mountainman

Hey archibald,

Why do you think the gospel of Thomas was considered heretical? Here is what Eusebius thinks of it ....

This is the critical question. What made these other books heretical in the eyes of Dear Eusebius?



Sloncha !

archibald

I am not really concerned as to whether they were thought heretical 'in some way' or not. There are lots of reasons why 'the character of the style' being 'at variance with apostolic usage' may have meant they were deemed non-orthodox. I am only interested here in (a) whether they are any evidence of, or secondarily (b) if they were deemed to be, mythicist heresies.

In relation to (a), I thought you had (on another thread) quoted from NHC in support of the general point that the NHC had elsewhere contained clues in favour of mythicist beliefs.

So, more importantly, I am asking whether we should consider the Nag Hamadi bunch to be mythicist. And I am asking how we could do that, if they had the G of T in their stuff.

And of course, in relation to (b), what Eusebius may have thought or not thought is not especially relevant to (a).

gurugeorge

But they did. See, the thing is, the distinction between "orthodoxy" and "heresy" isn't in any particular reading of the Christ story. There were all sorts of variations and all sorts of readings - and for a time, it seems, they all got along without too much fuss.

The real schism came post-Diaspora when "orthodoxy" (a relatively new sub-sect at that time) started claiming its "apostolic succession". That's the real dividing line - and extra stress on the fleshly component of the Christ, and a more recent timing of His advent, matters only insofar as it lends "apostolic succession" credence.

The tail wags the dog. There is a hyper-historicized Jesus because it was necessary for this new sub-sect, to give it leverage against the existing sects that were based on a revalued Messiah concept, vision, philosophy, etc.

So denial of anything that supported apostolic succession, and a need for priestly intermediaries, is what they trashed.

So for example, the "spiritual with fleshly avatar" vs. "wholly spiritual and just appearing to be fleshly" arguments were only relevant to that extent, not in and of themselves.

The orthodox "storyline" is so strongly entrenched in our minds it's difficult to get rid of the notion that "orthodoxy" was around from the beginning.

But it wasn't, it is strictly a child of the Diaspora, and all its polemic, far from being defensive against upstart heresies, is polemic to wedge a way in - to a variegated, loose movement, unify it and bring it under control. It starts off fairly gentlemanly but by the end of the second century and into the third, it starts to heat up and become vicious - that's when you see the great orthodox polemic against heresies in detail, and particularly "Gnosticism" (whose greatest sin was to be, so to speak "Protestant", not requiring earthly priestly intermediaries - and for a time, so long as Gnostics attended orthodox Churches, they were allowed, but eventually even that became untenable).

Now, to see the other side of the coin, we only have a few glimpses here and there, but since Nag Hammadi it's clearer. One very good book that shows you something of the Gnostics' view of orthodoxy is April DeConick's analysis of the Gospel of Judas, The Thirteenth Gospel (or via: amazon.co.uk). There, the Gnostics' view is of orthodoxy as the upstarts, and as a bunch of utter fools who put their credence in a false apostolic succession, rather than the Spirit.

The two parts dovetail nicely - orthodoxy's fretful polemic and gnosticism's lofty disdain and mockery.

The other thing to note about The Gospel of Judas is that it's very strongly based on GMark, on the Markian view of the disciples as nincompoops. Orthodoxy was in a bit of spot because GMark is where it got its idea of an apostolic succession from in the first place. But as GJudas shows, it was a double-edged sword, in that GMark's proto-Gnostic view of the apostles didn't give them enough dignity and gravitas.

Hence GMatthew. The first proper orthodox Gospel, based on GMark, but much, much more disciple/apostle friendly.

aa5874

gMatthew is basically the same as gMark except for far more elaborate fictional details.

For example, the author of gMark dedicated a SINGLE verse (Mark 1.13) to the TEMPTATION but the author of gMatthew used an ENTIRE chapter (Matt. 4) for his TEMPTATION story.

If the disciples were nincompoops in gMark then they were "photo-copied" as nincompoops in gMatthew.

archibald

George, unless you can show me that the Gospel of Judas portrayed a non-earthly Jesus, I am not sure how this fits in this thread. Albeit that I don't disagree with your interesting points about orthodoxy being only one of a number of (and possibly, though I'm not sure, not the original) version.

My only point is that whatever versions surfaced, mythicism (or non-existent or non-earthly personism if you like) does not seem to be one of them, as far as I can tell, so far.

aa5874

What nonsense!!! You don't know what you are talking about.

MYTHS have NO 'BIO'.

Lack of 'BIO' ADVANCES the MYTH Jesus theory.

MJers inherently PREDICTED that there would be NO 'BIO' for NT Jesus.

It is ILLOGICAL to use 'NO BIO' as support for HJ of Nazareth.

Well, you might think that being the Child of a Ghost is 'BIO" (BIOGRAPHY) but it is 'MIO' (MYTHOLOGY).

archibald

Off topic, I know, but I'd like to do a brief reply.

I haven't had time to read your link in detail, so I've only skimmed it. Does the author really trace every element back to the Septaguint? The introduction does not appear to say this.

This is the source I was previously more familiar with. I imagine you are too:

http://rationalrevolution.net/articles/gospel_mark.htm

I honestly think it is a matter of personal opinion as to how much of Mark is seen as allegory or fiction. For me, it is notable just how much, in fact, is not present in the OT, and how many of the connections are somewhat vague. I imagine there would be many cases where one could find many connections between things in the NT and the OT, and no need to think that Mark is necessarily quoting or using them at all. The two testaments have a lot of commonality. It's not as if one is about God and the other about needlework. Another consideration, not often aired, is that some of the actions and sayings might be in the Jesus tradition precisely because they come from a prophet who was himself fond of referencing the OT.

Also notable is how the connections are from all over the place, here and there. There is little doubt that Mark went in search of some of his pieces in the OT. There is not enough for me, unless I need to go back and read your link more closely, to change from thinking that he was embellishing an existing story.

Interestingly, Price, on many occasions, does not link to the OT, but to Paul.

gurugeorge

Strawman again

Read DeConick's book (she's a great writer, like Ehrman she makes this stuff accessible without descending into mere breathless journalism). The Jesus portrayed in GJudas is certainly in a human form, but it's fully a divine being. It's merely taken on that form in order to communicate with the disciples.

Which is, of course, exactly the same kind of entity portrayed in the Philippian Hymn - a kindly divine being that's stooping to help us, humbly taking on our mortal form.

But, again, you see, there's a spread of ideas about the relationship of the divine entity to the human form - some people thought the human form was a mere phantom (one absolute extreme) others thought it was like some sort of s-f "construct" (matter cobbled together to look like a human being), others thought it was a man possessed by the divine out of the blue, others thought it was a human being, but sort of possessed by the divine from birth and growing as a human being (virgin birth), and others thought it was just a man (the other absolute extreme).

So, how are you going to tell which of these is evidence for some human being who's at the root of all this mumbo-jumbo?

How do you know they're all not just like retconned superhero stories about an imaginary friend?

We have to be clear on this: for most of those people this entity was real, seemed real to them, they thought he - the divine being inhabiting or magically being a man - was historical.

Also, when we speak of "phantom", what they meant - those who meant it - was that the fleshly image was a "phantom". The divine being was real, to them, not something vague or airy-fairy. It was real, the Son of the Creator of this Cosmos, as real as it gets.

archibald

Hm. I think you are right. I really should have said 'NEP (non-existent/earthly personage) heresies' or 'SO (spiritual only) heresies' in the OP, because that is what I meant. I hope it hasn't caused too much confusion. It's too late to change it now, I think, but luckily other posters so far seem to have been using the NEP or SO concepts, I think. If I am wrong in that, they can let me know.

My mistake probably comes from having Doherty too much in mind when using the word 'mythicist'.

As for how you can tell which are historical, you can't.

The reason why I would tend to lean towards thinking that the Jesus ones do is probably a matter for a different OP, and I'm sure I've given my reasons on other threads.

Maybe it's best here if I stick to the NEP/SO question.

mountainman

But the fact remains that the heresiologists searched out and destroyed the Gnostic Gospels and Acts because they were LISTED on the Index of Prohibited Books because they were deemed heretical by the heresiologists. At the moment we do not really know WHY the Gnostic Gospels and Acts were deemed heretical - but the fact is they were.


Yes in addition to several links I had provided the quote from "The Interpretation of Knowledge" NHC 11.1 I think so, so long as you are willing to substitute the more general and common term "unbelievers" for mythicists. You need to read what the general comments are about the entire NHL on an overall basis.

There are many pagan works in the NHL, or rather a better term would be Platonist or Neoplatonist. There are a sequence of three books providing a blue-print of the modus operandi of "Christianization of literature". A completely pagan text Eugnostos ("Right Thinking"), the Blessed: NHC 3.3 --> is copied to NHC 5.1 with the addition of the word "saviour", which is then re-edited to become --> NHC 3.4 "The Sophia of Jesus Christ". See Robin Lane-Fox on this process.

I see the Gospel of Thomas as an attempt to preserve a series of pagan wisdom sayings by placing them into the mouth of the official state monotheistic God represented by the encrypted written form of Jesus (J_S in Greek and I_S in Coptic).

Elsewhere in the NHL we have long discussions between Hermes and Asclepius and it is reasonable to suspect that the editor of the NHL valued the traditions of Hermes and Asclepius over that of the centralised monotheistic state religion based on Constantine's Bible. We can be reasonable sure (via C14) that the Nag Hammadi Codices were manufactured c.348 CE.

Eusebius is seriously concerned about the UNBELIEVERS. These people were the worst heretics because for various reasons, just like mythicists, they refuse to believe in the bullshit assembled inside Constantine's Bible, and/or they consider that the Jesus story has been fabricated out of nothing existing. Here is what Eusebius says about the general political conditions surrounding the reception of the "Good News" in the Eastern Empire and Alexandria c.324/325 CE and the Council of Nicaea.


My personal opinion is that the earliest mythicists/gnostics RIDICULED the books of the new testament like it was going out of style, by authoring their own stories. The Gospel of Thomas is an exception rather than a rule. Most of the other Gnostic Gospels, and certainly all of the Gnostic Acts, ridicule the characters found in the canonical books.


Here is a summary of what I see as the signature of gnostic ridicule:



In a nutshell my wager would be that the Jesus jokes (Gnostic Acts, etc) by the UNBELIEVING mythicists were deemed heresy by the official monotheistic state heresiologists.

It was verboden to laugh about the published Jesus.
The monotheistic state cult was a serious religious business.
Besides it was an affront to the majesty of the Emperor.
And maybe that's why Crispus was executed by the publisher.