a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Secret Alias
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Secret Alias »

Stuart

So you are saying that the Antitheses - a work which is presumed to exist by modern scholarship without a known manuscript - has clear and incontrovertible Patristic evidence for its existence? Please point to this evidence. I say the evidence isn't that clear. I say the Antitheses could have been any number of things instead of a 'text written by Marcion.' I take it to be a section of the gospel which was unknown to the original author - presumably Justin - in his gospel. My interpretation is no more or less certain than the alternative because the information about this or these 'Antitheses' is so ambiguous, so piss poor. But that hasn't stopped other scholars from speaking about this 'Antitheses' as a certain commodity.

Why the certainty that 'the Antitheses' actually existed but that Secret Mark didn't? I'd say that comes down to the subjectivity of modern scholarship and the scholars involved. If you want to believe we can know Marcion's gospel you make arbitrary decisions about how you are going to proceed 'figuring it out.' But this is the shittiest sort of scholarship. The Marcionite gospel can't be known. You know that, I know that. It's just a bullshit game that scholars play to write nonsense that no one outside a handful of scholars cares about anyway. A make work project to fill in time before they die.

But the point remains. No manuscript exists for Marcion's gospel. No manuscript exists for Marcion's alleged Antitheses. And scholarship presumes and interprets their existences without much in the way of positive evidence and conflicting piss poor information generally. So much for works which are claimed to exist with any manuscripts. Let's move on to single exemplars. The writings of Justin and Clement of Alexandria survive thanks to a single exemplar. Many infancy gospels survive thanks to a single relatively recent exemplar. This argument about a 'single manuscript' for Secret Mark is a red herring which is a not a serious problem with the discovery. Eusebius mentions a collection of letters of Clement of Alexandria which existed in a library in the area of Mar Saba. I don't know what you are talking about.

The bottom line is that we have better information about Secret Mark than we do the Marcionite gospel. We don't have lengthy citations of the Marcionite gospel. We simply have off the cuff and often conflicting statements about what Marcion changed, a particular word that is different in the text. Nothing like a fragment of that gospel. No direct reference to how a particular passage followed another or preceded another like we have with Secret Mark. It's the worst sort of information - piss poor information - about Marcion and his gospel. And you take one to be certain and knowable and the other certain and disproved by the flimsiest sort of evidence for forgery. I suspect that your reasons for seeing the world in such an obtuse way has nothing to do whether Secret Mark is or isn't an ancient text or not.

On the subject of how we should approach Secret Mark's existence or non-existence I think Kok's book on the Gospel of Mark is a reasonable way to deal with the problem - https://books.google.com/books?id=U-YcB ... 22&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: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Secret Alias »

The evidence for Can the Rich Man be Saved is about the same as the letter to Theodore or letters of Clement generally - a single reference in Eusebius to their existences. If I remember correctly the MS of Can the Rich Man be Saved does not identify Clement as the author. Eusebius's mention of the text as Clementine was used to help identify the surviving MS which was tacked on to the end of a treatise or treatises by Origen. Both treatises have Carpocratians in mind (though they are not explicitly named in QDS). I wonder whether the name Harpocrates has something to do with Origen (born from Horus).
“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
Roger Viklund
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Roger Viklund »

Stuart wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 1:12 am And I hope people do understand that this is only one of the issues I have with Secret Mark. We can start with the lack of manuscript evidence as a second point. A third point is the introduction of Jesus who shows anger/wrath. There is also the issue of Clement using a direct martyrdom formula with Peter, something he never does anywhere else in his voluminous works that we have.

As no hypothesis so-far has managed to solve every contradiction in the gospels creations puzzle, it could also mean that your theory, at least to some extent, is wrong. One might not want to add another ingredient into already complicated theories, but one cannot let a theory steer the presence or non-presence of sources. You cannot dismiss a source which we have on the basis that it doesn’t fit the theory. That would be a kind of inverted science.

The examples you present could as easily be used for a directly opposite view. First, if I recall correctly, the Western text has the same word for angry in Mark 1:41 as is used in Secret Mark. But even if that wouldn’t be entirely correct, the fact that Mark would use a word he didn’t use in GMark, rather speaks for authenticity than for forgery. If we have an author who is so skilled in forging the letter and the quote from Secret Mark that most scholars think it looks genuine, why would s/he use a word for anger which Mark doesn’t use elsewhere? It would be such a stupid mistake. Mark (whoever wrote the gospel) is, of course, free to use whatever word he wants to. Authors generally know almost infinitely more words than they use in their formal writing. Even if I published tenth of thousands of manuscript pages, I would still know more words than I have used. Just consider those words that Mark used once. If such a word would be used in Secret Mark it would be considered a Markan word. But if he had refrained from using it in that particular sentence the same word would be seen as un-Markan. People are not word-machines!

The same also holds true for “Clement using a direct martyrdom formula with Peter”. If someone goes into all this trouble learning to mimic Clement, why would that someone present a view that doesn’t harmonize with the few surviving lines Clement wrote about Mark and Peter? It would be such a dumb mistake made by a master forger! It’s much easier to imagine that Clement (or whoever wrote the letter) only had a hunch of what happened and not necessarily remembered exactly what he heard, especially if he wrote about it on two occasions, say more than ten years apart. People are not machines!
andrewcriddle
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by andrewcriddle »

Secret Alias wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 12:55 pm The evidence for Can the Rich Man be Saved is about the same as the letter to Theodore or letters of Clement generally - a single reference in Eusebius to their existences. If I remember correctly the MS of Can the Rich Man be Saved does not identify Clement as the author. Eusebius's mention of the text as Clementine was used to help identify the surviving MS which was tacked on to the end of a treatise or treatises by Origen. Both treatises have Carpocratians in mind (though they are not explicitly named in QDS). I wonder whether the name Harpocrates has something to do with Origen (born from Horus).
On the (strong) evidence that Clement wrote Can the Rich Man be Saved see https://archive.org/details/ahomilyclem ... og/page/n8 Eusebius not only mentions the work, he quotes a substantial passage from it.

Eusebius makes no mention of letters by Clement of Alexandria. The first mention of such letters is in the much later Sacra Parallela, where some confusion with apocryphal letters of Clement of Rome is possibly involved.

Andrew Criddle
Secret Alias
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Secret Alias »

That's right I consistently make that mistake. Something wrong in my memory banks. But John of Damascus is in the monastery when he makes the identification. That's powerful stuff. You on the other hand argue that John has the letters of another Clement in mind. Well, but he says Clement of Alexandria. Or if you change tactic and say 'yes it might have been Clement of Alexandria' but Smith knew that. As we have discussed before, the level of complexity here in order for Smith to be the forger is astounding. Not only does he have to master Clement's writing style, Mark's writing style, the art of writing an ancient letter, but he also has to know the John of Damascus mentions the collection of Clement's letters and forgers a purported letter fragment from the collection. Again I ask why? If he was so led by his dick that they would sabotage the very field he literally spent his life devoted to? I mean common. He lived in New York, the queer capitol of the universe. Not being able to have gay sex in New York is like not being able to find steamed rice in Chinese restaurant. It doesn't make sense! It simply doesn't make sense that someone would go to this length to create a master forgery. This belongs on an episode of Dr Who not reality.

I am tired of all this scholarly talk about the banal subject of 'homosexuality' and sex. Let's talk for real.

I once hired some New York performers to go to Singapore and do some work and they kept talking about how they weren't going to get laid over there because it was illegal. They never had so much sex. The illegal part makes it more exciting. That's what makes a prostitute exciting. No one has ever stopped going to a prostitute because it's illegal. Same thing with gay sex. The performers mentioned a bar where everyone was walking around in their underwear. Man, I was worried they weren't going to show up on time for work they were having so much fun. I imagine that it was easy - and exciting - to get laid as a gay man in 1958 New York too. I'd quicker think Smith might have had these gay issues everyone mentions if he was married. There are lots and lots of married men that have gay sex. When you are an attractive heterosexual man, that never stops gay men from hitting on you. You can be standing there with your pretty girlfriend - both of you looking pretty and they start giving you all this eye-work. My attractive straight performers had married guys in Italy begging them to pound their ass. Just the reality. The reason why not-so-attractive straight guys think there is this 'line' where gays only hit on gays, is because gay men aren't interested in them. They aren't good looking enough. Closeted gay men still go out at night and have sex. But the only gay people who are frustrated in the way Carlson imagines Smith to have been are gay married men in the 1950s who lacked courage.

Gay people are just highly sexed men who tried having sex with other men. It's not like they are this separate 'species' whose motives could involve 'forgery' because they are somehow deviant. This whole stupid theory depends on an academic's ignorance of the real world. If Smith was highly sexualized in New York he might have tried having sex with a man. I don't think he was highly sexualized. My performers and sportsmen can't stand on a fucking street corner without getting distracted by a woman with a big ass. It's just the reality. Sorry, you guys don't know anything about human nature. You don't anything about the highly sexualized type of man. This is so stupid. If Smith was going to try to pull off a forgery he just treated as a mental game because he was a nihilistic sociopath. It had nothing to do with homosexuality. And how do you prove that he was a nihilistic sociopath. You can't. So you guys make up all the bullshit about him being gay as a motive. The only motivation that 'being gay' has ever provide for a man is to have sex. It's not like 'you're gay' so you start robbing banks. If you're gay there's a easy solution - you pull down your pants, you whack off or you go out and find some ass. It's not complicated. It's not a motive for forgery.

I am so sick of this complete garbage. Bottom line - prove Smith was a nihilistic sociopath, you've got motive. That's what you need to make him a forger. And BTW those researching Smith ran criminal background investigations on him. They did all sorts of checks - Freedom of Information Act requests. Why? Because this is the way to proceed. Guess what they found? Nothing. Nada. So out comes all this garbage about him being a 'closeted homosexual' as a single man in New York.

Final say - if you're highly sexualized the only thing that keeps you from having sex every night is being married to someone who isn't interested. Smith didn't have that. Therefore he was either getting it or he wasn't interested.
“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: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Secret Alias »

The mistake people make is making 'straight' versus 'gay' the polar extreme. It's not. You're either one of these guys


or your asexual like Morton Smith. The guys in the video could all end up in gay bar. They have the predisposition. In fact I think this was recognized in antiquity. The issue was 'lust.'
“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: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Secret Alias »

I have to admit. People ask me why I study the Bible. I tell them it gives me a lot of laughs. Not the answer most people expect. I've been killing myself laughing for like the last 15 minutes. Those guys in the video are like every performer I've ever worked with. There so stupid.
“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
Bertie
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Bertie »

The discussion does seem to circle back to the question of homosexuality.

Is that the strongest argument for Secret Mark being modern, or is there another that is stronger?

As I understand it, the problem isn’t homosexuality per se, but the specific practices of Ancient Greek homosexuality, for which Secret Mark is alleged to be a poor match. The research on this subject is vast, but the present day understanding of Greek homosexuality and the difference between that and contemporary homosexuality was not reached until after any potential forgery date, which would explain why the forger would make the homosexuality of Secret Mark look more like Oscar Wilde than it does Plato — he didn’t know any better.

I can’t do justice to the mainstream theory of Greek homosexuality in this thread, but going off of memory it protected the masculity of the elder partner and the future masculinity of the younger one with layers of ritual, initiation, pedagogy, emphesis on the “penetrative” nature of the act for the elder partner, blantant asymmetries in power between the partners, and a bunch of other stuff I’m forgetting. I read Secret Mark after I read classical literature, and remember thinking, “Yeah, that doesn’t sound right for Greek literature at all.”

So while the case for authenticity of Secret Mark may be strong, it has to be; in a Bayesian sense the prior probabilities are very against a document featuring late 19th-mid 20th Century-looking
homosexuality being genuine for Greek antiquity.
Giuseppe
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Giuseppe »

In terms of practical utility, I doubt that the presumed authenticity of Secret Mark can really support the mythicism, pace Bob Price.

If Secret Mark is authentic, then it means that the his preservers were so faithful to the text, even if they were proto-Catholic preservers. This would be evidence of a so high loyalty and reverence for the Written Word that would make more credible the same Written Word. As the logic goes: if they were so faithful to preserve a so scandalous fragment, then how much more would have they preserved more normal original texts?


While, if Secret Mark is a modern forgery, then it is evidence that it is sufficient the more minimal caprice (the mere wish, by a homosexual scholar, to defend homosexuality) to invent the relative Jesus who satisfies that caprice. As the logic goes, if even in modern times there occurs a forgery and the invention of a Jesus for the stupidest reason (apology of homosexuality), then how much more necessary and tremendously REAL was the forgery, the interpolation, the fabrication, the invention of various Jesuses in the real past, under well more serious THEOLOGICAL reasons?

So, the second scenario supports more easily mythicism. Bob Price is so intelligent and astute for the answer by him given to Roger (I go to memory): ''an authentic Secret Mark would help me better''. Note the irony, here.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Secret Alias
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Re: a possibility so remote that it deserves a little reflection

Post by Secret Alias »

No idea WTF you're saying.
“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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