How the Early Church Defined the New Testament Canon: Criteria Used

This essay delves into the historical development of the New Testament canon, focusing on the criteria employed by the early church in its formation. It begins by outlining the context of early Christianity, including the apostolic and post-apostolic periods, and the role of key figures like the apostles and early bishops. The essay examines the challenges faced in establishing the canon, such as the emergence of heretical movements like Marcionism and Gnosticism, which prompted the church to define authoritative texts. It explores the criteria used, including apostolic origin, the consistency of teachings, and the acceptance by early Christian communities. The essay also touches upon the influence of ecumenical councils and the eventual consensus on the 27 books of the New Testament. It highlights the importance of oral traditions, the writings of the Apostolic Fathers, and the evolution of the canon over several centuries, culminating in the establishment of the New Testament as a foundational text for Christianity. The essay also discusses the acceptance of the books and the role of different denominations.

BY WHAT CRITERIA DID
THE EARLY CHURCH FIX
THE NEW TESTAMENT
CANON?

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Essay : By what criteria did the early church fix the New Testament canon..................................1
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

Essay : By what criteria did the early church fix the New Testament canon
The history of church includes the period in which the Christian religion was formed with
the birth of Jesus and his twelve apostles. Christianity is the religion that is based on revelation
of Jesus Christ. In various Christian denomination ' The church ' is referred as institution
founded by Jesus for the salvation of human kind (White, 2017). Christianity began in 1st
century Jewish sect and it quickly spread throughout the Roman Empire and to various counties
such as Armenia , India, china, Iran etc. Christianity later on become the state religion of Roman
empire.
Early Christianity refers to the period when religion spread in the world and its beginning
in the first century as Jewish sect. It was divided into two distinct phases one was Apostolic
period and another one was post apostolic period. Apostolic period is that period when the first
apostles were alive and organising the church and the post apostolic period was the period in
which the early episcopal structure developed.
The Jesus apostles were the people that were commanded by Jesus to spread the teaching
provided to them to the whole world and create positivity among everyone. There are many
churches formed due to various disputed between the religion (Early Christian Worship, 2015).
The two largest churches are the Roman catholic church and the eastern Orthodox church. Also,
there are other churches that includes oriental orthodox, Lutheranism etc.
The apostolic period includes the period between the day of Pentecost and death of
apostle John and it includes about 70 years from period 30 AD to about 100 AD. This period
covers the years following Jesus until the death of twelve apostles. The principles source of
information for this earliest period was the act of apostles. The second period
The post – apostolic Period is the period after the death of apostles when bishops
emerged as perceiver of urban Christians population. They continued during the time of
Persecutions until the legalization of Christian worship during the period of Constantine the
great.
The biblical canon are the books Christians prefers as divinely inspired and it constitutes
a Christians Bible. The books that represent the Christian biblical canon includes both the old
and new testament (How the New Testament Canon was Formed, 2018). The early church use
the old testament according to the canon of the Septuagint. The apostles did not leave the defined
set of scriptures instead they adopted new Testament which were developed over years. The
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writings attributed to the apostles spread among the earliest Christians community. The pauline
epistles were circulating were spread in the collected form by the en d of first century. In the
early second Century, Justin martyr mentions the ' memories of Apostles which are knows as
gospels. There were fours gospels canon at the time of Irenaeus. By the early third century,
Origen was using 27 books as in the modern new testament.
In the early letter of Athanasius, bishop Alexandria, gave a list of books that would
become the new testament canon and it used the word “canonized”. After that, in 393 AD the
African synod hippo approved the new testament along with Septuagint books. The council of
Carthage repeated the decision for Septuagint books this council were under the authority of st.
Augustine. It regarded that the canon were already closed. From the fourth century, There
existed unanimity in the west regarding the new testament canon. And By fifth century , book of
revelation was accepted with few exceptions.
When the church began there were no new testament books. Only old testament were
used as scriptures. The books were written to deal with various problems in the church immoral
behaviour, bad theology etc. there were some books that were read exclusively in their target
area such as II Peter etc (The Formation and Significance of the Christian Biblical Canon ,
2016). These books were rejected from the canon due to doubt about their apostolic origin.
The new testament books were written in the first century. The new testament is a
collection of 27 documents from at least ten writers. Marcion lived in the first half of the second
century and was excommunicates from the church at Rome by the bishop in 144. The main
reason was that it rejected the old testament. Marcion collected a body of writings that rivalled
the old testament. Marcion collection included ten letters of Paul and one gospel.
The early Christians in the first century believed that Jehovah was the only true god, the
god of Israel and considered Jesus to be Messiah (Christ) prophesied in the old testament.
Early Christianity absorbed many of the shared religious, culture and intellectual tradition of
Greco- Roman world. The traditional history of Western culture, the emergence of Christianity
in Roman Empire is known as “triumph of Christianity”. In Greco – Roman culture people
claimed ethnic identity from ancestors. According to Paul, faith in Christ was all needed for
salvation. Paul was the founder of many communities and claimed that Jesus told in its vision to
be their apostle to the gentiles.
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There were several ecumenical councils were convened. These councils were mostly
concerned with Christological disputed. There were to councils one was Nicaea which
condemned Arian teaching as heresy and produced a creed. Another was council of Ephesus that
condemned Nestorianism and affirmed the blessed marry to be Theotokos. The most significant
council was of Chalcedon that affirmed that Christ have two natures one is fully god and another
is fully Man. Moreover, not all denomination accepted all the council for example, Nestorianism
and Assyrian church of the east split over councils of Ephesus. Oriental orthodox split over the
council of Chalcedon.
The earliest list of new testament books of which have definite knowledge was drawn at
Rome by heretic Marcion about 140. Marcion differentiated between the inferior creator – god of
old testament from the god and father revealed in Christ. Marcion canon consisted of two parts
one wqs an expurgated edition of the third gospel, which was the least Jewish of the gospels and
another part included ten of the pauline epistles.
The sources of the belief of apostolic community include the gospels and new testament
epistles. Christianity is the period of late antiquity begin with the Ascension of Constantine to the
Emperor ship of Rome in the early fourth century and continued till the advent of middle ages
(Oakes and Oakes, 2018).
By the fifth century, the ecclesiastical evolved a hierarchy “Pentarchy” or system of five
sees. The five pentarchs consists of Rome I.e. the pope, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem and
Constantine.
The new Testament canon before 140 includes awareness within the new testament itself
and the apostolic fathers. In the awareness with the new testament itself consist of apostle,
witness and traditions. The concept of apostle is defined as idea of authorization by the
transmission of definite powers. The apostles are Christ representatives. They were regarded as
the transmitters of revelation. The apostles were the witnesses of salvation revealed in Christ.
The apostles were the eyewitness and they bear the testimony for the forum of Church
and the entire world. This testimony is both oral and written. In apostolic times equal importance
is given to oral and written proclamation. The new testament writings were partially the remains
and fixation of previous oral traditions. Paul receives and transmit the traditions.
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The Apostolic fathers were more concerned with practical problems than the theological
reflections. It contains no formulated doctrine of scripture and there are various suggestions
provided for its development. Clement of Rome emphasise the importance of apostolic authority.
Ignatius of Antioch stated that around 115 Ignatius declared that the teaching of the apostles
were known through their writings. For the Ignatius the issue is the authority of revelation and
not its form whether oral or written. Polycarp sees an integral unity between old testament and
apostles. The new testament canon between 140 and 220 is the period that witness the rise of
several strong heretical movements such as marcionism, Gnosticism, Monatanism etc. In the
year 140 the Roman church received a visit from Marcion, it provided the teaching to Elder of
Rome but they found it unacceptable.
Marcion rejected the Old testament entirely and regarded the god that there is an inferior
being. Jesus had come to liberate mankind from the authority of God of old testament (Moxnes,
2015). Paul and Luke were the only people that favour Marcion. So, Marcion set up a canon that
consist of definite group of books which it regarded as fully authoritative and replaced the other
books. The canon which Marcion set consist of ten of the pauline Epistles and Luke's Gospels.
Marcion views were dangerous and widespread. The compilation of canon was a challenge with
an incentive for the Rome church.
The origin of gnosticism was not certain. This movement came in the middle of the
second century. It presented an idea on esoteric gnosis (knowledge). It raised in more accurate
form the questions of traditions and authority that engaged the Apostolic fathers. After that,
Montanism was the movement that started in ca. 156 in Phrygia Asia minor (Leith, 2017).
Montanus believed that Christ's promise of the Holy spirit has been fulfilled. The period of 312
to 590 is the period of Christian empire in which the Constantine declare Christianity as the
official religion of Roman empire and Christianity become a faith for the masses and start of
monasticism.
At the beginning of fourth century, Christians made up approximately 15 % of the
population of the empire that divided into cities and eastern part of the Roman state. The new
religion also spread to Armenia, Arabia, Persia and India. The Roman political power saw
Christianity as thereat to their authority. This new religion Claimed a sphere of freedom of
conscience (Haskins, 2017). In the fourth century, the church also had to face serious crisis that
is Arianism. Arius, a priest from Alexandra, Egypt, held heterodox opinions that denied the
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divinity of the son and holy spirit. This crisis were overcome with the emergence to the first two
Ecumenical councils. The first was the council of Nicaea and the other council of
Constantinople.
In the fifth century, two Christological heresies had the positive effect of obliging the
church to consider thoroughly the doctrine of Incarnation and to formulate it with greater
precision. The first heresies was Nestorianism, it claimed the existence of two persons in Christ
that have two natures (Hall, 2018). This was convicted at Council of Ephesus, that reaffirmed
the oneness of person of Christ. The Other heresy was Monophysitism it held that only one
nature existed in Christ which is the divide one.
Orthodox Jews often reject the new testament because the Hebrew scriptures repeatedly
declared themselves to be eternal and that nothing could be more added. The old testament
Prophets also recognize incompleteness in his revelation.
The Church in the early middle age covers the time from the last western emperor in 476
and his replacement with a barbarian king, Odoacer to the coronation of Charlemagne as
“Emperors of the Romans”. In the east, Roman Imperial rule continued through the period
which was known as Byzantine empire (Brown, 2015). Also, in the west, Imperial political
control gradually declines. In the east, the church maintained its structure and character and
evolved slowly and in the west the Bishops of Rome (i.e. the popes) were forced to adopt more
quickly and flexibly the changing circumstances.
In the first century the Jewish people begin to worship in the temple and for them Jesus
was their messiah. In the 2nd century the Jewish Christians were gone and Christianity was
multinational and most Christians were gentile (Bock and Simpson, 2017). Worship gradually
become more formal stereotyped after the death of Paul. In the 3rd and 4th century impressive
church building appeared in the principles cities of empire.
The Christianity has evolved over the years and there are various developments in the
church new churches were build and new testament canons were formed and the old were
modified and the new testament canon contains 27 books.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Bock, D.L. and Simpson, B.I., 2017. Jesus according to Scripture: restoring the portrait from
the Gospels. Baker Academic.
Brown, R.E., 2015. An introduction to the New Testament. Yale University Press.
Hall, J., 2018. Dictionary of subjects and symbols in art. Routledge.
Haskins, C.H., 2017. The rise of universities. Routledge.
Leith, J.H., 2017. Christian Doctrine from the Bible to the Present. Routledge.
Moxnes, H., 2015. Does the History of the Canon Matter? Contextualizing the Debate over the
Authority of the New Testament Canon. Biblical Theology Bulletin. 45(2). pp.108-115.
Oakes, P. and Oakes, J. eds., 2018. 20. Early Christianity.
White, A., 2017. A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom: Volume 1,
From Creation to the Victory of Scientific and Literary Methods. Routledge.
ONLINE
Early Christian Worship. 2015. [Online]. Available through
:<http://oxfordre.com/religion/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199340378.001.0001/
acrefore-9780199340378-e-2>
How the New Testament Canon was Formed. 2018. [Online]. Available through
:<https://www.churchhistory101.com/new-testament-canon.php>
The Formation and Significance of the Christian Biblical Canon . 2016. [Online]. Available
through :<https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/the-formation-and-significance-of-the-
christian-biblical-canon-9780567378903/>
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