stephan huller

Well I for one think there is something to this idea of a 'castration ritual' at the heart of earliest Christianity. I think part of the problem is that people really don't understand - or indeed many here don't want to even try to understand - what Christianity is all about.

If a writer is going to write a biography of someone he has to at least attempt to empathize with his subject matter. In the same way we have to ask ourselves what is the point of all the rites of Christianity? And we can't allow the logic of our contemporaries who happen to be religious cloud the waters.

My wife goes to church on Sunday because she honors her mother. There is whole psychology that one might apply to her way of thinking but that's the bottom line. Religion was important to both of her parents. It became important for her.

But this kind of religiosity has nothing to do with the reason why the first Christians came to adopt the religion of Christianity. I am not interested in the myth of the 'primitive Church.' I like to think that Christianity pretty much began as an organized body with a priesthood and a set of rituals that basically conform to what we have inherited today (especially in places like Syria and other places in the Middle East).

I think the writings of Ephrem are connected with that original truth. I think the Marcionites preserve an important part of that truth. The Alexandrian Church Fathers too.

The basic question again is 'what is Christianity?' and the answer on some level develops from the question 'what is Judaism?' or 'what is Samaritanism?' In other words, Christianity starts from the end of what came before it.

Of course you have to conceive and to accept that these religions acknowledged that they were only supposed to last for a certain amount of time. I think that Deuteronomy makes that perfectly clear especially chapter 32 which is called by the Samaritans 'the great Song.'

I don't know how I can compress twenty years of instruction into a single post but whereas the Jews IMO got distracted with all these other writings, the Samaritans stuck to the core vision of the original covenant (whether that was established by Ezra or Moses doesn't matter much here).

Marqe's commentary on chapter 32 makes clear that the Samaritans understood that Moses predicted that there would come a time when the original creation 'which was very good' would actually become perfect. This is embodied in the example of Jacob:

Jacob was magnified with two (blessings); not all of them were given to him, but it was said of him, "While Jacob was a perfect (TAM) man" (Gen. xxv. 27)[Mimar Marqe 4.2]

The Law will be complete when God finally perfects man as is promised in Deuteronomy chapter 32.

At the beginning of chapter two of Book One Marqe insinuates that there is some sort of divine plan for the perfection of man spelled out in the opening lines of Genesis:

See how it is in BERESIT and number the letters—six—like the six days, for each one resembles the other; and the name which brought all created things into being sealed the whole. Therefore He said, "God finished" (Gen. ii. 2). BERESIT was the starting-point and the Power finished (ibid. Targ.). Also the six days, Sabbath (i.e. seven) and holiness.[Mimar Marqe 4.2]

I won't get into the mystical particulars but Marqe is arguing that what is written in Genesis isn't so much a discussion of what happened in the past but an understanding of what will happen in the future - i.e. that man will be perfected by the second of two divine powers, here called 'the Power' (a being related originally to the gnostic concept of 'the Great Power' also used in Marqe).

Like Philo, Marqe seems to infer that the two names 'Lord' and 'God' signify two different divine powers each assigned two different roles in the two stage perfection of man:

Note the greatness of his knowledge. What he did in the name is a mystery; it established the glory with which his Lord vested him. The Lord said it of the Form of Adam, for by it it was established; by God it was perfected.—Then the Lord God formed man (Gen. ii.7).[ibid]

This understanding is repeated throughout the writings of Marqe. At one point Marqe explains (in a manner paralleled in Origen's Peri Pascha) that the pattern established at the beginning of Creation repeats every year with regards to the first month:

Thus the beginning of the months is made like The Beginning (BERESIT), which was made the start of Creation.
On the first day I created heaven and earth;
On the second day I spread out the firmament on high;
On the third day I prepared a dish and gathered into it all kinds of good things;
On the fourth day I established signs, fixing times, completing my greatness;
On the fifth day I revealed many marvels from the waters;
On the sixth day I caused to come up out of the ground various living creatures:
On the seventh day I perfected holiness. I rested in it in my own glory. I made it my special portion. I was glorious in it. I established your name then also—my name and yours therein as one, for I established it and you are crowned with it.
Therefore on the first day of the first month make it known and give thanks for it. When you are in it (the first month, first day), you will begin with (the section of) the Creation of the World (i.e. Gen. i. i-ii. 3, which has a place in all the liturgical orders for Sabbath), for I am like one who looses and I will untie the manacles of all those who have assembled for deliverance [ibid 1.9]

The same idea is expressed in terms of Moses ascent to receive the Law on Sinai especially with regards to the same mystical interest in the numbers six, seven and eight:

At the time God said to him, "Come up to me on the mountain" (Deut. x. 1 ; Targ.), when he went up to Him and the cloud covered him for six days, his body was holy and holiness was (thereby) increased. He ascended from human status to that of the angels. He was making supplication during the six days and prostrating before the King of all kings; he saw the Sanctuary of the Unseen spread out in the fire within the cloud. He was called on the seventh day from the midst of the cloud and he saw the ranks of the angels in their array. He descended from the mountain with great might—none like it! In the case of each of these things described there was a great wonder.[ibid 5.3]

In other words, Marqe originally understood that the Law set out a pattern by which man would be ultimately raised to the status of angels. This is set out even more explicitly in another passage with regards to the idea of 'two powers' - here referenced as Divinity and glory:

Divinity appeared and established the covenant; glory appeared and magnified what was good.
The angels came to magnify what was glorious and they were all assembled for Adam.
Divinity formed him and the breath of life was breathed in him; glory made him complete with a great spirit; the two of them were clad in two crowns of great light.
Divinity put in him a perfect mind and Glory gave him powerful illumination.
Divinity also glorified him with speech and Glory glorified him with perfect knowledge.
The angels were witnesses to him of what he would do and they are all mentioned gathered in every place where God is mentioned in Truth.[ibid 6.3]

I want people to be aware of the Samaritan tradition of Marqe because I think that Christianity was developed from his original formulation (especially the mystical interest in the same numbers reported among the Marcosians and Secret Mark).

If we are to go back to our original discussion, Marqe understands Deuteronomy 32 to be a prophesy about the perfection of man in the messianic age. This is again done by a second divine power long after the original creation. More interesting still Marqe juxtaposes the 'creation' (BARA) in the beginning with the 'call' (QARA) which will complete humanity:

For I will proclaim in the name of the Lord (Deut. xxxii. 3) is a renewal of the mention in Genesis, and the name with which he was vested and the great name whose secret he taught. Moses was magnified mightily in knowledge, wholly of faith. The secret of Genesis—know how it is; the great name and the word KI were heard from the mouth of Moses.

The mouth of the Divine One and that of the prophetic one were alike. We have seen a word which the True One wrote—BARA. What is its meaning? He wrote In the beginning ... created (BARA)(Gen. i. 1 ), and Moses at his beginning said, "For in the name" (Deut. xxxii. 3). BARA was said because the True One there planned and created by His will, and Moses said in his great knowledge, "I will proclaim"(QARA) (ibid.), just like the word BARA.[ibid 4.2]

I don't want to keep writing if no one is really but Marqe eventually explains that God's plan was to reveal the 'perfect work' (TAMYM PO'OLO)(Deut 32.3) which I have argued is the explanation of the Paulos.

The point of this lengthy discussion is that those forms of Christianity which originally engaged in ritual castration must have thought that the purpose of Christianity was to perfect humanity. One was being refashioned after the androgynous image of the angels. The Samaritan understanding must have factored into the development of Christianity. I believe that Marqe may well have even been the same figure as the evangelist Mark.

Chili

Yes I understand that very well but 'sage impotence' is very normal . . . and simple castration won't get you there unless one is reborn into perdition, perhaps?

Chili

Nice post and perhaps all true and I have a great respect for my parents too but they were Catholic and never once thought of themselves as Christian.

Christianity is not and cannot be a bona fide religion if it is the end of religion for Jews and for Catholics in Christendom. Period.

Christianity as a religion is an abomination and Catholics are Catholic because they are not Christian in the same way as Jews are Jew because they are not Christian.

charles

Stephen

You mention Marqe a lot in your book. He sounds like a very important figure in the Samaritan tradition. Where can I get more information about him? There is nothing at Wikipedia. I am very intrigued by many of your suggestions. Yet I am unable to find any reliable information about this figure?

Clivedurdle

All this talk of perfection has reminded me of Joel and dreaming dreams, as repeated in Acts.

Looking up Wiki it says Joel is written probably in 400's BCE, but this makes no sense, as the KJV refers to Northern armies, Grecians and Egyptians.

ie post Alexandria.

What I am after is a clear connection between being holy, and pure and sexless and without genitalia.

I think it is there but we have so many years of accretions of not stating this explicitly it is very well hidden.

Chili

Marqe is wrong to say that Adam was formed as man in the image of God because Adam was created by conjecture only in the TOK of Gen.3, never to have existence in being and therefore was banned from Eden to live his life as an outsider.

bacht

Not sure I'm following your thoughts here. I'm skeptical that any person can be permanently transformed away from the urge to sin. I don't accept that people are basically good, I think we have equal potential for righteousness and evil.

I was looking at a photo of old ruins and it occured to me that this is in fact a snapshot of our species: construction and destruction combined, neither ever totally triumphing. Or more cosmically, the constant tension between order and chaos is never resolved.

If anything removes the urge to sin it might be a lobotomy or some other radical brain surgery, but then we lose our free will, so we're not really fully human any more. Castration simply removes the ability to procreate, but not necessarily the urge to fornicate.

bacht

I have a question about the physical process of castration. What happens to the candidate if, after the testes are removed, he is immersed in water?

Chili

Of course he can. The only reason we have desire is because we are living beside our own self in what we call our ego consciousness wherein we have created a persona that really is a mask . . . that we decorate and embellish with worldly richess along the river of life as presented in Gen. 2:10-13 wherein all the oppsites are made known. To achieve this we will wind, crawl, walk and cheat and do anything to reach 'the top' which never can be ours as outsider to our own self. Realization of this comes when we look back on our life and see the third river rise [still] East of Eden to which we must return without bagage to enjoy the fullness of the fourth river that properly is translated as bright mind.

Evil and righteousness can only be conceived to exist while under the law that is in force only along the way up and comes to a sudden stop when our world comes to an end when we do this 180 and take the third river down to the place we first started and know it as if for the first time. Well, it is kind of like a lobotomy except that we voluntarily vacate our conscious mind and move into our subconscious mind. Kind of like voluntary castrastion but without cutting our nuts and so still have a conscious mind that is placed subservient to our intuition, which really is the memory of our soul and so we become one with our soul. In Genesis 3 it is called the TOL where the woman [who was never banned from Eden] still presides and so it is in getting to know her that we come to know our own true self.

It actually is also how we gain free will since it was this same woman who was in charge of the angels that guided our trains of thought while we were in exile (and we call her Mary).

charles

I have been just reading a number of things on the internet about eunuch meaning essentially the same thing as 'homosexual' in ancient times. I have a hard time believing this but here is an example of what I read:

.

http://www.well.com/~aquarius/

Could this be true? I find that hard to believe but I keep coming across this all over the internet. Thought?