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See Part 1 and Part 2.

Up to this point in the series, we have examined how the canonicity of the New Testament writings are proven by garnering a proper understanding of God’s absolute sovereignty over created reality, in supplementation to apprehending the interconnectedness between the New Testament canon[1] and the redemptive-historical inauguration of the New Covenant in Jesus Christ’s blood (Luke 22:20; 1 Cor. 11:25; Heb. 8:6-13; 9:15). In canvassing the first premise embedded within this series’ overarching thesis, we have already begun to demonstrate how the assumption that Christians did not have a concept of the New Testament canon until the fourth century is patently false. As such, it is appropriate to transition into an analysis of the second premise that we will seek to substantiate from the central thesis undergirding this series:

As decreed from eternity past, the canonicity of the New Testament writings was… immediately recognized by the apostles and earliest Christians during its first-century development (1 Thess. 2:13; 1 Tim. 5:18; 2 Pet. 3:16).

Following the pattern of what was argued in the preceding article, the second premise of this series’ thesis presupposes the absolute sovereignty of God, and by extension, the reality of God’s eternal decree (Ps. 115:3; Dan. 2:21-22; Eph. 1:3-6; 1 Pet. 1:1-9). The reason for continually emphasizing this specific presupposition stems from our awareness that one’s doctrine of God lies at the center of all biblical-theological inquiry,[2] and from our efforts to anticipate a key challenge to the validity of what is being argued in this particular premise:

If the apostles and earliest Christians truly had a concept of the New Testament canon prior to the fourth century, then why was there not uniformity of agreement shared by the church as to which writings were canonical—and which writings were not canonical—prior to that time?[3]

In contemporary New Testament scholarship, this is a challenge that has been raised by a plethora of biblical scholars throughout the past two centuries, and it would be an understatement to say that much can be presented in response to this line of reasoning. Nevertheless, in our efforts to defend the second premise contained in this series’ overarching thesis, we will be content with utilizing the remainder of this article to offer three points of rebuttal to the aforementioned assertion.

1. In light of our expressed convictions about the absolute sovereignty of God over the entirety of creation, we must approach the stated objection by distinguishing between the inspired writings that were canonical, the inspired writings that were not canonical, and the non-inspired writings that were not canonical. As was alluded to in the previous article, God was not only sovereign over the inspiration of Scripture[4] and the preservation of Scripture,[5] but He was also sovereign over what writings were canonical.[6] All writings that comprise the New Testament canon were inspired by God, but not all writings that were inspired by God during the first century were canonical.[7] For example, we know that the apostle Paul wrote at least one non-canonical letter to the church in Corinth that—given his authoritative role as an apostle—was inspired by God (1 Cor. 5:9).[8] Thus, there was likely several inspired writings penned throughout the first century that were not canonical.[9] Based on these careful distinctions, we necessarily come to the following conclusions: First, from eternity past, God chose which 27 writings from the first century would constitute the New Testament canon. In doing so, God sovereignly preserved those writings for every generation of church history to benefit from until the return of Christ. Secondly, from eternity past, God chose which inspired writings would accomplish a specific purpose during the first century or later. However, due to those inspired writings not being canonical writings (and likely due to other reasons known only to God), the Lord did not preserve their existence for future generations of church history to review. Thirdly, from eternity past, it was determined by God that there would be several non-inspired writings that were penned from a variety of sources. Regardless of if these writings were of some edification for the early church or not, they were not deemed canonical by God from before the foundation of the world. Therefore, given their lack of self-authentication and given the outworking of God’s providence in redemptive history, these non-inspired writings did not make it into the New Testament canon.
2. Despite the absence of total uniformity of agreement shared by the early church as to which writings belonged in the New Testament canon and which writings did not, this observation does not necessarily corroborate the suggestion that the church did not have a concept of a New Testament canon until the fourth century. In fact, if the expectations are that a “concept” of the New Testament canon is contingent upon there being total, absolute, or complete uniformity of agreement on what writings belong therein, then there has never been a New Testament canon to the present day.[10] Said differently, the standards that are demanded in this popular challenge have never been attained throughout church history, and are not met by the very individuals who are raising this issue in the first place. When evaluated in and of itself, this inconsistency seriously undermines the legitimacy of the objection at hand.
3. Finally, and of most significance to validating the second premise of this series’ thesis, it is evident from the New Testament itself that first century Christians regarded the writings of the apostles as equally authoritative for the church as the Old Testament canon.[11] For the sake of brevity, we will consider just three New Testament citations that confirm this assertion: 1 Thessalonians 2:13; 1 Timothy 5:18; 2 Peter 3:16. In 1 Thessalonians 2:13, Paul identifies his own writing as “the word of God.” Could there ever be a higher view of one’s own authority than to equate one’s written instruction with the verbal instruction of God Himself? Moreover, in 1 Timothy 5:18, Paul cites Luke 10:7 alongside Deuteronomy 25:4 to explain the biblically based justification for providing ministers with monetary support for their labors. This multi-verse association demonstrates that Luke’s Gospel was already in circulation by the early 60’s AD, and that it was to be regarded by first century Christians as equally authoritative as the instruction contained in the Old Testament canon. Does the identification of Luke’s Gospel record as being of equal authority to the writings of Moses not bear a lucid witness to the pre-fourth century concept of a New Testament canon? Furthermore, in 2 Peter 3:16, Peter explicitly refers to the writings of the apostle Paul as “Scripture.” How else would first century Christians interpret this characterization other than being an apostolic affirmation that Paul (and presumably the other apostolic writers) was producing canonical documents during their historical context?

It has been argued by many contemporary scholars that the New Testament authors were unaware of their own authority and had no inclination that their writings would ever be regarded as “Scripture.”[12] While it is true that several of the New Testament writings were “occasional” by nature, and although the apostles likely did not know the full extent of how their writings would come to solidify the New Testament canon in the future, each of the three aforementioned contentions highlight why it is incorrect to claim that the apostles and/or earliest (first century) Christians did not have a concept of canon until the fourth century. In the upcoming article, we will seek to further supplement this conviction through select testimonies from the second, third and fourth centuries of church history.

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[1]           For a review of the definition of “canon” that will be employed throughout this series, see Footnote 4 in the first article.

[2]           For an extensive commentary as to how “the doctrine of God lies at the center of all biblical-theological inquiry,” see Footnote 1 in Article 2 of this series.

[3]           This is one of the central challenges raised against a pre-fourth century conception of the New Testament canon by the church, and it is prolifically interacted with in Michael J. Kruger’s Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), Pages 27-87.

[4]           A succinct, working definition of what is meant by “the inspiration of Scripture” is found at https://www.aomin.org/aoblog/textual-issues/inspiration-inerrancy-preservation/- “We must understand that the doctrine of inspiration speaks to the origination and character of the original writings themselves, their character and authority. Inerrancy speaks to the trustworthiness of the supernatural process of inspiration, both with reference to the individual texts (Malachi’s prophecy, 2 John) as well as the completed canon (matters of pan-canonical consistency, the great themes of Scripture interwoven throughout the Old and New Testaments).”Although finite human beings cannot fully comprehend the mystery of biblical inspiration, it is not difficult to see that God is the ultimate source of Scripture in light of (1) the explicit claims of Scripture that ascribe their origin to God and (2) the biblical teaching about God’s sovereignty over all things in reality.

[5]           B.B. Warfield helpfully defines “the preservation of Scripture” as “the original autograph of Scripture, produced by the immediate inspiration of God, [has been preserved] in a multitude of copies whose production is presided over by God’s singular care and providence [so that] the ordinary Bibles in the hands of the people… conveys divine truth to the reader with competent adequacy for all the needs of the Christian life.” “The Westminster Confession and the Original Autographs,” in Selected Shorter Writings of Benjamin B. Warfield, vol. 2, ed. John E. Meeter (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1973), pp. 588-594. As with the inspiration of Scripture, the biblical depiction of God’s absolute sovereignty and the promise of God preserving His Word leads to a natural affirmation of this reality by orthodox Christians. It’s important to note that although the original, God-breathed manuscripts have been lost, the collection of manuscript copies have preserved what was originally written with a remarkably high degree of accuracy. Recent estimations by New Testament textual critics believe that only 8% of the entire New Testament has been subject to alteration from what was originally written, and of that 8%, roughly 1% makes any major difference on the interpretation of Scripture. For additional research on the preservation of Scripture, see Timothy P. Jones, How We Got the Bible (Peabody, MA: Rose Publishing, 2017), Pages 103-122.

[6]           For a thorough explanation of the eternal relationship between God’s sovereignty and the New Testament canon, see Footnotes 6 and 7 in the second article of this series.

[7]           The following quote from Michael J. Kruger in Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books epitomizes how Christians should regard the relationship of the inspired writings that were concretized during the first century but were not preserved for inclusion in the New Testament canon- “We have good biblical grounds for affirming God’s intent in giving his Word to his church (Rom. 15:4; 2 Tim. 3:16-17) and God’s sovereign ability to accomplish it (Ps. 135:6; Dan. 4:35; Acts 17:25-28; Eph. 1:11; Heb. 1:3). If so, then this has implications for how we are to think of books that the apostles may have written that were not preserved—such as Paul’s other letter to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 5:9). No doubt such letters, if written in an apostle’s authoritative role, would have been inspired by the Holy Spirit. But since God did not providentially allow these books to be exposed to the corporate church (apparently they were known only to a limited group, and they were lost or forgotten), then we have no reason to think that they are relevant for our discussion about which books are canonical. Again, how can we recognize a book’s canonicity unless we actually have that book (Pages 95-96)?”

[8]           In building off the commentary provided in the preceding footnote, Kruger offers helpful insights on this complex issue in Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books. “Of course, there is still the complex question of what terminology is appropriate for these ‘lost’ apostolic books. What shall we call them? Although we certainly could use the term canon to refer to these books… that seems only to confuse matters. If God providentially intended some apostolic books to serve as permanent foundational books for the corporate church (e.g., John’s Gospel), and other apostolic books to serve a temporary, one-time purpose after which they were lost or forgotten (e.g., Paul’s other letter to the Corinthians), then our terminology ought to reflect such a distinction. If so, then it seems best to refer to those lost apostolic writings as ‘inspired books’ or perhaps even as ‘Scripture’” (Page 96).

[9]           Such writings described here, though inspired by God, should not be deemed canonical by the church for at least two reasons. (1) God did not decree to include those writings in the New Testament canon from before the foundation of the world; (2) God did not decree to providentially preserve those writings for the long-term edification of the universal church from before the foundation of the world. As succinctly communicated by Michael J. Kruger in Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books– “During this unique apostolic phase, canonicity was a subset of Scripture—all canonical books were Scripture, but not necessarily all scriptural books were canonical” (Page 96).

[10]         In The Question of Canon: Challenging the Status Quo in the New Testament Debate (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2013), Michael J. Kruger observes that “the modern day lectionary of the Syrian Orthodox Church still operates on the twenty-two book canon of the Peshitta” (Page 32). Kruger proceeds to cite Harry Y. Gamble, “Christianity: Scripture and Canon” in The Holy Book in Comparative Perspective, ed. Frederick M. Denny and Rodney L. Taylor (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1985), pp. 46-47 as further support for his conclusions drawn on this matter.

[11]         Kruger, Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books, Pages 204-210.

[12]         Consider just a few literary works that advocate for this perspective- William Wrede, The Origin of the New Testament, trans. James S. Hill (London and New York: Harper and Brothers, 1909), Page 10; Lee M. McDonald, The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission and Authority (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007), Pages 32-33, 248-249; Harry Y. Gamble, Books and Readers in the Early Church (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1995), Pages 102-103.