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Home , Marcionism

Intro to the Bible: Session 4: The Cannon: Early 1) The early heresies forced the early church to define core beliefs and the core scriptures. 2) Marcionism a) Marcion was son of the Bishop of Sinope in , born c. A.D. 110, from wealthy parents. i) He is described as a ship owner. ii) Having fallen out with his father he travels to , (1) Where, being a seafarer or ship owner and a great traveler, (a) He already may have been known (b) His wealth obtains him influence and position. b) Marcion was already a consecrated bishop. i) Probably an assistant or suffragan of his father at Sinope. ii) According to he made the Roman community the gift of two hundred thousand sesterces soon after his arrival, a huge sum for those days, (1) The money was returned to him after his breach with the Church. c) Marcion is said to have asked the Roman presbyters the explanation of Matthew 9:16-17, i) Which he evidently wished to understand as expressing the incompatibility of the New Testament with the Old, ii) But they interpreted in an orthodox sense. d) His final breach with the Roman Church occurred in the autumn of 144, e) The Marcionites counted 115 years and 6 months from the time of Christ to the beginning of their sect. f) Martyr in his first Apology (written about 150), describes Marcion's as spread everywhere. i) These half a dozen years seem to many too short a time for such prodigious success and they believe that Marcion was active in Asia Minor long before he came to Rome. g) Date of death is not known. Marcionte churches existed until 800 A.D. 3) Marcionite Doctrine a) He wanted a untrammeled and undefiled by association with Judaism. b) The was a scandal to the faithful i) A stumbling-block to the refined and intellectual gentiles (1) By its crudity and cruelty, and the Old Testament had to be set aside. c) Christianity was the New Covenant pure and simple. i) Abstract questions on the origin of evil or on the essence of the Godhead interested him little, d) The two great obstacles in his way he removed by drastic measures. i) He had to account for the existence of the Old Testament ii) Postulating a secondary deity, a “demiurgus” (1) Was , in a sense, but not the supreme God; (2) he was just, rigidly just, he had his good qualities, (3) but he was not the good god, who was Father of Our Lord Christ. iii) The relation between these two troubled Marcion little e) Marcion had secondly to account for those passages in the New Testament, which referred to the Old. i) He cut out all texts that were contrary to his dogma; ii) He created his own New Testament (1) With only one , a mutilation of St. Luke, (2) Apostolicon containing ten epistles of St. Paul. f) The mantle of St. Paul had fallen on the shoulders of Marcion in his struggle with the . i) The early church of his day was nothing but the Judaizers of the previous century. g) The pure Pauline Gospel had become corrupted i) Marcion, said that even the pillar Apostles, Peter, James, and John had betrayed their trust.

1 ii) He loved to speak of "false apostles", and lets his hearers infer who they were. h) Once the Old Testament has been completely got rid of, i) Marcion has no further desire for change. ii) He makes his purely New Testament Church as like the Early Church as possible, (1) Consistent with his deep seated Puritanism. i) The first description of Marcion's doctrine dates from : i) "With the help of the Marcion has in every country contributed to blasphemy and the refusal to acknowledge the Creator of all the world as God". He recognizes another god, who, because he is essentially greater (than the World maker or ) has done greater deeds than he. The supreme God is just and righteous. The good God is all love, the inferior god gives way to fierce anger. Though less than the good god, yet the just god, as world creator, has his independent sphere of activity. They are not opposed as though the good God interferes in favor of men, for he alone is all-wise and all-powerful and loves mercy more than punishment. All men are indeed created by the Demiurge, but by special choice he elected the Jewish people as his own and thus became the god of the Jews." j) His theological outlook is limited to the Bible, k) His struggle with the Early Church seems a battle over what is authentic scripture. i) The Old Testament is true enough, ii) Moses and the Prophets are messengers of the Demiurge, iii) The Jewish is sure to come and found a millennial kingdom for the Jews on earth, iv) But the Jewish messiah has nothing whatever to do with the Christ of God. (1) The Invisible, Indescribable, Good God (2) Formerly unknown to the creator as well as to his creatures, (a) Has revealed Himself in Christ. (3) Christ is indeed the Son of God, but he is also simply "God" without further qualification; l) To Marcion however Christ was God Manifest not God Incarnate. i) His rejects the Infancy and childhood of Christ at all; ii) Marcion's Savior is what Tertullian mockingly says: (1) "Suddenly a Son, suddenly Sent, suddenly Christ!" iii) Marcion admitted no prophecy of the Coming of Christ whatever; (1) The Jewish prophets foretold a Jewish Messiah only, (a) This Messiah had not yet appeared. iv) Marcion used the story of the three angels, who ate, walked, and conversed with Abraham and yet had no real human body, v) Marcion would prefer to accept even a supposed birth rather than a real body. m) To Marcion matter and flesh are not essentially evil, i) But are contemptible things, a mere production of the Demiurge, ii) It was inconceivable that God should really have made them His own. n) Christ's life on earth was a continual contrast to the conduct of the Demiurge. i) Some of the contrasts are cleverly staged: (1) The Demiurge sent bears to devour children for childish merriment (Kings)-- Christ asked children come to Him and He blessed them; (2) The Demiurge in his law declared lepers unclean and banished them — but Christ touched and healed them. ii) Christ's supposed passion and death was the work of the Demiurge, (1) Who, in revenge for Christ's abolition of the Jewish law delivered Him up to hell. (2) But even in hell Christ overcame the Demiurge by preaching to the spirits in Limbo, (3) And by His resurrection He founded the true Kingdom of the Good God.

2 iii) Epiphanius says that Marcionites believed that in Limbo Christ brought to Cain, Core, Dathan and Abiron, Esau, and the Gentiles, but left in damnation all Old Testament saints. iv) Marcion denied the resurrection of the body, (1) "For flesh and blood shall not inherit the Kingdom of God", v) Denied the second coming of Christ to judge the living and the dead, (1) The good God, being all goodness, does not punish those who reject Him; (2) He simply leaves them to the Demiurge, who will cast them into everlasting fire. o) How did Marcionites live? i) Rejection of marriage (1) He baptized only those who were not living in matrimony: virgins, widows, celibates, and eunuchs all others remained catechumens. ii) He used water in baptism, anointed his faithful with oil and gave milk and honey to the catechumens. iii) Epiphanius says they fasted on Saturday out of a spirit of opposition to the Jewish God, who made the Sabbath a day of rejoicing. p) Challenges to the church i) Marcion defined his own canon ii) It forced the church to come to grips with the Old Testament iii) And to define their own canon iv) He raised questions on the nature of God v) The nature of Christ (Human/Divine/Hybrid/Both?) vi) The nature of resurrection vii) Christian attitude to the world and the flesh.

4) a) Montanism was an early Christian movement of the late 2nd century, i) Referred to by the name of its founder, Montanus, ii) Originally known by its followers as the “New Prophecy. “ b) Originated in Phrygia, a province of Asia Minor, i) Flourished throughout the region, ii) Spread rapidly to other regions in the Roman Empire iii) It persisted in some isolated places into the 6th century. c) Although it came to be labeled a heresy, i) The movement held similar views about the basic tenets of Christian doctrine to those of the wider Christian Church. ii) It was a prophetic movement that called for a reliance on the spontaneity of the Holy Spirit and a more conservative personal ethic. iii) Parallels have been drawn between Montanism and modern day movements such as and the charismatic movement d) History i) Montanus first began his prophetic activity, sometime between AD 135 and AD 177. ii) Montanus was a recent convert when he first began prophesying, iii) He believed he was a prophet of God and that the Paraclete spoke through him. iv) Montanus proclaimed the towns of Pepuza and Tymion in west-central Phrygia as the site of the New Jerusalem, making the larger Pepuza his headquarters. v) He had two female colleagues, Prisca and Maximilla, (1) Claimed the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. (2) Their popularity even exceeded Montanus'.

3 vi) "The Three" spoke in ecstatic visions and urged their followers to fast and pray, so that they might share these . e) Their followers claimed they received the prophetic gift i) From the prophets Quadratus and Ammia of Philadelphia, (1) Figures believed to have been part of a line of prophetic succession (2) Stretching all the way back to Agabus and the daughters of Philip the Evangelist. ii) In time, the New Prophecy spread from Montanus' native Phrygia across the Christian world, to Africa and Gaul. f) The New Prophecy split the Christian communities, i) The more orthodox clergy mostly fought to suppress it. ii) It was believed that the prophets were possessed by evil spirits, iii) The churches of Asia Minor pronounced the prophecies profane and excommunicated its adherents. iv) There was never a uniform of New Prophecy adherents, and in many places they maintained their standing within the orthodox community. v) This was the case at Carthage. (1) While not without tension, the church there avoided over the issue. (2) There were women prophesying at Carthage, (3) Prophecy was considered a genuine gift of the spirit. (4) It was the responsibility of the council of elders to test all prophecy and to determine genuine . g) The best-known defender of the New Prophecy was undoubtedly Tertullian, i) who believed that the claims of Montanus were genuine. ii) He believed in the validity of the New Prophecy and admired the movement's discipline and ascetic standards. iii) Although what became the orthodox Christian church prevailed against Montanism within a few generations, i 5) Beliefs a) Because much of what is known about Montanism comes from anti-Montanist sources, it is difficult to know what they actually believed and how those beliefs differed from the Christian mainstream of the time. b) One source reports that Montanists claimed their revelation direct from the Holy Spirit could supersede the authority of Jesus or Paul or anyone else. i) The New Prophecy was also a diverse movement, ii) What Montanists believed varied by location and time. c) Montanism was particularly influenced by Johannine literature, especially the and the Apocalypse of John (also known as the ). i) In John's Gospel, Jesus promised to send the Paraclete or Holy Spirit, from which Montanists believed their prophets derived inspiration. ii) In the Apocalypse, John was taken by an angel to the top of a mountain where he sees the New Jerusalem descend to earth. (1) Montanus identified this mountain as being located in Phrygia near Pepuza. d) Followers of the New Prophecy called themselves spiritales ("spiritual people") in contrast to their opponents whom they termed psychici ("carnal, natural people"). e) Ecstatic prophecy i) Montanism was a movement focused around prophecy, ii) Which were believed to contain the Holy Spirit's revelation for the present age. (1) Prophecy itself was not controversial within 2nd-century Christian communities.

4 iii) "And he [Montanus] became beside himself, and being suddenly in a sort of frenzy and ecstasy, he raved, and began to babble and utter strange things, prophesying in a manner contrary to the constant custom of the Church handed down by tradition from the beginning." f) The Montanist prophets did not speak as messengers of God but were described as possessed by God while being unable to resist. i) A prophetic utterance by Montanus described this possessed state: (1) "Lo, the man is as a lyre, and I fly over him as a pick. The man sleepeth, while I watch." ii) Thus, the Phrygians were seen as false prophets because they acted irrationally and were not in control of their senses. g) In some of his prophecies, Montanus apparently, and somewhat like the oracles of the Greco-Roman world, spoke in the first person as God: i) "I am the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." ii) Many understood this to be Montanus claiming himself to be God. iii) However, scholars agree that these words of Montanus exemplify the general practice of religious prophets to speak as the passive mouthpieces of the divine, iv) And to claim divine inspiration (similar to modern prophets stating "Thus saith the Lord"). v) That practice occurred in Christian as well as in pagan circles with some degree of frequency. h) Other beliefs and practices of Montanism i) Tertullian wrote that the Holy Spirit through the New Prophecy cleared up the ambiguities of scripture. ii) The new prophecies did not contain new doctrinal content, but mandated strict ethical standards. iii) To the mainstream church, Montanists appeared to believe that the new prophecies superseded and fulfilled the doctrines proclaimed by the Apostles. iv) The power of apostles and prophets to forgive sins. (1) The Church believed that God forgave sins through bishops and presbyters (and those martyrs recognized by legitimate ecclesiastical authority) v) They recognized female bishops and presbyters. vi) Women and girls were forbidden to wear ornaments, and virgins were required to wear veils. vii) An emphasis on rigorous ethics and asceticism. viii) Prohibitions against remarriage following divorce or the death of a spouse. ix) They also emphasized keeping fasts strictly and added new fasts. x) Montanus provided salaries for those who preached his doctrine, xi) Their prophets dyed their hair, stained their eyelids, (1) At that time, dyed hair and eye make-up was used by harlots; (2) Were allowed to play with tables and dice and lend on usury. (3) The mainstream Church forbade it. (4) The Church also forbade usury. 6) Impact on the New Testament canon, a) Caused the early Church to develop a mistrust of all recent writings of a prophetical nature. b) Not only did such a feeling tend to discredit several apocalypses that may have been, in various parts of the Church, on their way to establishing themselves, c) Even the Revelation of John was sometimes brought under a cloud of suspicion d) Because of its usefulness in supporting the 'New Prophecy'. 7) The "new Prophecy" could supersede the teachings of Jesus. a) The church closed the canon, forbidding new scriptures.

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