Comments on: Excerpts from Part 2 of John Hobbins’ Thoughts on the Canon

By: Barlow

Barlow — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 22:46:29 +0000

gracias por la informaci?n en este sitio, lo que realmente me ayud?. al menos conseguir una mejor comprensi?n sobre este tema. de entrada sensible y de aumentar la informaci?n. mantener el peligroso comentario de este blog para mantener el est?ndar de arriba. gracias.

By: MSH

MSH — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 06:26:19 +0000

@Jonnathan Molina: agreed; our inability (i.e., our lack of omniscience) to know to full exactitude if we have achieved the Urtext and have all the issues of canonicity nailed down doesn’t impede the message of the gospel.

By: The Canon of the OT « kilbabo

The Canon of the OT « kilbabo — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 15:37:34 +0000

[...] Heiser’s interactions with John Hobbins ‘thoughts about canon’ posts here, here and here. I have found this discussion very interesting and helpful. The topic of the canon, [...]

By: Jonnathan Molina

Jonnathan Molina — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 05:39:49 +0000

blop2008 said: My faith is in Christ which I know personally and he knows me personally since 2003. Since my faith is in him (the Living Logos) and not in canonicity and texutal copies of the scriptures, my faith isn’t shaken.

I came to this conclusion also, when I started to become aware of this whole dialogue and came out of my “fundamentalist” shell. I clearly remember the Lord reminding me during a particularly difficult moment that Abraham is called the father of the faith and he had no Bible (pre Moses, pre everything textual that we know of) and I’d have to say that this is the crux of the matter: Faith is in the Personhood of God and His Son, and our faith is nourished and amplified by His Word/words. But faith can exist independent of the text; one can argue that “faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God” in Abraham’s case was fulfilled in the literal coming to him of The Word of God (theophany wise)…either case (pre Bible or post) faith can be activated by the Providence of God and is all that is needed to be called “righteous” in His sight.

By: MSH

MSH — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 07:08:21 +0000

@blop2008: One thing for sure is that God doesn’t mind giving us the kind of clarity we’d want on matters like canonicity. That’s true of a lot of other things (note the difficulties and ambiguities on things like eschatology, where the soul comes from, etc.). Protestants are not as comfortable with the logical answer a Catholic would give here: “this is why a teaching magisterium and papal/council authority makes sense” – those bodies/communities make such decisions for the masses, and that is divinely approved. The CHURCH becomes the vehicle for the Spirit to make such decisions. Protestants have this in a smaller way, when the work of the Spirit in providence is appealed to as the means by which the canon was decided upon. The mistake is thinking that means people (CHURCH or not) didn’t make those decisions. It really isn’t honest to say the Protestant version successfully avoids having people as deciders just so it can be claimed that the authority of the CHURCH isn’t legitimized (in the Catholic sense).

By: blop2008

blop2008 — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 17:09:35 +0000

This all surely gets complicated and these are the kinds of details we must retrace to analyze the course of canonicity (writing; collecting; editing; compiling etc) throughout the history of the biblical scriptures. This may bother some (if not most) christians since the majority doesn’t know about this and with all the misinformation out there, it’s too bad.

My faith is in Christ which I know personally and he knows me personally since 2003. Since my faith is in him (the Living Logos) and not in canonicity and texutal copies of the scriptures, my faith isn’t shaken.

The scriptures have been tried-and-true for centuries despite these details amongst others in relation to archeology or textual transmission.

But this applies to anything else in this world that may appear untrue on the surface until demonstrated otherwise. I know of some Christians in my surrounding (Genuine Christians?) that would throw away their Bibles after learning this. In that case, where is their faith and where is their relation with God.

Why did God allow this to happen? Why would God allow some texts to be part of what we have that shouldn’t be there or some texts that aren’t there but that should be there….for centuries….in different shapes and forms in different traditions (Jewish, Protestant, Essene, and whatever other)???? I personally don’t know.

Did the apostles keep their own scriptures along with themselves as we carry along any Biblical canon in book format or computer format or audio format? Did Paul carry his own letters with him? Did Peter kept the letters of Paul for reading and reference? Or….were they all walking in the Spirit and the Spirit guided them toward all truth?

I believe the latter is also tried and true and overlooked.

By: Jonnathan Molina

Jonnathan Molina — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 06:51:47 +0000

Thanks Dr. Heiser. So it looks like we all have, for the most part, been on the same sheet of music on the agreed upon texts, which is comforting (I know there have to be a few exceptions). Yeah, I thought it was funny that Enoch was used for so many centuries and then, bam, no more Enoch. But I guess I’d have to agree with Origen and cherish-yet-give-up, lol. Better one book gone than upset the apple cart (though it saddens me just a tad–some pretty relevant stuff there, especially in light of the Watchers, etc…another fave of mine is the, alleged, Manasseh’s prayer, which is beautiful and has always intrigued me when I read the account of it in OT as to what did he say that moved God so much).

By: MSH

MSH — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 18:33:07 +0000

@Jonnathan Molina: I don’t believe (and someone chime in if this is wrong) that there’s any apocryphal or pseudepigraphical book we know of now (maybe Secret Mark – but that may be a forgery) that the early church did not. That said, we certainly have more manuscript evidence. I’m excluding the Gnostic material here since I don’t know any canon list that includes any of those works.

Origen actually comments on 1 Enoch — he defended it as canonical — in a funny way. Toward the end of his life (d. 254 AD) he wrote in a letter that he was giving up on it – that it seemed he was the only one in favor of it at the time, so he was essentially content to let the Spirit speak through the majority. An interesting anecdote for sure.

By: Jonnathan Molina

Jonnathan Molina — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 11:19:07 +0000

I have a question of my own (and if anyone has some feedback I’d appreciate it). Did the people who made the decision on our Protestant canon have as much information (i.e. number of texts, manuscripts) as we do now, less or more? (I’m sure someone out there can point out a link to a site or something that has the answer to this.) It just seems that if they had records and points of view that are gone today it may support why the Protestant canon seems to work so well, on the other hand, if they actually had less than us then we may be in a better position (through examining history, etc) on what would best represent a whole canon…if I’m making any sense. Though it seems from my brief time reading on the subject that the variety in canon forms was due in large part to Regional belief and tradition (example: The Book of Enoch was confirmed in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It predates the early church by 400 years. It was canonized in the Ethiopian Bible…did Western culture just deem the idea of specific angels, etc. inappropriate and voila no Enoch?)