> Burgy writes:
>
>> Glenn writes: "Jesus didn't speak Greek, He spoke Aramaic or Hebrew."
>>
>> Glenn -- would this point make any difference? I am personally convinced,
>> and, if pressed, I think I can make a plausible case, that Jesus spoke
>> Greek quite well,and did so on many of the gospel occasions, particularly
>> those recorded in John's gospel. He also very probably spoke Aramic,
>> Hebrew and even Latin. He was no "country bumpkin!"
>
> I would love to hear your case on this. The reaction of Nathaniel John
> 1:46 sounds like what people say about my home state. He was incredulous
> that anything good could come from there. But I am certainly open to
> hearing a very good case for Jesus' multi-lingual abilities.
I can't resist commenting on this since I've just finished reading an
interesting book called "Jesus and the Forgotten City: New Light on
Sepphoris and the Urban World of Jesus" by Richard A. Batey (1991, Baker
Book House, Grand Rapids, MI). Batey has a PhD from Vanderbilt and
served as administrative director of the University of South Florida's
excavation of Sepphoris and is a professor at Rhodes College.
The book discusses the archaeological investigation of the large city
of Sepphoris which existed a scant 4 miles from Nazareth. It was built
by Herod Antipas during Jesus's boyhood (and the author speculates that
he and Joseph may have worked on its construction as carpenters) and
served as the capital for Galilee and Peraea during Jesus's life.
Batey describes Sepphoris as a "burgeoning Greco-Roman metropolis
boasting upwards of thirty thousand inhabitants - Jews, Arabs, Greeks,
and Romans." [p. 14].
I think he makes a good case that Jesus was not a "country bumpkin"
and was exposed as a child and young adult to a great deal more than
is generally thought.
- Steve.
-- Steven H. Schimmrich Callsign KB9LCG s-schim@uiuc.edu Department of Geology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 245 Natural History Building, Urbana, IL 61801 (217) 244-1246 http://www.uiuc.edu/ph/www/s-schim Deus noster refugium