Layman

The same thought occured to me. Thanks to MW for bringing this to my attention.

Toto

I know you think this is a joke, but I'm sure that Layman believes that Marcion made significant changes in his versions of Paul's letters to fit his heretical opinions. And we know that Marcion was anti-Jewish. Why is this not a good possibility?

Layman

Because, as Tertullian establishes, the orthodox Church had its own versions of 1 Thess. and knew how they differed from Marcion's. Yet he is quite clear that the passage we have today was in the manuscripts he was using to combat Marcionism.

And Marcion is better known for altering words or cutting out swaths of passages he did not like. I'm not aware that he was accused of interpolating multipe passages. Could you provide some references to that effect? I'd honestly be interested in them.

Vinnie

Thats why I brought it up. I am well aware of the editorial activity of Marcion. But yes, I do consider the thesis that Marcion made it up as a defense for interpolation to be a joke for a number of reasons.

The primary reason being that it is methodologically flawed. First and foremost comes a discussion of Paul. The fact that a text agrees with a later author's views does not give one grounds to argue "interpolation" if it is consistent with the other author's views. They just agree.

If its not inconsistent with Pauline thought and so on there is no reason to toy around with Marcion. You have to provide good reason that it should be viewed as an inteprolation before moving on to candidates for interpolation. Marcion is only valid as a candidate once we have determined the passage is an interpolation but that is precisely the issue at hand here and Layman has argued that it pre-existed Marcion as well anyways so its a moot point. See his latest post.

Vinnie

Toto

I know that the usual story is that Marcion charged his opponents with interpolations and his opponents charged Marcion with cutting out what he did not like. But why could Marcion not have added this? Tertullian might have just accepted it into his edition.

If you believe that Tertullian would never invent or alter a text, I guess you'd believe anything.

But I'm running out of time and will have to take this up again after the holidays.

Vinnie

You are going on vacation or something aren't you? If so, have fun and happy Thanksgiving

If the stuffing is a little bland interpolate a little salt and pepper into it when no one is looking

Vommoe

Layman

Nothing but generalities from you, Toto. Offer some substance if you really want to participate in the discussion.

You are speculating with no evidence or even discussion that Marcion invents this passage that was in NO manuscripts before, then Tertullian likes it so much that he takes this from his most bitter heretic foe and added it to the sacred scriptures he is defending from that foe. And Tertullian does this in a public argument against Marcion's altering the scritpures, even though his audience would have had their own versions of Thess. and known that Tertullian was copying from Marcion! But wait, there is more. Tertullian, though loving this passage so much he adopts it from a hereitic, cannot go so far as to include the part about the prophets being "their own." For some unknown reason, the statement that the prophets were the Jews "own" goes too far for Tertullian and he denounces Marcion publically for changing "the" to "their own" while he's busy coopting the entire passage.

This is going to become a habit for me. LOL!

MortalWombat

What are you talking about? Cyprian most certainly cites 1 Kings 19 in this passage (although it appears he is using a different numbering system)That is taken directly from 1 Kings 19. He would therefore not need to quote Paul in Romans, because Paul is already quoting the original source, 1 Kings.

MortalWombat

Here is another passage from Cyprian from the same treatise where he lays the blame of Jesus' death at the Jews, yet again fails to quote Paul (although he does quote from the Old Testament and the Gospel of Matthew).

Treatise XII.1 Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews, Book 2

And again in the same book, again failing to mention that Paul thought that the Jews crucified Christ:

Layman

You mean he does not quote the Gospel of Luke, the Gospel of Mark, or the Gospel of John? Is this new evidence that they did not exist at that time? How much evidence do you think he needed to argue something no one in his audience was denying?

These references are irrelevant to the issue of the authenticity of this passage. It already existed in multiple manuscript traditions over a hundred years prior. And there was plenty of evidence to be had for this point. That the author did not create a Thesarus on the issue is irrelevant.