Early Christian Ebionaen Canon

[ebion]

There\s a Homepage of the Moderated Internet Discussion Group for the Academic Study of the Historical Jesus and the Rise of Christianity (CrossTalk2) which has a good collection of links:

Among the many resources available on-line, the following are highly recommended:

• Jesus of Nazareth in Early Christian
  Gospels (formerly titled: "The Quest of the Historical Jesus")
  by Andrew Bernhard.  An annotated bibliography with links to the texts of all extant Gospels written before the end of the second century.
• New Testament
  Gateway: Historical Jesus by Mark Goodacre: a page devoted to the Historical Jesus from the annotated directory of on-line academic materials on the New Testament. This page features links to articles, books, course materials and web sites on the Historical Jesus.
• The Five
  Gospels Parallels edited by John W. Marshall. 1996, 1997, 1998 
  Ph.D., Princeton University, Department of Religion
• The Synoptic Problem
  Home Page by Stephen Carlson: the starting-point for internet research
  on the Synoptic Problem
• The Gospel of Thomas
  Home Page by Stevan Davies: the starting-point for internet research
  on Thomas
• Jesus Seminar Principles
  of Evidence reproduced at the Gospel of Thomas Home Page.
• From
  Jesus to Christ A professionally designed web site accompanying the
  American PBS television programme of the same name.
• The Jesus Seminar Homepage
  by Mahlon Smith: the web site for information on the famous 'Jesus Seminar'.
  This site is a useful resource and features links to material  written
  by both the fellows of the Jesus Seminar and its critics.
• Westar Institute and
  Jesus Seminar Home : the slick,  official page of the Westar Institute,
  the home of the  Jesus Seminar.
• Into His Own: Perspective
  on the World of Jesus by Mahlon Smith: A first class site exploring
  the world in which  Jesus lived by means of well-organised, newly
  translated primary texts and other material.
• A Portrait of Jesus:
  From Galilean Jew to the Face of God   by Cam Howard: a splendid
  looking, useful web site based on the work of Marcus Borg.
• Ancient
  Jewish Accounts of Jesus by Alan Humm: a site with information on Jesus
  from Josephus and other Jewish sources, including  the  Mishnah,
  Babylonian Talmud and Toldoth Yeshu.
• The Flavius Josephus
  Home Page by G. J. Goldberg: featuring a discussion of the Testimonius
  Flavium, extracts from Josephus with Commentary - Organized by subject,
  with revised translations, and a comprehensive collection of passages showing
  the relationship between the works of Josephus and the New Testament.
• Divine
  Mediator Figures in the Biblical World : J.R. Davila's course on the
  cultural matrix that gave rise to NT Christology and the veneration of
  Jesus,  presents lectures and on-line discussion.
• Flavius
  Josephus by Peter Kirby: a detailed review of references to Jesus in
  the works of the 1st c. Jewish historian and the critical debate regarding
  their authenticity.
• Jesus at 2000 :
  The archive of the e-mail debate generated by the cyber-symposium celebrating
  the 2nd millennium of Jesus' birth (Feb/March 1996). Questions and answers
  regarding the historical Jesus posed to/by Marcus Borg, Dominic Crossan
  and Luke Timothy Johnson.
  Jesus at 2000: the Conversation Continues : follow-up teleconference with Marcus Borg, Luke Timothy Johnson, Deirdre Good, N.T. Wright, and John Dominic Crossan.
• The Jesus of History
  and the Future of Faith :  R.W. Kropf's review of the philosophical
  issues involved  in the renewed quest of the historical figure of
  Jesus and its potential for renewing the faith of (rather than
  in) Jesus, with responses (from Dialogos 6).
• The
  Life of Jesus by Ernest Renan: an English translation of the
  full text of the 1863 book that shook the Catholic world and cost the
  author his chair at the U of Paris. This is the first complete
  naturalistic biography of Jesus as a Jewish carpenter who was "not a
  founder of dogmas or a maker of creeds" but who "infused into the
  world a new spirit" and contains A.D. Howell Smith's biographical
  preface to the 1935 edition and an appendix on Renan and his critics.

[DCHindley]

That Text Excavation link will be as dead as a doornail, I'm afraid.

I think Ben just had all he could take of the chaos and sometimes abusive comments he was getting (you know who you were ... no, not you ebion).

Here is a table I drew up in 2001 based on a couple of academic collections of essays on the Didache plus my reading on the wandering itinerant hypothesis, but it covers like 1952 to 1996, sorted by date of the original article so you can see where opinion has changed over time:

Author	Article	Book or Journal	Date	Original	Language
Audet, Jean-Paul	Literary and Doctrinal Relationships of the "Manual of Discipline"	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1952	French
Alon, Gedaliah	Halakah in the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Didache)	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1958	Hebrew
Bammel, Ernst	Pattern and Prototype of Didache 16	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1961	German
Betz, Johannes	The Eucharist in the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1969	German
Rordorf, Willy	An Aspect of the Judeo-Christian Ethic: the Two Ways	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1972	French
Rordorf, Willy	Baptism according to the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1972	French
Theissen, Gerd	Itinerant Radicalism: The Tradition of Jesus Sayings from the Perspective of the Sociology of Literature	Radical Religion 2	1976	1973	German
Theissen, Gerd	Soteriological Symbolism in the Pauline Writings: A Structuralist Contribution	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1974	German
Theissen, Gerd	Legitimation and Subsistance: An Essay on the Sociology of Early Christian Missionaries	_The Social Setting of Pauline Christianity: Essays on Corinth_	1982	1974	German
Niederwimmer, Kurt	An Examination of the Development of Itinerant Radicalism in the Environment and Tradition of the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1977	German
Theissen, Gerd		_The First Followers of Jesus: a Sociological Analysis of Earliest Christianity_	1978	1977	German
Theissen, Gerd		_The Sociology of Early Palestinian Christianity_ aka _The First Followers of Jesus_	1978	1977	German
Mazza, Enrico	Didache 9-10: Elements of an Eucharistic Interpretation	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1979	Italian
Theissen, Gerd	"We Have Left Everything..." (Mark 10:28): Discipleship and Social Uprooting in the Jewish-Palestinian Society of the First Century	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1979	German
Theissen, Gerd	Christology and Social Experience: Aspects of Pauline Christology in the Light of the Sociology of Knowledge	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1979	German
Theissen, Gerd	Jesus' Temple Prophesy: Prophesy in the Tension between Town and Country	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1979	German
Theissen, Gerd	Nonviolence and Love of Our Enemies (Matthew 5:38-48; Luke 6:27-38): The Social Background	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1979	German
Theissen, Gerd	Sociological Theories of Religion and the Analysis of Early Christianity: Some Reflections	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1979	German
Theissen, Gerd	The Wandering Radicals: Light Shed by the Sociology of Literature on the early Transmission of Jesus Sayings	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1979	German
Halleux, Andre de	Ministers in the Dicache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1980	French
Theissen, Gerd		_Psychological Aspects of Pauline Theology_	1987	1983	German
Draper, Jonathan A.	The Jesus Tradition in the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1985	English
Schoellgen, Georg	The Didache as a Church Order: An Examination of the Purpose for Composition of the Didache and its Consequences for its Interpretation	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1986	German
Flusser, David	Paul's Jewish-Christian Opponents in the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1987	English
Seeliger, Hans Reinhard	Considerations on the Background and Purpose of the Apocalyptic Final Chapter of the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1989	German
Tuckett, Christopher	Synoptic Tradition in the Didache	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1989	English
Draper, Jonathan A.	Torah and Troublesome Apostles in the Didache Community	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1991	English
Draper, Jonathan A.	Christian Self-Definition against the "Hypocrites" in Didache 8	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1992	English
Theissen, Gerd	Judaism and Christianity in Paul: The Beginning of a Schism and its Social History	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1992	English
Theissen, Gerd	Some Ideas about a Sociological Theory of Early Christianity	_Social Reality and the Early Christians: Theology, Ethics, and the World of the New Testament_	1992	1992	English
Cody, Aelred	The Didache: An English Translation	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Davis, Cyprian, O.S.B.	The Didache and Early Monasticism in the East and West	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Dehandschutter, Boudewjin	The Text of the Didache: Some Comments on the Edition of Klaus Wengst	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Draper, Jonathan A.	Social Ambiguity and the Production of Text: Prophets, Teachers, Bishops, and Deacons and the Development of the Jesus Tradition in the Community of the Didache	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Harder, Kenneth J., and Jefford, Clayton N.	A Bibliography of Literature on the Didache	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Henderson, Ian H.	Style-Switching in the Didache: Fingerprint or Argument?	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Jefford, Clayton N.	Did Ignatius of Antioch Know the Didache?	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Jones, F. Stanley, and Mirecki, Paul A.	Considerations on the Coptic Papyrus of the Didache (British Library Oriental Manuscript 9271)	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Kloppenborg, John S.	The Transformation of Moral Exhortation in Didache 1-5	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Milavec, Aaron	The saving Efficacy of the Burning Process in Didache 16.5	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Mitchell, Nathan	Baptism in the Didache	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Pardee, Nancy	The Curse that Saves (Didache 16.5)	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Patterson, Stephen J.	Didache 11-13: The Legacy of Radical Itineracy in Early Christianity	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Reed, Jonathan	The Hebrew Epic and the Didache	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Riggs, John W.	The Sacred Food of Didache 9-10 and Second-Century Ecclesiologies	_The Didache in Context_	1995	1995	English
Draper, Jonathan A.	The Didache in Modern Research: An Overview	_The Didache in Modern Research_	1996	1996	English

Gerd Thiessen had applied the same Sociological principals (Mainly of max Weber, who reflected early Marxist socio-economic theory) he and most of these scholars apply to Jesus & his movement, to Paul as a historical figure.

I am not sold on the itinerant Jesus hypothesis, to me it seems to be more interested in preserving the Christian "social gospel" teachings of liberal Christianity (not meant derisively) which are deemed superior in every way to all previous and some subsequent religions. I just think that is making things easy for them, not get at a real Jesus movement. I am much more likely to endorse a militant/political Jesus as recently discussed on other recent threads.

DCH (OK, Boss, back to the oars! <sound of snapping & cracking whips>)

[ebion]

That Text Excavation link will be as dead as a doornail, I'm afraid.

I think Ben just had all he could take of the chaos and sometimes abusive comments he was getting

Thanks you're right; I changed the link to point to the IA. I tried contacting Ben with no success.

Here is a table I drew up in 2001 based on a couple of academic collections of essays on the Didache plus my reading on the wandering itinerant hypothesis, but it covers like 1952 to 1996, sorted by date of the original article so you can see where opinion has changed over time:

My stomach would be most grateful if you deleted anything even remotely related to Max Weber.

Of the other links, do you have a feel for if the Didache they studied were all based on the Byrennius manuscript, or if they were suspicious of it as I am? Did any use a version from the Apostolic Constitutions?

Gerd Thiessen had applied the same Sociological principals (Mainly of max Weber, who reflected early Marxist socio-economic theory) he and most of these scholars apply to Jesus & his movement, to Paul as a historical figure.

(The sounds of violent wretching, intermixed with loud curses for Weber to be roasting in a special place in Hell.)

I just think that is making things easy for them, not get at a real Jesus movement. I am much more likely to endorse a militant/political Jesus as recently discussed on other recent threads.

I agree and I'm now starting to look at the political dimension of Paul-in-Acts, now that we know that Paul was a Herodian.

The Herodians were Idumeans and sorta half-Hebrews that the orthodox Hebrews looked down on or rejected

Herod was a shrewd and unscrupulous tyrant, and was despised by the Judahites because he was an Idumean and not one of their own stock. Herod hated the people of Judah and one of his first acts was to execute forty-five of the leaders of the old aristocracy to eliminate any rivalry for leadership. Having secured the kingship, Herod next destroyed the priestly line of Hyrcanus, the last being Antigonus, who taunted Herod with his Idumean origin, and asserted that the kingdom should fall "on one of the royal family."a Finally he murdered Aristobulus, the last of the Aaronic high priests. Herod then sought to affiliate himself with the high priesthood through marrying Mariamne, Aristobulus' sister and the daughter of a high priest.

This would account for a lynch-mob going after him and why a half cohort of Roman soldiers rescued him. I'm guessing but his story of learning from the respected Hebrew teacher Gamaliel (Acts 22:3 [KJV]) doesn't ring true if he was a gentile like the Clementines assert, or if he was just an Idumean, but I can't see even Gamaliel saying no to taking him as a pupil if he is a son of Herod.

The Herodians were very tight with the Romans because Herod the Great had helped rescue Julius Ceasar in his war with Cleopatra's brother Ptolemy. The Roman garrison steadily increased in size in the years of Paul and the Jamesian church. So there's the possibility of a Roman sub-strata to anything that is Pauline in Christianity, even before Marcion. The sub-strata might be dark and Mithran.

[StephenGoranson]

While we have some information about early Ebionite (not Ebionaen) text usage, worth recalling is that the TaNaK canon itself was not yet fixed.
Daniel, e.g., in or out?

[DCHindley]

Here is a table I drew up in 2001 based on a couple of academic collections of essays on the Didache plus my reading on the wandering itinerant hypothesis, but it covers like 1952 to 1996, sorted by date of the original article so you can see where opinion has changed over time:

My stomach would be most grateful if you deleted anything even remotely related to Max Weber.

Gerd Thiessen had applied the same Sociological principals (Mainly of max Weber, who reflected early Marxist socio-economic theory) he and most of these scholars apply to Jesus & his movement, to Paul as a historical figure.

(The sounds of violent wretching, intermixed with loud curses for Weber to be roasting in a special place in Hell.)

I get it, you don't like Max Weber. I remember my college Sociology professor, who hailed from India, say his name in a low bass tone "Vehh-ber." He thought Weber's sociological perspective fit well with Indian culture, so was a supporter.

Now I'm no expert on Max Weber, although I have a couple of his books around, which I have not had the time to read deeply. When we have to deal with scholarship that was developed in the 19th century, we have to accept that they were people of their day, with all the personal prejudices and biases that were commonly accepted as "normal." I think what I have read shows he held some prejudicial opinions about Jews (the more recent self definition) which he projected into his sociological analysis of ancient social history.

Example I think was that Judeans prospered in the Babylonian captivity period due to their natural innate abilities as traders and bankers. It was not said with a derogatory intent, but those crazy beliefs about Jews starts to irritate even a non-Jew pretending to be Jewish to research an exposé, like Gregory Peck's Philip Schuyler Green character in Gentleman's Agreement (1947). I know that's a fictional depiction but I do agree that the more one is exposed to a problem that one had not been previously cognizant of, the more the subject affects you. "I never saw X until you pointed it out to me ..."

I do not censor my posts to accommodate personal opinions. My preference is just to deal with it, warts and all.

DCH (OK, back to weeerk, Boss man)

[ebion]

In case there was any doubt, Epiphanius (who hates us) includes James in the books the Ebionaens read:

23:1 They pretendedly accept the names of the apostles in order to convince their dupes, and have composed forged books in their names, supposedly by James, Matthew, and other disciples.

[Peter Kirby]

In case there was any doubt, Epiphanius (who hates us) includes James in the books the Ebionaens read:

23:1 They pretendedly accept the names of the apostles in order to convince their dupes, and have composed forged books in their names, supposedly by James, Matthew, and other disciples.

Do we have a sense of whether the text of James here was the NT epistle, a non-extent Gospel, or one of the pseudepigrapha under the name of James that are extent?

[Peter Kirby]

In case there was any doubt, Epiphanius (who hates us) includes James in the books the Ebionaens read:

23:1 They pretendedly accept the names of the apostles in order to convince their dupes, and have composed forged books in their names, supposedly by James, Matthew, and other disciples.

Do we have a sense of whether the text of James here was the NT epistle, a non-extant Gospel, or one of the pseudepigrapha under the name of James that are extant?

I have in mind, for example, the gospel of the Hebrews, which some might have attributed to James?

Another alternative is one of the other apocrypha such as https://www.earlychristianwritings.com/secretjames.html although it may be easier to contend that the extant texts are not in mind through an argued-for contradiction of ideas.

[ebion]

In case there was any doubt, Epiphanius (who hates us) includes James in the books the Ebionaens read:

Do we have a sense of whether the text of James here was the NT epistle, a non-extant Gospel, or one of the pseudepigrapha under the name of James that are extant?

I have in mind, for example, the gospel of the Hebrews, which some might have attributed to James?

Epiphanius is hard to read at the best of times, but I'd guess he's speaking of our Epistle of James. He cites books quite closely, which makes me think he's citing a copy of the Ebionaen NT he has at hand. For example he cites the beginning of the Ebionite Matthew as:

13:4 And, 'John came baptizing, and there went out unto him Pharisees and were baptized, and all Jerusalem. And John had a garment of camel's hair, and a girdle of skin about his loins. And his meat,' it says, 'was wild honey, whose taste was the taste of manna, as a cake in oil.'^[637]25

which is Matthew minus the first 2 chapters (including the geneaology and Virgin Birth). Compare this with our KJV:

In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea,
And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Esaias, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
And the same John had his raiment of camel’s hair, and a leathern girdle about his loins; and his meat was locusts and wild honey. (Matthew 3:1-4 [KJV])

Elsewhere in the Panarion Book 1 he clearly distinguishes Hebrews; in his section on Marcion he writes:

11:11 (There is no version) of First and Second Timothy, Titus, and Hebrews in his scripture at all, and even the epistles that are there have been mutilated, since they are not all there but are counterfeits.

So I'd guess his James is our Epistle of James. He calls the Ebionaen Matthew corrupt and mutilated:

13:2 Now in what they call a Gospel according to Matthew, though it is not the entire Gospel but is corrupt and mutilated

but offers no argument against the Ebionaen contention that their was the original, and it's ours that has been added to, with a geneaology that doesn't add up, and Virgin Birth that negates Jesus' Davidic lineage.

Do we have any idea if Epiphanius read Hebrew? He clearly says that his Ebionaen Mattthew was written in Hebrew (1.30.3:7). In which case he might have a Ebionaen Matthew in Hebrew in front of him, and his citations might be his on-the-fly translations from the Hebrew.

[andrewcriddle]

Epiphanius accepted our Epistle of James.

...the catholic epistles of James, Peter, John and Jude...

The Ebionite work he refers to must be something different.

Andrew Criddle