Minister’s Forum: Bible Basics for Religious Liberals

Sunday September 14, 2008

Tabiblia—Greek for the book

Athanasius (4th century church father) first used the word ‘canon’ to refer to the Bible; comes from Greek for reed, papyrus, rod which implies that it is a standard, measure, norm

What makes a book authoritative?

Inspiration

Quality

Antiquity

Orthodoxy

Your ideas

• Easiest way to approach a general orientation to the Bible is to look at the way the canon developed—historically, politically, and theologically
• the various books of the Bible were written over a 1000 year period
• the process of canonization took a similar amount of time
• they began with a profusion of writings, many originating in oral traditions
• then came times of purposeful gathering together; as when the nation of Israel gathered a library that would reflect the identity of the nation, and then reconstructed it after the Exile
• then came times of weeding out
• finally came the time of standardization

Why a Bible or canon at all—what does it accomplish for a community of faith?

• historical experience of a people
• inspired word of God
• norms of a community

Why do the Jews, Catholics and Protestants have 3 different canons?

Jewish version

• arranged in order of canonization which reflected their opinion of the order of importance—the Torah is core, all else is commentary
• original intention was to have a fluid, open-ended scripture
• two factors made a closed canon necessary: persecution from without and dissension from within both force the sharpening and narrowing of identity

The Hebrew canon consists of:

• Torah (“The Law”) was canonical before 400 BCE (constitution of 2nd commonwealth 535-450 BCE). Torah consists of 5 books created by oral tradition. In the oral tradition, that which is relevant is what is preserved as stories that speak to people, affirm identity, give guidance, comfort) Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy
• Books of the Prophets are really historical and prophetic books. May have been canonized due to schism with Samaritans. to legitimize the claim that the history of the winners was the history of God’s people? Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings—considered historical and theological commentary on the Torah
• Wisdom/Writings—third stage not attempted until after the fall of the
• 2nd Temple in 70 CE. Afterwards there were lots of books floating around. At the Council of Jamni in 90 CE the rabbis discussed what to include in this category.
  • is it suitable for reading in the synagogue?
  • does it defile the hands or is it of God?
  • is it associated with a specific festal day or practice (Esther, Job, Psalms)
  • excluded anything written after 200 BCE
  • the final order was not fixed until invention of printing press
  • After the canon was closed focus was on correct and accurate transmission

Christian Scriptures

• first 2 centuries of Christianity were very loose in terms of liturgy and theology, accepted Hebrew scriptures as inspired
• churches organized along lines of synagogues so the assumption was that if it was read in church it was authoritative
• move to close canon stimulated by three factors: the death of second generation (those who had heard the apostles in person), persecution by the Roman Empire, and internal dissension
• the 4 Gospels were canonized first. There were many others that were excluded either as too fantastic, inaccurate, or for more political reasons
• Pauline epistles (letters) next. Modern scholars know that many of those letters were not actually written by Paul, just as many items included in the Hebrew scriptures and attributed to Solomon or David were not written by them

Other writings last

A millennium later, at the Protestant Reformation, Luther rejected the doctrine of purgatory as describe in II Maccabees. This is how the Protestant and Catholic bible became different. Luther removed the books that didn’t agree with the Protestant theology; they became deuterocanonical.

Look at a good study Bible