Most Manuscripts are not Primary Sources

[StephenGoranson]

Above:
"Isn't it time to skeptically question......?"
Various non-canonical works are quoted by various writers, not always disapprovingly. Non canonical works are not all pro-paganism.
Non-canonical works existed before the fourth century. For example, from Oxyrhinchus. For example, in some translations from earlier Greek texts into Coptic from Nag Hammadi.
For these and other reasons--including misusing Momigliano's snippet in a manner that he did not--I am, concerning your current 4th-c. proposal,
skeptical.

[Leucius Charinus]

Above:
"Isn't it time to skeptically question......?"
Various non-canonical works are quoted by various writers,

Porphyry appears to cite works at "Life of Plotinus" (16) and various heresiologists appear to quote works. However the earliest extant manuscripts for these writers are far from primary sources. My argument is that these references are false flags designed to make us infer the NTA books were around well before the massive controversy they caused. I am associating the Arian controversy with circulation of NTA codices.

not always disapprovingly.

Some of the NTA works were brilliantly written and became popular. Some were useful to later 4th century Christian orthodoxy. For example the Roman church under Damasus was very interested in and lapped up the legendary works linking Peter (and Paul) to Rome. Some were very useful. The NTA works represented a spectrum of reaction --- literary, social, philosophical, religious, political, satirical --- to the appearance and authority of the Constantine Bible.

Non canonical works are not all pro-paganism.

Some wrote about the apostles praying and causing pagan temples to be destroyed. Some exhibit a satirical treatment of the Christian apostles. In many Jesus is the post resurrection version. The earliest NTA manuscripts even employ the nomina sacra which they found in the emperor's new books.

Non-canonical works existed before the fourth century. For example, from Oxyrhinchus.

I have made a collation of these here. Many of these are dated in the 4th century while some are dated to the 3rd century. They are all dated by means of paleography in isolation and my argument has been that 4th century upper bounds cannot be ruled out. I also reject the proposition that P.Oxy. 405 belongs to Irenaeus.

Brief Summary Index of Papyri

Manuscript Papyri Reference Chronology Comments ...........................


gPeter p.oxy.2949 "early" "Far from certain that these three fragments
p.oxy.4009 are from the gP mentioned by Bishop Serapion.
p.Vinbob G 2325 --- p,258, FN:11; "Fabricating Jesus" -
Craig A Evans.

"They are possibly but not conclusively
from the Gospel of Peter."
p.849 325 CE

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

gThomas p.oxy.654 3rd century Prologue and logoi 1-7
p.oxy.655 3rd century logoi 24, 36-39
p.oxy.1 3rd century logoi 26-33, 77a

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

gMary 2525 ?
p.Rylands.463 3rd century
p.oxy.3525 3rd century

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Irenaeus P.Oxy. 405 c.200 CE Adversus Haereses 3.9, 2-3 (Matt 3)


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

igJames p.3524 > 150 CE Protevangelium of James 25:1
p.Bodmer

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

aPaul p.oxy.6 450 CE
p.Antlin.13 450 CE
MS 2634/1 3rd CE? fragment "pastedown" in book cover
Egypt, 4th century

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

aJohn p.850 350 CE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Didache p.1782 350 CE
p.London.Or.9271

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Unknown G 210
840 350 CE Egypt: citation

http://mountainman.com.au/essenes/apocr ... papyri.htm

For example, in some translations from earlier Greek texts into Coptic from Nag Hammadi.

My argument has been that most (but not all) of the Coptic NHL texts had earlier Greek originals. These Greek works however IMO were not authored until the Constantine Bible appeared in the eastern empire at Alexandria. The infestation of an avalanche of Greek NTA books at Alexandria, and the massive controversy that caused, was met by a crack down by the emperor and his agents. The books were prohibited. It was dangerous in Alexandria. Therefore batches of NTA books were smuggled out of the city and 400 miles down the Nile to Nag Hammadi.

For these and other reasons--including misusing Momigliano's snippet in a manner that he did not--I am, concerning your current 4th-c. proposal,
skeptical.

One must take care with reading Momigliano. Like Gibbon, he uses heavy irony. I commend you for your skepticism for an alternative history for the authorship of the NTA. You have raised necessary questions. Thanks SG. I hoped to have answered them in a responsible and professional manner.

[StephenGoranson]

It is still the case that not all works that eventually were called NT apocrypha
were all written post Constantine nor
were all written by pagans.
Should I further report evidence against these claims
or should I accept "false flag"--and dual evidence levels--paranoia?

[Leucius Charinus]

It is still the case that not all works that eventually were called NT apocrypha
were all written post Constantine nor
were all written by pagans.
Should I further report evidence against these claims

I am always interested in evidence.

or should I accept "false flag"--and dual evidence levels--paranoia?

You should accept the significance of source classification into two levels - primary and secondary, and that the guidelines of the historical method counsel the historian to value the former over the latter.

Significance of source classification

History

In scholarly writing, an important objective of classifying sources is to determine their independence and reliability.[5] In contexts such as historical writing, it is almost always advisable to use primary sources and that "if none are available, it is only with great caution that [the author] may proceed to make use of secondary sources."[6] Sreedharan believes that primary sources have the most direct connection to the past and that they "speak for themselves" in ways that cannot be captured through the filter of secondary sources.[7]

[5] Kragh, Helge (1989). An Introduction to the Historiography of Science. Cambridge University Press. p. 121. ISBN 0-521-38921-6. [T]he distinction is not a sharp one. Since a source is only a source in a specific historical context, the same source object can be both a primary or secondary source according to what it is used for.

[6] Cipolla, Carlo M. (1992). Between Two Cultures:An Introduction to Economic History. W. W. Norton & Co. p. 27. ISBN 978-0-393-30816-7.

[7] Sreedharan, E. (2004). A Textbook of Historiography, 500 B.C. to A.D. 2000. Orient Longman. p. 302. ISBN 81-250-2657-6. It is through the primary sources that the past indisputably imposes its reality on the historian. That this imposition is basic in any understanding of the past is clear from the rules that documents should not be altered, or that any material damaging to a historian's argument or purpose should not be left out or suppressed. These rules mean that the sources or texts of the past have integrity and that they do indeed 'speak for themselves', and that they are necessary constraints through which past reality imposes itself on the historian.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_source

You should also accept the fact that we have unambiguous evidence that pious forgery and interpolation of manuscripts ("false flags") have been perpetrated by individuals within the church organisationin the past. The classic example being "Pseudo-Isidore" which went undetected for many centuries.

Or do you SG believe that we are dealing with a "Divine Institute" of men to the extent that we need not be at all suspicious of the historical integrity of the received manuscripts of the "Fathers". Manuscripts often a thousand years removed from their supposed century of authorship in antiquity? Do you subscribe to the notion of the "Immaculate Transmission" of manuscripts?

[StephenGoranson]

Yes, some try to fake history. For example, you.

[Leucius Charinus]

Historical revisionism is not the faking of history. A good example of historical revisionism in recent times are the revisions of the colonial histories for the British colonies in the US, Australia, Canada and other countries. The older traditional colonial histories were typically one-sided. The conflict between the British colonisers and the indigenous (first nations) people was often suppressed.

Historical revisionism

In historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of a historical account.[1] It usually involves challenging the orthodox (established, accepted or traditional) views held by professional scholars about a historical event or timespan or phenomenon, introducing contrary evidence, or reinterpreting the motivations and decisions of the people involved. The revision of the historical record can reflect new discoveries of fact, evidence, and interpretation, which then results in revised history. In dramatic cases, revisionism involves a reversal of older moral judgments.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_revisionism

It follows that in other cases revisionism involves a reversal of older religious judgements. In the 4th century the Roman empire was colonised by the Christians. The history of this is very one sided. The conflict between the Christian colonisers and the Hellenistic (pagan) civilisation was often suppressed.

[ebion]

The history of this is very one sided. The conflict between the Christian colonisers Churchian pagans and the Hellenistic (pagan) Christian civilisation was often suppressed.

There - fixed it for you :-,)

[Leucius Charinus]

The history of this is very one sided. The conflict between the Christian colonisers Churchian pagans and the Hellenistic (pagan) Christian civilisation was often suppressed.

There - fixed it for you :-,)

Your fix does not appear to address the politics of anti-pagan legislation. You've also introduced the term "churchian pagans". How do you define this term?

The Hellenistic pagan civilisation was suppressed during the Christian revolution of the 4th century. According to the writings of Palladas the Hellenic world was "turned on its head".

The cultural lights of the Greek intellectual traditions (medicine, literature, mathematics, astronomy, philosophy, etc) were suppressed and effectively switched off for a thousand years. A substitute illumination from Jesus and Peter and Paul (greatly supported externally by Seneca) as found resident in the Christian NT/LXX Bible codex was switched on by means of the support provided by the Christian emperors.

Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire began during the reign of Constantine the Great (r. 306–337) in the military colony of Aelia Capitolina (Jerusalem), when he destroyed a pagan temple for the purpose of constructing a Christian church.[1] Rome had periodically confiscated church properties, and Constantine was vigorous in reclaiming them whenever these issues were brought to his attention.[2] Christian historians alleged that Hadrian (2nd century) had constructed a temple to Venus on the site of the crucifixion of Jesus on Golgotha hill in order to suppress Christian veneration there. Constantine used that to justify the temple's destruction, saying he was simply reclaiming the property.[3][4][5][6] Using the vocabulary of reclamation, Constantine acquired several more sites of Christian significance in the Holy Land.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecuti ... man_Empire

[StephenGoranson]

Again, of course, manuscripts and sources properly should be assessed and weighed.
Isn't that a given assumed by most historians and text critics, and seen as common sense by large swaths of the general populace?
I see it as more a spectrum than two buckets.
When I caution about the "two buckets" approach, in a certain case, Peter, I try to do so because of what I see, namely, you:
a) entirely (not partially) dismissing most manuscripts and sources
b) except any measly meager pathetic--or even non-existent!--ones that can somehow be contorted in order to pretend that:
Constantine invented or quasi-invented Christianity and
all NT apocrypha
all were written
all after Constantine's quasi-invention
all by pagans
all in reaction
all for that purpose alone.

(Nor do I see how that imagined scenario, with vanishingly-small likelihood, helps colonist-harmed indigenous populations.)

[ebion]

Constantine was a pagan and turned the Churchians into minions of his Mithras/Molech cult:

• Saturday into Sunday
• Passover into OEaster
• Hebrews into Heathens
• The patriarch of the Romans into the Pontifex Maximus
• And then the Churchunists turned Paul from an apostate into an Apostle (sic.)

The bishops at the Council of Nicaea didn't have much choice: Constantine drafted the resolutions - nobody voted against him, and the 5 bishops that abstained were banished from the Empire. He built his new city of Constantinople around pagan monuments to Sol Invictus with his face on it after the Council of Nicaea. Just as they built cathedrals in the Vaticant and in London over the Mithran grottos. Just as their succesors, the Constantinian Churches of today, did when they who voted with the Emporers for CovID. A plague upon them all!

He built on the solid Pontifex Maximus base laid down by his predecessors like Aurelian, who got his pagan army to execute anyone possessing Christian writings. The massacres of the Christians in the East under the Shapurs were much worse, and have continued till today by the same crowd: "The Syriac speaking Christians of Mesopotamia, (Assyrians) of Iraq, Turkey, and Northwest Iran survived 2000 years of persecutions including repeated massacres by the Sassanians, Arabs, Mongols, Tatars, Kurds and Turks". We're all in Gaza now - they are the indigenous people of Palestine. And that's why the work on the Early Christian writings is so hard.

Because you cite Wickedpaedia, I'll respond with some YewTube videos:

• 20220917@Constantine Elevates Paul from Obscurity. A Marriage Made in Heaven or Hell Pt 1@FFEAMbNv9O8
• 20221021@Constantinian Christians Control the Narrative to Protect Evil Constantine. Ep 8 Constantine Paul@RFWMQ-l3JGw
• 20221027@10 Constantinian Falsifiers of the Fathers - Rufinus Falsifier of Origen@AD YFXND7KE
• 20221027@Ep 1 of 4 Fraudulent Hiding 324 AD Constantine Moved HQ of Pagan Idolatry 2Constantinople. Ep 9 A .@zWT4UkVgDIA
• 20221028@Ep 2 4 Fraudulent Hiding 324 AD Constantine Moved HQ of Pagan Idolatry to Constantinople. Ep 9 B@qZ3G9pBfnGE
• 20221029@11 Constantine Byzantium Anti-Jesus Legacy of Hate Destruction of Monotheism True Bible.@JtTO5aPK2LY
• 20221029@Ep 3 - In 324 Delphic Oracle Moved to Constantinople shortly b4 Nicean Conf. Deified Jesus 9 C .@opVcYgKHdWg
• 20221102@Did Paul Bring These Pagan figures in2 Christianity provable by Acts Later actions of Constantine@YeuWhSwmcFs
• 20221107@Chi Rho Fraud by Constantine - False Claim He Intended as New Christian Symbol when Is Pagan Sun God@bLeW wiMc4s
• 20221107@Eusebius -- Conniver Protector or Survivor Or Did Eusebius know of Apollo statue of Constantine@CAEDWdwGY-s
• 20221201@Tolstoy Greatest Anti Paul Thinker After Constantine Era@c1ioPwwoNlo
• 20221227@3 Is Constantine s Sol Invictus god also Baal in Bible Why Was Jesus given Sol s 12-25 birthday@TLYwiDKSG I
• 20230105@Constantine Letter to Bishops - Is This Proof Constantine is 4th Beast of Daniel 7 Who Changes Times@cPZ5U7nsVgY