Legion near Judea at time of Jesus

[Crispvs]

"Even if as you say, some were perhaps written only ten years after Jesus's crucifixion. That's still ten years."

Well, it might have been as much as ten years. Then again, both Mark's gospel and 'Q' could have been written two weeks after, for all we know. Ten years is simply the maximum likely timespan within which these works cold have been written (going by Jona Lendering's thinking in the matter of 'Q'). It is also worth bearing in mind that all three synoptic gospels were written well within living memory of the events they describe and could thus not be very far off what was already generally believed without losing credibility. If you are going to write about events which many people reading your work are likely to remember, you don't really want them then to go about the streets shouting for everyone to hear about what a liar and a charleton you are. You have to stay pretty close to the facts as everyone understands them for at least the majority of what you are saying. You have a bit more leeway to make fantastic claims if you looking back over three hundred and fifty years and want to talk about Alexander following a pair of snakes to the temple of Zeus Amon.


"And we know how things can be. Some people tell the truth and some tell you what they want you to hear. Whatever suits there own agenda"

True, but when it is likely that two members of the Sanhedrin, who both knew the characters and motivations of their fellow council members well and who had probably also seen the proceedings with their own eyes, were available for Peter, and thus Mark, to consult, the possibility for additional agendas and Chinese whispers is greatly reduced.


"The catholic church preaches that there was a centurion and roman troops which lead Jesus out to be crucified and actually did the crucifixion."

Technically, that is true. However, few in the church (as with the rest of society) are specialists on the Roman army. To the average person's understanding, a Roman soldier would be exactly that: a soldier in the huge , homogenous and super-disciplined Roman Army who, like all his comrades, came from Rome and spoke Latin. That is all they need to understand anyway - they are not specialists and the nature of the soldiers is at best incidental to them. Those of us who study these things in more depth (which includes everyone posting here in this thread) necessarily have a greater understanding of what many would consider the minutiae of the matter.

So yes - there was a centurio and at least four Roman soldiers, but the centurio would have given his orders in Greek and may have been a provincial himself and the soldiers were auxiliaries in well established units which recruited their men in Samaria, who would have spoken a Semitic language but who, like everyone else, also spoke Greek.


"They also say that Pilate posted sentries at Jesus's tomb after the crucifixion at the request of the Jews for fear that someone would steal the body. Well if these were comprised of undisciplined, etc. troops, then this would explain how supposedly all of them fell asleep during Jesus's resurrection. And we know roman legionaries were very well trained and disciplined and this kind of thing wouldn't have happened for fear of the consequences. Your thoughts?"

I don't believe that the guards on the tomb were Roman soldiers. According the Matthew's account, the chief priests and Pharisees requested Pilate to authorise a guard over the tomb. Pilate, presumably aware of the blackmail they could exert on him agreed, but rather than saying that Pilate mounted a guard, Matthew says he gave them the authorisation they had requested and then told then to make the arrangements themselves. The priests and Pharisees then went and saw to it that the tomb was sealed and mounted a guard. Nowhere does it say that the guard was composed of Roman soldiers, and given the context, it seems far more likely that they were temple guards, who would have been under the orders of the chief priests anyway. This would seem to be confirmed by the statement that the guards went to see the chief priests afterwards rather than a centurio or tribune, as a Roman soldier would have done, and together with the chief priests (and in exchange for a bribe) cooked up a story about having fallen asleep on duty which would have earned any soldier in a Roman unit the severest of punishments. The chief priests also undertook to smooth the matter over with Pilate (who they probably had over a barrel anyway). Temple guards then, not Roman auxiliary soldiers.

The more we look at it, the less we seem to see of actual Roman soldiers. In fact, for all the talk of Roman soldiers during the trial, crucifixion and burial, the only ones we can safely say were members of the Roman garrison are the centurio and the four soldiers who divided up the clothing of the crucified men. The men who carried out the arrest were a mixture of priests, temple guards (presumably) and general club wielding ruffians, as far as we can tell. The soldiers who subjected Jesus to abuse and mocked him by dressing him as a faux king were probably Jewish soldiers of Herod Antipas' personal retinue, and the guards on the tomb were temple guards under the orders of the chief priests.


Crispvs