Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

Secret Alias wrote: Thu Jun 01, 2023 5:10 pm James Edwards in 2020 (!) wrote something as insipid as this:
Irenaeus resorts to a precedent from antiquity, namely, the fourfold Gospel tradition
Why because Irenaeus SAID he was citing tradition? Here goes a tradition. "Every woman I have slept with begged me for more. They pleaded with me to stay with them and said they would pay any amount of money to make love to them over and over again." You see, I cited something. It must be true.
We also know for a fact that it wasn't a tradition. It's impossible to understand the pre-Irenaeus literature if it were.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

And even the ANF title it this way: "The Gospels are four in number, neither more nor less. Mystic reasons for this."

8. It is not possible that the Gospels can be either more or fewer in number than they are. For, since there are four zones of the world in which we live, and four principal winds, while the Church is scattered throughout all the world, and the pillar and ground 1 Timothy 3:15 of the Church is the Gospel and the spirit of life; it is fitting that she should have four pillars, breathing out immortality on every side, and vivifying men afresh. From which fact, it is evident that the Word, the Artificer of all, He that sits upon the cherubim, and contains all things, He who was manifested to men, has given us the Gospel under four aspects, but bound together by one Spirit. As also David says, when entreating His manifestation, You that sits between the cherubim, shine forth. For the cherubim, too, were four-faced, and their faces were images of the dispensation of the Son of God. For, [as the Scripture] says, The first living creature was like a lion, Revelation 4:7 symbolizing His effectual working, His leadership, and royal power; the second [living creature] was like a calf, signifying [His] sacrificial and sacerdotal order; but the third had, as it were, the face as of a man,— an evident description of His advent as a human being; the fourth was like a flying eagle, pointing out the gift of the Spirit hovering with His wings over the Church. And therefore the Gospels are in accord with these things, among which Christ Jesus is seated. For that according to John relates His original, effectual, and glorious generation from the Father, thus declaring, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1 Also, all things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made. For this reason, too, is that Gospel full of all confidence, for such is His person. But that according to Luke, taking up [His] priestly character, commenced with Zacharias the priest offering sacrifice to God. For now was made ready the fatted calf, about to be immolated for the finding again of the younger son. Matthew, again, relates His generation as a man, saying, The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham; and also, The birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise. This, then, is the Gospel of His humanity; for which reason it is, too, that [the character of] a humble and meek man is kept up through the whole Gospel. Mark, on the other hand, commences with [a reference to] the prophetical spirit coming down from on high to men, saying, The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Esaias the prophet,— pointing to the winged aspect of the Gospel; and on this account he made a compendious and cursory narrative, for such is the prophetical character. And the Word of God Himself used to converse with the ante-Mosaic patriarchs, in accordance with His divinity and glory; but for those under the law he instituted a sacerdotal and liturgical service. Afterwards, being made man for us, He sent the gift of the celestial Spirit over all the earth, protecting us with His wings. Such, then, as was the course followed by the Son of God, so was also the form of the living creatures; and such as was the form of the living creatures, so was also the character of the Gospel. For the living creatures are quadriform, and the Gospel is quadriform, as is also the course followed by the Lord. For this reason were four principal (καθολικαί) covenants given to the human race: one, prior to the deluge, under Adam; the second, that after the deluge, under Noah; the third, the giving of the law, under Moses; the fourth, that which renovates man, and sums up all things in itself by means of the Gospel, raising and bearing men upon its wings into the heavenly kingdom.

9. These things being so, all who destroy the form of the Gospel are vain, unlearned, and also audacious; those, [I mean,] who represent the aspects of the Gospel as being either more in number than as aforesaid, or, on the other hand, fewer. The former class [do so], that they may seem to have discovered more than is of the truth; the latter, that they may set the dispensations of God aside. For Marcion, rejecting the entire Gospel, yea rather, cutting himself off from the Gospel, boasts that he has part in the [blessings of] the Gospel. Others, again (the Montanists), that they may set at nought the gift of the Spirit, which in the latter times has been, by the good pleasure of the Father, poured out upon the human race, do not admit that aspect [of the evangelical dispensation] presented by John's Gospel, in which the Lord promised that He would send the Paraclete; John 14:16, etc. but set aside at once both the Gospel and the prophetic Spirit. Wretched men indeed! Who wish to be pseudo-prophets, forsooth, but who set aside the gift of prophecy from the Church; acting like those (the Encratitæ) who, on account of such as come in hypocrisy, hold themselves aloof from the communion of the brethren. We must conclude, moreover, that these men (the Montanists) can not admit the Apostle Paul either. For, in his Epistle to the Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 11:4-5 he speaks expressly of prophetical gifts, and recognises men and women prophesying in the Church. Sinning, therefore, in all these particulars, against the Spirit of God, Matthew 12:31 they fall into the irremissible sin. But those who are from Valentinus, being, on the other hand, altogether reckless, while they put forth their own compositions, boast that they possess more Gospels than there really are. Indeed, they have arrived at such a pitch of audacity, as to entitle their comparatively recent writing the Gospel of Truth, though it agrees in nothing with the Gospels of the Apostles, so that they have really no Gospel which is not full of blasphemy. For if what they have published is the Gospel of truth, and yet is totally unlike those which have been handed down to us from the apostles, any who please may learn, as is shown from the Scriptures themselves, that that which has been handed down from the apostles can no longer be reckoned the Gospel of truth. But that these Gospels alone are true and reliable, and admit neither an increase nor diminution of the aforesaid number, I have proved by so many and such [arguments]. For, since God made all things in due proportion and adaptation, it was fit also that the outward aspect of the Gospel should be well arranged and harmonized. The opinion of those men, therefore, who handed the Gospel down to us, having been investigated, from their very fountainheads, let us proceed also to the remaining apostles, and inquire into their doctrine with regard to God; then, in due course we shall listen to the very words of the Lord.

There's not even a salutary mention of Papias or Polycarp here.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Secret Alias »

Another argument for Irenaeus being the one who wrote Against Marcion. Parallels with Bezae.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_ ... frontcover

Like that "error" that Paul said he did submit to the authorities at Jerusalem. That too shows up in Against Marcion.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

Secret Alias wrote: Thu Jun 01, 2023 5:18 pm Another argument for Irenaeus being the one who wrote Against Marcion. Parallels with Bezae.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_ ... frontcover

Like that "error" that Paul said he did submit to the authorities at Jerusalem. That too shows up in Against Marcion.
Doesn't this just show that Irenaeus got his copies from Rome or something, if that was the text there?
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

Secret Alias wrote: Thu Jun 01, 2023 4:59 pm It's not that Ephrem preserved the gospel harmony of Justin. Justin's didn't have John in it. It's clues, patterns, sequences that might suggest an older order. Like Bethsaida as the name of the Nazareth synagogue narrative.
I'm certainly interested in this, though.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

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Secret Alias wrote: Thu Jun 01, 2023 5:12 pm The thing about Theophilus using a gospel harmony is on your page for Theophilus http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/i ... athen.html
Jerome, though, talks about it in the way he talks about misattributions [more likely] and forgeries [less likely] (and he seemed pretty good on picking up on that stuff sometimes):
I have read, under his name, commentaries On the Gospel and On the proverbs of Solomon which do not appear to me to correspond in style and language with the elegance and expressiveness of the above works.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

Here's one of those smoking guns, by the way:

page 277: https://www.tertullian.org/articles/eva ... k4_eng.htm
"It is no matter if somewhere the word 'appeared' is used."

Tertullian doesn't know if the word "appeared" is used at the beginning of Marcion's Gospel. Like.. wtf?
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

A bit more of an interpretation here, but Tertullian doesn't say that he understands why he's taking Luke "out of order" (pg 283):

With what purpose have I begun with this episode? To show you that Jesus was acknowledged by the demon, and affirmed by himself, to belong to none other than the Creator.

Tertullian neglects to point out that gMarcion "reversed" the order of these episodes. This suggests an explanation according to which (a) the more correct gMarcion order came to Tertullian somehow but (b) Tertullian was unaware that this was because it was the gMarcion order. After offering some feint for why he is taking Luke out of order, Tertullian reverts to Luke's order, as if refusing to allow further lapses of order to occur, for which he would find no explanation.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Secret Alias »

Someone's catching on. It's a bizarre commentary on Luke.
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Re: Enough of "Textual Criticism"! What Do People Imagine Marcionism Looked Like If You Visited Their Synagogues?

Post by Peter Kirby »

Tertullian does refer to the Antitheses, claiming to be able to go through them one by one. It's not clear to me yet whether at first hand. In the places where Tertullian is explicit about what was in the text of gMarcion, this is often inferred from such a reference to those Antitheses.

Even in this Marcion sees an 'opposition', that whereas Elisha needed a material help, and made use of water, seven times at that, Christ by the act of his word alone [Luke 5:13], without repeating it, immediately put the healing into effect—as though I were not bold enough to claim even the word he used, as part of the Creator's property.

It remains an open question for me about whether (a) all claims of omission in gMarcion come from another Against Marcion and (b) all claims of presence in gMarcion come from another Against Marcion or possibly Antitheses.

Generally, however, it does read like a commentary on Luke, both in order and in not usually discussing gMarcion explicitly. Except where it doesn't, of course, e.g., where the claim of omission is against not-Luke (whether Matthew or a text that has material known from Matthew). There are a few examples of this type, which best admit of a previous source.
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