The Christian Canon

[vulcanlogician]

I was watching a Christian apologist on YouTube claiming that the Council of Nicea had nothing to do with the Christian canon. A brief jaunt through google seems to have confirmed this. I guess I was misinformed.

So I looked into the matter.

This article says that it formed organically by an "ancient and widespread consensus"... without any politics or officiation. The article's author has an obvious bias, so I'd like to know: Is it accurate at all? Or is it just more bullshit apologetics? Can anyone give an impartial summary of how the canon formed or provide an unbiased link explaining how it did/might have formed organically, through officiation, or otherwise?

What about all the apocrypha out there? Who decided all that stuff was out? It seems official decisions were made somewhere along the line. Where?

[Foxaèr]

[RoadRunner79]

I was watching a Christian apologist on YouTube claiming that the Council of Nicea had nothing to do with the Christian canon. A brief jaunt through google seems to have confirmed this. I guess I was misinformed.

So I looked into the matter.

This article says that it formed organically by an "ancient and widespread consensus"... without any politics or officiation. The article's author has an obvious bias, so I'd like to know: Is it accurate at all? Or is it just more bullshit apologetics? Can anyone give an impartial summary of how the canon formed or provide an unbiased link explaining how it did/might have formed organically, through officiation, or otherwise?

What about all the apocrypha out there? Who decided all that stuff was out? It seems official decisions were made somewhere along the line. Where?

He cited Ehrman in the article. Why do you think that there is obvious bias (I assume that you mean eneough to make it untrustworthy)?

If as you correctly stated, it was not formed at Nicea or any other council, or official proclamation. Then wouldn’t the a natural adoption of the text by the people and Churches be left?

---

This matches my understanding of what occurred. Kruger has worked a lot on this topic, and is a good resource.

[vulcanlogician]

He cited Ehrman in the article. Why do you think that there is obvious bias (I assume that you mean eneough to make it untrustworthy)?

If as you correctly stated, it was not formed at Nicea or any other council, or official proclamation. Then wouldn’t the a natural adoption of the text by the people and Churches be left?

I didn't mean to imply it was untrustworthy, just that there was a bias. Biased assertions can nonetheless be true.

I'm just curious if there is another side to the story. Also, the article doesn't address my question about apocrypha. Apocryphal texts were around, so who (if anyone) decided that those texts were non-canonical?

Critical Thinking: Seven Steps
1) What am I being asked to believe or accept?
2) What evidence is available to support the claim?
3) What alternative ways are there to interpret the evidence?
4) Rate the evidence/alternatives on 0-10 scale based on validity/strength
5) What assumptions or biases came up when doing the above steps?
6) What additional evidence would help us evaluate the alternatives?
7) What conclusions are most reasonable or likely?

https://www.uncw.edu/jet/articles/Vol13_2/Kraus.html

I'm on step three

--I did throw in the line about "bullshit apologetics" which might have inferred I found the article untrustworthy. You can thank gotquestions.org for my being jaded in that respect.

[robvalue]

I'm not too clued up on who exactly made the decisions, but clearly some group of people did, or various groups over time.

What I find bizarre/amusing is this: where else do we see the word "canon", except in works of fiction? Some people just decided that certain recorded events happened, and some didn't, based on what? Usefulness for their agendas I guess, or just popularity. Clearly it's not accurate reporting or internal consistency that are the criteria. Normally in historical study, no sources need to be omitted, they either stand up to scrutiny or they don't.

[GUBU]

I was watching a Christian apologist on YouTube claiming that the Council of Nicea had nothing to do with the Christian canon. A brief jaunt through google seems to have confirmed this. I guess I was misinformed.

So I looked into the matter.

This article says that it formed organically by an "ancient and widespread consensus"... without any politics or officiation. The article's author has an obvious bias, so I'd like to know: Is it accurate at all? Or is it just more bullshit apologetics? Can anyone give an impartial summary of how the canon formed or provide an unbiased link explaining how it did/might have formed organically, through officiation, or otherwise?

What about all the apocrypha out there? Who decided all that stuff was out? It seems official decisions were made somewhere along the line. Where?

Ancient and widespread consensus my arse. Even a quick scan through the relevant wikipedia article shows how drawn out and political the process actually was.

[Amarok]

The bible not political 

Yeah right 

And Ehrman's is a proven liar so why would people think him credible

[brewer]

That might be a Christian Sony.

[Angrboda]

Carrier has a decent article on the history of canon formation, but I don't recall that it goes into much detail about the apocrypha.

The Formation of the New Testament Canon

Contrary to common belief, there was never a one-time, truly universal decision as to which books should be included in the Bible. It took over a century of the proliferation of numerous writings before anyone even bothered to start picking and choosing, and then it was largely a cumulative, individual and happenstance event, guided by chance and prejudice more than objective and scholarly research, until priests and academics began pronouncing what was authoritative and holy, and even they were not unanimous. Every church had its favored books, and since there was nothing like a clearly-defined orthodoxy until the 4th century, there were in fact many simultaneous literary traditions. The illusion that it was otherwise is created by the fact that the church that came out on top simply preserved texts in its favor and destroyed or let vanish opposing documents. Hence what we call "orthodoxy" is simply "the church that won."

[SteveII]

It has always been my understanding that the process of official recognition (canonization) was affirming already held beliefs--not actually changing anything. Of course there were a few books on the bubble.

Writings attributed to the Apostles circulated among the earliest Christian communities. The Pauline epistles were circulating, perhaps in collected forms, by the end of the 1st century AD.[a] Justin Martyr, in the mid 2nd century, mentions "memoirs of the apostles" as being read on "the day called that of the sun" (Sunday) alongside the "writings of the prophets."[5] A defined set of four gospels (the Tetramorph) was asserted by Irenaeus, c. 180, who refers to it directly.[6][7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Developmen...ollections