In my unlearned opinion, it would be wise to repeat your title, or the theme of your intended "paper", that is, the publication, the abstract, the text of what it is you intend to present to the conference in England.stephan huller wrote:And why do I think people pursue the answer in the synoptic texts? Because human nature likes dealing with certainties or at least perceived certainties. The same psychological phenomenon that is attending church is at the bottom of developing models for the gospel out of a false canon. It's there and that's all we got. Just pretend its real and continue to engage others "faking it" and you can have a job with authority and you can publish stuff and be respected. But its all bullshit. Marcion was first and anyone who has ever thought about Marcion for more than hour knows its true. They're just scared of losing that most sacred of human commodities = security
Juxtaposing your sentences highlighted above, with this, more recent quote of yours,
stephan huller wrote:The paper is coming along. As it stands I don't think I will even be mentioning Marcion....snip
one understands Peter's question, a couple pages back, inquiring about the theme of your presentation. Certainly, the title of this thread is misleading, if you delete reference to Marcion in your paper. We don't need the whole essay. Just a couple of key words, and the proper title, would go a long way towards relieving the stress and strain of burrowing through these umpteen pages of random ruminations.
I am not submitting this rejoinder to ridicule, or criticise, but rather to help. That, too, in my opinion, was the thrust of David's rhetorical flourish regarding the weather on your planet.
Please step back, just for a bit, and jot down the two or three MAIN POINTS you wish to emphasize in Great Britain, and why those points are important, and which particular texts support or challenge your hypothesis, with links, as urged by David.
I think you would be wise to ignore "Marcion", as we have no text written by him, and, further, when you state that Biblical scholars prefer the Greek texts of ancient "fathers", instead of the less well known Coptic, or Armenian, or Syriac texts, because of insecurity, I think you are on thin ice, about to fall in a cold lake. If we should uncover a treasure trove of ancient texts, buried in the sands anywhere in the world, WRITTEN IN ANY LANGUAGE, scholars will be all over them like bees to nectar.
It would seem, unless you do abandon your references to "Marcion", that you prefer the texts of Tertullian and a couple of other authors, over the known texts of tradition, i.e. the gospels. Our opinion of what Marcion wrote, is based entirely on what others claimed he had written. I doubt that orthodox biblical scholarship is fearful of Tertullian et al, I think they are bemused by the idea that a known fence sitter, Tertullian, having embraced the heretical Montanist ideology, and having rejected the authority of Rome, and Trinitarianism (a concept he had championed), should be perceived, seventeen odd centuries later, as having painted a more compelling portrait of earliest Christianity.
I think it is also a bit banal to argue too forcefully about presbyters singular versus plural. There are so many instances of scribal errors, both genuine and contrived, in the ancient texts, that it is relatively futile to focus on something so easily misrepresented through fatigue or carelessness. If this distinction is critical to your presentation, then your working draft may well benefit from a three sentence paragraph, signaling the justification for focusing on this (minor?) grammatical snafu, in the face of far more significant hurdles, including absence of provenance, and errors resulting from translation misunderstandings.