One of the discussions among scholars of early Christianity in the past century is to what extent it is appropriate to speak of "
orthodoxy" and "
heresy".
Higher criticism drastically altered the previous perception that heresy was a very rare exception to the orthodoxy. Bauer was particularly influential in the reconsideration of the historical model. During the 1970s, increasing focus on the effect of social, political and economic circumstances on the formation of early Christianity occurred as Bauer's work found a wider audience. A movement away from presuming the correctness or dominance of the orthodoxy is seen as understandable, in light of modern approaches. However, some feel that instead of an even and neutral approach to historical analysis that the
heterodox sects are given an assumption of superiority over the orthodox (or
proto-orthodox) movement. The current debate is vigorous and broad. While it is difficult to summarize all current views, general statements may be made, remembering that such broad strokes will have exceptions in specific cases.
Adoptionism An early form of Adoptionism, the doctrine that
Jesus became the
son of God by
adoption, held that Jesus was born human only, and that he became
divine, by adoption at his
baptism, being chosen because of his sinless devotion to the will of God. They understood Jesus as
Messiah and Son of God in terms of the anointing at his baptism. While the 27 books that became the New Testament canon present Jesus as fully human, Adoptionists (who may have used
non-canonical gospels) in addition excluded any
miraculous origin for him, seeing him as simply the child of Joseph and Mary, born of them in the normal way. Some scholars regard a
non-canonical gospel used by the Ebionites, now lost except for fragments quoted in the
Panarion of
Epiphanius of Salamis, as the first to be written, and believe Adoptionist theology may predate the New Testament. Others, on the contrary, consider that this work "clearly presupposes the canonical Gospels." This gospel's account of the
baptism of Jesus, as quoted by Epiphanius, says that the voice from heaven declared: "This day have I begotten thee", a phrase echoing , and some see this phrase as supporting the doctrine that it was at his baptism ("this day") that Jesus became God's (adopted) son. These words from Psalm 2 are also used twice in the canonical
Epistle to the Hebrews, which on the contrary presents Jesus as the
Son "through whom (God) made the universe." The Adoptionist view was later developed by adherents of the form of
Monarchianism that is represented by
Theodotus of Byzantium and
Paul of Samosata. It was formally rejected by the
First Council of Nicaea (325), which wrote the
orthodox doctrine of the consubstantiality of the Father and the Son (the co-eminence of the Holy Spirit, and thus the Trinity, did not come about until the Fourth Ecumenical [Council of Chalcedon] in AD 451) and identified Jesus as eternally begotten.
Arianism Arianism, declared by the Council of Nicaea to be
heresy, denied the full divinity of Jesus Christ, and is so called after its leader
Arius. It has been called the most challenging heresy in the history of the Church. Arius, born probably in
Libya between c. 260 and 280, was ordained a priest in
Alexandria in 312–313. Under
Bishop Alexander (313–326), probably in about 319, he came forward as a champion of
subordinationist teaching about the person of Christ. Arius appears to have held that the
Son of God was not eternal but created by the Father as an instrument for creating the world and therefore not God by nature, different from other creatures in being the one direct creation of God.
Ebionites The Ebionites ("poor ones") were a sect of
Jewish Christians who flourished in the early centuries of Christianity, especially east of the
Jordan. They emphasized the
binding character of the Mosaic Law and believed Jesus was the human son of Mary and Joseph. They seem to have been
ascetics, and are said to have rejected Paul's epistles and to have used only one
Gospel.
Gnosticism Several distinct religious sects, some of them Christian, adhered to an array of beliefs that would later be termed
Gnostic. One such sect, that of the
Simonians, was said to have been founded by
Simon Magus, the
Samaritan who is mentioned in the 1st-century and who figures prominently in several
apocryphal and heresiological accounts by Early Christian writers, who regarded him as the source of all heresies. The most successful Christian Gnostic was the priest
Valentinus (c. 100 – c. 160), who founded a Gnostic church in Rome and developed an elaborate cosmology. Gnostics considered the material world to be a prison created by a fallen or evil spirit, the god of the material world (called the
demiurge). Gnostics identified the God of the Hebrew Bible as this demiurge. Secret knowledge (gnosis) was said to liberate one's soul to return to the true God in the realm of light. Valentinus and other Christian gnostics identified Jesus as the Savior, a spirit sent from the true God into the material world to liberate the souls trapped there. While there appear to be Gnostic elements in some early Christian writing,
Irenaeus and others condemned Gnosticism as a heresy, rejecting its dualistic cosmology and vilification of the material world and the creator of that world. Gnostics thought the God of the Old Testament was not the true God. It was considered to be the
demiurge and either fallen, as taught by
Valentinus (c. 100 – c. 160), or evil, as taught by the
Sethians and
Ophites. The
Gospel of John, according to
Stephen L Harris, both includes Gnostic elements and refutes Gnostic beliefs, presenting a dualistic universe of light and dark, spirit and matter, good and evil, much like the Gnostic accounts, but instead of escaping the material world, Jesus bridges the spiritual and physical worlds.
Raymond E. Brown wrote that even though gnostics interpreted John to support their doctrines, the author didn't intend that. The
Johannine epistles were written (whether by the author of the Gospel or someone in his circle) to argue against gnostic doctrines. The
Gospel of Thomas, it is often claimed, has some Gnostic elements but lacks the full Gnostic cosmology. However, even the description of these elements as "gnostic" is based mainly upon the presupposition that the text as a whole is a "gnostic" gospel, and this idea itself is based upon little other than the fact that it was found along with gnostic texts at
Nag Hammadi. The scene in John in which "
doubting Thomas" ascertains that the resurrected Jesus is physical refutes the Gnostic idea that Jesus returned to spirit form after death. The written gospel draws on an earlier oral tradition associated with Thomas. Some scholars argue that the Gospel of John was meant to oppose the beliefs of that community. Some believe that Gnostic Christianity was a later development, some time around the middle or late 2nd century, around the time of Valentinus. Gnosticism was in turn made up of many smaller groups, some of which did not claim any connection to Jesus Christ. In
Mandaeist Gnosticism, Mandaeans maintain that
Jesus was a
mšiha kdaba or "
false messiah" who perverted the teachings entrusted to him by John the Baptist. The word
k(a)daba, however, derives from two roots in Mandaic: the first root, meaning "to lie", is the one traditionally ascribed to Jesus; the second, meaning "to write", might provide a second meaning, that of "book"; hence some Mandaeans, motivated perhaps by an ecumenical spirit, maintain that Jesus was not a "lying Messiah" but a "Book Messiah", the "book" in question presumably being the Christian Gospels. This however seems to be a folk etymology without support in the Mandaean texts. A modern view has argued that
Marcionism is mistakenly reckoned among the Gnostics, and really represents a fourth interpretation of the significance of Jesus. Gnostics freely exchanged concepts and texts. It is considered likely that Valentinius was influenced by previous concepts such as
Sophia, or by
Simon Magus, as much as he influenced others.
Marcionism In 144, the Church in Rome expelled
Marcion of Sinope. He thereupon set up his own separate ecclesiastical organization, later called Marcionism. Like the Gnostics, he promoted
dualism. Unlike the Gnostics, however, he founded his beliefs not on secret knowledge (gnosis) but on the vast difference between what he saw as the "evil" deity of the
Old Testament and the God of love of the
New Testament, on which he expounded in his
Antithesis. Consequently, Marcionists were vehemently
anti-Judaist in their beliefs. They rejected the Jewish-Christian
Gospel according to the Hebrews (see also
Jewish–Christian gospels) and all the other
Gospels with the single exception of the
Gospel of Marcion, which appears to be a redacted version of the
Gospel of Luke. From the perspectives of Tertullian and Epiphanius it appeared that Marcion rejected the non-Lukan gospels; however, in Marcion's time, it may be that the only gospel he was familiar with from
Pontus was the gospel of Luke. Although it has been suggested by some that Marcion's gospel pre-dated canonical Luke, the dominant scholarly view is that the Marcionite Gospel was a redaction of canonical Luke in order to conform to Marcion's anti-Jewish stance. Marcion argued that Christianity should be solely based on
Christian Love. He went so far as to say that Jesus' mission was to overthrow
Demiurge—the fickle, cruel, despotic God of the Old Testament—and replace Him with the Supreme God of Love whom Jesus came to reveal. Marcion was labeled a gnostic by
Irenaeus. Irenaeus labeled Marcion this because of Marcion expressing this core gnostic belief, that the creator God of the Jews and the Old Testament was the demiurge. This position, he said, was supported by the ten Epistles of Paul that Marcion also accepted. His writing had a profound effect upon the
development of Christianity and the
canon.
Montanism About 156, Montanus launched a ministry of prophecy, criticizing Christians as increasingly worldly and bishops as increasingly autocratic. Traveling in his native
Anatolia, he and two women preached a return to primitive Christian simplicity, prophecy, celibacy, and asceticism. which includes
Martin Hengel,
Larry Hurtado,
N. T. Wright, and
Richard Bauckham, the "incarnation Christology" or "high Christology" did not evolve over a longer time, but was a "big bang" of ideas which were already present at the start of Christianity, and took further shape in the first few decades of the church, as witnessed in the writings of Paul. Some 'Early High Christology' proponents scholars argue that this "high Christology" may go back to Jesus himself. ==See also==