From: sheaffer@netcom.com (Robert Sheaffer)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: Focus on Crucifiction (was: Cruxed for Prophecy?)
Date: 6 Oct 92 18:44:46 GMT
Article-I.D.: netcom.1992Oct6.184446.23437
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest)

In article <LEET.92Oct5105230@dove.ims.com> leet@ims.com (Lee Thomas) writes:
>
>Quoting off the top of my head, there was a skeleton found in Israel
>during an excavation for a housing project (1967?).  The box holding the
>skeleton bore the name "Yohanan Ben Ha'<something>" (I forget his last
>name); the skeleton bore evidence of crucifixion.  The heel bone still
>had a spike embedded in it.  Both legs were broken.  As I recall, the
>wrists showed evidence of having been worn by the action of the victim
>raising himself to breathe; this rotates the wrist bones against the
>crucifixion spike and thereby scrapes the bone.

Maybe we can get a little better information on this.

>Robert> I maintain that Pilate's claimed surprise at Jesus' supposed
>Robert> untimely demise was deleted because it calls unnecessary
>Robert> attention to the implausible time frame of the cruci-fiction
>Robert> story.
>
>This is not the parsimonious explanation.

Then what is? Why were the authors of Matthew and Luke unhappy with
this passage? I can think of no other plausible explanation. This
is the only part of Mark's crucifixion narrative they both left out.
In general, those authors frequently added material, but were reluctant
to delete (especially Matthew). 

John Ata seems to think that Jesus SHOULD have died this quickly. If so,
why was Pilate depicted as being surprised?

>Robert> (Another significant deletion is that of Mark's youth who fled
>Robert> naked in the garden, for reasons that might best be discussed
>Robert> on "soc.motss".)
>
>This has usually been interpreted to have been Mark himself, who was
>probably the best individual to have known how well the youth was
>dressed.  He fled naked (much to his shame) rather than be caught and
>arrested.  So, Robert, how does "soc.motss" come into the picture?

Well, the identification with Mark is purely conjectural. 

The link to "soc.motss" involves the argument that "the youth who fled
naked in the garden" in Mark (and conspicuously ignored by Matthew and
Luke) is the same as "the disciple Jesus loved" in John, whose head
Jesus cradled in his bosom. The passages from  the "Secret Gospel of Mark", 
discovered by the late Morton Smith in a newly-found Epistle of
Clement of Alexandria (this IS legit, Smith's analysis of said Epistle
has been published by the Harvard Univ. Press) bring the Lazarus story
into Mark, and suggest that Beloved Disciple = Naked Youth = Lazarus,
which dovetails with the statement in John that the Chief Priests
sought to arrest Lazarus; hence, the attempted arrest of the youth,
which otherwise makes no sense. (This is a very brief summary; the
detailed argument is in "The Making of the Messiah").


-- 
  
        Robert Sheaffer - Scepticus Maximus - sheaffer@netcom.com
  
 Past Chairman, The Bay Area Skeptics - for whom I speak only when authorized!

       "Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on this planet.
        Then all things are at risk. It is as when a conflagration has
        broken out in a great city, and no man knows what is safe, or
        where it will end."
                               - Emerson: Essay, "Circles"