Saturday, February 24, 2024

How Luke broke the Gospel

That title may seem a Strong Statement, but I've been pondering Marcion's favourite work, the protoBezae, for some time now - so, let's assemble what I got, in one place.

First up: we'll consider what Luke had to work with. For timing, everyone agrees Luke wrote after the Temple had fallen. Everyone agrees he built from Mark and from Tradition (oral or not). We Catholics and Mark Goodacre would add: Matthew. Another direct source was Paul's first volume, especially "Romans"; which was also important to Mark's implied genealogy which Matthew reified. In secondary volumes I deem safe to assume Luke knew 1 Thessalonians; Jesus' ascension being the firstfruits of Rapture. I can be convinced to include Philippians, also; and further-afield, "To the Hebrews" although perhaps under Barnabas' byline. Luke has the postdisciple John citing 1 John. And Luke was at least contemporary with such as Jude, the Patmian Revelation to John, the tract we know as "Barnabas", 1 Peter, and 1 Clement. Somewhere around here, I've argued, comes the Hegesippus > Africanus lore around James. I allow that Luke no longer even had the Lachrymose, 1 Clement feeding that need.

But Luke did not have equal respect for the library provided to him.

Luke's Acts, by ending the Spirit's journey at Rome, ended Paul's career. There was nothing left for the Apostle to do, but die. This led to a truncated copy of "Romans" which - conveniently - did not have Paul promising Spain. Also Luke offers an artificially rosey view of the early intraChristian disputes because hey, Holy Spirit. I suspect all these conflicts between Luke and the emergent canon, later, led to the Ecclesia's decision not to promote the Western text's inclusion of 1 Clement among the Catholic Epistles (which survived to the Alexandrinus).

Luke's gentilism, which surpassed Mark's and maybe even Paul's, led to Bezae's evangelion outside Luke, and to parallel adulterations in 1 Thessalonians.

Last fall I've started pondering Oxyrhynchus 4009 and 5575, and their - more likely its - parallels with "2 Clement". Since then I've pondered also if Justin Martyr and Ignatius might have assumed a more Petrine presentation of the Gospel. I'll just Go There: it's the Gospel of Peter, known to Serapion. Those accepting Luke - like Irenaeus - meant one of Luke's sources had to draw the short straw, which straw was "Peter" - perhaps because it was that obvious a pseudepigraph based, itself, on Mark. The Apocalypse of Peter followed it; although, for dumb reasons, 2 Peter stayed.

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