Thursday 31 December 2015

words - What Talmudic manuscripts (if any) have Jesus instead of Balaam? / What Does 'MS.M. Jesus' mean?


What manuscripts (if any) have Jesus instead of Balaam?


I'm aware that some claim that balaam is a code-word for Jesus. I know Rabbi Gil Student makes a good argument that it cannot be



I have read that the 19th century reform scholar Abraham Geiger thought that Balaam was code for Jesus.


This Talmudic passage from the Soncino (an orthodox British publisher) has "MS.M. Jesus" in the footnotes.


http://halakhah.com/gittin/gittin_57.html



He then went and raised Balaam by incantations. He asked him: Who is in repute in the other world? He replied: Israel. What then, he said, about joining them? He replied: Thou shalt not seek their peace nor their prosperity all thy days for ever.1 He then asked: What is your punishment? He replied: With boiling hot semen.2 He then went and raised by incantations the sinners of Israel.3


3 [MS.M. Jesus].



I have heard that "MS" stands for manuscript.


And if not then what would MS.M. Jesus mean? What is the M after MS.?


I've heard of Hesronot HaShas having parts of the Talmud that were censored by christian censors. Does that have Jesus in it instead of Balaam? It doesn't seem conceivable to me that christian censors would've changed Jesus to Balaam though.



I'm interested if anybody before Geiger claimed that Balaam was Jesus. How far back the claim goes and who made it.


Note


further to and from magicker72's great comments - So we have the Soncino abbreviations http://halakhah.com/tabbrev.html And To my question of what Talmudic manuscripts have Jesus instead of Balaam, it seems none. And to my question of who before Geiger equated Jesus with Balaam, I still see no examples given. It appears that rabbi Gil student is using a version of the Talmud that has Yeshu , though Gil argues that Yeshu is not Jesus.
http://www.angelfire.com/mt/talmud/jesusi.html
http://www.angelfire.com/mt/talmud/jesus.html and http://www.angelfire.com/mt/talmud/jesusnarr.html though clearly the Soncino translators of Gittin 57a, believe Yeshu, was Jesus http://halakhah.com/gittin/gittin_57.html (footnote for "sinners of israel" says Jesus - sinners of Israel being a censored version in Soncino's Hebrew and English, Yeshu being the actual version). So looking at the text as Gil's link, so Munich manuscript, not Soncino, it makes clear, Balaam is in boiling semen and Yeshu in boiling excrement with those that mock the sages. "What is your punishment? [Yeshu answered]: In boiling excrement."




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