Hey everyone do you guys have interesting or noteworthy insights and notes to share from your times reading the early Christian writings directly for yourselves? It is great to have historians explain the content and histories to us, but there is nothing like reading the direct sources for yourself.
I am doing studies and breakdowns of the earliest Christian letters. I recently did a study of the Muratorian Fragment. It is a fragmented letter that is the oldest list of mostly New Testament books that the earliest Christians considered as scripture while the consensus on what is scripture was in the process of being considered.
It gives some pretty interesting perspectives about how some books of the Bible were written and what the earliest Christians may have understood their theme and purpose to be. Here are my notes from the Muratorian Fragment. It is a very short letter for anyone to read through for anyone who wants to read it for themselves. You can easily find it and read it for yourself online.
If you guys have any noteworthy notes and helpful information or research that you have gotten from reading the early Christian writings for yourselves please share! (Sorry that the formatting is bad. This platform doesn't allow for proper formatting so it looks all bunched together even though I spaced it out when I typed it.)
Muratorian Fragment (AD 170-180)
NT Books mentioned
(NBN means not mentioned by name)
1. Matthew (NBN)
2. Mark (NBN)
3. Luke
4. John
5. Acts
6. 1 Corinthians (1)
7. 2 Corinthians
8. Ephesians (2)
9. Philippians (3)
10. Colossians (4)
11. Galatians (5)
12. 1 Thessalonians (6)
13. 2 Thessalonians
14. Romans (7)
15. Revelation
16. Philemon
17. Titus
18. 1 Timothy
19. 2 Timothy
20. Jude
21. 1 John
22. 2 John or 3 John (NBN)
Other books mentioned
Wisdom of Solomon
Revelation/Apocalypse of Peter (not completely trusted)
Shepherd of Hermas (Counted as good for reading but not on the level of scripture)
Here’s a breakdown of things written in the letter
Matthew (not mentioned by name only that there were 4 gospels)
Mark (not mentioned by name only that there were 4 gospels
3rd Luke (Written by Luke in his own name who Paul took as one zealous/studious of the law/what is right)
4th John (The disciples and bishops urged him to write an account and they fasted 3 days and it was revealed to Andrew that John should write the account.)
(Though various things may be taught from them there is no difference regarding the faith of believers since by One Spirit all things have been declared concerning the Lord’s nativity, His passion, His resurrection, His life with His disciples and His twofold coming, the first in the humility of rejection, which is now past and second in glorious royal power which is still in the future. )
The epistles of John (In them John constantly mentions that they saw with their eyes and heard with their ears and their hands have handled and they wrote them. In those sayings he professes himself not only to be an eye-witness but also a hearer and historian of all the wonderful facts concerning the Lord in their order.
Acts (Written by Luke addressed to most excellent Theophilus) (He wrote only to share what took place in his presence as shown by him not including Peter’s Martyrdom and Paul’s journey from Rome to Spain)
(Paul's letters make it clear to those desiring to understand which ones they are, from what place and for what reason they were sent.)
Corinthians (written to prohibit their heretical schisms)
Galatians (written against circumcision)
Romans (written and to show the plan of the scriptures and that Christ is of first importance)
(He writes twice to the Corinthians and Thessalonians for correction/admonition)
2 Corinthians
2 Thessalonians
Philemon
Titus
1 Timothy
2 Timothy
(These are held sacred in the esteem of the universal church for the regulation of church discipline.)
Jude
Two epistles of John
(These are counted among the universal epistles)
The order that the letters of Paul were written
(The blessed apostle Paul following the example of his predecessor John wrote to no more than 7 churches by name in this order…)
1st Corinthians
2nd Ephesians
3rd Philippians
4th Colossians
5th Galatians
6th Thessalonians
7th Romans
(It is shown by this sevenfold writing that there is one church spread abroad through the whole world.)
Revelation/the apocalypse (Although John writes only to 7 churches he addresses them all.)
Other books
Wisdom of Solomon (Written by the friends of Solomon in his honour)
Revelation/Apocalypse of John
Revelation/Apocalypse of Peter (some were not willing to have this letter read in the church
Shepherd of Hermas (was written very recently at that time in the city of Rome while Bishop Pius his brother was occupying the Bishop chair in Rome) (Therefore it should be read but not read publically to the people nor be placed among the prophets because their number is complete nor among the apostles, because it is after their time.)
Gnostic writings and forgeries
(The epistle to the Laodiceans and another to the Alexandrians were both letters in circulation that were forged in Paul’s name to further the gnostic heresy of Marcion and there were several other writings that could not be received into the universal church because it is not fitting for gall to be mingled with honey.)
(They accepted nothing whatsoever from Arsinous or Valentinus or Miltiades who composed a new book of Psalms for Marcion together with Basilides the Asian founder of the Cataphrygians.