Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

Interesting passage from Origen to Africanus
I had nearly forgotten an additional remark I have to make about the prino-prisein and schino-schiesein difficulty; that is, that in our Scriptures there are many etymological fancies, so to call them, which in the Hebrew are perfectly suitable, but not in the Greek. It need not surprise us, then, if the translators of the History of Susanna contrived it so that they found out some Greek words, derived from the same root, which either corresponded exactly to the Hebrew form (though this I hardly think possible), or presented some analogy to it. Here is an instance of this in our Scripture. When the woman was made by God from the rib of the man, Adam says, "She shall be called woman, because she was taken out of her husband." Now the Jews say that the woman was called "Essa," and that "taken" is a translation of this word as is evident from "chos isouoth essa," which means, "I have taken the cup of salvation;" and that "is" means "man," as we see from "Hesre ais," which is, "Blessed is the man." According to the Jews, then, "is" is "man," and "essa" "woman," because she was taken out of her husband (Φησὶν ὁ Ἀδὰμ ἐπὶ τῇ γυναικὶ οἰκοδομηθείσῃ ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐκ τῆς πλευρᾶς τοῦ ἀνδρός· «Αὕτη κληθήσεται γυνὴ, ὅτι ἐκ τοῦ ἀνδρὸς αὐτῆς ἐλήφθη.» Φασὶ δὲ οἱ Ἑβραῖοι «ἐσσὰ» μὲν καλεῖσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα· δηλοῦσθαι δὲ ἀπὸ τῆς λέξεως τὸ «ἔλαβον,» ὡς δῆλον ἐκ τοῦ· «Χῶς ἰσουὼθ ἐσσά,» ὅπερ ἑρμηνεύεται· «Ποτήριον σωτηρίου λήψομαι·» «ἴς» δὲ τὸν ἄνδρα, ὡς φανερὸν ἐκ τοῦ· «Ἐσρὴ ἀΐς,» ὅπερ ἐστί· «Μακάριος ἀνήρ.» Κατὰ μὲν οὖν Ἑβραίους ἲς καὶ ἐσσὰ ἀνδρὸς, ὅτι ἀπὸ ἲς ἀνδρὸς αὐτῆς ἐλήφθη αὕτη). It need not then surprise us if some interpreters of the Hebrew "Susanna," which had been concealed among them at a very remote date, and had been preserved only by the more learned and honest, should have either given the Hebrew word for word, or hit upon some analogy to the Hebrew forms, that the Greeks might be able to follow them. For in many other passages we can, I find traces of this kind of contrivance on the part of the translators, which I noticed when I was collating the various editions.
The first thing is that we can say is that Origen connects Genesis 2:23 (את ֹה־זָּחֳ קֻל ישִׁאֵ מיִכּ' for from man she was taken') with Psalms 116:13 (אָשֶּׂא שׁוּעוֹתְכּוֹס־י' I will take up the cup of salvation'). Kantor seems to think Origen was working with a Greek translation of the Scriptures because he can't distinguish between sin and shin. But Kantor seems to have forgotten that the oldest manuscripts did not distinguish between these two letters - as Samaritan Hebrew continues to do.

Pay attention to this though:
«ἴς» δὲ τὸν ἄνδρα
Goes a long way to make the case for the origin of the nomen sacrum ΙΣ coupled also with:
2 Samuel 4:5 איש בשת = Ις-βοσθε
Philo – that איש was part of the name given to Jacob from this ‘stranger’ – Ἰσραὴλ = ‘ish ra’ah [or ro’eh] ‘El, “a man seeing God” (Ἰσ = אִישׁ). Justin’s is slightly different but assumes the presence of אִישׁ even though the whole idea is etymologically unsound.

If there was a theological understanding that 'Jesus' and 'Christ' were separate beings and 'Jesus' was the heavenly god and 'Christ' the earthly messiah who dies on the Cross, Origen's understanding of a cosmic man ΙΣ is the most likely solution IMHO.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

Another curious discovery

ίσανδρος = like man https://books.google.com/books?id=IcxeA ... AHoECAIQAQ
ίσάνθρωπος = like man https://books.google.com/books?id=HgE2A ... 82&f=false
ισοθείας = like god
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

Just a theory to start my day where I take my son to his third soccer game this weekend at 11 am. There was a tendency in early Christianity to develop faux etymologies from Hebrew words. I can't - at 6:15 am - recall any specific examples right at the moment. But I know they existed. Ancient Greek speakers took Hebrew words and explained them with Greek etymologies. I think Plutarch does in his Table Talk where he tries to argue that the Jewish god = Dionysus. Irenaeus argues against the translation of Hebrew names and terminologies into Greek. I wonder if this one I have in mind actually existed.

The Hebrew word for man = אש originally but later איש. I strongly believe the original terminology in Genesis 1:26 is not 'Adam' as it reads now but 'Ish'
And God said: 'Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.'
Of course the LXX for the critical part of the scripture is
καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεός ποιήσωμεν ἄνθρωπον κατ᾽ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν καὶ καθ᾽ ὁμοίωσιν
But there is a rough congruence between ὁμοίωσις and ἴσος. There is a stream of thought in early Christianity which dates back to Judaism whereby the 'first man' made in the image of God opens the pathway to humanity made after Adam to become 'equal' to God. Remember that Christian theology says that humanity made after Adam has the εἰκόνα of God but not the ὁμοίωσιν. This came with Jesus's descent and the establishment of the sacraments of Christianity.

Clement of Alexandria writes for instance that:
But the Gnostic, being such as we have described him in body and soul, is found to be fair alike (ἴσος καὶ ὅμοιος) towards all his neighbours, whatever their legal position, whether servant or foeman or whatever it be (trans. J.B. Mayor)
The Gospel of Thomas 61 makes explicit that it is essential for everyone who seeks salvation to become equal. Thomas 61 is not the only ancient text to suggest that a human being is capable of becoming ἴσος, i.e. equal to him- or herself: Philo expresses the same idea, when he says that God made Moses a god and that Moses became equal to himself. According to Thomas 61:5, becoming equal is the opposite of becoming divided. Why are these two conditions set against each other? Dividedness and indivisibility are also philosophically loaded concepts. Both equality and indivisibility are Platonist attributes of ultimate reality; therefore, to be equal means to be divine, while to be divided means to lack divinity.

Platonist sources maintain that ultimate reality is indivisible, while both human body and soul are of composite nature and, therefore, divisible. According to Thomas 61:5, in order to reach the perfect state, one should seek to attain indivisibility. Once again, Thomas shares this sentiment with Philo, who spoke of the transformation of Moses from the dyad of body and soul into the indivisible monad of pure mind.

It is significant that the notion of perfection as being equal as well as the notion of imperfection as being divided both have not only a metaphysical, but also an ethical dimension. While an ancient reader could understand Thomas 61:5 as a metaphysical statement on human perfection, i.e. as an exhortation to become immutable like Philo’s Moses, he or she could also read it from the ethical perspective, i.e. as advice to become equable like Clement’s Gnostic. Similarly, the same reader could interpret the notion of division in Thomas 61:5 from the point of view of metaphysics, viz. as a defect of human nature that Philo’s Moses was able to escape, but that he or she could also understand as a moral flaw condemned by Jesus in Thomas 72.

My thought then for this morning is that when Ephrem identifies the Marcionite pronunciation of Jesus's name as Ysu (with semak rather than shin https://books.google.com/books?id=uQh2D ... on&f=false) I wonder whether it goes back to a Greek 'faux etymology' whereby the first man (identified by Origen as 'spelled' in Greek as ἴς) goes back to the 'First Man' in Genesis 1.26 but who - because he is made after the image and likeness. To this end, I wonder whether the Greek speaking early Christians who identified 'Jesus' as a wholly divine figure who descended from heaven necessarily understood him to be related to the idea of God's 'likeness' or 'equal' viz. the אש First Man created at the beginning.

http://wordinfo.info/unit/2795
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because he not only used to break the Sabbath, but he also was calling God his own Father, thus making himself equal (ἴσον) with God. [John 5.18]
and in the early hymn of Jesus:
Who, being in very form (μορφῇ) God,
did not consider equality with God (ἴσα Θεῷ) something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness (ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων).
And being found in appearance (σχήματι) as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
And Clement's contextualizing of the hymn:
But if thou dost not believe the prophets, but supposest both the men and the fire a myth, the Lord Himself shall speak to thee, "who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but humbled Himself," --He, the merciful God, exerting Himself to save man. And now the Word Himself clearly speaks to thee, Shaming thy unbelief; yea, I say, the Word of God became man, that thou mayest learn from man how man may become God. Is it not then monstrous, my friends, that while God is ceaselessly exhorting us to virtue, we should spurn His kindness and reject salvation?
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

But it is enough that if in the gospel he presents Christ as the Son of man, he cannot deny that as man, and in this manhood, he is Adam.
This is from Tertullian Against Marcion. The author's point of course is that when Jesus references Daniel's 'Son of Man' that 'Man = Adam' and thus he means a mortal being. The difficulty with this line of logic is that the portions of Daniel that describe the bar 'ěnoš are in Aramaic. Was there an original lost Hebrew text? Perhaps. But as it stands there is no direct connection with Adam in any of this. The person making the argument likely only knew the Greek text. Interesting the earliest Christian reading of Genesis 1:1 assumes a 'bar esh' = Son of Man:

Image

I wonder whether someone read Genesis 1.1 as if it was "(the) Son of Man himself ..." = bar esh yat in Aramaic.

https://books.google.com/books?id=6K-9C ... an&f=false

https://books.google.com/books?id=Xz9CD ... ew&f=false

“In the Son God created heaven and earth”

In principio fecit Deus coelum et terram

In filio fecit …

[see P. Nautin, In Principio: Interpre/tations des premiers versets de la Gene\se (Etudes Augustiniennes; Paris 1973) 61-94]

Dial of Jason and Papiscus [Ariston] (Jerome QuHebGen 3 [ed Vall. p 305]

(Justin Dial 61-62?)

Irenaeus Dem 43

Tertullian, AdvPrax 5.1: Aiunt quidam et Gwenesin in Hebraico ita incipere: in principio Deus fecit filium.

Hilary apud Jerome

Dial of Athanasius and Zacchaeus? In principio = in filio (Christ as arxh)

Dial of Simon and Theophilus

Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram 3 (PL 34.222) – see John 8.25

Jerome (PL 23.985-987): Plerique existimat, sicut in altercatione quoque Jasonis et Papisci scriptum est, et Tertullianus in libro contra Praxeam disputat necnon Hilarius in expositione cuiusdam Psalmi affirmat, in Hebraeo haberi: In filio fecit Deus coelum et terram. Quod falsum esse, ipssius rei veritas comprobat.

[Resnick (1992)] Comments on Jerome's interp of Ps 39/40.8 as the beginning (principium) of OT (logos; in hoc libri capite nuntiatus est) -- Breviarum in Psalmos 39.8 (PL 26.1002A). Jerome also accuses Hilary of Poitiers of misunderstanding Gen 1.1 with rendering 'in filio fecit Deus coelum et terram' Liber Hebraicum quaestionum in Genesim 1.1 (PL 23.937). Some other interpreters take the ref to be to Ps 1.1 (Arnobius Junior, Commentarii in Psalmos 39.8 (PL 53.381B), Ps-Rufinus, In Psalmos 75 Commentarius 39.8 (PL 21.295A)). Jerome thus connects this all with John 1.1. "While the phrase in capite libri would not necessarily suggest to us the prologue to John, the Syriac text of Psalm 40.8, when rendered in Latin, reads: Ecce venio: quia in principio librorum scriptum est de me. (n.63) Elsewhere Jerome reminds us that he sought the sense of the Syriac when translating biblical books. (n.64) Jerome's translation, then reflects a resonance between Genesis 1, Psalm 39.8 (Vulgate) and the prologue of John."

Bede, In lib. Genesis 1 (ed. Giles, 7.3)
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

The god Isos appears in the Magical Papyri
https://books.google.com/books?id=oR2KW ... os&f=false
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

The attested Marcionite variant Yesu might be just a regional variant which isn't specifically Marcionite

https://books.google.com/books?id=KNE9t ... wQ6AEIJjAA
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Charles Wilson
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Charles Wilson »

Secret Alias wrote: Sun Nov 18, 2018 7:03 am There was a tendency in early Christianity to develop faux etymologies from Hebrew words. I can't - at 6:15 am - recall any specific examples right at the moment. But I know they existed.



אמּר
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

It is curious when you really look at the early hymn of Jesus how centrally concerned it is with anthropomorphic considerations. We begin:
Who, existing in the form of God (μορφῇ Θεοῦ ὑπάρχων), did not consider equality with God (ἴσα θεῷ) something to be used to his own advantage
To begin with the figure of ΙΣ is presented throughout the hymn as some sort of 'halfway' point between the ultimate God (presumably the Father) and man (presumably Adam and his sons). He is the 'form' of God and is 'equal' to God but clearly a distinct hypostasis. We go on to hear that instead of sitting alone in some room in heaven this 'form' that is 'equal' to God comes down to share himself with the sons of Adam:
rather, emptied himself (ἑαυτὸν ἐκένωσεν) taking the form of a slave (μορφὴν δούλου λαβών), being made in human likeness (ἐν ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων γενόμενος). And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death [even death on a cross]
While some take the aorist participles λαβών and γενόμενος to denote action prior to the main verb ἐκένωσεν it seems to me that ΙΣ emptied himself was by “taking the form of a slave” and “being made in the likeness of men." To that end, we can I believe, equate this with the separationist reading of Mark referred to in Irenaeus whereby ΙΣ enters 'Christ' long enough to establish Christ as crucified and ultimately 'disappearing' as per Daniel 9:26 (inverting the reading 'Jesus' and 'Christ' in Adv Haer 4.11.7 after the example of Tertullian's Against the Valentinians).

If this is established, then it would stand to reason that the apostle is describing the gospel narrative in such a way that ΙΣ again stands at the midpoint between man and God. By his nature ΙΣ is the form of God but enough similarity was already established between man and God that ΙΣ could empty himself into a chosen man. But here is where my perplexity begins:

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name,
Is the 'him' here ΙΣ or the slave in whom ΙΣ emptied himself? It doesn't make sense to me that if ΙΣ had equality with God that God could make him even greater - even greater than himself! As such I have to suspect that God is exalting the slave (= Christ) and what is being described here is the enthronement of the messiah, the messiah who was crucified.
This reasoning becomes even stronger at the conclusion of the hymn:
that at the name of ΙΣ every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Lord ΙΣ is Christ to the glory of God the Father.
In other words, the narrative is about the manner in which two powers - and Christ - became one. I also wonder whether a well known variant (i.e. ἰς instead of εἰς https://www.trismegistos.org/ref/detail ... _id=462505) was present in the text. In other words:
and every tongue acknowledge that Lord ΙΣ is Christ to (εἰς) the glory of God the Father.
read:
and every tongue acknowledge that Lord ΙΣ is Christ, ΙΣ the glory of God the Father.
If this variant is attested anywhere it might suggest that the nomina sacra were a later stage in the preservation of the text. If this understanding is accepted as well, we see that the text originally emphasized the distinctiveness of ΙΣ and Christ as the last lines emphasize that only ΙΣ is the glory of the Father god.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: Did the Church Fathers Really Take ΙΣ = Jesus?

Post by Secret Alias »

On the substitution of ἰς for εἰς (itacism) in Christian manuscripts:

https://books.google.com/books?id=gsoFM ... 22&f=false

and

https://books.google.com/books?id=iZNdD ... or&f=false
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
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