Toto

In a post on the Debunking Christianity blog, Lying, Salvation and the Word of God: Proselytizing and the Fabrication Scriptures in Judaism and Christianity, Harry H. McCall writes:

I wonder, however, if this literature is more properly classified as mystical or visionary, rather than "forged." In the culture of the day, would it have been accepted as channeled, rather than literal? Later unimaginative generations tried to make the scriptures literally true.

In any case, an interesting essay, even if it could use a little proofreading.

JonA

Your source needs to do a little more research and a better job of reading the Biblical texts. At the writing of each of the books, especially the New Testament books, the writing in question was never regarded as part of "Scripture"; in this technicality it is correct to say that the authors did precisely condemn altering "Scripture". There are, however, instances of authors condemning folk who teach 'false doctrines' or alter the words of various texts now considered to be Scripture. A good example is the closing of the Book of Revelation:

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Revelation 22:18-19 (NRSV):

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to that person the plagues described in this book; if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away that person’s share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

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The authors at the time certainly were not fans of forgery or alteration of texts. Even in those texts that have been forged (often time especially in those texts that have been forged), the practice of forgery and 'false teaching' is either implicitly or explicitly condemned.

I didn't read the rest of your link yet. But with an opening like that it is difficult to believe it contains anything too worthwhile.

Jon

mountainman

Christianity cannot openly condemn the new testament (and Eusebius) as a forgery - "business is business" after all is said and done. Of course Christians are very much aware to the presence of forgery. Also for example see Robin Lane-Fox's comments on the forged Sybil swinging from the chandeliers in Constantine's Oration c.324/325 CE. The condemnation of pious forgery is most often levelled by ancient historians. For example:

Erhman in Forged: Writing in the Name of God--Why the Bible's Authors Are Not Who We Think They Are (or via: amazon.co.uk) mentions alot of forgery, but I dont know whether he condemns it or just reports to his readers it for the sake of business.


The early christians without exception (almost) before Nicaea, and certainly without exception after Nicaea, accused and condemned the Gnostics over forgery of the new testament and associated Greek LXX. It seems that the orthodox were in a position to condem Gnostic "forgery" of the non canonical Gospels and Acts, etc.

The author does mention this:

Doug Shaver

There isn't much point in condemning something that you think cannot be done. If a document was regarded as scripture, then, more or less by definition, it was not a fabrication.

Roger Pearse

Yes, I think we do have to be careful. If we say "this text is a lie, intended to deceive", we are implicitly saying that we know what the author was thinking, his intentions, his audience, and so forth. Yet for how few ancient texts do we know this? And I think you're absolutely right to ask whether there is some culture issue here.

Myself I have no idea what sort of thinking went into composing the books of Maccabees. Without a lot of study of how they came to be composed, how they came to be used, and so forth, I'd really hesitate to make the kind of judgements that the blogger makes.

The attitude of the church to forged "scriptures" has always been rather unambiguous, even if the author merely intended to novelise rather than to create a fraud. The author of the Acts of Paul was defrocked when found, as Tertullian tells us in De Baptismo 18. The attitude of the church to the Jewish apocrypha reflects the fact that the Jews were uncertain about much of this literature in the time of Christ. Jerome, who was in contact with 4th century Jewish rabbis, rejects the lot IIRC.

All the best,

Roger Pearse