| To simplify, those which were true would be recognized as true in their
day, while those which were false would be recognized as false in their day.
And those recognized as true would would be the ones passed down from generation
to generation, and those recognized as false would not be. Many false gospels
are claimed, by their authors, to have been written by such people as Thomas,
Mary, Peter, Nicodemus, and Joseph (Mary's husband). Yet none of these Gospels
were in circulation during the lifetimes of their supposed authors. In fact,
Joseph apparently died before Jesus began His ministry, so how could he have
written a Gospel? If any of these Gospels were in circulation during the
lifetimes of their authors, it would be logical to assume that they were
written by those who they claimed to be written by (since, if they were weren't,
the authors would have said so). To draw a comparison, if you were a researcher
compiling the writings of a certain author, you could easily assume that
those writings which were in circulation when the author was alive were indeed
written by that author (unless you have compelling evidence showing otherwise),
but you would have to be skeptical about those writings which popped up hundreds
of years later. |