Contradiction of The Color of Jesus Robe?

[Greg Merrill]

A Supposed Biblical Contradiction!
After preaching through Mt 27:28 where it says they put a "scarlet" robe upon Jesus, I read in Jn 19:2 that they put a purple robe upon him. Even I had the immediate thought "Well, which one was it?" I didn't come up with an immediate answer, so did some research. Some times
the Gospels record different details. The answers to these "supposed contradictions" is not a matter of "either or" but of "both." They put on a scarlet robe (as recorded by Matthew) and a purple robe (as recorded by John.) Luke 23 says they put on him a "gorgeous" robe. So either
they put on two robes of different colors (possibly two different kinds or lengths of robes) or one robe of two colors. There may be a reason to focus on the scarlet in Matthew, and a different reason to focus on the purple in John, just as Matthew focuses on Jesus as King, John focuses on Jesus as God.

 

[JackRT]

A Supposed Biblical Contradiction!
After preaching through Mt 27:28 where it says they put a "scarlet" robe upon Jesus, I read in Jn 19:2 that they put a purple robe upon him. Even I had the immediate thought "Well, which one was it?" I didn't come up with an immediate answer, so did some research. Some times
the Gospels record different details. The answers to these "supposed contradictions" is not a matter of "either or" but of "both." They put on a scarlet robe (as recorded by Matthew) and a purple robe (as recorded by John.) Luke 23 says they put on him a "gorgeous" robe. So either
they put on two robes of different colors (possibly two different kinds or lengths of robes) or one robe of two colors. There may be a reason to focus on the scarlet in Matthew, and a different reason to focus on the purple in John, just as Matthew focuses on Jesus as King, John focuses on Jesus as God.

I must be honest. I have read many attempts to reconcile various contradictions and have found most to be quite strained, some to be inventive and still others to almost laughable. Very few are convincing.

I would put yours in the first category. Sometimes it would be better to simply say "OK, its a contradiction."

 

[CtC]

Was it customary to use two or more robes at that time? Maybe just for special occasions? What would be the significance of doing so?

Alternatively, were multi-colored robes used? Considering the extra effort necessary to make them (maybe ornately combined), I would suppose this would be done out of honor.

I wish I could add value here. Instead, I'm just raising more questions. I'm interested to learn more!

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

No worries.
One translator translated purple,
another translated scarlet,
and others translated other.

YHWH'S meaning remains YHWH'S meaning.

No contradiction in YHWH, ever. (paradox, yes - WONDERFUL WONDERFUL paradoxes )

 

[Greg Merrill]

I must be honest. I have read many attempts to reconcile various contradictions and have found most to be quite strained, some to be inventive and still others to almost laughable. Very few are convincing.

I would put yours in the first category. Sometimes it would be better to simply say "OK, its a contradiction."

To say "It's a contradiction" would either put lack of faith on the trustworthiness of the Scriptures themselves, or on the version or translation of the scripture. The latter, Yes, the former, Never. I have studied the Scriptures deeply since 1973, and have never found a real contradiction in the Scriptures. They can all be adequately explained away. Care to give me your favorite "supposed contradiction" in the Bible?

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Care to give me your favorite "supposed contradiction" in the Bible?

Tangent , contrary like, remember who it was in the NT, in those days, as written,
who always contradicted JESUS ? (hint: they refused to repent, so they were not immersed in His Name, so they could not recognize nor accept Him as the Messiah)

 

[Greg Merrill]

Tangent , contrary like, remember who it was in the NT, in those days, as written,
who always contradicted JESUS ? (hint: they refused to repent, so they were not immersed in His Name, so they could not recognize nor accept Him as the Messiah)

What is the contradiction? Could you state it more clearly?

 

[vinsight4u]

/nvm

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

No worries.
One translator translated purple,
another translated scarlet,
and others translated other.

YHWH'S meaning remains YHWH'S meaning.

No contradiction in YHWH, ever. (paradox, yes - WONDERFUL WONDERFUL paradoxes )

------------------------------------------------------
==============================

remember who it was in the NT, in those days, as written,
who always contradicted JESUS ?

(the scribes, lawyers, pharisees, saducees,
i.e. religious leaders and teachers and educated ones)

generally, though JESUS is PERFECT ,
those opposed to HIM contradicted HIM - made many false statements against HIM , and sought to kill HIM...

i.e. the contradictions are NOT PRESENT IN YHWH, nor in HIS WORD as Given By Him,
but
come from those opposed to JESUS, contrary to YHWH...
often the contradictions having widespread approval among men (on the wide road to destruction)....

 

[Greg Merrill]

It seems that the scarlet robe He wore before the soldiers put the crown of thorns on Him.

Do you think there were two different robes of two different colors?

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Do you think there were two different robes of two different colors?

< shrugs > Don't know at this point - don't have any concern about it either way....
I know who knows though...
You know who knows also, I believe...

 

[vinsight4u]

/nvm

 

[CtC]

I had heard, many years back, that they would put a robe on someone after the lashing and let the blood start to dry, then rip it off to re-open the wounds. However, I believe this was more a historical note, rather than a scriptural account.

 

[ewq1938]

A Supposed Biblical Contradiction!
After preaching through Mt 27:28 where it says they put a "scarlet" robe upon Jesus, I read in Jn 19:2 that they put a purple robe upon him.

It's the same difference. Both can look like the same color.

 

[ViaCrucis]

A Supposed Biblical Contradiction!
After preaching through Mt 27:28 where it says they put a "scarlet" robe upon Jesus, I read in Jn 19:2 that they put a purple robe upon him. Even I had the immediate thought "Well, which one was it?" I didn't come up with an immediate answer, so did some research. Some times
the Gospels record different details. The answers to these "supposed contradictions" is not a matter of "either or" but of "both." They put on a scarlet robe (as recorded by Matthew) and a purple robe (as recorded by John.) Luke 23 says they put on him a "gorgeous" robe. So either
they put on two robes of different colors (possibly two different kinds or lengths of robes) or one robe of two colors. There may be a reason to focus on the scarlet in Matthew, and a different reason to focus on the purple in John, just as Matthew focuses on Jesus as King, John focuses on Jesus as God.

Both kokkos (scarlet) and porphyra (Tyrian red or Tyrian purple) were intense colors associated with royalty. This is a case of missing the forest for the trees by focusing on the exact color of the cloak--the point is the way in which Jesus is mocked by being given a crown of thorns and draped with a royal-color cloaked. Though if one wanted to be technical, it was probably actually a kokkos-colored cloak, as porphyra was definitely restricted to royalty--to the emperor and imperial house itself--having a cloak dyed porphyra would have been far too expensive to be wasted on such a mocking insult. But a scarlet, kokkos-dyed, cloak was a common article of Roman military clothing as such the cloak in question was probably from one of the soldier's themselves. Describing it as purple rather than scarlet still carries the point across about what the intention of the mocking was to signify.

This isn't a case where trying to reconcile a "contradiction" is really necessary unless one subscribes to a very ardent form of inerrancy. If John's intent was to get this detail absolutely down, rather than say point out the mockery of Jesus, then sure we could say John is most likely the one in the wrong here on this detail. But, as I said, that's missing the forest for the trees.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

You make a distinct mistake here. In classical languages the names of the major colours in the spectrum was narrower than the germanic one we inherented and that was passed on to the Romance languages by their Germanic conquerors as well.

When we see Maroon or Scarlet then both are forms of Red. In essence we can say English only has red, green, yellow, orange, blue, purple, black and white as colours with aquamarine, navy and their ilk just variations of another colour, a subdivision in essence.
Other languages have other spectrums. Japanese doesn't differentiate blue and green, using Ao for both, as does traditional chinese for instance (although they are differentiated in modern Chinese).

Latin and Greek similarly did not differentiate between red and purple completely. We see a similar confusion on the trim stripes of senatorial togas, which may be red or purple. So to first century readers, this argument would be similar to whether something was burgundy or maroon - both are red. It is anachronistic to think that calling a cloak scarlet or purple in a 1st century text is a contradiction; it is a minor difference.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

From Aullius Gellus' Attic Nights, Book II to illustrate the lack of differentiation between purple and scarlet in classical Greek and Latin:

"When the philosopher Favorinus was on his way to visit the exconsul Marcus Fronto, who was ill with the gout, he wished me also to go with him. And when there at Fronto's, where a number of learned men were present, a discussion took place about colours and their names, to the effect that the shades of colours are manifold, but the names for them are few and indefinite, Favorinus said: "More distinctions of colour are detected by the eye than are expressed by words and terms. For leaving out of account other incongruities, your simple colours, red (rufus) and green (viridis), have single names, but many different shades.
And that poverty in names I find more pronounced in Latin than in Greek. For the colour red (rufus) does in fact get its name from redness, but although fire is one kind of red, blood
another, purple another, saffron another, and gold still another, yet the Latin tongue does not indicate these special varieties of red by separate and individual words, but includes them all under the one term rubor, except in so far as it borrows names from the things themselves, and calls anything 'fiery,' 'flaming,' 'blood-red,' 'saffron', 'purple' and 'golden.' For russus and ruber are no doubt derived from rufus, and do not indicate all its special varieties, but ξανθός and ἐρυθρός and πυρρός and κιρρός and φοῖνιξ seem to mark certain differences in the colour red, either intensifying it or making it lighter, or qualifying it by the admixture of some shade."

 

[Greg Merrill]

Both kokkos (scarlet) and porphyra (Tyrian red or Tyrian purple) were intense colors associated with royalty. This is a case of missing the forest for the trees by focusing on the exact color of the cloak--the point is the way in which Jesus is mocked by being given a crown of thorns and draped with a royal-color cloaked. Though if one wanted to be technical, it was probably actually a kokkos-colored cloak, as porphyra was definitely restricted to royalty--to the emperor and imperial house itself--having a cloak dyed porphyra would have been far too expensive to be wasted on such a mocking insult. But a scarlet, kokkos-dyed, cloak was a common article of Roman military clothing as such the cloak in question was probably from one of the soldier's themselves. Describing it as purple rather than scarlet still carries the point across about what the intention of the mocking was to signify.

This isn't a case where trying to reconcile a "contradiction" is really necessary unless one subscribes to a very ardent form of inerrancy. If John's intent was to get this detail absolutely down, rather than say point out the mockery of Jesus, then sure we could say John is most likely the one in the wrong here on this detail. But, as I said, that's missing the forest for the trees.

-CryptoLutheran

I agree with you, and found your post informative. People say that there are contradictions in the Bible, and I posted the start of this thread just to show a supposed contradiction, not the more important aspects that you brought out. You are right though, and thanks for sharing.

 

[Aseyesee]

A Supposed Biblical Contradiction!
After preaching through Mt 27:28 where it says they put a "scarlet" robe upon Jesus, I read in Jn 19:2 that they put a purple robe upon him. Even I had the immediate thought "Well, which one was it?" I didn't come up with an immediate answer, so did some research. Some times
the Gospels record different details. The answers to these "supposed contradictions" is not a matter of "either or" but of "both." They put on a scarlet robe (as recorded by Matthew) and a purple robe (as recorded by John.) Luke 23 says they put on him a "gorgeous" robe. So either
they put on two robes of different colors (possibly two different kinds or lengths of robes) or one robe of two colors. There may be a reason to focus on the scarlet in Matthew, and a different reason to focus on the purple in John, just as Matthew focuses on Jesus as King, John focuses on Jesus as God.

So it is from the view of the one whose account it was. It's good to note one was taken off by the soldiers (and his put back in him) and the other left on, and typically the soldiers wore red robes.