The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
rgprice
Posts: 2057
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2018 11:57 pm

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by rgprice »

Good points Sinouhe, but something is still very odd here.

In Vision of Isaiah, the Beloved enters the world in disguise, so that he will not be recognized by Satan.

In Mark, the demons recognize who Jesus is, but he silences them so that his secret identity will not be reveled. But if Jesus were confronted by Satan at the outset, then trying to hide his identity is pointless anyway.

So, if anything, it may lead me to believe that the original version of Mark simply read:

Mark 1:
12 At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, 13 and he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.

This both more closely matches 1 Kings, and also eliminates the problem of Satan knowing the identity of Jesus. The statement about Satan in Mark is very strange, because it comes out of nowhere and isn't elaborated on. Furthermore, it seems to conflict with the Messianic Secret that runs throughout the rest of Mark. From whom is Jesus hiding his identity? The "lord of this world".

In 1 Kings 19, Elijah flees to the wilderness where he is attended by angels and travels for 40 days, but he is not confronted by Satan or any demons, nor does he face any kind of temptation.

As for the mention of John being arrested, I think this too was added in by an editor in Mark 1. It would seem that in the original version of Mark there was no mention of John being arrested here. The first mention of it was in Mark 6. So proto-Mark would have read something more like:

Mark 1:
9 At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10 Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. 11 And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

12 At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, 13 and he was in the wilderness forty days. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.

14 Then Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. 15 “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”


16 As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. 17 “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.” 18 At once they left their nets and followed him.

In this scenario, it would make sense that the editor of canonical Mark would have made a few simple changes to align Mark with the narrative found in Matthew and Luke. So the editor of the first edition of the New Testament would have made minor revisions to proto-Mark in order to incorporate into the four Gospel collection.

This narrative makes more sense. Jesus is baptized and then goes to the wilderness to convene with God, as is typical of Jewish narratives. The mention of Satan here is a distraction and irrelevant. Likewise, the arrest of John the Baptist is irrelevant here as well. Why would it be mentioned? It serves no purpose, comes out of nowhere and is unexplained. We have to wait until Mark 6 get any kind of explanation. But in Mark 6 the arrest of John the Baptist is detailed as if it is the first time we are hearing of it.

If this is the case, we are still left with the question of where the Temptation scene in Matthew/Luke came from. That this narrative scene was present in Q is highly unsatisfactory and one of the points against the Q hypothesis. Another proposal is that this is a secondary dependence of Luke upon Matthew. But I think its more something like this:
SynopticDiagram.png
SynopticDiagram.png (19.22 KiB) Viewed 2485 times
And this is surely also a simplification. I used to agree with Luke's dependence on Matthew, but it's increasingly unsatisfactory, and there is growing evidence that there were simply more narratives out there that have been lost. Justin Martyr's testimony indicates that he had read Gospel narratives that don't exactly match any existing narratives. Justin's comments show that he knew of a narrative that was very familiar to us, but different in important details. He can't possibly have been working from the canonical narratives, nor was he working from Marcion's. So there had to be other versions that have since been lost and are generally unattested.

I used to think that the birth narrative in Luke was dependent on Matthew, but the testimony from Justin as well as the Pocket Gospel in Vision of Isaiah and the Infancy Gospel of James all point to the existence of a proto-birth narrative that both Luke and Matthew independently drew from.
Charles Wilson
Posts: 2098
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:13 am

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by Charles Wilson »

rgprice wrote: Wed Jun 22, 2022 6:52 pmSo, the devil takes Jesus to the Temple, tells him to throw himself off, and then Jesus is whisked back to Galilee. A bit of a stretch.
As a descriptive story that is supposedly True as written, yes.
As a Symbolic Story where events are representative of events, NO!

The Key is "Back to Galilee".

The Galilee is where the Priests were given Settlements by the Hasmoneans. See: Uzi Leibner
( https://www.amazon.com/Settlement-Histo ... 3161498712 ) and Shulimit Elizur:

In Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee, Uzi Leibner states,

"In addition, several piyyutim, clearly indicate among the Jews of Galilee, it was believed that the Hasmoneans belonged to the Course of Immer (Elizur, 2004: 307), and surprisingly, this course is also among the only ones attributed to a settlement in the Upper Galilee (Jabnit, a few kilometers from Meiron). "

So the verses in question came from something earlier. The obvious Script is that a Priest is Symbolically offered everything from Jerusalem. The Priest has traveled from his Settlement to Jerusalem as he has been commanded to do. A coup against Herod recommends itself. The Priest rejects the bribe and escapes back to Jabnit, in Galilee. Probably from events surrounding Passover.

This is what is rewritten.

Y/N/M?

CW
User avatar
Sinouhe
Posts: 495
Joined: Tue Dec 28, 2021 1:12 pm

Re: La tentation de Jésus par Satan

Post by Sinouhe »

So, if anything, it may lead me to believe that the original version of Mark simply read:

Mark 1:
12 At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, 13 and he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.

Yes, you’re right. The “being tempted by Satan” can be a late addition to Mark to harmonize it with Mt and Lk.
This both more closely matches 1 Kings, and also eliminates the problem of Satan knowing the identity of Jesus.
Exact.
The statement about Satan in Mark is very strange, because it comes out of nowhere and isn't elaborated on.
In 1 Kings 19, Elijah flees to the wilderness where he is attended by angels and travels for 40 days, but he is not confronted by Satan or any demons, nor does he face any kind of temptation.
True.
As for the mention of John being arrested, I think this too was added in by an editor in Mark 1. It would seem that in the original version of Mark there was no mention of John being arrested here. The first mention of it was in Mark 6. So proto-Mark would have read something more like:

Mark 1:
9 At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10 Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. 11 And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

12 At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, 13 and he was in the wilderness forty days. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.

14 Then Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. 15 “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”


16 As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. 17 “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.” 18 At once they left their nets and followed him.

In this scenario, it would make sense that the editor of canonical Mark would have made a few simple changes to align Mark with the narrative found in Matthew and Luke. So the editor of the first edition of the New Testament would have made minor revisions to proto-Mark in order to incorporate into the four Gospel collection.
I agree with this analysis. Maybe the term "proto-mark" is a bit strong but it would not be surprising if the Mark we know was slightly altered for the reasons you mention.
If this is the case, we are still left with the question of where the Temptation scene in Matthew/Luke came from. That this narrative scene was present in Q is highly unsatisfactory and one of the points against the Q hypothesis. Another proposal is that this is a secondary dependence of Luke upon Matthew. But I think its more something like this:



And this is surely also a simplification. I used to agree with Luke's dependence on Matthew, but it's increasingly unsatisfactory, and there is growing evidence that there were simply more narratives out there that have been lost. Justin Martyr's testimony indicates that he had read Gospel narratives that don't exactly match any existing narratives. Justin's comments show that he knew of a narrative that was very familiar to us, but different in important details. He can't possibly have been working from the canonical narratives, nor was he working from Marcion's. So there had to be other versions that have since been lost and are generally unattested.
For the moment, i tend to think that the temptation story is an invention of Matthew based mainly on Ezekiel's visions.

But now that I think about it, it is possible that Zechariah 3:1-2 inspired Mt for the context of this story.
But also Mark.

The vocabulary used by Zechariah ("The Lord rebukes ἐπετίμησεν you, Satan!") seems to have influenced Mk (1:25 + 8:33 both contain ἐπετίμησεν in a similar context).

Mark 8:33
But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked ἐπετίμησεν Peter. “Get behind me, Satan Σατανᾶ!”he said


If Mk had Zechariah 3 in mind, then “ being tempted by Satan” could be authentic.
rgprice
Posts: 2057
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2018 11:57 pm

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by rgprice »

I've always considered the rebuking of Peter to be based on Paul's account from Galatains:

Mark 8:
32 He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’


Galatians 2:
11 But when Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood self-condemned; 12 for until certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But after they came, he drew back and kept himself separate for fear of the circumcision faction. 13 And the other Jews joined him in this hypocrisy, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.

Perhaps both were in mind? I don't see a reason to bring Peter into it unless Galatians was in mind.

I think the point of the Temptation scene Luke/Matthew is to establish that the devil is the "lord of this world" and that Jesus' fight is against him. This is in contrast to Gnostic teaching that the God of the Jews was the "lord of this world". So the Temptation scene in Luke/Matthew serves to set the record straight as to who Jesus was really against: Satan, not the God of the Jews (YHWH). It is notable, however, that Luke doesn't use Satan, only "the devil", but the fact that he has authority over all the kingdoms of the earth, "it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to," indicates that this is indeed Belial/Satan.

So I can see this as an addition to a Markan narrative, meant to clarify who Jesus was and who his opponent was, in the face of Gnostic teachings.

But now this gets me thinking about John.

John 8:
42 Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. 43 Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. 44 You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me!

John 8:44 is very controversial, and apparently actually reads, "You belong to your father, the father of the devil." This indicates that the writer of this passage (surely a Gnostic) viewed the god of the Jews as the father of the devil, not the Highest God. The Jews were not descended from the devil, they were descended from the God who fathered the devil, i.e. the creator of evil.

So, there was need to set the record straight.
Charles Wilson
Posts: 2098
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:13 am

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by Charles Wilson »

John 8: 44 (RSV):

[44] You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

rgp --

FWIW, I have this as calling out Nero. Nero was adopted by Claudius but his bio-father was evil "from the beginning".

CW
User avatar
Sinouhe
Posts: 495
Joined: Tue Dec 28, 2021 1:12 pm

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by Sinouhe »

rgprice wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 12:49 pm I've always considered the rebuking of Peter to be based on Paul's account from Galatains:

Mark 8:
32 He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’


Galatians 2:
11 But when Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood self-condemned; 12 for until certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But after they came, he drew back and kept himself separate for fear of the circumcision faction. 13 And the other Jews joined him in this hypocrisy, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.

Perhaps both were in mind? I don't see a reason to bring Peter into it unless Galatians was in mind.
Mark 8 could indeed be a direct allusion to Galatians, but the vocabulary used suggests that Mark had also Zachariah in mind when he puts into Jesus' mouth the same words that are used when Jesus the high priest confronts Satan. Paul Sloan develops this idea on a few pages in his book on the allusions to Zechariah in Mark. If you need, I can share with you the pages that talk about it.
rgprice
Posts: 2057
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2018 11:57 pm

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by rgprice »

Charles Wilson wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 1:20 pm John 8: 44 (RSV):

[44] You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

rgp --

FWIW, I have this as calling out Nero. Nero was adopted by Claudius but his bio-father was evil "from the beginning".

CW
No. There are actually a lot of papers on this, for example, Who is hiding in the Gospel of John or Why are the Heavens Closed, by April D. DeConick.

I missated it a little before, but its supposed to read, "You are from the father of the devil", not "You are from your father - the devil."

This literal reading is confirmed by the last segment of the verse (8:44f)
which straightforwardly acknowledges the presence of two beings, the liar and
his father: ST<XV AocAfj TO- i|;eu5oc,, EK TGOV i5iu)v ACXAET, on \pevart]<; icrtiv mid
raxnjp ocvzov. The full verse reasons that the Devil lies since his nature is that of
a liar. Why? Because not only is the Devil a liar himself but his father is also a
liar. But this is not the sense of the standard English translation which is peculiar
and strained. It reads OCUTOU. as a genitive "it" referring to an unnamed
singular antecedent such as "lying" or "falsehood." Thus: 6 Ttocrrip OUTOU is rendered
in the standard English translation idiosyncratically, "the father of lies."
In order to sort out what was going on with this verse, I went back through
the literature and discovered that this verse has a controversial history. In
another publication, I have drawn out the parameters of the controversy.2
I found that this verse functioned as a calling card for Gnostics who used it
as plain evidence that Jesus taught that the Jewish God was the father of the
Devil. A number of Gnostics employed this verse to prove that Jesus himself
instructed them that there existed a god in addition to Jesus' true Father. This
other god is the God of the Jews and is responsible for the generation of the
Devil and evil.
-- Who is hiding in the Gospel of John

Err, the Greek didn't paste, but you get the point...
Charles Wilson
Posts: 2098
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:13 am

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by Charles Wilson »

Thank you, rgp.
I'm not there yet but I have various different versions, including Aramaic and some versions that are all over the charts.
I'm still going with the identification of Nero here.
There is a lot of Claudius in the NT and this aligns with this idea. The Gnostics et. al. are on an entirely different track.

So: I thank you for the update.
"The Referee declares this match a draw..." I think. For now.

CW
Last edited by Charles Wilson on Tue Jul 12, 2022 5:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
davidmartin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Fri Jul 12, 2019 2:51 pm

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by davidmartin »

what about the book of Allogenes ? This is not the same Allogenes as the NHL, it's from Tchacos codex

Note: This isn't the best translation a bit hard to find online:

Be like those in this world and eat of my possessions! Take silver, gold and other things for yourself. "But Allogenes answered him: "Away from me, Satan! It is not you I search, but my Father who is raised high above all great Aeons. For I am him you call Allogenes, I am from a different family line, I am not from your family line." And then he who rules the world spoke to him …lacuna ... And then Sakla attacks him who liberates alone, many times. And he was not able to enslave them. After having defeated him he retrieved ashamed to his own place. Then Allogenes called out with a loud voice: Oh God, who is above the great Aeons, hear my voice, have pity on me and save me from all evil. Look down upon me and hear me, because I am in the empty lonely land. May the unspeakable enlighten me now…
Then the transfiguration occurs before the text breaks off and the saved saviour gets saved (by who?) 'Oh Allogenes! Your pleas are heard and I am being sent to you in this location to go and spread the Glad Tidings. But you have not found an escape from this prison yet…'

Interesting huh. No scripture quotes here. Allogenes/Jesus bats him away simply by stating who he is. So did this come from Mark or which gospel? Is there some older narrative behind it that the gospels might have used? Is this gnostic pessimism cranking up the negativity dial?
But here it sounds like Allogenes/Jesus saved saviour finds himself in Sheol, the 'wilderness' is a euphemism because it seems like he can't just walk out the desert back to Nazareth he had to be transfigured and saved to even begin to escape it?

I mean the transfiguration here might as well serve as the baptism with the voice being the dove
There is more, another connection to another text but i'll save that for later

Thoughts?
User avatar
Thomas R
Posts: 41
Joined: Tue Nov 16, 2021 4:32 pm

Re: The tempting of Jesus by Satan

Post by Thomas R »

rgprice wrote: Wed Jun 22, 2022 1:26 pm It would seem to me that Marcion or any of the Gnostics would have had nothing to do with Satan, that Satan or the devil wouldn't have been mentioned in Marcion's Gospel. Be Duhn has Satan appearing in two passages in the Evangelion.

Under the system of Marcion and Gnostics, the god of the Jews was the "lord of this world".

Under the system of those at Qumran, Belial/Satan was the "lord of this world".
Many so-called Gnostics believed in Satan, including Marcion according to the Panarion:


Panarion Book 1 23 : Satornilus

2,1 From him “knowledge,” as it is falsely called, begins again to add to the depth of its wickedness. It found its origin and occasion in Simon, but (now) it is augmented with other, further nonsense, whose refutation I shall give later. For Satornilus claims when speaking of the angels that the God of the Jews is one of them too, and that he and they are at odds with the power on high. But the Savior has been sent from the Father against the power’s wishes, for the destruction of the God of the Jews and the salvation of those who trust in < him >. And they, the members of this sect, are the ones who have the spark of the Father on high. For Satornilus claims that two men were fashioned at the first, one good and one evil. Descended from these are two breeds of men in the world, the good and the evil. But since the demons were assisting the evil, for this reason the Savior came, as I said, in the last days, to the aid of the good men and for the destruction of the evil and the demons. This tramp also says that marriage and procreation are of Satan, so that the majority of them abstain from meat, to attract certain persons to their deceit, if you please, with this pretended asceticism. Again, the charlatan claims that some of the prophecies were delivered by the angels who made the world, but some by Satan. For Satan too is an angel, he claims, who acts in opposition to the angels who made the world, but especially to the God of the Jews.


Panarion 31 : Valentinians

19,4 They teach that wicked spiritual beings have come from the grief. This is the origin of the Devil, whom they also call Ruler of the World, and of demons, angels, and anything spiritual that is wicked. But they say the Demiurge is a soulish son of their Mother, while the Ruler of the World is a creature of the Demiurge. And the Ruler of the World knows what is above him, for he is a wicked spirit; but the Demiurge, being soulish, does not. Their Mother dwells in the place above the heavens, the Intermediate Region; the Demiurge in the heavenly place, the Hebdomad; < but > the Ruler of the World, in our world.


Panarion 42 : Marcionites

3,1 But he took his cue from that charlatan and swindler, Cerdo. For he too preaches two first principles. But adding something to him, I mean to Cerdo, he exhibits something different in his turn by saying that there are three principles.One is the unnameable, invisible one on high which he likes to call a “good God,” but which has made none of the things in the world. Another is a visible God, a creator and demiurge. But the devil is as it were a third god and in between these two, the visible and the invisible. The creator, demiurge and visible God is the God of the Jews, and he is a judge.


Panarion 43 : Lucianists

1,4 After supposedly establishing that the demiurge, judge and just God is one God, but that the good God, likewise, is another and the evil God is someone else, Lucian, like Marcion, also likes to cite certain texts from the scripture of the prophets in support of his opinion. The ones I mean are, “Vain is he that serveth the Lord,” and, “They withstood God and were delivered.”


Panarion 45 : Severians

1,2 One Severus the founder of the so-called Severians arose, following next after Apelles. His fairy stories are the ones I am now about to relate. He too attributes the creation around us to principalities and authorities and holds that, in some unnameable and very high heaven and world, there is a good God. But he claims that the devil is the son of the chief archon in the authorities’ retinue, whom he sometimes terms Ialdabaoth and sometimes Sabaoth. This son whom he has begotten is a serpent. But he was cast to earth by the power on high, and after descending in the form of a serpent he became aroused and lay with the earth as with a woman and, since he ejaculated the seed of its generation, the vine was sired by him.


Irenaeus of Lyons

Chapter XXIV.-Doctrines of Saturninus and Basilides.

2. He has also laid it down as a truth, that the Saviour was without birth, without body, and without figure, but was, by supposition, a visible man; and he maintained that the God of the Jews was one of the angels; and, on this account, because all the powers wished to annihilate his father, Christ came to destroy the God of the Jews, but to save such as believe in him; that is, those who possess the spark of his life. This heretic was the first to affirm that two kinds of men were formed by the angels,-the one wicked, and the other good. And since the demons assist the most wicked, the Saviour came for the destruction of evil men and of the demons, but for the salvation of the good. They declare also, that marriage and generation are from Satan. Many of those, too, who belong to his school, abstain from animal food, and draw away multitudes by a reigned temperance of this kind. They hold, moreover, that some of the prophecies were uttered by those angels who made the world, and some by Satan; whom Saturninus represents as being himself an angel, the enemy of the creators of the world, but especially of the God of the Jews.
Post Reply