Friday, August 21, 2009

Bart Ehrman - Consistency, please!

Just to summarise his assertions on Lost Christianities:
  • Orthodoxy is just the belief that happened to win the 2nd-3rd century battles to define what was orthodox.
  • The Canon of scripture was arbitrary and resulted only to establish orthodoxy.
  • All other 'Christianities' and scriptures were just as legitimate

However, when we turn to the historical Jesus painted in his Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium?
  • We use the orthodox Christian sources as they are the (1) earliest and (2) most reliable of the scriptures.
  • We paint an eschatological Jesus based on the orthodox sources and testimony of orthodoxy throughout the ages.
  • However, we do not paint an esoteric gnostic Jesus or a Marcionite Jesus which he lends equal legitimacy to in Lost Christainities.
What can we take away from here?
Do you believe that Ehrman really finds all Christainities equal?
Do you believe that he really finds all scriptures equal?

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