What is the essence of Christianity according to Harnack?
Harnack proposed that the essence of Christianity, its element of permanent validity, addresses an essentially unchanging core of human nature that yearns for that “presence of the eternal in time” which would vindicate the human spirit’s sense of its own value over against an indifferent natural order.
Who was Marcion and what did he do?
Marcion was an early Christian theologian, evangelist, and an important figure in early Christianity. He was the son of a bishop of Sinope in Pontus. About the middle of the 2nd century (140–155) he traveled to Rome, where he joined the Syrian Gnostic Cerdo.
Why did Marcion reject the Old Testament?
Marcion believed that the god of the Old Testament was cruel, and that he was a different being than the God of Jesus. Misreading Paul’s opposition to the works of the law, Marcion gathered disciples to himself and preached his “New Testament–only” style of faith.
What is the meaning of Marcionism?
Definition of Marcionism : the doctrinal system of a sect of the second and third centuries a.d. accepting some parts of the New Testament but denying Christ’s corporality and humanity and condemning the Creator God of the Old Testament.
What is the main essence of Christianity?
To be a Christian is to be beloved by God; not to be a Christian is to be hated by God, an object of the divine anger. The Christian must therefore love only Christians – others only as possible Christians; he must only love what faith hallows and blesses. Faith is the baptism of love.
What are Gnostic beliefs?
Gnosticism is the belief that human beings contain a piece of God (the highest good or a divine spark) within themselves, which has fallen from the immaterial world into the bodies of humans. All physical matter is subject to decay, rotting, and death.
When was the Gospel of Marcion written?
The Gospel of Marcion, called by its adherents the Gospel of the Lord, was a text used by the mid-2nd-century Christian teacher Marcion of Sinope to the exclusion of the other gospels.
Is Marcion a Gnostic?
Marcion is sometimes described as a Gnostic philosopher. In some essential respects, Marcion proposed ideas which aligned well with Gnostic thought. Like the Gnostics, he believed that Jesus was essentially a divine spirit who appeared to human beings in human form, but did not actually take on a fleshly human body.
What do the donatists believe?
Donatism was a Christian sect leading to a schism in the Church, in the region of the Church of Carthage, from the fourth to the sixth centuries. Donatists argued that Christian clergy must be faultless for their ministry to be effective and their prayers and sacraments to be valid.
Who is God according to Gnostics?
What did Gnostics believe about Jesus?
Jesus is identified by some Gnostics as an embodiment of the supreme being who became incarnate to bring gnōsis to the earth, while others adamantly denied that the supreme being came in the flesh, claiming Jesus to be merely a human who attained enlightenment through gnosis and taught his disciples to do the same.
Did Marcion create the New Testament?
He considered himself a follower of Paul the Apostle, whom he believed to have been the only true apostle of Jesus Christ, a doctrine called Marcionism. Marcion published the earliest extant fixed collection of New Testament books….
| Marcion of Sinope | |
|---|---|
| Notable ideas | Marcionism |