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New thread because this subject became entangled in an unrelated thread -- Antisemitic beliefs spreading among evangelical Christians in America
For those who haven't followed the other back and forth: Here are some of the posts on the subject "Orthodox Corruption of the earliest texts"
it's just me responded in what seems to be his standard manner by claiming he "never gets an answer" when he asks a question. One might think he's just trying to spur the original commenter into posting something dumb - so I did reply -- you can have your opinion as to whether my response is dumb or not.
For those who haven't followed the other back and forth: Here are some of the posts on the subject "Orthodox Corruption of the earliest texts"
Originally Posted by Somerville
Recent research of mine has focused on the even greater divisions found in the first four-five centuries during which Christianity spread across the lands around the Mediterranean Sea. Most Christians today may have heard of apostates and heretics but few know much of the different theological beliefs that fell under the mantle of Christianity. They may have read Epistle to the Colossians or 1 Timothy in which Paul warns of 'false teachings' but know little if anything about the heresies.
it's just me responded in what seems to be his standard manner by claiming he "never gets an answer" when he asks a question. One might think he's just trying to spur the original commenter into posting something dumb - so I did reply -- you can have your opinion as to whether my response is dumb or not.
So, even though Paul in his epistles was ranting about the false teachers who were causing problems in some of the early gathering, you have never understood the problem.
OK, a little education for the knowledgeable Christian. Writing toward the end of the 4th century, Epiphanius stated that there were more than 80 different groups which called themselves Christian. After the orthodox beliefs became dominant owing to support by the Empire, these 'heretical' groups were erased from history, though we have learned a bit by document discoveries during the 20th century, such as the Nag Hammadi collection found by an Egyptian farmer in 1945.
A few of the early churches:
Ebionites, the earliest group that might be seen as Christian, those trying to live as they understood the Messiah had taught while at the same time adhering to the traditional Jewish religious practices, which included male circumcision. James the Just was the leader of this group in Jerusalem.
Gnostics, those with knowledge, from the Greek gnosis. They saw the Tanakh as the work of an inferior deity and that only the Christ could lead the believers back to worship of the true God. To reach true salvation required a special knowledge that could only be understood by those who were willing to study the appropriate texts. As with other early beliefs, we know little about the Gnostics except for the attacks upon them by early orthodox writers such as Origen and Tertullian.
Docetics, a belief mirrored in John 1 that Jesus existed before becoming human. There were several groups falling into this category: those who believed the Jesus they knew was only an image, what we would call a hologram, then there were those who believed Jesus entered into a human body at the time of the baptism by John and left the human during the crucifixion. Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34.
One offspring of the Docetics were those we know as Adoptionists, what they called themselves we don't know. The Jesus who walked the roads of Judea and preached was a human who had been 'adopted' by God and who really did die on the cross. The Jesus seen after the crucifixion was the image and not a physical being.
Marcionites, created by Marcion of Sinope. "Marcion believed that Jesus was the savior sent by God, and Paul the Apostle was his chief apostle, but he rejected the Hebrew Bible and the God of Israel. Marcionists believed that the wrathful Hebrew God was a separate and lower entity than the all-forgiving God of the New Testament.
Marcionism, similar to Gnosticism, depicted the God of the Old Testament as a tyrant or demiurge (see also God as the Devil). Marcion was the son of a bishop of Sinope in Pontus. About the middle of the second century (140–155) he traveled to Rome, where he joined the Syrian Gnostic Cerdo.[2]
Marcion's canon, possibly the first Christian canon ever compiled, consisted of eleven books: a gospel consisting of ten sections drawn from the Gospel of Luke; and ten Pauline epistles"
Arians, believed that Jesus was neither man nor God but instead more of a heavenly being greater than any angel but less than the supreme deity. Not quite adoptionism but almost - because what true deity could actually suffer a physical crucifixion. Origen of Alexandria, seen as one of the earliest expositors of Christian theology, wrote that Jesus was less than his Father, a belief of many early Christians before the development of trinitarian theology.