I was pointing to the long sourced list of a variety of estimations from scholars, and to be sure I got 2 other links on top of that.

No educated person says the Apocalypse of John came before the Pauline Epistles.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

No educated person says the Apocalypse of John came before the Pauline Epistles.

There you go again making an unsupported truth claim. Also a no true Scotsman fallacy.

Scholastic opinion varies about the date,as it does about the identity of "John of Patmos" the obscurists/deluded froot loop(s) who wrote Revelations.


Most scholars accept a date somewhere between 48 and 95 CE. That does not infer that ALL scholars accept Revelation was written before the Epistles which seem to have been written between CE 37-40 (at Damascus) and 66- 67 (Second Timothy)

There isno consenus about which of Paul's letters are forgeries, although some scholars acknowledge there is probably at least one in the canon.

[Aiza]

There you go again making an unsupported truth claim. Also a no true Scotsman fallacy.

Scholastic opinion varies about the date,as it does about the identity of "John of Patmos" the obscurists/deluded froot loop(s) who wrote Revelations.

Scholastic opinion does "vary" but I have never seen a single scholastic opinion which places it before the Epistles. I am more than happy to be proven wrong if you can find me a single estimate which says Apocalypse of John is the earliest extant Christian writing. I am not trying to be absolutist at all here: find me just one educated and legitimate source which tries to assert the order found in the OP.

[Angrboda]

Well, yes, Astro, it was a bit of cheek. You apparently don't watch the sci-fi crime drama Fringe. One of the main characters, Walter Bishop, who is something of a cross between a mad scientist and the absent-minded professor, is continually getting his lab assistant Astrid's name wrong. It's a running gag.

Anyway, for what it's worth, the somewhat inverted chronology at the head of this thread sounds somewhat far-fetched to me, but then one can make a decent argument for putting them in any random order; what that most likely tells us is that there isn't enough quality information to draw any conclusions, aside from the most gross, such as that a text or oral tradition preceded them and informed their content, rather than them being independently derived, and so forth.