What Is Bible Inerrancy?

DBOne thing I have long wondered is whether the quotation from Peter originated during the period of ideologic conflict between Peter and Paul?It appears that after Christs resurection there was a significant period of internal conflict among the various factions of the apostles, a James group, those following Peter, the Hellenistic influence of the Paul faction, perhaps even a faction following Mary. But we lose track of the majority of the apostles.We have almost no information about James or Simon the Zealot, Philip or Bartholomew, Matthias or Thaddius.We have found scraps of material from Thomas and Mary (perhaps or at least attributed to them) but again, little information about what they did or what their postions and theology were. We know little about the history of the expansion all the way to India or south into North Africa.Then there was the second wave of apostles and again, we have almost no information about them, even their names.Is there much information available that can lead to an understanding of what actually happened during the formation of the early church?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well, there may have been considerable accounting in existence. We get some hints of it, for example mentions of "A Gosple" or the "Book of Enouch" being in common circulation. But we only get hints. It's possible much was there but expunged.But one other thing I think needs to be considered. It could well be that it is only because movement was co-opted by the Evil Empire that we even know about Christianity. For example, Bartholomew and Thomas may well have gone as far as India yet there is almost no signs of what was acomplished. The same can be said for almost all of the expansionary churches in Asia, Africa, even northern Europe.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Yes. BUT................................(there's always that but)There is a small incongruity, a blip that stands out for me.There is little evidence of the diaspora extending into India and Northern Europe. Yet we see indications of the original group of Apostles heading off to Great Britian and to India. That to me is remarkable. If we look at the original body or leaders or elders we are talking about well under twenty people. We are also talking about a short time period, perhaps as little as twenty years, as many as seventy years.Why did about one quarter of the original leaders take off for distant places? Just to build an organization in the area around the Mediterranean would have been an immense task. Certainly. But that is only because all we have records of is the political movement. The whole remaining Cannon in the Roman or Orthodox churches is from the political movement.But there are hints from other sources. For example, the Gospel of Thomas paints a far different image of the existing theology, one that is far more Eastern Mystic, contemplative in nature. Since we have no information about the early church or the non-political, thological factions within the church, we can't really say what the early movement was like. Oh, I'm quite sure that things have been glamorized. LOLBut there is one other thing that I think is important and often overlooked. So much of what we do have in the NT is the documents from the period of creating the bureaucracy, of building the body politic. When we look at the Pauline and John documents we are looking at an attempt to formalize and redact an existing system. We also see a little of the conflict between Paul and Peter, but again, only hints beyond that.So the only real record we have is from the period where Christianity was becoming exclusionary instead of inclusionary. It is the purged version, the revised history.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion