Marcion is popular with scholars who theorize 2nd-century Paulines

[ebion]

I'm exploring the theory that Marcion* wrote the Paulines, or that the Marcionites subsequently wrote them. This implies that the "Paul" of the Paulines and the Paul of Acts can be quite different, and one can presume that the author(s) of the of the Paulines presumably had copies of Acts handy when he/they wrote the Paulines. The he/they/* is because it could have been one or more of Marcions teachers or mentors that originated them, and Marcion put them forth, or that Marcion put forth the doctorine and the written Paulines followed in due course.

I searched PBF and didn't find anything but a catchy thread title to plagarize (as flattery).

So the question I raise is: "is there any good evidence of the Pauline Epistles being extant before circa 144 AD?"

 

[ebion]

As none of Marcion's works survived, I'm asking where is the first explicit reference to a book or verse from a Pauline epistle. For example, Tertulian has one in Against Marcion Book 5 2.1

[1] The epistle which we also allow to be the most decisive45 against Judaism, is that wherein the apostle instructs the Galatians​

I find none in Justin Martyr.

I see none in Iraneus that I can identify as a reference to a book or verse.

Should I look in the Letters of Ignatius of Antioch? Are they "authentic" for this purpose?

 

[ebion]

I ask the question because it is central to the thesis of the Tubingen​

School/F.C. Bauer/H. Detering: is there any evidence of the existence of​

the Paulines before Marcion? Not just things that sound like they're Paulunist,​

but explicitly referring to the Paulines as if they are Epistles.​

​

The Letters of Ignatius of Antioch are very Paulunist, but so far I haven't​

seen anything that makes me say "Pauline Epistle". And they're about the only​

supposed retort the classic Tubingen/F.C. Bauer/Detering thesis I know of.​

​

As the Letters are so much of a mess, I decided they can't be used for​

anything serious anyway. But I came across a supposed retort that​

assumes some recension of the letters is valid, but the only things​

in there that I saw was "literary contact", "similarities in vocabulary" etc.;​

nothing that would come up to PBF, or my, standards.​

​

So I'm still left with nothing serious referring to the Paulines before​

Tertullian or P46, which is 200AD +/- 25​

​

There is a really good summary article one why this is important by Hermann Detering:​

The Dutch Radical Approach to the Pauline Epistles​

​

It's a summary but there is at least one new thing in there which stopped​

me dead in my tracks (pun intended):​

​

• Proxy baptism for the dead (1 Cor. 15:29) has not been confirmed earlier than among the Marcionites in the second century.

​

There is absolutely no way proxy baptism could be in a pre-60 AD story line.​

NO WAY. The Jamesian church was less than 30 years old, and they were all​

deep Hebrew believers (except the Apostate SPaul).​

​

Hence 1Cor. is post-150 AD at least; proxy baptism would not be until whatever​

the Marcionite church was well established, with enough dying Marcionites to need​

proxying, to such an extent they felt it necessary to work it into Holy Scripture.​

​

So in keeping with Detering, I'll take a confirmed position on this:​

​

1Cor. and by implication 2Cor., Rom., and Gal. (at least) are Marcionite works,​

and the Paul of the Paulines is a literary extrapolation of the Paul of Acts​

by the Marcionites (Marcions mentors, or Marcion, or his followers).​

​

There's also the "husband is dead"/"Jehovah is dead" part of Romans 7​

which is also purely, and unabashedly, Marcionite.​

​

I understand that the Paulines post-150 AD will have some dating reprecussions,​

be that as it may, but I'll let the Tubingen school speak to that.​