It is all just Paul or Peter's opinion?
Should we jut take Jesus or all of the Bible?
In the early second century, Polycarp of Smyrna, one of Christianity’s most famous martyrs, lists three sources of authority for early Christians. He writes, “So, then, let us serve him with fear and all reverence, just as he himself [Jesus] has commanded, as did the apostles, who preached the gospel to us, and the prophets, who announced in advance the coming of our Lord” (Pol. Phil. 6.3).
The three sources of authority for the earliest Christians were: (1) the teachings of Jesus passed on orally by the apostles; (2) the instructions of the apostles (cf. Acts 2:42); and (3) the words of the prophets, that is, the Old Testament Scriptures. These three streams of authority were different from each other stream, but each of the three was binding on early Christians.
The Scissor
Here is a crude example. Robert Funk along with 50ish scholars and over 100 laymen started a group in the USA. They would read the portion and would try to place it into 3 categories. The black meaning Jesus did not say it, the gray meaning Jesus likely said it, and red meaning Jesus definitely said it. lmost the entire gospel of John is in black. It is also interesting that the gospel of Thomas is given a significantly higher percentage of red and pink words than the biblical gospels. The "scholars" of the Jesus Seminar do not believe in the deity of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, the miracles of Christ, or the substitutionary atonement death of Christ. Perhaps most significantly, they deny that the Holy Spirit is the author of all Scripture. The true purpose of the Jesus Seminar is to promote the Jesus that the Jesus Seminar believes in instead of the Jesus of the Bible.
This too can happen with us as Christians framing that some as opinion and some are not. We expect good behaviour to be the real stuff, but attack on liberty as opinion. It then is possible to say that Paul was biased as he was unmarried, business minded and wanted power, so we remove 13 books, then we find that Hebrew may be Pauls, so we remove it as we don't know who wrote it. Then we take our scissors at 2nd Peter, first there are doubts whether Peter or another apostle wrote it, plus 2 Peter 3:16 says that Peter agrees that Paul is scriptural. So we remove it, 1st Peter is then not worth keeping. We look at John who enjoyed a good life and say that he was okay in the end as the Bishop of Ephesus. (Lets just forget the way Paul, Peter and John died or were tortured). So no we have Jude, James, Acts and the 4 gospels. James and Jude were said to be brothers of Jesus, so they have higher motive. Mark walked with Paul (Acts 12,13) so his view is wrong. So now we have Mathew, Luke , John and Acts. Luke stayed a long time with Paul (2 Timothy 4:11) so we remove him. So we have Matthew and John. John was mostly "made up" as said by Jesus Seminars so we loose John. Historically Matthew was inspired by Mark and Luke and Matthew had close relations so we are away with Matthew.
Ooops! We do not have the New Testament. So the Jesus outside the "opinion of men" fits our world view of a happy sage who says live, love, laugh and is accepting is just a fragment of our imagination.
Or do we just say only some portions are not scriptural. Then we begin again with a new Bible and a new sharper scissor.
The fact is, we sometimes read Scripture, thinking of what it ought to say, rather than what it does say.
Charles Spurgeon
The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit (ed. 1862)
See, these people lived with people who saw Jesus, if they were wring wrong stuff there were enough verifications that would have got them removed away from the Bible. Enough people, the church was small, they would have not copied and transmitted spam. If a book came from Peter or Paul that was not believed to be by Peter or Paul, it would have been contested.
Okay what about Patriarchy? Do you think that the women in the past were week? Jesus had strong women as his followers. Ladies of high influence. Lydia, Eunice, Joanna and many who lived and worked with Paul. It was not a male dominated field. Else this verse would have not been used - Husbands, die for your wives! (Ephesians 5:25) Do you think a misogynistic Paul could write that?
Or Peter in 1 Peter 3:7
Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers. The early church did indeed have a better view of women.(Read more)
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