The Cradle, the Cross, and the Crown (5 page)

Criteria of Canonicity
When the early church compiled the canon, it recognized which writings bore the stamp of divine inspiration. Four major criteria were used in this process.
²³
The first was
apostolicity
, that is, direct or indirect association of a given work with an apostle. This criterion was met by Matthew, John, and Peter, all of whom were members of the Twelve (Matt 10:2–3 pars.), as well as Paul, an apostle commissioned by the risen Christ on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1–9). It was also met by James and Jude, half brothers of Jesus (Matt 13:55; Mark 6:3; see Jas 1:1; Jude 1:1). Indirectly, the criterion was also satisfied by Mark, a close associate of Peter (1 Pet 5:13) and Paul (2 Tim 4:11), and Luke, a travel companion of Paul on some of his missionary journeys (see especially the “we” passages in the book of Acts).

SIDEBAR 1.1: PSEUDEPIGRAPHA IN THE EARLY CHURCH

There is no known example of a book falsely claiming to be written by an apostle (a “pseudepigraphical” work), orthodox or not, that was accepted by the early church as canonical. Serapion, bishop of Antioch (died 211), stated concerning the spurious
Gospel of Peter:
“For our part, brethren, we receive both Peter and the other apostles as Christ, but the writings which falsely bear their names we reject, as men of experience, knowing that such were not handed down to us.”
¹

Tertullian (c. 160-c. 225) recorded the defrocking of an Asian elder, noting that, “in Asia, the presbyter who composed that writing [i.e.
Acts of Pau
l
and
3 Corinthian
s
]
, as if he were augmenting Paul's fame from his own store, after being convicted, and confessing that he had done it from love of Paul, was removed from his office.”
²
Thus, when a book in the canon claims to have been written by a certain author, it may be assumed that the early church believed it was authentic.

__________________________

¹
Eusebius,
Ecc
l
. Hist.
5.22.1.

²
Tertullian,
On Baptism
17, in
Ante-Nicene Fathers: The Writings of the Fathers Down to A.D. 325
, vol. III:
Tertullian
, ed. A. Roberts, J. Donaldson, A. C. Coxe, and A. Menzies (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1994), 677. See also Eusebius's statement regarding apocryphal works: “in order that we might know them and the writings that are put forward by heretics under the name of the apostles containing gospels such as those of Peter, and Thomas, and Matthias, and some others besides, or Acts such as those of Andrew and John and the other apostles. To none of these has any who belonged to the succession of the orthodox ever thought it right to refer in his writings. Moreover, the type of phraseology differs from apostolic style, and the opinion and tendency of their contents are widely dissonant from true orthodoxy and clearly show that they are the forgeries of heretics”
(Eccl. Hist.
3.25).

The second criterion of canonicity was a book's
orthodoxy
, that is, whether a given writing conformed to the church's “rule of faith” (Lat.
regula fidei
). This allowed books such as Hebrews to be considered, though it appears that attribution to Paul or a member of the “Pauline circle” also played a major role in the acceptance of Hebrews into the canon. The question addressed under this rubric is whether the teaching of a given book conformed to apostolic teaching (see Acts 2:42).

SIDEBAR 1.2: ATHANASIUS'S EASTER LETTER OF AD 367

Athanasius, in his festal letter dated 367, lists the exact same canon as today. “There must be no hesitation to state again the [books] of the New Testament; for they are these: Four Gospels: according to
Matthew
, according to
Mark
, according to
Luke
, and according to
John
. Further, after these, also [The]
Acts
of [the] Apostles, and the seven so-called Catholic Epistles of the Apostles, as follows: One of
James
, but
two of Peter
, then,
three of John
, and after these, one of
Jude
. In addition to these there are fourteen Epistles of the Apostle Paul put down in the following order: The first to the
Romans
, then
two to the Corinthians
, and after these, [the Letter] to the
Galatians,
and then to the
Ephesians
; further, [the Letters] to the
Philippians
and to the
Colossians
and two to the
Thessalonians
, and the [Letter] to the
Hebrews
. And next two [Letters] to
Timothy”
, but one to
Titus,
and the last [being] the one to
Philemon
. Moreover, also
the Apocalypse
of John.”

The third criterion was a book's
antiquity
, that is, whether a given piece of writing was produced during the apostolic era. This served to corroborate the previous two criteria and excluded second-century and third-century apocryphal and pseudepigraphical literature (such as the Gospel of Thomas) that mimicked the authentic apostolic documents. It also ruled out documents such as the
Didache
or the
Shepherd of Hermas
that were produced subsequent to the apostolic era. Some of these latter writings reflected early church practice and were read with profit by the early Christians. In the end, however, they were not included in the canon because they failed to meet the criteria of apostolicity and antiquity.

The fourth and final major criterion of canonicity was that of
ecclesiastical usage
, that is, whether a given document was already widely used in the early church. As in the previous criterion, this benchmark was used in conjunction with the other standards stated above, and only documents that met all four criteria were included.
²⁴

Ecclesiastical Debates Regarding the Canonicity of Individual Books

Eusebius'
Ecclesiastical History
and Varying Opinions in the East and the West
On the whole these were the major criteria used by the early church to determine the canonicity of a given piece of writing. But not everyone agreed in every specific instance. The historian and church father Eusebius (c. 260–c. 340), bishop of Caesarea, provided a valuable reflection of current discussion in his
Ecclesiastical History
. Eusebius grouped the books of the NT into three categories. First were the commonly recognized books, that
is, those writings that were widely acknowledged as canonical. These documents included the four Gospels, Acts, Paul's letters, 1 John, 1 Peter, and Revelation. Second were the disputed books that were questioned by some, “but,” as Eusebius noted, “nevertheless known [i.e., recognized as authentic and thus canonical] by most.” These writings included James, Jude, 2 Peter, and 2–3 John. The third group encompassed the spurious books, which designated those works that at one time had been received by some but that had now been rejected. These writings included the
Acts of Paul
, the
Shepherd of Hermas
, the
Revelation of Peter
, and the
(Pseudo-) Epistle of Barnabas
.
²⁵

As the Roman Empire was divided into East and West, so were opinions concerning certain NT books to a certain extent. In the West (Italy/Rome, North Africa, Gaul, etc.), doubts seemed to persist regarding Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 3 John, and Jude. But these views were not universal since each of these books had its supporters.
²⁶
In the East (Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt), the status of James, 2 Peter, 2–3 John, Jude, and Revelation continued to be debated.
²⁷
But again this was not a universal opinion. For example, Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria (c. 296–373), published his thirty-ninth festal letter in 367, in which he prescribed the same 27-book NT canon still affirmed by the vast majority of Christians today.
²⁸

The Syrian church (Aramaic-speaking Christians in the East) hesitated to receive the General Epistles and Revelation. The Syrian translation of the NT (called “Peshitta”) supports a 22-book canon. It was not until the Philoxenian revision (c. 500) that the remaining NT books were added to the church's canon.

Certain orthodox books for a time assumed canonical status in particular segments of the church or at least in the opinions of some of its representatives.
²⁹
On the whole these writings were only rarely considered to be Scripture, but they were viewed as useful for the instruction of new Christians without being read during the church's worship. When some were included in the later complete codices (such as the fourth-century Codex Sinaiticus and the fifth-century Codex Alexandrinus), they were always placed subsequent to the
book of Revelation. This suggests that the church considered these writings to be useful for believers' edification but not divinely inspired.
³⁰
Thus, these codices, too large and bulky for personal use, among other things, served as “reference editions” of the Bible.
³¹

Early Church Councils
Only three early church councils officially dealt with the canon of Scripture.
³²
The first, the Council of Laodicea, was a local meeting of bishops around 363. The list of specific books included in the extant documents was probably added at a later time. The list consists of the present NT minus the book of Revelation. It is hard to know the exact outcome of the deliberations of this gathering with regard to the NT canon on the basis of the available evidence. The second was the Council of Hippo Regius in North Africa (393), which met and affirmed the present 27-book NT. The third was the Third Council of Carthage (397), which read the previous affirmations and repeated them.
³³
In no sense were these lists the result of debate. The conciliar documents simply stated the books of the OT and NT and added the following note: “Let this be sent to our brother and fellow bishop, Boniface, and to the other bishops of those parts, that they may confirm this canon, for these are the things which we have received from our fathers to be read in church.”
³⁴
Rather than engaging in a sustained debate or a process of sorting and sifting, “the church,” as P. Balla noted, “recognized as scripture in the fourth century those writings that had guided its life, at least in some regions, in the preceding centuries.”
³⁵

In the next century the East came to receive Revelation and the rest of the General Epistles. Thus, by the close of the fifth century, virtually all questions regarding the extent of the NT canon were closed in the minds of most.

To sum up, the salient facts regarding the recognition of the NT canon thus far are as follows. First, most books of the present NT canon are found in every witness to a canon in antiquity. Almost immediately, 20 out of 27 books were universally received; most accepted at least a 22-book canon.

Second, no book in the present canon had previously been universally rejected by the early churches. There is no post-second-century epiphany concerning a book in the NT that lacked ancient support.

Third, no book was ever received into the NT canon that was believed to be pseudonymous.
³⁶

Finally, no council subjectively selected or rejected the books of the canon. Instead, after a period of sifting and sorting, the church recognized the divine inspiration of the books included in the NT canon and declined to accept the claims of canonicity of any competing works on the basis that they failed to meet the above-stated criteria of canonicity—including apostolicity, orthodoxy, antiquity, and ecclesiastical usage.

Recent Developments in Scholarship on the NT Canon

The above survey of the major works and figures forms the basic framework for the study of the NT canon. The basic facts and data pertaining to the canonization process of the NT are not widely disputed. What has been the subject of considerable recent debate, however, is the interpretation of this data with regard to the question of the formation of the Christian canon. In fact, some, such as Sundberg, have called for a “revised history of the NT canon.”
³⁷
The discussion took its point of departure from the definition of the NT canon as “a closed list of authoritative books.” Since this terminology is not found, at least explicitly, until the third or fourth centuries, these writers argued that characterizing the early church's deliberations in the second century as determining the “canonical” status of a given book committed the fallacy of anachronism. According to these writers, at this early stage of the canonical process, a particular work could have been viewed as “Scripture” (i.e., a piece of sacred writing) but not as “canonical” because this kind of canonical consciousness and sense of a “closed collection” of NT books only emerged in the third and fourth centuries.

What can be said in response to these claims? First, as mentioned above, on the assumption that the Muratorian Canon is to be dated in the late second century, it would contradict these objections, for it clearly evidences this kind of canonical consciousness and presents a list of canonical books. This possible damaging counterevidence has been recognized by the proponents of this view. Consequently, scholars such as Sundberg or Hahneman have challenged the dating of the Muratorian Canon to the second century, proposing instead a date in the fourth century.
³⁸
But many continue to believe that a second-century date for the Muratorian Canon is more likely.
³⁹

Another problematic aspect of Sundberg's thesis is that the early church in all probability did not only evidence a concept of canon but in fact possessed an already established canon: the OT. Again, Sundberg and others challenged the notion of a closed OT canon in the first two centuries, maintaining that that OT canon was not completed until at least the fourth century and that the early church received the OT canon before Judaism determined the canonical boundaries of the Hebrew Scriptures. According to these scholars, the collection of Scripture was a fluid process.
⁴⁰