The Question of the Greek New Testament

[Godscreated]

With all that's been said here, we have this, we do not know what the originals were written in, we have none of them. Those originals were copied over and over and probably in many language of the first century. They would have been copied into a language for the intended audience. There were churches established in Jewish communities and Greek communities more than any other, we are told of Ethiopians receiving the message. Aractus has noted that the NT is seen in many older languages. Like he said Greek was the most common language and those who could write would do so in Greek, Greek was the language that was in the educational system of the time. None the less originals could have been and probably were written in Greek and Hebrew for the peoples they were intended for. Nevertheless what does it matter what language they were originally written in we do not have them. Also, Paul being a Roman citizen would be able to speak and write in Greek and, being educated in the Jewish community and probably by priest could speak and write in Hebrew and Aramaic.

GC

[Wyrd of Gawd]

In the past few years, though, something occurred to me.  Jesus wasn't Greek. Neither did he speak Greek. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John weren't Greek. Neither did they speak Greek.  Peter, Paul, James and Jude weren't Greek. Neither did they speak Greek. So how could an authentic NT have been originally written in Greek?

Paul was Greek. He was a Roman citizen and could read and write Greek:

Galations 6:11: "See with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand."
1 Corinthians 16:21 "I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand."

As for the others, they probably all could speak Greek, Aramaic and maybe Hebrew (depending on how commonplace it was in first century Jerusalem). The Bible does say that Peter and John were illiterate (Acts 4:13), but it doesn't preclude them from being able to dictate correspondence. Paul used scribes (e.g. Romans 16:22 "I Tertius, who wrote this letter, greet you in the Lord."), despite the fact that he could write them himself.

The two main authors of the NT are "Luke" and Paul. Luke wrote Luke-Acts, and by volume it's greater than all of the epistles attributed to Paul combined. We don't know for sure who wrote Luke-Acts, but it is the work of a single author, and was written sometime in the first century. Paul wrote about 7 epistles that we know of, and the others appear to be pseudonymous works. Galations, 1-2 Corinthians, and Romans are all examples of works that Paul DID write.

Paul was the original BS'er.  By his own words he  claimed to be whoever the crowd wanted him to be.  He claimed to have been a Jew, a Roman, maybe a Greek.  Some people thought that he was an Egyptian terrorist.  He was the ultimate con man.

[Aractus]

^ I don't know where you come up with these wacky ideas. Paul was martyred for his beliefs, and as far as we can tell he was executed in the 60's in the first century. That's consistent with the internal evidence in his epistles, with the accounts given in Acts, with the written recollections by early 2nd century church figures, and by the fact that his presence in Christianity ends at the end of Acts which itself terminates in the mid-60's. There are no further letters from him, and there are no further mentions of him alive.

What kind of a con man is willing to suffer persecution and die for their con??

[Minimalist]

Paul was martyred for his beliefs, and as far as we can tell he was executed in the 60's in the first century.

And, where is the evidence for that statement?

[Aractus]

As per my previous post I outlined the evidence. The direct evidence is from the second century, but the first century evidence on its own shows that Paul mysteriously disappears completely after being put under house arrest. That in combination with the fact that he writes about his persecution (see 2 Corinthians 11) means the most likely scenario for his sudden disappearance is his execution.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

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@Arac

Abdul Alhazred explicitly claims to be writing the Necronomicon, Odin explicitly claims to have written the Havamal.  Neither of these attributions are factual - of course.  Nothing prevents you or I from claiming to be Paul, and no amount of either of us claiming to be Paul will actually make the claim true.  Nor would our use of a secretary make either of us any more likely to actually be Paul or have anything, whatsoever, to say on that matter.  There is -no- work attributed to Paul that does not come under criticism.  The very notion of a "Paul" has problems all it;s own..before we ever get to the point of determining what - if anything- any "Paul" might have written.  

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There are 7 works attributed to Paul that even critical scholars like Bart Ehrman don't dispute. He wrote at least those 7 letters, and about that there is almost no doubt.

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Thanks for your input.

Yes, the verse in 1 Corinthians makes it probable that at least that epistle was written in Greek. In fact, now that you mention it, the pseudonymous nature of so much of the NT makes it possible that it was written in Greek.  My understanding is that1, as you suggested, Jesus spoke Aramaic (a Semitic language). That being the caw, I question the authenticity of a NT originally written in Greek (an Indo-European language).

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All the apostles and Jesus would have been able to speak Greek. They were bilingual if not trilingual. Just like India has the largest population of English speakers in the world today, despite their national language being - Indian. Almost all Indian people are bilingual. Similar story with aboriginal people who still speak their native languages - which just goes so much further to prove the point that an Aramaic speaking people under a Greek jurisdiction would have been bilingual.

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As for your point about what language were the books of the Bible written in, that's something that can be addressed with Biblical criticism. There was, for instance, the Gospel of the Hebrews - although it no longer exists we know exactly how long it was and what it contained. Despite its existence, the vast majority of new testament scholars do not believe it to be the original textual basis of Matthew which they believe to have been originally written in Greek. Same thing with most, if not all, of the other books of the new testament. There are some books of the Apocrypha which are believed to have originally been written in Hebrew, and the book of Daniel was for a long time considered to have been written in Hebrew. That is until the discovery of the dead sea scrolls, which has now led scholars to conclude that it has always been a curious bilingual work (that starts in Hebrew, switches to Aramaic and then returns to Hebrew).

A "biblical scholar" is a historian that specialises in the history of either the NT times or the OT times. Israel Finkelstein, for instance, is an archaeologist who specialises in iron-age Palestinian(/Israeli) history. You wouldn't ask a new testament scholar about the old testament text, just as you wouldn't ask Finkelstein about the new testament - that just isn't his area of expertise. A "critical scholar" refers to scholars that are non-religious, it's a somewhat ambiguous term since religious scholars can also be quite critical, and one that comes to mind is Dan Wallace. I would take what Wallace has to say more seriously than what Bart Ehrman has to say, even though Ehrman is the so-called "critical scholar". Mind you, I'd pay even more attention to Finkelstein, but as he's an iron-age archaeologist he doesn't have an opinion on who wrote the NT and in what languages, for that we need to ask Dan Wallace and his colleagues.

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India is second to the US for the number of English speakers in absolute numbers.  .http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List...population

[Minimalist]

So, IOW, you have no evidence and you are relying on silly traditions which were invented as explanations.  Does that about cover it?


(Don't knock yourself out.  There is no evidence.)

[Aractus]

No, it's based on the written record which is all we have. You base your ideas on nothing at all.

Anyway it doesn't even matter whether he was martyred or not, he was persecuted for his beliefs and this is in the primary written record.

[Minimalist]

What WRITTEN record?

There's nothing from the first century and dubious 2d century "accounts." 

It's the same with "jesus" BTW.  No real evidence.  Just the pious blathering of later believers.

[Aractus]

Yes there is. Daniel B. Wallace said in 2012 that there is a first century Mark fragment that had yet to be published while debating Bart Ehrman (who knew nothing about it). Although the fragment has not yet been published, it has been confirmed to exist and to date to before 90 AD:

• Although the first-century gospel fragment is small, the text will provide clues as to whether the Gospel of Mark changed over time, Evans said.His own research is focused on analyzing the mummy mask texts, to try to determine how long people held onto them before disposing or reusing them. This can yield valuable information about how biblical texts were copied over time."We have every reason to believe that the original writings and their earliest copies would have been in circulation for a hundred years in most cases — in some cases much longer, even 200 years," he said.This means that "a scribe making a copy of a script in the third century could actually have at his disposal (the) first-century originals, or first-century copies, as well as second-century copies."

Whether you like it or not, Biblical scholars now do have a fragmentary source confirmed to have come from the first century, and they are working to put back together what they have and publish it later this year. From the time taken to have this published and the description it's safe to say it will be a more substantial publication than P52.

My my, isn't it interesting how you're never aware of any evidence?