That's actually pretty funny. LOL. You folks can't quite decide whether Paul said this or that, and if if were Paul, but since some Council said so, then we can circle back and say Paul said to keep to the so-called oral tradition that said yo, this is Paul speaking, even though I wrote my mark AGAINST that false letter, but hey you folks 2000 years later sure know better than those to whom I personally wrote.
That's not what I've argued at all.
Rather than address the evidence presented you choose to straw-man the argument.
For anyone else reading this is the case.
When Paul wrote a letter its authority doesn't rest in the letter by itself. It rests first through the Holy Spirit to Paul.
Paul having written with guidence of the Holy Spirit would hand that letter to a person whom he trusted and that person would take that letter, say to Corinth. The church in Corinth knowing that person would know that when he says "This is a letter to you from Paul" would know that the letter is genuine. The letter also would not contradict teaching for us this is part of 'scripture + tradition'.
This very act of vouching for a letter
is tradition. It is because the vouching is done orally. That church would hold that letter and it would be there for years and 'tradition' would continue to vouch for the letter as being genuine.
Corinth would perhaps make a copy of the letter and send it to neighbouring churches. The fact that they vouch for the letter AND it doesn't contradict teaching would be what makes it known to be genuine. If the letter was passed to a neighbouring city and there was no one saying "This is the letter we in Corinth got from Paul" then the letter would be doubted because it's logical that if Corinth got the letter and passed it on they'd say "This is that letter we got". Therefore if no one vouched for it it would be doubted because the letter itself by itself doesn't authorise itself.
As time went by and heretics spread false letters the churches would speak to each other. One church might say "We have heard of a book
Acts of Peter". Even if it didn't contradict teaching (it's 'internal' evidence) it would not be seen as genuine because there's no
tradition of any church holding it as genuine.
Some three centuries later of this
tradition the church decided to group some of their documents together in a 'core' book we now call the Christian Bible. The church chose which books to hold in this. It did so by the tradition of what books it had always held to be genuine.
No one from this side of the discussion has argued that they didn't know it was genuinely Paul's letter.
What I, for one have done is questioned how those supporting
sola scriptura would know it was genuine, if you remove all the checks I stated above. You wouldn't have known because the letter alone doesn't authorise itself. The basis of
sola scriptura is as it says scripture ALONE. However even some of the
sola scriptura people here have to allow some 'tradition' in by accepting that the church authorised as canonical books it always knew were genuine. But at the same time they want to pretend that the church just knew because the books themselves just authorised themselves. There's no evidence for
sola scriptura from scripture. You can add assumptions to the text but then that itself shows that the text itself is not by itself sufficient.
I've stated as much before. But it seems that rather than address this, or evidence presented some would rather counter by arguing against points not made.
If you can address the books presented above by JacktheCatholic that would be terrific
Paul said it did. The Thessalonians had received a letter as if from Paul. Paul wrote them one and said, that one is not mine. This is how you know.
