holy Scripture. How did they? Various explanations have been offered.
1 The writings came to have authority because of their contents.
2 The writings came to have authority because they were written by authors who were recognised as having authority, by apostles.
3 The writings come to have authority because they are included on a list which is considered authoritative, that is to say canonical.
A writing comes to have influence as it is read widely and accepted as helpful and edifying for the growing and struggling Christian community. Because it actually built up the communities the writing would, by that very fact, have approved itself. It would have shown its worth, its merit. It would then be accepted as authoritative, because it had shown and was showing its value in its effectiveness. It exhibited its ‘authority’ by its effects. It thus ensured its place in the actual life of the church. This is what some writers mean when they say that it is ‘self-authenticating.’ It is not necessary to appeal from the writings and their effect in edifying the church to some other, external, criterion, for example: to who wrote them, or to whether they appear on a list which is officially accepted. It is enough that they nurture the faith of the community.
The books at first held their place because of their effect upon the groups of believers who read them. Paul’s writings were effective. They built up the piety and unity, doctrinal and practical, of the congregations to which they were addressed, and of the wider church in due course. This is what, I take it, Evans means when he says that the books made ‘profound religious sense.’ That was at the beginning. ‘It is, however, the case that the criterion of self-authentication is speedily overtaken by that of authorship, and the writings are then on their way to becoming canonical on other grounds.’24 Evans prefers such self-authentication to the appeal to apostolicity, finding that the evidence does not permit us to establish the ‘authority’ of the books on the ground of their being traceable either directly or indirectly to an apostle as their source. He regards such apostolicity as a fiction, a fabrication.
6 THE CANON AND THE QUESTION OF INSPIRATION
Christians inherited a doctrine of inspiration from the Jews. The doctrine of inspiration was later made into a very elaborate scheme and led to no little confusion. One thing is noteworthy. The term itself is not in evidence in the earliest judgments of the church about Scripture. Only much later did it become in some circles the standard, the orthodox way of speaking of the authority of the Bible. But from the beginning it was not so. And with good reason. You can, as did the early church, affirm the primary importance of Scripture without elaborating a theory of inspiration.
Would it be true to say that the books considered canonical had qualities which the doctrine of inspiration was later to emphasize? Are we able to say: because we recognize the books are inspired, we endorse their decision? But the fact is that it is just as difficult to determine whether a book is inspired as it is to say whether it is canonical We have already seen that the word ‘canonical’ has at least three meanings, namely (1) functioning in the community in a special way; (2) apostolic, that is traceable to an apostle or a close associate of one; and (3) being included on a list.
We shall discover that the term inspiration is also ambiguous and that we can give no simple answer to questions we have here raised. We do not simplify the problem by introducing a theory of inspiration to establish canonicity.
One procedure would be to accept the decision about the canon and starting there proceed to discuss inspiration. Or, one might start rather earlier, look at the practice of the church, consider the books available and ask whether, for whatever reasons, the books they chose were wisely chosen. One might then relate the reasons for accepting the books to the discussion of inspiration.
To conclude this section:
1 We cannot determine whether a book is canonical by finding out whether that book is inspired.
2 We cannot infer from how the book got written whether or not it has authority in the community. These are two different questions and we must not confuse them.
3 We cannot, without further ado, i.e. without further thought and investigation, simply accept the claim that the book or the writer is inspired or has authority, even if the book makes the claim for itself.
4 We must appeal to facts external to the writing to determine whether that writing has authority.
5 It is not sufficient to appeal to the fact that a book is included in a list of accepted books. Canonicity, in that sense, does not establish authority. We must ask whether we can agree with the reasons why the list was set up in the first instance in the way it was, and whether it has continuing relevance.
6 We must inquire whether the list they made of acceptable books still has contemporary relevance. To do that we shall set the books in the context in which they are used. For that is where the issue of their inspiration and their authority is properly discussed. We may not find these terms to be the most satisfactory.
To establish the status of a book we must consider the community in which the book is read and accepted, both its past — Who made the decision and why? — and the present — Who confirms the decision once made, and how? Does present attitude agree with past decision? Is there reason to reconsider, to reaffirm, or to revise older decisions once made? Answer these questions and then we may come to a reasonable view of the matter.
We conclude that the question of canonicity is the question of the book’s use and influence in the community. That is determined by empirical considerations, e.g. by asking, Does it have an influence which is unique? Books which have current influence have authority. Thus the question becomes central. What influence does the book have in the Christian community? Answer that and you have a dynamic rather than a formal answer to the question of Scripture. We must put practice into theory and then test the theory. We are then ready to address one further question: What sort of authority do such writings have?
7 A PARADOX
The contemporary church has inherited both the books and the decisions about which books are to be taken as primary and which as secondary. It inherits the decision and affirms it. But it does not examine all the books. It affirms the books it reads, and those it finds have been accepted. But it may not be aware of what other books there were, and are, to choose from. It does not say to itself something like: ‘Here are the books produced during the first two Christian centuries. Let us examine them, and choose the ones we consider appropriate and profitable to set aside for special use in the church. Something similar, mutatis mutandis, might be said about the Hebrew books.
We should ask: Why does a particular church community not do that? We can obtain and examine all these writings without difficulty. But most Christians have never read any of them. Why are we content to inherit and endorse a decision we did not make about which are the right books when we have not considered such books as, for example, actually were included in only some of the lists which were drawn up? Why do we continue to retain some books which were seriously questioned and whose place in the canon, i.e. on the list, was contested? Is it strictly honest to endorse such books as we are somewhat familiar with and exclude other books we have never read? Are we really prepared to leave that decision to someone else, without giving ourselves convincing reasons for endorsing that decision?
Of course Christians are influenced by decisions of the past in the way in which we use the writings. That these writings are handed down to us as those chosen by some historical decision means that we do not, and will not, read other important writings, or consider them in the same way as we consider these.
So Christians continue to use certain books and not others. That is the important fact, however it has been influenced by decisions
