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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
 Posted - 09/10/2001 : 15:16:29 [Permalink]
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quote:
quote:
As for the culture being illiterate, boy have you gotten that wrong. The ancient Jews were quite a literate culture (their religion required it)...There is no reason to believe that the majority of Jesus' contemporaries were illiterate.
Seems to me that scholars in the field put the literacy rate rather low.
http://www.jesusarchive.com/Epistle/04-01/context_april01.html
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Bill Warren had a very simple point to make in his paper, "Literacy and Social Strata in the Roman Empire: Identifications and Locations." The literacy rate for the Roman Empire as a whole may have been low, around five to 10 percent. But in the cities of the eastern Mediterranean where Christianity took root it was considerably higher, perhaps 15 to 25 percent.
If you read beyond the first paragraph you'll find that it continues by saying
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Little did Warren imagine the lively discussion he'd set off when he presented the
paper at the March 2001 conference of the Context Group. Nearly every one of the
30 scholars and graduate students in attendance had pronounced opinions on the subject.
All of the Context Group scholars, whose opinions they mention, contradict Warren and echo Greg.
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The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it. |
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