Child of God and a Woman

When reading the Bible, we are often faced with many questions of our own. How was this miracle granted? Why did God create the world? What was Jesus childhood like? The apocrypha fills in the gap of when Jesus was born an infant and when he became an adult. As we read in the the Infancy Gospel of Thomas child Jesus is shown to be temperamental and strikes down those who dishonor and displease him. Child Jesus is depicted as not only someone with divine powers and control over their emotions, but just as a child instead. Like many children, child Jesus gets mad when his toys (streams of water leading to his seven pools) are destroyed. Being a child, he does not fully understand the full consequence upon himself and his family when he struck down that child. The setting up of the antagonistic values of the Jewish people is apparent in this reading. It is always child Jesus is enjoying his time, someone ruins his fun or day, they are struck down or cursed, and the neighborhood Jewish community and Jesus has to right his wrongs. I thought that the Infancy Gospel of Thomas was very interesting since it depicts Jesus as a normal child instead of a holy man.

Each time Jesus causes a ruckus, his foster father, Joseph becomes embarrassed and threatened by their neighbors. He seems to play a very weak role in his inability to shield his family from such threats. Mary on the other hand shows awe each time child Jesus displays his powers. I wonder what that says about family structure in the ancient times.

See the Word Differently, See the World Differently

            Annette Yoshiko Reed's The Afterlives of the New Testament Apocrypha ends with the claim that rather than "diluting the value of biblical studies...NT apocrypha may aid in illuminating neglected elements of the 'Bible as It Was'...[such as the] recovery of some of the dynamics, trajectories, and connections that shaped the worlds of late antiquity and the Middle Ages and also continue to shape our own" (425).  Because of this concluding statement, I began to wonder if analyzing NT apocrypha as if they were just more in depth accounts of specific parts of traditional stories rather than completely different than said stories, would make the popular culture and religious scholars appreciate the parabiblical genre of text more. 
            In other words, I believe the critics of parabiblical literature would reconsider their stances if they approached NT apocrypha as an extension of small details that may have helped shape the worlds of late antiquity that religious scholars may bypass as irrelevant now. For example, Reed notoriously analyzes manga and anime illustrations that refer to Fallen Angels, remarkably similar to those of the Book of Enoch, which could make these illustrations seen as a false, new, irrelevant piece of parabiblical literature...or they could be analyzed as a more in depth narrative reaching to explain the Fallen Angels that are in Enoch to the wider, modern day society or appeal to a different demographic. 
            Ultimately, would changing the way religious scholars and modern-day popular culture critics think about texts, specifically change their analysis' to consider apocrypha as continuations or more in depth explanations of canonical texts, sufficiently alter the hostility that is so often shown toward non-canonical texts in modern cultural discourse? If yes, there could potentially be dozens of NT apocrypha used as resources for hundreds of religious scholars to further the knowledge and research of sacred and profane history in antiquity without the fear of being rendered irrelevant because of the current belief that "apocryphal counterparts [are] inauthentic, inferior, and 'late' (405)." 

In Search of the Truth

             In the internet world of clickbait headlines and fantastic articles, it is not rare to see a title advertising “The Truth About Jesus” or “What Would Jesus Really Do?” or something along those lines.  While the style of these articles is a new take, the idea of revealing the ‘True’ Jesus has been around for quite a while.  Each new document or artifact found that relates to Jesus or the New Testament is eagerly awaited by the popular community, temped by the possibility of newly revealed ‘Truth’.

            This desire for the truth is not a new phenomenon.  It has not always been, however, based upon new discovery.  As far back as the second century, there were those seeking to protect the truth (407). In this case, Irenaeus did this by denouncing the New Testament Apocrypha as “spurious writings” intended to deceive the less knowledgeable (407).  Later, he would be refuted by those who believed that the apocrypha held more truth than the rigidly defined canon. This debate, still, to a degree, in motion today, has been argued from both sides countless times.  While the debate is not exactly over, it has shifted somewhat from a focus on preserving the dictated canon to a curiosity for unknown texts.

            Today, with more focus on newly discovered, previously unknown texts, there is a fascination with revealing secret information that will unveil truth.  This shift from seeking to preserve truth to pursuing new discoveries is an interesting one, something that appears to reveal a dissatisfaction with the set canon.  While both extremes have their values, it seems that both preservation and discovery are equally important, and can both reveal information, Truth or not, that is valuable to history and scholarship.

            

Baby Jesus

There have been a lot of stories that have been re-written and almost completely altered to show different perspectives. When writings are popular among the people, others try to retell them in different ways. Most popularly are the retelling of the Grim Fairytales in Disney films and books. They took these dark, morbid stories and changed them to be light hearted so that children could enjoy the tales too. However, some authors don’t always turn the dark to light, but they also turn light hearted stories dark.

In reading the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, I was disturbed by how violent Jesus was portrayed as a child. I just don’t understand why this gospel needs to portray Jesus as a temperamental child. The beginning of the gospel was mainly of Jesus going around cursing people until his temper tantrum was over. What message are children supposed to gain from this version of baby Jesus? That it’s okay to have a temper tantrum and do all these awful things if you have the power to undo it. I’m not okay with that message. Yes, towards the end of the gospel Jesus behaves better but not by much. This version of baby Jesus portrayed him as a self entitled jerk that did whatever he wanted because he was the son of God.

Anyway, that is my interpretation of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. After reading it, I would say that it should be labeled as an apocrypha writing. I want to know what others thought of this gospel. What message did y’all gather from reading this writing?

Divisive Portrayals of Sacred Characters

Today we see around us interactions of world religions on a grand scale, sometimes tolerant, sometimes destructive. In the United States in particular, there exists much disagreement over the treatment of different religious groups. The suspicions felt by some Christian groups toward Islam come prominently to mind in the light of extremist terrorism. Some of these tensions come undoubtedly from the fact that the two groups believe different details and stories about the same religious figures and events, and there is nothing new here. Centuries ago, while Christians and Muslims were acknowledging their similarities, they were also speaking in confusion about what they saw as incorrect interpretations of the sacred stories and characters they had in common.

One such story is the Childhood of Jesus as it is presented in both the Qur’an and apocryphal Christian texts such as the Pseudo-Gospel of Matthew and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas which were popular in the Middle Ages. In each tradition, Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary, created birds from clay and brought them to life, but differences were present in details such as Mary’s suffering at the birth of Jesus and the way Christ spoke as an infant to comfort her in the Qur'an. Medieval Christians, on the other hand, believed in a peaceful picture of the birth of Christ and did not believe he spoke during infancy.

Each group found the other strange for telling "untrue" stories about familiar figures, but ultimately, as seen in the fourteen-century writings of Sir John Mandeville, similarities were exploited for the purpose of conversion. The point here is that for one reason or another, suspicions have always been present and can hinge on even slight details of belief. Even tiny differences in portrayals can be used by one group to demonstrate sacrilege in the other. In her article "Jesus and the Birds in Medieval Abrahamic Traditions," Mary Dzon states that the story of Jesus and the clay birds was "a multivalent trope used by different faiths to undercut competing groups perceived as challenging to the integrity of one's own religious tradition," (230) and such rhetoric can be used across religious in a wide variety of tales regarding sacred characters and events.

Why Age Shouldn't Matter

Similar with the popularity of the “anti-hero” or the new spins on classic stories, (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) it seems like everyone is looking for a new way to look at the classics we all know and love. While some will use the non-canonical texts in order to contradict the Bible – as seen in the idea floated around of “Did Jesus have a twin brother”? – I believe that an emphasis on these newer texts actually can be good for promoting not just understanding from a scholarly perspective, but also for understanding from a religious one.

             It can hardly be debated that whether you believe these scriptures are true or not, the non-canonical writings can provide insight on many issues and ideas that were prevalent in society during their writing. For scholars, this new light can help provide better details about the way the world worked, about the issues people were debating over, as well as a whole host of things we haven’t even considered yet. But from a religious perspective, a deeper evaluation into say the PGJ can simulate a deeper discussion, and critical analysis of the stories in the Bible. Grounded in many of the same questions that scholars are likely to ask, a deeper appreciation for these texts could also open doors religiously that were previously less likely to be open: could Mary also have been born from an immaculate conception, for example. In all, it seems somewhat silly to deny these newly found scriptures their time simply because they aren’t as old as some others. 

Dust off your cannons

To speak of a cannon is to refer to traditional assembly of texts. Dungan writes that it would be foolish of us to expect cannons to be neat packages when it’s often messy with ambiguity. The “cannons” we see today are often remnant of texts and scriptures that previous communities found important and thus came to be preserved. We typically think of cannons as final and closed while Dungan tells us that they are in fact fluid (2). As we have discussed in class, we think the Bible is finite and closed and say similar things in different translations, but there are new renditions of biblical stories that are created in the modern times. Perhaps modern writers and ancient scribes share certain qualities. Modern writers place their own additional information in stories to answer questions they have, maybe like ancient scribes altered biblical stories to not only extend their mind and creativity, but to also answer cultural questions communities at the time have. 

I wonder what these societies that have shaped our “canonical” bible would think of it. Would they feel that additional stories should have been preserved to better serve modern times? Would they think we are completely wrong in our interpretations? Would they tell us that we are right and everything essential is all bound into the holy book that we have? Or would they tell us nothing matters? Cannons are fluid and all that bounds them is the readers so perhaps we should change our point of view.

How Constantine reinvented the Bible

A Roman emperor by the name of Constantine in the midst of a bloody persecution where many believers were martyred decides to pray to the god of the persecuted. He has visions and successfully stamps out his pagan enemy Licinius and his great army; he personally rejects the tradition of his fathers and confesses Christ. We may not know why the sudden change, what political motivations were there? Did Constantine just want the blood shed to end? Did he have a sincere and lasting feeling for the martyred and persecuted Christians? Whither for sincere change in religious beliefs, political maneuverability, or just a deep concern over the amount of bloodshed, Constantine's actions ended a very terrible time! Yet he also paved the path for much more persecution that would continue in to the middle ages and beyond. 
Before completely losing his moderate approach he wrote an edict after his great victory giving everyone religious freedom, this edict was called the edict of Milan. The edict does indeed say that "... both Christians and all men [should have the] freedom to follow the religion which they choose, that whatever heavenly divinity exists may be propitious to us and to all that live under out government." but did this include the Jew's? By the sound of it, it should, but I’m guessing it probably didn’t because Constantine said some really anti-Semitic stuff.
 In a letter he wrote to share the decisions of the Council of Nicaea he shares some of these views while discussing the decision to reject the Jewish way of deciding when to celebrate Easter/Passover. “ It appeared unworthy that in the celebration of this most holy feast we should follow the practice of the Jews, who have impiously defiled their hands with enormous sin, and are, therefore, deservedly afflicted with blindness of soul…”

Constantine’s contradictions grew when he later became impatient with the slow conversion of his citizens that were still pagan, many of them were still stubborn to accept the new religion, so he forced pagan soldiers to recite monotheistic prayers every Sunday and outlawed pagan rituals, so much for freedom to follow any religion that you choose.

A Roman emperor would have never been able to reinvent the bible if it weren’t for Eusebius. And Eusebius would have probably never been able to reinvent the bible (and thus end the public discussion of scripture) if it weren’t for Constantine and the power that comes from being in charge of the Roman Empire. Once Constantine found a liking to the ideas and collection of scripture collected by Eusebius no one in their right mind would keep other scriptures that were not considered orthodox by Eusebius. Or even utter a word about a theological idea or question not already apart of the canon or orthodox tradition, for fear of banishment. (or worse as we see later on in history) This fear kept mouths closed, Christian fringe groups underground, and closed a cannon.

Canon complexities

The Greek polis culture’s demand for accuracy is something that I think we can identify with in our modern time period. It is easy to want every aspect of life to be clear cut and precise, yet not everything can be viewed mathematically. In the article “Canon: Process, Not Product?”, Brennan Beed begins by challenging this black and white idea of things being either inside or outside a canon. She compares it to the political border between Canada and the United States. It’s a pretty arbitrary border that was decided upon a while ago for reasons that were important at the time. A border wasn’t decided upon based on any real differences between the people living there.

As we’ve learned from reading Constantine’s Bible, Constantine used his power to impose the type of Christianity he viewed as correct - Catholicism - and influence what texts would be part of the bible. Being in such a position of power, he was able to shape early Christianity in a significant way. Going back to the comparison of the biblical canon to the border between Canada and the US,   it seems that both came about basically because someone said so. Of course we know it is not that painfully simple, but that is essentially what it comes down to.

Even though a biblical canon was imposed, Beed states that “Every community, it is clear, has a canon-within-the-canon, a part-of-the-canon-that-is-ok-to-ignore, and an extra-canonical-canon”. We have discussed this idea in class, and I feel that it definitely holds true. While some books are in our bibles and some aren’t, communities and individuals still make decisions about what they find personally authoritative and what they do not. Therefore, the idea of canon is not so black and white.

Canon vs. Canon vs. Canon

Perhaps in today’s society we cannot differentiate between canon and scripture because the use of the word canon has changed so much throughout time and has had so many different meanings and contexts, as described by Dungan. Originally, there were simply many different texts, or scripture, that were floating around the ancient world. Bringing together Dungan’s many different attempts to describe canonization, it is my understanding that for a document to truly be a canon, in the author’s opinion, the texts within the work must 1) be sacred, as most scripture of the time were, 2) be set in stone; unchanging and set in place without being removed or replaced by another text, and 3) be set in place for a specific need or purpose of the time. That, however, is in the modern context of the word ‘canon.’ Before this, while there were many different spellings and forms of the original word, canon would mean a ruler, a judicial ruling, or just simply a metaphor for accuracy. Either way, canon has always referred to a unit that brings order to the chaos, and consists of a set of established rules. In this view, it is easy to understand the confusion between canon and scripture; a lot of scripture that has not been canonized is assumed to somehow support a belief or ideal, which in turn comes with its own restrictions. This begs the question; why were some of these authoritative scriptures, although similar to the works chosen and put in the popular biblical canon today, chosen to be left behind? How did these particular documents get weeded out while others were chosen to go down in history forever?

Canon and Scripture

              From the reading of the Constantine Bible by Dungan, there so many things that I thought were interesting, I liked how he clearly mentioned and discussed how the Canon and the scripture have very different meanings. He makes a very good point when he says the Cannon does not cover the same ground as the scripture. This made me ask myself the question of what the differences between Cannon and Scripture, from my point of view I think scripture is just a series of writing that are written for people a specific religious background and the community that is reading the has given their justification stamp. Scripture as we said in class has is authoritative.

           Canon from my point of view is the aspect of the process of communication which involved the selection and ordering of a collection of Israel’s scriptures in order to construct a range of enduring witnesses. And eventually make a bible. Therefore with that being said this brings about the question of whether the difference between Canon and Scripture is one is authority given by God (Scripture) and the other is the decision made by the church on what belongs in the bible (Canon).

          When I go back to think about Canon and Scripture, I read an article by Matt Slick “What is Canon”. In this article the author wonders how these old communities came up with the idea of Scripture or Cannon .It does seems obsolete impose a “Canon” (which is a closed list of book in ancient Israel especially if books were migrating between masses (like Daniel between the Prophets and the Writings).  Equally extreme is to believe that “scripture” has no relationship with the constraining aspect of “canon,” as if to think “scripture” meant a free-flowing stream of religious books that moved (and continue to move) in and out of authoritative status depending on the whim of the community.

                 In the book Dungan insists that canon should not be confused with scripture, as if these terms were synonymous if the terms were simply synonymous. Dungan explains, “As we shall see, a canon results when someone seeks to impose a strict boundary and a smaller a subset of writings or teachings within the larger, slowly evolving.” “Canonization” not a gradual process of collection debate, and consensus-building but the decisive final moment of a process when the canonical boundaries are fixed.

Eusebius' Inconclusive Sieve

The authority of scriptural texts is a recurring issue in the readings and discussions in this course. Scholars such as Michael Satlow define authority by how a text influences those who use it, and in class, much of our discussion of authority centers around how a text may have been regarded by individuals or communities without concern for some proof of authentic origin. While these views of textual authority are largely subjective, David L. Dungan introduces us to Eusebius’ “three-layer sieve” method of determining the authority or authenticity of a text. With this system, Eusebius endeavors to create an objective method for determining the value of different texts.

The three layers of Eusebius’ sieve involve evaluating whether the text is “true, genuine, and well-authenticated” (78). Although he seems to view this as an objective judgment process, these vague categories present immediate difficulties in determining authority. The layer of truth involves determining if the text “accurately and fully teach[es] the Gospel,” which is problematic, to say the least, due to the various views and interpretations of Biblical teachings that exist across groups, even in early Christianity (78). Dungan acknowledges in his book’s epilogue that ultimately, Eusebius’ works were largely disproved, and I imagine this applies in particular to the “test of genuine apostolic authorship” (126, 78). As we have learned from previous readings such as Beal’s The Rise and Fall of the Bible, the authorship of the books in the New Testament is ambiguous at best. Many of these books and epistles were written much later than was originally thought and ascribed to earlier apostles, showing another issue with Eusebius’ qualifications. The final layer, “whether a writing was acknowledged by regular and consistent use by orthodox churches,” I believe comes closest to our class discussions of authority (78). With this layer, Eusebius determines whether or not the text has been granted authority by a community or individuals but this test is more limited in that he specifically examines its use “by bishops in apostolic succession, in public worship and as a source for theology and church governance” (79). Thus, even with this test, Eusebius tends more toward determining a text’s value based on perceived objective points but encounters just as many issues in that it relies on the opinions of other subjective users of the text.

Dungan introduces at length the Greek preoccupation with accuracy, a concern that Eusebius’ “three-layer sieve” clearly plays into. However, his attempt to create a clear-cut and impartial system for the classifying of scriptural texts ultimately falls short because of the inherent ambiguity of Biblical concepts of authorship and truth. Yet Eusebius’ list of “well-authenticated” texts played a significant role in the creation of Constantine’s Bible and potentially the later Christian canon, leaving readers wondering how much modern understanding of Christianity was shaped by one man’s flawed sieve.

Constantine and Law in Developing Christianity

The story of Constantine's influence in the development and establishment of Christianity is one with which most are familiar. He prayed to the Christian God for military victory, fought a surprisingly successful battle, and then championed the religion until his death. He thereby lifted Christians out of persecution and permanently changed the religious landscape of Europe. However, there is more to his story than this, particularly in the way in which he set the stage for Christianity's interaction with politics. After giving Christians his support and openly praising their God, Constantine continued to heavily involve himself with the affairs of the Church to the point of being the deciding factor in establishing significant aspects of the beliefs of today. In his book Constantine's Bible, David Dungan tells the story of Constantine's relationship with Christianity and the impact his politics had on the idea of canon.

Without Constantine's intervention in the Church, the shape of modern Christianity would probably be considerably more varied. Constantine solved theological disputes among bishops, such as the argument over whether Christ was the same as or subordinate to God, by careful use of his political power, wealth, and understanding of social nuance. Moreover, he effectively eradicated "heretics," groups like the Gnostics, the Marcionites, the Montanists, etc., which could have survived without his imposition and perhaps contributed to a more diverse Christian history. He outlawed heretic teachings, of course, but his masterful use of scripture on this front solidified the trajectory of the religion. He commissioned fifty Bibles from Eusebius of Caesarea according to the books which Eusebius declared universally acknowledged by the Catholic Church. During his time, this move set the standard for acceptable Christian texts and forced any Christian official who wanted to keep his standing to fall in line with and make use of this public grouping.

In the long run, Constantine's standing within the church as well as his political power brought legality into the equation. Like the law, the Bible and Christianity became black-and-white under his influence, and thereby he removed much flexibility and replaced it with force. Intertwining Christianity and the law led to the idea of the religion as solid, definite, and without variations. Constantine's marriage of political office and Christianity was therefore one of the deciding factors in the religion's organization and consistency.

Kanon: Rule or Ruler?

          The biggest eye-opener of Dungan's book Constantine's Bible was the use of the word canon, or kanon, in antiquity versus the present. In antiquity, specifically in Greek Polis, canon was used "as a metaphor for accuracy, definiteness, and truth...[for the] sudden thirst for order, clarity, and accuracy" (14). In a society obsessed with mathematical calculations and predictions for everyday things, it was important to use accurate systems of measurement to ensure efficiency and precision. With that being said, the physical ruler that today is used in schools and businesses worldwide stems from the sticks used in antiquity for the same reason, measurement. Because of its accuracy and efficiency, the ruler became a metaphor by the name of kanon. For example, in Polis, there were guidebooks filled with instructions for building things, the majority of which were named Kanon of (insert product name here). 
         While it is understandable that kanon stood as a reference to a metaphor for a ruler in Polis, it is surprising that the ruler later came to stand for rule. Though ruler and rule are spelled similarly, the context in which they are used are very different. Dungan explains that as time continued, kanon came to stand for rule in terms of a list of guidelines or governing principles. It was brought to the readers attention that kanon went from metaphorically standing for ruler, a physical tool for measurement, to rule, an understood list of governing or important guidelines. The differences between the two meanings are exponential which makes me question the use of the word usage in modern cultural discourse. Are religious scholars referring to ruler or rule when they are discussing potential canonical texts? When looking at how kanon was used in antiquity, do scholars take into consideration the earlier meaning of the term or remain using the current definition for the term? Is there a definition of the term kanon?

What it Takes to Create Canon

   Throughout our classes so far, the question of how to define 'scripture' or 'canon' has come up frequently, and so far, our answers have been somewhat muddled- the definition can be different for different people and different times, which in many ways utterly defeats the purpose of having a canon at all. Dungan discusses this seeming paradox, that a fixed set of texts isn't actually fixed, an argument that leads me to believe a true canon might not exist in today's world. Since the definition of what is canon is left up to the individual, a single version of canon is impossible.
   This wasn't the case when Constantine formed his canon. Rather than the decision resting with the individual, Constantine's canon was law- a legally fixed group of texts to be recognized as superior to others. While his subjects may have disagreed with his choices, while some might have treated texts outside his canon with more reverence, they did so with the understanding that their text lay outside of the formal canon.
   My point, I suppose, is that individual ideas of what texts are worthy of canonization will always be varied, people will believe that their favorite texts are the most important, but without a legal ruling on what is considered 'canon' like Constantine's, it is virtually impossible to define what is 'canon' because there is no one accepted version.