I don't see you rushing to throw your NT out the window...
Dr. Herbert Marsh, Nineteenth--Century English Bishop:
It is a certain fact that several readings in our common printed text are nothing more than alterations made by Origen, whose authority was so great in the Christian Church (A.D. 230) that emendations which he proposed, though, as he himself acknowledged, they were supported by the evidence of no manuscript, were very generally received.*
*Michaelis, Introduction to the New Testament, ed. Dr. Herbert Marsh (London, 1828), vol. 2, p. 368.
Johann Lorenz Von Mosheim, Eighteenth--Century Ecclesiastical Historian:
Not long after Christ's ascension into heaven, several histories of his life and doctrines, full of pious frauds and fabulous wonders, were composed by persons whose intentions perhaps were not bad, but whose writings discovered the greatest superstition and ignorance. Nor was this all; productions appeared which were imposed upon the world by fraudulent men, [such] as the writings of the holy apostles.”*
* Von Mosheim, Ecclesiastical History (London, 1810), vol. 1, p. 109.
St. Gregory, Fourth--Century Bishop of Nazianzus, writing to St.Jerome:
A little jargon is all that is necessary to impose on the people. The less they comprehend, the more they admire. Our forefathers and doctors have often said not what they thought, but what circumstances and necessity dictated.
7. C. F. Volney, The Ruins (Boston, 1872), p. 177.
Dr. Conyers Middleton, Eighteenth Century:
There never was any period of time in all ecclesiastical history in which so many rank heresies were publicly professed nor in which so many spurious books were forged and published by the Christians, under the names of Christ, and the apostles, and the apostolic writers, as in those primitive ages. Several of these forged books are frequently cited, and applied [in] defense of Christianity, by the most eminent fathers of the same ages, as true and genuine pieces.
8. Middleton, vol. 1, p. 59.
Dr. I. Hooykaas, Nineteenth--Century Reverend:
Not one of these five books (four Gospels and Acts) [was] really written by the person whose name it bears, and they are all of more recent date than the heading would lead us to suppose.
9. Drs. H. Oort, I. Hooykaas, and A. Kuneh, The Bible for Learners, trans. Philip A. Wieksteed (Boston, 1878), vol. 3, p. 24.
St. Faustus, Fifth--Century French Bishop:
Many things have been inserted by our ancestors in the speeches of our Lord which, though put forth under his name, agree not with his faith; especially since-as already it has been often proved-these things were written not by Christ, nor [by] his apostles, but a long while after their assumption, by I know not what sort of half Jews, not even agreeing with themselves, who made up their tale out of reports and opinions merely, and yet, fathering the whole upon the names of the apostles of the Lord or on those who were supposed to follow the apostles, they maliciously pretended that they had written their lies and conceits according to them.10
It is certain that the New Testament was not written by Christ himself, nor by his apostles, but a long while after them, by some unknown persons, who, lest they should not be credited when they wrote of affairs they were little acquainted with, affixed to their works the names of the apostles, or of such as were supposed to have been their companions, asserting that what they had written themselves was written according to these persons to whom they ascribed it.11
To strengthen belief in the resurrection of Jesus, St. Irenaeus invented many stories of others being raised from the dead.12
As Jeremiah Jones, an eighteenth--century reverend, comments:
Such pious frauds were very common among Christians even in the first three centuries; and a forgery of this nature, with the view above mentioned, seems natural and probable.13
10. Taylor, Diegesis, p. 66. 11. Ibid., p. 114. 12. Doane, p. 231. 13. Ibid.
"Should one continue to base one's life on a system of belief that--for all its occasional wisdom and frequent beauty--is demonstrably untrue?"
-- Charles Templeton, former right-hand man to Billy Graham in Farewell to God
following quotations from Catholic sources:
"If Christ Himself had written the book and set it forth as a text-book, so to speak, of His religion, we would rest securely in it, and have no need to inquire farther. That the Bible is not a book, like the Koran for instance, set forth by the founder of the religion as its authoritative exposition, is in fact the fundamental weakness of Bible Protestantism.
If Christ had intended His religion to be propagated and preserved by means of a book, can any conceivable reason be urged why He should not have written one? Of His ability to do so there can, for the Christian, be no question." (Plain Facts for Fair Minds, p. 26).
"Is it not strange that if Christianity were to be learned from the Bible only, that Christ himself never wrote a line or commanded his apostles to write; for their divine commission was not to write but to preach the gospel." (Question Box, p. 70).
"Christ gave his disciples no command to write, but only to teach." (Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 5, p. 767).
Most recent admission:
The Star, 1994 Manila, Philippines
VATICAN CITY, Italy - The Vatican criticized a literal interpretation of the
Bible
and said the fundamentalist approach to scripture was a kind of intellectual
suicide. A Vatican document said fundamentalism refuses to admit that the
**inspired Word of God has been expressed in human language... by human
authors possessed of limited capacities and resources.**
The 125-page document, The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church, was
written by the Pontifical Biblical Com-mission, a group of scholars who
assist the Pope in the study of scripture.
