Band wrote:
No scholarly article would use the word forged. Forged involves intent
Forgery involves intent, yes. In this case, intent to get people to believe something was written by say, Saint Paul, to give that text an authority it wouldn't otherwise have. That is exactly the case with some of the forgeries, according to Ehrman.
Ehrman uses a few words from 2 Thessalonians to prove his point:
"There are thirteen letters in the New Testament that claim to be written by Paul, including two to the Thessalonians. In the Second Letter to the Thessalonians, we find a most intriguing verse in which the author tells his readers that they are not to be led astray by a letter "as if by us", indicating that the "day of the Lord" is almost here (2:2). The author, in other words, knows of a letter in circulation claiming to be by Paul that is not really by Paul. This other letter allegedly teaches an idea that Paul himself opposes. Who would create such a forged letter? Obviously someone who wanted to advance his own views about when the end would come and decided to do so with the authority of Paul, even though he was not Paul.
But there is a terrifically interesting irony connected with the passage. Second Thessalonians, in which the passage appears, is itself widely thought among scholars not to be by Paul, even though it claims to be written by him (we'll see the reasons for thinking this in chapter 3). Is 2 Thessalonians itself a forgery in Paul's name? There can be little doubt about the answer: one of the "tricks" used by ancient forgers to assure readers that their own writings were authentic was to warn against writings that were not authentic. Readers naturally assume that the author is not doing precisely what he condemns".
I omit a few paragraphs here, and now let me continue to copy:
"With 2 Thessalonians you are presented with a particularly interesting situation. No matter how one understands the matter, the books shows that were were almost certainly forgeries in Paul's name in circulation all the way back during the time of the New Testament writings. If scholars who think that 2 Thessalonians was not written by Paul are wrong - that is, if Paul really wrote it - then it shows that Paul himself knew of a forgery in his name that had come to the Thessalonian church. But if the other scholars are right, that Paul did not compose 2 Thessalonians, then this book itself is a forgery in Paul's name that was floating around in the church. Either way, there must have been Pauline forgeries already in the first century".
Ehrman questions why scholars don't want to call forgeries forgeries.
Ehrman is also very careful about what he calls a forgery. For example, he doesn't call the gospels "forgeries". He says that the gospels were not written by the people who are alleged to have written them, but that does not mean they are forgeries, only books incorrectly attributed to an author by people who didn't know better but honestly believed those were the authors. The gospels were originally anonymous, not pseudonymous.
PSacramento, I'm with you until the very last sentence of your last post. I don't feel Ehrman takes verses out of context and builds doctrines on them.
