spin

Just to caution you, when is the first instance of Julian being called an apostate??


spin

Transient

Even more importantly we need evidence that Julian was baptised as a christian and accepted Jesus as his lord and saviour - otherwise it cannot be determined that Julian ever was a christian and therefore could never become apostate.

andrewcriddle

It is rhetorically implied by Ambrose writing to Theodosius Andrew Criddle

spin

I.e. over 15 years after Julian's death. None of the writers who were actually Julian's contemporaries made the claim, Athanasius, Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, who knew him.


spin

mountainman

Question (1): Was Mani "Christianized"?


If we leave Emperor Julian for the moment in the post Nicaean epoch and instead examine the "process of Christianization" in the epoch of before the Council of Nicaea, in which Mani the Buddhist-Like Prophet of Persia lived, and in which Eiusebius's "Church History" becomes alive and animated, we should immediately recognise that examples of the the modus operandi of this process are present in Josephus, via the interpolation of the "TF", in King Agbar of Eddessa, via his letter exchange with "Jesus", and in Senecca, via his forged correspondence with the Apostle "Paul", just to name three examples.

In each of these examples, at a later date, presumed by many to be in the 4th century, a "Christian Hand" interpolated and/or forged material which would have the intended audience believe that these known historical figures participated in the authorship of literary material which "make mention" of "Christian material".


Was Mani "Christianized" by interpolation of "Jesus" into his original writings

There can be no dispute that when we examine the evidence available on one of Mani's original Syriac writings, Gospel of Mani, sooner of later we might read the opening words in the following text

As far as I can determine the earliest fragments for any copies (i.e. including the above) of the literature of Mani or of the Manichaeans are dated to the end of the 4th century, after the christian orthodoxy had gained absolute control of the codex preservation processes, and after a myriad of other known interpolations and frauds were (most likely) perpetuated.

Example of the process of "Christianization" from the NHC

Direct evidence from the Nag Hammaid Codices dated to the mid fourth century includes the following explicit modus operandi of the fabrication of "The Sophia of Jesus Christ" (NHC 3.4) from a pagan text about “Eugnostos the Blessed” (NHC 3.3) via an intermediatory text at NHC 5.1). I have copied this note from post #6 (where it has not yet been addressed) in order to more fully justify the use of this term being used called "the process of Christianization".

Fabrication of the Sophia of Jesus Christ

As if they were sequentially presenting a geometrical treatise of Euclid, the editors of the NHC present three different versions of the one source text. In the first instance a book called “Eugnostos the Blessed” (Eugnostos means "Right Thinking") is written by scribal hand at NHC 3.3. It is then repeated a second time at NHC 5.1, with one small addition ... "The first aeon, then, is that of Immortal Man. The second aeon is that of Son of Man, who is called 'First Begetter' (and in Codex 5.1; "who is called 'Savior'" is added). Thus, the second version is exactly the same as the first version but with the addition of one phrase – namely "who is called 'Savior'. Finally at NHC 3.4, the tract entitled "The Sophia of Jesus Christ" is a "Christianized" and redacted form of the original Eugnostos the Blessed. In other words, the editor of the NHC is setting out the process by which non-Christian wisdom was "Christianized".

Did Jospehus mention Jesus in his original authorship of his Jewish histories?

Did any of the official correspondence from the court of King Agbar ever mention Jesus?

Hence the question .... "Did Mani mention Jesus?" is not to be trivially answered.


Further questions

(2) Was Mani crucified?
(3) Had Eusebius read the "Gospel of Mani"?

Toto

So are you saying that just because you have some examples of Christians forging the name of Jesus, that any mention of Jesus before the fourth century is a forgery?

Do you have some particular argument for this particular mention of Jesus being forged?

I fail to see the logic here.

Take your examples:

Josephus - the interpolation of the "TF"

Josephus wrote an influential history of the Jewish War that Christians adopted because it showed God wrecking vengeance on the Jews. Someone, probably Eusebius, added a part on Jesus. Josephus was not a heretic. How is this comparable to Mani?

King Agbar of Eddessa, via his letter exchange with "Jesus"

King Agbar was a historical person of some importance. Some Christian invented letters showing that he asked Jesus for help. Agbar was not a heretic. How is this comparable to Mani?

Senecca, via his forged correspondence with the Apostle "Paul"
Again, Seneca was an important person in his own right, whose writings were considered to be compatible with Christian philosophy. Someone forged some letters between Paul and Seneca, to show them on good terms. Seneca was not a heretic. How is this comparable to Mani?

mountainman

No I am just talking about Mani.

Just how certain can we be that the original writings of this author Mani mentioned "Jesus" for example. I have already pointed out that the earliest manuscripts that I have been able to find are dated to the late 4th century. Some of these later manuscripts show the name of "Jesus Chrestos", and some of them appear to cite a section of text from the non canonical Gospel of Peter.

OTOH if we can establish that the original 3rd century writings of Mani mentioned "Jesus" then I would have to revise my original hypothesis and theories etc. At the moment I am defending the position that Mani may have been some Buddhist-Like historical figure within the Persian Empire between 240 and 276 CE, sage and author of books which were unrelated to "Jesus of the NT".

Mani is sort of analogous perhaps to the Pythagorean figure (and author) of Apollonius of Tyana within the Roman Empire between 40 and 120 CE. Both had many followers at the time Eusebius was preparing and researching the material that he would assemble into his "History of the Church". (i.e. between 312 and 324 CE). Nothing related to the early sources about Apollonius of Tyana, including his miraculously preserved biography, mention "Jesus" or the "Christians", and I suspect the same may the case for the earliest writing of Mani and the Manichaeans.


Was Mani Christianized?

So yes, I suspect that it is reasonable to consider than Mani is another figure who has been "Christianized" in the 4th century by the orthodox regime which was at that time successfully burning and destroying ALOT of ORIGINAL books. It was the very beginning of the official fascist "Index Librorum Prohibitorum". Books targetted for burning and destruction include but are not limited to ........ the books of the Manichaeans, and the books of the Gnostic Gospels, and the books of the Gnostic Acts, and the Books of Porphyry, and the books of that Porphyrian Arius of Alexandria, and the books of Emperor Julian, and the books in the library of Alexandria, etc, etc, etc.

Transient

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cologne_Mani-Codex

What annoys me about this sort of stuff is statements like this one:
"From this recent discovery, we know much more about the man who founded one of the most influential world religions of the past."

Well no we don't. What we know is what someone writing well after the life of the person thinks about Mani. There is a world of difference. If we get a lot of very different sources saying basically the same thing independently and written quite close to the time when a person lived then it might be fairly likely that some of the stuff is true.
One story by one person is not very reliable at all. It could be largely made up for all we know.

stephan huller

mountainman

I have said this before. You came out and dismissed all the evidence from the first, second, third and early fourth centuries Church to prove that no Christian Church ever existed in that period. That is a very bold move. Let's suppose that in some way that was justified (which I am in no way acknowledging except as an intellectual exercise). To now go on to argue this whole other paradigm - the Manichaean tradition - should also be ignored merely because you MIGHT at some future date come up with evidence that Mani was only associated with Jesus in the fourth century HAS TO be seen as pushing the limits of common sense.

Mani and the Acts of Archelaus tradition in particular provide a clear framework for understanding Mani as a Christian messiah. That's the point that Toto makes that I don't think you quite get.

I know that you will turn around and dismiss the Acts of Archelaus because they have been passed on to us in a corrupt form. The texts have certainly been reworked. But the basic idea that Mani came to Harran claiming to be the Paraclete that Jesus announced in his gospel. Why would Eusebius (who never cites from the Acts of Archelaus to my knowledge) invent such a strange narrative?

If you look closely at the text you will see that the 'orthodox' religion at Harran is Marcionite rather than Catholic. This confirms Bauer's hypothesis that Marcionitism had 'exclusive rights' to the name 'Christian' and 'Christianity' and the Catholics had to settle for 'Palutians' (i.e. the followers of Palut). The Marcionite beliefs are confirmed both by the fact that Archelaus himself accepts Paul to be the Paraclete (a Marcionite position witnessed by Origen) and the fact that Marcellus (Latin = Gk 'Marcion') is connected with a great Church leader in the distant past that resembles Marcion.

I also personally suspect that the title Mani derives from menachem (Aram. Paraclete) but have never managed to work that out to my own satisfaction.

stephan huller

But that is true about anything. It is hard to dispute the fact that Mani was a real person who somehow founded a worldwide tradition which centrally connected him to Jesus. Now many or most people around here want to dismiss Christian claims because Jesus was a mythical figure. But it is harder to argue that Mani - who is universally acknowledged to have been a historical figure - only became a Christian owing to the influence of people who lived almost a century after his death.

He never became a Christian in the familiar sense of the world. He claimed - like Mohammed - to be the awaited Paraclete of Jesus. Why on earth would a Catholic conspiracy invent this? How would it possibly have taken over the identity of the religion so quickly?

Again the key is archaeological evidence. This seems to settle the question of whether Manichaeanism was

We now possess genuine primary Manichaean texts in considerable quantity from the former major Silk Road settlements and from various sites in Egypt. These comprise texts written in: Middle Iranian (mainly in Middle Persian, Parthian, Sogdian, Bactrian, and early New Persian); Tocharian and Old Turkish from the Turfan Oasis, China; in Chinese from Tunhuang, China; in Coptic from Medinet Madi, Egypt; and in Latin (the Tebessa Codex ) from Algeria, as well as small fragments in Syriac from Egypt. Furthermore, in a series of ongoing excavations since 1990, Australian and Canadian archaeologists under the direction of Dr Colin Hope (Monash University, Melbourne, Australia) have unearthed at Kellis (modern Ismant el-Kharab) in the Dakhleh Oasis (Egypt) what appears to have been a major Fourth Century AD Manichaean site consisting of at least four intact houses. A very large number of well preserved Manichaean texts in Greek, Coptic, and Syriac (including bilingual Syriac and Coptic word-lists) on wooden boards as well as smaller text-fragments on papyri have been recovered. Many of the texts recovered from Central Asia and Egypt are in a fragmentary condition and many primary texts and fragments are still unpublished (especially many Turfan fragments) or have been published only in facsimile form (particularly the still unedited codices of the Medinet Madi corpus). However, systematic work has been undertaken on these texts in several major institutions of learning, especially in Germany, Great Britain, France, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Belgium, Russia, Japan, China, and Australia." (From: http://www.museum.mq.edu.au/ahist/Do.../CFMabout.html)