Subject: Justin Martyr (was Re: Words of Jesus)

From: "Steve Carson-Rowland" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 14 Sep 1997 23:24:04 +1000

From: U. Schmid <[email-masked]>
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>(Comment previously) If this reasoning is correct, persons like Justin
must have been a bit dubious as to who wrote the Gospels, if they came out
almost a century after the fact yet were attributed to mid-1st-century
persons; and so he avoided naming them by their kata's Matthew, Mark.... .

Again, I don't fully understand what you mean.

[arguments snipped]
6. Therefore, it seems reasonable to conclude: Justin knew the titles as
they are found in the manuscript tradition (c.f.,
the plural "Euaggelia", the Memoirs of Peter, i.e. Gospel of Mark).

STEVE CR
Is the argument based on the contrast between Dial 106 ("..And when it is
said that He changed the name of one of the apostles to Peter; and when it
is written in the memoirs of **Him** that this so happened, as well as that
He changed the names of other two brothers, the sons of Zebedee, to
Boanerges..") and the other places in Justin's writings where the term
'Memoirs of the apostles' is used?  And therefore, Justin clearly has two
groups of gospels in mind? 

I'd not noticed that point in Dial 106 before. But first I want to make
sure I understand that that is your basis.

Is this off-topic anyhow? (I'm new to the list)

Regards,

Steve Carson-Rowland
Brisbane, Australia

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From: [email-masked] (U. Schmid)
Date: Sun, 14 Sep 1997 18:35:13 +0100

>From: U. Schmid <[email-masked]>

Justin uses not only the singular "Euaggelion" but also the unusual plural
"Euaggelia" denoting written Gospel accounts. He even identifies one of the
Apomnemaneumata = Euaggelion/Euaggelia as that of Peter's which points by
inferrence from the Presbyter tradition (cf. Papias) to the Gospel of Mark.
This Gospel is in the MSS tradition known as the "Euaggelion _kata_
Markon". Moreover, Justin makes a distinction between two groups of
Apomnemoneumata = Gospels, one group was written by "apostles" and another
group by "followers of theirs" (which, BTW, fits perfetly well with the
canonical Gospels). This inevitably leads to the conclusion that Justin (a)
knew written Gospel accounts that have been labelled individually as
"Euaggelion" denoting their common genre, although he preferred to call
them Apomnemoneumata, and (b) that they had to have beared names of writers
on them who could be and already had been identified as _either_ "apostles"
_or_ "followers of the apostles". Note, I'm not taking side in the
discussion about "historicity" of all these identifications made by Papias
or Justin. I'm simply concluding that by the time of Justin those
traditions already existed for quite some time and that Justin could refer
to them just in passing by.
Now, since there is no other title, combining the term "Euaggelion" with
the name of an individual, of the Gospel of Mark nor of the other lateron
canonical Gospels known to us than the famous "Euaggelion kata..." (apart
from pious expansions like "holy gospel...", etc.), there is no need to
assume that Justin knew Mark's Gospel and the others under a different
title.

Maybe you should not have omitted my point 5 related to the unanimously
attested Gospel superscriptions in the form "euaggelion kata...". But this
is it, basically.

Ulrich Schmid,
Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies

Ulrich Schmid,
Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies

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From: "Steve Carson-Rowland" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 15 Sep 1997 08:17:13 +1000

STEVE CR
Thanks for the explanation. I'm going on a 3 week business trip in a few
hours so I'll have to think about it properly when I get back. I will have
some more questions I think.

Regards,

Steve Carson-Rowland
Brisbane, Australia