What if I told you that you can take the Bible seriously but not literally? I’m Rev Darcy, a Universalist pastor from rural Alabama, and I’m inviting you on a journey with me through the Bible where we’ll dive deep into all of the drama without the spiritual trauma. Come with me to learn about just how much you are loved, just as you are in this moment, as we spend the next eleven minutes in heaven.
Listen to what the Spirit is saying to you through this sacred word from the Gospel of John 21:24-25 (CEB): “This is the disciple who testifies concerning these things and who wrote them down. We know that his testimony is true. Jesus did many other things as well. If all of them were recorded, I imagine the world itself wouldn’t have enough room for the scrolls that would be written.”
Welcome to another Eleven Minutes in Heaven with me, Rev Darcy (she/hers), as we continue our introduction to the Bible today by discussing how all 66 books common to the Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant Christian Bibles became part of those Bibles. As you can surmise from the claims of today’s sacred word, there are were a lot of contenders. How ever did we chose?
Sermon Note: Want to dive even deeper or check my claims? I recommend The Bible: An Introduction (3rd Edition) by Jerry L. Sumney (ISBN-13: 978-1506466781). Available at your local bookseller and online.
What is a Canon?
The 66 books considered by Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant Christians to be authoritative are called the Biblical canon. While we might hear the term Biblical canon and think of a medieval instrument of war used in Crusades past and present, that is not what this term means. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica:
The term canon, from a Hebrew-Greek word meaning “cane” or “measuring rod,” passed into Christian usage to mean “norm” or “rule of faith.” The Church Fathers of the 4th century CE first employed it in reference to the definitive, authoritative nature of the body of sacred Christian scripture.
In general, a writing is included in the New Testament Biblical canon because some committee of the church at some point decided that there was enough evidence that it was written by an apostle or a close known associate. They relied upon writings by early church fathers who referenced the work as evidence of such association. However, as you’ll find in my sermon notes from our last episode found on my Substack, claims of authorship may not be that accurate. The canon of what the Christian Church considers the authoritative Hebrew Scriptures was really determined by whether or not the work was included in the Septuagint— if you are Catholic or Orthodox— and if the you are Protestant then the criteria is if the Septuagint work has a corresponding Hebrew manuscript. More on that next week. Throughout this episode we will be exploring, briefly and by no means thoroughly, how a collection of related texts were determined to be canon.
Fixing the Canon
The process of determining what books were to be included in the Bible is called “fixing the canon” by Biblical scholars. For the Hebrew Bible, most scholars agree the canon of 24 books— by Rabbinical Judaism’ ordering— or 39 books— by Christianity’s ordering— was fixed between 140 and 40 BCE. For the Christian Bible, this process began as early as 130 CE and was definitely complete by 1546 (though small additions to the Gospels were approved by the Roman Catholic Church in 1870). It was Augustine of Hippo, who convened three councils between 393-419 CE, who formally declared the canon of the Christian Bible closed.
Sermon Note: Minor editions to the Bible are made when new manuscripts are discovered. The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls provided older manuscripts than those widely used in translations like the Vulgate and the King James Bible. Translations usually include an explanatory note.
The First Canon
The earliest known authoritative canon of the Christian Bible was drawn up by Marcion of Sinope between 130 and 140 CE. His canon included the Gospel of Marcion (loosely based on Luke) and the Pauline Epistles of Galatians, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Romans, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, 1st Laodiceans, Colossians, Philippians, and Philemon. Marcion was not a Jewish Christian, and he rejected the Hebrew Scriptures’ portrayal of God. He said that there was no resemblance between the God of Moses and the God of Jesus. This view is often mirrored, intentionally antisemitic or not, by twenty-first century Christians who read the Hebrew Scriptures superficially without knowing anything of the context of when they were written, by whom they were written, and why they were written. Remember from part 2 of this introductory series that the Hebrew Scriptures are a theological narrative written by the Jewish priests in captivity in Babylon and Persia and meant to convey the cause of their captivity— their faithlessness and exploitation of the vulnerable—, the faithfulness of God to God’s people and the eventual liberation of them from bondage by God. It is impossible to accurately read and understand the New Testament without a deep reading of the Hebrew Scriptures.
Knowledge this good must be shared!
The Canon We Know
The Biblical canon Christians know today has its origins the the patristic era of the church. Early fathers and mothers, the immediate successors to the Apostles, such as Origen, Cyril of Jerusalem, and Athanasius accepted the Hebrew Scriptures in the Septuagint and most of what we know as the New Testament today. Origen did not include 2nd or 3rd John, and neither he nor Cyril of Jerusalem included Revelation in their canon. While Augustine of Hippo and his Synod of Hippo in North Africa (393 CE), the Synod of Carthage (397 CE), and Council of Carthage (419 CE) were the first official church bodies to fix the New Testament canon to the 27 books we know today, there was no church-wide declaration until the Protestant Reformation. While the Protestants were divided on whether to include the Apocrypha or not, they generally accepted the 27 New Testament books we have today (though Martin Luther was not convinced of the canonicity of Jude, James, Hebrews, and Revelation). In response to the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church’s Council of Trent established the official canon of that Church in 1546. The Roman Catholic and Orthodox canons include Apocryphal books, and certain protestant churches include them as optional lectionary readings. But what are they?
Sermon Note:A key guiding principle of the Protestant Reformation, sola scriptura (“scripture alone”), is the reason for the uncertainty about the Apocrypha among Protestants. The fact that they were in the Septuagint, but not Hebrew manuscripts of the Hebrew Bible, made them weary that they were actually authoritative scripture.
Sermon Note: I tend to agree with Martin Luther on Revelation, but I’d hate to lose some really great verses about the peace and joy of God experienced by the beloved when they die, as well as, images of animals in heaven that are found in that problematic text.
The Apocrypha
The Apocrypha get their name from the Greek word for “hidden.” Believed to be written between 200 BCE and 100 CE, the consensus about these fourteen books throughout the history of the Christian church has been that they are useful for instruction. Seven of them are included in the Hebrew Scriptures as deuterocanonical (i.e., second canon) by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches. Interestingly, the original protestant Bible included all fourteen in an inter-testament section called “Apocrypha” because they were useful for instruction if not canonical. It was until the Puritan movement in England that the apocrypha was removed from the Protestant Bible. Today, versions of the Protestant Bible are published both with and without the Apocrypha.
Sermon Note: Some of the Apocrypha are additional verses or chapters of canonical books.
From Scarcity to Abundance
What do we do with this knowledge that what we know as the Bible is the result of committee work? Well, first, I think we should take comfort in the fact that— in spite of all the arguments that probably took place— there is a common narrative to the whole work. I also take comfort in the fact that from the early days of the Christian Church, there was pretty strong consensus on what was and was not canon. I don’t personally think there was some grand conspiracy. The list of what we consider canon today is very similar to that authored by church fathers and mothers who were part of the Christian church before it was married to Empire. But what about what didn’t make the cut? Well, beloved, I think the Spirit speaks to us in any way she can, so if there is a sacred word from the Apocryphal books or Gospels or epistles that didn’t make the list, I think you can still learn a lot about God and God’s faithfulness to all people through them. As long as you approach the discovery of truth freely and responsibly, I think you’ll be fine.
The transition of the Bible from oral to written tradition with a fixed canon created a new problem…one of access. How can you have access to the sacred word without a widely available technology of mass communication? Next week, we will continue our introduction to the Bible by discussing how the invention of the printing press changed the Bible forever by placing it in the hands of the common person in their own mother tongue. You might be shocked to learn that some of what we consider to be authoritative teachings of the church are based on translation errors.
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Beloved, go about your day knowing you are loved more than you could ever ask or imagine. Be kind to yourself and to one another. Have a snack, and take a nap. Above all, dwell in peace. May it be.
Eleven Minutes in Heaven is © Copyright 2024 Darcy Corbitt, LLC, PO Box 23, Camp Hill, AL 36850. Support Rev. Darcy and gain access to even more content by becoming a paid subscriber at revdarcy.substack.com/subscribe.
All scripture quotations come from the COMMON ENGLISH BIBLE which is © Copyright 2011 COMMON ENGLISH BIBLE. All rights reserved. Used by permission. (www.CommonEnglishBible.com).
Music included in this podcast is by Julius H used under the Pixabay Content License.
