But scholars have recognized for the last few decades that this treatise is more likely from Hippolytus (Church Father, tuned century).
As a skeptic, I used this proof of false ascription to justify a skeptical view toward the authorship of other ancient workds, such as the gospels, in a comment posted to Doxological Life forum, see here. The comment is awaiting moderation, so because it might be deleted, it is preserved here:
It should come as no surprise when there are plenty of ancient writings inside and outside of the Bible falsely ascribed to authors deemed important, influential, or authoritative.
ReplyDeletetrue, but when dealing with fundamentalists who'd rather die than admit error, we should marshal every example of first-century pseudepigrapha we can. There's a skeptical argument to be made from the fact that this "Hades" forgery managed to go undetected for centuries. How easy would it have been for falsely ascribed writings to deceive people in the 1st century? Paul admits writings falsely ascribed to him might decieve others (2nd Thess. 2:2).
ReplyDeleteThousands of Christian Jews propagated false rumors about apostle Paul during his own lifetime (Acts 21:18-24). The "brethren" misunderstood for a significant time one of the last things the risen Christ said (John 21:23). The people of Lystra automatically concluded from some easily falsifiable "miracle" that Paul and Barnabas were gods(Acts 14:11). Not even being inspired by God will guarantee that you can understand Paul correctly (2nd Peter 3:16).
And I haven't even mentioned the eye-popping gullibility of the apostles as Mark's gospel paints them. After three years running around with Jesus asking him every question just like anybody would do, they STILL think he is a military-messiah whose purpose is to free Israel from Roman occupation (Acts 1:6).
I'd say gullibility was high among the laymen of the 1st century even if not among the educated.