Michael Horton (2011) writes that most of the 27 books of the New Testament in the first century "were already widely recognized and employed regularly in public worship as divinely inspired. In fact, this was one criterion that was used for determining which texts were canonical" (p. 194). This is also why determining which books were inspired and canonical was important. The early believers wanted to know which books to read in their public worship services.
How did the process of canonization start?
The Ten Commandments (Deuteronomy 10:5) were the first collected words and thus the beginning of the canon.
The rest of the Pentateuch followed and was placed in the ark of the covenant (Deuteronomy 31:24-26). The books of Moses were recognized as canonical (Joshua 1:7, 8) and these canonical books should be memorized and meditated on.
Joshua was later recognized (Joshua 24:26).
The book of Judges was then accepted (Ruth 1:1). Ruth was the introduction to the books of Samuel which were acknowledged in 1 Samuel 10:25.
The books of Chronicles were recognized by Ezra/Nehemiah (Ezra 1:1, 2).
Job was accepted by Ezekiel 14:14-20.
The book of Psalms was acknowledged by 2nd Samuel 23:2.
Solomon’s writings were recognized in 1st Kings 4:32.
Jeremiah was accepted in Daniel 9:1, 2. The providence of God determined the Old Testament, not a council.
Can we be confident of the Old Testament Canon?
There are over 250 New Testament quotations from Old Testament books and none from the Apocrypha.
Christ identified the Old Testament canon or the Hebrew Bible (Luke 11:51) which did not include the Apocrypha. To understand the significance of Jesus’ statement in Luke 11:51, we must realize that the table of contents of the Hebrew Bible is different in two areas from our English Bibles. First, the number of books. The Hebrew Bible has 22 books because some books were considered one like Nehemiah and Ezra. Next, the order of books. Jesus states the extent of the Old Testament canon in Luke 11:51. The Old Testament religious leaders had shed the blood of God’s prophets from Genesis (“Abel”) to Chronicles (the last book in the Hebrew Bible which records the murder of Zacharias. Other righteous men were murdered as recorded in the Apocrypha, but the Lord does not include them as part of the canon.
Can we be confident of the New Testament canon?
Jesus promised His apostles that the Holy Spirit would guide them in writing the New Testament in John 14:26 and 16:13-14. The apostle Paul wrote "in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual things with spiritual things" (1 Corinthians 2:13). Paul made other similar claims in 1 Corinthians 14:37 and 2 Corinthians 13:3. Peter already recognized that the writings of Paul were "Scripture" in 2 Peter 3:15-16. "Scripture" is a New Testament designation exclusively of God's Word. Peter says that Paul's epistles are equally as authoritative as the "other Scriptures" or the Old Testament canon.
Paul recognizes Luke's writing as Scripture and as belonging in the canon in 1 Timothy 5:17-18 when he quotes Luke 10:7 as "Scripture." Luke was not an apostle but was recognized as an authorized companion of the apostle Paul and thus given the authority to write Scripture. These writings were already being accepted as part of the growing New Testament canon. Once the New Testament was written by apostles and their authorized companions the New Testament canon was closed and any other writings were forbidden in Revelation 22:18-19:
I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.
Wayne Grudem (1994) writes of the significance of this warning at the very end of the canon:
It is, however, not accidental that this statement comes at the end of the last chapter of Revelation, and that Revelation is the last book in the New Testament. In fact, Revelation has to be placed last in the canon. For many books, their placement in the assembling of the canon is of little consequence. But just as Genesis must be placed first (for it tells us of creation), so Revelation must be placed last (for its focus is to tell us of the future and God's new creation).
The events described in Revelation are historically subsequent to the events described in the rest of the New Testament and require that Revelation be placed where it is. Thus, it is not inappropriate for us to understand this exceptionally strong warning at the end of Revelation as applying in a secondary way to the whole Scripture. Placed here, where it must be placed, the warning forms an appropriate conclusion to the entire canon of Scripture .... this broader application of Revelation 22:18-19 also suggests to us that we should expect no more Scripture to be added beyond what we already have" (pp. 64-65).
The question in this debate is this:
Does the church have authority over the Bible
or does the Bible have authority over the church? Did the church give birth to the Scripture or did the Scripture give birth to the Church? The Roman Catholic view is the church has authority over the Bible.
Roman Catholic Johann Eck (as translated by Ford Lewis Battles, 1979) in his debate with Martin Luther said: “The Scriptures are not authentic, except by the authority of the church” (p. 13). The Vatican II as declared by Pope Paul VI (1966) also presented this view:
“It is clear therefore, that sacred tradition, sacred Scripture, and the teaching authority of the church are so linked and joined together that one cannot stand without the others, and that all together and each in his own way under the action of the Holy Spirit contribute effectively to the salvation of souls.”
The Protestant view is the Bible has authority over the church.
God used fallible men to write an infallible Scripture. A few examples are David in the Old Testament and Peter in the New Testament.
God also used fallible men to recognize an infallible list of books of Scripture. God has preserved His Word according to Matthew 5:17-18: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.”
What about the Apocrypha?
Norman Geisler and William E. Nix (1996) provide four different views on Old Testament books (pp.162-177).
1. Books that are accepted by all or the homologoumena.
The Church Fathers accepted 34 of 39 of the Old Testament books.
2. Books were disputed by some or the antilegomena.
These are the five that were not accepted at one time or another by some of the Fathers: Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Ezekiel, and Proverbs. As I argued before, eventually the church discerned these books were God’s Word and belonged in the canon.
3. Books that were rejected by all or the pseudepigrapha.
Jude 14, 15 quote Enoch 1:9 and Jude 9 quotes The Assumption of Moses (none of these is Apocryphal). Quoting uninspired sources is not unusual. Paul quotes the heathen poet Aratus in Acts 17:28. There is no such formula as “it is written” with any of these books.
4. Books accepted by some or the Apocrypha.
The Apocrypha teaches heresy such as prayers for the dead and the existence of purgatory (II Maccabees 12:33-34; 44-45). These dead Jews being prayed for had committed idolatry which is a mortal sin that contradicts R.C.C. doctrine. Scriptures teach judgment after death, Hebrew 9:27, therefore prayer for the dead is useless.
The Apocrypha teaches salvation by works (Tobit 12:9; Ecclesiasticus 3:30). The Apocrypha is immoral: Ecclesiasticus 33:26-28 teaches cruelty to slaves.
The Apocrypha is historically inaccurate. Judith speaks of Nebuchadnezzar as reigning in Nineveh (1:1).
Inspired books of the Bible were received by the church at large. Grudem (1994) states that the Apocrypha was rejected as Scripture even by the author of apocryphal 1 Maccabees 9:27 (100 B.C.): “The memory of an authoritative prophet among the people was one that belonged to the distant past, for the author could speak of a great distress ‘such as had not been since the time that prophets ceased to appear among them’ (1 Macc. 9:27; cf. 14:41)” (p. 56).
Geisler and Nix note (1996) that the Apocrypha was rejected by
Josephus (born A.D. 37/38)
and by Jesus and the writers of Scripture.
Again, it is significant that the New Testament writers quote over 250 times from the Old Testament but never from the Apocrypha (p. 175).
None of the Apocrypha passes the tests of canonicity
which include the following as stated by Geisler and Nix A General Introduction to the Bible (138-143). See Part 1.
1. Is it authoritative?
"Is it authoritative? This is perhaps the first and most important question that was asked by the Fathers .... Does the book come with a divine 'Thus saith the Lord?'" (Geisler and Nix, 138).
2. Is it prophetic?
Was it written by holy men of old who were moved by the Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:20)? Paul made this claim for his writings in Galatians 1:1.
3. Is it authentic?
Does the book tell the truth about God? This is why Martin Luther rejected the book of James because he thought it contradicted Paul's doctrine of justification by faith alone.
4. Is it dynamic?
Because God's Word is inspired by God it should be life-changing. This is what Paul expressed to Timothy: "And that from a child you have known the holy scriptures, which are able to make you wise unto salvation" (2 Timothy 3:15).
5. Is it received?
Inspired books of the Bible must be received by the church at large.
The Apocrypha was rejected by the authors of apocryphal 1 Maccabees 9:27 (100 B.C.): “The memory of an authoritative prophet among the people was one that belonged to the distant past, for the author could speak of a great distress ‘such as had not been since the time that prophets ceased to appear among them’ (1 Macc. 9:27; cf. 14:41)’ (Grudem, 56).
The Apocrypha was rejected by Josephus (born A.D. 37/38).
The Apocrypha was rejected by Jesus and the writers of Scripture.
The N.T. writers quote over 250 times from the O.T. but never from the Apocrypha (Geisler and Nix, 175).
Wayne Grudem (1994) gives four reasons for rejecting the Apocrypha.
1. They do not claim to be the Word of God.
2. They were not regarded to be the Word of God by the Jewish people.
3. They were not regarded to be the Word of God by Jesus or the New Testament writers.
4. They teach false doctrine (p. 59).
God, not man nor a council of men, decided which books belonged in our Bible. When God inspired a book of the Bible, it was in the canon. God used men to recognize which books were inspired but not to create the canon.
Why was the Apocrypha included in the early Bibles?
The Apocrypha was included in the Septuagint which was the Greek Bible of the early church. There were two canons in the early church.
One was the Palestinian Canon. This is the Hebrew Canon which originated in Palestine with the same Old Testament books as our English Bible. This was the canon of the Jews.
The other was the Alexandrian Canon. This was the Greek Canon with an additional 14 or 15 books which originated in Alexandria, Egypt, and where the Septuagint was written in 250 B.C.
Athanasius, bishop of Alexander, in A.D. 367 wrote in his 39th Festal Letter and not only identified the 27 New Testament canonical books but also identified the Apocrypha, and stated by Philip Schaff (1892) that these are “not indeed included in the Canon, but appointed by the Father to be read by those who newly join us, and who wish for instruction in the words of godliness.” For example, I Maccabees is one of the best-written historical accounts of the Maccabean revolt in the 2nd century BC.
The earliest English editions, like Coverdale’s English Bible (1535) disclaimed the Apocrypha: “Apocrypha: the bokes and treatises which amonge the fathers of old are not rekened to be of like authorite with the other bokes of the byble, neither are they founde in the Canon of Hebrue.”
The later English editions blurred the differences between the Apocrypha and the inspired books of the Old Testament. The Great Bible of 1541 omitted any disclaimer and listed the Apocryphal books.
The Geneva Bible (1560) returned to Luther’s position: “These bokes that follow in order after the Prophets vnto the New Testament, are called Apocrypha, that is bokes, which were not receiued by a commune consent to be red and expounded publikely in the Church, nether yet serued to proue any point of Christian religion, saue in asmuche as they had the consent of the other Scriptures called Canonical to confirme the same.”
The Geneva Bible (1599 edition) became the first English Bible printed without the Apocrypha.
King James was published in 1611 including the Apocrypha, without the traditional disclaimers concerning their non-canonical status. In 1615 the archbishop of Canterbury, the Anglican counterpart to the pope, decreed that anyone who bound or sold a Bible without the Apocrypha would suffer a year’s imprisonment. It took nearly twenty years of pressure from public outcry before the king finally relented and authorized the publication of an edition without the Apocrypha (1629), (Paul Downing, pp. 46-47).
Only the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 of the New Testament are “given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2nd Timothy 3:16, 17).
Works Cited
Eck, Johann. (1979). Enchiridion of Commonplaces, trans. by Ford Lewis Battles, Grand Rapids, MI: Baker.
Downey, Paul. (1999). Canonization and Apocrypha, in From the Mind of God to the Mind of Man, ed. James Williams. Greenville, SC: Ambassador-Emerald International.
Geisler, Norman L. and William E. Nix. (1986) A General Introduction to the Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
Grudem, Wayne. (1994). Systematic Theology. Grand Rapids, MI. Zondervan.
Horton, Michael. (2011). Christian Faith, Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Pope Paul VI. (1966). The Documents of the Vatican II Council. Walter Abbott, ed. Piscataway, NJ: American Press. II.10. The Imprimatur of this volume was provided by Lawrence Cardinal Shehan, Archbishop of Baltimore.