Here I continue to place Jesus and Galilee within the broader context of Israelite history. This episode works through the Hellenistic and Roman periods, including the time of Jesus, and finishes with a discussion of social and economic life in first century Galilee and Judea. This is part of series 5 (The Historical Jesus in Context) of the Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean podcast.

Podcast 5.7: Jesus, Galilee, and Israelite History, part 2 – To the Time of Jesus (mp3; archive.org page with various downloading options here).

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Timo S. Paananen’s blog now points us to the results for BAR‘s second handwriting expert.  Apparently the expert failed to meet several deadlines and has not yet submitted a written report.  Instead, through phone conversations he has communicated that he believes the Secret Gospel of Mark was forged by Morton Smith.  One wonders whether we will ever have a sufficiently definitive answer regarding the Secret Gospel of Mark.  This lack of clarity is very disappointing.  I will need to wait and read the full written report from that handwriting expert (if he does indeed submit it).  However, the reasoning of the expert as spelled out by Shanks in relation to phone conversations seems less than compelling as a definitive answer.

I just noticed that this blog is soon going to pass the 250,000 visitor mark.  I’m glad that the site is still being used.

When it rains it pours.  Biblical Archeology Review has hired an expert in Greek handwriting (Venetia Anastasopoulou) to offer her analysis of The Secret Gospel of Mark in relation to Morton Smith’s own handwriting.  You can access the BAR article here and you can directly access the very substantial 39-page report here.  Her main conclusion (p. 38) is as follows:

“OPINION

The following opinion is based upon an examination of the documents submitted to me for this purpose using the application of appropriate handwriting principles, and my experience and training as a forensic document and handwriting examiner. It is my professional opinion that the writers of the questioned document of “Secret Mark” on the document listed as Q1, Q2 an Q3 and Morton Smith’s handwriting on the documents listed as K1 – K27, are most probably not the same. Therefore it is highly probable that Morton Smith could not have simulated the document of “Secret Mark” .

QUALIFYING STATEMENT:

This opinion is based solely on the documents listed as having been examined. Due to the limitations imposed in examining document photographs, this opinion is highly probable. This opinion is subject to amendment if additional examinations are performed using additional exemplars which may exhibit evidence not observable in the documents upon which this opinion was based.”

As my review of Carlson’s book back in 2005 noted, the handwriting portion of his argument was among his strongest (the others seemed somewhat arbitrary to me).  However, I felt there were some key shortcomings regarding Carlson’s handwriting analysis and I did not find his hoax theory convincing.  Scott Brown and Pantuck’s recent post spelled out some other potential problems with Carlson’s approach, and now there is a properly trained expert in Greek handwriting who concludes that “it is highly probable that Morton Smith could not have simulated the document of ‘Secret Mark’” (p. 38).

Hopefully Stephen Carlson will offer his response to these developments, actively engaging the issues.  Hopefully others who have invested interests in seeing this as a forgery will fully consider  the evidence to the contrary.

I may post more once I’ve read through the whole report and through the recent article by Watson.

Further to some of my comments back in 2005 (see my post: The Secret Gospel of Mark and Carlson’s The Gospel Hoax: Smoking gun?), Scott Brown and Allan Pantuck have now written a rather damaging critique of Stephen Carlson’s work on the handwriting analysis of the Secret Gospel of Mark.

Thanks to Tony Burke for pointing me to the post on Timo Paananen’s Salainan evankelista blog and to Allan Pantuck for sending me a copy of the article.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/460671/LostTweetsCyzewski.pdf

This and the following episode place Jesus and Galilee within the broader context of Israelite history. This episode begins with the Assyrian period (700s BCE) and concludes with the Persian period, with the construction of the second temple (ca. 500 BCE). This is part of series 5 (The Historical Jesus in Context) of the Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean podcast.

Podcast 5.6: Jesus, Galilee, and Israelite History, part 1 – Until the Second Temple (mp3; archive.org page with various downloading options here).

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

You may also subscribe to this and subsequent episodes through iTunes or another podcatcher. View credits for my introductory music.