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Recent discussions of the “meta-data” of NT manuscripts have included consideration of the so-called “staurogram” found in some forms of the nomen sacrum for σταυρόω or σταυρός. In several early NT papyri, this tau/rho monogram is clearly visible; however, in certain passages (e.g., in 𝔓⁴⁵, 𝔓⁶⁶, and 𝔓¹²¹), its presence is either not entirely certain or debated. In such instances, the discussion must necessarily appeal to other elements in or features of the manuscript in order to posit the presence or the absence of a staurogram. This brief study considers a heretofore overlooked paleographical feature as evidence for identifying the presence of unclear or disputed instances of a staurogram in nomina sacra, namely the elevated manner in which the attendant supralinear stroke is written.

Knust and Wasserman here alert the reader to the fact that their project avoids questions of the canonical and historical status of the passage as their "book regards the puzzle of the pericope's uneven transmission and reception as an invitation to reconsider wider attitudes about 'the gospel,' Gospel books, and 'sinning' women" (46) in the history of Christianity. Though Knust and Wasserman are convinced that the story was likely interpolated, their main interest is in shifting the conversation from the idea of this being a textual "corruption" to the broader issue of the "active shaping of gospel traditions and books by the communities that received them" (51). Chapters Three and Four then convincingly argue the unlikelihood of the story being suppressed, with a particularly persuasive discussion highlighting that though ancient Christians supported a patriarchal order and strict penitential discipline, "neither an interest in disciplining wayward women nor a preference for strict Christian sexual morals requires that the pericope adulterae be suppressed" (139).

The close relationship between the two originally anonymous gospels that came to be ascribed to Marcion and to Luke is universally recognized. Attempting to reconstruct Marcion’s Gospel from the patristic sources, one finds passages attested as present, passages attested as absent, and passages that are simply unattested. Though there are a number of passages unattested, there is extant testimony concerning the presence or absence of a significant amount of material in Marcion’s Gospel. Given Marcion’s rejection of the Old Testament as scripture for his church, and his rejection of the Creator God and denial that this God was the father of Jesus Christ, it is striking that references to scriptural figures occur in Marcion’s Gospel as well as Luke’s. By raising the question of how these figures are presented and employed in these two gospels, this chapter highlights the inadequacy of simplistic views about the relationship between these texts.

The significance of Marcion’s

In recent years a renewed interest in Marcion’s Gospel has highlighted not only the importance of this text, but also the issues that remain debated in scholarly discussion. This article discusses the relevance of Marcion’s Gospel for understanding the state, use, and collection of the canonical Gospels in the second century; contested issues in the study of this text; and both the necessity of providing a new reconstruction of Marcion’s Gospel and methodological considerations when attempting to do so.

In his significant work on Marcion, Adolf von Harnack was the first to advance the view that Tertullian employed a Latin translation of Marcion's Euangelion when writing Adversus Marcionem. This view was quickly embraced and subsequently accepted by numerous scholars throughout the twentieth century. However, several scholars, most recently those focusing on Marcion's Apostolikon, have argued against the various attempts to advance Harnack's view. In particular, Ulrich Schmid's recent study of both the similarities and differences of the vocabulary of Tertullian's citations from his own and the Marcionite scriptures demonstrated that it is much more probable that Tertullian was translating Marcion's text ad hoc from a Greek copy of Marcion's Apostolikon. This article undertakes a similar examination of the vocabulary in Marcion's Gospel, which reveals that it in all likelihood Tertullian was working from a Greek copy, and not a Latin translation, of this text as well.

This article examines the curious phenomenon that Tertullian, despite explicitly contending that Marcion mutilated the Gospel of Luke, appears to accuse Marcion of having excised passages from it which are found in, and usually only in, Matthew. Scholarly explanations for this phenomenon include his having committed some type of error, his employing the term ‘Gospel’ for the fourfold Gospel, and his text of Luke containing readings from Matthew or Mark that are not in Luke as we know it. A version of the view that Tertullian's text of Luke contained harmonizations to Matthew or Mark was advocated by David S. Williams in a 1991 article, and subsequently embraced by Andrew Gregory. Though the possibility of harmonizations in Tertullian's text must be taken seriously, Williams's ‘exploratory and programmatic’ arguments for Tertullian's potentially extensive use of a harmonized source are, for both methodological and conceptual reasons, less than persuasive. After discussing the weaknesses in Williams's view, this article argues that in all but one case, where Tertullian's memory failed him, the best explanation for his accusations is that he viewed the four gospels as comprising ‘the Gospel’, and therefore that his accusations in Adversus Marcionem were motivated by Marcion having rejected the Gospel of Matthew.

Apelles, active in the mid second century ce, was a disciple of Marcion (see Marcion and Marcionites), first in Rome, then in Alexandria, and finally back in Rome. Keywords: Christianity; churches; heresy; religious history

Elements of the mission discourse of the Synoptic Gospels are found in Mark 6:6b−13; Matthew 9:35−10:15; Luke 9:1−6 and Luke 10:1−20. Similarities and differences in these accounts have led many New Testament scholars to posit the presence of a mission discourse in Q. This discourse, along with the parable that introduces it (Q 10:2), provides insight into how Q conceives of ‘mission’ as well as the ethical principles and precepts that are part of Jesus’ missional charge in this document. Through an intertextual approach to Q, with particular emphasis on narrative structure and imagery, this paper considered the interplay of mission and ethics in this early Christian text.

In text-critical studies of the Lukan version of the Lord’s Prayer (Lk 11,2-4), one of the most interesting, and at the same time most problematic, witnesses is Marcion’s Gospel. Scholarship for much of the twentieth century has generally followed the reconstruction of Adolf von Harnack in his magisterial work on Marcion: ... πάτeρ, (έλθάτω) τό άγιον πνeύμα (σου έφ’ ή μας και καθαρισάτω ημάς)* έλθάτω ή βασιλeία σου* τον άρτον σου τον έπιούσιον δίδου ήμίν τό καθ’ ημέραν, (και) άφeς ήμιν τάς άμαρτίας (ήμών) ... (και) μή άφeς ημάς eίσeνeχθήναι eις πeιρασμόν.1 As a result, it has more or less been assumed that this was the wording of the Lord’s Prayer in Marcion’s text.2 A major problem with this assumption, however, is that numerous of these readings are questionable at best. Despite valuable contributions by Joel Delobel and Ulrich Schmid discussing individual elements in Marcion’s text of the Lord’s Prayer,3 considerable lack of clarity remains concerning Marcion’s testi

The issue of the relationship between Luke and Marcion's Gospel has been revived recently in several discussions of Marcion and Luke-Acts.1 Although this renewed interest is to be welcomed because of the importance of the question for the study of the canon, the fourfold Gospel collection, the Synoptic Problem, and text-critical issues pertaining to the Gospels in the second century, it is curious that numerous, including the most recent, summaries of the veritable flurry of work in Germany in the 1840s and 1850s have been marred by inaccuracies. These erroneous views have then, at times, been employed to develop a connection to and draw support from the purported consensus of German scholarship by the mid1850s on the relationship between Luke and Marcion's Gospel, when no such consensus actually existed. Thus, the incorrect impression has arisen that recent advocates of the position that Luke was the product of a significant redactional revision after the time of Marcion are renewing a supposed consensus that resulted from the intense discussion of the issue in Germany 150 years ago. In the light of this besetting problem, the purpose of this article is to revisit the scholarly debates concerning Marcion's Gospel in the mid-nineteenth century in order both to provide an accurate presentation of the history of scholarship in this period and to address the claims found in recent discussions. I. THE PROLIFIC (AND PROBLEMATIC) PERIOD OF THE 1840S AND 18508 The primary figures involved in the lively debate of this period were F. C. Baur, Albrecht Ritschi, Adolf Hilgenfeld, and Gustav Volckmar.2 However, it was a long and critical review article by F. C. Albert Schwegler that marked the beginning of this period of investigation.3 Schwegler contended that the critical study of Marcion's Gospel had regressed since the work of J. G. Eichhorn, who had provided an extended summary and discussion of the challenges that had arisen to the traditional view, universally recognized to have been held by the church fathers, that Marcion had mutilated a copy of Luke.4 In Schwegler's estimation, the theory that Marcion had edited Luke based on his theological proclivities was entirely untenable, and therefore the traditional view finds itself entangled in "multiple, irresolvable contradictions and difficulties."5 Albrecht Ritschi pressed forward in this Une of thought in 1846, when, in the preface to his monograph, he set forth this thesis: "Marcions Gospel is not a mutilation of the Gospel of Luke, but rather its basic root [Grundstamm]"6 Since he considered the verdicts of Tertullian and Epiphanius concerning the relationship between Marcion's Gospel and Luke to be historically worthless, Ritschl sought to evaluate the relationship between the attested elements of Marcion's text and Luke based upon a criterion of connection [Zusammenhang].7 This criterion assumed that redactional activity, because it introduces foreign material, can be recognized as destructive of the original connection in or between pericopes.8 Ritschl devoted almost sixty pages of his monograph to setting forth the text of Marcion's Gospel on the basis of this criterion and to arguing that Marcion's Gospel reveals the better connection of pericopes. Therefore, one should conclude that Luke has added that which was missing from Marcion's Gospel rather than conclude that Marcion excised anything from Luke.9 Shortly after Ritschl's work appeared, Baur built on Ritschl's thesis in identical comments appearing in two publications, an article and a book.10 Despite occasionally criticizing how Ritschl applied his methodology, Baur agreed that there was "striking evidence for the originality of Marcion's text."11 As he continued with his argument, Baur contended that based on the data one must, without doubt, view Marcion's text as original and Luke as secondary. In fact, Baur concluded that Marcions Gospel was merely the text Marcion had at hand and that all the differences between it and Luke can only be seen as interpolations by a later hand. …