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Did the Greeks translate 'stauros and xulon' from Aramaic?
#6
ograabe Wrote:[..]
When we see the NT phase "take up your cross", I wonder why First Century Jews would use this expression if it refers to something Roman?

Otto,

I have just found this <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://practicaljesus.blogspot.com/2007/03/take-up-you-cross-daily-luke-9-23-25.html">http://practicaljesus.blogspot.com/2007 ... 23-25.html</a><!-- m -->, someone blogging on the topic and using CAL.

What "taking up your cross" meant for the listeners of these words has been bugging me for years. I had a suspicion that I do not understand it as it was meant to be understood. Most of the words of our Teacher have some background in TaNaKh, or explain the Torah and the Prophets, this phrase was somehow out of the blue. One way to approach it is to treat it as a prophecy about the type of death He had to suffer (please see Luke 9:23 with context). And in every place in Gospels these words are together with words about life and death, and so for me the meaning is "you must be ready to die". Shall we start another thread on "What does taking up your cross really mean" ?

But .. reading Josephus, we can find this in the Antiquities of the Jews, book 12, chapter 5 :

".. but Onias was called Menelaus. Now as the former high priest, Jesus, raised a sedition against Menelaus, who was ordained after him, the multitude were divided between them [..] they also hid the circumcision [..] they might appear to be Greeks. Accordingly, they left off all the customs that belonged to their country, and imitated the practices of the other nations. [..] King Antiochus [..] pretending peace, he got possession of the city by treachery [..] he left the temple bare, and took away the golden candlesticks, and the golden altar, and table, and did not abstain from even the veils [..] left nothing at all remaining. [..] And when the king had built an idol altar upon God's Altar, he slew swine upon it, and so offered a sacrifice neither according to the law, nor the Jewish religious worship in that country. He also compelled them to forsake the worship which they paid their own God, and to adore those whom he took to be gods, and made them build temples, and raise idol altars, in every city and village, and offer swine upon them every day. He also commanded them not to circumcise their sons, and threatened to punish any that should be found to have transgressed his injunction. He also appointed overseers, who should compel them to do what he commanded.[..] but the best men, and those of the noblest souls, did not regard him [..] they were whipped with rods and their bodies were torn to pieces, and were crucified while they were still alive and breathed : they also strangled those women and their sons [..] hanging their sons about their necks as they were upon the crosses. And if there were any sacred book of the law found, it was destroyed; and those with whom they were found miserably perished too."

The listeners of the words of Yeshu' must have remembered very well those events (well, stories about them of course) and "taking the cross" could have a meaning of readiness to die for what you believe in.

Shlama,
Jerzy
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Re: Did the Greeks translate 'stauros and xulon' from Aramaic? - by enarxe - 06-25-2008, 02:27 AM

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