{"id":564,"date":"2013-06-16T08:59:11","date_gmt":"2013-06-16T15:59:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cosmostheinlost.wordpress.com\/?p=564"},"modified":"2013-06-16T08:59:11","modified_gmt":"2013-06-16T15:59:11","slug":"rabelaisian-catholicism-redux-or-how-to-keep-the-church-impure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/cosmostheinlost\/2013\/06\/16\/rabelaisian-catholicism-redux-or-how-to-keep-the-church-impure\/","title":{"rendered":"Rabelaisian Catholicism Redux or: How to Keep the Church Impure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"pelikan<\/a>
The Cappadocians<\/a>: Keeping it impure<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Yesterday\u2019s post discussed (here<\/a>) how early Christian theology was fundamentally \u201cpolluted\u201d by the Greek tradition of philosophy as a way of life. \u00a0 But historian Jaroslav Pelikan suggest the contagion goes down even further, right down into the marrow, into the very language used to compose the New Testament:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt remains one of the most momentous linguistic convergences in the entire history of the human mind and spirit that the New Testament happens to have been written in Greek\u2013not in the Hebrew of Moses and the prophets, nor in the Aramaic of Jesus and his disciples, nor yet in the Latin of the imperium Romanum; but in the Greek of Socrates and Plato, or at any rate in a reasonably accurate facsimile thereof, disguised and even disfigured though this was in the Koine by the intervening centuries of Hellenistic usage.\u201d<\/p>\n

He continues in Christianity and Classical Culture<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a result of this convergence, every attempt to translate the New Testament into andy of almost two thousand languages\u2013including a Semitic language such as Syriac, despite all its affinities with Hebrew and Aramaic\u2013has, on encountering any term, been obliged to consider above all its previous career in the history of the Greek language; and that was a problem of natural theology [metaphysics] no less than a problem of philology.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"god<\/a>
Good guestion<\/a>. . . according to Pelikan<\/a>:\u00a0Yes.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There\u2019s been quite a lot of talk about divorcing God from the Greek heritage<\/a> at the very least ever since Harnack. While trying to argue away the Greek \u201caccretions\u201d to some vaguely \u201cpure\u201d Gospel he said<\/a>, \u201c. . . Roman Catholicism has nothing to do with the Gospel, nay, is in fundamental contradiction with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll see about that as tomorrow we turn to the article \u201cFarewell, Old Pagan World\u201d<\/a> by Philip Jenkins, one of our leading public commentators on religion. We will modify modify his claims, to the advantage of impurity, with the help of Catherine Pickstock<\/a>.<\/p>\n

While we\u2019re at it, let\u2019s not forget the influence of\u00a0Philo of Alexandria<\/a> and the translators of the Hebrew Bible into Greek, what became known as the Septuagint<\/a>. The connections between Greek and biblical thinking go deep. Harnack must be spinning as fast as a black hole in his grave as I type this!<\/p>\n

Finally, in preparation for the next Bloomsday, listen to Joyce playing upon the theme of purity from the life of Moses here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"James<\/a>
James Joyce sings \u201cFrom the Fathers\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday\u2019s post discussed (here) how early Christian theology was fundamentally \u201cpolluted\u201d by the Greek tradition of philosophy as a way of life. \u00a0 But historian Jaroslav Pelikan suggest the contagion goes down even further, right down into the marrow, into the very language used to compose the New Testament: \u201cIt remains one of the most […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1974,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,30,33,35,42,43],"tags":[111,174,204,373,378,437,621,675,718,1923],"class_list":["post-564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-catholic","category-judaism","category-literature","category-patristics","category-protestant","category-rabelais","tag-aramaic","tag-catherine-pickstock","tag-christianity","tag-gospel","tag-greek-language","tag-jaroslav-pelikan","tag-newtestament","tag-philip-jenkins","tag-purity","tag-rabelais"],"yoast_head":"\nRabelaisian Catholicism Redux or: How to Keep the Church Impure<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Here is how Greece has permanently contaminated Christianity. 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