Ebionites (, Ebionaioi, derived from Hebrew  ebyonim, ebionim, meaning 'the poor' or 'poor ones') as a term refers to a Jewish Christian sect who were vegetarians, viewed poverty as holy, believed in ritual ablutions, and rejected animal sacrifices.
They existed during the early centuries of the Common Era.The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church.
Oxford University Press; 2005. .
p. 526–.
The Ebionites embraced an adoptionist Christology, thus understanding Jesus of Nazareth as a mere man who, by virtue of his righteousness, was chosen by God to be a true prophet.
A majority of the Ebionites rejected as heresies the proto-orthodox Christian beliefs in Jesus's divinity and virgin birth.Bart D. Ehrman.
Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew.
Oxford University Press; 2005. .
p. 102– They maintained that Jesus was the natural son of Joseph and Mary who became the Messiah because he obeyed the Jewish law.
Accordingly, the Ebionites insisted on the necessity of following the Written Law of Moses alone (without the Oral Law); used one, some or all of the Jewish–Christian gospels, such as the Gospel of the Ebionites, as additional scripture to the Hebrew Bible; and revered James the Just as an exemplar of righteousness and the true successor to Jesus (rather than Peter), while rejecting Paul as a false apostle and an apostate from the Law., an abridgement
Since historical records by the Ebionites are scarce, fragmentary and disputed, much of what is known or conjectured about them derives from the Church Fathers who saw all Jewish Christians as Ebionites and confused different groups in their polemics whom they labeled heretical "Judaizers".A Companion to Second-Century Christian 'Heretics'.
BRILL; 2008. .
p. 267–.
Consequently, very little about the Ebionite sect or sects is known with certainty, and most, if not all, statements about them are speculative.
The Church Fathers consider the Ebionites identical with other Jewish Christian sects, such as the Nazarenes.Jeffrey Butz, The Secret Legacy of Jesus, , "In fact, the Ebionites and the Nazarenes are one and the same." pg.
124; "Following the devastation of the Jewish War, the Nazarenes took refuge in Pella, a community in exile, where they lay in anxious wait with their fellow Jews.
From this point on it is preferable to call them the Ebionites.
There was no clear demarcation or formal transition from Nazarene to Ebionite; there was no sudden change of theology or Christology.", pg.
137; "While the writings of later church fathers speak of Nazarenes and Ebionites as if they were different Jewish Christian groups, they are mistaken in that assessment.
The Nazarenes and the Ebionites were one and the same group, but for clarity we will refer to the pre-70 group in Jerusalem as Nazarenes, and the post-70 group in Pella and elsewhere as Ebionites.", pg.
137; Name
The hellenized Hebrew term Ebionite (Ebionai) was first applied by Irenaeus in the second century without making mention of Nazarenes (c.180 CE).Antti Marjanen, Petri Luomanen "A companion to second-century Christian "heretics" p250 "It is interesting to note that the Ebionites first appear in the catalogues in the latter half of the second century.
The earliest reference to the Ebionites was included in a catalogue used by Irenaeus in his Refutation and Subversion ..."
Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible 2000 p364 "EBIONITES Name for Jewish Christians first witnessed in Irenaeus (Adv. haer. 1.26.2; Gk. ebionaioi) ca. 180 ce" Origen wrote "for Ebion signifies 'poor' among the Jews, and those Jews who have received Jesus as Christ are called by the name of Ebionites."
Origen, Contra Celsum, II, 1.
Tertullian was the first to write against a heresiarch called Ebion; scholars believe he derived this name from a literal reading of Ebionaioi as 'followers of Ebion', a derivation now considered mistaken for lack of any more substantial references to such a figure.
The term the poor (Greek: ptōkhoí) was still used in its original, more general sense.
Modern Hebrew still uses the Biblical Hebrew term the needy both in histories of Christianity for "Ebionites" () and for almsgiving to the needy at Purim.The Oxford English-Hebrew Dictionary 9780198601722.
History
Emergence
The earliest reference to a sect that might fit the description of the later Ebionites appears in Justin Martyr's Dialogue with Trypho (c. 140).
Justin distinguishes between Jewish Christians who observe the Law of Moses but do not require its observance upon others and those who believe the Mosaic Law to be obligatory on all.Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, 47.
Irenaeus (c. 180) was probably the first to use the term Ebionites to name a sect he labeled heretical "Judaizers" for "stubbornly clinging to the Law".Irenaeus of Lyon, Adversus Haereses I, 26; III,21.
Origen (c. 212) remarks that the name derives from the Hebrew word evyon, meaning 'poor'.Origen, De Principiis, IV, 22.
Epiphanius of Salamis (c. 310–320 – 403) gives the most complete account in his heresiology called Panarion, denouncing eighty heretical sects, among them the Ebionites.Epiphanius of Salamis, Panarion, 30.
Epiphanius mostly gives general descriptions of their religious beliefs and includes quotations from their gospels, which have not survived.
According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, the Ebionite movement "may have arisen about the time of the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem (70 CE)."author not given, Encyclopædia Britannica article Ebionite The tentative dating of the origins of this sect depends on Epiphanius writing three centuries later and relying on information for the Ebionites from the Book of Elchasai, which may not have had anything to do with the Ebionites.Hakkinen, Sakara.
"Ebionites," in Marjanen, Antti, and Petri Luomanen, eds.
A Companion to Second-Century Christian'Heretics.
Vol. 76. Brill, 2008, 257–278, esp.
259
Paul talks of his collection for the "poor among the saints" in the Jerusalem church, but this is generally taken as meaning the poorer members of the church rather than a schismatic sect.Some scholars see the title present already in Paul's references to a collection for the "poor" in Jerusalem (Gal.1:10).
But in Rom.15:26 Paul distinguishes this sect from the other Jerusalem believers by speaking of "the poor among the saints."
In 2 Cor.9:12 Paul further confirms the economic, or literal, aspect by speaking of the collection as making up for "the deficiencies of the saints".
E. Stanley Jones, '"Ebionites", in Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible, Amsterdam University Press, 2000 p. 364.
The actual number of sects described as Ebionites is difficult to ascertain, as the contradictory patristic accounts in their attempt to distinguish various sects sometimes confuse them with each other.
Other sects mentioned are the Carpocratians, the Cerinthians, the Elcesaites, the fourth century Nazarenes and the Sampsaeans, most of whom were Jewish Christian sects who held gnostic or other views rejected by the Ebionites.
Epiphanius, however, mentions that a sect of Ebionites came to embrace some of these views despite keeping their name.
As the Ebionites are first mentioned as such in the second century, their earlier history and any relation to the first Jerusalem church remains obscure and a matter of contention.
There is no evidence linking the origin of the later sect of the Ebionites with the First Jewish-Roman War of 66–70 CE or with the Jerusalem church led by James.
Eusebius relates a tradition, probably based on Aristo of Pella, that the early Christians left Jerusalem just prior to the war and fled to Pella,Eusebius, Church History 3, 5, 3; Epiphanius, Panarion 29,7,7-8; 30, 2, 7; On Weights and Measures 15.
On the flight to Pella see: Jonathan Bourgel, "The Jewish Christians' Move from Jerusalem as a pragmatic choice", in: Dan Jaffe (ed), Studies in Rabbinic Judaism and Early Christianity, (Leyden: Brill, 2010), p. 107-138 Jordan beyond the Jordan River, but does not connect this with Ebionites.G. Uhlhorn, "Ebionites", in: A Religious Encyclopaedia or Dictionary of Biblical, Historical, Doctrinal, and Practical Theology, 3rd ed. (edited by Philip Schaff), p. 684–685 (vol. 2).O. Cullmann, "Ebioniten", in: Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, p. 7435 (vol. 2).
They were led by Simeon of Jerusalem (d. 107) and during the Second Jewish-Roman War of 115–117, they were persecuted by the Jewish followers of Bar Kochba for refusing to recognize his messianic claims.
As late as Epiphanius of Salamis (310–403), members of the Ebionite sect resided in Nabatea, and Paneas, Moabitis, and Kochaba in the region of Bashan, near Adraa.
(citing Epiphanius' Anacephalaiosis 30.18.1.)
From these places, they dispersed and went into Asia (Turkey), Rome and Cyprus.
According to Harnack, the influence of Elchasaites places some Ebionites in the context of the gnostic movements widespread in Syria and the lands to the east.Adolf von Harnack, The History of Dogma, "Chapter VI.
The Christianity of the Jewish Christians", 1907, .
Disappearance
After the end of the First Jewish–Roman War, the importance of the Jerusalem church began to fade.
Jewish Christianity became dispersed throughout the Jewish diaspora in the Levant, where it was slowly eclipsed by Gentile Christianity, which then spread throughout the Roman Empire without competition from Jewish Christian sects.
Once the Jerusalem church was eliminated during the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135, the Ebionites gradually lost influence and followers.
Some modern scholars, such as Hyam Maccoby, argue the decline of the Ebionites was due to marginalization and persecution by both Jews and Christians.
Following the defeat of the rebellion and the expulsion of Jews from Judea, Jerusalem became the Gentile city of Aelia Capitolina.
Many of the Jewish Christians residing at Pella renounced their Jewish practices at this time and joined to the mainstream Christian church.
Those who remained at Pella and continued in obedience to the Law were labeled heretics.
In 375, Epiphanius records the settlement of Ebionites on Cyprus, but by the fifth century, Theodoret of Cyrrhus reported that they were no longer present in the region.
The Ebionites are still attested, if as marginal communities, down to the 7th century.
Some modern scholars argue that the Ebionites survived much longer and identify them with a sect encountered by the historian Abd al-Jabbar ibn Ahmad around the year 1000.
There is another possible reference to Ebionite communities existing around the 11th century in northwestern Arabia in Sefer Ha'masaot, the "Book of the Travels" of Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela, a rabbi from Spain.
These communities were located in two cities, Tayma and "Tilmas", possibly Sa`dah in Yemen.
The 12th century Muslim historian Muhammad al-Shahrastani mentions Jews living in nearby Medina and Hejaz who accepted Jesus as a prophetic figure and followed traditional Judaism, rejecting mainstream Christian views.
Some scholars argue that they contributed to the development of the Islamic view of Jesus due to exchanges of Ebionite remnants with the first Muslims.
Views and practices
Judaism, Gnosticism and Essenism
Most patristic sources portray the Ebionites as Jews who zealously followed the Written Law alone (without the Oral Law), revered Jerusalem as the holiest city and restricted table fellowship only to Gentiles who converted to Judaism.
Some Church Fathers describe some Ebionites as departing from traditional Jewish principles of faith and practice.
For example, Methodius of Olympus stated that the Ebionites believed that the prophets spoke only by their own power and not by the power of the Holy Spirit.
excerpt from St. Methodius of Olympus, Symposium on Virginity, 8.10., "and with regard to the Spirit, such as the Ebionites, who contend that the prophets spoke only by their own power" Epiphanius of Salamis stated that the Ebionites engaged in excessive ritual bathing,Epiphanius, Panarion, 19:28–30.
possessed an angelology which claimed that the Christ is an angel of God who was incarnated in Jesus when he was adopted as the son of God during his baptism,Epiphanius, Panarion, 30, 14, 5.Epiphanius, Panarion, 30, 16, 4–5.
denied parts of the Law deemed obsolete or corrupt,Epiphanius, Panarion, 30, 18, 7–9.
opposed animal sacrifice, practiced Jewish vegetarianismEpiphanius, Panarion, 30.22.4 and celebrated a commemorative meal annually on or around Passover with unleavened bread and water only, in contrast to the daily Christian Eucharist.Irenaeus of Lyon, Against HeresiesV, 1.
The reliability of Epiphanius' account of the Ebionites is questioned by some scholars.
Modern scholar Shlomo Pines, for example, argues that the heterodox views and practices he ascribes to some Ebionites originated in Gnostic Christianity rather than Jewish Christianity and are characteristics of the Elcesaite sect, which Epiphanius mistakenly attributed to the Ebionites.
While mainstream biblical scholars do suppose some Essene influence on the nascent Jewish Christian church in some organizational, administrative and cultic respects, some scholars go beyond that assumption.
Regarding the Ebionites specifically, a number of scholars have different theories on how the Ebionites may have developed from an Essene Jewish messianic sect.
Hans-Joachim Schoeps argues that the conversion of some Essenes to Jewish Christianity after the Siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE may be the source of some Ebionites adopting Essene views and practices, while some conclude that the Essenes did not become Jewish Christians, but still had an influence on the Ebionites.
On John the Baptist
In the Gospel of the Ebionites, as quoted by Epiphanius, John the Baptist and Jesus are portrayed as vegetarians.J Verheyden, Epiphanius on the Ebionites, in The image of the Judaeo-Christians in ancient Jewish and Christian literature, eds Peter J. Tomson, Doris Lambers-Petry, , pp.
188 "The vegetarianism of John the Baptist and of Jesus is an important issue too in the Ebionite interpretation of the Christian life. " p. 102.
"Probably the most interesting of the changes from the familiar New Testament accounts of Jesus comes in the Gospel of the Ebionites description of John the Baptist, who, evidently, like his successor Jesus, maintained a strictly vegetarian cuisine."
p. 13 - Referring to Epiphanius' quotation from the Gospel of the Ebionites in Panarion 30.13, "And his food, it says, was wild honey whose taste was of manna, as cake in oil".
Epiphanius states that the Ebionites had amended "locusts" (Greek akris) to "honey cake" (Greek ekris).
This emendation is not found in any other New Testament manuscript or translation,Textual Apparatus of the UBS Greek New Testament United Bible Societies 1993 - with Peshitta, Old Latin etc.James A. Kelhoffer, The Diet of John the Baptist, , pp.
19–21 though a different vegetarian reading is found in a late Slavonic version of Josephus' War of the Jews.
p. 104 - "And when he had been brought to Archelaus and the doctors of the Law had assembled, they asked him who he is and where he has been until then.
And to this he made answer and spake: I am pure; [for] the Spirit of God hath led me on, and [I live on] cane and roots and tree-food."
Pines and other modern scholars propose that the Ebionites were projecting their own vegetarianism onto John the Baptist.page 39
The strict vegetarianism of the Ebionites may have been a reaction to the cessation of animal sacrifices after the destruction of Jerusalem Temple in 70 CE and a safeguard against the consumption of unclean meat in a pagan environment.Hans-Josef Klauck.
The Apocryphal Gospels: An Introduction.
A&C Black; 1 January 2003. .
p. 52–.
James Tabor, however, argues that Ebionite disdain for eating meat and the Temple sacrifice of animals is due to their preference for the ideal pre-Flood diet and what they took to be the original form of worship.
In this view, the Ebionites had an interest in reviving the traditions inspired by pre-Sinai revelation, especially the time from Enoch to Noah.
On Jesus the Nazarene
The Church Fathers agree that some or all of the Ebionites rejected many of the precepts central to proto-orthodox Christianity, such as Jesus' divinity, pre-existence and virgin birth.
The Ebionites are described as emphasizing the humanity of Jesus as the biological son of Mary and Joseph, who, by virtue of his righteousness in keeping the law perfectly, was adopted as the son of God to fulfill the Jewish scriptures.Bart D. Ehrman.
Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew.
Oxford University Press; 15 September 2005. .
p. 100– According to scholar Bart D. Ehrman, the Ebionites viewed Jesus as the perfect sacrifice who went to the cross for the sins of the world and was raised from the dead and exalted to heaven.
Origen (Contra Celsum 5.61)Schaff A select library of Nicene and post-Nicene fathers of the Christian church 1904 footnote 828 "That there were two different views among the Ebionites as to the birth of Christ is stated frequently by Origen (cf. e.g. Contra Celsum V. 61), but there was unanimity in the denial of his pre-existence and essential divinity, and this constituted the essence of the heresy in the eyes of the Fathers from Irenæus on."
and Eusebius (Historia Ecclesiastica 3.27.3) recognize some variation in the Christology of Ebionite sects; for example, that while all Ebionites denied Jesus' pre-existence, there was a sub-sect which did not deny the virgin birth.International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J p9 Geoffrey W. Bromiley - 1982 article "Ebionites" citing E.H.3.27.3 "There were others, however, besides them, that were of the same name, that avoided the strange and absurd beliefs of the former, and did not deny that the Lord was born of a virgin and of the Holy Spirit.
But nevertheless, inasmuch as they also refused to acknowledge that he pre-existed, being God, Word, and Wisdom, they turned aside into the impiety of the former, especially when they, like them, endeavored to observe strictly the bodily worship of the law."
also source text online at CCEL.org Theodoret, while dependent on earlier writers,Albertus Frederik Johannes Klijn, G. J. Reinink Patristic evidence for Jewish-Christian sects 1973 p. 42 "Irenaeus wrote that these Ebionites used the Gospel of Matthew, which explains Theodoret's remark.
Unlike Eusebius, he did not link Irenaeus' reference to Matthew with Origen's remarks about the "Gospel of the Hebrews"," draws the conclusion that the two sub-sects would have used different gospels.Edwin K. Broadhead Jewish Ways of Following Jesus: Redrawing the Religious Map of Antiquity 2010 p209 "Theodoret describes two groups of Ebionites on the basis of their view of the virgin birth.
Those who deny the virgin birth use the Gospel of the Hebrews; those who accept it use the Gospel of Matthew."
The Ebionites may have used only one, some or all of the Jewish–Christian gospels as additional scripture to the Hebrew Bible.
However, Irenaeus reports that they only used a version of the Gospel of Matthew, which omitted the first two chapters (on the nativity of Jesus) and started with the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist.
The Ebionites appear to have understood Jesus as either the Messiah or a prophetic precursor who heralds the coming kingdom of God on Earth in which two human Messiahs (a Davidic king and an Aaronite high priest) and/or an angelic Messiah (a cosmic judge of the Earth from heaven known as the "Son of man") will reign forever.
Consequently, from the Ebionite point of view, Jesus is believed to have come to fulfill a threefold mission: 1) teach all Israelites to live immediately according to a radical ethic of inward and outward righteousness that will be standard in the Messianic Age; 2) complete the work of Moses by calling for the abolishment of animal sacrifices during a cleansing of the Temple; and 3) die as a moral exemplar (rather than as a substitutionary atonement) to move Israelites to the repentance necessary for personal atonement and national redemption in order to prepare for the world to come.
Therefore, in order to become righteous, achieve communion with GodHippolytus and be saved from annihilation, the Ebionites insisted that both Jews and Gentiles must observe all the commandments in the Written Law (except for those concerning animal sacrifice) but they must be interpreted through Jesus' expounding of the Law (rather than the Oral Law).
On James the Just
Among modern scholars, Robert Eisenman suggests that the Ebionites revered James the Just, brother of Jesus and leader of the Jerusalem church, as the true successor to Jesus (rather than Peter) and an exemplar of righteousness, and therefore they followed the permanent Nazirite vow that James had taken.
One of the popular primary connections of the Ebionites to James is that the Ascents of James in the Pseudo-Clementine literature are related to the Ebionites.Van Voorst The other popularly proposed connection is that mentioned by William Whiston in his 1794 edition of Josephus, where he notes that we learn from fragments of Hegesippus that the Ebionites interpreted a prophecy of Isaiah as foretelling the murder of James.Whiston, W. Antiquities 2008 edition p. 594
Scholars, including Eisenman,Eisenman (1997), e.g. "As presented by Paul, James is the Leader of the early Church par excellence.
Terms like 'Bishop of the Jerusalem Church' or 'Leader of the Jerusalem Community' are of little actual moment at this point, because from the 40s to the 60s CE, when James held sway in Jerusalem, there really were no other centres of any importance."
p. 154 & "there can be little doubt that 'the Poor' was the name for James' Community in Jerusalem or that Community descended from it in the East in the next two-three centuries, the Ebionites."
p. 156 p. 34 - "These "Ebionites" are also the followers of James par excellence, himself considered (even in early Christian accounts) to be the leader of "the Poor" or these selfsame "Ebionites""., p. 145 - "For James 2:5, of course, it is "the Poor of this world ("the Ebionim" or "Ebionites") whom God chose as Heirs to the Kingdom He promised to those that love Him".", p. 273 - "..."the Righteous Teacher" and those of his followers (called "the Poor" or "Ebionim" - in our view, James and his Community, pointedly referred to in the early Church literature, as will by now have become crystal clear, as "the Ebionites" or "the Poor")."
,Pierre-Antoine Bernheim, James, Brother of Jesus,  "The fact that he became the head of the Jerusalem church is something which is generally accepted." from an ABC interview with author.
Will Durant, Michael Goulder, p. 134 "So the 'Ebionite' Christology, which we found first described in Irenaeus about 180 is not the invention of the late second century.
It was the creed of the Jerusalem Church from early times."
Gerd Ludemann, p. 52–53 "Since there is a good century between the end of the Jerusalem community and the writing down of the report quoted above (by Irenaeus), of course reasons must be given why the group of Ebionites should be seen as an offshoot of the Jerusalem community.
The following considerations tell in favor of the historical plausibility of this: 1. The name 'Ebionites' might be the term this group used to denote themselves.
2. Hostility to Paul in the Christian sphere before 70 is attested above all in groups which come from Jerusalem.
3. The same is true of observance of the law culminating in circumcision.
4. The direction of prayer towards Jerusalem makes the derivation of the Ebionites from there probable."
p. 56 - "therefore, it seems that we should conclude that Justin's Jewish Christians are a historical connecting link between the Jewish Christianity of Jerusalem before the year 70 and the Jewish Christian communities summed up in Irenaeus' account of the heretics."
John Painter p. 229 "A connection between early Jerusalem Christianity (the Hebrews) and the later Ebionites is probable." and James Tabor, argue for some form of continuity of the Jerusalem church into the second and third centuries and that the Ebionites regarded James as their leader.
Tabor argues that the Ebionites claimed a dynastic apostolic succession for the relatives of Jesus.The Blessing of Africa: The Bible and African Christianity, Keith Augustus Burton, Intervarsity Press 2007, pp.
116–117.
Conservative Christian scholars, such as Richard Bauckham, hold that James and his circle in the early Jerusalem church held a "high christology" (i.e. Jesus was God incarnate) while the Ebionites held a "low christology" (i.e. Jesus was a mere man adopted by God).Bauckham ‘We may now assert quite confidently that the self-consciously low christology of the later Jewish sect known as the Ebionites does not, as has sometimes been asserted, go back to James and his circle in the early Jerusalem church.’
Richard Bauckham, 'James and Jesus,' in Bruce Chilton, Jacob Neusner, The brother of Jesus: James the Just and his mission, Westminster John Knox Press, 2001, pp.
100–137, p. 135.
As an alternative to the traditional view of Eusebius that the Jewish Jerusalem church gradually adopted the proto-orthodox Christian theology of the Gentile church, Bauckham and others suggest immediate successors to the Jerusalem church under James and the other relatives of Jesus were the Nazarenes who accepted Paul as an "apostle to the Gentiles", while the Ebionites were a later schismatic sect of the early second century that rejected Paul.
Reproduced in part by permission of the author.
On Paul the Apostle
The Ebionites rejected the Pauline Epistles, and according to Origen they viewed Paul as an "apostate from the law".Paul and the Second Century.
A&C Black; 7 July 2011. .
p. 164–.
The Ebionites may have been spiritual and physical descendants of the "super-apostles" — talented and respected Jewish Christian ministers in favour of mandatory circumcision of converts — who sought to undermine Paul in Galatia and Corinth.
Epiphanius relates that the Ebionites opposed Paul, who they saw as responsible for the idea that Gentile Christians did not have to be circumcised or follow the Law of Moses, and named him an apostate.
Epiphanius further relates that some Ebionites alleged that Paul was a Greek who converted to Judaism in order to marry the daughter of a high priest of Israel, but apostatized when she rejected him."[The Ebionites]
declare that he was a Greek [...]
He went up to Jerusalem, they say, and when he had spent some time there, he was seized with a passion to marry the daughter of the priest.
For this reason he became a proselyte and was circumcised.
Then, when he failed to get the girl, he flew into a rage and wrote against circumcision and against the sabbath and the Law " - Epiphanius of Salamis, Panarion 30.16.6–9 Writings
No writings of the Ebionites have survived outside of a few quotes by others and they are in uncertain form.
The Recognitions of Clement and the Clementine Homilies, two third century Christian works, are regarded by general scholarly consensus as largely or entirely Jewish Christian in origin and reflect Jewish Christian beliefs.
The exact relationship between the Ebionites and these writings is debated, but Epiphanius's description of some Ebionites in Panarion 30 bears a striking similarity to the ideas in the Recognitions and Homilies.
Scholar Glenn Alan Koch speculates that Epiphanius likely relied upon a version of the Homilies as a source document.
Some scholars also speculate that the core of the Gospel of Barnabas, beneath a polemical medieval Muslim overlay, may have been based upon an Ebionite or gnostic document.John Toland, Nazarenus, or Jewish, Gentile and Mahometan Christianity, 1718.
The existence and origin of this source continues to be debated by scholars.
John Arendzen classifies the Ebionite writings into four groups.
Gospel of the Ebionites
Irenaeus stated that the Ebionites used the Gospel of Matthew exclusively."
Those who are called Ebionites accept that God made the world.
However, their opinions with respect to the Lord are quite similar to those of Cerinthus and Carpocrates.
They use Matthew's gospel only, and repudiate the Apostle Paul, maintaining that he was an apostate from the Law."
- Irenaeus, Haer 1.26.2 Eusebius of Caesarea wrote that they used only the Gospel of the Hebrews.Eusebius of Caesarea, Church History, III, 27, 4.
From this, the minority view of James R. Edwards and Bodley's Librarian Edward Nicholson claim that there was only one Hebrew gospel in circulation, Matthew's Gospel of the Hebrews.
They also note that the title Gospel of the Ebionites was never used by anyone in the early church.James R. Edwards, The Hebrew Gospel & the Development of the Synoptic Tradition, 2009 Wm.
B. Eerdmans Publishing Co, 2009.
p. 121Nicholson The Gospel according to the Hebrews, 1879 reprinted print on demand BiblioBazaar, LLC, 2009.
pp.
1–81William Whiston & H. Stebbing, The Life and Works of Flavius Josephus, reprinted Vol II, Kessinger Publishing, 2006.
p. 576 Epiphanius contended that the gospel the Ebionites used was written by Matthew and called the "Gospel of the Hebrews".They too accept the Matthew's gospel, and like the followers of Cerinthus and Merinthus, they use it alone.
They call it the Gospel of the Hebrews, for in truth Matthew alone in the New Testament expounded and declared the Gospel in Hebrew using Hebrew script.
- Epiphanius, Panarion 30.3.7 Because Epiphanius said that it was "not wholly complete, but falsified and mutilated",Epiphanius, Panarion 30.13.1 writers such as Walter Richard Cassels and Pierson Parker consider it a different "edition" of Matthew's Hebrew Gospel;Walter Richard Cassels, Supernatural Religion - An Inquiry into the Reality of Divine Revelation, 1877 reprinted print on demand Read Books, 2010.
Vol. 1, p 419- 422Pierson Parker, A Proto-Lukan Basis for the Gospel According to the Hebrews, Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 59, No. 4, 1940.
pp.
471 however, internal evidence from the quotations in Panarion 30.13.4 and 30.13.7 suggest that the text was a gospel harmony originally composed in Greek.
Mainstream scholarly texts, such as the standard edition of the New Testament apocrypha edited by Wilhelm Schneemelcher, generally refer to the text Jerome cites as used by the Ebionites as the Gospel of the Ebionites, though this is not a term current in the early church.Robert Walter Funk, The Gospel of Jesus: according to the Jesus Seminar, Publisher Polebridge Press, 1999.F.L. Cross and E.A. Livingston, The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 1989, Oxford University Press, p. 438–439.
Clementine literature
The collection of New Testament apocrypha known as the Clementine literature included three works known in antiquity as the Circuits of Peter, the Acts of the Apostles and a work usually titled the Ascents of James.
They are specifically referenced by Epiphanius in his polemic against the Ebionites.
The first-named books are substantially contained in the Homilies of Clement under the title of Clement's Compendium of Peter's itinerary sermons and in the Recognitions attributed to Clement.
They form an early Christian didactic fiction to express Jewish Christian views, such as the primacy of James the Just, brother of Jesus; their connection with the episcopal see of Rome; and their antagonism to Simon Magus, as well as gnostic doctrines.
Scholar Robert E. Van Voorst opines of the Ascents of James (R 1.33–71), "There is, in fact, no section of the Clementine literature about whose origin in Jewish Christianity one may be more certain".
Despite this assertion, he expresses reservations that the material is genuinely Ebionite in origin.
Symmachus
Symmachus produced a translation of the Hebrew Bible in Koine Greek, which was used by Jerome and is still extant in fragments, and his lost Hypomnemata,Symmachus' Hypomnemata is mentioned by Eusebius in his Historia Ecclesiae, VI, xvii: "As to these translators it should be stated that Symmachus was an Ebionite.
But the heresy of the Ebionites, as it is called, asserts that Christ was the son of Joseph and Mary, considering him a mere man, and insists strongly on keeping the law in a Jewish manner, as we have seen already in this history.
Commentaries of Symmachus are still extant in which he appears to support this heresy by attacking the Gospel of Matthew.
Origen states that he obtained these and other commentaries of Symmachus on the Scriptures from a certain Juliana, who, he says, received the books by inheritance from Symmachus himself."
; Jerome, De Viris Illustribus, chapter 54, Church History, VI, 17.Jerome, De viris illustribus, 54.
written to counter the canonical Gospel of Matthew.
Although lost, the Hypomnemata is probably identical to De distinctione præceptorum mentioned by Ebed Jesu (Assemani, Bibl. Or., III, 1).
The identity of Symmachus as an Ebionite has been questioned in recent scholarship.
Skarsaune argues that Eusebius may have only inferred that Symmachus was an Ebionite based on his commentaries on certain passages in the Hebrew Scriptures.
E.g., Eusebius mentions Isa 7:14 where Symmachus reads "young woman" based on the Hebrew text rather than "virgin" as in the LXX, and he interprets this commentary as attacking the Gospel of Matthew.(Dem. ev. 7.1)
and (Hist. eccl. 5.17) Elkesaites
Hippolytus of Rome reported that a Jewish Christian, Alcibiades of Apamea, appeared in Rome teaching from a book which he claimed to be the revelation which a righteous man, Elkesai, had received from an angel, though Hippolytus suspected that Alcibiades was himself the author.Gerard P. Luttikhuizen The revelation of Elchasai 1985 p216 Shortly afterwards, Origen recorded a sect, the Elkesaites, with the same beliefs.Antti Marjanen, Petri Luomanen A companion to second-century Christian "heretics" p336 Epiphanius claimed the Ebionites also used this book as a source for some of their beliefs and practices (Panarion 30.17).Philosophumena, IX, 14–17.
Luttikhuizen 1985 "Epiphanius deviates so strikingly from Hippolytus' account of the heresy of Alcibiades that we cannot possibly assume that he is dependent on the Refutation."
Epiphanius, Panarion, 19, 1; 53, 1.
Epiphanius explains the origin of the name Elkesai to be Aramaic El Ksai, meaning "hidden power" (Panarion 19.2.1).
Scholar Petri Luomanen believes the book to have been written originally in Aramaic as a Jewish apocalypse, probably in Babylonia in 116–117.Petri Luomanen (2007) Jewish Christianity Reconsidered pp.
96, 299, 331:note 7 Religious and critical perspectives
Christianity
The mainstream Christian view of the Ebionites is partly based on interpretation of the polemical views of the Church Fathers, who portrayed them as heretics for rejecting many of the proto-orthodox Christian views of Jesus and allegedly having an improper fixation on the Law of Moses at the expense of the grace of God.
In this view, the Ebionites may have been the descendants of a Jewish Christian sect within the early Jerusalem church which broke away from its proto-orthodox theology possibly in reaction to the Council of Jerusalem compromise of 50 CE.
Islam
Islam charges Christianity with having distorted the pure monotheism of the God of Abraham through the doctrines of the Trinity and through the veneration of icons.
Paul Addae and Tim Bowes write that the Ebionites were faithful to the original teachings of the historical Jesus and thus shared Islamic views about Jesus' humanity and also rejected classic and objective theories of atonement,
though the Islamic view of Jesus may conflict with the view of some Ebionites regarding the virgin birth, with Muslims affirming and Ebionites denying, according to Epiphanius.
Hans Joachim Schoeps observes that the Christianity which Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, was likely to have encountered on the Arabian peninsula "was not the state religion of Byzantium but a schismatic Christianity characterized by Ebionite and Monophysite views."
Hans Joachim Schoeps, Jewish Christianity (Philadelphia: 1969), p. 137.
Thus we have a paradox of world-historical proportions, viz., the fact that Jewish Christianity indeed disappeared within the Christian church, but was preserved in Islam and thereby extended some of its basic ideas even to our own day.
According to Islamic doctrine, the Ebionite combination of Moses and Jesus found its fulfillment in Muhammad.ibid., p. 140.
Judaism
The counter-missionary group Jews for Judaism favorably mentions the historical Ebionites in their literature in order to argue that "Messianic Judaism", as promoted by missionary groups such as Jews for Jesus, is Pauline Christianity misrepresenting itself as Judaism.
In 2007, some Messianic commentators expressed concern over a possible existential crisis for the Messianic movement in Israel due to a resurgence of Ebionitism, specifically the problem of Israeli Messianic leaders apostatizing from the belief in the alleged divinity of Jesus.
See also
References
Literature
J. M. Fuller, "Ebionism and Ebionites", in Henry Wace (ed.), A Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature to the End of the Sixth Century A.D., with an Account of the Principal Sects and Heresies.
G. Uhlhorn, "Ebionites", in: Philip Schaff (ed.), A Religious Encyclopaedia or Dictionary of Biblical, Historical, Doctrinal, and Practical Theology, 3rd ed. (1894), p. 684–685 (vol. 2).
Goranson, Stephen.
'Ebionites," in D Freedman (ed.), The Anchor Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), vol. 2, pp.
260–1.
External links
Yahad Ebyoni: Ebionite Jewish Community (archived website of a modern Ebionite revival group founded by Shemayah Phillips in 1985)
