Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
vocesanticae
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Joined: Tue Sep 15, 2020 3:10 pm

Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by vocesanticae »

Uploaded v1.23 today, a major update:
- Now up over 150,000 words (1.22 was around 125,000 words)
- Draft reconstructions for the First Gospel (Qn) and the Third Gospel (Early Luke / Gospel of Marcion) are now complete through chapter 10
- Lots of corrections continue made to earlier chapters as new evidence has continue to come to light
- The redactional tendencies of all strata (Qn, Mk1, Mt1, Lk1, Jn1, Jn2, Lk2, Mk2, Mt2, Jn3) are becoming increasingly clear as I continue to map signal syntheses and triangulations.
- The page format in the Signals and Reconstruction section is now uniform (tabloid size, landscape layout), facilitating a cleaner reading experience

Feedback welcomed, especially on the latest materials in chapter 10!

Please always go to the DOI base station to access the latest version: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3927056

If you'd like to try a fun little tutorial about how to do signals syntheses mapping (as an advanced, scientific form of source and redaction criticism), please check out my Star Wars themed exercise:
https://vocesanticae.com/2020/09/16/sta ... eparation/

On a different note, Owen Jarus from LiveScience gave a generous write-up on my recently published chapter about a medieval Latin legend of the good thief. https://vocesanticae.com/2020/09/21/liv ... apocrypha/
davidmartin
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Joined: Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:51 pm

Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by davidmartin »

I'm impressed with this! just started reading on your link

Here's a few random questions apologies if already covered in your doc

Does it shed any light on the Gospel of Thomas? maybe help the early camp?
Does it include Morton's Secret Mark material? (it's quite compelling esp. after the Hebrew Matthew discovery that sort of gives it a tad more support)

My own ideas led me to think the women do go out to preach at the end and play a greater role and this was omitted (but still fragments of it in one of the alternative endings). I've got a theory that prior to Paul, Mary was a ring leader and played a far greater role and there's plenty of evidence for that

I've often imagined what the first Mark might have looked like
I see a gospel that made much of the sayings of Jesus rather more than messianic or fulfillment of prophecy claims
I see a 'hidden layer' whereby the group behind it wishes to be sought out by those who read it and are interested and not necessarily their local church, what i mean is it's hoping to transmit the teachings of the original author amongst competing teachings and is self aware of the need to do this even wrapping certain things in symbols for the mature
I suspect the original Mark would have been more friendly to the apostles and Jesus family and shown perhaps more of an immanence spirituality and no hell (Mark copies its single ref from Matthew surely?)

I do think there might have been a baptism/descent of the spirit though heck of a lot of early sources for this

Anyway great stuff
if your interested in any of the stuff i put above can explain the reasons behind them
Secret Alias
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by Secret Alias »

1. it is not encouraging to read Tertullian as if he knows or is citing the Marcionite canon. I doubt Tertullian ever had his hands on a Marcionite canon. He was almost certainly copying out Irenaeus lost original treatise of the same name.
2. Epiphanius has his own problems. He cites the existence of a document which he claims he himself wrote (it was probably Basil) detailing SOME variant readings from the Marcionite canon. The order of epistles from the document (not Epiphanius's later correction) does not mirror Tertullian's Galatians first Pauline canon.

As such:
a. Tertullian's borrowing of Irenaeus's Against Marcion is Galatians first because Irenaeus's canon was such (so a text at St Catherines).
b. Irenaeus's ordering of the Pauline epistles reflects readings from his own canon rather than Marcion's.
c. Epiphanius is a joke. Hard to separate fact from fiction from made up in his writings.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
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Jax
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by Jax »

Just downloaded thank you. Look forward to reading it. :)
perseusomega9
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by perseusomega9 »

Have you done any work on the Markionite Apostolikon?
The metric to judge if one is a good exegete: the way he/she deals with Barabbas.

Who disagrees with me on this precise point is by definition an idiot.
-Giuseppe
vocesanticae
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by vocesanticae »

davidmartin wrote: Tue Sep 22, 2020 2:47 pm I'm impressed with this! just started reading on your link

Here's a few random questions apologies if already covered in your doc

Does it shed any light on the Gospel of Thomas? maybe help the early camp?
Does it include Morton's Secret Mark material? (it's quite compelling esp. after the Hebrew Matthew discovery that sort of gives it a tad more support)

My own ideas led me to think the women do go out to preach at the end and play a greater role and this was omitted (but still fragments of it in one of the alternative endings). I've got a theory that prior to Paul, Mary was a ring leader and played a far greater role and there's plenty of evidence for that

I've often imagined what the first Mark might have looked like
I see a gospel that made much of the sayings of Jesus rather more than messianic or fulfillment of prophecy claims
I see a 'hidden layer' whereby the group behind it wishes to be sought out by those who read it and are interested and not necessarily their local church, what i mean is it's hoping to transmit the teachings of the original author amongst competing teachings and is self aware of the need to do this even wrapping certain things in symbols for the mature
I suspect the original Mark would have been more friendly to the apostles and Jesus family and shown perhaps more of an immanence spirituality and no hell (Mark copies its single ref from Matthew surely?)

I do think there might have been a baptism/descent of the spirit though heck of a lot of early sources for this

Anyway great stuff
if your interested in any of the stuff i put above can explain the reasons behind them
Hi David,

From my initial comparisons of Qn and GThomas, there are numerous overlaps, including passages that the CEQ committee omitted from Q. Once my first draft reconstructions of Qn and GMarc are done based on the most reliable Greek and Latin sources for GMarc, I'll plan to do a second pass to include Coptic, Syriac, and Armenian sources, as well as Secret Mark. While I'm not yet conversant with Secret Mark debates and literature, several of my scholarly friends are quite open to its authenticity, and I'm not inclined to dismiss it out of hand as a forgery without carefully considering the textual signals it contains. So for now, I don't have any stated hypotheses one way or the other about whether and where Secret Mark fits within the 10+ major gospel strata between 65 and 150 CE whose characteristics I'm clarifying with each new version.

About the hell/hades question specifically, it's very much there and strongly attested for Qn/GMarc in the parable of Dives and Lazarus. It's just that its version of a two-tiered hades is based simply and exclusively on an inversion of socio-economic order, wherein eternal punishment is reserved for the avaricious. What I'm seeing is that each stratum has its own vision of hades that is a self-reflection of its social and economic priorities and community boundaries. Not that different from today, I suppose.

Best wishes,

Mark
vocesanticae
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by vocesanticae »

perseusomega9 wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 1:10 pm Have you done any work on the Markionite Apostolikon?
Not yet, but I was just proposing to my friend Phil Tite--who is much more of a specialist in the Pauline corpus (canonical and non-canonical), that he should take up a signals and strata analysis that considers the Apostolikon as reflecting one of our earlier (if not earliest) strata of Pauline writings. Once my work on Qn/GMarc is done, perhaps I'll turn next to the Apostolikon and the Pauline traditions. Everything I'm seeing there indicates there are at least 2-3 redactional stages seen in many of the writings attributed to Paul.
vocesanticae
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by vocesanticae »

Jax wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 11:08 am Just downloaded thank you. Look forward to reading it. :)
Thanks, Jax. Look forward to your constructive feedback!
vocesanticae
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Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by vocesanticae »

Secret Alias wrote: Tue Sep 22, 2020 3:15 pm 1. it is not encouraging to read Tertullian as if he knows or is citing the Marcionite canon. I doubt Tertullian ever had his hands on a Marcionite canon. He was almost certainly copying out Irenaeus lost original treatise of the same name.
2. Epiphanius has his own problems. He cites the existence of a document which he claims he himself wrote (it was probably Basil) detailing SOME variant readings from the Marcionite canon. The order of epistles from the document (not Epiphanius's later correction) does not mirror Tertullian's Galatians first Pauline canon.

As such:
a. Tertullian's borrowing of Irenaeus's Against Marcion is Galatians first because Irenaeus's canon was such (so a text at St Catherines).
b. Irenaeus's ordering of the Pauline epistles reflects readings from his own canon rather than Marcion's.
c. Epiphanius is a joke. Hard to separate fact from fiction from made up in his writings.
Can you point me to any scholarly publications that claim that Tertullian was not consulting and quoting from Marcion's Gospel? I honestly have never come across this view in the scholarly literature, even from those who take the most minimalist approach to reconstructing Marcion's Gospel.
davidmartin
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Joined: Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:51 pm

Re: Qn and GMarc Reconstruction Update

Post by davidmartin »

vocesanticae wrote: Wed Sep 23, 2020 3:26 pm About the hell/hades question specifically, it's very much there and strongly attested for Qn/GMarc in the parable of Dives and Lazarus. It's just that its version of a two-tiered hades is based simply and exclusively on an inversion of socio-economic order, wherein eternal punishment is reserved for the avaricious. What I'm seeing is that each stratum has its own vision of hades that is a self-reflection of its social and economic priorities and community boundaries. Not that different from today, I suppose.
Right if i understand it you're operating purely within the available texts and their variants and yes i think in all the extant ones Hades is found
My reason for doubting Hades was originally in Mark is
  • Mark only has 1 Hades mention. That's odd for such a heavy doctrine. Why not half a dozen like Luke? John has zero. Something is fishy
  • The mention in Mark is parallel to Matthew. Easy to imagine it leaking into Mark from there at some point
  • There's textual variants in this area. In Mark the scriptural additions 'worm does not die' etc are missing in some ms
  • Paul never mentions Hades and he is said to write prior to the gospels. If he doesn't know it, Mark being earliest might originally not have either
  • The Odes don't mention Hades instead claiming Sheol has been destroyed (ah, wonderful news)
  • One Christian group did favour hell, those around Matthews gospel and Rev, Ebionites used vers. of Matt (Ebionite Clementines is full of it + Apoc. Peter)
  • There's a similar saying in GoT that could account for it being turned into a Hades saying if the GoT was original (eye in place of eye/foot)
So there's a load of reasons i think Hades was never in the earliest Mark and the concept came in diagonally later on, but if you're purely going off extant manuscripts i can understand why none of these reasons would apply?
Note. the phrase 'Outer darkness' in Matthew is a different category as it may or may not equal Hades i'm open to Matthew contain some quite early sources as i see you are too, but influenced a lot in certain directions that included Hades
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