The Gospel of Thomas

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/thomas.html

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[TrustinJC]

There are things in the Gospel of Thomas that we do not find anywhere else. It cannot, therefore, be said to be a blend of the 4 gospels. It is simply another witness to Christ. And the fact that it MAY have been writen later is irrelevant since the majority of the books of the bible were also writen at later dates and by people who were not the one who's name is attributed to it.

[KabaneTheChristian]

@TrustinJC

Well, yes, of course it is more than a blend of the four gospels. My point was that it shows reliance on a blend of the four gospels composed in 180 AD, and thus is very late. A book that late is of minimal historical value.

You're actually incorrect. The books of the New Testament were all written by the people who tradition attributes them to.

[nicfirebear]

The Council of Nicea in 325 also regarded the issue of Jesus' divinity as they began to attack Arius and Arianism for their belief that Jesus was not divine. Out of this came the Nicean Creed. The First Ecumenical Council at Constantinople in 381 again attacked Arianism and Macedoniasm as they did not support the divinity of the Holy Spirit or the Trinity. There is plenty of support for the view that early christianity was not one big happy family concerning Jesus' status.

[KabaneTheChristian]

@nicfirebear

Arius caused such an uproar because he contradicted the historical faith of the Church. That is, he did not transmit an ancient apostolic tradition, but created something new. It was the Holy Council at Nicea that promulgated the ancient and historical Christian faith, as witnessed to by the writings of the Fathers and the Liturgies of the Church. As you yourself noted, the controversy wasn't really over the divinity of Jesus until Arius. It was over His humanity.

[KabaneTheChristian]

@nicfirebear

Of course, the attacks on the humanity of Jesus were equally wrong, but you see my point. The earliest Christian writings unequivocally attest to the Lord's divinity.

May Christ's peace be with you!

[nicfirebear]

On the other hand we have the Ebionites who were of the view that Jesus was just a man. Eperfaneus wrote about the Ebionites the Panareum, it is ascribed that they preferred a version of the Gospel of Mathew that was different from the Canon, leaving out the virgin birth, or never making it up one could say. Jesus was born of a sexual union to them. Rejection of the virgin birth casts doubt on Jesus's divinity... and lord knows the early Proto-orthodox church couldn't have doubt.

[KabaneTheChristian]

@nicfirebear

...version of St. Matthew's Gospel. If this other version of Matthew contradicted Orthodoxy, the Holy Fathers never would attribute the respect they did to it.

Peace!

[TrustinJC]

@KabaneTheChristian Pt 2 If you applied the same standard to the OT writings as you do to NT writings your bible would be much much smaller.

So what if the origional writings of Thomas are lost. Jesus never wrote any of the gospels. The gospels are still about his life and teachings.

In the same way, the Gospel According to Thomas is a recording of the things he taught regarding the teachings of Christ.

Now what about the book of Hebrews. Who wrote it?

[TrustinJC]

@KabaneTheChristian I said the majority of the books of the bible, not the NT.

My point is that the same standard must apply to NT writings as are applied to the OT writings. But this is not done.

How many of the OT books were actually writen by the main character or by the one who's name appears as the title of the book? And when were they writen? How many were actually written during the lifetime of the main characters spoken about?

con't

[Manikhayya]

Kool...

[YouSpamTard]

Silly kid, You mention the word argue. What the fuch you going to argue?, You do anything but take heart for yourself, or any other, for that mater.You go back into time to get close to Christ, but you cant even understand or have ever read any of the generic Christ scriptures. As far as your "blend" thing about scriptures, and you know so much, now think to yourself, dumb ass, raca, Tomas is a right there scribe, as close as we can get to an actual quotation of Christ, or savior, Good luck. :)

[nicfirebear]

@KabaneTheChristian Scholars link the origen of the Ebionites origens to the First Jewish-Roman War of 66–70 CE. From this early time period they held to the original Mathew (the most jewish and not containing the virgin birth). So they held Jesus as an important man. The Nazarenes may have professed Jesus' divinity but the Ebionites did not. It was not for this reason that they were not popular early on though, it was because of the difficulty of converting gentiles straight into Jewish law.

[nicfirebear]

@KabaneTheChristian Concerning the Docetics I disagree. They arose in 70 AD, which is when most early christian groups could arise during the slow travel of the time period. It's also within Peters lifetime. Peters gospel is mentioned along side Docetists in the Heretical "calling out" of Origen in the 2nd century, linking the two as it makes sense that a gospel proffessing Jesus' ultimate divinity would be in favor in the Docetist view that Jesus was completely divine and not man.

[nicfirebear]

@KabaneTheChristian The first two chapters of Matthew, the virgin birth and the genealogy, were not contained in the first versions of Matthew's gospel. I apologize if the absence of the virgin birth does translate to a sexual union to you but to others it would only be rational. The fleshing out of the story later and the possibility that the original Mathew was the Q source used further on by the ebionites only supports my argument that many christians had reason to believe in Jesus the man.

[nicfirebear]

@KabaneTheChristian I don't consider them wrong or right. There is however enough evidence to see the that not all Christian sects beleived the same concerning Jesus's divinity and it's understandable why. However I consider the action taken against them to be further evidence of the feud of ideas rather than some indication it was a small isolated incident the Church made it out to be. And no, the Cannon attests the lords divinity but not all the suppressed gospels support the status of Jesus.