Discussion of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas in the book is largely based on notes that I contributed in a thread on this forum in June of this year. The thread was this:That reminds me that I should expand the date range of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas to the fourth century and perhaps add a note that it may have pagan origins.Thanks PK. About half a dozen footnotes (out of 487) link to your ECW website. Particularly the analyses within the book defer to ECW in regard to the mainstream chronology (date range estimates) for all the texts within the NHL and for those in a representative sample of the so-called heretical NTA.Congrats on the book!
Can you share with us a bit of your discussion of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas in the book?
viewtopic.php?p=173632#p173632
Re: Infancy Gospel of Thomas papyrus
Here's the quote:
I now note that you had a series of questions about this which I had failed to see and thus failed to respond to because I decided to refrain from engaging in discussions in order to focus entirely and exclusively on the preparation of the book for a few months. I will respond to these below:Infancy Gospel of Thomas RE-DISCOVERED w/ Tony Burke
https://youtu.be/XfRwSjF4TGU?t=249Miracles of the Infant Jesus listed by Tony Burke:
* Forms birds out of clay
* Animates them
* Purifies water
* Withers a boy
* Kills boy in the market place
* Blinds people who accuse him of being a bad kid
* Restores the sight of people
* Resurrects boy who falls of a roof
* Does a miraculous yield of grain
* Stretches a beam of timber making a bed [ETA: Joseph had cut it too short]
* Carries water in a cloak
* Heals a snake bite
In longer versions of text"
* Heals a foot from axe cut
* Resurrects a man who fell off a ladder
* Resurrects an infant
///
Mark Bilby then mentions (from Introduction of Tony Burke's critical edition) a summary of "the particularly negative characterisations of the IGT. Scholars have said that the miracles are:
* rediculous
* immoral
* purile
* malevolent
* cruel
* crude
* Jesus a hero of ridiculous and shabby pranks
* "enfant terrible"
* who acts in an un-Christian way
* utterly worthless
* text generally lacking in good taste, restraint and discretion
Laughter / Laughter
- QUESTION for the peanut glallery:
Is this actually an ancient satire of the Infant Jesus along kind of similar lines as that directed in the "Toledot Yeshu" towards the conception and adult life of the grown Jesus? Do serious biblical scholars and historians genuinely lack a capacity in the recognition of the presence of satire if it happens to be directed towards their very own good, divine and majestic Jesus figure? [Think "Life of Brian"] Was there really no [pagan] opposition to the glory of the Jesus figure?Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposing or shaming the perceived flaws of individuals, corporations, government, or society itself into improvement.[1] Although satire is usually meant to be humorous, its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, using wit to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satire
Andrew Criddle made a response to this question as follows:So this could be a genuine scholarly discovery of sorts, LC. I could support the idea that the Infancy Gospel of Thomas was written in the fourth century, as a satire, given how I seem to come so close to saying that it's plausible already. And how so many of the things that others have said support this too.
When we examine this journal article we find the following:Holy Child or Holy Terror ? by Kristi Upson-Saia argues that the stories were originally anti-Christian but have been rewritten. Most scholars are not convinced.Has anyone argued for its fourth century date and/or pagan authorship yet?
Andrew Criddle
Abstract
Although scholars regularly take note of Jesus’ anger and violence in some scenes of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, most attempt to explain them away. Since the text was copied by and circulated among early Christians, they reason, ancient readers must not have found them as shocking and offensive as modern readers. Based on contemporaneous discussions of anger, I argue instead that early Christian audiences would have been equally uncomfortable with stories of a short-tempered and vengeful young Jesus. In fact, I suggest that these stories were likely composed by opponents of Christianity who wished to undermine Jesus’ character and authority by presenting a compromised portrait of his youth. By absorbing critiques of Jesus into their own literature, however, Christian redactors were able to manage embarrassing stories about the boy Jesus and ultimately regain control of his image.
Although scholars regularly take note of Jesus’ anger and violence in some scenes of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, most attempt to explain them away. Since the text was copied by and circulated among early Christians, they reason, ancient readers must not have found them as shocking and offensive as modern readers. Based on contemporaneous discussions of anger, I argue instead that early Christian audiences would have been equally uncomfortable with stories of a short-tempered and vengeful young Jesus. In fact, I suggest that these stories were likely composed by opponents of Christianity who wished to undermine Jesus’ character and authority by presenting a compromised portrait of his youth. By absorbing critiques of Jesus into their own literature, however, Christian redactors were able to manage embarrassing stories about the boy Jesus and ultimately regain control of his image.
Obviously I missed Andrew's citation above as well for the same reason. If I had been paying attention I would have certainly also included this in the book. The argument that the Infancy Gospel of Thomas as a pagan satire appears to be strengthened by the above observations.
It is submitted however that this text is just the tip of a massive iceberg of apocryphal texts, once the composition of the pagan satire is given a specific historical and political context. That context being in the pagan response to "The Emperor's New Book" and its circulation c.325 CE.
To flesh out the possibility of a "scholarly discovery" as you write above I would argue that perhaps the most influential discovery (if indeed it is) is the identification within the NHL of the use of the figures and names of the Platonic demiurge as a cypher for the "Archon Constantine".
Pagan / Hellenic Satire: The "Blind Archon" Constantine as the Demiurge:
Yaldabaoth, Sakla, Samael, Beliar in the NHL and in the Ascension of Isaiah
The argument is that Yaldabaoth, Sakla, Samael, and Beliar in the NHL and in the Ascension of Isaiah are cyphers that the Hellenistic resistance applied to the "Blind Archon" Constantine. In a sense this usage represents a political and philosophical satire of the Roman emperor's (ultimately successful) attempt to destroy the Hellenistic civilisation by replacing it with a Christian civilisation. The authors of the NHL lament -- employing satire - the destruction of their Logos and of Hellenism in general.
From the book:
In Part 1 of this study, it was suggested that the NHL were authored by the last voices of the Hellenistic philosophical elites who were being submerged beneath the Christian revolution of the 4th century. The emperor Constantine in the NHL is portrayed as a “blind chief”, an “arrogant Archon”, one who “wants to nullify all teaching”, one who wants to bring about “the final end of the Logos”, one who professed that his god is the one-and-only authority: "It is I who am God; there is none apart from me" An entire Hellenistic generation was fleeing.
p.163
p.163
Statistics: Posted by Leucius Charinus — Wed Nov 20, 2024 10:53 pm