I cannot explain what the origins of the name 'Paul' are other than to say that even in the accepted canonical sources it is not the original name of the apostle. There is a great deal of ambiguity in Acts about why he takes on this appelation. Without much in the way of explanation he changes from being called by one name and takes on another. One can only suppose that the exact reason for this transformation was held to be the deepest of mysteries among the earliest Catholic writers. It is enough to say that the Marcionite rejection of the Acts of the Apostles included the claim that Saul was Paul's original name.
Indeed when Irenaeus discusses the Marcionite rejection of 'Paul' it is clearly done by way of Acts 9:4:
It follows then, as of course, that these men must either receive the rest of [Luke's] narrative, or else reject these parts also. For no persons of common sense can permit them to receive some things recounted by Luke as being true, and to set others aside, as if he had not known the truth. And if indeed those of Marcion reject these, they will then possess no Gospel; for, curtailing that according to Luke, as I have said already, they boast in having the Gospel. But the followers of Valentinus must give up their utterly vain talk; for they have taken from that many occasions for their own speculations, to put an evil interpretation upon what he has well said. If, on the other hand, they feel compelled to receive the remaining portions also, then, by studying the perfect Gospel, and the doctrine of the apostles, they will find it necessary to repent, that they may be saved from the danger [to which they are exposed]. But again, we allege the same against those who do not know the apostle Paul (qui Paulum Apostolum non cognoscunt): that they should either reject the other words of the Gospel which we have come to know through Luke alone, and not make use of them; or else, if they do receive all these, they must necessarily admit also that testimony concerning Paul, when he (Luke) tells us that the Lord spoke at first to him from heaven: "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?" [Irenaeus Against Heresies 3.15.1]
We have already demonstrated in our last discussion that the 'others' here who are here identified as rejecting not only Acts's claims about the apostle being formerly known as Saul but don't know him as 'Paul' are the same 'other' Marcionites who employ a gospel according to Mark as their preferred liturgical text.
Indeed it is difficult to get around the idea that the two Marcionite groups earlier distinguished in Book Three of Against Heresies as using two different gospels necessarily represent the catechumen and the presbytery of the Marcionite Church. What stands in our way of this understanding is the all the shoddy interpretation of the various Patristic reports on the Marcionite tradition.
There can be no doubt that von Harnack is the main reason for the popular misunderstanding of who and what Marcion was. Yet all the blame cannot fall on his shoulders alone. There is a real tendency to avoid seeing that all the early reports about the Marcionites were clearly filtered through a single source - Irenaeus. This is especially true in the case of Tertullian of Carthage who many pretend is the actual author of the Five Books Against Marcion. It is very unlikely that Tertullian ever met a 'Marcionite,' visited one of their churches or actually saw their New Testament canon.
Nowhere is this situation made plainer than the very opening words of the five volume work which serve as a kind of confession that what has survived is a many times corrupt version of someone else original work:
Nothing I have previously written against Marcion is any longer my concern. I am embarking upon a new work to replace an old one. My first edition, too hurriedly produced, I afterwards withdrew, substituting a fuller treatment. This also, before enough copies had been made, was stolen from me by a person, at that time a Christian but afterwards an apostate, who chanced to have copied out some extracts very incorrectly, and shewed them to a group of people. Hence the need for correction. The opportunity provided by this revision has moved me to make some additions. Thus this written work, a third succeeding a second, and instead of third from now on the first, needs to begin by reporting the demise of the work it supersedes, so that no one may be perplexed if in one place or another he comes across varying forms of it. [Tertullian Against Marcion 1.1]
In my opinion, it is highly unlikely that this prologue was even written by Tertullian himself. It was clearly done after someone stumbled upon one of Tertullian's original sources and the inaccuracy and reworking of what appears here was plainly manifest. At the very least this sign should serve as a warning for anyone who would want to use the Five Books uncritically (even though there are so many who do).
I have demonstrated on more than one occasion that the three layers to Books Four and Books Five of Tertullian's Against Marcion necessarily correspond to:
- an original Syrian author who employed a Diatessaron (and thus pointed to things which Marcion 'removed' from sources other than Luke) and had an Apostolikon which resembles Ephrem's (i.e. with the order reflected in Book Five - Galatians, Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Romans etc.). The author here argued that it was reckless for Marcion to have cut an original 'complete' gospel (i.e. the Diatessaron) into a much shorter narrative.
- Irenaeus's Greek translation of that original Syriac work was modified into an argument reflecting the agenda of various parts of Against Heresies (i.e. that Luke rather than the Diatessaron was the original Evangelium 'cut' by Marcion).
- Tertullian's Latin translation of Irenaeus's newly refashioned work with typical glosses and additions by the third century author.
Tertullian's Against the Valentinians is proof that the Carthaginian modified early versions of Irenaean material. Book Three of Against Marcion and Tertullian's Against the Jews go back to some original work by Justin. There are may other examples of this loose translating of earlier works in those works now ascribed to Tertullian. All of which makes the suggestion that Book Four and Five of Tertullian's Against Marcion is the "other work" which Irenaeus says we will write "to refute them (i.e. the Marcionites) out of these (portions of the gospel and Apostolikon) which they still retain." (Irenaeus Against Heresies 3.11.12)
Of course no one should become distracted by my suggestion here. One can continue to read Tertullian's work as if he were merely 'influenced' by Irenaeus's pioneering heresiological works. Yet all of this helps to distract us from the fact that Irenaeus is really the first person to 'invent' the whole idea of 'Marcion' (as I noted in a previous post he never referred to 'Marcionites' in the plural only 'those of Marcion' a category which was apparently quite broad).
There can be no doubt that Irenaeus would point to his master Polycarp as a witness to the reality of the heretical boogeyman 'Marcion.' Nevertheless there is so much inherent ambiguity about his reporting and a parallel female figure of 'Marcellina' who not only shares a similar name but comes to Rome under similar circumstances (and is even taken by Jerome to be the first Marcionite in the city). Yet one can't help but wonder whether Irenaeus's inaccuracies as a source (or perhaps that his writings were preserved in a very corrupt form) might be the cause of much of the confusion that emerges.
What is glaringly obvious from the get go is that no comprehensive treatment of 'Marcion' exists anywhere in Irenaeus's Against Heresies. Whereas the bulk of the work is taken up by a fairly detailed account of the Valentinians and Marcosians (AH 1.1 - 21) Marcion actually only gets about three paragraphs in an account which starts as a discussion of a certain 'Cerdo' ('fox') and even this is almost generally acknowledged to have been taken over from an original report in the Syntagma of Justin Martyr.
In other words, it is very curious that if 'Marcion' is indeed as important a figure as he appears in later literature why Irenaeus would omit to actually write something of substance about him. Instead we get a short summary which only devotes a single paragraph to his 'gospel shortening.' We read:
Marcion of Pontus succeeded him, and developed his doctrine. In so doing, he advanced the most daring blasphemy against Him who is proclaimed as God by the law and the prophets, declaring Him to be the author of evils, to take delight in war, to be infirm of purpose, and even to be contrary to Himself. But Jesus being derived from that father who is above the God that made the world, and coming into Judaea in the times of Pontius Pilate the governor, who was the procurator of Tiberius Caesar, was manifested in the form of a man to those who were in Judaea, abolishing the prophets and the law, and all the works of that God who made the world, whom also he calls Cosmocrator. Besides this, he mutilates the Gospel which is according to Luke, removing all that is written respecting the generation of the Lord, and setting aside a great deal of the teaching of the Lord, in which the Lord is recorded as most dearly confessing that the Maker of this universe is His Father. He likewise persuaded his disciples that he himself was more worthy of credit than are those apostles who have handed down the Gospel to us, furnishing them not with the Gospel, but merely a fragment of it. In like manner, too, he dismembered the Epistles of Paul, removing all that is said by the apostle respecting that God who made the world, to the effect that He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and also those passages from the prophetical writings which the apostle quotes, in order to teach us that they announced beforehand the coming of the Lord. [AH 1.27.2]
It is very difficult to believe that Irenaeus himself actually wrote these words. For one the author of the Philosophumena clearly read Book One and did not cite this account of Marcion choosing instead to argue that the Marcionites claimed to possess the true Gospel of Mark. Moreover, Irenaeus is unversally acknowledged to argue in his Proof of the Apostolic Preaching that Pilate was the procurator of Claudius. The idea being that Jesus lived almost twenty years after his thirtieth birthday only to be crucified under Pilate in the reign of Tiberius's successor.
The point here is that an uncritical reading of Irenaeus has basically reinforced the idea that the Marcionites only had one gospel and that it was a shortened version of Luke. Yet this is certainly not the actual understanding of Irenaeus himself. The only other substantial references to Marcion appear in Book Three of Against Heresies. Here 'Marcion' is identified as having come to Rome in the middle of the second century (under circumstances which are suspiciously similar to the report of Marcellina the Carpocratian in the anonymous hypomnemata later associated with 'Hegesippus'). 'Marcion' is also cited extensively in chapter eleven of Book Three as rejecting the Gospel of John (AH 3.11.2) and then the rest of the material which follows defines the beginnings of each of the three synoptic gospels and ultimately argues on behalf of the idea of a fourth gospel - that 'according to John' again against Marcionite objections.
It is important to note that nowhere in this discussion does Irenaeus actually say that the Marcionites only have one gospel. Indeed the whole context of the chapter refutes that idea. The Marcionites clearly admit to having two gospels - the original Evangelium and then some other text which they apparently shortened in the middle of the second century. So we read:
These things being so, all who destroy the form of the Gospel are vain, unlearned, and also audacious; those, [I mean,] who represent the aspects of the Gospel as being either more in number than as aforesaid, or, on the other hand, fewer. The former class [do so], that they may seem to have discovered more than is of the truth; the latter, that they may set the dispensations of God aside. For Marcion, rejecting the entire Gospel, yea rather, cutting himself off from the Gospel, boasts that he has part of the Gospel. Others (alli) truly, in order that they might set frustrate the gift of the spirit which in recent times has been poured out upon humankind by the good pleasure of the father, do not admit that aspect [of the fourfold gospel] which is according to the gospel of John, in which the Lord promised that he would send the paraclete, but simultaneously put away both the gospel and the prophetic spirit; wretched men indeed! who wish to be pseudo- prophets, forsooth, but who set aside the gift of prophecy from the Church; acting like those who, on account of such as come in hypocrisy, hold themselves aloof from the communion of the brethren. We must conclude, moreover, that these men can not admit the Apostle Paul either. For, in his Epistle to the Corinthians, he speaks expressly of prophetical gifts, and recognises men and women prophesying in the Church. Sinning, therefore, in all these particulars, against the Spirit of God, they fall into the irremissible sin. [AH 3.11.9]
It is important to note that this twofold division of the Marcionites into those who use a shortened gospel and those who reject John as the 'more spiritual' gospel exactly corresponds - according to Irenaeus - to communities which use a shortened gospel (which Irenaeus claims is a shortened Luke) and those who use a fuller gospel of Mark:
Such, then, are the first principles of the Gospel: that there is one God, the Maker of this universe; He who was also announced by the prophets, and who by Moses set forth the dispensation of the law,--[principles] which proclaim the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and ignore any other God or Father except Him. So firm is the ground upon which these Gospels rest, that the very heretics themselves bear witness to them, and, starting from these [documents], each one of them endeavours to establish his own peculiar doctrine. For the Ebionites, who use Matthew's Gospel only, are confuted out of this very same, making false suppositions with regard to the Lord. But Marcion, mutilating that according to Luke, is proved to be a blasphemer of the only existing God, from those [passages] which he still retains. Those (qui autem) who separate Jesus from Christ, alleging that Christ remained impassible, but that it was Jesus who suffered, preferring the Gospel by Mark, if they read it with a love of truth, may have their errors rectified. Those (hi autem qui) who follow Valentinus, making copious use of that according to John, to illustrate their conjunctions, shall be proved to be totally in error by means of this very Gospel, as I have shown in the first book. Since, then, our opponents do bear testimony to us, and make use of these [documents], our proof derived from them is firm and true. [AH 3.11.7]
It is absolutely impossible to argue that these two groups which appear side by side throughout the whole of chapter eleven and which go back to an original understanding on Irenaeus's part that Marcion rejected the gospel of John (a claim attributed to the second class of Marcionites in AH 3.11.9).
The point I want to make here is that if we just look for a moment at what appears in Irenaeus's surviving writings, all of what gets passed down to Tertullian's Five Books Against Marcion and the Philosophumena in the third century is still utterly consistent with the idea that the Marcionites used two gospels. Irenaeus's point is to argue that the shortened gospel was corrupted from Luke. Tertullian helps us understand the underlying purpose of this claim. For Tertullian makes clear that it was Luke's similarity to the arguments of the Antitheses (a Marcionite 'letter' which circulated in the second century which explained why the gospel was a revelation developed from a better god that the one who revealed the Law to Moses) which end up proving Luke as the original source for Marcionite's 'curtailed gospel.' In other words, Tertullian says 'we know that the Marcionite gospel is a corruption of Luke because the Antitheses match perfectly with what periscopes appear in the Gospel of Luke.'
Yet if we stand back from this claim it is obvious that the one possibility which is not considered is that Luke was developed specifically to refute the claims of the Antitheses. In other words, Irenaeus simply took what scriptures the Marcionites were using to develop their case for Jesus being someone other than the Creator and then changing the wording and the context of each to 'prove' that Marcion not only 'shortened' the original gospel in order to make his public gospel (which apparently circulated alongside the Antitheses) but that it was he who changed the original wording of Luke in order to develop his 'heretical' antinomian arguments.
This is a very important point for us to consider. The Marcionites seem to have acknowledged that their founder established two forms of the gospel - a short gospel which described Jesus's ministry and his crucifixion and the full narrative which was kept in secret. The Marcionites had to have supported the existence of these two gospels from 1 Corinthians 2.1 - 3.10 (all things Marcionite were ultimately supported by references to the Apostikon). Irenaeus seems to indicate that the Marcionite pro-evangelium was the gospel of Mark (AH 3.11.9). The only difference which stood between the two communities was (a) when the 'curtailing' of the gospel took place (the Marcionites said it happened in the apostolic period while Irenaeus idenified it as happening during the reign of Antoninus) and (b) whether the shortened gospel was a curtailed Mark (a logical inference from the material) or a shortened Luke (so Irenaeus's propaganda).
The point again is that it is difficult to argue against the idea that the Marcionite paradigm was not identical with what is manifest in the Letter to Theodore (and implicit in Clement's other reference to the concept of a twofold division to the gospels). The idea of dividing the gospel into two is also present in the Shepherd of Hermas and other contemporary sources. Irenaeus ultimate expansion to four gospels interestingly subordinates the two Marcionite gospels (Luke, Mark) as being written by those who never actually saw Jesus. This can't be accidental (it was vigorously disputed by Marcionites cf. Adamantius 1.5).
