Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Littlejohn · 07-10-2008, 09:36 AM

From thread "Luciano", dating May 7, 2008, 02:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RParvus

Quote:

What are your views on Detering's "working hypothesis"? Is there any possibility of a chain?

Marcion is Peregrinus is Ignatius?

I don’t think there was a chain. I think Peregrinus was the author of the Ignatians and that he was a follower of Apelles. Although Apelles was at first a disciple of Marcion, he broke with him at some point and founded his own sect. He rejected several Marcionite doctrines including ditheism, docetism, and Marcion’s canon and sexual asceticism.

Dr. Detering has a copy of my book and has kindly put up a blurb for it on his radikalkritik website. I am hoping that once he has read the book he will give his opinion.

Roger Parvus

Sorry ... I have been interested in "Peregrinus" by Luciano of Samosata and I gained valuable data for my research on the Christianity' s origins.

All First, it must be said that the Peregrinus was a real historical figure of cynical philosopher, lived in the second century. We have of him the testimony of Aulus Gellius (see "Noctes Atticae") and Tertullian, and perhaps someone else, as Filostrato: a scholar of the "second sofistic" which, they say, belonged the same Luciano. While Tertullian cites simply as "Peregrinus", one find in Aulus Gellius "Proteus Peregrinus." But it isn't said that this quote is genuine, since it can be an interpolation of a Christian scribe (maybe because he thought to Proteus Peregrinus by Luciano of Samosata), which added to the name Peregrinus also Proteus.

However, the nickname "Proteus" was not an invention of Luciano, as he availed of some characteristics of the character that he intended to hide behind the figure of the philosopher stoics Peregrinus. While the latter lived in the 2th century, as already mentioned, the first ("Proteus") lived instead in the 1th century.

I read the essay by Hermann Detering about his view that behind the character Peregrinus hidden in fact that of Marcione. Reading the other assumptions, but I realized (forgive the presumption) that nobody has centered the target.

Indeed, the character "Proteus" (and therefore NOT Peregrinus) other wasn't that PAULUS OF TARSUS!!

The episode narrated by Luciano in "De morte Peregrinis ", namely that about imprisonment of Peregrinus Proteus, we found it equal equal in the Acts of Paul and Tecla!

At this point remains only one thing to do: try to understand who was in reality "Paulus of Tarsus" ..

All best.

Littlejohn

_____

PS: I have already explained, in another thread, that Paul of Tarsus we know today through epistles and Acts of the Apostles, is actually the result of "sincretica" overlap of two distinct characters: Paulus / Saul and "Paulus of Tarsus. " At the character resulting from such literary "fusion", was imposed the name of Paul of Tarsus.
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Clivedurdle · 07-10-2008, 11:46 AM

and....

Littlejohn · 07-10-2008, 12:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

and....

Sorry.....What?..

Best regards

Littlejohn
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Clivedurdle · 07-10-2008, 01:00 PM

Please continue - this looks fascinating.

Littlejohn · 07-10-2008, 01:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Please continue - this looks fascinating.

Sorry...The discussion on the personality and identity of Paul, will be made in another thread and on another occasion.

All best greetings

Littlejohn

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Littlejohn · 07-11-2008, 06:10 AM

Quote:

...The episode narrated by Lucian in "De morte Peregrinis ", namely that about imprisonment of Peregrinus Proteus, we found it equal equal in the Acts of Paul and Tecla!

A small curiosity for those concerned.

"Tecla" wasn't the name of ' "heroine" of the Acts of Paul and Tecla, but an attribute. Its real meaning is "THE BRILLIANT". Anything could say or much, depending on how you look at the whole affair ..

Littlejohn

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Littlejohn · 07-12-2008, 12:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Littlejohn

A small curiosity for those concerned.

"Tecla" wasn't the name of ' "heroine" of the Acts of Paul and Tecla, but an attribute. Its real meaning is "THE BRILLIANT". Anything could say or much, depending on how you look at the whole affair ..

Littlejohn

In order to better clarify the concept:

Tecla is a word that derives from the ancient germanic "Thecla", meaning "shining". This means that the attribute of the woman, at the time it was drafted the Acts of Paul and Tecla, could not be in germanic language, but in aramaic or greek or in latin. Why one didn't want to restore the attribute "shining" in one of these languages? ... Maybe because behind all this there is a truth hid embarrassing? ... I do not think anyone can exclude "tout-court" such an eventuality.

Littlejohn

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mountainman · 07-12-2008, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Littlejohn

..... drafted the Acts of Paul and Tecla

Hi LittleJohn,

The acts of Paul is currently classified as one of the Leucian Acts

Here is a small compendium of contemporary scholarship on the Acts of Paul .......

Quote:

Acts of Paul

Glenn Davis:
The Acts of Paul (Asia Minor, 185-195 CE) is a romance that makes arbitrary use of the canonical Acts and the Pauline Epistles. Many manuscripts have survived, there is an English translation in [Schneemelcher] v. 2 pp. 237-265, but there is not yet a critical edition. The canon list in the 6th century codex Claromontanus includes it with an indication that it contains 3560 lines, somewhat longer than the canonical Acts with 2600 lines. The author, so Tertullian tells us, was a cleric who lived in the Roman province of Asia in the western part of Asia Minor, and who composed the book about 170 CE with the avowed intent of doing honor to the Apostle Paul. Although well-intentioned, the author was brought up for trial by his peers and, being convicted of falsifying the facts, was dismissed from his office. But his book, though condemned by ecclesiastical leaders, achieved considerable popularity among the laity. Certain episodes in the Acts of Paul, such as the 'Journeys of Paul and Thecla', exist in a number of Greek manuscripts and in half a dozen ancient versions. Thecla was a noble-born virgin from Iconium and an enthusiastic follower of the Apostle; she preached like a missionary and administered baptism. It was the administration of baptism by a woman that scandalized Tertullian and led him to condemn the entire book. In this section we find a description of the physical appearance of Paul:

A man small in size, with a bald head and crooked legs; in good health; with eyebrows that met and a rather prominent nose; full of grace, for sometimes he looked like a man and sometimes he looked like an angel.

Another episode concerns the Apostle and the baptized lion. Although previously known from allusions to it in patristic writers, it was not until 1936 that the complete text was made available from a recently discovered Greek papyrus. Probably the imaginative writer had read Paul's rhetorical question: 'What do I gain if, humanly speaking, I fought with the wild beasts at Ephesus?' (I Cor. 15:32). Wishing to supply details to supplement this allusion, the author supplies a thrilling account of the intrepid apostle's experience at Ephesus. Interest is added when the reader learns that some time earlier in the wilds of the countryside Paul had preached to that very lion and, on its profession of faith, had baptized it. It is not surprising that the outcome of the confrontation in the amphitheater was the miraculous release of the apostle.

Geoff Trowbridge:
The Acts Of Paul (c. 150-200 C.E.) were by far the most popular of the apocryphal acts, spawning a great deal of Christian art and secondary literature, as well as a cult which venerated Thecla, the young girl who accompanies Paul on his missionary journeys. The Acts were considered orthodox by Hippolytus, as well as other writers as late as the mid-fourth century, but were eventually rejected by the church when heretical groups like the Manichaeans began to adopt them. Still, some late Greek texts of the Epistles to Timothy contain alternate passages that appear to be derived from the Acts. The Acts of Paul were often coupled with the Third Letter of Paul to the Corinthians, which was regarded as authentically Pauline by the Syrian and Armenian churches. Originally a separate work, it was likely written around the time of the pastoral epistles and conjoined with the later Acts only after it had been excluded from most Pauline collections. The letter was written primarily to combat Gnostic and Marcionite doctrine which utilized other Pauline works for anti-semitic means. This epistle has survived in several extant manuscripts, as have the stories of Thecla and the account of Paul's beheading in Rome; the remainder of the Acts exist only in fragmentary Greek texts from the third century, and Coptic texts from the fifth. The author, who is unknown, does not appear to show any dependence upon the canonical Acts, instead utilizing other oral traditions of Paul's preaching and missionary work. He likely wrote in Asia Minor near the end of the second century.

Philip Sellew
(The Anchor Bible Dictionary, v. 5, p. 202) writes: A 2nd-century Christian writing recounting the missionary career and death of the apostle Paul and classed among the NT Apocrypha. In this work Paul is pictured as traveling from city to city, converting gentiles and proclaiming the need for a life of sexual abstinence and other encratite practices. Though ancient evidence suggests that the Acts of Paul was a relatively lengthy work (3600 lines according to the Stichometry of Nicephorus), only about two-thirds of that amount still survives. Individual sections were transmitted separately by the medieval manuscript tradition (Lipsius 1891), most importantly by the Acts of Paul and Thekla and the Martyrdom of Paul, both extant in the original Greek and several ancient translations. Manuscript discoveries in the last century have added considerable additional material. The most important of these include a Greek papyrus of the late 3d century, now at Hamburg (10 pages), a Coptic papyrus of the 4th or 5th century, now at Heidelberg (about 80 pages), and a Greek papyrus of correspondence between Paul and the Corinthians (3 Corinthians = Testuz 1959), now at Geneva. These finds have confirmed that the Thekla cycle and story of Paul's martyrdom were originally part of the larger Acts of Paul (details in Bovon 1981 or NTApocr.).

My opinion is that this Acts of Paul, like the rest of the apochrypha, were written by pagan parodists of the fourth century (against the publication of the Constantinian canon 325-331 CE). The stories are truly and purposefully made totally unbelievable.

Have you read the Syriac "Acts of Philip"? Or the Acts of Thomas? Someone is taking the mickey out of the canon characters. (ie: parody). In the NHC 6.1 "Acts of Peter and the 12 Apostles" carbon dated to 348 CE the apostles (are there 11, 12 or 13??) are presented consistently as inept and uneducated non ascetics wandering around asking for food and lodgings. They know nothing about the acts of being true physicans and healers (as were the temple cults of Asclepius for example). They also consistently make new covenants ---- not with god, but with one another. It is a parody of the 4th century overnight rise of the christian religious ministry to the Hellenic culture.

The Hellenic culture is that city amidst the high waves of the sea and surrounded by high walls. The only opinion is endurance from the fourth century oppression. The man on the dock holds a palm leaf. Habitation and endurance. The Hellenic empire and the ancient traditions were under seige from Constantinianism.

The story of TAPOATTA is about the "Pearl Man Lithargoel" who refers to the "city of nine gates" referred to in th Gita. The author (of TAOPATTA) is a clever pagan polemicist, who still finds time and space to present a central theme of the "Pearl of (pagan) Wisdom". Someone buried it at Nag HMMadi to prevent it being found by the tax-exempt christian bishops scouring the countryside for many types of "forbidden books" in the mid-fourth century at which time land tax had "tripled in living memory".

Best wishes,

Pete
TAOPATTA

mountainman · 07-12-2008, 05:34 PM

Lucian is a very problematic author since the number of forgeries under his name is very high and the precise number is not yet known. Many of these Lucianic forgeries were bandied about in the fourth century. Start with "The Philopatris". Also note that Lucian and Leucius (after whom the Leucian Acts are named) are two entirely different (purported) authors of antiquity.

Best wishes

Pete

Littlejohn · 07-13-2008, 02:05 AM

Quote:

Pete wrote:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Littlejohn
..... drafted the Acts of Paul and Tecla

The acts of Paul is currently classified as one of the Leucian Acts

Hi Pete!

I think it highly unlikely that Luciano could have written this. According to tracks in patristic literature (see Jerome) to write the Acts of Paul and Tecla was a priest who was part dell'entourage of John the Apostle, in the period when the latter lived in Ephesus. According to Jerome, this priest would have written this work for "envy" against the author of the Acts of the Apostles. Also according to this source, the priest then repented and sconfessò what he had written. The reality was that the counterfeiters who composed the Acts of the Apostles, also inspired to acts Paul e Tecla, then existing. The author of this work (the already mentioned priest) in turn inspired the narrative (or the collection of material) of a character who was very close to "Paul of Tarsus."

Quote:

Glenn Davis:
The Acts of Paul (Asia Minor, 185-195 CE)

If Jerome said that to write the Acts of Paul and Tecla was a presbyter (ancient, no priest) of the "club" of John the Apostle, as may have been written between 185 and 195? ...

"...A man small in size, with a bald head and crooked legs..."

This should allow anyone to understand what was the true origin of the nickname "Paulus" (Paul): namely, a person small in stature! Both Paul/Saul that "Paul of Tarsus" had this feature.

Quote:

Wishing to supply details to supplement this allusion, the author supplies a thrilling account of the intrepid apostle's experience at Ephesus

The experiences of Paul in Ephesus were far more!

However, at least for the moment, this goes beyond what I can afford to make known ...

"... (against the publication of the Constantinian canon 325-331 CE)"

Still insist with Constantine? ... It is becoming a "fixed nail" for you! ..

Quote:

Have you read the Syriac "Acts of Philip"? Or the Acts of Thomas? Someone is taking the mickey out of the canon characters. (ie: parody). In the NHC 6.1 "Acts of Peter and the 12 Apostles" carbon dated to 348 CE the apostles (are there 11, 12 or 13??) are presented consistently as inept and uneducated non ascetics wandering around asking for food and lodgings. They know nothing about the acts of being true physicans and healers (as were the temple cults of Asclepius for example). They also consistently make new covenants ---- not with god, but with one another. It is a parody of the 4th century overnight rise of the christian religious ministry to the Hellenic culture.

I assure you that I have read everything that has to do with literature apocrifa, as well as a large part of patristi minors, little known, and historical eras of the church later than that of Eusebio. In any job, almost on time, rinvenivo of useful data to my research. In Acts of Peter and the 12 Apostles I found confirmation of a "certain" shift "space" on the part of Jesus. I ripromesso to make a second reading, more careful, to see if I can find new data useful.

Please note that there DON'T exist any work, both canonical, that apocryphal or gnostic containing 100% of truth about Jesus! All were composed by combining historical elements with elements of fantasy and this for a twofold purpose: either to make the tale so fantastic and capture the feeling of amazement of the simplest, or for mystify and falsify the historical reality, in order to hide what considered embarrassing and extremely dangerous for the castle of lies built by the counterfeiter fathers! Often these two aspects are simultaneously present in the various works.

To obtain useful data from any work, it needs a long and patient work of comparison with the data that continue to flow, thanks to unceasing research work!

All best

Littlejohn
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07-10-2008, 11:46 AM	#2
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	and....

07-10-2008, 01:00 PM	#4
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	Please continue - this looks fascinating.

07-12-2008, 05:34 PM	#9
mountainman Contributor Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Falls Creek, Oz. Posts: 11,192	Lucian is a very problematic author since the number of forgeries under his name is very high and the precise number is not yet known. Many of these Lucianic forgeries were bandied about in the fourth century. Start with "The Philopatris". Also note that Lucian and Leucius (after whom the Leucian Acts are named) are two entirely different (purported) authors of antiquity. Best wishes Pete

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