Petavius on the Panarion

[andrewcriddle]

The issue here is whether the odd chronology is a (presumably accurate) account of the unusual views of the Nazoreans, or an account of Epiphanius' own views (garbled in transmission).

Andrew,

Reading through section 29 "Against Nazoraeans," the section you refer to seems to be setting up E's later argument that the Nazoraeans were just another branch of Judeans, and not real Christians.

The passage (29.3.7 of Frank William's translation)

3,7 But with the transfer of the royal throne the rank of king passed, in Christ, from the physical house of David and Israel to the church. The throne is established in God’s holy church forever, and has both the kingly and the high-priestly rank ...

really only makes sense if considered a counter to any claim a Nazoraean, who adopt, he says, Jewish ways and differ in no way from them except accepting Christ as messiah, might make that emphasizes reliance on Judaic traditions like Law and circumcision, which 3,7 says were no longer the basis for royal succession. So Jesus the Jewish messiah based on his physical descent from David means nothing, but Jesus the Christ, a cross between royal and high priestly, born of the holy spirit through Mary, does.

since David’s seed, through Mary, is seated on the throne, < his throne endures > forever
and of his kingdom there shall be no end. He should now transfer the order of the former kingship; for indeed his kingdom is not earthly, as he said to Pontius Pilate in the Gospel, “My Kingdom is not of this world.” (7) For since Christ brings to fulfillment all the things (that have been said) in riddles, the preliminaries have reached a limit.

Yet after all this posturing, he admits that he really does not know whether they believe Jesus was messiah because he was physically descended from David, or as the product of the holy spirit through Mary.

As to Christ, I cannot say whether they too are misled by the wickedness of Cerinthus and Merinthus, and regard him as a mere man — or whether, as the truth is, they affirm that he was born of Mary by the Holy Spirit.

DCH

Hi David

I broadly agree with your analysis.

re-Reading the whole passage myself, one really odd thing is the idea that Christians were at one time called Jessaeans and that apparently the name Therapeutae in Philo is a rendering of Jessaeans.

But on the central issus Epiphanius does, in the first section, seem to be presenting his own (maybe garbled) version of how Christ fulfils the Old Testament, rather than an account of weird ideas held only by the Nazoreans.

Andrew Criddle

[theomise]

No matter how one looks at it, it is still confused as hell. It was Simon, not Alexander Janneus, who was the first high priest to be declared a hereditary ruler. This was by popular decree, circa 141/140 BCE, and this declaration was confirmed by the Syrian ruler out of necessity, effectively making Simon an "independent" client king to Syria.

However, it was Hyrcanus II who petitioned Roman intervention in his civil war with Aristobolus II and in the process relinquished the rule to Roman procurators (Antipater, and later his sons, including Herod), although Hyrcanus II retained the high priesthood, until Herod was appointed king by the Romans when Hyrcanus was mutilated and carried away by the Parthians during the revolt of Antigonus II.

Even then the Hasmonean Aristobulus II, who had also exercised both high priestly and government roles when he was in control before Hyrcanus got the Romans to intervene, was still quite alive and was used by Caesar to threaten Herod's control of Judea under Antony, although Aristobulus was poisoned before he could make use of his two legions against Herod.

I'm inclined to think that Epiphanius has confused Alexander Janneus with both Simon the founder of the Hasmonean dynasty and Hyrcanus II who ended the practice of joint possession of government and high priestly duties. It doesn't seem that he sees any problem with priestly rule as a variance from rule by the house of David, since David was said to have some priestly characteristics (in the Psalms, mainly). The house of David was anyone from the people of Judah and the family of Aaron from Levi. He was cool with that. The Gospels say that Jesus was a descendant of David, so he must have been, at least spiritually, picking up where the physical descendants had failed. Scripture cannot be wrong, so he has no problem twisting historical reality to make it resonate with scripture. It's not like we don't see such attempts to make silk purses out of sows' ears even today.

Hey DCH,

Awesome stuff... appreciate the historical insights.

It's as if we're all trying to solve a gigantic jigsaw puzzle with 10 million pieces: variables galore... with an unfortunate dearth of constants.

Cheers,
Theo