Eusebius: the be all and end all? [Archive I]

mountainman

October 23, 2006, 11:31 PM

So how about Origen? Wikipedia has a whole entry about him. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origen) He was born here, did that, went there and so on. Does that all come from good old Euseby?

The Wiki entry says "According to Epiphanius (Haer., lxiv.63) Origen wrote about 6,000 works". Assuming that is this Epiphanius (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphanius_of_Salamis), do we know about Epiphanius only via Euseby?

Absolutely, via Eusebius = EVERYTHING in the PRENICAEAN.
Your cited author Epiphanius was between 5 and 15 years
old when Constantine did his thing at Nicaea.

The works of Origen especially those towards the end of his
life were purported to have been assembled at the Caesarea
library under the management of Pamphilus, custodian by means
of the powers invested in him by the Roman law and ruling
Augustas, who preserved an studies this author's literature
(ie: Origen) specifically.

Eusebius was Pamphilus' "shall-we-say-pupil" who inherited the
originals of the works of the later part of Origen's life (purportedly).
What Origen says, and what following "harmonisers" of Origenistic
writings have to say, about the writings of Origen, is interesting.

Read Rufinus' account of the perversion of Origen.
Perhaps take in Origen's own letter quoted by Rufinus.

Eusebius used the works of Origen, but IMO "christianised"
them. I will grant that Origen studied the Old Testament,
and authored the Hexapla, but our thesis is that Eusebius
plaguerised Origen with respect to New testamanent materials,
and that the doctrines of Origen in the 3rd century, are
nothing more than the doctrines of Eusebius in the 4th.

Elsewhere ...

Could we leave off with this "Eusebius wrote the NT nonsense" and get back on topic, please?

Or to put it another way: assuming -- as most without a hobby horse to ride do -- that the books of the NT were written roughly between 50 and 150 CE, does the claim that NT writers, and in particular the Gospel authors, ...etc

You will note that mainstream BC&H researchers maintain that the
inference that the Eusebian chronology is true should be unquestioned.
That Eusebian history and chronology is true, is an axiom, a postulate,
an hypothesis, and surely, can be questioned and tested for integrity.

Pete Brown

Johnny Skeptic

October 24, 2006, 01:40 AM

Joseph McCabe was a brilliant man. He wrote many books and articles, and he strongly opposed Christianity. He was very well-read, and he had an incredible gift for expressing himself in writing.

Consider the following:

http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/joseph_mccabe/religious_controversy/chapter_16.html

The "Conversion" of Constantine

Let us for a moment consider the dear old labarum: one of the most profitable miracles that the hand of God, or of his earthly representative, ever achieved.

It is Eusebius, the bishop of Caesarea, who tells us of the miracle in his "Life of Constantine"; and you ought not to doubt it for a moment, because he says that he heard it from the Emperor's own lips! We will not, however, waste time in psychoanalytic research. I do not think that any ecclesiastical historian today believes in the vision, or even suggests an ocular illusion. All other historians smile at it. The labarum is as discredited as Catherine's wheel.

"The father of ecclesiastical history," as Eusebius of Caesarea is unhappily called, wrote his famous Ecclesiastical History some years before the death of Constantine; and it does not contain this very important miracle. When the emperor died, however, the bishop wrote a most untruthful and eulogistic "Life of Constantine," and in this he tells the story of the labarum. He tells us also that his chief business as a writer is to "edify"; which means, to advertise the Church. So modern historians are discreetly reticent about the zealous and courtly bishop. I will, as usual, supply the word which they leave unspoken. Eusebius was a liar. The other great Christian writer of the time, Lactantius, is by no means a model of veracity. But he merely says that Constantine saw the vision in a dream. The labarum appears on coins soon after the conversion of Constantine, but no one pretends that it was a reality except Eusebius.

Johnny: The article is too lengthy to quote extensively. I suggest that anyone who is interested in Eusebius visit the web site and read that entire section of the article. Even if Eusebius was not a liar, he was centuries removed from the supposed facts, which means that he had to rely exclusively on sources who were themselves removed from the supposed facts by well over a century. It seems to me that it all gets back to the ORIGINAL eyewitnesses who wrote about what they saw, who appear to be precious few, and the believability of their second hand and third hand sources. Much of Christian history is comprised of A quoting B, B quoting C, etc., leaving modern readers with the impossible task of figuring out which writings were facts, which were lies, and which were innocent but inaccurate revelations. Was Papias actually a hearer of John? Who knows?, certainly not anyone who is alive today, and certainly not anyone who was alive 100 years after Papias died. Long before the end of the next 1,000 years, Christianity will have faded into the obscurity that is so richly deserves. I mean really, folks, the Bible says "thou shalt not kill", but it also says that "God's Son MUST be killed or there will be no remission of sins."

Roger Pearse

October 24, 2006, 03:23 AM

So is that just me being my inattentive self, or does Pete have a point in that Eusebius is indeed at least a very large percentage of all we know about early Christianity? (An author whom we only know through Eusebius will have to count as Eusebian, I'd say.)

And to avoid confusion, Early Christianity is for the purposes of this discussion defined as everything up to Eusebius.

The 9 volumes of the Ante-Nicene Fathers collection, some 5,000 pages, are all pre-Eusebian. This doesn't include most of Origen either, plus works that have come to light since then. But Eusebius is valuable for authors that have perished (he does quote lots of people who have not, but of course we go to the original for Clement of Alexandria, etc).

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Roger Pearse

October 24, 2006, 03:30 AM

So how about Origen? Wikipedia has a whole entry about him. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origen) He was born here, did that, went there and so on. Does that all come from good old Euseby?

Much of our information about him does come from Eusebius.

The Wiki entry says "According to Epiphanius (Haer., lxiv.63) Origen wrote about 6,000 works". Assuming that is this Epiphanius (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphanius_of_Salamis), do we know about Epiphanius only via Euseby?

No. The Panarion of Epiphanius (mid-late 4th century) is extant. The Holy Martyr Pamphilus wrote an apology for Origen ca. 300, of which only the first book is extant in a translation by Rufinus. Eusebius, Pamphilus' pupil, added a book to it (also lost) in which he listed all the works of Origen accessible to him in Origen's library at Caesarea. Epiphanius may have used this for his statement. But prior to 400 the works of Origen were in wide circulation anyway.

The loss of the majority of his works comes from the use of his name as the badge of the losing party in the 'Origenist' disputes in the Eastern Roman empire which start around 400 and wrap up around 550. One of the unpleasant features of that society was that political disputes were conducted under ideological guise, and the object was to silence your foe by manufacture an 'ism' of whatever views he held and getting it officially condemned. (Those familiar with attempts to invent the word 'Islamophobia'
may see a parallel or two here). The political dispute in this case accused their enemies of 'Origenism.'

One of Origen's lost works was recovered from the find of books at Toura near Cairo in 1941.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Johnny Skeptic

October 24, 2006, 09:09 AM

The 9 volumes of the Ante-Nicene Fathers collection, some 5,000 pages, are all pre-Eusebian. This doesn't include most of Origen either, plus works that have come to light since then. But Eusebius is valuable for authors that have perished (he does quote lots of people who have not, but of course we go to the original for Clement of Alexandria, etc).

But upon what evidence did the Ante-Nicene Fathers and Eusebius base their conclusions about what supposedly happened in the first century?

Clivedurdle

October 24, 2006, 06:45 PM

p 181 following of Terry Jones Barbarians states:

Quote:
Shapur and the Messiah

Religious philosophy was the big issue in both Persia and Rome. the continuous military hammering between Rome and Parthia had not only brought about a crisis in Persia, it was also the major cause of the crisis that afflicted the Roman Empire in the third century. ...Trade between Rome and the Far East broke down....the cost of the Roman army sky rocketed, and sections of the Western Empire began to break free of central authority...This was the atmosphere in which Christianity began to take hold in the Roman world, and in the buzzing atmosphere of the Zoroastrian revolution in Persia, Christian spin off cults were attracting serious interest.

In Fars a cult called the Practitioners of Ablutions believed in the washing away of sins in baptisms. A messianic Jewish- Christian group called Elkesaites ...had their own version of the teachings of Christ and of Moses. In this rather fevered atmosphere a religious teacher appeared called Mani who claimed that he was the final prophet in a line that stretched from Zarathustra through Buddha to Jesus.

Shapur....proclaimed freedom of worship for Manichaens, Jews and Christians....There now even appeared a Christian bishop of Ctesiphon

http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch22.htm

( I am discussing Shapur I )

Quote:
A Christian bishop, Papa bar Aggai, at the capital, Ctesiphon, claimed patriarchal rights - as had the Bishop of Rome - and the bishop of Ctesiphon remained in rivalry for influence with the Christian leadership in Nisibis.

mountainman

October 24, 2006, 06:50 PM

I recommend Jay Raskin's The Evolution of Christs and Christianities for a different perspective. Eusebius is the source for most of our information on church history (other church fathers wrote more about theology and doctrine.) Raskin thinks that Eusebius was a master forger, but with the emphasis on master rather than forger.

Thanks Toto.

In an earlier post (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showpost.php?p=3372305&postcount=37") on a thread entitled "Another Eusebian Tell? Did he leave his fingerprints in 1 Cor 15?", Jay Raskin kindly summarised his defence of Eusebius, upon the charge of interpolation ....

I do go into Eusebius' motives in my book. Here's a small paraphrase of some of it.

When Eusebius wrote Church History, the Roman Empire was emerging from a long period of quite bloody Civil Wars. Constantine was commited to the Christians because they had fought for him, bringing him to power. However, a sharp turn was always possible. It was hard so say how strong Constantine's commitment to the Christians actually was. Eusebius and other powerful Christians had to tread carefully and play their cards right. Else they could find themselves at the wrong end of another bloody persecution. Constantine had double-crossed more than one friend on the road to absolute power.

One major problem was that Christianity was looked upon as a recent phenomenon, and the power of the Church even more recent still. It really couldn't compete with the Roman religions which traced their histories back to before the beginnings of Rome over 1,000 years. However, if Eusebius could show that Christianity was really the religion of the Emperors, at least the "good" emperors, and at least it had a history of 300 years, he could keep it on Constantine's sunny side. For Eusebius, writing the Church History was no mere exercise in scholarship or pedantric showmanship, it was an important opportunity to "seal the deal" so to speak with the Emperior Constantine. (Remember Constantine didn't become a Christian until he was on his death bed -- if then.)

Now, Eusebius had a real problem. The Roman Church probably didn't begin until around 150 and it probably didn't even acknowledge a human Christ until 200. Eusebius had to show that the Church's current doctrines, many of which probably had been adopted within Eusebius' lifetime somehow stretched back to the times of Christ and his apostles. He really had no choice but to interpolate into documents, as well as destroying others. Getting rid of rival Christian cults as quickly as possible was also a political necessity.

He seems to have been pretty successive in convincing Constantine that he had the real documents and it was others who had adultered the church's true teachings.

It is possible that when he did his interpolations, he prayed for the guidance of Jesus to tell him what to write. So in his mind, perhaps, rather than committing a crime, he was doing sacred work and fixing history, or at least showing how it probably was. If the heretics had twisted the story, was he not right to staighten it?

Eusebius tells us over and over again that the promise of Jesus was coming true at last, in his own lifetime, before his own eyes. Christianity had gone from the verge of extinction to the dominant power in just a few years. For him this was a miracle: the fulfillment of the promise of Jesus Christ. For him, what he wrote had the blessings of God and that was more important than telling a story based on the actual evidence. A story based on the actual evidence was one that only the heretics and faithless would have enjoyed. Eusebius simply had no desire to tell that one.

So that's the general and simple explanation of why Eusebius changed texts, as far as I see it. If he commited crimes, it was because he was a saint not a sinner.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

I did not at that time respond to the above summary by Jay, in order
to first read as much as possible of his book (See above reference).

However, this post has reminded me to go back to Jay's words quoted
above, and reread and reassess how Jay views this Eusebian forgery,
or perhaps the lesser-evil term "interpolator" should be used.

It appears that Jay sees Eusebius as a "champion saint of christianity"
who did what he did for the good of the cause, at a time when this very
"tribe of christians" were poised to be selected (presumeably out of a
pantheon of religions in the 4th century Roman empire) as the chosen
religion of the emperor Constantine.

Clearly Jay portrays Eusebius as an independent power (a literature-sage)
alongside this highly intelligent supreme imperial mafia thug. However, that
clearly is not the only possibility.

However, my stance is that it is not unreasonable to consider that Eusebius
was in no way independent of Constantine - that he was Constantine's specialised
propagandist, working (312-324) under an imperial sponsorship to prepare the texts,
doctrines, eccesliastical history, and background materials for a new ROMAN religious
order, with a predefined implementation date to coincide with Constantine's
(planned future) supremacy (ie: Nicaea, 325).

Pete Brown

Clivedurdle

October 24, 2006, 06:50 PM

Thanks to the (quite relevant) reference to Mani CLivedurdle,
and to the barbarian references of the author.

In order to maintain a consistency in the hypothesis our view of Mani
is reasonably simple. He existed, much like Apollonius of Tyana, and
was a philosopher-sage who journeyed between large geographical
regions, and who enjoyed some form of communion with the people
in power through many regions.

However, with effect from the rule of Constantine's propaganda, he
like many other figures of history (and fiction also) were made to
appear as if they either were themselves, or had some knowledge
of, or some comment about, this new and strange Roman religion
called "christianity".

My thesis is that archeological, carbon-dating and other scientific
evidence will increasingly support the hypothesis that there was
indeed absolutely nothing "christian" in the pre-Nicaean epoch,
but rather a continuity of a richness of diverse culture (Graeco-
Egyptian, Persian, Indian - see the Buddhist influence thread).

The appearance of the phenomenom of christianity in the archeological
record will be found to have a sharp, violent, dictatorial boundary
clearly demarked by the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE, at which time
it first appeared in antiquity.

This is really an argument about when is a xian not a xian, I would agree a version 8B model was rolled out after Constantine, but I think there are more than enough identifiable marks before then to define earlier versions of this particular Ford Escort!

mountainman

October 24, 2006, 07:18 PM

This is really an argument about when is a xian not a xian, I would agree a version 8B model was rolled out after Constantine, but I think there are more than enough identifiable marks before then to define earlier versions of this particular Ford Escort!

Yes, this is the mainstream BC&H view. That Constantine essentially
commandeered a small and insignificant (Galilaean) religious order
that was not new and strange. This is indeed the inference
which is presented by Eusebian literature defining chronology.

But it is not the only inference that an historian is entitled to make,
and explore, and test for integrity. Another inference is that Constantine
had the necessary resources to fabricate (out of the whole cloth) an entire
package of imperially supported fiction, and wanted to make it look old and
respectable. Hence the reference to "the tribe of christians" appears
in the TF.

If Eusebius and/or Constantine could have drawn upon all these
earlier versions of the Ford Escort legally, and openly, so to speak,
for what reason do you suppose Eusebius interpolated the TF.
Why is fraud so commonly associated with early references to this
"tribe of christians" in the pre-Nicaean epoch?

Or, if you prefer, we agree that Constantine rolled out the 8B.

But at the same time I claim that we need to be sure he did not
provide fraudulent registration papers, design drawings, various
litigation issues, and both good and bad road-testing affadavits
for the Ford Escord model, which he claims preceded the 8B.

The point raised by this thread basically highlights the situation
wherein "Eusebius is indeed at least a very large percentage of
all we know about "the Ford Escort Model", as is openly admitted
by the scholarly apologists, such as Lightfoot, above.

Pete Brown

Clivedurdle

October 25, 2006, 02:16 PM

gstafleu

October 25, 2006, 03:10 PM

The point raised by this thread basically highlights the situation
wherein "Eusebius is indeed at least a very large percentage of
all we know about "the Ford Escort Model", as is openly admitted
by the scholarly apologists, such as Lightfoot, above.
Dixit Roger Pearse:

The 9 volumes of the Ante-Nicene Fathers collection, some 5,000 pages, are all pre-Eusebian.

Are these then not about the Ford Escort?

And:

The Panarion of Epiphanius (mid-late 4th century) is extant.

I suppose if this talks about the Escort, it could have been influence by Eusebius?

Gerard

gstafleu

October 25, 2006, 03:13 PM

mountainman

October 25, 2006, 10:42 PM

Eusebius did not have control via Constantine of the Persian Empire. How do you explain the following report of a Ford Escort in the reign of Shapur 1?
A Christian bishop, Papa bar Aggai, at the capital, Ctesiphon, claimed patriarchal rights - as had the Bishop of Rome - and the bishop of Ctesiphon remained in rivalry for influence with the Christian leadership in Nisibis.

From here (http://catholicose.org/PauloseII/Catholicate.htm):

The First Catholicos of the Syrian Church

It was around the year 300, an attempt was made for the first time to establish the Church in the Persian Empire in an organised form. The initiative for this was taken by Bishop Papa (Baba, AD.267-329) of the Persian royal capital at Seleucia-Ctesiphon with the consent of the Patriarch of Antioch. In AD 315, the Bishop convened a Synod of the Persian prelates at Seleucia in which he tried to organize the local churches, with himself as a head.

By 315 CE, Constantine had taken Rome. The legend is too late IMO,
and according to the above, it was not under Shapur 1 (241- 272) but
Shapur II (310- 379). The appearance of Mani the Prophet was under
Shapur 1, but I believe Mani was certainly not a christian, but was made
a christian (by fabricated writings) in the fourth century.

Pete Brown

mountainman

October 25, 2006, 10:58 PM

Dixit Roger Pearse:
The 9 volumes of the Ante-Nicene Fathers collection, some 5,000 pages, are all pre-Eusebian.
Are these then not about the Ford Escort?

We are introduced to the Ante-Nicene fathers by Eusebius.
Eusebius, AFAIK, quotes all of them, and claims to have all
their writings on his desk as he prepares "Historia Ecclesiastica",
and "In Preparation of the Gospels".

Did he have the "Testimonium Flavianum" sitting in the ante-nicene
Josephus, or did he add it? Many people believe he added it.

I believe it is possible that he created the ante-Nicene literature
and then quoted from it, in the same manner as he created the "TF"
in Josephus, and then quoted from it.

And:
The Panarion of Epiphanius (mid-late 4th century) is extant

I suppose if this talks about the Escort, it could have been influence by Eusebius?

Gerard[/QUOTE]

Yes, and more importantly, influenced by whatever was "decided"
at the Council of Nicaea (325 CE), which I claim to be the event
by which christianity was thrust upon the Roman empire.

Pete Brown

Johnny Skeptic

October 26, 2006, 02:38 AM

How was Eusebius any better qualified to verify what supposedly happened centuries before he lived than anyone else? If a person has to be a scholar in order to discover God, something is wrong. Were Moses and Abraham scholars? It is incredible that scholarly Christians presume that a person can discover God in copies of copies of ancient texts and completely disregard the lack of credible evidence today that God is active in tangible ways that indicate that he is loving and compassionate. I am not interested in accepting a God who only wishes to reveal himself in copies of copies of ancient texts that were written by human proxies. The use of human proxies in all religious books contributes to doubt, hatred, and wars. In addition, it also contributes to doubt, hatred, and wars within religions. Many Christians have hated and killed other Christians.

gstafleu

October 26, 2006, 09:03 AM

I believe it is possible that he [Eusebius] created the ante-Nicene literature
and then quoted from it, in the same manner as he created the "TF"
in Josephus, and then quoted from it.
That argument is not as strong as some of your others. Inserting a sentence or two into Josephus is one thing, we know that kind of thing happened all the time (Bart Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060738170/internetinfidels/) e.g.). But creating 5000 pages from scratch is quite another. The first is reasonable assumption, the second enters the realm of conspiracy theory. Not that it couldn't have happened, but you'll need some solid evidence for such an extraordinary claim.

Again, this must be checkable via word frequencies, hapax (or oligo) legomena etc. For example, are there words in the 5000 pages that occur significantly more frequently then in the rest of contemporary literature. Are there words that occur in contemporary literature but not in the 5000 pages? I'm not a philologist, but something like that must be doable, even if the faking was done by a team rather than a single author.

Roger, Anybody: Any chance of such a fake?

Roger Pearse

October 26, 2006, 01:15 PM

Any chance of such a fake?

None whatever. Even if Eusebius were the greatest genius that ever existed (the inevitable corollary of statements being manufactured by MM), it would nevertheless be evident today.

Forgeries always smell of the age in which they are written, rather than that of the one to which they supposedly belong. Stephen Carlson, in his book on "Secret Mark" put this very well. Paraphrasing and abbreviating and ignoring all the nuances, the reason is that if they don't address some urgent issue of the age in which they are really written, they won't be read. Indeed why forge them at all, unless there is some burning reason? That reason is unlikely to be the same as the urgent issues of yesteryear.

Thus forged vases that the Victorians thought typically ancient today look typically Victorian. It's hard to see the smells when the world smells like that; easy when times change and the smell of the times with them.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Gamera

October 26, 2006, 02:30 PM

None whatever. Even if Eusebius were the greatest genius that ever existed (the inevitable corollary of statements being manufactured by MM), it would nevertheless be evident today.

Forgeries always smell of the age in which they are written, rather than that of the one to which they supposedly belong. Stephen Carlson, in his book on "Secret Mark" put this very well. Paraphrasing and abbreviating and ignoring all the nuances, the reason is that if they don't address some urgent issue of the age in which they are really written, they won't be read. Indeed why forge them at all, unless there is some burning reason? That reason is unlikely to be the same as the urgent issues of yesteryear.

Thus forged vases that the Victorians thought typically ancient today look typically Victorian. It's hard to see the smells when the world smells like that; easy when times change and the smell of the times with them.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Further, if I understand MM "theory" correctly, Eusebius is a Constantine-related forgery that reconstructs (or really generates) a non-existant Chrisitian history from scratch, but references writers such as Origen, who lost out to the Constantine putsch, and who must have been made up by Eusebius, or some other Constantine shill, but we've actually found works of Origen, so that the Constantinians not only forged the corpus of an author to create the history of Christianity, but they also forged writings of those whom they wanted to expunge from that constructed history in any case.

Seems a bit implausible.

mountainman

October 26, 2006, 06:39 PM

That argument is not as strong as some of your others. Inserting a sentence or two into Josephus is one thing, we know that kind of thing happened all the time (Bart Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060738170/internetinfidels/) e.g.). But creating 5000 pages from scratch is quite another. The first is reasonable assumption, the second enters the realm of conspiracy theory. Not that it couldn't have happened, but you'll need some solid evidence for such an extraordinary claim.

Again, this must be checkable via word frequencies, hapax (or oligo) legomena etc. For example, are there words in the 5000 pages that occur significantly more frequently then in the rest of contemporary literature. Are there words that occur in contemporary literature but not in the 5000 pages? I'm not a philologist, but something like that must be doable, even if the faking was done by a team rather than a single author.

You are going to enjoy reading Jay's book, and its in depth
discussion of what Jay calls the "ET" or "Eusebian Tell". There
have been a number of threads here about this already.

Essentially, Jay describes how it may be perceived that not only
does Eusebius appear to leave a writer's nuance, or quirk, in the
literature which is purported to be his own, but also leaves such
signs in the quotations of others, such as Tertullion. We are left
with the impression that Eusebius is writing Tertullion's literature.
Jay provides quite a number of separate examples of this.

Another suggestion, earlier here, was stylometric analysis of the
entire corpus of "christian literature", which will probably happen
sooner or later.

However, noone here appears to have done a tremendous amount
of research concerning Constantine, and assumes that this Roman
emperor is just sitting on thr sidelines, cheering on the christian team,
after having selected them to be the favourite religion of the empire.
Supreme imperial mafia thugs generally do things for a reason, and
basically the question needs to be asked, rather than Constantine
serving Eusebius (which is assumed for the sake of "christian history")
we have the quite possible alternative, that Eusebius (along with
everyone else at the time - no exceptions) was serving Constantine,
and Constantine was not what you would want to call a good person.

Best wishes,

Pete Brown

Toto

October 26, 2006, 07:09 PM

gstafleu

October 26, 2006, 08:55 PM

You are going to enjoy reading Jay's book, and its in depth
discussion of what Jay calls the "ET" or "Eusebian Tell".
Looking forward to it ;).

that Eusebius (along with
everyone else at the time - no exceptions) was serving Constantine,
and Constantine was not what you would want to call a good person.

I don't have any problem with that--but that doesn't mean Eusebius created Christianity from scratch. Witness the 5000 pages that Roger says cannot possibly be fakes. If you want to argue that Eusebius acted on Constantines wishes/dictates I can see that. If that then means that Eusebius' works, and especially Historia Ecclesiastica, are (very) biased and misrepresent history, I can see that too. But I can't see that he created each and every bit of antenicene christian literature from scratch.

He took an existant, and likely quite diverse, religion and molded it to his purposes. But he didn't create the whole thing himself. What is up for discussion I'd say is how much he molded it. How much of what is thought to be historical is in fact Eusebogus? Probably more than orthodoxy thinks. But not all of it.

Gerard

mountainman

October 26, 2006, 09:02 PM

Further, if I understand MM "theory" correctly, Eusebius is a Constantine-related forgery that reconstructs (or really generates) a non-existant Chrisitian history from scratch, but references writers such as Origen, who lost out to the Constantine putsch, and who must have been made up by Eusebius, or some other Constantine shill, but we've actually found works of Origen, so that the Constantinians not only forged the corpus of an author to create the history of Christianity, but they also forged writings of those whom they wanted to expunge from that constructed history in any case.

Origen is a special case due to his chronology in the period
being (more or less) the last of the presumed christian authors
in the period of antiquity being reviewed by Eusebius (0-312 CE).

I have no problem with Origen existing, and being a very scholarly
figure in relation to the LXX, which had been around the empire
for centuries, and probably sat, along with the Dhamapada, the
writings of Apollonius of Tyana, and other works, in the great
libraries of the then Roman empire (eg: Alexandria).

The "MM Theory" states that the new testament related portions
of Origen's literature (ie: any writings which references the Eusebian
Trade Marked "Tribe of christians") were fabricated by Eusebius
in situ at the library of Caesarea, where Origen's "genuine literature"
(philosophy and the like) was purportedly preserved.

This theory thereby explains a number of issues related to the big
problems which arose concerning "Origenistic doctrine" and the need
for later christian apologists (historians?) such as Rufinus, having to
mention that the writings of Origen had obviously been perverted by
Arian heretics. EG: See this thread (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=169596)

This provides the text of Rufinus, in his Epilogue to Pamphilus the
Martyr's Apology for Origen Otherwise the
Book Concerning the Adulteration of the Works of Origen.
Addressed to Macarius at Pinetum a.d. 397.

We see Origen perhaps as a real author of antiquity, but due to his specialist
field being that of the LXX, (ie: the Judaic/Hebrew traditional writings,
called the Old Testament, only when Constantine grafted and bound
his new fiction to it), he was targetted by Eusebius to become a doctrinal
mouthpiece for a (ficticious) pre-Nicene "tribe of christians", and the very
new and very stange literary testament which was attendent thereto.

Pete Brown
Authors of Antiquity (http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/article_029.htm)

mountainman

October 26, 2006, 09:10 PM

Pete - I don't think that Jay Raskin would support your idea that Constantine or Eusebius created Christianity out of whole cloth. He sees Christianity as evolving from earlier narratives and forces. Ironically or not, his method dates some aspects of the gospels and Christianity earlier than you might expect.

Yes, thanks Toto, I understand some of Jay's position, and in this
thread above made a reference (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showpost.php?p=3864437&postcount=11) to his conviction relating to this
Eusebius, whom he calls the Master Forger, with an emphasis on
the master, rather than the forger.

Pete

mountainman

October 26, 2006, 09:43 PM

I don't have any problem with that--but that doesn't mean Eusebius created Christianity from scratch. Witness the 5000 pages that Roger says cannot possibly be fakes.

Hey, everyone is entitled to opinions and research.

If you want to argue that Eusebius acted on Constantines wishes/dictates I can see that. If that then means that Eusebius' works, and especially Historia Ecclesiastica, are (very) biased and misrepresent history, I can see that too. But I can't see that he created each and every bit of antenicene christian literature from scratch.

He took an existant, and likely quite diverse, religion and molded it to his purposes. But he didn't create the whole thing himself. What is up for discussion I'd say is how much he molded it. How much of what is thought to be historical is in fact Eusebogus? Probably more than orthodoxy thinks. But not all of it.

Well, my approach is that I think that it is expedient to first rule out
the possibility that the whole fabrication was indeed not a fiction
composed by wicked men immediately before Julian came to power.

It should be reasonably clear cut. You do understand that the complete
statement of fiction must necessarily include all the books of the new
testament which were bound under order of Constantine, to the LXX,
sometime, but not too far after, the Council of Nicaea.

My approach is to first ask the question what real hard evidence
do we have for the Eusebian "tribe of christians" in antiquity from
an historical perspective and from a scientific and archeological
perspective as being existent anywhere on the planet in the pre-
Nicene epoch.

If you were to sit down and write out a list of citations from carbon
dating tests, archeological reports on buildings, inscriptions, grafitti,
on surviving monuments and statues and art, coins used by the empire,
and other sources of historical data, we should find some evidence
that this hypothesis is wrong. I have collated such evidence here (http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/article_070.htm).

Thanks for the dialogue gstafleu, but I believe it is first quite necessary
to rule out the possibility that the fabrication of the new testament (out
of the whole cloth, and along with its attendant "mass of literature")
was in fact a fiction composed by the wicked Constantine, and the
wretched Eusebius, for the sake of plundering the Graeco-Egyptian
(pagan, if you prefer) traditions and temples, and establishing a new
common Roman religious order that would celebrate life in the empire
within a Constantinian basilica, rather than on a hill, or in a grove of
trees, such as the grove of Abraham, referenced in this thread (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=182953).

I maintain that the theory is falsifiable, and emminently refutable.
Clearly, if someone were to sacrifice a small portion of any one of the
many papryii fragments, currently dated by paleographical methods
(ie: handwriting analysis) to the pre-Nicene epoch, to scientific carbon
dating testing, and such test vindicated the attestation to the writings
of christian literature before the Council of Nicaea, then the hypothesis
is subject to refutation.

However, in the interim period we will make a prediction that all such
carbon dating in the future (there are only 2 results now) will yield a
date after Nicaea.

I am happy to ride the wild hypothesis, and see where it takes me.
If it is shown to be false, by scientific or archeological evidence, then
I will go back to the farm, like Diocletian, and grow tomatoes.

Best wishes,

Pete Brown

PhilosopherJay

October 28, 2006, 11:59 AM

Hi Peter,

First let me thank Toto and you for recommending my book, Evolution of Christs and Christianities.

It does present evidence that much of what is taken as the standard or scholarly history of Christianity is really an invention of Bishop Eusebius. However, it also suggests that there were many forms of Christianity before him. It suggests that we can roughly place them by century:

!st Century: purely Jewish forms of Christianity which suggest that the Jewish God will send or select a person to be an anointed (Christ) King and take back the land of Israel from Roman domination. This form seems to have ended with the defeat of Bar Kochbar circa 136.

2nd Century: Greek Heretical Christianity which mixes all kinds of old and new myths in with Jewish scriptures in a mulititude of different ways.

3rd Century: Roman Apologetic Christianity which developes Christianities with stoic and apocalyptic outlooks. It is meant to appeal to cosmopolitan and wealthy aristocratic sensibilities in a time when the overextended Roman empire is crumbling.

It is not until the 4th Century and the time of Eusebius that we get the Rome-centered Imperial type of Christianity. This is what Eusebius propogates by essentially giving it an imaginary three century history. Here Christ is the Son/Hero/Founder/Savior of God's eternal Church. (If it is a view suggested by Constantine to him or by him to Constantine is an interesting question.)

In a sense, if we credit Eusebius with creating Christianity ex nihilo, we are fulfilling his wish of erasing the first three centuries of Christianities. We are starting Christianity with the Imperial Roman type of Christianity, albeit in the Fourth Century, rather than the first, as he proposed. I'm afraid if we do this, we will also not be able to see his cleverness in not only altering certain passages, but in mislabeling, erasing and rearranging other passages in historical works that opposed his viewpoint. I think we can separate out what say Tertullian wrote from Eusebius' revision of it.

On the other hand, I think starting with the idea that Eusebius created Christianity, as you suggest, is probably a good corrective to the dominant paradigm that Eusebius essentially reported a true history of Christianity. Only with a careful study of what contradicts and clearly opposes that history will we be able to see what Eusebius built upon.

Warmly,

Philospher Jay

You are going to enjoy reading Jay's book, and its in depth
discussion of what Jay calls the "ET" or "Eusebian Tell". There
have been a number of threads here about this already.

Essentially, Jay describes how it may be perceived that not only
does Eusebius appear to leave a writer's nuance, or quirk, in the
literature which is purported to be his own, but also leaves such
signs in the quotations of others, such as Tertullion. We are left
with the impression that Eusebius is writing Tertullion's literature.
Jay provides quite a number of separate examples of this.

Another suggestion, earlier here, was stylometric analysis of the
entire corpus of "christian literature", which will probably happen
sooner or later.

However, noone here appears to have done a tremendous amount
of research concerning Constantine, and assumes that this Roman
emperor is just sitting on thr sidelines, cheering on the christian team,
after having selected them to be the favourite religion of the empire.
Supreme imperial mafia thugs generally do things for a reason, and
basically the question needs to be asked, rather than Constantine
serving Eusebius (which is assumed for the sake of "christian history")
we have the quite possible alternative, that Eusebius (along with
everyone else at the time - no exceptions) was serving Constantine,
and Constantine was not what you would want to call a good person.

Best wishes,

Pete Brown

countjulian

October 28, 2006, 12:25 PM

Well, my approach is that I think that it is expedient to first rule out
the possibility that the whole fabrication was indeed not a fiction
composed by wicked men immediately before Julian came to power.

OK. Then why doesn't Libanius or Zosimus or Ammianus Marcellinus or any of the many pagan writers who lived after Constantine mention the fact that Christianity was really an invention of the 4th century, or even hint at it? Early church records record hundreds if not thousands of heresies, where did they all come from? Are telling us that every pre-Eusebian mention of Christianity by pagan writers is fake? Sounds more and more like the rantings of A.T. Fomenko to me.

mountainman

October 28, 2006, 06:27 PM

OK. Then why doesn't Libanius or Zosimus or Ammianus Marcellinus or any of the many pagan writers who lived after Constantine mention the fact that Christianity was really an invention of the 4th century, or even hint at it?

As you must already be aware CJ, the first 13 books of Ammianus Marcellinus
which cover the period of history that include the rule of Constantine are
lost, and thus we dont know what Ammianus Marcellinus actual wrote.
Libanius was 10 years old when the Council of Nicaea happened, and
Zosimus was not to be born for another 125 years.

The rule of Constantine, covering 3 decades was a dictatorship of
absolute power, which was described in the following manner:
16. He was a mocker rather than a flatterer.
From this he was called after Trachala in the folktale,
for ten years a most excellent man, (307-317)
for the following second ten a brigand, (317-327)
for the last, on account of his unrestrained prodigality,
a ward irresponsible for his own actions. (327-337)

--- Abbreviated from the Books
of Sextus Aurelius Victor - Translated by
Thomas M. Banchich

Anything written had to be preserved, and the new ecclesiatical orders
set in place by Constantine, especially from Constantinople, were largely
responsible for the preservation process. Look at what Cyril did for the
work of Julian, etc.

Early church records record hundreds if not thousands of heresies, where did they all come from? Are telling us that every pre-Eusebian mention of Christianity by pagan writers is fake?

I am telling you that we owe it to ourselves to do the check.
References to christianity by Josephus, by Pliny, Seutonius, Tacitus,
etc I believe are --- yes --- all fake, and interpolations from
the fourth century, at the earliest. SOme may be later.

I believe that all the rescripts of Roman Emperors to the writings
of purported christian apologists, are fraudulent in totality, such
that someone in the fourth century created the apologists, created
to literature of the apologies (and of course the persecutions), and
then created the imperial rescripts - totally fraudulently, but most
likely on official supreme imperial parchment, or vellum (ie: Constanine
provided any raw materials, and sponsored the exercise).

Sounds more and more like the rantings of A.T. Fomenko to me.

Everyone is entitled to an opinion.
Have a nice day.

Pete Brown

countjulian

October 28, 2006, 06:59 PM

I am telling you that we owe it to ourselves to do the check.
References to christianity by Josephus, by Pliny, Seutonius, Tacitus,
etc I believe are --- yes --- all fake, and interpolations from
the fourth century, at the earliest. SOme may be later.

Please. Have you ever read On the Passing of Peregrinus (http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/lucian/peregrinus.htm)?It's classic Lucian, and there is not a hint of interpolation. Even the most diehard MJers readily admit its authenticity. As for Christianity being a faked religion made for empire, give me a break. The cult of Sol Invictus/Mithra would have been much more useful to this end, and considering how hard many of the later bishops and Christian politicians tried to justify dstroying paganism, Judaism, and heresy, you'd think the Christian scriptures would be full of a lot more calls to violence against. The Christian scriptures don't say anything about running a state or administiring the laws, a la the Old Testament or the Quran and Sunnah. If you're looking for a religion made to suit an empire, I'd advise a closer study of Islam and Islamic origins.

post Scriptum

I'll get around to Ammianus Marcellinus later.

mountainman

October 28, 2006, 07:05 PM

G'day Jay,

Your clarification of these issues below is particularly succinct,
as is usual for your writing style in general, and I have no doubt
that your book will be most popular. In fact, in time I intend to
write a small and positive review of it, at my website, because
I believe that it is resonate with the changes in the world.

We live in a world which not only is rich in change, but rich
in the acceleration of change, both in the way we, as human
beings, perceive the world, and perceive our relationship to
the world. This is not just about technology, but about the
human spirit itself, in its natural and evolving state.

Thanks for your contributions to this. They are appeciated
for their rare objectivity, and are thus much contemplated.

Best wishes for now,

Pete Brown
Authors of Antiquity (http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/article_029.htm)

Hi Peter,

First let me thank Toto and you for recommending my book, Evolution of Christs and Christianities.

It does present evidence that much of what is taken as the standard or scholarly history of Christianity is really an invention of Bishop Eusebius. However, it also suggests that there were many forms of Christianity before him. It suggests that we can roughly place them by century:

!st Century: purely Jewish forms of Christianity which suggest that the Jewish God will send or select a person to be an anointed (Christ) King and take back the land of Israel from Roman domination. This form seems to have ended with the defeat of Bar Kochbar circa 136.

2nd Century: Greek Heretical Christianity which mixes all kinds of old and new myths in with Jewish scriptures in a mulititude of different ways.

3rd Century: Roman Apologetic Christianity which developes Christianities with stoic and apocalyptic outlooks. It is meant to appeal to cosmopolitan and wealthy aristocratic sensibilities in a time when the overextended Roman empire is crumbling.

It is not until the 4th Century and the time of Eusebius that we get the Rome-centered Imperial type of Christianity. This is what Eusebius propogates by essentially giving it an imaginary three century history. Here Christ is the Son/Hero/Founder/Savior of God's eternal Church. (If it is a view suggested by Constantine to him or by him to Constantine is an interesting question.)

In a sense, if we credit Eusebius with creating Christianity ex nihilo, we are fulfilling his wish of erasing the first three centuries of Christianities. We are starting Christianity with the Imperial Roman type of Christianity, albeit in the Fourth Century, rather than the first, as he proposed. I'm afraid if we do this, we will also not be able to see his cleverness in not only altering certain passages, but in mislabeling, erasing and rearranging other passages in historical works that opposed his viewpoint. I think we can separate out what say Tertullian wrote from Eusebius' revision of it.

On the other hand, I think starting with the idea that Eusebius created Christianity, as you suggest, is probably a good corrective to the dominant paradigm that Eusebius essentially reported a true history of Christianity. Only with a careful study of what contradicts and clearly opposes that history will we be able to see what Eusebius built upon.

Warmly,

Philospher Jay

aa5874

October 28, 2006, 07:26 PM

I am telling you that we owe it to ourselves to do the check.
References to christianity by Josephus, by Pliny, Seutonius, Tacitus,
etc I believe are --- yes --- all fake, and interpolations from
the fourth century, at the earliest. SOme may be later.

Are you claiming that Eusebius and Constatnine fabricated Marcion and the Marcionites? As far as I understand the Marcion doctrine was around since the 2nd century. I find it difficult to think that Eusebius and Constantine would invent followers of a form of Christianity that they themselves were trying to eradicate.

I would say that Eusebius is the Father of Roman Cathlocism, possibly using forgeries and interpolations to achieve that goal, but surely, Eusebius was not the inventor of Christianity.

In my opinion, Christianity evolved, with differences in doctrine, long before Eusebius. All that appears to have occured, is that Eusebius had the good fortune to be supported by the Political Arm.
It was just a matter of which doctrine Constantine supported, if it was Arianism, then 2000 years later, we probably would have only heared about Arius.

All believers in Jesus have the same problem as Eusebius, they cannot locate Jesus in history, and that is probably why, in my opinion, forgeries and interpolations were necessary.

mountainman

October 29, 2006, 04:54 PM

Please. Have you ever read On the Passing of Peregrinus (http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/lucian/peregrinus.htm)?It's classic Lucian, and there is not a hint of interpolation. Even the most diehard MJers readily admit its authenticity.

Please. Do not be impulsive.

Each of the purported authors of antiquity need to be properly
and carefully analysed in regard to their purported contribution
to this history of the first 300 years. One at a time, without haste.

There are alot of authors to deal with in this "mass of writings labelled
Eusebius", to use the term of the author of "Antiqua Mater".

There is another text, thought to be classic Lucian up until some
time back, exactly how far back, my research has not yet been
completed. But I suggest you take a look at the hitherto
classic Lucian entitled "the Philopatris".

the Philopatris passed under his name. This dialogue, unlike what Lucian had written in the Peregrine and The Liar, is a deliberate attack on Christianity. It is clear to us now that it was written two hundred years after his time, under Julian the Apostate; but there can be no more doubt of its being an imitation of Lucian than of its not being his; it consequently passed for his, the story gained currency that he was an apostate himself, and his name was anathema for the church.

As for Christianity being a faked religion made for empire, give me a break. The cult of Sol Invictus/Mithra would have been much more useful to this end, and considering how hard many of the later bishops and Christian politicians tried to justify dstroying paganism, Judaism, and heresy, you'd think the Christian scriptures would be full of a lot more calls to violence against.

Why share the profits of a new religion with an existent landholder?
With a new one true Roman religion based on the antiquity of the
Hebrews, who needed the Graeco/Roman/Egyptian traditional religions?
By default, all existent temples, lands, sanctuaries, relics, scultures,
jewellery, gold, silver, and all other forms of associated wealth, and
specifically the LAND ITSELF, became Constantine's by conquest.

The Christian scriptures don't say anything about running a state or administiring the laws, a la the Old Testament or the Quran and Sunnah. If you're looking for a religion made to suit an empire, I'd advise a closer study of Islam and Islamic origins.

No, you only need go to the 22 sub-creeds associated with, and signed
in addition to the main Nicaean OATH to Constantine. These clearly
concerned the running of the new emperial state religion. They are
listed out clearly on this page (http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/article_054.htm)

Pete Brown

mountainman

October 29, 2006, 05:21 PM

Are you claiming that Eusebius and Constatnine fabricated Marcion and the Marcionites?

Yes.

As far as I understand the Marcion doctrine was around since the 2nd century. I find it difficult to think that Eusebius and Constantine would invent followers of a form of Christianity that they themselves were trying to eradicate.

You will have to agree with me that it is in fact Eusebius who informs
us, in literary media (ie: in writings) of Marcion. You may make the
inference that Marcion existed independently some centuries before
Eusebius picks up his pen and so informs us from the fourth century,
but for the moment I seek to test this inference.

I would say that Eusebius is the Father of Roman Cathlocism, possibly using forgeries and interpolations to achieve that goal, but surely, Eusebius was not the inventor of Christianity.

This IMO needs to be tested for integrity.
It seems possible that he may have been the sponsored editor
of new technology writings assembled in the rule of Constantine.

In my opinion, Christianity evolved, with differences in doctrine, long before Eusebius.

And so Eusebius would have us believe. He is our sole guide.
As per the second post --- Lightfoot quote.

That is what we have been traditionally taught as the subject
matter of ancient history, for the period of antiquity covering
0-300 CE, but is there an alternative option? YES, my research
indicates that an alternative theory of the history can be framed
in which these forst 300 years contained nothing whatsoever
christian (ie: new testament), for it was yet to be FORGED in
the fourth CE.

All that appears to have occured, is that Eusebius had the good fortune to be supported by the Political Arm.
It was just a matter of which doctrine Constantine supported, if it was Arianism, then 2000 years later, we probably would have only heared about Arius.

Wasn't it so lucky the way things worked out right for christianity?

BTW, it appears from the above that you assume that the Council
of Nicaea was called by Constantine on account of the doctrine of
Arianism. This is incorrect. Nicaea was called by Constantine on
account of the words of Arius, which were simple, and totally
dogmatically asserted .....

there was time when he was not.
he was made out of nothing existing
he is subject to alteration and change
etc

All believers in Jesus have the same problem as Eusebius, they cannot locate Jesus in history, and that is probably why, in my opinion, forgeries and interpolations were necessary.

And all believers in Eusebius have the same problem as you.
You know he interpolated and forged literature, but you refuse
to countenance the possibility that in fact he forged the entire
package of the writings witnessing any and all evidence of the
existence of pre-Nicaean christianity.

This easily explains the reason why noone since Constantine has
located Jesus in history, except for his mother, and mother-in-law,
who were christianity's second and first recorded pilgrims,
respectively.

Pete Brown

Roger Pearse

October 30, 2006, 06:21 AM

Are you claiming that Eusebius and Constatnine fabricated Marcion and the Marcionites? As far as I understand the Marcion doctrine was around since the 2nd century. I find it difficult to think that Eusebius and Constantine would invent followers of a form of Christianity that they themselves were trying to eradicate.

There were still Marcionites in the mid-6th century, since Cosmas Indicopleustes mentions them.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

mountainman

October 30, 2006, 05:11 PM

There were still Marcionites in the mid-6th century, since Cosmas Indicopleustes mentions them.

The memory of Apollonius of Tyana is mentioned in independent
attestations also through the intervening centuries. The question
becomes one of relative and comparitive historicity, wherein, as
is the subject of this thread, we have one single (purported living)
human being called Eusebius, in tghe reign of Constantine, providing
us with practically every single bit of chronological information that
is known to have existed (in the 4th century) regarding "the tribe
of Marcion" and "the tribe of christians" in the pre-Nicaean epoch.

Nice article on Cosmas btw.

Pete Brown

Clivedurdle

November 1, 2006, 03:50 AM

Could we be very clear about Constantine, Arianism and Trintarianism? I thought the Church only went Trinitarian in the 380's with Ambrose.

I keep on plugging Jones Barbarians because this does discuss all of this in detail. Would someone else look at it and point out errors in it?

Gamera

November 1, 2006, 06:23 PM

Origen is a special case due to his chronology in the period
being (more or less) the last of the presumed christian authors
in the period of antiquity being reviewed by Eusebius (0-312 CE).

I have no problem with Origen existing, and being a very scholarly
figure in relation to the LXX, which had been around the empire
for centuries, and probably sat, along with the Dhamapada, the
writings of Apollonius of Tyana, and other works, in the great
libraries of the then Roman empire (eg: Alexandria).

The "MM Theory" states that the new testament related portions
of Origen's literature (ie: any writings which references the Eusebian
Trade Marked "Tribe of christians") were fabricated by Eusebius
in situ at the library of Caesarea, where Origen's "genuine literature"
(philosophy and the like) was purportedly preserved.

This theory thereby explains a number of issues related to the big
problems which arose concerning "Origenistic doctrine" and the need
for later christian apologists (historians?) such as Rufinus, having to
mention that the writings of Origen had obviously been perverted by
Arian heretics. EG: See this thread (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=169596)

This provides the text of Rufinus, in his Epilogue to Pamphilus the
Martyr's Apology for Origen Otherwise the
Book Concerning the Adulteration of the Works of Origen.
Addressed to Macarius at Pinetum a.d. 397.

We see Origen perhaps as a real author of antiquity, but due to his specialist
field being that of the LXX, (ie: the Judaic/Hebrew traditional writings,
called the Old Testament, only when Constantine grafted and bound
his new fiction to it), he was targetted by Eusebius to become a doctrinal
mouthpiece for a (ficticious) pre-Nicene "tribe of christians", and the very
new and very stange literary testament which was attendent thereto.

Pete Brown
Authors of Antiquity (http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/article_029.htm)

So we would expect, following the MM theory that there was a "pristine" Origen, whose writings were devoid of NT references. Yet we never find such manscripts. So the MM theory assumes the following options:

(a) either the Constantine hitmen got lucky, and the pristine writings of Origen were all lost, so that we can't show the MM theory is false, or

(b) the Constantine police hunted down and destroyed every extant pristine ms of Origen, over a far flung empire, at a time when it was a big deal to sail from Rome to Alexandria, and despite there lack of technological tools, they hunted down and destroyed every pristine Origen mss, in every library and every dresser drawer throughout the Empire.

Is that a fair rendition of your assumptions?

mountainman

November 1, 2006, 07:16 PM

So we would expect, following the MM theory that there was a "pristine" Origen, whose writings were devoid of NT references. Yet we never find such manscripts.

On the contrary, examine the references earlier provided.
We are told by Rufinus (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=169596) that such manuscripts were indeed extant.

This text of Rufinus, in located his Epilogue to Pamphilus the
Martyr's Apology for Origen, Otherwise the Book Concerning
the Adulteration of the Works of Origen. Addressed to Macarius
at Pinetum a.d. 397.

We are told by Rufinus that Origen himself wrote a letter
complaining that the heretics were altering his work while
he lived. Have a look at that letter, it is included in the
above text. What a sorry state of affairs!

So the MM theory assumes the following options:

(a) either the Constantine hitmen got lucky, and the pristine writings of Origen were all lost, so that we can't show the MM theory is false, or

(b) the Constantine police hunted down and destroyed every extant pristine ms of Origen, over a far flung empire, at a time when it was a big deal to sail from Rome to Alexandria, and despite there lack of technological tools, they hunted down and destroyed every pristine Origen mss, in every library and every dresser drawer throughout the Empire.

Is that a fair rendition of your assumptions?

It is actually quite fair, thanks for the paraphrasing.

Your evidence rests with the testimony of Rufinus, the purported
historian of ecclesiastical issues, who openly admits that the works
of Origen were all around the empire, in a state of disarray, because
the "arian heretics" had perverted his doctrine.

How could Rufinus now translate the extant works of Origen into
the Latin having discovered these perversions sitting there, right
in front of his eyes, in the greek texts pf Origen? Well, he obviously
made strategic corrections to the texts, and thus the doctrines
of Origin such that they were harmonised with what Origen actually
really really meant to have written.

Pete Brown