Freethought & Rationalism Archive

andrewcriddle · 10-16-2005, 04:50 PM

I've been considering the options about what Minucius Felix (MF) believed concerning the birth and death of Christ.

a/ Formally it is possible that MF believed something really weird eg that Simon of Cyrene was crucified instead of Christ. However this possibility is IMO unlikely and also unintersting from the point of view of those who regard MF's views as a survival of what had earlier been mainstream Christianity.

b/ It is possible that MF was by later Christian standards orthodox but expresses himself in a sometimes misleading way. However, although entirely possible, this does involve some explaining away of what MF actually says.

c/ If MF was neither orthodox by later standards nor simply eccentric he almost certainly believed that Christ in some sense died and probably that Christ was in some sense born. His attack on pagan religion

Quote:

Therefore neither are gods made from dead people, since a god cannot die; nor of people that are born, since everything which is born dies. But that is divine which has neither rising nor setting

would be attacking Pagans for believing in divine beings experiencing normal human birth and death. Whereas Christ according to MF would not have experienced such events in the way ordinary humans do. This would agree with his other statement

Quote:

For in that you attribute to our religion the worship of a criminal and his cross, you wander far from the neighbourhood of the truth, in thinking either that a criminal deserved, or that an earthly being was able, to be believed God...

(Any pagan could reply that MF is taking pagan myths in a crudely literal way while understanding accounts of Christ in a more sophisticated way, but even if MF was a Mythicist in Doherty's sense he would seem vulnerable to this sort of critique. This line of argument is IMO more relevant to the question of the validity of MF's views than to their nature.)

The question arises as to whether or not we have explicit examples of the type of views I'm suggesting MF held. I think we do.

Hilary of Poitiers a 4th century Latin bishop influenced by Minucius Felix and other Latin Christian writers expresses in The Trinity Book X views about the birth, human experiences and death of Christ which later theologians have found duboiusly orthodox emphasizing as they do Christ's divinity at the expense of his humanity.

The following quotation is a selection of the relevant passages from Book X

Quote:

Further, what terror had the pain of death for Him, to Whom death was an act of His own free will? In the human race death is brought on either by an attack upon the body of an external enemy, such as fever wound, accident or fall: or our bodily nature is overcome by age, and yields to death. But the Only-begotten God, Who had the power of laying down His life, and of taking it up again , after the drought of vinegar, having borne witness that His work of human suffering was finished, in order to accomplish in Himself the mystery of death, bowed His head and gave up His Spirit………….But if He died of His own will, and through His own will gave back His Spirit, death had no terror; because it was in His own power.

……………It is foolish and absurd, that He should fear death, Who could lay down His soul, and take it up again, Who, to fulfil the mystery of human life, was about to die of His own free will. He cannot fear death Whose power and purpose in dying is to die but for a moment: fear is incompatible with willingness to die, and the power to live again, for both of these rob death of his terrors.

…………But if through His own act He took to Himself flesh from the Virgin, and likewise by His own act joined a soul to the body thus conceived, then the nature of His suffering must have corresponded with the nature of His body and soul. ……..For the Virgin conceived, what she conceived, from the Holy Ghost alone , and though for His birth in the flesh she supplied from herself that element, which women always contribute to the seed planted in them, still Jesus Christ was not formed by an ordinary human conception. In His birth, the cause of which was transmitted solely by the Holy Ghost, His mother performed the same part as in all human conceptions: but by virtue of His origin He never ceased to be God.

This deep and beautiful mystery of His assumption of manhood the Lord Himself reveals in the words, No man hath ascended into heaven, but He that descended from heaven, even the Son of Man which is in heaven . `Descended from heaven' refers to His origin from the Spirit: for though Mary contributed to His growth in the womb and birth all that is natural to her sex, His body did not owe to her its origin.

Again the Lord Himself revealing this mystery of His birth, speaks thus: I am the living bread Who have descended from Heaven: if any one shall eat of My bread he shall live far ever : calling Himself the Bread since He is the origin of His own body. Further, that it may not be thought the Word left His own virtue and nature for the flesh, He says again that it is His bread; since He is the bread which descends from heaven, His body cannot be regarded as sprung from human conception, because it is shewn to be from heaven

So the Man Jesus Christ, Only-begotten God, as flesh and as Word at the same time Son of Man and Son of God, without ceasing to be Himself, that is, God, took true humanity after the likeness of our humanity. But when, in this humanity, He was struck with blows, or smitten with wounds, or bound with ropes, or lifted on high, He felt the force of suffering, but without its pain. Thus a dart passing through water, or piercing a flame, or wounding the air, inflicts all that it is its nature to do: it passes through, it pierces, it wounds; but all this is without effect on the thing it strikes; since it is against the order of nature to make a hole in water, or pierce flame, or wound the air, though it is the nature of a dart to make holes, to pierce and to wound. So our Lord Jesus Christ suffered blows, hanging, crucifixion and death: but the suffering which attacked the body of the Lord, without ceasing to be suffering, had not the natural effect of suffering. It exercised its function of punishment with all its violence; but the body of Christ by its virtue suffered the violence of the punishment, without its consciousness……That flesh, that is, that Bread, is from Heaven; that humanity is from God. He had a body to suffer, and He suffered: but He had not a nature which could feel pain. For His body possessed a unique nature of its own; it was transformed into heavenly glory on the Mount, it put fevers to flight by its touch, it gave new eyesight by its spittle.

…..He conformed to the habits of the body to prove the reality of His own body, to satisfy the custom of human bodies by doing as our nature does. When He ate and drank, it was a concession, not to His own necessities, but to our habits.

For Christ had indeed a body, but unique, as befitted His origin. He did not come into existence through the passions incident to human conception: He came into the form of our body by an act of His own power.

…………In like manner Jesus Christ being man is indeed human, but even thus cannot be aught else but Christ, born as man by the birth of His body, but not human in defects, as He was not human in origin.

………….Such a nature with such power could not be shut up within the confines of the nether world, nor even subjected to fear of it. When He descended to Hades, He was never absent from Paradise (just as He was always in Heaven when He was preaching on earth as the Son of Man), but promised His martyr a home there, and held out to him the transports of perfect happiness. Bodily fear cannot touch Him Who reaches indeed down as far as Hades, but by the power of His nature is present in all things everywhere. As little can the abyss of Hell and the terrors of death lay hold upon the nature which rules the world, boundless in the freedom of its spiritual power, confident of the raptures of Paradise; for the Lord Who was to descend to Hades, was also to dwell in Paradise.

……..We have incontestably proved that His body did not share the infirmity of a natural body, because its power could expel the infirmities of the body that when He suffered, suffering laid hold of His body, but did not inflict upon it the nature of pain: and this because, though the form of our body was in the Lord, yet He by virtue of His origin was not in the body of our weakness and imperfection.

There was, then, no place for human anxiety and trepidation in that nature, which was more than human. It was superior to the ills of earthly flesh; a body not sprung from earthly elements, although His origin as Son of Man was due to the mystery of the conception by the Holy Ghost

The Only-begotten God, then, suffered in His person the attacks of all the infirmities to which we are subject; but He suffered them in the power of His own nature, just as He was born in the power of His own nature, for at His birth He did not lose His omnipotent nature by being born. Though born under human conditions, He was not so conceived: His birth was surrounded by human circumstances, but His origin went beyond them. He suffered then in His body alter the manner of our infirm body, yet bore the sufferings of our body in the power of His own body………It is then a mistaken opinion of human judgment, which thinks He felt pain because He suffered. He bore our sins, that is, He assumed our body of sin, but was Himself sinless. He was sent in the likeness of the flesh of sin, bearing sin indeed in His flesh but our sin. So too He felt pain for us, but not with our senses; He was found in fashion as a man, with a body which could feel pain, but His nature could not feel pain; for, though His fashion was that of a man, His origin was not human, but He was born by conception of the Holy Ghost.

IMO if MF thought like Hilary on these matters then he could perfectly well have written as he does. This type of position may verge on Docetism but it is not Mythicist in Doherty's sense.

Andrew Criddle

GakuseiDon · 10-17-2005, 07:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Hilary of Poitiers a 4th century Latin bishop influenced by Minucius Felix and other Latin Christian writers expresses in The Trinity Book X views about the birth, human experiences and death of Christ which later theologians have found duboiusly orthodox emphasizing as they do Christ's divinity at the expense of his humanity.

The following quotation is a selection of the relevant passages from Book X IMO if MF thought like Hilary on these matters then he could perfectly well have written as he does. This type of position may verge on Docetism but it is not Mythicist in Doherty's sense.

That's interesting, Andrew. I think we can also get a hint by comparing M. Felix to Tertullian:

M. Felix:
the whole world was perfected by the divine reason... He orders everything, whatever it is, by a word; arranges it by His wisdom; perfects it by His power.

Compare with Tertullian (Apology):
We have already asserted that God made the world, and all which it contains, by His Word, and Reason, and Power. It is abundantly plain that your philosophers, too, regard the Logos--that is, the Word and Reason--as the Creator of the universe.

... And we, in like manner, hold that the Word, and Reason, and Power, by which we have said God made all...

And we, in like manner, hold that the Word, and Reason, and Power, by which we have said God made all, have spirit as their proper and essential substratum, in which the Word has inbeing to give forth utterances, and reason abides to dispose and arrange, and power is over all to execute. We have been taught that He proceeds forth from God, and in that procession He is generated; so that He is the Son of God, and is called God from unity of substance with God. For God, too, is a Spirit.

Vorkosigan · 10-17-2005, 07:46 AM

Didn't Roger Pearse (or Andrew??) note that some think MF copied/was copied by Tertullian?

GakuseiDon · 10-17-2005, 01:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vorkosigan

Didn't Roger Pearse (or Andrew??) note that some think MF copied/was copied by Tertullian?

I think that is the general consensus, though the question has always been who used who.

Roger Pearse provides quotes from several authors suggesting Tertullian was prior:
http://www.tertullian.org/minucius/mf.htm
A careful analysis of the use made in the Octavius of Cicero and Seneca has revealed that the author adopted and changed them for his own purposes. The dialogue is more than a mere patchwork of classical commonplaces. A comparison reveals that the works of Tertullian are utilized in the same manner by Minucius Felix as the others. Thus the question of priority has been resolved in favour of Tertullian.

Doherty provides quotes suggesting M. Felix was prior:
http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/CritiquesGDon.htm
Minucius Felix (p. 162-165) appears before Tertullian (p. 166-179): even more precisely, Oct is dated a little before 197, the year in which Apol was published (p. 163), the argument advanced being that Tertullian readily reworks his own works or those of his predecessors.

Ted Hoffman · 10-19-2005, 12:20 AM

There has been confusion regarding MF's meaning and position and IMO, Doherty clarifies *everything* in his recent rebuttal to GDon. He goes through various translations and analyzes the passages thoroughly.
A careful reading of Doherty's article makes it clear that MF did not subscribe to the idea that a flesh and blood man was a Christian deity of any kind or played any significant role in the birth of Christianity.
I think Roger Pearse, Criddle, GDon and other interested people should read the article and provide substantive responses.
Here is the link:
http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/CritiquesGDon-2.htm

andrewcriddle · 10-19-2005, 04:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ted Hoffman

There has been confusion regarding MF's meaning and position and IMO, Doherty clarifies *everything* in his recent rebuttal to GDon. He goes through various translations and analyzes the passages thoroughly.
A careful reading of Doherty's article makes it clear that MF did not subscribe to the idea that a flesh and blood man was a Christian deity of any kind or played any significant role in the birth of Christianity.
I think Roger Pearse, Criddle, GDon and other interested people should read the article and provide substantive responses.
Here is the link:
http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/CritiquesGDon-2.htm

I've read the article.

It doesn't seem to provide any ground for claiming that Minucius Felix believed that Christ was born and died, but in a 'spiritual realm'.

I'm not sure exactly what Doherty thinks MF actually did believe.

IMHO Doherty tends to treat Latin Rhetoric as if it was formal explicit argument. It is probably more difficult to determine MF's real views behind the rhetoric than Doherty allows. However it seems unlikely that MF was a mythicist in the sense in which Doherty thinks Paul was a mythicist.

(One specific point. Doherty, by pointing to the Euhemerist context of Tertullian's remarks, criticises GDon for exaggerating the parallels between Tertullian and MF . MF is also strongly Euhemerist and the Euhemerist context in Tertullian probably strengthens rather than weakens the parallel between MF and Tertullian here.)

Andrew Criddle

Ted Hoffman · 10-20-2005, 03:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

I've read the article.

It doesn't seem to provide any ground for claiming that Minucius Felix believed that Christ was born and died, but in a 'spiritual realm'.

Please Andrew, point out one place where Doherty claims that Minucius Felix believed that Christ was born and died, but in a 'spiritual realm'.

You will find that Doherty never makes such a claim. This latent dichotomy in the minds of critics has protracted the confusion surrounding MF's beliefs.

To be sure, Doherty wrote : "There is a very important distinction GDon and others are overlooking, and it is not the one between the historical and mythical Jesus (HJ and MJ). In fact, this dichotomy is here something of a misnomer. The forms of non-historical faith among the apologists we have been looking at in the latter half of the century should not, strictly speaking, be referred to as involving a mythical Jesus. Athenagoras & Co. are not "MJers" because they don't have any Jesus at all. The Logos itself is a mythical entity, but not in the same way. They don't have a sacrificial redeemer figure such as the one at the center of the Pauline cult, and this may to some extent be true even of Diognetus. No one among the apologists I have presented ever declared that they had a Jesus who was an entirely mythical figure.
Rather, they had a Logos who was a revealing emanation of God; Minucius Felix didn't even have this....The philosopher-apologists of the second century belonged to a Logos religion, in which the Son was not a Jesus-Savior figure but only an abstract heavenly force, a part of God."

Please, wrap your mind around this. Firmly.

andrewcriddle · 10-20-2005, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ted Hoffman

Please Andrew, point out one place where Doherty claims that Minucius Felix believed that Christ was born and died, but in a 'spiritual realm'.

You will find that Doherty never makes such a claim. This latent dichotomy in the minds of critics has protracted the confusion surrounding MF's beliefs.

To be sure, Doherty wrote : "There is a very important distinction GDon and others are overlooking, and it is not the one between the historical and mythical Jesus (HJ and MJ). In fact, this dichotomy is here something of a misnomer. The forms of non-historical faith among the apologists we have been looking at in the latter half of the century should not, strictly speaking, be referred to as involving a mythical Jesus. Athenagoras & Co. are not "MJers" because they don't have any Jesus at all. The Logos itself is a mythical entity, but not in the same way. They don't have a sacrificial redeemer figure such as the one at the center of the Pauline cult, and this may to some extent be true even of Diognetus. No one among the apologists I have presented ever declared that they had a Jesus who was an entirely mythical figure.
Rather, they had a Logos who was a revealing emanation of God; Minucius Felix didn't even have this....The philosopher-apologists of the second century belonged to a Logos religion, in which the Son was not a Jesus-Savior figure but only an abstract heavenly force, a part of God."

Please, wrap your mind around this. Firmly.

Thanks for the clarification

It is IMO most unlikely that Minucius Felix held such a minimal version of Christianity. MF clearly regards whatever he means by Christianity as worth dying for. It is IMO unilkely that anyone could regard what Doherty seems to think MF believed as being worth martyrdom.

However, assume for the sake of argument that this is what MF believed.

It would be very different from what we know about 1st century Christianity (whether we regard 1st century Christianity as Mythicist or not), that difference is part of my reasons for doubting MF actually did believe this, but again assuming he did, I don't see why it would be more difficult for an originally historical Christianity to develop towards MF's alleged beliefs than it would be for an originally mythical Christianity.

Doherty claims that what he regards as MF's beliefs could not plausibly have developed from an originally historical Christianity. He may well be right but if so they would seem also very unlikely to develop from an originally mythical Christianity.

IMO it is probably a mistake to explain the 2nd century apologists in a way that radically distinguishes their true beliefs both from what came before (Paul the Gospels etc) and what comes after (Orthodox Christianity.)

It is probably better to recognise the genre of these writings and that certain points of Christian belief were regarded at this time as inappropriate for emphasis in works intented primarily for non-Christians.

Andrew Criddle

Ted Hoffman · 10-21-2005, 02:37 AM

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