The 'Missing' Apostles

Can anyone explain why only select members of the Twelve Apostles have Gospels?I'm curious as to why the Council of Carthage choose to exclude the Gospels of Thomas, Philip etc when compiling the NT - yet do include the Gospels of Luke and Mark, who were only companions of Saint Paul.As Paul (afaik) never met Christ, Luke and Mark would seem to have far less validity then any member of the Twelve.[This message has been edited by DaveF, 01-17-2003]

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Originally posted by DaveF:
Can anyone explain why only select members of the Twelve Apostles have Gospels?

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I'm curious as to why the Council of Carthage choose to exclude the Gospels of Thomas, Philip etc when compiling the NT - yet do include the Gospels of Luke and Mark, who were only companions of Saint Paul.

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As Paul (afaik) never met Christ, Luke and Mark would seem to have far less validity then any member of the Twelve.

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[This message has been edited by DaveF, 01-17-2003]

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well the thing about thomas was his gospel was a gnostic work.

Admittedly, the Gospels of John, Thomas, Philip and Mary all have gnostic leanings - but it seems as though only pictic Gospels have ever been accepted.The simple fact that these individuals were very close to Christ and still had gnostic leanings surely must indicate that the gnostic viewpoint was compatible with the teachings of Christ.I have also read on a number of sites that the pictic view (absolute faith in scripture) was originally heretical, but grew rapidly in numbers during the time Nero put them to the lions as entertainment. I would be interested if anyone could recommend any books / sources regarding the early schizm of Pictic / Gnostic Christianity.I would also like recommendations on books regarding the inception of Roman Catholicism - I didn't realise that 'Catholic' meant 'Universal', nor that Constantine had allegedly created it by combining Pictic Christianity with a number of Pagan faiths in order to create a state religion.

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Originally posted by DaveF:
Can anyone explain why only select members of the Twelve Apostles have Gospels?

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Politics. What other driving force is there in mankind?

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I'm curious as to why the Council of Carthage choose to exclude the Gospels of Thomas, Philip etc when compiling the NT - yet do include the Gospels of Luke and Mark, who were only companions of Saint Paul.

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Sincerely, politics. The council of Carthage was a couple of hundred years after the fact and there were a lot of squabbling sects. The ones who won the public relations campaign got to choose whose books were cannonized. Carthage isn't the only council by the way.The best synopsis of this process that I have found is by Scott Bidstrup. He gives a lot of names and dates so you can check up on anything you doubt. No webpage found at provided URL: http://www.bidstrup.com/bible.htm

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As Paul (afaik) never met Christ, Luke and Mark would seem to have far less validity then any member of the Twelve.

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No one of the Twelve wrote a book that is included in the Bible. Mark was written first around 70 ad. Matthew was next and is largely based upon Mark and perhaps a book of quotations that has not survived. Luke also based his work on Mark but wrote for a Greek audience. Then there is John who wrote nearly a hundred years after Christ's death.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Paul, then called Saul, did meet Christ, on the road to Damascus. (Acts 9)------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

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Originally posted by DaveF:
Can anyone explain why only select members of the Twelve Apostles have Gospels?

​

I'm curious as to why the Council of Carthage choose to exclude the Gospels of Thomas, Philip etc when compiling the NT - yet do include the Gospels of Luke and Mark, who were only companions of Saint Paul.

​

As Paul (afaik) never met Christ, Luke and Mark would seem to have far less validity then any member of the Twelve.

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[This message has been edited by DaveF, 01-17-2003]

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The gospels are all anonymous works, they were not written by eyewitnesses, the reason that there are four is because there are four compass points!Look at the internal evidence, Mark wrote the first gospel and he didnt claim to be an eyewitness, matthew copied 90% of Mark, and corrected some errors in Mark such as when Mark said Moses gave the law to the jews, matthew corrects Mark by saying God gave the law.Why then would an eyewitness rely on a non eyewitness account? Also, Papias said that Matthew wrote the word (logoi) in Hebrew, and the gospel of matthew we have today shows no signs of trnaslation from Hebrew into Greek.Luke also makes it clear that he didnt know jesus and John is far too late to be the disciple, I was very surprised when I went to Uni and learned that no one knows who wrote any of the gospels, they sort of kept that from us at my church!Regarding Paul meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus, this is fraught with historical impossibilities, for a start the Bible claims that Paul was going to Damascus at the behest of the Sandhedrin to persecute christians, but the Sanhedrin had NO power in Syria, how could they? The leaders of a small Palestinian cult sending a hit squad into a country controlled by the Romans, simply didnt happen. Like most of the Bible you have to take Paul's conversion with a pinch of salt.
I mean its a fact that throughout the ages that Christians have been more than economic with the truth, just look at the writings of Eusebius or Martin Luther, they both explicitly declare that it is fine to lie for God, anything to further the cause.Brian

meh

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Originally posted by funkmasterfreaky:
meh

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One of your better researched posts

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Brian Johnston:
[B]

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Originally posted by DaveF:
Can anyone explain why only select members of the Twelve Apostles have Gospels?

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Why then would an eyewitness rely on a non eyewitness account? Also, Papias said that Matthew wrote the word (logoi) in Hebrew, and the gospel of matthew we have today shows no signs of trnaslation from Hebrew into Greek.

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Brian

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Hi again Brian, some interesting points here, but I'll just reply to one if that's ok..IIRC papias is supposed to have said that Matthew wrote in the hebrew dialect/tongue (I think it is 'dialektos' although i could well be wrong...not sure how I can check at the moment), and I think in this place the writer could have been more specific and said language.This and the fact that Aramaic seemed to have been the common tongue of hebrews at this time may indicate that Aramaic was meant here rather than hebrew which I believe had become a "holy" language by this time.Now we in the west have been assured that the NT was penned in Greek, or (perhaps in a semitic tongue "Q" which has now been lost).No eveidence is ever supplied for this, and if I might be so bold, I would suggest that this claim deserves our scepticism.Most bible students are surprised, not only to hear that there is an Aramaic NT, but that assyrian Christians (God luv'em) get a little feisty on this point and tell us in no uncertain words that their NT , in Aramaic is what the greek was translated from."With reference to....the originality of the Peshitta text, as the Patriarch and Head of the Holy Apostolic and Catholic Church of the East, we wish to state, that the Church of the East received the scriptures from the hands of the blessed Apostles themselves in the Aramaic original, the language spoken by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and that the Peshitta is the text of the Church of the East which has come down from the Biblical times without any change or revision."Mar Eshai Shimunby Grace, Catholicos Patriarch of the EastI think the problem has been is that western believers particularly in the wake of the reforamtion and "sola scritura" and all that, merely asserted that the greek is original, reliable etc...I have however come to the conclusion that our the COE is right and the Aramaic is the original.I also beleive their is evidence to support this.We acn look at some sometime if anyone is interested.

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Can anyone explain why only select members of the Twelve Apostles have Gospels?
-------------------Yeah, I can. I can't go all the way back and explain how those four became so important in the 1st century, but I can tell you why the Council of Carthage, which you mentioned, chose those four.It's pretty simple, really, if you happen to be a person interested in church history. Those four Gospels are called the only Gospels from at least the early second century. I know for certain that Justin mentioned them just shy of the mid-second century, and I'm almost certain that those four are in an earlier list, too.Somebody mentioned that there are four, because there are four points on a compass, but he didn't mention why he said that. The four points of a compass are mentioned as one of the reasons there are just four.By the third century, the "canon" was pretty well established, and it included Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The belief at that time was that Matthew wrote his first. Mark and Luke's gospels were considered to be Peter's and Paul's, because Mark was supposed to have been with Peter in Rome, and Luke was a companion of Paul's.To have added Gospels in the third century would pretty much have been impossible. It would have been seen as heresy.Now, perhaps Thomas' Gospel was written later, or perhaps the 2nd century church (in the Roman empire, at least) didn't believe he wrote it, or they didn't know about it, because Thomas is supposed to have gone east to India. The apostles who went east, out of the Roman empire, we mostly only have second-hand stories about. We have no writings from them. Whatever the reason, it's not much discussed in the second century. Surely no one before Clement of Alexandria mentions it, and I don't think he mentions it, either.Anyway, by the time of the Council of Carthage, there was no debate about which books were canonical. So you can blame it on Thomas leaving the Roman empire, or you can blame it on Thomas not having written it (I have no idea whether he did or not), or you can blame it on the churches in the Roman empire not knowing about it, but in the end, the reason there are only four is because those are the four the churches of the Roman empire knew about and accepted starting towards the beginning of the 2nd century.During the second century, there was only one standard for what was considered canonical, which is whether an apostle wrote it, or whether one of his companions wrote it. Such a document was authoritative and all others weren't. For some reason, not because of content, the Gospel of Thomas did not meet that standard in the eyes of the 2nd century churches of the Roman empire, and therefore it is not in the canon.

DaveF,Oh, and I forgot this one:--------------------
As Paul (afaik) never met Christ, Luke and Mark would seem to have far less validity then any member of the Twelve.
--------------------The early churches didn't care about this. As far as they were concerned, Paul met Christ on the way to Damascus and had visions of him later. He met the 12 and was approved by them, and he started most of the major churches of the Roman empire. He was an apostle, and he was perhaps the greatest one.You may not agree with their opinion, but they were the ones who established the canon, and that was their opinion. Anything Paul wrote was Gospel, just as anything Peter wrote was, but Paul wrote more than Peter, so we have more from him.

Hi TruthloverCan you maybe clarify a few things for me ?You say 'The early churches didn't care about this.'What churches didnt care about whether Paul met Christ or not?You also said 'He met the twelve and was approved by them'Which twelve did Paul meet?
Did they all approve of him or did some of them, such as James, have any issues with him?You say 'he started MOST of the major churches of the Roman Empire'In your opinion, what were the major churches in the Roman Empire and which ones did Paul start?Did he start them or did he modify them ?Also you say 'You may not agree with their opinion, but they were the ones who established the canon'Who established the canon ?Which particular canon, there were diferent ones.Who wrote the gospels ?You wont find a reputable scholar to agree that any of the apostles wrote any of the gospels.'anything that Paul wrote was Gospel'How many books or letters originally attributed to Paul are still attributed to him?Are any of the Pastorals attributed to him, or is Hebrews still attributed to Paul?The you say 'but Paul wrote more than Peter, so we have more from him. 'What an amazing piece of logic, you should be in the FBI.Best Wishes
Brian.------------------
Remembering events that never happened is a dangerous thing![This message has been edited by Brian Johnston, 02-15-2003]

Brian,Well, you have questions, but there's an overarching philosophy behind your questions, and since I can't pinpoint that, I can't totally answer your questions. I certainly wasn't trying to be precise. I was answering a question as to why the 4 Gospels in the accepted canon of every church of mainline Christianity throughout history are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and they don't include Thomas, Philip or any others. My answer to that question is the correct one.You asked what churches didn't care whether Paul met Christ or not. None of them didn't care, I imagine, not even the gnostic ones, which would be outside of mainline Christianity. If you want to define mainline Christianity as the churches that won the battle for existence and supremacy, I'm fine with that. I was not saying that they didn't care whether Paul met Christ. I was saying that whether Paul met Christ is not why they chose Luke's gospel, which was received because he was Paul's companion.Paul did not necessarily meet all the apostles. I don't know which ones he met. I do know he met Peter and James, and I am confident James had issues with him, but James, for whatever reasons, approved Paul as an emissary to the Gentiles, or allowed others to say he approved of Paul.However, if someone wants to know, and apparently DaveF did, why the 4 Gospels that are accepted be well over a billion people are accepted, it is because Paul was known as a major, or the major, approved apostle; approved by the twelve. Thus Luke was accepted. Matthew was thought by the major churches to have been written by Matthew, so it was. Mark was considered Peter's, because he was a companion of Peter, and John's was accepted as the work of the apostle John, written late in life as a refutation to gnosticism (note the abundance of separate gnostic eons mentioned at the start of the Gospel of John--Light, Word, Life, etc.).The major churches of the Roman empire would be Rome, Corinth, Ephesus, Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria and some others. While Paul was not given credit for starting the Roman church, the churches that are the ancestors of large scale Christianity today considered the Roman church to hold the teachings and opinions of both Peter and Paul.I was simply answering a question with well-known and accepted history, not presenting a theological system.The churches that are the ancestors of large-scale Christianity today did not have many canons. A few books were in question, but the canon in those churches did not vary much at all.You asked who established the canon I spoke of. I addressed the canon that DaveF said was approved at the Council of Carthage. I'm not sure even which council that might be without consulting history that I haven't looked at in eight years, but I do know that by the time any major councils were held, the canon was quite set already. The churches I've mentioned and was talking about were basically agreed on the canon from at least around AD 160, where the Muratorian canon matches modern ones pretty closely.I understand that Catholicism has 7 more old covenant books than Protestantism. Orthodox churches have even more than that if you can get one of their members to list a canon for you, and the Assyrian Orthodox church of the east ends their NT at 1 John. The Ethiopian Orthodox church includes the Book of Enoch. However, all of them agree on the four Gospels and their canons don't differ enough for me to consider them "different canons." I consider Marcion's a different canon, but now you're in a completely different sect that basically no longer exists and is not represented in mainline Christianity today.I hope that's clearer. I'm not defending modern Christianity. If it was united and noted for its love and its ability to transform people, you would be embarrassed to attack it. Since it's not, I'm embarrassed to defend it, and I won't. Christ's disciples are supposed to be so united that the world would know God sent him (John 17:20-23). That is the only defense of the teachings of Jesus Christ that I will ever offer or accept.

Several things strike me as being incorrect about your post. I hope you won't take offence.

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it is because Paul was known as a major, or the major, approved apostle; approved by the twelve.

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I am not aware of any evidence that Paul met any of the twelve apostles, though he would have been alive at the time.This is not exactly on target but it is related and you might find it interesting: No webpage found at provided URL: http://www.apostolicfathering.org/ncsm/paul_among_the_12_apostles.htm

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The churches that are the ancestors of large-scale Christianity today did not have many canons. A few books were in question, but the canon in those churches did not vary much at all.

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This is just wrong, my friend. There are/were hundreds of apocryphal books and just as many cannons, if you want to call them that. There was no cannon until until one was created by Constantine. The leaders who met to form the cannon fought viciously and then went home and essentially ignored the new cannon. It was many years before A cannon caught on and it caught on largely due to military action against 'heretics.' The various churches kept their own collections of documents. I imagine, even, that the idea of A Cannon was a bit foreign.

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I do know that by the time any major councils were held, the canon was quite set already.

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I'd like to see evidence for this.

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The churches I've mentioned and was talking about were basically agreed on the canon from at least around AD 160, where the Muratorian canon matches modern ones pretty closely.

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You mean this?

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The Muratorian Canon

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It leaves out a few books. At any rate, it was compiled some 130 years after the foundation of the church-- that is much too late a date for my way of thinking.Consider this: ------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Well, I didn't take any offense, but I don't understand what you're thinking. You wrote:---------------------------
Consider this:Because the N.T. Canon was not yet settled, they respected and quoted from works that have generally passed out of the Christian tradition. The books of Hermas, Barnabas, Didache, and 1 and 2 Clement were all regarded highly (Hannah, Lecture Notes for the History of Doctrine, 2.2).
The Christian Canon
---------------------------I don't get it. That article gives exactly the information I am telling you about. Are you suggesting that because Hermas, Barnabas, the Didache, and 1 Clement were considered Scripture by some churches and not by others that there were therefore many canons? That's not true. When you have a situation like that, you have a varying canon, not many canons. The churches that did not receive the four above mentioned books nonetheless considered the books good, sound teaching and would have quoted from them.Hermas, Barnabas, and Clement were all thought by some churches to be the companions of Paul mentioned in the letters. The Didache's other name is "The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles," (Didache is simply Greek for teaching). Other churches didn't believe the Hermas, Barnabas, and Clement were the companions of Paul mentioned in his letters, so they didn't treat the books as having apostolic authority.Jude, Revelation, 2 and 3 John, both Timothy's and Titus, and maybe Hebrews, I can't remember, were all in the same boat. Oh, and 2 Peter and Jude, too.All this tells you is that the standard for such books in the early church was difficult to apply, so there were three levels really. There were accepted books, like most of Paul's letters, the four Gospels, 1 Peter, and Acts, and then questionably ones, which I've mentioned, then orthodox ones clearly not of apostolic origin.These "many canons" you mention are simply differing choices on the questionable books. The Old Testament had its own set of questionable books as well.The evidence that Paul met Peter and James is the universal testimony of early writers that it was so, plus Acts. Is this conclusive evidence? I guess that is probably subject to opinion. However, there is absolutely no evidence against it except for weird Bible interpretations by people who want to revive gnosticism.And yes, you pointed to the right Muratorian canon, which, as I was guessing based on my faulty memory, was written about AD 160 (which would be 130 years after the foundation of the church). I am astounded by your assertion that this is too late to matter, since you asked about the decision of the Council of Carthage, of which there were seven, but the one you are referring to is the 3rd, and it occurred in AD 397, over two centuries after the Muratorian canon.If anything, the Muratorian canon could only be too early to apply, but it's not. It's simply the earliest extant published canon, and the series that follows all pulls from the same set of books I listed above, and the differences between them narrow steadily from the 2nd century (starting with the Muratorian canon, but lists are also given by Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria, not the same Clement mentioned above) to the 4th, and as far as I know, there are no differences whatsover in the published canons of the 4th century, at the end of which the council you asked about occurred.