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The Canonization of Scripture Question: What is a canon, as this term is used in religious studies? Discuss the concept of canon and the process of canonization of the books of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and the New Testament. Discuss the criteria for selection of the books in the canon. Hebrew Bible (Old Testament): Be able to identify the major divisions of the Hebrew Bible. New Testament: Discuss the internal and external forces affecting the shaping of the New Testament canon. Definition
Canon is, first of all, the English equivalent of the Greek word

, kanon, which in turn corresponds to the Hebrew word kaneh, which means, reed. Because measuring was done with a reed in ancient times, the word came to be used in the sense of a measuring-reed or ruler. This use was gradually extended to cover all kinds of rules or standards. As a technical term applied to an approved list or catalogue of official books of Scripture, the word first seems to have been used by the early Christian scholar Origen of Alexandria (died c. 250 CE). Canon is thus a Christian, not a Jewish term. Jews expressed the same idea of canonicity by the phrase, to defile the hands, a phrase that probably was understood in the sense that the books so described were so sacred that to touch them necessitated a ceremonial washing of the hands afterwards. In speaking of the canons of Scripture, three other concepts should be clearly distinguished: (1) Circulation: (2) Collection: and (3) Canonization. By circulation we mean the introduction of a Biblical book to whatever reading public there was, and its general acceptance as a book worth reading, and consequently, the reproduction of multiplied copies of it. By collection we mean the grouping together of individual books, usually similar in character or purpose, to form a corpus, such as the Torah ( = Instruction, Revelation, Law), or Pentateuch, the Prophets, [
nebiim, plural of

nabi, prophet] and the (Sacred) Writings, [

kethubim]which are the three major divisions of the Hebrew Bible. The Jewish

canon further subdivides the division designated as the Prophets into the Former Prophets and the Latter Prophets. [See Bernhard W. Anderson, Understanding the Old Testament, pp. 2-5 for a listing]. By canonization we mean the official or semi-official designation of an individual book or a

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group of books as canonical, as religiously authoritative because of its inclusion in a canon or list of sacred books. The Hebrew Bible As far as the Hebrew Bible was concerned, canonization in the strictest sense was a very late development. Varying degrees of authority were accorded to the various works of the Biblical writers at earlier stages in Israels history. In the case of much of the material that eventually made its way into the Hebrew Bible, when we talk of circulation of that material, we must first remember that the earliest Biblical materials circulated in oral, not written form. The earliest stories were told orally. Most of the earliest legal precepts were handed down orally. Most of the wisdom sayings and the songs and psalms were handed down orally. And it is doubtful if any of the prophets made a habit of writing down their own words, although it seems clear that the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah had disciples who did so on occasions after (sometimes many years after, or even generations after) the prophetic oracles were originally uttered. While literacy today is widespread and common, in the ancient world of the Hebrew people, and even in the later Mediterranean world of the Greeks and the Romans very few people acquired the skills of reading and writing. Consequently, the authors of the Biblical materials belonged to a tiny literate elite within largely illiterate societies. Since the majority of the Hebrew people and the early Christians could not read, most of the Biblical materials were first delivered orally, and circulated orally, long before any one wrote them down. And they were composed to be heard by the ear, and easily memorized, rather than to be read with the eye. And much of the material in the Biblical writings existed for years, perhaps centuries, as oral tradition before ever being written down. The stories were passed on orally from one generation to the next, and sometimes adapted to new occasions and altered to fit changing social and political circumstances. Then, after a time, collections of these oral stories were made and eventually committed to writing. Most of the materials of the four New Testament Gospels were also part of an oral tradition, before the Gospel writers incorporated them into their narratives. It does appear that varying degrees of authority were accorded to various books of the Hebrew Bible at earlier stages in Israels history. One early stage was the discovery of a Book of Torah ( = instruction,
revelation, law) in the Jerusalem Temple during the reign of King Josiah,
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about 621 BCE (2 Kings 22:8 23:8). Again, after the Exile, Ezra the Scribe read publicly the Torah of Moses about the year 398/7 BCE, and this is said to have been the occasion of the first popular observance of the Feast of Booths (Tabernacles) (Nehemiah 8:1-18). We cannot be certain that we have an exact historical record of what actually took place, of course, and even if the Biblical accounts are accurate, we still do not know what relation those books of Torah have to our presentday Pentateuch (Genesis through Deuteronomy). But the evidence suggests that at least by the post-exilic period (after 540 BCE) collections of the laws and instructions attributed to Moses were known and circulated, even though they may not have been identical with the first five books of our modern Bible. The first clear evidence for the existence of the Pentateuch as we know it comes from the Samaritans. They established a Temple on Mount Gerizim, near Shechem (NT: Sychar), as a rival to the one in Jerusalem, with a separate ritual and organization by about 300 BCE. The Samaritans accepted only the Pentateuch as Scripture, and they do so even until the present day. They would hardly have accepted it from the Jews, whom they hated, after their separation from normative Judaism. So we can infer that by about 300 BCE at the very latest, the whole of the Pentateuch, as a group of books, was in circulation in Palestine, and that it was generally accepted as Scripture. Negatively, since the Samaritans did not accept the rest of the Hebrew Bible as Scripture, we may assume that those other books had not attained the status of Scripture by that time. By about 200 BCE, when the Apocryphal Book of Ecclesiasticus (or, The Wisdom of Jesus, son of Sirach) was written, it is clear from references in that work that the writer knew the Pentateuch and the Prophetic books in approximately their current form, and that he probably knew some of the other books as well (see the preface to Ecclesiasticus, and chapters 44-49). The Maccabean revolt, which began c. 167/8 BCE, was certainly an external factor that gave further impetus to the collection and preservation of traditional Jewish literature (cf. 2 Maccabees 2:14). And the circumstances that led to that revolt necessarily tended to increase the reverence Jews felt for their literature (1 Maccabees 1:41-64). It is about this time in Jewish writings that we first come across quotation formulassuch phrases as thus it is written. to introduce a Biblical quotation or reference. This is a sure sign that anyone using these phrases regarded these references as coming from what we would call authoritative Scripture.

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The same situation is reflected in the Qumran documents the so-called Dead Sea Scrolls. All the books of the Hebrew Bible are found among the Dead Sea Scrolls except the Book of Esther. Likewise, every book of the Hebrew Bible is quoted in the New Testament, except the Book of Esther. Shortly after the Roman destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE, the Pharisaic party in Judaism regrouped itself at the town of Jamnia, on the Mediterranean coast; and there, about 90 CE, a council of Pharisaic Rabbis engaged in semi-official deliberations regarding the limits of the Hebrew Bible canon. There was still considerable debate about whether Esther, the Song of Songs (Song of Solomon), and Ecclesiastes would defile the hands, but eventually a consensus was reached that all of the works comprising our current Hebrew Bible (Old Testament)39 books as the current Protestant canon has themfell into that category. Other books that previously had been accepted by many Jews, especially Jews outside Palestine, (Apocrypha and Pseudipigrapha) were excluded at Jamnia. Those Pharisees at Jamnia were attempting to establish criteria by which to measure just which works ought to be included in their Scriptures. The works eventually accepted were believed to meet two criteria. (1) They concluded (for reasons never actually stated) that the period of prophetic inspiration had ended about the time of Ezra and Nehemiah (i.e., before about 350 BCE), and that no work composed after that time defiled the hands. The time of Ezra and Nehemiah preceded the period of Hellenization with its philosophy of blending the best of every culture and religion with Greek culture and religion. Biblical scholars usually assume that to avoid the possibility that later works might have been influenced by Greek ideas, the Rabbis of Jamnia closed the window of Scriptural authority before the opportunity for distortion was supposed to have arisen. So they accepted only works that people generally believed had been written earlier than Hellenistic times. (2) They further concluded that no work known to have been composed originally in a language other than Hebrew defiled the hands. This restriction was made probably for the same reason as the first, so that no work that might have been affected by the Hellenization process would be included. Thus, the books in the Apocrypha, which already had been accepted by Greek-speaking Jews and were included in the Greek Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Bible were not included in the Hebrew canon. [The Septuagint, with its extra books, was the earliest Bible accepted by the

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Christian movement. And thus, Christians accepted the Apocrypha as canonical until the Protestant Reformation, after which most Protestants ceased to consider it so.] One work, the Book of Daniel, did get included in the Hebrew canon, even though it failed both criteria. It was certainly written partly in Aramaic as well as in Hebrew, and it was almost certainly written between December of 168 BCE and December of 164 BCE, shortly before the death of the tyrant Antiochus IV Epiphanes, who ruled Palestine and Syria at that time. However, true to the nature of the book (apocalyptic writingpurporting to be predictions of events of later times) many, if not all first century Jews had come to believe that Daniel had been written during the Babylonian Exile (c. 605-538 BCE). At any rate, the Pharisees at Jamnia really did not have the authority to speak for all Jews everywhere in deciding which books were really Scripture, any more than later Christian councils did. Judaism long before this time was already a religion of the Book, and Jews had long since accepted most of the books of the Hebrew canon. The Pharisees at Jamnia were simply deciding, so to speak, when the final chapters of that Book were written. The final decision on the Hebrew canon was simply tradition and the consensus of common usage. The New Testament The New Testament canon apparently grew over a shorter period than that of the Hebrew Bible. The New Testament canon represents the standard or norm of belief for the Christian faith. It is an expression of the authority acknowledged by that faith community, and functioning within that community. Certain internal forces long present within the primitive Christian Church made the eventual establishment of some form of canon virtually inevitable. Likewise, certain external pressures also contributed to the content and shape of the final canon. Internal factors The early Church, first of all, had impetus from within it understood itself to be commissioned to spread its Good News (Gospel) of Gods inbreaking into the world in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. It understood itself as being charged to proclaim the story about Jesus. That assignment was reflected in the two basic types of writing included in the canon Gospels, which focus on the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus, and

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Letters, which show the progress of the Christian mission, as well as the problems it encountered and with which it dealt. It is true that Christianity began with an established Scripture, the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament), primarily in the Septuagint Greek translation. The religious literature of the first years of Christianity was not produced to replace that Scripture. Rather, it had the purpose of guiding the early Christian community, and especially for strengthening the faith of the mission communities. Another internal factor was simply the passage of time. It is clear from passages like Mark 9:1 and Romans 13:11b-12a that the primitive Christian community expected the return of Jesus within a very short time. But by the end of the first century CE, it was becoming clear that Jesus might not return so soon after all. And the earliest disciples and eyewitnesses were dying out. It was becoming impossible to appeal to members of that generation in person for guidance. The only recourse was to appeal to the writings of the earliest generation to find hints about how problems were to be solved and how worship was to be conducted, and how leaders were to be selected. External Factors But there were also external forces at work. About 140 CE, a man named Marcion, the son of a wealthy shipbuilder, came to Rome from what is now Turkey. He supported the Roman church generously and became very prominent. About the year 144 CE, however, it became evident that Marcions understanding of the Christian faith was radically different from that of the Roman congregation, and Marcion withdrew to form his own church. He did not accept the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) as authoritative as the Roman Christians did. And he issued a canon of his own, consisting of an edited version of the Gospel of Luke, and ten letters of Paul, excluding 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus. Also Marcion apparently purged from Pauls letters any passages that spoke in a positive way about the Jewish faith, its Torah, and its Prophets. Likewise he excised from Luke any material that showed Old Testament influence, for example, the first two chapters of that Gospel. Marcion seems to have been the first person to form a specifically Christian collection of authoritative Scripture. But ironically, he used that literature to support religious views that Christians in Rome and elsewhere felt compelled to reject. Thus, the Christian communities had a problem: in rejecting Marcion and his views, could they afford to reject the literature he used to support those views?
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Instead of rejecting the literature that Marcion had appropriated, the Christian communities began naming the books they considered authoritative. They retained the letters of Paul and the Gospel of Luke, and further affirmed that there were other books of equal authority. But if Marcion hastened the process of the formation of the canon, much debate about the canon still lay ahead, for the lists of the various churches in the Roman Empire continued to differ from one another for another 300 years! A second external factor was the movement centering on a man named Montanus. Montanus traveled widely around the middle of the second century CE announcing that a new age of the Spirit had begun, and basing his ideas on certain passages quoted out of context from the Gospel According to John. The Montanist movement also produced a large body of literature thought by some to be inspired Scripture. The Christian communities that opposed Montanus had to affirm that only those writings that drew directly upon apostolic traditions were authoritative. Arriving At A Consensus Thus Marcion had made it imperative for Christian communities to collect a body of normative literature, and Montanus made it imperative to affirm that only those writings that could call upon true apostolic tradition and authority could be included in that body of normative literature. So we have two influences on the development of the New Testament canon: (1) the internal one: the need for a body of literature on which the churches could rely for information about the life of Jesus for use in missionary proclamation, and for teaching to strengthen the Christian community, and (2) the external one: the need for a body of literature to which appeal could be made for authoritative teaching against many forms of heretical beliefs. And actually, the same body of literature served both needs: those books used in Christian worship services, and admitted by the churches as having a right to be so employed were also the same books appealed to for settling controversies and doctrinal disputes. The most ancient extant list of New Testament books is the Muratorian Fragment, which comes from the end of the second century, CE. It is a mutilated extract, and begins in the middle of a sentence dealing with the Gospel of Mark, goes on to mention Luke as the third Gospel, and

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John as the fourth. Then it has Acts, ascribed to Luke, thirteen letters of Paul, including 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus (but excluding Hebrews), then it has Jude, and two of the three letters attributed to John, and the Revelation, also attributed to John. Apparently Hebrews, 1 and 2 Peter, James, and one of the three Johannine letters are not considered canonical in this list. But the list does include the presently non-canonical Wisdom of Solomon from the Apocrypha and the Revelation of Peter, and the Shepherd of Hermas. By 325 CE the Church historian Eusebius of Caesarea was able to draw up three lists: (1) those books admitted by practically all the churches; (2) those books Eusebius was personally disposed to accept, although he realized that some churches rejected them; and (3) those books regarded as spurious by nearly all the churches and by Eusebius himself. By 367 CE, Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, in an Easter letter to churches in his diocese, became (apparently) the first to publish a list identical with the 27 books in our present New Testament canon. In many areas of the Roman world, however, the matter was not yet settled until a hundred or more years later. The third and fourth centuries CE were the period when a consensus began to be reached and affirmed, beginning with the Council of Hippo in 393 CE, and the Council of Carthage, in 397 CE, which both affirmed the list of Athanasius for their local regions in North Africa. But there never was a general conference of the whole Church that made a decision on the extent of the canon in that period. Actually, by that time, Christianity, like Judaism, had been using its Scriptures long before anyone ever decided that they were Scripture. The decision -makers were simply confirming what tradition and usage had already established by consensus, and there had rarely been any doubt about most of the books. Such doubts as there were applied only to a very fewHebrews, Revelation, James, 2 Peter, and the letters of John. The closest thing to a general conference on the matter was the Council of Trent in 1547, but that council occurred after the split in the Church led by Martin Luther, and the canon approved there included the Apocryphal books, which are not recognized as canonical by most Protestants.

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Criteria The criteria for inclusion of these books officially were: (1) the work must be (or be believed to be) from an eyewitness, or from one closely associated with an eyewitness, to the life and teaching and ministry of Jesus, and (2) the work must not dispute what had come to be established traditionally as orthodox teaching among the churches. Although, for the most part, all 27 books in our current canon met the second criteria, it now seems clear that about a fourth of them (including all four Gospels) fail the first criteria, though this fact was not known during that period. Thus, the New Testament canon, like that of the Hebrew Bible, rests mainly on tradition and usage. The justification for inclusion has usually been found in (1) the idea of apostolic authorship, for most of the books; and (2) the idea that other books, not thought to have been written by apostles, came from persons said to have associated with apostles; and (3) the general acceptance and continuous traditional use of them in the churches for centuries as a test of their value; and (4) in their inherent worth today as realized in Christian experience. Yet it cannot be said in every case that these tests would give an indefensible right to every book in our current New Testament to claim its place in the canon if it were not already there.
Compiled from various sources by Michael J. Watts, Adjunct Instructor of Religion, East Carolina University, 1993. Revised 2009