<title>ORTHODOXY AND HERESY IN EARLIEST CHRISTIANITY</> 

by <au>Walter Bauer</> 
[German original, copyright J.C.B.Mohr, Tu%bingen, 1934]
 
Second German Edition 
ed and supplemented by <ed>Georg Strecker</>
[Copyright J.C.B.Mohr, Tu%bingen, 1964] 

English Translation 
ed and supplemented by <ed>Robert A. Kraft</> 
and <ed>Gerhard Kroedel</> 
with a team from the 
Philadelphia Seminar on Christian Origins
[Copyright Fortress Press, Philadelphia, 1971] 

Updated Electronic English Edition
by <ed>Robert A. Kraft</>
[Copyright Robert A. Kraft, 10 April 1993]

***not yet fully ready for consistent electronic release***

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~p.229 [231] [ch 10]
    
                <7The Beginnings>7
  
<8Translated by John E. Steely and John J. O'Rourke>8 
  
@ Let us sketch once more the state of affairs that had developed at
the beginning of the second century. Orthodoxy, so it appeared to us, 
represented the form of Christianity supported by the majority in 
Rome -- a Christianity which, to be sure, still had to contend strenuously    
with the heretics throughout the entire second century and
even longer. Indeed, in the middle of the second century the controversy    
rose to the intensity of a life and death struggle, the outcome of
which has been of decisive significance not only for Rome but for 
Christianity in general. Already around the year 100 the Roman
church had extended its influence to Corinth. In the course of the
following decades the majority came to agree with Rome in some of 
the churches in Asia Minor, and a minority in some others -- as also
elsewhere, in Philippi and Antioch.  However, east of Phrygian
Hierapolis we could hardly discern any traces of orthodoxy. Christianity    
and heresy were essentially synonymous there (see above,
80 f., 171-173).
@ Rome, on the other hand, was from the very beginning the center 
and chief source of power for the "orthodox" movement within Christianity.    
 At the beginning of the second century, Christianity as
a whole still is called the "catholic church" by Ignatius (<1Smyr>1. 8.2; 
cf. <1Martyrdom of Polycarp>1 inscription, 8.1, 19.2), but by the end of
that century it has become divided, as far as the Roman or Roman
influenced outlook is concerned, into two distinct parts, the catholic
(<1Muratorian Canon>1, lines 66, 69, 61 f.)  or "great" (see above, 216 
n. 36) church on the one hand and the <1massa perditionis>1 [condemned    
multitude] of the heretics on the other. As a matter of course, 
~p.230
Rome possessed the most tightly knit, perhaps the only more or less 
reliable anti-heretical majority, because it [232] was farthest removed 
from the oriental danger zone and in addition was by nature and 
custom least inclined or able to yield to seemingly fantastic oriental
ways of thinking and oriental emotions that becloud clear thought.
The sober sense of the Roman was not the proper seed-bed for
Syrian or Egyptian syncretism.\1/ To be sure, his church also had to
undergo the experience that all ungodliness flows together at the 
center of the world. But the appreciation for rules and regulations,
law and order, asserted itself all the more and gained the upper hand.
This extremely powerful organism, although under great stress, knew 
how to rid itself even of the highly dangerous poison of Marcionism 
in the middle of the second century. In view of the actual circumstances,   
the Roman did not demand the impossible;\2/ he was by 
nature fitted to be an organizer, and this gave him a sharp weapon
for the battle against heresy. This weapon would prove to be all the
more effective since, as we already know, from very early times 
Rome did not lack the necessary material means for carrying out its 
far-reaching plans. 
@ Relying on the above and supported by the conviction that Rome
[233] constituted the church founded in the world capital by the
~p.221
greatest apostles, Rome confidently extends itself eastward,\3/ tries 
to break down resistance and stretches a helping hand to those who
are like-minded, drawing everything within reach into the well-knit 
structure of ecclesiastical organization.  Heresy, with its different 
brands and peculiar configurations that scarcely even permitted it to 
be united in a loose association reflecting common purpose, had 
nothing corresponding to this by way of a similar offensive and defensive   
force with which to counter. Only a few heresiarchs such as 
Marcion were able to draw together their followers throughout the 
world into an ecclesiastical structure. But Marcion himself, the most 
dangerous of all, to a large measure paralyzed his own cause insofar    
as he excised with his own hand the source of natural increase
for his community by his inexorable rejection of procreation.\4/ In the 
long run he simply had to drop out of the picture -- all the more since 
the organization and the concept of church offices which he advocated   
also ultimately failed to produce the same tight and efficient
structure as developed in the church.\5/
@ A united front composed of Marcionites and Jewish Christians, 
Valentinians and Montanists, is inconceivable. Thus it was the destiny
of the heresies, after they had lost their connection with the orthodox 
Christianity that remained, to stay divided and even to fight among 
themselves,\6/ and thus to be routed one after another by orthodoxy.
The form of Christian belief and life which was successful was that 
supported by the strongest organization -- the form which was the most
uniform and best suited for mass consumption -- in spite of the fact
that, in my judgment, for a long time after the close of the post-apostolic   
age the sum total of consciously orthodox and anti-heretical
Christians was numerically inferior to that of the "heretics." It was 
only natural that the compact ecclesiastical outlook with its concentrated    
energy would more and more draw to itself the great mass
of those who at first, unclear and undecided, had stood in the middle 
resigned to a general sort of Christianity, and who under different 
circumstances could even have turned in the opposite direction. And 
~p.232
it appears to be no less self-evident [234] that the Roman government 
finally came to recognize that the Christianity ecclesiastically organized    
from Rome was flesh of its flesh, came to unite with it, and
thereby actually enabled it to achieve ultimate victory over unbelievers    
and heretics. 
@ Something further must be taken into consideration in order to
understand the victory of this kind of orthodoxy. The course of 
Christianity was directed toward the West from the very beginning.
One could almost say that it was driven straight into the arms of 
Rome by its development. Many a crucial matter might have been
different if the actual Orient had not simply excluded the new religion 
for a long time, thus making it impossible for marked and undiluted 
eastern influences to become operative. In Edessa, Christianity is
more recent than Marcion, and in Egypt its first certain traces are 
found in the person of the gnostic Basilides during the reign of
Hadrian. The Palestinian Jewish Christians were not able to make
inroads into Babylonia, with its heavy Jewish concentration, nor was
Paul able to gain a firm foothold in Nabataean Arabia. As far as we 
can see, Damascus, the city of Paul's conversion, no longer plays a 
role in his later life,\7/ not to mention the fact that he also had 
included the other eastern areas only in his final plans. This was not
because the Orient was under control and Paul would not work in 
what was not his own territory, but because these regions at first
simply rejected Christianity. Samaria was closed, because even at the 
time of the Samaritan Justin everybody there worshipped the god 
Simon, not the god [235] Jesus (<1Dial>1. 120.6, <1Apol>1. 26.2-3); and 
~p.233    
trans-Jordania also was closed together with the adjacent areas, perhaps
because of competing groups such as the baptist sects, which were 
still of grave concern to Mani,\8/ but above all because of the presence
of an extremely vigorous paganism.\9/ Prevented by superior forces
from turning aside toward the East, Christianity moved northward, 
clinging close to the hellenized coast of Phoenicia and Syria, and
taking a sharp turn westward burst forth over Asia Minor toward 
Rome and Europe.
@ It was in Asia Minor (and more precisely primarily in its western 
part), in Macedonia, and in Greece that Paul engaged in successful
activity. He established nothing in his homeland of Cilicia and Tarsus
itself, despite extensive efforts (Gal. 1.21). What he held together
by virtue of his own personality fell to pieces, was fought over, and 
was divided up after his death. Lycaonia and Pisidia soon disappear 
from the tradition.  Of Galatia we learn that the capital, Ancyra,
which is still a notoriously heretical city for Jerome (<1Commentary>1
<1on Galatians>1 3.8 f.), might have been completely lost to Montanism
(the anti-Montanist in EH 5.16.4). Corinth comes completely under 
Roman influence, and in the second century the "church" sought also 
to appropriate Ephesus by means of John as one of the twelve apostles.
In this, of course, it meets with resistance from the heretics. And we
observe the same struggle in the Pauline communities of Phrygia,
which for the most part reject "right" belief (above, 81 f.) -- and where 
they do accept it, in the person of Papias of Hierapolis, they deny 
any connections with Paul (see above, 214 f.). If our analysis was
correct, Philippi, for the most part, soon embraced gnosticism, and 
perhaps one must conclude the same concerning Thessalonica (see 
above, 73-75).
@ This need not imply any deliberate defection from the Apostle to
the Gentiles. After all, we noted that in Phrygia it was precisely
orthodoxy that rejected Paul (above, 214 f.). Perhaps the Macedonian
gnostics were just as self-conscious of being the genuine disciples of
Paul as was Marcion. [236] In the long run almost any gentile Christian   
could attach himself to the Apostle to the Gentiles so as to  
~p.234    
receive legitimization from him -- the author of 2 Peter already complains  
about this (3.16). One such Paulinist could, unencumbered 
by the weight of a Jewish heritage, develop Paul's extreme pessimism
with respect to the material world into a doctrine of the demiurge, 
while another could omit this last step, as the Apostle himself had 
done. This one might put the whole Old Testament behind him,
because "Christ is the end of the law" (Rom. 10.4), while that one
might find the same sort of justification for continuing to revere it 
as "holy, just, and good" (Rom. 7.12). The "strong" as well as the
"weak" (those who practice abstinence) stood equally close to him.
His christology bordered on docetism with its repeated statements 
about the Christ who was to be considered as a man (<2homoiwma>2; 
Rom. 8.3, Phil. 2.7) abetted by his silence about the Lord's career on
earth, while his talk about the "Christ in the flesh" (e.g. Rom. 1.3, 
9.5) "born of woman" (Gal. 4.4) also permitted the complete humanity  
to be maintained firmly. Paul supported a belief in bodily
resurrection -- nevertheless, this involves neither flesh nor blood (1
Cor. 15.42-50). He was a pneumatic like none other (cf. 1 Cor. 14.18, 
2 Cor. 12.1-4), but was also the advocate of ecclesiastical order (e.g. 
1 Cor. 14.26-36). And although it is true that orthodoxy exulted in 
the high regard for church and apostles shown in Ephesians, and 
that the connections between Ephesians and certain churchmen (1 
Peter, Ignatius, Polycarp, and even <1Hermas>1) can hardly be ignored 
because of their frequency (even though the decisive argument for 
proof of literary dependence is lacking), it is also true that the
gnostics attributed their speculation about the aeons to this epistle 
and to Colossians.\10/
@ But the elasticity of the Pauline outlook did not become important
only for those who came after him; it possessed significance already
for Paul himself and for his epoch. Paul's as yet quite rudimentary 
organization of thought patterns, in combination with his apostolic 
openness that leads him to become everything to everyone so as to 
win all (1 Cor. 9.22), allows him to display a spirit of toleration that
scarcely knows what a heretic might be -- that is, "heretic" in the sense 
of a fellow Christian concerning whom one is convinced that his 
~p.235
divergent stance with regard to the faith bars him from the path of 
salvation. Paul is far from being under the illusion that even in his 
own communities everyone believes and thinks exactly as he does.
Nevertheless, it is instructive to observe the position he takes with 
regard to divergencies, especially by comparison to the view of later 
times. [237] According to Paul, the adherents of Cephas and of Apollos
in Corinth are not heretics, but represent legitimate varieties of the
new religion, as also do the teachings of the other independent 
apostles such as a Barnabas or a Titus. (It is unfortunate that we
know so very little about the last named and his position, and can
only suspect that he was of extraordinary significance; in any event, 
Titus was not, like Timothy, satisfied simply to enlist in the service
of the Pauline proclamation.) The faith as it was cultivated in the 
house church of Aquila and Priscilla and in similar conventicles -- how 
would it have looked? Through detailed explanations the Apostle 
endeavors to persuade the Corinthian Christians who reject bodily 
resurrection (1 Cor. 15.12) -- perhaps the Alexandrianism of Apollos
is at work here. For Justin, such people are only "so-called Christians"  
(<1Dial>1. 80.3), and Polycarp does not hesitate to use the expression  
"firstborn of satan" (<1Phil>1. 7.1). It is only with reference to a
most serious moral deviation that the Apostle proposes exclusion from 
the community by handing the offender over to the devil (1 Cor. 
5.1-5). In the pastoral Epistles the same sentence is leveled against 
Hymenaeus and Alexander because they have "made shipwreck of
the faith" (1 Tim. 1.19 f.).
@ Furthermore, the religious outlook of the Pauline circle may have 
picked up additional traits through men who, like Epaphras in 
Colossae (Col. 1.7), and perhaps also in Laodicea and Hierapolis, 
proclaimed abroad the Pauline gospel to the extent that they understood   
it and elaborated upon it. Possibly the aforementioned Epaphras   
is not entirely blameless for the fact that in the community he 
established at Colossae, peculiar syncretistic ideas were introduced
such as the worship of the cosmic elements -- or perhaps it would be
more accurate to suggest that such ideas already were present from
the very beginning in Colossae but that Epaphras did not take the 
trouble to eliminate them. Paul receives news about how things stand. 
But instead of reacting by attacking with a club, he develops his 
~p.236
view in the calm confidence that the Christian religion will again
eliminate from itself whatever is alien to it, and thus not compatible
with it.
@ On one occasion,\11/ to be sure, we see him flare up indignantly
and hear him hurl his anathema against a divergent view -- [238] this is
in Galatians, where it is a matter of preventing a gentile Christian
community from falling back into Judaism. But even here it is not 
the overt Jewish Christianity as advocated, for example, by the "pillar"
James that is considered heresy and the object of Paul's wrath. Brethren    
are transformed into false brethren only at that moment in which, 
in defiance of the agreement reached in Jerusalem, an attempt is
made to fasten the yoke of legalism on the necks of liberated gentile 
Christians. 
@ The Judaists, for their part, thought and felt differently, and demonstrated    
this again and again by the fact that they were unable to 
admit that the Pauline gospel could be adequate even for gentiles.
Rather, they were fully convinced that this proclamation <1as such>1, 
because of its inadequacy, separated men from the messianic salvation.    
Thus, if one may be allowed to speak rather pointedly, the
apostle Paul was the only heresiarch known to the apostolic age -- the  
only one who was so considered in that period, at least from one
particular perspective.\12/ It could be said that the Jewish Christians 
in their opposition to Paul introduced the notion of "heresy" into the
Christian consciousness. The arrow quickly flew back at the archer. 
Because of their inability to relate to a development that took place 
on hellenized gentile soil, the Judaists soon became a heresy, rejected 
with conviction by the gentile Christians. Basically, they probably 
had remained what they had been in the time of James the Just,
but the majority of the faithful ultimately came to deviate so much 
from them that the connection had to break. Thus the Judaists become    
an instructive example of how even one who preserves the old
position can become a "heretic" if the development moves sufficiently 
far beyond him. 
~p.237
@ That Jewish Christianity was repulsed in no way implies that the
gentile Christians at first had constituted a religious entity of their 
own, apart from their rejection of excessive Judaistic demands and
their confession of Jesus as Lord. On the contrary we must suppose
that the variety of types was quite considerable;\13/ and the location
where, in any given case, Christianity became indigenous was of 
great significance. [239] 
@ In Egypt the environmental conditions for the new religion were 
such that its initial development basically took a form that appeared 
to the later church to be heresy. In Asia Minor and further to the
west Paulinism was in operation. But not only did this Paulinism bear 
within itself various possibilities, but alongside it there were other
forms of the religion of Christ -- compatible with it, alienated from it, 
or wholly independent of it. To the extent that the Apostle to the
Gentiles took a stand with respect to them, even when he felt them
to be defective, he still did not detest and condemn them as heretical. 
@ It is not until the postapostolic era that the tensions increase and
press for a solution. The explanation for this lies at first in the decline   
of the eschatological expectation, which made the faithful  
~p.238  
increasingly unable and unwilling to tolerate disturbances and difficulties   
as defects of a brief transitional period. If one has to prepare
for a lengthy stay, he longs for orderliness and harmony in the house.
Thereafter, the respective contending forces reinforced their positions 
during this period. [240] The advances that Christianity makes in the 
pagan world have to be purchased by means of conscious and unconscious    
compromise with the syncretistic spirit of the times. And 
on the other side, the two factors that above all represent a counter 
balance to the syncretistic-gnostic religiosity acquire increased significance  
for the faithful -- the Old Testament and the primitive tradition,    
rooted in Palestine, of the life and teachings of the earthly 
Jesus.
@ It seems to me that down to the year 70, and especially where 
Christians who were free from the law attempted to win gentiles to
their religion, Christianity disengaged itself as clearly as possible from
Judaism and its approach because of an instinct for self-preservation 
that is as understandable as it is legitimate.\14/ After the failure of 
the Jewish revolt, this was no longer a danger and the new faith could
without apprehension appropriate resources and procedures from its
surviving competitor -- above all, it could abandon any reservations
it might have had toward the Old Testament.\15/ Surely this book
was of incalculable importance for the proof from prophecy, and for 
other needs of an apologetic sort and of Christian theology in general, 
and also for the structure and the enriched content of the worship
service. But then the dangers inherent in such a relationship were
dissipated insofar as the destruction of the temple had removed the 
relevance of a significant portion of the law and there was no longer 
any prospect of forcing circumcision and Mosaic observances on the
believers from the gentile world. 
@ With regard to the other major item mentioned above, the authentic
tradition of the life of Jesus, it is unfortunate that we have such a 
depressing paucity of information concerning its significance for the 
gentile preaching and the gentile Christians of the apostolic age. But
we do know that Paul made little use of it in his preaching.\16/ He 
~p.239
proclaimed the pre-existent Lord Christ, who descended from above,
died on the cross, and after the resurrection was exalted again to
heaven, whom he had encountered near Damascus. And since Paul 
deliberately refused to approach the gentiles as a Jew, but in his
dealings with them [241] exercised remarkable self-restraint in his use 
of the Old Testament,\17/ his converts were especially susceptible to 
sliding over to the gnostic side. Marcion was not the first to turn 
in this direction under Paul's influence. Something similar had suggested   
itself for Philippi and the Pauline communities in Phrygia. 
@ We must look to the circle of the twelve apostles to find the guardians   
of the most primitive information about the life and preaching
of the Lord, that tradition in which Jesus of Nazareth shows himself
to be alive so as effectively to stand in the way of those who, preoccupied   
with their syncretistic conception of the heavenly redeemer 
and filled with a dualistic contempt for matter, deprive his earthly
life of its main content. This treasure lies hidden in the synoptic 
gospels, and we must once again lament that we know so little about 
their place of origin and their influence on the outside world, even
in their earliest stages. Similarly, we have scarcely any trustworthy 
information about any activity of the personal witnesses of the life
of Jesus outside of Palestine. The only sure trail once more leads
back, in the person of Peter, to Rome.  Here Mark stands beside 
Peter already in the first century (1 Pet. 5.13). And it was here,
according to the ancient gospel prologues,\18/ that the gospel of Mark
originated. For <11 Clement>1 it is quite sufficient to assume that its 
author was acquainted with the gospel of Mark and with a form of
the <1logia>1 collection which, judging from the gospels of Matthew and 
Luke, still must have been in existence in his day. In Rome, the
synoptic gospels later emerge for the first time as ecclesiastical books
used liturgically, with the claim that they are memoirs of the apostles,
and they provide support for Justin in his battle against all the 
heresies. 
@ Likewise, the Roman confession springs from a synoptic foundation 
and makes the presence of Jesus commence with his being begotten
through the Holy Spirit and his birth from the Virgin.
~p.240
@ We may further deduce from <11 Clement>1 that in Rome, at least 
the leading circles which were authoritative in ecclesiastical and
theological matters were in exceptionally close contact with the Old
Testament. Finally; we also notice that among all of the Pauline letters, 
it is Romans that is most noticeably colored by the Old Testament,
and also that those New Testament authors who in other respects 
display clear [242] connections with Rome, the authors of 1 Peter and 
Hebrews, live, as it were, in the Old Testament. By means of such 
observations, we suggest additional reasons that must have made 
Rome an opponent of gnosticism from the very beginning, and the 
headquarters of a Christianity that was ecclesiastical in that sense. 
@ It is indeed a curious quirk of history that western Rome was 
destined to begin to exert the determinative influence upon a religion  
which had its cradle in the Orient, so as to give it that form
in which it was to achieve worldwide recognition. But as an otherworldly    
religion that despises this world and inflexibly orders life
in accord with a superhuman standard that has descended from
heaven, or as a complicated mystery cult for religious and intellectual 
connoisseurs, or as a tide of fanatical enthusiasm that swells today
and ebbs tomorrow, Christianity never could have achieved such
recognition.
~p.241 [245] [app 1]  


[*** ch10 notes: not fully proof-read yet***]

\1/ I am well aware that there were many Orientals among the 
Roman Christians of the most ancient period, and will not invoke 
the Latin names in the list of greetings in Rom. 16 against that 
fact. But the easterners Paul, and even more so Peter, the man of 
the Old Testament and of the synoptic tradition respectively (see 
below, 238 f.), and Ignatius (just in case he also was heard in 
Rome) instituted their towering personalities in Rome not on 
behalf of a pronounced syncretism, but on the contrary, provided 
considerable obstacles to it. Notwithstanding the Greek language 
of <01 Clement>0, directed to the Corinthians, a person like 
Clement is pronouncedly Roman and demonstrates what Roman 
leadership was striving for and what it hoped to avoid. And 
Justin, with his enthusiastic predilection for the millennial 
kingdom, is not Roman but oriental, and seems to me to leave the 
impression that his inclinations are by no means shared in 
general in his environment. He does distinguish between "godless 
and impious  <5ai(resiwtai>5" and the orthodox (<0Dial>0. 80.3-
5). But the latter are further subdivided by him into those who 
share the "pure and pious outlook (<5gnwme>5) of the Christians" 
only in a general way (80.2), and others who are "entirely 
correct in outlook" (<5orqognwmones kata panta>5; 80.5) -- i.e. 
who possess the correct <5gnwme>5 in <3all>3 particulars. The 
last named share his chiliastic persuasions, while the others 
will have nothing to do with such a notion. That these others 
constituted a majority in Rome can be seen from the somewhat 
earlier <0Hermas>0, who makes apocalypticism subservient to 
practical ecclesiastical aims; [on <0Hermas>0 and apocalyptic, 
see further Grant, <1Introduction to the Apostolic Fathers>1 (= 
Grant, AF 1 [1964]),  pp. 113 f., and Snyder, <1Hermas>1, pp. 9 
f.]. 

\2/ On this and on what follows, cf. chap. 6 above. 

\3/ There is no "west" for Christian Rome in the earliest period. 

\4/ Harnack, <1Marcion>1\2, pp. 148 f.

\5/ Cf. Harnack, <1Marcion>1\2, pp. 146 f.

\6/ As an example of this, it suffices to refer to the confiict 
between the followers of Marcion and of Bardesanes in Edessa; see 
above, 29. 

\7/ For a long time we hear nothing about Christianity in 
Damascus. The suggestion in the <0Chronicle of Arbela>0 that 
Christians might have been there around the year 200 (ed. with 
German translation by E. Sachau, Abhandlungen der preussischen 
Akademie der Wissenschaft, 6 for 1915: 59), is more than balanced 
by the silence of Eusebius, even where he speaks of the 
conversion of Paul (EH 2.1.9 and 14). I cannot agree at all with 
the favorable assessment of the historical worth of the most 
ancient parts of the <0Chronicle of Arbela>0, which belongs to 
the sixth century, by such people as Sachau, Harnack (in the 4th 
German ed. of <1Mission>1\2, pp. 683-689, especially 684 [this 
material is lacking in the ET, at p. 146]), and others. I find it 
impossible to reconcile the claim that there could have been 
Christianity -- and that of an ecclesiastical sort -- east of the 
Tigris already around the year 100 with the picture that I have 
constructed on the basis of older and better sources. If the 
beginnings here go back to the apostle Addai, as is claimed for 
Edessa by the <0Doctrine of Addai>0, extreme caution seems to me 
to be necessary (see above, 20). I have no fear that <0Arbela>0 
represents the fixed point from which my world could be turned 
upside down. 

\8/ Schmidt and Polotsky, <1Mani-Fund>1, 62.1. (On the baptizing 
sects, see J. Thomas, <1Le mouvement baptiste en Palestine et 
Syrie>1 (Gembloux, 1935).] 

\9/ One thinks, e.g. of the position of Emesa or of Heliopolis-
Baalbek with respect to Christianity. Cf. Harnack, <1Mission>1\2, 
2: 123, 125 (= 4th German ed., pp. 658,  660). 

\10/ Cf. Heinrici, <1Valentinianische Gnosis>1, pp. 184 f,, 192; 
Zahn, <1Geschichte>1,  1.2: 751. 

\11/ The thrust of the polemic in Phil. 3 and in Rom. 16.17-20 is 
not entirely clear 
 -- or in any event, can be interpreted in different ways -- and may be left aside at 
this point. 

\12/ I am resticting myself here to what is attested. Whether the 
Judaists also came into confiict with others who preached Christ 
apart from the law, and how they dealt with such, is not reported 
to us. 

\13/ In this regard, there is no change during the entire period 
treated in this book. [239] What was so particularly striking 
about the new religion for Celsus,  who attentively observed and 
thoroughly studied the Christianity that he attacked (Neumann, 
RPTK\3, 3: 772-775), is a rather disconcerting wealth of ideas, 
outlooks, and practices that mill about in confusion without 
achieving any arrangement or unity (Origen <0Against Celsus>0 
5.61-63). Celsus finds as the sole point of agreement within 
Christianity, which in other respects is disintegrated into 
fragments, the statement that "the world is crucified to me and I 
to the world" (5.64 f., citing Gal. 4.14). Indeed, at one point 
he mentions in passing that part of the Christians have knit 
themselves together into the "great church"  (5.59; see above, 
216 n. 36), and finds these people to be peculiar for their close 
relationship to Judaism from which they had derived the story of 
creation, the genealogy of mankind, and some other things. But 
the picture is hardly brought into clearer focus thereby; in any 
event, the overriding impression remains one of extreme 
diversity. In a bewildering way, the lines cross one another. And 
from our perspective, the model according to which Celsus 
constructed his picture of Christendom is sometimes the orthodox 
Christian, but at other times the heretic or an undefinable 
mixture of the two. Surely actual heretics provide the pattern 
when Celsus says that the Christians boasted of their sorcery and 
magic, and made use of foreign names and various magical formulas 
(6.38-40).  Indeed,  he has seen barbaric books full of names of 
demons and other abominations in the possession of certain 
Christian "presbyters" (6.40). Obviously the accusation of 
sorcery by the pagan civil authorities against the new religion 
also renders feasible or even encourages the idea that 
Christianity actually presented such an image when considered 
from one point of view. Is there anything that did not have its 
place alongside everything else in pimitive Christianity! 

\14/ 1 have sought to demonstrate this from a different point of 
view in <1Wortgottesdienst>1,  pp. 19 ff. 

\15/ Nevertheless, this reticence toward the Old Testament 
continues to persist in certain areas where the proximity of a 
strong Jewish influence is considered doubtful (cf. 1 John, 
gospel of John, Ignatius). 

\16/ On this, see Bauer, <1Johannesevangeliums>1, pp. 245 f. 

\17/ Cf. Bauer, <1Wortgottesdienst>1, pp. 39-46.

\18/ Harnack, <1Evangelien-Prologe>1, pp. 5 f. (= 324 f.), on the 
prologues to Mark and Luke. [For the texts, see also Aland, 
<1Synopsis>1, pp. 532 f.; ET in Grant,  <1Second Century>1, pp. 
92 f. See also above, 186 (n. 84).] 

//end ch.10//