Stage 6: The Church closed the book

When the Church made the New Testament canon official in A.D. 397, it simultaneously closed the book on future newly written additions to the Christian Bible, locking it up and throwing away the key. (The Catholic Church, however, revisited canonization in the 16^th century concerning some Old Testament-era Jewish writings, but these were a special case, which I explain in the “To Be or Not to Be: The Apocrypha” section that follows.) The reason for the permanent closure was twofold: 

Jesus was the final piece of the puzzle. Christians believe that Jesus Christ, in fulfilling the scriptures of the Old Testament, was the full revelation from God. Hebrews 1:1-2 says 

God, having in the past spoken to the fathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, has at the end of these days spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds. 

Therefore, God made it clear that the Bible as you and I know it today is sufficient information (until Jesus returns to the earth again; see Chapter 9) to know who he is and what makes him tick. 

No future book could meet the criteria for canonization. The essential component of each New Testament book was its close ties to the apostles (see the section, “Stage 5: Early Church recognized New Testament writings as scripture,” earlier in this chapter). Consequently, after the apostles died, by definition no further writing could be considered part of the New Testament canon. Interestingly, the Apostle John (the last surviving apostle) tacks on a specific warning at the end of Revelation to not add to the book or remove anything from it (Revelation 22:18-19). Given the fact that his book was the last apostle writing, his warning seems a particularly appropriate way to close out the entire New Testament canon, not just his book. 

To Be or Not to Be: The Apocrypha

One area of disagreement among Christians concerning the Bible is related to the apocryphal (or deuteron-canonical) books, a set of 15 Jewish writings that were written between 200 B.C. and A.D. 70, after the other books of the Old Testament were canonized (which officially happened in the centuries before 300 B.C.). Collectively, these books are sometimes called the Apocrypha, a term that comes from the Greek word for “hidden” (or, as Protestants stress, “questionable”). 

The debate over the Apocrypha has its origins in the centuries immediately preceding the birth of Jesus. The Jews living in Palestine, the geographical and historical centre of the Christian faith, recognized the books of the Hebrew Bible in Table 6-1 (which you find earlier in this chapter). However, the Jews living in the Greek-dominated areas around Alexandria tended to be more open to recognizing these additional apocryphal books as scripture. 

As Greece dominated the Mediterranean region in the centuries before Christ’s birth, Greek emerged as the popular spoken and written language of the entire area. Consequently, the Greek-speaking Jews of Alexandria saw the need for translating the Hebrew scriptures from the original Hebrew into Greek. This translation became known as the Septuagint. Given the fact that the Jews in Alexandria recognized other writings as scripture in addition to the already set canon, the translators naturally included the apocryphal works along with the core set of scriptures. 

However, the early New Testament Church was centred in Jerusalem and Palestine (where Jews acknowledged as scripture only the books of the Hebrew Bible). As a result, the first-century Christians knew of the Apocrypha but didn’t regard it as scripture. However, after later Christians used the Septuagint (because of its Greek language) as the key document when they translated the Old Testament into Latin, the apocryphal books took on increased authority within parts of the Christian Church. 

More than 1,300 years later, in the 16^th century of the Catholic Church canonized 11 of these apocryphal books at the Council of Trent and today considers them part of the Old Testament. In contrast, the Protestant Church has always rejected these books as scripture. The Orthodox Church stands in the middle, treating the apocryphal writings as scripture but not with the same weight as the other Old Testament and New Testament writings. 

I show you reasons for these differing claims in the sections that follow. 

Reasons for including the Apocrypha

Catholics and others who consider the apocryphal books as scripture make the following points in defence of these books: 

The New Testament refers to the apocryphal books. Specifically, Hebrews 11:35 alludes to the Book of 2 Maccabees, and Jude 14 references the Book of Enoch. 

Several early Christian leaders quoted the Apocrypha, and a few, most importantly Augustine, explicitly claimed it to be authoritative.

Many of the early Greek translations of the Old Testament contained the apocryphal books.