Chrestians/Christians?

[GakuseiDon]

I hope people found my analysis above interesting, even if not convincing!

It seems convincing to me.

Thanks Peter!

[GakuseiDon]

I'm not saying my reading is a slam-dunk by any means. I do think it is consistent internally, which lends weight to my reading. So if you think I'm wrong on any of it, please let me know why. Please quote GoP as well to show me where I am wrong.

From Chrestian to Christian - Philip beyond the grave contains my analysis of these pivotal XS/XRS / Chrestian / Christian logia in Philip

Yes, I've read through it, thanks. It doesn't answer the questions I have above though, IFAICS. I'm happy to go through your key logia one-by-one. Can we start by looking at Logion 6, please? My question is at the end:
________________________________

6. The father could be any father or Father, you have nothing in the text to go on for supporting your claim

In fact, it doesn't matter. My point is that the author refers to "Chrestians" as "we", and seem to suggest that "we" came after Christ came:

Since Christ came, the world has been created, the cities adorned, the dead carried out. When we were Hebrews, we were orphans and had only our mother, but when we became Chrestians, we had both father and mother.

Compare that to his later statement: "For the Father anointed the Son, and the Son anointed the apostles, and the apostles anointed us."

"We"/"us" are Chrestians AND Christians. And that is consistent with what we see in the Gospels: baptism first, then anointing with chrism. I'll expand on that below.

What do you think of the apparent timing for when "we" Chrestians gained a father in Logion 6? Do you agree that "we" Chrestians came about as a result of Christ coming?

[mlinssen]

I hope people found my analysis above interesting, even if not convincing!

It seems convincing to me.

That's not very convincing, but it amazes me how you can read all that AND have an outspoken opinion on it whereas you need "more time" to decide on a single word in a text versus a dictionary

[mlinssen]

I'm not saying my reading is a slam-dunk by any means. I do think it is consistent internally, which lends weight to my reading. So if you think I'm wrong on any of it, please let me know why. Please quote GoP as well to show me where I am wrong.

From Chrestian to Christian - Philip beyond the grave contains my analysis of these pivotal XS/XRS / Chrestian / Christian logia in Philip

Yes, I've read through it, thanks. It doesn't answer the questions I have above though, IFAICS. I'm happy to go through your key logia one-by-one. Can we start by looking at Logion 6, please? My question is at the end:
________________________________

6. The father could be any father or Father, you have nothing in the text to go on for supporting your claim

In fact, it doesn't matter. My point is that the author refers to "Chrestians" as "we", and seem to suggest that "we" came after Christ came:

Since Christ came, the world has been created, the cities adorned, the dead carried out. When we were Hebrews, we were orphans and had only our mother, but when we became Chrestians, we had both father and mother.

Compare that to his later statement: "For the Father anointed the Son, and the Son anointed the apostles, and the apostles anointed us."

"We"/"us" are Chrestians AND Christians. And that is consistent with what we see in the Gospels: baptism first, then anointing with chrism. I'll expand on that below.

What do you think of the apparent timing for when "we" Chrestians gained a father in Logion 6? Do you agree that "we" Chrestians came about as a result of Christ coming?

If by now you don't understand that the text doesn't say "Christ", then you're truly a hopelessly lost case Don

Where did you get this version of logion 6, Don? You've clubbed together parts of logion 4, 5 and 6

[davidmartin]

There is no name for a non-gnostic, mystical branch of Christianity even though it leaves traces everywhere, why is that?

"Marcion"

you're pulling my chain ml!
too late, way too late + too dualist..

PS I think the GoP is better dated early 2nd century and I think the first NHL editions dated it around then
Also I think you're Chrestians idea doesn't even need the GoP am I right? Cause of the other places you've found referencing Chrest

Thomas is also evidence for the Chrestians... I believe in the *something* you're talking about, whereas others say *something* doesn't exist

[davidmartin]

thanks dbz

Stevan Davies's work is seriously underrated IMO, nice to see it quoted

His summary provides an excellent base to add colour and propose alternatives + fit these in with the evidence we have
I see these communities he talks about as being what ml calls Chrestians or could be called original Christians
But as we can see, few if anyone is talking about this paradigm

Irish wrote:

They’re generally dated to ~125 CE. To call that the time of Jesus is an interesting choice

you cannot be serious, I'll take this as a request for more information

No-one knows the date or can establish a date. It's a guess, a first century date is entirely plausible
Would you date 2 Peter or Acts to the first century? in the case of the Odes it's quite feasible

Why do they date them 125? Because the clearest dependence on the Odes is in the epistle of Barnabas which is dated around 130 so they have to be before that - lol, that's merely a terminus date, could they be 75 years before that easily

The Odes are like Thomas, they can be dated mid first century plausibly - whether they are or not is open to question but not that they could be

No-one has to believe they are first century to partake in a thought experiment that they are and see whether the conclusions this would make fit the evidence we have and resolve difficult questions

Dating the Odes 125 is just a way to brush them under the carpet into insignificance - why do that? There's only one explanation - it breaks too many theories that mainstream scholars have been teaching and staking their reputations on. Ehrman's tripe turns out to be thin gruel in his treatment of Paul's predecessors.

[dbz]

No-one has to believe they are first century to partake in a thought experiment that they are and see whether the conclusions this would make fit the evidence we have and resolve difficult questions

Dating the Odes 125 is just a way to brush them under the carpet into insignificance - why do that? There's only one explanation - it breaks too many theories that mainstream scholars have been teaching and staking their reputations on.

• I asked my nephew of nine years, "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?" He replied neither, "The dinosaur came first!"

[mlinssen]

There is no name for a non-gnostic, mystical branch of Christianity even though it leaves traces everywhere, why is that?

"Marcion"

you're pulling my chain ml!
too late, way too late + too dualist..

PS I think the GoP is better dated early 2nd century and I think the first NHL editions dated it around then
Also I think you're Chrestians idea doesn't even need the GoP am I right? Cause of the other places you've found referencing Chrest

Thomas is also evidence for the Chrestians... I believe in the *something* you're talking about, whereas others say *something* doesn't exist

Marcion never existed, but creating him as a sock puppet allowed for the FF to address the gospel of Chrestianity - which *Ev was

GoP merely very neatly hands us the history of how Chrestianity became Christianity, and the NHL hands us the dozens of references to Xrhstos, Xrhstos-ness, IS the Chrest and so on: do notice that those are the only texts that elaborate on "the last name of Jesus" (LOL), and that Christianity gives us nothing but ligatures

GoP could be any date as long as it's late second CE, AFAIC.
Thomas 50 CE, John 75 CE, *Ev 100 CE, Mark 150 CE, LukeMatthew 200 CE: 175 CE for GoP would fit in nicely

https://leidenuni.academia.edu/MartijnL ... restianity is a new label on my profile, the top 4 are about Chrestianity while the bottom 2 are just Thomas miscellaneous

[dbz]

Marcion never existed, but creating him as a sock puppet allowed for the FF to address the gospel of Chrestianity - which *Ev was

• Which explains why we can not locate his drivers license or birth certificate

I mean: in physical pictures.

Nota bene:

I'm partial to the idea that *Ev introduced Amun into his system:

34 *Ev likely had οὐ δύνασθε Θεῷ δουλεύειν καὶ Ἄμμων: Amun, the Egyptian god who was the champion of the poor or troubled and central to personal piety. The name Amun meant something like “the hidden one” or “invisible”. Once again, μαμωνᾷ is a true hapax legomenon that doesn’t exist anywhere but in these verses. *Ev was hostile to God yet friendly to “the Father”, and with the canonicals repurposing Ἄμμων as μαμωνᾷ, assigning it a negative connotation instead, they also needed to reverse the verbs

Why don't we have any text whatsoever in which the alleged heretics strike back at the orthodox?

• A dark age age spanning half a century from the time of Paul and the first time Christians are reliably mentioned outside the Bible is a possibility.

So when do we have the first text in which refuted heretics refute back at the orthodox?

Perhaps I have failed to make myself clear; I will use an example:

Marcion gets refuted by e g. Justin Martyr; let's just suppose that Marcion really existed, for argument's sake (even though I argue the opposite in my theory) - did Marcion ever respond in writing, you think?
Did he, and was every single copy of it destroyed? Likely. Did he not? Then please motivate why not

Likewise for all other heretics: did they ever return the favour dealt them by the FF?
No? Why not. Yes? Then what happened to it

[mlinssen]

Marcion never existed, but creating him as a sock puppet allowed for the FF to address the gospel of Chrestianity - which *Ev was

• Which explains why we can not locate his drivers license or birth certificate

A fun one: when did Marcion first get "Patricised" and when was the last on those?

Justin Martyr (c. 100 – c. 165 CE)
Irenaeus (c. 130 – c. 202 CE)
Clement of Alexandria (c. 150 – c. 215 CE)
Tertullian (c. 155 – c. 220 CE)
Origen (c. 185 – c. 253 CE)
Epiphanius (c. 310–320 – 403 CE)
Jerome (c. 345 –420 CE)

Easily 250 years are covered this way; 250 continuous years during which apparently “the writings of Marcion” formed a great enough problem to be addressed by Church Fathers in multiple volumes per Church Father. Something that size doesn’t attest to some heretic distorting orthodox writings and publishing his own version of the mainstream document(s) on the side, such instead attests to an enormously influential, popular and persistent movement that was nigh impossible to suppress