Quote:ONE OF THE MOST fascinating features of early Christianity
is that so many different Christian teachers and Christian groups
were saying so many contrary things. It is not just that they said
different things. They often said just the opposite things. There is
only one God. No, there are many gods. The material world is the
good creation of a good God. No, it comes from a cosmic disaster
in the divine realm. Jesus came in the flesh. No, he was totally removed
from the flesh. Eternal life comes through the redemption
of the flesh. No, it comes through escaping the flesh. Paul taught
these things. No, Paul taught those other things. Paul was the
true apostle. No, Paul misunderstood the message of Jesus. Peter
and Paul agreed on every theological point. No, they were completely
at odds with one another. Peter taught that Christians
were not to follow the Jewish law. No, he taught that the Jewish
law continued to be in force. And on and on and on, world
without end.
Not only did those on every side in all of these debates think
that they were right and that their opponents were wrong; they
also maintained in all sincerity and honesty that their views were
the ones taught by Jesus and his apostles. What is more, they all,
apparently, produced books to prove it, books that claimed to be
written by apostles and supported their own points of view. What
is perhaps most interesting of all, the vast majority of these
apostolic books were in fact forged. Christians intent on establishing
what was right to believe did so by telling lies, in an attempt
to deceive their readers into agreeing that they were the
ones who spoke the truth.
Bart Ehrman p. 242 Forged
Stuff like this will make the religitards' heads explode. Sucks to be them.
