http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bart-d-ehrman/didnt-make-the-bible_b_905076.html

A sampling:


"Jesus the mischievous Wunderkind. Jesus may have been a miracle-working Son of God as an adult, but what was he like as a kid? That is the question answered by the amusing Infancy Gospel of Thomas, which regales readers with tales of Jesus' miraculous activities between the ages of five and twelve. As it turns out, Jesus was a mischievous young fellow and had a bit of a temper. Whenever someone irritates him -- a rough playmate or a strict teacher -- he uses his supernatural power to wither him on the spot. Eventually he gets his mood, and his power, under control, and becomes a remarkable young man to have around the carpenter shop and home."

Most non-canonical New Testament era writings are Gnostic bullshit.

That doesn't make the history authentic, though. I'm pretty sure the Gnostics considered the Roman-enforced version of Christianity to be bullshit -- before they were killed off by the papists.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/03/2011 11:17AM by Stray Mutt.

And I was under the impression that most CANONICAL New Testament era writings were bullshit.

The Gospel of Mary Magdalene would not have served their agenda.

Mormonism?

lol

The gospel of Thomas is hilarious.

http://books.google.com/books?id=XjP4Ua2bVy4C&pg=PA78&dq=infancy+gospel+of+thomas&hl=en&ei=VWU5TuXaLdPSiAKzn4TTDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=infancy%20gospel%20of%20thomas&f=false

Hoggle Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The gospel of Thomas is hilarious.
>
> http://books.google.com/books?id=XjP4Ua2bVy4C&pg=P
> A78&dq=infancy+gospel+of+thomas&hl=en&ei=VWU5TuXaL
> dPSiAKzn4TTDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum
> =1&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=infancy%20gospel%20
> of%20thomas&f=false


It has everything short of Jesus turning a guy into a jack-in-a-box and sending him into the cornfield.

So... +2

Random TZ references FTW!

There is another forged gospel that implies a homosexual encounter between Jesus and a disciple. I can't remember which gospel.

There are also the Deuterocanonical books that Luther evicted from the OLD Testament. Protestant apologetics like to say that these books were added to the Catholic canon in the 1500s. Not so. You can find writings by St Augustine (one of the Early Church Fathers, about 400 AD) where he lists all the canonical books, and those "apocryphal" writings are on his list.

Luther had his agenda of "Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide," and the Deuterocanonicals (especially Maccabees) conflicted with his teachings. RIP! Out the window. Luther also wanted to edit the NEW Testament, but his entourage kept his editing to the Old Testament.

If you are curious about these writings, I'd recommend reading the Book of Tobit. It contains a really sweet love story.

~VOW

Quote: "There are also the Deuterocanonical books that Luther evicted from the OLD Testament. Protestant apologetics like to say that these books were added to the Catholic canon in the 1500s. "

This is not quite correct. Luther kept the Deuterocanonical books in his German translation of the Bible, but in a separate section. English bibles, starting with the 1611 King James Version, also contained at least some of them. If I remember correctly, Joseph Smith's personal bible, now in the archives of the Community of Christ, has the Deuterocanonicals.

The Old Testament is actually a collection of writings circulation in the centuries around and before the birth of Jesus. There was not full agreement on exactly which writings were to be included in the authorized versions. The Greek translation made in the 2nd century B.C. included more books than the Hebrew selection, made about 100 A.D. The Catholic church used the Greek version, while the Reformers (Luther, Calvin etc.) chose to use the Hebrew version, with the extra books omitted or included in a section of their own.

Good point!

It's my understanding that Luther and the Anglican Church (who eventually produced the King James Version of the Bible) at first placed the Deuterocanonical books in sort of an appendix, and said while they weren't Scripture Canon, they could be read for inspirational purposes. Then I think they were published under separate cover, apart from the Bible. Eventually they just sorta...vanished.

By the time of the proliferation of various other Protestant churches, their leadership only accepted the 66 books as authentic Scripture, while the others dismissed.

~VOW

They also omitted the Peter Rabbit references as exposed by SouthPark Easter special.

After reading the comentary, I figured I had enough if what I wanted and didn't feel the need to read the Gospel itself. The premise was that Judas Iscariot was Jesus' favorite apostle, the one who understood Jesus the very best, and was therefore the one appointed to deliver him to the authorities to be crusified. Pagels explained the transition of how Judas was viewed in the evolving view of Jesus and his divinity. It was an interesting read and provided some insights of how Christianity evolved in the early days of its formation.

The compilers of the Bible allowed a lot of BS to find its way into the canon but even they had to draw the line on the infancy gospels!

One of the reasons that the non canonical stuff didn't make it into the Biblewas that it was written much later than the stuff which did make it.In some cases we are talking a couple of hndred years later which makes them much less likely to be at all reliable. The infancy gospel is very fanciful and non Jewish. Little Jesus makes birds out of clay and they come to life. Making images is forbidden to Jews.Not likely that happened for that reason alone Jesus also kills his little friends when they make him mad and then feels bad and raises them from the dead. There is no reason to think that there is any truth in them, unlike the canonical gospels which likely have some truth mixed in with the myth

Google the lyrics to "Jesus: The Missing Years" by John Prine. Then you'll find out all about the 18 missing years in the life of Jesus. ;^) That got left out.

Susan

The book, "Misquoting Jesus : the story behind who changed the Bible and why," by Bart D. Ehrman is a fascinating read.

I would also reccomend The Book: A History of the Bible, by Christopher de Hamel

http://www.amazon.com/Book-History-Bible-Christopher-Hamel/dp/0714845248/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1312471519&sr=8-2

Considering the amount of satire and disinformation floating around today, we in our day would not be able to tell the difference.

I think of an episode of Locked up Abroad where the guy kidnapped in India is told by his kidnapper, "Don't feel relief if the Indian army comes to release you. They might kill you just to make us rebels look bad."

If you buy the idea that human nature is pretty much the same now as then, you can't know if you might be reading the gospel by the Jon Stewart of the day -- or the pagan disinformation league.


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