Duvduv

My hunch is that the epistles were based on other writings that may have had nothing to do with the Christ religion and were produced as a set of letters for didactic purposes, not intended for the alleged recipients at all, probably in the 4th century with the emergence of the brand new empire with its brand new religion of Constantinian Chi-Rho Chrestes, as were writings of he biased church party hacks called heresiologists, of whom no opponents remain (probably because no opponents were heresiologists at all, and not because the church destroyed their writings).

Would letters like this be so uniformly complete with nothing missing otherwise? Would alleged recipients have known to keep them from the various communities for posterity and just happen to pop up in the hands of a guy like Irenaeus? The other questions asked by Jay are very relevant to this as well.

Toto

Duvduv - where does Marcion fit into your theory? He had a collection of Paul's letters sometime in the mid-second century. The proto-orthodox church came up with a competing version.

When you try to claim that a fourth century origin for the Pauline letters is even an open possibility, you are not having a serious discussion.

Duvduv

Who provides you with this scenario, details and information about Marcion??!
Is it gospel truth that Marcion "obtained" a "competing" set of epistles that no one knows where they came from? Is the story believable if it comes from a party propagandist?

aa5874

Again, you are making Presumptions about Marcion.

There are no works of Marcion which have survived where he claimed he had a collection of Pauline letters.

It is stated in a writing attributed to Hippolytus that Marcion did NOT use the Pauline writings and that Marcion used the writings of Empedocles.

And further, Ephraim the Syrian, who supposedly wrote 3 Proses Against Marcion did NOT EVEN mention a single Pauline passage that was used by Marcion.

Your close-minded presumptions will get you nowhere.

Duvduv

Not to mention the fact that "Justin Martyr" supposedly lived at the same time as Marcion and never a single time do his writings cite even one citation from any writings of Marcion. Did any heresiologist really know anything about Marcion aside from his name???

tanya

I agree with aa5874 and Duvduv. Where's the information about what Marcion did or did not have?

Did Hippolytus specifically claim that Marcion rejected Paul's epistles, or did Hippolytus simply assert that Marcion found inspiration in the writings of Empedocles without offering any comment about Paul's letters?

I would like to read this claim in the original Greek of Hippolytus. Does it exist? Do you have a link?

Duvduv

Why do non-Christian researchers hold so fast and tight to the claims found in writings of the apologists about the antiquity of a Christian church in either the first or second century when logic to the contrary is staring them straight in the face?!
Who can tell them anything besides the biased chuch writers?!

tanya

I am perhaps also not in that lofty class of "serious" poster, but I certainly would not consider aa5874's submissions worthy of "ignore" status.

Sometimes, we all, including aa5874, can submit an errant post, or one that is not fully thought out, or imprecisely expressed.

I think aa5874's contributions are very significant. He has opened my eyes to a number of issues, which I had heretofore ignored, misunderstood, or simply overlooked.

Toto, I think you are also an important contributor, and I hope you will continue your fine effort. There really is, in my view, little to be gained from writing derogatory comments about anyone. We are all human, not machines, and we can all make mistakes.

With respect to English errors by aa5874, in my view, as one who has observed NUMEROUS mistakes in English, by several of the "serious" folks on this forum, I urge people to understand the complexity of this irrational language, and to overlook any incidental grammatical failings. Go with the substance, ignore the fluff....

Thank you both, Toto and aa5874.

Toto

What we know about Marcion comes from the proto-orthodox who attacked him. Specialists generally accept what can be gleaned from these sources because it doesn't make sense for heresiologists to invent a movement that they disagree with. It makes sense to doubt some of the details, but why would the entire phenomenon be invented?

If you wish to propose an alternative explanation of the evidence, go ahead. But you can't just wave your hand and say - the source is Eusebius, therefore it was made up in the 4th century.

Toto

Please outline that logic to the contrary.