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Catharist on the sacrament, and their theology - Wikipedia

Catharism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Cathars also refused the Catholic Sacrament of the eucharist saying that it could not possibly be the body of Christ. They also refused to partake in the practice of Baptism by water. The following two quotes are taken from the Catholic Inquisitor Bernard Gui’s experiences with the Cathar practices and beliefs:
Then they attack and vituperate, in turn, all the sacraments of the Church, especially the sacrament of the eucharist, saying that it cannot contain the body of Christ, for had this been as great as the largest mountain Christians would have entirely consumed it before this. They assert that the host comes from straw, that it passes through the tails of horses, to wit, when the flour is cleaned by a sieve (of horse hair); that, moreover, it passes through the body and comes to a vile end, which, they say, could not happen if God were in it.[22]
Of baptism, they assert that the water is material and corruptible and is therefore the creation of the evil power, and cannot sanctify the soul, but that the churchmen sell this water out of avarice, just as they sell earth for the burial of the dead, and oil to the sick when they anoint them, and as: they sell the confession of sins as made to the priests.[22]

Theology

It has been alleged that the Catharist concept of Jesus resembled nontrinitarian modalistic monarchianism (Sabellianism) in the West and adoptionism in the East.[23][24]

Bernard of Clairvaux's biographer and other sources accuse some Cathars of Arianism,[25][26] and some scholars see Cathar Christology as having traces of earlier Arian roots.[27][28] According to some of their contemporary enemies Cathars did not accept the Trinitarian understanding of Jesus, but considered him the human form of an angel similar to Docetic Christology.[29]

Zoé Oldenbourg (2000) compared the Cathars to "Western Buddhists" because she considered that their view of the doctrine of "resurrection" taught by Jesus was, in fact, similar to the Buddhist doctrine of reincarnation.[30]

The Cathars taught that to regain angelic status one had to renounce the material self completely. Until one was prepared to do so, he/she would be stuck in a cycle of reincarnation, condemned to live on the corrupt Earth.[31]

The alleged sacred texts of the Cathars besides the New Testament, include The Gospel of the Secret Supper, or John's Interrogation and The Book of the Two Principles.[32]
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Catharism, a 12th century Christian dualist movement - Wikipedia

Catharism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Catharism (/ˈkæθərɪzəm/; from Greek: καθαροί, katharoi, "the pure")[1] was a Christian dualist movement that thrived in some areas of Southern Europe, particularly northern Italy, northern Spain and southern France, former Occitania and Catalonia, between the 12th and 14th centuries. Cathar beliefs varied between communities because Catharism was initially taught by ascetic priests who had few set guidelines. The Cathars were a direct challenge to the Catholic Church, renouncing its practices and dismissing it outright as the Church of Satan.[2]

Catharism had its roots in the Paulician movement in Armenia and the Bogomils of Bulgaria, which took influences from the Paulicians. Though the term "Cathar" (/ˈkæθɑːr/) has been used for centuries to identify the movement, whether the movement identified itself with this name is debatable.[3] In Cathar texts, the terms "Good Men" (Bons Hommes) or "Good Christians" are the common terms of self-identification.[4]

The idea of two Gods or principles, one being good the other evil, was central to Cathar beliefs. The good God was the God of the New Testament and the creator of the spiritual realm as opposed to the bad God who many Cathars identified as Satan creator of the physical world of the Old Testament. All visible matter was created by Satan, it was therefore tainted with sin, this even included the human body. Human souls were thought to be the genderless souls of Angels trapped within the physical creation of Satan cursed to be reincarnated until the Cathar faithful achieved salvation through a ritual called the Consolamentum.[5]

From the beginning of his reign, Pope Innocent III attempted to use diplomacy to end Catharism, but in the year 1208 Innocent's papal legate Pierre de Castelnau was murdered while returning to Rome after preaching the Catholic faith in southern France.[6] With the option of sending Catholic missionaries and jurists extinguished, Pope Innocent III declared Pierre of Castelnau a martyr and launched the Albigensian Crusade.[6] [7]
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Marcion of Sinope - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Marcion of Sinope - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



Marcion of Sinope[pronunciation?] (Greek: Μαρκίων[1] Σινώπης), (c.85 – c.160) was a bishop in early Christianity.[2]

His theology, which rejected the deity described in the Jewish Scriptures as inferior or subjugated to the God proclaimed in the Christian gospel, was denounced by the Church Fathers and he was excommunicated. He is often considered to have held a pivotal role in the development of the New Testament canon.

Life

Hippolytus records that Marcion was the son of the bishop of Sinope, in Pontus. His near-contemporaries Rhodo and Tertullian described him as a wealthy ship owner,[3] and he is said to have made a donation of 200,000 sesterces to the church. Marcion probably was consecrated a bishop, likely an assistant or suffragan of his father at Sinope.[3]


Conflicts with the bishops of Rome arose and he was eventually excommunicated by the Church of Rome, his donation being returned to him. After his excommunication, he returned to Asia Minor where he continued to lead his many church congregations and teach the Christian gospel in its Marcionite version.

In 394, Epiphanius claimed that after beginnings as an ascetic, Marcion seduced a virgin and was accordingly excommunicated by his father, prompting him to leave his home town.[4] This account has been doubted by many scholars, who consider it "malicious gossip". More recently, Bart D. Ehrman suggests that this "seduction of a virgin" was a metaphor for his corruption of the Christian Church, with the Church portrayed as the undefiled virgin.[5]

Teachings

Main article: Marcionism
Study of the Jewish Scriptures, along with received writings circulating in the nascent Church, led Marcion to conclude that many of the teachings of Jesus were incompatible with the actions of the god of the Old Testament, Yahweh. Marcion responded by developing a dualist system of belief around the year 144.[6] This dual-god notion allowed Marcion to reconcile supposed contradictions between Old Covenant theology and the Gospel message proclaimed by Jesus.

Marcion affirmed Jesus to be the saviour sent by the Heavenly Father, and Paul as his chief apostle. In contrast to the nascent Christian church, Marcion declared that Christianity was in complete discontinuity with Judaism and entirely opposed to the Old Testament message.

Marcion did not claim that the Jewish Scriptures were false. Instead, Marcion asserted that they were to be read in an absolutely literal manner, thereby developing an understanding that YHWH was not the same god spoken of by Jesus. For example, Marcion argued that the Genesis account of YHWH walking through the Garden of Eden asking where Adam was proved YHWH inhabited a physical body and was without universal knowledge (omniscience), attributes wholly incompatible with the Heavenly Father professed by Jesus.

According to Marcion, the god of the Old Testament, whom he called the Demiurge, the creator of the material universe, is a jealous tribal deity of the Jews, whose law represents legalistic reciprocal justice and who punishes mankind for its sins through suffering and death. Contrastingly, the god that Jesus professed is an altogether different being, a universal god of compassion and love who looks upon humanity with benevolence and mercy. Marcion also produced his Antitheses contrasting the Demiurge of the Old Testament with the Heavenly Father of the New Testament.

Marcion held Jesus to be the son of the Heavenly Father but understood the incarnation in a docetic manner, i.e. that Jesus' body was only an imitation of a material body, and consequently denied Jesus' physical and bodily birth, death, and resurrection (e.g., he accepted Luke's Gospel yet eliminated portions such as the birth narrative) and thereby denied the historic Christian Gospel (1 Cor 15:3-4).

Marcion proposed his unique New Testament canon. His canon consisted of only eleven books grouped into two sections: the Evangelikon, being a version of the Gospel of Luke,[7] and the Apostolikon, a selection of ten epistles of Paul the Apostle, whom Marcion considered the correct interpreter and transmitter of Jesus' teachings. From this selection of New Testament books he eliminated elements relating to Jesus' birth, childhood, Judaism, and material challenging Marcion's dualism.

Marcion and Gnosticism

Marcion is sometimes described as a Gnostic philosopher. In some essential respects, Marcion proposed ideas which would have aligned well with Gnostic thought. Like the Gnostics, he argued that Jesus was essentially a divine spirit appearing to men in the shape of a human form, and not someone in a true physical body.[8]

However, Marcionism conceptualizes God in a way which cannot be reconciled with broader Gnostic thought. For Gnostics, every human being is born with a small piece of God's soul lodged within his/her spirit (akin to the notion of a 'Divine Spark').[8] God is thus intimately connected to and part of His creation.[8] Salvation lies in turning away from the physical world (which Gnostics regard as an illusion) and embracing the God-like qualities within yourself.[8] Marcion, by contrast, held that the Heavenly Father (the father of Jesus Christ) was an utterly alien god; he had no part in making the world, nor any connection with it..[8]

Legacy

In 144, Marcion became one of the first declared heresiarchs for his deviations from the orthodox viewpoints of the apostolic church. The suppression of the Marcionist form of Christianity is thus viewed[9] as a catalyst for the development of the New Testament canon, the establishment of a centralised church law, and the structuring of the Church.

The church that Marcion founded had expanded greatly within his lifetime, and was a rival to the orthodox Christian church. Its adherents were strong enough in their convictions that the Marcionite church retained its following for more than a century. It survived Christian controversy, and imperial disapproval, for several centuries more.[10]

Marcion proposed and delineated a canon (a list of officially sanctioned religious works). This prompted the orthodox, apostolic church to form an official canon of books that had been recognized as divinely inspired and authoritative. Christians began to divide texts into those that aligned with the "measuring stick" (Greek kanōn literally means "measuring stick") of being an apostolic, authoritative, Christian writing (the works of New Testament as we know them today), those that were to be rejected as heretical or pseudonymous, and those that were able to be accepted but not to be seen as canon or read in public gatherings (e.g., The Shepherd of Hermas). Therefore, Marcion played a role in finalising the structure and contents of the collection of works now called the New Testament.

Notes

  1. ^ http://khazarzar.skeptik.net/books/justinus/apolog1g.htm
  2. ^ Tertullian, "Adversus Marcionem" book 1.
  3. ^ a b Catholic Encyclopedia, "Marcionites" (1911).
  4. ^ Haeresies, XLII, ii.
  5. ^ Bart D. Ehrman,Lost Christianities
  6. ^ 115 years and 6 months from the Crucifixion, according to Tertullian's reckoning in Adversus Marcionem, xv.
  7. ^ Joseph B. Tyson (Marcion and Luke-Acts: A Defining Struggle) contradicts the mainstream view of Marcion's gospel being based on Luke, opining instead that canonical Luke may be a response to Marcion's gospel.
  8. ^ a b c d e Adolph Harnack, Marcion: The Gospel of the Alien God (1924).[page needed]
  9. ^ "The Canon of Scripture" by F.F. Bruce 1988, page 151
  10. ^ Evans 1972 p. ix

References

  • Blackman, E.C. Marcion and His Influence 2004 ISBN 1-59244-73
  • Clabeaux, John James. The Lost Edition of the Letters of Paul: A Reassessment of the Text of Pauline Corpus Attested by Marcion (Catholic Biblical Quarterly Monograph Series No. 21) 1989 ISBN 0-915170-20-5
  • Dahl, Nils Alstrup. "The Origin of the Earliest Prologues to the Pauline Letters", Semeia 12 (1978), 233-277
  • Epiphanius of Salamis. The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, Book 1 (Sects 1-46) Frank Williams translator, 1987 ISBN 90-04-07926-2
  • Evans, Ernest (comments and translation): Tertullian, Against Marcion (Oxford University Press, 1972). E-text of Adversus Marcionem and Evan's introduction "Marcion : His Doctrine and Influence"
  • Grant, Robert M. Marcion and the Critical Method Peter Richardson & John Collidge Hurd, eds., From Jesus to Paul. Studies in Honour of Francis Wright Beare. Waterloo, ON, 1984. p. 207–215.
  • Harnack, Adolf von 1961. History of Dogma (Neil Buchanan, translating Harnack's Dogmengeschichte 1900), vol I, pp 267 – 313, vol II, pp 1 – 19
  • Harnack, Adolf von. Marcion: The Gospel of the Alien God translation 1990 ISBN 0-939464-16-0
  • R. Joseph Hoffmann. Marcion, on the Restitution of Christianity: An Essay on the Development of Radical Paulist Theology in the Second Century 1984 ISBN 0-89130-638-2
  • Knox, John. Marcion and the New Testament 1942 ISBN 0-404-16183-9
  • Francis Legge, Forerunners and Rivals of Christianity, From 330 B.C. to 330 A.D. (1914), reprinted in two volumes bound as one, University Books New York, 1964. LC Catalog 64-24125.
  • Livingstone, E.A. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (3rd ed.), pp. 1033–34, 1997 ISBN 0-19-211655-X
  • Riparelli, Enrico, Il volto del Cristo dualista. Da Marcione ai catari, Peter Lang, Bern - Berlin - Bruxelles - Frankfurt am Main - New York - Oxford - Wien 2008, 368 pp. ISBN 978-3-03911-490-0
  • Williams, David Salter. "Reconsidering Marcion's Gospel", Journal of Biblical Literature 108 (1989), p. 477-96
  • Wilson, R. S. Marcion: A Study of a Second-Century Heretic (London:Clarke) 1933

External links

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