Historian of Early Christianity waiting for school to start . . . ask me anything!

[Wannano]

Around the 300s, people waited until they were nearly dead to baptize.

The Bible records baptizing whole households, though assuming this included those under the age of reason is an assumption (even if it is a reasonable one).

There was a large debate about the baptism of infants around the 500s if I recall.

I would be interested in knowing what it was about if you happen to find it.

 

[DetectiveNiko]

Yeah I would say we should have a healthy dose of skepticism for everything in life, and make sure not to be overly skeptical (Which I tend to do), but there is a problem here.
If we just assume that the whole bible is true just because some event in it is true,historical, then what about all other non-christian religious texts ? Then they are automatically true aswell, like this event :

Splitting of the Moon - Wikipedia

It has a good tradition behind it, some (although very little) evidence to suggest its truthfulness, yet we as Catholics don’t believe it.

The problem with not giving the Bible skepticism arises when we get out of the subjective and apply it to all other religions (Also please tell me if I am stepping out of bounds, this is not a thread for talking about this kind of stuff

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Hi Bill!

I took a secular class on Roman history where the professor discussed two theories of Church expansion: (1) that the Church expanded rapidly in the years 40-80 AD, and more moderately later, and (2) that the Church didn’t expand that fast at first, but expanded very, very rapidly in the years just before Constantine.

Which theory would you lean toward, and why?

 

[PJM]

I’m being sincere here,

From a historical and biblical history How can; or perhaps a better question might be; CAN Catholicism be disproved historically.

This ought to give an opportunity to STRUT your stuff:smiley:

With Blessings

Patrick

 

[Myronthecatholic]

Not sure if this is off-topic or on, but what would the bible-as-history approach say about Matthew chapter 19? There seems to be a difference of opinion, at the least, between Moses and Jesus concerning divorce. What were the social mores at the time? Later at the end of the chapter, there are “…three reasons that a man cannot marry…”. Again, what was going on at the time; that is, how were those statements understood? (Today’s interpretation may be different). To be precise, I’m reading the Today’s English Version, American Bible Society translation.

 

[Kei]

You’re actually making an either or fallacy, whether or not you realize it. Or is it more a strawman? Anyway, you take what I said and made it into what I did not say…

 

[billsherman]

What is the first historical reference to Rome’s primacy? I don’t know of one prior to Irenaeus.

Clement I has an extant letter in which he was intervening in a dispute elsewhere. I believe the Vatican holds this as the earliest evidence of Roman primacy.

 

[billsherman]

Do you believe in Q?

Do I think it existed? Yes.

Why over the testimony of those who were in the same time period?

This is definitely the weakest part of the Two Source Hypothesis. I still believe that “Q” existed, even though no one ever mentions it in a letter, because the textual criticism argument makes too much sense. In essence, it had to exist if the theory is correct. And the theory remains the best resolution of the Synaptic Problem to date. I expect one of two things will happen someday: “Q” or a reference to it will be found, or someone much smarter than me will come up with a better answer to the Synaptic Problem.

If you do believe in Q, is it a written or oral tradition?

The quotations taken from it in Luke and Matthew are too similar for it to have been anything but a written source. James Dunn, in particular, disputes that. He believes the similarities can be explained through oral differences, but I don’t think we understand the oral tradition nearly well enough to make that leap.

 

[billsherman]

How much of the Gospel of John is actually historical? Are there any sayings which scholars believe do go back as far as some of the sayings found in the Synoptics/Q source? What would be judged as authentic?

I can’t give a number on the percentage that is historical, but I do believe it is broadly historical. That means most of the events depicted probably did occur in some form. And yes, there are certainly parts that go back to the oral traditions. Most scholars believe John is the most accurate on the timing of the passion and crucifixion sequence for example.

Also, would you characterize Jesus as an eschatological prophet like E.P. Sanders, or as a wisdom teacher like John Dominic Crossan?

Closer to Sanders for certain. Crossan has much to add to the debate, but I believe he seriously misinterprets crucial documents (primarily his insistence in the face of much evidence that the Gospel of Thomas pre-date Mark, and his bizarre theory that the Gospel of Peter contains the earliest form of the Passion).

The scholar I am the closest to on the Historical Jesus is John P. Meier. His work is not as accessible as Sanders’, but to the fearless reader I highly recommend it.

(I am not a scholar, but have developed heavy interest in historical Jesus research and the development of the New Testament canon. I have even learned a fair amount of Koine Greek in order to pursue an even greater understanding.)

Good for you! The Historical Jesus is a wonderful topic to dig into, there are many lifetimes worth of scholarship on the topic. I highly recommend you work through Meier’s books.

 

[billsherman]

To my thinking, John’s gospel was never intended to be a historical record. Its author’s purpose in writing was not to chronicle but to persuade. He says so himself in 20:31 (“But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.”).

This is correct. None of the early Christian documents were written primarily as historical documents (even Acts), they were all written to evangelize. This, of course, frustrates historians. Why, oh why, couldn’t Luke have included fifty pages on what Jesus did for the first thirty years of his life?

 

[RedFan]

Clement I has an extant letter in which he was intervening in a dispute elsewhere. I believe the Vatican holds this as the earliest evidence of Roman primacy.

Well, his letter to the Church at Corinth does respond to a matter on which at least some Corinthians had apparently consulted Rome, so one might think that these Corinthians must have recognized Rome’s hegemony. But read its tenor, and one thing jumps out: this is not the writing of a man who thought he could impose his will in Greece. (Indeed, in chapter 56 he suggests to the dissenting Corinthians that “they should submit themselves, I do not say unto us, but unto the will of God.”)

 

[billsherman]

Can you share more about how he came to his view on Jesus as libertine magician? Or link to something to read? I’m fascinated at how an educated man could come to this sort of idea.

Have you read his two books on the topic? I would start there.

Didn’t he find it a bit convenient that ‘Magic Mark’ folded so neatly into the canonical Mark account?

Well, the letter from Clement of Alexandria answers that question: Canonical Mark was a shortened version of Secret Mark.

How did he account for every existing copy of canonical Mark to be missing those bits?

There are many lost Gospels, so it is not inconceivable that every “expanded” version of Mark has been lost. Assuming this Gospel did exist, it was certainly never popular and only circulated in small numbers. Once the cannon was closed, non-canonical Gospels vanish very quickly. For example, there is only one known copy of the Gospel of Thomas and we have pretty solid evidence that it was pretty popular.

Was it wishful thinking on his part, hoping to be the discoverer of something profound?

By the end of his life, when I knew him (he was quite a bit older than me), he seemed to lament that the only thing he would ever be remembered for was Secret Mark. He wrote ten(!) other books, and no one ever reads those. He was a great scholar, who held some unorthodox ideas. And there is nothing wrong with that. It’s only by rocking the boat that some of the greatest progress is made.

 

[billsherman]

From a historical and biblical history How can; or perhaps a better question might be; CAN Catholicism be disproved historically.

No. History and Theology are vastly different subject areas. While one can inform the other, they can’t disprove one another. Catholicism, as I understand it (and again, I am no theologian), is based ultimately on faith. Faith in things that cannot be proven, or disproved, with history. You might be able to call into question some particular belief, but history can’t truly disprove any that I am aware of.

Take for example the resurrection. As a historian I can’t prove it happened. I can’t prove it, because it is something outside the known physical world, and history has no methodology for dealing with miraculous events. It just isn’t made to test those events. What it can do, however, is prove that people at the time BELIEVED the resurrection happened. That we can prove. Does that mean the resurrection happened? Of course not, but it proves something. The resurrection is ultimately the domain of faith. You can’t prove, or disprove it using history.

John P. Meier is a perfect example of this concept. He is, in my view, the best historian of Jesus alive today. Please check out his series “A Marginal Jew” (currently on volume 5), for the most comprehensive look into the Historical Jesus ever produced. In volume 1, he describes his goal as using the historical method to construct a purely historical picture of Jesus that ignores later theological views. In his most recent volume, he argues that only five (maybe four, I can’t quite remember) of Jesus’ parables can be reliably traced back to him. For the others, there isn’t evidence that they go back to Jesus.

This is enormously controversial. One reviewer condemned the book as heretical. That reviewer missed the point. Meier was working as a historian, using the historical method. He results do not prove ONLY those parables came from Jesus and the others were invented by charlatans. His results just show that those parables did come from Jesus, and there isn’t evidence the other came from him. That gap is the domain of faith.

John Meier is a Catholic priest who teaches at Notre Dame University, all of his books have received the imprimatur from his local ordinary, and his work has been praised by and quoted by Pope Benedict XVI. He has written many essays on how his work as a historian cannot contradict his faith, precisely because they are fundamentally different things.

Anyone who tries to use history as a weapon against religion is going to end up with bad history, weak faith, or both.

 

[fredystairs]

I am interested in Baptism. There are no direct statements in the NT involving the baptism of infants. From what I gather it may not have been a practice at all for many years. Do you have anything to contribute about the origin and practice of infant baptism

In Early Christianity infant baptism does not appear to have been the norm. John the Baptist also apparently only baptized adults. Beyond that, I’m sorry I have not done any research on the origins of infant baptism

There are several excellent articles on the Catholic Answers website concerning infant baptism. The Early Church Fathers wrote that the practice came from the apostles. When they did write about it, it was never seen as a novelty.

Infant Baptism | Catholic Answers Tract

https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/infant-baptism

Edited to add: there are other articles on the site. Just go to catholic.com and search for “infant baptism”

Blessings

 

[Hereiam]

FYI, I support a male-only priesthood because I believe in the theology that the priest acts ‘In persona Christi’

I also support a male-only priesthood, but because of obedience, and not necessarily any other logic.

But, I have difficulty accepting the reason for justifying male only priesthood is because to act “In persona Christi” requires a male body.

In Genesis 1:27, we learn:

     God created mankind in his image; in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

At the time of creation, there was no incarnation, so the image of God that man was created in spoke of the spirit, not the body.

To deny this, and say therefore the reason women cannot enter the priesthood is because they cannot act “in persona Christi” is to say that man, not woman, was only created in the image of God.

So the “persona Christi” is not a claim to gender, but a affirmation that God has become man, through the incarnation.

Again, I fully subscribe to the exclusivity of the male priesthood, but I do not agree that one gender has the ability to be more Christ like than the other.

Pax et Bonum!

 

[Prodigal_Son]

But, I have difficulty accepting the reason for justifying male only priesthood is because to act “In persona Christi” requires a male body.

The male is not male if there is no female; likewise, the female is not female if there is no male. To allow the whole Body of Christ on Earth play the same role of priest would be to attempt to make ALL male – and thus it would make no one truly male. At least this is the way I understand it. The person of Christ is not present in the Mass merely through the priest, but through the priest being a priest for the people. The congregation is the feminine.

We can even, perhaps, see this in the Trinity, if no one accuses me of heresy for saying so. When Jesus goes off on His own to pray, this is the image of God as receptive, almost as feminine, in comparison with His Father. The fullness of the image of God cannot be captured in the wholly masculine, since the masculine is not what it is without the feminine.

 

[guanophore]

Of course. But as I said, I am a historian, not a theologian.

Do you consider the New Testament and other pre-Nicean Fathers to be valid historical documents?

When Marco Polo went to China, he found Christians there. How did they get there? Who evangelized them?

Are there any Jewish writings from the first few centuries AD that speak of Christians or Jesus?

Was there any connection or overlap between Christians and Mithraists in the first two centuries?

Why was the Book of Enoch excluded from the Bible?

What was the Christian community in Rome like before Peter and Paul arrived?

@billsherman Gosh you might want to save this stuff. It sounds like a great final essay exam!

I actually date the beginning of the modern Church to 1870. That is because 1870 marks the end of the Papal States. From that point on, the Pope became almost entirely a religious leader, as opposed to the political and religious leader he was previously.

And the role of the Pope prior to the formation of the Papal States?

 

[DetectiveNiko]

Anyway, you take what I said and made it into what I did not say…

Sorry, wasn’t trying to do that. I was just trying to say how for religious texts we should have more skepticism than usual.

 

[pocaracas]

Hi Bill,
I saw you are also interested in Jesus’ background… so I’ll make some questions on that:
Which Jewish groups were present in the Israel area? We know of the Samaritans, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes… and what else?

To which of those did Jesus likely adhere?.. I’d say it would be the same as John the Baptist. (clearly, not the Pharisees )

Could belonging to a pre-existing group have fueled the propagation of christianity during the 1st/2nd centuries?

 

[BartholomewB]

Bill, I have two strictly historical questions about the later Hasmoneans.

(1) Aristobulus and Hyrcanus.—When Queen Salome died in 67 BC, she left two sons, Aristobulus and Hyrcanus, but neither of them seems to have gained recognition as the clear and undisputed successor to the throne. What went wrong? Is it an exaggeration to say that the rivalry between the two brothers resulted in a state of virtual civil war, which gave Pompey an excuse to step in and seize Judea for Rome?

(2) The last Hasmonean high priest.—Herod the Great picked a series of high priests from duly qualified families, though avoiding Hasmoneans, with a single exception. In the second year of his reign he appointed the 17-year-old Aristobulus III. What happened next? Is it true that Herod became jealous of the young Hasmonean’s popularity to the point that he feared for his throne and had Aristobulus quietly liquidated?