Toto

No, this is not reasonable. It is your private fantasy.

Wrong.

There was a time when he was not - i.e., before he was born to the Virgin Mary.

Where does this "appear?"

The Arians used Luke:

mountainman

Epiphanius' "Against Heresies" repeatedly refers to "individial Acts in use among heretical sects." There are further references from 4th century "councils" conflating "the heretics" with preservers and readers of the non canonical texts. We know that the orthodox were on the march and were actively searching out all locations for any copies of these "Other Gospels and Acts". We know that it was probibited to conceal them. The penalty expressed by Constantine was death by beheading.

dog-on

Paul was nuts, Mark was just writing a story and Mattew and Lukas were simply gullible.

There, solved.

mountainman

Surely one objective gauge for "reasonableness" might be the comparitive ratio of christians to pagans in the year 324/325 especially in the east and especially around Alexandria. We have seen Starks over inflated estimates and others also conjecture certain figures. But by all accounts - following Lane-Fox - Constantine operated against a huge "pagan" majority. That is, against a huge "Hellenistic" majority.


That Arius was one of the majority is reasonable political expectation
especially since he is described in terms conducive to someone who
appears to be a leader of whatever resistance was offered against Constantine. The following description is not conducive to Arius being "christian":

He brought state orthodoxy into the light;
He hurled his wretched self into darkness.
He ended his labors with this

He wrote that he did not wish God to appear to be the subject of suffering of outrage
He wrote that (on the above account) he suggested and fabricated wondrous things indeed in respect to faith.
He wrote books that collected and gathered terrible and lawless impieties
He wrote books that agitated tongues [Editor: Very popular books]
He wrote books which deceived and destroyed

He introduced a belief of unbelief.
He introduced a belief of unbelief that is completely new.
He accepted Jesus as a figment
He called Jesus foreign
He did not adapt, he did not adapt (it was said twice) to God [Editor: the "new" orthodox God]
He was twice wretched

He reproached the church
He grieved the church
He wounded he church
He pained the church
He demoted Jesus
He dared to circumscribe Jesus
He undermined the (orthodox) truth
He undermined the (othodox) truth by various discourses
He detracted from Jesus who is indetractable
He questioned the presence of Jesus
He questioned the activity of Jesus
He questioned the all-pervading law of Jesus
He thought that there was a place outside of Jesus
He thought that there something else outside of Jesus
He denied the infiniteness of Jesus
He did not conclude that God is present in Christ
He had no faith in Christ
He did not follow the law that God's law is Christ
He had little piety toward Christ
He detracted from the uncorrupted intelligence of Jesus
He detracted from the belief in immortality of Jesus
He detracted from the uncorrupted intelligence of the Church
He was barred publicly from God’s church

This above evidence suggests that Arius
thought that Jesus was certainly not divine.

Additionally, we have no documents known to have been authored by Arius, with the exception of a number of letters produced by the orthodox in his name in which he appears to reverse everything he said at Nicaea.

Arius has been written out of history.
Constantine pronounced "memorae damnatio" on his name.
Do you have any idea of the political significance of this act?

Toto

Your claim was that there was a connection between Arius in particular and the noncanonical gospels. You have not supported that claim.

mountainman

The name of Leucius Charinus appears as the author of a specific series of non canonical acts in the later fourth century. The name is vilified from one end of Christendom to the other. It is the only name we have for any of the non canonical texts. Eusebius and all other heresiologists provide no names for the gnostic authors who were writing at that time.

We currently think that the non canonical texts were authored in the following centuries - the 1st (deconnick's "Kernal" gThomas and "The Cross gospel" etc), 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th centuries. Of course, other material was written in later centuries, but most academics cut off the apocrypha by the 5th century. Thus we know that there were authors writing at the time of Eusebous and Constantine. Eusebius tells us about "their chief" whan he relates to us some information about the vile filthy dispicable "Acts of Pilate". Who authored these books?

I suggest that Arius of Alexandria was the author of these anti-christian works - but after Nicaea - and it was for this reason that Constantine was so mad at him. He wrote unauthorised stories about Jesus and the Apostles. The stories were Greek satires. Constantine poisoned Arius, and pronounced "memorae damnation" on the name, the books and the very memory of Arius of Alexandria. And that was the end of Arius.

However his books were preserved, and a new pseudonymous name was devised by the orthodox -- "Leucius Charinus" - the two scribes in the Acts of Pilate - to be associated to the specific non canonical greek texts authored by Arius. They could not mention the name of Arius by law. It was forbidden to mention the name of Arius. The Arian controversy was about Arius and his sophisms, and about the non canonical books which he authored, and which others preserved in spite of the orthodox wish to have them destroyed by fire.

Toto

This suggestion has no facts or theory behind it. Please stop posting this claim. We know what you think and we know that you have no evidence for it. You are just cluttering up the forum with ridiculous claims.

mountainman

You have not addressed the facts presented in support of the suggestion in the form of the letter from Emperor Constantine to Arius dated 333 CE, sourced from Athanasius, Defense of the Nicene Definition 40 (TLG), also found in Socrates, Church History 1.9.30 and Gelasius, Church History 3.19.1, and translated by Coleman-Norton, P.R., Roman State and Christian Church, London:
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, (SPCK) 1966, #67.

The fact remains that after centuries of BC&H scholarship the entire corpus of early christian literature remains without either one author or a century of authorship. Surely you must admit that the situation is absolutely ludicrous. Books do not get written by themseleves. Some human being(s) must have authored the NT canon and some human being(s) must have authored the NT non canonical books at some stage between the 1st and 4th centuries, at which time the evidence becomes irrefutable.

The mystery of the orthodox authorship of the NT canon and the gnostic authorship of the NT apocrypha will not be solved without attempts at naming actual historical names and actual historical dates - which is all I am attempting to do. Why are you reluctant to comment on the data presented by Constantine about Arius of Alexandria in the above letter?

Toto

What facts in particular? Constantine used some colorful language about Arius, but nothing I saw that supports you "suggestion."

What evidence becomes irrefutable?

There are many candidates for authorship of the noncanonical books other than Arius.


Some history is just lost and will never be recovered. You have to accept that.

Elijah

By Hellenistic you mean deriving from the Greek philosophy or also paganism? And you think Constantine responded by attacking Greek philosophy within Rome just like the Persians were doing? Do you know what would be the best source (original text wise) for the state religion the Persians put forward prior to Constantine’s Christian push? Any speculation on the benefits the Persians were seeing for why Constantine would think it was a good idea?

Still haven't found any evidence of Constantine going after the philosophers, still just attacking the superstitious paganism with their idolatry and sacrifices?

I don’t know what crazy conspiracy theory you got going on with Arian but it’s seems to be obviously a metaphysical argument about the beginning of the universe and how that related to the spiritual force Jesus was personifying. We’re not looking for an argument within Christianity, we’re looking for an argument from Julian’s camp saying that they made it all up which would be the most obvious attack to make if that’s the case. Why can’t you follow some Plato and be Christian? The early church fathers referenced him a bit.