Koyaanisqatsi
Veteran Member
And you should copy and paste from GMark exactly what is fictional and detail how you know that it is. Thanks.
So they believed in a hierarchy instead of Trinity coequality: Father > Son > Holy Spirit, with the Father having created the Son and the Son having created our Universe.I, Ulfila, bishop and confessor, have always so believed, and in this, the one true faith, I make the journey to my Lord; I believe in one God the Father, the only unbegotten and invisible, and in his only-begotten son, our Lord and God, the designer and maker of all creation, having none other like him (so that one alone among all beings is God the Father, who is also the God of our God); and in one Holy Spirit, the illuminating and sanctifying power, as Christ said after his resurrection to his apostles: "And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24:49) and again "But ye shall receive power, when the Holy Ghost is come upon you" (Acts 1:8); being neither God (the Father) nor our God (Christ), but the minister of Christ... subject and obedient in all things to the Son; and the Son, subject and obedient in all things to God who is his Father... (whom) he ordained in the Holy Spirit through his Christ.
And vice versa. To an Arian, trinitarian theology sounds a lot like the shirk of Islam; dividing up that which should be seen as the inviolable unity of God. Where, in the other direction, trinitarians believed that in denying the equal divinity of Christ, Arians were defying a part of God himself and were in peril of falling outside of his salvific grace. How can you accept into your heart a God whom you reject a major aspect? Houses divided against themselves, etc.As to what the Arians believed, Ulfilas includes the Creed of Ulfilas:
So they believed in a hierarchy instead of Trinity coequality: Father > Son > Holy Spirit, with the Father having created the Son and the Son having created our Universe.I, Ulfila, bishop and confessor, have always so believed, and in this, the one true faith, I make the journey to my Lord; I believe in one God the Father, the only unbegotten and invisible, and in his only-begotten son, our Lord and God, the designer and maker of all creation, having none other like him (so that one alone among all beings is God the Father, who is also the God of our God); and in one Holy Spirit, the illuminating and sanctifying power, as Christ said after his resurrection to his apostles: "And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24:49) and again "But ye shall receive power, when the Holy Ghost is come upon you" (Acts 1:8); being neither God (the Father) nor our God (Christ), but the minister of Christ... subject and obedient in all things to the Son; and the Son, subject and obedient in all things to God who is his Father... (whom) he ordained in the Holy Spirit through his Christ.
To many of us, Arianism and Trinitarianism may seem much alike, but to Trinitarian theologians, Arianism was a terrible evil, one that should be stamped out.
Book burning
Christian burnings
And many that believed, came and confessed and shewed their deeds. Many of them also which used curious arts, brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver.[2]
After the First Council of Nicea (325 AD), Roman emperor Constantine the Great issued an edict against nontrinitarian Arians which included a prescription for systematic book-burning:
"In addition, if any . . .
. . . if any writing composed by Arius should be found, it should be handed over to the flames, so that not only will the wickedness of his teaching be obliterated, but nothing will be left even to remind anyone of him. And I hereby make a public order, that if someone should be discovered to have hidden a writing composed by Arius, and not to have immediately brought it forward and destroyed it by fire, his penalty shall be death.
As soon as he is discovered in this offense, he shall be submitted for capital punishment....."[3]
Page 39
32. But perhaps being refuted as touching the term Unoriginate also, they will say according to their evil nature, 'It behoved, as regards our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ also, to state from the Scriptures what is there written of Him, and not to introduce non-scriptural expressions.' Yes, it behoved, say I too; for the tokens of truth are more exact as drawn from Scripture, than from other sources [962] ; but the ill disposition and the versatile and crafty irreligion of Eusebius and his fellows, compelled the Bishops, as I said before, to publish more distinctly the terms which overthrew their irreligion; and what the Council did write has already been shewn to have an orthodox sense, while the Arians have been shewn to be corrupt in their phrases, and evil in their dispositions. The term Unoriginate, having its own sense, and admitting of a religious use, they nevertheless, according to their own idea, and as they will, use for the dishonour of the Saviour, all for the sake of contentiously maintaining, like giants [963] , their fight with God. But as they did not escape condemnation when they adduced these former phrases, so when they misconceive of the Unoriginated which in itself admits of being used well and religiously, they were detected, being disgraced before all, and their heresy everywhere proscribed. This then, as I could, have I related, by way of explaining what was formerly done in the Council; but I know that the contentious among Christ's foes will not be disposed to change even after hearing this, but will ever search about for other pretences, and for others again after those. For as the Prophet speaks, 'If the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots [964] ', then will they be willing to think religiously, who have been instructed in irreligion. Thou however, beloved, on receiving this, read it by thyself; and if thou approvest of it, read it also to the brethren who happen to be present, that they too on hearing it, may welcome the Council's zeal for the truth, and the exactness of its sense; and may condemn that of Christ's foes, the Arians, and the futile pretences, which for the sake of their irreligious heresy they have been at the pains to frame among themselves; because to God and the Father is due the glory, honour, and worship with His co-existent Son and Word, together with the All-holy and Life-giving Spirit, now and unto endless ages of ages. Amen.
https://www.elpenor.org/athanasius/defence-nicene-definition.asp
According to Elaine Pagels, "In AD 367, Athanasius, the zealous bishop of Alexandria... issued an Easter letter in which he demanded that Egyptian monks destroy all such unacceptable writings, except for those he specifically listed as 'acceptable' even 'canonical'—a list that constitutes the present 'New Testament'".[4]
(Pagels cites Athanasius's Paschal letter (letter 39) for 367 AD, which prescribes a canon but does not explicitly order monks to destroy excluded works.[5][original research?]) Heretical texts do not turn up as palimpsests, scraped clean and overwritten, as do many texts of Classical antiquity. According to author Rebecca Knuth, multitudes of early Christian texts have been as thoroughly "destroyed" as if they had been publicly burnt.[6]
Burning of the Library of Alexandria
Main article: Destruction of the Library of Alexandria
The stories surrounding the loss of the great Library of Alexandria include:
Emperor Aurelian's (270–275 AD) sack of Alexandria in 272 AD, which badly damaged the section of the city which housed part of the library.
Supposedly (but incorrectly) the religious riots aimed against pagan temples and their rituals in 391 AD, sanctioned by decree of Emperor Theodosius I and led by Coptic Pope Theophilus.[7]
"Much of its downfall was gradual, often bureaucratic, and by comparison to our cultural imaginings, somewhat petty."[8] (Compare: El-Abbadi, M. (1990). The Life and Fate of the Ancient Library of Alexandria. Mayenne, France: United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, for tales of survival of the collection, in part, into the era of the Caliphate.)
Burning of Nestorian books
Activity by Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376–444) brought fire to almost all the writings of Nestorius (386-450) shortly after 435.[9]
'The writings of Nestorius were originally very numerous',[10] however, they were not part of the Nestorian or Oriental theological curriculum until the mid-sixth century, unlike those of his teacher Theodore of Mopsuestia, and those of Diodorus of Tarsus, even then they were not key texts, so relatively few survive intact, cf. Baum, Wilhelm and Dietmar W. Winkler. 2003. The Church of the East: A Concise History. London: Routledge.
Burning of Arian books
According to the Chronicle of Fredegar, Recared, King of the Visigoths (reigned 586–601) and first Catholic king of Spain, following his conversion to Catholicism in 587, ordered that all Arian books should be collected and burned; and all the books of Arian theology were reduced to ashes, along with the house in which they had been purposely collected.[11][12] Which facts demonstrate that Constantine's edict on Arian works was not rigorously observed, as Arian writings or the theology based on them survived to be burned much later in Spain.
Burning of Jewish manuscripts in 1244
In 1244, as an outcome of the Disputation of Paris, twenty-four carriage loads of Talmuds and other Jewish religious manuscripts were set on fire[by whom?] in the streets of Paris.[13][14]
Burning of Aztec and Mayan manuscripts in 1560s
During the conquest of the Americas and in the aftermath of the encounter between European and indigenous American civilizations, many books written by indigenous peoples were destroyed. There were many[quantify] books written by the Aztecs in existence at the time of the Spanish conquest of Yucatán in the 16th century.[citation needed] However, most were destroyed by the Conquistadors and the Catholic priests, with the exception of the work of the priest Bartolome de la Casas. In particular, many books in Yucatán were ordered destroyed by Bishop Diego de Landa in July 1562. De Landa wrote: "We found a large number of books in these characters and, as they contained nothing in which were not to be seen as superstition and lies of the devil, we burned them all, which they (the Maya) regretted to an amazing degree, and which caused them much affliction." Ironically, most of the books that were destroyed by the Europeans were biased and based upon the Aztec people's version of the history of the region.[citation needed] The Aztecs had previously conquered the area and destroyed many of the Mayan books and documents.[citation needed]
And that's just from a single Wiki article, Lumpy. Spend some time looking into it yourself; as I said, plenty of early Christians actively bragged about how many pagan and heretical books they burned.
Some bragged about burning people. Do you think for a moment that they'd hesitate to burn anything that didn't reflect their own dogma, whatever that happened to be?
You should also read the Wiki article on the Nag Hammadi library. Those Gnostic manuscripts from the 3rd and 4th centuries were found buried in a sealed jar. Why do you think some priest or monk went to such effort to hide them, if they weren't in grave danger of being seized and destroyed?
If there was really any evidence for the bookburnings, from legitimate sources of the time, you would have quoted from them. You have not quoted from them because they don't exist.
Individual Christian converts in 35 or 40 AD, spontaneously burning their books on divination, has little to do with this topic. It has nothing to do with the Church banning pagan or heresy books. The divination books were about incantations and sorcery and dark magic rituals, which gained a bad reputation because they sometimes used dangerous substances and caused injuries to the participants.
After the First Council of Nicea (325 AD), Roman emperor Constantine the Great issued an edict against nontrinitarian Arians which included a prescription for systematic book-burning:
"In addition, if any . . .
No he did not issue any such edict ordering any bookburnings. You're quoting from a modern author only. There is no legitimate source for the quote you're giving here.
These laws (Theodosian Codes 16.1.2 and 16.5.6) are significant for many reasons. They mark the first time the legal code coerced people to become Christians. They made orthodox catholic Christianity the official dogma of the church and suppressed the Arian factions. The laws established a pattern which would become more pronounced as Theodosius' reign progressed of using the apparatus of the state to suppress diversity of religious opinion.
The text of the Theodosian Code can be found in Theodosiani Libri XVI, 3 vols. in 2, edited by Theodor Mommsen and Paul M. Meyer (Berlin, 1905), and translated into English by Clyde Pharr, in The Theodosian Code (Princeton, N.J., 1952). See also Jill Harries and Ian Wood, eds., The Theodosian Code (Ithaca, N.Y., 1993), and John F. Matthews, Laying Down the Law: A Study of the Theodosian Code (New Haven, Conn., 2000). On the Emperor himself, Adolf Lippold's Theodosius der Grosse, und seine Zeit, 2d ed., enl. (Munich, 1980), is a thoroughly researched study of most aspects of Theodosius's policies. See also Wilhelm Ensslin, Die Religionspolitik des Kaisers Theodosius d. Gr (Munich, 1953), and Stephen Williams and Gerrard Friell, Theodosius: The Empire at Bay (New Haven, Conn., 1995).
Ah, poor Lumpy...sounds like the garbage you were spewing against the Mormons/Joseph Smith.If there was really any evidence for the bookburnings, from legitimate sources of the time, you would have quoted from them. You have not quoted from them because they don't exist.
Individual Christian converts in 35 or 40 AD, spontaneously burning their books on divination, has little to do with this topic. It has nothing to do with the Church banning pagan or heresy books. The divination books were about incantations and sorcery and dark magic rituals, which gained a bad reputation because they sometimes used dangerous substances and caused injuries to the participants.
No he did not issue any such edict ordering any bookburnings. You're quoting from a modern author only. There is no legitimate source for the quote you're giving here.
This very normative Christian site seems to have no issue with this being real history:
https://www.christianity.com/church...-600/theodosius-issued-an-edict-11629680.html
These laws (Theodosian Codes 16.1.2 and 16.5.6) are significant for many reasons. They mark the first time the legal code coerced people to become Christians. They made orthodox catholic Christianity the official dogma of the church and suppressed the Arian factions. The laws established a pattern which would become more pronounced as Theodosius' reign progressed of using the apparatus of the state to suppress diversity of religious opinion.
Sourcing for that Wiki link:
http://www.fourthcentury.com/index.php/urkunde-33
Background on the Theodosian Code:
https://www.encyclopedia.com/people...te-roman-and-byzantine-biographies/theodosius
The text of the Theodosian Code can be found in Theodosiani Libri XVI, 3 vols. in 2, edited by Theodor Mommsen and Paul M. Meyer (Berlin, 1905), and translated into English by Clyde Pharr, in The Theodosian Code (Princeton, N.J., 1952). See also Jill Harries and Ian Wood, eds., The Theodosian Code (Ithaca, N.Y., 1993), and John F. Matthews, Laying Down the Law: A Study of the Theodosian Code (New Haven, Conn., 2000). On the Emperor himself, Adolf Lippold's Theodosius der Grosse, und seine Zeit, 2d ed., enl. (Munich, 1980), is a thoroughly researched study of most aspects of Theodosius's policies. See also Wilhelm Ensslin, Die Religionspolitik des Kaisers Theodosius d. Gr (Munich, 1953), and Stephen Williams and Gerrard Friell, Theodosius: The Empire at Bay (New Haven, Conn., 1995).
A review of the history of the Theodosian Code:
https://journals.openedition.org/mefra/1754
A more significant available translation of the Theodosian Code:
http://www.scrollpublishing.com/store/Theodosian-Code.html
The Royal Library of Antioch was destroyed in 363 AD by the Christian Emperor Jovian, who "at the urging of his wife, burned the temple with all the books in it with his concubines laughing and setting the fire", which greatly displeased the citizens of the city as they could only watch angrily as the collection went up in smoke. Johannes Hahn in his work Gewalt und religiöser Konflikt (pp. 178–180) relates:
"Jovian ordered the destruction of the Traianeum, which Julian had converted to a library, because he wanted to gain the favor of the Antiochians. However, he failed completely: not only the pagans but also the Christians interpreted this as a barbaric act."[3]
The Royal Library of Antioch had been heavily stocked with "unholy" pagan literature by the aid of his non-Christian predecessor, Emperor Julian. This collection also included the pagan works of the library of George, Arian Bishop of Alexandria, hated by Christians and pagans alike, who was murdered by an Alexandrian pagan mob in 361.[4] The Emperor Julian then procured his library—replete with many classical texts—and added them to the library of Antioch.
View attachment 17665
"Emperor Constantine and the Council of Nicaea. The burning of Arian books is illustrated below. Drawing on vellum. From MS CLXV, Biblioteca Capitolare, Vercelli, a compendium of canon law produced in northern Italy ca. 825."
This file contains additional information such as Exif metadata which may have been added by the digital camera, scanner, or software program used to create or digitize it. If the file has been modified from its original state, some details such as the timestamp may not fully reflect those of the original file. The timestamp is only as accurate as the clock in the camera, and it may be completely wrong.
This suggests that the original image could get modified. How do we know that this image is the original one discovered and has not been tampered with or photo-shopped?
You desperately want there to be documented cases of early Church bookburnings, but you can't give us one example. Which is good evidence that they don't exist.
Ah, poor Lumpy...sounds like the garbage you were spewing against the Mormons/Joseph Smith.
This very normative Christian site seems to have no issue with this being real history:
https://www.christianity.com/church...-600/theodosius-issued-an-edict-11629680.html
Nothing here or below indicates that Theodosius ordered any bookburnings, or books to be destroyed, or libraries burned.
The first link below is just a repeat of the site already given, which contains the fraudulent Constantine quote, claiming Athanasius p. 39 as a source for it. But the entire Athanasius document is available and does not contain the dubious quote or Constantine Decree against Arianism.
In addition, if any writing composed by Arius should be found, it should be handed over to the flames, so that not only will the wickedness of his teaching be obliterated, but nothing will be left even to remind anyone of him. And I hereby make a public order, that if someone should be discovered to have hidden a writing composed by Arius, and not to have immediately brought it forward and destroyed it by fire, his penalty shall be death. As soon as he is discovered in this offense, he shall be submitted for capital punishment.
Although no intact manuscript of the whole Code survives (the structure of the first five books resting largely on the evidence of Alaric’s later Breviary and their titles repopulated from that source and the Justinian Code), the c. 2,700 entries that remain are estimated to comprise about three quarters of the original extent (c. 3,500 entries) and can, therefore, reasonably be taken to offer a representative picture of the chronological and geographical distribution of the complete collection.46 Using figures derived from the palingenesia provided by Tony Honoré,47 it is clear that for the period since the death of Theodosius the researchers employed by the Theodosian commission were able to provide as much, if not more, historic material from western sources than from eastern. The ratio for the period AD 395 to 428 is roughly 5: 4 (west: east).48 The balance only changes in the period from the initiation of the project (AD 429) to the launch of the Code itself (AD 437), in which the east accounts for forty-three texts, the west only twelve. However, when allowance is given for the fact that the western material ceases as early as AD 432, the real rates of collection are not as divergent as these figures suggest.49 In the same three-year period (429-432) the compilers drew on fifteen eastern laws, which, when compared to the twelve western, represents a reversal of the ratio for 395-428 of 5: 4 (east: west).
The Breviarum AlariciOffsite Link (Breviary of AlaricOffsite Link, Breviarium Alaricianum or Lex Romana Visigothorum), written in southern France in the sixth century, is one of the earliest surviving manuscript codices of Roman law. The text was compiled by order of Alaric IIOffsite Link, King of the VisigothsOffsite Link, with the advice of his bishops and nobles, in 506, the twenty-second year of his reign.
And you should copy and paste from GMark exactly what is fictional and detail how you know that it is. Thanks.
Bible scholars routinely categorise parts of the text as either historical or ahistorical - probably did happen / probably didn't happen. The Lumpmeister, Mr LumPro, Lumpy was (generously) conceding that it's not unreasonable, from a scholarly point of view, to do this.
He wasn't volunteering or putting himself forward as a candidate willing to dissect GMark into absolutely true or absolutely false and post it here along with incontrovertible supporting evidence.
Why should he? He doesn't claim to have incontrovertible evidence. He isn't a devotee of the historical critical method is he?
And he didn't actually say there must be some falsehoods, so don't grill him for examples of something he couldnt find in any case.
All he basically said was...if a bible skeptic proposed that one specific part of the Gospel was believed to be historically false, then he isnt automatically dismissing that out of hand in the way a bible inerrantist (like me) would.