By Patrick Quinn
July 10, 2006
Authorship of [_Letter to the Hebrews_][1] has been disputed from the earliest days of Christianity, largely because the Letter makes no authorial claim. Daniel Wallace has proposed an elegant popological explanation for the lack of attribution. This from [Wallace's Introduction][2]:_The author of this work does not state his name, though he assumes that the audience knows him (cf. 13:19, 22, 23). Most likely, the reason the author's name is not appended is because this epistle was published on a scroll. Ancient papyrus scrolls frequently listed author and addressee on the verso side, while the text was written on the recto side. If this letter was written in such a manner, it is easy to see how the author/addressee would not have been copied; in fact, such a "label" could easily have been lost, smudged, etc., shortly after reaching its destination._It was Origen, the first and phaps greatest theologian of early Christianity, who first threw up his hands and said that the author of Hebrews is known only to God. Hebrews is said to be written in the most refined Greek in the New Testament. It contains a large number of citations from the Septuagint that suggest the writer had a copy at hand; the citations are generally more precise than those found in the other letters. The reference to Timothy suggests a member of Paul's circle, which contained several evangelists--Barnabas, Apollos, Priscilla, etc.--who seem to have maintained close contacts w/ mainstream Judaism; all of them have been suggested as possible authors. (Martin Luther liked Barnabas.) Whoever the author, he or she was an educated scholar by the standards of the time.It seems to me self-evident that the writer is addressing a Jewish audience, but everything about Hebrews, including its destination and audience, is in dispute, and [Edgar Goodspeed][3] rejects a primarily Jewish audience and argues instead that the letter was intended for the church at Rome. Dr. Wallace prefers Corinth or one of the other Aegean churches. --I've received a lot of feedback in the past few weeks, and one common note has been concern that the purely popological parts of these posts (say that five times fast) are too dense. I quite agree, and am working toward a clearer exposition, but that will be cold comfort for readers who make it through what follows here. Apologies in advance for the next couple posts.The sea provides a useful metaphor for culture. Bandwidth is the water; culture is all the marvelous, infinitely varied things that live in it. Counting the fish--referents--in the cultural sea is straightforward, esp in the modern mediaverse. ("World Cup final" = 14.9 million). But how big is the sea? Can bandwidth be meaningfully quantified and compared across cultures? I think so.We begin by defining bandwidth as unit network size per unit population.Let's arbitrarily define bandwidth in units, "bands" (b), such that one band equals one meter of road per person.Or, one band = 1,000 people connected by one kilometer of road, or 1,000 people per kilometer of network. Thusbandwidth = b = (n/p)where n is the network size and p is the population in thousands.That's out base unit. The conventional numbers for the first century Empire assert that it contained about 55 million people and about 85,000 kilometers of roads; we'll call it 90,000 kilometers to account for the sealanes. 55 million people equals 55,000 groups of 1,000 people, so our network/population ratio for basic bandwidth in the Empire is 90,000/50,000, which tells us that the Empire possessed about 1.8 bands of bandwidth.b = (90,000/50,000) = 1.8 bandsOr at least that would be the Empire's bandwidth inventory if its data network consisted solely of people and roads--but that's not the case. Networks also include data storage devices (archives, libraries, hard drives etc.) Adding a storage device substantially juices the network, the result is a product, not a sum, and so we multiply our basic bandwidth unit by the number of storage devices on the network. The first and most important external storage devices adopted by humans were libraries, so I call the multiplier "L." Thusb = L(n/p)where L is the number of storage devices on the network.I'll pull a number out of the air and say the Empire contained 50 libraries (several sources mention that Rome itself contained about 30 libraries just before the barbarian invasions) Thus the Empire's bandwidth isb = L(n/p) = 50(90,000/50,000) = 90 bands.It's a rough-and-ready metric, but it (more or less) holds up across cultures and eras. Thus:* Rome built about 12,500 kilometers of road in Britain, which had a population of about 3.5 million people and phaps 5 libraries. Thus the bandwidth inventory in Roman Britain wasb = L(n/p) = 5(12,500/3,500) = 18 bands England in 1770 possessed about 50,000 kilometers of roads and sealanes and a population of about 7 million; lets assume 200 libraries:b = L(n/p) = 200(50,000/7,000) = 1,425 bands, or 1.4 kilobands.** The US in 1910: 92 million people, 5 million kilometers of network, call it 700 libraries:b = L(n/p) = 700(5,000,000/92,000) = 38,043 = 38 kbands The US today, population 300,000,000, 6.5 million kilometers of network, call it 100 million computers:b = L(n/p) = 100,000,000(6,500,000/300,000) = 2.2 billion bands, or 2.2 gigabands.** The present population of Lawrence is about 75,000 people. If we assume the city contains 100 kilometers of roads and 10,000 hard drives, our formula tells us b = 10,000(100/75) = 13,333.333...Lawrence possesses a bandwidth inventory of about 13 kilobands, or about 70 times more bandwidth than the whole Roman Empire.--As we'll see, the basic equation can be considerably improved, even tailored for different cultures and different levels of technology. [1]: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=65&chapter=1&version=49 [2]: http://www.bible.org/page.asp?page_id=1360 [3]: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/goodspeed/ch16.html
Comments
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thetomdotdot (anonymous) says...
I say lets call the base unit (1 band) a Quinn. Then a kilo unit would be a Mighty Quinn.
July 10, 2006 at 6:36 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
El_Borak (Bill Hoyt) says...
"it is easy to see how the author/addressee would not have been copied; in fact, such a "label" could easily have been lost, smudged, etc., shortly after reaching its destination"
Is plenariness a poplogical variable? Yes, we can move x amount of data, but we can't be sure that the data will arrive complete, and in such cases have no control over what portion of the data is lost. I mean, sure, we still have the complete Epistle to the Hebrews after 20 centuries, except that we don't know who wrote it and we don't know to whom it was written. It's odd to think that with all the redundancy built into the network later (copying, commentary, burying, translation) that allows us to recover primary data, one little smudge early and the data is irrecoverable. Weak.
July 10, 2006 at 8:33 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
"It's odd to think that with all the redundancy built into the network later (copying, commentary, burying, translation) that allows us to recover primary data, one little smudge early and the data is irrecoverable."
Precisely. That's what I mean when I talk about the collapse of the curve, about the inevitability of outcomes. VAST amounts of data have been irrecoverably lost. So it goes.
In general there are data extinctions associated w/ every change of primary medium. Prolly the most important extinction occurred w/ the introduction of mechanical printing. Those texts that were not set in type and mechanically reproduced were doomed.
July 11, 2006 at 6:31 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
thetomdotdot (anonymous) says...
I haven't heard the whole discussion so forgive my treading on trodden ground.
The collapse of the curve is exactly why I find this discussion so fascinating. I realize that you separate the content from the popology, but I don't.
Back when pc's hit the desktop (I actually used a PET 2001 16-n), I kept hearing some form of "now you can do this" or "now you can do that". Turns out you couldn't do this or that at all. And some of those this and thats still can't be done. Try actually "collaborating" on a complicated architectural project. What a mess.
My favorite example is counting change. At a transaction, change was counted UP from the amount paid to the amount tendered. Everybody did it this way, and the customer usually participated by counting along. This polite exchange effectively confirmed the accuracy of the transaction. Society practiced basic arithemetic skills daily. With the advent of digital registers (increased bandwith) the skill of counting change has disappeared along with the focused confirmation of the transaction.
My point is that - on my worst days - I believe that quality of content is inversely proportional to the width of the band. The only thing that has changed is that those who remain committed to the quality of communication have to speak up a little louder over the noise.
July 11, 2006 at 10:16 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
El_Borak (Bill Hoyt) says...
"quality of content is inversely proportional to the width of the band"
Or maybe the sum of quality is a constant. Same for schools - the more kids you educate the less education each one gets. Same for TV channels...same for recording artists...
July 11, 2006 at 11:57 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
Excellent comments! Responses soon.
July 11, 2006 at 12:10 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
ladylaw (Terry Bush) says...
One of my bestest friends in the world (Dennis O'Neil) is a brilliant historian (with the Masters Degree to show it) who eschews all internet and computer communication. He will/does call on the telephone from time to time (using long distance calling cards he buys based entirely upon their cost) but mostly writes letters. In long hand. I keep them all. He can turn the most mundane topic into a treatise of humor and intellect. I doubt this certifiably crazy man will ever be world famous, but his letters are well worth saving, if only for my progeny's enjoyment.
Point being - the written information that is passed along, kept, remembered, remaining for decades and centuries later often has lasted in large part because of the value placed upon it by the recipients.
July 11, 2006 at 2:50 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
El_Borak (Bill Hoyt) says...
Ladylaw now has a name. Woohoo...
"information...lasted in large part because of the value placed upon it by the recipients..."
Yep. I was thinking about this recently as it relates to radio. I was driving down 69 listening to some station playing awesome HairRock for about 45 minutes when the DJ broke in and broke my heart: "Welcome back to the Oldies Weekend." I cried.
But the point is not that I'm now old enough to be a favourable demographic, it's that the music was better than I remember it being when I was in high school. Why? Because the really crappy hair music (i.e. most of it) didn't make the cut. All that was played on the Oldies Weekend was the good old stuff.
It's not that new music sucks any worse today than it did in the 70s or 80s - most music sucked even then. But it's that the 80s seem better today because the 15% that was really good is still with us and you'll have a heck of a time finding a station that still plays Metal Church or Britny Fox. As TT said, "quality of content is inversely proportional..." information we have today is but the best of the best as chosen by the audience over a long period and that which did not fall victim to some accident of history.
The latter are the scarier, though: there are only 10 copies of Ceasar's "Gallic Wars" extant, and 2 of Tacitus' "Annals" - a few out-of-contol cooking fires and the world could have been immeasurably poorer. We are missing whole books even of works we have most of.
There's a lot we'd like to have, but there are a lot of smudges in history, too.
July 11, 2006 at 3:41 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
Apologies. I had to get Syd up. Phil gently nudged me.
TT:
"quality of content is inversely proportional to the width of the band."
I'll paint w/ a broad brush and invoke Sturgeon's Law: 90 percent of everything is crap. Because now "everything" is bigger than it ever was (the mediaverse is bigger than it ever was, the _culture_ is bigger than it ever was), there's more crap than there ever was, but the absolute size of the 10 percent that doesn't suck is larger, too. We have to wade through more crap to get to it, but there's more to be found when we do.
I've done a poor job of explaining my views of the role of cultural content in the operation of the theory, and I exacerbated the problem in my exchange w/ David on the last blog. DR and I have been talking about this stuff for years. Our exchange re content was a continuation of that conversation; I was as brief as I was because David has a strong grasp of the context. Content is of great importance when comparing the performance of different referents; the specifics of the message obviously determine the size of its potential audience. It is when we generalize the theory that content ceases to signify. The network doesn't care what it's carrying.
LL:
"Point being - the written information that is passed along, kept, remembered, remaining for decades and centuries later often has lasted in large part because of the value placed upon it by the recipients."
Exactly. Much of the material we retain from antiquity survived because it was treasured. From every era there also survives ephemeral material--much of the surviving papyri comes from rubbish piles in Egypt, which contain a zillion discarded receipts and handwriting exercises for every Gospel or Iliad--but that material survived incidentally. This is the collapse of the curve: Some material makes the cut, some doesn't, _and that's how it turned out_. Why certain material survives and other material doesn't is the central question of popological history, and in a great many cases the answer is "The material was treasured generation after generation."
Bill--
"There's a lot we'd like to have, but there are a lot of smudges in history, too." You betcha, and one of the most interesting implications of the theory is that the losses occurred over a finite period that has now ended: We won't lose anything else, or at least the loss rate has now become trivial. We will (sadly) never lose an Act of Congress, the operations of major business firms have been permanently recorded in minute detail, every concievable historical actor or agency is documented 24/7. _That's_ the real "end of history." No more gaps.
July 11, 2006 at 6:17 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
thetomdotdot (anonymous) says...
"The network doesn't care what it's carrying."
I'm with you on that, certainly at that level. All the same, I go to the outfield with the belief that the network impacts what it is carrying whether it cares or not.
LL's friend of letters and my grandfather of the diaries are part of Sturgeons 10%, yet they are, for all pracical puposes, off the network. Unless she and/or I put forth some effort to change that.
"Some material makes the cut, some doesn't, _and that's how it turned out_.. "
Exactly the opportunity I needed to clarify and belabor my point. My inverse proportion was intended to apply to the quality of the cultural content that MAKES THE CUT. LBs HB elite represents a filtration of the music that made the cut, but makes no accounting of the even greater music we never heard. The sum of the two are Sturgeons 10%.
But on the days that are worse than my worst days I go farther. A simple inverse proportion never lets the quality of cultural content get to zero unless the bandwidth reaches infinity. The garbage dump of American politics proves we don't have to wait for that.
July 11, 2006 at 10:03 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )