Orthodox Biblical Canon

Nektarios · Post by **Nektarios** » Sat 22 January 2005 2:30 am

What is the complete and correct biblical canon for the Orthodox Church? I know its different from the Latins. What specific books belong to our Deutrocanonical books?

Nektarios

Mary Kissel · Post by **Mary Kissel** » Sat 22 January 2005 4:22 am

Nektarios, please see here
Sacred Scripture thread Because that's been discussed there already.... this question belongs in that thread too Don't feel bad tho..it happens many times. and if you still don't understand it then ask again...but there please i don't know the answer, but i thought i'd save you some 'headaches' and just direct you there. :mrgreen:

Justin Kissel · Post by **Justin Kissel** » Sat 22 January 2005 9:55 am

I think there's a lot of interesting quotes/information posted on the other thread. But maybe I think that because I'm a nerd and am intriqued by the subject. Just in case you don't want to read the whole thread and just want a readers digest version, I'll post a summary here. The Orthodox have never finally set their canon in stone; even an Ecumenical Council approved multiple canons of Scripture for usage. This practice of not having a "set in stone" canon has contined in Orthodoxy up to this day. This doesn't mean that any person can pick and choose, what this means is that each local bishop or church can direct his flock on this matter as he wishes, taking into account the Church's teachings throughout the ages. A synod or bishop could say that they accept the book of Tobit as fully inspired Scripture, for example; what they couldn't do is say that something like the Gospel of Thomas is Scripture. Their are limits to how far the Church can push things: generally speaking the only dispute is over the following books:

3 Esdras
Tobit
Judith
1-3 Maccabees (4 Maccabees was always in an appendix when it appeared in a manuscript, and never considered Scripture)
Wisdom of Solomon
Sirach
Baruch
Letter of Jeremiah
Susanna
Bel and the Dragon
Ps. 151
Prayer of Manasseh
Prayer of Azariah
Song of the Three Youths

These books and additions can be considered fully Scripture (though "deuterocanonical"--a 2nd canon of sorts) as Catholics believe, partially authoritative and "on a lower footing" as most Orthodox believe today, or not inspired or Scripture at all, as Protestants believe. There is patristic support for each of these positions, though some would be more in keeping with Orthodox thought than others. Again, though, I would stress that it is not for you or I to decide what the Church believes, but for us to follow our bishops insofar as that is possible. I asked a ROCOR priest about the ROCOR's position on this last night, and he said basically what the contemporary theologians said in the other thread: ROCOR doesn't see it as fully authoritative like the rest of Scripture, but does nonetheless recognize that it has an important part in the doctrine and worship of the Church and do not exclude it totally either. In other words, we place it on a lower footing.

The idea of a set-in-stone Scriptural canon for the entire Church is really a very new concept. Yes, certain Fathers gave canonical lists and said things like "you mustn't include any other books in the canon," but the fact of the matter is, there has never been unified opinion on the subject (I compile what various Fathers throughout the centures said here). When the Reformation took place, the Protestants needed a fixed canon, 1) because with each passing year they were distancing themselves more and more from tradition, 2) because they were children of the Renaissance (and later the Enlightenment), and they just couldn't countenance something so "illogical" and "uncertain" as not knowing which books were and were not Scripture, and 3) because they based their doctrines on the faulty (and self-refuting) principle of sola scriptura--using the Scripture alone to determine the faith. The Catholics responded with a Counter-Reformation of their own (at the Council of Trent), and decided on a specific canon and anathematized those who didn't follow their own version of the canon. But it is incorrect when Catholic apologists say things like "the Canon was set at the end of the 4th century, and it wasn't until Luther in the 16th century that anyone took books out". Even a casual look at the Fathers--and even Catholic Theologians for that matter--between those two times shows that this just isn't so.

This fact (and I don't think I am exaggerating when I assuredly call it a fact) will not be taken easily by Protestant or Catholics. Most Orthodox probably would have a problem with it to, since we've been so conditions to believe what the Catholics believe about the Bible. The Protestants will think that this makes the Scripture uncertain, and would topple their whole theology, which is based on sola scriptura--"scripture alone". They can argue with Catholics about when and how the Scriptural canon was created--but demonstrating that it was not finallized would cause major problems for many them. Obviously the Catholics wouldn't like this either, since this takes away one of the Catholic's favorite arguments for converting Protestants. They think the early canon history demonstrates the authority of the Church--and particularly they seem for some strange reason to think that the Roman Council of 382 (under Pope Damasus) and those in Africa in 393 and 397 demonstrate that Rome is the true Church. Unfortunately, I think the Orthodox (I mean your typical lay person or priest) have been influenced by the Catholics, and to a lesser extent by the Protestants, way too much on this issue.