Review: Forged by Bart Ehrman

Product Summary

It is often said, even by critical scholars who should know better, that “writing in the name of another” was widely accepted in antiquity. But New York Times bestselling author Bart D. Ehrman dares to call it what it was: literary forgery, a practice that was as scandalous then as it is today. In Forged, Ehrman’s fresh and original research takes readers back to the ancient world, where forgeries were used as weapons by unknown authors to fend off attacks to their faith and establish their church. So, if many of the books in the Bible were not in fact written by Jesus’s inner circle—but by writers living decades later, with differing agendas in rival communities—what does that do to the authority of Scripture?

First Impressions

"It may seem odd to modern readers, or even counterintuitive, that a religion that built its reputation on possessing the truth had members who attempted to disseminate their understanding of the truth through deceptive means. But it is precisely what happened. The use of deception to promote the truth may well be considered one of the most unsettling ironies of the early Christian tradition."

- Excerpt from Chapter 7

Forged: Writing in the Name of God is a built upon a foundation of two significant premises, only one of which is controversial. The first premise posits that forgery was rampant in the ancient world and that some of those forgeries found their way into The New Testament.

This however, is not the controversial claim that Bart Ehrman espouses. It is actually Bart's second premise that is more likely to ruffle feathers, as he makes the assertion that contrary to popular opinion forgery was not a relatively accepted practice in its day.

Anyone familiar with Dr. Ehrman will not be surprised that the arguments he makes demonstrate both impeccable reasoning skills and is supported by a wealth of evidence and research--what else should one expect from a professor who has spent decades in the field of New Testament studies and engages in public debates on a regular basis?

Since the subject of the book is early Christian forgeries, Ehrman goes through a painstaking amount of detail in order to properly differentiate the various forms of authorship among the texts.

Authorship Terminologies

Orthonymous: "Rightly named". A text that is actually by the person who claims to be writing it. The seven undisputed letters of Paul are an example that would fall into this category. Nothing that is orthonymous can be a forgery, as there is no false claim of identity made.

Homonymous: "Same named". A text that is written by someone who happens to have the same name as someone else. One such example would be the Book of Revelation, wherein the author identifies himself as "John". Later Christians saw this name and mistakenly attributed the book as being a work of John, son of Zebedee. Once again, this does not pass Bart's criteria for a forgery as it was not the author's fault that later readers assumed he was someone else.

Anonymous: "Having no name". A writing in which the author does not identify themselves. This is the case for roughly a third of the New Testament canon (All four gospels, Acts, 1, 2, 3 John). Anonymous writings were much more common in Jesus' time than they are today. Logic follows that an anonymous text cannot be a forgery since it makes no claims of identity whatsoever.

Pseudonymous: "Falsely named". A writing that bares a name different from that of the actual author. Bart makes an important distinction here. The first type of pseudonymous writing is what we would think of as a pen name. When Samuel Clemens wrote the book Huckleberry Finn and signed it as Mark Twain he was not trying to deceive his readers, he was only trying to mask his identity. Ergo, not a forgery.

The other type of pseudonymous text is...

Pseudepigraphal: "Written under a false name". A text attributed to someone other than the actual author. There is a distinction to be made here as well. Some texts (such as the four NT gospels) were originally written anonymously but were later ascribed to particular authors. This is still not an example of forgery because it was later scribes that made the falsification, not the authors themselves.

The form of pseudepigraphy that Ehrman is writing about is otherwise known as a...

Forgery: A pseudepigraphal writing in which the author knowingly claims to be someone else. Oftentimes the author claims to be a person of authority or high social standing whose reputation could elevate the legitimacy of the forger's text. 

So what's one notable forgery within The New Testament? With good humour, Ehrman shares the following passage:

Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, That ye be not soon shaken in mind or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand.

- 2 Thess 2:1-2

The passage above is significant for three reasons:

1. It is a New Testament text claiming that others have circulated letters written in their name. In other words, that fellow Christians had been committing forgery. 

2. The text from which it is taken (Second Epistle to the Thessalonians) is itself a forgery!

3. It is irrefutable proof that forgeries existed in early Christian communities. How so? Well, if you believe that the text is authentic and true then it naturally follows that you would also believe that the author is telling the truth when he says that there are those who have taken to writing letters in his name. If you do not believe the text is authentic then you must concede that it is a forgery, because it explicitly states that it was written by Paul, even though biblical scholars have known for quite some time that it was not!

Why would someone forge a letter in the name of Paul full well knowing that they are not him? There's several reasons for this, most of which involve a certain amount of deception. Unfortunately for my readers I am not going to share what these reasons are, nor will I say what other texts Ehrman has declared as forgeries. If you want to find out you'll just have to read the book for yourself. I'm a cruel bastard, I know (if you already know the answers to the above then there is a good chance that your reading of the book will mostly be for pleasure, as it was for me!).

Ehrman also takes the time to mercilessly demolish the oft repeated mantra that the practice of forgery was not regarded as negatively as it is today. He does this by sharing excerpts from many significant historical figures of the same time period--all of which have nothing but hated and vitriol for those who would pen a text in another's name.

Bart also disputes the claim that it was common among the philosophically minded to sign off under the pen name of their master, by providing a great deal of evidence that, well, they didn't. He does however offer quite a bit of evidence to dispel the myth.

The author seems to infer that some of the reason scholars are hesitant to label any Christian text as being a forgery is due to fear of the repercussions. It is not uncommon among scholars to sanitize their terminology to such an extent that it strips their writing of any personal attachment to the subject. At this point the text can be freely and objectively criticized without fear of backlash, since the general public has no idea what the hell they're talking about!

I could, of course, be mistaken and simply reading too much into this.

I particularly enjoyed chapter 8 as it touched on several modern Christian forgeries, such as the notion that Jesus spent time in India among monks, Pilate's alleged death sentence, and the "long lost" second book of Acts. 

Ehrman's book is not a scholarly text (which he readily admits from the start), rather it is more in line with his previous works: Misquoting Jesus, God's Problem and Jesus, Interrupted in that it is written for a general audience and meant to share fascinating aspects from the scholarly community that have gone relatively unnoticed thus far.

If you are interested in an academic work full of technicalities, citations and references to century old German texts, have no fear--Ehrman himself writes in the book that a scholarly monograph on this very subject is in the works.

Final Thoughts

Forged is a must-buy if you are interested in the subject of early Christian forgeries. Honestly I think the title was a little deceptively marketed, as the title makes it seem as though the Bible will be the brunt of the focus. This is not the case; canonical and non-canonical texts share equal time. Nonetheless the book effectively demonstrates the fact that throughout human history there have been those who are willing to deceive in order to make way for "the truth".

PS: I was determined to make a thorough review of this book, but it seems as though New Testament language and literature scholars do a much better job of reviewing this book than I could manage! Check out professor (and fellow blogger) Dr. James F. McGrath of Butler University who wrote pretty much all there is to say about this book.

My Bart Ehrman Obsession Grows Exponentially with each Book Release

So I'm psyched that I can now pre-order...

Book Cover Description -- “We may never know what drove these people . . .to hide their own identity and to claim, deceitfully, that they were someone else. Their readers, had they known, would probably have called them liars and condemned what they did. But in their own eyes, their conscience may have been free from blame, and their motives may have been as pure as the driven snow. They had a truth to convey, and they were happy to lie in order to proclaim it.”—from Forged

It is often said, even by critical scholars who should know better, that “writing in the name of another” was widely accepted in antiquity. But New York Times bestselling author Bart D. Ehrman dares to call it what it was: literary forgery, a practice that was as scandalous then as it is today. In Forged, Ehrman’s fresh and original research takes readers back to the ancient world, where forgeries were used as weapons by unknown authors to fend off attacks to their faith and establish their church. So, if many of the books in the Bible were not in fact written by Jesus’s inner circle—but by writers living decades later, with differing agendas in rival communities—what does that do to the authority of Scripture?

Dr. Ehrman investigates ancient sources to:

• Reveal which New Testament books were outright forgeries.

• Explain how widely forgery was practiced by early Christian writers—and how strongly it was condemned in the ancient world as fraudulent and illicit.

• Expose the deception in the history of the Christian religion.

Ehrman’s fascinating story of fraud and deceit is essential reading for anyone interested in the truth about the Bible and the dubious origins of Christianity’s sacred texts.

Forged  has a release date of March 22nd, 2011. Expect a full review to follow shortly thereafter.

Review - Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium by Dr. Bart D Ehrman

Amazon Summary

"[...]At last count," Ehrman begins, "there were something like 8 zillion books written about Jesus .... It's not there aren't enough books about Jesus out there. It's that there aren't enough of the right kind of book. Very, very few, in fact. I'd say about one and a half."

The right kind of book, according to Ehrman, is one that portrays Jesus roughly as Albert Schweitzer did, as a first-century Jewish apocalypticist: "This is a shorthand way of saying that Jesus fully expected that the history of the world as we know it (well, as he knew it) was going to come to a screeching halt, that God was soon going to intervene in the affairs of this world, overthrow the forces of evil in a cosmic act of judgment, destroy huge masses of humanity, and abolish existing human political and religious institutions. All this would be a prelude to the arrival of a new order on earth, the Kingdom of God."

Ehrman's is a historical-Jesus book, a very smart, humble, and humorous popular summary of Christian and secular evidence of Jesus' life, work, and legacy. He believes that apocalypticism is the true core of Jesus' message, and that comfortable middle-class complacency among scholars, clergy, and laypeople has forged a counterfeit, domesticated, "ethical" Jesus to cover up their befuddlement about his misprediction of the apocalypse. 

The book will frustrate many readers because it offers no real guidance regarding what one should do with Jesus' apocalypticism. Its project--to prove that Jesus was wrong about the apocalypse--may even appear destructive to some. Yet the argument is convincing enough to induce among careful readers a constructive experience of confusion. Jesus makes readers ask the very question it appears to ignore, in a newly humble way: how, then, should we live? A serious matter, but considering humanity's endless string of wrong answers and infinite capacity for self-delusion, worthy of some good belly laughs, as well.

Since many messed up crazies have written about Jesus, I feel the need to preface this review by introducing the author, so as to show you that he isn't just a random nut with a bible, free time and an internet connection. 

Dr. Bart D. Ehrman first attended Wheaton College where he earned his B.A., followed thereafter by a M.Div. and Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary. He currently serves as the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor at the University of North Carolina where he teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses on a variety of subjects: New Testament Textural Criticism, Early Christian Apocrypha, The Apostolic Fathers, Literary Forgeries in the Early Christian Tradition, New Testament Greek and Exegesis and more are his domain. Dr. Ehrman has developed courses for The Teaching Company, and is frequently sought after by universities worldwide as a guest speaker. Bart is also the author of nearly two dozen books--some written as academic texts and others penned for a general audience--with three New York Times bestsellers to his name. 

For a more complete list of his awards and special recognitions, click here.

In short, the dude knows his stuff. Now that we know his credentials, let's move on to the book itself.

First Impressions

The thesis posited in this book is that Jesus is best understood as a Jewish apocalypticist. While this is not a new theory--in fact, it has been the dominant view of biblical academia for the better part of a century--Dr. Ehrman has taken it upon himself to climb down from the ivory tower and communicate this theory to a larger reading audience.

As with all books written by Dr. Ehrman, the information provided is well organized, thoroughly researched and presented clearly for ease of reading. The notion of Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet, Ehrman explains, is backed by strong evidence; namely, Jesus' abundance of apocalyptic messages are independently attested by numerous sources, including our earliest biblical resources available (Mark, Paul, and Q). Take just one example into account:

"And he said to them, "I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God come with power." - Mark 9:1

The speaker of this prophecy? Jesus of Nazareth. It is fitting to note that Jesus addresses the people he is speaking with, and reassures them that some among the crowd--some of those listening to Jesus right then and there!---would still be alive when the kingdom of God has come into power, heralded by the Son of Man.

This recurring prophecy of forthcoming cosmic judgement saturates the New Testament, especially within the gospels. If you're skeptical, you can read them for yourself, or read this book and see Ehrman explain the multitude of verses attributed to Christ that are clearly apocalyptic.

Ehrman argues, convincingly, that it should come as no surprise that Jesus was familiar with, and advocated, apocalyptic teachings. As a devout Jew, Jesus would be well familiar with the prophets of the Old Testament. The Book of Daniel is one such apocalyptic tale that Jesus would have heard read in the synagogue. Furthermore, Ehrman reminds us that the man who baptized Jesus, John the Baptist, was also an apocalyptic prophet who preached of repentance and the imminent day of judgement. Take the parable of the ax and the tree, which is difficult to understand in any context other than apocalyptically:

"The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire" - Matthew 3:10

So let's recap. We know that some of the prophets of the scriptures that Jesus read were apocalypticists. We also know that his confidant--the one who baptized Jesus himself--John the Baptist, was also an apocalypticist. Ehrman goes into further detail by showing how Paul (who is responsible for more books of the New Testament than any other author and ultimately shaped the faith) was also apocalyptically inclined (1 Cor. 15:20-28 | 2 Cor. 5:1-3 | 1 Thes. 4:15-18).Yet somehow, even with those who he read being of this persuasion, Jesus himself making such statements, and his greatest followers ardently believing this as well, most Christians today do not. 

Why is this? Well, I won't get into the specifics (Ehrman does a much better job at it than I possibly could), but it is not surprising that the longer that Christians went without the world coming to an end, the less likely they were to emphasize apocalypticism, especially apocalyptic prophecy spoken by Jesus himself. This slight change from Jesus claiming an imminent end within a generation or two to an indefinite "soon" was an act of revision by the faithful. This is not quackery or the musings of scholars, it's evident to anyone who reads the gospels side by side, and takes notes of the slight changes in language and context; especially when read from earliest written gospels to later counterparts.

Earliest Sources: Mark, Q, Paul - All placed heavy apocalyptic themes on Jesus' lips

Later Sources: Matthew, Luke, Acts - Begin to see apocalyptic themes downplayed or slightly muted

Later Still: John, Thomas, Nag Hammadi Texts - The authors outright refute and attack apocalyptic views

If one's spiritual leader predicts, falsely, of an imminent end that never came, should it surprise any of us that later authors did not continue to write such things, and minimized, redefined or altogether eliminated teachings that said leader espoused? Such was the case for Christians in the years following Christ's death.

This is just a few of the arguments presented within the book. The proof is abundant, Ehrman is a wonderful teacher, and it all makes for a fascinating read.

Final Thoughts

The book was written in such a clear and astute manner, which is something that I've always appreciated from Bart Ehrman books. He doesn't dumb down the subject for the readers--he's just incredibly talented at presenting academic evidence to a general reading audience.

This book is great for anyone with an interest in the historical Jesus, or the transformation and development of early Christian beliefs subsequent to Christ's death. Since this was written in accordance with what can be historically demonstrated, one does not need any particular theological belief to enjoy reading this book.

With all that said, if you're new to Bart Ehrman, I suggest one of his more popular reads, such as Misquoting Jesus, God's Problem or Jesus Interrupted before tackling this book, which has a specific focus and may not appeal to all readers.