Is 2 Peter clearly a forgery?

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Most of those do not support your claim very well. Even 1 Corinthians does not work that well because the letter was not written to all people, but rather, it was a letter from Paul to Corinth.

As it stands, even your 1 Corinthians would have an internal conflict, as 1 Cor 7, is part of the set of things Paul writes to them, but it is not something that God says, as stated by Paul himself.

That being said, technically the 1 Cor 14:37 is actually compatible with a non-immediate canonization, as this is a writing from a superior to Corinth. Paul could entirely just legitimately be resting on his authority. Given that is just Corinth's letter, he's probably just doing that.

As it stands, we do have reason to doubt immediate canonization given the conflicts that Paul had with other people in the early church. After all, Romans 4 and James 2 are using the exact same passage to argue for different beliefs, James for works, and Paul for faith, and the most straightforward interpretation of all of this is that James is arguing against Paul. Now if the writer of James could feel fine arguing against Paul, that really strongly suggests that not everybody felt the same on Romans for the period of time that James was written. Even further, it is pretty hard to say that a person picking the exact same passage to argue it for the opposite conclusion of another person does not have them in mind or that they actually agree with each other.


Well, technically, something could have been inspired without being scripture. But that being said, my basic point is that there were doubts circling around this before the situation.

That being said, I am mostly just resting on how the majority of scholars accept that this is just falsely attributed to Peter, based upon content issues. This isn't an issue of much dispute at this point, and even conservative opponents admit that 2 Peter as not genuine is the majority view:
As Richard Bauckham wrote: "New Testament scholars are now nearly unanimous in the opinion that at least one NT letter, 2 Peter, is pseudepigraphical."

I mean, scholars feel fine putting this as not genuine into freaking textbooks, and they do so because of the content issues, such as the uncanny parallels with Jude, along with an apparent difference between the two. They do so because the letter isn't actually written to a well-defined audience, and other letters that were written to a specific audience are treated as if they are actual general letters to everybody. Finally, it just is not as well attested, with a lack of use before Origen, and a few who outright considered it false.

in what universe is Augustine (b 325 ce ) a leader of the early church?
and Thomas?
if you mean the apostle then you are quoting gnostic sources?
cuz I don't remember a orthodox gospel of Thomas or you are talking Aquinas (b 1225 ce)
Jerome (b 347 ce) also not a leader of the early church.

so I guess by early church you must mean early catholic church.
You got anything from the Apostolic Fathers?
your argument basically boils down to
'the early catholic church accepted as scripture the books accepted as scripture by the early catholic church'.

-makes sense within your tradition but does not get much traction outside it.

-Jake

@AG

You are being very selective in your exegesis and what you are saying is not supported at all by a wider reading. All scripture is viewed as being divinely inspired and Paul clearly perceived his work to such. Peter perceived Paul's work to be such and the writings of people like Origin clearly show that this interpretation was far more widespread than its opposite; which was really only pushed by Tertullian (during his Montanist years).

Appeal to authority.


@JakobVirgil



Sorry I meant to use the term Church Fathers, I did not edit my post. The reason St. Jerome and St. Augustine are useful in discussing these sorts of things is that their own writings are among the best preserved works on the early Church. The majority of criticism of 2 Peter tends to put its composition date closer to people like St. Jerome and Eusebius (c. 265–339); who noted its widespread readership and its old nature. Event he biggest early critic of 2 Peter, Eusebius did not put in with the number of books he considered to be 'spurious' such as other works attributed to Peter like the Apocalypse of Peter. There was alot of psudo-petrine literature around during this time and 2 Peter was not considered by these people to be the same sort of work as this. The missing link in all of this, that would essentially prove the books cannoninity is the work on the subject by Clement of Alexandria. The next nearest works on the subject are that of Origin and St. Irenaeus (c. 130–200) who quotes (as a scriptural proof) from it in his own works. The writings of Methodius show that St. Irenaeus considered 2 Peter cannononical. There is also reference to 2 Peter among works that are known to have been forgeries or spurious. For example, the Apocalypse of Peter is based on 2 Peter is a section of 1 Clement.

The arguments against Second Peter seem to revolve around its language difference with First Peter and its limited attestation when compared with the other Epistles. However, Second Peter is far better attested than the works of Herodotus and almost all other non-NT authors. While AG may be partly right in relation to the majority of scholar's views on the subject, this is a situation that is changing rapidly. At present only the Jesus Seminar is really defending the view that it is an outright forgery and most scholars at present are prepared to sit at some point in the middle of the discussion; with view ranging from, unlikely direct authorship or badly attested to; just fine as it is. This is in no way a closed case.

I call question answered

Q: Is 2 Peter clearly a forgery?

A: 2 peter is not clearly a forgery but is a bit wobbly when compared to
say Pauls letter to the Romans.

The question has been answered.
with the cavet
not clearly a forgery != clearly not a forgery.

-Jake

Where you use [!=] as easy ouit for the conventional mark of inequality, I assume.

Of course, "early" is relative and so far as I know there is no binding convention as to time reference for "early church". To some of the young, 1850 might legitimately be "early church".

You need to get down and talk "apostolic period" usw.

apostolic period as we all know is the only time xianty was interesting

Interesting is of course subjective and individual, even if you buy into as technical term - I do not - it depends on your field.

There are actually some very interesting times and places, but without adjusting definitions I can concede that might be the last time it could be interesting as a whole.

How should I rebut this? How about saying "No, I am not being selective".

Paul clearly perceived his writings to be a scripture? Right... Too many problems with that view.


Your point? There is no logical fallacy invoked, and appealing to experts is perfectly legitimate. A lot of idiots have no grasp on legitimate and illegitimate appeals to authority (hint: one is deductive and rests upon a strongly rejected premise, thus is considered an informal fallacy, while the other is inductive, and used all the time by everybody everywhere)


Right, because we all know that you have your pulse on the majority of scholars on the topic. In fact, you also have great prognostication abilities, so you really can predict where the future in scholarship will go, right? (Note: It must be remembered that most people with a dog in the fight predict their dog will win. The scholars themselves consistently over-value their contributions and abilities, so how can we trust this kind of speculation on 91's part?)

Honestly, here's what it is, almost all scholars agree that 2 Peter is not genuine, but rather a pseudepigraph. A few try to argue that it is not a forgery though, by arguing that the ancient world was tolerant to this stuff, however, this case is poorly supported, which Bart Ehrman points out in a recent work of his in a persuasive argument. http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/ ... hrman.html
" And so Ehrman suggests that the best explanation for what we find in the New Testament is what we today and ancients would agree in calling forgery. And given the evidence, I cannot but conclude that Ehrman is right about this."

McGrath is not a member of the Jesus seminar. 2 Peter not being written by Peter is a basically accepted fact. Ehrman's efforts are generally relatively conservative to the profession, and he himself debated Craig Evans by holding to his position being the majority upheld by most scholars. Other scholars have also publicly backed his efforts without much question or doubt. http://robertcargill.com/2011/02/18/i-s ... rt-ehrman/ Even calling efforts to reject Ehrman's claims to be weak scholarship

Wrong. Your view is not supported within the early Church. This is a mistake Dr. Ehrman makes also.



Sure, but give me an argument. You can reference authority; I do it often but you need to give an argument also.



Wrong. The majority of scholars agree that 2 Peter was not written by St. Peter. It does not follow that it is not a genuine work (Richard J. Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter, p.161-16). There are a great many possibilities that exist from here, such as the use of a Amanuensis; which considering Peter's education is a very likely option. It could even have been subject to a garish translation early on, or could have been someone writing Peter's teachings down without direct dictation.



Dr. Ehrman makes the case that Peter most likely could not compose in Greek. Almost no one within the academic world thinks Peter penned the piece himself (though considering its rough Greek is a real possibility) . From this he concludes that the work is a forgery; this is a massive assumption.



Not many have; in fact most scholars don't take the stuff produced by the Jesus Seminar seriously at all. Even if their claims to having around 200 members were true; which it most likely is not (they tend to count the people on their mailing lists as members), the Society of Biblical Literature has over 8,000 members. The SBL is not hostile to the Jesus Seminar but does not take them all that seriously. The Jesus Seminar only has 74 scholars who have ever published anything and only 14 of them are considered to be of the first class (which is less than some theology departments). Ehrman is not one of those 14 (Johnson, Real Jesus, p. 6)(Craig, Rediscovering the Historical Jesus: Presuppositions and Pretensions of the Jesus Seminar).

This isn't a mistake though, because the issue of how immediately something is a scripture is going to have to be at least in part, if not mostly, based upon internal evidence. It is hard to say that someone who is an authority is in error.


Not really, no. Not with what I did. I referenced authority to make it clear where we all stood on the matter. I don't actually consider you a peer to the scholarly community on scripture.


Except that part of the reasons they reject Peter's authorship is not just words, but also the content. Content issues are not addressed by amanuensis, and yet, they are some of the biggest problems with the view that this is a genuine writing. If they reject Peter as genuine because the content could not have been written by Peter, then amanuensis is not relevant.


Ok, but just from the review, this is already addressed. Ehrman addresses whether this is written by Peter, whether this is a translation from Aramaic to Greek, whether this is a likely writing given the background location and period, etc. Amanuensis is already addressed if the possibility of this being a translation is rejected.

You haven't actually engaged what you apparently oppose.


91, that's irrelevant. I said this: "Other scholars have also publicly backed his efforts", and I provided another scholar backing his efforts. I didn't say "Scholars back the Jesus Seminar", nor did I say "Scholars agree with everything Ehrman writes", but rather my basic point was that Ehrman is only bringing basic, standard, widely accepted scholarship to the masses. He's not arguing mythicism, instead what he does write and talk about is often the conclusions that most scholars already agree with. Your entire rebuttal is really a non sequitur, as I made what I was talking about pretty clear.

That being said, it can't be stated that conservatives are looked upon highly by most scholars. They aren't, but rather seen as apologetic hacks that disregard the critical method to maintain presupposed conclusions.

In any case, I am probably pretty soon to being done with this discussion.

None of what you have just said would justify a historian or theologian from dismissing the attestation from and around the period. This is a strange view, since Dr. Ehrman's criticism deal a great deal with attestation; though he makes mistakes in his judgments on the matter; I have discussed attestation previously in this thread.




You do not have to regard me as a scholarly peer in relation to scripture. However, since you have decided to defend the view that Second Peter is an outright forgery (in other threads you have cited your position) then you ought to argue the case. You can support it with evidence from scholars but you are attempting behind a statement and that does make it a logical fallacy.



Cite content. Also, proving an addition to the text (which is also a possibility would not prove the document is a forgery).



Wrong. There is no original copy, so a bad translation is always a possibility. Nor does the fact that if it is not a translation rule out the possibility of an Amanuensis.



Wrong. The academic consensus deals the question of Petrine Authorship. The idea that Second Peter is a forgery is not standard, widely accepted scholarship. A great deal of Dr. Ehrman's work goes far beyond the academic consensus.

I may not know everything about everything, but it has always seemed to me that in the absence of an authorised biography of Christ, complete with the early years inserts of pictures, then the schooling years, then the post-schooling, pre-working years, then the paternal, or in Christ's case, the preaching years, then pictures of him on the cross itself, and then pictures of him being wrapped and entombed, then pictures of a sealed and unsealed tomb, then documented Police evidence and affadavits from the women who found the unsealed tomb, then pictures of Christ's appearance as independently verified by an authority, and then posted on YouTube, and then the biography's being sold as ONE account of what could otherwise have happened, Dr Ehrman will never be appeased.

There is something in him, coming at history from his belief that the resurrection never happened, that will not allow him the momentary intuitive leap needed to understand that a second-hand recording, followed by generations of mistranslation and in the absence of the original text, the text itself may be compromised, but the fact that every translation and story tells the same thing, it is highly likely, therefore, that the original source is accurately represented.

Remember, a mistranslation made Cinderella's fur slipper glass. Does that change the essence or characterisation or involvement of various characters in the story, falsifying it?

@PJW

For some people, even this would not be enough.

Except most of your sources are significantly later.


Except that an appeal to authority isn't a logical fallacy, it is an informal fallacy. Informal fallacies can be logically valid, they just have issues, such as premises, that people would not want to justify by the light of day.

In any case, I already cited evidence. MCalavera already stated that he himself was not a person who would want to stand up to scholarly agreement. I really don't care about discussing anything with you though.


Already cited these issues. Don't care much further.


Ok? I am not really sure I care much at this point, as either you are going to admit that early transmission of scriptures is bad, or you are admitting that this is false with that possibility. Either one really undermines a lot of the case here.

Even further, pretty much the most straight-forward hypothesis is that this is just questionable. I mean, like I said, content issues are also a factor. Just the ad hocness is going to be a further issue.


Umm... ok? And most of the reference we have to Ehrman is on Petrine authorship. Now, whether it is forged is a bit beyond the consensus. Fine... whatever, don't really care, as the guts of most of what he says are still actually not contested. You can nitpick, but I don't think you really get at the substance of what I am trying to say, and for that reason, I don't give a damn.


Except we don't really know.

A lot of the accounts are not independent but rather do depend on each other, which hurts any case for accurate representation. Even further, a lot of what is said is subject to a lot of efforts to interpret it all as saying the same thing, when it could just not really be as similar as we want to think.

Finally, this is a freaking claim that elves create shoes on the north pole, that aliens abducted Elvis, and that Benny Hinn cured cancer. No, he shouldn't be satisfied by less than all of that information. We *REGULARLY* reject large numbers of claims with the actual freaking eyewitnesses out there still saying "I saw that alien spaceship", "I know a witch put a hex on me", "scientology improved my eyesight", etc. It isn't as if all of the other BS claims in the world on magic acts didn't have witnesses. They did, and actual witnesses are better than a third or fourth-hand account like the Gospels, and we STILL don't believe the witnessed claims because they are crazy, and because the idea that they are all true is crazier than the idea that our witnesses are a little touched in the head. If we have a bajillion accounts that on further examination are false, and we have this account that we can't examine much further, then our background probability is going to have to be incredibly low for this, probably low to the point where no such evidence of this sort could ever justify the claim, period.

That being said, Ehrman is a former Christian, he didn't originally come at this with the belief that the resurrection never happened. Instead he currently regards miracle claims as non-historic on the grounds that we cannot actually do history while taking them seriously, as from our background knowledge, a miracle is literally the LEAST probable thing to happen. People who try to turn this discussion into "anti-supernaturalistic bias" and so on and so forth, must just not be thinking straight on the issue of supernatural claims and how profound they are, common they are, and incompassible the entire set of these claims are with anything we can really take seriously.

By what standard? I cited Origin (185-250), Eusebius (263) and St. Irenaeus (pre 200). All of these authors provide attestation that is closer to the source material than most ancient history sources.



You are presenting something that is not the subject of scholarly consensus. So you should either agree that the claim that Second Peter is a forgery is beyond the scope of the evidence or you ought to present more. Referencing a consensus will not get to to the claim you are making.



Your statement here is a a nirvana fallacy. You are stating that since one translation could be bad all must be bad. This is a formal logical fallacy.

The entire second half of your post abandons all sense the historical attestation method.... I will disregard you comments since most of it is just a non-sequitur (miracle claims have little to do with the idea that St. Peter did not compose Second Peter and Dr. Ehrman's presumption of naturalism also has nothing to do with authorship) and I see it mostly as an attempt to throw mud upon the subject matter.

"Ok? I am not really sure I care much at this point, as either you are going to admit that early transmission of scriptures is bad, or you are admitting that this is false with that possibility. Either one really undermines a lot of the case here. "

Early AND late transmission of the scriptures involves humans. Humans can and do mishear dictation, humans can and do miscopy, humans can and do have lapses which make them write a worth diffgerent from whay they intented. [All of that WAS intentional, of course, except for one slip of the finger]

Further, early AND late transmission of the scriptures, even where translation is not in question, involved authors and scribes operating in a multilingual environment, at a minimum Hebrew, Greek, and two or more forms of Aramaic. Their levels of competence in the various languages varied considerably.

Further, the earliest manuscripts or fragments we have are not the original transcripts. We must assume unrecoverable transmission errors and some degree of editing by people of unguessable ability and attitude.

So - there is an inherent and ineluctable uncertainty in our documentation, how much unguessable. No one with any experience of real life, no teacher, no historian, could deny that.

But "early transmission is bad"? Hardly. Tell me that the manuscript tradition for Homer, Shakespeare, Ovid, Richard Rolle, the Nibelungenlied is bad. The manuscript tradition for the NT is much better documented, the Urtext closer to reconstructible than most others, better than works a third of its age.