Marcion --- The Butcher of Pontus

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Post Reply
robert j
Posts: 1007
Joined: Tue Jan 28, 2014 5:01 pm

Marcion --- The Butcher of Pontus

Post by robert j »

What if attempts to construct Marcionite versions of Paul's letters are nothing more than following a red herring dragged across the trail by the Patristic heretic hunters?

What if the accusations attributed to Irenaeus, Tertullian and others that Marcion butchered the letters of Paul were nothing more than a rhetorical devise, a polemic tactic?

After all, if Marcion's people would cut up the dead bodies of their parents along with sheep to devour at their feasts, as Tertullian claimed (Adv Marc 1.1), Marcion certainly wouldn't hesitate to chop-up the scriptures.

But what if Marcion took the letters of Paul essentially as Paul wrote them (and not that different from those we have today) and found in Paul's antinomian arguments what he considered to be a kindred soul. Perhaps Marcion only put his own spin on the letters, used his own interpretations of Paul's letters to support and promote his own further doctrines. And perhaps it was just Marcion's selective interpretations that the Patristic heretic hunters attacked and refuted using their accusations of butchery.

I wonder if Marcion would rather have chopped off his own right hand than chop-up the letters of his hero Paul. Another man considered Paul to be his hero --- Clement of Alexandria who wrote between the purported times of Irenaeus and Tertuillian. Clement refuted the doctrines of Marcion with philosophical arguments in several sections of his lengthy Stromata. Clement accused the heretics of selective use of the scriptures (Stromata, Book 7, chapter 16), but surprisingly, nowhere did Clement accuse Marcion of chopping-up or altering the letters of Clement's own hero, the “blessed", “noble”, even “divine” apostle Paul.

But I wonder if Marcion --- or the nascent proto-orthodox for that matter --- would have dared to make extensive changes to Paul's letters that were likely held in the highest esteem by more than a few eastern Mediterranean congregations. Sure, if the proto-orthodox falsely accused the Marcionites of using significantly altered versions of Paul's letters, the Marcionites could hold up their unaltered copies and cry, “liars”. But the proto-orthodox weren't aiming their polemics at the hard-core Marcionites --- they were trying to stem the tide --- to gain ground against the spread of Marcionism among other believers in the Christ in favor of their own “true” faith.

robert j.
Last edited by robert j on Tue Apr 05, 2016 1:41 pm, edited 2 times in total.
User avatar
toejam
Posts: 754
Joined: Sun Apr 06, 2014 1:35 am
Location: Brisbane, Australia

Re: Marcion --- The Butcher of Pontus

Post by toejam »

Yep. The same problem dogs all our knowledge of other Christians sects - most of the time we're only hearing one side of the story.
My study list: https://www.facebook.com/notes/scott-bignell/judeo-christian-origins-bibliography/851830651507208
Charles Wilson
Posts: 2100
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:13 am

Re: Marcion --- The Butcher of Pontus

Post by Charles Wilson »

Tacitus, Histories, Book 3

"All other nations were equally restless. A sudden outbreak had been excited in Pontus by a barbarian slave, who had before commanded the royal fleet. This was Anicetus, a freedman of Polemon, once a very powerful personage, who, when the kingdom was converted into a Roman province, ill brooked the change. Accordingly he raised in the name of Vitellius the tribes that border on Pontus, bribed a number of very needy adventurers by the hope of plunder, and, at the head of a force by no means contemptible, made a sudden attack on the old and famous city of Trapezus, founded by the Greeks on the farthest shore of the Pontus. There he destroyed a cohort, once a part of the royal contingent. They had afterwards received the privileges of citizenship, and while they carried their arms and banners in Roman fashion, they still retained the indolence and licence of the Greek. Anicetus also set fire to the fleet, and, as the sea was not guarded, escaped, for Mucianus had brought up to Byzantium the best of the Liburnian ships and all the troops. The barbarians even insolently scoured the sea in hastily constructed vessels of their own called "camarae," built with narrow sides and broad bottoms, and joined together without fastenings of brass or iron. Whenever the water is rough they raise the bulwarks with additional planks according to the increasing height of the waves, till the vessel is covered in like a house. Thus they roll about amid the billows, and, as they have a prow at both extremities alike and a convertible arrangement of oars, they may be paddled in one direction or another indifferently and without risk.

"The matter attracted the attention of Vespasian, and induced him to dispatch some veterans from the legions under Virdius Geminus, a tried soldier. Finding the enemy in disorder and dispersed in the eager pursuit of plunder, he attacked them, and drove them to their ships. Hastily fitting out a fleet of Liburnian ships he pursued Anicetus, and overtook him at the mouth of the river Cohibus, where he was protected by the king of the Sedochezi, whose alliance he had secured by a sum of money and other presents. This prince at first endeavoured to protect the suppliant by a threat of hostilities; when, however, the choice was presented to him between war and the profit to be derived from treachery, he consented, with the characteristic perfidy of barbarians, to the destruction of Anicetus, and delivered up the refugees. So ended this servile war..."

This passage has left footprints all over Acts. "Polemon" was married to "Bernice", consort of Titus. I believe the section is mirrored in "The Queen's Eunuch". The Camarae boats explain the curious small boat held together by ropes. These Camarae also explain the enigmatic last 2 chapters of Acts, which ends with the inlet into the Cohibus River. BTW:

Acts 8: 32 - 34 (RSV):

[32] Now the passage of the scripture which he was reading was this: "As a sheep led to the slaughter
or a lamb before its shearer is dumb,
so he opens not his mouth.
[33] In his humiliation justice was denied him.
Who can describe his generation?
For his life is taken up from the earth."
[34] And the eunuch said to Philip, "About whom, pray, does the prophet say this, about himself or about some one else?"

Ummm...That would be you, Anicetus. You are about to be double-crossed.

ANYWAY, all of this takes place in or near the Pontus and if a late dating is placed on the Paulines, it would be impossible to have them constructed without knowledge of all of this. Marcion ,ay or may not be the Butcher of Pontus but he wasn't far away from one.

CW
Post Reply