As-salaam alaikum. Over at BloggingTheology, I was involved in a recent discussion about New Testament manuscripts. Brother Paul Williams pointed out that there are no 1st-century CE manuscripts of the NT, to which a Christian apologist with a particular hostility to Islam, whom I refer to as “Cerberus” (or “Cerbie” for short), claimed that there is a surviving fragment of the Gospel of Mark in the Dead Sea Scrolls. He was referring to 7Q5, a fragment made famous by the Christian scholars Jose O’Callaghan and Carsten Theide. But while the evidence discounts 7Q5 being a fragment of Mark, “Cerbie” (aka Paulus) insisted that it was. Below is the discussion…
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Hey Paulus, Thank you for your reply.
Please see the above comment I made to Jonathan. And please answer the question I have posed to him as well: , do you have any manuscripts that are radio-carbon dated from the 1st, 2nd, 3rd or fourth centuries?
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not one manuscript from the 1st century.
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Wrong. Numerous parchments from the Dead Sea scrolls contain portions of the New Testament. Since Qumran was abandoned around ad 70, then clearly the mss predate this period.
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Wow….. Just wow.
Reference pls.
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“Wrong. Numerous parchments from the Dead Sea scrolls contain portions of the New Testament. Since Qumran was abandoned around ad 70, then clearly the mss predate this period.”
Hahahaha, Cerbie must be a comedian. because I am laughing my head off!
The desperation is really starting to show. The second they get cornered, out come the lies from these brainwashed zombies.
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Cleary the Muslims here aren’t up to date on scholarship. Oh well, what can one expect when erhman is their only source of info.
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“Wrong. Numerous parchments from the Dead Sea scrolls contain portions of the New Testament. Since Qumran was abandoned around ad 70, then clearly the mss predate this period.”
Waiting for your reference……, whenever you comment to anyone I will be posting this to remind you
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We know Ehrman is a common xtian bitchslapper and that it annoys crosstians.
The man has done a great job getting so many people out of your cult.
All xtians can do in return is whine.Like
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Well, aren’t you immature. This is a com box, so I’m certainly nglad r going to waste my time producing all the academic periodicals and journals on this, especially to a Muslim using liberal arguments to firtherhis christophobia.
But alas, how about you do some research yourself on Carsten Peter Thiede, a German scholar who argues the hypothesis (begun by Spanish Papyrologist José O’Callaghan) that cave 7, an exclusively Greek mss collection, contains a very early ms of Mark (7Q5). There has, of course, been intense discussion on this in many journals and periodicals.
But probably let me save you the trouble. Given your reliance and blind acceptance of erhman as your primary source, I’m sure you will dismiss the findings of Theide because they don’t suit your agenda. Cheerio
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Thanks for your reply Paulus, I think we can agree that when someone makes a claim, YOU HAVE TO BACK IT UP.
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Your 7Q5 is UNIVERSALLY REJECTED as a fragment of Mark.:
Millard, A. R. (2000). Reading and Writing in the Time of Jesus. NYU Press. pp. 56. ISBN 0-8147-5637-9. “C.P. Thiede drew on papyrology, statistics and forensic microscopy to try to prove O’Callaghan’s case, yet without convincing the majority of leading specialists.”
McCready, Wayne O. (1997). “The Historical Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls”. In Arnal, William E.; Desjardins, Michael. Whose Historical Jesus?. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. pp. 193. ISBN 0-88920-295-8. “On the whole, O’Callaghan’s thesis has met with scholarly skepticism since the fragments are extremely small, almost illegible, and his strongest case does not agree with known versions of Mark.”
Qumran ms. 7Q5 … is captioned as if it contains a fragment of Mark: it was of course O’Callaghan who made that controversial — and now virtually universally rejected – identication of this Dead Sea text as a piece of the New Testament …” Elliot (2004), JK, Book Notes, Novum Testamentum, Volume 45, Number 2, 2003 , pp. 203.
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I don’t see Ehrman’s name above, do you?
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ROFTL!!! Oh Cerbie, Cerbie, what are we going to do with you? The spirit of ignorance is strong in you! I had a feeling you were going for O’Callaghan’s BS about the gospel of Mark! I heard this argument years ago. Archive sums it well. This claim is pure Christian BS! Your lying spirit has shown itself once again. This isn’t “scholarship”. It’s Christians making things up to save themselves the embarrassment of not having a single 1st century manuscript of their pathetic “New Testament”.
As for your non sequitur about the NT manuscripts, you have presented absolutely no evidence that these manuscripts reflect the preserved material from the 1st century. I’m sorry Cerbie, but your fantasies don’t count as evidence! Poor, poor Cerbie. So desperate!!!
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well, call me a prophet cause I just predicted precisely what you would say, did I not? The ‘majority of scholars’ objection doesn’t work. First, it’s fallacious. Second, I know for certain you would abandon such a position on say the consensus of scholars on Jesus death. So forgive me for laughing at your affirmed objection.
As it stands, I think the position for its authenticity has been well defended above the retractors you mention. If you disagree, perhaps provide proper reasons, not just isolated quotes from others. The primary reason it has been rejected has been because it would place GMark too early. But of course such an objection isn’t really an objection at all if ones dating is only an educated guess. Sadly these scholars abandon hard evidence for a preferred dating hypothesis. Much like Muslims really.
Mr Fail.
Just another boring rant from you pretending to be another expert again. Gee, we must be up to 20 or so disciplines you pretend to be an expert in. And unsurprising not a shred of evidence against my position .
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Hahahahaa, Cerbie you dummy! It’s ironic that you didn’t bring a shred of evidence to support the claim that the gospel of Mark is in the Dead sea scrolls and yet rant about me not bringing any evidence myself. Also, when did I claim I was an expert? I said that I have heard this argument before and that I think it is just a bunch of BS. Come now, Cerbie. Surely you can do better than these childish rants? Oh wait, no you cant. Nevermind.
now will you actually present evidence for a change or should we assume that you are just parroting what you hear like a good Christian zombie?
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Thanks for your reply,
I am going to have to step out from our discussions, Paulus and Jonathan. It was an….interesting experience, to say the least
I leave you with these words from the Qur;an, Surah 18:110 :
Say: I am only a mortal like you. My Lord inspireth in me that your God is only One God. And whoever hopeth for the meeting with his Lord, let him do righteous work, and make none sharer of the worship due unto his Lord.
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Apparently I don’t need to prevent evidence since you already apparently know all about the papyrologist O’Callaghan’s research and have already concluded its BS.
We all know that what that really means is that our are in fact the parrot, have never read anything from the guy but simply dismiss like a typical muhammadan.
You’re boring me Porky. Zzzzzzzzzz
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Yaaaaawn, oh sorry. I’m getting sleepy again from the usual Christian whining and BS. Don’t blame me for being up to date on the scholarship. You’re the one bringing out of date arguments that have been debunked for a long time! It has nothing to do with being an expert. It has to do with reading the research literature.
Present your proof, idiot. We’re all waiting. If you don’t have any, then let us know so we can conclude that you have nothing. Such a good Christian zombie, you are!
Speaking of fallacies, your posts are riddled with them. Thus far, no proof has been given. All you are doing is appealing to the fact that certain Christian scholars have made the argument about the Dead Sea Scrolls. By you own standards, you are committing a fallacy. Hahahaha, poor stupid doggie!
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Where’d you run off you, doggie? Here boy (whistles)…
What is your evidence for 7Q5 being a fragment of the Gospel of Mark? We’re still waiting. While you desperately search for this evidence, let me make it even harder for you. Here is a devastating critique from a fellow Christian, namely Dr. Daniel Wallace (a darling of the Evangelical camp):
“First, what is the hard evidence on which O’Callaghan’s identification is based? A scrap of papyrus smaller than a man’s thumb with only one unambiguous word—και. Only six other letters are undisputed: τω (line 2), τ (line 3, immediately after the και), νη (line 4), η (line 5). To build a case on such slender evidence would seem almost impossible even if all other conditions were favorable to it. But to identify this as Mark 6:52-53 requires (1) two significant textual emendations (tau for delta in a manner which is unparalleled; and the dropping of ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν even though no other MSS omit this phrase); and (2) unlikely reconstructions of several other letters. Add to this that the MS is from a Qumran cave and that it is to be dated no later than 50 CE and the case against the Marcan proposal seems overwhelming. If it were not for the fact that José O’Callaghan is a reputable papyrologist and that C. P. Thiede is a German scholar, one has to wonder whether this hypothesis would ever have gotten more than an amused glance from the scholarly community.”
https://bible.org/article/7q5-earliest-nt-papyrus
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Next he will bring up First Century Mark, which is also a bust
https://islamicarchives.wordpress.com/2018/01/20/shhhh-first-century-mark-is-not-authentic/
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JazakAllahkhairun for the link to Wallace on 7Q5. I have put it on my blog, since I have found it noteworthy
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Yawn. I already told you little muhammadan that you bore me. Citing th “common” objections to this ms isn’t really all that exciting.
I’ve already addressed that second objection on a too early dating for GMark. Imagine I rejected the Birmingham Koranic ms because it appeared too early for my preconceived idea. Would you find such an argument persuasive?
And the first doesn’t convince me or many others. The are plenty of mss emendations in the 5800+ Greek mss tradition.
The most likely source for that manuscript is GMark. Or can you propose something else that fits the criteria? Bet you can’t…
Now go back to ge masjid and try to find yourself some jihadi to annoy.
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LOL, poor Cerbie is in denial and mad as hell!
If you want to be a moron your whole life, that’s your business, but don’t expect reasonable people to buy your BS. The fact is that numerous studies have been done (one by Robert Gundry comes to mind) and they all conclude that 7Q5 is not a fragment of Mark. Even Christians, like Wallace, say this.
Your idiotic question as to what that document really is, if not the Gospel of Mark, is childish at best. The answer is that we cannot identify the document because there is just not enough information. As Wallace pointed out, the ONLY clear word in the fragment is “kai”. That’s it! How can you possibly identify the document from such meager evidence? Like I said, you Christians are just desperate.
Interestingly, if you bothered to read Wallace’s article, he explains that he found 16 possible matches between the fragment and other documents. Here is what Wallace says:
“Second, when one allows for different possibilities than just O’Callaghan’s for the partially legible letters, the Ibycus program19 does, indeed, seem to permit other texts to be identified with 7Q5. In my own cursory examination of the TLG via Ibycus, I found sixteen texts which could possibly fit (though only if one stretched both his or her imagination and the textual evidence).”
In the footnote, he identifies the possible candidates:
“The search involved the following pattern: των, καιτ, ννη, corresponding to lines two, three, and four of 7Q5 (and even allowing O’Callaghan his nu in line 2). The passages found include Ezek 23:36; Josephus, Vita 42-3; Vita 236; Bellum 5.528; 7.380-1; Philo Cher. 44; 119; Plant. 135; Plant. 136; Mut. 173; Thucydides, Hist. 1.10.2; 1.60.1; 3.109.2; 4.67.4; 5.82.5; 8.55.1. I would not be so rash as to suggest that 7Q5 is a copy of any of these passages, but just that the identification with Mark 6 is not unparalleled. Almost all of these passages—like Mark 6—involve what I consider to be insuperable problems: date (in the case of the Josephus texts), length of line, and manipulation of partially legible letters. With a little imagination, however, I was able to emend several of the texts (even finding plausible homoioteleuta, metatheses, etc.) and make the data fit. In fact, in one text this was not even necessary. In Philo, Plant. 135 the three lines of text can be reconstructed, without any textual emendation, in a 16/14/16 stichometry:
θωματων απαντων αρ (16)
ιστον και τελειο (14)
τατον γεννημα ο εισ (16)
τον πατερα . . .
There is a certain advantage of this text over Mark 6: whereas O’Callaghan’s reconstruction involves twenty or twenty-one letters per line as the norm—including line 3 which has a three-letter gap and ought therefore to have fewer letters, the Philonic text has two letters fewer in line 3, taking into account the gap in 7Q5 at this point.
Of course, there is still the problem of forcing the partially legible letters into the theory—but this suffers no disadvantage over against the Marcan proposal.”
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“Next he will bring up First Century Mark, which is also a bust”
I see you’ve gone back to being an erhman puppet. Geez you Muslims are so predictable. Haven’t got an original thought ever!
Boring.
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“I see you’ve gone back to being an erhman puppet. Geez you Muslims are so predictable. Haven’t got an original thought ever!
Boring.”
Bwahahaha! Oh you silly boys get so riled up when Ehrman is mentioned! I love it!
“The fact is that numerous studies have been done (one by Robert Gundry comes to mind) and they all conclude that 7Q5 is not a fragment of Mark. “
When you’re so used to hyperbole and lying, eventually (and often these day with a muhammadan like you), you get caught out. I’ve posted the following for your interest. Note, it’s from your own source
“There is today both interest in and sympathy toward the O’Callaghan hypothesis—especially now that it has a fresh advocate in Thiede.6 Indeed, at the ETS national meeting in November 1992, even Alan Johnson pleaded the case for Thiede’s volume.7”
Hmm, at the time this article was written it sure shows you to be a demonic liar!
And just to demolish your stupidity and lies, let’s demonstrate that these objections have been discussed already.
“Thiede also responds at length to the three most common (and most serious) objections to this identification: (1) 7Q5 has a tau where Mark 6:53 has a delta (τι[απεράσαντες] vs. διαπεράσαντες); (2) in order to make the lines be of somewhat equal length and correspond to Mark’s text, the ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν of v. 53 must be omitted—even though no extant MSS omit this expression; and (3) a number of O’Callaghan’s identifications of the partially readable letters are quite improbable. To those involved in the debate over 7Q5’s identification, Thiede’s argument is more summary than new insight. In essence, he argues that (1) there are frequent interchanges between tau and delta in koine Greek,13 rendering such a possibility here hardly surprising; (2) other early papyri (e.g., Ì52, Ì45) omit material at times, even though such an omission is a singular reading; and (3) if O’Callaghan’s critics had taken the time to look at the fragment instead of a photograph, their objections about his letter reconstructions would have vanished“
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Ooooh, such anger! Poor Cerbie is clinging to the ashes of this theory; so desperate to save the integrity of his Bible!
Moron, do a little research before you open your mouth. The article is from Wallace’s original paper…from 1994! Read here:
http://place.asburyseminary.edu/trenpapers/683/
Face it, poor doggie. The theory has been universally rejected by scholars. There is just no current discussion anymore.
And as for your…ahem…”demolishment” of my “stupidity and lies”, you actually showed that you are the stupid and demonic liar! Read the very paragraph, dummy! Wallace states:
“These counter-charges by Thiede are not as substantial as he supposes. We shall approach them chiastically. First, both the original editors of this fragment and most who have followed disagree with several of O’Callaghan’s letter reconstructions. At every point in which the enlarged photograph of the fragment at the end of Thiede’s booklet (p. 68) seems to disprove O’Callaghan’s reconstructions, Thiede discounts the empirical evidence which he himself provides and renders his own judgments untouchable by any who have access only to a photograph. In other words, he is saying, “You don’t have a right to criticize O’Callaghan’s reconstruction because you haven’t seen the fragment.” Such a stance is elitist at best; at worst, it moves the entire discussion from a scholarly dialogue to a fideistic statement: Thiede basically says “Trust me.” A constant refrain is that O’Callaghan’s reconstructions are possible. Perhaps this is so, but such are also highly unlikely. In particular, an unbiased reader looking at the photograph will almost certainly disagree with O’Callaghan’s reconstructed nu in line 214 and agree with the original editors’ judgment about epsilon, sigma in line 5 (against O’Callaghan’s sigma, alpha). Thiede is quite right that examination of a document firsthand is to be preferred to examination of a photograph.15 And this is precisely where his and O’Callaghan’s approach falters: others have looked at the MS firsthand and have disagreed with O’Callaghan.”
Hahahaha, when will you learn, you satanic dog of hell?
And to further humiliate you, here are some excerpts from Robert Gundry:
“Notably, he [Thiede] makes much of his having examined 7Q5 itself, not just photographs of it; but when it comes to the crucial disputed letter in line 2, he argues from the photograph and admits that the supposed diagonal stroke of a nu does not appear to the naked eye.”
Based on microscopic examination, he then humorously concludes:
“Perhaps the identification of 7Q5 with Mark 6:52-53 can now rest in peace with suffering exhumation. Regrets.” (No NU in Line 2 of 7Q5: A Final Disidentification of 7Q5 With Mark 6:52-53.” Journal Of Biblical Literature 118, no. 4: 698.)
Ouch, poor Cerbie has more wounds to lick! Where will you go from here, little mutt?
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I guess I better just become a muhammadan then. Find me some black raisin head slaves, a few concubines and maybe star in some Jihadi cause. That must be the only option available, correct?
Haha, I’m not clinging to anything. It might be news to a silly masjidian muhammadan slave like yourself, but you’ll find that there will be disagreement on every topic. Silly Jihadi wannabe…
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Hahahaha, this is all poor Cerbie can do. Mouth off on unrelated nonsense, and humiliate himself further!
So, are there any 1st century manuscripts then of your so-called “New Testament”? You crashed and burned on 7Q5 and are clearly unable to defend your asinine views with reasonable evidence. No wonder you are so ticked off! So, are there any other candidates that you want us to consider? I’ll be waiting. 😉
The Quran and Bible Blog 
you what is funny about these fools is that first it was shrod of turin, then they thought they found the empty tomb only to discover it had 3 DIFFERENT locations and now it is a “first century” piece from g mark . lol this is funny.
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Christianity has a history of historical forgeries and false alarms, so it’s not surprising.
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*shroud
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lol i remember that blunder, let’s forget the nonsensical claims that passed, the real deal is many people assume
1) that a simple fragment proves with *certainty* that the rest of the book that we don’t have around the same time period somehow existed in that time period in the same form as we know it today
2) It’s still anonymous
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*2) they assume that also proves it was written by an eyewitness when it’s still anonymous
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Ergo we still have many significant reasons to be sceptical
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