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Coptic Gospels

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Lennon
There's the gospel of mark, matthew luke and john.

But some of the dead sea scrolls contain:

The gospel of thomas
The gospel of mary
The gospel of Andrew

And recently there's another publication of the gospel of judas to be released soon.

The coptic gospels are true historical pieces from about the second and third centuries... The four main gospels were also written at least 40 years after the death of jesus.

So why do christians believe in only these four gospels?
a_dubDesign
Lennon wrote:

So why do christians believe in only these four gospels?


Crap, I had that on a test once, its the qualifications for cannonization (being in the bible). There was a list of some things that were taken into consideration when it was decided, but I definetly dont remember all of them. There was hwo far down the road did it come along, or I guess a better way to say it is how long after jesus died was it written down. Another thing they took into consideration was who was the person who wrote it, as most biblical scholars agree that not all of the gospels were written by the person bearing the name of the book. I'd imagine that the council also spent alot of time discussing it amongst themselves and praying about it. Of course that last one is just what I'm imagining.

Theres other reasons, but I don't remember them, and I didn't on test day either. But then again, I didn't really agree with alot of what they taught, and alot of what the school did. I was out after a year.

I'd also like to add that just because they are not a part of the accepted cannon they could always contain truth. I would just make sure to check everything against the mass accepted books though.
johanfh
The point is: it took some time before what we now call 'the Bible' was completed. You can see that in the New Testament, the books in it are written between 'bout the year 45 and 100 (some scholars say it's later, but that's not the point in this discussion).
There were other books written in the same years or written somewhat later. Some of these books became widespread (for example the letter of Clemens) and where in the Bible for a while. But in the end the books from wich the people knew they were written by people who actually lived in the same time as Jesus became accepted as 'the New Testament'. That took some time and it was for a lot of different reasons it became like this.

The books Lennon mentioned (the gospel of Thomas, Andrew, Mary) are not in the Dead Sea scrolls, since these scrolls were all about the period before Christ. In the scrolls you find books from the Old Testament or from the same period as the Old Testament.

But in Nag Hammadi there were also scrolls, wich contained the gospel of Thomas. This gospel and the gospel of Mary (I don't know the gospel of Andrew) are so called 'gnostic gospels'. The gnostics were a group of christians who believed that Jesus was a wise man (not God) who saved the world from a bad god, the old testament god, which hated the earth. They used the gospels from Thomas and Mary to defend themselves but most scholars believe they wrote these gospels themself, because they are so totally different from what is written in the New Testament and the books wich are known to be written in the same time (the so called patristic literature) and because these books were not commonly used.

I hope this helps. A lot of people find it nice to think about the 'mystic' things around it ( 'what if all christians are lyars and this is the truth?' Wink ) but sorry, most historics, and not only christian historics, just don't believe these books are really written by people from the first christian age.

Greetings,
JohanFH
Soulfire
Lennon wrote:
So why do christians believe in only these four gospels?

We believe in the word of the Bible, and those gospels are not contained or considered as part of the Bible. Did you really expect that only 4 people would write about the Son of God? No, I'm sure there are plenty more than even the dead sea scrolls. I think they didn't include all of these in the Bible because they are all the same basic story, and Christians pretty much know the story.
AftershockVibe
Soulfire wrote:
Lennon wrote:
So why do christians believe in only these four gospels?

We believe in the word of the Bible, and those gospels are not contained or considered as part of the Bible. Did you really expect that only 4 people would write about the Son of God? No, I'm sure there are plenty more than even the dead sea scrolls. I think they didn't include all of these in the Bible because they are all the same basic story, and Christians pretty much know the story.



Well, I think you're mostly right but you have to be very careful and remember it's a stupid thing to believe that politics social trends at the time haven't changed important images of all religions. For example, why is Jesus portrayed as a white caucasian male?
CompactHaven
Soulfire wrote:
Lennon wrote:
So why do christians believe in only these four gospels?

I think they didn't include all of these in the Bible because they are all the same basic story, and Christians pretty much know the story.

Nah, that couldn't have been it. God spicifically said not to add or subtract from the Bible.
Not adding something that should have been there in the first place would be the same as subtracting concidering what God would want.
There must be another reason.

P.S. If someone has already posted the reason, I have not gotten around to ready all of the replies to see yet, so please don't jump on me.
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