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"‘Tonight, in the city of David, a Savior is born, 'tis Christ the Lord.'"

"There are not over a hundred people in the United States who hate the Catholic Church. There are millions, however, who hate what they wrongly believe to be the Catholic Church, which is, of course, quite a different thing."
-Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
Placating terrorists, meeting with dictators, compassion for murderers... but no humanity for the unborn... incredible.
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Lauchlin Profile
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Newbie

Registered: 07-2006
Posts: 389
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Re: Elaine Pagels: Naughty Naughty


Us Bishops, or We the Clergy is the only translation that makes sense in this context, I had thought, which was why I was arguing the point.

To attack the Church would benefit the valentinians, to attack its constituents would really ruin any hope they had of converting anyone to their way of thinking...

Thus, my main premise is that Mankowski's 'central point' is kind of misguided, and he is looking for reasons to discredit it because he doesn't like what it says.

Do you really have any doubt in your mind that the Valentinians would want to discredit or speak out against the Bishops? Or for that matter, that some of these Bishops would not be kind of annoyed, to say the least, about such a thing...?

Lauchlin
Mar/23/2007, 7:33 am Link to this post Send Email to Lauchlin   Send PM to Lauchlin
 
TomThumb Profile
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Peacemaker

Registered: 02-2007
Posts: 868
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Re: Elaine Pagels: Naughty Naughty


quote:

Lauchlin wrote:

Us Bishops, or We the Clergy is the only translation that makes sense in this context, I had thought, which was why I was arguing the point.

To attack the Church would benefit the valentinians, to attack its constituents would really ruin any hope they had of converting anyone to their way of thinking...



Well, it's puzzling you say that and carry on this argument, Lauchlin, because neither quote Pagels mined has anything to do with Us Bishops or We the Clergy. In fact, the Valentinians are attacking the general faithful in both of those quotes, not the clergy nor the bishops. In the first Quote, Pagels deliberately suppresses the meaning and context of the quote by using a bracketed "us" in place of the actual "those who belong to the Church". Again, this was not done by accident, it is purposefully dishonest. The second quote is even more ridiculous. There is no amount of bracketing that could make this appear to be a direct Valentinian response to church oficials; the only way to make it seem as such is to chop it in half and attach it to another quote. This meets no standards of scholarship that I am aware of.

Broadly speaking, Pagels' contention is that the Gnostics were driven from the Christian community simply because they would not accept ecclesiastical authority. She downplays belief and theological difference; to her, there is no reason the Gnostics could not have been at home within the Christian community other then the Bishops will to power. To her, as to many nowadays, all ideas are relative, and everything comes down to an issue of power. Christianity, in her account could have easily encompassed both a Divine and non-Divine Jesus, a risen Jesus and a non-risen Jesus, Yahweh as God and Yahweh as evil demiurge, Jesus as Messiah and Jesus as mere wandering sage, and so on. She has read back in time modern detachment from and indifference towards belief into an era when martyrs would die for the risen Christ. In her eyes, both the Gnostic and Christian views of Jesus were equally valid given peoples knowledge of Jesus' life, ministry, and death, and it is only the authoritarianism of the Bishops who shattered this happy co-existence in her view.

That is the backdrop. In this specific instance, Pagels is presenting a narrative. In her sequence of events, the bishops have issued orders to the Valentinians. The Valentinians responded. She quotes St. Irenaeus announcing the Valentinians response to himself and his fellow bishops. If Pagels had simply said, "Here are some mean things that gnostics said about Christians," than we would not be having this conversation. Everyone agrees that gnosticism and Christianity are seperate religious systems in conflict with one another, each making contradictory and irreconciable truth claims. Christians and Gnostics said unpleasant things about each other, this we know. But that isn't what Pagels says here; what she does instead is pretend to present a historical account in which Irenaeus details a specific account of a specific response to a specific audience: the audience being the Christian bishops. If her source quote(s) does not in fact present a Valentinian response to direct orders from ecclesiastical authorities as she insists, then she has engaged in dishonesty. Clearly she has. Neither quote from Irenaeus is detailing an event of this nature.







Last edited by TomThumb, Mar/23/2007, 11:41 am
Mar/23/2007, 10:49 am Link to this post Send Email to TomThumb   Send PM to TomThumb MSN Yahoo
 
Lauchlin Profile
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Registered: 07-2006
Posts: 389
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Re: Elaine Pagels: Naughty Naughty


Hmmm...

Have you read the book...? It seemed to me that she outlined certain things about Gnostics, chief among them being that part of their faith is to make up their doctrine as they go along... this is an oversimplification, I know, but it is an important point.

That tells me that they were alienated from the faith based on beliefs, and the wish to be in control, hence the importance of the quotes in question.

But then, reading your last paragraph, we have been arguing two different things. I do not know the passages well enough to say anything against your account of it. Was it portrayed, wrongly, as a specific address to the other bishops? I know not. All I know is that the passage does seem to be more geared to the leader's of the faith, as opposed to the general public. And such words against the Bishops would indeed imply a distaste for their leadership, which is a possible reason why they split from the Church. Perhaps she is simply viewing that as the more prominent issue from the side fo the Gnostics.

Lauchlin
Mar/23/2007, 1:46 pm Link to this post Send Email to Lauchlin   Send PM to Lauchlin
 


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