Corpus-Paul

[Edgar Krentz <ekrentz AT sbcglobal.net>]

I am responding to Richard Fellows, who asked for data to back up my  
statement that I found his
proposal that Timothy and Titus were the same person unpersuasive. He has 
discussed this at length
with respondents twice before. Here is my response to his request.

Ed Krentz

Date:   Sun, 06 Mar 2005 16:54:29 -0800
From:   "Richard Fellows" <rfellows AT shaw.ca>
Subject:        Titus-Timothy
To:     ekrentz AT sbcglobal.net

Edger,
 
RF: are you able to explain or retract your recent email on Titus-Timothy? I 
think it was
unhelpful and confusing. The Titus-Timothy theory is a serious and important 
hypothesis for which
there are strong arguments. It deserves to be considered in detail by expert 
minds, and not
dismissed lightly. The list and I deserve an explanation of your brief 
comments.

EK: > I have not responded because I cannot really take such double naming 
seriously in the
Greco-Roman world. And I will make clear below why I said that. I indicated 
in what I said that
you were not locating your theory of double names in the customs, ideology, 
etc. of thee
Greco-Roman world. So I do not retract at all my evaluation of your theory. 
Since I do not have
the problems in the NT you are trying to solve with this theory before me, I 
cannot detail why I
though your theory aberrant in regard to those issues. I can only concentrate 
here on naming
conventions.

RF: If you have evidence against the hypothesis, then you should present it 
to the list.  It makes
no sense to cite your rejection of the hypothesis as the reason for your 
silence on the subject.

EK: Richard, I will try to indicate my skepticism about your theory, though I 
have kept none of
you emails. 

Titus is a Latin name. Why, when, and how would a Greek get such a Latin name?

I find your evidence for such double names unpersuasive. It certainly does 
not fit any of the
naming conventions of the Roman world. You do not argue that Timothy was 
under the patronage of a
family that had Titus as its nomen gentile. And I might add I know of no such 
family. That was one
way of acquiring a Roman name.

In The Roman world people do get names based on what they have done. Roman 
names of Roman citizens
have three parts: praenomen, nomen, and cognomen. So T. Livius Narrator. The 
T. stands for Titus,
one of the usual praenomens. Markus Tullius gets the nickname Cicero 
[chickpea, possibly a putdown
name for a novus homo] as cognomen.. Quintus Fabius, because of his 
generalship in the Punic wars
comes to be called Cunctator [delayer]. 

In the NT world Prisca gets the loving diminutive Priscilla. Simon Peter is 
given a nickname,
Cephas = Petros = Rock, that signifies his significant position in the 
post-Easter church, based
on Isaiah 51, where Abraham and Sarah are called the Rock from which Israel 
is hewn, the quarry
from which they are cut. James and John are called Boanerges by Jesus, again 
a descriptive of
their attitude. Gentiles first call Jesus' followers Christians as a name to 
degrade them.

Josephus, a Pharisaic Jew, gets the nomen gentile Flavius from his 
benefactor, Flavius
Vespasianus, who pensioned him off in Rome, enabling him to write the Bellum 
Judaicum, glorifying
Rome's role in the Jewish Roman war.

Now none of these reasons for a double name fit Timothy = Titus. Timothy is a 
good Greek name
[according to Acts his father must have been a Greek speaking gentile]. Titus 
is a Latin name. Why
a good Roman praenomen should equal a good Greek name is problematic. There 
are no other such
names known to me. Greeks who become active in Roman circles keep their Greek 
names, e.g.
Polybius, who writes the history of Rome does not adopt a Latin name, 
Plutarch, who wrote the
Parfallel Lives of Greeks and Romans, has no Latin name, nor does Dionysius 
of Halicarnassus, etc.


Why would Timothy need or want a Roman name? He is not active in Roman 
circles. There is no reason
for one going to Crete needing a Roman name. Titus is never in a Roman 
context in the NT.

So why should there be any reason to suppose that in this case the name 
conventions of antiquity
are broken?

Saul is called Paul only in Acts. That indicates his movement into the 
Graeco-Roman world, and
thus has a literary function. He never calls himself Saul, only Paul.
 
RF on EK> It would be highly interesting for Richard fellows to submit his 
Timothy=Titus
hypothesis to the classics list. I suspect it would be heartily rejected. 
This is nothing more
than an appeal to authority. Furthermore it is an authority that has not even 
been consulted!

EK: I suggested that you submit your naming theories to the classics list, 
where there are people
who know the Greco-Roman world very well. That would be one way to put your 
theory to the test, to
see if they would find your naming theory at all plausible.
 
RF: So you can see why I felt that your email was unhelpful. It combined a 
dismissive tone with an
appeal to authority. NT studies are plagued by such things, but we deserve 
better.

EK: The authority which I suggested was the knowledge of informed 
specialists. Why don't you use
it? I intended that as a helpful suggestion-which you clearly have not heard.

RF: Of course, if counter arguments can be brought forward and if the 
positive arguments for T-T
can be negated, then the discussion will have been useful. But my 
disappointment with the C-P list
in general is that there is so little reasoned debate (on T-T or any other 
subject).

Regards, Richard.

EK: Let me suggest that there has been much discussion of your theory at 
least twice on the Corpus
Paulinum list. Neither time did I feel that you really heard the other side 
in the discussion. And
I guess I don't really expect you to hear this response either. It will be 
the last response I
make to what you wrote above.

Ed Krentz



=====
Edgar and Becky Krentz
Christ Seminary--Seminex Prof. of New Testaament Emeritus
Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
1100 E. 55th Street
Chicago, IL 60615
ekrentz AT sbcglobal.net
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GERASKO D' AEI POLLA DIDASKOMENOS
"I grow older, constantly learning many things"[Solon Of Athens]
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