AHC: Bible contains books later on

Maybe a badly written title, but the challenge here is to have books of the bible telling stories up to the time of the crusades, at least, that are seen in the same way that other books of the New Testament are, rather than just some "extra stuff".
 
Maybe a badly written title, but the challenge here is to have books of the bible telling stories up to the time of the crusades, at least, that are seen in the same way that other books of the New Testament are, rather than just some "extra stuff".

I can't really think that anything else might be "added" that perhaps wouldn't be regarded as "extra stuff" or would perhaps be in the line of the book of James that is generally regarded as "more philosophical" than Biblical (this was the reason that Luther wanted to exclude it, along with Esther, and the books of the Maccabees).
 

scholar

Banned
Maybe a badly written title, but the challenge here is to have books of the bible telling stories up to the time of the crusades, at least, that are seen in the same way that other books of the New Testament are, rather than just some "extra stuff".
Prevent the Bible's complete canonization until after a "crusade" like age occurs, where the established religious authority deems some of the books/stories written up until those times to be of divine origin and have it be Catholic to the Christian Faith. You can also do this by shattering the Council of Nicea's rulings should the Eastern Roman Empire fall faster and its supremacy challenged by regional locations.
 
Have Jesus write a Gospel containing His teachings. After the Crucifixition and the Ascension to Heaven, Peter begins to write down his sermons and teachings, establishing a tradition of each Pope writing a Gospel and adding a book to the New Testament.
 
I thought it was because Luther just hated the Jews? :confused:

IIRC Luther just began hating jews after he was done and satisfied with his teachings.
I imagined ot somewhat on these lines:

Luther: "Hey my dear jewish friends I recently corrected Christianity! Time for you guys to join!"

Jew: "No"

Luther: "You dirty little @#$@#"
 
IIRC Luther just began hating jews after he was done and satisfied with his teachings.
I imagined ot somewhat on these lines:

Luther: "Hey my dear jewish friends I recently corrected Christianity! Time for you guys to join!"

Jew: "No"

Luther: "You dirty little @#$@#"
Yes, that was Luther's perspective on the Jews, more or less. :(

But his disliking of the Book of James (he didn't actually exclude it; he just pushed it to the back of his German New Testament) was different. Having realized the medieval church had disastrously minimized the importance of faith and elevated that of works, he wanted to ensure everyone realized faith's importance. (Quite correctly, in my view.) The Book of James, however, was written to combat the opposite problem:

James 2:14-19 said:
What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”

Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.

Luther thought that this wouldn't be helpful to most Germans, who'd already been hearing for centuries how important works were - and it might even hurt them. I think his response went too far, but his motives were good.
 

dead_wolf

Banned
Adding books "later" means not taking the easy route of simply having a different canon form in the first place.

What about something akin to the Dead Sea scrolls being discovered by the Crusaders, who then take that knowledge back to Europe? Or the Gospel of Mary or of Gospel of Nicodemus. Basically any of the Gnostic texts.
 
Perhaps Islam evolves as more of an adjunct to Christianity, along the lines of the Eastern Orthodox or Coptic faiths.

I think this is probably on the right line of thinking. If Islam evolves more along the lines of Christianity (perhaps have Shi'ism and its Messianic undertones become the main religious denomination?) Then it could pose both a serious military and theological challenge to Christianity - which would mean that new books might have to be added into the canon to explain why Jesus is the true Messiah and not, say, Imam Hussein.
 
What about something akin to the Dead Sea scrolls being discovered by the Crusaders, who then take that knowledge back to Europe? Or the Gospel of Mary or of Gospel of Nicodemus. Basically any of the Gnostic texts.
Wouldn't work. A lot of the Dead Sea Scrolls is older texts of the Old Testament canon; bringing them back to Europe might start an earlier tradition of textual criticism (with interesting effects in itself!) but nothing else. The rest are clearly Jewish, largely apocalyptic or mystical, works which no medieval Crusader would come close to accepting. The Qumran community was Essene, which is a Jewish (largely heretical) sect; Gnostics were a very distinct Christian (heretical) sect.

I don't think finding Gnostic texts would cause even that many differences. Educated medieval Christians were quite aware of Gnostics and other early heresies; refutations of them by Church Fathers had survived and were being used for doctrinal study. So, finding the actual books written by those heretics might be an interesting curiosity but wouldn't be surprising in the least.
 

Stolengood

Banned
Wouldn't work. A lot of the Dead Sea Scrolls is older texts of the Old Testament canon; bringing them back to Europe might start an earlier tradition of textual criticism (with interesting effects in itself!) but nothing else. The rest are clearly Jewish, largely apocalyptic or mystical, works which no medieval Crusader would come close to accepting. The Qumran community was Essene, which is a Jewish (largely heretical) sect; Gnostics were a very distinct Christian (heretical) sect.
I think what he meant was Nag Hammadi, which was... ecclectic, to say the least. Not to mention Oxyrynchus.
 
What about if the Gnostics somehow won out and added their mystical works to the end of the New Testament? I mean, the post-Chronicles parts of the Old Testament, not to mention the Apocrypha, can get a bit weird, as can Revelations, so I don't see why all those Egyptian guys can't be added on as well. I like the idea of Popes writing their own addenda, too.
 

Stolengood

Banned
I like the idea of Popes writing their own addenda, too.
...as much as the Popes were leaders of the Church, I don't see them doing that; later ones would probably be continually undermining the earlier ones' authority. It helped their position that the corpus was standardized and immovable.
 
...as much as the Popes were leaders of the Church, I don't see them doing that; later ones would probably be continually undermining the earlier ones' authority. It helped their position that the corpus was standardized and immovable.
Besides, I doubt people would accept a book written by a decadent or corrupt pope.
 
Prevent the Bible's complete canonization until after a "crusade" like age occurs, where the established religious authority deems some of the books/stories written up until those times to be of divine origin and have it be Catholic to the Christian Faith. You can also do this by shattering the Council of Nicea's rulings should the Eastern Roman Empire fall faster and its supremacy challenged by regional locations.

although, to get Christianity really going, don't they need to get some kind of official Bible solidified and approved? If they don't have one, it seems that Christianity would be splintered and quarrelsome (not that it wasn't already, it would be even more so). To get the OP done, maybe they have more Councils to add to the book as some of the Apocrypha is approved?
 
Somebody did add to the Bible, Joseph Smith. Although the Book of Mormon was claimed to be an ancient work, the Doctrine and Covenants is a modern addition.
Speaking of popes making their own additions, later prophets can make their own additions. In practice the additions made after Joseph Smith can be counted on one hand.
 
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