Freethought & Rationalism Archive

stephan huller · 04-01-2013, 10:25 AM

Do know that the text of Ephrem's Against Marcion is only partially available to us. It was discovered under some other (Orthodox) text. Mitchell did a primitive job of recovering the text (= pouring some solution that revealed parts of the original Ephrem composition). But now we have the technology (= infrared digital scanning) to get the whole text. Can you think of one 'authority' who sees this as a priority? No. Why? Because it's all bullshit. No one cares about the Marcionites per se. They are only interested in having their opinions furthered by evidence from the testimonies (written in Greek and Latin) about the Marcionites. Can you imagine this happening in a 'real scientific' discipline? 'Oh, there's the remains of a lost book by Homer under this pile of tires. All you have to do is buy a bulldozer and you can have the text.' Imagine a classics scholar saying, 'Nah, that's too much work. We're happy with the Iliad and the Odyssey.'

Roger Pearse · 04-01-2013, 12:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

The evidence for Marcionitism being the official form of Christianity at this time comes from the Life of Mar Apa see J. Labourt, Le christianisme dans l’empire Perse, sous la dynastie Sassanide (224–632) (Paris, 1904), 163–91

The life of Mar Aba does not, in fact, make any such statement. You can find the passage, chapter 3, here. It tells us that, in that region, the Persians called the Marcionites "Christian". This would naturally happen if the first group calling themselves by that name to come over the Tigris in that area were Marcionites. The passage seems to be over-interpreted in some of the scholarly literature (notably in Walter Bauer).

All the best,

Roger Pearse
(Some related notes here).

jakejonesiv · 04-01-2013, 12:27 PM

We can easily read the text for ourselves, which Roger Pearse very kindly supplies for us.
The interested reader should click on the link and scroll down to Section 4.1

The second time Jesus descended in the form of God, he opened a case against the Lord of Creation for having put him to death. When the Lord of Creation saw the Godliness of Jesus, he knew that there was a God higher than himself. Jesus leveled his charges against the Lord of Creation and demanded that the Laws which the Lord of Creation had written be the judge in their case.

When he placed the Laws between them, Jesus asked, "Did you not write, 'And who ever kills, shall die and who ever spills the blood of the righteous, his blood shall be spilled.'?" After the Lord of Creation acknowledged that he had written them, Jesus demanded that he surrender himself to be punished by death. Then Jesus added, "I have been more just than you to your creations," and he began to list the kindnesses he had done them. Seeing that he had been condemned by his own laws for killing Jesus, the Lord of Creation pleaded that he had killed Jesus unknowingly and offered in retribution to give Jesus all those who believe in him to take where he pleased. After Jesus left the Lord of Creation, he appeared to Paul. He revealed to his apostle the compensation, and thereafter, Paul preached that Jesus "redeemed us for a price." This, then, is the basis of Marcion's doctrine as we have come to know it.

stephan huller · 04-01-2013, 12:31 PM

but none of this contradicts what I am suggesting

jakejonesiv · 04-01-2013, 12:37 PM

When the Lord of the Laws and Creation saw how beautiful the world was, he decided to create man.
http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/sc...refutation.htm This is the same being who had Jesus ignorantly put to death, and was found guilty under his own laws.

stephan huller · 04-01-2013, 12:52 PM

So let's start at the beginning.

1. There are two divine names in the Pentateuch and the Jews always identified those names with separate powers or 'characteristics' of the divinity (= judgement, mercy).
2. The earliest Christian sources did the same (see Hermogenes and the author of Against Hermogenes agreeing on this point)
3. At some point in time the original Jewish creation myth as told in Genesis was reinterpreted as involving a single god ('the Lord') as opposed to more than one God.
4. In the surviving Christian reinterpretation of these stories 'the Lord' thinks he is the only god but later discovers there is another 'God'
5. Eznik tells this story in two ways. The first time (as I cited above) the beneficent God is said to have been absent from Creation. Only the Lord created. Then in the passage you cite 'Jesus' is mentioned converting the Lord to goodness. But Jesus = the Good God (Chrestos)
6. If we go back to the earliest Jewish source (= Philo) we see not only the same idea of Lord and God representing two separate powers but specifically the Marcionite title of Jesus applied to God = Chrestos

Quote:

that that species in the nature of things which is void of passions, namely, Isaac (to whom the oracle had been given, that he should not descend into Egypt), may be the victim of an irrational affection, in order I suppose that he may be wounded by the stings of pleasure or pain, or of any other passion, showing that the man who is not wholly perfect and who makes laborious improvements, will receive not merely a wound, but utter destruction. However, the good God [ὁ ... χρηστὸς θεὸς] will neither allow that invulnerable species among created things to be subdued by passion, nor will he surrender the practice of virtue to bloody and raging destruction. On which account we read in a subsequent passage, "Cain rose up against Abel, his brother, and slew Him." For according to the first imagination, he suggests the idea that Abel has been killed. But if you look at it according to the most accurate investigation, you will see that the intimates that Cain himself was slain by himself, so that we ought to read it thus: "Cain rose up and killed himself," and not the other. And very reasonably may we attribute this to him. For the soul, which destroys out of itself the virtue-loving and God-loving principle, has died as to the life of virtue, so that Abel (which appears a most paradoxical assertion) both is dead and alive. He is dead, indeed, having been slain by the foolish mind, but he lives according to the happy life which is in God. And the holy oracle which has been given will bear witness, which expressly says, that he cried out loudly, and betrayed clearly by his cries what he had suffered from the concrete evil, that is from the body. For how could one who no longer existed have conversed? [Quod deterius potiori insidiari 1:46 - 49]

There are many other example in Philo of identifying the god Chrestos with 'God' in the Pentateuch. I can also cite the important idea in Philo of Jacob being 'adopted' by God (or taking God to be his Lord) at Bethel. This is the origins of the Marcionite redemption rite. The list goes on and on.

Is that clear enough now?

stephan huller · 04-01-2013, 12:56 PM

The idea here is that Jesus was 'the Good God' of the tradition Jewish theological understanding who came at the end of time to improve the original creation. This makes perfect sense if you think about what Christianity is all about as a functioning religion. Of course certain Yahwehists took offense at the idea that 'the Lord' wasn't perfect. But this is much more sensible than imagining that a religion got of the ground (= Marcionitism) which invented a whole mythology which wasn't grounded in anything other than the loose imagination of lunatics.

jakejonesiv · 04-01-2013, 06:24 PM

All religion is grounded in the imagination of lunatics.

stephan huller · 04-01-2013, 06:27 PM

but show me a religion invented completely out of thin air

jakejonesiv · 04-01-2013, 06:29 PM

We can read the text so kindly provided by Roger Pearse for ourselves.

They say that the Unknown God, the God of Love, who was in the first heaven, was hurt by seeing so many souls suffering at the hands of the two imposters: Matter and the Lord of Creation. Therefore, the Unknown God sent His Son to work miracles and cure the blind and foresaw that men would be jealous and crucify him. He also knew that once crucified and buried as mortal, His Son would descend into Hell and empty it by freeing the souls which had been cast there by the Lord of the Laws and Creation.

REFUTATION OF THE SECTS
MARCION'S VIEWS AS RELATED BY YEZNIK (4.1)

04-01-2013, 12:27 PM	#33
jakejonesiv Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Atlanta Posts: 2,060	We can easily read the text for ourselves, which Roger Pearse very kindly supplies for us. The interested reader should click on the link and scroll down to Section 4.1 The second time Jesus descended in the form of God, he opened a case against the Lord of Creation for having put him to death. When the Lord of Creation saw the Godliness of Jesus, he knew that there was a God higher than himself. Jesus leveled his charges against the Lord of Creation and demanded that the Laws which the Lord of Creation had written be the judge in their case. When he placed the Laws between them, Jesus asked, "Did you not write, 'And who ever kills, shall die and who ever spills the blood of the righteous, his blood shall be spilled.'?" After the Lord of Creation acknowledged that he had written them, Jesus demanded that he surrender himself to be punished by death. Then Jesus added, "I have been more just than you to your creations," and he began to list the kindnesses he had done them. Seeing that he had been condemned by his own laws for killing Jesus, the Lord of Creation pleaded that he had killed Jesus unknowingly and offered in retribution to give Jesus all those who believe in him to take where he pleased. After Jesus left the Lord of Creation, he appeared to Paul. He revealed to his apostle the compensation, and thereafter, Paul preached that Jesus "redeemed us for a price." This, then, is the basis of Marcion's doctrine as we have come to know it.

04-01-2013, 06:29 PM	#40
jakejonesiv Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Atlanta Posts: 2,060	We can read the text so kindly provided by Roger Pearse for ourselves. They say that the Unknown God, the God of Love, who was in the first heaven, was hurt by seeing so many souls suffering at the hands of the two imposters: Matter and the Lord of Creation. Therefore, the Unknown God sent His Son to work miracles and cure the blind and foresaw that men would be jealous and crucify him. He also knew that once crucified and buried as mortal, His Son would descend into Hell and empty it by freeing the souls which had been cast there by the Lord of the Laws and Creation. REFUTATION OF THE SECTS MARCION'S VIEWS AS RELATED BY YEZNIK (4.1)

Thread Tools	Search this Thread
Show Printable Version	Search this Thread: Advanced Search

04-01-2013, 10:25 AM	#31
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	Do know that the text of Ephrem's Against Marcion is only partially available to us. It was discovered under some other (Orthodox) text. Mitchell did a primitive job of recovering the text (= pouring some solution that revealed parts of the original Ephrem composition). But now we have the technology (= infrared digital scanning) to get the whole text. Can you think of one 'authority' who sees this as a priority? No. Why? Because it's all bullshit. No one cares about the Marcionites per se. They are only interested in having their opinions furthered by evidence from the testimonies (written in Greek and Latin) about the Marcionites. Can you imagine this happening in a 'real scientific' discipline? 'Oh, there's the remains of a lost book by Homer under this pile of tires. All you have to do is buy a bulldozer and you can have the text.' Imagine a classics scholar saying, 'Nah, that's too much work. We're happy with the Iliad and the Odyssey.'

04-01-2013, 12:31 PM	#34
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	but none of this contradicts what I am suggesting

04-01-2013, 12:37 PM	#35
jakejonesiv Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Atlanta Posts: 2,060	When the Lord of the Laws and Creation saw how beautiful the world was, he decided to create man. http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/sc...refutation.htm This is the same being who had Jesus ignorantly put to death, and was found guilty under his own laws.

04-01-2013, 12:56 PM	#37
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	The idea here is that Jesus was 'the Good God' of the tradition Jewish theological understanding who came at the end of time to improve the original creation. This makes perfect sense if you think about what Christianity is all about as a functioning religion. Of course certain Yahwehists took offense at the idea that 'the Lord' wasn't perfect. But this is much more sensible than imagining that a religion got of the ground (= Marcionitism) which invented a whole mythology which wasn't grounded in anything other than the loose imagination of lunatics.

04-01-2013, 06:24 PM	#38
jakejonesiv Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Atlanta Posts: 2,060	All religion is grounded in the imagination of lunatics.

04-01-2013, 06:27 PM	#39
stephan huller Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: seattle, wa Posts: 9,337	but show me a religion invented completely out of thin air

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.