Going Through the Many Things Morton Smith Missed in the Letter to Theodore

I am so sick and tired of people who claim that Morton Smith forged his discovery. If that were true how could he have missed so many obvious things that the original author certainly intended his recipient to understand. Let's start with the very opening words of the letter. Clement jumps into an acknowledgement that his addressee Theodore has apparently "shut the mouth (ἐπιστομίσας) of the unspeakable teachings of the Carpocratians."[To Theod. I.2] The material is so often rendered 'silenced' that most readers don't realize that the reference actually comes from Psalm 58 LXX.

Here the sinners are 'speaking lies' which is likened to a serpent spitting poison. The snake has to have their mouths smashed or closed in order to prevent this:

Sinners have gone astray from the belly, they speak lies. Their venom is like that of a serpent; and that of a deaf asp, and that stops her ears; which will not hear the voice of charmers, nor heed the charm prepared skillfully by the wise. God has crushed their teeth in their mouth ( ὁ θεὸς συνέτριψεν τοὺς ὀδόντας αὐτῶν ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν): God has broken the cheek-teeth of the lions. They shall utterly pass away like water running through: he shall bend his bow till they shall fail. They shall be destroyed as melting wax: the fire has fallen and they have not seen the sun. Before your thorns feel the white thorn, he shall swallow you up as living, as in his wrath. The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance on the ungodly; he shall wash his hands in the blood of the sinner. And a man shall say, Verily then there is a reward for the righteous, verily there is a judge that judges them in the earth. [Psalm 58.3 - 11]

Clement continually borrows from Psalm 58 with its image of the 'snakes' having their mouths shut to prevent the emission of their poison. The first example is from Stromata 7:16:

But if, like the deaf serpents, (Psalm 58:4 LXX) they listen not to the song (Psalm 58:5 LXX) called new, though very old, may they be chastised by God, (Psalm 58:6 LXX) and undergo paternal admonition (Psalm 58:7 LXX) previous to the Judgment (Psalm 58:11 LXX), till they become ashamed and repent, but not rush through headlong unbelief, and precipitate themselves into judgment. For there are partial corrections, which are called chastisements, which many of us who have been in transgression incur, by falling away from the Lord's people (τοῦ λαοῦ τοῦ κυριακοῦ).

The same borrowing appears many times in the Exhortation to the Greeks. The text begins with a reference to:

Sweet and true is the charm of persuasion which blends with this strain ... if one of those serpents even is willing to repent, and follows the Word, he becomes a man of God. [Exhortation 1.10]

And again more clearly taking from Psalm 58:

Neither childlessness, nor poverty, nor obscurity, nor want, can hinder him who eagerly strives after the knowledge of God; nor does any one who has conquered by brass or iron the true wisdom for himself choose to exchange it, for it is vastly preferred to everything else. Chrestos is able to save in every place (ὁ χρηστός ἐστι πανταχοῦ σωτήριος). For he that is fired with ardour and admiration for righteousness, being the lover of One who needs nothing (τοῦ ἀνενδεοῦς ἐραστής), needs himself but little, having treasured up his bliss in nothing but himself and God, where is neither moth, robber, nor pirate, but the eternal Giver of good. With justice, then, have you been compared to those serpents who shut their ears against the charmers. For "their mind," says the Scripture, "is like the serpent, like the deaf adder, which stoppeth her ear, and will not hear the voice of the charmers." [Psalm 58:4,5 LXX] But allow yourselves to feel the influence of the charming strains of sanctity, and receive that mild word of ours, and reject the deadly poison, that it may be granted to you to strip yourselves as much as possible of destruction, as they [the snakes] have been stripped of old age.

Hear me, and do not stop your ears; do not block up the avenues of hearing, but lay to heart what is said. Excellent is the medicine of immortality! Stop at length your grovelling reptile motions. "For the enemies of the Lord," says Scripture, "shall lick the dust." Raise your eyes from earth to the skies, look up to heaven, admire the sight, cease watching with outstretched head the heel of the righteous, and hindering the way of truth. Be wise and harmless. Perchance the Lord will endow you with the wing of simplicity (for He has resolved to give wings to those that are earth-born), that you may leave your holes and dwell in heaven. Only let us with our whole heart repent, that we may be able with our whole heart to contain God. [Exhortation 10:105, 106]

If you look very carefully at the last cited text it is impossible not to see that it references the first addition to Secret Mark mentioned in the Letter to Theodore. Look at the use of the sexually charged term ἐραστής to describe the 'lover' of Jesus. Notice the reference a little later to the Phaedrus's vision of a sublimated pederastic love leading to the sprouting of wings and the ascent to heaven, the reference to 'stripping off' layers of clothes and death like skin. The material perfectly suits the Letter to Theodore and Morton Smith never saw any of it.