Solo

Russian Wikipedia says that the modern Skoptsy were preceded in Ryssia by sects of castrati in the XII-XIII century. (Известно, что некоторые духовные лица на Руси в XII—XIII веках были скопцами (то есть кастратами)).

It is very clear this was always a very marginal movement of a few thousand limited to a few regions of Russian 'outback' (Nothern Caucasus, Urals, Sibeira), and in significance well behind the Starovery (Old Believers), Khlysty or Dukhobors.

Jiri

stephan huller

Thanks for the Russian reference, I had noticed this and put this on my blog a while back but it's great to be reminded of this.

Marginal yes. So the question is how many nutbars can be found who really want to cut off their balls in any society at any given time? But, having a Catholic wife and having spent many hours with her debating religion, you can't discount the effect of the celibate on believers.

I am not saying that my mother in law was enamored with eunuchs. Rather our discussion was limited to the celibacy of Catholic priests. Nevertheless even though she openly spoke in favor of allowing priests to be married, there was always a kind of respect that the celibate 'prove' their holiness - their likeness to the angels - by their continued 'state of grace.'

To this end, we have to remember that in ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY there was always a twofold division to the community. Even many scholars forget this. There were always a large mass of laypeople who copulated and worked and ate and shit and lived like normal people at all times and in all ages.

These people - and especially the rich benefactors within this culture - end up supporting the presbytery which I believe were originally radical ascetics who did not eat meat, eschewed wine, women and song (well maybe not the song part).

The point is that I imagine that in all periods there was this twofold division which for instance shows up in the traditional Coptic (and orthodox) division of the church by a curtain or veil (see Secret Mark). The 'fuckers' for lack of a better term stood on the wrong side of the veil and only saw the shadow of what was going on flickering on the surface of the dividing wall. This was of course intended to be symbolic I think of the highest head which is blocked from us just as it was the Creator of the world.

We can only see the shadow of what was called 'the things to come.'

The curiosity about what lay behind that curtain was what enticed people to want to undergo baptism and castration. It was like walking in the red light district of Amsterdam or looking at the cover of a pornographic movie or magazine or the smell that a restaurant deliberately spreads out on to the street to attract customers.

Indeed there must have been a great number of sensory appeals made to the 'fuckers' on the other side. There was the sound of the angelic choir i.e. the chorus of sweet sounding castrati singing behind the veil, the smell of the incense its smoke, perhaps even colored lighting (see Irenaeus's description of the Marcionite rites and the Anonymous Treatise on Baptism).

As baffling as it might now seem to modern sensibility, there was a real appeal made to attract catechumen through this sensory experience. The one clue that was apparent to all that participated was that the presbyters themselves were emasculated ascetics and were identified as living embodiments of angelic perfection (see Clement of Alexandria and Irenaeus dispute this key understanding of the 'gnostics').

Still I am certain that NOT EVERYONE ever went over to the cause of castration. I don't think that the Church - any church - would have wanted it that way. The Manichaeans had a similar clear distinction between the elect and laity. There had to be mules to continue to support the financial costs of running an ecclesiastical body. New members were needed too so the 'fuckers' had to be encouraged to keep on fucking.

Clivedurdle

http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/sjc.html

The discussions in the NT of circumcision and virgin births make a lot more sense in a context of perfect ones.

stephan huller

I never noticed this reference before but it is perfect. Thank you. I have always suspected that a lot of the 'weird talk' - you know the incomprehensible allegories of the gnostics - really referred to self-castration rituals especially LGM 1 of Secret Mark = "And after six days Jesus gave charge to him (or 'told him what to do'); and when it was evening the young man comes to him donning a linen sheet upon his naked body, and he remained with him that night." (To Theodore III.6 - 9) but your example is MUCH BETTER (insofar as it is more explicit).

As an aside I was on the phone with Marvin Meyer a while back and we were shooting the shit I don't know about what. The conversation got on to talking about Secret Mark - blah, blah, blah - and I made the mistake of saying something like "... and don't you think that the Marcionites can be connected to this baptism story because (a) Tertullian says that John the Baptist is only introduced in Luke chapter 5 - i.e. there can't have been a baptism of Jesus by John and (b) the "Jesus tells him 'what to do' reference sounds like self-castration which would again fit the description of the Marcionite in Tertullian."

You can't imagine how quickly the conversation ended and he wanted to get off the phone

Meyer was like "what proof do you have that it was self-castration?" "what proof is there that the Marcionites engaged in this ritual." The conversation went from like 60 mph to 0 in like ten seconds! (lol)

But they're SO close-minded the traditional scholars are. You don't become the head of department or a full professor by engaging in 'speculation.' EVEN THOUGH ITS SO BLOODY OBVIOUS THAT SOMETHING LIKE THIS EXISTED IN THE EARLIEST PERIOD.

The critics of Secret Mark are like 'it's gay' and I am like no it's just looks gay like the effeminate priesthood of the Egyptian church looked like a bunch of homosexual prostitutes to outsiders. But I really don't think anything was going on.

It reminds me of that time someone pointed out to my grandfather that his fly was undone. His wife snapped 'open cage, dead bird.'

Anyway thanks for that reference. Really good.

charles

If I am to understand you correctly you are saying that you not only believe that Secret Mark is a real historical gospel text but in fact that it is the gospel of the Marcionite sect and the basis for their self-castration rituals. But all the Church Fathers make clear that the Marcionites used the Gospel of Luke. A corrupt version of that text admittedly. But this would seem to make it impossible for Secret Mark to be the gospel of the Marcionites.

Clivedurdle

<< Matthew 19:12 >>

New International Version (©1984)

For some are eunuchs because they were born that way; others were made that way by men; and others have renounced marriage because of the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it."

stephan huller

Yes, it is very interesting. I read a little about this topic over the last few years (no one except gay studies professors want to admit they know everything there is to know about this topic lol) and the Jewish concept is very much in line with the rest of the Roman world on this. There really were a class of people who were identified as 'eunuchs by nature' whose meaning has been debated back and forth for generations. Some take this to mean inability to sustain an erection with a woman (i.e. what we would identify today as a 'homosexual'). Others that they were physically deformed or born with female genitalia). I am really not as informed on this topic as I should be but I believe that the Aramaic saris is identified by Jastrow as meaning someone who is impotent. It comes from a root which means 'weak' 'feeble' etc.

Again I want to reinforce that in traditional (what used to be called 'primitive') society there is no real understanding of sexual PREFERENCE. The more masculine someone is the more he can have sex with anyone, anything at anytime. Some east African I met as performers for instance boast that in Europe they would have Italian men ask them to sodomize them and these Kenyans would openly boast how they could 'bust the ass' of any man that asked them (lol). They would boast that they had sex with a ninety year old woman. All this demonstrated to people in their culture that they were a basha (one of many ki-swahili words which comes from Arabic viz. pasha) but which meant 'player' in swahili.

They were not considered 'gay' by their culture even though they were having sex with men. The reason again was that they took the role of the man in the sex act.

On the other side of the ledger there were some Kenyans I met who I was told HAD ASSUMED THE FEMININE ROLE in the sex act and they were considered gay and would not return home because their neighbors would likely have a tire put around them and then be doused in gasoline and set on fire.

I don't know how much this 'eunuch according to nature' really corresponds to the modern concept of 'gay.' I tend to think it means more of a physical deformity (i.e. gynomorphic males and andromorphic females) and that such a category was so rare that it had no place in Christian practice - except for "John" who seems to be so identified (i.e. a eunuch from birth).

stephan huller

The idea that the Marcionite gospel resembled Luke is only one report which got repeated a lot because of it came from Irenaeus (and Irenaeus's work was widely read). The Philosophumena by contrast reports that the Marcionites themselves seemed to claim that their gospel was 'according to Mark.' (vii.18) This seems to be echoed in Megethius the Marcionite's argument against Peter being the author of his gospel (Dialogues of Adamantius). There are a number of other reasons for identifying the Marcionite gospel being related to 'according to Mark' in our canon none more significant than the argument that Marcion itself is a backformation of 'those of Mark' in Aramaic.

charles

Stephen,

Another difficulty you have is that you are suggesting that ALL sects of Christianity seemed to have encouraged the eunuch ideal. Nevertheless you seem to be forgetting about the Ebionites and Jewish Christianity generally. How can you reconcile the fact that Judaism is entirely opposed to castration?

stephan huller

Yes this is all true about castration in the Torah BUT you are forgetting that the Evangelium introduced a more perfect revelation. Consider also that the angel pulled the yarech or 'thigh' of Jacob when they were wrestling (Gen 32:36). As Fred Rosner notes (Encyclopedia of Medicine in the Bible and Talmud:

http://books.google.com/books?id=Lbv...page&q&f=false

I am not the first to suggest that Jacob was castrated by the angel. What others have failed to realize is that there must have been a tradition which connected this neutering with his transformation into an angel. It became the basis to the early Christian ritual (Origen = Adamantius = Adam in the state of grace before the fall i.e. whose skin originally had an adamantine shell).

On the idea of Jacob wrestling with an angel.

When Jacob wrestled with the angel, and held his own, wrestling right through the night, the angel gave him the name Yisra’el, which is in form the name of an angel. The homiletic root of Israel - yashar - was translated into Greek as chrestos (I can demonstrate all of this if anyone would like).

There is an ancient text called The Ladder of Jacob preserved only in part, from the second c. B.C. that expands on the concept of Jacob as an angel. The same concept is prominent in mediaeval Jewish texts. I take it that Jacob was not quite equal to the angel he wrestled with. As that angel was the Angel of the Presence (read the passage carefully and you will see it) then Jacob-Yisra’el was the angel embodying the world, as opposed to the angel containing the germ of the world, the Angel of the Presence. Otherwise, Jacob-Yisra’el was the earthly reflection of the Angel of the Presence. The two explanations are compatible with each other.

The second explanation is the traditional one. It is usually set forth in the observation that it does not say the angels were going up and coming down. It says the angels were going down and coming up. This means they came down , saw Jacob-Yisra’el’s face [the word translated “presence” is literally “face”] recognised it, and went back up to compare it with the original.