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Presbyter Chat

Presbyter Chat

By: Darren Kelama
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Your theological questions answered through the lens of Pre-Nicene Christianity. Hosted by Presbyter Darren Kelama


If you're not reading the same bible as the first Christians in 144 A.D. you're reading just another book. The first Christian bible is not only the foundation of faith that virtually every denomination traces its canonical roots back to - it's also the only place you'll find the gospel preached by Paul the Apostle that he specifically references numerous times: "But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." (Galatians 1:8-9)In addition to the Gospel of the Lord you'll also read in their original, unedited form Galatians, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Romans, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, Ephesians, Laodiceans, Colossians, Philemon and Philippians. That is the entirety of the first Christian bible as it was gathered and transcribed in 144 A.D. and as it is now. Numbered chapters and verses in standard bible format.

The Very First Bible also acts as a cryptographic key, allowing us to see which scriptures were edited and added as it ballooned from one gospel and ten books into 73 books and four gospels over time. For the first time you will read the first Christian bible exactly as it was transcribed in 144 A.D. and one of the first things you'll notice is that it doesn't contain the Torah* (Old Testament).

The first Christians didn't pray to the barbaric deity portrayed in the Old Testament and now it's easy to see why.

You will see the original Gospel of the Lord that was preached by the Apostle Paul and Scriptures reveal God through Jesus, as it happened. After 2,000-years of 'interpretive editing,' additions, deletions, theological focus groups and sloppy translations, the modern bible has more in common with modern art than it does with the very first Christian bible.

Free ebook version
https://www.theveryfirstbible.org
Available as paperback (ISBN: 978-0-578-64159-1)
Books, videos, resources and podcasts are published and produced by the Marcionite Christian Church .Copyright Pre-Nicene.org Christianity Ministry & Evangelism Social Sciences Spirituality
Episodes
  • The Archivist, Not the Heretic: Marcion, Scriptural Proof, and the False Charges of Docetism, Ditheism, and Gnosticism

    The Archivist, Not the Heretic: Marcion, Scriptural Proof, and the False Charges of Docetism, Ditheism, and Gnosticism
    26 Aug 2026
    In this episode, we reopen a 2,000-year-old early Christian cold case to examine Marcion of Sinope, the Pontic shipowner who compiled the world’s very first Christian canon in 144 AD. Traditional church history has long branded him a dangerous heretic who taught Ditheism, Docetism, and Gnosticism while hacking the Gospel of Luke to pieces. However, a groundbreaking study by Professor A.W. Mitchell in the Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21985332) turns this ancient narrative completely on its head, revealing that the accusations were merely polemical caricatures invented by hostile heresy-hunters. We dive deep into the forensic literary evidence proving that Marcion did not "mutilate" the Gospel of Luke; rather, canonical Luke is a later, heavily edited, and Judaized expansion of Marcion’s earlier, shorter Evangelion. We will dissect how the legendary 30-year "silent years" of Jesus' life are actually structural scar tissue left behind by editors attempting to graft a biological birth narrative onto a primitive, cosmic descent gospel. Finally, we reveal how the chief accuser Tertullian was too textually unstable to be trusted, and how even Jerome's Latin Vulgate project secretly raided Marcion's archives to translate the epistles of Paul. It's an eye-opening journey into the psychology of ancient theological projection, showing that the history of the New Testament actually runs backwards.Notes:
    • The Very First Bible: The Evangelion and Apostolikon (144 AD). Marcionite Church, 2020. ISBN 978-0578641591.
    • Tertullian. Adversus Marcionem. Ed. and trans. Ernest Evans. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon, 1972.
    • Irenaeus. Adversus Haereses. In Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson. Buffalo: Christian Literature Publishing, 1885.
    • Epiphanius. Panarion, Book 42. Trans. Frank Williams. The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis: Book I. 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 2009.
    • Lactantius. De Mortibus Persecutorum, 12.3–5.
    • Le Bas, Philippe, and William H. Waddington. Inscriptions grecques et latines recueillies en Grèce et en Asie Mineure. Vol. 3, Inscription 2558. Paris: Firmin-Didot, 1870. [Deir Ali / Lebaba inscription, 318 AD.]
    • Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. Codex Vaticanus Arch. B. S. Pietro A 3 (Vat. lat. 214664). Digital Vatican Library. https://digi.vatlib.it/mss/detail/214664
    • BeDuhn, Jason D. The First New Testament: Marcion’s Scriptural Canon. Salem, OR: Polebridge Press, 2013.
    • Harnack, Adolf von. Marcion: The Gospel of the Alien God. Trans. John E. Steely and Lyle D. Bierma. Durham, NC: Labyrinth Press, 1990. (Orig. German ed. 1921/1924.)
    • Hays, Christopher M. “Marcion vs. Luke: A Response to the Plädoyer of Matthias Klinghardt.” Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 99 (2008): 213–232.
    • Kelama, Darren, and A. W. Mitchell. “The 29 AD Eclipse-Seismic Theophany: Astronomical and Historical Evidence for the Primitive Christian Evangelion and the Resolution of the Phlegonian Conflation.” Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies 2/1 (2026). DOI 10.5281/zenodo.18291492.
    • Klinghardt, Matthias. The Oldest Gospel and the Formation of the Canonical Gospels. Leuven: Peeters, 2021. (Orig. German ed. 2015.)
    • Knox, John. Marcion and the New Testament: An Essay in the Early History of the Canon. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942.
    • Lieu, Judith. Marcion and the Making of a Heretic: God and Scripture in the Second Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
    • Mitchell, A. W. “The Theophanic Replacement Protocol: A Forensic Reconstruction of Divine Identity Theft, Textual Erasure, and the Formation of Nicene Christianity.” Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies 1/5 (2025). DOI 10.5281/zenodo.17964659.
    • MarcioniteChurch.org



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    24 min
  • The Great Nothing Has Returned: A Christian Survival Guide

    The Great Nothing Has Returned: A Christian Survival Guide
    12 Jul 2026
    A malevolent force is operating through every lever of power — government, media, finance, military — and for the first time in history, its reach is nearly global. Borders that once kept the damage in check are gone. Good has been inverted as evil. Most people feel it but can't name it.In this episode of Presbyter Chat, Darren Kelama names it — and traces it straight back to the Pre-Nicene Christians who fought the same enemy centuries ago. Drawing on scripture from the first Christian Bible of 144 AD, academic research from the Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies, and the survival playbook of the most persecuted denomination in history — the Marcionites — this episode lays out:• Who the "sons of disobedience" are and how they operate through hijacked institutions • Why voting, politics, and the democratic path are now closed • The ancient Greek discipline of Apatheia — calm, detached clarity in the face of manufactured chaos • How persecuted Christians survived by becoming invisible to a system that feeds on fear • Practical steps to disconnect, go off-grid, and protect your family before the window closesScripture readings from the Evangelion and the Epistle to the Laodiceans. Referenced theologians include Thomas Römer, Walter Brueggemann, Peter Enns, and A.W. Mitchell's Theophanic Replacement Protocol.The enemy cannot crush an opponent it cannot see, cannot starve, and cannot terrorize. Your duty is to survive.
    Notes:Mitchell, A. W. "The Theophanic Replacement Protocol: A Forensic Reconstruction of Divine Identity Theft, Textual Erasure, and the Formation of Nicene Christianity." Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies (2025). DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17964659.Romer, Thomas. The Invention of God. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015Sorabji, Richard. Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.The Very First Bible: The Evangelion and Apostolikon (144 AD). 2020. Marcionite Church (marcionitechurch.org). ISBN: 978-0578641591. LinkMarcionite Church (MarcioniteChurch.org)Podcast based largely on this paper: https://www.journal.pre-nicene.org/JPCS-July-2026.htmlExternal media: https://www.youtube.com/@PreNiceneTV



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    25 min
  • Who Were the Ghost Bishops of Jerusalem? Exposing a 1,700 Year Coverup (Part 1)

    Who Were the Ghost Bishops of Jerusalem? Exposing a 1,700 Year Coverup (Part 1)
    17 Jun 2026
    In the library of a theological seminary, a researcher opens Eusebius's Church History and traces the bishops of Jerusalem - the mother church, the apostolic see of sees. He finds fifteen names spanning nearly two centuries. Marcus. Cassian. Publius. Maximus. Julian. Gaius. Symmachus. And eight more.No biographies. No letters. No sermons. No doctrines. No martyrdom accounts. Not a single quotation from their enemies. Fifteen bishops, two hundred years - and a perfect, surgical silence.Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria - churches that suffered the same persecutions - all preserved rich documentary traditions. Only Jerusalem is a vacuum. Not a damaged record. An erasure.This is Part 1 of "Sleight of Hand, Sleight of Scripture" - a documentary series from Pre-Nicene Perspective, hosted by Darren Kelama, based on the 2026 paper "The Myth of the Jerusalem Continuity" by Chancellor A.W. Mitchell (Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies).In this episode, we walk the crime scene: Aelia Capitolina, the pagan colony Hadrian built on the rubble of Jerusalem in AD 135. Banned from the city on pain of death were not only Jews - but Jewish scriptures. Inside those walls, the only Christian canon that could legally exist was one without the Old Testament: the Evangelion and the Apostolikon. Hadrian, unwittingly, granted the unalloyed Pauline gospel a two-hundred-year sanctuary.And we meet the first ghost: Marcus, the first Gentile bishop of Aelia Capitolina, whom Mitchell identifies as the first Christian bishop in the Pauline sense - leader of a church whose Bible had no Torah, whose God was not Yahweh, whose throne was the mother church itself, and whose treasury held the accumulation of Paul's diaspora collection. ▶ PART 2 DROPS NEXT WEEK—————————⏱ CHAPTERS—————————0:00 — Cold Open: Fifteen Names, Fifteen Ghosts1:52 — The Question That Launched a 1,700-Year Cold Case2:20 — Welcome to Pre-Nicene Perspective (Series Intro)2:48 — Aelia Capitolina (AD 135)4:12 — Possessing the Septuagint Was a Capital Crime5:08 — The Only Christians Who Could Survive in Aelia6:04 — The Mitchell Thesis (2026 Paper)7:00 — Part III — The Red Herrings8:24 — Claim 1: "The Records Were Lost"9:48 — Claim 2: Irenaeus Never Quotes Them10:44 — Claim 3: "Jerusalem Was Always Yahwist"11:40 — Part IV — The Investigation Begins12:36 — The First Christian Bishop in the Pauline Sense13:04 — The Treasury of the Mother Church13:52 — The Apostolikon — Paul's War Report14:28 — Marcus Resolves to Act (Cliffhanger — Part 2 Next Week)—————————ACADEMIC SOURCES & FURTHER READING—————————📄 PRIMARY SOURCE — the paper this episode is based on:Mitchell, A. W. "The Myth of the Jerusalem Continuity: Aelia Capitolina, the Marcionite Mission to Rome, and the Suppressed Apostolic Succession (AD 135–325)." Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies (2026). DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.20481484🔗 https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20481484🏛️ MODERN SECONDARY SCHOLARSHIP:• BeDuhn, Jason D. The First New Testament: Marcion's Scriptural Canon. Salem, OR: Polebridge Press, 2013. (Especially pp. 28–33 on Marcion's maritime network and the in-situ gathering of the Pauline scrolls.)• Ehrman, Bart D. Forged: Writing in the Name of God. New York: HarperOne, 2011. (On the industrialization of pseudepigraphy.)• The Very First Bible 144 AD: The Evangelion and Apostolikon. Marcionite Church, 2020. ISBN 978-0578641591.🏛️ INSTITUTION & HOST:• Marcionite Keleuthos Divinity School — 🔗 https://marcionitechurch.org• Host: Darren Kelama — Pre-Nicene PerspectiveThe Very First Bible:https://www.theveryfirstbible.orgVisit the free library and learn more.
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    15 min
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