Fake 'Gospel' Manuscript Exposed

The so-called “Gospel of Jesus’s Wife” is almost certainly a fraud.

You don’t need to know about it—if you haven’t heard about it—unless you want to see another fake unmasked.

In the centuries after the four Gospels in the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) were accepted by first-century Christians as divinely-inspired Scripture, numerous fakes arose pretending to be written by associates of Jesus. A more recent example announced in 2012 caused a brief stir. Live Science says,

A papyrus holding text that suggests Jesus Christ was married and whose authenticity has been a matter of intense debate since it was unveiled in 2012 is almost certainly a fake.

Karen King, the Harvard professor who discovered the Gospel of Jesus’s Wife and has defended its authenticity, has now conceded that the papyrus is likely a forgery and that its owner lied to her about the provenance and his own background.

The forger appears to be a certain Walter Fritz, a smooth-talking Floridian, pornographer, and former member of the East German Stasi (secret police). Feminist Harvard historian Karen King, who first defended the fragment’s authenticity, is now rushing away from it as fast as she can. The full details of intrigue, fraud and deceit are told by Ariel Sabar in The Atlantic who calls it an “outrageous modern fake.”

Now back to your regularly scheduled life.

Update 6/21/06: Al Mohler gave a detailed analysis of the history of this claim in his 6/20 broadcast of The Briefing. He tells more about Dr. Karen King and her role in popularizing the myth.

Toss another piece of trash onto the pile of alleged anti-Christian “evidence”. Why so much lust to discredit the Gospel accounts of Jesus? Live Science notes, “The papyrus received extensive media coverage after it was first revealed in 2012.” Secular academics leap onto this kind of trash. Look at the character of the guy promoting it: communist, pornographer, shyster; good grief. We appreciate Live Science and The Atlantic setting the record straight, but it never deserved the publicity it was getting in the first place.

Here’s a positive alternative: “The Museum of the Bible” will be opening in 2017 in Washington DC, and it will be fantastic. A small version of it traveled to major cities up till a couple of months ago. The state-of-the-art museum will house priceless antiquities from cuneiform tables up to modern digital Bibles, with rare Bibles from the Reformation, original Dead Sea scrolls and facsimiles, and much more, displayed with real class and special effects! It will be worth a trip to the nation’s capitol just to see this one amazing collection acquired by Steve and Brian Green, the Christian founders of Hobby Lobby, who have invested a fortune in preserving these treasures. The positive influence of the Bible on civilization will be clearly on display.