The Canon of the Scripture

The Canon of the Scripture Author’s Name The Institutional Affiliation Course Number and Name Instructor Name Assignment Due Date 3 Major Lessons First, the canon formation is described as a process led by the Spirit and functioning within the community of believers over time. In explaining the process, Thompson describes God as revealing to a messenger, inspiring the messenger, and then instructing the community to accept the messenger’s authority, to designate some of the authoritative messages as permanent and canonical, and finally to apply Scripture in personal practice. This framing places power not in privative judgment nor in a particular ecclesial decision but in providential guidance operating through communal usage, which not only justifies diversity of opinion but also justifies a confidence in the resultant canon (Thompson, 1991, pp. 59-61). Second, the process of creating the Old and New Testaments canons was not homogeneous, as certain books were not well-received. The three-fold pattern of Law, Prophets, and Writings of the Old Testament seems to be complete by the time of Jesus, but subsequent rabbinic arguments struggle with books like Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, and Ezekiel without replacing what had become the standard collection (pp. 62-63). In the case of the New Testament, the perceived apostolic connection was significant to eligibility, and the earliest comprehensive list, equivalent to the twenty-seven books we have today, dates back to the Festal Letter of Athanasius in 367, reflecting centuries of assessive usage by the time it was compiled (pp. 63-64). Third, the treatment of the Apocrypha in divergent ways sheds light on the influence of languag...