One of the
arguments that Michael Kruger makes in his work Canon
Revisited, (Michael J. Kruger, “Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins
and Authority of the New Testament Books”, Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books © 2012),
is that not only did the church passively “receive” the canon, but because of
the intrinsic, “divine” qualities of the New Testament writings, (and their
clear apostolic origins), that the canon of the New Testament actually imposed
itself upon the early church (pg 115).
Did they do
this “imposing” early or late? Another “misconception”
that Kruger addresses is that it was “late”, and the notion that Irenaeus
somehow invented the concept of a New Testament canon.
In recent years, … , somewhat of a quasi-consensus
has been building that the canon was first regarded as Scripture at the end of
the second century (c.200). McDonald is
representative of this view, ‘[New Testament] documents were not generally
recognized as Scripture until the end of the second century C.E.’
Rather, he
cites evidence of canon-think prior to the year 200, in the form of an emerging
“canonical core” – works collected even in the first century, even during the
lifetimes of the Apostles, and recognized as “core” Scriptural works of an
emerging New Testament, such as the four gospels and Paul’s letters:
Justin Martyr (c.150): He refers to plural “gospels” and at one
point provides an indication of how many he has in mind when he describes these
gospels as “drawn up by His apostles and those who followed them.” Since such
language indicates (at least) two gospels written by apostles, and (at least)
two written by apostolic companions, it is most naturally understood as
reference to our four canonical gospels.
The fact that he actually cites from the Synoptics and John shows that
he had a fourfold gospel in mind.
Papias (c.125): Papias tells us that the early church had
received the gospels of Mark and Matthew and valued because of their apostolic
status. In fact, Papias even affirms
that Mark received his information from Peter himself—a very ancient tradition
of the church. Although Papias writes
c.125, he actually refers to an earlier time (c.90) when he received this
information from “the Elder” (who is no doubt John the Elder, one of Jesus’
disciples). Papias also knew 1 Peter, 1 John, Revelation, and some Pauline
epistles.
Barnabas (c.130). The Epistle of Barnabas (4.14) explicitly
cites Matt 22:14: “Many are called but few are chosen.” Barnabas clearly regards Matthew as Scripture
because he introduces his citation with “It is written” (the same language he
uses when citing OT books).
1 Clement (c.95). 1 Clement charges the church to “Take up the
epistle of that blessed apostle, Paul… To be sure, he sent you a letter in the
Spirit concerning himself and Cephas and Apollos.” Scholars agree that Clement is referring here
to the letter of 1 Corinthians which he said Paul wrote “in the Spirit,” no
doubt showing the high authority he gave to the book. 1 Clement also makes likely allusions to
other epistles of Paul including Romans, Galatians, Philippians, Ephesians; and
also Hebrews.
2 Pet 3:16 (c.65). One of the earliest examples comes from the
well-known passage in 2 Pet 3:16 where Paul’s letters are regarded as on par
with “the other Scriptures” of the Old Testament. Most notably, this passage does not refer to
just one letter of Paul, but to a collection of Paul’s letters (how many is
unclear) that had already begun to circulate throughout the churches—so much so
that the author could refer to “all his [Paul’s] letters” and expect that his
audience would understand that to which he was referring.
The church
today has warrant for accepting the 27-book New Testament canon as a fait accompli, because the God-breathed
Scriptures – a literal “act of God” – were recognized as Apostolic, regarded as Scripture from the first, were
dutifully collected, meticulously copied, and patiently handed on, from the
hands of the Apostles, to their disciples, and so on, and so on…
That’s an “apostolic
succession” we can count on.
Hi John,
ReplyDeleteI, too, have been very interested to read Dr. Kruger's expositions. I was particularly heartened to see how gently yet effectively he dismissed Devin Rose.
I think that when the Romanists are shown their errors in this manner it has to have a good effect.
I hope you and Beth are well.
Peace.
Hi Constantine :-)
ReplyDeleteBeth is doing very well. She still gets very tired, very quickly. And she has little aches and pains. And her hair is not growing back as quickly as she would like. But by God's will, she has been "disease-free" for months, and the longer she goes like this, the more the odds increase that she will stay this way. After two years of this, the plan is, they'll say "she is cured".