Jerome as author-translator of the full Vulgate New Testament

Go read ARA for yourself and get back with some proper critique. There is a lot of info on Facundus if you care to read it. Not really sure what you're saying.

You are missing the point. You wanted to divert from the Grantley McDonald anachronism blunder, referencing Facundus and Haymo helping to construct the heavenly witnesses verse in their having "in terra".

Nothing from the Newton material relates to that blunder.

And it is rather a fundamental error.
 
The Latins of the next age were not ignorant, see the 20 full verse uses by about AD 600.

In the second claim from Newton, which Grantley acknowledges as an error, even his apology for Newton is a failure. Since many of the early church writer references had in fact been published by the time of Isaac Newton.
It seems that the info on that page of yours isn't very reliable

Symboli Apostolici et Athanasii Enarratio - Kattenbusch concludes that the text was probably written in the fifth century (not the 4th) KATTENBUSCH, F., Das apostolische Symbol. Seine
Entstehung, sein geschichtlicher Sinn, seine ursprüngliche Stellung im
Kultus und in der Theologie der Kirche. Ein Beitrag zur Symbolik
und Dogmengeschichte ... Zweiter Band. Verbreitung und Bedeutung
des Taufsymbols, Leipzig, 1900, 451-452+n34 and 898.

Jerome's Prologue to the Canonical Epistles - Not authentic (by common consent)

Expositio Fidei Catholicae - Author/Date is unknown/speculative

De Trinitate Books 1-7 - Author/Date is unknown/speculative.

You are missing the point. You wanted to divert from the Grantley McDonald anachronism blunder, referencing Facundus and Haymo helping to construct the heavenly witnesses verse in their having "in terra".

Nothing from the Newton material relates to that blunder.

And it is rather a fundamental error.
You are missing the point. Grantley McDonald didn't say that Facundus and Haymo "helped" to construct the heavenly witnesses verse in their having "in terra".

Grantley McDonald cites them as evidence of the existence of Trinitarian allegoresis of this verse before the formulation of the comma. He isn't saying the Comma had anything to do with them.
 
Symboli Apostolici et Athanasii Enarratio - Kattenbusch concludes that the text was probably written in the fifth century (not the 4th) KATTENBUSCH, F., Das apostolische Symbol. Seine Entstehung, sein geschichtlicher Sinn, seine ursprüngliche Stellung im Kultus und in der Theologie der Kirche. Ein Beitrag zur Symbolik
und Dogmengeschichte ... Zweiter Band. Verbreitung und Bedeutung

This is based on a later scholar.

Codices liturgici latini antiquiores: secunda editio aucta, 1968, p. 84-85
Klaus Gamber
https://books.google.com/books?id=vINGAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA84

There is a bit to be checked on the translation and interpretation.
 
You are missing the point. Grantley McDonald didn't say that Facundus and Haymo "helped" to construct the heavenly witnesses verse in their having "in terra". Grantley McDonald cites them as evidence of the existence of Trinitarian allegoresis of this verse before the formulation of the comma. He isn't saying the Comma had anything to do with them.

This makes zero sense.
Their inclusion of "in terra" points to an earlier exemplar with the heavenly witnesses.

There is no way that omission can relate to a supposed AD 200 to 300 formation of the verse.
 
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Expositio Fidei Catholicae - Author/Date is unknown/specutive

De Trinitate Books 1-7 - Author/Date is unknown/speculative.

There are two Expositio Fidei Catholicae.

Longer explanations of the date questions are given in The Witness of God is Greater. I created the shorter summary, and in some cases I have added a sentence or two about these issues, and will consider further additions.
 
Another thing that is wrong with your "full references."

You have "Contra Varimadum c. AD 380- (possibly anti-priscillianist Idacius Clarus AD 350)"

By reason of metathesis, the person against whom the book was written is likely Marivadus (per Tiexeront - below).

The Catholics attribute the authorship of Contra Varimadum to Vigilius, bishop of Thapsus, who assisted, February 1, 484 at the Synod of Carthage, although the Wiki entry disputes his authorship (reasons unknown). However Wik concedes a 5th century date, not a 4th century date.


Per Houghton, re anti-Arian writers of that era & Vigilius:
"Anti-Arian works are preserved from the pens of Quodvultdeus (QU), a bishop of Carthage who moved
to Campania in 439, Vigilius of Thapsus (VIG-T), and Fulgentius of Ruspe (FU). Fulgentius, writing in the early sixth century, was the most prolific: his text of the Gospels normally follows Jerome’s revision, but in the other books of the New Testament he corresponds to Old Latin forms......Another work roughly contemporary with Vigilius is three books against an Arian called Varimadum (PS-VIG Var), with frequent quotations from an Old Latin version of the New Testament......The most debated verses of the Catholic Epistles are 1 John 5:7–8, also known as the Johannine Comma. The additional mention of ‘the Father, the Word and the Spirit’ (pater uerbum et spiritus) appears to have originated in Latin tradition, possibly as a gloss at the end of the fourth century. The reference to these verses in the prologue to the Catholic Epistles (PROL) indicates their presence in the fifth century. The earliest form has the sequence in terra . . . in caelo, attested by Priscillian, the Pseudo-Augustine Speculum, the De trinitate ascribed to Vigilius of Thapsus and numerous later writers, as well as VL 64, the Spanish witnesses in the Vetus Latina Register (VL 59, 67, 91, 94, 95, 109), the first hand of VL 54, and a large number of Vulgate manuscripts."

See also:


Tiexeront, Handbook of Patrology (1923) p.192
____________________________________________________

"Since the year 439, Roman Africa had fallen completely under the power of the Vandals. These were
Arians, and their kings, Genseric (d. 477), Huneric (477-484), and Thrasamund (496-523)—especially the
first two—severely persecuted the Catholics. Hence there took place in African Christian literature at this
time a renaissance of polemics against Arianism. This is evident from the writings of [346] Eugenius,
bishop of Carthage (480-505), Cerealis, bishop of Castellum in Mauritania Caesariensis (c. 485),
Antoninus Honoratus, bishop of Cirta in Numidia, and of the bishops Victor of Cartenna, Asclepius and
Voconius of Castellum.The works of the last two have perished. The De Poenitentia Publica and Ad
Basilium quendam super Mortem Filii are perhaps extant.

To this same cycle belong also the writings of Vigilius, bishop of Thapsus, who assisted, February 1,
484, at a public disputation held at Carthage between Catholics and Arians. Under his name have been
printed 9 treatises, of only 2 of which he is the undoubted author: a dialogue Contra Arianos, Sabellianos
et Photinianos, and 5 books Contra Eutychetem. He himself, however, mentions 2 treatises which he wrote,
but which have not yet been identified: a book Against the Arian Marivadus and Against the Arian
Palladius.

To this same controversy belong also, in great part, the works of him who in the sixth century was the
best theologian in the West,— St. Fulgentius.

St. Fulgentius was born in 468 at Telepte in Byzacena, of a wealthy family and received a very careful
education. He had already begun to take part in worldly affairs, when little by little there awoke in his soul
the desire to embrace the monastic life. This he put into execution, first in several monasteries of Africa.
Then he tried in vain to enter Egypt, landed in Sicily, and returned by way of Rome to Africa, where he
founded a new monastery. Here he was reluctantly made bishop of Ruspe (507 or 508). He remained but a
short time in this little town. Exiled to Sardinia by King Thrasamund, together with more than sixty other
Catholic bishops of Byzacena, he formed with [347] them a kind of permanent theological council, but was
unable to return to his see in Africa until the accession of Hilderic, in 523. He died in 533.

St. Fulgentius had a penetrating, clear, and vigorous mind, capable of handling the most abstract questions
and of throwing abundant light upon them. He was well grounded in S. Scripture and tradition, and knew
how to use them to support his solutions. He was thoroughly versed in the writings of St. Augustine and so
faithfully reproduced his doctrine on grace that he has been rightly called "Augustinus abbreviatus." His
talent, however, was of only secondary rank, and the great esteem he enjoyed in his own time and in the
following centuries is attributable to the fact that those centuries were destitute of really superior men. His
style is less pure and less polished than that of the writers of the fourth century, but clear and easy; his
compositions are often lengthy and diffuse.

St. Fulgentius wrote theological treatises, letters, and sermons. Almost all his theological treatises deal with three questions: the Trinitarian question against the Arians, the question of grace against the Semi-Pelagians, and the question of the Incarnation, often treated in connection with one of the two others.

Against the Arians, St. Fulgentius wrote, c. 515, the treatise Contra Arianos, to answer the ten questions
proposed to him by Thrasamund; and then the books Ad Thrasamundum Regem Vandalorum, in reply to
new objections of the king, which seem to have been drawn from the mystery of the Incarnation. To this
same period belong also a treatise (lost) Adversus Pintam1 and a short treatise De Spiritu Sancto, represented
by two fragments. Later, St. Fulgentius composed the De Trinitate ad Felicem Notarium, the Contra
Sermonem Fastidiosi Ariani ad Victorem, and 10 books Contra Fabianum Arianum, of which 39 precious
fragments are still preserved. The De Incarnatione Filii Dei et Vilium Animalium Auctore ad Scarilam is
an exposition of the Trinitarian doctrine, but not aimed directly at the Arians.
 
This makes zero sense.
Their inclusion of "in terra" points to an earlier exemplar with the heavenly witnesses.
Not necessarily.
There is no way that omission can relate to a supposed AD 200 to 300 formation of the verse.
I think the evidence is that the Comma was not fully formulated, or at least brought in from the margin, until towards the end of the 4th century, per Houghton, which coincided with growing intolerance to heresies of every description amongst the orthodox. cf. the works of Paulus Orosius (Historiarum adversum paganos, Consultatio sive commonitorium ad Augustinum de errore Priscillianistarum et Origenistarum, Liber apologeticus contra Pelagium de Arbitrii libertate).

See also: Vigiliae Christianae:
The Origin of Zealous Intolerance: Paulus Orosius and Violent Religious Conflict in the Early Fifth Century

So possibly it was allowed as part of a deliberate strategy for use against what were perceived as heresies. What may have started as an experiment in only one or a few codices then rapidly got out of control as they began to be widely copied and distributed. There is also the possibility that the Comma arose first in Spain and was imported into Africa, and thence to Rome.
 
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This is based on a later scholar.

Codices liturgici latini antiquiores: secunda editio aucta, 1968, p. 84-85
Klaus Gamber
https://books.google.com/books?id=vINGAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA84

There is a bit to be checked on the translation and interpretation.
From google translate, as supplemented, I get roughly:

An «Enarratio in Symbolum Apostolorum», (Commentary on the Creed of the Apostles) which (somewhat defectively) is unique to the Codex Veronensis LIX (57) from the 6th/7th Century handed down under the name of Athanasius. The symbol has an otherwise unknown version called the Symbolum catechesis (on the occasion of the «Traditio symboli»#) probably made in the 4th century. The African Vigilius of Thapsus (2nd half of the 5th c.) is very probably not the man formerly occasionally assumed to be the author.*

*The concluding article "In sanctam matrem ecclesiam" could point to Verona,
where the suffix "mater" to "ecclesia" often occurs, but then as the name of
Cathedral. The article «descendit ad interna», which is followed by Rufin's comment
attested for Aquileia. indicates the proximity to this metropolis. Since the only handwritten
tradition still comes from Verona, there is much to be said for the assumption that Verona
is the home of the symbol and from there is the author of the "Enarratio" (unless copied by someone living in Verona for use in Verona).

# Traditio Symboli (Lat., the ‘delivery’ or ‘handing over of the Creed’).
During early times candidates for Baptism, who were mainly adults, were subjected to a long course of instruction before admission to the sacrament. Their training was both practical and doctrinal, as in modern ‘Confirmation classes’, and the latter part of it consisted of explanations of the Creed.

__________________

....giving a precise date for the whole composition to the 4th century? I think not, but whom am I to say?
 
I think the evidence is that the Comma was not fully formulated, or at least brought in from the margin, until towards the end of the 4th century, per Houghton, which coincided with growing intolerance to heresies of every description amongst the orthodox. cf. the works of Paulus Orosius (Historiarum adversum paganos, Consultatio sive commonitorium ad Augustinum de errore Priscillianistarum et Origenistarum, Liber apologeticus contra Pelagium de Arbitrii libertate).

This is all wild conjecture against the evidence.

Not only do you have full quotes of the heavenly witnesses verse in the 4th century, homogeneous, also the early Old Latin manuscripts, from the 2nd century line, ALL have the heavenly witnesses verse. This evidence came forth in the 1800s, so it will not be mentioned by Erasmus or Newton or Porson. Metzger plays tricks with the Latin manuscripts, and this has led to later writers, like Peter Gurry, to follow in the footsteps of the Metzger deception.

You are travelling around looking for conflicting interpolation conjectures from various writers, but they all conflict, and they all have huge problems. And not one really gives a sensible step-by-step development of the heavenly witnesses verse. Grantley's attempt is one of the most strained and convoluted, as when he tries to include Facundus and Haymo texts as related to the formulation of the verse.

None of the writers will properly describe the Old Latin evidence, because then they would have to give the Tertullian and Cyprian quotes their proper due.

Omission is a far easier understanding than interpolation.
 
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This is all wild conjecture against the evidence.

Not only do you have full quotes of the heavenly witnesses verse in the 4th century, homogeneous, also the early Old Latin manuscripts, from the 2nd century line, ALL have the heavenly witnesses verse. This evidence came forth in the 1800s, so it will not be mentioned by Erasmus or Newton or Porson. Metzger plays tricks with the Latin manuscripts, and this has led to later writers, like Peter Gurry, to follow in the footsteps of the Metzger deception.

You are travelling around looking for conflicting interpolation conjectures from various writers, but they all conflict, and they all have huge problems. And not one really gives a sensible step-by-step development of the heavenly witnesses verse. Grantley's attempt is one of the most strained and convoluted, as when he tries to include Facundus and Haymo texts as related to the formulation of the verse.

None of the writers will properly describe the Old Latin evidence, because then they would have to give the Tertullian and Cyprian quotes their proper due.

Omission is a far easier understanding than interpolation.
So many years.....so little learned.

Having been soundly knocked out and refuted in every way by numerous members here, Avery is now starting the fight all over again, as if he's not currently standing there with a black eye and broken nose.

Go play bingo or something.
 
Another thing that is wrong with your "full references."

Full references refers to the full heavenly witnesses quote.

On my summary page, I am not adding a lot of auxiliary info.
Often that is covered in The Witness of God is Greater.

And there can be some times where my own view is a bit more conservative than Witness. If so, I will try to make that clear. There may be times where I am less conservative, as well!

All this tweaking is why I appreciate the feedback, either on my summary list or the longer info that is on Witness.
 

So trying to put the best spin on your thesis, you propose:

(a) The (frankly absurd) theory that the Comma was previously removed from all the Greek and many Latin scriptures all over the world due to appearing to be "Sabellian". Your problem is that the Councils had found a way to resolve this ambiguity.

The Latins didn't seem to initially care much about Sabellianism as a heresy. Sabellius (a North African who taught at Rome) was excommunicated in AD 220, but possibly for stirring up dissension as much as for anything else (Wiki: "Wace and Bunsen have both suggested that Calixtus' action was motivated more by a desire for unity rather than by conviction"). Sabellius taught that the Father and Son were one substance (cf. Tertullian unum not usus).

From the days of Sabellius and Tertullian (155 AD – c. 220 AD) the Latins had been inclined to the one-hypostasis-in-God doctrine per the Council of Sardica AD 343. It was the Greeks who objected to this formula on doctrinal grounds, leading to the Council of Alexandria in AD 362.

The Council of Alexandria AD 362 put a spin on "the three are one" doctrine that was found acceptable; by rendering orthodoxy as "the three persons (hypostases) are one substance." So there wouldn't have been a need (there could never have been a need) to remove the Comma unless it was seen to be spurious.


(b) The possibility that the Comma is older than the late fourth century.

(i) Especially by reference to those writings which declare the "Father and the Son" as "one." Yet this isn't the Comma but the doctrine of Sabellius and Tertullian.

Chadwick, allows for "the interpolation of the three heavenly witnesses in the first epistle of John (5:7-8)" but where "the case for thinking Priscillian himself the author of the interpolation carries no conviction. It is surely older (Cyprian , De Unitate 6, comes close to it ), a modification of the text made in the West at a time when the Monarchian controversy was raging in the third century..."

Cyprian (200 AD – 258 AD) , De Unitate 6:
"He who breaks the peace and the concord of Christ, does so in opposition to Christ;
he who gathereth elsewhere than in the Church, scatters the Church of Christ. The Lord says, “I
and the Father are one;” and again it is written of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Spirit, “And these three are one.”* And does any one believe that this unity which thus comes
from the divine strength and coheres in celestial sacraments, can be divided in the Church, and can
be separated by the parting asunder of opposing wills? He who does not hold this unity does not
hold God’s law, does not hold the faith of the Father and the Son, does not hold life and salvation.

* This and many others could be allegorisis of 1 John 5:8, due to missing verbum & heavenly witnesses, as expounded by Tertullian, whom Cyprian read widely.

(ii) The possibility that extant documents with the Comma are older than the Priscillian era. Yet there is little possibility of the Ps. Athanasius De Trinitate being older than the Council of Alexandria - AD 362, which gave the Latin impetus to orthodoxy of three "persons" being one, as recorded in it.

Ps.-Athanasius/ps.-Eusebius Vercellensis, De Trinitate I, CCSL 9:14 (cf. PL 62:243): “[…]
Ergo quamuis in superioribus exemplis scribturarum tacita sint nomina personarum, tamen
unitum nomen diuinitatis per omnia est in his demonstratum sicut et in hoc argumento
ueritatis, in quo nomina personarum euidenter sunt ostensa et unitum nomen naturale cluse
est declaratum, dicente Iohanne euangelista in epistula sua: Tres sunt, qui testimonium dicunt in
cælo, pater et uerbum et spiritus, et in Christo Iesu unum sunt, non tamen unus est, quia non est
eorum una persona
.” Ps.-Athanasius/ps.-Eusebius Vercellensis, De Trinitate I, CCSL 9:19 (cf.
PL 62:246): “Iam audisti superius euangelistam Iohannem in epistula sua tam absolute
testantem: Tres sunt, qui testimonium dicunt in cælo, pater et uerbum et spiritus, et in Christo Iesu
unum sunt.”

("There are three who bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit, and in Christ Jesus they are one, but not one, because there is not one person among them.")

_________________________________________
- Eusebius Vercellensis († c. 370) - Key Participant with Athanasius at Council of Alexandria - AD 362.

Eusebius has been assigned as an author of De Trinitate for several reasons, e.g. by A.E.Burn, including that a Roman contemporary of Pope Damasus (A.D. 366-384) refutes in "Questions on the Old and New Testaments" a now dead Eusebius who had said that the Holy Spirit was consubstantial with the Father and with the Son, corresponding to what is found in De Trinitate.

(This De Trinitate has also been assigned to others, including Gregory of Alvira (Gregory Baeticus (died c. 392) the bishop of Elvira, in the province of Baetica, Spain) by Dom Morin in Revue d'histoire et de litterature religieuses (No. 2, 1900) due to a similarity of phraseology between an acknowledged Gregory work. De Fide, and De Trinitate. Yet this may be because the latter cites the former or that both cite common sources (i.e. Tractatus Origensis, A treatise of Phoebadius of Agen against the Arians.)

The Council of Alexandria - AD 362 followed the Council of Sardica in AD 343 at which the Westerners at Sardica had offcially and unequivocally stated "that there is only one hypostasis in God" per Donald Fairbairn ( THE SARDICAN PAPER, ANTIOCHENE POLITICS, AND THE COUNCIL OF ALEXANDRIA (362): DEVELOPING THE ‘FAITH OF NICAEA’):

"Athanasius knew this perfectly well and for several years after 343 held this belief.
But by 362 he had realized that to maintain a doctrine of one hypostasis
only without qualification would be to antagonize unnecessarily a
large section of basically orthodox opposition in the Eastern
Church and that a doctrine of three hypostases was compatible with
Nicene orthodoxy."

At Alexandria - "For the first time in a conciliar document, both
oneness of ousia and threeness of hypostases are affirmed, an
affirmation that will show the way out of the quagmire that has
threatened to drown the Nicene community since its initial use of
the term homoousios in 325"

"The bishops affirm that the Spirit is not a creature, just as they have
previously insisted the Son is not a creature. The affirmations
seem to emerge out of a recognition that what the church has
been saying of the Son must also be said of the Holy Spirit."
 
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You have "Contra Varimadum c. AD 380- (possibly anti-priscillianist Idacius Clarus AD 350)"

By reason of metathesis, the person against whom the book was written is likely Marivadus (per Tiexeront - below).

The Catholics attribute the authorship of Contra Varimadum to Vigilius, bishop of Thapsus, who assisted, February 1, 484 at the Synod of Carthage, although the Wiki entry disputes his authorship (reasons unknown). However Wik concedes a 5th century date, not a 4th century date.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Varimadus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigilius_of_Thapsus

See also:
https://www.oclarim.com.mo/en/2019/06/14/church-fathers-60-vigilius-of-thapsus/
Tiexeront, Handbook of Patrology (1923) p.192
____________________________________________________
Tixermont not Tiexermont :)

And I plan on going over the scholarship later.
 
"Athanasius knew this perfectly well and for several years after 343 held this belief.
But by 362 he had realized that to maintain a doctrine of one hypostasis
only without qualification would be to antagonize unnecessarily a
large section of basically orthodox opposition in the Eastern
Church and that a doctrine of three hypostases was compatible with
Nicene orthodoxy."

Yet compare Jerome to Damasus:

Jerome called Sabellian and heretic

Jerome - Letter 15 to Damasus
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001015.htm

3. Just now, I am sorry to say, those Arians, the Campenses, are trying to extort from me, a Roman Christian, their unheard-of formula of three hypostases. And this, too, after the definition of Nicæa and the decree of Alexandria, in which the West has joined. Where, I should like to know, are the apostles of these doctrines? Where is their Paul, their new doctor of the Gentiles? I ask them what three hypostases are supposed to mean. They reply three persons subsisting. I rejoin that this is my belief. They are not satisfied with the meaning, they demand the term. Surely some secret venom lurks in the words. If any man refuse, I cry, to acknowledge three hypostases in the sense of three things hypostatized, that is three persons subsisting, let him be anathema. Yet, because I do not learn their words, I am counted a heretic. But, if any one, understanding by hypostasis essence, deny that in the three persons there is one hypostasis, he has no part in Christ. Because this is my confession I, like you, am branded with the stigma of Sabellianism.
 
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