[B-Greek] Iesous/zeus connection

Gary Hedrick garyh at cjfm.org
Thu Sep 29 01:03:48 EDT 2005


	The only similarity between Zeus and INSOUS is phonetic.  To say the
two words are related is a bit like saying the English word for a severed
tree trunk ("log") derives from the Greek LOGOS.
	Re: Yeshu in the Galilee, someone was asking for examples of the
Yeshu spelling, but it's not an issue of spelling.  We know that Yeshua was
spelled yod-shin-vav-ayin.  It's a contraction of Yehoshua, or Joshua.  The
issue about Yeshua is whether the ayin was pronounced.  There is a theory
that the Galileans did not pronounce final ayin, but I don't believe there
is scholarly consensus on this.
	In traditional (non-messianic) Judaism, some of the rabbis,
particularly those with an axe to grind, drop the final ayin and refer to
Yeshua as Yeshu.  But it has nothing to do with an ancient Galilean
pronunciation.  It's an acrostic that represents a curse on Jesus of
Nazareth.  Thankfully, these extremists are in a minority.

Gary

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-----Original Message-----
From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of bitan buth
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2005 7:44 PM
To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [B-Greek] Iesous/zeus connection


Shalom Jack, 

Your conclusion about no connection between Zeus and Jesus is sound. 
Thank you.

However, a couple of perspective points:

EGRAPSAS
> Jesus' Galilean friends would have called him Yeshu

Is there even one first century example of such a name? We have quite a few
[yeshua`].

(If you happen to find the one alleged "Yeshu", I will ask for a picture,
where the writer runs out of space but spells the name y-sh-u-` on the other
side.)
(How many 'Yeshu' besides Jesus of Nazareth in the later Talmud? This can be
explained as preserving it as a foreign/Greek name.)
(PS: Arabic place names in the Galilee preserved `ayin and Het, correctly,
which means somebodies' dialects up there were OK,)
My take is that he was still Yeshua` in the first century and later. 

EGRAPSAS
>In the Galilee, Aramaic was pronounced differently

This still sounds like assuming 'Aramaic-only' for the region. 
(yes, this assumes previous exchanges)

I would incerely ask one simple favor: can you quote even two story-parables
in Aramaic out of the nearly 2000 recorded in the admittedly bilingual
Hebrew/Aramaic rabbinic literature corpus? 

(This comment coincidentally comes while reading Casey and Porter argue
against each other while making assumptions that ignore some facts on the
ground, as though story parables might have been common in either Greek lit
or in Jewish Aramaic lit. Students need to hear a third side about how
problematic such assumptions are. I've no problem with admitting that we
have problems knowing where and how the trilingual situation worked out. But
leaving Hebrew out of the equation just doesn't wash with Mishnaic Hebrew
specialists anymore. [PS to Greek people-- I'd love to have more Greek story
parables, too. Like the 'miser burying a gold talent' in Aesop] Anyway, I'm
not suggesting a re-hash of the complexities of the sociolinguistics of the
periods concerned. I am serious, though, about the challenge to see two or
even one Aramaic story-parable from Jewish lit. It is a remarkable
phenomenon that if a story is called a parable or introduced 'to what is
this like' it is in Hebrew. This is basically ignored in NT scholarship.)

Yisge shlamax, =PLHQUNQEIH SOU H EIRHNH 
Randall Buth

Randall Buth, PhD
Biblical Language Center
www.biblicalulpan.org
c/o margbuth at gmail.com
also, Director, Biblical Studies in Israel
under Rothberg International School,
Hebrew University
ybitan at mscc.huji.ac.il



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