Ben C Smith

For those interested in exactly what Theophilus has to say about the gospels, here are the relevant passages.

From Theophilus, To Autolycus 3.12:

Ετι μην και περι δικαιοσυνης ης ο νομος ειρηκεν, ακολουθα ευρισκεται και τα των προφητων και των ευαγγελιων εχειν, δια το τους παντας πνευματοφορους ενι πνευματι θεου λελαληκεναι.

Moreover, concerning also the justice of which the law has spoken, it is found that there are attending details both in the prophets and in the gospels, on account that all of them spoke, spirit-borne, by one spirit of God.

Theophilus of Antioch, To Autolycus 3.13:

Η δε ευαγγελιος φωνη επιτατικωτερον διδασκει περι αγνειας, λεγουσα· ∏ας ο ιδων γυναικα αλλοτριαν προς το επιθυμησαι αυτην ηδη εμοιχευσεν αυτην εν τη καρδια αυτου. και ο γαμων, φησιν, απολελυμενην απο ανδρος μοιχευει, και ος απολυει γυναικα παρεκτος λογου πορνειας ποιει αυτην μοιχευθηναι.

And the evangelical voice teaches more urgently concerning chastity, saying: Every one who looks upon another woman to desire her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. And the one who marries, it says, a woman divorced from the man commits adultery, and whoever divorces his wife except by reason of fornication makes her commit adultery.

Refer to Matthew 5.28; Matthew 5.32 = Luke 16.18.

Theophilus of Antioch, To Autolycus 3.14:

Το δε ευαγγελιον· Αγαπατε, φησιν, τους εχθρους υμων και προσευχεσθε υπερ των επηρεαζοντων υμας. εαν γαρ αγαπατε τους αγαπωντας υμας, ποιον μισθον εχετε; τουτο και οι λησται και οι τελωναι ποιουσιν. τους δε ποιουντας το αγαθον διδασκει μη καυχασθαι, ινα μη ανθρωπαρεσκοι ωσιν. Μη γνωτω, γαρ φησιν, η χειρ σου η αριστερα τι ποιει η χειρ σου η δεξια. ετι μην και περι του υποτασσεσθαι αρχαις και εξουσιαις, και ευχεσθαι υπερ αυτων, κελευει ημας ο θειος λογος, οπως ηρεμον και ησυχιον βιον διαγωμεν. και διδασκει αποδιδοναι πασιν τα παντα, τω την τιμην την τιμην, τω τον φοβον τον φοβον, τω τον φορον τον φορον, μηδενι μηδεν οφελειν η μονον το αγαπαν παντας.

And the gospel says: Love your enemies, and pray on behalf of those who revile you. For, if you love those who love you, what kind of reward do you have? Even the thieves and tax-collectors do this. And it teaches those who do good not to boast, lest they become pleasers of men. For it says: Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. Moreover, also concerning subjection to rulers and authorities, and prayer on their behalf, the divine word gives us orders, in order that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life. And it teaches to render all things to all, honor to whom honor, fear to whom fear, tax to whom tax, [and] to owe nothing to anyone except only to love all.

Refer to Matthew 5.44, 46 = Luke 6.28, 32; Matthew 6.3; 1 Timothy 2.2; Romans 13.7-8.

From Theophilus, To Autolycus 2.22.2:

Οθεν διδασκουσιν ημας αι αγιαι γραφαι και παντες οι πνευματοφοροι, εξ ων Ιωαννης λεγει· Εν αρχη ην ο λογος, και ο λογος ην προς τον θεον.

Whence the holy writings and all those borne by the spirit teach us, from among whom John says: In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God.

Refer to John 1.1.

It should also be kept in mind that only one of his works, To Autolycus, is still extant, though he was known to have written others. Jerome, On Famous Men 25:

Theophilus sextus Antiochensis ecclesiae episcopus, sub imperatore M. Antonino Vero librum contra Marcionem composuit, qui usque hodie exstat. feruntur eius et ad Autolycum tria volumina, et contra haeresim Hermogenis liber unus, et alii breves elegantesque tractatus ad aedificationem ecclesiae pertinentes. legi sub nomine eius in evangelium et in proverbia Salomonis commentarios, qui mihi cum superiorum voluminum elegantia et phrasi non videntur congruere.

Theophilus, sixth bishop of the church of Antioch, in the reign of the emperor Marcus Antoninus Verus composed a book Against Marcion, which is still extant, also three volumes To Autolycus and one Against the Heresy of Hermogenes and other short and elegant treatises, well fitted for the edification of the church. I have read, under his name, commentaries on the gospel and on the proverbs of Solomon which do not appear to me to correspond in style and language with the elegance and expressiveness of the above works.

(It would seem that Jerome harbors doubts that the commentaries on the gospels and on the proverbs are genuine.)

It would be especially interesting, in the context of this thread, to see what Theophilus wrote against Marcion, since Marcion himself accepted many gospel details.

From Jerome, epistle 121:

Theophilus, Antiochenae ecclesiae septimus post Petrum apostolum episcopus, quatuor evangelistarum in unum opus dicta compingens, ingenii sui nobis monumenta dimisit.

Theophilus, seventh bishop of the Antiochene church after Peter the apostle, in compiling the sayings of the four evangelists into one work, left us monuments of his ingenuity.

Jerome is, however, the only writer of whom I am aware that mentions this harmony of gospel sayings.

Ben.

andrewcriddle

If we accept some contact between Tatian and Justin and accept that Tatian is the author of the Diatessaron then we have to take seriously the textual affinities of Justin's Gospel text and the Diatessaron. It is highly plausible that Tatian knew the type of synoptic Gospel harmony used by Justin and likely that he knew it during Justin's lifetime.
IF one is borrowing from the other then at least one of the narratives is presumably a semi-fictional construction to make a point. Favorinus (the subject of the anecdote in Attic Nights) is a well-known person from the ancient world whereas the characters in the Octavius are much more obscure.

It is more likely IMO that an anecdote about a well known person would be borrowed as a framework for a dialogue, than that the framework for a dialogue between obscure characters would be removed from its original context and converted into an anecdote about a well-known character.

(Also we know that Minucius Felix had an excellent knowledge of secular Latin works, it is less likely that Aulus Gellius who IIUC does not mention Christianity at all would know of a Christian apology.)

Andrew Criddle

GakuseiDon

In fact, those "mythicist" apologists were later praised by those that followed, for their philosophical content. And that's exactly what they were, they were nearly all written in the late Second Century, at a time when Rome had a philosopher for an emperor, and Christians were trying to position Christianity as a philosophy school rather than a superstitious sect. By that time, pagans almost certainly knew about Christ and what Christians believed. You make it sound like Christians just had to mention Jesus and people would become believers. Is that how apologists work today? No -- the philosophy school was the Intelligent Design of its day. IDers rarely mention Genesis or the Bible -- not because they are hiding it, or even ashamed of it -- but because an ID is more relevant to the audience.

I've gone over examples in our debate on this, for those who are interested:
http://members.optusnet.com.au/gakus...ndC_Review.htm

I would respond: How about if we find the same things in the HJ writers? Wouldn't that render your point moot?

I don't find that in Theophilus. Are you quoting from memory again? The nearest I can find is:
http://www.earlychristianwritings.co...lus-book2.html

But what else is this voice but the Word of God, who is also His Son? Not as the poets and writers of myths talk of the sons of gods begotten from intercourse [with women], but as truth expounds, the Word, that always exists, residing within the heart of God. For before anything came into being He had Him as a counsellor, being His own mind and thought. But when God wished to make all that He determined on, He begot this Word, uttered, the first-born of all creation, not Himself being emptied of the Word [Reason], but having begotten Reason, and always conversing with His Reason. And hence the holy writings teach us, and all the spirit-bearing [inspired] men, one of whom, John, says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God," showing that at first God was alone, and the Word in Him. Then he says, "The Word was God; all things came into existence through Him; and apart from Him not one thing came into existence." The Word, then, being God, and being naturally produced from God, whenever the Father of the universe wills, He sends Him to any place; and He, coming, is both heard and seen, being sent by Him, and is found in a place.

If you think that HJer writers could deny that gods could be born from mortal men, take my "Spot the mythicist!" challenge (from here:
http://members.optusnet.com.au/gakus...view_Part2.htm)

ONE (and only one) of the following statements is made by one of Doherty's mythicists. The rest come from two HJers. Can you spot which one is from the mythicist?

* But when you say that they only make men into gods after their death, do you not admit that before death the said gods were merely human?

* They, therefore who cannot deny the birth of men, must also admit their death; they who allow their mortality must not suppose them to be gods.

* Therefore neither are gods made from dead people, since a god cannot die; nor of people that are born, since everything which is born dies

* It is impossible that a god should be bound or mutilated; and if it be otherwise, he is indeed miserable

* ... you form a virgin from Diana ... What excuse can be found for that insolence which classes the dead of whatever sort as equal with the gods?

* Besides, if they were able to make gods of themselves after their death, pray tell me why they chose to be in an inferior condition at first?

* It is a settled point that a god is born of a god, and that what lacks divinity is born of what is not divine.

* And they say that he [Tammuz] was killed by a wound from a wild boar, without being able to help himself. And if he could not help himself, how can he take thought for the human race? But that a god should be an adulterer or a hunter or should die by violence is impossible

* And he [Osiris] was killed by Typhon and was unable to help himself. But it is well known that this cannot be asserted of divinity... And how, pray, is he a god who does not save himself?

Taken in isolation, we could ask, how could HJers make these kinds of statements without indicating how the same didn't apply to Christ? Well, the fact is that THEY DID. But we can understand WHY they did when reading the context, rather than extracting just a sentence. We need to look at the overall literature.

The plain fact of the matter is that you haven't checked the HJ literature to see whether those "indicators" that you find in your mythicist writers aren't also in the HJ writers. You simply haven't looked at all the available evidence. I suggest this amounts to a one-sided presentation of the evidence.

Ted Hoffman

Doherty's point is not about just what we find but also what we do not find.
Doherty does not take them in isolation. You are knocking a strawman.
This is an empty declaration. You havent uncovered anything new that is not already mentioned by Doherty so you cannot claim that he hasn't checked everything.

The next thing is to account for that silence. Thank you very much.

Ted Hoffman

These are very vague alussions and that give us no idea about the nature of the gospels and whether they contained any HJ.

youngalexander

You are referring to pg106

... a type of crank that historians who study the past two centuries sometimes encounter: anticlericals who deny the historicity of Christ (which irritates me, atheist that I am) and addled brains who deny the existence of Socrates, Joan of Arc, Shakespeare, or Moliere, get excited about Atlantis, or discover monuments erected by extraterrestials on Easter Island.

Interesting list. Having spent the past half century examining the outpourings of such 'cranks', I must say that I do not find that those 'who deny the historicity of Christ' fit the same mold. Misguided they may be, 'cranks' they are not. Afterall, why would you bother debating them otherwise?

A second point is the 'anticlerical' designation. I have noted similar accusations on this forum. Usually they take the form of 'hate Christianity'. Now while we do observe the odd anti-X rant from time to time, I would not have thort that this is in anyway associated with the proponents of a MJ position.

One wonders to what extent Veyne has examined the question?

While I am at it, for GDon a bit of a spoiler
Did the Greeks Believe Their Myths? (or read no further) - the last par.

The theme of this book was very simple. Merely by reading the title, anyone with the slightest historical background would immediately have answered, "But of course they believed in their myths!" We have simply wanted also to make it clear that what is true of "them" is also true of ourselves and to bring out the implications of this primary truth.

Profound stuff, eh ac?

GakuseiDon

If we find the same silences in the HJ writers as well, then that decreases the force of Doherty's arguments.

The problem is that Doherty doesn't account for his audience. IDers use science rather than the Bible -- should we take from that alone they aren't Christians? No, you couldn't. They are writing to their audience, and they know that the audience aren't going to accept it just because the Bible says so. But if Doherty was consistent, he would have to claim that Christian IDers should be pushing the Bible, or at Christianity, in their writings. Of course, even if an IDer didn't identify himself as a Christian, we would still suspect as much (perhaps incorrectly).

If Theophilus wrote to the pagans around 180 CE, AND referred to himself as a Christian, AND wrote that the Logos could be "both heard and seen" and "found in a place", who else on earth other than Christ would the pagans have thought he was talking about? Justin Martyr had a generation before associated the Logos to Christ. Theophilus (and nearly all the other "mythicist" apologists) wrote in philosophical terms at a time when Marcus Aurelius was emperor, or had just passed away. Most of those apologists were writing to the Emperor or the Senate.

IDers use "science", not religion, to push its point. Philosophy, amongst the pagans, seems to have been the "science" of its day. If the apologists were trying to defend Christianity through its philosophical underpinnings, then there would been little place for Christ, just as there is no place for the Bible in ID. Since the HJ writers also defended Christianity in the same way to the same audience, I think this audience needs to be taken into account. I just don't see Doherty addressing this question.

TedH, is there anything in the "mythicist" apologists that can't be found in the HJ writers? Or anything not found that is also missing from one or more HJ epistles to the pagans? Perhaps that may be a productive exercise.

Ted Hoffman

This is like arguing that because several people have the blood of the victim on their hands, a murder suspect is less likely to be guilty. Doherty has repeated several times that it is a cumulative argument not based on one piece of data.
You clearly dont know much about ID. First of all, all IDers are theists. And specifically, ID leading proponents like Dembski have the Christian God as the designer. Also, IDers DO NOT use science: they dress religious ideas with scientific garb. There is a giant difference. Articles by Forrest, Matzske, Gross and others are at Pandasthumb and I dont expect to see anyone claiming that IDers use science. They routinely misrepresent and abuse science.
Your point being that the Emperor already knew that a HJ existed? If so, how do we know this?
First of all, there is no evidence that there was no room for a HJ in presentations of Christianity made to the emperor. To sustain this line of argument, you will first have to prove that the emperor would go ballistic everytime he heard that the movement causing him concern was actually started by the son of a carpenter.

If they defended Christianity by presenting it as a Philosophical web, and the emperor believed their BS, and none of his advisors, scholars and wise men could tell the BS from the real Christianity, then nobody knew what Christianity was as late as 175AD.
HJ writers mention a HJ. MJ writers dont. That is a start.
Some MJ writers say Jesus was killed by spiritual beings, not Pontius Pilate.
Some non-HJ writers talk of the logos as a force.
Some non-HJ writers say salvation comes through knowledge/wisdom, not through Christs's salvific death.
Some non-HJ writers talk of the son as a creative force that took part in creation.
Etc etc.

youngalexander

1. IDCs purport to use science but in fact do not. (I shall readily supply the evidence if required.)
2. IDCs do not identify themselves as Christians. They claim that there is a 'Designer' - origin unspecified.

Sorry GDon, this just does not make sense. I have argued against this 'analogy' before, it is quite mistook - but this is rubbish!

GakuseiDon

Oh, I totally agree. But the analogy is that IDCs use the authority of science, just as late Second Century apologists used the authority of philosophical concepts, to push their agenda.

Exactly. Even Christian IDCers don't try to push a "Christian" Designer, even though they may have that in mind. They aren't necessarily trying to hide their belief, but rather they are writing to their audience.

Why is that?