A short summary on John the Baptist...

[mlinssen]

Explain how John the Baptist is an "embarrassing and rival figure for the theology" of Marcion please, just name one single verse (or more) where that is the case

the passage where Jesus asks:
“What did you go out into the wilderness to look at?”

It seems to me that Marcion, by using the mouth of Jesus, is going to despise the crowds of people who followed John in the wilderness. The wilderness was probably an euphemism to say: a place where only few people were privileged by hallucinations of the Christ.

The episode witnesses a reality of wild prophetic hallucinations, a riotous diversity on which Marcion wanted to impose an embryo of 'orthodoxy'.

Hence, the previous existence of a legend of a visionary prophet, John, privileged by revelations, and by a lot of followers perceived as rival by Marcion.

Thomas logion

78. said IS : because-of who/at? did you(PL) come outward to the(F) field to behold [dop] a(n) reed he move outward by-the-hand-of the wind and to behold [dop] a(n) human there-be garment they being-smooth on he in.the.manner of your(PL.PL) kings with your(PL.PL) Mighty-one these-ones the(PL) garment who/which being-smooth on they and they will be-able she/r know the(F) truth not

A field is what Thomas has, turned into wilderness by the NT of course, in order to fit in with the Tanakh scene they want to place this in. And according to Vinzent (and likely Klinghardt then) *Ev contains the same - and Thomas is used to sketch the scene for the real scene, which also is Thomas

46. IS said: starting from Adam toward Johannes the Immerser, in the births of the women there is not he who exalted to Johannes the Immerser So that his eyes will not break. I said it However: he who will come to be in you he been made little person he will know the reign of king and he will be high to Johannes.

And again we see that *Ev is using his source to give meaning to his own version of John B, only in order to execute his master plan:

16Das Gesetz und die Propheten wurden bis Johannes prophezeit. Von da an wird die Herrschaft Gottes verkündigt.
17Der Himmel und die Erde vergehen schneller als ein einziges Häkchen der Worte des Herrn.

Purposely in German so you'll have to look it up yourself, which will highly likely happen only after you have read the following "counter" (ROFL) to that by Matthew:

11:12 From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subject to violence,f and the violent lay claim to it. 13 For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John. 14 And if you are willing to accept it, he is the Elijah who was to come.g

292 counts of Baptist in ChristiThora, by the way. You surely will not be disappointed

[mlinssen]

Marcion is using John the Baptist EXACTLY like John will mutate his Judas into a willingness puppet - yet the John B of *Ev is a sock puppet, and that is his entire and only function:

He takes John B and places him into Judaism, and has him prophesy the coming of Jesus - in a brand new kingdom of his own

And of course that screams for retaliation

Vinzent is a fucking genius

[Giuseppe]

A field is what Thomas has, turned into wilderness by the NT of course, in order to fit in with the Tanakh scene they want to place this in.

I have never thought about that.
That saying seems to have been written to make precisely your point in this discussion.

Just curious to know what Vinzent thinks about the historicity of John the Baptist, then.

[mlinssen]

A field is what Thomas has, turned into wilderness by the NT of course, in order to fit in with the Tanakh scene they want to place this in.

I have never thought about that.
That saying seems to have been written to make precisely your point in this discussion.

Just curious to know what Vinzent thinks about the historicity of John the Baptist, then.

I realise that you must have seen way too many wild, crazy, and if course also some sensible, intelligible theories Giuseppe.
And I don't come across as the typical scholar (LOL)

But this is it, we really can close the forums all over the world:

Romans creating Christianity was a natural counter reaction to Marcion creating Chrestianity: an anti-Judaic religion not only placed outside Judaism, but even directly opposed it - and worse, accusing Judaics of killing its god

Just let that sink in for a minute. A few minutes. Then close your eyes and let your imagination run wild.
Do you see the ramifications?

Can you see the angry mobs protesting outside synagogues?
Can you see the angry looks exchanged in the streets between Chrestians and - very visible and distinguishable - Judaics?
Can you see the first stone going through the first window?
Can you see the first Judaic beaten up in a dark alley?

Now, the Judaics react, of course. Perhaps they form a vigilante but in essence they find themselves in a guerilla war fighting against an invisible enemy: anyone could or could not be a Chrestian.
So all they can do is fight back when fought against, plead with the Roman rulers to "do something", and travel in groups only - we are talking massive disruption of cities where Judaism suddenly becomes the centre of attention, unwillingly. And everyone of course would have to have an opinion on it, label it, judge it, take sides: everyone would have to be either for or against Judaism whether they liked it or not

But all that doesn't matter: the only thing that matters is power and control, running the city, managing the nation. Stability is desired because that means predictability. Predictability means a steady flow of income, and that means being able to forecast. And we all want to know the future.
So eventually the "powers that be" had no choice than to intervene, and they found themselves in the exact same guerilla war as the Judaics did. And in the end, after whatever they tried, the only thing they could do is taking away the fuel to the fire

Judaism being banned was the only way to manage this - yet taking Judaism out of the equation didn't solve the problem, as it were the Judaics who caused the everything of this new religion's King, leader or God, but it was the Romans who did the dirty deed.
(And we can see why Matthew has Pilate wash his hands)

So taking away Judaism only aggravated the problem, as all the anger could now be directed, with undivided attention, against the Romans. Roman rulers in particular, but likely everything Roman

Rinse and repeat the scenario above that applies to Chrestians versus Judaics, and simply replace Judaics by Romans: the exact same things hold true

And there's only one solution really, and that is to retaliate. With full force, in writing. Stitch the wound, in an effort to heal it, and rewrite the stories yourself. Have a preacher at every street corner bringing your own version of the good news, accept that the first couple will get ripped apart by the crowd, and just persevere. Combine that bottom-up approach with a top-down one by having the intelligentsia push the propaganda at that level as well, and just persevere.
And the first thing to do there is to focus on the entire cause of the entire issue, and that is, my dear Giuseppe, this very scene right here: John, the Judaic, presenting (by proxy) Jesus as the King of a new kingdom, in the wilderness

And the rest is history

And all that, all of it, was triggered by a simple story about self-seeking, magnificently masterminded yet momentously misunderstood, that has absolutely nothing to do with any of it - even though it did breathe ferocious anti-Judaism from beginning to end - so very much in fact that even while completely confounding all of it only took off a tiny bit, leaving more than enough to continue on.
And that was Thomas

And yes, I'm curious too to which extent Markus is prepared to take the next step. I still have some 50 pages to go in his book so I'll know by tomorrow. Until then, Vinzent highly likely says what I've written here

[schillingklaus]

Marcion's is not the first story featuring John B, pre-synoptic gospels with euhemerization had preceded him. The priority of John is not an embarrassing problem for Judaizers, who need the messiah annointed by Eliyah according to Scripture; and it is equally not embarassing for those who understood that the proclamation of the conversion must precede the institution of the Eucharist for the acquisition of the nous must precede the application of the nous. It is only troublesome for Marcion that someone predicted the coming of Jesus and was able to preach appropriately the faith in him before Paul.

Given the plural there, can you at least name one?

It would seem that you have the order of Marcion and NT wrong by the way, unless you have one of those pre-synoptic gospels precede Marcion and present a John B who preaches a Judaic Messiah.
Even before Paul does? What exactly is your order then?

Of course those pre-synoptics would also precede Marcion, and they are lost because they fell out of service as soon as they were obsoleted by canonical gospels. Their existence follows from redactorial fatigue in all synoptics.

There's at least a common source to Mk and Mt, a common source of Lk and Mk, and a source of the triple tradition. In the case of the passion story, this has been elucidated best by Jean Mahne in LA CRUCIFIXION: POLEMIQUE ANTI-JUIVE ET MYTHE GNOSTIQUE.

[mlinssen]

Marcion's is not the first story featuring John B, pre-synoptic gospels with euhemerization had preceded him. The priority of John is not an embarrassing problem for Judaizers, who need the messiah annointed by Eliyah according to Scripture; and it is equally not embarassing for those who understood that the proclamation of the conversion must precede the institution of the Eucharist for the acquisition of the nous must precede the application of the nous. It is only troublesome for Marcion that someone predicted the coming of Jesus and was able to preach appropriately the faith in him before Paul.

Given the plural there, can you at least name one?

It would seem that you have the order of Marcion and NT wrong by the way, unless you have one of those pre-synoptic gospels precede Marcion and present a John B who preaches a Judaic Messiah.
Even before Paul does? What exactly is your order then?

Of course those pre-synoptics would also precede Marcion, and they are lost because they fell out of service as soon as they were obsoleted by canonical gospels. Their existence follows from redactorial fatigue in all synoptics.

There's at least a common source to Mk and Mt, a common source of Lk and Mk, and a source of the triple tradition. In the case of the passion story, this has been elucidated best by Jean Mahne in LA CRUCIFIXION: POLEMIQUE ANTI-JUIVE ET MYTHE GNOSTIQUE.

You could make yourself useful for a change and actually quote something worthwhile instead of just making claims and then throwing books at it - you're no better that the average biblical academic

[Jagd]

pre-synoptic gospel drafts

What are these, exactly?