Sinope, Turkey. Before it, It was in Eastern part of Roman Empire.
Before go to Marcionism topic, Let's we see about Sinope city. Sinope historically known as city on the isthmus of İnce Burun (İnceburun, Cape Ince) and on the Boztepe Peninsula, near Cape Sinope (Sinop Burnu, Boztepe Cape, Boztepe Burnu) which is situated on the northernmost edge of the Turkish side of the Black Sea coast, in the ancient region of Paphlagonia, in modern-day northern Turkey. In ancient times, Sinope was influenced by Roman-Greek Paganism philosophy and dualistic from Zoroastrianism, which that influences would bring from what is called as Marcionism Heresy.
Sinope was strategically located among the trade routes that were developing on the southern Coast of the Black Sea, but remained relatively isolated from other inland communities until the 4th century BC. There is literary evidence of early links between Colchis and Sinope in mythological tradition. Strabo's writings link the legendary founder of Sinope, Autolycus, with Jason and the Argonauts. Polybius described Sinope as being "on the way to Phasis". The Persian Achaemenid Empire's northward expansion in the 4th century disrupted Sinope's control over its eastern colonies, including Trapezus (present day Trabzon). The satrap Datames briefly occupied the city around 375 BC. There is archaeological evidence of increased economic activity between the port city of Sinope and the surrounding inland areas during between 4th and 1st c. BC. Sinope appears to have maintained its independence from the dominion of Alexander the Great, and with the help of Rhodes turned back an assault led by Mithridates II of Pontus in 220 BC. Sinope eventually fell to Pharnaces I in 183 BC, after which it became the capital of the Pontic Kingdom.
The Roman general Lucullus conquered Sinope in 70 BC, and Julius Caesar established a Roman colony there, Colonia Julia Felix, in 47 BC. Mithradates Eupator was born and buried at Sinope, and it was the birthplace of Diogenes, of Diphilus, poet and actor of the New Attic comedy, of the historian Baton, and of the Christian heretic of the 2nd century AD, Marcion.
Marcion of Sinope, The Arch-Heretic
Marcion preached that God had sent Jesus Christ, who was distinct from the "vengeful" God (Demiurge) who had created the world.
With dualistic pagan philosophy from what he learned, when He studied the Hebrew Bible, 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 YHWH. He viewed YHWH on Old Testament as Evil god who was different with God The Father and Jesus on New Testament.
God in Old Testament, he said that YHWH is The Most Punisher, Violent, and differentist with other peoples beside Jews. On Marcion's eye, YHWH is The Violent God who loves to punish gentiles who were infidels and sends them go to the Hell.
This notion of two gods which known as ditheistic—a higher transcendent one and a lower world-creator and ruler—allowed Marcion to reconcile his perceived contradictions between Christian Covenant theology and the gospel proclaimed by the New Testament. Catholic Church always teaches that Old Testament is fulfilled with New Testament and Old Testament as Shadow to prepare for welcoming the New Testament, So YHWH is The Holy Trinity himself. YHWH on Old Testament absolutely is same with God The Father, God The Son who is Jesus Christ, and The Holy Spirit.
In contrast to other leaders of the nascent Catholic Christian Church, however, Marcion declared that Christianity was in complete discontinuity with Judaism and entirely opposed to the scriptures of Judaism. Marcion did not claim that these scriptures were false. Instead, he asserted that they were entirely true, but were to be read in an absolutely literalistic manner, one which led him to develop an understanding that God of Israel was not the same God spoken of by Jesus. So, Marcion taught duotheistic, one of polytheism branch. For example, Marcion argued that the Genesis account of Yahweh walking through the Garden of Eden asking where Adam was, proved that YHWH inhabited a physical body and was without universal knowledge, attributes wholly incompatible with the Heavenly Father professed by Jesus.
Marcion had pictured YHWH 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. In contrast, 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 a book titled Antitheses, which condemned by Catholic Church in 144.
Papyrus 69 (2th Century) which is "a witness to a Marcionite edition of Luke's Gospel"
Gospel of the Lord, Marcion of Sinope
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. Marcion held that Son of the Heavenly Father changed his body shape from Spiritual became seems like Human on shape which have been seen.
Marcion was the first to codify a Christian canon. His canon consisted of only eleven books, grouped into two sections: the Evangelikon, a shorter version of the Gospel of Luke, and the Apostolikon, a selection of ten epistles of Paul the Apostle, which were also slightly shorter than the canonical text. Early Christians such as Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Epiphanius claimed that Marcion's editions of Luke and the Pauline epistles were intentionally edited by Marcion to match his theological views.
Marcion's Background
Epiphanius records in his Panarion (c. 375) that Marcion was born the son of a bishop in Pontus (modern-day Turkey), likely Philologus of Sinope and Marcion was an Anatolia Roman. Rhodo and Tertullian, young men in Marcion's old age, described him as a "mariner" and a "ship-master" respectively. Some time in the late 130s, Marcion traveled to Rome, joined the Roman church, and made a large donation of 200,000 sesterces to the congregation there. Conflicts with the church of Rome arose and he was eventually excommunicated in 144, his donation being returned to him.
Irenaeus writes that "a certain Cerdo, originating from the Simonians, came to Rome under Hyginus [...] and taught that the one who was proclaimed as God by the Law and the Prophets is not the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Against Heresies, 1, 27, 1). Also, according to them, Marcion and the Gnostic Valentinus were companions in Rome. With other words, Credo the student of Simon Magus, who was Simonians (Note: the Gnostic Heretical group which was condemned by Catholic Church under Pope St. Peter The Apostle which is recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. The act of simony, or paying for position, is named after Simon, who tried to buy his way into the power of the Apostles), also influenced Marcion with his gnostical teaching.
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.
Some scholars have taken this "seduction of a virgin" as a metaphor for Marcion's corruption of the Christian Church, with the Church portrayed as the undefiled virgin, and that Marcion apparently has become "the victim of the historicisation of such a metaphor, even though it contradicts the otherwise firm tradition of his strict sexual probity"
Beside Roman-Greek pagan philosophy and dualistic ancient polytheistic Persian, Marcionism was also influenced by Simonians, who were variously accused of using magic and theurgy, incantations and love-potions; declaring idolatry a matter of indifference that was neither good nor bad, proclaiming all sex to be perfect love, and altogether leading very disorderly, immoral lives. Eusebius of Caesarea, in his 4th century Historia Ecclesiastica, writes that 'every vile corruption that could either be done or devised, is practised by this most abominable heresy'. In general, they were said to regard nothing in itself as good or bad by nature: it was not good works that made men blessed, in the next world, but the grace bestowed by Simon and Helena on those who followed them.
Justin Martyr wrote in his Apology (152 AD) that the sect of the Simonians appeared to have been formidable, as he speaks four times of their founder, Simon.
The Simonians were also said to venerate Simon under the image of Zeus, and Helena under that of Athena. However, Hippolytus adds that "if any one, on seeing the images either of Simon or Helen, shall call them by those names, he is cast out, as showing ignorance of the mysteries." From this it is evident that the Simonians did not allow that they actually worshipped their founders. In the Clementine Recognitions Helena is called Luna, which may mean that the images were allegorical representations of the sun and moon. Simonians also believed that there is a Mother of the Aeons and There is a mystical passage on the unity of all things, suggestive of the Emerald Tablet.
Still on Marcionism Topic, There are other features in the portrait which are reminiscent of Marcion. The first thing mentioned in the Homilies about Simon's opinions is that he denied that God was just. By "God" he meant the creator god. But he undertakes to prove from the Jewish scriptures that there is a higher god, who really possesses the perfections which are falsely ascribed to the lower god. On these grounds Pope St. Peter complains that and fought against what is Marcionism, Valentinians, and Simon Magus who were Heretics, when he was setting out for the gentiles to convert them from their worship of many gods upon earth according to Acts of the Apostles 8:9-24.Satan had sent Simon before him to make them believe that there were many gods in heaven.
St. Pauls the Apostle said,
" But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema. " (Galatians 1:8)
Successors of Marcionism
There are many successor of Marcionism those who brought the gnostic views to the world after Marcion of Sinope. In the 3rd Century CE, Manichaeism was founded by the Parthian prophet Mani (216–274 CE), in the Sasanian Empire. Manichaeism teaches an elaborate dualistic cosmology describing the struggle between a good, spiritual world of light, and an evil, material world of darkness.
In the 10th century, Bogomilism was a Heresy Christian neo-Gnostic, dualist sect founded in the First Bulgarian Empire by the priest Bogomil during the reign of Tsar Peter I. It most probably arose in the region of Kutmichevitsa, today part of the region of Macedonia.
The Bogomils were dualists or Gnostics in that they believed in a world within the body and a world outside the body. They did not use the Christian cross, nor build churches, as they revered their gifted form and considered their body to be the temple. This gave rise to many forms of practice to cleanse oneself through fasting or dancing.
The Bogomils rejected the ecclesiastical hierarchy. Their primary political tendencies were resistance to the state and church authorities (Note: Anarchism in Europe was introduced firstly by Bogomils).This helped the movement spread quickly in the Balkans, gradually expanding throughout the Byzantine Empire and later reaching Kievan Rus', Dalmatia, Serbia, Bosnia, Italy, and France (Cathars).
In the 12th and 14th centuries, Catharism was Pre-Reformation quasi-dualist or pseudo-Gnostic Heresy movement which thrived in Southern Europe, particularly in northern Italy and southern France.
Catharism was denounced as a heretical sect by the Catholic Church, its followers were attacked first by the Albigensian Crusade and later by the Medieval Inquisition, which eradicated the sect by 1350. Many thousands were slaughtered, hanged, or burnt at the stake, sometimes without regard for age or sex.
Catharism taught that there were not one, but two gods—the good God of Heaven and the evil god of this age because they interpreted 2 Corinthians 4:4. According to tradition, Cathars believed that the good God was the God of the New Testament faith and creator of the spiritual realm. Many Cathars identified the evil god as Satan, the master of the physical world, was the God of Judaism or God of the Old Testament. The Cathars believed that human souls were the sexless spirits of angels trapped in the material realm of the evil god. They thought these souls were destined to be reincarnated until they achieved salvation through the "consolamentum", a form of baptism performed when death is imminent. At that moment, they believed they would return to the good God as "Cathar Perfect". Catharism was initially taught by ascetic leaders who set few guidelines, leading some Catharist practices and beliefs to vary by region and over time.
Albigensian Crusade against Cathars
The first mention of Catharism by chroniclers was in 1143; four years later the Catholic Church denounced Cathar practices, particularly the consolamentum ritual. From the beginning of his reign, Pope Innocent III attempted to end Catharism by sending missionaries and persuading the local authorities to act against the Cathars.
The word 'Cathar' (aka. Gazarri etc.) is coined by Catholic theologians and used exclusively by the inquisition or by authors otherwise identified with the Orthodox church--for example in the anonymous pamphlet of 1430, Errores Gazariorum (Re: Errors of the Cathars). The full title of this treatise in English is, "The errors of the Gazarri, or of those who travel riding a broom or a stick."
Their doctrines (Cathars) have numerous resemblances to those of the Bogomils and the Paulicians, who influenced them, as well as the earlier Marcianists, who were found in the same areas as the Paulicians, the Manicheans and the Christian Gnostics of the first few centuries AD.
St. John Damascene the Catholic Doctor, writing in the 8th century AD, also notes of an earlier sect called the "Cathari", in his book On Heresies, taken from the epitome provided by Epiphanius of Salamis in his Panarion. He says of them: "They absolutely reject those who marry a second time, and reject the possibility of penance [that is, forgiveness of sins after baptism]". These are probably the same Cathari (actually Novations) who are mentioned in Canon 8 of the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea in the year 325, which states "... [I]f those called Cathari come over [to the faith], let them first make profession that they are willing to communicate [share full communion] with the twice-married, and grant pardon to those who have lapsed ..."
Cross of Positive Christianity with Nazism
In the Post-Reformation Modern Era, in 1935, there was a Heretical Gnostic Church named as "German Evangelical Church" with "German Christians" as its parishioners. Their movement was sustained and encouraged by factors such as:
- the 400th anniversary (in 1917) of Martin Luther's publication of the Ninety-five Theses in 1517, an event which endorsed German nationalism, stoked hostility toward foreign peoples, granted Germany a preferred place in the Protestant tradition, and legitimised antisemitism;
- the antisemitic writings of Martin Luther (e.g., On the Jews and Their Lies);
- the Luther Renaissance Movement of Professor Emmanuel Hirsch; supported by publications by Guida Diehl, the first speaker of the National Socialist Women's League;
- the revival of völkisch traditions; it was characterized by organicism, racialism, populism, agrarianism, romantic nationalism and – as a consequence of a growing exclusive and ethnic connotation – by antisemitism from the 1900s onward.
- the de-emphasis of the Old Testament in Lutheran theology, and the partial or total removal of Jewishness from the Holy Bible;
- the respect for temporal (secular) authority, which had been emphasised by Luther. The movement used scriptural support (Romans 13) to justify this position.
German Christians celebrating Luther-Day in Berlin in 1933
Alfred Rosenberg was a Latvian Jew those who taught Adolf Hitler and as Hitler Ideology Teacher to promote Racial Supremacy and Pure Racial. Rosenberg also taught that God of Judaism or the Old Testament God is merely a Devil who controlled the world with his Judeo-Bolshevism. So, Rosenberg removed the genealogies of Jesus that showed his Davidic descent, Jewish names, and places were removed, quotations from the Old Testament were removed unless they showed Jews in a bad light, references to fulfilled Old Testament prophecies were removed, and Jesus was reworked into a militaristic, heroic figure fighting the Jews using Nazified language. Alfred Rosenberg convinced Hitler to believe that Jesus was an Aryan people or Germanic who was fighting the Jews and was crucified as Aryan by Jews.
Although "Positive Christianity" is explicitly associated with the racial ideology of Nazi Germany, its theological underpinnings long predate the latter. The earliest form of Christianity that resembled positive Christianity was the 2nd-century Marcionite sect, which also declared the Old Testament non-canon and associated it with Judaism. However, this stemmed from a rejection of the Jewish religion in favor of Gnostic theology, rather than a racially-based hatred of the Jews as a people.
Rosenberg made new religion like "Positive Christianity" as an ultimate goal to convince many German Jews or Austrian Jews who lived in Europe so that they still reject Christ as their Messiah and still embrace their infidelity with Rabbinical Judaism today. Rosenberg had convinced many German on his life so that Germans want to remove or sweep out Catholicism from Germany. (Note: about Positive Christianity, Emil Maurice, Erhard Milch and other Nazi High Officers were Jews, but this is not topic about Jewish Conspiracy, but Rosenberg is one of Neo-Marcionist who has conspiracy to destroy Christianity with Jewish Background)
Alfred Rosenberg, The Latvian Jew Teacher who taught Hitler the Pure Racial, The Founder of "Positive Christianity"
