Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

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Secret Alias
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Secret Alias »

And notice that Book Four begins:
Omnem sententiam et omnem paraturam impii atque sacrilegi Marcionis ad ipsum iam evangelium eius provocamus quod interpolando suum fecit.

Every opinion and the whole scheme of the impious and sacrilegious Marcion we now bring to the test of that very Gospel which, by his process of interpolation, he has made his own.

Every sentence, indeed the whole structure, arising from Marcion's impiety and profanity, I now challenge in terms of that gospel which he has by manipulation made his own.
So he raises an accusation of 'interpolation' - i.e. to introduce (something) between other things; especially to insert (possibly spurious) words into a text. He brings up almost no examples of that EVER. He mentions the Marcionite accusation that the orthodox texts are interpolated at 4.3:
Si vero apostoli quidem integrum evangelium contulerunt, de sola convictus inaequalitate reprehensi, pseudapostoli autem veritatem eorum interpolaverunt, et inde sunt nostra digesta, quod erit germanum illud apostolorum instrumentum quod adulteros passum est,1 quod Paulum illuminavit et ab eo Lucam?
Again that the Judaizers 'interpolated' the Marcionite gospel at 4.4:
Si enim id evangelium quod Lucae refertur penes nos (viderimus an et penes Marcionem) ipsum est quod Marcion per Antitheses suas arguit ut interpolatum a protectoribus Iudaismi ad concorporationem legis et prophetarum, qua etiam Christum inde confingerent, utique non potuisset arguere nisi quod invenerat.
And that's it!! What kind of BS is this? A charge is raised at the very beginning only to complete drop out of the text. Then he goes on to mention erasure of passages. Maybe 3 or 4 examples which are really quite minor. Again it's all bullshit. At 6.2:
Certe propterea contraria quaeque sententiae suae erasit, conspirantia cum creatore, quasi ab assertoribus eius intexta: competentia autem sententiae suae reservavit. Haec conveniemus, haec amplectemur, si nobiscum magis fuerint, si Marcionis praesumptionem percusserint. Tunc et illa constabit eodem vitio haereticae caecitatis erasa quo et haec reservata.
at 7.4 it is the 'erasure' of Matthew 5:17 so bullshit about Luke being erased:
Ceterum et loco et illuminationis opere secundum praedicationem occurrentibus Christo iam eum prophetatum incipimus agnoscere, ostendentem in primo ingressu venisse se non ut legem et prophetas dissolveret, sed ut potius adimpleret. Hoc enim Marcion ut additum erasit.
at 9:15 'erasure' of Matthew 5:17 again bullshit, bullshit about any change to Luke:
Quid ergo tibi fuit de evangelio erasisse quod salvum est?
And then one last mention of 'erasure' at 43:7 which is the worst example yet. He says:
Now Marcion was unwilling to expunge from his Gospel some statements which even made against him----I suspect, on purpose, to have it in his power from the passages which he did not suppress, when he could have done so, either to deny that he had expunged anything, or else to justify his suppressions, if he made any. But he spares only such passages as he can subvert quite as well by explaining them away as by expunging them from the text. Thus, in the passage before us, he would have the words, "A spirit hath not bones, as ye see me have," so transposed, as to mean, "A spirit, such as ye see me to be, hath not bones; "that is to say, it is not the nature of a spirit to have bones. But what need of so tortuous a construction, when He might have simply said, "A spirit hath not bones, even as you observe that I have not?"

Et Marcion quaedam contraria sibi illa, credo industria, eradere de evangelio suo noluit, ut ex his quae eradere potuit nec erasit, illa quae erasit aut negetur erasisse aut merito erasisse dicatur. Nec parcit nisi eis quae non minus aliter interpretando quam delendo subvertit.
And then he drops any mention at all of any intention to actually provide us information about the Marcionite text and simply cite from Luke in order and claim that these 'are the Marcionite passages which the heretic retained.' I can't believe that smart people buy into this con game. He's just committed the greatest bait and switch in history right under the noses of everyone for millennia. You are perpetuating the greatest fraud. And why? Just so you can have something to write about? There are lots of things in the Bible to think about, consider whatever. But Marcion is just garbage in garbage out.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Secret Alias »

And at the very beginning of Against Marcion he admits that what follows is a COMPLETE BREAK not only from what others say about Marcion and his gospel but even what he said in the first draft of Against Marcion:
Whatever in times past we have wrought in opposition to Marcion, is from the present moment no longer to be accounted of.

Nothing I have previously written against Marcion is any longer my concern.

Si quid retro gestum est nobis adversus Marcionem, iam hinc viderit.
So basically in version 1 he said something other than Marcion corrupted Luke. That's almost for sure given the fact that he promises to show Marcion corrupted one of his gospels and the only references to him 'erasing' anything comes from Matthew. Again, to claim Marcion corrupted Luke based on a text which does not show Marcion corrupted Luke at all - which just says he corrupted and erased A GOSPEL - and then proceeds to argue from passages of Luke found 'allegedly' in the Marcionite gospel - is ridiculous and unworthy of serious consideration.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Secret Alias »

And with regards to (a) the fact that a previous version of Against Marcion existed which did not mention Marcion interpolating or erasing from Luke but Matthew and (b) the specific issue of 'interpolation' a careful reading of Book 5 confirms that another gospel besides Luke was originally made. Again in Book Four he says:
For if the Gospel, said to be Luke's which is current amongst us (we shall see whether it be also current with Marcion), is the very one which, as Marcion argues in his Antitheses, was interpolated by the defenders of Judaism, for the purpose of such a conglomeration with it of the law and the prophets as should enable them out of it to fashion their Christ, surely he could not have so argued about it, unless he had found it (in such a form).
So basically he says that SINCE the Marcionite gospel = Luke therefore when the Marcionites use Galatians to prove that Paul had the gospel before the pillars in Jerusalem Luke existed in its present form since Galatians was written. But this is stupid. Paul doesn't mention 'the gospel of Luke' but 'my gospel.' And then in Book Five it is plainly rendered as implausible:
But with regard to the countenance77 of Peter and the rest of the apostles, he tells us78 that "fourteen years after he went up to Jerusalem," in order to confer with them79 about the rule which he followed in his gospel, lest perchance he should all those years have been running, and be running still, in vain, (which would be the case, ) of course, if his preaching of the gospel fell short of their method. So great had been his desire to be approved and supported by those whom you wish on all occasions to be understood as in alliance with Judaism! When indeed he says, that "neither was Titus circumcised,"82 he for the first time shows us that circumcision was the only question connected with the maintenance of the law, which had been as yet agitated by those whom he therefore calls "false brethren unawares brought in." These persons went no further than to insist on a continuance of the law, retaining unquestionably a sincere belief in the Creator. They perverted the gospel in their teaching, not indeed by such a tampering with the Scripture as should enable them to expunge the Creator's Christ, but by so retaining the ancient régime as not to exclude the Creator's law. Therefore he says: "Because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ, that they might bring us into bondage, to whom we gave place by subjection not even for an hour." Let us only attend to the clear sense and to the reason of the thing, and the perversion of the Scripture will be apparent. [Cum vero nec Titum dicit circumcisum, iam incipit ostendere solam circumcisionis quaestionem ex defensione adhuc legis concussam ab eis quos propterea falsos et superinducticios fratres appellat, non aliud statuere pergentes quam perseverantiam legis, ex fide sine dubio integra creatoris, atque ita pervertentes evangelium, non interpolatione scripturae qua Christum creatoris effingerent, sed retentione veteris disciplinae ne legem creatoris excluderent. Ergo propter falsos, inquit, superinducticios fratres, qui subintraverant ad speculandam libertatem nostram quam habemus in Christo, ut nos subigerent servituti, nec ad horam cessimus subiectioni. Intendamus enim et sensui ipsi et causae eius, et apparebit vitiatio scripturae.] When he first says, "Neither Titus, who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised," and then adds, "And that because of false brethren unawares brought in,"89 etc., he gives us an insight into his reason90 for acting in a clean contrary way,91 showing us wherefore he did that which he would neither have done nor shown to us, if that had not happened which induced him to act as he did
So by the third version of Against Marcion, the author says the Marcionites held that they had the gospel which Paul protected against the Judaizers, but he says that gospel is Luke which the Marcionites falsified. But surely no one can seriously read Galatians as if it tells the story of the pillars of Jerusalem taking Luke and adding 'slight' modifications to acknowledge "a continuance of the law, retaining unquestionably a sincere belief in the Creator etc."

So what modern commentators do is say Galatians isn't about a written gospel. But then why are Marcionites and orthodox writers fighting over Galatians as if it was telling the story about Paul having a written gospel? In the end, the third version of Against Marcion is made to make it appear as if Luke was ur-Marcion. But that was not what the text originally said and it is apparent from the content that there was a different contest between something like Gospel of the Hebrews and the gospel of Paul.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Secret Alias »

Oh and one 'interpolation' is explicitly mentioned in all Five Books Against Marcion - the title of the epistle to the Ephesians:
Ecclesiae quidem veritate epistulam istam ad Ephesios habemus emissam, non ad Laodicenos; sed Marcion ei titulum aliquando interpolare gestiit, quasi et in isto diligentissimus explorator.
There it is! Marcion is a falsifier based on the fact that that Ephesians - which often has no title - is called 'to the Laodiceans' in Marcion's canon. Bad guy!!
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by perseusomega9 »

Secret Alias wrote: Tue Apr 13, 2021 9:59 am But that was not what the text originally said and it is apparent from the content that there was a different contest between something like Gospel of the Hebrews and the gospel of Paul.
And the Gospel of Mark sure looks like it's responding to a more Jewish, pro-12 Apostle/Disciple Gospel.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Secret Alias »

Whoever forged the fourfold gospel knew what turns on bibliophiles. He made it mystical ('the quaternion!'), organized ('every heresy corresponds to one of the gospels') and even 'dramatic' ('Marcion only took one of the four and falsified it but now I'm really on to him!') to excite the minds of normally bored and dispassionate philologists. The one thing is always true about intellectuals is they overcomplicate things. They are inevitably Quixotic. It's such a stupid explanation for how the gospels were made - it worked! My father, your father any normal person would laugh at how implausible Irenaeus's bullshit is. But that's not whom he designed the nonsense for. He created the 'Marilyn Monroe' of bullshit bombshells. It's like he looked over at the Jews peddling Moses narrating his own death and foreshadowing the loss of the Israelite monarchy and even a 'second Law' built into the first and said 'hold my beer! I sense a challenge for writing implausible bullshit!'

And then we have Gaius of Rome explicitly laid it out - 'the true gospel only existed until Victor, after that a musical* bullshit mystery gospel was introduced.' Any no one listens, because they are too mesmerized by the mystical bullshit. 'Wonder and be amazed at how the Lord set forth EXACTLY four gospels!' Too bad religion wasn't run by plumbers and bricklayers. This fourfold mystical nonsense would never had got past the Sancho Panza types.

*a gospel 'through four' is necessarily a musical terminology, Irenaeus never attributes 'diatessaron' to Tatian, Eusebius does. It should be noted that Rhodon was a follower of Tatian and he corresponds with Callistus.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Stuart »

Tertullian in the early 3rd century claims that Luke is the targeted different gospel discussed in Galatians in AM 4.3-4, and obliquely in AM 5.2. But this is likely a later understanding, long after the sect split from the main church. It should be noted that Tertullian is late enough that he weighs in the controversy over order, favoring the Western, with John and Matthew prior to Mark and Luke (which he admits many ascribe authorship to Paul, meaning not just Marcionites held this view). The four part gospel is possibly an editorial addition, as the primary issue is what order to bind them; something I am convinced was not an issue until the aftermath of the Decian persecution if not the aftermath of the Diocletian persecution, when the church had to replace all the destroyed scriptures, when Canon and order would be issues at their peak importance.

The Marcionite version of Galatians, which Tertullian says Marcion found, is (in my view) actually targeting an early version of Matthew as the "perverse" other gospel. We have many cues in Galatians pointing in this direction, "began in the spirit" to "endeding in the flesh" type statements, and thoseabout returning to the Law and so on. These are characteristics far more pronounced and focused in Mathew than in Luke. The Judaizing is much stronger in Matthew. It has already been noted that anti-Marcionite literature focuses much more on Matthew than Luke as a counter punch and that lines within Matthew 5:17-19 (5:17 especially) are directly attacked by Marcionite champions, and so fiercely that the church fathers acknowledge it.

Stephen, I am with you (and also Bob Price), when you say that Marcion is probably a legendary figure from much earlier, if that is he existed at all. In my view Marcion is in fact one and the same as Mark and a disciple of Paul, legendary characters from literature taken as the symbolic patron saints of the movement.

The four gospels did not arise from merely a anti-Marcionism, rather from sectarian competition for political control from a variety directions. The ultimate selection of four and their binding order were deeply political, not idealistic nor musical.

And I do not buy any of the legends passed off as history by Eusubius or others. They are folklore, nothing more. Justin, by knowing Luke in Canonical form,[1] and apparently some very late variants (e.g., tears like blood, which is outed by the NWI) indicating Luke had been in circulation for generations, must either have been only alive long after Marcion was buried, or he could not have been the author of the works in his name. I think both are likely true. If you want to keep Justin an author and from a prior era, then you have to claim, much like the Pauline letters, that Justin's writings are snowballs, mostly composed long after his death by his pupils and disciples and that only a few scraps are his. (Robert Price argues similar about Marcion and Paul, as I think he is eager to maintain a connection.)

Frankly I don't see much if any contact between Justin's writings and the Marcionite text. I am not even sure we have a unity in the text of tehhe Dialogue. What we see as unity in style is probably the result of the collector's editorial layer, not reflective of any early fragment in the text which might be from the actual Justin.

Notes:
[1] As you deny there was a Marcionite text independent of the Canonical, you can maintain that the view of their not actually existing a Marcionite version of Paul and the gospel in shorter forms, although it seems a stretch to say the church fathers made up the entire story of their existence. But to do so basically means you are rejecting most critical analysis, as you have no answer for the technical problems, such as missing words in Marcion, even without theological meaning, such as τε and παραχρῆμα (shows the same fatigue in replacing εὐθέως we see in Matthew for Kkingdom of heaven replacing kingdom of God, leaving a few instances unchanged), I suppose arguing that as unlikely statistically as it may be they just happened to be passed over, as were dozen of other Lukan favorite words in the passages attested. Why Occam's Razor argues against the likelihood of that scenario, you are at least consistent in holding that view.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Peter Kirby »

Ben C. Smith wrote: Fri Apr 09, 2021 5:58 pm Besides the infancy narrative in Luke 1-2, which is reflected quite often in Justin Martyr, what passages does Justin quote or allude to which would reflect what we know as (chapters 3-24 of) canonical Luke over and against the Marcionite Gospel?
Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Apr 11, 2021 6:40 am What remains:

Luke 22.39-46: 39 And He came out and went, as was His habit, to the Mount of Olives; and the disciples also followed Him. 40 Now when He arrived at the place, He said to them, “Pray that you do not come into temptation.” 41 And He withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and began to pray, 42 saying, “Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done.” [43 Now an angel from heaven appeared to Him, strengthening Him. 44 And being in agony, He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground.] 45 When He rose from prayer, He came to the disciples and found them sleeping from sorrow, 46 and He said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Get up and pray that you do not come into temptation.”

Justin Martyr, Dialogue 103.6-8:
7 Moreover, the statement, ‘All my bones are poured out and dispersed like water; my heart has become like wax, melting in the midst of my belly’ (= Psalm 22.14), was a prediction of that which happened to Him on that night when men came out against Him to the Mount of Olives to seize Him. 8 For in the Memorabilia which I say were drawn up by His apostles and those who followed them, (it is recorded) that His sweat fell down like drops of blood while He was praying (= Luke 22.43-44) and saying, ‘If it be possible, let this cup pass’ (= Luke 22.42), His heart and also His bones trembling, His heart being like wax melting in His belly in order that we may perceive that the Father wished His Son really to undergo such sufferings for our sakes, and may not say that He, being the Son of God, did not feel what was happening to Him and inflicted on Him.” / 7 καὶ τὸ, Ὡσεὶ ὕδωρ ἐξεχύθη καὶ διεσκορπίσθη πάντα τὰ ὀστᾶ μου, ἐγενήθη ἡ καρδία μου ὡσεὶ κηρὸς τηκόμενος ἐν μέσῳ τῆς κοιλίας μου, ὅπερ γέγονεν αὐτῷ ἐκείνης τῆς νυκτός, ὅτε ἐπ' αὐτὸν ἐξῆλθον εἰς τὸ Ὄρος τῶν Ἐλαιῶν συλλαβεῖν αὐτόν, προαγγελία ἦν. 8 ἐν γὰρ τοῖς ἀπομνημονεύμασιν, ἅ φημι ὑπὸ τῶν ἀποστόλων αὐτοῦ καὶ τῶν ἐκείνοις παρακολουθησάντων συντετάχθαι, γέγραπται ὅτι ἱδρὼς ὡσεὶ θρόμβοι κατεχεῖτο, αὐτοῦ εὐχομένου καὶ λέγοντος, ‹Παρελθέτω, εἰ δυνατόν, τὸ ποτήριον τοῦτο,› ἐντρόμου τῆς καρδίας δῆλον ὅτι οὔσης καὶ τῶν ὀστῶν ὁμοίως καὶ ἐοικυίας τῆς καρδίας κηρῷ τηκομένῳ εἰς τὴν κοιλίαν, ὅπως εἰδῶμεν ὅτι ὁ πατὴρ τὸν ἑαυτοῦ υἱὸν καὶ ἐν τοιούτοις πάθεσιν ἀληθῶς γεγονέναι δι' ἡμᾶς βεβούληται, καὶ μὴ λέγωμεν ὅτι ἐκεῖνος, τοῦ θεοῦ υἱὸς ὤν, οὐκ ἀντελαμβάνετο τῶν γινομένων καὶ συμβαινόντων αὐτῷ.

I just noticed one more thing: this is the only place where Justin says that the Memorabilia were drawn up by "those who followed" the apostles.

Notice the rest:

"For the apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels,..." (1 Apol 66)
"And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read" (1 Apol 67)
"and since we find it recorded in the memoirs of His apostles that He is the Son of God" (Dialogue 100)
"the words which are recorded in the memoirs of His apostles" (Dialogue 101)
"as has been declared in the memoirs of His apostles" (Dialogue 102)
"recorded in the memoirs of the apostles" (Dialogue 103)
"in the memoirs of His apostles" (Dialogue 104)
"as we have learned from the memoirs" (Dialogue 105)
"as I have learned also from the memoirs" (Dialogue 105) - seems to refer to Luke 23:46, "Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit"
"these words are recorded in the memoirs" (Dialogue 105)
"in the memoirs of the apostles" (Dialogue 106)
"He changed the name of one of the apostles to Peter; and when it is written in the memoirs of Him that this so happened, as well as that He changed the names of other two brothers, the sons of Zebedee, to Boanerges, which means sons of thunder" (cf. Mark 3:17)
"in the memoirs of His apostles" (Dialogue 106)
"it is written in the memoirs" (Dialogue 107)

There are four designations. Two of them are frequent: memoirs (generically) and memoirs "of the apostles." Two of them are specific.

One specific designation is the reference to "memoirs of Him" - there is a debate, but it seems nonsense to me to refer "Him" to Jesus, as the translator does. Jesus did not leave a memoir, so it would be unnatural to describe the text this way. It's very natural to describe the text of a memoir of Peter this way. (Less obvious is the reference. It could be a reference to the Gospel "of Mark" that minimizes the role of Mark to amanuensis of Peter, as similarly in the letter of 1 Peter and as described by Papias, or it could be a different Gospel of Peter.)

Why single out the memoirs of Peter? I think Justin, like many others in the second century, is conscious of the differences between the different texts. Justin found this written (regarding Boanerges) in only one of the memoirs which he used: the memoirs that he believed to be from Peter. This is why he would sometimes draw attention to the specific author, so that there would be no confusion when comparing to other similar passages, which give the sending of the twelve without the part that renames James and John. (If this is the explanation, it favors the idea that something close to our 2nd gospel was known to Justin as having been written by Peter, whether under that title or, under the title of Mark, by familiarity with the tradition of Papias.)

Why mention the name of them ("called gospels"), then assiduously avoid that name? It is an idiosyncratic tendency that vanishes almost as soon as it had started. Recall, however, that Marcion called his text the "Gospel" and that Valentinus considered a "Gospel of Truth" authoritative. Both of these movements were making big waves in Rome, in the very same time and at the very same place that Justin wrote. Neither the "Gospel" nor the "Gospel of Truth" listed who they were according to. They were both anonymous texts, perhaps without even a title. In contrast with this, Justin doesn't accept the authority of anonymous texts. He accepts only the authority of the "memoirs." Justin's reference to explicit authorship, in a chain that reaches back to the apostles (if not by the apostles themselves), is similar to many other claims made to an apostolic succession as the basis of authority.

Why, then, mention authorship by "those who followed" here (the other specific reference), apparently in connection with the story in Luke 22:43-44? There is no gospel witness that I can find for this anywhere outside of the Gospel of Luke. What's more, it appears to be absent from the Gospel of Luke in a substantial part of the textual transmission. Although some disagree, I would view it as an early interpolation into the text of the Gospel of Luke. If the text used by Marcion preceded the Gospel of Luke -- or, at the very least, if that text wasn't based on the Gospel of Luke in its later interpolated form -- then the sequence must be from the Marcionite form, to the early Lucan form, to the interpolated Lucan form. And if it is not in the Marcionite form of the text, then it could not have been quoted here from the Marcionite form of the text. It was quoted from the Lucan form, in its interpolated state.

But then should we fall back on the assumption that this is a revision of Justin Martyr? It's far from necessary to do so. Even without this reference from Justin Martyr, we would already know that this interpolation entered the text of Luke very early. Just one generation later, we find the same text referenced by Irenaeus against the docetists; two generations later, it's used by Hippolytus. The "Against Heresies" of Irenaeus was by far the more influential work, even in the lifetime of Irenaeus, compared to the Apologies and Dialogue of Justin, which barely survive. Irenaeus had no need to interpolate other second century works that had less purchase than his own, when he could plagiarize from them (and obviously did so) as a much more effective way to combat his enemies. And while it is too much to elaborate on here, there's already a huge gulf between Justin and Irenaeus, where so many concepts are absent in Justin that find elaboration later, that Justin can only be the earlier form, who has somehow been preserved in a way that was not significantly revised to match later theology (as, by way of contrast, the letters of Ignatius were). Perhaps it was their rhetorical structure as apologies and philosophical dialogues that made them likely candidates for transmission without much violence, since in pre-modern times the format of a dialogue was frequently employed to state ideas tentatively enough not to raise much attention from censors.

The answer to our question is, then, apparent: this particular expanded form of the reference to the memoirs here, calls our attention to the fact that what is quoted isn't found in every version of those memoirs. And if we went looking for them only in the memoirs of the apostles, such as Peter, we wouldn't find this line. Justin wants to be accurate and, once saying that it is found in the memoirs of the apostles (a repeated phrase), catches himself and adds that one must consider the memoirs of the followers of the apostles too. So much is obvious about the Gospel of Luke from its preface (Luke 1:1-4). As the author of Luke is conscious of the fact that he is not an apostle, yet is trying to write a text like those that have been attributed to apostles, so is Justin also aware of this. This attenuates the implicit argument that his gospels are superior because they are, more specifically, the reminiscences of the apostles, not just any (anonymous) gospel. But because Justin still wants to make use of this text and its wonderful proof against the docetists, Justin makes sure that his definition of the memoirs is expanded to include the Gospel of Luke.

GIven all this -- and given the evident distaste Justin has both for Marcion and for using the name "Gospel" for these texts, as Marcion did -- it becomes clear to me that Justin already wants to distance himself from the Marcionite text, making use of other Gospels: specifically, the memoirs of the apostles and those who followed them, including the Gospel of Luke.

Finally, if it is true that Justin is implicitly distinguishing between the memoir-gospels that are read on Sunday and the unaccepted non-memoir gospels, then Marcion's text was not numbered among the memoirs, as one of the most clearly stated things about Marcion's text, one of the primary charges against it, arguing for its secondary nature (according to the heresiologists), is its total anonymity.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Peter Kirby »

The idea that Marcion and Valentinus (and followers) were roped together as corruptors of the gospels finds an echo in Origen:

"After this he says, that certain of the Christian believers, like persons who in a fit of drunkenness lay violent hands upon themselves, have corrupted the Gospel from its original integrity, to a threefold, and fourfold, and many-fold degree, and have remodelled it, so that they might be able to answer objections. Now I know of no others who have altered the Gospel, save the followers of Marcion, and those of Valentinus, and, I think, also those of Lucian. But such an allegation is no charge against the Christian system, but against those who dared so to trifle with the Gospels. And as it is no ground of accusation against philosophy, that there exist Sophists, or Epicureans, or Peripatetics, or any others, whoever they may be, who hold false opinions; so neither is it against genuine Christianity that there are some who corrupt the Gospel histories, and who introduce heresies opposed to the meaning of the doctrine of Jesus." - Origen, Against Celsus 2.27

PS - The only explanation I have of the "Lucian" reference is that it refers to Peregrinus in Lucian of Samosata:
11. “It was then that he learned the wondrous lore of the Christians, by associating with their priests and scribes in Palestine. And—how else could it be?—in a trice he made them all look like children, for he was prophet, cult-leader, head of the synagogue, and everything, all by himself. He inter preted and explained some of their books and even composed many, and they revered him as a god, made use of him as a lawgiver, and set him down as a protector, next after that other, to be sure, whom11 they still worship, the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced this new cult into the world.
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Re: Justin Martyr, the Gospel of Luke, and Marcion.

Post by Ken Olson »

Peter Kirby wrote: Fri Apr 16, 2021 10:58 pm The answer to our question is, then, apparent: this particular expanded form of the reference to the memoirs here, calls our attention to the fact that what is quoted isn't found in every version of those memoirs. And if we went looking for them only in the memoirs of the apostles, such as Peter, we wouldn't find this line. Justin wants to be accurate and, once saying that it is found in the memoirs of the apostles (a repeated phrase), catches himself and adds that one must consider the memoirs of the followers of the apostles too. So much is obvious about the Gospel of Luke from its preface (Luke 1:1-4). As the author of Luke is conscious of the fact that he is not an apostle, yet is trying to write a text like those that have been attributed to apostles, so is Justin also aware of this. This attenuates the implicit argument that his gospels are superior because they are, more specifically, the reminiscences of the apostles, not just any (anonymous) gospel. But because Justin still wants to make use of this text and its wonderful proof against the docetists, Justin makes sure that his definition of the memoirs is expanded to include the Gospel of Luke.

GIven all this -- and given the evident distaste Justin has both for Marcion and for using the name "Gospel" for these texts, as Marcion did -- it becomes clear to me that Justin already wants to distance himself from the Marcionite text, making use of other Gospels: specifically, the memoirs of the apostles and those who followed them, including the Gospel of Luke.

Finally, if it is true that Justin is implicitly distinguishing between the memoir-gospels that are read on Sunday and the unaccepted non-memoir gospels, then Marcion's text was not numbered among the memoirs, as one of the most clearly stated things about Marcion's text, one of the primary charges against it, arguing for its secondary nature (according to the heresiologists), is its total anonymity.
This is well reasoned, Peter. I think it may also help us with understanding why there are so few identifiable references to Luke in Justin, because he may have wanted to privilege the two gospels thought to be by apostles.

But I'm even more baffled by Justin's failure to name the authors of the canonical gospels if anonymity was such a problem for Marcion's Evangelion and Valentinus's gospel, particularly since, if the Evangelion did not have the prologue we find in Luke, it would not have been obvious it was a second generation work and not the work of an apostle. But were Matthew and Mark (or Peter's gospel written down by Mark) transmitted without those names attached to them? As the work of apostles, but not particular, named apostles? I have no problem with the idea that the canonical gospels originally circulated without the names we find attached to them; I just wonder how this fits with Justin and the problem of an anonymous Evangelion circulated by Marcion.

Best,

Ken
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