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Breakthrough Decodes 'Classical Holy Grail'
wka writes "Scientists at Oxford University have made a major breakthrough in their study of a large collection of Greek and Roman writings. Many of the documents known as the 'Oxyrhynchus Papyri' (found at 'ancient rubbish dump in central Egypt') are 'meaningless to the naked eye - decayed, worm-eaten and blackened by the passage of time.' Using an infrared technique originally developed for use with satellite imaging, scientists are able to view the original writing, which 'could lead to a 20 per cent increase in the number of great Greek and Roman works in existence'. Thus far, works by Sophocles, Lucian, Euripides, Hesiod and others have been (re-)discovered. Additionally, scientists think they 'are likely to find lost Christian gospels.' (via The Light of Reason)"
Anciant pornography is less likely to show in literary work and far more likely to be done in paint as often has been the case .
We have plenty of examples of this, we do have a fair bit of background from many already avaiable anciant greek and roman works as to the culture of morality revolving around sexual attitudes back then.
These works are more likely to be a boon to the study of the more esoteric areas of the cultures , not that i dont doubt we will find some works relating to the sexuality of the cultures , This is by far in a way not a main area of study.
Though you are right that eroticism has driven many technoligies , but this is more of particular note in more represed cultures, as the current theorys go the anciant Greek and (earlyer) anciant Roman society were far less prudish about their bodys then we tend to be nowadays so pornography would be far less prolific as it tends to thrive where sexuality is less open.
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
As a classicist, I want to express the incredible debt we owe to physical sciences. We dig stuff up all the time we can't read, and rely on chemists and physicists to find a way to get to the text. The Vindolandum tables, for instance - slats of wood on which Roman legionaires in Britan wrote letter on, and which were burned. Chemists managed to trace the residue of the ink on the wooden remains and we have volumes of personal correpondence.
In this case, lost works by Sopholces are invaluable; we have only 7 of his plays complete. Any scrap we can add to the corpus provides a much better perspective of greek tragedy in general. And the possibility of finding lost gospels is always exciting for those of us interested in the development of Christianity.
So to sum it up: Thanks for the help, guys! We'll be sure to include your names when people start asking who's responsible for the next crappy sword-and-sandal flick!
The use of multispectral imaging (MSI) to view ancient papyri has been going on for some years now, with the following being some of the most interesting projects:
- recovering text from a manuscript containing 10th century copies of some of Archimedes works which had been erased and over-written in the 12th century. http://www.thewalters.org/archimedes/frame.html
- similar to the project above, this is the recovery of carbonised Roman papyri found in Herculaneum (which was covered in 100 feet of lava during the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD) http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-14522 44_1,00.html
There are also lots of other artefact imaging projects, such as that being carried out by the Digital Hammurabi Project (http://www.jhu.edu/digitalhammurabi/), who want to digitise (make high-res 3D computer models of) ancient cuneiform tablets or the work at the University of Kentucky which may allow text to be 'read' without the artefact being touched at all - using a CT scan which can be decoded on a computer http://www.research.uky.edu/odyssey/fall04/seales. html
Awesome stuff...
I hope one of the new gospels has something that will really get the Bible-thumpers in a rage.
Doubtfull. It's well known among biblical scholars that there are works in Christianity that have been rejected from 'the cannon" of works that is the bible. These books are refered to as Apocrypha Rejecting alternative texts as authoritative is old hat at far as Christianity is concerned.
AccountKiller
I think you mean the canon. Cannonization wasn't done before the 14th century, and then mostly to heretics. Canonization, however, is never done to heretics, because a person or text that has been canonized by the church is by definition sacred.
This might seem very confusing, but it isn't, really.
Of course, this is all moot anyway since Jesus never existed.
So all of those external references to these characters were also false? The Bible is one of teh most criticly attested documents ever studied. Archaelogy continuously affirms it and when it seems to contradict it it is usually only a few years before better studies (better meaning better documentation, archaelogical evidence, scholarship, acceptance in scholarly circles etc) show the Bible correct again.
Bad Panda! No Bamboo for you! In matters of importance ACs will not be responded to. Want to say something critical,OK
The Lost Axe Head (2 Kings 6:1-7)
Science is based on the *assumption* that the universe is predictable: proof by induction. It seems to be working out pretty well for us so far, but if it stopped being true tomorrow, science wouldn't be wrong.
As is inevitable in threads like these, I should mention Karl Popper.
Crackpot alert !
It's highly likely that Jesus had a wife. There's strong evidence to show that Jesus had Rabbii training, and strong evidence that his wife was Mary Magdelene, aka Mary of Bethany (yes, the one and same person). During that era, it was extremely unusual for a jewish male to not be married, and a Rabbii had to be married. It was basically a 'law'.
Voodoo theology. See the wikipedia article for a level-headed description of the matter.
The Roman Catholic church has long sought to hide the line of Jesus, spread by Mary Magdelene when she moved to the area of Marseilles.
Actually, in the area of Arles, in a locality which is now known as the Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer (I should know, I'm from there). Together with Martha, Mary of Bethany, Salome, and Lazarus, among others. Then Lazarus went on to become bishop of Marseilles, Martha went to kill a monster that wreaked havoc in Tarascon, and Magdalene ended her life in the Sainte-Baume moutains.
This happens to be one of the many popular legends that flourished in medieval folk christianism. One of the early bishops of Marseilles was actually called Lazarus, but there is no relation with the resurrected one. Similar stuff occured all over Europe, e.g. Saint-Denis, patron saint of France, has been wrongly identified with Denys the Areopagite. In my own city, Arles, the legendary first bishop Trophimus has been identified with the homonymous disciple of Paul mentioned in the New Testament.
While many such confusions may have arisen out of sincere self-delusion, one should keep in mind that holy relics (which attracted pilgrims in droves) were extremely important at the time, both in terms of prestige and of plain commercial interest. Exposing the relic of a Father of the Church was much more profitable, in any sense, than some obscure 3rd century bishop.
The deal with Clovis was renegged less than 100 years after his death, removing the line of the Menengoverians by the assassination of Dagobert II.
You are an ignorant ass. The Merovingians faded into irrelevance out of sheer incompetence. They were replaced by the descendents of Charles Martel (then a kind of "prime minister", in charge of the actual work of running the empire), not by cunning or assassination, but simply because the guy saved the country and the rest of Europe from Arab domination - which brings us to your next point...
Add to the fact that the Roman Catholic church is highly intolerant of other religions - the murder and war against the Saracens in the 11th century
Look, man, I have no particular sympathy for Catholicism, but you should remember that the relationship between Christian Europe and the Moslem world has been one of constant invasions and counter-invasions - and the Saracens called the first shots in the 7th-8th centuries, until they got their arses kicked big time by Charles Martel, and were driven out by his successors, the Carolingians - eponymous to Martel's grandson, a certain Charlemagne.
When you add up aggressions and atrocities from both sides, all you can say is that there's no winner - only a few million losers.
Thomas-
That is not exactly true. The inquisition was a wholly Catholic affair that effected peoples of varied faiths, and assigned to them the role of heretic and firewood. That is not to say that the Protestants did not do their own fair share of mass-murder in the name of religious faith, but, try and find a religion that can wash its hands of that sort of claim. I doubt you will find many.
And for your general information, the other gospels and new testament works have not been "tainted" through translation or interpretation- anyone who wants to can still access the original greek of those texts.
We have no original texts; the earliest texts that we have are fragments of copies of copies. Unsurprisingly, these multi-generation copies disagree with each other in places. One well known disagreement is the ending of Mark. The modern ending is found in none of the earliest manuscripts, and when we do begin finding manuscripts with an ending, we find two different endings. The Catholic Church declared the currently popular ending canonical at the Council of Trent in the 16th century.
There is also no "the Bible." Each major branch of the Christian church has their own Bibles, with numbers of books ranging from about two dozen for the Syrian church to 66 for the Protestants to 81 for the Ethiopian church. The most common dates I've seen for the Gospel of Thomas are 100-150, which puts it in about the same range as the 90-120 dates for the Gospel of John.
Since you brought up Paul, it's worth examining the authenticity of his writings too. For example, the Ethiopian Bible has 3 letters to the Corinthians, while the Catholic/Protestant Bible has only 2 such letters. Several of his epistles, including 3rd Corithians, were debated strongly when the Catholic church began putting together its Biblical canon in the 4th century. The Catholics rejected 3rd Corinthians, but kept several of the other more dubious epistles, which modern scholars now have come to same conclusion that some 4th century bishops did--they were forgeries.
The controversy over what was really canonical or not erupted again in Europe with the Protestant Reformation. Luther rejected the apostolicity of Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation, and moved them to the back of his translation of the Catholic Bible. Modern rediscoveries of the gnostic gospels, and communication between the European branch of Christianity with branches in Asia and Africa with their different Bibles have brought these controversies to life again.
That would be an interesting situation, but it is unlikely. Christans of the time were mostly also Jews, any deviation from Jewish law was controversial, and therefore makes it into their writings.
Leviticus 20:13 If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
Now christian teach on old testament law is a little complex, as the new testament replaces it. It replaces it as a continuation. It was a big deal with early Christians realized they were able to eat pigs and other "unclean animals". Several of the early books (particularly the writings of Paul, but also Acts) go into detail about this. If Homosexuality was suddenly allowed in the early teachings there would be a big deal made as many discriminated against those who practiced it and the elders had to correct them.
Homosexuality was fairly common in Rome. It was clearly illegal in Jewish law. So you can't claim it is a new thing that wasn't thought of back them, nor can you claim it was only done in closets and those who had no interest didn't know it existed.
I can't think of anything that says something about elections. However Leviticus 19:36-37 apply. Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, in meteryard, in weight, or measure. Just balances, just weights a just ephah and a just hin, shall ye have.
Yes I was studying Leviticus this week.
The students and faculty of BYU are some of the most curious people when it comes to discovering old artifacts of historical significance; especially of it being closely related to religious or early symbolic representations of their culture as to identify and understand the symbolism within the cultures. Thus, better enabling them to understand the scriptures in a cultural and spiritual way since the scriptures are literally littered with symbolism. Take a look at Isaiah sometime and tell me that's not difficult without understanding symbolism.
It's not that 'Mormons' aren't happy with the teachings, writings and 'second bible'. In fact they are, quite a bit. But anything of historical value within this direction of understanding culture and history is definitely what they're after.
~zo
Jews refers to the tribe of Judah, one of the twelve rolling out of Egypt. ... and knowing that through his seed, all nations should be blest.
The concept of being chosen by God refers to Abram (later, Abraham) rolling out of Mesopotamia and being given everything he could see from the top of Mount
Moses on Sinai comes later, after Egypt, and the organizational behavior lesson that real change takes two generations.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
And while we're at it, the Catholics didn't burn witches in the dark ages; it was a heresy to even believe in them until the High Middle Ages, and it was the Protestants who made witch hunting an organized sport.
First, the high middle ages lasted from 1000-1200 or 1050-1400, depending on your source. Either way, they started just before the time period given by the GP.
Second, the most famous witch hunting manuel is the Malleus Maleficarum, written by Heinrich Kramer and James Sprenger, on orders of the Pope Innocent VIII, a Catholic. The papal bull was issured on Dec. 9, 1484. The protestant reformation didn't kick off until 1517, when Martin Luther nailed his edicts to the door. There were earlier attempts, but none of them ignited like his did. Henry V, in 1419, prosecuted his stepmother, Joan of Navarre, for attempting to kill him via witchcraft. So, what we can see is that witches and witch hunting were in vogue before the protestants were around.
Nice Marmot
As for sources, here is one that took me less than 5 minutes to find: "In the Jesus Seminar, all or most of GTh is treeated as a composition of the 50s antedating the canonical Gospels; but the majority of scholars thinks that, although GTh may have preserved some original sayings of Jesus, as a whole the work is a composition of the 2d century and reflects at time incipient gnosticism."
Raymond Brown. An Introduction to the New Testament. Doubleday, 1997.
To translate: according to exactly the same standards used to date the Canonical gospels (esp. John) later than 70, Thomas is late indeed.
This illustrates exactly the problem with treating Wikipedia as a definitive source: it tends to attract the work of talented amateurs or marginal scholars. It very often misses the mainstream in fields where there is a lot of controversy, and nearly always misses the mainstream in subjects related to the New Testament. In this case, the wikians have taken as correct a marginal view held by what most scholars would consider the radical fringe of New Testament scholarship - viz. the Jesus Seminar and especially Crossin. No serious, careful scholar of the field would have made a strong claim that the majority of critical scholarship regards Thomas as being of 1st century Provenance. On the other hand, someone who picked up a couple of the tendentious, popular treatments at Barnes and Noble certainly would.
A good, popular treatment of the Thomas controversy (and why the Jesus Seminar theories are unlikely to stand up) take a look at "Hidden Gospels: How the Search for Jesus Lost Its Way" by Phillip Jenkins. This book is admittedly conservative in outlook, but it's basically factually accurate and it lays out the issue in a way understandable to the lay person.
(And, for what it's worth, I'm a Doctoral Candidate in New Testament in a rather good program at a non-religious school, so I like to think I know more than some random wikipedia contributor.)
I'll trot over and edit the Thomas article later.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
Actually no real witch hunting occurred in the so called dark middle ages, which mostly were more civilized than the so codern era.
Most of the witch hunting over here in Europe occured after 1600 and endured sort of until around 1750.
The funny thing is, that mostly the catholics are blamed for the witch hunting, but in fact, the catholic church is to blame for many things, but not for being the most evil witch hunters. In fact witch hunting was sort of moderate in catholic countries, while in many protestantic parts it became sort of a plaque, which was even more fueled after the 30 years war, which left a thinned and devastated and basically frightened population.
If the americans speak of Salem, believe me, that is nothing compared to what happened over here, and in the end triggered the age of enlightment.
It in my opinion was the main mistake (besides his later day stance towards jews) of Marthin Luther, that he was bound by his times and could not see in how bogus the whole witch idea is, thus he enforced witch hunting in the long run, in the protestantic areas. (The whole witch idea came originally from greece btw. but never was really that important until the 15 hundreds)
As for the resurrection, nobody actually checked that he was really dead
Actually, they did. When the Romans crucified people, they typcially came back after a while and broke their legs as an act of merciful euthenasia (you see, if you can't support your weight with your legs, you hang by the arms, leaving you unable to breath properly and suffocating you.)
When they got to Jesus, they found he was already dead, so there was no point in breaking his legs. Instead, they ran a spear through his chest, and when they pulled it out, a mixture of blood and water came out of the wound, leaving no question that his ticket was punched.