On 1 May, 16:35, none <""doug\"@(none)"> wrote:
> Roger Pearse wrote:
>> On 29 Apr, 08:19, none <""doug\"@(none)"> wrote:
>>> George Hammond wrote:
>>>> ("4-demigods") Matt, Mark, Luke and John.
>>> These last four are the books chosen by the council ofNicea
>>> to be in the New Testament. Â
>
>> The Council of Nicaea did not determine the content of scripture. Â The
>> 4 gospels are considered canonical by all the ante-Nicene fathers,
>> right back as far as it goes.
>
> Luke and John were written in Turkey 100-200 years after Matthew and
> Mark so that is not quite correct.
Um, if Matthew was written ca. 80 AD, then you are saying Luke and
John were written between 180 AD and 280 AD? This is absurd. There
are shed-loads of quotations from them both before those dates. There
are commentaries on them from 200 AD! There's even a bit of a
physical manuscript dated to ca. 125 AD.
But I don't quite see what this wild stuff has to do with my comment.
>> I heard this story about the bible and the council some years ago and
>> got suspicious. Â It sounded wrong, based on what I knew ofTertullian
>> and the ante-Nicene fathers. Â So I went out and hunted down all the
>> primary sources on the council. Â You can consult them here:
>
>
>> I also looked in Metzger on the Canon of the NT, just to check I
>> hadn't missed any.
>
>>> The council also voted as to whether women were humans. Â
>
>> What a curious idea; impossible for any Christian council to do such a
>> thing. Â Someone is pulling your leg, my friend.
>
> This is an interesting assumption. Â Why would you insult them to suggest
> this? Â ...
Come, this won't do. You know very well why this claim about the
Council is made -- it's an appeal to contemporary societal values and
is intended as a smear. Either produce evidence for your claim or
retract it, hey?
>>> The point of the council was to try to unify the various christian sects
>
>> No, I'm afraid it was not. Â Christianity was not split into sects at
>> that date. Â Rather it was to decide whether the Second person of the
>> Trinity was of the same substance (homoousios) as the First person, or
>> of like substance; and to reach an agreed date on which to celebrate
>> Easter.
>
> No, there were some severe differences.
Evidence?
> And the sects still do not agree on the date for easter for example.
Which 'sects' did not agree on this? Name them.
The reality is that Christians in the East and West, who were all in
communion with each other, did not celebrate it at the same time, for
historical reasons. That is one reason why they wanted to get together
and work out an agreement. There was no quarrel between the bishops
of Rome and Alexandria on this; they just didn't have an agreed way to
do it.
> They also decided to not include other groups texts such as the
> gosphel of thomas. Â Someone
> had to go through and select among the texts from various groups
> and then edit them to make them somewhat more consistent.
Well, I'm going to have to be blunt. Please now produce an ancient
text which supports this claim or retract it. :-)
Seriously, all this is bunk. I have given you a link to all the
ancient texts that refer in any way to the council of Nicaea. None of
them contain the above story.
>>> ... and so it accepted the texts from various ones even though there
>>> are terrible discrepancies between them.
>
>> This sounds like a confused memory of the fact that the last few books
>> (2 and 3 John, 2 Peter, Hebrews, Revelation) were not geographically
>> spread over the same areas, and harmonisation gradually happened after
>> the church became legal when it was easier to hold councils.
>
> Matthew for instance, is the jewish book ... (snip)
None of the assertions snipped appear relevant to my comment, tho.
>> All this probably has no direct relevance on your thread, but don't we
>> all want to have the right raw *data*? Â I know that I do. Â I hope that
>> helps.
>
> You are correct that it has no relevance and that George has no clue
> about the connection he is trying to draw with his word salad between
> science and religion.
I have no opinion on George's theory (I can't take any interest in
such things), but it sounds a bit odd.
All the best,
Roger Pearse
