I have long argued that contrary to what you may hear a lot of people say (especially New Testament scholars!), the act of writing a book in someone else’s name (e.g., claiming to be Paul, or Peter, or John, knowing full well you weren’t [!]) was NOT regarded as an acceptable practice in the ancient world but was classified as a kind of lying.
Scholars who think otherwise argue that the authors were not doing anything duplicitous.
There are different ways scholars have made this argument, but the basic line is pretty much the same, that everyone knew that pseudepigraphy was a practice, and since they knew it was a practice, they could see through it and and either weren’t deceived or weren’t bothered if they found out they were deceived.
I continue to think this view is absolutely and precisely wrong. In my books on forgery I point out that whenever ancient readers *talk* about the phenomenon, actually saying anything about it, they condemn it.
I’m not saying that the people who did it condemned it; they may have thought they were justified in doing it. What I am saying is that, whatever the perpetrators said, the practice wasn’t socially respectable or accepted. It’s kind of like cheating (on an exam, on a lover, on a tax return): it’s done a lot, but when it’s talked about, it’s condemned.
To my knowledge no one in the ancient world ever
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Is it possible that this practice was viewed differently in the Jewish world, as a convention of common literary genres, as opposed to the mostly gentile Christian world, which did not approve of pseudepigraphy?
It would be possible if we didn’t have Jewish authors talking about it. We have no approbation of the practice there either. It’s interesting that there are only two books of the entire Hebrew Bible that claim to be written by someone who decidedly did not write them: Daniel and Ecclesiastes (the latter author indicating he was king Solomon). So forgery was not a big deal among Israelite authors, but with the rise of apocalypticism, it did become big.
Unrelated to today’s post: when is “The Bible: A historical and literary introduction” 3rd edition with Joel Baden going to be available?
Probably not till the summer or fall.
Dear Dr Ehrman-These two are slightly odd questions, and so I apologize in advance. Thank you once again for all of your fascinating posts on this website.
1-What is the ‘great glory’ in which the Son of Man appears in verses such as Matthew 24:30, Matthew 25:31 and Mark 13:26? Might this perhaps be a reference to a transcendent heavenly and glorious power, maybe analogous to the ‘kavod’ found in Ezekiel ?
2-Would I be correct in saying that, in your view, this this Son of Man is best interpreted as a non-human, immortal heavenly being?
1. IT’s hard to know if he means something specific (e.g. the “shekinah”) or just meant “WHOA that will be amazing.”
2. Yup. He appears to be some kind of angelic being in human form, as in Daniel 7.
I wrote (transcribed) a poem titled, Hell Ain’t So Bad by Charles Bukowski one night when I was channeling dead poets. Forgery?
If you distributed it in Bukowski’s name as his own poem, yes, that would be a forgery.
I understand that Aristotle felt that effective communication is entirely dependent on tailoring the message to the listeners. This comes close to subordinating “the truth” to pandering to the audience.
Even ARistotle would have agreed that shaping a tale in light of your audience is not the same as lying about who you were (as an author).
Mr Ehrman
When you attended MBI, how did you — and your classmates and teachers — treat the sexist passages in 1 Timothy 2:12 and 1Corinthians 14:34? Did you all believe these passages to be still relevant?
Oh yes. Literally still relevant, completely. Yikes.
Hi Bart. I’m looking for your help with my book. As an honest Christian I cannot deny that both Jude and 2 Peter used Pseudepigrypha authoritatively. I’m trying my best to present the “whole” truth about the New Testament and how Evangelical Christianity, including Michael Heiser are not being honest with the text. Meaning that to “redefine” God-breathed (2 Tim 3:16) to mean God’s Providence vs inspiration is dishonest and instead they need to wrestle with the reality that both errors and myths are mixed in with the New Testament. I think and study like a scholar and have been struggling to hold onto my faith while yet accepting the real problems with calling the New Testament “scripture” of “God’s Word.” All I’ve wanted for 30 years of research is the truth no matter how it affects my faith. Can you help me prove that both Jude and 2 Peter believed 1 Enoch, Jubilee’s, and the Testament of Moses to be inspired stories. Therefore showing that our faith cannot rest on the New Testament as being innerant and therefore must find something else . Thanks alot.
Ps. I know your story and admire you as a person of authenticity.
I think the problem with “God-breathed” is that it’s a hapax legomenon — that is, it never was used in Greek until this author came up with it; that makes it a problem because we can’t know exactly what he meant by it. With most Greek words, we can see how it gets used in many hundreds of instances where its meaning is unambiguous. But without those comparative possibilities, we have to pretty much guess on what it probably means, and we may get it wrong, either completely or in terms of its fuller nuance. (Same thing with “arsenocoites” — traditionally translated “homosexual.” Paul made the word up).