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Isn't it time to resolve the issues related to this article? All labels make the article appear untrustworthy and unserious./ 199.115.115.212 ( talk) 12:13, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
No Latinist past the intermediate level could accept Slingerland's way of construing the sentence, and at any rate it isn't fatal to what I take to be S's main argument that Chrestus was alive and contemporary with the tumultus. I don't know whether the other scholars are represented accurately, but I'm sorry, this reading of the Latin is just plain wrong. It does not, however, vitiate the argument that this Chrestus lived in the time of Claudius. I would omit the grammatical point altogether from our article, as picayune. While additional objections from Gruen or others are part of the debate and represent varying views, this grammatical point is simply an error of fact from Slingerland. Scholars sometimes make errors; I see them get the numbering of primary source passages, or page numbers, verifiably wrong all the time. WP need not perpetuate copyediting errors, nor any other point of fact that is demonstrably incorrect. I personally would find Slingerland questionable, however, if his understanding of Latin is so poor and yet he chose to base an argument on a supposedly close reading of Latin. Cynwolfe ( talk) 13:57, 4 April 2013 (UTC)There is, however, a more serious problem. Slingerland's reconstruction rests on his own rendering of Suet. Claud. 25.4. In his view, impulsore Chresto refers not to a stirring up of tumultuous Jews but to a provocation of the emperor against the Jews. The ablative absolute, in short, should go with the verb, not with the participle (pp. 151-168). The case is attractive in principle, but altogether unconvincing in fact. The word order virtually excludes it. (emphasis mine) The ablative absolute occurs within the participial phrase, bracketed by Iudaeos and tumultuantis. If Suetonius had wished to indicate that expulit resulted from impulsore Chresto, he made a botch of it. Slingerland may well be right that Chrestus has nothing to do with Christianity -- but Chrestus also had nothing to do with prodding the princeps.
Ok, then could you either suggest or modify that section to get over this minor point so there are just the 2 main interpretations and that section does not become an exercise in Latin. I will support that approach. I think the suggestion above will work if that section just says:
In Claudius 25 Suetonius wrote in Latin: "Iudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantis Roma expulit" which is generally translated into English as:
The question of whether it means that Claudius expelled all of the Jews or only those making disturbances has been discussed among scholars.
If that is agreed to via the selection of "or similar English wording", we can move on. Thanks. History2007 ( talk) 19:51, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
Hi Cynwolfe, I have a question with regards to your dismissal of the second translation:
Your argument (above) was "Rhetorically, it simply isn't possible that Suetonius meant impulsore Chresto as the causal agent for the main verb expulit, because he placed it between Iudaeos and tumultantis: everything between those two words goes together (readers of German will understand this kind of construction too)."
My Latin is only basic (school level), but German is one of my native languages. The second translation makes perfect sense to me in German, given that the Jewish sentence is part of a longer list of tribes/populations that Suetonius enumerates.
Here is Suetonius: Lyciis ob exitiabiles inter se discordias libertatem ademit, Rhodiis ob paenitentiam veterum delictorum reddidit. Iliensibus quasi Romanae gentis auctoribus tributa in perpetuum remisit recitata vetere epistula Graeca senatus populique R. Seleuco regi amicitiam et societatem ita demum pollicentis, si consanguineos suos Ilienses ab omni onere immunes praestitisset. Iudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantis Roma expulit.
And here is my German translation: Den Lyziern, aufgrund ihrer toedlichen inneren Zwietracht, nahm er ihre Freiheit weg; den Rhodiern, in Anbetracht ihrer Reue alter Verfehlungen, stellte er die Freiheit wieder her. Den Iliern, als roemischem/s Gruendervolk, bewilligte er auf Ewigkeit Steuerbefreiung, etc etc. Die Juden, auf Anraten von Chrestus, da sie staendig revoltierten, verwies er aus Rom."
My translation is quick and dirty because my Latin is only mediocre. But my point is that this German sentence structure stresses first of all the population, and then secondarily stresses how Claudius deals with each population in turn (by placing his action in final position). And then only as an afterthought (placed in the middle of each German sentence) does the sentence provide Claudius's reasoning/motivation. As a whole, the stylistic impression is that of Claudius as a relentless man of action. At least in German.
It would be more "usual" to write the German thus: "Die Juden, da sie staendig revoltierten, verwies er auf anraten von Chrestus aus Rom." But this would stylistically "dilute" the Emperor's decisive action.
I have insufficient expertise to address your other points against the second translation (portraying Chrestus as an adviser to Claudius), but I feel your resort to German syntax as an argument may not be warranted. I would welcome your comment, as well as those of other native German speakers with a better command of Latin than me, with a view to re-instate the Slingerland reference. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.135.37.206 ( talk) 13:39, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Gruen also committed to this position in his book Diaspora: Jews amidst Greeks and Romans, as cited here. One thing I should clarify is that I haven't considered this phrase as an ablative absolute so much as an agent; but I see how in this instance the two functions would not be discrete. Cynwolfe ( talk) 19:11, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
I don't know that it would be useful to leave a warning on the IP editor's talk page, since s/he is switching between several addresses and might not see a message left on a talk page belonging to only one of them. But the personal attacks and demands made by this editor are unacceptable, and further contributions along these lines should be ignored. Cynwolfe is absolutely right about the meaning of the Latin; the position of impulsore Chresto makes it extraordinarily unlikely that it is an agent with expulit. If Slingerland's mistaken interpretation has attracted some attention in scholarship, as it seems it has, then it may be worth including something about it in this article, but only if criticism such as Gruen's is included. --Akhilleus ( talk) 20:07, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
I apologise to Cynwolfe if my message above is unacceptable. It was not intended to offend but is my sincerely held belief. Please feel free to delete my offending passage above. Cynwolfe's response can then also go because it misses the point (now explained in her homepage). And these lines can then also go. Cynwolfe - please execute.
On 13 August 2013 you deleted the Slingerland translation, giving this justification:
As you can see from the section above, I have tried to find out Cynwolfe's rationale why she thinks Slingerland's translation is impossible. Cynwolfe has now retracted her "German explanation", and has then proposed a frequency argument (she says she would need to see, in Suetonius, 3-4 occurrences of Slingerland's proposed construction). But she has then failed to follow through her frequency proposal, and has then basically told me to go away and do my own research.
I am therefore concerned that your deletion of the Slingerland translation is based on a single, inconsistent and digressive expert. I propose that the Slingerland translation should be reinstated as suggested by Akhilleus above. I hope editors other than Cynwolfe will then discuss the appropriateness of including the Slingerland translation, with a view to retaining or deleting Slingerland. (For avoidance of doubt, let me say that I have not read the Slingerland reference and therefore do not know how solid his arguments are, neither do I know whether literature exists supporting him.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.170.123.7 ( talk • contribs)
@ NebY and Karma1998: The Jewish and Pagan authors are almost irrelevant to the historical Jesus and the historicity of Jesus, according to Bart Ehrman. Only fanatical atheists and fanatical Christians think these authors make or break the historicity of Jesus. tgeorgescu ( talk) 20:12, 15 September 2021 (UTC)
"Scholars generally agree that these references refer to the same event.[59]"
Is that so? Cassius Dio talks of a ban on potentially seditious gatherings and explicity states that it was not an expulsion (due to, basically, logistical reasons - the Jewish community was too large to kick them all out). Bruce ("Christianity Under Claudius", Bull. John Rylands Lib. 44, March 1962) disagreed that Cassius and Suetonius refer to the same event. Rather, he argued that the ban on gatherings was an initial Claudian measure (in the early-mid 40s AD) mainly due to a desire to prevent a repetition of the Alexandrian riots (38 CE) (which have no attested indication that Christianity played any part in them), and that, when tensions within the Jewish community of Rome escalated later in that decade (probably due to Christian proselytizing, as "Chrestus" would have been a highly unusual name for an observant Jew or Jewish Christian), he ordered the expulsion of at least the troublesome part of the Roman Jewish community.
(Acts claims the entire Jewish community was expelled, but Acts is conspiciously evasive about the religious status of Priscilla and Aquila when they are first encountered - as it has to be in a) claiming there was no Christianity in Rome until the - almost certainly fictional as narrated - Petropauline missionary effort, but b) presenting P&A as "model second-generation Christians" for the reader to look up to and to strive to imitate, as they probably were within still-living memory when Acts was composed. This is impossible without fudging - except perhaps by appealing to divinely transmitted miraculous knowledge of the deeper workings of Christian (as opposed to Yohananine) baptism as expounded by P&A to Apollos, or by explicit mention of Pauline instruction - but there is not even an indication of either, despite Acts being quite willing to use such tropes at other occasions. So the Acts narrative should be considered a streamlined paraphrase, as they say in movies, "based on actual events", giving a roughly correct general impression but unreliable in the details.)
At any rate, the differences between Suetonius' and Cassius' words are too large to dismiss - they are in direct and explicit contradiction if they do refer to the ame "event" (as opposed to "process" - if Cassius reports an early stage of Claudius "pacifying" policy, and Suetonius the ultimate development, the contradiction simply disappears and a consistent scenario of increasing pressure results). 18:55, 7 December 2021 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.182.114.91 ( talk)
That's disrespectful language. Say instead, "a person, of whom we have no information.". Period! 2600:4040:9838:E600:501D:9A77:6763:367 ( talk) 02:17, 23 May 2023 (UTC)
This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
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This page has archives. Sections older than 90 days may be automatically archived by Lowercase sigmabot III when more than 5 sections are present. |
Isn't it time to resolve the issues related to this article? All labels make the article appear untrustworthy and unserious./ 199.115.115.212 ( talk) 12:13, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
No Latinist past the intermediate level could accept Slingerland's way of construing the sentence, and at any rate it isn't fatal to what I take to be S's main argument that Chrestus was alive and contemporary with the tumultus. I don't know whether the other scholars are represented accurately, but I'm sorry, this reading of the Latin is just plain wrong. It does not, however, vitiate the argument that this Chrestus lived in the time of Claudius. I would omit the grammatical point altogether from our article, as picayune. While additional objections from Gruen or others are part of the debate and represent varying views, this grammatical point is simply an error of fact from Slingerland. Scholars sometimes make errors; I see them get the numbering of primary source passages, or page numbers, verifiably wrong all the time. WP need not perpetuate copyediting errors, nor any other point of fact that is demonstrably incorrect. I personally would find Slingerland questionable, however, if his understanding of Latin is so poor and yet he chose to base an argument on a supposedly close reading of Latin. Cynwolfe ( talk) 13:57, 4 April 2013 (UTC)There is, however, a more serious problem. Slingerland's reconstruction rests on his own rendering of Suet. Claud. 25.4. In his view, impulsore Chresto refers not to a stirring up of tumultuous Jews but to a provocation of the emperor against the Jews. The ablative absolute, in short, should go with the verb, not with the participle (pp. 151-168). The case is attractive in principle, but altogether unconvincing in fact. The word order virtually excludes it. (emphasis mine) The ablative absolute occurs within the participial phrase, bracketed by Iudaeos and tumultuantis. If Suetonius had wished to indicate that expulit resulted from impulsore Chresto, he made a botch of it. Slingerland may well be right that Chrestus has nothing to do with Christianity -- but Chrestus also had nothing to do with prodding the princeps.
Ok, then could you either suggest or modify that section to get over this minor point so there are just the 2 main interpretations and that section does not become an exercise in Latin. I will support that approach. I think the suggestion above will work if that section just says:
In Claudius 25 Suetonius wrote in Latin: "Iudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantis Roma expulit" which is generally translated into English as:
The question of whether it means that Claudius expelled all of the Jews or only those making disturbances has been discussed among scholars.
If that is agreed to via the selection of "or similar English wording", we can move on. Thanks. History2007 ( talk) 19:51, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
Hi Cynwolfe, I have a question with regards to your dismissal of the second translation:
Your argument (above) was "Rhetorically, it simply isn't possible that Suetonius meant impulsore Chresto as the causal agent for the main verb expulit, because he placed it between Iudaeos and tumultantis: everything between those two words goes together (readers of German will understand this kind of construction too)."
My Latin is only basic (school level), but German is one of my native languages. The second translation makes perfect sense to me in German, given that the Jewish sentence is part of a longer list of tribes/populations that Suetonius enumerates.
Here is Suetonius: Lyciis ob exitiabiles inter se discordias libertatem ademit, Rhodiis ob paenitentiam veterum delictorum reddidit. Iliensibus quasi Romanae gentis auctoribus tributa in perpetuum remisit recitata vetere epistula Graeca senatus populique R. Seleuco regi amicitiam et societatem ita demum pollicentis, si consanguineos suos Ilienses ab omni onere immunes praestitisset. Iudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantis Roma expulit.
And here is my German translation: Den Lyziern, aufgrund ihrer toedlichen inneren Zwietracht, nahm er ihre Freiheit weg; den Rhodiern, in Anbetracht ihrer Reue alter Verfehlungen, stellte er die Freiheit wieder her. Den Iliern, als roemischem/s Gruendervolk, bewilligte er auf Ewigkeit Steuerbefreiung, etc etc. Die Juden, auf Anraten von Chrestus, da sie staendig revoltierten, verwies er aus Rom."
My translation is quick and dirty because my Latin is only mediocre. But my point is that this German sentence structure stresses first of all the population, and then secondarily stresses how Claudius deals with each population in turn (by placing his action in final position). And then only as an afterthought (placed in the middle of each German sentence) does the sentence provide Claudius's reasoning/motivation. As a whole, the stylistic impression is that of Claudius as a relentless man of action. At least in German.
It would be more "usual" to write the German thus: "Die Juden, da sie staendig revoltierten, verwies er auf anraten von Chrestus aus Rom." But this would stylistically "dilute" the Emperor's decisive action.
I have insufficient expertise to address your other points against the second translation (portraying Chrestus as an adviser to Claudius), but I feel your resort to German syntax as an argument may not be warranted. I would welcome your comment, as well as those of other native German speakers with a better command of Latin than me, with a view to re-instate the Slingerland reference. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.135.37.206 ( talk) 13:39, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Gruen also committed to this position in his book Diaspora: Jews amidst Greeks and Romans, as cited here. One thing I should clarify is that I haven't considered this phrase as an ablative absolute so much as an agent; but I see how in this instance the two functions would not be discrete. Cynwolfe ( talk) 19:11, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
I don't know that it would be useful to leave a warning on the IP editor's talk page, since s/he is switching between several addresses and might not see a message left on a talk page belonging to only one of them. But the personal attacks and demands made by this editor are unacceptable, and further contributions along these lines should be ignored. Cynwolfe is absolutely right about the meaning of the Latin; the position of impulsore Chresto makes it extraordinarily unlikely that it is an agent with expulit. If Slingerland's mistaken interpretation has attracted some attention in scholarship, as it seems it has, then it may be worth including something about it in this article, but only if criticism such as Gruen's is included. --Akhilleus ( talk) 20:07, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
I apologise to Cynwolfe if my message above is unacceptable. It was not intended to offend but is my sincerely held belief. Please feel free to delete my offending passage above. Cynwolfe's response can then also go because it misses the point (now explained in her homepage). And these lines can then also go. Cynwolfe - please execute.
On 13 August 2013 you deleted the Slingerland translation, giving this justification:
As you can see from the section above, I have tried to find out Cynwolfe's rationale why she thinks Slingerland's translation is impossible. Cynwolfe has now retracted her "German explanation", and has then proposed a frequency argument (she says she would need to see, in Suetonius, 3-4 occurrences of Slingerland's proposed construction). But she has then failed to follow through her frequency proposal, and has then basically told me to go away and do my own research.
I am therefore concerned that your deletion of the Slingerland translation is based on a single, inconsistent and digressive expert. I propose that the Slingerland translation should be reinstated as suggested by Akhilleus above. I hope editors other than Cynwolfe will then discuss the appropriateness of including the Slingerland translation, with a view to retaining or deleting Slingerland. (For avoidance of doubt, let me say that I have not read the Slingerland reference and therefore do not know how solid his arguments are, neither do I know whether literature exists supporting him.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.170.123.7 ( talk • contribs)
@ NebY and Karma1998: The Jewish and Pagan authors are almost irrelevant to the historical Jesus and the historicity of Jesus, according to Bart Ehrman. Only fanatical atheists and fanatical Christians think these authors make or break the historicity of Jesus. tgeorgescu ( talk) 20:12, 15 September 2021 (UTC)
"Scholars generally agree that these references refer to the same event.[59]"
Is that so? Cassius Dio talks of a ban on potentially seditious gatherings and explicity states that it was not an expulsion (due to, basically, logistical reasons - the Jewish community was too large to kick them all out). Bruce ("Christianity Under Claudius", Bull. John Rylands Lib. 44, March 1962) disagreed that Cassius and Suetonius refer to the same event. Rather, he argued that the ban on gatherings was an initial Claudian measure (in the early-mid 40s AD) mainly due to a desire to prevent a repetition of the Alexandrian riots (38 CE) (which have no attested indication that Christianity played any part in them), and that, when tensions within the Jewish community of Rome escalated later in that decade (probably due to Christian proselytizing, as "Chrestus" would have been a highly unusual name for an observant Jew or Jewish Christian), he ordered the expulsion of at least the troublesome part of the Roman Jewish community.
(Acts claims the entire Jewish community was expelled, but Acts is conspiciously evasive about the religious status of Priscilla and Aquila when they are first encountered - as it has to be in a) claiming there was no Christianity in Rome until the - almost certainly fictional as narrated - Petropauline missionary effort, but b) presenting P&A as "model second-generation Christians" for the reader to look up to and to strive to imitate, as they probably were within still-living memory when Acts was composed. This is impossible without fudging - except perhaps by appealing to divinely transmitted miraculous knowledge of the deeper workings of Christian (as opposed to Yohananine) baptism as expounded by P&A to Apollos, or by explicit mention of Pauline instruction - but there is not even an indication of either, despite Acts being quite willing to use such tropes at other occasions. So the Acts narrative should be considered a streamlined paraphrase, as they say in movies, "based on actual events", giving a roughly correct general impression but unreliable in the details.)
At any rate, the differences between Suetonius' and Cassius' words are too large to dismiss - they are in direct and explicit contradiction if they do refer to the ame "event" (as opposed to "process" - if Cassius reports an early stage of Claudius "pacifying" policy, and Suetonius the ultimate development, the contradiction simply disappears and a consistent scenario of increasing pressure results). 18:55, 7 December 2021 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.182.114.91 ( talk)
That's disrespectful language. Say instead, "a person, of whom we have no information.". Period! 2600:4040:9838:E600:501D:9A77:6763:367 ( talk) 02:17, 23 May 2023 (UTC)