UPDATED 6/5/01 - A few more "doors" to "The Library" have been added, which may now be entered by clicking one's browser on any of the images below.
The Center for Marcionite Research
Studies devoted to the subject of the so-called heretic, Marcion of Sinope (70 C.E.- 150 C.E.), the compiler and publisher of the earliest known New Testament canon.
Welcome!
This "cyber-building" is dedicated to presenting information on a historical figure with whom most people are unfamiliar - Marcion, a native of Sinope ( or modern-day Sinop, a seaport off the coast of the Black Sea in Turkey)- who lived approximately from 70 to 150 C.E. ( according to the most recent reckoning by R.J.Hoffmann in his work entitled Marcion: On the Restitution of Christianity, SCP 1984).
Marcion's main claim to fame, as generally acknowledged by most historians, is that he produced the earliest known New Testament canon, which preceded the Catholic version. He also founded a great church which lasted well into the fifth century, and for a time posed the most serious competition to the Catholic church.
But Marcion's claim to notoriety arose from his teaching, in which a sharp line of distinction was drawn between the acts of the just, severe, angry God of the Old Testament and those of the purely good, loving, benevolent God declared by Jesus. According to Marcion, Jesus Christ unveiled a new God, which was not the same deity of the Hebrew scriptures. Nor was Jesus, according to Marcion, the Messiah prophesied by the prophets of old - the Messiah to Israel, who was to be a warrior, was still yet to come, to fulfil the national expectations and promises of that nation. But Jesus, who entered into this world from another universe, arrived as a universal savior, to purchase (or,"ransom") the human race from the Old Testament God ( "the God of this world" in 2 Cor.4:4), and to provide freedom and escape from his condemnations and wraths (i.e., those things described in the orthodox book of Revelation). Such is a brief introduction to Marcion.
For further information on Marcion one may read the various articles and texts available at The Center for Marcionite Research Library , which also includes a full version of the lost Gospel of Marcion (now hyperlinked to two of the ancient sources used for its reconstruction, Tertullian's Adversus Marcionem and Epiphanius' Panarion).Thank you for visiting!
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