What is the Evidence for 'Jewish Christianity' Beyond Literary References?

[Secret Alias]

"this account"?? = Irenaeus' account of the Ebionites??

That the Nazarenes and Ebionites came from Nazara and Kochaba

[Ben C. Smith]

Whatever the case may be, there is no reason to think that Irenaeus had any first hand knowledge of the Ebionites. If Bauckham...is right that the twin villages of Nazara (Nazareth) and Kochabe (Kochabe) in Batanea (or Bashan) go back to the 'Branch' and 'Star' prophecies concerning the messiah, surely we have the right to question the legitimacy of this account.

"this account"?? = Irenaeus' account of the Ebionites??

"This account" = Julius Africanus' letter to Aristides: http://www.tertullian.org/fathers2/ANF-06/anf06-48.htm.

[MrMacSon]

Cheers, gentlemen (or should that be Gentile-men? )

[Ben C. Smith]

Cheers, gentlemen (or should that be Gentile-men? )

Well, I am certainly a Gentile, but I do not think Stephan is. No idea about Mr. David Martin.

[Secret Alias]

I am both Gentile and Jew depending on the circumstances.

[MrMacSon]

Well, I am certainly a Gentile, but I do not think Stephan is. ..

Oh yes. That's a major faux pas on my part. Sorry Stephan.

[MrMacSon]

My difficulty is believing in anything that comes from the mouth of the Church Fathers. Forget about...whether or not Jesus existed.3 Look at chapter 3 of Against Heresies. Irenaeus's fourfold gospel seems to develop from that passage in Papias. Papias is behind the introduction of the fourfold gospel. The Ebionites are quickly matched with Matthew. Matthew implicitly comes from the place where they speak the Hebrew dialect. But Matthew is a misunderstanding of Papias. Irenaeus mentions the secret gospel of the heretics (perhaps 'secret gospels') and then he's onto Hegesippus's episcopal succession - only expanded to a later period.

The point is there are writings more ancient than Irenaeus, theoretically. Irenaeus was an 'exegete'1 which means you'd expect he's treat books with respect. But Irenaeus abuses his source and comes up with new material.1 It reminds me of the saying from the Samaritan Asatir - 'new words will come from the Law.' I don't care what people will say - there is a Montanist, a new prophesy characteristic to Irenaeus. He's improvising 'meaning' from existing material. The Montanists are unmentioned in Against Heresies and Tertullian ranks Irenaeus beside Proclus.

From the perspective of the third century 'Montanism' is made to seem like an aberration. Like there was a sect which encouraged people to make up shit and before and after it everything was good and normal. But what if Montanism wasn't an exception? What if Irenaeus's wasn't a blip? What if there was a 'Montanist character' to all early Christian texts.2 People were working and reworking everything. Texts were in flux.2 They kept expanding until at some point some yelled 'stop!'

That's my problem. Maybe the texts of Christianity have no reality behind them. If Matthew is a development of a misunderstanding of Papias in Irenaeus, why is there a Matthew before Irenaeus? If the Ebionites are derived from Hegesippus via Irenaeus, what makes them real?

1 I'd say Irenaeus was as much if not more doing eisegesis and even midrash ...

2 A likely scenario. As for Marcionism, Montanism could have been labelled a heresy after the fact. A misrepresentation and mischaracterisation to sideline it [them] to allow for a major lie that Orthodoxy had existed from the start.

3 a human Jesus seems to have been evolving through the sequential & evolving writings of the early Church Fathers and as the synoptic gospels developed: Mark ->Matthew -> Luke ...

[MrMacSon]

"this account"?? = Irenaeus' account of the Ebionites??

That the Nazarenes and Ebionites came from Nazara and Kochaba

That reminds me of this you posted a few days ago, -

Sanhedrin 43 Our Rabbis taught: Yeshu had five disciples, Matthai, Nakai, Nezer, Buni and Todah. When Matthai was brought [before the court] he said to them [the judges] ...

Todah as a name associated with Jewish messianism.

Note that Nezer is there, as well.

[Secret Alias]

Sorry Stephan.

Hardly a problem. We celebrated Xmas and my parents were atheists.

[Secret Alias]

It is curious that Africanus mentions Herod's destruction of toledoth:

Herod, knowing that the lineage of the Israelites contributed nothing to him, and goaded by the consciousness of his ignoble birth, burned the registers of their families.

If Herod really did destroy these scrolls it is hard to see how this would affect proofs of descent from Jesus for the desposyni:

A few, however, of the studious, having private records of their own, either by remembering the names or by getting at them in some other way from the archives, pride themselves in preserving the memory of their noble descent; and among these happen to be those already mentioned, called desposyni, on account of their connection with the family of the Saviour.

Instead what Africanus's source has in mind is their descent from David:

He also relates that Vespasian after the conquest of Jerusalem gave orders that all that belonged to the lineage of David should be sought out, in order that none of the royal race might be left among the Jews; and in consequence of this a most terrible persecution again hung over the Jews ... But when this same Domitian had commanded that the descendants of David should be slain, an ancient tradition says that some of the heretics brought accusation against the descendants of Jude (said to have been a brother of the Saviour according to the flesh), on the ground that they were of the lineage of David and were related to Christ himself. Hegesippus relates these facts in the following words. Of the family of the Lord there were still living the grandchildren of Jude, who is said to have been the Lord's brother according to the flesh. Information was given that they belonged to the family of David, and they were brought to the Emperor Domitian by the Evocatus. For Domitian feared the coming of Christ as Herod also had feared it. And he asked them if they were descendants of David, and they confessed that they were. Then he asked them how much property they had, or how much money they owned. And both of them answered that they had only nine thousand denarii, half of which belonged to each of them.

This is a very strong reason to suspect that Africanus's source is Hegesippus. Whether or not Hegesippus mentions Herod's destruction of the toledoth the logic is central to the later stories (fables) of persecution of the relatives of Jesus. Notice also the reference to 'heretics' prompting the persecutions.