Arguing Against the Church Fathers

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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Secret Alias
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Arguing Against the Church Fathers

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If the Church Fathers are our only source of information about early Christianity why do so many here arguing for another understanding of Christianity which is TOTALLY DIVORCED from the Church Fathers? Is that even likely? What are the odds if we had the details of a murder OF A WOMAN let's say, that is happened AT NIGHT, in Chicago, and there were gunshot wounds to the head - what are the odds that a theory could be correct if it worked off the premise that it was REALLY the murder of a man in New York by knife wound in broad daylight? The forum has become so crazy in recent years where we are essentially arguing things that have no relationship whatsoever to texts, evidence or ancient witnesses? Is this a sign of the general decline of civilization or is it some 'step forward' that I am not entirely aware of yet? Please give me reason to believe the current forum with the current participants is progress rather than a sign of the end of the world approaching.
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Re: Arguing Against the Church Fathers

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Secret Alias wrote: Sun Aug 07, 2022 9:41 pm Read Philo on Genesis 42:11.
  • Where does one read Philo on Genesis 42:11? What part of what work of Philo?
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Re: Arguing Against

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Secret Alias wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:41 pmThe forum has become so crazy in recent years where we are essentially arguing things that have no relationship whatsoever to texts, evidence or ancient witnesses? Is this a sign of the general decline of civilization or is it some 'step forward' that I am not entirely aware of yet? Please give me reason to believe the current forum with the current participants is progress rather than a sign of the end of the world approaching.
The internet is a wonderful, terrible thing.
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Re: Arguing Against the Church Fathers

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Secret Alias wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:41 pm Please give me reason to believe the current forum with the current participants is progress rather than a sign of the end of the world approaching.
Perhaps it is time for you to read the Dead Sea Scrolls and find out for yourself what you already suspect.

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Re: Four Iterations

Post by billd89 »

MrMacSon wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:50 pm
  • Where does one read Philo on Genesis 42:11? What part of what work of Philo?
Yonge's 'On the Confusion of Languages' LINK:
(146) And even if there be not as yet any one who is worthy to be called a son of God, nevertheless let him labour earnestly to be adorned according to his first-born word, the eldest of his angels, as the great archangel of many names; for he is called, the authority, and the name of God, and the Word, and man according to God's image, and he who sees Israel. (147) For which reason I was induced a little while ago to praise the principles of those who said, "We are all one man's Sons."{43}{#ge 42:11.} For even if we are not yet suitable to be called the sons of God, still we may deserve to be called the children of his eternal image, of his most sacred word; for the image of God is his most ancient word. (148) And, indeed, in many passages of the law, the children of Israel are called hearers of him that seeth, since hearing is honoured with the second rank next after the sense of sight, and since that which is in need of instruction is at all times second to that which can receive clear impressions of the subjects submitted to it without any such information.

1. God the Father
2. God His Logos
3. God His Paradigm/Ikon
4. (Faithful) Children of God = Israel

Are we children of the Logos or the Ikon? Who is the Ikon? (It's Seth; we -- Therapeutae aka A. A. -- are Jessaeans.)
De Opificio Mundi 25: τὸ δὲ δόγμα τοῦτο Μωυσέως ἐστίν, οὐκ ἐμόν· τὴν γοῦν ἀνθρώπου γένεσιν ἀναγράφων ἐν τοῖς ἔπειτα διαρρήδην ὁμολογεῖ, ὡς ἄρα κατ’ εἰκόνα θεοῦ διετυπώθη (Genesis 1:27). εἰ δὲ τὸ μέρος εἰκὼν εἰκόνος δῆλον ὅτι καὶ τὸ ὅλον εἶδος, σύμπας οὗτος ὁ αἰσθητὸς κόσμος, εἰ μείζων τῆς ἀνθρωπίνης ἐστίν, μίμημα θείας εἰκόνος, δῆλον ὅτι καὶ ἡ ἀρχέτυπος σφραγίς, ὅν φαμεν νοητὸν εἶναι κόσμον, αὐτὸς ἄν εἴη [τὸ παράδειγμα, ἀρχέτυπος ἰδέα τῶν ἰδεῶν] ὁ θεοῦ λόγος.

But this is the Doctrine of Moses, not mine; writing of the Birth of Man therefore expressly confesses he was moulded after the image of God (Genesis 1:27). Now if part of the image is The Ikon, I say the whole is too; which is the sensible Cosmos. The Reproduction of the Divine Image - which I call that the Archetypal Seal - we perceive in the supra-sensible Cosmos, even if it is [the example, the Archetypal Idea of ideas] God's Logos.

billd89 wrote: Mon Apr 25, 2022 3:18 pmAnother example of Philo's Archetype is worth examining (and here is a thesis):
De Opificio Mundi 69: ἡ δὲ εἰκὼν λέλεκται κατὰ τὸν τῆς ψυχῆς ἡγεμόνα νοῦν· πρὸς γὰρ ἕνα τὸν τῶν ὅλων ἐκεῖνον ὡς ἂν ἀρχέτυπον ὁ ἐν ἑκάστῳ τῶν κατὰ μέρος ἀπεικονίσθη, τρόπον τινὰ θεὸς ὢν τοῦ φέροντος καὶ ἀγαλματοφοροῦντος αὐτόν·

My working trans:
And Ikon is called 'Sovereign Ruler' of Psyche, namely: Nous. For the One is in everything, in some sense; He is the Archetype against which each has been partly modelled, in some manner the god which is carried and made a statue of (i.e. 'glorifies') him.

Philo presents an intriguing but complex topic mentioned in De Opificio Mundi 16 and 25. Jews were forbidden from glorifying, representational ikons of God, then in the 1st C. AD as now. Unless Philo's audience was heterodox or proselytes who needed an explanation within their own trope, this analogy sounds problematic. In any case, Nous cannot be the Unknown Father-God - for how could that be - unless pagan idolatry (i.e. mimicry) is accepted by this philosophically-minded Jew.

The Soul's nous - its hegemon or 'ruling faculty' (we might say 'Conscience') - is 'Ikon': the Image of God/Imago Dei. Here, 'Ikon' is not Anthropos but rather or supposedly Logos, unless Logos = Cosmic Man. (Elsewhere in Philo, the Image is Anthropos, Adam Kadmon.) The Authors of Genesis knew and incorporated this myth, c.272 BC; Sethians would seem to be in existence by c.350 BC if not earlier (Josephus also claimed they were ancient, and sets them apart: a cult of Judaism.) Philo is describing mystical doctrine of the 'Son of God' cult: Sethians.
  • Genesis 5:3, RSV
    When Adam had lived a hundred and thirty years, he became the father of a son in his own likeness, after his image (Hebrew wayyōled bidm–utō ketsalmō; Greek egennēsen kata t–en idean autou kai kata tēn eikona autou), and named him Seth.
Where an individual's mind (nous) has for its archetype the Logos-Nous, (Son of) Divine Mind, the Creator should be the Second Power/Second God. 'Father and Creator' is therefore two hypostases (as the Christian Trinity has three): God made the Image of God (Archetype) and Mankind is fashioned after the Image, in an iconic sense. 'Sons of Man' (Cainite, after Anthropos) and 'Sons of God' (Sethian, after Logos) should be exclusive categories, if not competing cults.
Last edited by billd89 on Mon Aug 08, 2022 2:03 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Arguing Against the Church Fathers

Post by Secret Alias »

I would translate it "one Man's sons.' But that's me. And then Eusebius's use of this passage for Jesus:

"Εὐπρεπὲς γὰρ τοῖς ἑταιρείαν πρὸς ἐπιστήμην θεμένοις ἐφίεσθαι μὲν τοῦ τὸ ὂν ἰδεῖν· εἰ δὲ μὴ δύναιντο, τὴν γοῦν εἰκόνα αὐτοῦ τὸν ἱερώτατον λόγον."

Ἐν τῷ δ´ αὐτῷ συγγράμματι καὶ τάδε φησί·

"Κἂν μηδέπω μέντοι τυγχάνῃ τις ἀξιόχρεως υἱὸς θεοῦ προσαγορεύεσθαι, σπουδαζέτω κοσμεῖσθαι κατὰ τὸν πρωτόγονον αὐτοῦ λόγον, τὸν ἀγγέλων πρεσβύτατον, ὡς ἂν ἀρχάγγελον πολυώνυμον ὑπάρχοντα· καὶ γὰρ ἀρχὴ καὶ ὄνομα θεοῦ καὶ λόγος καὶ ὁ κατ´ εἰκόνα ἄνθρωπος καὶ ὁ ὁρῶν Ἰσραὴλ προσαγορεύεται. Διὸ προήχθην ὀλίγῳ πρότερον ἐπαινέσαι τὰς ἀρετὰς τῶν φασκόντων ὅτι ’πάντες ἐσμὲν υἱοὶ ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου.‘ Καὶ γὰρ εἰ μή πω ἱκανοὶ θεοῦ παῖδες νομίζεσθαι γεγόναμεν, ἀλλά τοι τῆς ἀειδοῦς εἰκόνος αὐτοῦ λόγου τοῦ ἱερωτάτου· θεοῦ γὰρ εἰκὼν λόγος ὁ πρεσβύτατος."

Καὶ πάλιν ἐπιλέγει·

"Ἤκουσα μέντοι καὶ τῶν Μωσέως ἑταίρων τινὸς ἀποφθεγξαμένου τοιόνδε λόγιον· ’Ἰδοὺ ἄνθρωπος ᾧ ὄνομα Ἀνατολή·‘ καινοτάτη πρόσρησις, ἐάν γε τὸν ἐκ σώματος καὶ ψυχῆς συνεστῶτα λέγεσθαι νομίσῃς, ἐὰν δὲ τὸν ἀσώματον ἐκεῖνον θείας ἰδέαν φοροῦντα εἰκόνος ὁμολογήσεις ὅτι εὐθυβολώτατον ὄνομα ἐπεφημίσθη τὸ Ἀνατολῆς αὐτῷ. Τοῦτον μὲν γὰρ πρεσβύτατον υἱὸν ὁ τῶν ὅλων ἀνέτειλε πατήρ, ὃν ἑτέρωθι πρωτόγονον ὠνόμασε. Καὶ ὁ γεννηθεὶς μέντοι μιμούμενος τὰς τοῦ πατρὸς ὁδοὺς πρὸς παραδείγματα ἀρχέτυπα τὰ ἐκείνου βλέπων ἐμόρφου τὰ εἴδη."

Ταῦτά μοι ἀπὸ τοῦ Ἑβραίου Φίλωνος ἐνταῦθα κείσθω, ληφθέντα ἐκ συγγράμματος ᾧ τέθειται ἐπιγραφὴ Περὶ τοῦ τὸ χεῖρον τῷ κρείττονι φιλεῖν ἐπιτίθεσθαι. Ἤδη δέ μοι καὶ ἄλλοτε τὰ τῆς τῶν παλαιῶν Ἑβραίων εὐσεβείας δόγματα παρατιθεμένῳ ἐν τοῖς τῆς Εὐαγγελικῆς Προπαρασκευῆς καὶ τὰ περὶ τοῦ δευτέρου αἰτίου διείληπται αὐτάρκως, ἐφ´ ἃ καὶ νῦν τοὺς φιλομαθεῖς ἀναπέμψω. Τοσούτων οὖν παρ´ Ἑβραίοις καὶ τόνδε τὸν τρόπον περὶ τοῦ δευτέρου τῶν ὅλων αἰτίου τεθεολογημένων καιρὸς ἤδη καὶ τοῦ Πλάτωνος ἐν Ἐπινομίδι τάδε λέγοντος ἐπακοῦσαι·
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Re: Arguing Against

Post by mlinssen »

billd89 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 1:38 pm
Secret Alias wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:41 pmThe forum has become so crazy in recent years where we are essentially arguing things that have no relationship whatsoever to texts, evidence or ancient witnesses? Is this a sign of the general decline of civilization or is it some 'step forward' that I am not entirely aware of yet? Please give me reason to believe the current forum with the current participants is progress rather than a sign of the end of the world approaching.
The internet is a wonderful, terrible thing.
I absolutely agree that all these dumb ignorant idiots merely shouting around their unsubstantiated opinions should be silenced and ignored, and preferably taken into the back for a proper throbbing

Whether they digitally infest this pristine forum today or pamfletted forum doors with their parchments well over a millennium ago
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Re: Arguing For?

Post by billd89 »

A "throbbing" in the back-room? No, that doesn't sound right AT ALL.

I would just be happier with the original Greek/Latin in support, and more precise (better) translations -- thx.

Link:
διὸ προήχθην ὀλίγῳ πρότερον ἐπαινέσαι τὰς ἀρετὰς τῶν φασκόντων ὅτι „πάντες ἐσμ̀ν υἱοὶ ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου“ (Gen. 42, 11)· καὶ γὰρ εἰ μήπω ἱκανοὶ θεοῦ παῖὲς νομίζεσθαι γεγόναμεν, ἀλλά τοι τῆς ἀειδοῦς εἰκόνος αὐτοῦ, λόγου τοῦ ἱερωτάτου· θεοῦ γὰρ εἰκὼν λόγος ὁ πρεσβύτατος. {148}...

Colson's Philo Vol.4 (1935) p.90:
147: And therefore I was moved a few pages above to praise the virtues of those who say that “We are all sons of one Man ”’ (Gen. 42:11). For if we have not yet become’ fit to be thought ‘Sons of God’ yet we may be Sons of His Invisible Image, the most holy Word. For the Word is the eldest-born Image of God. {148} And often indeed in the Law-Book we find another phrase, 'Sons of Israel,' hearers, that is, 'Sons of Him that Sees'…

My hasty trans:
A little earlier I was praising the virtues of those who say "We all are Sons of one Anthropos" (Gen. 42, 11); and if we are not yet able to think ourselves ‘Sons of God’, but rather we may be 'Sons of His Invisible Ikon', the 'Logos of his Priest' because the Logos is the 'First-Born of God'.

I'm still not sure that I completely understand this:

If I cannot yet see myself as a full-fledged 'Son of God' {that's explained elsewhere: it entails another lineage also}, I may still see myself as a 'Son of The Logos' Ikon' or a 'Son of the Logos of God's High-Priest' because God's Logos is ultimately the same intermediary.

Correct? (I read this as Philo's attempt to consolidate or rationalize competing cultic systems.)
Last edited by billd89 on Mon Aug 08, 2022 4:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Four Iterations

Post by MrMacSon »

billd89 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 1:49 pm
MrMacSon wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:50 pm
  • Where does one read Philo on Genesis 42:11? What part of what work of Philo?
Yonge's 'On the Confusion of Languages' [147 [and 41]] LINK:

Thank you,bild89 (and for the other citations) !!

Secret Alias wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 1:57 pm I would translate it "one Man's sons.'
billd89 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 2:18 pm
I would just be happier with the original Greek/Latin in support, and more precise (better) translations -- thx.

Link:

διὸ προήχθην ὀλίγῳ πρότερον ἐπαινέσαι τὰς ἀρετὰς τῶν φασκόντων ὅτι „πάντες ἐσμ̀ν υἱοὶ ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου“ (Gen. 42, 11)· καὶ γὰρ εἰ μήπω ἱκανοὶ θεοῦ παῖὲς νομίζεσθαι γεγόναμεν, ἀλλά τοι τῆς ἀειδοῦς εἰκόνος αὐτοῦ, λόγου τοῦ ἱερωτάτου· θεοῦ γὰρ εἰκὼν λόγος ὁ πρεσβύτατος. {148}...

Colson's Philo Vol.4 (1935) p.90:

{147}: And therefore I was moved a few pages above to praise the virtues of those who say that “We are all sons of one Man ” (Gen. 42:11). For, if we have not yet become fit to be thought ‘Sons of God’ yet, we may be Sons of His Invisible Image, the most holy Word. For the Word is the eldest-born Image of God. {148} And often indeed in the Law-Book we find another phrase, 'Sons of Israel,' hearers, that is, 'Sons of Him that Sees' since hearing stands second in estimation and below sight, and the recipient of teaching is always second to him with whom realities present their forms clear to his vision and not through the medium of instruction.


Philo starts On the Confusion of Languages XXVIII with reference to the previous section and


XXVIII {142} ... ‘‘God came down to see the city and the tower,” but the phrase which follows, “which the sons of men built” (Gen. xi. 5), is no idle addition, though perhaps some profane person might say with a sneer, ‘‘a novel piece of information this which the lawgiver here imparts to us, namely that it is the sons of men and not some other beings who build cities and towers. ‘‘Who,” he would continue, “even among those who are far gone in insanity, does not know facts so obvious and conspicuous?”

{143} But you must suppose that it is not this obvious and hackneyed fact which is recorded for us in our most holy oracles/scriptures, but the hidden truth which can be traced under the surface meaning of the words.

{144} What then is this truth? Those who ascribe to existing things a multitude of fathers as it were, and by introducing their miscellany of deities, have flooded everything with ignorance and confusion ... they assume a multitude of what they falsely call sources and causes to account for the origin of the existing world and have no knowledge of the one Maker and Father of all.

{145} But they who live in the knowledge of the One are rightly called “Sons of God,” as Moses also acknowledges when he says, “Ye are sons of the Lord God ” (Deut. xiv. 1), and “God who begat thee” (ibid. xxxii. 18), and “Is not He Himself thy Father?” (ibid. 6) ...

{146} But if there be any as yet unfit to be called a Son of God, let him press to take his place under God’s First-born, the Word, who holds the eldership among the angels, their ruler as it were. And many names are his, for he is called, “the Beginning,” and the Name of God, and His Word, and the Man after His image, and “he that sees,” that is Israel.

{147} And therefore I was moved a few pages above [§41; see below in this post] to praise the virtues of those who say that “We are all sons of one Man” (Gen. xlii. 11). For if we have not yet become fit to be thought sons of God yet we may be sons of His invisible image, the most holy Word. For the Word is the eldest-born image of God.

https://archive.org/details/PhiloSupple ... 0/mode/2up


( Philo baits and switches from the plural, 'sons of men,' to the singular, 'a son of God' and 'sons of Man' )


On the Confusion of Languages § 41 in context:


ΧΙ. {39} Now there are many who...find refuge in the support of the solely Wise Being and beseech Him to become their helper. Such a one is the disciple of Moses who prays thus in the Psalms: “Let their cunning lips become speechless” (Ps. xxx. [xxxi.] 19). And how should such lips be silent, unless they were bridled by Him who alone holds speech itself as His vassal?

{40} Let us flee, then, without a backward glance from the unions which are unions for sin, but hold fast to our alliance with the comrades of good sense and knowledge.

{41} And therefore when I hear those who say ‘‘We are all sons of one Man, we are peaceful” (Gen. xlii. 11), I am filled with admiration for the harmonious concert which their words reveal. “Ah! my friends,’’ I would say, “how should you not hate war and love peace: you who have enrolled yourselves as children of one and the same Father, who is not mortal but immortal: God’s Man,a who, being the Word of the Eternal, must needs himself be imperishable?’’ [Colson, modified slightly]{41} In reference to which I admire those who say, "We are all one Man's sons, we are men of Peace," (Gen 42:11.) because of their well-adapted agreement. Since 'how,' I should say, 'could you, O excellent men, avoid being grieved at war, and delighted in peace, being the sons of one and the same Father, and he not mortal but immortal, the man of God, who being the reason of the everlasting God, is of necessity himself also immortal?' [Yonge]

...< . . omit {42} . . >

{43} But those who rejoice in the oneness of their blood and honour One* Father,* right reason, reverence that concert of virtues, which is full of harmony and melody, and live a life of calmness and fair weather.

FH Colson version



a This conception of the Logos recurs in §s 62 and 146

* one and father capitalised, 'One Father', by me




On the Confusion of Languages § 62 :


{60} ... The better is when the beam of the virtues rises like the rays of the sun; the worse when virtues pass into the shadow and vices rise above the horizon.

{61} We have an example of the former in these words: ‘‘And God planted a pleasaunce in Eden towards the sun-rise’’ (Gen. ii. 8). That garden was not a garden of the plants of the soil, but of heavenly virtues, which out of His own incorporeal light the Planter brought to their rising, never to be extinguished.

{62} I have heard also an oracle from the lips of one of the disciples of Moses, which runs thus: ‘‘Behold a man whose name is the rising’’ (Zech. vi. 12), strangest of titles, surely, if you suppose that a being composed of soul and body is here described. But if you suppose that it is that Incorporeal one, who differs not a whit from the divine image, you will agree that the name of “rising’’ assigned to him quite truly describes him.

{63} For that man is the eldest son, whom the Father of all raised up, and elsewhere calls him His first-born, and indeed the Son thus begotten followed the ways of his Father, and shaped the different kinds, looking to the archetypal patterns which that Father supplied.


Philo is espousing monotheism and what could be viewed as the foundation of Christianity
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Re: Arguing Against the Church Fathers

Post by Secret Alias »

How is having more than one god monotheism?
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