Marcionism or Marcionite Christianity was an early Christian dualistic belief system originating with the teachings of Marcion of Sinope in Rome around 144 AD.115 years and 6 months from the Crucifixion of Jesus, according to Tertullian's reckoning in Adversus Marcionem, XV. Marcion was an early Christian theologian, evangelist, and an important figure in early Christianity. Marcion was born between about 85 and 100 and died around 160. He is reported to have been the son of a bishop of Sinope in Pontus, though nearly all biographical detail about him derives from hostile sources and from a "heretic legend" that later writers extrapolated from his works; Sinope itself first appears as his birthplace in late antique sources. About the middle of the 2nd century (140–155) he traveled to Rome. Irenaeus and other patristic writers present him there as a follower of the Syrian gnostic Cerdo, from whom he is said to have taken the doctrines of the evil creator and the alien good God, but recent scholarship regards the derivation as uncertain and probably unhistorical. Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus into the world as the savior was the true Supreme Being, different and opposed to the malevolent deity, the Demiurge or creator deity, identified with Yahweh in the Hebrew Bible. He considered himself a follower of Paul the Apostle, whom he believed to have been the only true apostle of Jesus.
Marcion's canon, possibly the first Christian biblical canon ever compiled, consisted of eleven books: the Gospel of Marcion, which was a shorter version of the Gospel of Luke, and ten Pauline epistles. Marcion's canon rejected the entire Old Testament, along with all other epistles and gospels of what would become the 27-book canon of the New Testament, which during his life had yet to be compiled.
Marcionism was denounced by its opponents as heresy and written against by the Church Fathers – notably by Tertullian in his five-book treatise Adversus Marcionem (Against Marcion) in about 208. Marcion's writings are lost, though they were widely read and numerous manuscripts must have existed. Even so, many scholars say it is possible to reconstruct a large part of ancient Marcionism through what later critics, especially Tertullian, said concerning Marcion. The movement was widespread, which forced rivalling sects to begin making defences. Marcionites founded Churches across the Roman empire, and their decline is attributed to state intervention by later imperial edicts banning all groups deemed heretical from assembly.
History
According to Tertullian and other writers of early proto-orthodox Christianity, the movement known as Marcionism began with the teachings and excommunication of Marcion around 144. The reason provided by hostile accounts was potentially for being schismatic. Marcion was reportedly a wealthy shipowner, the son of a bishop of Sinope in Pontus, Anatolia. He arrived in Rome c. 139-140, soon after the Bar Kokhba revolt, and is said to have contributed 200,000 sestertius to the church, using his personal wealth to fund an ecclesiastical organization. Marcionism continued to thrive for around 300 years, although Marcionite ideas may have persisted much longer.Arendzen, John. "Marcionites." The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 9, Robert Appleton Company, 1910, www.newadvent.org/cathen/09645c.htm. Accessed 11 July 2026. The organization continued for some centuries later outside the Byzantine Empire in areas which later would be dominated by Manichaeism, particularly as the Sasanian Empire.
Schism within Marcionism By the reign of emperor Commodus (180–192), Marcionism was divided into various opinions with various leaders; among whom was Apelles, whom Rhodo describes as "priding himself on his manner of life and his age, acknowledges one principle, but says that the prophecies are from an opposing principle, being led to this view by the responses of a maiden by name Philumene, who was possessed by a demon". However, "others, among whom were Potitus and Basilicus, held to two principles, as did Marcion himself. Others consider that there are not only two, but three natures. Of these, Syneros was the leader and chief.”Eusebius of Caesarea, Ecclesiastical History, Book v. Chapter xiii.
In the early 3rd century, a splinter group of Marcionites was established by Prepon the Syrian, who claimed the existence of an intermediate spiritual entity between the good and evil gods.Hippolytus, Refutation of all Heresies, book 7, ch. 19
Teachings
The premise of Marcionism is that the ministry of Jesus is incompatible with the actions of God in the Old Testament. Focusing on the Pauline traditions, Marcion felt that all other conceptions of the Gospel, and especially any association with Israelite religion, was opposed to, and a backsliding from, the truth. He further regarded the arguments of Paul regarding Law and Gospel, wrath and grace, works and faith, flesh and spirit, sin and righteousness, death and life, as the essence of religious truth. He ascribed these aspects and characteristics to two principles, the righteous and wrathful God of the Old Testament, who is at the same time identical with the creator of the world, and a second God of the Gospel who is only love and mercy.Adolf von Harnack, History of Dogma, vol. 1, ch. 5, p. 269
The character of the creator in Marcion's system is disputed. On the reading long dominant since Adolf von Harnack, Marcion opposed a merely just and wrathful demiurge to the wholly good God of the gospel; Sebastian Moll has argued instead that the contrast is between a good and an evil God, and that Marcion did not seek to discard the Old Testament but treated it as the foundation of his theology. On either reading the demiurge is not a principled adversary of the alien God, and the material creation is not held to be satanic but only as good as a world constituted by law and punishment can be.
In Marcionite belief, Jesus was not a Jewish Messiah, but a spiritual entity that was sent by the Monad to reveal the truth about existence, thus allowing humanity to escape the earthly trap of the demiurge. Marcion called God 'the Stranger God', or 'the Alien God' in some translations, as this deity had not had any previous interactions with the world, and was wholly unknown, similar to the Unknown God of Hellenism and the Areopagus sermon.
Various popular sources count Marcion among the Gnostics. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (3rd ed.) puts it, "it is clear that he would have had little sympathy with their mythological speculations" (p. 1034). In 1911 Henry Wace stated:
A primary difference between Marcionites and Gnostics was that the Gnostics based their theology on secret wisdom (as, for example, Valentinus, who claimed to have received the secret wisdom from Theudas, who had received it directly from Paul) of which they claimed to be in possession. In contrast, Marcion based his theology on the contents of the Letters of Paul and the recorded sayings of Jesus—in other words, an argument from scripture, with Marcion defining what was and was not scripture. Also, the Christology of the Marcionites is thought to have been primarily Docetic, denying the human nature of Jesus. This may have been due to the Marcionites' unwillingness to believe that Jesus was the son of both God the Father and the demiurge. Scholars of Early Christianity disagree on whether to classify Marcion as a Gnostic: Adolf von Harnack does not classify Marcion as a Gnostic, whereas G. R. S. Mead does.G. R. S. Mead, Fragments of a Faith Forgotten: Some Short Sketches among the Gnostics of the First Two Centuries (London, 1906), p. 246. Harnack argued that Marcion was not a Gnostic in the strict sense because Marcion rejected elaborate creation myths, and did not claim to have special revelation or secret knowledge. Mead claimed Marcionism makes certain points of contact with Gnosticism in its view that the creator of the material world is not the true deity, rejection of materialism and affirmation of a transcendent, purely good spiritual realm in opposition to the evil physical realm, the belief the "True" God sent Jesus to save humanity, the central role of Jesus in revealing the requirements of salvation, the belief Paul had a special place in the transmission of this "wisdom", and its docetism. According to the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article on Marcion:
Marcionism shows the influence of Hellenistic philosophy on Christianity and presents a moral critique of the Old Testament from the standpoint of Platonism. According to Harnack, the sect may have led other Christians to introduce a formal statement of beliefs into their liturgy (see Creed) and to formulate a canon of authoritative Scripture of their own, thus eventually producing the current canon of the New Testament.
Marcion is believed to have imposed a severe morality on his followers, some of whom suffered in the persecution. In particular, he refused to re-admit those who recanted their faith under Roman persecution; see also lapsi. This severity extended to a thoroughgoing asceticism corresponding to Marcion's distance from the demiurge's creation. Marriage counted as porneia leading to phthora, destruction, and Marcion barred his community from marriage and sexual intercourse; only catechumens who vowed celibacy, or who renounced sexual relations if already married, were baptized and admitted to communion, so that the propagation of the created world would be curtailed. Meat and wine were likewise renounced, but fish was permitted and regarded as a kind of holy food, alongside bread, honey, milk and vegetables, so that the Marcionites can be classed as pescetarian. Epiphanius reports that bread and water were used at the Eucharist,Epiphanius, Panarion 42.3.3. and in keeping with Marcion's docetic Christology Tertullian records that hoc est corpus meum became figura corporis mei, the figure of my body.Tertullian, Adversus Marcionem 4.40.3.
Marcionite canon
Tertullian claimed Marcion was the first to separate the New Testament from the Old Testament.McDonald & Sanders, editors, The Canon Debate, 2002, chapter 18 by Everett Ferguson, page 310, quoting Tertullian's De praescriptione haereticorum 30: "Since Marcion separated the New Testament from the Old, he is necessarily subsequent to that which he separated, inasmuch as it was only in his power to separate what was previously united. Having been united previous to its separation, the fact of its subsequent separation proves the subsequence also of the man who effected the separation." Page 308, note 61 adds: "[Wolfram] Kinzig suggests that it was Marcion who usually called his Bible testamentum [Latin for testament]." Marcion is said to have gathered scriptures from Jewish tradition, and juxtaposed these against the sayings and teachings of Jesus in a work entitled Antitheses.Gnostic Society Library presentation of Marcion's Antitheses Besides the Antitheses, the Marcionite Testament comprised a Gospel of Christ — Marcion's version of Luke, which the Marcionites attributed to Paul — differing in a number of respects from the version now regarded as canonical.Marcionite Research Library presentation of The Gospel of Marcion It appears to have lacked the prophecies of Christ's coming, the infancy narrative and the baptism, and its wording is generally terser than that of canonical Luke. It also included ten of the Pauline epistles, in the following order: Galatians, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Romans, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, Laodiceans, Colossians, Philemon, Philippians.