Apocrypha and the "intertestimental gap" between OT and NT

[BobRyan]

Acts 18:28 for he vigorously refuted the Jews publicly, showing from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ.

Paul as the text above shows is referencing "the scriptures" using the definition that the Jews also accepted for that same term. We see it again in Acts 17:11 - where "the scriptures" is a term that even non-Christian Bible students understood and accepted.

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Which Jews? Sadducees, who accepted only Torah? Essenes? Alexandrian Jews with the Septuagint text?

No such confusion as per Josephus' comment in the first century.
No such confusion as per Luke in Acts 18:28

Acts 18:28 for he vigorously refuted the Jews publicly, showing from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ.

No such confusion as per Luke in Luke 24.

No such confusion as per Jerome in his Vulgate and its prologues.

No such confusion as per the Hebrew Bible Tanakh still extant today and the one that even the people on this thread admit - the Pharisees accepted in the first century.

 

[chevyontheriver]

No such confusion as per Josephus' comment in the first century.
No such confusion as per Luke in Acts 18:28

Acts 18:28 for he vigorously refuted the Jews publicly, showing from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ.

No such confusion as per Luke in Luke 24.

No such confusion as per Jerome in his Vulgate and its prologues.

No such confusion as per the Hebrew Bible Tanakh still extant today and the one that even the people on this thread admit - the Pharisees accepted in the first century.

You have a very different understanding of history than I do. I guess I have to leave you to it.

 

[chevyontheriver]

Apparently the NT writers and contemporaries had absolutely no such confusion. We see them using the term "all of scripture" and "the scriptures" repeatedly without any reference to "of course we don't actually know what that is" - as we just saw in post #42.

The NT shows literary dependence on the LXX, which does mean that the first Christians knew what ‘all of Scripture was’. But you can read into history exactly what you wish. I would have been shocked had you not come down hard for the shorter Jewish canon as opposed to the full Christian canon of Catholics and the Orthodox.

 

[Xeno.of.athens]

I would have been shocked had you not come down hard for the shorter Jewish canon as opposed to the full Christian canon of Catholics and the Orthodox.

I agree. Mr Ryan is a Protestant and his denomination accepts the 6th or 7th century AD Jewish old testament canon with the addition of the entire new testament as their collection of sacred books.

Catholics take an older view, one that arose in the late fourth century AD among Christian bishops and scholars and based on the traditional use of books in the Church's liturgy. Hence Catholics have 73 canonical books in their collection of sacred books. The orthodox have the same 73 with some additions, such as 3 & 4 Maccabees, Psalm 151, and one or two additional books of Esdras. These latter are not among the canonical books of Catholicism, but they are not rejected as if they were wicked works of men (or Satan).

 

[fhansen]

Jerome (author of the Vulgate translation in 405 A.D.) agrees with the first century Jewish historian - Josephus that the Hebrew Bible never included the Apocrypha and as Josephus stated the Hebrew canon had been kept securely in the temple for over 300 years by the first century A.D. and had not changed.

Praise God that the Church follows the Holy Spirit rather than certain Jews, Jerome, Luther, who also had issues with James and the Book of Revelation, et al. The same church that assembled the NT cannon, incidentally, rejecting many competing writings.

 

[Erose]

Manuscripts are funny that way -- they get copied over time.
Josephus is writing after 70 A.D. and pointing out that they still affirm that same canon of scripture. The point remains.

You are right manuscripts do get copied over time. Hand copied. Little known fact about manuscripts getting copied over time, is that over time they tend to get corrupted, modified, revised, etc. That is why there are so many manuscripts out their that don't quite jive with each other. If anything that the dead sea scrolls have taught us is that.

"We have but twenty-two [books] containing the history of all time, books that are justly believed in; and of these, five are the books of Moses, which comprise the law and earliest traditions from the creation of mankind down to his death. From the death of Moses to the reign of Artaxerxes, King of Persia, the successor of Xerxes, the prophets who succeeded Moses wrote the history of the events that occurred in their own time, in thirteen books. The remaining four documents comprise hymns to God and practical precepts to men (William Whiston, trans., Flavius Josephus against Apion, Vol. I, in Josephus, Complete Works, Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1960, p. 8).

"And how firmly we have given credit to those books of our own nation is evident by what we do; for during so many ages as have already passed, no one has been so bold as either to add anything to them or take anything from them, or to make any change in them; but it becomes natural to all Jews, immediately and from their very birth, to esteem those books to contain divine doctrines, and to persist in them, and, if occasion be, willing to die for them. For it is no new thing for our captives, many of them in numbers, and frequently in time, to be seen to endure racks and deaths of all kinds upon the theatres, that they may not be obliged to say one word against our laws, and the records that contain them (Josephus, Ibid. p. 609).​

So where is the 300 year claim? I don't see it in the above quote. Is it somewhere else?​

There are at least four important things can be derived from this statement of Josephus.

1. Josephus includes the same three divisions of the Hebrew Scripture, as had the Prologue to Ecclesiasticus and Philo.
2. He limits the number of canonical books in these three divisions to twenty-two. This would be the same as the current twenty-four – Ruth was attached to Judges, and Lamentation attached to Jeremiah.
3. He says there has been no more authoritative writings since the reign of Artaxerxes, son of Xerxes (464-424 B.C.). This is the same time of Malachi – the last book in the Old Testament.

A couple of things here:
1) I agree.
2) Here is the issue with above. The twenty two or twenty four question has one primary issue. What were included in those twenty-two or twenty-four? The Pharisee's Canon, which for the most part became the Rabbinical Canon, I agree. But here is the problem. I went back and looked at the earliest references we have to the listings of what where included in those 22 scrolls, and here is the differences that I found from the current Jewish/Protestant canon: Melito (170AD): missing Esther and Lamentations. Origen (240AD): Includes the Epistle of Jeremiah but is missing the 12 minor prophets (which I think was a mistake on his part when writing since the list only included 21 scrolls and he refers to 22). Cyril of Jerusalem (350AD) includes the Epistle of Jeremiah and Baruch. St Jerome (390AD) Does not include Lamentations.

Now these were not taken from the Christian canonical lists but references to the Jewish canonical lists. So my point here is that even up to 390AD when the Church was addressing this question as well, the Rabbinical schools hadn't even hash it completely out yet either.

Another point to be made is that none, and I repeat none of the lists of what was contained in those 22 scrolls match up perfectly with the modern Jewish canon.

So the question still remains what were contained in these 22 Scrolls referred to by Josephus?

We know that Artaxerxes ruled for forty years. Ezra came to Jerusalem in the seventh year of his rule. The Bible says:
Ezra arrived in Jerusalem in the fifth month of the seventh year of the king (Ezra 7:8).
Nehemiah came in his twentieth year:

In the month of Nisan in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was brought for him, I took the wine and gave it to the king. I had not been sad in his presence before (Nehemiah 2:1).

Therefore the last canonical books were composed in this period.

Where they? Where in Scripture is this claim to be found? Does this mean that you do not think the NT writings are not Scripture?

1. Between the time of Malachi and Josephus’ writing (425 B.C. to A.D. 90) no additional material were added to the canon of Scripture. Consequently there was the notion of a long period of time without a divinely authoritative Word from God.

Yeah, you can't prove that.

 

[BobRyan]

You are right manuscripts do get copied over time. Hand copied. Little known fact about manuscripts getting copied over time, is that over time they tend to get corrupted, modified, revised, etc.

That is one reason that the Dead Sea scrolls are so helpful in proving that such problems are not the case with Bible manuscripts.

 

[BobRyan]

So where is the 300 year claim? I don't see it in the above quote. Is it somewhere else?​

.

It is in this post that you quoted

...

There are at least four important things can be derived from this statement of Josephus.

1. Josephus includes the same three divisions of the Hebrew Scripture, as had the Prologue to Ecclesiasticus and Philo.
2. He limits the number of canonical books in these three divisions to twenty-two. This would be the same as the current twenty-four – Ruth was attached to Judges, and Lamentation attached to Jeremiah.
3. He says there has been no more authoritative writings since the reign of Artaxerxes, son of Xerxes (464-424 B.C.). This is the same time of Malachi – the last book in the Old Testament.
   We know that Artaxerxes ruled for forty years. Ezra came to Jerusalem in the seventh year of his rule. The Bible says:

Ezra arrived in Jerusalem in the fifth month of the seventh year of the king (Ezra 7:8).
Nehemiah came in his twentieth year:

In the month of Nisan in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was brought for him, I took the wine and gave it to the king. I had not been sad in his presence before (Nehemiah 2:1).

Therefore the last canonical books were composed in this period.

1. Between the time of Malachi and Josephus’ writing (425 B.C. to A.D. 90) no additional material were added to the canon of Scripture. Consequently there was the notion of a long period of time without a divinely authoritative Word from God.

It ends like this --

Therefore the last canonical books were composed in this period.

1. Between the time of Malachi and Josephus’ writing (425 B.C. to A.D. 90) no additional material were added to the canon of Scripture. Consequently there was the notion of a long period of time without a divinely authoritative Word from God.

So that is about 500 years... but I list it as "over 300"

 

[DamianWarS]

Some people claim that "1 Thessalonians, written around 50 A.D." was the first NT book written. If you know of a "traditional church" claiming no gap between OT and NT - then I would have to assume they believe one of the non-NT books was written in 49 A.D. What book would that be? And why wouldn't it be Christians that are writing scripture in 49 A.D.? Why would it be non-Christian Jews writing scripture in 49 A.D.




Ok so then even in the view you propose that is about a 100 year gap between what some traditionalists call the OT and what we all call the NT.

The Bible is not unfamilar with gaps. Genesis to Exodus seems aptly fitting. I see your point here but the Bible shows periods of silence as normative so a gap alone does not demand it to be filled. Did not Christ say he is coming soon? While we await his arrival we exist in a gap.

 

[Erose]

It is in this post that you quoted




It ends like this --

Therefore the last canonical books were composed in this period.

1. Between the time of Malachi and Josephus’ writing (425 B.C. to A.D. 90) no additional material were added to the canon of Scripture. Consequently there was the notion of a long period of time without a divinely authoritative Word from God.

So that is about 500 years... but I list it as "over 300"

Okay pretend that I'm as dumb as a rock and explain to me your reasoning for coming to A) the conclusion you propose via number one and B) where does Josephus say the writings were in the Temple for 300 years untouched?

 

[Erose]

That is one reason that the Dead Sea scrolls are so helpful in proving that such problems are not the case with Bible manuscripts.

Ah, but they really do not. Are there passages in the Dead Sea Scrolls that are the same as what is found in the Masoretic text? Yes there are. But there is also passages that compare more what the Septuagint and the Samaritan Bibles than they do the Masoretic text.

 

[bbbbbbb]

Ah, but they really do not. Are there passages in the Dead Sea Scrolls that are the same as what is found in the Masoretic text? Yes there are. But there is also passages that compare more what the Septuagint and the Samaritan Bibles than they do the Masoretic text.

And, then, of course, there are numerous texts among the Dead Sea scrolls which were particularly valued by the Essenes, but no other group within Judaism of the period. What does one make of these?

 

[chevyontheriver]

And, then, of course, there are numerous texts among the Dead Sea scrolls which were particularly valued by the Essenes, but no other group within Judaism of the period. What does one make of these?

That there were multiple versions of a canon within Israelite religion rather than one canon. But we knew that from the debate between Sadducees and Pharisees.

 

[bbbbbbb]

That there were multiple versions of a canon within Israelite religion rather than one canon. But we knew that from the debate between Sadducees and Pharisees.

That poses somewhat of a conundrum for those who insist on a fixed canon of scriptures, does it not?

 

[chevyontheriver]

That poses somewhat of a conundrum for those who insist on a fixed canon of scriptures, does it not?

Not at all. Books could be added until the final revelation of God in written form containing the New Testament and finalized by the Church. Expect nothing new until Jesus returns in glory.

What was the canon the moment before Genesis and Exodus were written? Nothing. Then it changed after those were written. So the canon was not yet fixed before Genesis and Exodus were written. But the result was we got, after a while, basically the Sadducee canon of the Torah alone.

Think of the Prophets being added to the canon of Scripture. The Sadducees said the canon was fixed, and they resisted adding them. The Parisees accepted them but the Sadducees did not. And then the Machabees books were written. And then comes Jesus, and books get written about him. Those books didn't make it into the post-Christian Jewish canon. Surprise.

The question is not whether the canon is fixed though. The question is by what authority a book can be added to the canon. The Sadducees thought they had that authority. You could make a case that they had the authority for a period of time. The Pharisees thought they had that authority. You could make a case that they had the authority for a period of time. But that time would have passed after Pentecost. It is the Church alone who sets the canon for Christians. The Church did that by rebuking Marcion, who wanted to ditch the entire OT. The Church did that again by accepting the books found in the Septuagent. The Church did that again by accepting the NT in it's present form in the fourth century.

Could a new book be added? Could a lost letter of Paul be found valid and added? I doubt it. And we're not accepting of the Book of Mormon, anything from Ellen Gould White, or even the Church Fathers. Whatever pope Francis writes will come nowhere close to becoming canon regardless what the new ultramontaine folks might want. But the point is not so much whether a new book could be added, but who would be allowed to decide. The Catholic Church decided. They decided that there would be an OT, what it would contain, that there would be a NT, and what it would contain. Who do you think should have set the canon? How do you know which books are in your own personal canon?

 

[bbbbbbb]

Not at all. Books could be added until the final revelation of God in written form containing the New Testament and finalized by the Church. Expect nothing new until Jesus returns in glory.

What was the canon the moment before Genesis and Exodus were written? Nothing. Then it changed after those were written. So the canon was not yet fixed before Genesis and Exodus were written. But the result was we got, after a while, basically the Sadducee canon of the Torah alone.

Think of the Prophets being added to the canon of Scripture. The Sadducees said the canon was fixed, and they resisted adding them. The Parisees accepted them but the Sadducees did not. And then the Machabees books were written. And then comes Jesus, and books get written about him. Those books didn't make it into the post-Christian Jewish canon. Surprise.

The question is not whether the canon is fixed though. The question is by what authority a book can be added to the canon. The Sadducees thought they had that authority. You could make a case that they had the authority for a period of time. The Pharisees thought they had that authority. You could make a case that they had the authority for a period of time. But that time would have passed after Pentecost. It is the Church alone who sets the canon for Christians. The Church did that by rebuking Marcion, who wanted to ditch the entire OT. The Church did that again by accepting the books found in the Septuagent. The Church did that again by accepting the NT in it's present form in the fourth century.

Could a new book be added? Could a lost letter of Paul be found valid and added? I doubt it. And we're not accepting of the Book of Mormon, anything from Ellen Gould White, or even the Church Fathers. Whatever pope Francis writes will come nowhere close to becoming canon regardless what the new ultramontaine folks might want. But the point is not so much whether a new book could be added, but who would be allowed to decide. The Catholic Church decided. They decided that there would be an OT, what it would contain, that there would be a NT, and what it would contain. Who do you think should have set the canon? How do you know which books are in your own personal canon?

It does seem more than peculiar for God to have waited until the Council of Trent to establish a specific canon of scripture if, in fact, the canon was open for all of the preceding centuries.

 

[chevyontheriver]

It does seem more than peculiar for God to have waited until the Council of Trent to establish a specific canon of scripture if, in fact, the canon was open for all of the preceding centuries.

But it was final way before the Council of Trent. The Council of Trent merely repeated the results of the Council of Florence, and that merely repeated the results from a thousand years before. The canon was settled on or around 400 AD. Which isn’t long for something that monumental written around three centuries before.

 

[bbbbbbb]

But it was final way before the Council of Trent. The Council of Trent merely repeated the results of the Council of Florence, and that merely repeated the results from a thousand years before. The canon was settled on or around 400 AD. Which isn’t long for something that monumental written around three centuries before.

If so, why did the Council of Trent bother to determine the canon?

 

[chevyontheriver]

If so, why did the Council of Trent bother to determine the canon?

The council of Trent did not DETERMINE the canon. It just copied previous work. It’s only Protestant polemicists that say Trent determined the canon, or better yet that Trent added books to the canon that previously existed.

 

[bbbbbbb]

The council of Trent did not DETERMINE the canon. It just copied previous work. It’s only Protestant polemicists that say Trent determined the canon, or better yet that Trent added books to the canon that previously existed.

They seem to have copied some previous work, but not all, because to this day there are branches of Christianity, such as the Coptic church, which have considerably different canons. The reality remains that there is no uniformly agreed-upon canon of Christian scripture accepted by all branches of Christianity, unless, of course, one wishes to deny the existence of other branches than the one with which one is affiliated.