EarlDoherty

What stuff? "Through whom he created all orders of existence, the Son who is the effulgence of God's splendour and the stamp of God's very being, and sustains the universe by his word of power"? Where is the Gospels story or the Gospel Jesus in that? "When he had brought about the purgation of sins"? Have YOU even read Hebrews? How did Jesus the High Priest do that? By offering his blood in the heavenly sanctuary! For this writer, THAT is the means of "purgation of sins", not the death, which itself is never located on earth. Where is the Gospel story in that? The act of salvation takes place in HEAVEN!

Why am I wasting my time with people who don't know what they are talking about???

Earl Doherty

stephan huller

Still we have to wonder why all the earliest Catholic source either denied that it was written by Paul (Irenaeus and Hippolytus) or claimed that it was a (poor) translation of something originally written in Hebrew (= Aramaic). No easy answer. While I have heard it argued that Hebrews is present in Irenaeus's treatises, the lack of direct citations is noteworthy. As such it wasn't merely that Irenaeus didn't think Paul wrote it, he may well have deemed it heretical or of questionable orthodoxy. Moreover the Muratorian canon, which must have been written around the turn of the third century also omits mention of Hebrews. As it is difficult to avoid connecting the Muratorian canon with Irenaeus (given that Irenaeus is the first person to mention the fourfold gospel), the united Roman front against Hebrews is noteworthy as well as Clement's steadfast loyalty to the text. This might suggest that the text is Alexandrian and the Muratorian canon's mention of a Marcionite Epistle to the Alexandrians has long been considered to be an explanation for the omission of Hebrews as an authentic Pauline letter.

Moreover Clement's eagerness to insert Luke into association with Hebrews is odd for Irenaeus cites Luke consistently as an opponent of Marcionitism (or at least as disproving the sect). Could Clement have been deliberate here in his identification of Luke as having a hand 'translating' (the Latin of Cassiodorus is not clear from memory) this debated text? I find it hard to believe that Irenaeus would have rejected Hebrews if he thought Luke was associated with it. One might even suppose that Clement picked Luke deliberately to squash any of its original association with the Epistle to the Alexandrians condemned by the Roman Muratorian canon. Luke also presents Paul as a 'visionary' so the present text might well be classified as a Catholic reworking of a lost Marcionite epistle - the Letter to the Alexandrians - to the point that it was no longer even recognizable as Pauline.

Who was likely associated with the 'rehabilitation' of the text? It can't be Irenaeus (which is important). But Hippolytus his student is now a prime suspect.

Notice also that the Ignatian corpus was reworked not once (i.e. from the Syriac to the short Greek text) but twice (= then from the short Greek text to a long Greek text). This long text introduces the four gospels and the established canon. I have always thought the short Greek was associated with Irenaeus and the long with Hippolytus (i.e. a reworking of the original reworking because it was still not completely 'pure' of heresy). The situation with Hebrews might well be the same. Irenaeus rejecting it but Hippolytus rehabilitating it. This would suggest that orthodoxy as we know it was really only finalized in the first half of the third century. It was initiated by Irenaeus but completed by Hippolytus (much like the Refutation of the Heresies expands Irenaeus's original effort in Against Heresies).

aa5874

May I remind you that is is YOU who have dated Epistle Hebrews to BEFORE the Jewish War.

Please stop your nonsense. You have dated Epistle Hebrews WITHOUT attestation, corroboration and the author's identification.

My argument is that the Epistle to the Hebrews is an Anonymous writing with no known date of authorship and was NOT even mentioned in "Against Heresies" up to c 180 CE or later and that there is no claim anywhere in the Epistle that it was composed in the 1st century before c 66 CE and NO author of the Canonised Gospels made use of a single verse in Hebrews.

Again, your claim is nonsense.

I argue that the Jesus story and cult originated in the 2nd century and that the stories of Jesus were changed based on the short gMark, the long gMark, gMatthew, gLuke, gJohn, the writings of Justin Martyr, Aristides, Municius Felix and the Pauline letters.

But there is ONE consistent theme in the Jesus stories. Jesus was the Son of God that was crucified on earth during the time of Tiberius after he was Delievered up by the Jews to be KILLED..

Apologetic sources even claimed that it was Predicted that the Jews would CAUSE Jesus to be KILLED.

See Hippolytus "Treatise Against the Jews".

See Justin's "Dialogue with Trypho"

See Tertullian's "Answer to the Jews".

See Aristides "Apology"

Again, it is you who have dated the Anonymous Epistle Hebrews to before the Jewish War WITHOUT attestation, corroboration and the author's identification.

You have NO recovered dated manuscripts of Epistle Hebrews in the 1st century.

No supposed early Apologetic source mentioned the existence of an Epistle to the Hebrews.

Marcion did NOT mutilate the Epistle to the Hebrews based on Apologetic sources.

You are attempting to date a copy of Epistle Hebrews that may have been manipulated.

Please, stop your nonsense

Isn't that amazing!!! The very Doherty that BOASTS he will put me On Ignore now wants me to read his books.

I really want to READ the Evidence from Antiquity. When I review any matter, I review the Evidence--NOT opinion.



I am reading the books of the OT, the short gMark, the long gMark, gMatthew, gLuke, gJohn, Acts of the Apostles, the Pauline Epistles, the Non-Pauline Epistles, Revelation, Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp, Aristides, Justin Martyr, Theophilus of Antioch, Athenagoras, Melito, Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Origen, Arnobius, Ephrem, Eusebius, Jerome, Chrysostom, Philo, Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, Pliny the younger, Lucian, Cassius Dio, Julian, the Muratorian Canon, The Donation of Constantine and other sources of antiquity.

Based on what I have read so far the Epistle Hebrews is NOT the Foundation of Christianity. It is the Jesus story in the short gMark that is the Foundation of the Jesus cult of Christians that originated in the 2nd century.

In the short gMark Myth Fable, Jesus the Son of God did Miracles in Galilee and was crucified under Pilate AFTER he was Delivered up by the Chief Priest and the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem.

Vorkosigan

Here's a paper arguing that Iranaeus was more familiar with Heb than people generally think.
http://www.hebrews.unibas.ch/documents/2010Bingham.pdf

He points out that a lost work of Iranaeus instanced by Eusebius does cite from Heb in blocks.

Vorkosigan

stephan huller

I haven't read this and I thank you for it. I will certainly do so. But there is still a strange situation that so many early Fathers think that Irenaeus didn't like something which was - by that time - quite kosher. The Muratorian canon is also odd given that it is usually placed shortly after Irenaeus and thus undoubtedly influenced by him.

stephan huller

Another interesting point. It has been noted by jake here that the echoes of a desert tabernacle are quite noticeable in Hebrews. This would seem to be at odds with a sanctuary at Jerusalem. But it has always struck me that this is the point of Stephen's speech in Acts - and Stephen is right! The Pentateuch says nothing about a temple only a flimsy tabernacle. The Dositheans (a Samaritan sect) seemed to have taken this position after (or possibly before) the destruction of the Samaritan temple on Gerizim. It is also the idea behind the booths constructed on Sukkot.

I have always wondered whether Philo's Jewish community had constructed a replica tabernacle (for many odd reasons here and there). There is consistent mention of an Alexandrian altar in rabbinic literature but not a temple. A replica desert tabernacle would be a powerful political statement against the authority of Jerusalem by the Alexandrian community. It would also help place 'the Dositheans' mentioned in Jewish, Samaritan and Christian literature as Alexandrian sectarians (Eulogius specifically alludes to the continued existence of Dositheans in Alexandria as late as the sixth century which points to the city as a Dosithean stronghold). Samaritans remained in Alexandria all the way into the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries.

Most of this is speculation but of peripheral relation to our discussion of Hebrews.

maryhelena

:thumbs:

Thanks, aa, for continually getting down to the basics here.

That, folks, is what we have - a story. It's this story that has to be addressed if we are searching for early christian origins. The Story.

Interpretations of 'Paul' or the Pauline epistles will not help in understanding that story. A story set in real time, a story set in Jewish history. A story with a claim that a Jewish messiah figure was executed via Roman authority. That is a historical claim - and no amount of interpreting the Pauline epistles can side-line or negate the relevance of that claim for an investigation into early christian origins.

And it is that gospel claim that, at the very least, is demonstrating that a physical reality, an historical reality, is of fundamental importance to the gospel writers. Whether the gospel JC is viewed as somehow coming down from heaven, or whether that gospel JC is viewed as a composite literary creation, a literary creation reflecting historical figures - the gospel focus on physical reality, on historical reality, is fundamental to it's storyline - and consequently, of relevance to an investigation into early christian origins.

aa5874

I do NOT at all argue or claim the Gospels focus on historical reality. I argue that the NT is a compilation of 2nd century or later Jewish/Romam/Greek Myth Fables about Gods, Sons of Gods, Angels, Holy Ghosts, Demons, and Satan.

The claim that Romulus was the founder of Rome has no real historical value and it is the same with the Jesus story.

Bingo the Clown-O

Ask Neil Godfrey.

Bingo the Clown-O

I don't know. I wasn't talking about the Gospels. I was talking about the Vision of Isaiah.

Maybe some of these ‘people who don’t know what they are talking about’ only exist in your imagination.