SIDEBAR 7: REASONABLE STANDARDS OF PROOF, PART III
SIDEBAR 7: REASONABLE STANDARDS OF PROOF, PART III
As we start to move beyond Irenaeus, let us consider some advice from Kruger’s treatise regarding issues we will see in the remaining evidence:
… overplaying of disagreements over canonical books also happens in other areas. Throughout early Patristic testimony about the canon, the church fathers occasionally acknowledge that a particular book is “disputed” by some. A well-known example is Origen’s comments on 2 and 3 John in which he acknowledges that “not all say that these are genuine.” Although Hahneman uses this comment to point out that universal agreement on these epistles has not yet been achieved, he entirely overlooks the implications of Origen’s comments in the other direction, namely, that apparently most Christians do consider them genuine-including Origen himself. The phrase “not all say” indicates that Origen is simply noting exceptions to a more broadly established trend. Thus, it is misleading to use this passage as evidence that John’s letters were not regarded as canonical. That is more than this language can bear. At most, it reveals that in certain quarters of the church some disagreements over these books continued to occur (which is hardly surprising). (p. 265-266).
This cannot be true, argues Kalin, because elsewhere Origen acknowledges that some had doubts about these books. However, it is unclear how these two facts are incompatible. Why cannot Origen accept a book as genuine and, at the same time, acknowledge that others had doubts about it? Kalin seems to think that if Origen admits that some have doubts about a book, then that must mean Origen himself rejects it—but this simply does not follow. (P. 285).
Exactly correct! Now, apply such reasoning to the Apocrypha. This is a common error when discussing the “third category” that a handful of early Fathers mention—but not all Fathers. The others who do not mention it cannot be presumed to agree with the idea of a category for ‘disputed Books’ purely because they acknowledge that something is disputed by someone else. By simply noting that someone disagrees with it being Scripture, a father is not “putting a Book in a lesser category” or denying full canonicity. He only noted disagreement. And like everyone else, he may well see those who disagree with him as just plain stupid.
… it took a while for the church to reach a consensus about all of these books. … there was no formal, official declaration of the church that closed the canon. We can agree with Ehrman that “the canon of the New Testament was ratified by widespread consensus rather than by official proclamation.” There are numerous examples of this consensus, most notably the Festal Letter of Athanasius in 367, where he affirms precise twenty-seven books of our current New Testament. In agreement are also Eusebius, Codex Claromontanus, Rufinus, Jerome, Augustine, the African Canons, and the Synods of Hippo and Carthage. Although there was not absolute uniformity (which is true still today), after this period the church coalesced around these twenty-seven books with remarkable unity. (p. 286-287).
Every single one of those lists and Fathers that Kruger specifically mentions as examples of the consensus for the New Testament is also evidence of the acceptance of Susanna. Every single one except Jerome is evidence of the acceptance of Baruch. We have other evidence that, in fact, those Books were unanimously Scripture from “time immemorial”—in that as far as we know, every Christian church and Father had always accepted them (until Jerome, in the case of Baruch).
This means that a consensus—in fact, a unanimity, or nearly so—for some Apocrypha as canon is actually of far earlier date than the consensus Kruger is relying upon as proof of many of the Books of the New Testament canon.
On the other Apocrypha, we are reviewing the evidence as we go, and you should judge when and whether a consensus may have existed to accept those Apocrypha.
However, note the way Kruger assigns each of these “witnesses” equal importance. Jerome gives us a list, and the Codex Claromontanus gives us a list, and multiple synods voted on lists. All lists are equal, right? But they are not equal at all. We are looking for a consensus within the Church, a consensus of people, not a “consensus of lists.”
E.g., 217 bishops attended the Council of Carthage in 419. The list from that Council is really 217 lists, unanimously agreeing with each other in every single detail. (Bear in mind, they need not have entered the Council in agreement and need not have voted 217-0. The point is that (a) at least a majority apparently did feel that way, and (b) after the vote, all 217 went forth and followed the collective will).[1] We are concerned with what the Church accepted, and the evidence from that one list is that 217 Bishops agreed to accept the canon list of the Council (all of the Apocrypha). For the purposes of trying to figure out whether a consensus existed, it is 217 lists, not one.
And 217 is a staggeringly large number in this context. There are only two dozen-ish lists (depending on how you count them). Only 127 Fathers have left source material to be referenced www.biblindex.org/citation_biblique/search, which is part of Biblia Patristica). Wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Church_Fathers lists 137 Fathers that might fit my timeframe (up until 450 AD) but it is not clear that all left writings.
On the other hand, the individual lists of Fathers who were authors may have been ‘followed’ by many or only a few. To determine such things, we need to look outside the list for evidence. Some of the lists are scraps of paper found in monasteries a thousand years later. Melito’s letter may have been known to no one but the recipient until Eusebius found it in a box and copied it into his book. Or the writings of a Father could go on to have vast impact via changing minds, educating people, etc.—just like Eusebius’ book would. We are looking for evidence that shows the impact of a list, and needless to say, citation evidence is the key to that analysis. Jerome’s canon list, in particular, had considerable influence in the Middle Ages, but for our purposes, we are looking for what his influence was by 450 (a generation after his death).
Only with Synods and Councils can the list alone tell us what a group really thought. Other lists could just be one man’s opinion, or they could have a massive impact far beyond the region (North Africa) of the Councils (that could have the same impact too), but only citation evidence can tell us which.
… one gets the impression that it would require an extremely high (if not unanimous) amount of agreement about a book before Hahneman would regard its canonical status as decided. …. With this sort of standard in place, we would never be able to say that we have a canon, even in the modern day. … [even] in the twenty-first century because the Syrian church continues to have a different list…. it seems that Hahneman has applied an unreasonably strict standard for the level of agreement required for a book to count as canon. (P. 265).
Of note: without a standard of “consensus,” there can be no canon even today. Also, even if some Books are more disputed than others (e.g., the Books the Syrians do not accept), all are still canon.
My focus here is not to argue whether to have a canon or what standard is appropriate; my point is that such decisions have to be made consistently. Still, I use Kruger’s standard as the standard for the purposes of my discussion. Because bear in mind that Kruger was writing his book to show that Christians have “good reasons” for accepting the 27-Book New Testament as the authentic Apostolic Books.
That is it. That is all he was trying to prove, but it is not easy to do so. He had spent his entire life up to that point worrying about the “Achilles’ heel of Protestant Christianity,” the “hidden, dragging illness of the Church,” “the single thread that unravels the entire garment of the Christian faith.” He fought the good fight, consulted a thousand books, and penned his magnum opus. And he believes “consensus” has to be the standard to prove “good reasons.”
On that basis, then, the question is whether the early Church had a consensus on the Apocrypha (besides Susanna and Baruch, which clearly meet any fair standard of consensus), and whether they, too, were canon.[2]
Moreover, when drawing upon the Gospels, Justin [Martyr] sometimes uses “it is written,” the formula citandi for introducing scriptural books. (P. 228).
The question is what to make of such a reference (and similar things, of which there are many, such as a mention of the “blessed Judith” without a mention of the Book of Judith). The words do not say “Scripture” or “Canon”, but everyone agrees it may mean “Scripture”… but it might not… and even “Scripture” does not quite mean “Canon”…
My point, as you would expect, is just that this sort of wording is accepted as ‘proof enough’ when people want it to be and quibbled over when they do not. So, whatever you decide, you then have to be consistent. The evidence consists of mostly the same authors, the same Books, etc.
In addition, these quibbles have more value the fewer the citations, because once there are more than a few, the concept becomes arguing for the sake of arguing. Once you have a couple citations to the Book of Wisdom, you have more than enough contextual evidence to see whether the Father thought the Book of Wisdom was Scripture. I cannot really convey that sort of context easily in a “short” book like this, but it is there in the background, nonetheless, because if I did not truly think someone meant a reference to be Scripture, then it is never included herein (or at least is expressly noted otherwise).
Even so, I think there are very few debatable instances below, and I honestly feel a lot more was kept out that should have been put in. Had I used Don Stewart’s standards for judging New Testament references, there would be a great many more citations below. That is not a criticism of Stewart, just a comparison to show that I set out to be conservative to avoid arguing over such things. If the individual citation was not a clear acceptance of the Apocrypha as Scripture, then either (a) I found somewhere else in the same work that the author described it as Sacred Scripture or Prophecy or some such, and identify that with the quote,[3] or (b) I note that I am including it on some other basis (e.g., a few notable mentions are included where they are just cited along with canonical Scripture without any distinction being made by the Father, etc.—the vast majority of that category I did not add to my data; they just are not worth the effort given how many of category (a) I found).[4]
In general, even if you wish to argue that a fraction of what I found is mistaken, or mistranslated, or whatever, it actually makes no great difference. I believe that it is “plenty” by any reasonable comparative standard. The specific numbers are useful but not really the point, which is that the Protestant admits that “plenty” is not enough to prove authentic Apostolicity—and yet still has to somehow prove that Books with comparable evidence are authentic.
[1] At least in those 217 Bishoprics. It may have had greater scope in terms of number of Bishoprics (perhaps other Bishops who did not attend were within the geography covered), but it was also limited (it was only a “North Africa” council, not a full council from Europe or Asia, and it does not seem like Alexandria/Egypt were included either). Alas, I could not find how many Bishops there were globally in 419 AD—it would be nice to know what percentage of the world’s Christians were covered, etc. In any event, lacking other information, I just say 217 Bishoprics.
[2] Some people claim that the early Church never “decided” to consider Apocrypha as Scripture, because there was no ecumenical council (or some such). But that amounts to a requirement for a particular parliamentary procedure, and only for the Apocrypha. Substantively, “the churches choose to read Daniel in the version of Theodotion,” as Jerome says—to them, they chose, somehow, some way. My question is what choices did they make, as evidenced by what they were actually doing? I am less concerned with what procedure they did or should have followed. I would also note that if you look at many of my quotes from Kruger, Geisler, Gallagher and Meade, etc., you will find claims that the early Church accepted Books of the New Testament, or the Protestant canon, etc. Whatever standard they (or you) have for the acceptance of such things has to be consistent—you cannot use consensus for the acceptance of the Gospels and demand unanimity or an ecumenical council for the Apocrypha.
Also, I have no concern whatsoever for whether or how a canon decision might be eternal, or whether the canon was “closed” as of a certain date. If the Church had one canon and later changed it (by adding or by removing), that is something I want to know. For my purposes, I talk of a canon at 200 AD (etc.). What that means to “The” canon is for you to figure out.
[3] Example: In Treatise 8, 20 Cyprian writes “Be rather such a father to your children as was Tobias. …command your children what he also commanded his son, saying: [Tobit 14:10-11] And again: [Tobit 4:5-11]…” (www.newadvent.org/fathers/050708.htm). So, he does not clearly identify it as Scripture, and he could be quoting a mere example. It is a very good point…
… Except it is not. Because (1) in other works, he quotes the exact same lengthy passage using the wording “Holy Scripture,” e.g., in Treatise 12,3,1 www.newadvent.org/fathers/050712c.htm, and (2) even in the same work, he quotes other sections of Tobit in other places (section 5) as “the words of God Himself; the divine instructions.”
When looked at holistically, there is no doubt that Cyprian was citing Scripture when he quoted Tobit in Treatise 8, 20, even if the language used was vague. And yet, even something that met the standard of item (1) (a reference as “Holy Scripture” for even the exact same long quote in another work) was excluded; it had to be said in the same work (item (2).
[4] Such citations are noted by “cited along with Scripture without qualification…” and similar notations. I took all the lingo from Gary Michuta’s The Case for the Deuterocanon.
