“The Question of Canon” Now Available
I was just informed by IVP-Academic that my book, The Question of Canon: Challenging the Status Quo in the New Testament Debate, is now out and available for purchase (see here). This was a bit of a surprise because I haven’t received my own copy yet! But, I am glad to know it is out.
Here is the description of the book:
…Unlike many books on the New Testament canon, this book does not seek to explain why these books and no others. It asks the questions: Why is there a NT at all? Was the notion of a canon of literature out of sync with the earliest
Continue reading...
Did Matthew Think He Was Writing Scripture?
One of the most common misconceptions about the New Testament canon is that the authors of these writings had no idea that they were writing Scripture-like books. I dealt with this misconception on a general level here, showing that there was a clear apostolic self-awareness amongst the New Testament authors.
While this apostolic self-awareness may be easy to show for authors like Paul, what about the gospels which, technically speaking, are formally anonymous? Do their authors exhibit awareness that they were writing something like Scripture? To explore this further, let us just consider just one of our gospels, namely the Gospel of Matthew.
The first step is to get … Continue reading...
Thomas Jefferson Would Be Proud: Using Human Criteria to Decide the Bible’s Authority
This is the third and final installment of my (limited) review of A.E. Harvey’s book, Is Scripture Still Holy? Coming of Age with the New Testament. Prior installments can be found here and here.
As we have seen in prior posts, Harvey’s book is designed to critique the traditional Christian doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture. After arguing that (a) Scripture isn’t revelation anyway, only Jesus is God’s revelation; and (b) since humans were involved in writing and transmitting Scripture, then it is unreliable and likely corrupted, one might wonder whether Harvey tries to salvage any authority for the Bible at all.
At the end of chapter one, … Continue reading...
Is Scripture Still Holy? A Review (Part 1)
In his latest volume, Is Scripture Still Holy? Coming of Age with the New Testament, A.E. Harvey tackles the thorny problem of whether Christians can still believe the Bible is, in some sense, a “Holy” book in light of the modern scholarly consensus which declares it to be quite ordinary. Given the problem of the canon, the disagreements over the Apocrypha, the various textual versions in the Dean Sea Scrolls, the existence of Q, and the discovery of the Gospel of Thomas, how can Christians still believe the Bible is special?
While the title of this volume implies that the author may still be presenting this as an open … Continue reading...
Origins of The New Testament Canon (Backpack Radio)
… Continue reading...