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3 The Theory of the False Pericopes 3.1. INTRODUCTION TO THE FALSE PERICOPES The Pseudo-Clementine Homilies maintain a general concern for the sensus litteralis of the Scriptures. As such, allegorical interpretation is not accepted. We saw in the previous chapter that when it comes to Greek myth, allegorism is deemed irrelevant; when it comes to the Pentateuch, allegorism is altogether rejected (owing in part to its association with pagan myth) on the grounds that it constitutes introducing a “foreign and external” sense to the scriptural text. Its risqué content renders Greek paideia and the mythic poems of the gods as illegitimate sources for the inculcation of piety and temperate living. Allegorism does little to resolve this problem, and such a method of interpretation is in no way to be applied to the law of God (lex dei). What, then, is to be done about the Pentateuch’s “morally offensive” and/or “theologically difficult” passages? As part of his approach to this situation, the Homilist postulates that the written Pentateuch contains various “false pericopes.” As I noted briefly in the previous chapter, these tend to be the types of passages that, under other circumstances, would be interpreted allegorically. But rather than allegorize difficult or offensive passages, the Homilist rejects them as “false.” Paradoxically, it is because of the Homilist’s uncompromising commitment to the sensus litteralis that he is willing to excise as “false” certain passages of Scripture. This notion of the “false pericopes” is one of the very trademarks of the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies.1 The theory of the false pericopes is, as Karl Evan Shuve puts it, “one of the more distinctive and provocative elements of the 1. See Hom. 2.38–41, 48–52; 3.3–5,10; 3.50. While the notion of false pericopes may be fueled by Gnostic threats, other second-century Christians (some Gnostic Christians as well) seem to be experimenting with this kind of critical evaluation of the Pentateuch. See, for example, Flor. (discussed below). Theophilus of Antioch advances the idea that Jesus’ teaching adjudicates Scripture as true or false. On this point, see Robert M. Grant, Greek Apologists of the Second Century (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988), 162, 171–72. 51 Pseudo-Clementine Homilies,” which functions as “a central element of the Homilies’ defense of the oneness and goodness of God.”2 Scholarly discussion concerning the Pseudo-Clementines in general has been largely dominated by source-critical interests. And yet, “although the doctrine of the false pericopes is generally acknowledged to be an important feature of the Homilies, it has been the subject of few focused studies.”3 According to Georg Strecker, the theory developed during a (later) period when Jewish and Gnostic interpreters were eager to explain the nature of scriptural contradictions. Thus Strecker claims that the theory of the false pericopes is to be seen as an expression of (later) “rationalistic” exegetical approaches.4 In a similar way, Hans Joachim Schoeps says, “It must be observed that the biblical criticism of the Kērygmata Petrou is thoroughly permeated with rationalism, its distinctive feature.”5 According to Strecker, the theory would have served as a defense against various Gnostic approaches, likely (though not originally) including Marcionite biblical criticism, for example.6 According to Schoeps, however, the theory of the false pericopes would have been quite widespread, and was developed rather early. Various Jewish and early Jewish Christian exegetes (e.g., Ebionites, Marcion, the rabbis) were simultaneously and independently coming to terms with scriptural contradictions.7 Schoeps argues that in particular Ebionites would have appropriated the theory to their own ends, illustrated by their exegesis of especially Matt. 5:17-18: 2. Karl Evan Shuve, “The Doctrine of the False Pericopes and Other Late Antique Approaches to the Problem of Scripture’s Unity,” in Nouvelles intrigues pseudo-clémentines—Plots in the Pseudo-Clementine Romance: Actes du deuxième colloque international sur la littérature apocryphe chrétienne, ed. Frédéric Amsler et al. (Lausanne: Editions du Zebre, 2008), 437. 3. Shuve, “Doctrine of the False Pericopes,” 437. According to Shuve (438), “the doctrine of the false pericopes is best understood as part of the heresiological discourse of the Homilies.” For Georg Strecker’s discussion of the false pericopes, see his Das Judenchristentum in den Pseudoklementinen, 2nd ed., TUGAL (Berlin: Akademie, 1981), 162–87. 4. See Strecker, Das Judenchristentum, 186. Such “rationalistic” considerations will be addressed below, in ch. 6. 5. Hans Joachim Schoeps, Jewish Christianity: Factional Disputes in the...

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