03-21-2014, 03:29 AM
I don't have a problem understanding that the 1st century Church was 1st established among the Jews...and Aramaic speaking peoples both in Israel and in the diaspora. Why? Because that is what the New Testament clearly shows us.
Jesus commanded His Apostles to 1st go to the Jews and they did just that...we see this even with the Apostle Paul and Barnabas, who were sent out among the Gentiles to preach the Gospel...and, what do we see recorded being their pattern?
They are seen going into the Synagogue of the Jews each Sabbath and preaching the Gospel in each city they entered, and from the converts of these encounters they built the 1st assemblies among the Gentile lands in their Jewish homes...this was always with Jews 1st...then Gentiles converts were added in over time, while the 1st leaders of these home groups were clearly Jews.
Any historian who knows his stuff will tell you that the Church in the 1st century, even among the Gentile lands, were governed by Jewish men, who no doubt spoke Aramaic as their primary language, even in the diaspora.
Some folks seem to think that the Apostles wouldn't have originally written their Gospels, Acts, and Letters, in their own native language, then have them at once translated into Greek and perhaps Latin as well. Why not? It seems very reasonable to me.
Since the early Church was Jewish led, they being the 1st converts and the 1st leaders during the 1st century...it isn't too hard to understand that these leaders could easily understand Aramaic, in which the Apostles wrote to their churches...translations were then made from them, under the Apostles authority. The book of Acts and the Gospel of Luke were written to the Jewish High Priest, Theophilus, some time before 70 A.D. at his request. I think it safe to say that it was given to him in the Aramaic language and was later translated.
What was given to The Church of the East, 1st in Edessa, would have been the original form of the Aramaic Gospels, Acts, and Letters of the Apostles, and this text, the Aramaic speaking Christians of the Eastern lands have always had since the time of the Apostles...unchanged in the Eastern form. It is neither a translation of the Greek Alexandrian, Byzantine, Caesarean, or Western text form...but shows affinity with them all to some degree, it being the Parent text, from which all others have flowed from and have changed course to varying degrees, in this manner or that.
Jesus commanded His Apostles to 1st go to the Jews and they did just that...we see this even with the Apostle Paul and Barnabas, who were sent out among the Gentiles to preach the Gospel...and, what do we see recorded being their pattern?
They are seen going into the Synagogue of the Jews each Sabbath and preaching the Gospel in each city they entered, and from the converts of these encounters they built the 1st assemblies among the Gentile lands in their Jewish homes...this was always with Jews 1st...then Gentiles converts were added in over time, while the 1st leaders of these home groups were clearly Jews.
Any historian who knows his stuff will tell you that the Church in the 1st century, even among the Gentile lands, were governed by Jewish men, who no doubt spoke Aramaic as their primary language, even in the diaspora.
Some folks seem to think that the Apostles wouldn't have originally written their Gospels, Acts, and Letters, in their own native language, then have them at once translated into Greek and perhaps Latin as well. Why not? It seems very reasonable to me.
Since the early Church was Jewish led, they being the 1st converts and the 1st leaders during the 1st century...it isn't too hard to understand that these leaders could easily understand Aramaic, in which the Apostles wrote to their churches...translations were then made from them, under the Apostles authority. The book of Acts and the Gospel of Luke were written to the Jewish High Priest, Theophilus, some time before 70 A.D. at his request. I think it safe to say that it was given to him in the Aramaic language and was later translated.
What was given to The Church of the East, 1st in Edessa, would have been the original form of the Aramaic Gospels, Acts, and Letters of the Apostles, and this text, the Aramaic speaking Christians of the Eastern lands have always had since the time of the Apostles...unchanged in the Eastern form. It is neither a translation of the Greek Alexandrian, Byzantine, Caesarean, or Western text form...but shows affinity with them all to some degree, it being the Parent text, from which all others have flowed from and have changed course to varying degrees, in this manner or that.