Please help, only people educated on the history of the bible and gospels please?

Question

When the bible was being put together by th echurch, it is a fact that many gospels were left out by choice of human beings-why? You take out a whole chapter in a book and you may miss the points. I'm just curious about reading these-and is there a way to do so?
Thanks.

Yes there were, please only people with knowledge on this. http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/Bible/outside.stm

Pastor Art, I'm a Female for one thing, and a spiritualist for another. I am not looking for an arguement, and you should really be the one to cast the first stone eh?
I'm looking for those who understand the historical accounts of how the bible was put together because I do not just want to hear "there are none, an dit was magically all there" I want to hear from mature, open minded people-who understand that the first church had to decide what to put in the bible before it was ever created, and that there are lost manuscripts-and I want to read them too. It has nothing to do with arguements or disbelieving, far from it. You read way too much into that.

Thankyou to those of you who understood what I was looking for!
If I wasn't a believer In Jesus I wouldnt want to read all sources. I definitely believe in him and I love to learn and read. Reading the lost gospels I feel will give insight into other perspectives and show different sides. It's lovely to learn :) thanks

UKUL: I'm not interested in whether it's fiction or fact- I'm interested in finding the whole thing, to read it all. It has nothing to do with wanting to know your beliefs, but thanks anyways-your post was ever so, unhelpful :)

Everard G :Yes, thankyou! that is what I have learned and exactly the info I was looking for-

Dream: That is interesting, do you think it was written by an imposter? or more symbolic for something if read in th eright context? Or perhaps Jesus had a hard time controlling his God-like abilities? i at least have an open mind to examine all possibilities.

Answer 1

Not all ancient Judeo-Christian texts made it into the Christian Bible. These ancient texts are called "outside books," "extrabiblical books," or "noncanonical books."

http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/Bible/outside.stm

Answer 2

I want to second what alanagkelly has to say, especially her book recommendation. But here is my 2 cents:

Yes, there were documents called gospels that were not recognized as scripture by the proto-orthodox. However, few were even roughly as early as the canonical gospels. The Gospel of Thomas, which was found with the Gnostic gospels, has material that very well MAY go back to the historical Jesus. But the document has a whole dates from the early 2nd century at the earliest. Matthew, Mark, Luke date in the 2nd half, probably 4th quarter of the 1st century. John is late 1st, early 2nd century. (The genuineness of the Secret Gospel of Mark is deeply disputed.) The Gnostic Gospels all date later, sometimes much later than the Gospel of Thomas. There are a couple other documents for which we have fragments that MIGHT contain material that goes back to the historical Jesus.

The bottom line here is that little, if anything, that is as early as the canonical gospels was left out.

What is unfortunate is that none of the gospels that predated the canonical gospels survive (see 1st chapter of Luke).

Why read the documents that post-date the New Testament canon? I think they give a very interesting and important look at the beliefs that date in the decades and centuries after the formation of the NT canon. They are important for the history of early Christianity, even if they do not add anything to our picture of the historical Jesus.

Answer 3

I am reading a book about this right now. It is called Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew. Here is the amazon summary:

"What if various early Christian writings, such as the Gospel of Thomas or the Secret Gospel of Mark, had been allowed into the canonical New Testament? The proto-orthodox Christians won out over many other groups, and bequeathed to us the four Gospels, a church hierarchy, a set of practices and beliefs, and doctrines such as the Trinity. Ehrman eloquently characterizes some of the movements and Scriptures that were lost, such as the Ebionites and the Secret Gospel of Mark, as he outlines the many strands of Christianity that competed for attention in the second and third centuries. He issues an important reminder that there was no such thing as a monolithic Christian orthodoxy before the fourth century."

It is really interesting so far. He also explains that they know some of them are forgeries and that even some of the books in the biblical cannon are considered forgeries.

Answer 4

here's the big mystery and enigma of the bible... it was written with prophecy... Just like Nostradamus's work... so these catholics would collect the prophecies and the one leading the church.. calling himself god... would work to change prophecies.. this is the unseen battle... prophecies are natural .. expected outcomes... but by changing and manipulating the prophecies they found they could change the outcome of certain events.. now the church has been doing this officially for almost 2000 years... but that which guides them for longer ... so the church was guided to hide prophecies not accomadating to their "god,,, who is a human by the way" .... if you look at the catholic bible... it's very very violent... they used the burning of heretics.. then the inquistions to change the outcome... so prophecy becomes plans... the reason the bible became so important is that they are still working to destroy the prophecy it's written about... so through out history that is why the bible changed... christianity works the same way... crusades, burning of witches..by knowing prophecy they know who and what to destroy... for most of the prophecies intend to destroy religion... that is why the books are left out... the first coming of the man refered to as jesus.... the one who would have all the answers to destroy the church and all the answers humanity would have been given as to how nature works and what make the world go round... that is why the bible is written with the singular purpose of murdering this man... if I were to try and understand the order of the bible... i would look to see where the prophecies change.. and war broke out...for nature doesn't make war... the church does... a prophet is someone who would do what he was told... the false prophets would seek to change prophecies... Even Nostadamus knew to be afraid of the church.... Another area that needs to be looked into along the same lines is... what information has been change once it went through the christians hands... remember they promote their god as all knowing... well prophecy might be knowing something others don't but it's far from all knowing... I've noticed a trend that once people are discredited then dead... the christians reclaim their work and redistribute it with a christian spin... claiming their god knows it all... that is why the church is full of pagan practices... if you get anywhere with any of this information please I'd be interested if you found some missing truth... I can be reached through http://www.gypsys-emporium.com/talk_to_me

Answer 5

Within the first 100 years there was already an accepted body of scripture. It wasn't formalized until many years later, but certain letters and gospels were accepted and commonly distributed in the churches.

There actually were many writings that were rejected by the apostolic leaders in the very infancy of the church. The are what we call gnostic writings. They were often written by unknown authors claiming to be someone they weren't. They offered "secret truths" which were outright contradictory to Jesus' teachings and Old Testament truth. They were easily identified by people who had actually heard Jesus teach and had firsthand accounts of what he had said. They were very much a blend of Christianity and the Greek culture they were becoming more a part of. They were rejected by people that had known Jesus long before the official canon was decided upon. The canon reflected the writings that had been accepted for generations, but it was solidified to further discredit the false gospels and letters.

Answer 6

Yes, books were left out! And books were rewritten, kept secret, people were killed for translating the Bible, etc. It has a long weird history.

There is no official bible written by God, the bible is a collection of texts chosen by a group of man and not all of the texts that were considered made it into the bible.

The Church chose and altered texts according to their own agenda - and if you do not believe that, simply look at the other things they were doing at that time: burning women alive in front of their children, killing anyone who went against the church, they even sold tickets to heaven! Anyone with enough money could go!

If they would do things like that, then what would stop them from writing a book?

Answer 7

The bible was placed together with the four Gospels that best showed the aspects of God and did not conflict with the doctrine that had already been established in other sources such as Paul's letters. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are also the oldest established Gospels and are the least likely to be corrupted by myth and legend and so are considered the most accurate.

Answer 8

Yes, there were many books taken out of the bible, Mary had a book, and Enoch, and many others. There is a book called, Missing Books of the Bible, that has these books in them. Its a black book, and pretty long. But it is super interesting.

Now, the church didn't originally put the Bible together, Constantine did, when the Romans controlled everything...

Religion is the best way to control a person or a group of people...

Answer 9

Some of the missing gospels are available, if you know their names, try Amazon or something like that. I don't how many were not included in the Gospel, but the usual reasons are
(1) They lack a certain relation with G-d that the redactors looked for.
(2) In early church days, there were many interpretations of the character of Christ- was he human, was he God, was he both, is the Trinity true? Certain views counter to the accepted one were not included.
BTW: The Acrophytic writings are NOT excluded gospels. They were books not included in the Jewish Scripture, generally because they were too new.

Answer 10

Well, lets' see whay this one was left out,,,for instance:

The Infancy Gospel of Thomas opens with a story about five-year-old Jesus making twelve sparrows out of mud. He claps his hands; they come to life and fly away. A nice story but in the next story, child Jesus curses a boy and makes him wither up. Later Jesus is angered when another child bumps into his shoulder and strikes him dead! This gospel, which may be as old as the second century, is a different book from the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas.

Answer 11

In the early 300s Emperor Constantine had his ‘conversion’ – he realised xianity would be a powerful tool to keep the peasants in line.

In the late 300s, to fulfil Constantine’s legacy (cos he was dead by then) a gaggle of bishops voted on which books would be included in the bible.

These are the simple facts.
Fundies will disagree cos it doesn’t quite fit their idea of how it happened, yet other fundies will presume that ‘god’ influenced the bishops to come up with ‘the truth’.
ALL fundies will choose to forget there were many agendas happening during and after the process.
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