If you haven't read the first post in this series you should start here. It's utterly amazing. We, as scholars, all simply take for granted that 'the gospel of Marcion was an ADULTERATED version of the Gospel of Luke.' Yet where did this idea come from? Could it be that the term is really a left over - a response if you will - from a contemporary accusation that the Catholic gospel of Mark was an 'inferior copy' of an original 'spiritual version' of the Gospel of Mark?
To begin to investigate these matters properly we have to begin by allowing for the fact that our inherited assumptions about 'Marcion' and his gospel might not be correct. Indeed it is the Catholic Church Fathers who shape the agenda for us. First Irenaeus and then Tertullian and then many others after them, tell us that 'Marcion' adulterated his gospel from a Catholic original.
Yet let's look at this term 'adulterated' for a moment. Tertullian is the first to develop it in his works against Marcion. He undoubtedly employed a lost original work Against Marcion which was either written by Irenaeus or passed through his hands.
In the First Book of his five volume work Against Marcion Tertullian already notes that the accusation of 'adulteration' within the church comes from the Apostle Paul and the Marcionites and the Catholics interpret the words in two different ways. Tertullian notes that Paul:
writes of how certain false brethren had crept in unawares, desiring to remove the Galatians to another gospel, he himself shows clearly that that adulteration [adulterium] of the gospel was not concerned with diversion of the faith towards another god and another Christ, but with adherence to the regulations of the law [Tertullian AM i. 21]
The term 'adulteration' here always means the same thing for Tertullian - viz. "the indictment of contamination of the flesh." [On Modesty 4] The Marcionites clearly argued that Christianity was no longer Judaism because something had been added to it - 'leaven' - which raised it from a Jewish veneration of the seven heavens to a devotion directed toward the power in the highest heaven ABOVE the seventh heaven - viz. 'the Ogdoad' or the 'eighth.' The Catholics by contrast - like Tertullian argued that Christianity had nothing to do with a change of gods only an abandonment of the traditional principles of Jewish worship.
This is a key distinction which is rarely noted by scholars. The Marcionites argued that Judaism and the Mosaic worship was inferior BUT RELATED TO the ideal practices of Christianity. Everything old was simply 'raised to a higher power.' We can think of the myth of the Demiurge who wakes from his dream and realizes that his whole creation was just a poor copy of a better heavenly world above having been so instructed by Jesus and drawn toward repentance.
It is the Catholic model which abandons Jewish festivals and Jewish practice NOT THE MARCIONITES. All of this gets inevitably obscured by the intense hyperbole on the part of the Catholics who constantly accuse the Marcionites essentially of apostasy from the ruler of the world.
This is why it is so interesting to think about the consistent application of the term adulterium to the Marcionites by the Catholics. It is very curious because in many of the passages - including the one just cited the word 'adulterium' is never used even in the Vulgate.
Where did the accusation regarding Marcionite 'adulteration' originate? I think it must have been grounded in the idea that the initiates had been betrothed as brides to the Father FIRST and that any subsequent attempts to change the focus AWAY from that marital bond was understood to be 'adultery.'
This is made manifest a little earlier in the same chapter where Tertullian allows us to see into the Marcionite worldview:
They allege that in separating the Law and the Gospel Marcion did not so much invent a new rule [for Christianity] as refurbish a rule previously adulterated [quam retro adulteratam recurasse]. [ibid]
Clearly then it was the Marcionites who first used the term 'adultery' to describe the attempts of Catholics to 'break the marriage bond' as it were between its betrothed 'brides' to the previously unknown Father.
Indeed Tertullian picks up the topic a little later again where he says:
But if it was after the apostolic age that the truth suffered adulteration [adulterium] as regards the rule of God, it follows that in its own time the apostolic tradition suffered no adulteration as regards God's rule of faith, and we shall be called upon to recognize as apostolic no other tradition than that which is today set forth in the apostolic churches. But you will find no church of apostolic origin whose Christianity repudiates the Creator [ibid i.21]
This of course is the million dollar question. This is the point that Tertullian continually makes in his writings. The churches of the heretics are in shambles and the Catholic churches devoted to the 'ruler of the world' are flourishing. The fact that only the Catholic 'brand' survives DISPROVES the claims of the heretics.
However we need only go back to the writings of Irenaeus a generation earlier to hear the Marcionites accuse the Catholics of receiving 'assistance' from Caesar, from essentially being 'bankrolled' by the Emperor [AH iii.30.1]. The Marcionites liken this to the Israelites stealing gold and silver during the Exodus and establishing the idol of the Golden Calf instead of cleaving to the god that redeemed them from bondage (a curious argument for a sect that supposedly 'hated' the Creator) [ibid].
In other words, Tertullian uses the decimation of the Marcionites AND the favor shown the Catholics by the Roman government to disprove the claims of the now 'heretical traditions' that something happened in the late second century to break the exclusive 'union' that Christianity had with its 'higher power' in the hidden realm ABOVE the seventh heaven.
My guess is that Christianity was being forced to accept the ruler of the world as a means of recognizing the authority of Caesar. But that's another story.
All we need to acknowledge for the moment is that it is plainly evident from Tertullian's own writings that it was the Marcionites who first accused the Catholics of 'adultery' or 'adulteration.' For indeed Tertullian's definition of adulterium - viz. "the indictment of contamination of the flesh" - could very easily have been also been developed by the Marcionites to mean "the indictment of contamination of the GOSPEL" for the original Aramaic term has the double meaning of both 'glad tidings' and 'flesh.'
So it was that BOTH Catholics and heretics accused one another of contaminating the gospel. The Catholic position as we noted is very well known by scholars. Irenaeus eventually makes the case that the Marcionite gospel was an 'adulterated' version of Luke. However since scholars are not as familiar with the Marcionite understanding I would like to spend a few minutes re-educating them as to its rationale.
The Marcionites did not believe that they used a bastard copy of Luke. Instead they argued that they had the original revelation which came to the Apostle - the one which he refers to every time he mentions 'my gospel' or some such expression. The various references to the name of the text as 'the gospel of Christ' - or as Tertullian names the Marcionite text 'the gospel of the Lord' makes amply clear to me at least that the text began with the opening line of Mark 1:1 just like the Diatessaron. I will get back to this point later.
For the moment however I would like to explain the Marcionite understanding of Catholic 'adulteration' of THEIR original gospel.
It is difficult to get at this argument because the Catholic authors of texts against the Marcionites go out of their way to avoid reporting on it. It is clear from the Dialgoues of Adamantius that the Marcionite thought the CODICIES of the Catholics were 'deceitful.' A codex by its very nature binds many books into one.
The Marcionites clearly understood the process of the 'adulteration' of their original gospel to go back to the time of the Apostle himself. As Tertullian notes there is an understanding inherent in that polemic that the 'adulteration' involved 'strategems' or 'cunning' borrowed from the Jews. It might be useful to follow the parallel use of the term dolos (craft, cunning) in both 1 Cor 5.6 AND the description of Jesus' Passion to see how this ties into Tertullian's original point that the Marcionites accused the Catholics of promoting 'adultery' from the true God revealed by Jesus previously hidden in the highest heavens.
First, the Marcionite reading witnessed also among the Catholic Fathers (D*; Goth Bas Const; lat; Lcf):
Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast adulerates (doloi) the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth. [1 Cor 5.6 - 8]
I have already discussed the original importance of the Festival of the Unleavened Bread in Apostolic Christianity (i.e. the Marcionite tradition which EXCLUSIVELY followed his teachings). Christianity was meant to baptize its catechumen on the eighth day of Passover owing to traditional Jewish identification of the day in association with the 'baptism in the sea' [1 Cor 10:2]
Now the reader should already see the contrast original noted by Tertullian manifest itself again here. It was the Catholics who abandoned not only the traditional custom linking the parting of the Red Sea on the seventh and eighth of Passover as baptism but specifically the writings of the Apostle which specified it as a 'typos.' There can be no other way but to interpret that the Catholic understanding of baptizing their catechumen on Easter Sunday as an innovation and a secondary development AWAY FROM the original Marcionite practice of maintaining the liturgy 'in relation' to Jewish practices.
How do we know that the Marcionites maintained this practice? Everyone acknowledged that they were fanatically devoted to the literal word of the Apostle.
Once again let me state Tertullian's observation from the beginning of Book One. The Marcionites say that 'adultery' is separating Christianity from its exclusive betrothal to Father God unknown to previous generations of Jews and revealed by Jesus. The Catholics say that the Apostle wanted us to abandon Jewish practices - like tying baptism to a Jewish festival like that of the Unleavened Bread. The Catholics want us to read the Apostle as if he is lashing out at those who would keep Christianity tied to Judaism - i.e. the Marcionites - but this position is ultimately illogical as the Apostle does exactly himself in other passages.
Clearly then the Marcionites understood the Jewish 'dolos' - cunning, craft - which was 'added' to the original Christian association of baptism with the eighth day of Passover was the argument that there was no God higher than the Creator. I hesitate to identify it as a 'Catholic argument' because it was never so identified by the Marcionites. They identified it as a Jewish argument even though they themselves were keeping Jewish feasts like Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread in a way which superficially at least paralleled traditional Jewish practice.
The Marcionites identified 'Jewish adulteration' of the gospel as the argument that there was no Father God above the seventh heaven or who could be distinguished from the Creator. How do we go about proving that? It begins with noticing that the same term dolos appears in association with Mark's description of the last days of Jesus:
After two days was the feast of the passover, and of unleavened bread: and the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might take him by craft (dolos), and put him to death. [Mark 14:1]
It is worth noting that Tertullian begins his discussion of what the Marcionites believe that 'adulterations' of the true gospel were "concerned with diversion of the faith towards another god and another Christ." [Tertullian AM i. 21] It is patently obvious from the writings of the Church Fathers on the Marcionites that they did not believe that Jesus was 'the Christ' nor that he was 'the Son of God.' To this end it is worth noting the little scrap of information that Tertullian gives us about the Marcionite interpretation of the Passion to shine light on how 'Jewish dolos' again might have been responsible for having Jesus crucified.
Tertullian writes that the Jews arrange for two charges against Jesus which are read by Pilate. As he notes:
Surely they would have arraigned him under some other charge, being in doubt whether he had said he was the Son of God, if he had not by the statement "Ye say it," indicated that he was what they said. Also when Pilate asked, Art thou the Christ?1 he answered again "Thou sayest it," so that he might not seem, through fear of the authority, to have refused to answer. [Tertullian AM iv.42]
The point of course is that the same 'Jewish dolos' that was at work at the time the Apostle was writing the Letter to the Corinthians was already at work in the gospel which killed Jesus. The Marcionites CLEARLY DID NOT BELIEVE Jesus to be 'the Son of God' nor the Christ. This is explicit in Tertullian Book Four of Against Marcion.
Who then was Jesus for the Marcionites? He was the true Word of the Father, an angel from heaven which brought the presence of the unknown Father to this world for the first time.
The reason I bring all of this up because I want to create some context for my ultimate claim that the Alexandrian 'secret' religion of St Mark and the Alexandrian 'secret gospel' mentioned in To Theodore HAVE TO BEGIN TO BE SEEN to have some relation to the Marcionite gospel. The pattern is unmistakable.
I can't believe that the Catholics innocently developed a strategem that the Marcionite gospel was an 'adulterated' copy of Luke. This was first introduced at the time Irenaeus wrote Book Three of Against the Heresies (c. 189 CE). I suspect that it was written as a means of answering the characterization of the Roman Gospel of Mark in To Theodore as essentially a 'carnal' version of the 'spiritual' gospel of Alexandria.
Of course I can't prove it right now. But let's work toward this idea by going back to what I have argued was the ultimate context for Clement's discussion in To Theodore - the pre-existent Alexandrian veneration of the baptism of the catechumen on the eighth day of Passover LIKE THE MARCIONITES.
This can't be coincidence. The idea is that Judaism originally understood that the seven days of the festival of Unleavened Bread were meant to conclude with some mystical interpretation of the day which followed - the eighth - where yeast could be again added to their meals. The Apostle was understood as saying that the Jewish yeast is dolos while what is added to the Christian meal on the eighth is 'the Holy Spirit.'
In other words, the Jewish yeast led to the death of Jesus, what is added to Christianity leads to eternal life.
I think everyone knows what the Jewish 'ogdoad' is - circumcision. Jewish children are only considered 'alive' on the eighth day. Against this understanding, the original Church placed the baptism which occurred on the ogdoad of Passover. Again, the Apostle makes clear that this develops out of the 'baptism in the sea' [1 Cor 10:2] which according to Jews and Samaritans originally occurred on the seventh day of Passover but a day was added for those outside Israel.
Now as I have noted it can't be coincidence that the neaniskos of Secret Mark is initiated only after six days making it a seven day ritual. The whole Torah is built around the seven day cycle of perfection. The Jews were well known to envision seven heavens; the earliest Christians posited the Ogdoad as effectively 'one heaven better' than that of the highest realm known to the Jews.
My guess would be that the Christians argued that their eight day festival embodied the superiority of their new covenant. It too was 'one better' than the traditions of the Jews. In some form, the celebration of baptism AND the addition of leaven were somehow taken together to be a sign that 'something spiritual' was added to the original doctrine of Moses which made it superior.
When I look to the discussion we just cited in To Theodore in our last post, Clement is clearly acknowledging the existence of TWO Gospels of Mark - where one represents the 'unspiritual lump' and the other - the 'secret text' in Alexandria has had 'spiritual leaven' added to it. This is distinguished against a Carpocratian teaching that has been 'adulterated' with lies.
As I have noted many times here I can't help but see this whole discussion was influenced by the traditional Alexandrian liturgy of the second century - which as I noted was anchored still in the Jewish Festival of Unleavened Bread. Yet more significant than this I think we can still see reflections of Clement's understanding reflected in the hostile writings of the Church Fathers from the period.
There is yet another reference in Clement's 'authentic writings' which deserves comparison with To Theodore. It comes from the Fifth Book of the Stromata where Clement develops a very Marcionite sounding interpretation of 2 Cor 13:2:
To these statements [regarding the highest God being utterly unknowable] the apostle will testify: "I know a man in Christ, caught up into the third heaven, and thence into Paradise, who heard unutterable words which it is not lawful for a man to speak," -- intimating thus the impossibility of expressing God, and indicating that what is divine is unutterable by human power; if, indeed, he begins to speak above the third heaven, as it is lawful to initiate the elect souls in the mysteries there. For I know what is in Plato (for the examples from the barbarian philosophy, which are many, are suggested now by the composition which, in accordance with promises previously given, waits the suitable time). For doubting, in Timaoeus, whether we ought to regard several worlds as to be understood by many heavens, or this one, he makes no distinction in the names, calling the world and heaven by the same name. But the words of the statement are as follows: "Whether, then, have we rightly spoken of one heaven, or of many and infinite? It were more correct to say one, if indeed it was created according to the model." Further, in the Epistle of the Romans to the Corinthians it is written, "An ocean illimitable by men and the worlds after it." Consequently, therefore, the noble apostle exclaims, "Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God!"
And was it not this which the prophet meant, when he ordered unleavened cakes to be made, intimating that the truly sacred mystic word, respecting the unbegotten and His powers, ought to be concealed? In confirmation of these things, in the Epistle to the Corinthians the apostle plainly says: "Howbeit we speak wisdom among those who are perfect, but not the wisdom of this world, or of the princes of this world, that come to nought. But we speak the wisdom of God hidden in a mystery." And again in another place he says: "To the acknowledgment of the mystery of God in Christ, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." These things the Saviour Himself seals when He says: "To you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven." And again the Gospel says that the Saviour spake to the apostles the word in a mystery. For prophecy says of Him: "He will open His mouth in parables, and will utter things kept secret from the foundation of the world." And now, by the parable of the leaven, the Lord shows concealment; for He says, "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened." For the tripartite soul is saved by obedience, through the spiritual power hidden in it by faith; or because the power of the word which is given to us, being strong and powerful, draws to itself secretly and invisibly every one who receives it, and keeps it within himself, and brings his whole system into unity [Strom. v.80.3]
I should spend a moment to explain what THE MARCIONITES thought the Apostle meant by someone - or 'this man' as he says in what follows (I think originally pointing to HIMSELF) - traveling to 'the third heaven."
As Wace summarizes from Eznik:
Marcion is said by Esnig to have taught that there were three heavens: in the highest dwelt the good God, in the second the God of the Law, in the lowest His angels; beneath lay Hyle, or matter, having an independent existence of its own. [p. 697]
We can clearly understand this to mean then that the Father was in the 'third heaven,' the Demiurge who sat in the seventh planetary sphere had is own 'heaven' about the 'six' other planetary watchers (and thus confirming that the Marcionites undoubtedly had a kabbalistic interest in the number six shared by the 'Marcosians' in Alexandria. As I noted their names mean the same thing - those of Mark - and various Church Fathers do acknowledge a Marcionite interest in kabbalah.
Let's get back to our original discussion of Clement's citation. The Alexandrian begins with the 'heavenly revelation' that led to the establishment of the Marcionite gospel and moves to acknowledge that even though God originally gave this revelation to mankind he also mandated that it should be 'hidden' like the leaven in the meals.
I see an uncanny consistency throughout the writings of Clement regarding a 'spiritual substance' being 'hidden' in the 'lump' of the word of God - viz. the gospel.
Now I don't want to rehash my old arguments that the Marcionite gospel was clearly understood by Marcionites to be the original text behind the Catholic Gospel of Mark but those arguments are available to readers of this post here. I would prefer instead to continue to identify the opinion just cited by Clement as one used by the heretics to promote the superiority of their 'spiritual' tradition over that of the Roman Catholic Church.
Just as Clement speaks of the significance of the leaven of 'spiritual power'and the mysteries of God needing to be 'hidden' in the word of God Irenaeus in his discussion of things 'added' to the Marcosian gospel notes that those of Mark "adduce an unspeakable number of hidden and spurious writings, which they themselves have forged, to bewilder the minds of foolish men, and of such as are ignorant of the Scriptures of truth." [AH i.20.1]
Indeed note that just as Clement writes in the Stromata that "by the parable of the leaven, the Lord shows concealment; for He says, 'The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.' For the tripartite soul is saved by obedience, through the spiritual power hidden in it by faith; or because the power of the word which is given to us, being strong and powerful, draws to itself secretly and invisibly every one who receives it, and keeps it within himself, and brings his whole system into unity" [Strom v.80.2] Irenaeus clearly knows of this interpretation but takes it to distinguish the two churches where the two 'versions' of the Gospel of Mark were kept - i.e. Rome and Alexandria when he writes:
Also the parable of the leaven which the woman is described [by these heretics] as having hid in three measures of meal, they declare to make manifest the three classes. For, according to their teaching, the woman represented Sophia; the three measures of meal, the three kinds of men-- spiritual, animal, and material; while the leaven denoted the Saviour Himself. Paul, too, very plainly set forth the material, animal, and spiritual, saying in one place, "As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy;" and in another place, "But the animal man receiveth not the things of the Spirit;" and again: "He that is spiritual judgeth all things." And this, "The animal man receiveth not the things of the Spirit," they affirm to have been spoken concerning the Demiurge, who, as being animal, knew neither his mother who was spiritual, nor her seed, nor the AEons in the Pleroma. And that the Saviour received first-fruits of those whom He was to save, Paul declared when he said, "And if the first-fruits be holy, the lump is also holy," teaching that the expression "first- fruits" denoted that which is spiritual, but that "the lump" meant us, that is, the animal Church, the lump of which they say He assumed, and blended it with Himself, inasmuch as He is "the leaven."[AH i.8.3]
There can be no doubt that Irenaeus is attacking Clement's interpretation. Could Secret Mark be the hidden writing also identified by the Church Father? I think so.
Interesting also is the fact that it is only by Book Three - the place the fourfold gospel is finally revealed - that Irenaeus also starts identifying the Roman Church as 'the unadulterated' tradition. Could this be from coming into contact with arguments like that in To Theodore? Look at some of the statements in that text. Irenaeus puts forward and argument that God "has preserved to us the unadulterated Scriptures in Egypt" - albeit referencing the LXX translation of the Old Testament; the Marcionites apparently used Theodotian's translation.
In another place he clearly references arguments from Clement of Alexandria when he writes that:
when, however, they [the heretics] are confuted from [our] Scriptures, they turn round and accuse these same Scriptures, as if they were not correct, nor of authority, and [assert] that they are ambiguous, and that the truth cannot be extracted from them by those who are ignorant of tradition. For [they allege] that the truth was not delivered by means of written documents, but viva voce: wherefore also Paul declared, "But we speak wisdom among those that are perfect, but not the wisdom of this world." And this wisdom each one of them alleges to be the fiction of his own inventing, forsooth; so that, according to their idea, the truth properly resides at one time in Valentinus, at another in Marcion, at another in Cerinthus, then afterwards in Basilides, or has even been indifferently in any other opponent, who could speak nothing pertaining to salvation. For every one of these men, being altogether of a perverse disposition, depraving the system of truth, is not ashamed to preach himself.
But, again, when we refer them to that tradition which originates from the apostles, [and] which is preserved by means of the succession of presbyters in the Churches, they object to tradition, saying that they themselves are wiser not merely than the presbyters, but even than the apostles, because they have discovered the unadulterated truth. For [they maintain] that the apostles intermingled the things of the law with the words of the Saviour; and that not the apostles alone, but even the Lord Himself, spoke as at one time from the Demiurge, at another from the intermediate place, and yet again from the Pleroma, but that they themselves, indubitably, unsulliedly, and purely, have knowledge of the hidden mystery: this is, indeed, to blaspheme their Creator after a most impudent manner! It comes to this, therefore, that these men do now consent neither to Scripture nor to tradition. [AH iii.2.1,2]
Clearly referencing 'those who prefer the gospel of Mark' [cf AH iii.11.7] over the other gospels Irenaeus writes:
These men do, in fact, set the Spirit aside altogether; they understand that Christ was one and Jesus another; and they teach that there was not one Christ, but many. And if they speak of them as united, they do again separate them: for they show that one did indeed undergo sufferings, but that the other remained impassible; that the one truly did ascend to the Pleroma, but the other remained in the intermediate place; that the one does truly feast and revel in places invisible and above all name, but that the other is seated with the Demiurge, emptying him of power. It will therefore be incumbent upon thee, and all others who give their attention to this writing, and are anxious about their own salvation, not readily to express acquiescence when they hear abroad the speeches of these men: for, speaking things resembling the [doctrine of the] faithful, as I have already observed, not only do they hold opinions which are different, but absolutely contrary, and in all points full of blasphemies, by which they destroy those persons who, by reason of the resemblance of the words, imbibe a poison which disagrees with their constitution, just as if one, giving lime mixed with water for milk, should mislead by the similitude of the colour; as a man" superior to me has said, concerning all that in any way corrupt the things of God and adulterate the truth, "Lime is wickedly mixed with the milk of God." [ibid 17.1]
And again:
But, again, when we refer them to that tradition which originates from the apostles, [and] which is preserved by means of the succession of presbyters in the Churches, they object to tradition, saying that they themselves are wiser not merely than the presbyters, but even than the apostles, because they have discovered the unadulterated truth [ibid 15.1]
I have to go to bed but I think the reader get's the general idea. Irenaeus likely developed the idea that the heretical tradition was 'adulterated' as a response to traditional Marcionite attack against those who tried deny the existence of a higher God than that associated with traditional Judaism. Good night ...
