PhilosopherJay

Hi All,

Of all the early Greco-Roman sources cited on Christianity, the one with the best chance of being authentic is Pliny's the Younger's letter #96 to the Emperor Trajan. It is dated circa 112. What it tells us is not that there was any type of Christianity derived from Jesus or Judaism, but rather that there was a type of early Christianity, as Marcion contended, that was not based on Judaism.

The evidence that this Christian cult had nothing to do with Judaism is fairly strong:

1. Pliny never mentions Judaism, either in this letter or in connection with anything to do with the province of Bithynia. This was the period of time between two Jewish-Roman wars. We should expect him to report any kind of subversive activity by Jews or people connected to Judaism. Certainly leaving out the fact that the Christian cultists were connected with Judaism, if they were, would have been a big mistake.

2. The leaders of the cult are apparently two slave women called deaconesses. The Jewish culture of the age would have ridiculed women playing such religious roles. As the website Religious Tolerance notes:
3. The practitioners got up before dawn and sang a hymn to Christ. Shouldn't they also be singing hymns to the Jewish God as well? Shouldn't Pliny have said hymns to Christ and the Jewish God whom they consider his father? It is hard to imagine any Jewish based group that would only meet to sing a hymn to Christ.

4. The oath the cultists take have nothing to do with the Jewish Ten Commandments or the Christian Two Commandments (Love God, Love your Neighbor). They swear to not do anything wicked, specifically ne furta (not steal) ne latrocinia (not rob) ne adulteria committerent (not commit adultery), ne fidem fallerent (break trust), ne depositum appellati abnegarent (deny a deposit).

5. They held meals at some point, but when Trajan banned these things as politically subversive, they immediately stopped doing that. Certainly, this does not sound like Jewish-Christians. They give up their ceremonies without any protest.

6. Most of the members apparently quickly gave in and blessed the Gods, and the Emperor and cursed Christ to save themselves.

This sounds like some kind of Neo-Platonic Chrestus cult that worshipped Chrestus (Goodness) as a God. At the same time, the fact that it is run by two slave deaconesses and they talk about being against adultery (probably a lie) and they rose before dawn and promised to give back deposits, makes it sound like some kind of prostitution-banking racket. Perhaps the men left large deposits of money or other valuables that the women promised to give back at some point.

Note also that Pliny the Younger had been a public official for 30 years at this point. Yet, he has no idea about how to try cases involving Christians. This indicates how obscure the sect must have been.

Either this represents a cult that had nothing to do with Christianity or a cult that was Proto-Christian before Christianity merged with Judaism.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Horatio Parker

I have read that there is evidence of Xtians in Rome dating back to 40 CE, which is seems too recent if JofN was crucified circa 33 CE in Palestine.

Juststeve

Jay:

To the extent Paul preached to and converted Gentiles there would have been non Jewish Christians from almost the beginning. That is consistent with what Paul says and the book of acts as well. Therefore I see little that is surprising about there being Christians who had little to do with Judaism.

We can probably never know for sure but I would suspect that Christianity spread much more readily among Pagans than among Jews. There would have been very strong religious scruples against the worship of a crucified man among the Jews, perhaps less so among Pagans. The very act of worshiping any man instead of HaShem would have been anathema to a religious Jew. For that reason I suspect that Christianity spread much more easily among Pagans who were used to the idea of men becoming Gods and receiving worship.

I believe the Christian claim that Christianity is somehow based on Judaism to be a canard. While the Historical Jesus was a Jew there is little even in the Gospels to indicate that he was trying to replace Judaism with something else. That became the work of Paul after Jesus was dead and Paul had the experience that convinced him he was alive again.

Steve

aa5874

Your claims are erroneous.

It is the complete REVERSE.

There is hardly any human being in antiquity that had the ability to forgive the SINS of all mankind. Even the Deified Emperors of Rome Sacrificed to MYTH Gods and Worshiped MYTH Gods like Zeus or Jupiter and Multiple other MYTH Gods.

In addition, your claims about "Paul" are unsubstantiated. The NT is an Unreliable source.

In Tacitus "Histories" 5, and Philo's "On Embassy to Gaius" it is claimed that Jews do NOT worship men as Gods.

In Theophilus "To Autolycus" it is claimed Christians do NOT worship men as Gods.

DCHindley

My "highly speculative" and just-has-to-be-wrong hypothesis (which is actually right) would make this a manifestation of the Christ mystery that had developed out of Jewish messianic speculation as taken over by gentiles.

It seems likely that Pliny had every expectation of finding a subversive cell of malcontents, but was surprised to discover it was some sort of bizarre mystery cult resembling a private association. He was amazed to learn that some of the participants were even Roman citizens, whom he could not even imagine could be associated with subversion. Many of these latter even showed their loyalty to the Roman order by performing the tokens of obeisance towards it's ruler (Trajan). But the stubborn ones, more than likely the slaves of these Roman households, held onto it and refused to yield.

My guess is that the slaves of several Roman households had formed a private association which revered a redeeming savior Christ, developing out of the gentile wing of Jewish messianic speculation before the 90s CE, and typical of what other private associations devoted to foreign gods did in that period. Common meals, singing praise to the god, swearing to do good.

Chances are the masters of these households knew of it and tacitly approved, even patronizing the association by paying for the meals or providing the meeting place, etc. Private associations, especially those which were populated by the lower classes, tended to imitate the structure of society, and in the mind of the master of the house, was a harmless diversion for them which kept them out of trouble (stealing, etc).

I am not so convinced of all this "chrestos" talk, as it was proposed on the basis of exactly one legend over the doorway of a Marcionite church at Deir Ali, three miles south of Damascus, dated to October 1, 318 CE, which said "The meeting-house of the Marcionists, in the village of Lebaba, of the Lord and Saviour Jesus the Good." No early source, though, mentions the Marcionites using the term Chrestos for Christos or calling Jesus Isu (this was first proposed by Daniel Jon Mahar* sometime between 1998 and 2001, and now all radical critics accept it as gospel fact).

So, I don't tend to agree that this is a middle platonic cult worshiping the Good. I might be prepared to think their Christ developed out of Gnostic speculation, which in turn is clearly influenced by Platonism. Although I don't think Pliny's Christians were Marcionites (too early for that) I do think that Marcion was influenced by early Neo Platonic thought.

DCH

*"The English translation itself is admittedly conjectural in places, as also are the notes. One such creative liberty is the name for the Marcionite Savior, "Isu Chrestos" - "Isu" derived on the designation of Syrian Marcionites, the spelling for "Chrestos" (=the Good one ) derived from an ancient inscription to a Marcionite synagogue."

stephan huller

Isu is clearly the rendering of the Greek Iesous into Syriac. There are other references to Chrestos being related to the Marcionites. I just can't recall them right now. The only thing that comes to mind is Christ is chrestos and Christians are chrestoi for Justin in Apology 4.1. Lactantius mentions something else. There is specifically Marcionite information. I'll remember it shortly.

Isu is in Ephrem Syrus Against Marcion in Three Books. There's more too.

I think Eznik is another. I will think about Chrestos too.

PhilosopherJay

Hi DCHindley,

Interesting stuff about the Marcionite Church and Jesus the Good on the door. I hadn't heard it before.

What I'm going on especially here is these facts which fit together rather nicely:

1) We have two other contemporaneous historical sources to Pliny talking about Chrestus - ("The Good" or "The Good One") Suetonius and Tacitus ("e" later erased and changed to "i").

2) Justin Martyr basically starts his apology talking about Chrestians (the good ones), from chapter 4:

3.The women deaconesses swear that their oath is not to any scelus (a wicked deed, heinous act, crime, sin, enormity, wickedness). If you're a follower of "the good one" it makes sense to swear not to do anything wicked.

4. Marcion who was from Pontus in Bithynia where Pliny is describing this superstitious outbreak has a good savior God. As Tertullian (Anti-Marcion 1.6) tells us, "we know full well that Marcion makes his gods unequal: one judicial, harsh, mighty in war; the other mild, placid, and simply good and excellent."


Warmly,

Jay Raskin

DCHindley

Danny Mahar is better know for editing the Deluxe Study Edition of George Lamsa's The Modern New Testament from Aramaic (2001), and publishing a textbook for learning Aramaic, Aramaic Made EZ (1998). He apparently was exposed to it while a member of The Way, the founder of which was keen on the study of the Estrangelo dialect, and was a friend of Lamsa.

According to Wiki:

The Way published a three-volume interlinear version of the Syriac New Testament Bible in 1988, after a 15-year effort by The Way International Biblical Research Team. The Way Biblical Research team cataloged 600 Aramaic manuscripts to compile their New Testament text and lexical aids. This was the first printed edition of the Estrangelo script Aramaic New Testament.

Victor Paul Wierwille became associated in 1957 with Aramaic Bible scholar George M. Lamsa, and Lamsa finished his translating [of] the Lamsa Bible in Wierwille's home [The Holy Bible from Ancient Eastern Manuscripts was published in 1957]. Lamsa and Wierwille produced the first American Aramaic New Testament in 1960. [this is incorrect, as it was A brief course in the Aramaic Language that was published 1961].

Aramaic Publications:

Aramaic-English Interlinear New Testament – 1988
Volume 1 Matthew – John
Volume 2 Acts – Philemon
Volume 3 Hebrews – Revelation
The Concordance to the Peshitta Version of the Aramaic New Testament − 1985
The English Dictionary Supplement to the Concordance to the Peshitta Version of the Aramaic New Testament – 1985
The Aramaic New Testament Estangelo Script – 1983

Just so I can drop names along with you, Stephen, I've been to The Way's HQ in New Knoxville, Ohio 2 or 3 times (on business) and met the incoming President Rosalie F. Rivenbark in 2000, and even the previous President L. Craig Martindale, whose lowly subordinate showed me the "Silo" style dormitories to prove that the locals were wrong about them containing nuclear missiles. From the death of the founder in 1985 to 2000, they had lost about 80% of their membership under Martindale's leadership. No wonder why the place looked so empty, and they had another unused campus in Indiana. So much for Name Dropping ...

Oh, uh, the point of this all ... yeah, is that Mahar admits that he took liberties to suggest that the Marcionites were accustomed to call Jesus Christ "Isa Crestos" cobbled from his Aramaic studies (Isa) and the 4th century church inscription in Greek (chrestos). Apples and Oranges.

DCH

Minimalist

Pliny also does not mention anything about Christ being crucified by a Roman official. It is always dangerous to assume why someone did not do something but the idea that these Christians worshiped a criminal who was not only executed by Rome but that he came back to life just seems like the sort of thing that the urbane Pliny might have thought his boss would find amusing.

aa5874

Again, the contents of the Pliny letters appear to be the product of "Chinese Whispers".

Pliny does NOT mention a character call Jesus at all in the letters.

And, Again, if it is claimed by HJers that there were MANY persons in antiquity who may have asserted that they were the Christ then the mention of the name Christ cannot be even assumed to about NT Jesus.

The Pliny letters to Trajan appear to show that Pliny was NOT even aware of the BELIEFS of those Christians in custody and had to TORTURE at least two of them.