The Canon of the Bible

by Samuel Davidson

The canon of the Abyssinian church seems to have had at first all the books in the Septuagint, canonical and apocryphal together, little distinction being made between them. Along with the contents of the Greek Bible there were Enoch, 4 Esdras, the Ascension of Isaiah, the Jubilees, Asseneth, &c. That of the New Testament agrees with the [pg 106] present Greek one. At a later period in the Arabic age a list was made and constituted the legal one for the use of the church, having been derived from the Jacobite canons of the apostles. This gives, in the Old Testament, the Pentateuch, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Judith, Kings, Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, Esther, Tobit, two books of Maccabees, Job, Psalms, five books of Solomon, minor and greater prophets. The Wisdom of Sirach (for teaching children) and the book of Joseph ben Gorion, i.e., that of the Maccabees, are external. The New Testament has four gospels, Acts, seven apostolic epistles, fourteen of Paul, and the Revelation of John. Later catalogues vary much, and are often enlarged with the book of Enoch, 4 Esdras, the Apocalypse of Isaiah, &c. The canon of the Ethiopic church was fluctuating.[340]

The canon of the Armenians had at first the Palestinian books of the Old Testament, twenty-two in number, and the usual New Testament ones, except the Apocalypse. It was made from the Syriac in the fifth century by Sahak and Mesrob. The deutero-canonical books and additions were appended, after the disciples of those two men who had been sent by them into different places, brought back authentic copies of the Greek Bible from the patriarch Maximian, by which the version already made was interpolated and corrected; as it was subsequently corrected by others despatched to Alexandria and Athens, who, however, did not return till their teachers were dead. The MSS. of this version were afterwards interpolated from the Vulgate; Oskan himself translating for his edition (which was the first printed one, a.d. 1666), Sirach, 4 Esdras and the Epistle of Jeremiah from the Latin. The book of Revelation does not seem to have been translated till the eighth century. Zohrab's critical edition (1805) has Judith, Tobit, the three books of Maccabees, Wisdom, and the Epistle of [pg 107] Baruch among the canonical books; and in an appendix, the fourth book of Esdras, the prayer of Manasseh, the Epistle of the Corinthians to Paul and his answer, the Rest (end) of the apostle and evangelist John, the prayer of Euthalius. Like the edition of Oskan, this has all the deutero-canonical books, which were derived from the Septuagint, and incorporated by the first translators with their original version. Another edition published at St. Petersburgh (1817), for the use of the Jacobite Church, has the prayer of Manasses and 4 Esdras after the Apocalypse.

The Georgian version consisted of the books and additions in the Greek translation from which it was made. The New Testament has the canonical books in the usual order. Jesus Sirach and two books of the Maccabees (2d and 3d) were not in the Georgian MS. used by Prince Arcil for the edition of 1743, but were rendered out of the Russian. The Moscow Bible printed under the direction and at the cost of Arcil, Bacchar and Wakuset, is the authorized edition of the Georgian Christians.

The Bible canon of the Eastern church in the middle ages shows no real advance. Endeavors were made to remove the uncertainty arising from the existence of numerous lists; but former decisions and decrees of councils were repeated instead of a new, independent canon. Here belongs the catalogue in the Alexandrian MS., of the fifth century, which is peculiar. After the prophets come Esther, Tobit, Judith, Ezra and Nehemiah, 4 Maccabees, Psalms, Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles, the all-virtuous Wisdom, the Wisdom of Jesus of Sirach. In the New Testament, the Apocalypse is followed by two epistles of Clement. The list was probably made in Egypt. That of Anastasius Sinaita,[341] patriarch of Antioch, is similar to Nicephorus's Stichometry, which we shall mention afterwards. Baruch is among the canonical books; Esther among the antilegomena. [pg 108] The Apocalypse is unnoticed. The 85th of the Apostolic canons gives a list of the Old and New Testament books, in which the usual canonical ones of the former are supplemented by Judith and 3 Maccabees; those of the latter by the two epistles of Clement, with the Apostolic constitutions. This catalogue cannot be put earlier than the fifth or sixth century, and is subject to the suspicion of having been interpolated. We have also Nicephorus's Stichometry (806-815;)[342] of which we may remark that Baruch is among the canonical books of the Old Testament; while the Revelation is put with the Apocalypse of Peter, the epistle of Barnabas and the Gospel according to the Hebrews, among the antilegomena of the New Testament. It is also surprising that the Apocalypse of Peter and the Gospel according to the Hebrews are not among the Apocrypha, where Clement's epistles with the productions of Ignatius, Polycarp, and Hermas appear. The list is probably older than that of the Antioch patriarch Anastasius Sinaita. Cosmas Indicopleustes (535) never mentions the seven Catholic epistles of the New Testament or the Apocalypse. The Trullan council (a.d. 692) adopts the eighty-five Apostolic canons, rejecting, however, the Apostolic Constitutions. Photius, patriarch of Constantinople,[343] follows the eighty-fifth Apostolical canon of the Trullan Council.[344] But in his Bibliotheca[345] he speaks differently regarding the epistles of Clement, and does not treat them as canonical. Though the first was thought worthy to be read in public, the second was rejected as spurious; and his own opinion was not altogether favorable to them. John of Damascus;[346] the second Nicene council (787); the Synopsis divinæ Scripturæ Vet. et Novi Test. (about 1000); Zonaras (about 1120); Alexius Aristenus (about 1160); and Nicephorus Callistus (1330), call for no remark.

In the Western church of the Middle Ages, diversity of opinion respecting certain books continued. Though the views of Augustine were generally followed, the stricter ones of Jerome found many adherents. The canon was fluctuating, and the practice of the churches in regard to it somewhat lax. Here belong Cassiodorus (about 550); the list in the Codex Amiatinus (about 550); Isidore of Seville[347] who, after enumerating three classes of Old Testament books gives a fourth not in the Hebrew canon. Here he specifies Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Tobit, Judith, 1 and 2 Maccabees, saying that the church of Christ puts them among the divine books, honors and highly esteems them.[348] There are also the fourth council of Toledo (632); Gregory the Great[349] Notker Labeo;[350] Ivo (about 1092); Bede;[351] Alcuin;[352] Rabanus Maurus;[353] Hugo de St Victor;[354] Peter of Clugny;[355] John of Salisbury;[356] Thomas Aquinas;[357] Hugo de St Cher;[358] Wycliffe;[359] Nicolaus of Lyra,[360] &c., &c. Several of these, as Hugo de St Victor, John of Salisbury, Hugo de St Cher, and Nicolaus of Lyra, followed Jerome in separating the canonical and apocryphal books of the Old Testament.[361]

The Reformers generally returned to the Hebrew canon, dividing off the additional books of the Septuagint or those attached to the Vulgate. These they called apocryphal, after Jerome's example. Though considered of no authority in matters of doctrine, they were pronounced useful and edifying. The principal reason that weighed with the Reformers was, that Christ and the apostles testified to none of the Septuagint additions.

Besides the canonical books of the Old Testament, Luther translated Judith, Wisdom, Tobit, Sirach, Baruch, 1 and 2 Maccabees, the Greek additions to Esther and Daniel, with [pg 110] the Prayer of Manasseh. His judgment respecting several of these is expressed in the prefaces to them. With regard to 1 Maccabees, he thinks it almost equal to the other books of Holy Scripture, and not unworthy to be reckoned among them. Of Wisdom, he says, he was long in doubt whether it should be numbered among the canonical books; and of Sirach that it is a right good book proceeding from a wise man. But he speaks unfavorably of several other apocryphal productions, as of Baruch and 2 Maccabees. It is evident, however, that he considered all he translated of some use to the Christian Church. He thought that the book of Esther should not belong to the canon.

Luther's judgment respecting some of the New Testament books was freer than most Protestants now are disposed to approve. He thought the epistle to the Hebrews was neither Paul's nor an apostle's, but proceeded from an excellent and learned man who may have been the disciple of apostles. He did not put it on an equality with the epistles written by apostles themselves. The Apocalypse he considered neither apostolic nor prophetic, but put it almost on the same level with the 4th book of Esdras, which he spoke elsewhere of tossing into the Elbe. This judgment was afterwards modified, not retracted. James's epistle he pronounced unapostolic, “a right strawy epistle.” In like manner, he did not believe that Jude's epistle proceeded from an apostle. Considering it to have been taken from 2 Peter, and not well extracted either, he put it lower than the supposed original. The Reformer, as also his successors, made a distinction between the books of the New Testament similar to that of the Old; the generally received (homologoumena) and controverted books (antilegomena); but the Calvinists afterwards obliterated it, as the Roman Catholics at the Council of Trent did with the old Testament.[362] The epistle to the Hebrews, those of Jude [pg 111] and James, with the Apocalypse, belong to the latter class. The distinction in question proceeded from genuine critical tact on the part of the early Lutheran Church which had canonical and deutero-canonical writings even in the New Testament collection. Nor did the Reformers consider it a dangerous thing to bring the fact before the people. To make it palpable, Luther attached continuous numbers to the first twenty-three books of his version, bringing the four antilegomena after these, without numbers; and this mode of marking the difference continued till the middle of the 17th century.[363] Luther was right in assigning a greater or less value to the separate writings of the New Testament, and in leaving every one to do the same. He relied on their internal value more than tradition; taking the word of God in a deeper and wider sense than its coincidence with the Bible.

Bodenstein of Carlstad examined the question of canonicity more thoroughly than any of his contemporaries, and followed out the principle of private judgment in regard to it. He divides the biblical books into three classes—1. Books of the highest dignity, viz., the Pentateuch and the Gospels; 2. Books of the second dignity, i.e., the works termed prophetic by the Jews, and the fifteen epistles universally received; 3. Books of the third and lowest authority, i.e., the Jewish Hagiographa and the seven Antilegomena epistles of the New Testament. Among the Apocrypha he makes two classes—such as are out of the canon to the Hebrews yet hagiographical (Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Judith, Tobit, the two Maccabees), and those that are clearly apocryphal and to be rejected (third and fourth Esdras, Baruch, Prayer of Manasseh, a good part of the third chapter of Daniel, and the last two chapters of Daniel.)[364]

Zwingli asserts that the Apocalypse is not a biblical book.[365]