Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

I've always said the "fiery one" story from 2nd century CE is among the first historical events in Christianity

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morn ... l-justice/

And also the first part of Lucius's story is witnessed today http://reverbpress.com/religion/liar-li ... -set-fire/

This belongs on the political satire forum. Which is really material for the Jerry Springer show.

So what would they have used back then; the napalm like liquid jell for Greek Fire? (I rather doubt somebody outside of the special units in the military could handle that stuff - even unlit touching it by accident was said to be excruciatingly painful). Don't answer its rhetorical.

You obviously haven't read Lucius's Passing of Peregrinus or you've forgotten the jist of it. Peregrinus appears very similar IMO to these modern figures.

Secret Alias wrote:You obviously haven't read Lucius's Passing of Peregrinus or you've forgotten the jist of it. Peregrinus appears very similar IMO to these modern figures.

I've read it, and of course a number of the crazy theories as to who Pergrinus "really is" - since unlike the New Testament the fictional stories must of course represent some real person we know about (said with thick sarcasm) - and there are many candidates, including Polycarp and even some suggest Marcion. Personally I would suggest another, that the character and his tale, being a composite fictionalized satire, is actually as real a person as Voltaire's Candide.

The two cases cited are irrelevant. Peregrinus was not in sight. The man who self-immolated had Buddhist of Tibet in mind, and their suicides to protest the Chinese oppression and cultural hegemony. The other pastor is simply a case of hyperbole, as if we haven't seen that out of televangelists over the years - some rather famous. The pastor who did not light himself falls into the same category as Hollywood's Baldwin and Penn when they said they'd give up US citizenship and move to France if Bush got elected.

Now if we wish to discuss Lucius' work in terms of Voltaire's OK. But really that has nothing to do with Christian texts and more to do with satire and political commentary of the day.

Aside from the fact that I don't agree with your 'complete fictitious' understanding (again from a typical lack of imagination on the part of tradition Marcionite scholarship), I think it is worth noting (even if only in passing) that what Peregrinus did in the middle of the second century continues to be practiced or carried out by Christians today. Yes there are non-Christian examples. And certainly the Christian pastors today weren't consciously imitating Peregrinus. But given the fact that I believe that Lucius's eyewitness records the event that underlies these mostly fictitious narratives, it is worth noting that there is a psychological attraction among the religious para-suicidal toward self-immolation. There is a psychological/religious 'truth' there for some reason. Something which leads me to suspect at the very least that Lucius isn't completely making up his side of the common witness of a particular Christian martyr.

Secret,

How many bishops were there in the 2nd century? 10? 50? 100? 1000? We don't know, and how many ones suggests may say more about their bias than reality. But I'll admit I'd be comfortable accepting, even saying Christianity was small in numbers during this period, that between self declared heretical sect leaders and those appointed proto-orthodox and Marcionite bishops that the numbers likely ran into a the hundreds.

Just to throw out a number - making the scientific observation that any number is a finite number - lets say we can agree on a really small number of 250-300 throughout the Empire (60 churches, averaging 5 Bishops over 60 years; an admittedly low number). How many of them do we know anything about? Maybe two dozen, including some that appear to be nothing more than names Eusubius might have made up. At most we know the names of 10%, but more likely less than 5% - I would hazard to say less than 2%, as most were unremarkable. Note for comparison, how many Roman legion commanders and generals do we know? Not many. Now throw in significant priests who never were elevated to bishop and you quickly realize we know barely a small random sample.

Now this is where I have problem with your comment of imagination. It sounds to me more of a license for wild speculation.

Even if Peregrinus was based on a real preacher, a real sect leader (and there were many), is it likely we actually know who it really was? Probably not, the statistical probability is at least 10:1 and more likely 50:1 on a good day. That is why I am very cautious to assign a name to any such character. Now if the character is a composite, pulling together different characters, perhaps like Dialogue Adamantius taking on one then another heretic, only presenting them as one single character. So for the story we have a man switching religions like fashion model changes dresses.

What I am trying to say is, there is huge uncertainty here, and many different scenarios to account for Lucius' chameleon character, and that includes a number of purely fictional characters. The relationship to real characters could be like Alice in Wonderland, satire with targets hidden to all who don't know the slang. And we really don't know Lucius' slang. Perhaps he is taking swings at one then another popular figure and movement of the day.

There is a monomaniacal obsession (nod to Peter Kirby ) to find the exact person this applies to. Speculation like this makes me shiver, and I refuse to go there. The probability any of the speculations are correct is very small.

Stuart wrote:
What I am trying to say is, there is huge uncertainty here, and many different scenarios to account for Lucius' chameleon character, and that includes a number of purely fictional characters. The relationship to real characters could be like Alice in Wonderland, satire with targets hidden to all who don't know the slang. And we really don't know Lucius' slang. Candide is the same, the monkey husbands a crack taken at Darwin (its the one I remember off the top of my head)., but taking swings at one then another popular figure and movement of the day.

This is an entirely pedantic point, but there is a chronological difficulty in treating Candide (published 1759) as a response to Darwin.

Andrew Criddle

Seems I must reread Candide indeed.

I could blame my Junior year HS English teacher, but I think I need to own that one. Ouch!