The Gospels

[jacobson9393]

What are the reasons that the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, were selected for the Canon and what are the reasons that other gospels such as the gospel of Thomas or Mary Magdalene were not?

 

[dronald]

What are the reasons that the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, were selected for the Canon and what are the reasons that other gospels such as the gospel of Thomas or Mary Magdalene were not?

Gnosticism was big during the early Christian era and The Gospel of Thomas is an obvious Gnostic Gospel trying to combine real words of Jesus with their “secret knowledge.” The same as the Gospel of Judas, an obvious Gnostic writing about a secret knowledge.

Basically any other Gospel you can think of was written after 100ad so they can easily be dismissed. Matthew was written by Matthew, as was John. Mark was relaying Peter’s words and Luke was tight with Paul.

Let’s not derail this specific topic, but the question on why the Didache was rejected is far more curious, imo. It’s been discussed here though, and there’s not a very good reason other than it just wasn’t meant to be Canon.

 

[JerryZ]

What are the reasons that the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, were selected for the Canon and what are the reasons that other gospels such as the gospel of Thomas or Mary Magdalene were not?

Perhaps the reason it was not included is because even though it was know to exist from references from some of the Church Fathers, (Athanasius, Didymus, and Eusebius, and Serapion of Thmuis) its contents had been lost when the Canon was established in around 350.
It was in fact rediscovered in 1873.

 

[JerryZ]

Gnosticism was big during the early Christian era and The Gospel of Thomas is an obvious Gnostic Gospel trying to combine real words of Jesus with their “secret knowledge.” The same as the Gospel of Judas, an obvious Gnostic writing about a secret knowledge.

Basically any other Gospel you can think of was written after 100ad so they can easily be dismissed. Matthew was written by Matthew, as was John. Mark was relaying Peter’s words and Luke was tight with Paul.

Let’s not derail this specific topic, but the question on why the Didache was rejected is far more curious, imo. It’s been discussed here though, and there’s not a very good reason other than it just wasn’t meant to be Canon.

The Didache was lost to the Church by the time of the Council of Trent, that declared closed the Canon in 1546

The Church knew about the Didache due to some references from some of the Church fathers (Athanasius, Didymus, and Eusebius, and Serapion of Thmuis).

It was actually rediscovered in 1873, when Bryennios discovered the codex Hierosolymitanus, which contained the full text.

Also a strong explanation of why it was not included earlier, is that, even if they had the text of the Didache at the Synod of Hippo in 393 AD they did not have a clear author for it. And we still do not know who wrote it.