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Old 10-27-2010, 06:37 AM   #41
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So we should.....unh....just feel sorry for the poor mistaken Christian's who have tortured and murdered millions because of that mistake?
I do not believe that follows from anything I said.
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Old 10-27-2010, 02:45 PM   #42
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What does 'forged' mean
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Originally Posted by Transient
Stephan Huller - answer these questions without resorting to avoidance ans personal insults.
In my experience with stephan, these past few months, I have learned one thing: Transient: Please, don't hold your breath waiting for an answer.....

So, stephan does not understand what "forged" means, with regard to AH, Adversus Haereses, ostensibly written by one "Irenaeus", a man whom stephan considers to have been of Jewish ethnicity, speaking Aramaic as a native language, and writing all of his voluminous tomes in Syriac, then translating it into Greek, while living in Lyons, a Latin speaking Roman colony two thousand years ago.

The FACT that our only extant copies of AH exist in Latin, of unknown origin, plus a partial copy of books 4-5 written in Armenian, seems not to bother anyone on this forum, apart from a handful of "morons" (including avi) who fail to salute the great masters of the universe, aka scholars possessing peer reviewed publications, all of whom have read Eusebius' and conclude that "Irenaeus" was indeed a fellow well known to lots of other folks, including Hippolytus and Origen and Tertullian.

What is forgery? Forgery, for the stephans of this world, includes the entire rewriting of history of all ancient documents, in order to ensure peaceful, tranquil, domestic bliss within the empire.

Therefore, in my opinion, it would have been child's play for Eusebius, acting on orders of the Emperor, to have installed 100 scribes copying newly modified texts from half a dozen authors, ensuring that the only version of history out there, represented the Nicean position on the trinity.

Do I believe that "Irenaeus" was a real person? I don't know. I like to follow the evidence, and the evidence here all leads to Eusebius.

Eusebius claims "Irenaeus" was real. Question is, does he make that claim based upon fact, or upon the need to provide a second century origin for the canon?

What about Toto's very valid point of contention, pointing out that AH contains many "subversive" (for want of a better word,) elements, i.e. AH expresses notions entirely contrary to a 4th century creation de novo.

I don't have a ready reply to that argument, but, I am not going to forego the notion that Eusebius rewrote history, by adjusting, and creating text, just because AH, as it has survived, seems imperfect, from our 21st century perspective. Yes, Eusebius, if he were the author of AH, did not compose a document, AH, as we would write it, were we the ones undertaking the forgery, instead of him. Yes, our only extant copy, in Latin, seems at variance with what we imagine Eusebius ought to have written, in that improbable scenario where he indeed had served as the creator of AH.

There is the very good argument, why should anyone suppose that Eusebius modified the text of those two authors, Tertullian, and Hippolytus, while also referencing "Irenaeus" in discussions about Origen of Alexandria?

It is both possible, and logical to assume that Eusebius did NOT modify the text of those two authors, however, again, our only evidence of those two authors' texts, is dated hundreds of years, after Eusebius, hence, the assumption that AH represents a bona fide, late 2nd-early 3rd century document, untouched by Eusebius, is simply wishful thinking, in my opinion. In other words, when a person has a diagnosis of malignant cancer, why should we assume that his aberrant blood test results, are caused by dehydration--he's just a little bit thirsty, drink a bit, and the values will return to a more normal value. Nice, wishful thinking. Eusebius is a known forger. Constantine is a known killer. Why assume honesty on their part? Why assume that they did NOT change history?

The story would be different if we did not have convincing evidence of Eusebius' hand in the soup, together with the ladle. Eusebius' very successful disposition of all of his former friend's writings, (Arius of Alexander, was a friend of Eusebius of Caesarea), is proof enough for me, that he would not even blink an eye to Constantine's command to modify Tertullian and Hippolytus.

So, the real question, in my sub-moronic mind at least, is whether or not Constantine gave the order to make the changes in the text.

How do we analyze crimes? Means, motive, method.

Did Constantine have the means to gather up all (perhaps ten) documents written by Tertullian and Hippolytus? Did he have the means to rewrite those documents, making whatever changes were required?

Did he have a motive? Why bother? Did he really need to gather up all of Arius' writings? Why did he do that?

Method: Constantine was very methodical, whether killing his wife, or his son, or burning all of Arius' writings, he worked as every good general should. Precise destruction of one's foes, real or imagined.

As far as I am concerned, the "scholarship" of thousands of true believers, i.e. folks who have read Eusebius, and think that his account represents a kernel of truthfulness, is utterly worthless in attempting to assess the possibility that "Irenaeus" was a real person.

The only evidence that would convince me that AH was really written by him, and not by Eusebius, i.e. that "Irenaeus" genuinely was the first to identify the four gospels, and the first to name the legitimate books of the canon (which is what Nicea is all about, right--uniformity of belief, uniformity of action, uniformity of doctrine) is a stone or document unearthed in a closely monitored excavation, of a temple or cave or storage shed, somewhere in the world, in which the documents or stones or carvings are dated with confidence (certainly not by palaeography) no later than 300 CE.

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Old 10-27-2010, 04:36 PM   #43
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. . .The logical choice of culprit in forcing together the contradictory four gospels would be Constantine. How sure are we that he did not do it? I know that there are mentions of the four gospels in Irenaeus and Tertullian, but how sure can we be that these passages are not backdated?
Assuming that they are authentic, what political forces before Constantine could have caused groups to swallow their pride, split their differences, and allow four different groups to accept each other's gopel?

Warmly,

Jay Raskin (AKA PhilosopherJay)
The existence of the Diatesaron in the late second century discounts the hypothesis that "strong forces" were required to bring the four gospels together.Phil Jenkins, in his book entitled Lost History of Christianity (or via: amazon.co.uk) writes,

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Around the year 170, Tatian created a Syrian version of the four canonical Gospels combined into a single harmony, the Diatesaron. . . The Syrian Bible was a conservative text, to a degree that demands our attention. In recent years, accounts of early church claim that scriptures and gospels were very numerous, until the mainstream Christian church suppressed most of them in the fourth century. This alleged purge followed the Christian conversion of the emperor Constantine, at a time when the church supposedly wanted to ally with the empire in the interests of promoting order, orthodoxy, and ecclesiastical authority. . . The problem with all this is that the Eastern churches had a long familiarity with rival scriptures, but rejected them because they knew they were late and tendentious. . .
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Old 10-27-2010, 05:37 PM   #44
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Good point arnoldo

The question is whether Tatian's text resembled our surviving gospel harmonies. The Arabic Diatessaron identifies itself as Tatian's text all evidence suggests otherwise.

The ultimate question in the field of Diatessaronic is to what degree do the surviving manuscripts resemble the lost original MS. I know from personal contact with Ulrich Schmid that the answer is very little.

I am not sure the Diatessaron really was a harmony of four. I think that is just what the orthodox called it to dismiss its significance. Epiphanius identifies it with the Gospel of the Hebrews. He might be right
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Old 10-27-2010, 07:46 PM   #45
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Default The Alexandrian 'dig'

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Ok lets get back on track - Stephan said he evidence about something to do with some Alexandrian dig - what is it?
What dig?
What evidence?
I am very interested in the details of any new archaeological discoveries.
What have you got Stephan?
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Old 10-27-2010, 07:51 PM   #46
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Good point arnoldo

The question is whether Tatian's text resembled our surviving gospel harmonies. . .
Dura Parchment 24 suggests Tatian's text does resemble our current gospels.


According to Plooij "There is no reasonable doubt that the fragment is really Tatian"
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Old 10-27-2010, 08:19 PM   #47
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No actually arnoldo what I am asking is whether the Arabic Diatessaron, the Liege Harmony, the Old Latin Gospel Harmony faithfully preserve the original Diatessaron of Tatian.
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Old 10-28-2010, 04:58 AM   #48
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No actually arnoldo what I am asking is whether the Arabic Diatessaron, the Liege Harmony, the Old Latin Gospel Harmony faithfully preserve the original Diatessaron of Tatian.
Thanks for the clarification. Concerning the original Diatessaron of Taitian, I've read that this harmonized gospel may've been written in part as a reaction against Marcion's abridged gospel. If so, then Marcion may've indirectly been the "strong force" which brought the four gospels together rather than Constantine.
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Old 10-28-2010, 06:19 AM   #49
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Originally Posted by Arnoldo
If so, then Marcion may've indirectly been the "strong force" which brought the four gospels together rather than Constantine.
Hmm. Arnoldo, I am confused:
1. Do you have a reference to confirm that Marcion, whose entire literary output is non-existent, knew of all four gospels?
2. Are you arguing that Marcion possessed sufficient leverage within the nascent Christian community, from Rome to Alexandria, to compel adoption of all four gospels, even though his followers accepted the idea that Luke was the only legitimate book, among the four, and even though Marcion himself had been excommunicated by the church of Rome, as a docetic heretic?
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Marcion was the first to propose a canon of the bible. However, his canon only consisted of eleven books grouped in two sections, the Gospel, a version of the Gospel of Luke[8], and ten letters of the Apostle, i.e. Apostle Paul, whom he considered the correct interpreter and transmitter of Jesus' gospel message. Both sections were purged of elements relating to the Christ's childhood, the Jewish religion and other material which challenged Marcion's dualist theology.
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Old 10-28-2010, 07:13 AM   #50
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Default warning: repetitiveness below re: Eusebius

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Originally Posted by stephan huller
No actually arnoldo what I am asking is whether the Arabic Diatessaron, the Liege Harmony, the Old Latin Gospel Harmony faithfully preserve the original Diatessaron of Tatian.
That would be very difficult to address, since there is no extant copy of the "original Diatessaron of Tatian".

Describing two arabic manuscripts, one dating from the 12th to 14th century, the other from the 14th century = "Borgian manuscript" with both Arabic versions thought to represent translations of Syriac originals:
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11. .... Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrrhus, four hundred years before Isho`dad, wrote thus in his book on Heresies (written in 453): "Tatian the Syrian....This [writer] also composed the gospel which is called Diatessaron, cutting out the genealogies and whatever other passages show that the Lord was born of the seed of David according to the flesh."
Hmm. Maybe those passages hadn't yet been invented, they were not there for Tatian and Marcion to omit...?
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....
....
14 Passages Lost from the Diatessaron.--If the Diatessaron has thus been growing so as to represent the ordinary text of the canonical gospels more completely, we have also evidence that suggests that it has been at some time or times purged of certain features that are lacking in these canonical gospels.
(emphasis x 2 by avi)


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The Syrian bishop Theodoretus of Kyros, by his own admission, destroyed over 200 copies of the Diatessaron to make way for the canonical Gospels,...
(page 2/12)

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Partly against this background Tatian (so Eusebius tells us) created his own original system of thought....
(page 3/12)

Right, according to Eusebius.....

All roads may indeed lead to Rome, but in biblical research, all "sources" appear to originate with Eusebius.

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