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10-03-2010, 09:00 PM
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#131 | |
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Roger,
Very interesting. There are some incongruities though. The critics of Latin Irenaeus all note that the Latin appears to have been made word for word from the Greek (when preserved by Epiphanius, Hippolytus and Eusebius), very much like the 6-7 century Armenian "crib translation" you mention, which preserve books 4 & 5. They describe the Latin translator as somewhat of a bumpkin, making several blunders and using transliterations of many Greek words, that suggest he was not a scholar. Is this man the kind that undertakes to make Irenaeus orthodox? If the Armenian translation preserves the sense of the Greek in such a way that it could be used to cast doubt on what came to be the orthodox position about the nature of the son, why was Irenaeus not condemned by one or more of the warring councils, as were the works of Origen? I will concede that the final chapters of book 5 are not present in any copies of the Latin translation surviving to today, which the Armenian shows Irenaeus attacking a position that later became orthodox, and proposing his own (that the Word = logos was God the Father incarnate in Jesus Christ). Also, Augustine seemed to cite a Latin translation of Irenaeus in 421, 50 years before the period that the SC editors suggest for its creation. Yet there is no direct evidence that a second translation was circulating. It looks, based on this, that the Latin translation, as muddy as it was about the nature of the son, preceded the period that could account for the differences between the Latin translation and the Armenian. One last point ... the Latin is said to be unclear about "the two natures of the son" while the Armenian is crystal clear, but at variance with what became orthodox doctrine about the nature of the son in the trinity. This is interpreted in SC as an indication that the Latin translator "rendered [the Greek of Irenaeus] more orthodox, if less comprehensible" in reaction to the Arian controversy of the late 4th century. Looks like I have to do some research on the Arian controversy as it played out, but particularly in the region of Armenia. The Armenian translation may be the one reflecting a redefinition of Irenaeus' muddy thought (after all, the nature of the persons of the trinity was not really pinned down by various parties until the 3rd century) to support one of the many factions this controversy generated. DCH (time for bed...) Quote:
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10-04-2010, 01:51 AM
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#132 | |
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"Arius' entire effort consisted precisely in acclimatizing Plotinic logic within biblical creationism."The five sophisms of Arius are the backbone of the controversy - they appear repeated down the centuries, fainter and fainter. Stuff like .... "He was made from nothing existing". You might like to note that most accounts of the Arian controversy, and Arius, -- including Rowan William's account above) do not appear to mention that various "Gnostic Gospels and Acts" were routinely associated with various of the Arian sects (as reported by the orthodox in the 4th and 5th centuries). Your research may question whether the Arian controversy and the preservation of at least some "Gnostic Gospels and Acts" were related. If you find any answers I'd be interested. I think they were highly related, because it was a battle for the "Closure of the Canon" between Nicaea and just after the death of Julian c.367 CE with Athanasius's list of "acceptable books". |
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10-04-2010, 05:38 AM
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#133 |
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In order to investigate the textual situation for Irenaeus book 1 I've been trying to read through Against the Heresies (or via: amazon.co.uk)
by Unger and Dillon (Dillon did final editing after Unger's death). Unger accepts that Tertullian used the Latin translation of Irenaeus but I am troubled by his view that in several places Tertullian is correct where the Latin is wrong. Some of these might possibly be corruptions in the Latin tradition but probably not all. Unger suggests that Tertullian used our Latin translation but also had direct access to the Greek as a check on the Latin. (Against the Heresies book 1 Introduction p 14). This might well be true but I am doubtful if we can prove that Tertullian used a pre-existing Latin version once we accept that he also had access to the original language version. On the other hand Unger suggests that Firmicus Maternus (early 4th century CE author of Error of the Pagan Religions) knew Against Heresies, his examples seem convincing, but since Firmicus Maternus seems to have been fluent in Greek I'm not sure this is evidence for his use of a Latin translation of Irenaeus. Andrew Criddle |
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10-04-2010, 07:43 AM
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#134 | |
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The key point that strikes me is that we need to distinguish between what is possible, and what we have actual evidence for. Tertullian was bilingual in Latin and Greek -- we know this because he composed several of his works in a Greek version (now lost). So he *could* have either rendered the Greek into Latin himself, or used an existing Latin version. But he is also the first literary writer in Latin. He composed much of the technical vocabulary of Latin Christianity. He had strong links with Asia Minor (vide his connection with Montanism), and composed his lost defence of them after reading a Greek attack upon them. All this is fact and evidenced. So unless we have definite evidence that he used a specific Latin version, whose existence is problematical, I suggest that we should take the view that he used the Greek. Anything else seems to involve unnecessary supposition. The SC text also refers to Tertullian using the Greek text at various points, I think. It is quite possible that earlier Latin versions of Irenaeus did exist. He was, after all, bishop of Lyons in Gaul. To be understood he would need to use Latin. But ... this is not fact, but speculation. Until we have evidence of an early version, I think we should take the path of safety and not argue a case based on this idea. Just thinking, won't the only way to show that two authors used each other in Latin, rather than both relying on the Greek, be if both commit at least one error -- the same, non-trivial error -- which is not found in the Greek, nor derived from a possible Greek variant? We would need to see this supposed error, this "fingerprint" passage, first, then. We should also consider a possibility, if there IS a fingerprint passage, whether Tertullian's version of the text might have influenced the Latin translator. Tertullian was much read in Gaul, even to the extent of reading his heretical works, which owe their preservation to some such group in late antiquity (which created the Corpus Corbienese family of manuscripts). Against this is the areas of known disagreement. All the best, Roger Pearse |
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10-04-2010, 07:55 AM
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#135 | ||
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To respond to the query, the general position of the church was that it did not condemn writers who died in the peace of the church for errors only detected later and never discussed in their lifetime. For instance Augustine himself refuses to condemn Tertullian for some wild-sounding bit of theology, on the broad-minded ground that he is not sure that Tertullian actually meant what he seems to say (and Augustine had evidently read enough to realise that the problem was indeed one of terminology; Tertullian was using a Stoic technical terminology against Hermogenes, and had no idea that words like "corpus" would have a certain other meaning in church discussions of the incarnation ca. 400 AD). (This from Augustine, De Haeresibus 53). Early writers did not tend to be read much after 400, precisely because they did not discuss the sorts of issues then in vogue, and when they did, their theological ideas were often evidently outdated or misleading. Origen was an exception; his works were very widely used, and his name became attached to the disputes which were underway from 400 on. These are the "Origenist" disputes, which raged fro 150 years and were settled at the home synod in the mid-6th century by the condemnation of the Origenists, and the consequent destruction of Origen's literary legacy. But this sort of thing did not generally happen to early authors. Irenaeus himself drifted out of use and was largely forgotten, I suspect. All the best, Roger Pearse |
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10-04-2010, 08:00 AM
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#136 | |
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I'm afraid I have never troubled to determine why POxy 405 is from Irenaeus. All the best, Roger Pearse |
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10-04-2010, 08:24 AM
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#137 |
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Has anyone developed a thesis that the barbaron dialekton of Irenaeus was Aramaic or Syriac? I think this would help explain a number of anomalies in the surviving MS ('Colarbasus,' and the inevitable manner in which the translation breaks down whenever Irenaeus discusses passages or concepts rooted in Aramaic or Hebrew - viz. the discussion in AH 2.24.2 that the two and a half letters in Jesus name 'signifies that Lord who contains heaven and earth'). In that last section especially we see a complete breakdown in the translation. Irenaeus expresses his view that developing explanations in Greek (as the gnostics apparently did) is wholly inappropriate as Jesus name was Aramaic (Yeshu?). I have never developed this idea into anything close to a paper but is there any reason for discarding the idea that the 'lectures' of Irenaeus that Photius references might have been originally written in Aramaic? Polycarp seems to have spoken Aramaic. Irenaeus also employed the hypomnemata of Hegesippus which must have been written in Aramaic. Is the reason Irenaeus is so incomprehensible to us because of the inferior translation of an original compilation of Aramaic material? Has anyone ever suggested this?
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10-04-2010, 10:30 AM
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#138 | |
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Indeed, it may be an absolutely trivial aside, off topic, and off track. Sorry, if so. My question to you, or to Andrew, is very simple, and is not intended as most of my rejoinders may be, to confront your Christian belief system. It is a simple, straight forward, unsophisticated question: To which verse of Mathew 3 does this fragment correspond? I can worry about why this fragment is attributed to "Irenaeus" some other time... Sorry, that my own knowledge of both Christianity and the Bible, and Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew, et al,.... is so limited.... (In fact, my knowledge of almost everything is equally delimited....)  avi |
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10-04-2010, 10:37 AM
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#139 | |
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Why must every single person have written in either Hebrew, or Aramaic, or some other Semitic language? Gosh. Why can't we ASSUME, since we don't know anything, that "Irenaeus" was a GREEK scholar, born and raised in Turkey, who emigrated to Latin speaking Lyon. OK, you may well be correct, maybe he did know, speak, and write a Semitic language, but why should that ASSUMPTION be made? Why must the "Hypomnemata" of Hegesippus have been written in Aramaic? Why wouldn't it have been written in the native language of the Greek author Hegessipus? Too many assumptions, too little evidence.... Perhaps I am just too ignorant.... avi |
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10-04-2010, 10:50 AM
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#140 |
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avi - Google is your friend.
Hypotyposeis: Matt 3:16-17 in POxy 3.405 See also Daniel Wallace interview, with a comment from Peter Head |
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