Vatican Archives: extracanonical gospels?

[rakovsky]

The Vatican archives must have a large number of documents collected from the first 4 centuries of Christianity. Do you think that they may have some documents that we don't know about? Perhaps writings of Papias, or a copy of Mark with another ending included, or another apocryphal gospel from the 1st to 2nd centuries AD?

[DCHindley]

The Vatican archives must have a large number of documents collected from the first 4 centuries of Christianity. Do you think that they may have some documents that we don't know about? Perhaps writings of Papias, or a copy of Mark with another ending included, or another apocryphal gospel from the 1st to 2nd centuries AD?

You mean, like texts that are intentionally hidden away?

Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, who claimed a PhD in Psychology, makes a claim like this for his so-called Essene Gospel of Peace, which is almost universally regarded as a fake by academics. Szekely had an agenda to promote his International Biogenic Society (which has survived his own death in 1979), which promoted vegetarian living with a spiritual twist, and who had reached the height of his popularity in the early-mid 20th century. Let's just say there was a hefty fee to join.

DCH (... pass the Acai berries, please).

[rakovsky]

Yes, things intentionally hidden in the archives.

[andrewcriddle]

The restricted material in the Vatican archives officially involves medieval and later documents.

Documents were released a few years ago dealing with the suppression of the templars. There may be other surprises to come from the medieval period but probably not from earlier times.

Andrew Criddle

[rakovsky]

Andrew. Why would they not have a single deep archived document from before medieval times? Outside of the Epistles , the NT and a few other books we have nothing from the 1st century on Christianity. It feels like something is missing. Where are the earlier versions of the NT? Where are the writings of the famous Papias Hegesippus and others? Why is there nothing from James besides one epistle? It seems strange.

[Peter Kirby]

The manuscripts may be (...are...) medieval, but that doesn't mean that the texts within them are all medieval and irrelevant to classicists or to the folks interested in Christian origins. Something like a Mar Saba letter (that one with "Secret Mark") does not claim to be an ancient manuscript but still holds immense interest for what it quotes. There could also be material from lost authors such as Papias or Hegesippus, as rakovsky mentions.

[Adam]

In the beginnings of Christianity, the relatively few people who were Christian included few who wrote about Christianity. What they did write was probably on flimsy or temporary (wax) material, so little enough would survive for centuries, much less two millennia. Rakovsky is quite unreasonable in his expectations from the Vatican Library. Shades of the Da Vinci'Code!

[rakovsky]

In the beginnings of Christianity, the relatively few people who were Christian included few who wrote about Christianity. What they did write was probably on flimsy or temporary (wax) material, so little enough would survive for centuries, much less two millennia. Rakovsky is quite unreasonable in his expectations from the Vatican Library. Shades of the Da Vinci'Code!

Well, Paul and other apostles wrote letters to their followers. And we know papyrus was a real material used for writing that could last centuries. It seems someone could have transcribed and kept Papias' writings.

[Peter Kirby]

Rakovsky is quite unreasonable in his expectations from the Vatican Library. Shades of the Da Vinci'Code!

Stephen Carlson (a pretty reasonable fellow, so far as they come) once tracked down data indicating that copies of Papias seem to have existed as late as the 17th (18th? 19th? don't recall exactly) century in the libraries of Europe. Perhaps "expectations" are a case of "hope springing eternal," but I wouldn't say that they are quite unreasonable... it's well within the realm of plausibility.

Again, manuscript age is not the same as "text" age (aka the original document date of origin).

[rakovsky]

Eusebius later concurred, citing Hegesippus' lost History of the Church, (Church History 2.23.3-19; 4.22.4) to demonstrate that James was both "brother of the Lord" and was famously righteous, and also claimed that Clement, in his lost Hypotyposeis = Note Book, had stated that James was "brother of the Lord" (Church History 2.1.3-6).

The loss of these books seems strange to me. It seems that they should be around someplace unless they were destroyed. Another strange thing is that almost the only books that narrate Jesus' life that are accepted are the five or six in the Bible (if you include Revelations). Pretty much any other books narrating Jesus are rejected as apocryphal. It;s strange because there are dozens of those books from the 1st-3rd centuries.