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Loading...With this post I conclude my thread on how we got the canon of the New Testament. In the last post I began to talk about how having a canon affected the way people read the books of the New Testament. Even though there are important *differences* among the various books, when they are all put between the same two covers, people read them as if they were all saying the same thing. Here I pick up right before I left off….
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There are, for example, four Gospels, each presenting a different understanding of Jesus’ words and deeds. The thirteen letters assigned to Paul contain inconsistencies and incoherencies (especially between the ones he actually wrote and those produced in his name later by others). The alleged writings of James, Peter, John, and Jude also present distinctive messages, sometimes at odds with the others.
But when all twenty-seven books were canonized into a single book, the statements of one writing came to be read in light of another, forcing readers (almost always unsuspectingly) to think they are saying the same thing. When Matthew, for example, insists that followers of Jesus need to keep the Jewish law, his views are now read in light of Paul’s insistence that gentiles not follow the law. That is, the two authors’ views are conflated in such a way that they appear to affirm each other, even though, when simply read individually for what they have to say, the appear to be at odds.
So too Mark’s view of Jesus’ death as an atoning sacrifice is
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Man, this is going to be a great book! Hurry up and get on with it. I want to buy about 1000 copies.
Enjoyed this thread and looking forward to the book. Do you think the New Testament authors believed they were “inspired” and if so in what sense? Do we know much about how the view of inspiration developed over time?
No, I don’t think they thought that they were inspired in the way that modern Christians would say. They were just writing letters and books. But they certainly thought they were “right” and that they were writing what God thought was right!
Except maybe the Apostle Paul – don’t you think he felt that he obtained direct revelations from Jesus and what he wrote was in a way inspired by Jesus and not his own teachings..
He certainly thought his views came from God, but that’s a bit different from thinking that his writing itself was inspired by the Holy Spirit.
Prof Ehrman, I don’t quite understand the distinction you are making there.
If Paul believed that his views came from God, then doesn’t it follow that he would have regarded those ideas as continuing to be divinely inspired when they were put into writing? Kindly explain.
Most highly religious people think that their understandings of the faith come from God. But that doesn’t mean that every time they write their views down they believe their writings are being inspired by the Holy Spirit.
Question: Doesn’t “And the Word became flesh and lived among us” support incarnation theology? Or is that portion of the text not compatible with the rest of the Gospel according to John?
Yes indeed; from time immemorial it has been one of the key verses to support it, probably THE key verse.
But you say …Christ “became incarnate through the Virgin Mary,” a view not supported by either Luke or John (or any other New Testament author) Could you clarify why that verse isn’t enough or is contradicted somehow by the rest of John’s Gospel?
Because that verse doesn’t say anything about him being born of a virgin. (Either does the rest of John) Christians may think it *implies* it, but only because they’re bringing their preconceived views into the text. John doesn’t have a virgin birth. Luke has a virgin birth but not an incarnation. Only later were the two combined into the establshed doctrine.
Hi Bart, I understand that you do not believe that the historical Jesus referred to himself with the imagery of the Danielic Son of Man, but Luke did portray that Jesus referred to himself with the imagery of the Danielic Son of Man. And this imagery suggests imagery of a preexistent cosmic judge, which some call the “Cosmic Son of Man.” Likewise, if Jesus referred to himself as the Cosmic Son of Man instead of some other entity, as you propose in various books, then this could mean that Luke implied a virgin birth of an incarnational being. However, the imagery of the cosmic son of man could be a preexistent angel instead of the uncreated Christ.
Yes, Mark and Matthew do as well. But not, the image of the “son of man” does not require a pre-existent being who became human. It requires a divine being who comes from heaven. The Synoptics think that Jesus will be that being. But not because he existed before his birth but because he was was a divine being *before* returning to earth at the end of time. For them he became a divine being at his exaltation (or baptism), not before he was born.
Hi Bart, A reply to your following comment: “Yes, Mark and Matthew do as well. But not, the image of the “son of man” does not require a pre-existent being who became human. It requires a divine being who comes from heaven. The Synoptics think that Jesus will be that being. But not because he existed before his birth but because he was a divine being *before* returning to earth at the end of time. For them he became a divine being at his exaltation (or baptism), not before he was born.”
I agree that the Danielic Son of Man imagery in the Synoptic Gospels does not require a preexistent being who became human, but it is a viable possibility that eventually developed in Second Temple theology, which possibly existed in oral tradition during the ministry of Jesus. And Matthew and Luke portray that Jesus saw born a divine being (and I doubt they were looking for demigod imagery).
“And if there is anything we desperately need in the world today, it is the acceptance and celebration of diversity.”
That’s true. But organized religion is not the place to look for diversity of opinion/belief.
Religion is inherently divisive: Believers/non-believers. Sinners/saints. The saved/the damned. Orthodox/heterodox.
Any organization that requires strict adherence to a creed under pain of eternal punishment will not be inclined to celebrate diversity. Organized religion is inherently totalitarian.
Religion is a great tool to use to divide people. But is all organized religion inherently divisive? I’ll give you that maybe fundamentalist monotheism necessarily is. But all religions ever?
It was a revelation to read in the NT textbook that John’s extreme anti-semitism, which had a nefarious historical influence, was probably related to his having been rejected and apparently evicted from his own Jewish community or synagogue. I so much wish this had been widely known very early on.
Not that John and his community of believers being kicked out from their synagogue looked good . Hundreds of years later the shameful excommunication of Baruch Spinoza from his Amsterdam synagogue looks painfully similar. Spinoza took his humiliation and immediate total isolation humbly and quietly. He continued his work elsewhere.
But John reacted differently, and the condemnation of the entire Jewish people became an eternal curse with devastating consequences.
Reading about this biographical unknown fact in John’s influences served, in my case, as largely explicatory of the blood curdling pronouncements demonizing ( all) the Jews.
John is a different Gospel, so by default it is examined on its own terms. But then there is Luke’s anti-semitic stance, a case onto itself. In this and all the very many layers and Gospel themes, the study of each Gospel in its own right is unavoidable for true understanding.
Bart, did the successive generations of Church leaders that contributed to the final canon believe that the four Gospels were actually written by the four eponymous apostles ? If so, this would mean that perhaps some aspects of the Church leaders’ thought process and decision making were informed by incorrect facts and assumptions ?
Thank you.
Absolutely they did. The names were assigned to these books precisely to ground their authority in the names of their authors,and in antiquity as now those ascribed names were simply accepted as factual.
Thank you Bart.
Is it on pre-order yet?
. . . and I still think you should have written this one first.
I’m considering it deferred gratification. Neither of the two books I’m projecting as coming next has been put under contract; we’re in negotiations now. So at this point the two-book sequence is simply my hopeful plan, not a set decision.
Thanks, I would love to be reading this one next as soon as possible.
Hi Bart, I appreciate what you say about believers not appreciating the different views among the authors of the New Testament, but sometimes you overemphasize the differences.
For example, I have read some convincing commentary on Matthew that says it was written to both Jewish and Gentile Christians while making no attempt to enforce the Jewish traditions of Gentile Christians. Do you really believe that the author of Matthew insisted that all Gentile Christians needed to convert to Jewish Christianity?
And I appreciate how you point out that the author of Luke did write about atonement during the Last Supper while a scribe added those verses about atonement. However, I do not see any footnotes in Bible translations that suggest the atonement taught in Acts 20:28 by the same author was a scribal addition. How do you explain Acts 20:28?
For reference: “Keep watch over yourselves and over all the flock, of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God[a] that he obtained with the blood of his own Son.[b]” (Acts 20:28 NRSVUE)
Footnotes
20.28 Other ancient authorities read of the Lord
20.28 Or with his own blood; Gk with the blood of his Own
I’m not sure you’re talking about an overemphasis on my part? I’ve never argued that Matthew urged gentile Christians had to convert to Judaism. As to Acts 20:28 — that’s not a question of emphasis but interpretation. I discussed the passage at some length on July 7 of this year in a post.
Hi Bart,
First, I somehow read your July 7 post, perhaps half asleep, and did not understand your main points, all my fault. I imagine that Acts 20:28 indicates that the author of Luke-Acts intended harmony with Paul’s view of redemption, but I need to work much more on developing that argument while addressing your scholarship on it. I will pass on this for now.
Second, it looks to me that you did imply that Matthew urged gentile Christians to convert to Judaism when you wrote the following in this post:
“When Matthew, for example, insists that followers of Jesus need to keep the Jewish law, his views are now read in light of Paul’s insistence that gentiles not follow the law. That is, the two authors’ views are conflated in such a way that they appear to affirm each other, even though, when simply read individually for what they have to say, the appear to be at odds.”
Am I missing something on this one?
Yup, you are! 🙂 I’m saying that Matthew did NOT have Paul’s view, but when the two authors’ writings are all put in the SAME book, then readers read them AS IF they are saying the same thing. (Readers conflate the two very different views)
I have a question. Who did the Gentiles believe in before Jesus? Did they believe differently than the Jews?
Gentiles were all polytheists (“pagan”), worshiping many gods in various ways, but almost always involving prayer and offerings. THere were thousands of pagan religions, and none of them insisted that they were the only true one. You could engage in as many as you want. Christianity changed all that.
Dear Bart. Do you know if the Odes of Solomon ever found widespread acceptance within the early church? I understand modern scholarship believes the work could have been composed by a member of the Johannine community due to the many parallels in style and theology, so if the gospel and epistles of John found acceptance, why not the Odes?
No, I don’t believe they ever were considered canonical, for example. The idea that htey come from the Johannine community is modern I believe. They are attributed to Solomon, so ealry Chrsitains would not have thought of them as belonging to the New Tesatment.
I have appreciated your series on the development of the canon. Perhaps I should have asked this earlier: when you discuss the choice (over time) of which books/letters to include in the canon, it appears to me that the four oldest “gospels” ended up being the “chosen ones.” Is that correct? And is that just coincidence?
I’m not sure what you mean by coincidence? Within the proto-orthodox communities, these were indeed the books taht most church leaders by the end of the second century agreed were teh authoritative accounts of Jesus’ life. There were not many disputes about them..
What I was trying to get at: you write a lot about the proto-Orthodox forces winning the debate and choosing books for the canon that supported their understanding of orthodoxy, while ruling out other writings. Could one also say that they chose for the canon the oldest, most historically reliable gospels among the many that circulated? And was this not a major reason for their inclusion in the canon, not just the gospels purported support for or convergence with orthodoxy? Orthodoxy then had to conform with these writings. Or did I misunderstand your arguments about the proto-Orthodox choice of books for the canon?
They certainly thought they were doing that, yes. But orthodoxy was a driving factor for making those decisions; once the decisions were made, the books could be used to determine what was orthodox doctrine, but they didn’t choose the books and THEN decide what was right about them.
If Paul had never become a Christian, do you suppose that Christianity would still have ended up being super focused on establishing a single “correct” doctrine and exclusive cannon? Or would it probably have evolved more like the Eastern religions, with less ink spilled over trying to get all believers to conform to a specific set of beliefs?
For me the big issue is whether Christainity would have remained a Jewish sect, rather than a religion that embraced gentiles without requiring conversion to Judaism. Paul promoted the idea that gentiles were welcomed as gentiles, and if that didn’t happen, surely Christianity would never ever have made inroads into the Roman world.
‘…When it comes to the Bible, that interpretive assumption is so natural that virtually no one realizes they are making it.’
This is overwhelmingly true Prof Ehrman. I have really enjoyed this thread. Partly because I have pondered and written (still reviewing and adding on though) as an amateur on the subject. Currently have these concluding questions in my write-up.
1. If the Church had admitted into the canon of the New Testament the books we all unambiguously accept today as Forgeries (e.g., Gospel of Peter, Apocalypse of Peter, etc.), would we have defended them as being authentic just like we do with the books already in there (Gospel of Matthew, Apocalypse of John, etc.)?
2. If there are forgeries outside the New Testament, how couldn’t there be forgeries in the New Testament given the evidence and prevalence of such practice at the time?
3. Does a book or text become authentically authored or divinely inspired just by virtue of its admission into the New Testament Canon by some Church Fathers who won the day, defined ‘Orthodoxy’, and in the process, rewrote history?
What do you think?
1. Great question! My view: Yup, almost certainy. 2. Exactly! 3. Yup! For orthodox circles.