DCHindley

No disrespect intended, Neil, but I think you left much of Charles' information out of your analysis of dating of the ascension part of the, well, Ascension.

Thank goodness that the PDF has been OCRd and much of the English text is searchable. You can also cut & paste (with a bit of editing for OCR errors) to reconstruct his complete analysis in brief.

It might take a bit of back and forth, as his introduction is more of a summary of what he discussed in the footnotes to the translation.

DCH

mountainman

The third part add nothing new to the evidence, but the second part contains the following assessment of chronology.

So now we have evidence of a manuscript dated to the mid 4th century. What happens next represents a conjecture of profound insight and belief. But it is not surprising since everyone seems to make the same conjecture. Time after time, without any evidence at all.

Isn't this a wonderful result for the story of "Christian Origins"?
But Charles may also very well be quite wrong.

This is a story repeated time and time again since the epoch of Charles until today, with manuscripts of all the other non canonical texts. The earliest physical manuscripts (of all other texts that comprise the non canonical corpus) in various languages are found ranging between the 4th and the 5th century. Setting aside the Oxyrhyncus paleographic dating of papri fragments, no earlier physical evidence has been found before the mid fourth century. I see a pattern emerging here.

andrewcriddle

Hi Earl

Sorry I wasn't clearer. There is a 4th century papyrus roll (not a codex), very fragmentary, which originally comprised a coptic version of a text of the whole Ascension of Isaiah very similar to the Ethiopic. One of these fragments comprises chapter 11 vs 14-16. Only a few phrases are legible but what survives seems very close to the text represented by the Ethiopic.

I don't think this evidence is drastically significant but it does probably require a 3rd century or earlier date for the Ethiopic text of chapter 11.

Andrew Criddle

andrewcriddle

One other issue which may be relevant is that some scholars, mostly Eastern European, (eg E Turdeanu), have suggested that the Latin text of the latter part of the Ascension, (the manuscript of which has been lost for hundreds of years), agrees with the Slavonic because it is not a translation from Greek but a translation from Slavonic.

Most scholars are not convinced, but if true it would explain some puzzling details in the Latin text.

If this was correct then the Latin would lose value as an independent witness to the Slavonic type of text. Given that the Slavonic text appears to have been transmitted by Bogomil/Cathar dualists, this would make it plausible that, instead of being original, the Slavonic text is a mythicization of an originally unambiguously historicist text.

Andrew Criddle

DCHindley

Doug,

I'm suspecting the issue is quite a bit more complicated than "what's above is like what's below". This morning I cracked open my 2 volumes of Harry Austryn Wolfson's Philo: Foundations of Religious Philosophy in Judaism Christianity and Islam (2nd printing, revised, 1948, no ISBN in them thar days, but the 4th printing, also revised, 1968, is 0674664507).

Philo, a Jewish Platonist, accepted some parts of Plato's conceptions and rejected others, while adding some elements of his own. Aristotleans and Stoics also had their own ideas about these issues of ideal patterns and cosmology, including the nature and place of daemons and angels.

Wolfson devotes quite a bit of ink to the subject of God and Ideas (vol. 1, pp. 200-203), Ideas (pp. 204-216), Powers (pp. 217-225), Creation and Structure of the World (pp. 295-324) and Unbodied Souls or Angels (pp. 366-384). The relationship between Plato's theory of Ideas and his concept of the cosmos (the universe) and the beings that inhabit it, is fairly complex.

I am going to try to scan and OCR some of the relevant pages and whip up a little article. It might take a few days, but with luck it will generate more light than heat. While I (over)paid $100 for my completely spotless volumes*, they are available for sale used for $50-$100, just make sure you get both volumes of the same edition, of which there were four revisions between 1947 and 1968. Wolfson died in 1974.

DCH

*I believe they were purchased by L. C. Haas, president of The Temple Club of Cleveland (Ohio), for Jerome N Curtis, a lawyer who was president of the Jewish Community Council of Cleveland, in appreciation for a speech he gave in February 1948 at The Temple Club relating to the 29 November 1947 United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181 (II) Future Government of Palestine. Curtis is on record as having written to the UN General assembly on 1/16/1948 about this very matter. The topic might possibly have been about the status of Jewish refugees as a result of that partition vote, as Curtis was also active as a board member of the Cleveland Committee for the National Confrence of Jewish Social Welfare, at least as of Dec. 1949.

DCHindley

Earl,

While researching my response regarding Wolfson & Philo, I stumbled upon a 1983 PhD dissertation about Philo's use of Plato's Timaeus that just happens to give a very nice summary of what middle Platonism was all about.

D. T. Runia, PHILO OF ALEXANDRIA AND THE TIMAEUS OF PLATO (1983). There are 2 pdf files, file #1 has the goods (Chapter Four: THE TIMAEUS FROM PLATO TO THE AGE OF PHILO).

The importance of the Middle Platonists in passing on the torch of Platonism is increasingly being recognized. But who were these philosophers? Where did they come from? And what were their methods and teachings? As we have seen, the origins of the movement in all likelihood lie in Alexandria. When, however, in the second century A.D. professing Platonists start to emerge in greater numbers they are spread throughout the Eastern Mediterranean, with even a local school in distant Carthage. The evidence does not point to any particular concentration of activity in Athens. [Omit a series of names] There is an air of mediocrity surrounding these figures. Middle Platonism did not produce a dominant figure like Plotinus [a NeoPlatonist of the 2nd century CE] who could produce a major synthesis.

...

The following list gives, in very general terms, those philosophical doctrines found in Middle Platonism which are almost wholly derived from the Timaeus and its interpretative tradition.(99)

(1) The doctrine of the three principles - God, the ideas, matter. On this doctrine the entire edifice of the philosophical systematics is built.(100)

(2) Theology. The highest god is a transcendent nous, reminiscent of Aristotle's Unmoved mover.(101) He creates only indirectly, by inciting the second god (i.e. the rational part of the cosmic soul) to action. Plato's demiurge is thus split in two.

(3) The ideas. The ideas are considered transcendent real entities, but their function is more 'physical' than epistemological, i.e. to serve as paradigm for the cosmos and all its natural parts (ta kata fusin).

(4) The ideas as God's thoughts. The ideas as transcendentalia are located in God's nous as the object of his thought.(102) Creation takes place when God looks to his thoughts as cosmic paradigm.

(5) Matter. The Platonic receptacle is interpreted under the influence of Aristotelian ulh and Stoic ousia. It is the unformed, quality-less substrate out of which the cosmos is created. A tendency towards (mild) dualism, in which matter is regarded as a source of evil , is sometimes encountered.

(6) Creation. Under the influence of Plato's account the structure of reality is explained in a creationistic way, even if a literal creation is denied.(103)

(7) Cosmogony. The question of whether the genesis did or did not take place in time (i.e. whether the Timaeus should be read literally or not) was endlessly discussed. The division between literalists (Plutarch, Atticus) and nonliteralists (the majority) is fundamental in Middle Platonism.(104)

(8) The theme of divine Providence. God's providential activity (105) is explicitly affirmed, and efforts were made to correlate it with the problems of fate and free will. God is, by definition, never the cause of evil.

(9) The cosmic soul. The important role of Plato's cosmic soul is retained. But note two modifications: its functioning is portrayed very much in terms of the Stoic Logos; it can be regarded as irrational and as awakened and made rational by the creating god.(106)

(10) Cosmology. A hierarchy of living beings, much more complex than that of the Timaeus, is introduced under the influence of the Old Academy.(107) There is much interest in demonology and much indecision as to whether to accept a fifth element.

(11) Man's soul. The doctrine of the tripartition and trilocation of the soul is retained, but it is considered that essentially the soul has two parts, to logikon and to alogon.

(12) The telos. The doctrine of man's end in life is a part of ethics. It is summed up in the Platonic slogan omoiwsis qew found in the Theatetus. By reading it into the Timaeus, it is connected with the conception of qewria.(108)

http://dare.ubvu.vu.nl/handle/1871/15502

I am still researching the technical details about the cosmology of Plato's Timaeus and how Middle Platonists interpreted it in the 1st century CE.

DCH

Toto

The last two posts have been merged into this thread per DCH's request

DCHindley

Hello all,

While I started this in order to investigate Earl's Sublunar Realm concept, it is becoming evident that what Earl is proposing has some affinity with Gnostic points of view. Since this touches on my own research into the development of Christianity, I have decided to really look closer at the subject of Platonism in general.

As a result, I have expanded my research to include Platonism, Middle-Platonism, and Neo-Platonism as it relates to the creation and nature of the cosmos, and the world soul and created souls, and where in the cosmos each kind of soul belongs.

I am running out in a few minutes to check out The Middle Platonists: 8- BC to AD 220 (or via: amazon.co.uk) (John Dillon, 1977) and Neo-Platonism (or via: amazon.co.uk) (R T Wallis, 1972), and have The Platonic Cosmology (or via: amazon.co.uk) (Richard D Mohr, 1985) on order through inter-library loan. FWIW, I am also going to reference Andrew Criddle's six part 2009 study entitled "Neoplatonism and Gnosticism". I also have some articles and books by Birger Pearson who postulates a Middle Platonic Gnostic Myth, example Gnosticism, Judaism, and Egyptian Christianity (or via: amazon.co.uk), 1990.

Philo of Alexandria is another case entirely. While Philo was definitely a classically trained Middle-Platonist, he had significantly modified the classical view in order to make it compatible with the concept of God in the Pentateuch. For this, I was able to download copies of both volumes of D T Runia's Philo of Alexandria and the Timeaus of Plato (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1983) and I already had a copy of the 2nd revised edition of Henry Austryn Wolfson's Philo: Foundation of Religious Philosophy in Judaism, Christianity & Islam (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1948).

Unfortunately, I did not realize that Earl's book Jesus: Neither God nor Man (or via: amazon.co.uk) is over 800 pages and costs just under $40. Unfortunately, not a single copy is to be found in any state academic library or the county library system, so I cannot even get a copy through interlibrary loan. I am loathe to buy a copy, as I am a cheap SOB.

So, when I get the books all in, the best I may be able to do is provide an overview against which you all can evaluate arguments about sublunar realms and flesh vs spirit.

Until then ... if participants can give specific doctrines and sources by Earl, I would appreciate that.

DCH

DCHindley

A list member was kind enough to mail me his own signed copy of Earl's book, and I've been leafing through it. I will say that Earl has referenced a wide variety of primary and secondary sources, many of which I am familiar with too. It is clear that he has been following discussion boards, including Mark Goodacre's Synoptic-l. The books format bears not a little resemblance to Crossan's Birth of Christianity, especially in layout and the cutsie section titles.

In the next couple of days I will be looking at Earl's concept of Platonism and its relationship with a divided universe, sublunar realms, and mystery cults, and summarize them here.

As soon as I get a copy of Mohr's The Platonic Cosmology from interlibrary loan I'll get into an analysis of how close Earl's conceptions about these things are based in what the primary sources actually say.

DCH

mountainman

Hi All,

Has anyone read Platonism and Christianity: A Mere Antagonism or a Profound Common Ground?
by C. J. De Vogel, Vigiliae Christianae, Vol. 39, No. 1 (Mar., 1985) (pp. 1-62)?

Best wishes,


Pete