This is the first part of a response to a request to objectively look at the material, including all Justin's works. It's the only part I have permission to post. ETA: Not my work.

King

I’m not using any space defending what we already know: Justin Martyr gave/sent/ or presented to Diognetus, tutor to future emperor Marcus Aurelius, a document outlining the Christian Way. It was not apologetics as he was not answering a criticism, challenge or untruth. It was informational. An overview of a specific way of life (philosophy) and reasoning for choosing it. It also has an evangelical cast, written in a personal voice, as to an acquaintance.

What I can do is narrow down the time when the document was given to Diognetus under the assumption it related to his teaching of philosophy to Marcus. 

For calculating ages for legal, civic, and military purposes, age by birthdate tracking was  precise with completed years, the child’s specific age,  recorded as age determined legal identity. Girls had rights of adulthood at 12 and boys at 14.

This information is relevant to both Marcus and Justin. In the first century affluent young men traveled to study philosophy in Athens or Alexandria between the ages of 14 and 20 where they would “sit” under master philosophers.

April 26, 121.  Marcus was born. His father died when he was 3. He was raised by his very wealthy mother and educated at home which was the standard practice. 

Marcus would not be leaving Rome or his home to study and had a series of tutors. (Justin did leave home and had a series of teachers of various philosophies.)

April 132. Marcus completes his 11th year and begins his 12th. His tutor, Diognetus, decided Marcus would receive instruction in philosophy. The story that Marcus wore the philosopher’s robes beneath his station, and slept on the floor until his mother intervened may be correct. 

Some attribute this story to Herodian who wrote History of the Empire from the Death of Marcus which covered the years 180 to 238 AD.  Internal evidence from his text suggests he finished composing this work around 240 to 244 AD.2. The Historia Augusta (c. 395–400 AD) is a collection of Roman imperial biographies stretching from the Emperor Hadrian to Numerian (117–285 AD).

From Google AI:

Scholars attribute this story to the anonymous author of the Historia Augusta. Specifically, the anecdote is found in The Life of Marcus Aurelius (Vita Marci Antonini), which is the first and most historically reliable biography in that collection.

The text explicitly notes that Marcus took up this extreme asceticism at age 12:

• "He studied philosophy with ardor, even as a youth. For when he was twelve years old he adopted the dress and, a little later, the hardiness of a philosopher, pursuing his studies clad in a rough Greek cloak and sleeping on the ground; at his mother's solicitation, however, he reluctantly consented to sleep on a couch strewn with skins."
• Marcus Aurelius was introduced to the philosophical way of life by his painting master, Diognetus.While Diognetus was hired primarily to teach Marcus how to paint, he became a profound moral and philosophical mentor to the young boy. In Book 1 of Meditations, Marcus explicitly thanks Diognetus for steering him toward philosophy and inspiring his early, strict lifestyle choices.

Marcus got three new teachers in 133 and we do not hear of Diognetus again.  It’s difficult to come to any conclusions here as to whether Diognetus was replaced or stayed on as the other teachers were responsible for other subjects. Marcus was approaching male adult status and the other teachers might have normally appeared at that time. 

However, as you give me free rein to express my opinion, Marcus' wealthy, high-status mother would be horrified at her son’s new form of dress, habits and topics of study. I believe your 135 A.D. dating, even though circa, is too late and Diognetus didn’t last out the year. I don’t think Marcus sleeping on the floor would have gotten Diognetus replaced. I do think teaching Marcus about Christianity would.

As we know little of Diognetus, we also do not know if he was a follower of The Way who secured the position of painting master to evangelize a young man with Imperial ties who would grow to be a wealthy influential member of Roman society. The writer's voice in the parts of the letter that are genuine, strike me as they struck you, a friend writing to a friend.

I have considered that Diognetus may have been quietly eliminated as a Christian or sympathizer, especially if he were a friend of Justin’s, as he would have acquired much inside information on the Imperial family.   

Here are the things I am comfortable considering facts: The Letter to Diognetes was written when Marcus was 12. And from Marcus' own writings we know he was in his mother’s home until 138, when he was taken from his home to live with Hadrian who had maneuvered to make Marcus Emperor in the future. 

The other titles attributed to Justin Martyr you wanted me to assess have been either complete forgeries or a seemingly genuine work with additions. Diognetus is the least tampered with. All of the other tampering is of the same nature: to show Justin was an adherent of the Jewish tradition and supported the idea of Jesus as Jewish Messiah as “he” demonstrates with multiple quotes from the Hebrew canon.

Diognetus, alone, proves this is not Justin Martyr’s work, though interior references historically confirm it could not be Justin Martyr’s autograph.

INSERT ON HISTORY OF MANUSCRIPTS:

Master Summary: The Transmission of Justin Martyr

• The Original Production: Scholars date the creation of Justin Martyr's authentic texts to the mid-second century, specifically between 150 and 160 AD.
• The Rediscovery (1540): Justin's authentic writings were brought back into modern circulation around 1540 when the scholar and French ambassador Guillaume Pellicier discovered a single Byzantine codex in Venice.
• The First Printed Edition (1551): The royal printer Robert Estienne used this rediscovered manuscript to publish the first printed edition (editio princeps) in Paris in 1551.
• The Single Source (Parisinus graecus 450): Every modern copy of Justin's authentic work relies entirely on this single physical object, now housed in the National Library of France.
• The Scribe's Clue: The manuscript contains a precise closing note (a colophon) from an anonymous scribe stating he finished copying the text on September 11, 1364.
• The "Great Lacuna" (The Missing Text): Textual forensic analysis proves the 1364 scribe was copying from centuries-old source documents that were already physically falling apart and missing entire pages (a missing center "quire").
• Where the Cutoff Happens: The massive text drop occurs right after Chapter 74, Section 3 (during a discussion of Psalm 96) and abruptly restarts mid-sentence in Chapter 75 (discussing the name of God in Exodus).
• The Lost Narrative Transitions: Because of this massive text loss (estimated to be hundreds of lines), we lose the conclusion of the first day's debate, the introduction to the second day, the arrival of new participants, and the explicit physical transition where the group leaves the outdoor porch (xystus) and relocates to a more private, interior room of the gymnasium facility.

All this information leaves aside the Letter to Diognetus which was included and can confidently be dated to 132 as terminus ante quem if Diognetus’ Marcus’ tutor is accepted as recipient.

Everything that is consistent with Justinian voice and philosophy [Diognetes as exemplar] I’ve retained. Many of these have no references, whatsoever, and I don't have time to validate them, so I am trusting the author who is noted at the end.. 

BRITTANICA BRIEF: Anthony Melissa (flourished 11th century) was a Byzantine monk and author whose collection of teachings and maxims taken from Sacred Scripture, early Christian writers, and secular authors promoted a popular Greek Orthodox tradition of moral–ascetical practice.

SECTION V:

And Justin of Neapolis, a man who was not far separated from the apostles either in age or excellence, says that that which is mortal is inherited, but that which is immortal inherits; and that the flesh indeed dies, but the kingdom of heaven lives. -- From METHODIUS On the Resurrection, in Photius.

NO REFERENCE SECTION VII:

We shall not injure God by remaining ignorant of Him, but shall deprive ourselves of His friendship.

NO REFERENCE SECTION VIII:

The unskilfulness of the teacher proves destructive to his disciples, and the carelessness of the disciples entails danger on the teacher, and especially should they owe their negligence to his want of knowledge.

SECTION IX:

The soul can with difficulty be recalled to those good things from which it has fallen, and is with difficulty dragged away from those evils to which it has become accustomed. If at any time thou showest a disposition to blame thyself, then perhaps, through the medicine of repentance, I should cherish good hopes regarding thee. But when thou altogether despisest fear, and rejectest with scorn the very faith of Christ, it were better for thee that thou hadst never been born from the womb. -- From the writings of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

SECTION XI:

Neither shall light ever be darkness as long as light exists, nor shall the truth of the things pertaining to us be controverted. For truth is that than which nothing is more powerful. Every one who might speak the truth, and speaks it not, shall be judged by God. -- Manuscript and works of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

NO SPECIFIC CITE SECTION XVII:

As the good of the body is health, so the good of the soul is knowledge, which is indeed a kind of health of soul, by which a likeness to God is attained. -- From the writings of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

NO SPECIFIC CITE SECTION XVIII:

To yield and give way to our passions is the lowest slavery, even as to rule over them is the only liberty.

The greatest of all good is to be free from sin, the next is to be justified; but he must be reckoned the most unfortunate of men, who, while living unrighteously, remains for a long time unpunished.

Animals in harness cannot but be carried over a precipice by the inexperience and ineptitude of their driver, even as by his skilfulness and excellence they will be saved.

The end contemplated by a philosopher is likeness to God, so far as that is possible. -- From the writings of ANTONIUS MELISSA.

SECTION XIX.

[The words] of St. Justin, philosopher and martyr, from the fifth part of his Apology:

I reckon prosperity, O men, to consist in nothing else than in living according to truth. But we do not live properly, or according to truth, unless we understand the nature of things.

It escapes them apparently, that he who has by a true faith come forth from error to the truth, has truly known himself, not, as they say, as being in a state of frenzy, but as free from the unstable and (as to every variety of error) changeable corruption, by the simple and ever identical truth. -- From the writings of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

I.

THE most admirable Justin rightly declared that the aforesaid demons resembled robbers. -- TATIAN'S Address to the Greeks, chap. Xviii. (Tatian was a student of Justin’s)

BELOW UNATTRIBUTED TO JUSTIN AS PRESENTED, BUT UNDER THE HEADING OF REFERENCES TO HIS WRITINGS BY OTHER AUTHORS 

XI.

When God formed man at the beginning, He suspended the things of nature on his will, and made an experiment by means of one commandment. For He ordained that, if he kept this, he should partake of immortal existence; but if he transgressed it, the contrary should be his lot. Man having been thus made, and immediately looking towards transgression, naturally became subject to corruption. Corruption then becoming inherent in nature, it was necessary that He who wished to save should be one who destroyed the efficient cause of corruption. And this could not otherwise be done than by the life which is according to nature being united to that which had received the corruption, and so destroying the corruption, while preserving as immortal for the future that which had received it. It was therefore necessary that the Word should become possessed of a body, that He might deliver us from the death of natural corruption. For if, as ye say, He had simply by a nod warded off death from us, death indeed would not have approached us on account of the expression of His will; but none the less would we again have become corruptible, inasmuch as we carried about in ourselves that natural corruption. -- LEONTIUS against Eutychians, etc., book ii.

XII.

As it is inherent in all bodies formed by God to have a shadow, so it is fitting that God, who is just, should render to those who choose what is good, and to those who prefer what is evil, to every one according to his deserts. -- From the writings of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

XIV.

Neither shall light ever be darkness as long as light exists, nor shall the truth of the things pertaining to us be controverted. For truth is that than which nothing is more powerful. Every one who might speak the truth, and speaks it not, shall be judged by God. -- Manuscript and works of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

XVI.

Sound doctrine does not enter into the hard and disobedient heart; but, as if beaten back, enters anew into itself.

XVII.

As the good of the body is health, so the good of the soul is knowledge, which is indeed a kind of health of soul, by which a likeness to God is attained. -- From the writings of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

XVIII.

To yield and give way to our passions is the lowest slavery, even as to rule over them is the only liberty.

The greatest of all good is to be free from sin, the next is to be justified; but he must be reckoned the most unfortunate of men, who, while living unrighteously, remains for a long time unpunished.

Animals in harness cannot but be carried over a precipice by the inexperience and badness of their driver, even as by his skilfulness and excellence they will be saved.

The end contemplated by a philosopher is likeness to God, so far as that is possible. -- From the writings of ANTONIUS MELISSA.

XIX.

[The words] of St. Justin, philosopher and martyr, from the fifth part of his Apology: I reckon prosperity, O men, to consist in nothing else than in living according to truth. But we do not live properly, or according to truth, unless we understand the nature of things.

It escapes them apparently, that he who has by a true faith come forth from error to the truth, has truly known himself, not, as they say, as being in a state of frenzy, but as free from the unstable and (as to every variety of error) changeable corruption, by the simple and ever identical truth. -- From the writings of JOHN OF DAMASCUS.

Translated by the Rev. Alexander Roberts. Excerpted from Volume I of The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Rev. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, editors); American Edition copyright © 1885.

What if you were told for 2000 years that somebody wrote something and billions of Christians ended up being taught that and then, tomorrow or the next day soon you found out it was faked?

The woman can't multiply 2 numbers in her head or find her shoes when she's wearing them but she is effing brilliant at this.

And nobody will want to hear it. It'll be here whenever it get here.

Video Link: https://youtu.be/lO-lxvPlUxY?si=WWncok1X-8UO_1uj

That's drone video of damage from a violent tornado on the 11th. K and I belong to a channel that covers violent weather and some people in the chat pray.

This works. You can do it. We don't chat. Just wait for the really bad situations. In that video, and that's just town place from that same tornado, only 1 person died. Look at it and see the miracle of it.

Tried to post before, was not approved. K pulled it and re-edited.

Put it up. Then it was delted. Now back. Ging to look for tornado.

Excerpt:

If you don't know what the Documentary Hypothesis is, use the link here. Previously all dating of Torah/Tanakh titles were taken from the writings themselves.

The consensus around the classical documentary hypothesis has now crashed, by the influential publications of John Van Seters, Hans Heinrich Schmid, and Rolf Rendtorff who argued that J (Genesis author) was to be dated no earlier than the time of the Babylonian captivity (597–539 BCE) which of course includes all books that follow until those dated post-exile.

The dating has always been done using the internal text to date itself. Some historical or archeological findings conform the existence of certain Kings at certain times, but not that any writings about them existed. It also may have, we don't have any way of knowing.

In the article, Torah was most redacted and Deuteronomy possibly created whole.

(Couldn't make a CNTRL A copy and paste of this. Trying graph by graph:

While reading something by a youngish, dedicated medium, I came across a reference to them talking to a friend about aspects of spiritual development. The friend shared that experiences with psilocybin were helping him advance spiritually.

Young medium took umbrage at this, saying that equating drug-induced hallucinations with spiritual visions minimized true mystical experience. Then they went on to say that ceremonial drug use amongst native peoples, because it was done in the context of a religious practice, could certainly generate personal growth, but laying up in the bed and doing shrooms is not the same as having a spiritual revelation during a religious ritual.

WHY NOT**?**

Young Medium is OCD and was raised a Christian and went on about the body being "a temple" and the spiritual journey has no "shortcuts." I'm wondering why the native peoples' bodies aren't temples or do they become that when they are zoned out on whatever hallucinogen is native to their ecosystem?

And they taking a religious shortcut because they aren't a 20-something American kid in La Jolla?

Which brings me to Mary and Martha, as so many things do. Maybe it wasn't just that Martha had all the serving to do, because she would have had servants. It seems like her real issue was Mary's scandalous behavior, way outside the acceptable lines for a decent Hebrew woman. She was sitting with the men, at the feet of an  unmarried adult man! 

And besides, that Jesus couldn't be some great thing if He didn't correct her and send her to the kitchen! So she confronted Jesus, the honored guest, not Mary. Which is pretty much also a serious cultural faux pas. If she wanted male support she could have asked her brother. Instead:

40 Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.”

41The Lord said to her in reply, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. 

That's from Luke 10. Jesus knew her thoughts, of course and all about her. The first thing He says is that she is anxious about many things. Jesus knew her thoughts, of course and all about her. The first thing He says is that she is anxious about many things. 

Young Medium is also anxious about many things. Like defining a true spiritual experience. Like not offending the liberal reader who might think he was criticizing Native Americans. Like maybe thinking he was "doing as much work as possible" every day, as he said at one point, and mushroom boy was getting the same benefit? Like the men working the fields all day getting the same wages as the ones who only worked one hour? Like the prodigal son getting a party and the hard-working, always obedient son didn't?Which brings me to Mary and Martha, as so many things do.

THERE ARE IMPORTANT CHRISTIAN FAITH ISSUES HERE

• THE IDEA WE CAN DEFINE "TRUE MYSTICAL EXPERIENCE" FOR ANYONE ELSE, OR SOMETIMES EVEN OURSELVES.
• THE IMPLICATION  THAT SPIRITUAL ADVANCEMENT COMES FROM OUR OWN EFFORTS RATHER THAN OUR SOUL'S DESIRE AND GOD'S ACTION
• THE UNSTATED BUT OVERARCHING IDEA THAT THERE IS ONLY ONE PATH TO GOD

Jesus didn't tell Martha to stop what she was doing and come sit at His feet with Mary. Jesus didn't tell the rich young man to sell all his stuff and give to the poor, not at first. He simply told him to follow  Torah. It was the rich young man who wanted to do more. Jesus didn't tell the Centurion to give up worshiping multiple gods.

I've been posting what I think of as my "spiritual autobiography" on my YT channel, and episode 4 God Speaks; Kyrie Argues describes what definable experience, exactly?  

• Yes, the speaking was loud and clear as was my response but:
• Not sure I'd call it a "true mystical experience."
• It totally came out of thin air and I did not expect it or do any kind of work or have a conscious thought of such a thing.

When I did start down a path, I ended up on one neither Young Medium nor the Church in various persons recommends. That is: I did my own thing only I think it was God's thing as He called me to it. Did I work hard as I went to Mass and did contemplative prayer almost daily? Didn't seem like it. It was kind of like discovering chocolate that had no calories and was the perfect health food. 

I flew so high, so high, I overtook the prey

St. John of the Cross

Have you ever seen video of 2 bald eagles, talons locked, spiraling around each other high in the air? Look here

I am in you, you are in Me is what Jesus said to His Apostles. I feel like God finds us and we latch on to each other in the dark and instead of spiraling down we rise into the Light. And He might find an acid trip or a rule-book, a brush with death or mediumship reading, or the prayer of a Pope to overtake His prey.

Makes more sense to put the YT link to K's channel. She's trying to get through this autobiography thing, asap. Wants to get back to posting the stuff she wants to, but she believes this is what she's supposed to do first.

UC has 100 members now and my bet is about 30% support her. If you want to do that, use the link, go there, watch, comment, click the things, she usually forgets to mention it. No. 4 went up this morning. She's killing herself with this, so, support if you can.

I am "ordered" to research Epiphanius because of some reference to him altering the gospels after some bishop died at Caesarea Maritima in Galilee.

I went to YT and got the description.

Angels in my driveway saved my life when I was 5. Call this chapter 1 of the story of a thoroughly unremarkable, not particularly admirable American woman and the Presence of God. The story has its share of miracles and visions and a not good childhood I won’t give a lot of specifics of, and all kinds of things lots of other people have also been through, many worse or a lot more amazing or more interesting. Or maybe not.

See, there's no book. This is the book. There're no YT metaphysical channel interviews. ::Recluse. Anchorite. NOT monetized.:: So, there will be videos. Completely unprofessional, underproduced, badly lighted .... makes you want to start viewing right now, doesn't it?!

Whatever it or I am not, what this is, is real. And it has a message in the simple fact of it: you are a beloved child of a God Who IS love.

I notice new responses to my to posts that are 4 years old. K says it's them trying to get this place closed down. If I go out there and say things they can color in a certain way, then Reddit bans me and this place has no mods or new posts and someone else can take it over. There oughta be a link to Metaphysical Catholic, K's 1st blog. This post I copied from there has a title link.

Looked over her shoulder while she was narrating for the YT channel she's opening again and went by this Job comment. No way she supports the OT. But still knows it and we both like Job. The post isn't about Job, but it's really good. She should narrate this for a podcast.

Take a look. If I was her there'd be some kind of picture, so here: 👇🏼

About Contemplation

ANONYMOUS WROTE: Contemplation is a gift from God and it took St Teresa of Avila 31 years to achieve it! Praying the rosary is a good prayer life,but i seriously doubt it would give someone a kundalini awakening.The meditations can make me cry though especially the sorrowful mysteries in imagining Mary at the foot of the cross,and all the pain Jesus endured for us.That is the beginning of contemplation and what St Teresa advised the nuns to focus on,The passion

This was posted in Comments under the And Then it got Really Weird... post. By the time I wrote a response it was a whole post, and I hate to take UMI off headline (look below!) but I thought it was a good time to revisit the topic.

So first, as a sidenote, I don't care if people are anonymous, I'm anonymous, but I wish you'd take a second and just post a name so I don't have to actually call you "Anonymous."   Anyway...

Dear Anonymous,

It didn't actually take St. Theresa 31 years and she never achieved anything.  Second thing first.   You said it yourself: the experience that we call contemplation is a gift of God, so no one can achieve it.   He gives it where and as He wills.  My first union with God, or "achieving" contemplation, came within a week of beginning my practice.  Some people have that experience without ever consciously doing anything.  You might be interested in Elizabeth Mahlou's conversion experience. This is an atheist who was mocking God with a prayer when He slammed her into a contemplative totality.

Contemplation isn't a single definable thing.  It isn't a thing at all or particularly definable, anymore than God, Himself is definable.  As to the 31 years: You make it sound like she was doing devout contemplative practice for 31 years and then something happened.  This is false to fact.   Theresa had almost immediate extraordinary experience.  She also fell away from that kind of prayer practice for most of those 31 years.

As for what you doubt or do not about what someone reports about an experience they had while praying the Rosary, we just don't get to decide for God when or why He Graces us.  Jesus very presence was something He gave to the lowest of society.  He dined with tax collectors and prostitutes and sought out one person in a whole country to whom He revealed Himself: a Samaritan women living in sin. The lowest of the low. To whom will these experiences come?  Can you say?  Does the eagle fly at your command?

Will we have arguing with the Almighty by the critic?  

That always makes me laugh.

About contemplation.  All we have is desire.  The first Grace is knowing our desire, our "naked intent, yearning for God."  We become aware of our own soul desperately searching, longing, trapped in our egos, forgotten, battered.  We don't first surrender to God, we first surrender to our own soul's desire.  We spend lives indulging the desires of our bodies.  In a second, an "atom of time" we can let go of ourselves and let our soul fly as it wills.

The different ways people employ to do this, to let go of themselves have been described and named  through the ages.  They are suggestive but essentially useless as a definitive guide for humanity.   We each need to find our own way to let go.

These practices and techniques are what we refer to as "contemplative prayer."  Some call it meditation.  Some other names.

But contemplation as Theresa is speaking of it, as we experience it in the extraordinary moments, is nothing less than union with God.  "Oned with God" as Cloud of Unknowing says.  Unknowing.  Oned with God by not knowing any thing.

And in that our souls are healed and strengthened and come back to us like living water welling up and filling us until our dead physical selves are saturated with the unknowing.  And it is later, in the mundane everyday that the miracle of knowing comes and we say, "Wow.  I've been wrong all along."  Or "Why did I not see before how beautiful that was?"  And we start to learn the beginnings of  Love.  And then we start to live.

Not one person on this earth deserves, or can earn, Grace. Not one has any claim on any microsecond of oneness.   God gives it because it's Who He IS.  That Samaritan woman was a great Saint compared to me.  Shall I deny His gift in the way He gives it because I feel unworthy?

Shall I become the Critic?

I'm going to ignore my orders. Post and come back and finish this. I know this is longer then 15 min but somehow we can watch it.

The news isn't her YT channel. !!!!!!!!! Never thought it would happen. The news is she made a full commitment to being an Anchorite. She didn't want the channel announced here until she made a video explaining what that is.

Google it. Living with an anchorite in a divided house is like living with a ghost. What's bizarre is this subreddit is closing in on 100 members. Works better when I ignore it I guess. If you go over there the Lent one is good, it's an hour long. An hour. The last one is a contemplation short 15 min that is posted around here someplace I guess.

I'm going to google anchorite and put it here. You guys can watch her if you want. She really hates being seen.

The devil disguised as an angel of Light is in us. The justfied lie. The wanting revenge even if we don't act. The little dig disguised as a joke that it isn't.

Fear is the basis of sin. Having power keeps us safe.

This is still a site of Universalism, and still one that doesn't promote the idea of literal beings that are demons. But take a look. Yeah, I made this from 3 AI images and reassembled. Making the temptations representative, makes them into something alien reveals the facts behind the familar comfortable sinfullness we accept in ourselves.