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Exploring Early Christian Diversity: Refuting Misconceptions About Canonical Disagreement

This session delves into the complexities of early Christianity, highlighting the diversity among factions and their texts. While it is true that early Christians disagreed on various theological matters, this does not negate the authenticity of the New Testament as divinely inspired. The notion that disagreement implies a lack of truth is a fallacy; the presence of diverse early Christian writings actually enriches our understanding of faith. We will examine Bauer's argument and clarify that earlier theological consensus existed around key texts, emphasizing that diversity does not disprove divine origin.

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Exploring Early Christian Diversity: Refuting Misconceptions About Canonical Disagreement

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Presentation Transcript

  1. REFUTING THE GAINSAYERS Session 3

  2. Nag Hammadi Codices

  3. Diversity • People disagree • No one has the right to claim they have the corner on truth. Reason for the Fascination

  4. Early Christians disagreed with one another • No one united Christianity, but various Christianities. • Each faction has its own books. • The books in our NT belonged to the theological “winners”. • If another group won, their books would have formed the canon. Bauer’s Argument

  5. Hence, you can’t trust your Bible because everybody disagrees about it. • So we can’t be confident we have the right books in our Bibles. • Everyone is entitled to their own version of truth and no one has the right to claim the others’ are false. • You get to pick the Jesus you like the most. Canonical Diversity

  6. Does the existence of disagreement prove that the 27 NT books are not from God? • This is a non sequitur argument. • The fact that there are disagreements has no bearing on whether one is the truth or whether you can know one is the truth. • Assumption: If these books are from God, there would be agreement on all of them. Diversity is Not An Argument

  7. There would be rapid acknowledgement and hardly any disagreement. • This is an invalid assumption. Diversity is Not An Argument

  8. God chose to deliver His canonical books through normal, historical channels. • There has always been and will always be false teaching and false teachers in the church. • There are spiritual forces opposing the church. • Not all who claimed to be Christians are really Christians. Reasons for Disagreement

  9. We get the impression that early Christianity was in utter chaos. • There was actually a great deal of unanimity. • Majority of the NT was agreed upon by A.D. 125, especially the 4 gospels. • There was no dispute about the 4 gospels. • Many theological debates resolved. • They had enough ammunition to deal with the disputes. The Diversity Is Exaggerated

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