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.