Alternating Marcionite and synoptic priority & posteriority?

[Bernard Muller]

To Ben,

(Bernard, I know you will not agree with any of the indicators I have posted recently, since they lean toward Marcionite priority; but do you know of any other examples for Marcionite posteriority? You have given 2 so far, I think, and I have added 1. But, if there are more, I would love to have them.)

I revised my blog post on the topic http://historical-jesus.info/53.html. I even quoted you. I hope you don't mind. If you do, I can paraphrase your quote. And I got 2 arguments relative to the epistles http://historical-jesus.info/73.html.

All these arguments are mostly or totally independent of: if gMarcion is witnessed to have changes or deletions which can be explained by Marcion stated beliefs, then that means Marcion worked from gLuke, even if Marcionism would explain the differences between gLuke and gMarcion. But even the later can be justified as a method to affirm the posteriority of gMarcion, because Tertullian in AM defined Marcion's Christian tenets through Marcion's own Antitheses before analyzing the Evangelion, which would avoid the argument: we know Marcion's teaching through his Evangelion and the Evangelion tells about Marcion's teaching (a circular argument). Instead: we know Marcion's teaching through his Antitheses and the Evangelion reflects the Antitheses and gLuke (not a circular argument).

And gLuke theology and christology is not much different of the ones of gMatthew (except for the level of Judaism in them). So I do not see why gLuke should be considered a reaction to gMarcion, when gMatthew is not.

I think we have enough evidence gLuke was written in the first century, which would make Marcion copying on gLuke: http://historical-jesus.info/62.html.
BTW, gMatthew, better than gLuke, can be dated 1st century (http://historical-jesus.info/53.html).
And Q as a separate document and "Luke" not knowing gMatthew: http://historical-jesus.info/q.html and even the complete gMark (the great omission http://historical-jesus.info/appf.html).
All of that add up support to the posteriority of gMarcion. And I did not develop these web pages in order to prove the posteriority of gMarcion.

You might think 5 arguments drawn from the Evangelion are not enough, but certainly Marcion did not want to give indication his gospel was written late (as for the other synoptic authors) and certainly not later than gLuke.

By the way, I found all your arguments for posteriority of gLuke very weak.

Cordially, Bernard

[Ben C. Smith]

To Ben,

(Bernard, I know you will not agree with any of the indicators I have posted recently, since they lean toward Marcionite priority; but do you know of any other examples for Marcionite posteriority? You have given 2 so far, I think, and I have added 1. But, if there are more, I would love to have them.)

I revised my blog post on the topic http://historical-jesus.info/53.html. I even quoted you. I hope you don't mind. If you do, I can paraphrase your quote.

No problem. You can keep it. All of this is highly contingent and in the earliest of stages.

And I got 2 arguments relative to the epistles http://historical-jesus.info/73.html.

Thanks. I will be looking at the epistles soonish, but independently, since it is possible for Marcion to be completely derivative in one area but original in another.

All these arguments are mostly or totally independent of: if gMarcion is witnessed to have changes or deletions which can be explained by Marcion stated beliefs, then that means Marcion worked from gLuke.

Good, good.

Of course I think we have enough evidence gLuke was written in the first century, which would make Marcion copying on gLuke: http://historical-jesus.info/62.html.
And Q as a separate document and "Luke" not knowing gMatthew: http://historical-jesus.info/q.html and even the complete gMark (the great omission http://historical-jesus.info/62.html).

All factors to be considered, to be sure.

All of that add up. And I did not develop these website pages in order to prove the posteriority of gMarcion.

Understood.

By the way, I found all your arguments for posteriority of gLuke very weak.

But of course.

Ben.

[Bernard Muller]

To Ben,
I added up more arguments on my previous post. Please consider them too. Good night!

Cordially, Bernard

[Ben C. Smith]

JW:
@Ben, By an Act of Providence, legendary Textual Critic Bart Ehrman has recently finished a series of posts arguing that Luke 22:44

And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became as it were great drops of blood falling down upon the ground. (ASV)

is an orthodox addition with the purpose of countering Docetics like Marcion.

Summary of Ehrman's argument:

• 1) Style = There is a clear Chiasm for Jesus' related prayer here without the offending verse.
  
  2) Context Change = GMark's context here is Jesus distress. GLuke changes the context of the same story to prayer delivering from temptation.
  
  3) Manuscript = Good support for omission.
  
  4) Tone = The source GMark, has a tone of Jesus distress. GLuke has exorcised every other indication of distress in the story.
  
  5) Theme = The Verse goes against GLuke's theme as compared to GMark of presenting Jesus as calm and in control.
  
  6) Transmission Motivation = Three Patristics of the second century, Justin, Irenaeus and Hippolytus, cite the offending verse against Docetics like Marcion.

Spot on evidence for purposes of this Thread. Orthodox Christianity citing as evidence, against Docetics like Marcion, in their version of GLuke verses here likely not in the original GLuke.

Thanks, Joe. I totally agree that the bloody sweat is an addition to the text, and agree that it was almost certainly aimed at the docetics.

In other news, I just moments ago received Jason BeDuhn's book, The First New Testament: Marcion's Scriptural Canon (huzzah! Amazon took its sweet time getting it to me), and of course the first thing I checked was his reconstruction of Luke 21.30 in the Marcionite text, in which he retains both the mention of "fruit" and the third person plural that Tertullian offers and Roth accepts: "people know that the summer is near." He also points out in his notes that several manuscripts (including D, as I pointed out) retain the generic third person of that verb over and against the second person "you", though in the passive voice, without a subject.

Ben.

[Ben C. Smith]

I also have Two Shipwrecked Gospels by Dennis R. MacDonald, in which he argues that our canonical Luke-Acts was composed after and made some use of Papias. Between the arguments concerning Papias in MacDonald and those concerning Marcion in various others, I have to admit that it is looking more and more to me like Luke-Acts (the version with Luke 1-2, including the Lucan prologue) postdates both Papias and Marcion. I am still sifting through the arguments, and of course this conclusion does not mean that all or even most of the materials that make up Luke-Acts postdate Papias and Marcion, but the position has some definite benefits and explanatory power.

(And no, Bernard, I am not ignoring your dating of Luke to late century I; all in good time.)

Ben.

[John2]

Ben wrote:

"Between the arguments concerning Papias in MacDonald and those concerning Marcion in various others, I have to admit that it is looking more and more to me like Luke-Acts (the version with Luke 1-2, including the Lucan prologue) postdates both Papias and Marcion. I am still sifting through the arguments, and of course this conclusion does not mean that all or even most of the materials that make up Luke-Acts postdate Papias and Marcion, but the position has some definite benefits and explanatory power."

I'm not into Marcion but I'm following this discussion with interest. One thing that comes to mind concerning Stephen's idea that Marcion was Jewish is Cerinthus. While we have less information about him than we do about Marcion and he was earlier than Marcion, Church fathers mention his connection (real or imagined) to Jewish Christians and attack him for this. So I'm thinking if there was even a hint of a connection between Marcion and Jewish Christianity (or Judaism) someone would have likewise said something about it.

The biggest thing that comes to mind though is Luke's use of Josephus, which I consider bedrock for the dating and structure of Luke and Acts. It would seem weird if there was an original Luke without the prologue given that its reference to Theophilus (ala Josephus' Epaphroditus) is a key component of Luke's use of Josephus that is echoed in Acts 1:1 ("The former treatise I made, O Theophilus ...").

[Bernard Muller]

to Ben,
It looks to me Dennis R. MacDonald is trying to be trendy and attempting to fuse long-time accepted ideas with new ones: gLuke late, therefore after Marcion and "Luke knew about gMatthew also.
And I wonder what "Luke" would borrow from Papias.
Of course, DRM thinks the logias of Matthew in Papias' writing refer to Matthew's gospel. I think he is wrong here.
By definition of Q, "Mark" did not know about it, but the Q authors knew about gMark, so "Matthew, so "Luke" (but only gMark minus the great omission).
By the way Ben, since you make a point to buy expensive books, why don't you read my website also?
More so the pages on "Q" http://historical-jesus.info/q.html,
the great omission http://historical-jesus.info/appf.html,
dating the gospels http://historical-jesus.info/gospels.html (with a part about Papias).

Cordially, Bernard

[Ben C. Smith]

I'm not into Marcion but I'm following this discussion with interest. One thing that comes to mind concerning Stephen's idea that Marcion was Jewish is Cerinthus. While we have less information about him than we do about Marcion and he was earlier than Marcion, Church fathers mention his connection (real or imagined) to Jewish Christians and attack him for this. So I'm thinking if there was even a hint of a connection between Marcion and Jewish Christianity (or Judaism) someone would have likewise said something about it.

I am still thinking about the possible connection of Marcion to Judaism. Not sure on any of that yet.

The biggest thing that comes to mind though is Luke's use of Josephus, which I consider bedrock for the dating and structure of Luke and Acts. It would seem weird if there was an original Luke without the prologue given that its reference to Theophilus (ala Josephus' Epaphroditus) is a key component of Luke's use of Josephus that is echoed in Acts 1:1 ("The former treatise I made, O Theophilus ...").

Good point. I too tend to think that Luke-Acts postdates Josephus.

Ben.

[Ben C. Smith]

It looks to me Dennis R. MacDonald is trying to be trendy and attempting to fuse long-time accepted ideas with new ones: gLuke late, therefore after Marcion and Luke knew about gMatthew also.

Trendy? That sounds like a psychoanalytic ad hominem. To be perfectly predictable, I honestly do not care whether he is being trendy or not; I care about how well his arguments explain the data.

And I wonder what "Luke" would borrow from Papias.

The death of Judas, for one thing. The type of preface he uses, for another. But I have not even finished reading the entire book yet, so I do not want to get into all of that here and now.

Of course, DRM thinks the logias of Matthew in Papias' writing refer to Matthew's gospel. I think he is wrong here.

That is not what he thinks at all. Matthew is Matthew. The logia are what he calls The Logoi of Jesus, or Q+. Wikipedia has an article on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q%2B/Papias_Hypothesis. It includes a chart.

By definition of Q, "Mark" did not know about it, but the Q authors knew about gMark, so "Matthew, so "Luke" (but only gMark minus the great omission).

That is indeed the original definition of Q, but MacDonald calls his hypothetical document Q+, which is different. Even if you hate the lingo, the arguments that lie below it may still have merit.

By the way Ben, since you make a point to buy expensive books, why don't you read my website also?
More so the pages on "Q" http://historical-jesus.info/q.html,
the great omission http://historical-jesus.info/appf.html,
dating the gospels http://historical-jesus.info/gospels.html (with a part about Papias).

I have already read (most of) the second and third of your links. Just because I write things that disagree with you on dating or on the formation of the synoptic gospels does not mean I have not read your arguments; it simply means that I disagree with your arguments. (You should be somewhat used to that by now .)

Ben.

[Bernard Muller]

to Ben,

The death of Judas, for one thing.

Papias:
"Judas walked about in this world a sad example of impiety; for his body having swollen to such an extent that he could not pass where a chariot could pass easily, he was crushed by the chariot, so that his bowels gushed out."
Acts:
"Now this man [Judas] purchased a field with the reward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.
And it was known unto all the dwellers at Jerusalem; insomuch as that field is called in their proper tongue, Aceldama, that is to say, The field of blood."

Here, I think that Papias was trying, as an apologist, to explain the death of Judas, as told by 'Acts': how could someone, even very fat, can have his bowels gushed out by just falling on the ground?
Papias brought a solution, but rather awkward & introducing more problems: Judas got stuck and was crushed by a chariot.
How could someone be so wide, and a chariot so fast on a narrow trail?
But that looks like a typical apologist explanation for a "difficult" passage and suggesting that 'Acts' (& therefore gLuke) was written before Papias' times.

The direction here is a lot more likely 'Acts' => Papias than the reverse.

That is not what he thinks at all. Matthew is Matthew. The logia are what he calls The Logoi of Jesus, or Q+. Wikipedia has an article on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q%2B/Papias_Hypothesis. It includes a chart.

I bothered to inquire before I wrote my previous post and therefore I already knew about MacDonald's ideas, which are not like mine.

You still should read my piece on Q.

Cordially, Bernard