The Gospel of the Lord

by Marcion of Sinope

English, Greek (translation)

63 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 1978

About the author

Marcion of Sinope (c. 85 – c. 160) was an early Christian theologian, an evangelist, and an important figure in early Christianity. Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus Christ into the world as the savior was the true Supreme Being, different from and opposed to the malevolent demiurge or creator god, identified with the Hebrew God of the Old Testament. He considered himself a follower of Paul the Apostle, whom he believed to have been the only true apostle of Jesus Christ, a doctrine called Marcionism. Marcion published the earliest extant fixed collection of New Testament books.

Early Church Fathers such as Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian denounced Marcion as a heretic, and he was excommunicated by the church of Rome around 144. He published the first known canon of Christian sacred scriptures, which contained ten Pauline epistles (the Pastoral epistles were not included) and a shorter version of the Gospel of Luke (the Gospel of Marcion). This made him a catalyst in the process of the development of the New Testament canon by forcing the proto-orthodox Church to respond to his canon.

Reviews

[Karl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very close to the canonical gospels. Give it to an average Christian and he will not be able to tell if it is in the Bible or not.