The Early and Complete Bible

Discussion in 'Church History' started by The Parson, Jun 22, 2017.

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  1. Guttenburg

    Guttenburg Synical at best

    When the scholarship outweighs the spirituality - you have a problem. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. 1Cor.1:25
     
  2. RabbiKnife

    RabbiKnife Open the pod bay door, please HAL. Staff Member

    And when laziness in the name of "spirituality" outweighs godly scholarship, you have a problem as well.

    Who is to be the ultimate judge of whether "scholarship" outweighs "spirituality", or vice versa?
     
  3. Athanasius

    Athanasius Life is not a problem to be solved Staff Member

    This isn't about 'scholarship over spirituality' or vice versa. The Apocrypha being placed between the OT / NT is about as good a place for it as any, given they're largely intertestamental (aka deuterocanonical). We err in accepting them as canon, and err in discarding them outright. They are, for example, quite valuable in understanding second temple Judaism and the cultural milieu of Jesus' lifetime. This also isn't to give the Apocrypha unfair weight. Biblical scholars read _all_ sorts of works (the Gnostic gospels being another example) as a matter of practicing their field of study. This restriction on working only with the 66 books of the Protestant bible is artificial, and not supported in the actual scholarship.
     
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  4. RabbiKnife

    RabbiKnife Open the pod bay door, please HAL. Staff Member

    For example, I have a friend who is now a leading authority on early copies of the Gospel of Mark, particularly in Coptic.
    He had to learn Coptic in order to do his research, and since a good portion of the texts extant in Coptic are non-canonical, a great deal of his reading was non-canonical.

    Understanding the Coptic cultural from non-canonical sources provided him great insight into understanding and properly evaluating the very, very early Coptic text he was working with.
     
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  5. The Parson

    The Parson Your friendly neighborhood parson Staff Member

    Have you read some of the opinions where many people don't believe anything good ever came out of Egypt? Especially when dealing with manuscripts? Just curious...
     
  6. TrustGzus

    TrustGzus What does this button do? Staff Member

    Nothing good ever came out of Egypt?

    The Hebrew nation came out of Egypt.
    Jesus came out of Egypt (Matthew 2:15).
    Post-Bible times...Athanasius was from Egypt.
     
  7. The Parson

    The Parson Your friendly neighborhood parson Staff Member

    Manuscript wise Joe.
     
  8. פNIʞƎƎS

    פNIʞƎƎS Connoisseur of Memes Staff Member

    You know what they say about opinions.....
     
  9. Athanasius

    Athanasius Life is not a problem to be solved Staff Member

    The same thing they say about Nazareth?
     
  10. The Parson

    The Parson Your friendly neighborhood parson Staff Member

    Are there manuscripts out of Nazareth?
     
  11. TrustGzus

    TrustGzus What does this button do? Staff Member

    Tim, do you find it odd that the greatest defender of the Trinity in church history (Athanasius) comes from Egypt yet somehow "corrupted" manuscripts come from the same place as this awesome defender of the faith?

    On the flip side, don't you find it odd that the "greatest" manuscripts come from Antioch yet Antioch also gave us several heretics in church history such as Nestorius and Arius?

    It seems incongruent, don't you think?
     
  12. RabbiKnife

    RabbiKnife Open the pod bay door, please HAL. Staff Member

    When folks start with an agenda and them make generalizations about it, I tend to ignore them completely.

    Presupposition: The TR is preserved by God and any manuscript from Alexandria is corrupt:
    Opinion: No good manuscripts come from Egypt.
    Proof: See, my presupposition is proof that my opinion is correct.
     
  13. The Parson

    The Parson Your friendly neighborhood parson Staff Member

    Well, doesn't it even click with anybody that those same (true) manuscripts from the 1st century at Antioch, became another critter in Alexandria in the 3rd and 4th centuries? And yep, you'll find nut cases everywhere, but in Alexandria, we find the biggest nut cases trying to change the word of God? In Alexandria we had the biggest click of Gnostic's & Philosopher's, heretics of the first order who are revered today. Lord knows why... Philo, Pantaenus, Clement, Eusebius, Origen, and Pamphilus. These old boys did more damage to Christianity than maybe Westcott and Hort TG and RK.
     
  14. RabbiKnife

    RabbiKnife Open the pod bay door, please HAL. Staff Member

    I have done my fair share of damage to the manmade religion masquerading in the name of Jesus, I will admit that.

    Origen is more of a creature of Antioch than Alexandria.

    The texts in the Alexandrian family differ so slightly from the other families of texts for the differences to be essential non-existent. There is absolutely no theological difference of any substance in either family.

    Traditionalsim is, however, a marvelous tool in the hands of the enemy.
     
  15. TrustGzus

    TrustGzus What does this button do? Staff Member

    While I haven't had conversations with RK on these issues, he and I agree on many points of other issues and I think (I know on my end) have respect for the other in disagreements. This is an area where he seems to be going down the same path I go down.

    No geographic locations is monolithic. If I go to Salt Lake City, I will be surrounded by Mormonism. However, I can find the true faith in SLC.

    If I go to the Bible belt, I can find people that will agree with the heresies of Arius of Antioch.

    I think the geographical argument of the KJV brothers is over simplistic in that way.

    The historical records for Antioch and Alexandria shows the same for those towns as in Anytown, USA. There was good and bad in both. So why think all manuscripts from X are bad and all from Y are good?

    And if Gnosticism was such a big deal in Alexandria, why don't RK and TG end up with expositing Gnosticism when we use our Bibles? It seems to me all of my Bibles, no matter what stream of manuscripts they use, counter Gnosticism.
     
  16. Guttenburg

    Guttenburg Synical at best

    So then you wouldn't even be open to the description of the ones in Egypt that corrupted the scripture?
     
  17. TrustGzus

    TrustGzus What does this button do? Staff Member

    I am completely open. However, you've issued a verdict: they've corrupted Scripture. I say prove it. Tim speaks of Gnosticism. As I said, exposit any modern version, Gnosticism is not the result. So where is the result of such an influence?
     
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  18. Athanasius

    Athanasius Life is not a problem to be solved Staff Member

    I'm equating the sentiment regarding manuscripts with the old adage, 'nothing good comes from Nazareth'. TrustGzus makes some excellent points above how this isn't true with respect to manuscripts and theologians, just as it wasn't true with respect to Jesus.

    Besides, everyone and their angelic interpretation of Genesis 6 loves Origen.
     
  19. RabbiKnife

    RabbiKnife Open the pod bay door, please HAL. Staff Member

    Please show me any reasonably accepted "modern" translation that shows a corrupted text or changes anything related to true Christian doctrine.

    I'll wait.
     
  20. BrianW

    BrianW Active Member

    I was taught that there was over 90% agreement in the texts and that what differences could be found had no effect whatsoever on doctrine. I'll be interested in seeing what answers you get.
     
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