Freethought & Rationalism Archive

stephan huller · 03-21-2013, 10:17 AM

I should also note that the idea that Marcion was Mark - or more specifically that Marcion's gospel was Mark rather than Luke - was championed by Hermann Raschke in the last century in his Werkstatt des Markus-Evangelisten among other writings. I was fortunate enough to have my friend Ulrich Schmid actually scan the entire book to me (which is in German and only available from a handful of German university libraries) last year. While there are a lot of crazy ideas (very similar to my own in the sense that they are unusual sounding) it would take too long to explain all of them in this post.

Again I am not sure I - or even he - would agree with everything he wrote in that book. Many scholars change their mind. Von Campenhausen championed then retreated from the idea that Polycarp wrote the Pastorals. So too Bultmann with respect to the idea that 'the Son of Man' was someone other than Jesus. That's what happens when you put experimental stuff out there. It's like making jazz or avant garde art. It's not easy to establish the aesthetic for the next generation. You often get it wrong or - perhaps better - not quite right, the first, second or even third time. Sometimes you never get it right.

It is easier to simply regurgitate old information as you do in each one of your posts. Sometimes safer is better. But I like taking chances for better or worse.

Here is one summary of Raschke's pertinent theories about the Gospel of Mark and Marcion:

Quote:

And now arises the question, If that gospel was current as canonical in Tertullian's and Irenaeus's day, how came they to speak of Marcion's elision of the Birth Stories without noting that they are elided in Mark, to comment on the brevity of Marcion's gospel when Mark's was less than half as long as Luke's, or to denounce Marcion for leaving out much of the Lucan record of the Lord's teaching when Mark did the same? Herr Raschke argues (p. 34) that Irenaeus was so completely under the fixed idea of a mutilation of Luke that he could not see the identity of Marcion's gospel with the canonical Mark. This is a difficult conception. As a matter of fact, Irenaeus (III, xi, 8), putting his mystical thesis that the gospels must be four, neither more nor less, cites Mark as beginning in the manner of our text, and making " a compendious and cursory narrative." That is in effect what he denounces Marcion for doing. The question thus insistently arises whether the existing text of Irenaeus, a Latin translation made at the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth century, represents what Irenaeus wrote in the second. If it does, Raschke's solution must stand, for the inconsistency of the attitude in the existing treatise is gross. That Marcion had before him a primitive compilation of miracle stories, ascribed to Mark, is quite conceivable; but our Mark is not the disorderly thing described by Papias; and apart from the passage cited there is nothing, I think, in Irenaeus to show any familiarity with our text. If he had a copy before him, how could he endorse it while denouncing Marcion? The same question arises in regard to the whole polemic of Tertullian against Marcion [John M Robertson Jesus and Judas p 226]

and again later:

Quote:

Herr Raschke comments, that description just fits Mark. When we come to the specific charges of mutilation, the surmise is confirmed. Epiphanius, for instance, complains that Marcion's gospel mutilates the text about Jonah, saying merely that " no sign will be given," and lacks the mention of Nineveh and the Queen of the South and Solomon. But all this applies to our gospel of Mark! As Herr Raschke puts it, Epiphanius was commenting on the text of Mark. When yet other patristic charges of mutilation against Marcion are found to impinge on Mark, and further charges of adding to Luke are likewise found applicable to Mark, the inference, Marcion's gospel = Mark, becomes so urgent that only a new body of evidence, accounting for these strange coincidences, can repel it. [ibid 229]

Of course I did not have access to the information from Raschke when I wrote that book. I would certainly have included a reference or two to Raschke. But then again the publisher would almost certainly have demanded that I take it out. The publishing house was not an academic publisher. The book was not intended as an academic work and so the limit on footnotes, the limit on the number of appendices etc.

Indeed even if - in the unlikely event that, beyond Act's identification of Agrippa as 'Christian-like' or 'almost a Christian' - there was to be some discovery that Agrippa was indeed connected to Christianity, my book would hardly be cited as a support text. It almost certainly did not happen 'like that' - i.e. as described in the book. In the same way you can't hum a bar from Bitches Brew. Does that make it 'un-musical'? It is what it is.

Actually come to think of it you can hum a few bars of Miles Lays Down the Voodoo and Bitches Brew but only the trumpet playing from Miles Davis. That was probably intentional. Da - da -DA, dadada -DA-DE. Dadada -da -dada -DE. Dede - DA -de. Man I love that album as much as my wife hates it. Can clear a room in five minutes.

maryhelena · 03-21-2013, 01:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

Why is it that people who follow mountainman into the abyss don't become suspicious that none of his ideas has any basis other than shared hatred and suspicion of Christianity and the comfort that a half-baked conspiracy theory provides to explain its origins?

Stephan, I really don't know how you can say all this with a straight face.....

It seems to me to be like the pot calling the kettle black.....

Quote:

"The Real Messiah: The Throne of St. Mark" presents a very half baked delusional theory that never should have been put forth into writing. This theory is that a man named Marcus Agrippa, being only 8 years old at the time, was by the side of Jesus when he was arrested, by his side at the trial, and was actually the Barabbas that was set free by the people while Jesus was condemned to death. This book claims that " Christians go to their churches today to recognize Jesus as the messiah is thanks to the perverted testimony of church fathers who had their own agenda most likely with a burning political need to modify the developing religion". The book claims that Jesus was a better option than Marcus Agrippa because he was meek and mild and easy to manipulate and could be made to appear that he had always intended his kingdom not to be of this world but of another.

Review of The Real Messiah on amazon

my bolding

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Real-Messiah...3896332&sr=1-2

stephan huller · 03-21-2013, 01:25 PM

how am I going to control what my patrons do to sell product.

maryhelena · 03-21-2013, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

how am I going to control what my patrons do to sell product. Unlike Pete I can say with categorical certainty that this is a fallacious statement

Stephan, the quote is directly from your book:

Quote:

Christians go to their churches today to recognize Jesus as the messiah is thanks to the perverted testimony of church fathers who had their own agenda most likely with a burning political need to modify the developing religion"

Preview is available on google books:

This link might work - it's the 4th quote that comes up.

http://books.google.co.za/books?id=A...0C&q=perverted

Otherwise search for 'perverted'...

stephan huller · 03-21-2013, 01:43 PM

Oy

I said this about Pete:

Quote:

Why is it that people who follow mountainman into the abyss don't become suspicious that none of his ideas has any basis other than shared hatred and suspicion of Christianity and the comfort that a half-baked conspiracy theory provides to explain its origins?

How does this apply to the statement you cite from my book:

Quote:

Christians go to their churches today to recognize Jesus as the messiah is thanks to the perverted testimony of church fathers who had their own agenda most likely with a burning political need to modify the developing religion"

Do you object to the idea that the Church Fathers had a political need to modify the developing religion? Do you object to the term perversion? Then please tell me how this relates to what I said about Pete?

maryhelena · 03-21-2013, 01:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

Oy

I said this about Pete:

Quote:

Why is it that people who follow mountainman into the abyss don't become suspicious that none of his ideas has any basis other than shared hatred and suspicion of Christianity and the comfort that a half-baked conspiracy theory provides to explain its origins?

How does this apply to the statement you cite from my book:

Quote:

Christians go to their churches today to recognize Jesus as the messiah is thanks to the perverted testimony of church fathers who had their own agenda most likely with a burning political need to modify the developing religion"

Do you object to the idea that the Church Fathers had a political need to modify the developing religion? Do you object to the term perversion? Then please tell me how this relates to what I said about Pete?

That, Stephan, I will leave for others to decide...

stephan huller · 03-21-2013, 01:57 PM

So you don't actually have a point other than to attack me. You did the same thing to Earl Doherty, conspiring with others who resented the fact that he actually managed to publish an original idea. You actually have no other discernible function here at the forum other than to goad and harass people who have held unusual theories like yourself albeit actually managed to complete them in published form. Then when one of your fellow conspirators from the Earl Doherty character assassination (one who only started posting here in order to torment Earl after driving him from the Jesus Myth forum) has set up a special thread for you to question my book you chose to ignore that thread and continue to do the only thing you are capable of doing - goading and harassing, following me from thread to thread, making statements like this but never responding to simple questions like the one I just directed at you.

Must be great to be you.

Sabine Grant · 03-21-2013, 02:01 PM

:blank:

maryhelena · 03-21-2013, 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

So you don't actually have a point other than to attack me. You did the same thing to Earl Doherty, conspiring with others who resented the fact that he actually managed to publish an original idea. You actually have no other discernible function here at the forum other than to goad and harass people who have held unusual theories like yourself albeit actually managed to complete them in published form. Then when one of your fellow conspirators from the Earl Doherty character assassination (one who only started posting here in order to torment Earl after driving him from the Jesus Myth forum) has set up a special thread for you to question my book you chose to ignore that thread and continue to do the only thing you are capable of doing - goading and harassing, following me from thread to thread, making statements like this but never responding to simple questions like the one I just directed at you.

Must be great to be you.

icardfacepalm:

stephan huller · 03-21-2013, 02:05 PM

Again - Do you object to the idea that the Church Fathers had a political need to modify the developing religion? Do you object to the term perversion? Then please tell me how this relates to what I said about Pete?

Oh let me guess, your response - 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah,' 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah,' 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah,' 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah ...'

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03-21-2013, 01:25 PM	#13
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	how am I going to control what my patrons do to sell product.

03-21-2013, 01:57 PM	#17
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	So you don't actually have a point other than to attack me. You did the same thing to Earl Doherty, conspiring with others who resented the fact that he actually managed to publish an original idea. You actually have no other discernible function here at the forum other than to goad and harass people who have held unusual theories like yourself albeit actually managed to complete them in published form. Then when one of your fellow conspirators from the Earl Doherty character assassination (one who only started posting here in order to torment Earl after driving him from the Jesus Myth forum) has set up a special thread for you to question my book you chose to ignore that thread and continue to do the only thing you are capable of doing - goading and harassing, following me from thread to thread, making statements like this but never responding to simple questions like the one I just directed at you. Must be great to be you.

03-21-2013, 02:01 PM	#18
Sabine Grant Talk Freethought Staff Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Florida Posts: 32,364	:blank:

03-21-2013, 02:05 PM	#20
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	Again - Do you object to the idea that the Church Fathers had a political need to modify the developing religion? Do you object to the term perversion? Then please tell me how this relates to what I said about Pete? Oh let me guess, your response - 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah,' 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah,' 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah,' 'Stephan wrote the Real Messiah ...'

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