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An Origenian Background for the Letter to Theodore

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 July 2019

Michael Zeddies
Michael Zeddies*
Affiliation:
Independent Scholar
*
email: mzeddies@gmail.com
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Abstract

The Letter to Theodore may need to be reattributed to Origen of Alexandria. Many of its features seem demonstrably Origenian, and its language aligns with early Christian and Origenian usage. Two noncanonical gospel fragments in the letter do not betray a modern author, but rather evoke early Christian symbolism and narrative structure. The single garment worn by a character in the first fragment reflects Christian symbolism and resembles the philosopher’s garment, which many early Christians adopted and portrayed in material artifacts. Origen’s intellectual interests can explain the letter’s preparation for philosophical exegesis, and its language reflects his text-critical practice. Nevertheless, Origen’s circumstances indicate the text of the noncanonical gospel fragments is unreliable. The letter also echoes Papias in the manner that Origen does. Morton Smith’s account of its discovery does not betray a forgery or hoax, but plausibly depends on other nonfiction works of manuscript discoveries written during the 1960s. Further work may be needed to secure attribution, but Origenian authorship is a simpler explanation of the evidence than modern forgery.

Keywords

Letter to TheodoreOrigenMar SabaMorton SmithSindonphilosopher’s garmentSecret MarkPapias
Type
Articles
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 112 , Issue 3 , July 2019 , pp. 376 - 406
Copyright
© President and Fellows of Harvard College 2019 

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References

1 Morton, Smith, Clement of Alexandria and a Secret Gospel of Mark (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973Google Scholar). Smith, Clement, 448–56, serves as the letter’s critical text and translation here, as (S. [page number]).

2 Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery? The Secret Gospel of Mark in Debate (ed. Tony Burke; Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2013); pages 308–12 include the letter.

3 Timo, S. Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock: Clement’s Letter to Theodore in Recent Scholarship,” CurBR 11 (2012) 87–125Google Scholar.

4 Theod. 1.15–2.2.

5 For early examples, see Helmut, Merkel, “Appendix: The ‘Secret Gospel’ of Mark,” in NTApoc 1:108Google Scholar.

6 Michael, T. Zeddies, “Did Origen Write the Letter to Theodore?,” JECS 24 (2017) 55–87Google Scholar. Belated thanks go to Scott Brown and Allan Pantuck and especially to Tony Burke and Ellen Muehlberger for their feedback on earlier drafts of that article. I also thank the editors and anonymous readers who helped improve that article and this one.

7 Smith, Clement, 70.

8 Ibid., 24, 36, 60; Origen, Comm. Matt. 15.30 (GCS 41:441.1–442.9).

9 Attila, Jakab, “Une lettre ‘perdue’ de Clément d’Alexandrie? (Morton Smith et l’ ‘Évangelie secret’ de Marc),” Apocrypha 10 (1999) 7–15Google Scholar, at 13; Smith, Clement, 48.

10 Annick Martin, “À propos de la lettre atribuée à Clément d´Alexandrie sur l`Évangile secret de Marc,” in Colloque International “L’Évangile selon Thomas et les textes de Nag Hammadi” (29–31 mai, 2003) (ed. Louis Painchaud and Paul-Hubert Poirier; Bibliothèque copte de Nag Hammadi “Études” 8; Quebec: University of Laval Press, 2007) 277–300, at 296–98.

11 Theod. 1.1, ἐκ τῶν ἐπιστολῶν τοῦ ἁγιωτάτου κλήμεντος (S. 446, 448); Martin, “À propos de la lettre,” 299–300; Pierluigi Piovanelli, “Halfway between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley: Morton Smith’s ‘Own Concept of What Jesus “Must” Have Been’ and, Once Again, the Questions of Evidence and Motive,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke), 162–63; Andrew Criddle, “Letters of Clement of Alexandria?,” Hypotyposeis, 23 August 2008, http://hypotyposeis.org/weblog/2008/08/letters-of-clement-of-alexandria.html.

12 Jerome, Epist. 33.4; Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.36.3; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 59, 65 n. 68.

13 Jerome, Epist. 70.4.3; Joseph, W. Trigg, Origen (London: Routledge, 1998) 9–10Google Scholar, 54; Pierre, Nautin, Origène. Sa vie et son oeuvre (Paris: Beauchesne, 1977) 293Google Scholar; Robert, M. Grant, “The Stromateis of Origen,“ in EPEKTASIS. Mélanges patristiques offerts au Cardinal Jean Daniélou (ed. Jacques, Fontaine and Charles, Kannengisser; Paris: Beauchesne, 1972) 285–92Google Scholar, at 285; Hanson, R. P. C., Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition (London: SPCK, 1954) 184Google Scholar.

14 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 60–63.

15 Norman, Russell, The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) 140Google Scholar, 141, 146–47, 154; Annewies, van den Hoek, “The ‘Catechetical’ School of Early Christian Alexandria and its Philonic Heritage,” HTR 90 (1997) 59–87Google Scholar, esp. 70; eadem, “Origen and the Intellectual Heritage of Alexandria: Continuity or Disjunction?,” in Origeniana Quinta: Papers of the 5 th International Origen Congress (ed. Robert J. Daly; Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1992) 40–50.

16 Smith, Clement, 287; Jerome, Ruf. 2.19; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 78–79.

17 See Völker’s comments at Smith, Clement, 31 (and Smith’s reply at 31–32). Zeddies, “Origen?,” does not discuss these comments.

18 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 79; Hanson, Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition, 74–85, 152–53; Origen, Comm. Cant. Prol. 1; see p. 397 below.

19 Theod. 1.22–2.2; Smith, Clement, 31; Hanson, Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition, 87; Scott G. Brown, “Mar Saba 65: Twelve Enduring Misconceptions,” in Splendide Mendax: Rethinking Fakes and Forgeries in Classical, Late Antique, and Early Christian Literature (ed. Edmund P. Cueva and Javier Martínez; Groningen: Barkhuis, 2016) 303–30, at 307–8. Brown relies on Clement’s use of μυστικός as referring to mysteries, not secrecy, yet Origen also uses the term in the same manner (Henri, Crouzel, Origen [trans. Worral, A. J.; San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1989] 99–119Google Scholar).

20 See especially Francis, Watson, “Beyond Suspicion: On the Authorship of the Mar Saba Letter and the Secret Gospel of Mark,” JTS 61 (2010) 128–70Google Scholar.

21 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 56–58.

22 Ibid., 56.

23 Paul Foster, foreword to Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke), xiii; Paananen, “Deadlock,” 113–20.

24 Francis Watson, “Beyond Reasonable Doubt: A Response to Allan J. Pantuck,” BAR Magazine, Scholar’s Study: Did Morton Smith Forge “Secret Mark”?, April 2011, https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/wp-content/uploads/secret-mark-handwriting-response-watson.pdf, 6; Craig A. Evans, “Doubting Morton Smith and Secret Mark, The Bible and Interpretation, August 2011, http://www.bibleinterp.com/articles/eva358016.shtml; Piovanelli, “Halfway,” 182.

25 Stephen, C. Carlson, The Gospel Hoax: Morton Smith’s Invention of Secret Mark (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2005Google Scholar); Peter, Jeffery, The Secret Gospel of Mark Unveiled: Imagined Rituals of Sex, Death, and Madness in a Biblical Forgery (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007Google Scholar).

26 Carlson, , “Can the Academy Protect Itself from One of Its Own? The Case of Secret Mark,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke, ), 299–307Google Scholar.

27 Carlson, “Academy,” 300–302.

28 Scott, G. Brown and Allan, J. Pantuck, “Craig Evans and the Secret Gospel of Mark: Exploring the Grounds for Doubt,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke, ), 105–19Google Scholar.

29 It may, however, explain why Smith so readily accepted Clementine authorship.

30 Carlson, “Academy,” 302–3.

31 See Allan, Pantuck, “A Question of Ability: What Did He Know and When Did He Know It? Further Excavations from the Morton Smith Archives,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke, ), 185–203Google Scholar.

32 Carlson, “Academy,” 304–5; Scott, Brown, “Factualizing the Folklore: Stephen Carlson’s Case against Clement’s Authorship,” HTR 99 (2006) 291–327Google Scholar, esp. 306–22; idem, review of The Secret Gospel of Mark Unveiled: Imagined Rituals of Sex, Death, and Madness in a Biblical Forgery, by Peter Jeffery, RBL, 15 September 2007, http://www.bookreviews.org/pdf/5627_5944.pdf, esp. 14–39; idem, “Mar Saba 65,” 304–17, 319–20.

33 GCS 3:287.5; GCS 30:22.17–29; also Fr. Matt. 90, 91 (GCS 41.1:51, 52.18); Zeddies, “Origen?,” 73 (citing Kyle Smith on the salt metaphor).

34 Peter, Jeffery, “Clement’s Mysteries and Morton Smith’s Magic,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke, ), 212–lGoogle Scholar, at 215–16.

35 Ibid., 226–30; Theod. 1.18, 1.20, 2.2 (S. 446, 448, 450), κατηχουμένων … τελειουμένων … μυουμένους. Jeffery argues that, for Clement, baptism bestowed perfection, which was different from and prior to the gnostic’s initiation into philosophical study.

36 Origen, Princ. 4.2.4–5, esp. 4.2.4, ἁπλούστερος … ἐπὶ ποσὸν ἀναβεβηκώς … τέλειος (GCS 22:312.1–313.4); John, J. O’Keefe, “Scriptural Interpretation,” in The Westminster Handbook to Origen (ed. John, A. McGuckin; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2004) 193–97Google Scholar, esp. 193–94; Origen: Commentary on the Gospel according to John, Books 1–10 (trans. Ronald E. Heine; FC 80; Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1989) 11–12; Alviar, J. José, Klesis: The Theology of the Christian Vocation according to Origen (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1993) 121–24Google Scholar. Alviar writes that Origen sometimes “arrives at a division of the faithful into the ‘simple’ and the ‘perfect,’ ” even if sometimes he instead “groups the faithful into three classes” (122). Elizabeth Ann Dively Lauro summarizes recent scholarship on this division (The Soul and Spirit of Scripture within Origen’s Exegesis [Bible in Ancient Christianity 3; Boston: Brill, 2005] 15–33). A literal, edifying “bodily” (σωματικὸν) exegesis was usually given to the simpler believers (ibid., 51–58). These include those who, like catechumens, are preparing for union with the divine (ibid., 80–82, esp. 82, discussing Princ. 4.2.4). Lauro separates a moral/“psychic” (ψυχικόν) stage of exegesis from a properly spiritual/“pneumatic” (πνευματικόν) one (ibid., 50–51, 58–76, and throughout). However, she notes that Origen sometimes seems to describe them together as πνευματικά, or as the “higher meanings,” τοὺς ἡψηλοτέρων, in contrast to the lower, somatic/“bodily” meaning (ibid., 54 n. 54, 62–63). She similarly contrasts the “nonliteral” senses with the “literal” sense (ibid., 3 n. 9; see also 51 n. 49, 56 n. 60, 154, 199–200, and 233–34).

37 Manlio Simonetti, Biblical Interpretation in the Early Church (trans. John Hughes; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1994) 41–48, esp. 43: “Origen in De Princ. IV 2:4 makes a threefold division of the meanings of scripture, parallel to … the division of Christians into simpliciores (incipientes), progredientes, and perfecti…. While simple, ignorant Christians will stop at the knowledge of the humanity of Christ and a literal understanding of Scripture, the perfect rise to a knowledge of the divinity of Christ and the spiritual sense of Scripture. In effect, Origen often distinguishes two senses in his scriptural interpretations, the literal and the spiritual.” Simonetti later adds that “The term ‘perfect’ is always relative, applied to the Christian because the progress towards perfection is for him unending (Hom. in Num. 17:4)” (ibid., 51 n. 7). Lauro similarly explains that “Throughout temporal life every person continues to make progress but does not reach completely the perfection that is necessary for salvation” (Soul and Spirit, 130 n. 53; see also 92, 100, 125–26, 128, 206, 207, 231, 233, and 235–36). Compare also Origen, Comm. Matt. 12.15, προὔκοπτον ἐν τῷ γινώσκειν, said of Jesus’s disciples, with Theod. 1.20–21, προκόπτουσι περὶ τὴν γνῶσιν (GCS 40:105.13; S. 448).

38 Origen’s terms include τελετάς, μυούμενος, ἐποπτικώτερα, and μυσταγωγέω; see Origen, Princ. 4.2.4 (GCS 22:312–14); idem, Comm. Cant. 2.2 (SC 375:458); idem, Cels. 3.59–61, 6.23, 7.10 (GCS 2:254–56; 3:93–94; 3:162); idem, Pasch. 31 (Origène. Sur la Pâque. Traité inédit publié d’après un papyrus de Toura [ed. Octave Guéraud and Pierre Nautin; Christianisme antique 2; Paris: Beauchesne, 1979] 214); Dragos-Andrei Giulea, “Seeing Christ through Scriptures at the Paschal Celebration,” OCP 74 (2008) 27–47, esp. 42–44; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 68–69, 74.

39 Jeffery, “Mysteries,” 230–43; see p. 378 above.

40 Watson, “Suspicion,” 131 n. 10.

41 Jeffery, “Mysteries,” 243–44.

42 Trigg, Origen, 15; Russell, Doctrine of Deification, 164; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 83.

43 Jeffery, “Mysteries,” 244–46.

44 Jerome, Ruf. 1.18; Origen, Cels. 5.62; see pp. 384–85 below.

45 Scott Brown, “Behind the Seven Veils, I: The Gnostic Life Setting of the Mystic Gospel of Mark,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke), 247–83; idem, “Beyond the Seven Veils, II: Assessing Clement of Alexandria’s Knowledge of the Mystic Gospel of Mark,” in Fakes, Forgeries, and Fictions: Writing Ancient and Modern Christian Apocrypha (ed. Tony Burke; Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2017) 95–128.

46 See p. 378 above.

47 Watson, “Suspicion.”

48 Zeddies, “Origen?,” does cite Watson’s article twice, at 63 n. 55 and 73 n. 135.

49 Tony, Burke, “Introduction,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke, ), 1–29Google Scholar, at 17–19; Craig, A. Evans, “Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark: Exploring the Grounds for Doubt,” in Ancient Gospel? (ed. Burke, ), 75–100Google Scholar, at 86, 89–91, 98, replied to by Brown and Pantuck, “Evans,” 115–18, 120–21, 132–34. Watson’s article is also discussed in Allan J. Pantuck, “Solving the Mysterion of Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark,” BAR Magazine, Scholar’s Study: Did Morton Smith Forge “Secret Mark”?, 20 February 2011, http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/wp-content/uploads/secret-mark-handwriting-response-pantuck.pdf. Paananen, “Deadlock,” raises various concerns with Watson’s article, mostly without elaboration.

50 Watson, “Reasonable Doubt,” 1.

51 Watson, “Suspicion,” 170.

52 Smith, Clement, 286.

53 Watson, “Suspicion,” 133–34.

54 See pp. 377–78 above. Smith originally envisioned the possibility of misattribution but later dismissed it (Smith, Clement, 19–20, 28).

55 See Zeddies, “Origen?,” 59, 65 n. 68.

56 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 59–60.

57 Anna, M. Silvas, Gregory of Nyssa: The Letters: Introduction, Translation and Commentary (VCSup 83; Leiden: Brill, 2007) 68–70Google Scholar, 105, 202, 245–70; Andrew, Radde-Gallwitz, “The Letter Collection of Gregory of Nyssa,” in Late Antique Letter Collections: A Critical Introduction and Reference Guide (ed. Cristiana, Sogno, Bradley, K. Storin, and Edward, J. Watts; Oakland: University of California Press, 2017) 102–12Google Scholar; Bradley, K. Storin, “The Letter Collection of Gregory of Nazianzus,” in Letter Collections (ed. Sogno, , Storin, , and Watts, ), 81–100Google Scholar, esp. 87–89, 95 n. 1, 100 n. 59; Robin Darling Young, “The Letter Collection of Evagrius of Pontus,” in Letter Collections (ed. Sogno, Storin, and Watts), 161–74, esp. 166; Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac (trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015) xvi, xxiv–xxix; Alan, Cameron, “The Authenticity of the Letters of St Nilus of Ancyra,” GRBS 17 (1976) 181–96Google Scholar.

58 Ilaria, L. E. Ramelli, The Christian Doctrine of Apokatastasis: A Critical Assessment from the New Testament to Eriugena (VCSup 120; Leiden: Brill, 2013) 346Google Scholar, 659–61; Roger, E. Reynolds, “Basil and the Early Medieval Latin Canonical Collections,” in Basil of Caesarea: Christian, Humanist, Ascetic; A Sixteen-Hundredth Anniversary Symposium (ed. Paul, Jonathan Fedwick; Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1981) 513–32Google Scholar, esp. 516.

59 Trigg, Origen, 65–66; Crouzel, Origen, 41; Peter, W. Martens, Origen and Scripture: The Contours of Exegetical Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) 20Google Scholar; Richard, A. Layton, Didymus the Blind and His Circle in Late-Antique Alexandria: Virtue and Narrative in Biblical Scholarship (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2004) 2–3Google Scholar.

60 Lorenzo, Perrone, “Discovering Origen’s Lost Homilies on the Psalms,” Auctores Nostri 15 (2015) 19–46Google Scholar, esp. 22.

61 Smith, Clement, x, 24; Scott G. Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel: Rethinking Morton Smith’s Controversial Discovery (Studies in Christianity and Judaism 15; Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2005) xi, xiii. I suggest “arcane Mark.”

62 Watson, “Suspicion,” 136–37.

63 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.25.5 (GCS 9.2:576.12).

64 Robert, Horton Gundry, Mark: A Commentary on His Apology for the Cross (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993) 1045Google Scholar. This is supported by the claim at Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.1–2, that Peter only learned of Mark’s Gospel by way of prophecy, ἀποκαλύψαντος (GCS 9.1:140.3–19, esp. 11).

65 Watson, “Suspicion,” 136–38; Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.14.7 (GCS 9.2:550.27–28); Theod. 1.21–22 (S. 448). I follow Smith, Clement, 446 in capitalizing “more spiritual Gospel” here; Watson does not.

66 Origen, Comm. Jo. 1.40, ὃ δέ φησιν Ἰωάννης «εὐαγγέλιον αἰώνιον», οἰκείως ἂν λεχθησόμενον πνευματικόν (GCS 10:12.12–14).

67 Birger, A. Pearson mentioned in 1975 that the letter’s use of “spiritual” is Origenian (“Response by Birger A. Pearson,” in Longer Mark: Forgery, Interpolation, or Old Tradition? Protocol of the Eighteenth Colloquy: 7 December 1975 [ed. Wilhelm, Wuellner; Berkeley: Center for Hermeneutical Studies, 1976] 40Google Scholar).

68 Watson, “Suspicion,” 138–39; Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, 245 n. 26; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 63–64.

69 Jerome, Ruf. 1.18 (CCL 79:18); Zeddies, “Origen?,” 65–68, explaining that Jerome’s testimony here seems reliable; Ronald Heine, Origen: Scholarship in the Service of the Church (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010) 129; idem, The Commentaries of Origen and Jerome on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002) 17; Hanson, Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition, 85.

70 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 85.

71 Jerome, Ruf. 1.18 (CCL 79:18).

72 Watson, “Suspicion,” 142–43.

73 Guy, Stroumsa, Hidden Wisdom: Esoteric Traditions and the Roots of Christian Mysticism (2nd ed.; SHR 70; Leiden: Brill, 2005) 109–31Google Scholar, esp. 117–22 (Stroumsa mentions the letter). Watson, , Gospel Writing (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013) 539–40Google Scholar, 549–50; John, J. O’Keefe and R., R. Reno, Sanctified Vision: An Introduction to Early Christian Interpretation of the Bible (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005) 135Google Scholar. Origen, Princ. 4.2.4–5 (GCS 22:312–315); see also Princ., 4.3.6, ἀναγωγῆς μυστικῆς (GCS 22:333.6; ANF 4:370); and Princ., 4.3.9, Εἰ τοίνυν αἱ προφητεῖαι αἱ περὶ Ἰουδαίας …, μὴ σαρκίνως ἡμῶν ἐκλαμβανόντων ταῦτα, μυστήρια τοιάδε τινὰ ὑποβάλλουσιν (GCS 22:335.7–9; ANF 4:371). See also Jerome, Comm. Gal. 3.5.13a, translating Origen’s Stromateis on carnali Scripturae intellegentia, and Scripturae carne versus spiritum Scripturae (CCSL 77A:171.58–59, 172.72–73.74); see pp. 380–81 above.

74 Watson, “Suspicion,” 143; Jean, Daniélou, Origen (trans. Walter, Mitchell; New York: Sheed & Ward, 1955) viiGoogle Scholar.

75 Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, xiii.

76 Watson, “Suspicion,” 139–42.

77 Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, 220–30; Watson, “Suspicion.”

78 Watson, “Suspicion,” 145; Brown, “Folklore,” 317–18; idem, “The Question of Motive in the Case against Morton Smith,” JBL 125 (2006) 351–83, at 365.

79 Watson, “Suspicion,” 135, 145; see Saul, Levin, “The Early History of Christianity, in Light of the ‘Secret Gospel’ of Mark,” ANRW 2.25:4270–92Google Scholar, at 4278. Smith, Clement, 185, dismissed such a reading.

80 Theod. 2.23–3.14.

81 Jeffery, Unveiled, 61.

82 Helmut, Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels: Their History and Development (London: SCM, 1990) 296–97Google Scholar.

83 Jerome, Hom. in Luc., nudus nudum Christum sequitur (CCSL 78:514.242–43); idem, Epist. 120.11–12, vis esse perfecta … nudam solamque virtutem [crucem] nuda sequaris et sola (CSEL 55:477.24–25, 478.2); also Epist. 52.5.2; 58.2.1; 125.20.5. (Stephan Huller deserves some credit for seeing this connection, in “The Preservation of the γυμνὸς γυμνῷ Formula of the Letter to Theodore in Jerome and other Early Latin Fathers,” Stephan Huller’s Observations, March 28, 2011, http://stephanhuller.blogspot.com/2011/03/preservation-of-formula-of-letter-to.html.)

84 Andrew, Cain, “Three Further Echoes of Lactantius in Jerome,” Philologus 154 (2010) 88–96Google Scholar, at 92–94, suggests Jerome took his phrase from Lactantius, but that does not preclude the existence of a parallel phrase in Greek.

85 Everett, Ferguson, Baptism in the Early Church: History, Theology, and Liturgy in the First Five Centuries (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009) 36Google Scholar, 81, 123–25, 127, 253, 286, 330, 436–38.

86 Brown, “Veils II,” 99–102, esp. 100 (see Clement, Paed. 2.3.36.2, ἕπου τῷ θεῷ γυμνὸς ἀλαζονείας, γυμνὸς ἐπικήρου πομπῆς [GCS 12:178.23–24]). The letter’s phrase lacks ἕπομαι, equivalent to Jerome’s sequor, but it is only a fragmentary quotation, and we do not know its lexical context. Anyway, I am only arguing the phrase could have been used for various purposes, including pious ones.

87 Origen, Hom. Luc. 32, καὶ γυμνοῖς πάντων (GCS 35:194.17). Nor would Origen have been averse to associating γυμνὸς γυμνῷ with the Carpocratians if its meaning were spiritual, since he admits that a heretical passage in Gos. Heb. bore a spiritual meaning (Comm. Jo. 2.87–88).

88 Origen, Comm. Jo. 1.46, καὶ ἐρευνῆσαι τὴν ἐν αὐτῷ γυμνὴν τύπων ἀλήθειαν (GCS 10:13.18–19); Watson, Gospel Writing, 539.

89 Smith, Clement, 121–22; see also Brown, “Folklore,” 319; Eckhard Rau, “Das Geheimnis des Reiches Gottes: Die esoterische Rezeption der Lehre Jesu im geheimen Markusevangelium,” in Jesus in apokryphen Evangelienüberlieferungen. Beiträge zu ausserkanonischen Jesusüberlieferungen aus verschiedenen Sprach- und Kulturtraditionen (ed. Jörg Frey and Jens Schröter; WUNT 2/254; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010) 187–221, esp. 207–9, 210). Canonical examples of initial indifference to women by Jesus, with subsequent acceptance, include the Syro-Phoenician woman at Mark 7:24–30, the sinful woman at Luke 7:36–50, and his mother at John 2:1–12. This may also help show that LGM1 and LGM2 form a Markan intercalation, though I take no position on that issue (Carlson, “Academy,” 305; idem, “Reply to Scott Brown,” ExpTim 117 [2006] 186–87; Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, 166–71, 173–75; idem, “Motive,” 371–72; idem, “Mar Saba 65,” 310).

90 Watson, “Suspicion,” 146.

91 Jeffery believes the letter argues “one should have no relations with women at all,” but does not explain this puzzling claim (Unveiled, 208). Nor does he seem to imagine that the longer Markan Gospel might have included material beyond what the letter describes.

92 Theod. 1.2–7, 2.7, ἀῤῥήτους διδασκαλίας … σαρκικῶν καὶ ἐνσωμάτων ἁμαρτιῶν … ἀνδραποδώδων ἐπιθυμιῶν … βλασφημὸν καὶ σαρκικὴν (S. 446, 448, 450); Watson, “Suspicion,” 145.

93 Evans, “Morton Smith,” 88.

94 Christopher King, J., Origen on the Song of Songs as the Spirit of Scripture: The Bridegroom’s Perfect Marriage-Song (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005) 28Google Scholar; Panagiotes, Tzamalikos, Origen: Philosophy of History and Eschatology (Leiden: Brill, 2007) 374–75Google Scholar. See also Origen, Princ. 3.4.2: carnalis ac materialis sapientia (GCS 22:266.17–18).

95 See Origen, Cels. 4.6, on the Christian God’s ineffable power (GCS 2:278.26); ibid., 7.42, on Plato’s God (GCS 3:193.1); ibid., 7.43 on the attributes of Celsus’s God (GCS 3:193.25, 194.2, 194.3); Hans, Lewy, Chaldaean Oracles and Theurgy: Mysticism, Magic, and Platonism in the Later Roman Empire (ed. Michel, Tardieu; 3rd ed.; Série Antiquité 77; Paris: Institut d’Études augustiniennes, 2011) 328Google Scholar n. 59. Origen frequently discusses Paul’s claim to have heard ἄρρητα ῥήματα, at 2 Cor 12.4, for example, in Comm. Jo. 13.28, 13.29, 13.34, 13.58, and 13.316 (GCS 10:28.10, 28.13, 28.28, 234.14, 275.10). See also Hanson, Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition, 78.

96 GCS 3:205.27, 205.30; GCS 30:183.1.

97 Katy, L. Gaca, The Making of Fornication: Eros, Ethics, and Political Reform in Greek Philosophy and Early Christianity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003) 273–85Google Scholar.

98 See Winrich, Löhr, “Carpocratians,” DGWE, 240–42Google Scholar; Christoph, Markschies, “Carpocrates,” Lexikon der Antiken Christlichen Literatur (ed. Siegmar, Döpp and Wilhelm, Geerlings; Freiburg: Herder, 1998) 119Google Scholar; Alexandrian Christianity (ed. and trans. John Oulton and Henry Chadwick; LCC 2; London: SCM Press, 1954) 24–29. (Chadwick errs in citing Origen, Cels. 6.53 on the Carpocratians; the reference is at 5.62.)

99 Watson, “Suspicion,” 146.

100 Ibid., 146, 147.

101 Ibid., 147. Watson, like most translators of the passage (including Smith), uses “young man” or “youth” for νεανίσκος, but both English terms are misleading, since they can refer to minors or teenagers. A νεανίσκος was an adult male in his twenties or even his thirties (Marvin Meyer, “The Youth in the Secret Gospel of Mark,” Semeia 49 [1990] 129–53, at 139). This is roughly Jesus’s age (Luke 3:23), yet no one calls the historical Jesus a “young man” or a “youth.”

102 Brown, “Folklore,” 313–22; idem, “Motive,” 365–73; idem, “Mar Saba 65,” 308–13. Jeffery, Unveiled, 208, likewise viewed the elements of LGM1 as erotic, arguing at length that they are evidence of forgery by Smith (Jeffery, Unveiled, 91–122, 185–239). Brown refutes this, in his review of The Secret Gospel of Mark (by Jeffrey), 23–39, and in “Mar Saba 65,” 313–16. See also Hans-Josef, Klauck, Die apokryphe Bibel. Ein anderer Zugang zum frühem Christentum (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 85–86Google Scholar.

103 Watson, “Suspicion,” 146, 147.

104 Erin, Vearncombe, “Cloaks, Conflict, and Mark 14:51–52,” CBQ 75 (2013) 683–703Google Scholar, at 691–92, 693.

105 Brown, “Motive,” 371–72; see also the entry for “linen sheet” at idem, Mark’s Other Gospel, 330.

106 Gundry, Mark, 623.

107 Vearncombe, “Cloaks,” 686; Walter, Miller, Greece and the Greeks: A Survey of Greek Civilization (New York: Macmillan, 1941) 116Google Scholar; David, J. Symons, Costume of Ancient Rome (London: Batsford, 1987) 17Google Scholar; Matthias, Pausch, Die römische Tunica. Ein Betrag zur Peregrinisierung der antiken Kleidung (Augsberg: Wissner, 2003) 66Google Scholar; Mireille, M. Lee, Body, Dress, and Identity in Ancient Greece (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015) 113Google Scholar. Jean-Paul, Morel, “The Craftsman,” in The Romans (ed. Andrea, Giardina; trans. Lydia, G. Cochrane; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993) 214–44Google Scholar, mentions the worker’s tunic at p. 220.

108 Vearncombe, “Cloaks,” 686; Lesley, Adkins and Roy, A. Adkins, Handbook to Life in Ancient Greece (updated ed.; New York: Facts on File, 2005) 444Google Scholar, 451, 452; Larissa, Bonfante and Eva, Jaunzems, “Clothing and Ornament,” in Civilization of the Ancient Mediterranean: Greece and Rome (ed. Michael, Grant and Rachel, Kitzinger; 3 vols.; New York: Scribner’s Sons, 1988) 3:1390Google Scholar; Robert, Garland, Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks (2nd ed.; Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2009) 139Google Scholar; Mary, G. Houston, Ancient Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Costume and Decoration (vol. 2 of A Technical History of Costume; 2nd ed.; New York: Barnes & Noble, 1947) 68Google Scholar. Carthaginians wore the tunic alone outdoors (Bonfante and Jaunzems, “Clothing and Ornament,” 1407). Romans occasionally wore the toga alone (Florence, Dupont, Daily Life in Ancient Rome [trans. Christopher, Woodall; Oxford: Blackwell, 1993] 261Google Scholar).

109 Samuel, L. Lachs, “Rabbinic Miscellany,” in Community and Culture: Essays in Jewish Studies in Honor of the Ninetieth Anniversary of the Founding of Gratz College, 1895–1985 (ed. Nahum, Waldman; Philadelphia: Gratz College, 1987) 111–22Google Scholar, at 114–15.

110 Ibid., 115. On the link between Origen and R. Hoshaya Rabba, see Marc, Hirshman, “Reflections on the Aggada of Caesarea,” in Caesarea Maritima: Retrospective after Two Millennia (ed. Avner, Raban and Kenneth, G. Holum; DMOA 21; Leiden: Brill, 1996) 469–75Google Scholar, at 471.

111 Howard, M. Jackson, “Why the Youth Shed His Cloak and Fled Naked: The Meaning and Purpose of Mark 14:51–52,” JBL 116 (1997) 273–89Google Scholar.

112 Gundry, Mark, 620.

113 Jackson, “Youth,” 278–80.

114 Frederick William Danker, “σινδών, όνος, ἠ,” BDAG, 924; Lara, O’Sullivan, The Regime of Demetrius of Phalerum in Athens, 317–307 BCE: A Philosopher in Politics (Mnemosyne Supplements, History and Archaeology of Classical Antiquity, 318; Leiden: Brill, 2009) 71Google Scholar, 312–13. Danker also cites Acts Thom. 121 based on Smith, Clement, 176, but that “quasi-Encratite” text (Jeffery, Unveiled, 112) describes girding a woman’s sindon before baptism (καὶ σινδόνα αὐτὴν περιζῶσαι), which does not imply scantiness (Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha [ed. R. A. Lipsius and M. Bonnet; 2 vols.; Leipzig: Mendelssohn, 1891–1903] 2.2:231.6). Cyril Richardson claimed that loincloth “seems its obvious meaning” at Vit. phil. 6.90, without elaboration (review of The Secret Gospel: The Discovery and Interpretation of the Secret Gospel according to Mark and Clement of Alexandria and a Secret Gospel of Mark, by Morton Smith, TS 35 [1974] 571–77, at 575). Richardson cites The Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden (ed. Francis Ll. Griffith and Herbert Thompson; 3 vols.; Oxford: Clarendon, 1921) 1:34, but that source merely describes an instance of Egyptian šnd-t as meaning either “loin-cloth or tunic” and explains that it actually represents a “dress,” adding that in Coptic the term can simply mean “cloth.” That is clearly inadequate justification for reading Greek σινδών as “loincloth.”

115 Joel, Marcus, Mark 8–16: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (AB 27A; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009) 994Google Scholar. Marcus indicates he was familiar with Jackson’s explanation of σινδών, so it is puzzling why he did not think it superseded Edwards’s article.

116 Douglas, Edwards, “Dress and Ornamentation,” ABD 2:236Google Scholar.

117 Georges, Losfeld, Essai sur le costume grec (Paris: de Boccard, 1991) 145–46Google Scholar; Miller, Greeks, 123; Paul, Zanker, The Mask of Socrates: The Image of the Intellectual of Antiquity (trans. Alan, Shapiro; Sather Classical Lectures 59; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995) 187Google Scholar.

118 Rolf Hurschmann, “Tribon,” BNP 14:901; Dio Chrysostom, Hab. 72.2; Xenophon. Mem. 1.6.2.

119 Miller, Greeks, 124; Oxford Companion to Classical Literature (ed. Paul Harvey and Margaret Howatson; 2nd ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989) 198; Robin, Margaret Jensen, Face to Face: Portraits of the Divine in Early Christianity (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005) 44Google Scholar; Zanker, Mask, 266.

120 Lucian, Fug. 14.

121 Hurschmann, “Tribon”; Bonfante and Jaunzems, “Clothing and Ornament,” 1404; Apuleius, Metam. 11.8; idem, Flor. 7.

122 Arthur P. Urbano, “ ‘Dressing a Christian’: The Philosopher’s Mantle as Signifier of Pedagogical and Moral Authority,” StPatr 62 (2013) 213–29, at 217; Bonfante and Jaunzems, “Clothing and Ornament,” 1404; Tertullian, Pall. 4.10.

123 Tertullian, Pall. 5.3; Urbano, “ ‘Dressing,’ ” 213, 218–21; Walter, Lowrie, Monuments of the Early Church (New York: Macmillan, 1906) 224Google Scholar, 403–7; Margarete, Bieber, “Roman Men in Greek Himation (Romani Palliati): A Contribution to the History of Copying,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 103 (1959) 374–417Google Scholar, at 411; Alexander, Coburn Soper, “The Latin Style on Christian Sarcophagi of the Fourth Century,” The Art Bulletin 19 (1937) 148–202Google Scholar.

124 Jensen, Face to Face, 154; Zanker, Mask, 300–301; Thomas, Matthews, The Clash of Gods: A Reinterpretation of Early Christian Art (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993) 69–72Google Scholar. Jensen sees both Zanker’s connection with philosophy and Matthews’s connection with Asclepius.

125 Albertus, F. J. Klijn, The Acts of Thomas: Introduction, Text, and Commentary (2nd ed.; NovTSup 108; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 10Google Scholar, 15, 65, 174; see Acts Thom. 20, 96 (Act. Apost. Apocr. 2.2:131.8, 209.20).

126 Urbano, “ ‘Dressing,’ ” 222–23, especially the Christian martyr Aedesius of Eusebius, Mart. Pal. 5.2, who dressed ἐν τρίβωνος σχήματι (GCS 9.2:919.1–8, esp. 6); Synesius Cyrenensis, Epist. 147.

127 Diogenes Laertius, Vit. phil. (CCTC 50:463.62–70; see also LCL 185:93–95); Smith, Clement, 176; Adela, Yarbro Collins, Mark: A Commentary (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007) 693Google Scholar nn. 209–10.

128 Vearncombe, “Cloaks,” 692–93; Collins, Mark, 693; Vit. Aesop. G 112 (Aesopica [ed. B. E. Perry; Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1952] 1:70); PGM VI.3095.

129 Losfeld, Essai sur le costume grec, 148. I arrived at my conclusions independently of Losfeld, albeit more than twenty years later.

130 Tertullian, Pall. 5.3, At enim pallio nihil expeditius, etiam si duplex, quod Cratetis (SC 514:198; see also Tertullian: De Pallio [trans. Vincent Hunink; Amsterdam: Gieben, 2005] 254).

131 Vearncombe, “Cloaks,” 687, 689.

132 Diogenes Laertius, Vit. phil. 6.13 (CCTC 50:413.135–36; LCL 185:14–15; see also Diogenes Laertius: Lives of the Eminent Philosophers [ed. James Miller; trans. Pamela Mensch; New York: Oxford University Press, 2018] 265 n. 18); Vit. phil. 6:22, τρίβωνα διπλώσας πρῶτος (CCTC 50:421.28–29; LCL 185:24–25); see also Vit. phil. 6.6.

133 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 7.18.1–3 (GCS 9.2:672.3–18, esp. 13; NPNF 2 1:304). Alexander Nagel suggests that this phrase implies the statue’s figure “wore this slight clothing without looking underdressed,” pointing by way of example to a fifteenth-century statue of Christ “wearing a diplois without a fibula, leaving the right shoulder free, and the torso exposed. The overall effect is not one of near-nudity but of high virtue and dignity” (The Controversy of Renaissance Art [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011] 136). At Lucian, Peregr. 11–16, the character Peregrinus dresses in a τρίβων and is hailed by Christians and pagans alike as a philosopher.

134 Hermann, Langerbeck, “The Philosophy of Ammonius Saccas and the Connection of Aristotelian and Christian Elements therein,” JHS 77 (1957) 67–74Google Scholar, at 70. See also Hans, Dieter Betz, “Jesus and the Cynics: Survey and Analysis of a Hypothesis,” JR 74 (1994) 453–75Google Scholar; William, Desmond, Cynics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008) 272Google Scholar; Downing, F. Gerard, Cynics, Paul and the Pauline Churches (London: Routledge, 1998) 174–79Google Scholar, 224–25, 307–11; Stoicism in Early Christianity (ed. Tuomas Rasimus, Troels Engberg-Pedersen, and Ismo Dunderberg; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010) 8–10; and Hubertus, R. Drobner, “Christian Philosophy,” in The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Studies (ed. Susan, Ashbrook Harvey and David, G. Hunter; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008) 672–90Google Scholar; Arthur, P. Urbano, The Philosophical Life: Biography and the Crafting of Intellectual Identity in Late Antiquity (North American Patristics Society Monograph Series 21; Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2013) 75Google Scholar, 124, 125–27, 148 n. 90, 149, 151–62.

135 Urbano, “ ‘Dressing,’ ” 214, 217.

136 Ibid., 218; see also Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 4.8; Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.11.8.

137 Langerbeck, “Ammonius Saccas,” 68. The identity of Ammonius is disputed: see, for example, Urbano, Philosophical Life, 70–79; Frederic, M. Schroeder, “Ammonius Saccas,” ANRW 36.1:493–526Google Scholar.

138 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.19.13–14 (GCS 9.2:562.12–20, esp. 18–19); Urbano, “ ‘Dressing,’ ” 221–22.

139 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.15.1; 6.19.13 (GCS 9.2:553.17–31; 562.12–18).

140 Vearncombe, “Cloaks,” 687, 688; Palladius, Hist. Laus. 37 (TS 6.2:109.4). The σινδών of Synoptic tradition (Matt 27:59//Mark 15:46//Luke 23:53) has an analogue in the ὀθονίος of John 19:40 and the ὀθόνια of Luke 24:12//John 20:5–7, though it is not clear these materials were identical. Nevertheless, the philosopher Apollonius of Tyana wore a garment of ὀθόνη (Philostratus, Vit. Apoll. 1.32 [LCL 16:108–11]; compare Urbano, “ ‘Dressing,’ ” 217). See also Marcus, Mark 8–16, 942.

141 Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, 158–62; idem, review of The Secret Gospel of Mark (by Jeffrey), 19–20; idem, “Motive,” 370–72; Gundry, Mark, 623; Vearncombe, “Cloaks,” 683. Vearncombe argues Mark 14:51–52 can bear both straightforward and symbolic reading (“Cloaks,” 701–3). See also Rau, “Geheimnis.” Rau suggests that LGM1 has certain esoteric connections with 2 Clem. 2.12, Gos. Thom. 22, 37 and Gos. Eg., but admits his reading is speculative (“Geheimnis,” 205–6). The esoteric nudity he describes has nothing to do with LGM1, whose characters are fully clothed. Instead, Rau’s speculations seem connected only to the other noncanonical gospels he cites, and the groups that used them. Unlike LGM, perhaps the Carpocratian gospel did depict esoteric nudity.

142 Theod. 3.9–10; Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, 158–62, 215–19; idem, “Mar Saba 65,” 304–6; idem, “Veils I,” 247–50, 279–82; idem, “Veils II,” 118–25; idem, review of The Secret Gospel of Mark (by Jeffrey), 16–23.

143 On exegetical initiation, see pp. 380–81 above.

144 Brown, “Veils I,” 250–64, 276–78; idem, “Veils II,” 102–4, 111–12; idem, review of The Secret Gospel of Mark (by Jeffrey), 6–14.

145 Brown, “Mar Saba 65,” 304–6; idem, “Motive,” 370.

146 Origen, Hom. Lev. 6.6 (GCS 29:367.23–26; Origen: Homilies on Leviticus [trans. Gary Wayne Barkley; FC 83; Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1990] 126). A religious context for the σινδών within Judaism is also suggested by Josephus, Ant. 3.153.

147 Origen, Hom. Luc. 23, nec duas habere tunicas nec dupliciti veste circumdari//μὴ δύο χιτῶνας ἔκειν καὶ ἐνδεδύσθαι (GCS 35:152–53, esp. 152.16–20; Origen: Homilies on Luke; Fragments on Luke (trans. Joseph Lienhard; FC 94; Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1996) 98.

148 Origen, Dial. 5.18 (SC 67:66); idem, Comm. Rom. 5.8.5 (GCS 539:468); idem, Comm. ser. Matt. 143 (GCS 38:296); idem, Cels. 2.69 (GCS 2:190). At Comm. Jo. 10.213, Origen briefly mentions Heracleon’s treatment of the σινδών, without further comment (GCS 10:207).

149 Origen, Cels. 2.69; Theod. 3.18 (S. 447, 452).

150 Martens, Origen and Scripture, 29–32, 34–38, 39, 53, 122; Martens writes that Origen “intimately associates philosophical activity with exegetical activity” (Origen and Scripture, 36 n. 43, also citing Origen, Cels. 1.9, 2.16, 3.58, 5.58, and 6.49). See also Brown, review of The Secret Gospel of Mark (by Jeffrey), 8; Heine, Origen: Scholarship, 222, 225; Alfons, Fürst, “Origen: Exegesis and Philosophy in Early Christian Alexandria,” in Interpreting the Bible and Aristotle in Late Antiquity: The Alexandrian Commentary Tradition between Rome and Baghdad (ed. Josef, Lössl and John, W. Watt; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011) 13–32Google Scholar; Jeffrey, Hause, “Origen,” in Ancient Philosophy of Religion (ed. Graham, Oppy and Trakkakis, N. N.; The History of Western Philosophy of Religion 1; Durham, NC: Acumen Publishing, 2009Google Scholar; repr. New York: Routledge, 2014) 199–210; Ronald, Heine, “Stoic Logic as Handmaid to Exegesis and Theology in Origen’s Commentary on the Gospel of John,” JTS 44 (1993) 90–117Google Scholar; Róbert, Somos, Logic and Argumentation in Origen (Adamantiana 7; Münster: Achendorff Verlag, 2015Google Scholar) esp. 73–139, 191–206.

151 See pp. 380–81 above.

152 Jeffery, “Mysteries,” 217.

153 Martens, Origen and Scripture, 35, writing that Origen “initiated his students into the discipline of philosophy”; Crouzel, Origen, 158–62; Urbano, Philosophical Life, 46, 112, 118–19, 123 n. 211, 141–46, 154–58; Origen, Ep. Greg. 1; idem, Cels. 3.58.

154 Watson, “Suspicion,” 146, 147.

155 Smith, Clement, 116; Theod. 3.9 (S. 447, 452).

156 Carlson, Gospel Hoax, 65–71, esp. 67, 125 n. 4; Watson, “Suspicion,” 146–47.

157 Ibid., 125 n. 4; see Herm. Sim. 9.11.6 (88.6) (LCL 25:416); Hippolytus, Narr. virg. Cor. (GCS 1.2:277; see also Palladius, Hist. Laus. 65 [TS 6.2:161.25–26]).

158 Plutarch, Dion 55.2 (trans. Bernadotte Perrin; LCL 98:116, 117).

159 Indeed, the original phrase in LGM may have more closely resembled the other ancient examples, since, as shown below, we cannot be certain that ἔμεινε σὺν αὐτῷ τὴν νύκτα was precisely the phrase used in that text.

160 Watson, “Suspicion,” 147.

161 Theod. 3.18.

162 Oulton and Chadwick, Alexandrian Christianity, 185–86; Martens, Origen and Scripture, 193–200, 206–9, 214–16, 221–26; Lauro, Soul and Spirit, 26–33, 47–50, 211–15; Crouzel, Origen, 72–73; see pp. 380–81 above.

163 Origen, Princ. 4.2.4–5, esp. 4.2.4 (GCS 22:312.8–14; Origen: An Exhortation to Martyrdom, Prayer, and Selected Works [trans. Rowan Greer; New York: Paulist, 1979] 182).

164 Watson, “Suspicion,” 147; Origen, Cels. 4.19 (GCS 3:288–89).

165 Origen, Comm. Cant. Prol. 1.1 (GCS 33:62.22–27, 78.10–19).

166 Peter, Schäfer, The Origins of Jewish Mysticism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011) 183–85Google Scholar.

167 Theod. 1.16–21, 2.6, 12 (S. 448, 450); “arcane” is my own translation of μυστικὸν.

168 Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel, 122–24; although Brown’s argument is complicated by his defense of Clementine authorship, he states emphatically, “both versions were the Gospel of Mark” (123). Origen is also known for his use of agrapha, apocrypha, and deuterocanonical scripture; see Stephen, Carlson, “Origen’s Use of the Gospel of Thomas,” in Sacra Scriptura: How “Non-Canonical” Texts Functioned in Early Judaism and Early Christianity (ed. Charlesworth, J. H. and McDonald, L. M. with Jurgens, B. A.; T&T Clark Jewish and Christian Texts Series 20; London: Bloomsbury, 2014) 137–52Google Scholar; Hanson, Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition, 133–45.

169 Watson, “Suspicion,” 147.

170 See, for example, Amy, S. Anderson, The Textual Tradition of the Gospels: Family 1 in Matthew (NTTS 32; Leiden: Brill, 2004) 74Google Scholar; Simonetti, Biblical Interpretation, 40–41.

171 For example, Origen, Comm. Matt. 14.6 (GCS 40:287.3); idem, Princ. 4.3.5 (GCS 22:331.1, 331.22); Morwenna, Ludlow, “Spirit and Letter in Origen and Augustine,” in The Spirit and the Letter: A Tradition and a Reversal (ed. Paul, S. Fiddes and Günter, Bader; London: T&T Clark, 2013) 87–102Google Scholar, at 91–93; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 82 n. 211 (where I erroneously cite GCS 38, not GCS 40).

172 Grant, “Stromateis,” 286; Simonetti, Biblical Interpretation, 44–45; Lauro, Soul and Spirit, 51–60, 109–14, 126–27; Mark, Sheridan, “Scripture,” in Westminster Handbook to Origen (ed. McGuckin, ), 197–201Google Scholar.

173 Theod. 3.18, ἡ μὲν οὖν ἀληθὴς καὶ κατὰ τὴν ἀληθῆ φιλοσοφίαν ἐξήγησις (S. 447, 452).

174 See pp. 380–81 above.

175 Origen’s text-critical practices would also explain the letter’s attention to “provenance, purpose, authenticity, and text-form as preliminary to exegesis” (Watson, “Suspicion,” 143).

176 Anderson, Textual Tradition, 74.

177 Peter, M. Head, “The Early Text of Mark,” in The Early Text of the New Testament (ed. Charles, E. Hill and Michael, J. Kruger; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) 108–20Google Scholar, at 112; also Michael, J. Kruger, “Early Christian Attitudes toward the Reproduction of Texts,” in Early Text (ed. Hill, and Kruger, ) 63–80Google Scholar, at 64 n. 2.

178 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 81, 84–86. There, I suggested Origen wrote while Theodore was at Caesarea, and Origen was away; that is one possibility, but, as I also noted, Theodore’s identity and career are disputed (Zeddies, “Origen?,” 85 n. 231). However, that does not affect Theodore’s role as the proposed recipient of the letter.

179 Theod. 2.3–10.

180 Smith, Clement, 1–4, 448, 450, 452.

181 Smith, makes a similar point in “Merkel on the Longer Text of Mark,” ZTK 72 (1975) 133–50Google Scholar, at 136.

182 Watson, “Suspicion,” 147.

183 Ibid.

184 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15–16, 6.25.4–5; Charles, E. Hill, “What Papias Said about John (and Luke): A ‘New’ Papian Fragment,” JTS 49 (1998) 582–629Google Scholar, at 608–9; Scott Manor, T., “Papias, Origen, and Eusebius: The Criticisms and Defense of the Gospel of John,” VC 67 (2013) 1–21Google Scholar, at 7. Hill translates ὑφηγήσατο at Hist. eccl. 6.25.5 as “instruction,” but even when corrected to “example” (see p. 384 above), it still indicates a Petrine-Markan connection. Hill also states that Origen’s citation of 1 Pet 5:13 is another connection with Papias, but whether Papias cited 1 Pet 5:13 is disputed: see Michael, F. Bird, “Mark: Interpreter of Peter and Disciple of Paul,” in Paul and the Gospels: Christologies, Conflicts, and Convergence (ed. Michael, F. Bird and Joel, Willitts; London: T&T Clark, 2011) 30–61Google Scholar, at 58–59.

185 Hill, “Papias,” 608–9, suggesting Eusebius’s copy of Papias was the one Origen left behind in Caesarea. The question of what traditions are shared among Papias, Irenaeus, and Origen has been somewhat contested: see, for example, Richard, Heard, “The ἀπομνημονεύματα in Papias, Justin, and Irenaeus,” NTS 1 (1954) 122–29Google Scholar; Perumalil, A. C., “Are Not Papias and Irenaeus Competent to Report on the Gospels?,” ET 91 (1980) 332–37Google Scholar; Enrico, Norelli, Papia di Hierapolis. Esposizione degli oracoli del Signore. I frammenti (Letture cristiane del primo millenio 36; Milan: Paoline, 2005) 216–20Google Scholar; Adam, Winn, The Purpose of Mark’s Gospel (WUNT 2/245; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 48–49Google Scholar.

186 Michael, Kok, The Gospel on the Margins: The Reception of Mark in the Second Century (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015) 119Google Scholar, 205; Watson, Gospel Writing, 128. Bird believes “Papias implies that Mark wrote after Peter’s death” (“Mark: Interpreter,” 58), but this overlooks the ambiguity that Kok and Watson describe.

187 Scholars disagree as to whether Origen places Mark in a chronological sequence at Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.25.4–6 (Kok, Margins, 209 n. 110). Whatever Origen’s intent there, his ambiguous chronology of Mark’s Gospel and Peter’s death (see also Hist. eccl. 3.1.2) seems compatible with the letter, which describes Mark writing his canonical version before Peter’s death (κατὰ τὴν τοῦ πέτρου ἐν ῥώμῃ διατριβὴν), but the longer version afterwards (τοῦ δὲ πέτρου μαρτυρήσαντος) (Theod. 1.15–21 [S. 448]).

188 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15–16 (GCS 9.1:290.21–292.6; Eusebius: The History of the Church from Christ to Constantine [trans. Geoffrey A. Williamson; rev. Andrew Louth; London: Penguin Books, 1989] 103).

189 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.25.4–5 (GCS 9.2:576.7–15; NPNF 2 1:273, with edits); ibid., 6.25.13 (GCS 9.2:578.21–580.4; Williamson, Eusebius, 202). In Arthur C. McGiffert’s translation from NPNF 2, I emend “instructions” to “example,” per Gundry (see p. 384 above).

190 Watson, “Suspicion,” 150, 151.

191 Ibid., 148–50; Brown and Pantuck, “Evans,” 133–34.

192 Origen’s remark that there are four “indisputable” (ἀναντίρρητά) gospels in the Church does not preclude Alexandrian use of the longer version of Mark’s Gospel (compare Comm. Jo. 1.21, Hom. Luc. 1): see p. 397 above.

193 Theod. 1.16–17, 22–24 (S. 446, 448); Brown and Pantuck, “Evans,” 134; Protr. 1.2.4 (GCS 12:4.17–18).

194 See, for example, Origen, Cels. 4.87, 4.99, 7.3, 7.49, 7.56, 8.16, as a small selection.

195 GCS 10:236.23. A proximity lemma search in TLG Online suggests no other Christian author used it before Origen.

196 These passages from Origen also share the four concerns mentioned above (see n. 175) that Watson identified in the letter: provenance (apostolic), purpose (Matthew’s audience), authenticity (of Hebrews), and text-form (“phraseology and construction” [φράσις καὶ ἡ σύνθεσις] [GCS 9.2:578.25; Williamson, Eusebius, 202]). See also the nearby passages from Origen on Luke’s audience, and on the authenticity of the Petrine and Johannine epistles (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.25.6, 7–10 [GCS 9.2:576.16, 576.18–578.10]).

197 Watson, “Suspicion,” 152–70; Brown and Pantuck, “Evans,” 104–21; Pantuck, “Solving the Mysterion”; Brown, “Mar Saba 65,” 318–20; Zeddies, “Origen?,” 56, 73.

198 See pp. 379–80 above. Watson also believes the sequence of Greek letters μ,ω,ρ,θ,η,ν found in the letter’s term μωρανθῆναι deliberately hints at authorship by Smith (“Suspicion,” 155); but this same sequence is found in the term ἐμωράνθησαν in Origen, Fr. Matt. 91 (GCS 41.1:52.18). Regarding Smith’s research prior to 1958, it shows little if any interest in Origen, indicating Smith had no inkling of finding an Origenian text. Watson claimed that Smith’s “esotericism” was also unusual for the 1950s (“Reasonable Doubt,” 1–3), but Hanson spends 38 pages discussing Clement and Origen’s esotericism (Origen’s Doctrine of Tradition, 53–90), and the Coptic text of the esoteric Gospel of Thomas was publicized in 1956. Regarding Hunter, Watson admits that “coincidences do happen in real life” (“Reasonable Doubt,” 5).

199 Watson, “Suspicion,” 165–66.

200 John, H. P. Reumann, The Romance of Bible Scripts and Scholars: Chapters in the History of Bible Transmission and Translation (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1965) 145Google Scholar.

201 Ibid., 145–46.

202 Smith thanks Reumann for his help from 1962–1963 (Smith, Clement, 87).

203 Watson, “Suspicion,” 163 n. 100.

204 Ibid., 166.

205 Brown and Pantuck, “Evans,” 120–21. Reumann’s note about detective stories comes at the beginning of his own chapter on Tischendorf (Scholars, 145–62); that chapter almost certainly depends on Ludwig, Schneller, Search on Sinai: The Story of Tischendorf’s Life and the Search for a Lost Manuscript (trans. Dorothee, Schröder; London: Epworth, 1939Google Scholar).

206 Leo, Dueul, Testaments of Time: The Search for Lost Manuscripts and Records (New York: Knopf, 1965) 257–81Google Scholar, 282–302.

207 Ibid., 279–80.

208 Ibid., 269; Robert, Curzon, Visits to Monasteries in the Levant (London: Murray, 1849) 382Google Scholar.

209 Watson, “Suspicion,” 170.

210 Zeddies, “Origen?,” 87.