Canon Revisited: Potential Defeaters

In three previous posts, I’ve worked specifically through different areas of Dr Michael Kruger’s Canon Revisited, (Michael J. Kruger, “Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books”, Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books © 2012):

Attention Roman Catholics: “Sola Scriptura” is in the Bible

The Canon of the New Testament as Self-Authenticating

Michael Kruger’s Criteria for Canonicity

There are a number of other blog posts here at Triablogue focusing on many different aspects of his work, as well as on his blog series, “Misconceptions about the Canon”.

But over the next week or so, I specifically want to work through the details of Dr Kruger’s argument, because there are historical and exegetical details that, because of his status as a New Testament scholar, readers will not necessarily be familiar with. We may have touched on some elements in the past, but they’re assembled here as part of a cogent argument that critics will need to address before they simply say “nuh uh!” and hang up.

As is the case with any good scholar, Michael Kruger is not squeamish about dealing with challenges to his work. The vast majority of this book (following after the chapters in which he (a) reviews the various theories of the New Testament canon, and (b) outlines his own thoughts regarding the “New Testament Canon as Self Attesting”) involves “Exploring and Defending” this “Canonical Model”.

Here again are his “criteria for canonicity”, reasons why the New Testament books are included in the canon, reasons why the early church included these 27 works, and only these 27 works in the New Testament canon:

(1) They have “divine qualities” (canonical books bear the “marks” of divinity),

(2) Corporate reception (canonical books are recognized by the church as a whole),

(3) Apostolic origins (canonical books are the result of the redemptive-historical activity of the apostles).

In the rest of the book, Dr Kruger goes into more detail about what is meant by these qualities, and what kinds of challenges these “criteria” do face in the real world of New Testament scholarship. In a brief section at the end of chapter three (pg 121), he notes:

The essence of the self-authenticating model is that Christians have a rational basis (or warrant) for affirming the twenty-seven books of the New Testament canon because God has created the proper epistemic environment wherein belief in the canon can be reliably formed. However, that is not all that needs to be said. Even if one has a rational basis for holding to a belief, that belief still faces the possibility of epistemic defeat by other beliefs that one might come to hold. Such “defeaters are the kind of beliefs that would challenge or undercut a prior belief, giving one reason to think that the prior belief is false.

While he notes, “in a volume this size it is not possible to mention all potential canonical defeaters, so we will focus on the primary ones”. Here are some of the primary challenges he sees and addresses:

The challenge to divine qualities: apparent disagreements and/or contradictions within the New Testament books: Argues against the existence of divine qualities in these books. If New Testament books are inconsistent with one another – as many scholars have claimed – then how could they really be from God?

The challenge to Apostolic Origins: a number of New Testament books were not written by the Apostles: Much of modern scholarship argues that a number of New Testament books are pseudonymous forgeries. For instance, only seven of Paul’s epistles are widely regarded as authentic. How, then, can we claim that all canonical books are apostolic?

The challenge to corporate reception: there was widespread disagreement in the early church that lasted well into the fourth century: Is it still possible to say that there was significant consensus of the early church, or was this “consensus” called into question “when we recognize the widespread disagreement and confusion that existed in early Christianity about the extent of the canon? If the church experienced disarray over canonical books from the very start, should this not raise doubts about whether the Spirit was really at work?

He admits that not all of the question can be addressed adequately in a single volume, “we will attempt to provide at least a preliminary response” to each of these objection in the rest of the volume.

And in the process, he gives a broadly Reformed and Evangelical understanding of what the early church was, what it was like, and how it operated, especially with regard to its posture vis-à-vis the Scriptures.

There is rock-solid information here about the early church that you won’t want to be without.