How Could Quesnell in 1983 Have Not Immediately Recognized to Theodore was a Recent Forgery if it Really Was?

[Secret Alias]

Lots and none at all.

But not going line by line through the rest of what you wrote I guess the issue comes down to decorum. I mean I accuse Giuseppe of being an imbecile here at the forum. But that's the kind of culture we have here. It's the rough and tumble intellectual Wild West. Smith finds a manuscript, takes photos leaves where he found it. Other people saw it in the 1970s. Quesnell saw it in the 1980s. It might be a forgery. There's always a chance of that even after it is examined by someone deemed to be qualified. But at a certain level the twenty years of non-examination closes the book on an accusation that Smith was involved in a 'plot.' At best, he was a psychopath who spent time developing his Greek to the sophistication required to imitate Mark, Clement and ancient letter writing and then adding it to the pile of books the librarian gave him on a particular day and then he must have muttered to himself something like - 'who fucking cares if I get caught.' Because the NYT and the attention would add to the likelihood the document WOULD BE examined. It wasn't of course. But Smith couldn't have known that in 1958. I think the question of whether or not the document is a forgery deserves to be examined. But scholarship doesn't need to stand still because of negligence on the part of previous generations to carry out the appropriate examination when the document was freely available in the library.

[Secret Alias]

And they were dismissed as insubstantial and unpersuasive by proponents of authenticity.

But Carlson's main point about a forger's tremor was dismissed by Quesnell. Tselikas's argument that ancient texts never have grammatical and syntactical anomalies is even more laughable. Has even studied any of the MSS of Justin Martyr? I was on record as saying the Jesus Wife Fragment was likely a forgery quite early on. I thought the studies carried out on the photograph WERE substantial. Not so with Carlson's analysis. And Quesnell scrutinized the document for irregularities with the ink etc.

While I can't 'know' what was in Carlson's mind when writing the Gospel Hoax it can't in my estimation be coincidence that his change of career was helped by creating outlandish arguments (homosexuality, salt) that other 'established' scholars couldn't date put into writing. Perhaps to a lesser degree Gullotta was 'helped' or gained notoriety writing our article. But much of the DaVinci Code-like reasoning about 'codes' or ciphers being placed by Smith in the text and parallel arguments that he wanted to get caught because he was a homosexual or a deviant (I don't even remember who said what in this scholarly horror show) is just so outlandish it doesn't much in the way of commentary other than to say that the SBL session which invited mind-readers to conclude Smith was insane was a natural extension of this barbarity.

[Secret Alias]

When you say we should acknowledge the text is 'what it appears to be,'

I am not sure why Quesnell should be inadequate to judge whether or not the document appeared to be what it is - i.e. a late Byzantine MS from the 17th or 18th centuries. That's what Dourvas told him it looked like. We're talking about appearances. He provided similar handwriting samples from other books. It shouldn't be that hard to acknowledge that 'it looks exactly like what it purports to be.' Quesnell demonstrates that this wasn't a 'slam dunk.' I don't know what difference a color photograph (Carlson demonstrates what one can do with a blurry black and white print quite ably) is going to make in this regard. With the GWF you had arguments which developed from evidence FROM THE PHOTOS which eventually proved to be correct. The forger's tremor argument is clearly the product of Carlson's shitty black and white prints. Garbage in garbage out. Not getting why it is so hard for us to say:

1. it's always possible that something is not what it appears to be
but as it stands
2. the MS appears to be what it is

and move on. I am of course imposing our inherited 'innocent until proven guilty' presumptions into the world of academy. Perhaps the French understanding of guilty until proven innocent is more appropriate. But surely someone has to develop an argument for that. It would be unnatural for all of us to live in a culture with one legal framework and establish a completely foreign understanding for this particular case. Not sure why that's appropriate here.

You've spent a lot of time proving the TF is a forgery. The world has gotten along just fine accepting a forgery as something authentic. It will undoubtedly be better off knowing the truth. But one can argue that our notion of 'truth' and 'falsity' needs to be challenged and moreover for us not to accept truths as truths merely because of habit. Accepting To Theodore as authentic for the time being and subsequently changing our mind when better evidence emerges might be good practice for us.

[Secret Alias]

Sorry my wife is now in the room. Can't answer the rest. Will do shortly.

[Ben C. Smith]

I originally became interested in Secret Mark because I was working on the relationship between John and the Synoptics.

Same here. Exactly the same.

[Ken Olson]

I wrote:

You presuppose the conclusion for which you are supposed to be providing evidence when you dismiss other people's arguments as “merely … the ill-will of mean spirited or ambitious adversaries.” You are nowhere near having shown that that is the only reason, or even a major reason of a major proponent of the forgery thesis.

I have to qualify that. I think there is a preponderance of evidence to suggest that ill will toward Morton Smith is a major part of Jacob Neusner's advocacy of the forgery thesis.

[Secret Alias]

I can't read minds. Anything I say would be a subjective opinion pretty much. I don't think Carlson was motivated by antipathy. But again I wonder whether to Theodore affords us the opportunity to get away from blanket suppositions about the absolute "truth" and "inauthenticity" of texts. If you want me to play psychologist Carlson's thesis has always struck me as mirroring the very things calls out about Smith's alleged forgery. If it is a forgery then it is a very creative forgery. I know I personally have tried to write fiction and - even though I am a very imaginative person - have never been able to pull it off. A fiction writer has to believe in his invention. As you can see by my many posts here at the forum, I am a creator of garbage. The manufacture of this garbage involved some sort of creativity - true - but it ultimately lacks the 'stick-to-it-ness' that brings fiction to life. Both Carlson's Morton Smith and Carlson himself have both creativity and 'belief in the creation.' Where many many creations are lifeless golems lacking the breath of life, Carlson and his Morton Smith are productive Ialdabaoth's. They bring to life lifeless matter. Many critics of Smith couldn't put all the pieces together. Carlson was a successful Dr Frankenstein.

From Carlson's point of view then seeing Morton Smith as a creative genius is self-evident because Carlson is a successful artist. The Gospel Hoax is a scholarly work built on a foundation of creative fiction. There is no evidence to support most of his suppositions. We should celebrate his artistic license but the business of Morton Salt Company and cottaging - it's scholarly porn. It's realized fantasy. I on the other hand, because I lack artistic ability can't believe that Morton Smith had the creative power to put all the pieces together. I mean that as a complement to Carlson. He reinvented himself also. He proved that just because you're a patent attorney you can reinvent yourself as a successful Biblical scholar. I am not sure that his projection - based on his own abundance of gifts - of Morton Smith being a mirror image of himself holds much water. Carlson possesses superior creative abilities. There are no signs that Morton Smith was THAT creative. He didn't write fiction. He didn't reinvent himself. All signs point to him following the path set for him when he was young. Morton Smith had profound insights but I am not sure there is evidence for the kind of creativity that Carlson and other artists possess.

With that said, I have no issue with people having reservations about the text. I have no problem with people ignoring the text or not talking about Secret Mark or treating to Theodore as an expression of the historical Clement of Alexandria. People have that right. But one of the reasons people do that I think because it allows them to see the gospel problem as a kind of linear development from Mark + John. I can understand why people want to do this. It certainly makes life easier. Fine. Be a vegetarian. Simplify your life by not getting into relationships. Cut your cable. Whatever. But that doesn't mean that there isn't such a thing as meat, as love or HBO. You know what I mean?

The Patristic writings are filled with references to secret gospels or a secret gospel. The Patristic writings make reference to alternate texts of the gospel of Mark. The Patristic writings etc etc.

I guess the bottom line for me is to say in the same way as it is difficult to prove that Morton Smith didn't use all of the evidence I can assemble for why a text like Secret Mark once existed, the same can be said to be the inverse proposition - namely that Papias's statement about Mark's relationship to the canonical gospels argues for the existence of Secret Mark (Terence Mullins etc). The universe is very big and it contains a lot of possibilities. Life is in many ways the business of separating the possible from the impossible and it's a work in progress. I am not arguing that Secret Mark is True. We used to speak about canonical Mark and Matthew and Luke as being capital T true. I am not suggesting that about Secret Mark I am simply saying that we are reduced to testing how true it is. As of today the Letter to Theodore is true. Tomorrow someone might come along and demonstrate a convincing proof that it isn't true. And then someone might come after him and turn the table the other way. I think because this is religion and God and the Holy Spirit and all that stuff we speak in terms of absolutes. As far as I am concerned scholarship should proceed AS IF Secret Mark is true until persuasive evidence to the contrary emerges. That hasn't happened as of today.

[Ken Olson]

In my earlier post I wrote that I still had hope that more conclusive evidence on the authenticity of the Letter to Theodore and Secret Mark might still turn up, but that I did not know what such evidence would look like or which direction it would point. One possible way that to show that Secret Mark is not a modern forgery is to show that it was quoted in a known ancient document (i.e., not To Theodore).

This already came up in this thread with regard to Kostantinous Spanoudakis case that Nonnus of Panopolis's Dionysiaca used Secret Mark [Konstantinos Spanoudakis, “The Staphylus Episode. Nonnus and the Secret Gospel of Mark,” in Nonnus of Panopolis in Context II: Poetry, Religion, and Society, edited by Herbert Bannert and Nicole Kröll (Mnemosyne Supplements 408; Leiden and Boston: Brill 2018) 216-251].

Secret Alias wrote:

Have you read this?

https://secretmarkblog.blogspot.com/202 ... k.html?m=1

I think this closes the book on Secret Mark. Best thing ever written on the subject.

And Andrew Criddle responded:

I wasn't able to get full access but I read most on Google books.

If you actually read the account in the Dionysiaca (See https://archive.org/details/dionysiaca0 ... 5/mode/2up ) the story of Staphylus does not seem particularly close to Secret Mark. It is at a literal level a story of a banquet which allegorically uses drunkenness as a neoplatonic symbol of spiritual experience.

If there were stronger parallels then on the one hand it might support authenticity but on the other hand it might indicate that both are post-Clementine neoplatonic influenced works. However, as it is IMVHO the links are rather flimsy.

And Secret Alias replied:

Be that as it may ...

I won't reproduce the entire article here, much of which does not concern Secret Mark directly, but I will post some screenshots of the pages in which Spanoudakis lists the parallels he sees between the two texts. Spanoudakis does not give an English translation of the texts, nor does he discuss what exactly he sees as the parallels in his list. He comments that “direct reproduction is not to be found” and “a recollection from memory is evisaged.”

I agree with Andrew that the links are rather flimsy. I don't think Spanoudakis mounts a serious case, rather, he suggests a possibility. Perhaps someone else could mount a serious case out of the data.

Best,

Ken

[Ken Olson]

Sorry, all three page screenshots showed up in the preview, but only the third showed up in the post. Here's the first

SGM 1.jpg (117.12 KiB) Viewed 5901 times

[Ken Olson]

And the second.