Are the Right Books in the Bible?

The Bible is not a single book. It is a collection of dozens of books written by many different authors over the course of centuries. Eventually, these books were acknowledged by the Church to be the inspired word of God and were collected into an official “canon” of Scripture, which we today call the Bible. 

It was not until the late fourth century that the New Testament canon of 27 books was officially finalized. Prior to this, there was some disagreement about the extent of the canon. In the first four centuries, many Christian writings were in circulation, some of which were regarded as heretical by the standards of historic Christian orthodoxy. Furthermore, there is still disagreement among different Christian traditions about the Old Testament canon to this day. Skeptics often argue that this means that Christians cannot know that the correct books ended up in the Bible, and if Christians cannot know that the correct books ended up in the Bible, then they cannot reasonably believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God. But is this really the case?

The New Testament Canon

It is true that there were numerous apocryphal “Scriptures” circulating in the early centuries of Christianity, some of which paint a very different picture of Jesus than that found in the New Testament. However, even agnostic New Testament Bart Ehrman, the author of numerous anti-Christian books, acknowledges that the New Testament Gospels are “the oldest and best sources we have for knowing about the life of Jesus”; this is “the view of all serious historians of antiquity of every kind, from committed evangelical Christians to hardcore atheists.”^[1]Bart D. Ehrman, Truth and Fiction in The Da Vinci Code: A Historian Reveals What We Really Know About Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Constantine (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 102. Why is this the case? It is because, while the New Testament writings are from the first century, all heretical Christian “Scriptures” are from the second to fifth centuries.^[2]Bart D. Ehrman, Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), xi-xv. Furthermore, “almost all of the “lost” Scriptures of the early Christians were forgeries. On this, scholars of every stripe agree, liberal and conservative, fundamentalist and atheist.”^[3]Ehrman, Lost Christianities, 9. Clearly, the heretical Christian “Scriptures” were later corruptions of the original Christian message recorded in the New Testament. This is why the existence of these heretical writings provides no reason to call into question the accuracy of the New Testament canon.

Although it took three centuries from the writing of the last New Testament book for the New Testament canon to be finalized, this does not mean that there was no consensus about the canon earlier. Quite early on, there was widespread consensus about the canonical status of the four Gospels and Acts, Paul’s epistles, 1 Peter, and 1 John.. The only New Testament writings about which there was any significant dispute were Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, Jude, and Revelation; it took a little longer for a strong, widespread consensus to develop about the canonical status of these books. Meanwhile, some early Christians regarded the early Christian writings 1 and 2 Clement, the epistle of Barnabas, and the Shepherd of Hermas as having the status of Scripture. While the theology of these writings is largely in line with that of the New Testament, they ended up being excluded from the canon, due to being too far removed from the apostles and/or too narrow in focus to be part of God’s Scripture for His entire Church.

Three centuries might seem like a long time for there to be dispute about the canon of Scripture. But we must remember that the earliest Christians believed Jesus could be coming back any time, and were focused on preaching the gospel and building the Church, rather than defining an exact canon of Scripture. Furthermore, the Scriptures had to be painstakingly copied by hand, and circulated using ancient, slow transportation methods, which meant that it took a long time for all the New Testament writings to actually get circulated to all the churches. It was for these reasons, and not because of serious doubts about the authenticity of the New Testament writings, that a widespread consensus about the exact extent of the canon took centuries to develop. 

The early Church was not acting randomly when it acknowledged the canon of Scripture. It was guided by the “rule of faith,” the teachings of the apostles handed down by oral tradition. Jesus appointed His apostles to speak His Authoritative word (Matt 16:17-19; John 14:26, 16:12-15), and the New Testament is the written deposit of the teachings of the apostles. Thus, it is reasonable for Christians to accept the New Testament canon as God’s word.

Skeptics may argue that Christians still cannot be 100% certain about the exact extent of the canon, given that there were disputes about the canon in the early Church. But so what? The early Church was able to get along fine without a finalized canon. Even if the New Testament books which were at one time disputed were removed from the canon, leaving only the undisputed books, this would not change the doctrinal teachings of the New Testament to any significant degree. 

The Old Testament Canon

All Christians agree that the sixty six books of the Protestant Old Testament canon are God’s inspired word. These were the writings accepted by first century Jews as Scripture, and Jesus Himself clearly affirmed the Divine Authority of the Torah, the Prophets, and at least some of the other Writings that make up the Jewish Scriptures. So, it is certainly reasonable for Chrisitans to accept the Jewish Scriptures as God’s word. 

There is disagreement among Protestant, Roman Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox Christians about whether additional ancient Jewish writings (what Protestants call the Apocrypha) should be accepted as part of the Old Testament canon as well (In this previous theology post, I have made the case for why the Protestant position on this issue is the most reasonable Christian position). But whether these disputed writings are accepted as canonical or not does change the theological teachings of the Old Testament to any significant degree. Thus, this ongoing disagreement among Christians about the exact extent of the Old Testament canon provides no reason for Christians to doubt that their Old Testament canon is basically correct.