Lestes (λῃστής)

• Lestes (λῃστής)
  • Revolutionary, not so much
  • Mark 14-51-52 labels Jesus a lestes
  • Heyschius defines Pirates (Peirates == Perates)
  • Heyschius also tells us Hebrews were pirates
  • What about Josephus
  • Herodotus - Histories
  • Lucian - Alexander the False Prophet - an entire book on Lestes written during the time of the New Testament
    • What does it say?
  • Piratical Aphrodite
  • Lestes also abduct Things
  • Conclusion....

Revolutionary, not so much

During the timespan of the bible writers (Septuagint 250BCE, GNT ~70CE)

• Stasiastes (στασιαστής) was a revolutionary
• Lestes (λῃστής) was a plunderer

Things evolve. And Lestes is no exception. After the Roman state Christian theocracy began 329CE, made paganism illegal in 391CE, and Latin took hold reframing many originally Greek/Hellenic concepts, words, and translations of those words, were manipulated or reframed into a Christian Lens.

...Lestes at the time of the bible writers, was a plunder of booty: a robber, predator, brigand, marauder, seize as booty or prey. Someone who doesn't care and will go after someone. It's not a stasiaston (στασιαστής), which is someone who stirs up sedition, insurrectionist or revolutionary.

• Lestes is not even close to a seditionist or insurrectionist.
• Stasiastoun shows up once in New Testament, and for Barabbas, never for Jesus.

Bottom line:

• Barabbas is a revolutionary.
• Jesus is a plunderer. (see below)

We can't use interlinear or English translations... which contains mistranslations from later reframing from Latin, later Hebrew, or Victorian authors. Even the LSJ has some victorianisms to watch out for.

Mark 14-51-52 labels Jesus a lestes

• See Mark 14-51 Translation from Source where jesus asks "why do you come at me as if i was a LESTES?", and where the context is with a n4k3d kid in a park runs away leaving behind a surgical/medical grade bandage that was "on his nakedness"

And with a n4k3d kid in a park, and the stormtroopers closing in, that context is.... well, it's not a rebel... robbery of souls perhaps, plunderer of human booty, fraud charlatan manipulator staged miracles, etc... insurrection doesn't fit the context.

Crucifixion is used if the theft occurs in a religious building, and Jesus committed a crime by shutting down the dove sellers for a week before he was crucified, trashed the cashier. His disciples were defined in the Bible as criminals (hamartolo). High priests went after him.

We also know that crucifixion was used for traffickers, from Julius Ceaser.

It would seem he died for his own sins, here.

Many translations after the Greek have employed figurative metaphor to make those more limited languages (like the Ancient Hebrew 7000 word dead language from pre-400BCE) make sense, lulling us in to accepting poetic meaning (and Christian reframing of negative words into virtuous heroics). But the Ancient Greek has detail that doesn't require that metaphor. But it's important to be aware of the evolution past 400CE of the derivative languages (like Latin and English, and the rebooted Hebrew of ~1000CE during the Masoretic), and their influences on the later Victorian Greek lexicon (LSJ).

To confuse λῃστής (plunderer) with στασιαστής (revolutionary) is to erase the linguistic and legal distinctions present in the Greek sources themselves. We must read lēstēs with the ears of a Hellenistic Greek, not with the assumptions of a Latinized Christian or a Victorian glossator. The Hellenistic world knew the difference between a predator and a patriot.

Heyschius defines Pirates (Peirates == Perates)

Hesychius ( tells us that Perates (people who cross the limits of boundaries) and Peirates (pirates) were the same thing, coming from the same root.

• see Hebrew Worship Part 1 for an in depth analysis of Perates vs Peirates.

Philo of Alexandria tells us the ancient Hebrews were Pirates... and that he wouldn't want to be one.

Heyschius also tells us Hebrews were pirates

What does this say? Heber, hebraios. Perates - wanderers who Test limits of boundaries. Perates == peirates == Pirates. It's why Abraham is called a perate in the Bible, because he is a trader in human souls. Reality.

What is the porthmeus? The undertaking that is the testing of your life is done by the porthmeus. That is the trafficker in human souls.

That's the ferryman. The one who purveys. Carries human soulery

• Perate (πέρατα) peirate (πείρατα) peiratai (πειραταί)
• Kakourgoi (κακούργοι) - those who do bad things.
• lestai (λῃσταί) - The traffickers

What about Josephus

Josephus (37 to ~100 CE) wrote during the time (75 CE - 100 CE) that the New Testament was being written (50-110 CE), labeling those insurrectionists as lestes. While they were insurrectionists, he was using Lestes to paint a more criminal picture of them, not to say that Lestes == Insurrectionist. Subtle difference.

Through his writings, Josephus reframed lestai (λῃσταί) to mean “insurrectionists,” though he leaned on its classical connotations of "plunderer" “robber” and “bandit” to morally delegitimize them. This was a rhetorical strategy.

Josephus was not a Christian apologist glorifying that movement — far from it. He was a Jewish historian working under Roman patronage, and his orientation was shaped by survival, diplomacy, and a political balancing act between his Jewish heritage, his Roman benefactors, and his own personal history as a former rebel.

• Josephus was born into a priestly aristocratic family in Judea.
• During the First Jewish–Roman War (66–73 CE), he initially fought as a general in Galilee but later surrendered to the Romans.
• In The Jewish War, Josephus consistently uses the word λῃσταί (lestai) to describe:
  • Zealots
  • Sicarii (dagger-men)
  • Messianic claimants (e.g. The Egyptian, Theudas)
  • Rebels during the siege of Jerusalem
• He uses lestai with clear disapproval, describing them as violent criminals, self-interested brutes, or fanatics who brought ruin upon the Jewish people.
• Josephus did believe lestai were insurrectionists. That’s how he framed them to Roman audiences, to show that the Roman war wasn’t against Judaism, but against criminals

Josephus, the 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian, played a key role in shaping how Roman and post-Roman audiences perceived resistance movements in Judea. In his major works — The Jewish War and Antiquities of the Jews — he often uses the Greek word lestes (λῃστής) to describe Jewish rebels, zealots, and insurgents. Obviously this term is not a neutral label; understandably (by it's definition) it carried a strongly negative political and moral connotation in Roman discourse, and in >1000yrs of classical Greek literature.

Josephus called insurrectionists “lestai”, participating in a broader effort to highlight the criminal, rather than making space for the ideological or messianic. This linguistic move helped support Roman authority by branding opponents of the empire not as freedom fighters or patriots, but as mere outlaws.

HOWEVER

There was a precedent for that word "lestes", previously before Josephus wrote that. Josephus would be a good example of how the propagandists were redefining & reframing things, from a Jewish and Roman Lens.

Josephus rebranded the ancient word Lestes to Insurrectionist, around the time of

Herodotus - Histories

Herodotus - Histories - Book 5, Chapter 6, Section 1&2 : Translated By A. D. Godley

Lucian - Alexander the False Prophet - an entire book on Lestes written during the time of the New Testament

Lucian wrote Alexander the False Prophet, which is an entire book on Lestes. Written during the time of the gospels of Jesus's apostles.

Lucian (135-180CE) - Alexander the false prophet

• a book about Lestes, gives historical context for that passage in Mark 14:51 where Jesus says "why are you coming at me like some kind of Lestes" while a naked kid runs away.

Gospels (70-125CE) - so Lucian's work is relevant to the time the New Testament was written, representing the word meaning at that time, see Lestes.

Was in the same region

• Lucian was a Syrian, who ends up in Egypt. That's exactly surrounding Judea.

What does it say?

Piratical Aphrodite

• piratical (λῃστρικά) - metaph., of “ἑταῖραι, τὰ λ. τῆς Ἀφροδίτης” - A companion following Aphrodite (Pirates worship Aphrodite)

Aphrodite's corsairs are those pirates:

[reference needed] It was said that when Paris sailed for Sparta, deceiving Aphrodite came with him.

Lestes also abduct Things

Lestes (ληστής) abduct not only people, but priceless artifacts to establish them elsewhere.

The Golden Fleece is one. There was a bust of Hera that Tyrrhenian pirates tried to steal from Samos, but the locals tied the bust up with willow branches, or perhaps chaste tree branches. Therefore she could not be "abducted" and was therefore chaste. (edited)

Pirate culture.

Abductions are also possessions.

This is why Jesus is this mystery pirate, literally calling out to Helios on the cross ref ref. He is surrounded by "Marys", is raising people from the dead (giving them antidotes), but also enticing kids from their parents and sail around with them all on a boat.

Conclusion....

To truely understand, we must read these texts with a Hellenic Lens.

Many apologists / propagandists piled in to support the overthrow. It was a quick ~200 years between ~65CE to 391CE when the erasure was legalized (paganism became illegal). The lestes apostles spun up their own ministry, it's all they knew having grown up in that cult. People with the christian lens (sympathetic to them) redefined the word to "revolutionary" later. As if dying on a cross reserved for heinous crimes was a revolution of some kind (i guess because he shut down the doves of another religion?).