Forgery and Counterforgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in Early Christian Polemics (115 page)

The Syriac tradition is known through Ephrem’s four-volume biblical commentary (which survives in Armenian translation), which D. Bundy argues is itself pseudepigraphic (falsely ascribed rather than forged).
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Latin manuscripts began to appear at the end of the nineteenth century; we now have six.
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The Coptic version, found in the Heidelberg Papyrus, was discovered by Carl Schmidt in 1904 and published in 1905.
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Finally, and most important, the sole Greek witness, which, dating from the third century, is by far the earliest manuscript evidence, was found among the Bodmer papyri and published as Bodmer Papyrus X by Michel Testuz in 1959.
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Whereas earlier scholars such as Harnack believed that 3 Corinthians was originally part of the Acts of Paul,
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today it is generally ascribed an independent origin and circulation. For one thing, only the Heidelberg papyrus presents it as part of the Acts; the other manuscripts present it as part of the New Testament. Moreover, among the manuscripts of the Acts of Paul only the Heidelberg manuscript contains the correspondence. Still more important, there are clear anomalies between the narrative of the Acts and the letters. According to the correspondence,
heresies present a grave threat to the Christians in Corinth; but in the narrative, once Paul arrives in the city there is no word about heresy. On the contrary, Paul is pleased with the progress of the Corinthian believers. Relatedly, during Paul’s visit he makes no mention of an earlier correspondence and mentions none of the problems addressed in it. What is more, whereas Cleobius is presented as an arch-heretic in the Corinthians’ letter to Paul, in the narrative he is portrayed as a spirit-filled Christian. And so, it appears that the correspondence originated independently of the Acts of Paul, as recognized not long after the publication of the Bodmer papyrus, for example, by Klijn.
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Technically speaking the correspondence consists of four parts: a narrative introduction to the Corinthians’ letter to Paul, the letter itself, a narrative introducing Paul’s reply, and that letter itself. As S. Johnston has conveniently summarized, different surviving witnesses attest each of these four parts. Our oldest and only Greek witness, the third-century Bodmer Papyrus, attests only the two letters themselves, without narrative introduction. On these grounds it is generally thought today that the sequence of composition and redaction was as follows: the letters themselves were first composed and circulated, narrative introductions to each were later added, and the whole was subsequently inserted into the Acts of Paul.
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Luttikhuizen, in opposition to Testuz, has made a strong case that the Armenian and Syriac versions drew the correspondence from the Acts of Paul—rather than from an independent manuscript transmission—since they contain the second introductory narrative.
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As they stand now, the letters place a particular stress on the importance of the flesh: the fleshly existence of Christ, the fleshly nature of his resurrection, and the fleshly character of the resurrection of believers yet to come. In the first letter, allegedly written to Paul by Stephanus, Daphnus, Eubulus, Theophilus, and Zeno, we learn that two false teachers, Simon and Cleobius, have arrived in Corinth
and proclaimed “pernicious words” that have destroyed “the faith of some.”
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In particular they have declared that

one must not appeal to the prophets and that God is not almighty, there is no resurrection of the body, man has not been made by God, Christ has neither come in the flesh, nor was he born of Mary, and the world is not the work of God but of angels. (vv. 10–15)

Paul’s response is more or less a point-by-point refutation, given at much greater length than the succinct summary of the false teachings themselves. As Paul has learned “from the apostles before me who were always with Jesus Christ,” Christ was certainly “born of Mary … that he might come into this world and save all flesh by his own flesh and that he might raise us in the flesh” (vv. 5–6).
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God is called both the “almighty” and the “maker of heaven and earth,” and is said to have “sent the prophets first to the Jews” (v. 9). Salvation “of the flesh” comes through the (real) body of Christ (v. 16). Those who “assert that heaven and earth and all that is in them are not a work of God” are “not children of righteousness but of wrath” (v. 19). Moreover, “those who say that there is no resurrection of the flesh shall have no resurrection” (v. 24). Paul concludes his polemic by giving three arguments for the real, physical resurrection of the flesh: the sowing of seeds, the story of Jonah, and an apocryphal account of a corpse that was revived when thrown on the bones of Elisha (vv. 26–32). Those who accept this message, as “received by the blessed prophets and the holy gospel,” will be rewarded; those who have rejected it will be punished with fire, “since they are Godless men, a generation of vipers” (vv. 34–37).

No one thinks that either letter is authentic.
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There are, however, a substantial number of Pauline themes and verisimilitudes. Connections with 1 and 2 Corinthians in particular abound: Paul’s tribulations (v. 2; cf. 2 Cor. 1:3–10, 11:23–28); the imminent appearance of Christ (v. 3; cf. 1 Cor. 15:51); Paul’s claim that he delivered to the Corinthians what he also “received” (v. 4; cf. 1 Cor. 15:3); the body as a temple of righteousness (v. 17; cf. 1 Cor. 6:19); an attack on those who say that “there is no resurrection” (v. 24; cf. 1 Cor. 15:12); the resurrection compared to
sown seeds (vv. 26–27; cf. 1 Cor. 15:36–37); the coming judgment (v. 37; cf. 2 Cor. 5:10). A large number of other Pauline words and phrases are scattered throughout: “prisoner of Jesus Christ” (v. 1; cf. Phil. 1:7, Phlm. 1); “seed of David” (v. 5; cf. Rom. 1:3); believers’ “adoption” (v. 8; cf. Rom. 8:15–17); “children … of wrath” (v. 19; cf. Eph. 2:3); the “marks” that Paul bears (v. 33; cf. Gal. 6:17); “that I may win Christ” (v. 34; cf. Phil. 3:8–9); “that I may attain to the resurrection of the dead” (v. 33; cf. Phil. 3:11); and many others. Clearly the author knows Paul’s letters and imitates their phrasing. In this case we are not dealing with a forger who is simply claiming to be an apostle and providing little “evidence” to support his claim (as, say, with the letters of 1 Peter or Jude). This author wants to sound like Paul.
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Even so, as we will see in a moment, he fails miserably on several fronts.

The function of the forgery is to use the apostolic name to oppose heretical groups who denigrate the flesh and the fleshly resurrection. Over the years scholars have failed to resist the vain temptation to nail down the identity of the opponents with greater precision. And so, for example, Rist argued that the opponents were Marcionites of an Apelles sort: “the best organized and the most aggressive ‘heresy’ during the latter part of the second century.”
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W. Rordorf proposed that the opponent was Saturninus;
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M. Muretow held that it was Simon Magus;
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Hovhanessian suggested the Ophites.
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Most commonly, however, it is recognized that there is not a specific group of “heretics” in view, but a kind of teaching, found in various guises among the Marcionites and sundry Gnostics. This is the conclusion of Klijn: “we are not able to say that the correspondence was written against one particular kind of heresy. The correspondence probably describes a tendency in the early church.”
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And Luttikhuizen: “we may be dealing with a
general
warning against the invasion of Gnostic ways of thinking into Christianity rather than with the refutation of a specific group of Gnostics.”
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Or Johnston: the letter is an attack on “all the gnostic ideas that circulated during his era.”
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At the same time, given the popularity of Paul among both Marcionites and sundry Gnostic teachers, it is worth entertaining the idea that the author believed himself to be countering teachings that claimed support in Paul’s own proclamation. We have seen such a contest over Paul in 2 Peter, whose pseudonymous author objected to the “ignorant and unstable” false teachers who “twist” Paul’s letters “to their own destruction” (2 Pet. 3:16). Already in Paul’s own day we know of groups of his own devotees who, in his opinion, seriously misconstrued his message. This at least is true of one of the groups in Corinth who claimed to be “of Paul,” in opposition to others who claimed to be “of Cephas,” “of Apollo,” or “of Christ.” Possibly the most striking feature of the historical Paul’s intervention in this Corinthian dispute is that he does not side with his own party, but attacks them along with all the others for misunderstanding the true meaning of the gospel, even though this was a group that specifically appealed to his authority for their views.

Many of the themes of 1 Corinthians—especially, but not exclusively, those involving splits in the community—are replicated a generation later in the letter of 1 Clement, also written to Corinth, the church, remarkably, said to be the recipient of the apocryphal correspondence we are now considering. Like 3 Corinthians, 1 Clement is deeply concerned about the teaching of the future resurrection, and is invested in arguing for its reality in the face of those who denied it (esp. 1 Clem. 24–26). Both letters appeal to nature in support of their views: the claim, “if one will not take the parable of seeds. … ” (3 Cor. 26), is not formally far removed from “he shows us the magnificence of his promise even through a bird” (1 Clem. 26.1). In fact, there is good reason for thinking that 3 Cor. 26 (“For they do not know, O Corinthians, about the sowing of wheat”) is an allusion to 1 Clement 24:4–5 (“We should consider the crops: how, and in what way, does the sowing occur?”). Both passages are based on Mark 4:26–27; and there are several striking verbal parallels:
(Mark has
instead),
(Mark has
), and
(not in Mark).
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Still, even though there is a literary connection between these two writings, it would be difficult to show, historically, that Clement’s opponents were the same as 3 Corinthians docetists.
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