Welcome to The Letter to Theodore Blog!

Hi Everyone,

I often joke that I’m one of the leading experts on the Letter to Theodore simply because no one else cares! Everyone else is more interested in "Secret Mark." Morton Smith himself noted this shift in focus in his 1973 book, where on page 6, he mentioned that he stopped thinking about his discovery as a letter of Clement and focused instead on the "Secret Gospel of Mark." He wrote:

“The work for this chapter was completed in 1961, at which time I turned from Clement to study the Gospel fragment. Since that time I have made only minor changes in the text and have not attempted to take account of recent publications on Clement (Barnes, Origen, 314f.).”

This blog aims to avoid these mistakes. I don’t care about "Secret Mark" or even Clement of Alexandria as much as I do about the scholarly process itself. I believe the discovery of the Letter to Theodore hasn’t been given a fair chance, and part of that is due to Morton Smith’s approach. Despite his boldness, Smith often seemed like a young, scared professor who didn’t want to risk his career over a discovery that might be deemed a fake. His caution about the Letter to Theodore being a pseudepigraphal work made him so wary that he started behaving like a forger.

For example, why did he feel the need to bring in so many experts to decide on various details of his discovery? While it's understandable that he sought help with the manuscript due to his lack of background in paleography, he only dedicated two and a half pages and an appendix to that topic. It seems he never fully grasped the significance of his discovery.

Some of this can be attributed to the academic world, where scholars often excel at discussing issues without truly saying anything definitive. Smith was thrust into the spotlight with a major discovery, forcing him to take a stand on its significance. Uncertain and overwhelmed, he wrote an overly complex tome that few appreciated. It was overwritten because he didn’t know what to make of the Letter to Theodore.

Through this blog, I hope to address and correct some of these issues. I aim to provide a clear, balanced perspective on the Letter to Theodore, free from the confusion and misdirection that has surrounded it. I hope you enjoy this journey with me.

Welcome to the discussion, 

Stephan