spamandham

A reasonable person can't. I think you used the expression 'pathologically disagreeable' a page or 2 back...others have come to the same conclusion. Anyway, I'm enjoying reading these posts.

avi

I am not.
No, this is inappropriate.
This is the crux of the matter.

His question deserves a proper answer, not something flippant, frivolous, glib, and off-topic.

I am asking the same question.

I realize from having inquired, earlier, that my queries do not rise to the lofty level to which you feel obliged to respond, and that's perfectly fine by me. Many others on this forum disdain my questions, and share your antipathy for addressing my sophomoric queries, so you certainly rank among the majority of forum members, for ignoring them....

To me, the value of this forum is entirely related to elaboration of evidence, not theory. I really don't care a whit, about what professor so and so from some university in Australia thinks about some hebrew or aramaic nonsense. What I do care about is an answer to aa5874's question, regarding the evidence from the NEW TESTAMENT's interpreters, forgers, redactors, ad nauseum, the so called, "patristic" evidence as well as the gospels, Paul's letters, etc, which, contrary to the beliefs of many on this forum, were authored in GREEK, not hebrew, and not aramaic, and not latin.

What is really needed, in my opinion, is a proper catalogue, which shows the confidence level, for each of the various documents still extant, that each author's document bears some meaningful information. Quoting Eusebius one minute, and then acknowledging that the guy is a liar the next, does not inspire confidence in the original reference. Is the document(s) authored by Epiphanius genuine? Is there evidence of "interpolation"? How many unique copies do we possess? Do they agree with one another? Is there evidence in the text of political influence on the content?

Answers to those questions are far more useful, and instructive, than "a guy I knew..."

Someone with my degree of ignorance can write such nonsense, as you have written, but a scholar of your standing, ought to be setting a better example, in responding to questions of merit, to assist those of us just setting forth on this quest to comprehend the history of the first few centuries of Christianity.

avi

stephan huller

Really, I find it hard to imagine that anyone enjoys AA para-suicidal missions to destroy anyone's research even at the risk of making himself ridiculous. I am new to this site and I would never have imagined that it is possible for the human brain to rationalize a position were some texts (Paul, Irenaeus for instance) are completely worthless 'fictions' and then others (like Justin Martyr) are nothing short of time capsules of the second century. It's absurd. No, it's more than that it's INSANE (which is why I suspect it is entirely disingenuous).

I apologize that as a middle age Jewish man I occasionally mix humorous anecdotes with my answers. I guess this is a 'serious forum' where I have to spend 20 posts defending my suggestion that Justin's reference to Simon and Marcion MIGHT NOT be authentic. Heaven forbid! And to argue with someone who has the intensity of Jack Nicholson in the Shining only to learn that he himself rejects as wholesale fictions the Pauline writings and Irenaeus, what is this Candid Camera? Punk'd?

Is Ashton Kutcher going to come to my front door with a camera man and tell me this all a joke?

Okay no more humorous anecdotes. I am sorry if I didn't answer your original question (even if I find your support of AA's position probably more fascinating than your original question). Let me drive my son to school and I will go back and answer your original question when I get back ...

aa5874

But, what you have posted BEFORE are recorded.




Please answer the question.

How PRISTINE is Epiphanius' Panarion?

stephan huller

Okay Avi I'm back and I have a problem at work but I am trying to take an hour to understand what your issue is beyond my attempts at humor. You say:

If I knew you personally I might know where you are coming from a little better. You reference 'the so-called Patristic evidence.' Let's get this straight. There were Patristic writers. As such there is Patristic evidence. I may not always like what they say but there is a body of literature associated with men who are called 'Fathers of the Church' which is typically identified as 'Patristic writings.'

I think you are saying that you believe that the Patristic writings were developed in Greek. My response is that the idea that the majority of Patristic texts were written in Greek seems to be reasonable enough.

I think that Irenaeus and other Patristic writers hint at the earliest gospel being written in Hebrew or Aramaic. I don't think we can ignore this evidence as its pretty consistent. I also read Black's "Aramaic Approach to the Gospels and Acts (or via: amazon.co.uk)" and I couldn't find a way to refute all his evidence.

I also think that Mark the gnostic (Irenaeus AH i.13 - 21) presents a powerful argument that there were people making kabbalistic interpretations of a Hebrew or Aramaic gospel as early as the mid second century (I can explain this argument for you if you want later).

Do I believe that Irenaeus is correct in identifying the Gospel of the Hebrews as Matthew's gospel? Do I accept Epiphanius's claim that the Gospel of the Hebrews is related to the Diatessaron? These are all questions which require further examination. However I lean toward the assumption that the original gospel would have been written in Hebrew or Aramaic. Indeed just from an aesthetic point of view (this doesn't mean its true), I can't believe that Jews or Samaritans would have accepted the authority of any text claiming to be a new Torah if it wasn't written in Hebrew.


You also point to the the 'seriousness' of AA's original question:

You say,

Honestly, I am not so sure that every time AA tells me that if I question parts of Justin's Apology I am forced to deny every other Patristic text, I have to 'take seriously' that position because - IMO - it's utterly irrational.

I am the first one to acknowledge Epiphanius's unreliability. At at a blog post from March 14th of this year http://stephanhuller.blogspot.com/20...atessaron.html I cited Daniel Plooij's words that:

“I think Epiphanius ought to be the last witness we should trust uncontrolled, especially in his testimonies on heretics and heretical writings. He combines all kinds of notices, rumours, and calumnies into abracadabra often completely incomprehensible." [A Primitive Text of the Diatessaron p. 78]

When he wrote this, Plooij had what Epiphanius said about the Diatessaron in mind, but he intended it as a general assessment as well. After trying to disentangle what Epiphanius has on the Samaritan sects, I have to agree. Note that “uncontrolled” is used here in its technical meaning, “without any way of testing from other evidence or another witness”.

With that said, what are we going to do? We're crack addicts when it comes to new information about the early Church. If there was some lady in contemporary Bethlehem who uncovered the Gospel of the Hebrews, what would any of us do to be the first to look at that text? I am reminded of a scene from that old movie the Magic Christian with Peter Sellers and Ringo Star.

So that's the reality. Once we go outside of the 'official story' of the Church and its origins we are in a most unfortunate situation. We have to deal with whispers, innuendo, gossip and lies to get our information.

Don't like that situation? Want the firmness of 'absolute truth'? Get baptized into one of the surviving faiths from antiquity and accept what they say unconditionally.

Otherwise we are essentially groping with a problem which - despite the mask of 'seriousness' which necessarily comes from all the evidence being preserved in what are now dead languages - is really the ancient equivalent of 'did Al Gore really cheat with Larry David's wife'? 'Is there an Obama birth certificate?' 'Who's gay in Hollywood'?

In other words, the things that we are talking about were done SECRETLY in ancient Christianity. Clement's Letter to Theodore demonstrates quite clearly that gospels were NOT distributed like pamphlets. So the texts and the rites associated with ancient Christianity could be as ἀπόκρυφος as the sex lives of famous people.

No kidding aside I think the problem in scholarship has always been that BECAUSE the information about the early sects has been preserved in languages AND CONCEPTS that are inaccessible to most people it has been analysed by a small pool of academics who spent YEARS AND YEARS away from the 'real world' LEARNING TO FUNCTION IN THOSE ANCIENT LANGUAGES and then these cloistered individuals turn around and are given the task of doing the necessary detective work to put all the pieces together and explain who Marcion was, who Marcus was, what the heresies looked like, how they functioned etc.

But I think that scholarship doesn't realize how little imagination linguists and philologists have. I don't know that they are necessarily qualified to examine the 'deeper things' about the texts that they are essentially translating.

To this end, I would argue that in order to understand Marcion, Mark and the rest of the things related to the heresies you have to have (a) be a serious philologist (b) familiar with all the material written on the subject from ancient sources but (c) MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL you have to have the instincts of a reporter. You have to have IMAGINATION to follow leads and 'see a story' lurking within the pool of seemingly unrelated bits and pieces mentioned in the Church Fathers.

There are very few LIVING people who are qualified for this job. I don't even consider myself sufficiently qualified to tell people 'just take my word for it.'

I think of myself as a researcher who comes up with a lot of interesting observations (hence the name of my blog). When I think I have assembled enough evidence to write a paper that would survive the scrutiny of the peer review process, I start working on an article.

But that is why again I don't understand the hostility of AA to my putting forward a SUGGESTION that all the heretics with names related to Μάρκος might go back to a single historical individual. I think I have evidence to write a paper. I just haven't figured out how to line up all my ducks in a row and present the material in a way that is easy to read and accessible to everyone.

stephan huller

To AA's point again (I will stop answering this line of question eventually) but I will use another analogy to explain my position (again notice that as the same question gets repeated I lower my explanation to the point that ANYONE can understand what I am saying).

This issue of the relative corruption of the Patristic material is like when a youth in his early twenties goes into a bar thinking he is going to meet Megan Fox. After a couple of drinks he realizes that he has to lower his standards. Now he is willing to walk away with America Ferrera. By the end of the night he's going home with Roseanne Barr.

I don't know how many times I can explain the same phenomenon in ways that can be easily understood by someone who holds a position that the writings of Justin are 'pure' and the writings of 'Irenaeus' are fictions even though there is no evidence that the manuscripts of either writers were preserved in essentially different ways.

I argue that because there is a pattern in the preservation of the manuscripts of ALL the surviving Church Fathers that we should treat all the surviving Patristic writers from the Ante-Nicene period WHICH CAME TO US through 'regular channels' as essentially flawed but ultimately necessary pieces by which we construct our understanding of the early period in Christianity.

I prefer manuscripts that have come to us by means of archaeological discovery - like the text discovered at Toura (Origen's Peri Pascha, Conversation with Heraclides etc).

Here is Roger Pearse's description of that discovery (thank God for Roger - a living angel, truly):

Around the start of August 1941 the British military authorities in Cairo sent a gang of native Egyptian workmen to clear some galleries in the stone-quarries of Tura, 10 miles from Cairo, in order to store munitions there. These discovered a pile of papyrus codices among the loose debris in one of the three galleries in quarry 35, around 20-25m from the entrance in the central rotunda. The books were not hidden, but simply buried under the rubble and dust of ages which reached almost a metre high at the sides of the tunnels. As such people do, they stole them all. The police and members of the Antiquities Service learned of the find on 10th August, but were too late to seize more than a small portion. Later still, portions of these books, quire by quire, began to be sold to the Cairo antiquities dealers and sold on at exorbitant prices. Much was purchased by the Egyptian museum; others remain in private hands. Rumours circulate that the ignorant workmen burned others for fuel, which Puech dismisses as a common folk-story in such cases; wilder rumours speak of thousands of pages.

The manuscripts contained lost works by some of the church fathers. Doutreleau drew up a list of the physical codices and their contents:

Since the books are not as they were found, some estimate of original size is important. Each codex is comprised of quaternions/quires/'cahiers' -- groups of 16 pages -- made by taking 4 sheets of paper and folding them once. The maximum practical size of such a codex seems to be 30 quaternions (480 pp), which makes a book around 10 cm thick. By comparison, none of the Nag Hammadi codices, which were found complete, has more than 175p -- some are only 88pp.

The Tura books have reached us, quire by quire, through the dealers. It is possible that the books were unbound when found, and placed in the corridor as piles of quaternions in antiquity. The differing page sizes allow us to assign each quire to a codex, if there is no better guide.

Yes the Toura texts are now often fragmentary but if anyone has ever read the manner in which Origen's material gets distorted and manipulated by later 'translators' and editors it is impossible not to be almost brought to tears when we think how much of the ancient past was lost at Toura.

In any event, I can't tell you how to live your life or how you should think. But it seems irrational to me to hold a position which posits absolute preferences and rejections of sources given our predicament as scholars of early Christianity.

To give an example. While I do not accept the Pastorals as authentically Pauline they do tell us about the people who were working to subvert Marcionitism. Thus the material is corrupt but still invaluable.

stephan huller

And just to maintain a discussion of my original premise (and not have the thread succumb to the efforts of some to destroy the dissemination of new information) here is another example of how I think that the traditions of the Marcionites and the Marcosians all go back to a common use of Secret Mark.

It all started with me going through Dobronsky's A Treasury of Sephardic Laws and Customs and was struck by the possibility that the 'baptism on behalf of the dead' (1 Cor 15:29) might be a development of a traditional Jewish 'bathing of the dead' commonly referred to as rekhitza. Rekhitza comes from the Hebrew term רחץ which simply refers to ritual cleansing in the Torah. Of course ritual cleansing does not requite full immersion in Judaism but it must be noted that among the followers of Mark there was a similar controversy referenced by Irenaeus.

Irenaeus notes that what we call 'baptism' was actually called ἀπολύτρωσις by the followers of Mark. The term in Greek was always identified by the buying and selling of slaves. In Jewish circles, redemption is connected with the rescuing of the nation after the manner of the Crossing of the Sea. I have noted many times that the Song of the Sea is the ritual context of Marcosian ἀπολύτρωσις. The members of Israel are assumed to be 'owned' by the Jewish God and through their 'cleansing' they are also 'purchased' by the Father and are thus transferred from one master to another another. These ideas show up not only in the writings of the so-called 'Marcionites' (Μαρκιωνισταί a term which in Aramaic means 'those of Mark') but also form the basis to the earliest Catholic Church Fathers. It is even found in the writings of Irenaeus.

The point I want to make here is that the Catholics and the followers of Mark developed their understanding of what is commonly called from TWO different baptism narratives. I would argue that in its purest form the Gospel of Mark DID NOT have the familiar Jesus coming to Jordan and being immersed and a dove descending on him reference. There can absolutely no doubt that this wasn't in the gospel associated with the Μαρκιωνισταί. I very much want to emphasize this. It is EXPLICIT in Tertullian's account of the gospel of the Μαρκιωνισταί.

I take this one step further noting that the Philosophumena alludes to a claim of the Μαρκιωνισταί that their 'Marcion' (a name confirmed by Hilgenfeld to be a variant of 'Mark') wrote the original Gospel of Mark (Philo. vii.18). Now that we have strong evidence suggesting that Clement's reference to a 'fuller' (and implicitly 'truer') Gospel of Mark employed by the Alexandrian Church which references ANOTHER baptism narrative which was apparently excised when the text was edited in Rome in the late second century, I think we can begin to restore the CONTEXT of so-called Μαρκιωνισταί and Μαρκιανισταί ritual washing as being rooted in something like the 'mysteries of the kingdom of God' being applied to a dead person in what is usually called LGM 1:

But the disciples rebuked her. And Jesus, being angered, went off with her into the garden where the tomb was, and straightway a great cry was heard from the tomb. And going near, Jesus rolled away the stone from the door of the tomb. And straightaway, going in where the youth was, he stretched forth his hand and raised him, seizing his hand. But the youth, looking upon him, loved him and began to beseech him that he might be with him. And going out of the tomb, they came into the house of the youth, for he was rich. And after six days Jesus told him what to do, and in the evening the youth comes to him, wearing a linen cloth over his naked body. And he remained with him that night, for Jesus taught him the mystery of the Kingdom of God. And thence, arising, he returned to the other side of the Jordan.

I have noted many times that the claim μυστήριον DID NOT apply specifically to baptism is utterly idiotic and is a consequence of two factors - (a) the complete loss of any ORIGINAL material from the Alexandrian Church before Clement and (b) a parallel effort in the late second and early third century to modify the term with sacramentum which essentially was a military oath.

I have argued that there was a comprehensive effort to redefine Christianity away from a ritualized ἀπολύτρωσις. Pagels has recently argued much the same thing (but deliberately misapplied the sacrament to the community of her favorite gnostic Heracleon). Ritualized ἀπολύτρωσις was developed ultimately from Alexandrian Judaism as I have shown here and was characteristic of the faith centered on the revelation given to St. Mark. I interpret the Letter to Theodore as arguing that the central μυστήριον of the Alexandrian community was rooted in an alternative baptism given to St. Mark by Jesus even though (a) Mark is never explicitly identified as the and (b) the terms ἀπολύτρωσις and βαπτίζω are never explicitly referenced.

When there were doubts circulating about the authenticity of Morton Smith's discovery, I think people were so distracted by the question of forgery that very few ever noticed that it is possible to make out the existence of a 'Markan tradition' distinct from the 'orthodoxy' of St. Peter. I think that there is a pronounced interest in associating baptism with 'death' in this tradition. Not only are there frequent and garbled reports of a ritualized 'death' component to the βάπτισμα of the Μαρκιωνισταί (Tert. AM v.20, On the Resurr. Flesh 48, Epiphanius Anacelphalaeosis 3.42.3, Chrysostom Hom. Corinth. at 15:29, Eznik De Sectis 4) - which again CANNOT be based on our familiar Jesus, John and the Jordan narrative - as well as the ἀπολύτρωσις of the Μαρκιανισταί which comes from an original report from Irenaeus.

Irenaeus writes at the end of his account of the Μαρκιανισταί that there ritual is carried out in different forms by different branches of the sect (implying that this is a very large community indeed). Nevertheless 'death' is assumed to be the underlying ritual context as we read in his closing remarks:

Others still there are who continue to redeem persons even up to the moment of death, by placing on their heads oil and water, or the pre-mentioned ointment with water, using at the same time the above-named invocations, that the persons referred to may become incapable of being seized or seen by the principalities and powers, and that their inner man may ascend on high in an invisible manner, as if their body were left among created things in this world, while their soul is sent forward to the Demiurge. And they instruct them, on their reaching the principalities and powers, to make use of these words: "I am a son from the Father--the Father who had a pre-existence, and a son in Him who is pre-existent. I have come to behold all things, both those which belong to myself and others, although, strictly speaking, they do not belong to others, but to Achamoth, who is female in nature, and made these things for herself. For I derive being from Him who is pre-existent, and I come again to my own place whence I went forth." And they affirm that, by saying these things, he escapes from the powers. He then advances to the companions of the Demiurge, and thus addresses them:--"I am a vessel more precious than the female who formed you. If your mother is ignorant of her own descent, I know myself, and am aware whence I am, and I call upon the incorruptible Sophia, who is in the Father, and is the mother of your mother, who has no father, nor any male consort; but a female springing from a female formed you, while ignorant of her own mother, and imagining that she alone existed; but I call upon her mother." And they declare, that when the companions of the Demiurge hear these words, they are greatly agitated, and upbraid their origin and the race of their mother. But he goes into his own place, having thrown off his chain, that is, his animal nature. These, then, are the particulars which have reached us respecting "ἀπολύτρωσις ." [AH i.21.5]

I can't emphasize enough that 'death' is the underlying context for both the Μαρκιωνισταί and Μαρκιανισταί. This cannot be coincidental. On the one hand we have a group WHICH EVERY SCHOLAR WHO HAS EVER BOTHERED TO STUDY THEIR TRADITION acknowledges absolutely and firmly does not have Jesus and John in the Jordan doing what we might describe as a 'living baptism.' So what was the scriptural context for their much celebrated 'baptism on behalf of the dead' come from? I guess scholars turn their heads and start watching Oprah or something.

Then on the other hand we have a Μαρκιανισταί interest in ἀπολύτρωσις where a scriptural context is identified - viz. Mark chapter 10 (cf. Irenaeus i.22.2). While LGM 1 is not explicit referenced here (I think it is however implicitly referenced earlier in Irenaeus's report) we learn that Mark chapter 10 IS THE VERY PLACE that LGM 1 ends up showing up once Morton Smith discovers the Letter to Theodore. As we just noted a ritualized form of 'death' is the underlying context for this baptism ritual too.

I don't see how anyone can't connect the dots here. Not only are the two names of the groups associated with two individuals named 'Mark' so similar they end up becoming interchangeable (i.e. Μαρκιωνισταί and Μαρκιανισταί) but it is impossible for me to believe that the two references DON'T go back to a 'community of Mark' in Alexandria.

Indeed I would like to take matters one step further. I am very happy to cite what I consider to be one of the most comprehensive studies of the Greek term βαπτίζω on the web. The fact that it is associated with some nutty ministry is immaterial. It is easily accessible for everyone and I think makes a very good case that we should understanding the term in the context of 'whatever is capable of thoroughly changing the character, state, or condition of any object, is capable of baptizing that object; and by such change of character, state or condition does, in fact, baptize it."

In other words βαπτίζω doesn't necessarily mean 'immersing something with WATER.' To this end, Scott Brown's objection to LGM 1 as a 'baptism' ritual is rendered irrelevant and it helps in turn explain how LGM 1 (with its ambiguous reference to whether water actually βαπτίζω the initiate) can explain the wide variation in the specific form of βαπτίζω among the Μαρκιανισταί.

Irenaeus repeatedly says things like 'their tradition respecting redemption is dark and incomprehensible,' (AH i.22.1) 'fluctuating, it is impossible simply and all at once to make known its nature, for every one of them hands it down just as his own inclination prompts,' (ibid) 'there are as many schemes of ἀπολύτρωσις as there are mystagogues,' (ibid) 'it is handed down by them in so varied and discordant forms', (AH i.22.2) 'some of them prepare a nuptial couch ... [o]thers, again, lead them to a place where water is, and baptize them ... [a]fter this they anoint the initiated person with balsam,' (AH i.22.3) 'there are some of them who assert that it is superfluous to bring persons to the water, but mixing oil and water together, they place this mixture on the heads of those who are to be initiated, with the use of some such expressions as we have already mentioned. And this they maintain to be the redemption,' (AH i.22.4) 'they differ so widely among themselves both as respects doctrine and tradition, and since those of them who are recognised as being most modern make it their effort daily to invent some new opinion, and to bring out what no one ever before thought of, it is a difficult matter to describe all their opinions,' (AH i.22.5)

The one thing that seems to remain constant among the Μαρκιανισταί is a ritualized 'death' state which forms the basis to the μυστήριον. How can anyone argue then that something like LGM 1, with its revived but formerly dead νεανίσκος, formed the basis to this ritual?

But this is the point of why the passage had to be excised and why Clement references many 'gospel of Marks' were ultimately created in the period. You can't have a 'baptism' with living people being baptized 'as if' they were dead and somehow argue that the Creator was perfect. The point of Markan baptism was clearly to emphasize that 'true life' only existed in this 'new state' that only came from undergoing 'release' or λυτρόω from one master and being transferred to ownership of a better Lord.

I don't know if my readers can see the underlying connection with the&nbp;רחץ of the dead in Judaism but I hope one final reference might make this clear. Dobrinsky's notes in his section 'the Order of the Washing of the Dead According to the Syrian, Moroccan and Judeo-Spanish Traditions' that:

The reason for cleansing the deceased and for dressing him in shrouds (takhrikhim) is because it is derived from the laws of dressing related to the Kohanim (priests), who were required to wash before dressing. Another reason is that, just as one is washed when he is born as he emerges from the womb of his mother, so too should he be washed and cleansed when he leaves this world.

The point is that if we work backwards then, Clement clearly connects LGM 1, the description of the dead νεανίσκος undergoing the 'mystery of the kingdom of God' as somehow related to the liturgy of the Alexandrian Church. I don't know if any of my readers have ever seen a functioning old Coptic Church - or an Orthodox Church for that matter - but there is a clear division between the regular believers and those who were fully initiated into the mysteries of God. A curtain divides the congregation which in former times corresponded to the priests and members of 'the elect' and lay people.

In other words, one can see the beginnings of the idea that the priests of Alexandria were established through a 'death washing.' This idea is repeatedly referenced in rituals associated with the establishment of monks for instance. I think I can even argue for the existence of this practice among the Μαρκιωνισταί if I am given a chance.

The point is that there can be no question that Secret Mark is a real expression of what was in the earliest copies of the gospel treasured by followers of Mark. The problem has been so far that no one has understood how to properly define the term Μαρκιανισταί.

Oh, and one more thing. The same word רחץ in Aramaic means 'faith' even 'the faith.' Something students of early Christianity might want to investigate further ...

PhilosopherJay

Hi Stephan,

Unfortunately, I haven't had time to study your theory as much as I would like. (Hopefully, I will have more time next week.) Still, from just a quick read through, it seems to me that you have an important hypothesis with a good deal of evidence to back it up.

Just generally, it seems amazing to me that Marcion's gospel could have disappeared so completely knowing that it was such a major issue vexing Christians in the early Third century. The solution that it didn't disappear, but that we have it mainly preserved in Mark's gospel makes excellent sense of the situation.

Thanks for the stimulating ideas.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Toto

Egads, I can't get this image out of my mind. Is this what NT scholarship leads to?? :devil:

stephan huller

No but I have noticed that when you actually investigate the claims of men who purport to be 'successful with the ladies' you generally discover this methodology at work. It just stuck out in my head as an example of desperation.

I guess I could have drawn from Jewish literature where we find a consistent interest in likening a scholar's study of texts to the love that is shared between man and woman. I just hate being pretentious ...