The reconstruction of the pauline 10-letter-collection, methodological considerations

I have sketched a few preliminary methodological considerations which might become part of the introduction to the volumes on the reconstruction of the pauline 10-letter-collection which is almost finished. Any feedback is most welcome! 

Methodological considerations

1. According to the retrospective approach, which I have reflected on in more detail elsewhere,[1] every methodological consideration begins with the realisation that the beginning and approach of a research project are one, if not the decisive factor in setting the course for the observations to be made.

2. This approach includes critical reflection on one's own assumptions and a possible transparency of the explicit and, more importantly, implicit assumptions.

3. The prerequisites for what is attempted here in terms of reconstruction are the history and tradition on which this work is based, which is set out in the history of research. These preconditions also include the current intellectual discourse of which it is a part and about which I have attempted to give an account in the aforementioned work, as well as the projective future with which it intends to shape history, tradition, discourse and social future, as set out there.

4. In the sense of an open, fair, multicultural and interreligious future on our small earth, the aim of the investigation is to recognise and present the prerequisites for historically or traditionally grown patterns of explanation, to examine them for their rational reliability and, if necessary, to deconstruct them in order to enable a conversation beyond disciplines, denominations, religions and all worldviews.

5. A deconstructive, fundamental scepticism towards all inherited constructs takes the place of historically or traditionally grown patterns of explanation, with the aim of offering a transparent construction of explanations that should be comprehensible, correctable or falsifiable.

6. With regard to the present object of investigation, this deconstructive-constructive approach begins with the questioning of all traditional dating of testimonies with which we are concerned, unless they can be historically localised.

7. Such localisation (temporally and locally) begins with the materiality that is central to the current discourse, i.e. with manuscripts, papyri and the like, not with critical editions, even if the use of such editions is indispensable due to the breadth of the subject under investigation.

8. This does not mean that testimonies can only be as old as their first tangible appearance indicates. However, any assumption about their greater age beyond this appearance must be regarded as a hypothesis, which has a stronger burden of justification the further back in time it seeks to historically locate the testimony beyond its appearance.

9. To concretise these methodological considerations with regard to our object of observation: The investigation does not begin with Paul, his letters, with the Gospels or with any other early Christian writings, it begins with the first historical appearance of testimonies. This happens in two temporal layers and at different locations. As far as we have historical information, early Christian writings first appear in two collection contexts:

- in the late second century, books III-V of Irenaeus, Adversus haereses, suggest a larger collection of such writings. In these books it is argued and quoted from texts that this collection contained four Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, probably 14 Pauline letters (perhaps only 13, as the Epistle to Philemon is not listed), Catholic letters and the Apocalypse of John. Irenaeus wrote in Lyon around 177 AD, but came from Syria, described Polycarp of Smyrna as his teacher and had contacts in Rome.

- Before the middle of the second century, according to the witness from the early third century, Tertullian, and other witnesses from the second and later centuries, Marcion of Sinope, a shipowner who ran a teaching centre, is said to have brought writings from his home in Pontus to Rome. Witnesses attribute a collection published in Rome to him, which he is said to have called the "New Testament" and which, according to a preface, the Antitheses, contained a Gospel and 10 Pauline letters.

It is and remains unclear when, where and by whom any of the writings contained in these two collections were written, how they were combined into one collection, whether they were edited for these collections and, if so, who edited them and how, unless further external evidence or internal reasons for more detailed historical determinations can be cited.