Toto

Tertullian's attack on the Valentinians

Gnosticism

For myself, I find that trying to wrap my mind around these gnostic concepts makes my head hurt, so I might have missed something.

Do you suffer from the misimpression that the field of Biblical Studies has scientific journals that even come close to guaranteeing any sort of accuracy or credibility?

You can read the article for yourself and decide if the ideas make any sense.


Since this is not an exact science and ancient history can only work on the basis of probabilities, you should not posit that the idea existed, but you should consider the possibility that it did. If you think that the documents were trustworthy, the idea existed at the time of Valentinus (100-160 CE), who was a follower of Theudas; Valentinus claimed that Theudas had received secret wisdom from Paul.

wikipedia fwiw

I claim no expertise. But I know enough to evaluate claims such as Louw and Nida's.

LegionOnomaMoi

Tertullian wrote in Latin, so why are you pointing to him as an ancient source for the use of a greek word?
In addition to reading the entirety of the nag hammadi collections, as well as Ehrman's Lost Scriptures and works by Tertullian, Irenaeus, etc. in the original greek/latin, I've read a fair amount of secondary scholarship on gnostism (M. A. Williams' Rethinking Gnosticism, various papers from The Journal of Early Christian Studies, Die Gnosis: Wesen und Geschichte einer spätantiken Religion, etc.). I'm aware of what gnosticism is. However, even among the works of specialists who believe that more than just the bare seeds of gnostic ideas were around during Paul's day, I've yet to come across one who accepts Mead's interpretation of ektroma or presents a defense of it. If you know of one, by all means point it out.



History (now that I am no longer an undergrad) is a hobby of mind. My research and graduate work is in cognitive science. Or, perhaps more accurately, certain "subfields" of, concepts from, or related fields to cognitive science: neuroscience, linguistics, dynamical systems, the philosophy of science, conceptual representation, etc.

Whether or not history should be considered a social science or not is still debated (a thorough defense of this categorization may be found in Tucker's Our Knowledge of the Past (Cambridge University Press, 2004). However, even within the physical sciences one rarely (if ever) sees the smug assurance of 19th century positivism. And history is certainly fraught with more difficulties than the physical sciences (hypothesis testing is limited to working with evidence, rather than generating it in a lab).

That said, whether one thinks of history as a social science or not, it is still about, as you say, probability. Hypotheses of what happened in the past must be tested against the evidence, and the most probably explanation accepted (even if this is "we can't know anything about X event, period, person, etc.").

One of my majors was (as I believe I said) ancient Greek and Latin. Which meant I spent a lot of time reading not just Greek and Latin authors, works about these texts, and works on the languages themselves, but also papers and books on Greco-roman history. I was often struck at how a fair number of historians writing about Socrates, Andocides, Sparta, and many other topics would take tidbits of evidence and build mountains. The approach in Biblical/NT studies, on the other hand, is usually far more skeptical than one finds in other areas concerned with ancient history. I would imagine this is because while both the person and writings of someone like Paul have been under critical scrutiny for over 200 years (much of the work which went into establishing which letters are were almost certainly inauthentic versus which are almost certainly authentic took place in the 19th century, which is when the now almost universally accepted theories of Markan priority and Q as a common source behind Matthew and Luke originated).

Biblical/NT scholars do sometimes go well beyond standard historical practices when it comes to historical issues, but they do so in both directions (both more skeptical and less). Additionally, they aren't the only ones who write on these subjects (gnosticism, early christianity, etc.). Other historians who specialize in greco-roman history, near-eastern history, or some other field which concerns ancient history do as well. When it comes to academic literature, off of the top of my head Donald Akenson, Loveday Alexander, Ronald Hutton, and Ronald Lane Fox (just to name a few) have all written about these issue, and none are biblical scholars.


I know this. History is about the best explanation for the evidence (which involves, among other things, understanding the evidence).

Without even getting into the issue of Valentinus' claim, you have to understand that gnosticism is an umbrella term (and as used to day is a modern one). The fact that so-called "gnostic" ideas existed in the 2nd century is beyond any plausible doubt. That full-blown gnostic cosmology of the type Mead refers to was, and was also around in Paul's day, is another matter entirely. You talk about probability. How likely is it that an idea we don't have any attestation for until centuries after Paul is the best way to understand his use of this word in context, particularly when so far a central component of the one argument you've described for doing so rests on misunderstanding of greek grammar?

How? That is, if you can't read greek, have you read what work has gone into understanding greek words, building lexicons, etc.? You stated that Mead's was the best explanation and that there is no ancient usage of ektroma meaning "born to late" so that particular metaphorical extension (compared to other attested metaphorical extensions) is implausible. But you have yet to point to any greek use of the term used in the sense Mead does. So you use one standard of evidence to reject the work of Louw and Nida, and another to accept Mead.

Toto

I am only using him to show that the concept of the "abortion" was around.


Do you know of any who have addressed it and rejected it?

As I said, I consider it likely that the word was a later interpolation into Paul's letter.

I think the central component of Mead's argument is the word έκτρωμα - a core concept in later thought that claimed to come from Paul. If you assume that there is no connection, you are left with a reference that makes no sense, especially in light of Paul's other descriptions of himself.

I reject Louw and Nida because they have obviously jerry-rigged a meaning to fit their theology. Mead does give an example of ancient usage to support his interpretation - it's just not ancient enough for you, if you think that Paul wrote this passage around 50 CE and that gnostics did not exist until the next century. But I doubt the accuracy of those dates.

Adam

Yes, we know. You're far too busy to have time to read Proto-Luke. Nor does Steve Bnk have the time. I guess my Post #97 here and my thread Gospel Eyewitnesses will remain forever unchallenged that MJ is dead.

I'll reiterate my point yet again. Now that I have isolated the earliest sources within the gospels, the fact that they show no legendary accruals shows that we are seeing some historical personage or another. We are seeing the historical Jesus, unless the surrounding texts about somebody else were spliced together with the natural texts. But I have never heard of anyone claiming that. Is anyone claiming that the Marcan and Matthean (M) texts have no historical connection with the Q, L, and Passion Narrative texts?

outhouse

LOL you really want this addressed.




Ok i'll bite.


They were not wittnesses.

What your getting is decades of oral tradition, when you do the job of weeding it all out like you have done.

You did a decent job but fail at certain points. substitute eyewitness with oral traditions that might be from eyewitnesses and I would give you thumbs up.


My issue is I dont trust any of the authors at all as far as I can throw them. Its all based from what I find as legends from jesus enemies who thought they would want to use judaism for themselves.

Christ/jesus/yeshua didnt start christianity, romans did

Sheshbazzar

They will forever remain as outstanding examples of piss-poor reasoning, and high sounding but flakey scholarship.
Serious students of the Bible will be laughing at your silly antics for years.
All this from the guy that cannot even tell us what the first verse of his imagined 'gospel' is.




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LegionOnomaMoi

Again, you stated that the translation "untimely" to mean "too late" was impossible because there is no example we have of the word used in this precise sense. In favor of this interpretation, you stated Mead's was far more likely. As your reason for rejecting the interpretation "untimely" to mean "too late" was a lack of any example of the greek word with this precise sense, then it seems only reasonable that you wouldn't accept Mead's unless he too could provide an example of ektroma used in the sense that he states. He doesn't. What he does is state that the concept of "abortion" at some point meant something less. So you have one set of standards for greek lexicographers (they cannot point to other metaphorical uses or the fact that the word means untimely and therefore conclude that in this case it means too late), and another standard for Mead (all he has to do is show that the concept of one sense of the supposedly could be used in this sense).

So Durant, the BDGA, Louw-Nida, and others who consider it plausible that, given the context in which the word appears and given that it doesn't technically mean "early" but "untimely" that here Paul uses "untimely to mean late" are just obviously wrong because they can't point to a specific usage of this word with this specific metaphorical sense, yet you don't even bother to wonder whether Mead knows of the greek word being used in the sense he is talking about? He doesn't refer to this specific wordbeing used in this specific way, (a criterion you require of those like Louw-Nida), merely the general concept used vaguely in some vague "gnostic circles."

For someone who says history is about probability and evidence, you seem to apply this skeptical approach rather selectively.

But let's just go where the evidence leads (I won't make you go through greek you can't read; that's not fair). What is Mead relying on? He doesn't say. But the only reference in Greek to this that I know of is Irenaeus, who addresses Valentiniasm and how they think (according to him) that Christ rose a girl from the dead while she was outside of the pleroma, like an abortion, and that Paul to says Jesus appeard to him "as an abortion." Only, Mead has a problem here. He states that we should not the use of the article, as Paul means etroma in a technical, gnostic sense. According to Mead
"Notice the article, "as to the abortion," not "as to an abortion." Now "the abortion is a technical and oft-repeated term of one of the great systems of the Gnosis, a term which enters into the main fabric of the Sophia-mythus. In the mystic cosmogony of these Gnostic circles, "the abortion" was the crude matter cast out of the Pleroma or world of perfection."

The first problem is that the term as used by Ireneaus DOESN'T have the article. It actually conflicts with Paul's use. The second problem is that we are relying on a work which is designed to show how wrong the Valintinians are, which hardly makes a very reliable source. The third problem is that this usage doesn't go back to Paul, but dates to a cosmology well after his time (it probably doesn't even go back to Valentinus, and Irenaeus is specifically referring to his folllowers, not Valentinus here).

So Mead's whole point about the article (which is incorrect anyway) falls apart here. Paul uses an article where Irenaeus doesn't. Then there's the fact that we're using a work specifically designed to represent this view as one which is completely wrong, and that Irenaeus is (supposedly) quoting not what Valentinus said but what his followers are saying. His followers are also saying that Jesus caused a human girl on earth to rise from the dead (she's the "abortion"). And, in fact, the reason Irenaeus is using this example is to show how ridiculous it is. Clearly (so the reasoning goes) the valentinians don't know what they are talking about, since they attempt to make Paul's use of the term into their own. And Irenaeus wrote/spoke greek.

Which, then, is more likely? That a source which is deliberately trying to attack, mock, and ridicule later gnostic views should be the trusted source for our interpretation of Paul's usage (which he presents as a way of "proving" how the gnostics obviously distort scripture), or that Paul uses the term "untimely born" here but to mean late? To say "that doesn't make sense because the term wasn't used to mean 'late birth'" falls apart very quickly because the term certainly didn't refer to the gnostic understanding until they made it up. So we have two possibilities: either Paul slightly extended the metaphorical use of the term, by making it mean "born late" rather than "born to early," or he is using another usage somebody else already extended to something vastly different which isn't attested to until well over a century after Paul. Either way, somebody made up a new usage.

M. A. William's book was about rejecting the category "gnostic" or "gnosticism" altogether. It refers to such a wide variety of views that it's has no meaning. For most scholars, it's still convenient but only as a sort of umbrella term (and they can't agree on which groups to include). As for addressing it, it simply doesn't make any sense. The whole approach to gnosticism Mead relied on is outdated.

Only there's no reason to think so, and there's a reason that textual critics don't.

It makes no sense unless one realizes that it is quite easy for someone to extend the meaning of a word that refers to an "untimely birth" usually in an early sense to mean "late to the game." Mead's argument relies on the same exact thing, only even more exotic: extending the word to refer not just to a metaphorical born late but an entire cosmology.

When I asked about whether you knew of linguistic study of metaphor it was because humans use it all the time in language and thought. A famous example is from one cognitive linguist (Langacker, I believe) who overheard someone in a bar answering a question about when some girl had left by saying "she left about two beers ago." There's no "dictionary" use of beer which indicates it can be used to measure time. But humans do this on a regular basis. Metaphor is deeply rooted not only in language change, use, and thought, but also in our ability to construct entirely new uses (like the above) all the time.



He doesn't give an example. He simply states "this is true." He doesn't refer to a text, and his entire bit about the article is completely wrong.

The concept "late birth" and "untimely birth" are a lot more related than "late birth" and "crude matter cast out of the pleroma." So whose "obviously jerry-rigging" here?


Based on?

Adam

Yikes! I stand REFUTED!

Sheshbazzar

Nothing new. You were refuted a long time ago, over and over, and by a string of opponents.

Still can't locate that first verse eh? To bad, until you do, both your theses and your credibility add up to zilch.

Toto

On the contrary, Mead's usage of abortion is essentially the literal meaning of the word. Abortion = born too early to be fully formed, with implications of being unformed, dead or a disgusting bloody mess. What he describes as the technical meaning is based directly on the literal meaning.

To assume that the word might mean "born normally but too late to meet Jesus" makes no sense. It takes a word that means born too early and turns it into a word that means too late, and removes all of the metaphorical baggage of disgusting, bloody, dead, etc. This is not a "slight extension" of the meaning. It is more a reversal, and just an patent attempt by modern critics to harmonize the text with what they think it ought to mean.

Your example of "two beers" is intuitively obvious, as a shortened form of "the time it takes to drink two beers." There's no great mystery there.

I would not want to rely to heavily on Mead. I was very impressed with the book when I first read it, but later realized that he was part of a school of thought that believed in communication with the spirits. But on this particular point, what he says about the concept of the abortion is born out by everything else I have read, and is the only interpretation that makes any sense of the use of that unusual word.

As I said, I'm not wedded to his interpretation. But it makes sense, especially if the text is a second century interpolation.

If Mead is not correct in relating this to the Valentinian concept of the Sophia, the alternative would be that Paul is describing himself as a wretch, which is a slight extension of the literal meaning of the word. Turning his words into a claim that he was just born too late is not a credible interpretation.

Dating the text of Paul's letters, and dating any possible interpolations, is another topic that would take this too far afield. Short answer: there is no record of these letters before Marcion "collected" them, and the earliest text is dated to the late second century. The standard dating relies on historical clues in Acts, based on the assumption that Acts is real history, which I see no reason to adopt. I have also been influenced by William O. Walker's book on Interpolations in the Pauline Letters.