Giuseppe wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 5:49 am
Given the fact that we are agreeing with a so high number of things (I recognize now that I was wrong to accuse McGrath of hypocrisy, but the accusation of
ignorance remains all, insofar the question is not more about Valentinus being or not a celestial mythicist
just as Paul - in the mythicist paradigm - but about Valentinus being or not an early Christian who preserved
partially - under the mythicist paradigm of Carrier/Doherty - the original belief of a celestial crucifixion in outer space,
insofar he believed in two crocifixions, one of which in outer space), then I go right to the point of interest.
GakuseiDon wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 5:07 am
Just two questions: (1) in your understanding of the text, who crucified the celestial Jesus
Who crucified the celestial Jesus, according to Paul, were the planetary Archons.
Who crucified the celestial Jesus, according to Valentinus, could only be the planetary Archons and particularly one of them (or their chief): the demiurge, i.e. the same god of the Jews.
Who crucified the earthly Jesus who was the mere image, according to Valentinus, of the his celestial Jesus, are the Jews and Pilate, as per the Gospel of John.
GakuseiDon wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 5:07 am
and (2) did the two crucifixions take place at the same time, or was one before the other?
Tertullian says that the inferior Christ suffered "after the fashion" of the superior Christ. In an Italian translation of the passage, "after the fashion" is translated, in the English equivalent, so:
"Instead, was subjected to the passion the psychic and corporeal Christ, who was formed to reproduce the Christ who is above, i.e. the one who, in giving Achamoth a formation related to being and not related to knowledge, had been stretched on the Cross, i.e. in Horos. Thus they force everything into images, evidently imaginary Christians themselves as well.
Now, if the earthly Christ (crucified in earth) was "formed to reproduce" the celestial Christ (crucified in outer space), then this could only happen if the celestial crucifixion in outer space happened chronologically
before the earthly crucifixion in Judea.
The entire passage sounds really as if the earthly Christ is simply an earthly avatar of the celestial Christ.
When
X is avatar of
Y, we can conclude that
X has less ontological status than
Y. In other terms,
Y is a more real thing than
X,
pace all the realistic features said about
X.
This is why I would be
a bit reluctant to call,
stantibus rebus, the Valentinians as historicists. Okay, they are said to accept a lot of Gospel material. Frankly, they seem in my eyes some of the more idiots among the Christians from II° CE, as any reader of the Fourth Gospel could be. But then, when I realize that their earthly Jesus was simply imitating on the earth what their celestial Jesus had already done in the outer space, I become perplexed about their historicist profession of faith. Afterall, Tertullian himself would agree with myself, since Tertullian himself recognized that the belief in two crucifixions could have only a possible outcome, from a logical point of view: the negation of the reality of the earthly things, insofar a
correspondent celestial reality is claimed, of which the
earthly clones are reduced to be the mere images, symbols, allegories, literature, myth.