The first thing to note is there are four traditional views concerning the progression of early Christianity.
1. “Hellenism influenced the post–New Testament Church to the point of eradicating the original sense of the gospel message. The later church accommodated the surrounding culture, adding layers to the gospel that resulted in a message that significantly differed from the original,” (53).
2. “The Christianity that originated with Jesus and his apostles was merely the starting point of a series of theological developments that continued to evolve over the centuries. As a result, fourth century orthodoxy was vaguely connected to the original,” (53).
3. “There was no ‘heresy’ or ‘orthodoxy’ within earliest Christianity, but rather there were various ‘Christianities,’ each competing for dominance,” (105). Thus, orthodox Christian beliefs are simply the beliefs of those who obtained power.
4. “The theology emanated from the New Testament, continued through the church fathers, was guarded by Apologists, and solidified in the ecumenical church councils represents a continuous uninterrupted stream. The creeds accurately represent the essence of the apostolic faith,” (53-54).
By recognizing each of these views you can begin to see them in the theology of others. For example, one of my professors seems to believe a combination of two and three. By being able to recognize this I am able to more confidently disagree with his views, because they are a result of flawed thinking concerning the development of the early church and Christian doctrine. The last view is the view that I, and the authors of the book, hold to. However, number three is the primary view that the authors are disputing.
The Bauer-Erhman thesis argues that diversity was widespread in the early church, implying that there were no unified Christian beliefs. Bauer believed that “The Roman church imposed its version of orthodox Christian teaching onto the rest of Christendom. What is more, the Roman church rewrote history, expunging the record of deviant forms of belief, in order to further consolidate its ecclesiastical authority,” (26). Köstenberger and Kruger argue that Bauer’s historical reconstruction is not valid because it is based on very little evidence or does not accurately account for the evidence. They give several examples to demonstrate this, but I will not summarize these. The last thing they look at is the New Testament. Within their examination it becomes clear that there was continuity between the various authors of the New Testament regarding theological beliefs. If you are interested in the exact arguments regarding the invalidity of Bauer’s historical reconstruction and the diversity in the New Testament, I highly recommend you read the book (also read the review I put the link to). I do not want to spend time summarizing them because it would take too much space and my purpose in writing is to inform others about the issues, not argue for the truthfulness of Köstenberger’s and Kruger’s view.
There are some final comments, the authors make at various points in this part of the book, that I would like to highlight to give better insight into some of the underlying problems and modes of thought that surround this controversy.
1. “The question addressed by the Bauer-Erhman thesis serves as a case study for how an idea is born, how and why it is appropriated by some and rejected by others, and how a paradigm attains compelling influence over people who are largely unacquainted with specific issues it entails,” (18).
2. “With the rise of postmodernism came the notion that the only heresy that remains is the belief in absolute truth—orthodoxy. It is no surprise that in this culture Bauer’s views are welcomed with open arms,” (39).
3. With regards to the New Testament writings, “strong convictions do not mandate dishonesty or inaccuracy,” (73). All writing is biased, but that does not necessitate all writing to be unreliable.
4. “The New Testament bears credible and early witness to the unified doctrinal core, in particular with regard to Christology, centered on Jesus and his apostles, a core that is, in turn grounded in Old Testament messianic prophecy,” (81).
5. “The Bauer-Erhman thesis insufficiently recognizes that at the core, power was a function of divine truth.” Not “truth being a function of human power. This, in turn, reveals an anti-supernatural bias in Bauer’s historical method and underscores the importance of using the proper philosophical grid in the study of Christian origins. The Bauer-Erhman thesis is wrong not just because these scholars’ interpretation of the data is wrong, but because their interpretation proceeds on the basis of a flawed interpretative paradigm,”(101).
If there is one thing you learn from all of this, I hope it is that not all scholars agree with one another, nor are all scholars equally right. Do not just take for granted something a scholar says to be true. Instead, test it against what you know to be true about God and scripture. As, you can see Bauer’s view does not account for the sovereignty and power of God. This is something that is commonly repeated in liberal scholarship and something to watch out for. You must believe in the supernatural in order to be a Christian, so anyone who diminishes or fails to account for it should be suspect. We can know the truthfulness or lack thereof of an argument by what the teaching says about God, without having to know all of the history and theology to go with it. However, we should all be grateful to those who spend the time studying these issues so that we can more boldly proclaim the truth.
[1] All quotations are from this book unless otherwise noted.