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Originally Posted by WT Sharpe
Some books, such as II Peter, have been in dispute since the early days of Christianity. Others have been questioned by later Christian authorities, such as when Martin Luther famously called James the "epistle of straw."
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Yep, these are indeed the case. One explanation about II Peter (again courtesy of Bob Siegel) is that it could be that Peter was terrible at writing Greek, and had someone transcribe the first letter, but he tried his own hand at the second, as it's apparently quite poor grammar.
Ehrman is an extremely controversial writer, and I do not actually accept his scholarship wholesale. Though I do believe he has brought up some good points.
If you see the citation I made above about 99% of the Bible being reliable, attributed to Bruce Metzger. That was Bart Ehrman's mentor, and Ehrman himself admits said mentor would not agree with his conclusions.
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offers for reasons why people forged writings in the name of famous authors: (1) profit (new libraries would often pay generously for new works by famous authors), (2) to honor a beloved teacher, students often attached the teacher's name as an act of gratitude and modesty, (3) to gain an audience, and (4) the belief that had the person named as author had a chance to address the issue, this is what they would have said. In the last case, I might add that such persons may have felt "inspired" to write their books.
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These would be some of those good points.
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That there were forgeries written in Paul's name, such as III Corinthians and the Pauline epistles to Seneca, is not in dispute. The only question is to whether any of these made it into the accepted NT canon.
II Thessalonians and Colossians still tend to be hotly debated by scholars, but there seems to be considerably less support for Pauline authorship for the book of Ephesians. Scholars argue that the style is entirely unlike other Pauline works. Long, convoluted sentences are used by this author, whereas Paul tended to write in short, abrupt sentences. Also there is the choice of vocabulary. There are 116 words used in this short work that are found in none of the undisputed works. Such a deviation is quite untypical of any author. There is even less support for the Pastoral Epistles of I and II Timothy and Titus. Critical scholars are virtually unanimous in their opinion that Paul was not the author.
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You had me up till that last sentence there. If they were "virtually unanimous" then the
scholars who chose the Canon would not have included it. No?
But the main thing is that your statement is a logical fallacy. It can't be proven true or false. How do you show something is "virtually unanimous."
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Not least among their reasons for that judgment is that the historical backdrop of these books seems to be more appropriate to a later historical period than the one in which Paul lived and worked. In addition, the author's opinion of women's role in the churches (usurp no authority and remain silent) seems to be at odds with the prominent role they played in Paul's own ministry. (For that reason alone the idea that Paul didn't write these books elevates him, in my opinion.)
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Sure, these are possibilities, and historical context and writing style are methods for dating books.
We can continue to debate. But these books were not pulled out of a vacuum. There were strict criteria for Canonization, including accepted authorship, consistency with other scripture, and general acceptance within the church as a whole. New theories and ideas don't necessarily hold a trump card simply because they are
new. I already cited the Jesus Seminar as how far afield things can go.
-Pie