Duvduv

I can't tell where it says they didn't "read it" publicly in Constantinople but they did in Antioch. It still wouldn't make sense that that the book which was ostensibly part of the canon for over 200 years was hardly known in a single town which was the center of the empire. Again, who else suggests this was the case there? What about in Rome or Alexandria? We don't find that kind of view anywhere else do we?

arnoldo

There are many early christian writings that although they may not be direct commentaries on the gospels/epistles provided quotes from them. For example, Clement of Rome may’ve written the following in the late first century/early second century.


Towards the late second/early third century, Origen of Alexandria wrote many commentaries on the gospels/epistles. One of which is Origen’s Commentary on the gJohn.

mountainman

This (and much other) evidence is quite consistent with the canonical Acts of the apostles being a 4th century literary phenomenom.

mountainman

Every single one of these "early christian" sources, including the "TF" and the forged letter of Jesus to Agbar, were all meticulously assembled in the 4th century source known as Eusebius, and may also be forged.

mountainman

Is this a joke?

sotto voce

It's one thing to imitate my style, mm. It's quite another to apply it appositely.

Roger Pearse

Not the first commentator, I'm sure; but the first extant commentator.

Biblical commentaries did not tend to be preserved. In the 6th century the medieval church started to compile what are known as "catenas" (the Latin for "chains") -- verse by verse commentaries made up of chains of quotations from earlier commentators. So you would have a verse, then the name of an author, followed by what he said; then another name, followed by his quote; then the next verse, and so on.

The catenas were much more useful than the bulky but less concentrated works of earlier writers, and consequently the latter tended to disappear. The commentaries of Eusebius of Caesarea, for instance, are mostly lost, and are all untranslated.

In addition, the theological obsessions of the post-Nicaea church were different from those who wrote in the period when Christianity was illegal, in a very different culture. What earlier writers wrote on hot topics like the homoousion could often be rather vague, or even heretical-seeming, simply because they wrote before the issue was clearly defined. Far better, then, to use the 4th century writers such as Basil the Great, whose definitions were precise.

These issues meant that the earlier theological works were not very useful, and so did not tend to be copied, and so perished when the last physical copies vanished in the disorders of 1204 onwards. The same applied to apologetic works also, but many of these were preserved through a curious accident, that a 10th century archbishop was interested in them and one of his toadies compiled a copy, which has happened to survive.

We must never argue from what has not been preserved.

That's because the details of christology became serious politics in the 5th century, and the Cappadocians were the reliable sources to use.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

aa5874

Chrysostom did state that Acts of the Apostles was hidden which could NOT possibly be true if it was Canonised.

Acts of the Apostles is the LARGEST book by word count in the NT Canon and contains the supposed history of the post-Ascension Acts of the Apostles , the single most important event, the Day of Pentecost when the disciple received the Gifts of the Holy Ghost, the Persecution of Christians, the record of the supposed FIRST Martyr, and the conversion and Travels of Saul/Paul.

In fact, Chrysostom's statement is confirmed by Justin Martyr who wrote NOTHING about the Acts of the Apostles and Paul.

But, even more remarkably, is that Justin Martyr did NOT use anything from Acts to DEFEND the existence of his Jesus.

Justin Martyr used the Memoirs of the Apostles and an unknown OLD man to defend his Jesus story.

Acts of the Apostles was UNKNOWN by Justin c 150 CE and was Hardly known even up to the end of the 4th century based on Chrysostom.

Duvduv

So you can simply dismiss the fact that virtually nothing in the way of commentaries existed before the 4th century, and that nothing managed to survive despite the argument that the canonical texts themselves were produced before Christianity became "legal" and yet they did survive?!
And the other writings of assorted kinds also survived according to the view that they came from the first or second centuries, i.e. the apocryphal writings and apologetic writings.
Why did they survive and not a shred of a commentary did? Or is it likely that all the aforementioned texts as we know them are only from the 4th or 5th centuries?

Roger Pearse

Sorry if you found what I wrote inconvenient. You certainly need not learn if you prefer not to.

All the best,

Roger Pearse