neilgodfrey

An argument for interpolation for the Romans 1:2-6 can be based on criteria, not speculation. You may disagree with William Walker's criteria for interpolations, but the fact that interpolation can be argued on the basis of his criteria belies the assertion that the arguments are "speculative at best". There is evidence for the interpolation argument. You may disagree with the interpretation of the evidence, and the criteria on which the interpretation is based, but it is misinformed to sweep aside the interpolation argument with assertions that it is merely speculative and lacks any evidence.

Doherty does not, I am sure, claim that the entirety of Romans 1:2-6 is an interpolation, but I will present an argument here that it is, in order to demonstrate that there is more than baseless speculation to the argument for interpolation.

Romans 1:2-6
The criteria used are from William Walker’s “Interpolations in the Pauline Letters”. Some of the specific points are from Detering, but he did not discuss them in relation to Walker's criteria as I am doing here.


Criteria 1: Text-critical evidence for interpolation

There is an inexplicable failure of Tertullian to cite the Son of David reference here:

Tertullian (Contra Marcion 4.36) relishes the use of Bartimaeus addressing Jesus as “Son of David” to counter Marcion’s assertion that Jesus had no human lineage or social recognition at his coming. Since Tertullian knew Paul was Marcion’s sole apostle it is perplexing that he did not conclusively push his argument against Marcion by citing this passage in Romans if it were known to him. He had opportunity to do so in CM 4.36 when discussing the Bartimaeus passage and again in CM 5.13 when discussing Romans. Even if we surmise that the reason he did not address the Romans passage was because it had been expunged by Marcion despite being kept in the gospel then we have even deeper perplexity since Tertullian would have loved nothing more than another opportunity to accuse Marcion of scandalous, hypocritical inconsistency.

Criteria 2: Contextual evidence for interpolation:

Romans 1:1-3 is an unnaturally extended epistolary introduction. (The normal ancient introduction was simply modest handful of words expressing little more, often no more, than “From X to Y”.) The formal introduction of a letter is simply not the place to embark on a lengthy digression to discuss several specific doctrinal and biographical points and is not found in any other ancient letters.

“Which he promised afore through his prophets in the holy scriptures”: This passage is a digression about the gospel Paul preaches and it stands oddly in the middle of a personal greeting at the opening of a letter. One is led to imagine an author in advanced state of dementia who loses track of what he is saying and wanders off before he can even finish a conventional “Hello, I’m Paul, I’m very glad to see you!” and thereby wandering off into possibly the longest letter opening in history.

Another conceptual jarring within these opening lines is one claim that Paul’s apostleship is of singular importance and set him apart for a “separate” function (1:1) and another that his apostleship is a communal “we” affair (1:5). There is no obvious room for both these views side by side: is the author feeling a bit on the bipolar side with the very first lines of his essay?

The longer text is not only unique in its length for an ancient letter but forms a clumsy transition to 1:7 by its awkwardly adjacent repetitions of what they are called to be:

Among whom are ye also called to be Jesus Christ's:
To all that are in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints

Without 1:2-6 we find that Rom.1:1 is followed naturally and smoothly, and consistently with ancient letters, by 1:7. Indeed, that 1:1 directly anticipated 1:7 is seen by the dual threefold conceptual correspondence:

Paul,

a servant of Jesus Christ,

called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God

To all that are in Rome,

beloved of God,

called to be saints

Criteria 3: Ideational evidence for interpolation

1:3, by virtue of being at the opening of the letter as an explanation of the very gospel Paul preaches, imputes great significance to the idea that Jesus was the Son of David. This contradicts Paul’s firm insistence elsewhere that he has no interest in the fleshly lineage or heritage of Jesus, even dismissing any such interest as a waste of time:

Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer (2 Cor.5:16)

Later in Romans the author further says that Jesus came to earth only in “the likeness” of sinful flesh, thus again contradicting the idea that he could have been a literal Son of David:

God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh (Rom.8:3)

The opening verses introduce the adoptionist doctrine that Jesus was only declared to be the Son of God at the resurrection. This also contradicts Romans 8:3 (quoted above) where the author accepts that it was “his Son” that God sent to earth, ostensibly “as” His Son, prior to any death and resurrection.


Criteria 4: Comparative evidence for interpolation

I have already referred to the apparent contradiction of Paul in one line asserting his separating personal apostleship and in another the commonality of his apostleship with others. The former assertion, that his apostleship sets him apart in a singular way, is certainly consistent with his assertions of a unique apostolic calling expressed in Galatians; while the latter assertion, that of a “communal apostleship”, would appear to be consistent with the way Acts, contrary to the letters, depicts Paul as one of several other apostles, even subordinate to them.

1:5 speaks of the Romans’ “obedience to the faith”. Yet one of the widely accepted features of “the genuine” Pauline letters is his concept of faith as an act or a mental state or response. The Pastorals, on the other hand, view faith as a regulatory set of teachings or dogma to which one subscribes. Partly for this reason the Pastorals are widely thought to be non-Pauline. So when we read in 1:3 of “obedience to the faith” we must think of this sort of faith as something that can be obeyed, i.e., as a non-Pauline understanding of the term.


Criteria 5: Motivational evidence

This passage in question touches the major doctrinal controversies in the early history of Christianity – the uniqueness of Paul or his subservience and identity with the other apostles; the relationship between faith and obedience; the nature of Jesus when he appeared on earth, and what was meant by the Son of God; and the status and relevance of the Jewish scriptures for Christianity. Macion claimed Paul as his authority and the sole true apostle for all, rejected the physical genealogy of Jesus and viewed him as the Son of God from the beginning, and denied the relevance of the Jewish scriptures to his gospel. One can imagine an anti-Marcionite redactor of wanting to “save” Paul’s writings, and the souls of his readers, by steering them into a “correct” understanding of the great apostle, even reminding them of their need for “obedience” to the precepts of the “faith” as taught by the authorities, such as himself, in the church.


Criteria 6: Locational evidence

Why here, in the opening greeting? The intrusion of doctrinal and biographical information in what should otherwise be a simple greeting might suggest that someone has tried to guide a reader into a correct understanding as they commence to engage a notoriously controversial letter. Tertullian admitted the letter “looks very much as if it abrogated the law”, but this introduction takes time out to speak of “obedience” to a non-Pauline concept of “faith”; this passage wedged in the greeting also counters any tendency to see Paul as a Sole Apostle for all his greatness; it especially sets “aright” one’s understanding of the nature of Jesus as a real man with human ancestry before one encounters any subsequent potentially “confusing” references to Jesus being in only the “likeness” of flesh; and finally it prepares readers for an adoptionist understanding of the Son of God.

Neil Godfrey

(from an old vridar post)

neilgodfrey

would you like to enlighten the rest of us, fathom, about who you really are and your qualifications?

FathomFFI

Silence does not justify any evidence of anything whatsoever, let alone interpolation.

FathomFFI

No.

:wave:

FathomFFI

We'll take a look at one of your claims, Neil.

It should be noted that the Gospel of Marcion was believed to be Marcion's version of the Gospel of Luke, well butchered.

Therefore, Tertullian was appealing to Marcion's Gospel of Luke with his use of Bartimaeus (Luk 18.35.) Since both Tertullian and Marcion place Jesus as being greater than Paul, Tertullian most likely appealed to the higher grade words of Jesus from Marcion's Gospel to support his position.

In fact, the usage of Jesus' own words is a theme held by Tertullian all through Contra Marcion 4.36, as he relates the story of the young rich man inquiring about eternal life (Luke 18.18).

Finally, it should be noted this assertion completely disintegrates with just a little more study on the works of Tertullian. Shown below, from Chapter XXII of On The Flesh of Christ, is all the the evidence you need to understand that he did indeed quote Paul's statment in Romans. Here is the text.

So yes, now you know that Tertullian knew all about what Paul said in Romans, and you also know it was not interpolated.

Doherty's argument deals with another claim of interpolation, yet again we see from Tertullian in Chapter XX of On The Flesh of Christ, the very text Doherty claims is an interpolation:

Therefore, since the argument rests on the supposed silence of Tertullian, and since we have demonstrated that no such silence actually existed, what then is the purpose of the rest of your argument, Neil?

Believe me, critiques are good, for they show the weaknesses in arguments, so that perhaps you can adjust and make them stronger.

Regards.

Team FFI.

neilgodfrey

You're confusing me Fathom.

You said that my argument that attempted to explain a silence does not count because no argument from silence counts.

But then you advanced your own argument from silence and said that trumps what you like to call my argument from silence.



You advanced an argument that showed Tertullian would have made use of the text from Paul had he known it at the time, even though this argument completely contradicts your above argument that asserted he would use the words of Jesus if available (which they were in Luke's gospel re the flesh of Christ etc), and not Paul's, or at least both.

But if Tertullian knew of the existence of that passage in Paul when he wrote CM, and even if he did prefer to use the words of Jesus to make his point, then how on earth could you -- knowing Tertullian's penchant for attack -- explain Tertullian not trouncing all over Marcion for his hypocrisy in presumably deleting it from his own edition of Paul? (I made that point in the original post, but of course, once again, you apparently did not read more than the first sentence.)

So the mystery of the first question, re the text Contra Macion, remains. Unless, according to you, either I accept your first argument from silence, or I accept your second argument that not only contradicts your first argument but also raises more questions.

The best you have done is to leave a question (re the first criterion) unanswered.

I am also confused by your reasoning that is analogous to a judge, on being presented with several points of evidence, interrupts the prosecution after they have cited their first and says, "there is no case to answer" before any of the rest of the evidence is heard.

Neil Godfrey

FathomFFI

An argument from silence is never a good argument, Neil. It never will be. You were using Tertillian to work out your argument, and claimed his supposed silence was textual evidence.

You argument was based on what you believed was a lack of evidence, but now you know you will need to adjust that argument, because the # 1 point of your argument was your understanding that Tertillian did not know of the text of Roman 1.1-7

So make it better, Neil. Work with this and change direction. I can critique the rest of your argument if you feel it necessary, but it all seems to depend on # 1 being true.


How do I explain something when we are not certain of the facts? We don't know if Marcion deleted anything from Romans, all we know is that in the 2nd century Tertillian had the text we have today of Romans.

We go with what we know and can prove. Sure we can use theories, but they absolutely need to come with a plethora of support.

Regards.

Team FFI.

Ben C Smith

Has Doherty now called Romans 1.2-6 (or any part of it) an interpolation, too? I was originally talking about Galatians 4.4. When I asked Earl once whether the seed of David reference was going to follow as another interpolation, he implied it was not out of the question, but did not by any means commit to it at the time.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

Are you suggesting that Tertullian was unaware of the seed of David bit in Romans 1.3? He knew it. Tertullian, On the Flesh of Christ 22.3:

Sed et Paulus, utpote eiusdem evangelii et discipulus et magister et testis quia eiusdem apostolus Christi, confirmat Christum ex semine David secundum carnem, utique ipsius. ergo ex semine David caro Christi. sed secundum Mariae carnem ex semine David, ergo ex Mariae carne est dum ex semine est David.

But Paul also, being a disciple and teacher and witness of the same gospel because he is an apostle of the same Christ, confirms that Christ is from the seed of David according to the flesh, evidently his own flesh. Therefore the flesh of Christ is from the seed of David. But it is from the seed of David in according to the flesh of Mary, and therefore from the flesh of Mary, since it is from the seed of David.

But in Against Marcion Tertullian has promised to refute Marcion from his own text; I imagine this seed of David line was absent from the Marcionite text.

Ben.

neilgodfrey

Not as far as I know. My only point was, as I tried to explain for Fathom's benefit, was to demonstrate that the proposition that a part of that section of Romans was indeed based on more than speculation. I wrote in my original piece:

That was my point.

Neil