My Lifelong Obsession with Against Marcion

[Secret Alias]

The idea that the author's 'retraction' was somehow influencing his portrait of Marcion's development of a gospel of 'antitheses' is interesting. It continues through Book 4:

Marcion premises that in the fifteenth year of the principate of Tiberius he came down into Capernaum, a city of Galilee [Anno quintodecimo principatus Tiberiani proponit eum1 descendisse in civitatem Galilaeae Capharnaum]—from the Creator's heaven, of course, into which he had first come down out of his own.[utique de caelo creatoris, in quod de suo ante descenderat] Did not then due order demand that it should first be explained how he came down from his own heaven into the Creator's? [Ecquid ergo ordinis fuerat ut prius de suo caelo in creatoris descendens describeretur?] For why should I not pass censure on such matters as do not satisfy the claims of orderly narrative, <but let it> always tail off in falsehood? [Cur enim non et ista reprehendam quae non implent fidem ordinariae narrationis, deficientis in mendacio semper?] So let us ask once for all a question I have already discussed elsewhere [Plane semel dicta sint per quae iam alibi retractavimus], whether, while coming down through the Creator's territory and in opposition to him, he could have expected the Creator to let him in, and allow him to pass on from thence into the earth, which no less is the Creator's [an descendens per creatorem, et quidem adversus ipsum, potuerit ab eo admitti et inde tramitti in terram aeque ipsius]

Exclamat ibidem spiritus daemonis, Quid nobis et tibi est Iesu? venisti perdere nos: scio qui sis, sanctus dei. Hic ego non retractabo an et hoc cognomentum competierit ei quem nec Christum vocari oporteret, si non creatoris. (I do not here raise the question whether this appellation was suitable to one who ought not to be called Christ, unless he were sent by the Creator.)

But the Scripture offers me further information, even in the interpretation of the Lord Himself [Sed plus mihi scriptura confert, ipsius scilicet domini interpretatione]. For when the Jews, who looked at Him as merely man, and were not yet sure that He was God also, as being likewise the Son of God [Nam cum Iudaei solummodo hominem eius intuentes, necdum et deum certi, qua dei quoque filium], rightly enough said that a man could not forgive sins, but God alone [Mark 2:7 merito retractarent non posse hominem delicta dimittere, sed deum solum], why did He not, following up their point about man, answer them, that He had power to remit sins [cur non secundum intentionem eorum de homine eis respondit habere eum potestatem dimittendi delicta]; inasmuch as, when He mentioned the Son of man, He also named a human being? [quando et filium hominis nominans hominem nominaret?]

And thus she may evidently be regarded as having discerned768 the law, instead of breaking it. This will prove to be the faith which was to confer intelligence likewise. "If ye will not believe," says (the prophet), "ye shall not understand." When Christ approved of the faith of this woman, which simply rested in the Creator, He declared by His answer to her, that He was Himself the divine object of the faith of which He approved [Hanc fidem probans Christus eius feminae, quae solum credebat creatorem, eius fidei se deum respondit quam probavit]. Nor can I overlook the fact that His garment, by being touched, demonstrated also the truth of His body [Nec illud omittam, quod dum tangitur vestimentum eius, utique corpori non phantasmati inditum, corpus quoque demonstrabatur]; for of course" it was a body, and not a phantom, which the garment clothed. This indeed is not our point now; but the remark has a natural bearing on the question we are discussing [non quasi iam de hoc retractemus, sed quia ad praesentem conspirat quaestionem].

Therefore even the Pharisee, who invited Him to dinner in the passage before us, expressed some surprise [retractabat] in His presence that He had not washed before He sat down to meat, in accordance with the law, since it was the God of the law that He was proclaiming.

These He simply commanded to show themselves to the priest; "and as they went, He cleansed them" ----without a touch, and without a word, by His silent power and simple will. [5] Well, but what necessity was there for Christ, who had been once for all announced as the healer of our sicknesses and sins, and had proved Himself such by His acts, to busy Himself with inquiries into the qualities and details of cures [de qualitatibus curationum retractari]; or for the Creator to be summoned to the scrutiny of the law in the person of Christ?

Now, if He knowingly permitted the man, whom He deliberately elected to be one of His companions, to plunge into so great a crime, you must no longer use an argument [retractare] against the Creator in Adam's case, which may now recoil on your own God:1613 either that he was ignorant, and had no foresight to hinder the future sinner;1614 or that he was unable to hinder him, even if he was ignorant;1615 or else that he was unwilling, even if he had the foreknowledge and the ability; and so deserved the stigma of maliciousness, in having permitted the man of his own choice to perish in his sin.

[Secret Alias]

Book 5:

Nothing is without an origin except God alone [Nihil sine origine nisi deus solus]. In as much as of all things as they exist the origin comes first, so must it of necessity come first in the discussion of them [Quae quantum praecedit in statu omnium rerum, tantum praecedat necesse est etiam in retractatu earum]. Only so can there be agreement about what they are: for it is impossible for you to discern what the quality of a thing is unless you are first
assured whether itself exists: and you can only know that by knowing where it comes from.

Rightly, then, did Peter and James and John give their right hand of fellowship to Paul, and agree on such a division of their work, as that Paul should go to the heathen, and themselves to the circumcision.101 Their agreement, also, "to remember the poor"102 was in complete conformity with the law of the Creator, which cherished the poor and needy, as has been shown in our observations on your Gospel [sicut in evangelii vestri retractatu
probatum est].

Let Marcion's eraser be ashamed of itself: except that it is superfluous for me to discuss [ex abundanti retracto] he has left out [abstulit], since my case is stronger if he is shown wrong by those he has retained.

My introduction to the previous epistle led me away from discussion of its superscription [Praestructio superioris epistulae ita duxit, ut de titulo eius non retractaverim]: for I was sure it could be discussed in some other connection, it being his usual one, the same in all his epistles [certus et alibi retractari eum posse, communem scilicet et eundem in epistulis omnibus].

Praetereo si quando paria eorum quae retractata sunt, quaedam et breviter expungo [Whenever cavils occur the like to those which have been already dealt with, I pass them by]

Having established the doctrine of the resurrection which was denied [Defensa etenim resurrectione, quae negabatur], it was natural to discuss what would be the sort of body [consequens erat de qualitate corporis retractare], of which no one had an idea [quae non videbatur]. On this point we have other opponents with whom to engage[Sed de ista cum aliis congredi convenit] For Marcion does not in any wise admit the resurrection of the flesh, and it is only the salvation of the soul which he promises; consequently the question which he raises is not concerning the sort of body, but the very substance thereof.

He treats of this subject in order to offer consolation against the fear of death and the dread of this very dissolution, as is even more manifest from what follows, when he adds, that "in this tabernacle of our earthly body we do groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with the vesture which is from heaven,551 if so be, that having been unclothed,552 we shall not be found naked; "in other words, shall regain that of which we have been divested, even our body. And again he says: "We that are in this tabernacle do groan, not as if we were oppressed553 with an unwillingness to be unclothed, but (we wish)to be clothed upon."

As to the house of this our earthly dwelling-place, when he says that "we have an eternal home in heaven, not made with hands," he by no means would imply that, because it was built by the Creator's hand, it must perish in a perpetual dissolution after death. That this discussion [retractans] is intended to assuage the fear of death and the grief due to that dissolution, is even more evident from what follows, when he adds that in this tabernacle of an earthly body we groan, desiring to be clothed upon with that which is from heaven, seeing that when unclothed we shall not be found naked; that is, we shall have given to us again that of which we have been unclothed, the body

The nearer this work draws to its end [Quanto opusculum profligatur] the less need there is for any but brief treatment of questions which arise a second time [breviter iam retractanda sunt quae rursus occurrunt], and good reason to pass over entirely some which we have often met with [quaedam vero tramittenda, quae saepius occurrerunt].

Come now: when he says, Let no man judge you in meat and drink or in respect of an holy day or of the new moon or the sabbath, which are the shadow of things to come, but the body is of Christ, what think you, Marcion? We are not now discussing [non retractamus] the law except that here too he explains in what way it is superseded, by being transferred out of shadow into body; that is, from figures into the truth, and that is Christ.

[Secret Alias]

The point of course is that the treatise itself - viz. Against Marcion - is presented as a lost repackaging of something Justin WOULD HAVE PUBLISHED but kept private (in other words a 'secret' document) which was stolen by a 'false brother' and then published in a falsified form. This has two obvious parallels:

1. the situation described in Galatians ACCORDING TO THE EARLIEST INTERPRETATION OF THE MATERIAL (again Tertullian) where Paul has a gospel which he privately showed to the pillars and then the Jewish-Christians have a version of Paul's written gospel which espouses 'Judaizing teaching'
AND
2. the situation described in the Letter to Theodore which seems to echo Tertullian's understanding of the Letter to the Galatians only described from an Alexandrian POV viz. an unworthy presbyter who somehow passes the 'secret' gospel to Carpocrates and he spreads a licentious doctrine based on its contents

It is difficult to know why the same formula keeps repeating itself over and over again other than Christianity was an underground religion and the idea of 'bringing to light' hidden texts seemed appropriate or believable in the late second century. I think it is worth overlaying on top of this basic paradigm a similar echo of concepts from Papias with respect to the gospel of Mark and the Marcionite opposition to 'orderliness' viz. the pre-existent Jewish understanding of 'prophesy' with respect to the revelation of the messiah (= 'Christ').

Interestingly, in some form it was necessary to make Justin 'rethink' his original compendium of 'heresies' (i.e. 'sects') of Christianity whereby it is presupposed that Christianity is what Clement calls 'the true philosophy' but that various 'sects' have crept up to alter the true doctrine. Marcion does not seem to have appeared in the original Syntagma (a situation paralleled by Lampe notion of Valentinus escaping censure). Irenaeus himself seems to have developed 'Against Heresies' IN HIS OWN NAME (i.e. Irenaeus's name) as 'the Syntagma' of Justin + a long attack against 'Valentinians' (= Tertullian's Against the Valentinians). Similarly (but ultimately differently) Irenaeus speaks of Justin writing an 'Against Marcion' which must have been the original text of this name (there were at least 7 texts named 'Against Marcion' developed in the late second - early third centuries viz. Justin, Theophilus, Rhodo, Hippolytus, Irenaeus etc). But a relationship clearly exists between Irenaeus's own Against Marcion and Books 4 and 5 of our surviving Against Marcion.

It would seem from the opening words of the Latin Against Marcion that survives in Tertullian's name that Justin wakes up and discovers a text of Against Marcion is circulating in the circle of Tatian (viz. the 'apostate' of the preface) and Justin is horrified. That's my treatise! he effectively exclaims. Interestingly he doesn't just complain that the apostate stole his lost treatise but also decides - very strangely - that this would be an appropriate time to 'correct' his own well attested understanding of the Son being subordinate to the Father while he reintroduces this alleged Against Marcion text that 'corrects' his previous ignorance of Marcion in his Syntagma (i.e. including Marcion among the heresies). Of course the strangeness of this situation can be explained easily by a later forger wanting to use Justin's name and authority but not wanting to perpetuate Justin's own 'heresy' with respect to the heavenly monarchy.

So the late second century/third century forger decides to create a bizarre 'Against Marcion' whereby Justin acknowledges that he has previously witnessed the wrong understanding of the relationship between Father and Son as 'two powers' and seeks to condemn Marcion's understanding of two powers as 'just' and 'merciful' EVEN THOUGH HE HIMSELF PREVIOUSLY ACKNOWLEDGED TWO POWERS from the new POV of AN ABSOLUTE AUTHORITY IN HEAVEN 'the Father' who is at once the Creator and a 'Son' who is at once 'the Christ' foretold by the Jewish scriptures. This seems to be a position or an emphasis very much like what Paul of Samosata would eventually expound. The Logos theology of Justin and Clement is ignored. The Godhead is absolutely One. That's a rule and there seems to be little interest discussing it. It is acknowledged that Justin (viz. 'the author') has spoken in a different way about the Father and Son. But the details of how Father and Son relate to one another before the revelation of 'Christ' i.e. Jesus are deemed to be unimportant. What matters is maintaining the 'Rule.'

So again, 'Justin' i.e. the pseudepigraphal name used by the author allegedly comes across an 'Against Marcion' text which he recognizes as 'his own.' He decides to 're-tract' it (meaning to correct it and reform it according to the alleged original exemplar). The structure is so obviously reactionary it is downright bizarre:

Books 1 - 2 = a 'retraction' of Justin's well attested position regarding two powers in heaven i.e. 'all powerful' Father and an 'instrumental' Son (who seems to be the Jewish God). The author now makes Justin 'retract' that original understanding in order to confess instead an absolute monarchy in heaven and then proceed to attack Marcion from that POV.
Books 3 = a repurposing of material originally derived from Justin's Dialogue but also a treatise called Against the Jews but where original arguments against the Jews denying that the prophetic scriptures applied to Jesus as the Christ are now repurposed against the Marcionites.
Books 4 - 5 = a repurposing of something written by someone (Justin?) on a gospel that seems to be Diatessaronic (so Andrew and I) and then in Book 5 a discussion of a Galatians first collection of Paul's letters an ordering known to have been associated with Irenaeus (Anastasius of Sinai).

Already with Irenaeus's use and repurposing of Justin there is obvious discomfort. For instance there is a point in Against Heresies where Irenaeus decides to reference the Mosaic theophany. For Justin the god of the burning bush is the Son who was an instrument of the Father. But Irenaeus takes over the Justin material but somehow argues on behalf of the Father being present in the bush with the Son. Little things like this point to Irenaeus 'taking' over Justin and attempting to force his doctrines AND HIS NAME into agreement with a new orthodoxy which attempted to steamroll Christianity to be compatible with the recognition of an absolute monarchy in heaven headed by the Father. The Father is no longer - as in Justin - a god WHO SITS ABOVE the god recognized by the Jewish Patriarchs (i.e. the Sinai theophany, burning bush, Peniel etc) IN HEAVEN (the position of the various 'two powers' statements collected by Segal) but as the very god who communed with human beings since Adan THROUGH THE SON and where the Son is absolutely indistinguishable from the Father.

The contemporary setting seems to emerge from Rhodo's comical letter to Callistus (Callistiwn) where a Marcionite leader Apelles is 'questioned' about his belief in the monarchia. He is smart enough to confess that he accepts monarchia. But cannot explain how Marcionism is compatible with it other than to say he 'believes in it.' Similarly, as I have noted many times before, Samaritan documents tell of an Imperial persecution during Commodus's reign instigated by the philosopher chair Alexander of Aphrodisias where Samaritan leaders were forced to prove that their doctrines were compatible with monarchia and when they failed a holocaust ensued. My guess has always been that as the Empire began crumbling economically belief in the monarchy (i.e. the Imperial government) wasn't an abstract theological concept but one which was deemed to testify to the loyalty of subjects to Caesar.

[yakovzutolmai]

It is difficult to know why the same formula keeps repeating itself over and over again other than Christianity was an underground religion and the idea of 'bringing to light' hidden texts seemed appropriate or believable in the late second century.
...

So again, 'Justin' i.e. the pseudepigraphal name used by the author allegedly comes across an 'Against Marcion' text which he recognizes as 'his own.' He decides to 're-tract' it (meaning to correct it and reform it according to the alleged original exemplar). The structure is so obviously reactionary it is downright bizarre:

Underground, because it didn't actually exist at the time.

Reactionary, because it probably was. Cosmopolitan Jews in Asia resisting the encroachment of Ebionite-like and later Marcionite-like systems. Everything written expressly to defeat these trends which, we might assume, succeeded in completely replacing Israelite religion in the East.

The second century underground Christians were likely run-of-the-mill Hellenized Jews, whose erstwhile missionary efforts would have quieted thanks to the Jewish revolts. The context for this set to embrace gospel narratives probably wouldn't exist outside of a couple of decades in West Asia, and would be unique to local popularity contests against Marcionites, but the end result was a religious system that wasn't seen as Jewish and had more freedom to spread.

I find it hard to believe that names like "Justin Martyr" and "Polycarp" belonged to real people.

[Secret Alias]

Underground, because it didn't actually exist at the time.

So Catholic priests only started becoming homosexuals when the newspapers reported it?

[Secret Alias]

I'd like to put the various arguments from the second century side by side:

1. Papias could say (with an honest face) that the gospel of Matthew was better than the gospel of Mark because Matthew grounded his gospel narrative 'in the correct arrangement/order' whatever that meant even though Mark came first/preceded Matthew.
2. Tertullian could say that even though 'the apostle' brought his written gospel to Jerusalem and someone in the circle of the pillars copied it and developed a 'Jewish gospel' (like the one Papias praised in the gospel of Matthew) it is reasonable to suppose AGAINST THE MARCIONITES that this apostle managed to be reconciled with his enemies in Jerusalem because it is so reported in Acts and in later (post-Marcionite) copies of Paul's letters.
3. The author of Against Marcion could think that his audience would accept the idea that even though Justin held a well-known position regarding the relationship between Father and Son (i.e. THAT THEY WERE TWO POWERS ESSENTIALLY) that he could have 'woken up' one day discover a copy of Against Marcion circulating among members of his greater circle realized that it was a falsified copy of an unpublished manuscript he once wrote against Marcion (even though Marcion didn't appear in his Syntagma of heresies) and then proceeded not only to publish the lost manuscript but do so with a complete 'retraction' of his well known position about two powers and spend two of the five books attacking the Marcionites for holding a similar position to his original understanding of the heavenly monarchia (i.e. that it involved two powers).

Aside from confirming that ancient Christians were stupid, what it seems to show to me at least is that Montanism was fairly widespread in orthodoxy. For behind all these forms of nonsense is the unmistakable idea that a Holy Spirit was in operation within the Church helping it write new texts which contradicted the original exemplar.

[Secret Alias]

If retractus is a Latin copy of a Greek original, the original word used by the author is παλινάγρετος. This is deeply significant as the idea is present in Against Heresies which is written by Irenaeus.

But the meaning of παλινάγρετος in Homer (ού γαρ εμόν παλινάγρετον ... ότι κεν κεφάλη κατανεύσω ) undoubtedly points towards αγρέω . In -αγρετός , then , we have a word whose meaning connects it with αγρέω , while its form connects it also with αγείρω https://books.google.com/books?id=7-0LA ... er&f=false

And again

In that case we must trace it thus : ὰγρεῖν is properly to hunt game in the fields , then it comes to mean generally to catch or lay hold on , and thence simply to take ; which last sense is contained in παλινάγρετος, Il . a , 526. , where Jupiter says ού γαρ εμόν παλινάγρετον " none of my resolutions can be taken back again , they are irrevocable ; " and the other sense is in πυράγρα, an instrument for laying hold on things in the fire , a pair of tongs . But this way of tracing the meanings of a word is one which must offend any one at all skilled in etymological investigation , though others may be satisfied with it , and may think it quite agreeable to the simple language of antiquity to call a hunter , whenever it escapes from him , pursues and endeavours to retake. https://books.google.com/books?id=nAIyA ... 22&f=false

Irenaeus:

Wherefore I have laboured to bring forward, and make clearly manifest, the utterly ill-conditioned carcase of this miserable little fox. For there will not now be need of many words to overturn their system of doctrine, when it has been made manifest to all. It is as when, on a beast hiding itself in a wood, and by rushing forth from it is in the habit of destroying multitudes, one who beats round the wood and thoroughly explores it, so as to compel the animal to break cover, does not strive to capture it, seeing that it is truly a ferocious beast; but those present can then watch and avoid its assaults, and can cast darts at it from all sides, and wound it, and finally slay that destructive brute. So, in our case, since we have brought their hidden mysteries, which they keep in silence among themselves, to the light, it will not now be necessary to use many words in destroying their system of opinions. For it is now in thy power, and in the power of all thy associates, to familiarize yourselves with what has been said, to overthrow their wicked and undigested doctrines, and to set forth doctrines agreeable to the truth. Since then the case is so, I shall, according to promise, and as my ability serves, labour to overthrow them, by refuting them all in the following book. Even to give an account of them is a tedious affair, as thou seest.(5) But I shall furnish means for overthrowing them, by meeting all their opinions in the order in which they have been described, that I may not only expose the wild beast to view, but may inflict wounds upon it from every side.

The reason this is so significant is the fact that ἀγρέω is related to the root of the word 'heresy.'

αἱρέω, take, seize, freq. in Aeolic Inscrr. as IG12(2).6.33 (Pass., Lesbos); ἄγρει δ' οἶνον ἐρυθρόν Archil.4.3; τρόμος παῖσαν ἄγρει Sapph.2.14, cf. Thgn.294; ἀγρεῖ πόλιν captures the city, A.Ag.126 (lyr.); of fishing, AP6.304 (Phanias); in prescriptions, ἄγρει, take! Nic.Th.534, al.

[Secret Alias]

There is also a sense of 'resurrection' associated with the terminology. From the Dionysiaca:

On thy fragrant altar, that thousand-year-old wise bird the phoenix lays sweetsmelling woods with his curved claw, bringing the end of one life and the beginning of another; for there he is born again, self-begotten, the image of equal time renewed (παλινάγρετος) —he sheds old age in the fire, and from the fire takes in exchange youthful bloom.

Also in the same book "in a mystic-like tone,63 the resurrection of the youth using the adjective παλινάγρετος (12.144). Also in another section:

So also you have sorrow soon you too now , but I will see you shall first lacerate your hearts with unsleeping grief ; again , and your hearts will but somewhere I shall gaze upon you again; and your hearts will rejoice once more, recovered (παλινάγρετος). This irreversible joy will appear later, and nobody shall deprive you of it unto never - ending time." https://books.google.com/books?id=uKUPE ... 22&f=false

Such are the generations of men, short-lived: one rides life’s course, until death brings it low; one still flourishes, only to give place to another: for time renews itself [παλινάγρετος], changing form as it flows from hoary age to youth

[lsayre]

Wouldn't it be ironic to discover that the real Justin was Marcion?

[Secret Alias]

It's been a thought.