Perhaps I Had Too High Hopes For You, Tovia Singer

Why didn't you say so, Tovia Singer? · Perhaps I Had Too High Hopes For You, Tovia Singer

I mean "the moment it matters, you don't understand" in your video on Genesis 6 or your foolish dream about winning a war against Iran proving Ezechiel 38 refers to such ethnic Israelites who practise Judaism and their relatives ... and even worse, in so doing disproving the Church Fathers.

However, I began an answer on the Biblical authors of the New Covenant, these being 8 or possibly 9 people (some claiming Hebrews was not by St. Paul, but by Gamaliel's other disciple, St. Barnabas).

"We don't even know who the NT authors were"

In general.

I think I have heard this one before, but about the OT authors too.

No, Moses didn't write the Pentateuch. Daniel's prophecy of the two rams wasn't in the time of Nebuchadnezzar or Cyrus and the whole book is later. There were two Isaias.

Tovia, you seem to give some credence to one author being Paul, and then you divorce him from the main character of the second half of Acts and from the author of the Pastorals. That's a fair parallel to accepting the Isaias of IV Kings 19 as author of part of Isaias.

You know why we both know Moses wrote the Pentateuch, even if he was not the primary source for Genesis 9 and even if Deuteronomy 34 was written by Joshua? Because that's what the tradition says. The tradition among Christians, which we inherited from Second Temple Jews, the tradition among Samarians who refuse the book of Ruth, the tradition among Jews, also inherited from Second Temple Jews, which is not the same thing. If one of these traditions is right, whichever it is, Moses wrote the Pentateuch.

I'm not ignorant of which is true, I'm just keeping the argument accessible to those who have parts of the Catholic truth.

You would say the Jewish tradition is the true one, I disagree, vehemently, but on this theory too, Moses wrote the Pentateuch.

Now, the same applies to why we believe Daniel is the author of Daniel and the two rams prophecy was given to one deported by Nebuchadnezzar. And to why Isaias has one author.

This presumes, we normally trust tradition on who wrote what book. Even outside sacred scriptures. I trust tradition that Julius Caesar penned Commentarii de Bello Gallico. I trust tradition that Arrian wrote a work on the Life of Alexander the Great. _Anabasis of Alexander._ I also trust tradition that he was not at all a contemporary but had access to lost works by such, by two of Alexander's generals.

It's not trusting a tradition on an authorship which takes a special argument, it's not trusting one. Saying "Moses wrote the Pentateuch, Daniel wrote Daniel, Caesar wrote the Gallic War, Arrian wrote Anabasis of Alexander, Xenophon wrote an older Anabasis, from which I will recall "pente parasangas"* until I die, presumably, but Paul didn't write Timothy and his disciple didn't write Acts" is special pleading. As such it needs a special argument.

Luke and Acts were written much later.

I will here not content myself with referring to your video.

You gave the reasons, 1) Luke copies Mark, Mark is post-AD 70, and 2) Acts so late that Luke missed out on Paul being executed under Nero. I've heard a reason 3) that Mare Adriaticum was in the time of St. Paul still called Mare Illyricum and so the change occurred in 140 AD, showing an anachronism.

1a) Luke copies Mark.

Not according to tradition.

Now, you could say, tradition is in this specific case not to be trusted, since there is a Synoptic thing going on, seeming to indicate there is some copying.

Here is my response.

I'd tend to go with the version in Stromata, by Clement of Alexandria. Matthew was written first. Then Luke, ignoring Matthew, wrote his Gospel.

He brought it to Peter in Rome to get it approved (so, this is, if so, an early attestation of Papacy, since Luke was probably in the Holy Land when he collected the witness accounts).

Peter already knew Matthew, and spontaneously picked up scrolls, one brought by Luke and one he already had by Matthew. He started reading in alternation from both (starting after the childhood accounts, which are complementary). He also inserted some remarks on his own. Mark was his secretary and thought he was finally dictating a Gospel, so started to take this down as dictation.

Peter remarks what Mark is doing and authorises that as a Gospel and Luke after it.

This story pretty fully accounts for the Synoptic unity or near unity of loads of text.

Two more details. It's not all that probable that this alternate reading went on all the time without either of St. Peter or St. Mark noticing what happened. It's also not excluded, the reading time being in English one hour for silent reading and someone has stated reading it aloud took 1 h 30 min. If St. Peter's enthusiasm lasted that long, St. Mark takes a palm in good secretary taking down-ship. Indeed, among other patronages, he's not just invoked for Alexandria, where he was the first bishop, and Venice, where his relics are since the Crusades, but also precisely secretaries.

The other possibility is, Peter noticed what was happening, perhaps halfway through, perhaps earlier, took it as a sign of the Holy Ghost, and then continued. Perhaps he didn't tell St. Mark, whose witness in Alexandria would have been accessible to Clement the Stromatist.

The other thing is, while St. Luke was doing his interviews, it's very probable the Christians he interviewed already had the Gospel of St. Matthew, were used to hearing episodes or pericopes from it (you already know, some other readers of mine don't know, in Hebrew that's a Parashah). This may well have coloured the wording they reported to St. Luke.

So, no, forget the Prussian Kulturkampf shtick that "Matthew and Luke copied Mark" ...

1b) Mark is post-AD 70

This is based on the idea that Jesus did not predict the destruction of the Temple.

You have pretended to find fault with how He predicted it, namely the words "not a stone shall be left on a stone" and you point to the Western Wall.

First, it's clearly not from Herod's time.

Coin discovery sheds new light on sacred Jerusalem site
Nov. 24, 2011, 1:38 AM GMT+1 / Source: The Associated Press | By Matti Friedman
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna45419597

But that would still be before AD 70, so what's going on?

Christians have proposed, and I'll add a third:

• Western Wall is the wrong site
• Western Wall is outside the actual temple as such and part of a surrounding complex, like around the Court of the Gentiles
• Jesus prophecied only about the stones already standing in His time, the Western Wall was added later (Archelaus II, perhaps).

Or even "not a stone on a stone" describes a figure of speech or is sufficiently fulfilled in all the buildings that were destroyed.

So, the idea that the prophecy is wrong doesn't stand.

The idea that the prophecy is added after the event has been pretended about Daniel's two rams prophecy too, as I've mentioned.

2) Acts is written so late that Luke didn't get the memo that Paul was executed under Nero.

Or, Acts is written under Emperor Claudius, making the Gospel of Luke early too.

At this time, St. Paul was in prison, but definitely not executed yet. The reason that the martyrdom of Peter and Paul isn't mentioned is that the book was already finished when it happened.

3) Mare Illyricum became Mare Adriaticum in 140 AD

This seems to be one reading of the texts, there is no official declaration that "Mare Illyricum" should be renamed "Mare Adriaticum" from the time of Hadrian or his successor. It's simply the idea of a man who found "Mare Illyricum" in Cicero, I presume, perhaps Caesar too and "Mare Adriaticum" in a post 140 text, not sure which.

Here is wiki on the ancient names, I'm omitting a subsequent paragraph of the section that gives non-Classic names:

The origins of the name Adriatic are linked to the Etruscan settlement of Adria, which probably derives its name from Illyrian adur 'water, sea'.[2] In classical antiquity, the sea was known as Mare Adriaticum (Mare Hadriaticum, also sometimes simplified to Adria) or, less frequently, as Mare Superum '[the] upper sea'.[3] The two terms were not synonymous, however. Mare Adriaticum generally corresponds to the Adriatic Sea's extent, spanning from the Gulf of Venice to the Strait of Otranto. That boundary became more consistently defined by Roman authors—early Greek sources place the boundary between the Adriatic and Ionian seas at various places ranging from adjacent to the Gulf of Venice to the southern tip of the Peloponnese, eastern shores of Sicily and western shores of Crete.[4] Mare Superum on the other hand normally encompassed both the modern Adriatic Sea and the sea off the Apennine peninsula's southern coast, as far as the Strait of Sicily.[5] Another name used in the period was Mare Dalmaticum, applied to waters off the coast of Dalmatia or Illyricum.[6] During the early modern period, the entire sea was also known as the Gulf of Venice (Italian: golfo di Venezia),[7] although that name is now informally applied only to the northern area of the sea, from Maestra Point in the Po Delta to Cape Kamenjak on the Istrian Peninsula.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adriatic_Sea#Name

But suppose this were the case, suppose this were an anachronism. I didn't look it up, so I gave the other possibility.

Like scribes in the Tabernacle and Temple changed names in the Torah to update, after the cities of Exodus 1:11 were renamed, so also a Christian scribe could have changed the name after 140. But I find it likelier that wiki is right, and that the prevalence of the name Adriatic ows more to Acts than to Emperor Hadrian.

"Paul ... definitely was not a Pharisee."

He does not apply Pharisaic thinking.

From the parallel passage on the Gospels, I presume you mean, he's not getting into legal stuff. And when he does, as in Timothy, you say it's another person and not Paul.

The problem here is, on the Christian view, which is the right one, the old law was done away with when Jesus died. Debating what work you can or can't do on a Sabbath after Good Friday is like debating how the Holy Roman Emperor proceeds when naming a duke, after 1806 and 1918.

So, lot's of the things St. Paul learned when he studied under Gamaliel, simply doesn't apply any more, and that's why he's not using that type of questions. Jesus famously was saying the thing about donkeys before he was crucified, when the Old Law still was in full force, except Judah had lost the sceptre, Rome didn't allow Jews to carry out death penalties, and if they did so anyway, it was illegal lynchings. Also, people were High Priests on a rotational basis and that's unlike the rules foreseen by Moses about Aaron.

"He is also quoting from Menander."

If you don't believe the Messiah has come, you won't try to be relevant to people who need to accept him.

St. Paul did believe He had come, had asked for the Gentiles on top of the Jews, and so St. Paul was complying by being an efficient missionary to Gentiles.

"Completely at home in the Greco-Roman world"

As you are in the US of A. You may disapprove of things, some I would approve of, but you know your stuff. You don't take California for a Caliphate, even if that's part of where the name came from.**

For instance, you mention Einstein. Princeton. How is that less abhorrent than Menander?

I mean, his cousin Alfred is making decent statements about music history. He compares Gregorian music to Synagogal recitation and finds common ground, but a huge difference in Gregorian having a smoothing out of rhythmical differences and no chromatism.

But the guy who pretends everything is determined? He was worshipping a false god.

"He is applying Middle Platonic thinking everywhere."

Like Philo and Josephus aren't doing so? Josephus was also a former Pharisee, and Philo did some parallel work to them. Between Philo and Pharisees, St. Paul at least scores one Pharisaic point in clearly believing the Resurrection of the Dead.

"Pharisee means the exact same thing as Orthodox Jew."

No. The earliest Pharisees were not yet parts of Rabbinic Judaism. The earliest tractates of the Mishna are pre-Christian, therefore not anti-Christian. This is by the way not the case with Sanhedrin 59a, Yohanan Ben Zakkai. He wrote after the Destruction of Jerusalem. This arguably totally switched the way the LXX was viewed (OT accessible to Gentiles).

"Paul claims to be a Pharisee."

You mention Philippians 3, and here is a passage which might solve the objections you have to that claim:

Though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other thinketh he may have confidence in the flesh, I more Being circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; according to the law, a Pharisee According to zeal, persecuting the church of God; according to the justice that is in the law, conversing without blame But the things that were gain to me, the same I have counted loss for Christ
[Philippians 3:4-7]

In other words, if there is a noticeable lack of Pharisaic thinking in St. Paul's letters, it's because he gave that up.

"Always talking of himself."

Always be wary if someone throws this around about someone he disapproves of!

I check Romans, quick overview: a few verses in the presentation, chapter 1, three verses in chapter 9 ... no, he actually isn't.

I have recently been obliged to talk about myself for a purpose, and some might pretend this is a very representative sample. It also isn't.

Only Luke in Acts claims Paul was a student of Gamaliel.

This is dealt with in the part about Acts and Luke, and it is dealt with in part in above objections to his being such.

But did you know that wiki on Gamaliel states that he was a grandson of Hillel, but even so, he is passed over when Pirkei Abot gives the lineage of the Hillel school, reference to 1—2.

Perhaps Gamaliel too was not very typical as emerging "Orthodox" Judaism was concerned. Perhaps the very little there is of Gamaliel in the Mishna is due to Yohanan Ben Zakkai being the gatekeeper between Second Temple Judaism, recently destroyed, and emerging Rabbinic Judaism.

Did I forget anything?

I suppose I'll be watching your video again, just to make sure, maybe write a PS or maybe another post, but in the meantime, I'll finish this one. I came to notice, one passage in St. Paul would probably have appealed to basically every Pharisee:

For the justice of God is revealed therein, from faith unto faith, as it is written: The just man liveth by faith For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and injustice of those men that detain the truth of God in injustice Because that which is known of God is manifest in them. For God hath manifested it unto them For the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; his eternal power also, and divinity: so that they are inexcusable

Because that, when they knew God, they have not glorified him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened For professing themselves to be wise, they became fools And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of a corruptible man, and of birds, and of fourfooted beasts, and of creeping things Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness, to dishonour their own bodies among themselves Who changed the truth of God into a lie; and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen

For this cause God delivered them up to shameful affections. For their women have changed the natural use into that use which is against nature And, in like manner, the men also, leaving the natural use of the women, have burned in their lusts one towards another, men with men working that which is filthy, and receiving in themselves the recompense which was due to their error And as they liked not to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense, to do those things which are not convenient Being filled with all iniquity, malice, fornication, avarice, wickedness, full of envy, murder, contention, deceit, malignity, whisperers Detractors, hateful to God, contumelious, proud, haughty, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents

Foolish, dissolute, without affection, without fidelity, without mercy Who, having known the justice of God, did not understand that they who do such things, are worthy of death; and not only they that do them, but they also that consent to them that do them
[Romans 1:17-32]

This would be a Midrash if you like on

Behold, he that is unbelieving, his soul shall not be right in himself: but the just shall live in his faith.
[Habacuc 2:4]

And why would it be worse to cite Menander than to cite Bugs Bunny?

Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre UL
Thursday in Pentecost Novena
21.V.2026

The post was mostly in reference to:

Rabbi Tovia Singer - Are the New Testament Authors REALLY Jewish? 2331
TeNaK Talk (TaNaCh) | 13 May 2026
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=564eZ2eeoZ0

* 15 to 22 1/2 miles, or 24 to 36 km, it seems the exact value is not fully known. Too brisk a walk for me, I'm sure, even back in 2004. After one thirty km day, I had sores. ** See Will There Be a Real Hobbiton or Beruna? There Is California.