MANSFIELD Matthew identifies Mary M. and the other Mary. He doesn't say that they were the ONLY women who went, nor does he imply such.
TILL No, he doesn't say that they were the ONLY women who went to the tomb, but there are certain linguistic rules that Mansfield cannot escape from. Mansfield said that Matthew did not "imply such," i.e., that Mary M and the other Mary were the ONLY women who went to the tomb, but he must also admit that Matthew did not imply ANYWHERE that there were other women besides Mary M and the other Mary. If I am wrong in this, I hope he will point out exactly where Matthew did imply that other women were with Mary M and the other Mary.
Now since it is true that Matthew named only Mary M and the other Mary in his text and implied nowhere that other women were present, then linguistic rules force readers to understand that when verse 5 says, "But the angel answered and said to THE WOMEN...," the angel had to be speaking to Mary M and the other Mary; otherwise, Matthew made a grievous linguistic error in this verse. Now if I am wrong in saying this, let Mr. Mansfield point out what my error is.
Furthermore, the text goes on to use the pronouns "they" and "them" as the angel speaks to "the women" and as Matthew tells about their departure from the tomb. I assume that Mr. Mansfield knows what a pronoun is. It is a word that is used for (pro) a noun. Since a pronoun is a word used for a noun, there must be a noun in the text that the pronouns "they" and "them" refer to. What else can that antecedent of "they" and "them" be except "the women"? And who were "the women"? And how many times am I going to have to explain all of this before it finally sinks in?
Now if "the women" in verse 5 were not Mary M and the other Mary because Mary M had run away, then Matthew made a serious mistake that misled his readers. If not, why not? When is Mr. Mansfield or some of the other inerrantists on the list going to address this question. If "the women" did not include Mary M because she had already left, clear writing would have required Matthew to let his readers know this. Is this a point that's just too difficult for Mr. Mansfield to see?
Whoever "the women" were, that would be who "they" and "them" were, so if Matthew named no other women except Mary M and the other Mary and implied nowhere that other women were present, there is no linguistic rule that will allow the readers to understand "they" and "them" to signify anyone else but Mary M and the other Mary. It doesn't matter how many women Mark may have mentioned; it doesn't matter how many women Luke may have mentioned. We are talking about Matthew's text and what the rules of grammar require readers to understand it to mean. Will Mr. Mansfield or someone please address that issue and quit all of the cutsy evasions?
In another posting, I pointed out that if the antecedents of pronouns can be identified in a text, then the antecedents can be substituted for the pronouns without altering the meaning of the text. I did that with verses 8 through 11 of Matthew's text, so I will repeat it again with a challenge that Mr. Mansfield show that the text as I have rewritten it must be considered incorrect:
"So Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went out quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to bring His disciples word. And as Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to tell His disciples, behold, Jesus met Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, saying, 'Rejoice!' So Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came and held Him by the feet and worshiped Him. Then Jesus said to Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, 'Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brethren to go to Galilee, and there they will see Me." Now while Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were going, behold, some of the guard came into the city...."
Now will Mr. Mansfield please explain to us why the rules of pronoun-antecedent agreement do not require readers to understand the text in this way? He could accomplish a lot more and certainly make a more favorable impression on us if he would address issues like this directly.
TILL
> 2. Who are THE WOMEN referred to in verse five, where it says, "But the
> angel answered and said to THE WOMEN..."?
MANSFIELD "The women" is plural. The reader of Matthew would assume that this referred to the two already identified. That reader would have no reason to assume otherwise.
TILL Ah, at last! Thank you! Thank you! Why did it take so long?
MANSFIELD But again, there is absolutely no language that can be interpreted as meaning that these are absolutely the only two ppl there.
TILL But since there is no language to allow readers to assume that there were any other women present, the rules of grammar require readers to understand that "the women" were Mary Magdalene and the other Mary and that the antecedent of the pronouns "they" and "them" were THE WOMEN, who must be understood to be Mary M and the other Mary. SO WHERE DOES THE TEXT ALLOW FOR THE REMOVAL OF MARY M FROM THE SCENE? If Mary M did indeed leave the scene, then Matthew made a linguistic mistake in his usage of the pronouns "they" and "them." And an error is an error is an error. That is the issue that Mr. Mansfield must deal with. Let's hope he does.
TILL
> 3. To whom do the third-person plural pronouns THEY and THEM in this
> passage refer? (Please designate the antecedents of these pronouns by
name.)
MANSFIELD Umm, do I get a cookie if I get the answer right?
TILL See what I meant by "cutsy evasions"? Could it be that Mansfield didn't answer the question because he saw the corner that the answer would paint him into?
TILL
> I'll even help Nanson with the answers, because as anyone can see, the
> answers to all three questions have to be "Mary Magdalene and the other
> Mary," because these are the only two women specifically identified in
> Matthew's narrative.
MANSFIELD No, it doesn't "have" to be this way. If there are other women there, the pronouns could be referring to them also.
TILL If there were other women there and if Mary Magdalene left the scene before the angel spoke, then Matthew made an error in writing by not naming at least one more woman, and even if he had named another woman, principles of clear, concise, coherent writing would have required him to state that Mary M left the scene if indeed she did. When is Mr. Mansfield going to understand that consistency and contradiction are not the issue in this part of the Mary Magdalene problem? Clarity in writing is the issue, and if we can't expect an omniscient, omnipotent deity to be clear and coherent in his writing, then we can't expect it of anybody. Please address the issue, Mr. Mansfield.
MANSFIELD BTW, wasn't it common in those days to speak of someone who might have had a family or other following in the singular? When ppl in that time said they had seen Jesus, couldn't a logical assumption be made that the person saw Jesus AND whoever was normally seen with Him? Couldn't it be a logical conclusion that Mary M. _might have been_ usually seen with a following of other women, so that when someone said they had seen Mary M., the hearer might logicaly conclude that the speaker meant that they had seen Mary M. AND those who were normally with her?
TILL This sounds about like the type of far-fetched scenario that an inerrantist would resort to in order to squirm out of the vise this problem is squeezing him in. I know of nothing that supports this premise. If Mr. Mansfield knows of such evidence, he should produce it. I did take two years of Greek in college, and I remember that the rules governing pronoun-antecedent agreement were the same as they are in English. Pronouns must agree with their antecedents in person, number, and gender. That is why the rules of grammar require readers of Matthew's text to understand that Mary Magdalene heard the angel's announcement and met Jesus and worshiped him as she was running from the tomb.
TILL
> No doubt, Nanson will argue that even though Matthew identified only
> Mary Magdalene and the other Mary in his narrative, we can know from
> Mark's and Luke's account that at least four other women were on the
> scene: Salome (Mark 16:1), Joanna (Luke 24:10), and "the other women"
> (so at least two, Luke 24:10). However, it doesn't matter what the other
> gospel writers may have said in their narratives.
MANSFIELD Now you've hit on it! It doesn't matter what the other gospel writers might have said. At least not for this imaginary early Christian who only had access to Matthew.
TILL Please show where my premise is wrong, and try to understand that even though there may be 50 other gospels that identified as many as 500 women who were on the scene, that would not matter as far as Matthew's text is concerned. Matthew's text must be interpreted according to what he said and what the rules of grammar require language to mean. Please address this. I have given you ample opportunity.
TILL
> Matthew's account had
> to be comprehensible to his readers, who could well have been people
> who in their entire lifetimes never had access to any of the other
> narratives. So if "the women" whom the angel spoke to in Matthew 28:6
were
> not Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, then Matthew's narrative was
> confusing and really made no sense to his readers. Likewise, if the
> antecedents of the third-person plural pronouns "they" and "them" in the
> succeeding verses were not Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, Matthew's
> narrative could not have been correctly understood by his readers.
MANSFIELD Huh? It doesn't really matter if the witnesses were ONLY Mary M. and the other Mary, or if it might have included Minnie Mouse and Pocohontas. Your major point here is that "the narrative is confusing and really made no sense to his readers". You haven't demonstrated this, even to the least degree.
TILL I haven't demonstrated this "even to the least degree"? Well, we'll just wait and see how you address the many places above and in the other three postings where I did address it in intricate details that I would like to see you reply to.
MANSFIELD Matthew's reader would have the clear impression that Jesus had been seen alive after He was dead. The reader has the clear story of the resurrection of the Messiah, with said Messiah giving His great commission to the disciples, _after_ the resurrection. What's so confusing here?
TILL Please note that I have said above that the issue is not inconsistency in Matthew's text, so I agree that it gives a clear impression that Jesus had been seen alive after he was dead and that it gives a clear story of the Messiah giving the "Great Commission." So what is confusing here? There is nothing confusing here. The confusion results when the Mary Magdalene of Matthew's text (as she absolutely must be understood by the rules of grammar) is compared to the Mary Magdalene of John's text. And, of course, if Mary M really did leave the scene, then Matthew misled the early Christians who had no access to other gospels so that they could fill in the gaps. How many times do I have to state these two problems?
TILL
> Why is this so important? The answer is simple. When the angel
> spoke to "the women" (Matt. 28:6), he told them that Jesus had risen
> from the dead and then invited them to come see where the body had
> lain. He told them to go tell the disciples that they could see Jesus in
> Galilee. When "the women" heard the angel's message, "THEY departed
> quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy" (v:8). All rules of
grammar
> demand that the antecedents of the pronoun "they" in this verse have to
> be Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, the only two women
> that Matthew identified in his narrative. So if Mary Magdalene
> heard the angel's message that Jesus had risen and then ran from the
> tomb with great joy, she surely left the tomb thinking that Jesus had
been
> raised from the dead. Furthermore, Matthew even said that they (the
> women, who had to include Mary Magdalene) met Jesus as they were
> running from the tomb and touched him and worshiped him (vv:9-10).
MANSFIELD Great huh? Perfectly clear narrative concerning what happened when two of the witnesses found that Jesus was resurrected.
TILL Yes, the only problem is that the Mary Magdalene of this text cannot be reconciled with the Mary Magdalene of John's text. Are you going to attempt a reconciliation that respects the rules of grammar that must be imposed on Matthew's text? If so, I will look forward to seeing it.
TILL
> All of this having happened, we must wonder why John's gospel has
> Mary Magdalene going to the tomb,
MANSFIELD Hold on a minute! We don't even know that such a thing as a "John's gospel" even exists. Well anyway, it's obvious that you can't stick to your own stipulations, so I guess we must plod on...
TILL No, the problem is that you can't even see the problem, or at least you pretend that you can't. I really suspect the latter. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to interpret Matthew's text in accordance with the rules of grammar and then (1) explain how that his Mary Magdalene is consistent with John's, and (2) explain why the omniscient, omnipotent Holy Spirit would have guided Matthew to write a text that would have misled early Christians as to what happened on resurrection morning. Where is Bill Carrell when we really need him? He at least understood the problem and took the position that Mary M was just so confused that she didn't understand the angel. It would be a delight to address that position for a while rather than endlessly stating and restarting the Mary M problem for those who can't see it or at least claim that they can't. Guess which one I suspect?