Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Giuseppe
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Giuseppe »

But again these aren't independent reports.
I don't think that Justin could invent a false description of the belief of the his Marcionite opponents and go indisturbed. Otherwise the his adversaries would have answered: ''you confute the Marcion of your invention, but we believe x, y and z, confute that, please''.

It is similar to those that say that Paul ignored deliberately a historical Jesus for fear of giving credit to his Brother James. Paul could not pass in silence precisely the best weapon that James would raise against him if he had had really a brother named Jesus.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Secret Alias
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Secret Alias »

all know that the Gospels certainly do not shine of a good understanding of the true identity of Jesus by the people with whom he had to deal.
But this is perhaps the most interesting angle to look at. If we assume - as we must - that the Marcionites were no closer to a historical understanding of the gospel i.e. that the gospel was the product of an apostle who had a vision about events he wasn't necessarily a direct participant in, we can safely assume that they comfortably embraced the text of the gospel as the only source of information about the events described in the gospel. They were unlike - let's say - Papias in this regard. That might explain why they were so fixated on their apostle, the events described in his gospel come totally from his brain. There are no other sources.

Under such a scenario there is no true identity of Jesus outside of the apostle's imagination, outside what the apostle received from Christ. Rather than trying to understand what Jesus thought of the Jews we need to only consider what the apostle was trying to say about the Jews in the manner that we don't need to know Julius Caesar but Shakespeare's interest in portraying Jesus in a certain way. There are just too many similarities between the apostle and Philo then to simply adhere to the rather 'idealistic' or over-simplistic understanding of the Jews among the Church Fathers as 'monotheists' or 'monarchian' in outlook. Since the apostle is like Philo he probably inherited an understanding of an Almighty God (the Father) and two powers who serve him as well as a Logos.

Clement remains faithful to this original model but the emphasis of Irenaeus and his followers is to inject an artificial and wholly alien understanding of Judaism as a strictly monarchian belief system which reflects late-second century rather than contemporary values at the time of the apostle. To this end when Church Fathers say this or that about Marcion they simply have imposed a new understanding of Judaism onto the original model so that Marcion's or Marcionite assumptions become reflections of antipathy rather than what they were really were - an extension of Hellenistic Jewish speculation about the godhead. There is no hatred here.
“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 Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Secret Alias »

I don't think that Justin could invent a false description of the belief of the his Marcionite opponents and go indisturbed. Otherwise the his adversaries would have answered: ''you confute the Marcion of your invention, but we believe x, y and z, confute that, please''.
First of all, name me one independent 'reply' that survives where someone 'critiques' or evaluates Justin's claims. There are none so what are you talking about?
“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 Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Secret Alias »

It is similar to those that say that Paul ignored deliberately a historical Jesus for fear of giving credit to his Brother James. Paul could not pass in silence precisely the best weapon that James would raise against him if he had had really a brother named Jesus.
But you will argue confidently that the James references was added subsequently to the original publication of the letters. But Justin's text isn't allowed to have been edited by Irenaeus even though there are clear signs in the Dialogue of additions c. 195 CE as noted by Evans and others. Why the double standard? Why are Justin's references to Marcion 'authentic' but the James reference in Paul a 'later addition'? Seems rather subjective.
“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
Giuseppe
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Giuseppe »

Secret Alias wrote: Thu Sep 14, 2017 8:33 am
I don't think that Justin could invent a false description of the belief of the his Marcionite opponents and go indisturbed. Otherwise the his adversaries would have answered: ''you confute the Marcion of your invention, but we believe x, y and z, confute that, please''.
First of all, name me one independent 'reply' that survives where someone 'critiques' or evaluates Justin's claims. There are none so what are you talking about?
But a reply, a reaction in that sense is 100% expected if Justin had given a false representation of the Marcion's theology. I have no need of proving the existence of that kind of reply (if you are right about Justin). It is simply 100% expected.
Why are Justin's references to Marcion 'authentic' but the James reference in Paul a 'later addition'? Seems rather subjective.
The Mythicists of the year 2017 have no problem to consider authentic the James references in Paul. Only as simply conjecture they study the hypothesis interpolation.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Secret Alias
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Secret Alias »

It's a hundred percent expected if the work had an actual existence 'in the world' as a living testimony in the present form. But come on now. These documents have been worked and reworked dozens of times. This is true for the New Testament material, the Patristic texts etc. We don't have a time capsule of what 'person A' said on the day any of these texts was written. We don't have a verbatim copy of Mark's gospel as it was written in 70 CE. Come on this is 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
Giuseppe
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Giuseppe »

This your colossal conspiracy of silence about the true theology of Marcion has the traits of an omnipotent God against whom it is impossible even to rebel.

There is only another person in this forum who is inclined to see interpolations everywhere, and that is Stuart. But even he doesn't assume a so colossal Conspiracy of Silence about the true theology of Marcion.

and if there is something that a Mythicist doesn't like, is just to assume a Conspiracy of Silence in order to save a presumed lost theology...

... or a Jesus (who was called Christ).
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Secret Alias
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Secret Alias »

It is hardly a 'conspiracy of silence.' The question is for example - did Justin really send THIS or THESE letters to the Emperors? Of course not. There might have been something originally sent. I do not know but he did not send a sixty plus chapter 'letter' to the Emperor - not to mentioned the outright forgery tacked on to the end. Nor is all of what is not 1 Clement originally 'Clementine' etc etc. Not even worth talking about. We have to stop thinking of ancient Christian works as pristine. They are not. These are not the original correspondences and the situation with - for example - three different lengths and dimensions of the Ignatian correspondences only becomes manifest to us because we have the longest work surviving at shorter lengths. If all we had was the longest versions of the Ignatian material no one would have any inkling of shorter length works.
“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
Giuseppe
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Location: Italy

Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Giuseppe »

The question is for example - did Justin really send THIS or THESE letters to the Emperors? Of course not. There might have been something originally sent. I do not know...
So Carrier about presumed Christian writings addressed to Emperors:
That book was allegedly addressed to Marcus Aurelius himself, but probably never delivered; no emperor would read such droning tedious tomes—the similar “Apologies” of Tertullian and Justin are likewise far too long, dull, pretentious, and polemical to have ever warranted any emperor’s attention; their being addressed to Aurelius was simply a literary device (or at best a vain hope).
http://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/12480
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Secret Alias
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Re: Did Mark introduce 'Abbà' against Marcion?

Post by Secret Alias »

But a literary device of whom? The editors of Justin obviously. Those who manipulated the text after Justin.
“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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