In our last series of posts we demonstrated that Clement uses the same methdology in the Letter to Theodore as we find in his undisputed 'homily' (identified by scholars as 'Quis Dives Salvetur' but only identified as a 'homily' in the original manuscript tacked on to a collection of writings by Origen).; In either case Clement cites material from a non-canonical gospel as well as certain inferences drawn by opponents of the 'true Church' and then proceeds to use the canonical gosple of Mark to demonstrate that their opinions are false. In the case of Quis Dives Salvetur the cited material matches what is found in a number of gospels related to the Gospel According to the Hebrews - the Persian Diatessaron of Aphrahat, the Manichaean Diatesssaron and perhaps, the Marcionite Gospel of Christ (itself undoubtedly also a 'Diatessaronic text') - to counter claims that Jesus declared that rich people could not enter 'the kingdom of heaven.' In the case of to Theodore, a claim reported to him initially by a certain Theodore in a previous correspondance that the text contained a passage which demostrated that Jesus' favored disciple 'loved' him while both men were naked together.
I have noted many times that the fact that Clement uses the gospel according to Mark alone of the canonical set to counter what he claims to be 'erroneous' or uninformed opinions is a powerful argument for the authenticity of the Letter to Theodore. Clement never tells us the name of the non-canonical gospel being used by his opponnents in Quis Dives Salvetur, nor does he give us their name. Nevertheless we learn from a parallel argument at the beginning of the Third Book of the Stromateis (and a related line of reasoning at the end of the series i.e. Stromata 7.16) that the sect in question is certainly the Carpocratians.
We demonstrated in at least five places in Book Three of the Stromateis that Clement cites further material from the Question of the Rich Man (Mark 10:17 - 31) which indicates a strong resemblance with the non-canonical gospels just mentioned and especially the Marcionite gospel. Jesus for instance is understood by both the Carpocratians and Clement himself to have given a new commandment in the pericope - 'thou shalt not lust' which is connected with the dictum which follows "Sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and come, follow Me." Furthermore, Clement explicitly states that the Question of the Greatest Commandment (Mark 12:34 - 46) was asked by the same rich youth. In both cases Clement's citation of material from this 'secret' (or 'unnamed') gospel agrees with the non-canonical witnesses (the Gospel According to the Hebrews, the Marcionite gospel and other Diatessaronic texts) against the four canonical texts. But more importantly.
In spite of these differences again, Clement in both the Letter to Theodore and Quis Dives Salvetur brings forward 'the gospel according to Mark' (i.e. canonical Mark) to explain what the author of the 'secret' (or 'unnamed') gospel was trying to say. This can only be an indication in my opinion not only of a consistent exegetical methodology (as stated earlier) but the fact that the unnamed gospel in Quis Dives Salvetur is also 'Secret Mark.' The connection with the Gospel According to the Hebrews is significant because of what Morton Smith, one of the greatest scholars of his generation, determined about his discovered text. As Scott Brown demonstrates in his Mark's Other Gospel, after consulting with a number of contemporary scholars:
Smith noticed that the placement of the first addition to canonical Mark (LGM 1) within the section of Mark leading up to the passion narrative corresponds to the placement of the raising of Lazarus within the Gospel of John. Smith carried this observation further and noted extensive parallels between the materials within Mark 10:1–34 plus LGM 1 and John 10:40–11:54, indeed, between the whole of Mark 6:32–15:47 and John 6:1–19:42.13. The pervasive differences between the two gospels even where these parallels exist, however, led Smith to conclude that neither John nor longer Mark was directly dependent upon the other as a source but, rather, that both authors had recourse to very different Greek editions of an earlier Aramaic gospel." [Brown Mark's Other Gospel p. 7]This would certainly explain the consistent similarities with the Gospel According to the Hebrews but, as we noted in our last series of posts, the gospel being cited in Quis Dives Salvetur, the Stromateis and the Instructor cannot be either the Gospel According to the Hebrews or a canonical text. It is a non-canonical gospel, related to the Gospel According to the Hebrews, but ultimately different from it. Our only clue again, is that Clement uses the canonical gospel according to Mark to explain the text, which - given the discovery of the Letter to Theodore - would indicate that the text is most likely the so-called 'Secret Mark' mentioned in the Mar Saba document.
Given that this line of reasoning is so straightforward and so utterly unassailable I find it difficult to believe that no one has noticed this before us. I think that part of the problem is that the existing generation of scholars all want to use or abuse the Letter to the Theodore in order to advance their existing theories about the origins of Christianity and the gospels. Perhaps it will only be when the current generation of melonheads dies out that we can hope to have a fair assessment of the significance of the discovery ... or perhaps we can continue to do what we have been doing at this blog - i.e. demonstrating that the text is utterly consistent with the beliefs and exegetical practices of Clement of Alexandria.
Indeed in this post I would like to take what we have discovered so far to the next level and demonstrate that Clement's explanation of the Question of the Rich Man necessarily anticipates the existence of the raising of the rich youth (i.e. LGM 1) which is identified as closely following the conclusion of the Question of the Rich Man pericope according to his testimony in the Letter to Theodore. According to his comparative analysis with the canonical 'gospel according to Mark' in to Theodore, the introduction of new material involving a dead (and 'rich') youth occurs after Mark 10:34. The Question of the Rich Youth ends at Mark 10:32 and Morton Smith already notes numerous linguistic similarities between LGM 1 and Mark 10:17 - 31 in his 1973 book.
Where our analysis supercedes that of Smith is that the similarities in turn between the non-canonical gospel cited in Quis Dives Salvetur and the Gospel According to the Hebrews in particular make it almost certain that Clement's 'secret' (or 'unnamed') gospel - which the Alexandrian 'preferred' over all others - was Diatessaronic. As we have noted several times now, the Rev. C W Phillips first noticed that the Gospel According to the Hebrews betrayed an uncanny integration of three scriptural pericopes - (1) the Rich Fool and related material (Luke 12), (2) the Question of the Rich Youth and (3) the Rich Man and Lazarus (Luke 16). Phillips and numerous Diatesaronic scholars after him have concluded that the two 'rich' men of (1) and (2) end up meeting in the underworld - where presumably the 'rich youth' of (2) ultimately 'dies' ('ritually' or otherwise). This has always seemed to be the perfect set up for the resurrection of the beloved youth who was rich in LGM 1. I think by continuing our analysis of Clement's interpretation of the Question of the Rich Youth we can finally confirm our initial suspicions.
Perhaps the place to start this breakthrough in terms of confirming the authenticity of to Theodore is to go back to the original reference in Quis Dives Salvetur which demonstrates the non-canonical gospel shared by Clement's Alexandrian Church and his opponents was related to the Gospel According to the Hebrews and the Diatessaronic tradition. Clement begins Quis Dives Salvetur with a citation of an unknown gospel by an adversary:
some, merely hearing, and that in an off-hand way, the utterance of the Saviour, 'that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven,' despair of themselves as not destined to live, surrender all to the world, cling to the present life as if it alone was left to them, and so diverge more from the way to the life to come, no longer inquiring either whom the Lord and Master calls rich, or how that which is impossible to man becomes possible to God." (Quis Dives Salvetur 2)
As noted above Clement's methodology is not to attack the non-canonical gospel but to demonstrate that it is utterly consistent with the canonical set of four and that his opponents have merely misinterpreted the text. To do with Clement cites the canonical gospel according to Mark where instead of 'the kingdom of heaven' we read 'the kingdom of God.' Clement indicates after his complete citation of his Alexandrian Church's 'canonical Mark' that the other canonical gospels (i.e. Matthew and Luke) agree with its terminology (including undoubtedly the use of 'the kingdom of God' in place of 'the kingdom of heaven') - i.e."in all the rest correspondingly; although perchance the expressions vary slightly in each, yet all show identical agreement in meaning."
It is important to note that Clement never once says that 'the kingdom of God' and the 'kingdom of heaven' are synonyms for one another. In fact, as we have demonstrated, the exact opposite seems to be the case agreeing with what Irenaeus reports of the heretics (viz. that there are three different places gives as 'rewards' for the three different natures of humanity according to divine prominence). Let's avoid delving to deeply into these matters and noting instead that the only other time in Clement's undisputed writings when Clement cites the above mentioned line from the Question of the Rich Youth he goes out of his way to avoid demonstrating his preferred reading (i.e. whether the rich man will find it difficult to attain 'the kingdom of God' or the 'kingdom of heaven'). We read:
Much more, then, is the Scripture to be believed which says, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man " to lead a philosophic life. But, on the other hand, it blesses "the poor;" as Plato understood when he said, "It is not the diminishing of one's resources, but the augmenting of insatiableness, that is to be considered poverty; for it is not slender means that ever constitutes poverty, but insatiableness, from which the good man being free, will also be rich." [Stromata 2.5]It is absolutely significant that Clement does not add either the 'kingdom of God' or the 'kingdom of heaven' to complete the saying here. It is always very important to pay attention to the subtleties of Clement's exegesis.
In Quis Dives Salvetur (like Stromata 3.4, 11 etc.) Clement cites a passage from the non-canonical gospel shared with his opponents and instead of attacking the 'flaws' in the text (i.e. owing to its disagreement with all the acknowledged canonical witnesses) he goes on to demonstrate how they are in 'concord' with one another even if on the surface they seem to be saying two different things. In the case of the text cited in Stromata 2.5 Clement avoids acknowledging what plainly must be that in fact he prefers the same reading as the heretics - i.e. '"It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven' (as opposed to the 'kingdom of God'). Instead he goes to speak of 'attaining the philosophical life' and in what follows, referencing the 'poor' as a condition of soul rather than individuals who have little or no material goods.
It might be instructive to see what Clement confirms his understanding of 'the philosophical life' is going back to the conclusion of the Exhortation to the Greeks, his earliest surviving work. It is there we see here that 'philosophy' (i.e. the love of wisdom) is related consistently related back to the image of a man 'loving' God:
we have as our teacher Him that filled the universe with His holy energies in creation, salvation, beneficence, legislation, prophecy, teaching, we have the Teacher from whom all instruction comes; and the whole world, with Athens and Greece, has already become the domain of the Word. For you, who believed the poetical fable which designated Minos the Cretan as the bosom friend (επιστήθιοσ φίλοσ) of Zeus, will not refuse to believe that we who have become the disciples of God have received the only true wisdom; and that which the chiefs of philosophy only guessed at, the disciples of Christ have both apprehended and proclaimed. And the one whole Christ is not divided: "There is neither barbarian, nor Jew, nor Greek, neither male nor female, but a new man," transformed by God's Holy Spirit. Further, the other counsels and precepts are unimportant, and respect particular things,--as, for example, if one may marry, take part in public affairs, beget children; but the only command that is universal, and over the whole course of existence, at all times and in all circumstances, tends to the highest end, viz., life, is piety, --all that is necessary, in order that we may live for ever, being that we live in accordance with it. [Exhortation 11]It is only because scholarship has not done its job integrating the Letter to Theodore into the 'canon' of accepted writings of this Church Father that we have not properly understood the greater message from Clement.
When for instance Clement concludes the Letter to Theodore with the reference to:
Now the true exegesis and that which accords with the true philosophy...Clement is still thinking of the 'misinformation' being spread by the heretics (or those condemning them) that LGM 1 is a reference to a homosexual love between Jesus and his beloved disciple. What then is 'the true philosophy' or the true love of God (i.e 'wisdom') if it is not the physical love that so many scholars can only see being described in the passage from the Letter to Theodore? The initial reference in the Exhortation to king Minos is critical because it represents our clearest understanding of what 'the truth' was hidden by the seven veils in the inner sanctum of the Church of St. Mark in Alexandria.
The original reference to Minos as the bosom friend of Zeus comes from the Odyssey Book 19:
And in Crete is Knossos, a great city, and in it Minos ruled for nine seasons (= ennead Gk ἐννεάς), the bosom friend (επιστήθιοσ φίλοσ) of mighty Zeus.There was a mystery associated with the worship of Cretan Minos involving a throne, Minos resting in the bosom of Zeus, the ennead which occured in a cave. The term 'bosom friend' (επιστήθιοσ φίλοσ) was commonly used for an intimate who rested on one's chest during a drinking party. The title became associated in Christian circles with the apostle John in numerous Biblical manuscripts obviously developing from the representations of the association between 'beloved disciple' and Jesus in the gospel.
While there is nothing explicitly homosexual about the term επιστήθιοσ φίλοσ, its explicit reference to physical 'love' between man and man could be used in association with homosexual couples. So we see that as early as the Gilgamesh Epic, Gilgamesh and Enkidu are both lovers and 'bosom friends.' However it is important to note that Minos is never so described, undoubtedly because the enthroned king is usually described as 'the son of Zeus.' This is clearly the context for Clement's comparison of the mysteries of the pagans and those of his Alexandrian community. Minos, who was clearly not originally 'the son of Zeus' anywhere in Homer becomes so adopted owing to his experience in the cave at Knossos.
Indeed if we look carefully Clement seems to be reacting here to something said originally by Celsus, the most famous critic of Christianity, and preserved in part in the writings of his successor Origen. We read in Book Three of Against Celsus that the pagan philosopher:
says of us, that "we ridicule those who worship Jupiter, because his tomb is pointed out in the island of Crete; and yet we worship him who rose from the tomb, although ignorant of the grounds on which the Cretans observe such a custom." Observe now that he thus undertakes the defence of the Cretans, and of Jupiter, and of his tomb, alluding obscurely to the allegorical notions, in conformity with which the myth regarding Jupiter is said to have been invented; while he assails us who acknowledge that our Jesus has been buried, indeed, but who maintain that He has also been raised from the tomb,--a statement which the Cretans have not yet made regarding Jupiter. But since he appears to admit that the tomb of Jupiter is in Crete, when he says that we are ignorant of the grounds on which the Cretans observe such a custom, we reply that Callimachus the Cyrenian, who had read innumerable poetic compositions, and nearly the whole of Greek history, was not acquainted with any allegorical meaning which was contained in the stories about Jupiter and his tomb; and accordingly he accuses the Cretans in his hymn addressed to Jupiter, in the words:- "The Cretans are always liars: for thy tomb, O king, The Cretans have reared; and yet thou didst not die, For thou ever livest." [Against Celsus 3.43]
Regardless of what Clement and Origen claim about Celsus's original point it is clear that there must have been similarities between the two cults. I have noted many times that all indications we get from Alexandria is that a throne - the throne of St. Mark - was at the center of the 'inner sanctum' and had a role in its mysteries. This evidence from Clement and Origen would appear to confirm that suspicion.
Indeed I have noted in many places including published journals that the backrest of the throne has a coded message in Aramaic which alludes to the 'the ninth vision' which I have argued is related to the ninth vision of Zechariah which involves the enthronement of the future messiah with the high priest Jesus (LXX) sitting at his right together on the throne. This surely is as good a lead as any to helpd explain the consistent reference to the mystery of the 'love' of God at the end of all of Clement's surviving works (i.e. Exhortation 11, Stromateis 7.16 and to Theodore). In other words, Jesus's beloved disciple (the names 'John' and 'Mark' are interchangeable in the Coptic tradition as their patron saint possessed two names) was understood to be resting on Jesus's bosom after the Passion, and thus fulfills the expectation that is immediately introduced after LGM 1 - i.e. the Request of Salome (Mark 10:35 - 45) on behalf of her sons to sit beside Jesus.
Indeed too much of the focus which follows Mark 10:32 - 34 and its prediction of Jesus's suffering in Jerusalem is directed toward the crucifixion. The original understanding (as witnessed by Ephrem most explicitly) is that Jesus is also throwing down the gauntlet in front of the disciples to ask them to earn the right to be enthroned at the conclusion of the Passion. This is why the Question of Salome immediately follows Mark 10:32 - 34 in both the canonical gospel of Mark and the Diatessaronic tradition. It is also worth noting that Ephrem suggests that Salome's son 'John' succeeded in attaining this enthronement.
Of course it is worth pointing out that the arrangement of Secret Mark suggests that some sort of ritual initiation separated the two narratives. As we noted above, the same 'rich youth' of Mark 10;17 - 31 'dies' goes and goes down into the underworld to see the 'rich fool' suffering in flames. He also encounters a certain 'Lazarus' (who is clearly 'Eliezer' the servant of Abraham in Genesis who is identified by the numerological significance of his name - i.e. 318 - in Genesis 14.14). The introduction of Lazarus clearly points to the introduction of something 'mystic.' The fact that as Morton Smith notes above, that John can have a version of LGM 1 which identifies the youth emerging from the tomb as the very name which the same individual encounters in the underworld suggests some underlying transformation or exchange of souls.
While all of this is speculative it is impossible for us to disregard that just before Celsus introduces the comparison of the mysteries of Christianity with the throne rites of Minos, he clearly intimates that they involved some 'transformation' of mortals into immortals - exactly paralleling Minos's reintroduction to the world as a 'son of God' after his reemergence from the cave at Knossos. We will cite the whole preceding section in Book Three just before the introduction of the throne rites of Minos:
We must notice the remarks which Celsus next makes, when he says to us, that "faith, having taken possession of our minds, makes us yield the assent which we give to the doctrine of Jesus ... regarding he, who was but a mortal body, as a God, and with supposing that we act piously in so doing." It is superfluous to say any more in answer to this, as a great deal has been said in the preceding pages. And yet let those who make this charge understand that He whom we regard and believe to have been from the beginning God, and the Son of God, is the very Logos, and the very Wisdom, and the very Truth; and with respect to His mortal body, and the human soul which it contained, we assert that not by their communion merely with Him, but by their unity and intermixture, they received the highest powers, and after participating in His divinity, were changed into God. And if any one should feel a difficulty at our saying this regarding His body, let him attend to what is said by the Greeks regarding matter, which, properly speaking, being without qualities, receives such as the Creator desires to invest it with, and which frequently divests itself of those which it formerly possessed, and assumes others of a different and higher kind. And if these opinions be correct, what is there wonderful in this, that the mortal quality of the body of Jesus, if the providence of God has so willed it, should have been changed into one that was ethereal and divine?Clearly there is some intimation on the part of Celsus that he has learned that the Christians - many scholars have speculated, the Christians of Alexandria in particular - had a throne rite where initiates had their nature's transformed through some unknown procedure. While there are a number of ways that we might like to explore this possibility perhaps the most fruitful might be to continue to scrutinize what Clement says about the Question of the Rich Youth as it seems to confirm Celsus's intimations about the secret rites of Christianity.
Celsus, then, does not speak as a good reasoner, when he compares the mortal flesh of Jesus to gold, and silver, and stone, asserting that the former is more liable to corruption than the latter ... But, admitting that there are degrees of corruptibility, we can say in answer, that if it is possible for the matter which underlies all qualities to exchange some of them, how should it be impossible for the flesh of Jesus also to exchange qualities, and to become such as it was proper for a body to be which had its abode in the ether and the regions above it, and possessing no longer the infirmities belonging to the flesh, and those properties which Celsus terms "impurities," and in so terming them, speaks unlike a philosopher? For that which is properly impure, is so because of its wickedness. Now the nature of body is not impure; for in so far as it is bodily nature, it does not possess vice, which is the generative principle of impurity. But, as he had a suspicion of the answer which we would return, he says with respect to the change of the body of Jesus, "Well, after he has laid aside these qualities, he will be a God and if so why not rather Aesculapius, and Dionysus, and Hercules?"
He next says of us, that "we ridicule those who worship Jupiter, because his tomb is pointed out in the island of Crete; and yet we worship him who rose from the tomb, although ignorant of the grounds on which the Cretans observe such a custom." Observe now that he thus undertakes the defence of the Cretans, and of Jupiter, and of his tomb, alluding obscurely to the allegorical notions, in conformity with which the myth regarding Jupiter is said to have been invented; while he assails us who acknowledge that our Jesus has been buried, indeed, but who maintain that He has also been raised from the tomb
We have demonstrated many times now that Origen's citation of the Gospel According to the Hebrews in his Commentary on Matthew 15:14 demonstrated to a number of Diatessaronic scholars that there was a particular ordering of passages in the material around the Question of the Rich Youth which suggested that he ended up in the underworld only to rise again. Why this would appear immediately before Jesus's 'Passion' in Jerusalem is unclear, but part of this obscurity has to be related to the fact that no one has ever managed to give a proper explanation for the reason that his sufferings in Jerusalem were called his 'Passion.'
To be certain those Christians which emphasized Jesus's humanity might argue for the applicability of the name owing to the verb πάσχω in Matthew principally and the related term πάθημα. Yet it is undeniable that there are clear difficulties for this etymology in earliest Alexandrian Christianity which explains by Origen, in the course of rejecting a contemporary etymology of πάσχω from 'Pascha' never delves too deeply into the correct interpretation of the term is.
It is often lost in such discussions that the Latin term 'the Passion' is rendered in Greek by the traditional term for Passover - viz. Πάσχα. The gospel's certainly reference the idea that something will 'befall' (πάσχω) the Son of Man in Jerusalem but as Origen notes:
Christ is sacrificed according to the type of the passover ... and thus the passover is indeed a type of Christ, but not of his passion [Peri Pascha 11]Indeed Origen goes to great lengths to go back to Philo's understanding of the original Hebrew to stress that the term means 'transition' i.e. διάβασις. All of this stress on a knowledge of Semitic terminology has always made me believe that the rabbinic identification of Christians as 'notzrim' נוצרים as notsarim (root YOD-tsade-resh, nif‘al participle). I have always believed that this deserves serious consideration. The esoteric term notsarim from yod-tsade-resh means “re-formed” or "transformed" and thus compliments the etymology of Philo, Clement and Origen.
The point here is that I think notsarim is “those with a new yetser (nature)." They have been transformed by going through the διάβασις which leads to redemption. It has to be noted that the followers of Mark are condemned by Irenaeus for connecting some sort of additional baptism at the equivalent of Mark 10:35 - 45 in their gospel. I have always thought that this is a reference to LGM 1 (which immediately precedes it). However Irenaeus's information (which is applied by Epiphanius to the Marcionite baptism) necessarily again connects the ritual to what happens during the Passion (which follows) and the attainment of the promise of enthronment.
It is enough however for the moment to see that Clement's interpretation of the Question of the Rich Youth necessarily implies such a transformation too. In Quis Dives Salvetur, Clement goes out of his way to say that Jesus's command to 'sell all his possessions' was never meant as a reference to 'money' per se but rather a transformation of one's material nature:
The renunciation, then, and selling (πωλῆσαι) of all possessions (ὐπάρχοντα), is to be understood as expressly spoken of the passions of the soul (τῶν ψυχῶν παθῶν διειρημένον). [Quis Dives Salvetur 14]In no unmistakable terms then, Clement is suggesting that 'selling of all one's possessions' is in fact pointing to the transformation of one's physical being. This explains again the consistent emphasis in to Theodore and elsewhere that the Carpocratians (and heretics generally) still retain their 'lusts' or 'passion' because they have not ritually removed them through the true sacrements of the Alexandrian Church.
What else could Clement be referencing here other than baptism? After all baptism is not only described as 'redemption' i.e. ἀπολύτρωσις by both the followers of Mark and the Marcionites (i.e. freedom purchased through paying a price) but also 'regeneration.' In Marcionite terminology in particular there is a mystic understanding of the initiate being 'purchased' from the Creator by the 'stranger god.' While the particulars of the terminology will likely always be unknown it is certain from Epiphanius that the Marcionite developed their understanding of ἀπολύτρωσις from Mark 10:35 - 45 (to the point that Marcion himself is portrayed sitting beside Christ cf. Origen Hom. Luc).
It is also worth noting I think that in his interpretation of the meaning of the Question of the Rich Youth Clement clearly recognizes that ὐπάρχοντα ('possessions') comes from the root ὐπάρχω - i.e. 'to come into being'. In other words, he is pointing to something more fundamental about the rich youth which needs to be renounced - viz. his very nature. This is why Clement always interprets this passage in terms of what we have called the 'Phillips cluster of narrative.' In other words, the rich youth 'dies' loses his old nature and puts on a new and perfect garment. It is worth noting that the Marcionites associated baptism with (a) death and (b) the rejection of the Law. This would naturally follow if LGM 1 was present in their gospel following the sequence in Diatessaronic witnesses noticed by Phillips (i.e. immediately following the Rich Man and Lazarus).
Clement also clearly connects the instruction to the rich youth to 'sell his goods' with the commandment which preceded it in the 'secret' gospel's version of the Question of the Rich Youth referenced in Stromata 3.4,11 etc - Οὐκ ἐπιθυμήσεις - i.e. 'Thou shalt not lust!' (see previous post). In other words, one can only stop lusting after one has been ritually purified through undergoing the transformational process of 'death,' rebirth' and ritual regeneration. In short the basic material condition of individual must be 're-formed' in order to attain 'perfection.'
Clement says again something very similar to the last citation only now from the Fourth Book of the Stromateis where we read:
And this is the import of "Sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and come, follow Me" -- that is, follow what is said by the Lord. Some say that by what "thou hast" He designated the things in the soul, of a nature not akin to it, though how these are bestowed on the poor they are not able to say. For God dispenses to all according to desert, His distribution being righteous. Despising, therefore, the possessions which God apportions to thee in thy magnificence, comply with what is spoken by me; haste to the ascent of the Spirit (τὴν τοῦ πνεύματος ἄνοδον), being not only justified by pouring out of what is evil (οὐκ ἀποχῇ κακῶν μόνον δικαιωθείς), but in addition also perfected, by the Lord's benificence (καὶ τῇ κυριακῇ τελειωθεὶς εὐποιίᾳ). [Stromata 4.6]Clearly this is the same process as what is described in Quis Dives Salvetur only now there are some additional 'clues' or 'leads' about the ritual. The evil nature 'streams forth' from the body, while perfection is delivered by a 'good thing' bestowed by Jesus to the individual. Yet there is also a great deal more than this - the explanation also of the origin of the term 'Ebionite' - viz. the poor.
It is clear from this other statements in the writings of Clement's successor Origen that the 'poor' - consistent with the interpretation here of 'the rich' - were a designation of people who did not have knowledge of what was required to attain perfection. In short, they were a class of people within the Church who - for whatever reason - had not underwent the things which led to 'reformation.' Indeed in what follows Clement explains how he brings forward additional information regarding the ritual requirement to 'selling one's old nature' and how this act ultimately benefits 'the poor' (i.e. those who have yet to make the transition or διάβασις to perfection). We read:
In this instance He convicted the man, who boasted that he had fulfilled the injunctions of the law, of not loving his beloved (τὸν πλησίον ἀγαπήσαντα cf. Lev. 19.18); and it is by beneficence that the love (ἀγάπη) which, according to the gnostic ascending scale, is Lord of the Sabbath, proclaims itself. We must then, according to my view, have recourse to the word of salvation neither from fear of punishment nor promise of a gift, but on account of the good itself. Such, as do so, stand on the right hand of the holy place; but those who think that by the gift of what is perishable they shall receive in exchange what belongs to immortality are in the parable of the two brothers called “hirelings.” And is there not some light thrown here on the expression “in the likeness and image,” in the fact that some live according to the likeness of Christ, while those who stand on the left hand live according to their image? There are then two things proceeding from the truth, one root lying beneath both,—the choice being, however, not equal, or rather the difference that is in the choice not being equal. To choose by way of imitation differs, as appears to me, from the choice of him who chooses according to knowledge, as that which is set on fire differs from that which is illuminated. Israel, then, is the light of the likeness which is according to the Scripture. But the image is another thing. What means the parable of Lazarus, by showing the image of the rich and poor? And what the saying, “No man can serve two masters, God and Mammon?”—the Lord so terming the love of money. For instance, the covetous, who were invited, responded not to the invitation to the supper, not because of their possessing property, but of their inordinate affection to what they possessed [Strom 4.6]This is a very important passage which is significant not only for the fact that we have all the passages which followed the Question of the Rich Youth before Jesus's announcement of the impeding 'passion' in Jerusalem in the Diatessaronic tradition (i.e. the Rich Man and Lazarus and the Parable of the Great Feast). So I would like to take all the points one by one.
The most important thing to note at the beginning our analysis of this material in the Fourth Book of Clement's Stromata is the fact that Clement's 'secret gospel' incorporated the material from the discussion of the 'Greatest Commandment' (Mark 12:28 - 31) following a pattern in the Gospel According to the Hebrews, the Marcionite gospel and Aphrahat's Persian Diatessaron (see our last post). As such, Clement's citation of Lev 19.18 is understood to be an integral part of the meaning of the Question of the Rich Youth. The youth claims somehow to have 'already fulfilled' the requirement to τὸν πλησίον ἀγαπήσαντα but Jesus shows is about to show him otherwise.
It is amazing how limited our understanding of the term πλησίον is here. Even in Hebrew רֵ֫עַ does not simply mean 'neighbor' but there is a range of meanings and a special mystical significance. The earliest kabbalistic treatises understand that the friend is the 'Son of God' and the same thing is introduced in various early Church Fathers. In other words, there is a reason why Jesus begins his question and answer session by emphasizing that only the Father is good - in other words, that he is not the Father. To love the πλησίον is really to love the Son of God which makes it all the more interesting that LGM 1 follows this declaration in Secret Mark, leading again to a popular misconception of what was going on when the rich youth learned to love the Savior (it also explains why the editors of the canonical gospel removed both LGM 1 and the reference to τὸν πλησίον ἀγαπήσαντα in what remains of the question of the rich youth.
For instance in that most beautiful and sexual of Hebrew love songs, the Song of Songs, the male lover addresses his beloved nine times as πλησίον (1:9, 15; 2:2, 10, 13; 4:1, 7; 5:2; 6:4), leading Sampley to comment that "the content of the occurrence of πλησίον in the Song of Songs confirms "that πλησίον is used as a term of endearment for the bride." Yet when we turn around and go back to original Hebrew we find more notably that רֵ֫עַ is often used as a term for 'husband.' In other words, it would be very easy in either tradition to develop the original interest in 'loving the πλησίον' into a commandment for sexual licentiousness especially if those doing so were trying to slander the original Alexandrian tradition. We hear of such insults develop in Tertullian's Apology and the presence of LGM 1 almost immediately after this commandment would only fuel the slander.
Of course all of these claims of sexual perversion on the part of heretics are simply propaganda on the part of their detractors. Agape was the Greek word chosen by the original translators of the Torah to designate divine love because it was deemed to be something other than sexual love and the early Christians continued this association. Clement is instead pointing to the 'true Agape' as a transformational experience which occured in a ritual setting inside of the Church of Alexandria's inner sanctum. Indeed this interpretation is confirmed by yet another allusion in Clement's writings to the Question of the Rich Youth:
Again when he says, "If you would be perfect, sell your possessions and give to the poor," he convicts the man who boasts that he has kept all the commandments~ from his youth up. For he had not fulfilled "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Only then was he taught by the Lord who wished to make him perfect, to give for love's sake.It is noteworthy that it is not only the heretical gospel's demonstration of the youth's ἀγάπη for Jesus which gets associated with sexual perversion. Clement even identifies the command to 'give for love's sake' (i.e. Luke 6:30) is reported to have developed into a sordid application among the same Carpocratian heretics.
Do I need to spend much time convincing my readers now that LGM 1 is the ritual basis for the Alexandrian ἀγάπη? It is only the Carpocratians who are ever identified by Clement as engaging in a 'agape' ritual. It is always a sordid affair being infused with too much ἀφροδίσια so that the heretics allegedly drink too much, eat too much and become sexual libertines.
Without developing this post into something which is so long that it can't even be read by anyone, it is worth going back to the initial comparison of the mysteries of Christianity and those of Minos for a minute where Clement compares the perfected who "stand on the right hand of the holy place" to those who:
are in the parable of the two brothers called “hirelings.” (Luke 15:17) And is there not some light thrown here on the expression “in the likeness and image,” in the fact that some live according to the likeness of Christ, while those who stand on the left hand live according to their image? There are then two things proceeding from the truth, one root lying beneath both,—the choice being, however, not equal, or rather the difference that is in the choice not being equal. To choose by way of imitation differs, as appears to me, from the choice of him who chooses according to knowledge, as that which is set on fire differs from that which is illuminated.The parable of the Prodigal Son is a particularly interesting choice of scripture as it features a son who is received with a grand feast by his father. The allusion here to a 'feast' necessarily must have implied 'the Agape' to Clement and so the place of the 'right' designates the one who has been adopted as 'the Son' (i.e. the πλησίον) and the 'left' are those who are meant to love God through his 'associate' (πλησίον).
It is impossible in my mind that Clement could have formulated such a distinction of those who are seated to 'the right' and 'the left' in the context of a discussion of the Question of the Rich Youth (i.e. Mark 10:17 - 31) without being aware that both the canonical and 'secret' gospels of Mark follow this story with a request to sit 'to the left' and 'to the right' on the divine throne. The implications are again that one of Salome's sons did indeed 'complete' the διάβασις from mortality to immortality and being seated on the divine throne. However, Clement has deliberately shrouded his explanation in Philonic terminology - i.e. the distinction between 'the image' and 'the likeness' in the original creation.
I don't want to take up too much time explaining Philo's original distinction between the two terms other than to say that he states in one place that:
nothing mortal can be made in the likeness of the most high One and Father of the universe but [only] in that of the second God, who is his Logos (Quaest. in Gn. 11.62).The context here was of course the creation of the world and the Alexandrian community's interpretation of Genesis that the world and man were NOT made after the likeness of the Father but rather the Logos, the creative Word. Without spending too much time on this in what remains of this post, it is obvious to see how this doctrine would have been applied by the Marcionites or other heretical groups - viz. that the description of what happens after the Question of the Rich Youth is the liturgical basis for the 'redemption' of the members of the Church from the Creator (i.e. the Logos) to the perfect Father in heaven (i.e. they are 'perfect' now because they made after the image of the perfect one in heaven).
This then must be the ritual context for Jesus appearance on the earth and his ultimate initiation of the rich youth in LGM 1 into the mysteries of the kingdom of God. As we have noted before the reference to 'the truth' that is hidden by seven veils is clearly to the episcipal throne (cf. Isaiah 16:5). The comparison in Celsus, Clement and Origen of the Alexandrian rituals to the ancient rites of Minos are founded on the idea that it is an enthronement ritual. LGM 1 is the beginning of that transformational process but it has to be said that Jesus the Word was undoubtedly not understood to have made the initiates after his image but - following the logic of the 'heretics' - after the perfection of the hitherto 'unknown Father' (the fact that Adam Kadmion is always described as andogynous or 'bisexual' explains why all our evidence suggests the ritual involved castration before ritual immersion).
The important thing to keep in mind is that the youth who came out of the water has to be understood now to be St. Mark himself. His enthronement at the end of the gospel becomes the basis for the Alexandrian Patriarchate (whose representatives were originally called 'Fathers' and later in the late second century when Demetrius introduced two subordinate 'bishops' under the designated representative of St. Mark each presumably having the rank of 'father' the one who sat in the patriarchal throne became the 'father of fathers' or Papa viz. 'Pope').
It is well known that the best manuscripts of the Gospel of John end suddenly without making reference to its original ending. Irenaeus introduces the proper ending - which features an enthronement - while criticizing the ending preferred by the heretics which apparently inferred that Jesus's coming wasn't foretold by the Jewish prophets. I have long noticed that the Coptic manuscript of the Apocalypse of Peter preserves an alternative ending to the gospel which must have been the original ending to the original Alexandrian gospel of Mark. It features not only an enthronement but clear intimation that Jesus wasn't the one being enthroned.
Of course the surprising detail for those unfamiliar with it, is that it is a retelling of the Transfiguration only now placed after the resurrection. I happened to have pointed out that the surviving Arabic Diatessaron makes reference to this post-resurrection Transfiguration to my friend and colleague Tjitze Baarda who actually wrote an article on the subject and credited me with the discovery. Here now is what I consider to be a testimony to the original ending of the gospel. The one being enthroned in my opinion, is the rich youth - aka St. Mark. Enjoy:
And my Lord Jesus Christ our King said unto me: Let us go unto the holy mountain. And his disciples went with him, praying. And behold there were two men there, and we could not look upon their faces, for a light came from them, shining more than the sun, and their rairment also was shining, and cannot be described, and nothing is sufficient to be compared unto them in this world. And the sweetness of them . . . that no mouth is able to utter the beauty of their appearance (or, the mouth hath not sweetness to express, &c.), for their aspect was astonishing and wonderful. And the other, great, I say (probably: and, in a word, I cannot describe it), shineth in his (sic) aspect above crystal. Like the flower of roses is the appearance of the colour of his aspect and of his body . . . his head (al. their head was a marvel). And upon his (their) shoulders (evidently something about their hair has dropped out) and on their foreheads was a crown of nard woven of fair flowers. As the rainbow in the water, [Probably: in the time of rain. From the LXX of Ezek.i.28.] so was their hair. And such was the comeliness of their countenance, adorned with all manner of ornament. And when we saw them on a sudden, we marvelled. And I drew near unto the Lord (God) Jesus Christ and said unto him: O my Lord, who are these? And he said unto me: They are Moses and Elias. And I said unto him: Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the rest of the righteous fathers? And he showed us a great garden, open, full of fair trees and blessed fruits, and of the odour of perfumes. The fragrance thereof was pleasant and came even unto us. And thereof (al. of that tree) . . . saw I much fruit. And my Lord and God Jesus Christ said unto me: Hast thou seen the companies of the fathers?
As is their rest, such also is the honour and the glory of them that are persecuted for my righteousness' sake. And I rejoiced and believed [and believed] and understood that which is written in the book of my Lord Jesus Christ. And I said unto him: O my Lord, wilt thou that I make here three tabernacles, one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias? And he said unto me in wrath: Satan maketh war against thee, and hath veiled thine understanding; and the good things of this world prevail against thee. Thine eyes therefore must be opened and thine ears unstopped that a tabernacle, not made with men's hands, which my heavenly Father hath made for me and for the elect. And we beheld it and were full of gladness.
And behold, suddenly there came a voice from heaven, saying: This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased: my commandments. And then came a great and exceeding white cloud over our heads and bare away our Lord and Moses and Elias. And I trembled and was afraid: and we looked up and the heaven opened and we beheld men in the flesh, and they came and greeted our Lord and Moses and Elias and went into another heaven. And the word of the scripture was fulfilled: This is the generation that seeketh him and seeketh the face of the God of Jacob. And great fear and commotion was there in heaven and the angels pressed one upon another that the word of the scripture might be fulfilled which saith: Open the gates, ye princes.
Thereafter was the heaven shut, that had been open. And we prayed and went down from the mountain, glorifying God, which hath written the names of the righteous in heaven in the book of life
