No 19

(The Canon of Scripture)

The word “canon” is derived from the Greek “kanon” (rule) and, in general terms means the rule by which a thing is judged; a standard. When the word canon is applied to Scripture, more emphasis is placed on authenticity. In the early church, writings such as we see in the Bible today were, for the most part, letters between persons (The Epistles) or an historical account of events (The Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles). The authors of these writings had no idea that their written communications would be passed down through the centuries and that one day, we would rely on them as God’s Word.

A question that begs to be asked is: “Which writings or letters do we keep and which do we reject? In the early centuries of the church, Christians were sometimes put to death for possessing copies of Scripture (in those days books were in individual scrolls, not bound together in one binding as today). Because of this persecution, the question soon came up, “What books are worth dying for?” Some books may have contained sayings of Jesus, but were they inspired as stated in 2 Timothy 3:16? For the Old Testament, there was little controversy because the Jews were very meticulous in keeping the standard or canon of their writings over the centuries in line with God’s purposes for His people.

However, the early church had some very specific criteria in order for books to be considered as part of the New Testament. These included: 1) Was the book or scroll written by someone who was an eyewitness of Jesus Christ? 2) Did the book pass the “truth test”? (I.e. did it concur with other, already agreed upon Scripture?). The Bible that we have in our hands today didn’t just fall from the sky; as a matter of fact, just its very existence proves to me that there is a Holy Creator God who wants an intimate relationship with His creation. Praise the Lord for the Bible!