How To Rescue the True Faith

It is easy to dismiss a tradition. Let me give you a '101' on how to do it.

If you are a wicked government all you have to do is persecute the faith. Take its members and force them to swear allegiance to another belief system. If they refuse you make examples out of some. If resistance continues you 'encourage' reform by directing your efforts at the highest ranks of the ecclesiastical structure. Someone is bound to compromise and offer up a deal if you elevate him to a position of power. You get rid of the old leadership and put that guy in charge. Or maybe you bring someone in from the outside. There are a lot of ways to get the job done.

The point is that the traditional way of looking at the Imperial persecutions is so two dimensional its almost comical. Historians get their ideas from later church documents (when the faith had already accommodated itself to the Roman power structure). So you get something like this:

Bad Roman Judge: Swear by Caesar
Holy Christian Martyr: No never, Jesus is my King
Bad Roman Judge: Then we will kill you
Holy Christian Martyr: I am prepared to die
Bad Roman Judge: Execute him/her!
Holy Christian Martyr: Awwwww

I am not taking anything away from the martyrs. I am just doubting the fact that we get the whole story from the surviving martyr cycles.

Take for example the story of Polycarp. It is very easy to see through the claims of his surviving martyrdom narrative compiled at some stage by Irenaeus in Rome from an original Marcionite canon of martyrs (the story cited by Eusebius does not end with Polycarp's death; the 'grand finale' is Metrodorius, the Marcionite bishop). It is very easy to see that the Imperial authorities didn't want to kill Polycarp to do but he somehow found away to get his wish.

The epicenter of the great persecutions of the third century seem to be centered in Alexandria. This is an acknowledged fact. But why is that? Why focus your efforts here if - as most scholars like to think - the real center of Christianity was at Rome or Antioch?

Could it be that Rome and Antioch were never the real centers of Christianity. Could it be that various efforts were made to establish Antioch as the center in the second century (I have always thought the 'Theophilus' of Luke is Theophilus of Antioch). Can the same thing be true for Rome in the late second, third and fourth centuries? They couldn't have been totally effective because the Alexandrian Papa's blessing was essential for Nicaea to succeed and subsequent efforts to develop the canon.

The point is that I am highly suspicious of the manner in which Christian historians develop the story of their Church. It is as if they already knew the story from before they were born and their job is merely to 'make it sound scientific' (I feel that way about most scholarship in the study of Christianity.

As someone who was born with absolutely no knowledge of Jesus, Christ, the gospel, the New Testament and the Church, Antioch and Rome always seemed like non-starters. It is hard to account for the development of the gospel from either of these cities. Antioch was an administrative center; Rome was ... well, Rome.

It was only when I stumbled upon Alexandria and A PRE-EXISTENT CLAIM that Alexandria was the original center of the Christian faith that all at once everything made sense to me. Most people believe what they do because ... well, their parents believed in this stuff. When you hear that Alexandria MIGHT have been the cradle of Christianity it immediately has a lot of things going for it:

1) an highly, influential and highly Hellenized Jewish population
2) this highly influential and highly Hellenized Jewish tradition has a unique influence over the earliest Church Fathers from that city
3) it is easy to imagine that the opening lines of John were developed from this highly Hellenized Jewish culture
4) if you really, really listen to the Alexandrian tradition you can actually start to discern arguments that not only was the original gospel written in Alexandria but more importantly that the gospel told the story about how Christianity was meant to be found in Alexandria (i.e. that the papal throne was meant to reside here)

Now I know that everyone out there who knows anything about history acknowledges (1) and (2). There isn't a single honest theologian who would deny (3). However proposition (4) is the stickler. It goes against everything we have ever been taught about Christianity, and in fact our canon seems designed to refute that argument.

But let's be honest with ourselves. The whole point of Acts is to make the same kind of argument for Antioch. There was a prominent apostolic throne there in ancient times associated with Peter. But there is a difficulty here which can't be denied too. For it is impossible to argue that THE GOSPEL argued for Antioch's primacy. And while we have learned to see gospel as something split up into four and then bound within a canon of related texts this can't always have been so.

The revelation of the gospel ranks higher than the other texts of the canon. It has to be identified as nothing short of the new Torah for the proselytes of this new Messiah. Our standard view is to imagine that after the Resurrection all the missionaries for this new faith gathered somewhere and were sent out to the four corners of the world. Where this 'somewhere' is suddenly doesn't matter. It was just 'somewhere.'

But did the Antiochenes think that this somewhere was 'Antioch'?

No, they did not.

The assembly of the Church at Antioch founded on Peter and Paul's reconciliation (something which is entirely at odds with the early description of that meeting in Galatians) is necessarily after this original 'sending out.'

But did the Alexandrians ever think that the Church was founded in Alexandria after the Resurrection?

I think so.

I am convinced that the original Alexandrians thought that the gospel was about Jesus announcing the establishment of the Messiah on their Papal throne. I will develop this idea further in subsequent posts but I want my readership to at least 'get where I am coming from' on this.

If you are a Protestant you somehow have to see the Papacy as some ugly, later invention which represents nothing short of the corruption of the 'primitive Church' which is portrayed - ever so briefly - in that original gathering in Palestine at the end of the gospel when the apostles were sent out into the world.

This church we are always told was made up of only simple people - fishermen and other rustic types. But I am not so sure about this.

There is something about this whole formulation which rubs my Jewish sensibilities the wrong way. Where is the throne in this scene? Where is the messiah sitting on his throne? This would be essential to complete the proper messianic portrait that generations of my ancestors would have expected to ever even consider going over to any messiah.

The way Europeans read the gospel is downright silly. Jesus goes on the cross, dies and comes back but somehow his disciples don't know its him until he shows them the marks on his hands and feet and then suddenly everyone 'knows its him' and they live happily ever after.

I written before on this subject but if we really scrutinize the Alexandrian sources a number of differences become apparent with our version of this story which only accord with common sense namely:

1) Mark didn't just run away in Mark 14:52
2) Mark was a witness to the Passion (this only makes sense - how else could he have written this part of the gospel narrative? Who would have believed him if he was somewhere else?)
3) Jesus took another form when he showed himself to the disciples after the Resurrection which occurred at Mark's house in Jerusalem
4) The founding of the Church happened when Mark sat on his throne in Alexandria

Now all of these opinions require a great deal of digging through the surviving sources. (1) is an inference based on (2) which comes from a statement in the Passio Petri, the traditional and most common Coptic epithet for Mark (i.e. 'the beholder of God) and common sense. (3) is based on statements in the writings of Peter I translated to English in Tim Vivian's excellent book. (4) is obvious to anyone who has ever walked into a Coptic Church or familiarized himself with their tradition.

While this is a patchwork of fragmentary references there other supporting bits of evidence from other sources too. Yet what I wanted to introduce to the reader is the idea that the strange sounding 'Coptic faith' isn't as silly as it first appears.

I have always found the Roman interpretation of Simon as petros and the founding of the church on petra quite dubious to say the least. The Alexandrian interpretation of this gospel passage is that it has to do with the physical location of the Church of St. Mark (the one in which the Papal throne was established) by the sea near a rock (petra) where stone (petros) is taken away.

Something about Alexandria just makes sense to me as the place for the founding of Christianity not only because I developed an argument connecting this founding to an event in the life of Marcus Agrippa (a king named Mark who happened to be recognized as the messiah by Jews). That has nothing to do with it. It is that if you read Clement's Letter to Theodore with a critical eye you can see how the questions in this section of Mark (and parallel sections of the Diatessaron) have everything to do with the central question of - who will sit in the throne after Jesus dies?

You have to look at the context of the narrative. This is Jesus last stop before Jerusalem and the death that he keeps telling his disciples has to happen at that Passover (the Alexandrians thought Jesus' ministry was entirely contained within one calendar year). Salome comes up and asks who will be enthroned beside Jesus. The Diatessaron actually preserves a long answer from Jesus in this section. But think in terms of Chechov's gun' - i.e. "the technique whereby an element is introduced early in the story, but its significance does not become clear until later on. For example, a character may find a mysterious object that eventually becomes crucial to the plot, but at the time the object is found it does not seem to be important."

Let's stop thinking we know everything about the gospel. If we are Protestants we can't just 'assume' that the Papal throne was a later addition to the original formula of Christianity just because some of us have developed a 'thing' for Rome. Anyone who has any degree of discernment has to recognize that the title of 'Papa' was appropriated from Alexandria at least formally by the fifth century.

Was the Papacy pre-existent in Alexandria? Yes. How far back did it go? I can't see a reason why To Theodore is not an authentic text (Carlson's arguments are based on a collective desire of American scholars and other evangelicals to deny the implication of the letter). To this end, Lawrence Schiffman and I are prepared to say in print or on film (indeed I have done both) that there is a reference to the divine throne in that text that is completely compatible with contemporary or slightly earlier forms of Judaism.

To this end, I see no reason to see the Papal throne is as old as Alexandrian Christianity. When this door is opened we have to turn around and question Irenaeus strange 'correction' of the heretical beliefs of an Alexandrian community centered on St. Mark and his gospel.

When Irenaeus speaks about a community that "preferred the Gospel of Mark" and through their text are said to "separate Jesus from Christ, alleging that Christ remained impassible, but that it was Jesus who suffered (on the Cross)" it is easy to connect this group with the heresy of 'Mark' in Book 1, Chapter 13f and moreover the writings of Clement of Alexandria. It is an exact match. The 'Marcosians' are nothing more than a branch of the Alexandrian Church located in the Rhone valley.

The Copts actually claim as much saying that St. Mark's church in Alexandria had an ecclesiastical network which stretched the globe.

So what about this gospel of Mark which ends with Christ standing watching Jesus endure the Passion? You already know my answer. It is connected with the statement in the Passio Petri that Mark was present at the Passion and the repeated idea in that text that he founded the Papacy from his throne in Alexandria.

Yet I have commented on this stuff in other posts. There is something else that is interesting about this section of text. The Codex Sinaiticus (an Egyptian codex) decides to omit mention of the conclusion of Mark. Irenaeus already alludes to what must have been there in some versions of the manuscript - i.e. the idea that Christ, the witness of the Passion watches Jesus on the Cross.

Irenaeus doesn't tell us how this gospel originally ended but he does tell us what the correct ending SHOULD HAVE BEEN namely:

Also, towards the conclusion of his Gospel, Mark says: "So then, after the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of God; " confirming what had been spoken by the prophet: "The LORD said to my Lord, Sit Thou on My right hand, until I make Thy foes Thy footstool." Thus God and the Father are truly one and the same; He who was announced by the prophets, and handed down by the true Gospel; whom we Christians worship and love with the whole heart, as the Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things therein.

Yet look closely at this statement and notice how many corrections of the 'wrong faith' of that community who 'prefer the gospel of Mark' where Christ watches Jesus suffer there are:

1) the gospel SHOULD end with an enthronement in heaven
2) the gospel SHOULD end with the idea that God and the Father (the very meaning of the title Papa) 'are one and the same'
3) that SHOULD be Jesus who was understood to be 'announced by the prophets and who handed down the true gospel'
4) that Christianity SHOULD worship Jesus and only Jesus with the whole heart

Now I have already mentioned how stupidly most Christians read the gospel but it is even worse with the approach of scholars to the writings of the Church Fathers. All discernment seems to go out the window.

If Irenaeus is correcting the beliefs of this community who 'wrongly' hold this separation of 'Jesus' and 'Christ' where Jesus is God and Christ is the traditional royal messiah expected by the Jews since the beginning (as I have posted elsewhere) no one should be surprised that none of this if out of step the Alexandrian two advent expectation of Clement and Origen and various statements about the beliefs of the Marcionites.

But can we not just simply 'reverse' Irenaeus' correction of the beliefs of these contemporary Alexandrian 'two advent' believers who rely only on the gospel of Mark to see how their 'untrue text' ended, namely that:

1) this 'other' gospel of Mark DID END with Mark's enthronement IN THIS WORLD (which is as we said the beginning of the Alexandrian Church)
2) this 'other' gospel of Mark DID END with the recognition that Jesus was God and Mark was the Father (Papa)
3) this 'other' gospel of Mark DID END with Mark as the royal messiah 'announced by the prophets and who handed down the true gospel'
4) this 'other' gospel of Mark DID END with a justification for the idea that Christianity SHOULD worship Mark as Papa whom the contemporary Alexandrian community worshiped as a living re-incarnation of Jesus and venerated with all their heart.

I don't know if you can prove this but I think some of you might be able to discern the logic of where I am going with the direction of my research for my next book which will be out in the fall of 2010.

AN ADDITIONAL NOTE: I think I have divined why I have so many run ins with religious types over my approach to Biblical scholarship. I don't think we need to be make any definitive about anything related to the Church, the gospel or Christ. I don't need to definitively prove that Mark was the Christ or that Jesus wasn't and was instead only God (like being 'only God' is an insult! If this was Let's Make a Deal and they had two curtains and the host said you could take the office that was behind each one - God or the Messiah - what idiot would pick curtain number 2?).

For me, when I saw the throne of St. Mark I just knew what it was. I don't know if it was Jewish upbringing but you just have to look at that thing and it has messiah written all over it, both metaphorically and literally.

Yet beyond this, it has to be said that there has to be room for people to simply think aloud and make polite observations about what might have been in the distant ancient past. Only then can we really know for sure what once was ...