More on the Alleged 1544 Copy Error

I've been doing a series on the date of Herod the Great's death, which was inspired by lawyer Frederick Larson's Star of Bethlehem. In that documentary, Larson argues that Herod died in 1 B.C.E. rather than 4 B.C.E. This is a significant aspect of Larson's overall argument because Larson demonstrates that certain astronomical phenomena occurred in 2 B.C.E., and he identifies that phenomena with the star of Bethlehem. But the Gospel of Matthew says that the star appeared during the reign of Herod the Great. Consequently, Larson's thesis must coincide with Herod dying after 2 B.C.E., ruling out a 4 B.C.E. date for Herod's death.

This morning, I read an article that Larson cites on his web site: David W. Beyer's “Josephus Re-Examined: Unraveling the Twenty-Second Year of Tiberias”, which was on pages 85-96 of Chronos, Kairos, Christos II, ed. E. Jerry Vardaman (Macon: Mercer University Press, 1998). I may revisit this article in the future, since it expresses key points in a concise yet informative manner----on such issues as the eclipse during the year of Herod's death, numismatics, etc. Beyer also had interesting information about when the church fathers dated Jesus' birth, and he argues that most of the church fathers who commented on the subject dated it to 2 B.C.E. (though, of course, they did not call the year 2 B.C.E.).

But I was disappointed because I had a hard time understanding Beyer's main argument, which concerned the manuscripts and editions of Josephus. Larson appeals to Beyer's article to support the claim that editions of Josephus after 1544 are inconsistent with pre-1544 editions on an issue that pertains to the date of Herod's death: the date of the death of Herod Philip, the son of Herod. According to Larson and Beyer, most post-1544 editions of Josephus' Antiquities 18.106 say that Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius after reigning for thirty-seven years. For believers in a 4 B.C.E. date for Herod's death, that is consistent with Herod Philip succeeding Herod the Great in 4 B.C.E., meaning that Herod died in that year. But Larson says that pre-1544 editions say that Herod Philip died in the twenty-second year of Tiberius, and that is consistent with Herod the Great dying in 1 B.C.E.

In my last post in this series, I noted Andrew Steinmann's statement that "the twenty-second year of Tiberius" reading is not based on an extant Greek manuscript of Josephus. I wondered what pre-1544 Greek manuscripts had for Antiquities 18.106, since there are Greek manuscripts of Josephus that predate 1544. I was curious about whether or not Beyer addresses this issue. To be honest, after reading his article, I do not know. Beyer has a chart about early manuscripts (not published editions, in this case, but manuscripts) that say that Herod Philip died in the twenty-second year of Tiberius after a reign of thirty-five (rather than thirty-seven) years. These manuscripts pre-date 1544. But Beyer does not identify the language of these manuscripts, as he mentions the languages of the post-1544 editions. I concluded from a Google search that one of those pre-1544 manuscripts is in Latin. I'm not saying that Latin manuscripts are necessarily inferior to Greek ones, for the Latin ones may be based on Greek ones. But I'm racking my brain trying to answer the question: When do pre-1544 Greek manuscripts say that Herod Philip died? And Beyer does not address this question in a clear manner. (Beyer does say, however, that the 1544 edition was in Greek, and that he could not find a previous Greek published edition at the British Library, making the 1544 edition "the first printed edition of the Antiquities in Greek." There were Greek manuscripts that were earlier than 1544, but, for Beyer, 1544 marked the first published edition of the Antiquities in Greek.)

Moreover, I read a good critique of Beyer by Richard Carrier, who believes that Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.E. (Whereas Larson goes with a 1 B.C.E. date to uphold the historicity of Scripture, Carrier, an atheist, does the opposite: he argues for a 4 B.C.E. date in an article that seeks to undermine biblical inerrancy.) Carriers' entire critique of Beyer is worth the read, but I will just quote two arguments that Carrier makes:

"...Beyer examined only manuscripts in the British Museum and the Library of Congress--yet the best manuscripts are in France and Italy--one of which is the oldest, Codex Ambrosianae F 128, inscribed in the 11th century (the oldest manuscript Beyer examined was 12th century); and another is the most reliable: Codex Vaticanus Graecus 984, transcribed in 1354; both confirming a reading of 'twentieth,' and thus invalidating all his conclusions from the start. [A]ll scholarly editions agree: the word for 'twentieth' (eikostô) exists in all extant Greek manuscripts worth considering. Where does the reading 'twenty-second' come from? A single manuscript tradition of a Latin translation (which reads vicesimo secundo). Beyer's case completely falls apart here. The Latin translations of Josephus are notoriously inferior, and are never held to be more accurate than extant Greek manuscripts, much less all of them. Indeed, this is well proven here: whereas the Latin has 22 for the year of Tiberius, it also has 32, or even in some editions 35, as the year of Philip, not the 37 that Finegan's argument requires. Thus, clearly the Latin translator has botched all the numbers in this passage. Any manuscripts that Beyer examined were no doubt either from these inferior Latin manuscripts, or Greek translations from these Latin manuscripts. Therefore, there is no basis whatever for adopting 'twenty second' as the correct reading. "

Carrier does say that Beyer looked at Greek manuscripts, which I am inferring were pre-1544 ones. But, in the end, Carrier invalidates the significance of 1544 in Beyer's argument, for Carrier notes that there are pre-1544 manuscripts saying that Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius, not the twenty-second. (Carrier argues, however, that the quantity and date of manuscripts do not really matter, for there may be numerous manuscripts that are based on a faulty manuscript, and a later manuscript may be based on "older and more reliable archetypes".)

Carrier also does well to note the variants on the length of Herod Philip's reign. To my surprise, Beyer actually comments at length about this issue. Beyer says, for example, that the thirty-seven year reign for Herod Philip was not used before 1544----that instead we find thirty-two years, or thirty-five years. That would place the beginning of Herod Philip's reign in the C.E. realm., after 4 B.C.E. and 1 B.C.E. But does this not undermine Beyer's argument that pre-1544 manuscripts show that Herod the Great died in 1 B.C.E.? Beyer says that political instability may have been the reason that Herod Philip assumed "full administrative authority" some time after Herod's death, but, if we're going to concede that Herod Philip did not take authority immediately after Herod passed away, why should we assume that Antiquities 18.106 is even relevant to the issue of when Herod the Great died?

That's all I have on this issue for today. I have some links for you to read, if you are interested in going deeper on the topic of the date of Herod's death. I linked to Carrier's article above, and I will be revisiting that, for it is the best response to those who propose a 1 B.C.E. date that I have encountered thus far. But I also found Ernest Martin's book, which Larson strongly recommended (see here). And here is a list of the manuscripts of Josephus, which I didn't find user-friendly in helping me to evaluate Beyer's charts, but there is useful information there.

The Alleged 1544 Copy Error

I’m continuing my series on the date of Herod the Great’s death. Frederick Larson argues in The Star of Bethlehem that Herod the Great died in 1 B.C.E., not in 4 B.C.E., and he attributes the widespread scholarly belief in a 4 B.C.E. date for Herod’s death to a 1544 copy error that was made in Josephus’ works. To support this argument, Larson appeals to a “recent study [that] was made of the earliest manuscripts of Josephus’ writings held by the British Library in London, and the American Library of Congress” (from Larson’s web site). In this post, I will provide some specifics about this: what the study was, and what the alleged copy-error was. I will draw from a 2009 article that Larson cites on his web site: Andrew Steinmann’s “When Did Herod the Great Reign?”, which appeared in Novum Testamentum Volume 51, Number 1, pages 1-29.

Yesterday, I quoted Steinmann’s summary of a reason that many scholars date Herod the Great’s death to 4 B.C.E.—-the lengths of the reigns of Herod’s sons, who succeeded Herod. Here is the quote:
“…the reigns of Herod’s sons and successors also appear to indicate that he died in 4 BCE. Archelaus was banished in 6 CE after a reign often years over Judea, Samaria and Idumea (Antiquities 17.342). Herod Antipas lost the tetrarchy of Galilee and Perea in the second year of Gaius (38/39 CE) after a reign of forty-three years according to numismatic evidence (Antiquities 18.252). Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius (33/34 CE) after a reign of thirty-seven years over Gaulanitis (Antiquities 18.106). All of these point to their taking office in 4 BCE.”
But Steinmann does not believe that Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.E., but rather in 1 B.C.E. So how does Steinmann address the lengths of the reigns of Herod’s sons? As I said yesterday, Steinmann argues that Archelaus and Herod Antipas ruled (in some fashion) while Herod the Great was still alive.
In this post, I will talk about Herod’s third son, Herod Philip. This is where the alleged copy-error comes into play. Steinmann quotes Jack Finnegan’s Handbook of Biblical Chronology:
“…in 1995 David W. Beyer reported to the Society of Biblical Literature his personal examination in the British Museum of forty-six editions of Josephus’ Antiquities published before 1700 among which twenty-seven texts, all but three published before 1544 read ‘twenty-second year of Tiberius,’ while not a single edition published prior to 1544 read ‘twentieth year of Tiberius.’ Likewise in the Library of Congress five more editions read the ‘twenty-second year,’ while none prior to 1544 records the ‘twentieth year.’ It was also found that the oldest versions of the text give variant lengths of the reign for Philip of 32 and 36 years. But if we allow for a full thirty-seven-year reign, then ‘the twenty-second year of Tiberius’ (35/36 CE) points to 1 BCE (1 year BCE + 36 years CE = 37 years) as the year of the death of Herod.”
Steinmann provides the bibliographical information for Beyer’s report (as does Larson on his web site): David W. Beyer, “Josephus Reexamined: Unraveling the Twenty-Second Year of Tiberius” (Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, November 19, 1995). Steinmann also adds: “Moreover, the Niese edition of Josephus lists ‘twenty-second year’ as the reading in the Latin version of Josephus (produced in the fourth to sixth centuries), and notes that as early as the sixteenth century Joseph Scaliger had proposed this as the correct reading…Niese’s edition is the only widely available critical text of Josephus. Unfortunately, it is based on only a few manuscripts (five in this part of Antiquities). The Latin version is usually characterized as following the Greek original very closely.”
Beyer’s point was that no edition of Josephus (specifically, Antiquities 18.106) prior to 1544 said that Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius after a reign of thirty-seven years. Rather, all but three of the pre-1544 editions said that Herod Philip died in the twenty-second year of Tiberius (and I do not know what those three editions said, only that they did not claim that Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius). How does this relate to the date of Herod’s death? The twentieth year of Tiberius was 33/34 C.E. Herod Philip reigned for thirty-seven years. Thirty-seven years earlier than 33 B.C.E. was 4 B.C.E. If Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius (assumed to be 33 C.E.) and ruled for thirty-seven years, then his reign began in 4 B.C.E., and the assumption is that Herod Philip began his reign right after Herod the Great died, meaning that Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.E. But suppose that Herod Philip died in the twenty-second year of Tiberius? In that case, Herod Philip began his reign two years later than 4 B.C.E., in 1 B.C.E. (assuming that the twenty-second year of Tiberius was 36 C.E.). In the 1 B.C.E. scenario, as in the 4 B.C.E. scenario, the assumption is that Herod Philip began his reign after the death of Herod the Great. (As far as the variants on the length of Philip’s reign are concerned—-that Philip reigned for thirty-two years or thirty-six years—-those place the beginning of Philip’s reign even later than 4 B.C.E. and 1 B.C.E., in the C.E. range.)
Steinmann notes, however, that the “twenty-second year of Tiberius” reading “is not based on any reading in any Greek manuscript of Josephus.” I interpret that to mean that no Greek manuscript that we have for Antiquities 18.106 supports a 1 B.C.E. date for Herod’s death. And, if the Flavius Josephus Home Page is correct, we have Greek manuscripts that pre-date 1544:
“The oldest manuscripts of the works of Josephus in their original language of Greek date to the tenth and eleventh centuries…The Jewish Antiquities, because of its length, was transmitted in two parts; the best texts for the first half (Antiquities Books 1 to 10) are Codex Regius Parisinus (fourteenth century) and Codex Oxoniensis (fifteenth century); the best texts for the second half (Antiquities Books 11 to 20) are Codex Palatinus (ninth or tenth century) and Codex Ambrosianus…”
So I think that more work needs to be done before we attribute a 4 B.C.E. date for Herod’s death to a copy error made in 1544. What do the Greek manuscripts have for Antiquities 18.106, and what is the date of those manuscripts? I wonder if Beyer interacts with that issue. I know that the Greek text for Josephus on my BibleWorks is based on the 1890 Niese edition, and it had the twentieth year of Tiberius (the 4 B.C.E. date). I’m curious: On what manuscripts was the Niese edition basing this?
I am not dogmatic that Antiquities 18.106 absolutely has to say that Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius, as opposed to the twenty-second year. I’m just leery about how Larson conveyed the issue. And, interestingly, Steinmann ultimately argues that Herod Philip could have begun his reign in 4 B.C.E. rather than 1 B.C.E., the same way that Steinmann says that Archelaus and Antipas began their reigns—-while Herod the Great was still alive.
UPDATE: I found Beyer's article online (see here). I'll read it and blog about it soon. 

Steinmann on Archelaus, Antipas, and Herod's Death

I said earlier this month that I would do a little research project on the date of Herod the Great's death (see here). I became interested in this topic because I watched a documentary entitled The Star of Bethlehem, in which a lawyer named Frederick Larson argued that the star of Bethlehem was an astronomical phenomenon that appeared in 2 B.C.E. The apparent problem with this date is that the Gospel of Matthew says that the star of Bethlehem appeared during the reign of Herod the Great, and many scholars maintain that Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.E. Larson contends, however, that Herod died in 1 B.C.E., and that the belief that Herod died in 4 B.C.E. is due to a copy error that was made in Josephus' work in 1544.

While some of Larson's critics contend that Larson bases this insight on an un-named scholar, making the insight (in their eyes) quite tenuous, Larson on his web site offers scholarly documentation for his claim. Today, I read a 2009 article that Larson cited: Andrew Steinmann's “When Did Herod the Great Reign?”, which appeared in Novum Testamentum Volume 51, Number 1, pages 1-29. Steinmann addresses such issues as the basis that scholars had for dating Herod's death to 4 B.C.E., the problems with that date, and the copy-error that was made in 1544.

To be honest, I do not want to do a full-fledged study of this issue, for it does not interest me that much. I will, however, do a series about Steinmann's article, and I would like to note that some of Steinmann's points overlapped with what I read elsewhere. I will not cover every single point that Steinmann made, for there was a lot of mathematical calculation in his article, and I don't want to get bogged down in that (though I do think that Steinmann's calculations are important in terms of this issue). Rather, I will blog about Steinmann's points that interested me. I also cannot promise that my posts for this series will appear every single day until the series is completed, but I will write on this topic when I have the time and the energy.

Here we go! According to Steinmann, many scholars believe that Josephus' information on the reigns of Herod's sons indicate that they took office in 4 B.C.E., which (for them) means that Herod died in that year, since the sons could only succeed Herod after his death. Steinmann states the following, and, in my quotation, I have taken the liberty of inserting Steinmann's citations of Josephus (which, in the article, are in footnotes) into the text of Steinmann's article:

"...the reigns of Herod's sons and successors also appear to indicate that he died in 4 BCE. Archelaus was banished in 6 CE after a reign often years over Judea, Samaria and Idumea (Antiquities 17.342). Herod Antipas lost the tetrarchy of Galilee and Perea in the second year of Gaius (38/39 CE) after a reign of forty-three years according to numismatic evidence (Antiquities 18.252). Herod Philip died in the twentieth year of Tiberius (33/34 CE) after a reign of thirty-seven years over Gaulanitis (Antiquities 18.106). All of these point to their taking office in 4 BCE."

Steinmann (like Larson) believes that Jesus was born in 2 B.C.E., and that Herod the Great died in 1 B.C.E. So how does Steinmann deal with the reigns of Herod's sons? Essentially, Steinmann argues that Herod's sons reigned (in some form) while Herod was still alive. Steinmann cites Josephus' Jewish War 1.625, 631-632 and Antiquities 16-17 to argue that Herod made his son Antipater a de facto co-regent, and, indeed, Herod in War 1.625 does yield royal authority to Antipater while he (Herod) is still alive. But, a little more than two years before the death of Herod, Antipater got in trouble because he murdered his uncle Pheroras, the tetrarch of Galilee. Herod then appointed Archelaus as his successor, and, according to War 2.26, there was a claim that Archelaus had reigned for some time before he went to Rome for Augustus to confirm his authority. According to Steinmann, this may imply that Archelaus was a co-regent before the death of Herod, and Steinmann proposes that Archelaus chose to date the beginning of his reign to the time when Herod appointed him----in 4 B.C.E., a little over two years before Herod died.

Meanwhile, Galilee lacked a tetrarch, since Antipater killed him a little over two years before Herod's death. According to Steinmann, Herod may have moved to fill that vacuum by appointing his son Herod Antipas the tetrarch of Galilee. Or Antipas could have reckoned the beginning of his reign to the time that the previous tetrarch was killed, in an attempt to bolster his own (Antipas') legitimacy. In any case, Steinmann argues, Antipas could have reckoned his rulership over Galilee as commencing in 4 B.C.E., even with Herod the Great being alive at the time.

Then there is the reign of Herod Philip over Gaulanitis. This is where the copy-error enters the picture. But I will discuss that in my next post for this series.

A Possible Project on the Date of Herod's Death

I talked here about The Star of Bethlehem, a documentary in which lawyer Frederick A. Larson argues that the star of Bethlehem occurred in 2 B.C.E. I wrote:

” But is this not problematic, since Josephus documents that Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.E., and Jesus was born during the reign of Herod the Great? Larson says that this is due to a copy error that was made in Josephus’ works in 1544, and Larson cites scholarly articles on his web site to document this.”

I admitted later on in the post that I have not done a lot of research on the date of Herod the Great’s death. I have simply assumed that he died in 4 B.C.E., for that has been what I have seen in the scholarly works that I have read. But, as I continue to read up on the Internet about this topic, I’m developing a desire to do a little bit of not-too-time-consuming research on it, as well as to blog about what I read—-for the benefit both of myself and also people who are interested in this issue.

What has sparked my interest in this topic is a critique of Larson that I read on Hugh Ross’ Reasons to Believe web site (see here). There, astrophysicist Dr. Jeffrey Zweerink states the following concern:

“Most historians place Herod’s death in 4 BC, yet Larson argues for a date of 1 BC (based on research from an unidentified scholar who claims that a ‘printing or copying error’ around AD 1544 ‘propagated widely’ the 4 BC date). Larson’s model rests crucially on the later date for Herod’s death, placing the model on questionable footing at best.” Later on, Zweerink says: “This date is based on research from an unnamed scholar, possibly Dr. Craig Chester. Most historians, however, place Herod’s death in 4 BC.”

On the DVD itself, Larson does not refer to specific scholars to support his claim about the date of Herod’s death, but (if my memory is correct) he did appeal to a study of Josephus’ earliest manuscripts that are held by the British Library in London and the American Library of Congress (as he does on his web site). Larson does provide specific documentation on his web site, however. He refers to an article by Andrew Steinmann, “When Did Herod the Great Reign?”, which appeared in Novum Testamentum Volume 51, Number 1, pages 1-29. He also cited (and strongly recommended) Ernest L. Martin’s The Star That Astonished the World. Another work that he cited was David W. Beyer’s “Josephus Re-Examined: Unraveling the Twenty-Second Year of Tiberias”, which was in Chronos, Kairos, Christos II, ed. E. Jerry Vardaman (Macon: Mercer University Press, 1998). But my question is this: Do these sources say what Larson says that they say? I don’t plan to track down the works by Martin and Beyer, for I’d have to request the books from my school’s library, and there are other books that I would like to request from there—-books that relate to my more pressing projects. But I do have immediate access to Steinmann’s Novum Testamentum article, and I may take a look at that.

Zweerink speculates that Larson got his idea about the date of Herod’s death from Dr. Craig Chester, an astronomer. I think that Larson did read Chester’s address to Hillsdale College on the star of Bethlehem (see here to read that), for the documentary showed him reading something that looked like Hillsdale’s publication, Imprimis, which I used to receive. But, echoing Ernest Martin, Chester does not talk about manuscript evidence for Josephus or a copying error in 1544, but rather he argues on other grounds that Herod died after 4 B.C.E.

Then there is what wikipedia says (see here): “The Gospel of Matthew clearly describes the birth of Jesus as taking place when Herod was king.^[64] According to Josephus, Herod died after a lunar eclipse.^[65] This is usually identified as the eclipse of March 13, 4 BC.^[66] The narrative implies that Jesus was born sometime between the first appearance of the star and the appearance of the Magi at Herod’s court. As the king is said to have ordered the execution of boys two years of age and younger, the star must have made its first appearance within the previous two years. Modern scholars usually date the birth of Jesus as 6–4 BC.^[67]“

Wikipedia cites Josephus’ Antiquities 17:7:4 and also scholarly articles for its claims: Timothy David Barnes, “The Date of Herod’s Death,” Journal of Theological Studies ns 19 (1968), 204–19; and P. M. Bernegger, “Affirmation of Herod’s Death in 4 B.C.,” Journal of Theological Studies ns 34 (1983), 526–31.

The lunar eclipse is obviously a significant issue in attempts to determine when Herod died, for Chester interacts with that issue at great length himself.

So here are some things that I may read and blog about. I don’t know when I’ll begin doing this, however, for I have some stuff on my plate over the next couple of days (i.e., my weekly quiet time on Psalms, etc.). But stay tuned!