Forged (25 page)

Here the opponents are described in rather nasty terms, but the terms get nastier as you progress through the letter. One point worth emphasizing is that even though these opponents have come into the Christian community (as members), they deny Christ. This should not be taken to mean that they deny being Christian. Quite the contrary, they are portrayed as Christian teachers. By saying that they deny Christ the author is claiming that they aren't really Christians, because what they teach is false. It is not too hard to imagine that they would say the same thing about him. But his writing became Scripture. Their writings, if they ever existed, were forever lost.

In any event, throughout this book the author has nothing good to say about the opponents. They defile the flesh (whatever that means), reject authority, and revile the holy angels. They are irrational animals, they carouse together, and they are “waterless clouds” and “fruitless trees, twice dead, uprooted.” They are ungodly and do ungodly deeds; they are “grumblers, fault-finders, following their own passions, who boast with loud mouths” (vv. 8–16).

Here again it is hard to say if the author is attacking a real, historical group. He certainly is filled with vitriol for his enemies, but it is
impossible to put together a coherent picture of what these people actually taught, based on the rapid-fire name-calling that the author engages in. Possibly the original readers of the book knew exactly whom he was referring to and what they taught. Or possibly the author is simply using an imaginary set of enemies to set up a foil for his own teaching about the true nature of Christian faith, which was “once and for all handed over to the saints” (v. 3). In either event, in his attempt to attack falsehood, the author himself has apparently committed deception. He claims to be Jude (v. 1), and by this claim he seems to be saying that he is the brother of Jesus.

Five persons are named Jude (or Judas—same Greek word) in the New Testament, the most infamous of whom, of course, is Judas Iscariot. One of the others is Jude, the son of Mary and Joseph the carpenter, one of the four brothers of Jesus mentioned in Mark 6:4. The author of this short letter is almost certainly claiming to be that particular Jude, because he identifies himself as “Jude, the brother of James.” Since most ancient people did not have last names, an author with a common name would typically identify himself (so that you would know
which
Jude he was) by mentioning a known relative, almost always his father. But here the author names not his father, but his brother, James. This must mean that James is the member of the family who is particularly well known.

And what James in the early church was especially well known? The most famous James was the head of the first church, the church in Jerusalem. This James was the brother of Jesus, mentioned throughout the New Testament, for example, by the apostle Paul on several occasions (see Gal. 1:19). If this Jude is identifying himself as the brother of
that
James, then he is, by implication, obviously the brother of Jesus.

But it is almost certain that the historical Jude did not write this book. Its author is living during a later period in the history of the church, when the churches are already well established, and when false teachers have infiltrated them and need to be rooted out. In fact, the author speaks of “remembering the predictions of the apostles”
(v. 17) as if they, the apostles, lived a long time before. In contrast to them, he is living in “the last days” that they predicted (v. 18). This is someone living after the apostolic age.

There is another reason for being relatively certain that Jude did not write the book (referred to earlier, in Chapter 2). Like the lower-class Galilean peasant Peter, the lower-class Galilean peasant Jude could almost certainly not write. Let alone write in Greek. Let alone compose a rhetorically effective letter evidencing detailed knowledge of ancient Jewish texts in Greek. This is an author claiming to be Jude in order to get Christians to read his book and to stand opposed to false teachers who hold a different view of the faith.

Forgeries in Opposition to Paul

P
AUL WAS A LIGHTNING ROD
for controversy not only during his own lifetime, but also afterward. Some Christians saw him as the greatest authority of the early church, whose vision of Christ on the road to Damascus authorized him to proclaim the true understanding of the gospel. Others saw him as an outsider to the apostolic band, an interloper who transformed the original message of Jesus and his apostles into a different religion far removed from the truth.

We have already seen that supporters of Paul forged letters in his name. These pseudonymous authors obviously felt that Paul's authority could prove persuasive in the context of the various controversies and struggles the Christian community was encountering. So we have a range of Pauline writings that he did not in fact write: Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus,
3 Corinthians,
letters to Seneca, and no doubt numerous other letters that have not survived from the early church.

But Paul's detractors also produced forgeries. In these cases, the pseudonymous writings countered Paul's teachings, or at least teachings that were thought to be Paul's teachings, whether they actually represented the views of the historical Paul or not. These forgeries
were not, of course, written in Paul's name, but in the names of other authorities of high repute, who cast aspersions either directly or indirectly on the so-called apostle to the Gentiles.

T
HE
N
ONCANONICAL
E
PISTLE OF
P
ETER

One of these we have already considered in Chapter 2, the
Epistle of Peter,
which appears as a kind of introduction to the
Pseudo-Clementine Writings.
This letter presupposes what was widely assumed in the ancient church and is still assumed by many scholars and laypeople today: Peter and Paul did not see eye to eye on the true gospel message.

The historical Paul himself indicates in his authentic writings that he and Peter were sometimes at odds. This is nowhere clearer than in Paul's letter to the Galatians, where he indicates that Peter chose not to share meals with Gentile (formerly pagan) Christians in the city of Antioch when Jewish Christians arrived in town (see 2:11–14). Presumably Peter thought these visitors would be offended by his decision not to keep kosher. Peter's withdrawal from Gentiles (to keep kosher) may have been simply an attempt not to make waves among Jewish believers who thought it was important for Jews to maintain their Jewish identity even after becoming followers of Jesus. For Paul, on the other hand, Peter's withdrawal was an affront to the gospel. This gospel, in his view, proclaimed that Jew and Gentile were equal before God in Christ and that there was no need for followers of Jesus to follow the law, including kosher food laws.

Paul confronted Peter in public and called him a hypocrite for eating with the Gentiles when no Jewish brothers were present, but refusing to do so when they arrived. It is very unfortunate indeed that we don't know how Peter replied or who, in the general opinion, got the better of the argument. All we know is Paul's side, as he reports it in the letter to the Galatians. But it is clear that he and Peter were sometimes at odds, and it is not at all clear that they ever reconciled over the issue.

This tension between Peter and Paul over the keeping of the law,
as we have seen, is very much at issue in the noncanonical
Epistle of Peter,
where the author, claiming to be Peter, but actually writing long after his death, attacks a person whom he calls his “enemy.” This enemy has preached a “lawless gospel to the Gentiles,” that is, a gospel that says one is made right with God apart from the law. This personal enemy of Peter has falsely claimed that he, Peter, agrees with his false understanding of the faith. “Peter,” however, does not agree with it and attacks his enemy for claiming that he does.

This, then, is a thinly veiled attack on Paul written by a Jewish Christian who thought that it was proper, and even necessary, for Jews who believed in Jesus to continue observing the Jewish law. Failing to do so meant a breech in true religion. Paul, for this author, is not an apostolic authority. He is a false preacher.

T
HE
P
SEUDO
-C
LEMENTINE
W
RITINGS

A similar teaching is found in the
Pseudo-Clementine Writings
themselves.
³
If you will recall, these are a set of long narratives allegedly written by Clement, the fourth bishop of Rome (i.e., the pope), in which he describes his travels, his meeting with the apostle Peter, and his conversion to become a follower of Jesus. Most of the books narrate his subsequent adventures while participating with Peter on his missionary journeys. In particular these accounts relate how Peter engaged in conflicts and miracle contests with Simon the Magician, who claimed to be the true representative of God, but who, according to Peter, was a false teacher. In some passages of these books it is clear that Simon is understood to be someone else—Peter's real-life enemy, the apostle Paul.

Nowhere is this more clear than in several passages in the
Pseudo-Clementine Writings
known as the
Homilies.
⁴
In one passage Peter elaborates God's way of dealing with the world from the very beginning. Peter points out that there have often been pairs of people who appear in sacred history. The first to appear is always the inferior of the two. So, for example, the first children born to Adam and Eve were the wicked Cain (first) and the righteous Abel (second). So too
the father of the Jews, Abraham, had two children: the firstborn, Ishmael, who was not to inherit the promises, and then Isaac, who was. Isaac then had two sons, Esau, the profane, and Jacob, the pious. And on and on through history.

This pattern applies to the Christian mission field, argues “Peter.” The first missionary to the Gentiles was “Simon” (i.e., Paul); he was necessarily inferior. The second, the superior, was Peter himself, who claims, “I have come after him [Simon/Paul] and have come in upon him as light upon darkness, as knowledge upon ignorance, as healing upon disease” (2.17). Not a very affirming portrayal of Paul! Peter has followed in Paul's missionary path, straightening out everything that Paul had gotten wrong.

A second passage is even more condemning. As is well known, Paul was often said to have been commissioned to be an apostle by Christ in the vision he had on the road to Damascus (see Acts 9). Paul was not one of the original followers of Jesus. On the contrary, he started out as a persecutor of the Christian church. But then Christ appeared to him and converted him, telling him to become his missionary to the Gentiles. Paul himself, the historical Paul, took this commissioning with the utmost seriousness and claimed in books such as Galatians that, since he received his gospel message directly from Jesus, he was beholden to no one. Anyone who preached a message contrary to his message was advocating falsehood rather than truth (Gal. 1:6–9). He, Paul, had the truth from Christ himself. And among other things, this truth was that Gentiles were not to adopt the Jewish law in order to find salvation in Christ (thus Gal. 2:15–16).

The author of the
Pseudo-Clementines
heartily disagrees and portrays Peter himself as mocking Paul for his claims to have direct access to the teachings of Jesus, based on a single brief vision. In
Homily
17 Peter says to “Simon” (i.e., Paul):

Visions cannot be trusted, because you have no way of knowing, really, what you are seeing. So if Paul's authority is rooted exclusively in a vision, it is no authority at all.

Peter continues with an argument that would seem hard to refute:

Paul may have had a brief vision of Jesus. But Peter was with him for months—a year!—not asleep and dreaming, but awake, listening to his every word. And Jesus himself declared that it was Peter, not Paul, who was the “Rock” on whom the church would be built. Paul is a late interloper whose authority rests on entirely dubious grounds. It is the teachings of Peter that are to be followed, not those of Paul.

Whether or not this is the view of the historical Peter is something we will probably never know. But it is certainly the view of Peter set forth in the forged writings known as the
Pseudo-Clementines.

J
AMES

In the New Testament itself we find a book that appears to attack Paul's teachings, or at least a later misinterpretation of Paul's teach
ings. This is a letter that claims to be written by someone named James. In the early church it was widely assumed that this James was the brother of Jesus.

James was known throughout the history of the early church to have been firmly committed to his Jewish roots and heritage, even as a follower of Jesus.
⁵
According to the New Testament he was not a disciple of Jesus during his lifetime (see John 7:5), but he was one of the first to see the resurrected Jesus after his death (1 Cor. 15:7), and because of that, presumably, he came to believe in him. No doubt it was his filial connection that elevated him to a position of authority in the church.