Analyses of Jesus' Wife Fragment Finally Published

[robrecht]

Tabor and Jones are both reluctant to jump on this particular bandwagon.

[OingoBoingo]

Tabor and Jones are both reluctant to jump on this particular bandwagon.

Brice Jones points out there are examples of scribes skipping over holes in a manuscript, and then later writing around them, but that doesn't really address what we see here where on one side the scribe writes around the hole, and on the other side he writes into it as though it weren't there at all. Looking forward to more discussion on the subject.

[OingoBoingo]

I hope no one thinks I'm spamming on this subject, but I just find the whole thing fascinating, and have since day one.

Prof. Stephen Carlson, textual critic at Uppsula University, has added his 2 cents to the discussion over at Goodacre's blog:

What the observation shows is that the papyrus was damaged before written on. To be sure, there are cases of scribes avoiding the imperfections of their writing medium (esp. holes in expensive parchment), but I have to wonder whether such a used piece of papyrus would be used for a literary text like this. Let's not forget that the codex size, given the line length, must have been huge. Who would spend so much money on a massive codex, only to skimp out on the writing material with worn out pieces? (And would used pieces not even be the right size?) So it complicates considerably the scenario for authenticity substantially while, if anything, continuing to lend support for the forgery scenario.

It also complicates other aspects of the text. The carbon dating of the papyrus does not date the writing of the text, only when the papyrus plants were cut to make the writing material. Ordinarily, it is reasonable to suppose that the writing happened rather soon after preparation, but this observation now calls that reasonable assumption in question. We must now suppose that the papyrus was originally prepared in the early Islamic period, lasted long enough to be damaged, and then written upon. And the later the writing becomes, the more anomalous it becomes. The dialect becomes even more out of date; access to earlier exemplars that much more problematic.

In assessing authenticity, it is best not to get hung up on one particular detail but look at the totality of the circumstances. Yeah, one iffy detail can be explained away, but how well does it fit the competing scenarios?

[One Bad Pig]

I hope no one thinks I'm spamming on this subject, but I just find the whole thing fascinating, and have since day one.

Prof. Stephen Carlson, textual critic at Uppsula University, has added his 2 cents to the discussion over at Goodacre's blog:

By all means, carry on! I've been following it for quite some time myself. More links would be appreciated though.

[JonathanL]

I hope no one thinks I'm spamming on this subject, but I just find the whole thing fascinating, and have since day one.

Prof. Stephen Carlson, textual critic at Uppsula University, has added his 2 cents to the discussion over at Goodacre's blog:

I think you mean Uppsala University.

[OingoBoingo]

By all means, carry on! I've been following it for quite some time myself. More links would be appreciated though.

Yep. I can do that. :)

[OingoBoingo]

I think you mean Uppsala University.

Yes, of course. :D

[Teallaura]

By all means, carry on! I've been following it for quite some time myself. More links would be appreciated though.

^Yeah, that!

[robrecht]

Brice Jones points out there are examples of scribes skipping over holes in a manuscript, and then later writing around them, but that doesn't really address what we see here where on one side the scribe writes around the hole, and on the other side he writes into it as though it weren't there at all. Looking forward to more discussion on the subject.

I know. It will be interesting to see if Jones comes back. Up until now, he has refused to take a stand.

[OingoBoingo]

Live Science did a follow up on their previous article (as reported by robrecht)

http://www.livescience.com/45328-gos...y-be-fake.html

Its a summary of what's already been pointed out here. Basically that the John's Gospel fragment is a forgery, and so, if the Jesus' Wife Fragment is written in the same hand with a similar ink, it too is probably a forgery (besides the other reasons for thinking it a forgery). They also mention the fact that the fragments are too late for the language they're written in. They have added some details concerning their investigation into Laukamp's supposed smuggling of the papyrus from East to West Germany.

Source: Live Science

since the investigation was published, Live Science has been in contact with an agency in Berlin that issues permits for the exportation of antiquities. Representatives of that agency said they could find no record that a papyrus like this had been exported from their office. It's possible that the Gospel of Jesus' Wife papyrus was exported from elsewhere in Germany or from the European Union.

© Copyright Original Source

The list of scholars now convinced that the Jesus Wife fragment is a forgery is growing, but Prof. King, Harvard, and others associated with its promotion have grown silent. Malcolm Choat, and Roger Bagnall say they need more time to investigate the recent claims of forgery.

Its the same over at the Weekly Standard (http://www.weeklystandard.com/articl...60.html?page=3), where the journalist working the story there has been met by confusion by Bagnall and silence from Harvard and King.



The Smithsonian Channel still plans on airing their documentary on Monday. It doesn't seem they care too much for transparency and truthfulness. Regardless of recent discoveries, a controversial documentary will have viewers tuning in, and they've already spent the money producing it, so they're not going to take a loss on it. Plus, they've already shown it in France without any issue. They probably figure they have nothing to lose. I imagine Harvard's thinking is that its best to just shut up, let the documentary happen. Let the general public think the fragment is legitimate for now, and then let the academics quietly debate the subject in journals and blogs after the fact, all to save face, and not admit their carelessness in the promotion of the fragment.

In both articles, Leo Depuydt of Brown University is outspoken as ever.

Source: Live Science

Leo Depuydt, of Brown University, sent an email to several journalists and scholars saying that King should retract her findings. "When is this papyrological pantomime, this Keystone Coptic, this academic farce, this philological burlesque finally going to stop?" asked Depuydt in the email.

© Copyright Original Source

[OingoBoingo]

Okay. Well another day, and more coverage on the Jesus' Wife fragment. The Smithsonian documentary will be shown today.

Mark Goodacre updated his blog with another roundup of websites reporting on the subject.
http://ntweblog.blogspot.com/2014/05...-round-up.html

He mentioned the Live Science article I posted about a few days ago, as well as a piece by the Daily Mail that the media is catching up to the news about the John fragment forgery (nothing new that hasn't already been discussed here).

Other articles he mentioned are reviewed in greater detail below.
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The Wall Street Journal wrote an article calling the Jesus Wife fragment a hoax .
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/...35540828090438

The writer interviews Askeland and quotes Goodacre's blog. Interesting comments from the article include the following

Source: The Wall Street Journal

The Harvard Theological Review recently published a group of articles that attest to the papyrus's [sic] authenticity. Although the scholars involved signed nondisclosure agreements preventing them from sharing the data with the wider scholarly community

© Copyright Original Source

I don't know if nondisclosure agreements over this thing are common (I seem to recall that Daniel Wallace needed to sign a nondisclosure for some recent early Gospel fragments), but I still found it curious.

I also thought the following was an honest point on media culpability in all of this.

Source: The Wall Street Journal

It is perhaps understandable that Ms. King would have been taken in when an anonymous owner presented her with some papyrus fragments for research. What is harder to understand was the rush by the media and others to embrace the idea that Jesus had a wife and that Christian beliefs have been mistaken for centuries. No evidence for Jesus having been married exists in any of the thousands of orthodox biblical writings dating to antiquity. You would have thought Thomas Aquinas might have mentioned it. But this episode is not totally without merit. It will provide a valuable case study for research classes long after we're gone and the biblical texts remain.

© Copyright Original Source

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Also of interest is a youtube clip of prof. Michael Peppard of Fordham University being interviewed on PBS's Newshour. Three weeks earlier he was interviewed in the same studio about Harvard's initial results about the authenticity of the fragment. In that interview he laid out a very fair and balanced case for both sides of the debate and mentioned that though Harvard's case was strong, many scholars (himself included) took a stance of neutrality. In the latest interview, he lays out the recent forgery claims by Christian Askeland and Alin Suciu. He mentions that many scholars (himself included) have now been convinced that the Jesus Wife fragment is, in fact, a forgery. When asked about Harvard Divinity School's response (and others associated with the fragment), he acknowledges that they've been silent, but is quick to point out we shouldn't judge them too quickly, since the new news is really very new, and they may not have had time to prepare a response. Last night, though, the silence was broken (see below).

Youtube clip from 3 weeks ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7NtIbiOles

Youtube clip from yesterday:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wrne_vSfsVM
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Prof. Goodacre points out a New York Times article by Laurie Goodstein, that was published yesterday where those associated with the Jesus Wife fragment speak out for the first time since the discovery of the Gospel of John fragment forgery.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/05/us...wife.html?_r=0

Here I'll just cite Goodacre's review of the article.

Source: Mark Goodacre

Speaking for myself, I'd have loved it if we had a new fragment of an ancient text of this kind -- it's what scholars of Christian origins long for. Moreover, many of the sceptics are such because they have asked the critical questions about their own hypothesis, not because they have avoided them. But we all say daft things in interviews. I talked with Laurie Goodstein myself this weekend and while I am grateful to her for linking to the blog, I must admit that I was somewhat relieved that she did not quote our conversation since I was a little more focused, at the time, on making sure that I was not late to the new Spider-Man film, which is excellent, by the way.

© Copyright Original Source

I agree, the latest Spider-Man is terrific :)

[robrecht]

"The Smithsonian Channel still plans on airing their documentary on Monday. It doesn't seem they care too much for transparency and truthfulness. Regardless of recent discoveries, a controversial documentary will have viewers tuning in, and they've already spent the money producing it, so they're not going to take a loss on it."

The very brief trailer released last week seemed to take the forgery allegation seriously, but it is hard to imagine that they will be up-to-date with the most recent questions raised by the gospel of John fragment, which is the piece of evidence that seems to have finally made Karen King sit up and take notice of the real possibility that she was duped.

[OingoBoingo]

The very brief trailer released last week seemed to take the forgery allegation seriously, but it is hard to imagine that they will be up-to-date with the most recent questions raised by the gospel of John fragment, which is the piece of evidence that seems to have finally made Karen King sit up and take notice of the real possibility that she was duped.

They had a week to postpone or cancel the airing of the documentary based on the recent findings. Maybe that isn't an easy thing to do, I don't know. But I do know that a lot of lay viewers will walk away accepting whatever claims the documentary makes, and do little investigation after the fact. Its the dissemination of incomplete data that bugs me. They should have continued their delay of the documentary til after other scholars had a chance to look at Harvard's results at least.

[robrecht]

They had a week to postpone or cancel the airing of the documentary based on the recent findings. Maybe that isn't an easy thing to do, I don't know. But I do know that a lot of lay viewers will walk away accepting whatever claims the documentary makes, and do little investigation after the fact. Its the dissemination of incomplete data that bugs me. They should have continued their delay of the documentary til after other scholars had a chance to look at Harvard's results at least.

Do you know if the documentary is in fact going to make any claims of authenticity?

Almost all of these kinds of documentaries are fairly worthless. There was a really good series produced in France a few years back with longer segments of unedited mostly seasoned European scholars toward the end of their careers. No one has ever heard of it because it was as dry as the dust from Qumran, only of interest to those who take scholarship seriously.

[OingoBoingo]

Do you know if the documentary is in fact going to make any claims of authenticity?

I'd be surprised if no one makes that claim.

Almost all of these kinds of documentaries are fairly worthless. There was a really good series produced in France a few years back with longer segments of unedited mostly seasoned European scholars toward the end of their careers. No one has ever heard of it because it was as dry as the dust from Qumran, only of interest to those who take scholarship seriously.

Sounds a little like The Bible's Buried Secrets documentary with Francesca Stavrakopoulou, but that was on the BBC. There was a doc with the exact same name on NOVA a few years earlier, with very similar subject matter that I liked better. Interviewed people like Dever, Finkelstein, Coogan, Mazar and the like.