The Trinity Lie and the Fraud in the Name of Saint Ignatius
Introduction to the research:
It is self-evident to textual criticism scholars in the West and objective specialists that the text of the Trinity mentioned in the Gospel of Matthew 28/19 (“Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”) did not exist before the fourth century, specifically when it first appeared in the Sinaiticus manuscript.
For more research on this topic, please read the following link: The Hebrew manuscript of Chem Tov is free of the text of the Trinity:
http://jesus-messiah.com/apologetics...hew-proof.html
But in vain some of their fraudsters tried to prove the authenticity of this text and prove its existence through the writings of the early fathers in their letters... They specifically mentioned Saint Ignatius of Antioch because he is considered the first and oldest saint to have been a disciple of the apostles of Christ, and thus he differs from other fathers of the early church, as he is counted among the apostolic fathers who received knowledge directly from Paul, Peter, and John... Some of them even went so far as to claim that this Ignatius is the same one whom Jesus spoke about in the Gospel of Matthew when he was not... He was still a child and said, “Then Jesus called a little child to Him, and set him in the midst of them. And He said, ‘Truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this little child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.’” And whoever receives one such little child in my name receives me (Matthew 18:2-5).
Father Tadros Yacoub Malaty says, while translating Ignatius in his book “Dictionary of the Church Fathers and Saints with Some Church Figures”:
Ignatius (Ignatius, Ignatius) was born around the year 30 AD. It is said that he grew up in Syria. Some see him as the child whom the Lord Christ carried, presenting him as an example of humility (Matthew 18:2-4).
When the apostles saw his ardent zeal, they ordained him as a bishop of Antioch. Some differed on the identity of the one who ordained him. Some believe that the Apostle Paul ordained Ignatius over the converted nations....
https://st-takla.org/Saints/Coptic-O...Story_247.html
As for Father Athanasius Fahmy George in his book "Introduction to Patrology", he mentioned the same previous words, giving a hint that Ignatius had called himself (God-bearer or Theophorus):
Saint Ignatius gave himself the title "God-bearer" but he did not give an explanation for it. According to tradition, he was that child whom Christ raised in his hands as an example of innocence and righteousness (Matthew 1:18).
This priest even mentioned in the same book that (Saint Ignatius of Antioch (the God-bearer) is the first father and teacher of the Church, and the first great theologian after the apostles... Ignatius was not only the first father and teacher of the Church, but he was also the first church writer to rely in his theological teachings and writings on the enlightenment and guidance of the Holy Spirit)...
https://st-takla.org/books/fr-athnas.../egnatius.html
I say: Therefore, it is not strange that when Christians try to prove the authenticity of the text of the Trinity mentioned in the Gospel of Matthew, they resort to a respected figure like Ignatius when they claim that Ignatius spoke about the Trinity in his letter to Philadelphia. When Christians do this, they do so for several reasons, including that he was born in the first century AD, and it was even said that he was born before the alleged crucifixion of Christ (born approximately in the year 30 AD), and that he was ordained a priest by the Apostle Paul, and that he was a contemporary of the disciples of Christ and received knowledge from them.... He is the first teacher and father of the church, and even the first great theologian after the apostles, and no one before him was ordained a bishop or priest, and the other fathers came after him.... He is the first of the fathers at all....
Thus, the man is a source of trust, and that he mentioned the text of the Trinity found in Matthew in his writings because he was a contemporary of the writers of the Gospels and thus heard this text from them or read it himself and became acquainted with it... and that the Gospels were circulating in His era and the man did not need to search in manuscripts... because he was directly living the inspiration of the Gospel writers without time or place barriers... and thus the man had what was not available to other fathers, as he was an eyewitness to the word and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to the Gospel writers.
But the question remains: Did Ignatius really quote the text of the Trinity from the Gospel of Matthew in his letter to Philadelphia, as the Christians try to falsify?... and the question in another, more comprehensive way: Did any of the fathers of the first century really know anything about the Trinity or about the teachings of the Trinity?... or did this teaching not appear until the end of the second century at the hands of others?
This is what we will try to answer in detail in this research, God willing.
The first topic:
Where did Saint Ignatius quote the text of the Trinity found in Matthew?
Christian critics mention that St. Matthew cited the text of the Trinity found in the Gospel of Matthew 28/19 (Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit) in a letter he wrote to Ignatius to the people of Philadelphia... which, according to them, proves the authenticity of the teachings of the Trinity. And that this teaching has been fixed in the minds of the apostles and fathers since the first century AD... and that it is not a late teaching... Therefore, they needed to prove this Trinity by resorting to the writings of Ignatius and his letter to Philadelphia, in which they found a citation of this text.
Indeed, when we search for Ignatius’s letter to Philadelphia in Chapter IX, entitled:
Chapter IX.—The Old Testament is good: the New Testament is better.
The Old Testament is good, but the New Testament is better.
We find this text:
For those things which the prophets announced, saying, “Until He comes for whom it is reserved, and He shall be the expectation of the Gentiles,”963 have been fulfilled in the Gospel, [our Lord saying,] “Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
And its translation is:
For these things which the prophets announced, saying, “Until He comes for whom it is reserved, and He shall be the expectation of the Gentiles,”963 and the words were fulfilled in the Gospel when the Lord said, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
Link to the Epistle to Philadelphia from the Encyclopedia of the Church Fathers
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.vi.ix.html
Link from another site on St-Takla.org
https://st-takla.org/books/en/ecf/001/0010196.html
Section Two:
When and where did Ignatius write his letters, especially the Epistle to Philadelphia, and what were the circumstances surrounding him at that time:
Father Athanasius Fahmy George says in his book Introduction to the Patrology of the Fathers about Ignatius:
During the persecution launched by Trajan (98-117), the Roman emperor, he was arrested and sentenced to death as prey to the lions in the Colosseum of Rome. We do not know exactly when this was, but it was certainly between the years 107-117 AD. Thus, Ignatius was taken to Rome surrounded by guards whom he himself called "tigers" because of their mistreatment of him. During his journey to Rome, he stopped in the cities of Asia Minor, Philadelphia, Smyrna, Troy... The first to tell us about the texts of these letters was Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, which he sent (except for the Epistle to the Romans) to the Philippians (Philippians 2:13).
https://st-takla.org/books/fr-athnas.../egnatius.html
As for Tadros Yacoub Malti, he said in his previous source:
The saint went out under a heavy guard of ten soldiers, and he was accompanied by two of his churchmen, Philo and Agathopus.
When the soldiers saw the people's love for him and their gathering around him upon his departure, they deliberately mistreated him and treated him with violence and cruelty, so he called them leopards despite his kindness to them, and what the people paid them to be gentle with their bishop... They arrived in Smyrna, where Saint Polycarp, its bishop, received him, and many delegations came from the churches of Ephesus, Trallea, and Magnesia, so he took advantage of the opportunity and wrote letters to these churches.
He sailed by ship from Smyrna to Troas, and the saint also wrote three letters: “To Philadelphia, Smyrna, and Saint Polycarp.”
Ignatius spoke about all of this about himself in his letter to Rome, where he said:
As he wrote in one of his letters: “From Syria to Rome I fought against savage monsters, on land and in the sea, by night and by day, forced to stay among ten leopards, and in the company of soldiers who became worse and more rude the more they tried to show kindness” (From Ignatius’s letter to the Romans)
https://www.antiochpatriarchate.org/ar/page/924/
I said: If the man wrote his letters at a time when he was under the yoke of captivity and the shackles of detention and torture by direct order of the Roman Emperor Trajan and his soldiers who led him in chains to Rome. The man stopped during his torture journey in Smyrna where Polycarp was bishop... He wrote his letters in Troas after he left Smyrna on the ship, including his letter to Philadelphia, which he sent to Polycarp... Polycarp published the letters after the man died, as Father Athanasius Fahmy George confirmed in his previous source.
Ignatius' age is estimated to be 87 years or a little less when he wrote these letters... because he was born in 30 and died in 117 or 107 according to other accounts... Here we ask:
1- What proves to us that Polycarp did not distort the letters of Ignatius because he was the one who published them from him, or that he perhaps attributed them to Ignatius falsely and slanderously?
2- What basically proves to us that Ignatius wrote these letters, especially since he was at this old age and advanced age (about 80 years or more), especially since his guards were very harsh with him and did not leave him alone for a moment, but he described them saying that they were like leopards and tigers, as Tadros Malti said: They deliberately abused him and treated him with all violence and cruelty, to the point that he called them leopards, and Athanasius Fahmy confirmed the same words saying: Thus, Ignatius was taken to Rome surrounded by guards whom he himself called "tigers" for their mistreatment of him. So
did guards with these descriptions really let him write... And if they did let him, was he the one who wrote it himself at this advanced age where a person is not able to carry his body, let alone his pen? Or was it someone else who wrote his letters?... And if someone else was the one who wrote to him, then who is the one who wrote them on his behalf and how reliable and trustworthy is he?
The third topic:
Are all of Ignatius' letters authentic, and is the letter to Philadelphia among the original letters or the forged ones?
Athanasius Fahmy George says:
Saint Ignatius wrote seven letters in the last days of his life:
* The letters are: the letters to the Ephesians, to Magnesia, to Tralles, and to the Romans, written from Smyrna (Izmir).
As for the letters to Philadelphia, Smyrna, and the letter to Polycarp, they were written from Troas (Troas).
* The first to tell us about the texts of these letters is Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, which he sent (except for the letter to the Romans) to the Philippians (Philippians 2:13).
* There are other letters attributed to Saint Ignatius, but they date back to the fourth century and are not from his writings.
https://st-takla.org/books/fr-athnas.../egnatius.html
The seven letters that are considered authentic as mentioned by Eusebius, the famous church historian in the first half of the fourth century, are:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignatius_of_Antioch
The Epistle to the Ephesians
The Epistle to the Magnesians
The Epistle to the Caesarea Trales
The Epistle to the Romans
The Epistle to the Philadelphians The Epistle to
the Smyrnaians
The Epistle to Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna
in the fifth century AD, was added to its original collection with false letters, and some of the original letters were replaced by interpolations, which were inserted to recruit Ignatius after his death as a witness to the theological disputes of that era.
The false letters of Ignatius:
Epistle to the Tarsians
Epistle to the Antiochians
Epistle to Hero, a deacon in Antioch Deacon of Antioch
Epistle to the Philippians
Epistle of Maria the Proselyte to Ignatius
Epistle to Mary at Neapolis, Zarbus
First Epistle to St. John Second Epistle to St. John
Epistle
of Ignatius to the Virgin Mary.
I said this is conclusive evidence that some letters were forged in his name by the man belonging to the fourth century AD... or the fifth century
Writing
in 1886, Presbyterian minister
and church historian William Dool Killen asserted none of the Ignatian epistles were authentic. Instead, he argued that Callixtus, bishop of Rome, pseudepigraphically wrote the letters around 220 CE to garner support for a monarchical episcopate, modeling the renowned Saint Ignatius after his own life to give precedent for his own authority.[18]:137 Killen contrasted this episcopal polity with the presbyterian polity in the writings of Polycarp
. He argued that Callixtus, bishop of Rome, pseudepigraphically wrote the letters around 220 CE to garner support for a monarchical episcopate, modeling the renowned Saint Ignatius after his own life to give precedent for his own authority. Killen contrasted this episcopal polity with the presbyterian polity in the writings of Polycarp. It is now the universal
opinion
of critics, that the first eight of these professedly Ignatian letters are spurious. They bear in themselves indubitable proofs of being the production of a later age than that in which Ignatius lived. Neither Eusebius nor Jerome makes the least reference to them; and they are now by common consent set aside as forgeries, which were at various dates, and to serve special purposes, put forth under the name of the celebrated Bishop of
Antioch .
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.vihtml/
I said: So the aforementioned letters, whose authenticity is confirmed (this topic also needs research, but this is not the place for it now), are seven letters, including the Letter of Philadelphia, which contains the text of the Trinity found in the Gospel of Matthew... and there are other letters, eight or nine in number, that are forged and inserted in the man’s name...
The fourth topic:
How did the letters of Ignatius reach us, and what is the theory of groups?
His letters have come down to us in three groups: the short, the long and the abridged. The short ones are the original ones, and a Greek manuscript (second century) has preserved these letters for us, but it does not include the letter to the Romans. The oldest text that preserves this letter dates back to the tenth century. In the fourth century, someone took care of them and altered them, adding to them and making them groups that include thirteen letters instead of seven. In addition to the letters to the churches of Ephesus, Magnesia, Tyrrell, Rome, Philadelphia, Smyrna and Polycarp, he included letters to Antioch, Tarsus, Philippi, Heron and Mary the Capsul, and the letter of the latter to Ignatius. These letters remained a subject of controversy among biblical scholars and evangelists. Some said that they were forged, while others said that they were authentic. Then came Lightfool, Haranck, Zahn and Funk, who succeeded in proving their authenticity with internal and external evidence, and all those who said that they were forged were silent. These letters became among the best remaining works of the early fathers. We possess two Greek recensions, a shorter and a longer It is plain that one or other of these exhibits a corrupt text, and scholars have for the most part agreed to accept the shorter form as representing thegenuine letters of Ignatius . Archp
. Usher (1644), Isaac Vossius (1646), J.B. Cotelerius (1672), Dr. T. Smith (I709), and others,… came to be generally accepted in their shorter form as the genuine writings of Ignatius. But although the shorter form of the Ignatian letters had been generally accepted in preference to the longer, there was still a pretty prevalent opinion among scholars, that even it could not be regarded as absolutely free from interpolations, or as of undoubted authenticity. Thus said Lardner, in his Credibility of the Gospel History (1743): “have carefully compared the two editions, and am very well satisfied, upon that comparison, that the larger is an interpolation of the smaller, and not the smaller an epitome or abridgment of the larger. ….”
Although the short texts of Ignatius were accepted as the original texts instead of the long letters, there was a prevailing opinion among specialized scholars that even the short texts of Ignatius' letters may not be free from distortion and interpolation. This expression of uncertainty was repeated in substance by Jortin (1751)
, Mosheim (1755), Griesbach (1768), Rosenmüller (1795), Neander (1826), and many others; some going so far as to deny that we have any authentic remains of Ignatius at all, while others, though admitting the seven shorter letters as being probably his, yet strongly suspected that they were not free from interpolation
. And many others... Some have even gone so far as to deny that there is anything original from Ignatius's writings left at all, while others nevertheless acknowledge that the seven short letters may indeed be his writings but they doubt that they were not entirely free from distortion either.
See: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.vihtml/
The conclusion of this discussion is that Ignatius' letters came in more than one short and long form and that the original text of Ignatius is the short letters while the long letters circulating today are nothing but a mere distortion inserted in Ignatius' name.
The fifth and final discussion:
Was the text of the Trinity found in Matthew 28/19 mentioned by Ignatius in the distorted long letters or in the original short text?
Now that we have proven that the letters of Ignatius are between long and distorted, and between short and original, the answer to the research question remains:
Is the text of the Trinity that was found in the writings of Ignatius and is alleged to have been taken from the Gospel of Matthew 28/19.. Is this a text found in the long letters of Ignatius with added commentaries and revisions or in his short letters that are judged to be authentic and accurate?
In fact, and without any doubt, we say that the text of the Trinity contained in the letter of Ignatius to the Philadelphians... is found in the text with added revisions and interpolations and is not among the original words of Ignatius contained in his short letters.. In order to be sure of this, we must put a link to the long texts that have been expanded and revised and to which commentaries have been added that are not from the words of Ignatius.. and another link to the original text of the short letter that is free of any additions or insertions hidden between its folds.
Link to the extended text with the text on the Trinity added from the Encyclopedia of the Apostolic Fathers
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.vi.ix.html
This site contains not only the extended letters of Ignatius, which are interpolated with words not written by Ignatius, but also the text of the other eight forged letters of Ignatius that were added later under his name in the fourth or fifth century...
The Old Testament is good: the New Testament is better The priests indeed are good, but the High Priest is
better ; to whom the holy of holies has been committed, and who alone has been trusted with the secrets of God. He is the door of the Father, by which enter in Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the prophets, and the apostles, and the Church. All these have for their object the attaining to the unity of God. But the Gospel possesses something transcendent [above the former dispensation], viz., the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ, His passion and resurrection. For the prophets announced Him, but the Gospel is the perfection of immortality. All these things are good together, if you believe in love . And as we see, it is completely devoid of any mention or reference, near or far, to the text of the Trinity contained in the long, revised, distorted letter, “our Lord saying,] “Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” The summary and conclusion of the research:
Father Tadros Yacoub Malaty says, while translating Ignatius in his book “Dictionary of the Church Fathers and Saints with Some Church Figures”:
Ignatius (Ignatius, Ignatius) was born around the year 30 AD. It is said that he grew up in Syria. Some see him as the child whom the Lord Christ carried, presenting him as an example of humility (Matthew 18:2-4).
When the apostles saw his ardent zeal, they ordained him as a bishop of Antioch. Some differed on the identity of the one who ordained him. Some believe that the Apostle Paul ordained Ignatius over the converted nations....
https://st-takla.org/Saints/Coptic-O...Story_247.html
As for Father Athanasius Fahmy George in his book "Introduction to Patrology", he mentioned the same previous words, giving a hint that Ignatius had called himself (God-bearer or Theophorus):
Saint Ignatius gave himself the title "God-bearer" but he did not give an explanation for it. According to tradition, he was that child whom Christ raised in his hands as an example of innocence and righteousness (Matthew 1:18).
This priest even mentioned in the same book that (Saint Ignatius of Antioch (the God-bearer) is the first father and teacher of the Church, and the first great theologian after the apostles... Ignatius was not only the first father and teacher of the Church, but he was also the first church writer to rely in his theological teachings and writings on the enlightenment and guidance of the Holy Spirit)...
https://st-takla.org/books/fr-athnas.../egnatius.html
I say: Therefore, it is not strange that when Christians try to prove the authenticity of the text of the Trinity mentioned in the Gospel of Matthew, they resort to a respected figure like Ignatius when they claim that Ignatius spoke about the Trinity in his letter to Philadelphia. When Christians do this, they do so for several reasons, including that he was born in the first century AD, and it was even said that he was born before the alleged crucifixion of Christ (born approximately in the year 30 AD), and that he was ordained a priest by the Apostle Paul, and that he was a contemporary of the disciples of Christ and received knowledge from them.... He is the first teacher and father of the church, and even the first great theologian after the apostles, and no one before him was ordained a bishop or priest, and the other fathers came after him.... He is the first of the fathers at all....
Thus, the man is a source of trust, and that he mentioned the text of the Trinity found in Matthew in his writings because he was a contemporary of the writers of the Gospels and thus heard this text from them or read it himself and became acquainted with it... and that the Gospels were circulating in His era and the man did not need to search in manuscripts... because he was directly living the inspiration of the Gospel writers without time or place barriers... and thus the man had what was not available to other fathers, as he was an eyewitness to the word and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to the Gospel writers.
But the question remains: Did Ignatius really quote the text of the Trinity from the Gospel of Matthew in his letter to Philadelphia, as the Christians try to falsify?... and the question in another, more comprehensive way: Did any of the fathers of the first century really know anything about the Trinity or about the teachings of the Trinity?... or did this teaching not appear until the end of the second century at the hands of others?
This is what we will try to answer in detail in this research, God willing.
The first topic:
Where did Saint Ignatius quote the text of the Trinity found in Matthew?
Christian critics mention that St. Matthew cited the text of the Trinity found in the Gospel of Matthew 28/19 (Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit) in a letter he wrote to Ignatius to the people of Philadelphia... which, according to them, proves the authenticity of the teachings of the Trinity. And that this teaching has been fixed in the minds of the apostles and fathers since the first century AD... and that it is not a late teaching... Therefore, they needed to prove this Trinity by resorting to the writings of Ignatius and his letter to Philadelphia, in which they found a citation of this text.
Indeed, when we search for Ignatius’s letter to Philadelphia in Chapter IX, entitled:
Chapter IX.—The Old Testament is good: the New Testament is better.
The Old Testament is good, but the New Testament is better.
We find this text:
For those things which the prophets announced, saying, “Until He comes for whom it is reserved, and He shall be the expectation of the Gentiles,”963 have been fulfilled in the Gospel, [our Lord saying,] “Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
And its translation is:
For these things which the prophets announced, saying, “Until He comes for whom it is reserved, and He shall be the expectation of the Gentiles,”963 and the words were fulfilled in the Gospel when the Lord said, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
Link to the Epistle to Philadelphia from the Encyclopedia of the Church Fathers
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.vi.ix.html
Link from another site on St-Takla.org
https://st-takla.org/books/en/ecf/001/0010196.html
Section Two:
When and where did Ignatius write his letters, especially the Epistle to Philadelphia, and what were the circumstances surrounding him at that time:
Father Athanasius Fahmy George says in his book Introduction to the Patrology of the Fathers about Ignatius:
During the persecution launched by Trajan (98-117), the Roman emperor, he was arrested and sentenced to death as prey to the lions in the Colosseum of Rome. We do not know exactly when this was, but it was certainly between the years 107-117 AD. Thus, Ignatius was taken to Rome surrounded by guards whom he himself called "tigers" because of their mistreatment of him. During his journey to Rome, he stopped in the cities of Asia Minor, Philadelphia, Smyrna, Troy... The first to tell us about the texts of these letters was Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, which he sent (except for the Epistle to the Romans) to the Philippians (Philippians 2:13).
https://st-takla.org/books/fr-athnas.../egnatius.html
As for Tadros Yacoub Malti, he said in his previous source:
The saint went out under a heavy guard of ten soldiers, and he was accompanied by two of his churchmen, Philo and Agathopus.
When the soldiers saw the people's love for him and their gathering around him upon his departure, they deliberately mistreated him and treated him with violence and cruelty, so he called them leopards despite his kindness to them, and what the people paid them to be gentle with their bishop... They arrived in Smyrna, where Saint Polycarp, its bishop, received him, and many delegations came from the churches of Ephesus, Trallea, and Magnesia, so he took advantage of the opportunity and wrote letters to these churches.
He sailed by ship from Smyrna to Troas, and the saint also wrote three letters: “To Philadelphia, Smyrna, and Saint Polycarp.”
Ignatius spoke about all of this about himself in his letter to Rome, where he said:
As he wrote in one of his letters: “From Syria to Rome I fought against savage monsters, on land and in the sea, by night and by day, forced to stay among ten leopards, and in the company of soldiers who became worse and more rude the more they tried to show kindness” (From Ignatius’s letter to the Romans)
https://www.antiochpatriarchate.org/ar/page/924/
I said: If the man wrote his letters at a time when he was under the yoke of captivity and the shackles of detention and torture by direct order of the Roman Emperor Trajan and his soldiers who led him in chains to Rome. The man stopped during his torture journey in Smyrna where Polycarp was bishop... He wrote his letters in Troas after he left Smyrna on the ship, including his letter to Philadelphia, which he sent to Polycarp... Polycarp published the letters after the man died, as Father Athanasius Fahmy George confirmed in his previous source.
Ignatius' age is estimated to be 87 years or a little less when he wrote these letters... because he was born in 30 and died in 117 or 107 according to other accounts... Here we ask:
1- What proves to us that Polycarp did not distort the letters of Ignatius because he was the one who published them from him, or that he perhaps attributed them to Ignatius falsely and slanderously?
2- What basically proves to us that Ignatius wrote these letters, especially since he was at this old age and advanced age (about 80 years or more), especially since his guards were very harsh with him and did not leave him alone for a moment, but he described them saying that they were like leopards and tigers, as Tadros Malti said: They deliberately abused him and treated him with all violence and cruelty, to the point that he called them leopards, and Athanasius Fahmy confirmed the same words saying: Thus, Ignatius was taken to Rome surrounded by guards whom he himself called "tigers" for their mistreatment of him. So
did guards with these descriptions really let him write... And if they did let him, was he the one who wrote it himself at this advanced age where a person is not able to carry his body, let alone his pen? Or was it someone else who wrote his letters?... And if someone else was the one who wrote to him, then who is the one who wrote them on his behalf and how reliable and trustworthy is he?
The third topic:
Are all of Ignatius' letters authentic, and is the letter to Philadelphia among the original letters or the forged ones?
Athanasius Fahmy George says:
Saint Ignatius wrote seven letters in the last days of his life:
* The letters are: the letters to the Ephesians, to Magnesia, to Tralles, and to the Romans, written from Smyrna (Izmir).
As for the letters to Philadelphia, Smyrna, and the letter to Polycarp, they were written from Troas (Troas).
* The first to tell us about the texts of these letters is Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, which he sent (except for the letter to the Romans) to the Philippians (Philippians 2:13).
* There are other letters attributed to Saint Ignatius, but they date back to the fourth century and are not from his writings.
https://st-takla.org/books/fr-athnas.../egnatius.html
The seven letters that are considered authentic as mentioned by Eusebius, the famous church historian in the first half of the fourth century, are:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignatius_of_Antioch
The Epistle to the Ephesians
The Epistle to the Magnesians
The Epistle to the Caesarea Trales
The Epistle to the Romans
The Epistle to the Philadelphians The Epistle to
the Smyrnaians
The Epistle to Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna
in the fifth century AD, was added to its original collection with false letters, and some of the original letters were replaced by interpolations, which were inserted to recruit Ignatius after his death as a witness to the theological disputes of that era.
The false letters of Ignatius:
Epistle to the Tarsians
Epistle to the Antiochians
Epistle to Hero, a deacon in Antioch Deacon of Antioch
Epistle to the Philippians
Epistle of Maria the Proselyte to Ignatius
Epistle to Mary at Neapolis, Zarbus
First Epistle to St. John Second Epistle to St. John
Epistle
of Ignatius to the Virgin Mary.
I said this is conclusive evidence that some letters were forged in his name by the man belonging to the fourth century AD... or the fifth century
Writing
in 1886, Presbyterian minister
and church historian William Dool Killen asserted none of the Ignatian epistles were authentic. Instead, he argued that Callixtus, bishop of Rome, pseudepigraphically wrote the letters around 220 CE to garner support for a monarchical episcopate, modeling the renowned Saint Ignatius after his own life to give precedent for his own authority.[18]:137 Killen contrasted this episcopal polity with the presbyterian polity in the writings of Polycarp
. He argued that Callixtus, bishop of Rome, pseudepigraphically wrote the letters around 220 CE to garner support for a monarchical episcopate, modeling the renowned Saint Ignatius after his own life to give precedent for his own authority. Killen contrasted this episcopal polity with the presbyterian polity in the writings of Polycarp. It is now the universal
opinion
of critics, that the first eight of these professedly Ignatian letters are spurious. They bear in themselves indubitable proofs of being the production of a later age than that in which Ignatius lived. Neither Eusebius nor Jerome makes the least reference to them; and they are now by common consent set aside as forgeries, which were at various dates, and to serve special purposes, put forth under the name of the celebrated Bishop of
Antioch .
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.vihtml/
I said: So the aforementioned letters, whose authenticity is confirmed (this topic also needs research, but this is not the place for it now), are seven letters, including the Letter of Philadelphia, which contains the text of the Trinity found in the Gospel of Matthew... and there are other letters, eight or nine in number, that are forged and inserted in the man’s name...
The fourth topic:
How did the letters of Ignatius reach us, and what is the theory of groups?
His letters have come down to us in three groups: the short, the long and the abridged. The short ones are the original ones, and a Greek manuscript (second century) has preserved these letters for us, but it does not include the letter to the Romans. The oldest text that preserves this letter dates back to the tenth century. In the fourth century, someone took care of them and altered them, adding to them and making them groups that include thirteen letters instead of seven. In addition to the letters to the churches of Ephesus, Magnesia, Tyrrell, Rome, Philadelphia, Smyrna and Polycarp, he included letters to Antioch, Tarsus, Philippi, Heron and Mary the Capsul, and the letter of the latter to Ignatius. These letters remained a subject of controversy among biblical scholars and evangelists. Some said that they were forged, while others said that they were authentic. Then came Lightfool, Haranck, Zahn and Funk, who succeeded in proving their authenticity with internal and external evidence, and all those who said that they were forged were silent. These letters became among the best remaining works of the early fathers. We possess two Greek recensions, a shorter and a longer It is plain that one or other of these exhibits a corrupt text, and scholars have for the most part agreed to accept the shorter form as representing thegenuine letters of Ignatius . Archp
. Usher (1644), Isaac Vossius (1646), J.B. Cotelerius (1672), Dr. T. Smith (I709), and others,… came to be generally accepted in their shorter form as the genuine writings of Ignatius. But although the shorter form of the Ignatian letters had been generally accepted in preference to the longer, there was still a pretty prevalent opinion among scholars, that even it could not be regarded as absolutely free from interpolations, or as of undoubted authenticity. Thus said Lardner, in his Credibility of the Gospel History (1743): “have carefully compared the two editions, and am very well satisfied, upon that comparison, that the larger is an interpolation of the smaller, and not the smaller an epitome or abridgment of the larger. ….”
Although the short texts of Ignatius were accepted as the original texts instead of the long letters, there was a prevailing opinion among specialized scholars that even the short texts of Ignatius' letters may not be free from distortion and interpolation. This expression of uncertainty was repeated in substance by Jortin (1751)
, Mosheim (1755), Griesbach (1768), Rosenmüller (1795), Neander (1826), and many others; some going so far as to deny that we have any authentic remains of Ignatius at all, while others, though admitting the seven shorter letters as being probably his, yet strongly suspected that they were not free from interpolation
. And many others... Some have even gone so far as to deny that there is anything original from Ignatius's writings left at all, while others nevertheless acknowledge that the seven short letters may indeed be his writings but they doubt that they were not entirely free from distortion either.
See: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.vihtml/
The conclusion of this discussion is that Ignatius' letters came in more than one short and long form and that the original text of Ignatius is the short letters while the long letters circulating today are nothing but a mere distortion inserted in Ignatius' name.
The fifth and final discussion:
Was the text of the Trinity found in Matthew 28/19 mentioned by Ignatius in the distorted long letters or in the original short text?
Now that we have proven that the letters of Ignatius are between long and distorted, and between short and original, the answer to the research question remains:
Is the text of the Trinity that was found in the writings of Ignatius and is alleged to have been taken from the Gospel of Matthew 28/19.. Is this a text found in the long letters of Ignatius with added commentaries and revisions or in his short letters that are judged to be authentic and accurate?
In fact, and without any doubt, we say that the text of the Trinity contained in the letter of Ignatius to the Philadelphians... is found in the text with added revisions and interpolations and is not among the original words of Ignatius contained in his short letters.. In order to be sure of this, we must put a link to the long texts that have been expanded and revised and to which commentaries have been added that are not from the words of Ignatius.. and another link to the original text of the short letter that is free of any additions or insertions hidden between its folds.
Link to the extended text with the text on the Trinity added from the Encyclopedia of the Apostolic Fathers
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.vi.ix.html
This site contains not only the extended letters of Ignatius, which are interpolated with words not written by Ignatius, but also the text of the other eight forged letters of Ignatius that were added later under his name in the fourth or fifth century...
The Old Testament is good: the New Testament is better The priests indeed are good, but the High Priest is
better ; to whom the holy of holies has been committed, and who alone has been trusted with the secrets of God. He is the door of the Father, by which enter in Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the prophets, and the apostles, and the Church. All these have for their object the attaining to the unity of God. But the Gospel possesses something transcendent [above the former dispensation], viz., the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ, His passion and resurrection. For the prophets announced Him, but the Gospel is the perfection of immortality. All these things are good together, if you believe in love . And as we see, it is completely devoid of any mention or reference, near or far, to the text of the Trinity contained in the long, revised, distorted letter, “our Lord saying,] “Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” The summary and conclusion of the research:
1- Ignatius is the first of the Church Fathers ever to have been taught by the apostles of Christ.
2- Ignatius wrote seven original letters (this matter is still under consideration by scholars) and eight forged letters belonging to the fourth or fifth century.
3- The Philadelphian Letter, which contains the alleged text of the Trinity, is among the seven original letters and is not among the eight forged letters belonging to the fourth or fifth century.
4- All of Ignatius’s seven original letters come in either long, short, or abbreviated form.
5- Only Ignatius’s short letters are original, while the long and abbreviated letters are distorted and have words inserted into them that were not
6- The alleged text of the Trinity that Ignatius quoted from Matthew is not found in the original short text, but rather in the distorted long text.
Thus, we have proven that the first and most important father of the first century AD knew nothing about the teachings of the Trinity, and that what is found in his writings regarding the Trinity was deliberately inserted by others, and that the man is completely innocent of this thought and these ancient pagan myths...
Our question remains: Is there any of the Christian fathers of the first century AD who mentioned anything about the teachings of the Trinity in any of his writings...? I
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