Do you know about the secret Gospels? The ones about Jesus life that have been suppressed by the church. They talk about Jesus wife, how he wasn’t really crucified, or give some secret knowledge about God? Popularised by novels such as the Di Vinci Code, those hostile to Christianity are quick to jump on the train to believe the few manuscripts and books claimed to have been written by other apostles. There are claims that the early church worked to suppress these other gospels and writings because they didn’t align with what the church wanted the public to believe about the The thing is, these Gnostic Gospels have been thoroughly debunked as forgeries or imitations, and the reason the Church discredited these documents is because they were known forgeries of imitations. Some of these forgeries are also much more modern than people realise. The Gospel of Thomas is a popular Gnostic writing, but there is no evidence it is written by the Apostle Thomas of the New Testament, and its earliest writing can be dates to the early second century, nowhere near the first century writings of the other Gospels. Further, it was not quoted at all by early church fathers – those whom the Apostles had direct discipleship of – whereas nearly all the four canonical gospels can be reconstructed JUST from the writings of early church fathers.
The Gospel of Jesus wife was welcomed as a breakthrough document when its discovery was announced in 2012. And while it is written on Papyrus from the fourth century, it appears to have been written on VERY recently – in fact, since 1997. Unfortunately, the forger appears to have used an online PDF version of the Gospel of Thomas as their inspiration, and some of these PDF features appeared to make it onto the Papyrus!
When someone makes a claim about these Gnostic Gospels, simply ask them “what is their historical evidence or the ancient citation for their claim.” Remember, the burden of proof is on the person who made the claim.
For more reasons to believe, go to Curated Resources