mikem

The dating is irrelevent. The 2nd letter of Peter is pseudonymous. That does not make it an "abject forgery". Psudonymous authorsip was a widely accepted literary convention in antiquity. With reference to 2Peter, this does not make it any less valuable as an authentic source of apostolic teaching, even if it didn't come directly from Peter.

Paul was wrong about the imminence of the Second Coming in 1 Corinthians, but he did modify his position in later letters, and correct the expectations of others on this issue.

Steven Avery

My point is that we frequently have the same invalid logic on these forums. Assume a dating or an authorship that is very different than that of believing scholarship, and use that presumption as a base to discredit some other aspect of the scholarship (such as a scripture harmony).

And since conservative scholarship is the one significant alternative to skepticism and mythicism, the tact is more tacky.

The one authorship claim is - "These are the secret words which the living Jesus spoke, and Didymus Judas Thomas wrote them down." implying a later author himself working with some material purported to be from Thomas. There is no first-person claim in the material comparable to the Peter and Paul discussions, and no geography or history or such. Why it is called a "Gospel" in common parlance instead of "Sayings" or "Logia" I dunno.

As to the evangelical position, beyond not considering it as canon, and pointing out that it had no potential canonical status among early church writers, I don't know much more.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Steven Avery

This is simply a part of the contention that is not the view of believing scholarship.

Not for purported scriptural writings, where a high standard was held, including truthfulness of authorship. Glenn Miller of course has some excellent writings in this regard, and there are other good sources. Probably a thread or two here.

The skeptics are often more honest in this discussion than 'liberal Christians' and are often very forthright in accusing supposed pseudonymous writings of being frauds, forgeries, fakes. They are right in that accusation, wrong in its application to NT writings.

The dating and authorship questions are interlinked. The reason 2 Peter is 'defended' as being pseudonymous by 'liberal Christian' scholarship is simply because that is the best they can do if they work with a presumption of late dating.

Shalom,
Steven

mikem

[QUOTE=praxeus]Maybe not, but we must go where the evidence leads us, not what "believing scholarship" wants us to believe. In any event, nor all "believing scholars" accept that 2 Peter was by the apostle, unless you are restricting "beleiving scholars" only to those who you agree with.

High standard? High standard of what? Honesty? This is not about standards of honets, but about literary conventions. Pseudonymity was not considered dishonest, it was not about trying to fool people about who wrote what.

Because it suits their purposes.

2 peter is regarded as pseudonymous because of it's content, and the content indicates lateness, not as you suggest late because it it is considered pseudonymous.The reasons it is considered pseudonymous are:

1. It incorporates Jude, weakening claims for autheticity. (The longer document is usually taken to absorb the shorter one, as is the case with Mark and Q being incorporated by Mt and Lk.)

2. It relies on a wide range of traditions about Peter, indicating a later synthesis.

3. It does not address any local church, and the Peter the letter reflects is the Peter of later tradition, the "foundation rock" of the church.

No doubt some conservative Xtians would dispute all the above, which is fine, but it is a position held not just by "liberal" christians, (whoever they are supposed to be, but also by mainstream mCatholic scholars, as well as some conservative evangelical scholars.

pharoah

From Early Christian Writings on 2 Peter:

So you'd have us believe that a epistle by the preeminent apostle of his time was circulating in the first century, but somehow not mentioned by any church father until the 3rd century, and its authenticity was still being disputed in the 4th century.

Not to mention the fact that some of it is a carbon copy of Jude.

Steven Avery

This type of summary is what you get when you rely on a Peter Kirby summary instead of reading and digesting the scholarly sources. Rarely have I seen such a hodge-podge of relying on soft argumentation, summary dismissals and non-mention of important quotations and not even mentioning primary external evidences (eg. P72). Any idea that Peter can be used as a reliable and balanced source can be thrown out the window after reviewing this page.

Perhaps you would at least read the external attestation and pseudepigraphy sections of the Michael Kruger article so you don't simply regurgitate a view that is grossly unbalanced.
http://www.etsjets.org/jets/journal/...5-671_JETS.pdf
http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/2peter_kruger.pdf
The Authenticity of 2 Peter

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Steven Avery

The same article above has a good discussion, showing the falsity of this assertion. Of course, Glenn Miller goes into it in greater depth.

Your other arguments are mostly what I affectionately call "soft" argumentation, where critics can always invent one argument or another, if they are trying to get from their preferred point A to point B.

Shalom,
Steven

mikem

You don't have to respond to points you don't want to of course, but in a discussion about pseudonymity and honesty, it seems to me legitimate to defend those you call "liberals" from the charge of dishonesty. They may well be wrong, you may well be right, but a wrong point of view can be sincerely held.

I have skimmed the article by Kruger, and he has some interesting quotes in the first section on Pseudonymity. I do not think that his reference to 2 Thessalonians 2:2 is particularly apt. Paul is clearly talking about a forgery. Paul was after all still alive, and able to write in his own name. This is not the case with pseudonymous writings. The other examples are not so easy to dismiss and I will have to give this issue more thought.

Back to Peter. A point I failed to mention earlier is that 2 Peter refers to letters from PAUL, and refers to them as scripture (chapter 3:15 - 16). If both Peter and Paul were martyred in the 60s, then this would mean that almost from the outset, writings by the apostles were automatically regarded as divinely inspired. This just does not square with what we know from Acts and other sources about the tensions and divisions in the church.

It seems more likely that 2 Peter was written some time after both apostles died, at a time when known apostolic writings were being treated with greater reverence. Letters by martyrs were generally highly regarded in the early church.

Clivedurdle

Umm, is it possible to take I Corinthians 7 at face value?

That Paul et al were expecting a FIRST coming, following a heavenly sacrifice, to start a new heaven and earth with the revelation of the Christ to all?

Look at all this glass darkly, universe groaning stuff - it does not make sense if Jesus had already been!

Paul was clearly expecting the FIRST coming in his generation - as were many many sects around that time! Their evidence for their beliefs was their visions - again classic stuff from other religions!

Steven Carr

'But the heavens and the earth that now exist are being preserved by the same command of God, in order to be destroyed by fire.' Preterists like Wright simply deny that the Bible teaches that the earth will be destroyed, come the day of resurrection.

Pretereists have poblems claiming that 2 Peter was written just a few years before Jesus's prophecies were about to be fulfilled, and yet Peter talks about thousands of years, instead of a few months.

Whenever 2 Peter was written, he should have pointed to the past (or forthcoming) destruction of Jerusalem, if peterists are right that these prophecies were about the destruction of Jerusalem.

How could Peter not have shot down these scoffers claims that everything had continued just as it had for ages, by pointing out that they only had to wait a few years or so to see incredibly drastic changes , such as the destruction of the Temple, and the vindication of all Jesus had taught?