A culminating work of the Jesus Seminar era and of others influenced by it, the New New Testament A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts edited by Hal Taussig presents old old Gnostic heresy. A founding member of the Jesus Seminar, Taussig and 19 American “spiritual leaders” and scholars selected 10 texts to add to the New Testament. These texts include:
The Prayer of Thanksgiving
The Prayer of the Apostle Paul
The Thunder: Perfect Mind
The Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Mary
The Gospel of Truth
The Acts of Paul and Thecla
The Letter of Peter to Philip
The Secret Revelation of John
The First, Second, Third, and Fourth Books of the Odes of Solomon
Daniel Wallace, professor of New Testament Studies, says that there is an agenda in mind with these selections. He says:
What strikes one immediately is that most of these additions seem to be of two types: Gnostic or proto-Gnostic essays and writings that exalt women. Further, what is also striking are books that did not make the cut. Among them are the Shepherd of Hermas, the Didache, the Epistle of Barnabas, First Clement, and other books in the collection known as the Apostolic Fathers. In other words, the books selected by the council were selected with an agenda in mind; they were not chosen because they ever made a serious claim to canonicity. Indeed, as was mentioned above, at least one of them is not even mentioned in any extant ancient writing. (source)
In his article “A New New Testament: Are You Serious?“, Wallace demonstrates how this council of 19 deserves much scrutiny. He also summarizes the ancient Canon decisions for the New Testament. While there was no universal church council that made an official list, the ancient church followed basic guidelines such as apostolicity, orthodoxy, catholicity (not Roman Catholicism but general acceptance by all the churches). He explains:
Apostolicity meant that a book had to be written by an apostle or an associate of an apostle if it was to be included in the New Testament. Practically speaking, this meant that any document written after the end of the first century was automatically disqualified. This is why the Muratorian Canon—the first orthodox canon list, composed in the late second century—rejected the Shepherd of Hermas as authoritative, even though it considered it to be very beneficial to Christians. Further, any book that was known to be a forgery was rejected by the ancient church. Not one of the thirteen books proposed by the council of nineteen was written by the person it is ascribed to. The ancient church would—and often did—immediately reject such books because of their spurious nature. The test of apostolicity alone thus disqualifies all thirteen newly discovered books. . . .
Orthodoxy meant that those books considered for canonical status needed to conform to what was already known to be orthodox. Orthodoxy was known even before any writings were accepted as scripture. It was known through hymns, the kerygma, and the traditions passed down by the apostles. If there never had been a New Testament, we would still have enough to go on to guide us as to what essential Christianity looked like. And it looked nothing like most of the thirteen books proposed by this new council. The Gnostic and proto-Gnostic books were soundly rejected by the ancient church. And even those that were closer to orthodoxy (like The Acts of Paul and Thecla) were rejected because they failed the test of apostolicity. To put The Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Mary, and The Gospel of Truth into the New Testament, side by side with writings that embraced a diametrically-opposed view of the Christian faith, is unspeakably brash. And although Professor Taussig and his friends think they are doing Christendom a favor by including known heretical writings in their expanded New Testament, they are doing so at both the cost of historical integrity and pedagogical method. . . .
Finally, catholicity was a criterion used in deciding what earned a place at the table of the New Testament canon. . . . To be sure, some New Testament books struggled in this department, but not all did. In fact, within a century of the completion of the New Testament, the ancient church throughout the Mediterranean world achieved a remarkable unanimity concerning at least twenty of the twenty-seven books. This included all thirteen letters ascribed to Paul and the four Gospels. The rest would find acceptance by the fourth century, in both the eastern and western branches of the church. Most of the new additions to the New Testament fail this test miserably, too. Again, catholicity is not something that the council of nineteen considered when deciding on what books to put in. Rather, catholicity is something that this book aims to achieve. And yet it does so principally through a Gnostic-like route: by urging Christians to accept these books on the basis of their largely politically correct viewpoint, the council is seeking to reshape Christianity into something more palatable to the postmodern world, where presumably knowledge replaces faith.