Need a quick and concise history of biblical canon

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dsmantz

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I did a forum search, and went 9 pages into 827 results to find nothing.

I’m aware that the canon was semi-formally formed in the 300’s, but I’m looking for how it formed over the years in the Church, the Reformation, and where we’re at today. Pretty pretty please?

Thanks guys!
 
Shane,

Quickest I could find:
  1. Melito, bishop of Sardis, an ancient city of Asia Minor (see Rev 3), c. 170 AD produced the first known Christian attempt at an Old Testament canon. His list maintains the Septuagint order of books but contains only the Old Testament protocanonicals minus the Book of Esther.
  2. The Council of Laodicea, c. 360, produced a list of books similar to today’s canon. This was one of the Church’s earliest decisions on a canon.
  3. Pope Damasus, 366-384, in his Decree, listed the books of today’s canon.
  4. The Council of Rome, 382, was the forum which prompted Pope Damasus’ Decree.
  5. Bishop Exuperius of Toulouse wrote to Pope Innocent I in 405 requesting a list of canonical books. Pope Innocent listed the present canon.
  6. The Council of Hippo, a local north Africa council of bishops created the list of the Old and New Testament books in 393 which is the same as the Roman Catholic list today.
  7. The Council of Carthage, a local north Africa council of bishops created the same list of canonical books in 397. This is the council which many Protestant and Evangelical Christians take as the authority for the New Testament canon of books. The Old Testament canon from the same council is identical to Roman Catholic canon today.
  8. Another Council of Carthage in 419 offered the same list of canonical books.
  9. The final (and first “infallible”) definition of canonical books for Roman Catholic Christians came from the Council of Trent in 1556 in the face of the errors of the Reformers who rejected seven Old Testament books from the canon of scripture to that time.
Hope this is what you were looking for and that it helps.
 
A more careful look at the Hippo and Carthage canons will reveal several differences from today’s canon – specifically, those canons omitted Lamentations.
 
dsmantz said:
I did a forum search, and went 9 pages into 827 results to find nothing.

I’m aware that the canon was semi-formally formed in the 300’s, but I’m looking for how it formed over the years in the Church, the Reformation, and where we’re at today. Pretty pretty please?

Thanks guys!
Click to expand...
The above is a nice summary of what was happening in Western Europe and North Africa (the Latinate/Latin speaking church), but not inclusive what was going on elsewhere in the Christian world. I don’t know if that’s relevant to your specific needs or not. Perhaps not, since you mention the Reformation–a Western phenomenon.
 
Dave_Noonan said:
The above is a nice summary of what was happening in Western Europe and North Africa (the Latinate/Latin speaking church), but not inclusive what was going on elsewhere in the Christian world. I don’t know if that’s relevant to your specific needs or not. Perhaps not, since you mention the Reformation–a Western phenomenon.
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It’d be nice to have some information dealing with the other Rites of the church other than Latin at the time. I’m aware other things were going on, but mainly I’m dealing with a dear good friend of mine. He and I went through quite a few theological courses together. He was booted out for a few unorthodox views, but we still kept contact. He and I have always enjoyed these theological discussions over lunch, but they usually deal with things of a more eternal nature 😉

Recently he was saying how he’s starting to find more and more credibility in Catholic apocryphal writings such as the Gospels of Judas and Thomas, the Acts of Peter, and many other writings that can lead one to error. I had discussed that while some of these extra-canonical writings are good for reading, such as 1 Clement to Rome, The Didache, and others, but the documents he was holding as truth were, in fact, loaded with BS.

We got caught up in the formation of Scripture, and how these writings weren’t hidden off somewhere because they were the truth and someone didn’t like them. Then I stumbled, because I’d spent too much time on other things instead of my study and understanding of Scripture and the life behind it.

So, I need some quick help. Doesn’t have to go into huge detail, but I do need to be able to base a well formed argument on the information given.
 
the reformation only resulted in new editions of the bible with books of Catholic canon taken out and some rewritten.The Catholic bible has remained the same.1st part of question would take to long to post.
 
valentino said:
the reformation only resulted in new editions of the bible with books of Catholic canon taken out and some rewritten.The Catholic bible has remained the same.1st part of question would take to long to post.
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No offense, but this post wasn’t helpful in the least.
 
dsmantz said:
It’d be nice to have some information dealing with the other Rites of the church other than Latin at the time. I’m aware other things were going on, but mainly I’m dealing with a dear good friend of mine. He and I went through quite a few theological courses together. He was booted out for a few unorthodox views, but we still kept contact. He and I have always enjoyed these theological discussions over lunch, but they usually deal with things of a more eternal nature 😉

Recently he was saying how he’s starting to find more and more credibility in Catholic apocryphal writings such as the Gospels of Judas and Thomas, the Acts of Peter, and many other writings that can lead one to error. I had discussed that while some of these extra-canonical writings are good for reading, such as 1 Clement to Rome, The Didache, and others, but the documents he was holding as truth were, in fact, loaded with BS.

We got caught up in the formation of Scripture, and how these writings weren’t hidden off somewhere because they were the truth and someone didn’t like them. Then I stumbled, because I’d spent too much time on other things instead of my study and understanding of Scripture and the life behind it.

So, I need some quick help. Doesn’t have to go into huge detail, but I do need to be able to base a well formed argument on the information given.
Click to expand...
Well, the quick answer is that the early Councils, especially in the fourth century, spent a great deal of time considering the status of literally hundreds of gospels, apocalypses, acts and letters, and determined that a very small number of them (27) were of apostolic authority and so could be proclaimed in the liturgy (the definition of canon), a somewhat larger number were not apostolic but were consistent with the deposit of faith and so beneficial for reading and studying, and another large number were actually contrary to the faith, in whole or in part, and therefore should not be read by the faithful.

Protestants use the term “apocrypha” for all the non-canonical texts, including those we accept which they reject. It comes from the Greek word for “hidden,” and from the time of the Puritans the term came to have a derogatory meaning (in common use today apocryphal is generally synonymous with “legendary”), so Catholic scholars tend to avoid its use.
 
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