The Gospel and The Throne

I will assume that the readers of this post have read the posts that preceded it namely - that the context of Mark's original enthronement was the scene describing Moses' recognition as king of Israel in Deut 33 and that Mark was remembered in three different cultures to have consistently emphasized that only the ten utterances were from heaven.

If the reader is now 'on the same page as me' with regards to what the episcopal throne of Alexandrian 'declares' about Mark it is impossible to avoid seeing any longer that the tradition was originally Marcionite.

Now I know what 'Marcionite' has come to mean for the intellectually lazy - i.e. a tradition that 'hates' the Law and prophets. However I have already demonstrated in a previous post how the reports of the Church Fathers had to have misconstrued the original 'Marcionite' (i.e. Aram. marqione = 'those of Mark') position.

In other words, the followers of Mark said that only the ten utterances came from heaven; their detractors said they maligned the Law and the prophets.

So this is what is represented on the throne - i.e. we see ten torches, five on the left, five on the right - which symbolize this concept of 'heavenly Torah.'

Now let's move on to what I see as the implications of this symbolism - i.e. the Marcionites have a similar emphasis when it comes to the gospel.

The Church Fathers say that all they had was a bastard copy of Luke. The source of this information comes from Irenaeus who indeed was the first person ever to mention a text of this name.

I have always felt that the opening lines of Luke fit much better as the introduction to a Diatessaron, a 'super gospel' in the name of John. I think this came from Polycarp and was developed alongside Acts as the single gospel text of his community in Asia Minor and was likely 'introduced' by 1 John ... but more on that another time.

I don't believe for a moment that a strong argument has ever been made that the Marcionites used a 'bastard text of Luke.' The only reason the argument is accepted is because scholarship didn't start in a void. It took over from the presuppositions of the Church and 'rebaptized' them as scientific-sounding hypotheses.

The thing that I have always found so striking about the Marcionites is their consistent emphasis that their gospel text came from heaven, that their gospel text didn't have a human author (it was NOT a 'gospel of Paul' but a 'gospel of Christ' or 'Chrestos').

This emphasis is repeated (and ridiculed) by Tertullian and other writers and scholars have ignored what is really striking about it.

It can easily be connected with that Markan emphasis we learn about in Samaritan and Jewish sources regarding the 'different character' of the ten utterances.

It is difficult to dance around this issue but one can see in the rabbinic reports at least that the emphasis that the 'ten utterances' were from heaven - even fire brought down from heaven - was leading to heresy. It naturally lowered the status of the other 603 even if it wasn't intended.

I can't help but think that the Marcionite emphasis regarding the 'heavenly source' for the gospel comes from the same source. On some level the community said, there were two Torahs in Israel - where our Torah was revealed from heaven (2 Cor 13:1f) and was from the same source as the ten but your Torah, the laws of sacrifice, the laws which sanctioned divorce etc. were made on the authority of Moses.

The 'gospel of Christ' is better than the law of Moses (or at least the 603 established subsequent to the ten) because our Christ is better than your Moses.

This is the idea behind 2 Cor chapter 3 and notice the 'radiance' that comes from the gospel - one would swear that the light was made of 'heavenly fire.'

Now I could go on and develop a rather dull examination of all the sources in the anti-Marcionite writings of the Church Fathers which show that the Marcionites didn't believe the gospel had a human author. Instead I would like to show the specifically Alexandrian context to bring us back to the imagery on the throne.

Origen already knew a tradition where Jesus and 'Marcion' (i.e. Mark) sat enthroned, Jesus on the 'right hand' of the episcopos of the Church.

Now let's look at a passage from the Dialogues of Adamantius which Roger Pearse has graciously translated for us. As he notes:

Comparing the GCS edition with the Pretty page online, I find that 830a is the pagination of some early edition, which appears on p.86-87 of the GCS edition.

Interestingly I can see a deviation between the Greek and the translation of Rufinus at just this point; Rufinus doesn’t use the word “Jesus.”

On the previous page, the statement by Peter, “you are the Christ” has been raised. Eutropius the pagan arbitrator asks whether Peter wrote the gospel.T he Marcionite Marcus replies “Christ, not Peter, wrote the gospel.”

Pretty: “What right has Marcus to say that Christ wrote the gospel. The Gospel writer did not refer to himself; he refers to him who he is proclaiming - Jesus Christ.”

Rufinus: “Deinde quomodo dicit Christum scripsisse euangelium? Non enim tanquam de se scribens loquitur scriptor euangelii, sed tanquam alium et qui extra se sit praedicans Christum.”

Greek: “πῶς δὲ λέγει τὸν Χριστὸν γεγραφηκέναι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον? οὐ γὰρ ὡς περὶ αὑτοῦ ὁ γράψας τὸ εὐαγγέλιον ἐσήμανε, σημαίνει ὃν κηρύσσει Χριστὸν Ἰησοῦν,…”

My attempt from Greek: “But how does he say that the Christ has written the gospel? For he who wrote the gospel did not indicate himself, he indicates the one he is proclaiming - Christ Jesus.”

I noted at his site that it is impossible to see that this wasn't a fight over the 'gospel of Peter' but the age old Alexandrian contention that the gospel of Mark was not a 'gospel of Peter' as the Roman Church wants to believe.

The continuation of this Alexandrian understanding is represented in Pope Shenouda III's the Evangelist Mark Chapter 3.

As I already noted at Roger's site, the Marcionite are already identified as using a 'gospel of Mark' in Hippolytus' report (Hippolytus denies the report but clearly testifies to the pre-existence of this claim). There are a zillion reasons for believing that not only did the Marcionite gospel begin with Mark 1:1 but was properly identified by some as a 'gospel of Mark.'

I don't want to get off track my original interest though in connecting the Markan emphasis of only the ten utterances representing 'the heavenly Torah' and the Marcionite (= 'those of Mark') interest in portraying the gospel as the restoration of 'the heavenly Torah' which in turn was inferred (by later wholly hostile sources) to mean a devaluation of 'the Law and the prophets' on their part.

There are countless references I could bring forward but I am struck by the pseudo-Clementine Homily III to a lost gospel account:

Accordingly [Jesus] knowing the true things of the law, said to the Sadducees, asking on what account Moses permitted to marry seven, 'Moses gave you commandments according to your hard-heartedness; for from the beginning it was not so: for He who created man at first, made him male and female.'

The Marcionite gospel had Jesus similarly deny any form of divorce owing again to Moses effectively developing commandments on his own authority (the Coptic Church does not allow for divorce).

The point of this post is to put forward that Marcionite concept of 'gospel without human author' seems to fit the first century Markan milieu we have already demonstrated elsewhere. Indeed when you really think about it - how can the gospel have a human author?

I know Christians have learned to take for granted that a man named Matthew wrote this text and another man named Mark wrote that text and so on. Yet the Marcionite position seems to present a logical extension of Jesus' statement about divorce and his healing on the Sabbath etc.

The Marcionites were emphasizing that the 603 weren't heavenly whereas the gospel was. This is witnessed by the statement attributed to Marcion by Harnack:

"O wonder beyond wonders, rapture, power, and amazement is it, that one can say nothing at all [i.e. the Gospel ] nor even conceive of it, nor even compare it to anything"

This comes shining through the Dialogues of Adamantius too when we see the Marcionite Megethius debate with the Catholic representative Adamantius (undoubtedly at Alexandria):

Meg. I will show that the gospels, that you (Catholics) read, are false.

Ad. From whence can this be proven?

Meg. I shall prove from out of these very gospels that they are false.

Ad. Then will you also permit me to prove from these same gospels that they are not false?

Meg. I shall permit it, if it can be exhibited by you. Still earlier it was proclaimed, of who composed the gospels.

Ad. The disciples of Christ are those who had written them, which are John, Matthew, Mark and Luke.

Meg. Christ never had Mark and Luke for disciples, and out of this itself they are proven to be false. For who were the disciples, which names are written in the Gospel,- were the gospels composed of these, but by others, who were unknown, who were not made disciples? Who is Luke, or who is Mark? Thus even upon these very names are your gospels clearly convicted of the verdict of falsehood ...

Indeed Megethius goes on to say that the Catholic 'codices are deceitful' and the argument continues:

Meg. I show there to be a false gospel. For the apostle says there is one Gospel, but you say there are four.

Ad. There are four gospels, but it is one gospel...

Meg. The Apostle doesn't say, "according to my gospels", but "according to my gospel". You see how he speaks of one. And a second time he says "if anyone should proclaim to you a different gospel, let him be accursed" (Gal.1:9?). How is it that you speak of four?

Ad. The Gospel which we speak is one, but there are four evangelists.

Meg. Neither are there four evangelists, for the Apostle says (Gal.1:7) : "which is not another but there are some that trouble you and would divert (you) unto a different gospel of Christ."

Ad. Paul speaks of there being a plurality of evangelists, how is it that you say there is only one?

Meg. He does not speak of many evangelists.

So there is only one evangelist who is - as we have seen in the beginning of this discussion - also Christ (i.e. 'Christ wrote the gospel'). Notice what follows:

Meg. I shall show that there is one gospel.

Ad. From whom can you appeal from scripture itself that confirms there is only one Gospel?

Meg. Christ.

Notice that the discussion ends with Marcion being the 'bishop' (episcopus) who established 'a great many bishops' -

Meg. Marcion was my bishop (episcopus ).

Ad. Since the death of Marcion there have been so many successor bishops among you, or rather pseudo-bishops, why then have you not been named after his successors instead of after the schismatic Marcion?

It is interesting to note that the existing text does not answer that question.

I guess the point of this rambling post is that when you really get down to 'brass tax' Ulrich Schmid has already demonstrated that most or many of the variants in the Marcionite gospel look like western readings of Mark. The opening words of the Marcionite gospel - the place where the title is found - seems to be Mark 1:1. The very name 'Marcion' and 'Marcionite' invariably go back to a historical individual named 'Mark.'

Tertullian says 'the gospel of Marcion' so many times in his treatise you get the feeling that Marcion wrote (or edited) the text.

I can't shake the feeling that Marcion stood behind our 'St. Paul' as well. Inventing the person of 'Paul' would be a neat trick for the Catholics to pull the rug right from under the Marqione (so now 'Marcion' can't be the authority on his own revelation; he's only 'interpreting' the writings of someone else).

My suspicion is that the Mark stood at the heart of the 'Marcionite' church. I think all these smoke and mirrors hide St. Mark sitting on that little throne in Alexandria. I also think the Marcionites were headquartered in Alexandria.

Origen preserve a reference to an enthroned 'Marcion.'

Then there's that whole business of the Marcionite preservation of a letter to the Alexandrians and the disappearance of that letter or its renaming in the Catholic canon (maybe it wouldn't be a big deal if it were a 'letter to Pittsburgh' but Alexandria??? The real question has to be why isn't there a letter to this massively important Christian center in the Catholic New Testament. It has to be explained.

My answer is that all of Catholic Christianity was developed in opposition to the authority of Mark aka 'Marcion' and the Alexandrian see.

The idea that Marcion was like Mark the 'first bishop' (so Rufinus) after whom all other bishops in his church sounds again suspiciously Alexandrian. Look at the influence of the see of Mark over all of Alexandria and - in the third and fourth centuries - its influence over Palestine, Gaza, north Africa and beyond.

When all of this is said we come back to the throne of St. Mark - a little throne for a 'little Mark' (Marcion) - and we notice the shared shared interest in the revelation/restoration of the original 'heavenly Torah.'

Is there a relationship between the Marcionite emphasis on a 'heavenly gospel' is somehow related to the recorded position associated with various first century Mark figures and the 'heavenly Torah'?

I think so.

But I think I can only answer it more fully when I bring in some ignored evidence from To Theodore which has to do with our throne.

Yet before I go, just one more thing. Isn't it interesting that the Marcionites while fighting the Catholics deny that the Gospel has a human author, deny Mark was an evangelist, say that 'Christ wrote it' (owing to Mark 1:1 viz. 'the Gospel of Christ' etc)... and then there is this now disputed letter to Theodore where Clement of Alexandria says virtualy the same thing about this longer, secret gospel of Mark.

To those within the fold it is acknowledged that 'Mark':

left his composition to the church in Alexandria, where it even yet is most carefully guarded ...

But to outsiders the tactic was different:

one must never give way; nor, when they put forward their falsifications, should one concede that the secret Gospel is by Mark.

Things that make you go, hmmmmm. I think am dating myself ...