Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

Correct. If I understand well, the point of Norelli about his presumed ''surprising confirmation'' of his hypothesis is that the birth episode found in 11:2-22 is ''surprisingly similar'' with the description of the same birth episode found in Belibaste (via the Inquisitor), even if Belibaste was not deriving it from the AoI in his hand (therefore proving his origin in a more older AoI used by the heretics).

Therefore the simple evidence of a docetic birth in the generic Cathar theology doesn't make the point of Norelli.

What would do the point of Norelli is the presumed 'perfect similarity' between 11:2-22 and the birth episode narrated by Belibaste.

A possible criticism is that when you want to interpret in a 'docetical' manner the birth episode, assuming a birth episode, there are not so a lot of alternatives available for you, isn't it? Why the (docetic) birth episode of Belibaste would be more similar to 11:2-22 than, to say, the (docetic) birth episode found in a generic Valentinian Gospel ? The implicit risk is to conclude (wrongly) that any heretic who knows about a docetic birth episode would know the 11:2-22 of AoI.

Giuseppe wrote:Correct. If I understand well, the point of Norelli about his presumed ''surprising confirmation'' of his hypothesis is that the birth episode found in 11:2-22 is ''surprisingly similar'' with the description of the same birth episode found in Belibaste (via the Inquisitor), even if Belibaste was not deriving it from the AoI in his hand (therefore proving his origin in a more older AoI used by the heretics).

Therefore the simple evidence of a docetic birth in the generic Cathar theology doesn't make the point of Norelli.

What would do the point of Norelli is the presumed 'perfect similarity' between 11:2-22 and the birth episode narrated by Belibaste.

A possible criticism is that when you want to interpret in a 'docetical' manner the birth episode, assuming a birth episode, there are not so a lot of alternatives available for you, isn't it? Why the (docetic) birth episode of Belibaste would be more similar to 11:2-22 than, to say, the (docetic) birth episode found in a generic Valentinian Gospel ? The implicit risk is to conclude (wrongly) that any heretic who knows about a docetic birth episode would know the 11:2-22 of AoI.

We do know that the Cathars used some version of AoI

Andrew Criddle

neilgodfrey wrote: ↑Fri Jun 24, 2016 6:59 pm
If you want to compare the Slavic text ... yeh, right ... Screen%20Shot%202016-06-25%20at%2012.03.37%20pm.png

I need to check again what the phrase in verse 19 translates as.

What were you looking for in the Slavonic text?
Verse 19 in slavonic translates as "And they did not know him." It's a pretty short verse there in Slavonic.

At the moment I am thinking through the issue of whether Chp. 3 of the Ascension of Isaiah (subsection Testament of Hezekiah) included reference to Gabriel. As you may remember, there are two recensions, G1 and a shorter one, G2. G1 is considered generally much more authentic, and when it comes to Chp. 3 we only have an Ethiopic translation, which is considered a very close translation of G1. The Ethiopic does not mention Gabriel.

Meanwhile, we do have G2, and it has a missing spot here where scholars suppose the name Gabriel goes because it would fit the context of being associated with Michael.

G1 is considered better than G2, but Greek is considered more reliable than Ethiopic. One webpage that I found on the Ascension of Isaiah claimed that whenever a recension (eg. G2) has a phrase (eg Gabriel) that the other recension doesn't, then we should just drop that extra phrase as an interpolation, but I don't really agree with that exegetical method.

So where does that leave us on the possible name Gabriel here?

I wrote more about this as Question 4 on this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=4943&p=111069#p111069