Did Marcion invent Paul the ''apostle"?

The earliest historical author of the Christian Church was Justin Martyr.

Justin never quotes from the Gospels or any of the NT but what he calls ''Memoirs of the apostles" and the Old Testament, usually the OT.

He wrote against Marcion whose movement had steam but only followed the apparently unknown by Justin Paul the apostle and the Gospel of Luke, neither really liked the Jews but Marcion hated the Jewish God.

Now if Justin had heard of Paul he would have used his Epistles to rebuke Marcion but he didn't and probably never heard of or didn't believe the story of Paul.

The next big author was Iranaeus and he is the first to mention 4 Gospels and Paul the Apostle, Acts. Is it me or was everything written or compiled from the time of Marcion to Iranaeus and tinkered with for a few hundred year's after.

The big question is, how can we trust that Marcion didn't write under the name of Paul? He rejected several letters that were obviously written in his time and not Pauls. Nobody knew who Paul was until Marcion, and I bet he was popular because of Marcion and the Church had to adopt him.

Hence the two religions in the NT, that of Jesus and...Paul. Nobody knew then if Paul was a real person so to win converts they started using Paul.

The theory that the Epistles were written in the mid first century have nothing to base it on. Paul is absent from the historical records, even in Josephus and the oldest MS. are fourth century.

a reply to: SethTsaddik

I have asked similar questions for years and wont bore folks by regurgitating more of the same, but Paul has no historical context. I want to be more respectful of peoples beliefs...so I wont go on another diatribe.

Suffice it to say, I share your sentiment, but be prepared for a barrage of chapter and verse folk.

a reply to: SethTsaddik

Unfortunately everything we know about Marcion is from hostile witnesses... After being deem an heretic anything that existed from his teaching was destroyed... possibly including his followers

So i don't think its possible to answer such a question

interesting theory though

Before Marcion, Before Justin there is Clement of Rome talking about Paul within 30-40 years of when the apostle is thought to have died:

(Paragraph 5)

But, passing from examples in antiquity, let us come to the heroes nearest our own times. Let us take the noble examples of our own generation. By reason of rivalry and envy the greatest and most righteous pillars[of the Church] were persecuted, and battled to the death. Let us set before our eyes the noble apostles: Peter, who by reason of wicked jealousy, not only once or twice but frequently endured suffering and thus, bearing his witness, went to the glorious place which he merited. By reason of rivalry and contention Paul showed how to win the prize for patient endurance.  Seven times he was in chains; he was exiled, stoned, became a herald [of the gospel] in East and West, and won the noble renown which his faith merited. To the whole world he taught righteousness, and reaching the limits of the West he bore his witness before rulers. And so, released from this world, he was taken up into the holy place and became the greatest example of patient endurance.

The Letter of the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, Commonly Called Clement's First Letter Written around A.D.96

originally posted by: monkcaw
Before Marcion, Before Justin there is Clement of Rome talking about Paul within 30-40 years of when the apostle is thought to have died:

(Paragraph 5)

But, passing from examples in antiquity, let us come to the heroes nearest our own times. Let us take the noble examples of our own generation. By reason of rivalry and envy the greatest and most righteous pillars[of the Church] were persecuted, and battled to the death. Let us set before our eyes the noble apostles: Peter, who by reason of wicked jealousy, not only once or twice but frequently endured suffering and thus, bearing his witness, went to the glorious place which he merited. By reason of rivalry and contention Paul showed how to win the prize for patient endurance.  Seven times he was in chains; he was exiled, stoned, became a herald [of the gospel] in East and West, and won the noble renown which his faith merited. To the whole world he taught righteousness, and reaching the limits of the West he bore his witness before rulers. And so, released from this world, he was taken up into the holy place and became the greatest example of patient endurance.

The Letter of the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, Commonly Called Clement's First Letter Written around A.D.96

It figures it would be from a man who was from "The Church of Rome".

a reply to: monkcaw

That 1 Clement letter is anonymous.

And no first, second or third century copies exist. It's no better evidence for the existence of Paul than the epistles attributed to the name Paul. Clement would never have spoken so ill of Peter even if it was true. It's not true, not historical (It explains the story of the Phoenix as if it were a real thing and goes into extreme details about it) and not written by Clement of Rome.

Not evidence that Paul was a historical person.

Like the also anonymous Gospels a name was just given it, someone with authenticity, and THE star pupil of Peter was assigned as author by whoever for whatever reason.

a reply to: Matrixsurvivor

The interesting thing is that particular letter is actually anonymous and the same Clement was said to be a succesor to Peter by non Pauline Jewish Christians who wrote a rather large chronicle of his travels with Peter. I honestly find the larger story more credible, even if it's novelised, than a letter whose author leaves no clue as to his identity. Most Epistles announced who was writing or dictating in ancient writings.

Paul is only mentioned as ''the enemy" Saul who attacks James at one point.

a reply to: Akragon

Thanks.

Some good evidence exists. Who enters the picture first in the annals of Christian history? Marcion.

Justin never even mentioned Paul or quoted him or even acknowledged his existence as if he didn't know who he was. It was Marcion he wrote against.

Iranaeus then writes his own anti Marcion material but introduces the concept of 4 Gospels and ''the apostle" as Church fathers called Paul.

So I would say that is strong evidence that the character of Paul was invented and Acts spun to weave in this new "apostle" to the Jerusalem descended Church of Christ.

And who is the best candidate, the only candidate really, for the position of most likely to have written the ten Epistles that Marcion was said to use?

Marcion himself, who refused to assimilate and was branded a heretic yet he was the first person to form a Pauline Church and the source of the Pauline epistles. Without Marcion there would be no Paul.

Good evidence, you can never prove such things, true, but you can can reasonably conclude based on evidence. It's always a theory but an easier topic to form one on than who wrote, say, Hebrews. That is not even really guessable because it's impossible to tell, nothing to go on.

But thanks.

So I would say that is strong evidence that the character of Paul was invented and Acts spun to weave in this new "apostle" to the Jerusalem descended Church of Christ.So I would say that is strong evidence that the character of Paul was invented and Acts spun to weave in this new "apostle" to the Jerusalem descended Church of Christ.

Interesting theory and discussion.

However, the problem I see is the dating. As I recall (and feel free to correct me on this since I'm just going from memory) Marcion's "gospel" dates from ~120AD. So if Iranaeus is involved in spinning Acts to incorporate Paul, that would place the dating of Acts after that, correct? And since most scholars believe Acts and Luke were written by the same person, this would move the dating of Luke out to far past the generally accepted timeframe of even John.

Of course, we don't know for certain the dates of the 4 Gospels, so it is possible that the generally accepted dates could be all wrong. But one primary reason given for dating the Epistles earlier is that they don't seem to know anything about the destruction of the Temple or Jeruselem. It would seem that if Paul were invented post 120, he might say at least a little something about the largest catastrophe of their time.

I wish some more scholars or whomever would do more research on the historicity of Paul. Interesting stuff!

a reply to: Elcabong

Iranaeus came after Justin Martyr who knew Marcion, wrote against him.

So I don't see how Iranaeus messes up the dating, I am suggesting that between the time of Justin and Iranaeus is when the NT was written or part of it at least. I am also suggesting Marcion wrote Paul's epistles, I didn't say Iranaeus wrote Acts, just that he was the first to mention it.

Let me know if I am missing something, I don't see a problem honestly.

I have read some things about how Marcion could have wrote the Epistles and I do see the merit in that theory. I just don't understand the dating would work out. Let me explain the dating as I understand it, and maybe you can help me understand how it would work with the Marcion Epistle theory. So from what I've read:

- Mark, Matthew, Luke, Acts (in that order) were written 70-90AD
- John sometime after, maybe 90s, some say early 100s or slightly later
- "True" epistles 50-60 are the generally accepted dates. Some Christians scholars attempt to push that back to 30s or 40s. What are the epistle dates based on?
He doesn't know anything about the Temple destruction
Doesn't know much about a lot of the gospel stories, virgin birth, etc so thought to be earlier than the gospels
Certain kings, priests, and other various characters he interacts with (assuming those stories are true)
Generally, the epistles are thought to be the oldest documents of Christianity (according to a number of scholars)

So if you accept that, then when did Marcion write the Epistles?

I thought Marcion came out with his writings in the ~120 timeframe. If so, that breaks a lot of what I mentioned above and a lot of people need to go back to the drawing board.

Again, that's not proof that he didn't write the Epistles. It just means (in my view) that a lot of what is commonly accepted regarding the dates must be wrong.

I'm not very familiar with Justin Martyr and Iranaeus and their participation in all this, so I could be missing something there.

a reply to: Elcabong

All dates regarding the version of the books of the NT we have today are mere guesses, we can know some of the contents from quotes but just quotes and starting with Iranaeus.

What we do know is that before him nobody had heard of Paul in the first century or up to the authorship of Justins apologies, until Iranaeus. Justin mentioned Marcion, but not Paul.

To me that says he never heard of Paul. Why would he write against Marcion and not mention any apostles or Paul? Logically he would have mentioned Paul if he was a real person but he focuses instead on Marcion, Paul's biggest supporter, never mentioning Paul. It makes no sense unless Marcion made Paul up and made him popular.

Leading the Latin Church to adopt the epistles as their own to compete, which explains why Marcion was the most written against heretic in history. He was a threat who needed to be dealt with and by taking his epistles and money and then excommunicating him they did just that. He was even slandered as a rapist.

So Iranaeus was the first to mention the 4 Gospels and other books of the NT. Since he was younger than Marcion and Justin it makes perfect sense that the Pauline epistles and NT were written between the time of Justin and Iranaeus.

I hope that makes sense because I don't know how to make it more clear, the dating is only an issue if you choose to believe that guessing is an accurate method of determining date of composition.

Since it isn't, we don't have autographs and they don't appear in the historical records until the second century I do not believe that the guesses of anyone can be used as evidence. A guess is a guess, and they are not universally accepted by scholars (dates).

It's Fundamental Christian scholars who say they were written in the first century but they don't even know WHO wrote most of the books, never mind when. It would not have been difficult to forge the Pauline epistles, hell the Church admits some are pseudo epigraphs.

Why not all then?

Mt. Mk. Lk. Jn. are all anonymous which means not written by those 4, but scholars still say that they were, and I don't trust them accordingly.

All of Paul's teachings are expansions upon the teachings of Jesus Christ.

a) Love, and loving on another
b) peace
c) giving of the comforter, the Holy Ghost
d) giving of the Holy Ghost to teach
e) the indwelling of God in the believers, i.e. the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, God the father and Jesus.
f) the oneness of God with the believers and each other.
g) His Oneness not in quality or objectives but physically as a member of the godhead. Or being God, not a god but God in the flesh.
h) Salvation, the saving of mankind
i) his dying on the cross for mankind
j) righteousness given to mankind and how to live in that righteousness
k) justification and how to live in that Justification
l) Joy
m) Life as a follower of Christ
and much much more

a reply to: Elcabong

The Epistle of James, the brother of John was written circa 43bc before he was beheaded by Herod.

The earliest of Paul's epistles was written in 48bc and that would be Galatians. His other letters were written before the time of Caesar Nero, While it is thought that Paul was beheaded by Caesar Nero in 68AD two years before the destruction of Jerusalem, which included the Herodian Temple.

Peter wrote his letters sometime between 68 and 90AD, many believe he was killed in 70AD at the time of the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem. Many believe that the first letter was written from todays Iraq from the area known as Babylon, though the city was not there any more the place and their cities were still there. Unlike the opposite view that Babylon was a mystery name given to Rome, but that holds no water when everyone at that day knew where Babylon was in the east, the place where the wise men came from when they came and "worshipped" Jesus.

John wrote his letters before his gospel around 90Ad, his Gospel and the book of Revelation in 95AD

a reply to: ChesterJohn

Who cares if they are expansions on Christ's teachings or not?

They aren't, but I am questioning the very existence of Paul, not debating theology.

Paul never knew Jesus or what he taught though so I don't see how he could have expanded on his teachings, they weren't even written yet and he knows nothing of them in his letters.


But, ALL of the dates you provided are guesses since that is all anyone can do . Nobody actually knows when any of the NT was written, or the Old.

The oldest Bible is in 400 AD give or take.

a reply to: SethTsaddik

Yeah just another one of your opinions based on your assumptions.

a reply to: SethTsaddik

Then you would also have to get rid of Peter's testimony about Paul when he wrote before 68AD in his letter.

But you may have head knowledge of the Bible, but you lack a lot of discernment concerning the wisdom therein. Discernment comes from having the Holy Ghost of which you don't have the Holy Ghost. This we can judge by your words and action, also known as fruit, concerning the scriptures.

a reply to: SethTsaddik

All dates regarding the version of the books of the NT we have today are mere guesses, we can know some of the contents from quotes but just quotes and starting with Iranaeus.

What we do know is that before him nobody had heard of Paul in the first century or up to the authorship of Justins apologies, until Iranaeus. Justin mentioned Marcion, but not Paul.

Not true at all.

Let's start with a list of well known historians ======================

• Marcus Velleius Paterculus (c. 19 BC–c. 31 AD), Roman history
• Memnon of Heraclea (fl. 1st century AD), Greek and Roman history
• Quintus Curtius Rufus (c. 60–70), Greek history
• Flavius Josephus (37–100), Jewish history
• Pamphile of Epidaurus, (female historian active during the reign of Nero, r. 54–68), Greek history
• Thallus (early 2nd century AD), Roman history
• Plutarch (c. 46–120), would not have counted himself as an historian, but is a useful source because of his Parallel Lives of important Greeks and Romans
• Gaius Cornelius Tacitus (c. 56 –c. 120), early Roman Empire

Now I am not about to do your homework but are you propagating that because Saul/Paul is not a primary interest in these historians accounts is to say that Saul/Paul was bogus? Have you considered other numerous writers such as are written in the numerous records of the ancient Britain Glastonbury or French provinces accounts or the many other accounts of early church records of the Nazarene's?

Would you also care to explain why Pontius Pilate is not found in any Roman Records and is only briefly mentioned by Tacitus in one of his texts named Christus? [Annales, Historiae, Chapter 15, paragraphs 54 and 55] -- Did you know that for centuries the very same accusations were made about Pilate?

Do we have evidence for Pontius Pilate outside the biblical texts?
Quote
In 1961, archaeologists discovered a plaque fragment at Caesarea Maritima, an ancient Roman city along the Mediterranean coast of Israel. The plaque was written in Latin and imbedded in a section of steps leading to Caesarea’s Amphitheatre. The inscription includes the following:
“Pontius Pilatus, Prefect of Judea, has dedicated to the people of Caesarea a temple in honor of Tiberius.”
Emperor Tiberius reigned from 14 to 37 AD. This matches the biblical timeline that records Pontius Pilate ruling as governor of Judea from 26 to 36 AD.
Unquote

So up to 1961 there was no proof of a Pontius Pilate in Roman history. Simply a non biblical mention from a writer named Tacitus who we know nothing of where he got his information. Guess work? Do you see my point?

All of the NT letters were gathered from all sorts of circumstances and at one time were nothing but historical accounts just as Tacitus is a historical account. Simply because these letters are assembled into a collection does not negate their same value as Tacitus and to somehow infer that biblical accounts are not historical or academia accepted is really very disingenuous.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

I don't worry about the acknowledged prior to canonization as pseudepigraphal 2 Peter. For obvious reasons.

Even though it's pseudepigraphal it still calls Paul's teachings ''hard to understand" otherwise known as nonsense or nonsensical.

All of the general epistles have hints of disapproval of Paul's teachings and anyone like him, James has ''Faith without works is dead." after a polemic against faith alone based salvationist theology.

John talks of anyone who speaks of Christ having not come in the flesh as antichrists. Paul says Christ came ''in the likeness of flesh."

I will exclude Jude as I don't know specifically of any hints of anti Pauline polemics but Revelation when studied thoroughly is conclusively anti Paul, addressing only the 7 Churches in Asia where "This you know, all those who are in Asia have turned from me." according to none other than Paul himself.

Clearly we have polemical elements embedded in the New Testament between two factions, Asia and Rome.

Jewish Nazarenes vs Gentile Christians

Jerusalem vs Paul

And the story ends with Paul victorious because he sided with Rome and had Roman connections and with Herodians.

The whole thing is a farce, a fiction, but the factions were real. Constantine forced them to reconcile and establish one system with one book agreed upon by all following the establishment of the Trinity as Canonical at Nicea, Athanasius later banned all Apocrypha and enforced it leading to the discovery of Nag Hammadi in the 1940's.

Paul is barely mentioned with a short prayer and a short apocalypse being the only mentions of him in the corpus so he was known but not important.

But my basic premise of Paul only showing up sometime between Justin and Iranaeus in the historical record because of Marcion promoting him is pretty solid logically.

It is not a stretch to think Marcion was the person to discover the "existence" of Paul, Tertullian all but says it. If he wasn't mentioned by Josephus he was nobody as Josephus mentioned exciting characters and insignificant ones and never Paul.

And if Marcion was the first to promote Paul's epistles he probably wrote them, as the Church has no idea of the origins of Paul's epistles. But Acts was written to include Paul with the apostles.

And it does a sloppy job.

Marcion wrote Paul's epistles, the Church accepted them, then excommunicated and persecuted Marcion.

That's my theory, at least I know it's a theory and don't blindly accept it as historical fact.

Which is never a good idea, and that includes the Bible itself.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

You don't have to like my theories but I am not going to stop pondering and examining the evidence and advancing my conclusions when I want.

The very historical existence of Paul is a theory.

It's only fair to theorize alternatives. And with the Church acknowledging many of the '' Pauline" epistles as pseudepigraphal I have no problem with thinking so are the rest.