Apocryphicity

A Blog Devoted to the Study of Christian Apocrypha

Thoughts on Ehrman and Pleše’s Apocryphal Gospels

by Tony

Spurred on by the brief review of The Apocryphal Gospels by Bart Ehrman and Zlatko Pleše (Oxford University Press, 2011) in the LA Times, I have finally gathered together my own thoughts on the collection.

The goal of the collection, in the editors’ words, is to provide “everything that a graduate student or scholar working on the apocryphal Gospels would need or want access to” (p. viii). And, to some extent, they succeed. This is the first ever collection of primary texts in their original languages with facing English translations (though Andrew Bernhard’s Other Early Christian Gospels, used on occasion here, contains a number of texts). And it is undeniably an excellent all-in-one source for the material, drawing in texts from Tischendorf’s Evangelia Apocrypha, several CCSA (Corpus Christianorum Series Apocryphorum) editions, a variety of century-old journal articles, the Nag Hammadi Library, and others. On Tischendorf, the editors comment that his 150-year-old editions are  “inadequate for the needs of scholars today” and that “many texts have been uncovered since Tischendorf’s day, some of them relatively difficult to access” (p. viii).  Nevertheless, they liberally draw upon Tischendorf’s work, primarily in the absence of new editions of certain texts—a deficiency the editors point out on several occasions, …

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Conference on Erasure History

by Tony

I will be participating next week in a conference at the University of Toronto entitled Erasure History:Approaching the Missing Sources of Antiquity (see HERE for more information). I will be responding to James Corke-Webster's paper "History without the Historian: Removing Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History from the Archive." I'd better brush up on my Bauer.

New Unknown Gospel from Oxyrhynchus

by Tony

Brent Landau passed on to me a few notes regarding the find:

"Cool things I learned at Dirk Obbink's lecture in Oklahoma City this evening" (Tuesday, September 13, 2011)

1) The new "unknown gospel" from the Oxyrhynchus Papyri (mentioned in THIS news report) that was mentioned in press releases in connection with the ancientlives.org project has Jesus performing an exorcism on the Gerasene demoniac…BUT, there's no herd of swine! The demons just go away. No pigs were harmed in the performing of this miracle.

2) On the other side of the "unknown gospel" fragment are several sayings of Jesus about acknowledging him as Lord that resemble (but are not identical to) logia found in the Synoptics and Thomas. So apparently this gospel alternates between narrative and sayings, but with less of the transitional material found in the Synoptics.

3) The "unknown gospel" will be published in vol. 77 of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri.

4) A new fragment of the beginning of the Gospel of Mark has been identified, which was probably enclosed in an amulet and likely dates to the third century. Like several other important witnesses, it lacks the phrase "Son of God" after "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ." But, unlike any other manuscript, it

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New Discussions of Secret Mark

by Tony

Allan Pantuck has contributed another article (HERE) to the ongoing discussion on Secret Mark at the Biblical Archeology Review page. The article is a response to the handwriting analysis of Agamemnon Tselikas. Tselikas has, in turn, added a (rather weak) response to Pantuck (HERE).

And James McGrath has entered into a discussion with Craig Evans about his recent post on Secret Mark on the Bible and Interpretation blog. McGrath’s response can be found on Exploring Our Matrix, and Evans has, in turn, responded on Near Emmaus.  And McGrath again back on Exploring Our Matrix.

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“Hoaxes” or Apocrypha?

by Tony

Larry Hurtado has an interesting post on his blog entitled "Hoaxes From the Past (That Keep on Re-appearing)." He discusses briefly (essentially presenting an overview of the contents of Edgar J. Goodspeed's Famous Biblical Hoaxes, or, Modern Apocrypha) a number of modern apocryphal texts, including The Aquarian Gospel of Christ (see this previous post on a handy source for such texts). The overview raises for me an issue over the appropriate use of the term "hoax." What is it that divides these modern apocryphal texts from ancient apocrypha? Or, in some cases, from pseudepigraphical canonical texts? The writer of the introduction to the Apocalypse of Paul, for example, claimed to have found this text hidden away beneath his house in the fourth-century. Clearly Paul did not write the text and it was likely written in the fourth-century by the text's "discoverer." A similar "discovery" in the nineteenth-century, such as The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ, is not much different, is it?

I understand the hostility some may feel toward modern apocrypha, but I don't feel the same way about ancient apocrypha. Is the difference solely of time and distance? Or is there something else that is different about the origins of these texts? Are modern apocrypha just as valid an area of study for 19th and 20th century developments in Christianity as ancient apocrypha for medieval Christianity?

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Solving the Mystery of the Gospel of Peter’s Talking Cross

by Tony

Mark Goodacre presented a paper at last year's SBL with the provocative argument that the "cross that spoke" in the Gospel of Peter is an element that derives from a scribal misunderstanding of the nomen sacrum ΣΤΑ (thus reading "cross" instead of "crucified one"). I missed the paper at SBL, but Mark has two posts describing his argument (start HERE) and these have sparked some fruitful discussion.

Reading the posts I was reminded of a few instances in the Infancy Gospel of Thomas manuscripts in which the same nomen sacrum has led to some corruptions in the text. The first is in the 11th-century Sabaiticus 259 (=Gs). In 6:2b we have the reading "…and that you may bear the name of salvation." Other Mss have instead "When you see my cross which my father mentioned to you…" The Gs reading seems to have arisen from a misreading of ΣΤΑ (cross) as "salvation." Another corruption appears in 6:2a where we have "Do not consider him to have the worth of a small man (ANOU)." The early versions have "small cross"; so perhaps our scribe (or an earlier one in the chain of transmission) misread ΣΤOU as ANOU.The only Ga Ms to have this chapter (Vienna, Cod. hist. gr. 91) is also corrupt (for microu staurou it reads mikroterou). The Gd Ms Cod. Ath. gr. 355 has the correct reading, but not as a nomen sacrum.

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Quentin Quesnell on Secret Mark

by Tony

Timo Panaanen of Salainen evankelista (HERE) has posted a transcription of his interview with Quentin Quesnell on his viewing of the Secret Mark manuscript in 1983.

In related news, Biblical Archeology Review has posted Agamemnon Tselikas' handwriting analysis report (and a helpful summary) on the Secret Mark manuscript (HERE). Look for a response on this soon from Allan Pantuck.

More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Vol. 1

by Tony

Congratulations to Jim Davila and Richard Bauckham on getting the manuscript of their first volume of Old Testament Pseudepigapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures to their publisher. Jim's post on Paleojudaica (HERE) includes a list of the contents of the volume. Note that some of these texts are actually Christian-penned, but feature Old Testament/Hebrew Bible figures or events; so the book will be of interest also to readers of the Christian Apocrypha. 

2011 Réunion de l’AELAC

by Tony

The programme for the 2011 Réunion de l'AELAC, which takes place June 30-July 2 in Dole, has been posted on-line (available HERE).These are the titles of the papers announced thus far:

Anne-Marie Polo de Beaulieu, “Usages et fonctions des apocryphes dans les recueils d'exempla et la prédication aux XIIIe-XIVe siècles.”

Brent Landau, “Revelation of the Magi.”  

Yves Tissot, “Évaluation critique de l'édition des Actes de Thomas de M. Bonnet."

Kristian Heal, “The Syriac History of Joseph.”  

Tony Burke, “New Developments in Constructing a Critical Edition of the Syriac Infancy Gospel of Thomas.”

Witold Witakowski, “The ‘Vienna Protology’ and recently discovered paintings in a church in northern Ethiopia based on this Ethiopic apocryphal text.”

L’édition de textes à traditions multiples : approches théoriques et pratiques avec les interventions de:

Els Rose, “L’édition des Virtutes apostolorum.”

Zbigniew Izydorczyk, “Excer[-or-]cizing uncertainty: reflections on editing the Evangelium Nicodemi.”

Bart Janssens, “Les séries latines de Brepols et les outils électroniques.”

Caroline Mace, “La série grecque du CC et le logiciel Classical Text Editor.”

And here is the abstract for my paper:

“New Developments in Constructing a Critical Edition of the Syriac Infancy Gospel of Thomas”

The Infancy Gospel of Thomas (IGT) is one of the most ancient texts of the Christian Apocrypha, dating perhaps to the early second century.  Though scholarship on IGT has been sparse for decades, the past ten years has seen a surge in interest in this text. Several

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Reflections on the Secret Mark Symposium, part 3

by Tony

[With apologies for taking so long; a short vacation and a nasty cold kept me from work].

The afternoon session began with Marvin Meyer’s paper, “The Young Streaker in Secret and Canonical Mark.” Meyer holds a position on Secret Mark similar to that of Helmut Koester—that canonical Mark is an abridgement of a longer version of Mark that included the two Secret Mark passages. This longer Mark helps to clear up the confusion over the neaniskos (young man) who shows up at the end of canonical Mark, a character so mysterious that Matthew and Luke ignore him when composing their texts. In the course of his paper, Meyer echoes the views of some of the scholars from the morning session regarding indicting Smith: “I myself find it rather distasteful to see in these exposés what seem to be inappropriate attacks upon one of our late colleagues, Morton Smith, and my perception that some scholars are inclined to ‘pile on’ concerns me…Some of the charges seem almost libelous.” Meyer provides several examples of other neaniskoi in ancient literature, some of whom flee and abandon their robes, just as in canonical Mark. One example in particular, the fresco from the Villa of the Mysteries at Pompeii, provides the closest parallel to Mark’s figure: “As his expression indicates, the youth is excited and surprised by what he is discovering from the women. Like the youth in Mark, he is discovering the mysteries, and he is amazed.” Meyer finishes the paper by looking at …

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