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I can't reply at length right now (I'm involved in another project) but I wanted to thank you for clarifying two things for me that I hadn't quite seen before:

First, you evidently thought I was trying to use Scriptures to show that people in the NT Church asked for the prayerful intercession of the saints in heaven. I did not try to do that, nor could I have done so: there's no example to be had in the text.

What the sacred text does provide, is the underlying theology: the Church as the whole Body of Christ praying together with our Head, a Body which includes those here on earth as well as those who have gone on before us. It is this solidarity of all for one and one for all -- in one Spirit, one Lord, one Baptism, one Body --- in Christ our Lord, which make it possible to pray with and be prayed for by the saints, whether on earth or in heaven.

Truly no intercessory prayer could possibly have meaning, or be efficacious, or "work" if we were not all praying in Christ. And His Body is not hampered by "dead clumps." All of us, on earth or in heaven, are members; nor, as St. Paul said, can we dare say we don't need each other.

So what I was doing was not providing examples, but explicating the underlying theology.

I liked your observation that the actual examples of such intercessory prayer are from Sacred Tradition and not from the text of the NT. This Sacred Tradition shows how the Church from the very beginning understood and acted on these truths.

Second, you provided me with an early example about which I would like to know more:

"It then becomes clear that at the time of Judas Maccabeus - around 170 B.C., a surprisingly innovative period - prayer for the dead was not practiced, but that a century later it was practiced by certain Jews." --French historian Jacques Le Goff.

I had been thinking that the earliest examples we have of praying for the dead, and of being prayed for by those in heaven, were the following:

2 Macc 12:35-49 (where the Jews pray and offer sacrifices for the souls of the fallen soldiers) and
2 Macc. 15:11-16 (where both the martyred priest Onias, and the great prophet Jeremiah, are seen in heaven "in a vision worthy of belief," paying and interceding for the Jews in their battle against the pagan idolators.)

What Jacques Le Goff makes of this I do not know, but you quote him saying that by a century after Judas Maccabeus (about 70 BC), you find Jews praying for the dead.

You seem to be familiar with this De Goff's writings. What evidence does he proffer that there were Jews circa 70 B.C. were praying for the dead?

The earliest examples I can find, aside from that, are from the inscriptions on the Catacombs, 2nd-rd century A.D. That's not to say there isn't textual evidence, too, from Ante-Nicene writings, but not that I have seen.

wanted to thank you for clarifying two things for me that I hadn't quite seen before: First, you evidently thought I was trying to use Scriptures to show that people in the NT Church asked for the prayerful intercession of the saints in heaven. I did not try to do that, nor could I have done so: there's no example to be had in the text.

I was not simply referring to the conspicuous absence of even one prayer among the approx. 200 the Holy Spirit recorded in Scripture, which incongruous absence itself for such a basic common spiritual exercise is so profound as to exclude praying to anyone else but the Lord as being sanctioned, but i was also referring to attempts to such it based upon principle.

Which is simply more of the same elastic extrapolation of Scripture ("wrest" 2Pt. 3:18), as the unity of the body of Christ, even if it allows for believers in glory interceding for those on earth, does not translate into or support praying to them.

Only God is prayed to in Scripture, and abundantly so, and we are only instructed to address Him in prayer, and only He is shown able to hear and personally respond to the multitudinous prayers addressed to Him.

In addition, among spiritual beings, outside of false gods, only He is shown receiving such adulation, homage and entreaty that is given to Mary.

As said before, one would have a hard time in Bible times explaining kneeling before a statue and praising the entity it represented in the unseen world, beseeching such for Heavenly help, and making offerings to them, and giving glory and titles and ascribing attributes to such, which are never given in Scripture to created beings (except to false gods), including having the uniquely Divine power glory to hear and respond to virtually infinite numbers of prayers individually addressed to them

Which manner of adulation would constitute worship in Scripture, yet Catholics imagine that by playing word games then they can avoid crossing the invisible line between mere "veneration" and worship.

Moses, put down those rocks! I was only engaging in hyper dulia, not adoring her. Can't you tell the difference?

What is there to like? This is one example of one of many errors that developed in post OT Judaism with its many fables and superstitions, and which the NT warns of.

You affirm one thing as Sacred Tradition but cannot sanction all that comes in the cart, and which means that the real basis for the veracity of prayer to created being in Heaven such is the infallible magisterium of Rome. RCs invokes Scripture and Tradition to support this, but which operates under the premise that one one cannot be sure what the contents of Divine revelation are apart from faith in her.

For Rome has presumed to infallibly declare she is and will be perpetually infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares.

I had been thinking that the earliest examples we have of praying for the dead, and of being prayed for by those in heaven, were the following: 2 Macc 12:35-49...2 Macc. 15:11-16

Which comes from books which were disputed as canonical until after the death of Luther, and in the first instance supports offerings and prayers being made for souls who die due to mortal sin, for which Rome holds there is no hope, despite RC special pleading here.Thus if anything this apocryphal book proves too much.

Nor does this teaching praying to the departed or angels, which remains the issue, not whether the departed may pray for those on earth. Why RCs move the goal posts is obvious.

What Jacques Le Goff makes of this I do not know, but you quote him saying that by a century after Judas Maccabeus (about 70 BC), you find Jews praying for the dead. You seem to be familiar with this De Goff's writings. What evidence does he proffer that there were Jews circa 70 B.C. were praying for the dead? The earliest examples I can find, aside from that, are from the inscriptions on the Catacombs, 2nd-rd century A.D. That's not to say there isn't textual evidence, too, from Ante-Nicene writings, but not that I have seen.

2 Macc was penned about 124 B.C. (est.) Le Goff finds:

PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD Christians seem to have acquired the habit of praying for their dead at a very early date. This was an innovation, as Salomon Reinach nicely observes: "Pagans prayed to the dead, Christians prayed for the dead." Now, it is of course true that beliefs and mentalities do not change overnight, so it should come as no surprise that we do find instances, particularly in the domain of popular belief, in which non-Christians prayed for the suffering dead in the other world....

These practices developed around the beginning of the Christian era. They were a phenomenon of the times, particularly noticeable in Egypt, the great meeting ground for peoples and religions. Traveling in Egypt around 50 s.c., Diodorus of Sicily was struck by the funerary customs: "As soon as the casket containing the corpse is placed on the bark, the survivors call upon the infernal gods and beseech them to admit the soul to the place received for pious men. The crowd adds its own cheers, together with pleas that the deceased be allowed to enjoy eternal life in Hades, in the society of the good."

"The passage cited earlier from the Second Book of Maccabees, which was composed by an Alexandrian Jew during the half-century preceding Diodorus's journey, should no doubt be seen against this background." It then becomes clear that at the time of Judas Maccabeus--around 170 s.c., a surprisingly innovative period—prayer for the dead was not practiced, but that a century later it was practiced by certain Jews. No doubt it is in relation to beliefs of this type that we should think of the strange custom described by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:29-30: "Else what should they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for the dead?" This baptism for the dead was not the Christian baptism but rather the baptism received by Greek proselytes who converted to Judaism.

The abundant epigraphic and liturgical evidence available for the first few centuries of the Christian era has often been used to prove that belief in Purgatory is very ancient indeed." But it seems to me that the interpretation goes beyond the evidence. The favors that God is urged to grant the dead essentially involve the pleasures of Paradise, or at any rate a state defined by pax et lux, peace and light. Not until the end of the fifth century (or the beginning of the sixth) do we find an inscription that speaks of the "redemption of the soul" of one who is deceased.

The soul in question is that of a Gallo-Roman woman from Briord, whose epitaph includes the phrase pro redemptionem animae suae.s. Furthermore, the inscriptions and prayers make no mention of a specific place of redemption or waiting other than the one traditional since the time of the Gospels, the "bosom of Abraham." But in order for the idea of Purgatory to develop, it was essential that the living be concerned about the fate of their dead, that the living maintain contacts with the dead, not in order to call on them for protection, but rather in order to improve their condition through prayer. - The Birth of Purgatory By Jacques Le Goff. pp. 45,46 , transcribed using http://www.onlineocr.net.