Timo S. Paananen's Dissertation on "Admissible Concealed Indicators"

[Peter Kirby]

The dissertation is available to read online:

https://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/han ... sAllowed=y

https://www.academia.edu/40126874/A_Stu ... el_of_Mark

The dissertation is mostly about the methodological assumptions behind the claims made for forgery by several 21st century scholars: on the topics of 'literary, derivative relationship', 'concealed authorial indicator', and 'jokes'. While not entirely dismissing this kind of approach as not rightly belonging to the category of evidence, Panaanen shows that as practiced it would obviously result in false positives, demonstrating this through parallels with other cases that are similarly argued but not accepted as using scholarly methods or coming to appropriate conclusions. He maintains that these types of claims are quite inadequate to the task of uncovering actual evidence relevant to the authorship of the document, unless replaced with more unambiguous criteria for detecting such features. Panaanen also notes that the claim of cumulative gathering of such invalid clues is a trope of pseudo-scholarship.

His point could be accepted by anyone who is unsatisfied with the loose and woolly bundles of speculation that have been offered, including those who prefer to suspend judgment or consider it not to be authentic but do so while declining to accept unsound arguments.

[billd89]

What ever happened to his co-author, here?

[andrewcriddle]

To a limited extent I agree with Panaanen. Some of the arguments linking Morton Smith to the Mar Saba letter do appear flimsy. (After reading and enjoying Anglo-Saxon attitudes I do not believe it influenced in any way the author of the Mar Saba letter.)

However there is a general problem; claiming that Morton Smith composed the Mar Saba letter is prima-facie a startling claim and naturally encourages speculation, of varying degrees of plausibility and relevance about his motives and agenda.

If however like many scholars e.g. Smith and Landau one accepts that the letter is substantially later than Clement, one has either to bring forward what are IMO implausible scenarios in which the letter is much later than Clement but still ancient (see for example Smith and Landau) or one has to suggest a modern composition but not necessarily by Morton Smith or accept a composition by Morton Smith.

Although a charitable interpretation of the evidence might encourage the idea of a modern composition but not necessarily by Morton Smith, I think we all recognize the implausibility of this solution. However the startling nature of the claim that Morton Smith is the author encourages an exaggeration of the direct evidence linking Morton Smith to the Mar Saba letter.

(IMHO Panaanen unduly minimizes the connections between Morton Smith's concerns and those of the Mar Saba letter, but that is another matter.)

Andrew Criddle

[Peter Kirby]

To a limited extent I agree with Panaanen. Some of the arguments linking Morton Smith to the Mar Saba letter do appear flimsy. (After reading and enjoying Anglo-Saxon attitudes I do not believe it influenced in any way the author of the Mar Saba letter.)

That's one good example, yes.

It seems that we are not the only ones. Peter M. Head:

https://evangelicaltextualcriticism.blo ... -news.html

Francis Watson has attempted to move from 'suspicion of forgery' to 'beyond reasonable doubt' in a paper published recently in JTS. This is an interesting read, and raises some questions, although occasionally it gets a bit ridiculous. To my mind it doesn't close the discussion. ...

Did I say 'ridiculous'? There is a section about 'A Forger's Signature': this includes the two odd bits: i) the move from forgery to forge to smithy as a hidden confession; and ii) the argument that MWRANQHNAI contains the hidden: MWR-QHN (Morton) - 'a concealed reference to those who are fooled (Mortonized, we might say) by this forged (Smithed) letter.' ...

It is like an argument out of Doctor Who.

However there is a general problem; claiming that Morton Smith composed the Mar Saba letter is prima-facie a startling claim and naturally encourages speculation, of varying degrees of plausibility and relevance about his motives and agenda.

If however like many scholars e.g. Smith and Landau one accepts that the letter is substantially later than Clement, one has either to bring forward what are IMO implausible scenarios in which the letter is much later than Clement but still ancient (see for example Smith and Landau) or one has to suggest a modern composition but not necessarily by Morton Smith or accept a composition by Morton Smith.

Although a charitable interpretation of the evidence might encourage the idea of a modern composition but not necessarily by Morton Smith, I think we all recognize the implausibility of this solution. However the startling nature of the claim that Morton Smith is the author encourages an exaggeration of the direct evidence linking Morton Smith to the Mar Saba letter.

(IMHO Panaanen unduly minimizes the connections between Morton Smith's concerns and those of the Mar Saba letter, but that is another matter.)

Andrew Criddle

It is all genuinely puzzling. I will give you that.

There are several hypotheses about the origin of the letter fragment:

(1) authentic letter by Clement
(2) ancient forgery, not by Clement
(3) medieval or early modern forgery, not by Clement
(4) modern forgery, not by Morton Smith
(5) modern forgery by Morton Smith

And considering some ruled out leaves only the rest. There's a symmetry here, but yes symmetry is broken based on what one rules out. It could be logical to rule out (1) and (2)-(4), being left with (5). Other processes of elimination could also be logical.

I've previously written about the need to take (5) seriously:

I recently had occasion to quote Walter Stephens, to the effect that the presentation of a forgery requires its author to distance himself by taking another role, that of sponsor:

...

Because of these various masks and because of the requisite earnestness of a sponsor-forger in identifying as someone other than the author, the opportunity is there to argue that the sponsor was not himself the forger but rather "the dupe of a previous forger" (p. 695):

...

In the case of the Mar Saba letter, there are ostensibly several different voices or hands:

(a) the author of a secret gospel of Mark
(b) Clement, the author of a letter to Theodore
(c) an anonymous copyist in the last pages of a book
(d) someone finding the book in a library

Similar questions can be asked of the Mar Saba letter regarding literary forgery of (a) and (b), diplomatic forgery of (c), and what relationship the sponsor has to all of this.

I'm curious about what indicates against the plausibility of the scenario from Smith and Landau.

[andrewcriddle]

[

However there is a general problem; claiming that Morton Smith composed the Mar Saba letter is prima-facie a startling claim and naturally encourages speculation, of varying degrees of plausibility and relevance about his motives and agenda.

If however like many scholars e.g. Smith and Landau one accepts that the letter is substantially later than Clement, one has either to bring forward what are IMO implausible scenarios in which the letter is much later than Clement but still ancient (see for example Smith and Landau) or one has to suggest a modern composition but not necessarily by Morton Smith or accept a composition by Morton Smith.

Although a charitable interpretation of the evidence might encourage the idea of a modern composition but not necessarily by Morton Smith, I think we all recognize the implausibility of this solution. However the startling nature of the claim that Morton Smith is the author encourages an exaggeration of the direct evidence linking Morton Smith to the Mar Saba letter.

(IMHO Panaanen unduly minimizes the connections between Morton Smith's concerns and those of the Mar Saba letter, but that is another matter.)

Andrew Criddle

It is all genuinely puzzling. I will give you that.

There are several hypotheses about the origin of the letter fragment:

(1) authentic letter by Clement
(2) ancient forgery, not by Clement
(3) medieval or early modern forgery, not by Clement
(4) modern forgery, not by Morton Smith
(5) modern forgery by Morton Smith

And considering some ruled out leaves only the rest. There's a symmetry here, but yes symmetry is broken based on what one rules out. It could be logical to rule out (1) and (2)-(4), being left with (5). Other processes of elimination could also be logical.

I've previously written about the need to take (5) seriously:

I recently had occasion to quote Walter Stephens, to the effect that the presentation of a forgery requires its author to distance himself by taking another role, that of sponsor:

...

Because of these various masks and because of the requisite earnestness of a sponsor-forger in identifying as someone other than the author, the opportunity is there to argue that the sponsor was not himself the forger but rather "the dupe of a previous forger" (p. 695):

...

In the case of the Mar Saba letter, there are ostensibly several different voices or hands:

(a) the author of a secret gospel of Mark
(b) Clement, the author of a letter to Theodore
(c) an anonymous copyist in the last pages of a book
(d) someone finding the book in a library

Similar questions can be asked of the Mar Saba letter regarding literary forgery of (a) and (b), diplomatic forgery of (c), and what relationship the sponsor has to all of this.

I'm curious about what indicates against the plausibility of the scenario from Smith and Landau.

I discussed Smith and Landau's scenario here My basic point was that even if it explained the origin of the Secret Gospel itself it does not explain the pseudo-Clementine material surrounding it.

Andrew Criddle