In any event, let us make the transition back to serious scholarship for a moment. We have noticed for sometime now and have noticed that Clement of Alexandria demonstrates incredible skill, weaving near contemporary writers seamlessly into the moving stream of his discussions. We noted the allusion to the Emperor Marcus Aurelius's Meditations into the conclusion of the Stromateis (Strom 7.16):
As, then, in war the soldier must not abandon the arrangement (τάξιν = 'post') which the commander has arranged (ἔταξεν), so neither must we desert that given by the Word, whom we have received as the guide of knowledge (ἄρχοντα εἰλήφαμεν γνώσεώς) and of life. But the most have not even inquired, if there is one who should direct us (ἐξητάκασιν), and who this is, and how he is to be followed (ἀκολουθητέον). For as is the Word, such also must the believer's life be, so as to be able "to follow God" (ὡς ἕπεσθαι δύνασθαι τῷ θεῷ), who brings all things to end from the beginning "by the right course." (ἐξ ἀρχῆς τὰ πάντα εὐθεῖαν περαίνοντι).
The original passage that Clement is citing from the beloved Emperor speaks of the necessary independence of the true philosopher:
Acquire the contemplative way of seeing how all things change into one another, and constantly attend to it, and exercise thyself about this part of philosophy. For nothing is so much adapted to produce magnanimity. Such a man has put off the body, and as he sees that he must, no one knows how soon, go away from among men and leave everything here, he gives himself up entirely to just doing in all his actions, and in everything else that happens he resigns himself to the universal nature. But as to what any man shall say or think about him or do against him, he never even thinks of it, being himself contented with these two things, with acting justly in what he now does, and being satisfied with what is now assigned to him; and he lays aside all distracting and busy pursuits, and desires nothing else than to accomplish the straight course through the law, and by accomplishing the straight course to follow God (καὶ οὐδὲν ἄλλο βούλεται ἢ εὐθεῖαν περαίνειν διὰ τοῦ νόμου καὶ εὐθεῖαν περαίνοντι ἕπεσθαι τῷ θεῷ) [Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.11]
Indeed we have shown that over and over again Clement isn't just developing arguments in a void. He quite often draws from sources that scholars with a limited frame of reference might not pick up on.
For instance as John Ferguson notes in his superior English translation of Book Three of the Stromateis, the interpretation that Clement foists onto the Carpocratians is the misrepresentation of Plato's ideal in writings of the Stoic Epictetus, the teacher of Marcus Aurelius. It is in Epictetus that we read the basis for the attack against the Alexandrian heretics:
"What then, are not women common by nature?" So I say also; for a little pig is common to all the invited guests, but when the portions have been distributed, go, if you think it right, and snatch up the portion of him who reclines next to you, or slyly steal it, or place your hand down by it and lay hold of it, and if you cannot tear away a bit of the meat, grease your fingers and lick them. A fine companion over cups, and Socratic guest indeed! "Well, is not the theatre common to the citizens?" When then they have taken their seats, come, if you think proper, and eject one of them. In this way women also are common by nature. When, then, the legislator, like the master of a feast, has distributed them, will you not also look for your own portion and not filch and handle what belongs to another. "But I am a man of letters and understand Archedemus." Understand Archedemus then, and be an adulterer, and faithless, and instead of a man, be a wolf or an ape: for what is the difference? [Discourses 2.4.8-10]
As Ferguson notes what appears in Stromateis Book Three as a criticism of the Carpocratians makes no sense in terms of what Plato writes in the Republic for here
the "communism" applies only to the ruling class where men and women have equal status, and neither possesses the other; there is sexual abstinence and no promiscuity; copulation is permitted at festivals with a partner allocated by lot.
We have brought forward countless other examples of such unreferenced borrowings ranging from the Wendland's widely accepted theory about much of the Paedagogue being developed from the writings of Musonius and Chadwick's observation that Clement alludes to Celsus's anti-Christian treatise the True Word.
The reason all of this is important is not only have we argued that the 'naked with naked' is an unattributed reference to Dissertation 41 of Maximus of Tyre (where it is universally acknowledged reference to Gorgias 523d) but because we have just discovered another possible allusion to a near contemporary writer in the 'sister' reference which follows in to Theodore which also makes explicit reference to the original letter from the unknown 'Theodore.'
Let's cite the concluding section of the letter originally discovered by Morton Smith at Mar Saba once again:
After these words follows the text, "And James and John come to him," and all that section. But naked man with naked, and the other things about which you wrote, are not found.
And after the words, "And he comes into Jericho," the secret Gospel adds only,
"And the sister of the youth whom Jesus loved and his mother and Salome were there, and Jesus did not receive them."
But the many other things about which you wrote both seem to be and are lies.
Now I have already noted that the explicit citation here of the 'insertion' which is called LGM 2 (= the second reference to the longer gospel of Mark) is paralleled by the insertion of Luke 19:1 - 10 in the Diatessaron (i.e. between 'Jericho' and 'and when Jesus went out of Jericho'). Yet on top of this, before and after the reference to 'Secret Mark' Clement makes allusion to prominent near contemporary orators.
We have already dealt with the 'naked with naked' attribution and the great orator Maximus of Tyre. Now let us note that cryptic allusion to 'both seem to be and are' (καὶ φαίνεται καὶ ἔστιν) are found in a widely influential oration of Hermogenes of Tarsus (fl. 161 - 180 CE):
τὰ δὲ ἄλλα τὰ πολλὰ ἃ ἔγραψας ψεύσματα καὶ φαίνεται καὶ ἔστιν [to Theod. 3.17]
Παρά δέ Υπερείδη κάχείνην εύροι τις άν τήν δεινότητα, ή και φαίνεται και έςτιν, ουχί την κατά μέθοδον μόνην, ςπανίως μέντοι, οπού γε και παρά τω Δημοςθένει ςπάνιον τοΰτο [Hermogenes, Peri Ideon p. 387]
As Ian Rutherford notes (Inverting the Canon: Hermogenes on Literature Harvard studies in classical philology: Volume 94 p. 372) the terminology was employed by Hermogenes to distinguish "that which both is and appears to be (which corresponds to the language of Demosthenes in his public speeches); that which is and does not appear (which is characteristic of Lysias) and that which appears but in reality is not (which describes the style of the sophists)."
Again this isn't like discovering a fingerprint at a crime scene but it does add to the circumstantial evidence that Morton Smith wasn't aware of all the contemporary allusions to the letter he discovered and thus could not have been the forger. Of course I am sure that all these things are new to Evans and Chilton but that's because they have never for a moment weighed the evidence for and against authenticity to come to their conclusions about the Letter to Theodore. For them this has always been about whether Morton Smith deserves to be punished for his 'dissing' of Jacob Neusner. Of course if encouraging a thug mentality among academics is Neusner's lasting legacy in scholarship, one would think that they are - if anything - bearing out Morton Smith's original criticism of their teacher.
Just a tree by its fruit ...
