Three reasons to think that Pilate was introduced before Justin and before Marcion

[Giuseppe]

The trajectory I think at present is the following:

• Paul's epistles

• Memorabilia known by Justin

• Marcion's Evangelion (= proto-Luke)

• Mark

• Matthew

• John

• Luke

I think that the Memorabilia known by Justin were the first exercises of Christian midrash and, as such, the first invented story that euhemerized Jesus on the earth.

My question is now to inquiry about the introduction of Pilate. Three options:

• 1) was Pilate introduced already in the Memorabilia known by Justin?

• 2) Was Pilate introduced the first time by Marcion?

• 3) Was Pilate introduced after Marcion?

I am inclined to think that Pilate preceded Justin, and therefore Pilate was already mentioned in the Memorabilia known by Justin.

Three reasons to think so:

• 1) we have evidence that the Gospel of Peter, or a his kernel, was known by Justin, accordingly it was a portion of the Memorabilia known by Justin; in the Gospel of Peter Pilate is already mentioned;

• 2) Pilate, once translitterated in Hebrew, gives PLT, the Semitic root for all the verbs meaning "to release, to set free": isn't the Pilate' s role only the role of the one who wanted to release Jesus?

• 3) Dubourg has argued for the Gospel Passion story being based on the Book of Esther, just as the Alexandrine parody against Agrippas was inspired by the same Book of Esther. In particular, the root of Esther is STR/SṬR, and it is also the root of:
  • stratia, stratēgos, stratiōtēs,
  • theatron,
  • stauros,
  • place of fornication,
  • fornication with Pagans.
  
  So it was expected that the Christian midrash gave birth to an original story where Jesus is crucified on the stauros by soldiers in a Pagan place, and was defamed as son of a fornication with Pagans. The Pagan place of the execution gave the Pagan identity of the killers: they couldn't be the "Jews".

[mlinssen]

Papyrus 52 (Rylands Library Papyrus P52) is the earliest John that we have, and 2nd-3rd CE seems a plausible date range. No paleography or carbon dating will ever assign any certainty to this I think, but this could well be a fragment from 1st half 2nd CE, and a very early translation of Coptic John, untainted

Transcription is bold where extant, it's not entirely accurate but hard to do on mobile. I haven't verified the lacunae, I haven't checked a thing really

John 18:31-33 recto

ΟΙ ΙΟΥΔΑΙΟΙ ΗΜΙΝ ΟΥΚ ΕΞΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΠΟΚΤΕΙΝΑΙ
ΟΥΔΕΝΑ ΙΝΑ Ο ΛΟΓΟΣ ΤΟΥ ΙΗΣΟΥ ΠΛΗΡΩΘΗ ΟΝ ΕΙ-
ΠΕΝ ΣΗΜΑΙΝΩΝ ΠΟΙΩ ΘΑΝΑΤΩ ΗΜΕΛΛΕΝ ΑΠΟ-
ΘΝΗΣΚΕΙΝ ΕΙΣΗΛΘΕΝ ΟΥΝ ΠΑΛΙΝ ΕΙΣ ΤΟ ΠΡΑΙΤΩ-
ΡΙΟΝ Ο ΠΙΛΑΤΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΕΦΩΝΗΣΕΝ ΤΟΝ ΙΗΣΟΥΝ
ΚΑΙ ΕΙΠΕΝ ΑΥΤΩ ΣΥ ΕΙ Ο ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΤΩΝ ΙΟΥ-
ΔΑΙΩΝ

John 18:37-38 verso

ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΕΙΜΙ ΕΓΩ ΕΙΣ ΤΟΥΤΟ ΓΕΓΕΝΝΗΜΑΙ
ΚΑΙ (ΕΙΣ ΤΟΥΤΟ) ΕΛΗΛΥΘΑ ΕΙΣ ΤΟΝ ΚΟΣΜΟΝ ΙΝΑ ΜΑΡΤΥ-
ΡΗΣΩ ΤΗ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ ΠΑΣ Ο ΩΝ ΕΚ ΤΗΣ ΑΛΗΘΕΙ-
ΑΣ ΑΚΟΥΕΙ ΜΟΥ ΤΗΣ ΦΩΝΗΣ ΛΕΓΕΙ ΑΥΤΩ
Ο ΠΙΛΑΤΟΣ ΤΙ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ ΚΑΙ ΤΟΥΤΟ
ΕΙΠΩΝ ΠΑΛΙΝ ΕΞΗΛΘΕΝ ΠΡΟΣ ΤΟΥΣ ΙΟΥ-
ΔΑΙΟΥΣ ΚΑΙ ΛΕΓΕΙ ΑΥΤΟΙΣ ΕΓΩ ΟΥΔΕΜΙΑΝ
ΕΥΡΙΣΚΩ ΕΝ ΑΥΤΩ ΑΙΤΙΑΝ

Did John invent the staking by Pilate on instigation of the Judeans? Likely, given this fragment.
Paul has nothing to do with it of course, Paul is just a rhetoric distraction based on the Apostolikon and profoundly late, and just a show of trying to link Chrestianity to Judaism by rooting both in either. None of it ever happened, it is just Dialogue with Trypho revisited - or vice versa

John is the first gospel, the first narrative based on Thomas.
I couldn't come up with a business case for adding John to the NT if I were paid a million euros - he simply doesn't belong at all, so the only reason to include him is that he couldn't be excluded - and the only reason for that is that he was the earliest gospel

It says Peilatos in some MS, FWIW

[Giuseppe]

In addition, I add a fourth item supporting the originality of a Roman trial, ergo of Pilate as the original killer in the early Christian midrash:

• 4) the "fists" received by Jesus are, by effect of the retroversion from Greek to Hebrew, the same "signs of royalty" received by the presumed victim: just when Jesus is beaten, he is really (ironically) honoured as king.

Now this fits better the fists given against Jesus by the Roman soldiers, more than by the guards of the high priest, since the theme of the royalty is found in the episode where the Roman soldiers derided Jesus as "king of the Jews", while the Jewish guards derided Jesus only as a "prophet".

[Giuseppe]

The early Christian midrash gave also the missing link between the original myth of a celestial crucifixion in outer space and the earliest Gospel Passion story: the key of this connection is found precisely in the root of Esther above, i.e. STR/SṬR, the same root of both stauros and theatron.

The theater, the circus, the spectacles, the carnival are considered places of fornication with Pagans.

The mocking of Jesus by the Roman soldiers is a new version of this place of fornication that is symbolized by the "theater", STR/SṬR.

Among the Pagans, the circus is allegory of the heaven.

Circus imago poli

https://books.openedition.org/ausonius/5304?lang=it


By hating the theater, the circus, the carnival, de facto the Jews hate the paganism.

When the Gospel Jesus is mocked and crucified on the stauros (STR/SṬR), he is victim of a Pagan carnival (STR/SṬR), that is the culmination of the evil: after it there can only be the eschatological triumph of the messiah.