Ep. 16 - Do We Have the Right Books in the Old Testament? - Part 1
Episode Transcript
Ep. 16 - Do We Have the Right Books in the Old Testament? - Part 1
[00:00:00] JC Schroeder: Hello friends! In today's episode, we're going to talk about a page in the Bible that we don't really give much thought about, but it's actually super controversial. That page: the table of contents. Is this list at the front of the Bible, right? Are we missing anything? Do we have too much? In today's episode, we're going to talk about if we have the right books in the Bible. This episode today is going to be part one where we focus primarily on the Old Testament or the Hebrew Bible. And the next episode we'll have part two to complete the Old Testament. And then after that we'll have the New Testament. You'll have to forgive my voice a little bit. But I think we should make it. All right. Sound good. Let's get started. I'm JC Schroeder and welcome to Bite Size Seminary.
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[00:00:57] Introduction
[00:00:57] JC Schroeder: When you look at the table of contents of a Bible, [00:01:00] there are some significant choices that are made there. What's considered the Bible? What's God's word and what's not? Theologians have a fancy term that describe that list. They use the term, the canon of Scripture. Now, this is not a "kaboom" sort of cannon. That cannon, the "kaboom" cannon, has two "n's" in the middle. This canon just has one, C A N O N. And that describes an authoritative list of documents. It's used to describe these are the books that are considered to be Scripture. These are God's words. And that table of contents reflects how God has worked in his word in preserving and giving and preserving his word, but also in working in his people and in his church to give what he desires for his people. But how do we know that list is the right one? That's what we're going to look at.
[00:01:57] Definitions and Foundations
[00:01:57] JC Schroeder: Now as we think about, this [00:02:00] issue of the canon of Scripture. There's a couple of introductory elements, that set the ground work and stage for us as we approach this very interesting, but also very complex issue. Now, some of this foundational information will be helpful for both the Old Testament and the New Testament. But after we get through this, we're going to focus primarily on the Old Testament. Now, when we're thinking about the canon of Scripture, it's important for us to note that there are different ways of looking at the canon. One way to look at the canon of Scripture. Is that it's determined by God. God is the one who makes the decision if something is or is not canonical or is Scripture. He does this by authoring Scripture by writing Scripture, along with the human authors. And this happens right at the moment of the [00:03:00] writing. This is what theologians call the active sense of the canon.
[00:03:04] Now another way that we could look at this discussion about the canon of Scripture is the passive sense, is the recognition of the canon of Scripture. The first one was the determination. God determines what is scripture, what is in the cannon. But then God's people need to recognize what he has written to be in Scripture. And this is done by humans, whether it's Israel or the church, they recognize what God has written. This is what theologians also call the passive sense of the canon. And this sense takes a long period of time. This is a process. It's not automatic. There's debate. There's back and forth. There's disagreement. There's a process of time. Now the canon God determines what is [00:04:00] scriptural. And it's final. We go with his decision. But the human element needs to deal with all right what is scriptural and what is not scriptural.
[00:04:10] Now another set of definitions, maybe not definitions is not the right word, but we'll go with it for right now. About the cannon is that the canon has some fluidity and some rigidity to it. As God is giving his word, and as humans are trying to recognize what God has given as Scripture. There is some rigidity to this process, but then there's also fluidity. What do I, what do I mean by that? So, there is in this idea of the canon of Scripture there is rigidity. Let's deal with that one first.
[00:04:54] There's some rigidity, meaning that there is a canonical trajectory [00:05:00] in the Scripture. The idea here is that. This, this idea of the canon of Scripture is not, willy-nilly, decided by whatever, by some guy in some cave or some king, or what have you. That there is a core set of documents that help shape that idea of what the rest of the canon is going to say. And what we'll see later in this episode is that canonical core is what God reveals in the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament. And that that core helps shape what is thought of as being inbounds or out of bounds in the idea of what can be allowed in Scripture.
[00:05:50] This is all based upon how God acts towards his people towards his people, Israel in making a covenant with them, we're [00:06:00] going to come back to this idea. But the, the, the, the thing I want to press here is that there is not everything's in flux. There was no way to determine what was right, what was wrong. No, I don't think that's true. I don't think the evidence bears that out. There does seem to be really good evidence to suggest that there was a way to determine what God was giving as Scripture. And the Israel could recognize what that was. And so there is shape and there is some rigidity to this idea of canon.
[00:06:34] Now many Christians would agree with that in that yeah, of course there's rigidity. This is what the, what the canon is. And everyone agreed with that. Well, yes, and no. There is also, and it's important for us to recognize that there is also some fluidity in this canonical discussion. What do we mean by fluidity? It means that the final shape of the canon was not determined by one [00:07:00] particular person or group or king or event. And then it made it like a decree and everything changed from that point. No, the evidence doesn't bear that out. There was debate among Jews. And there was debate in the church over what was considered to be Scripture, what was considered to be canonical.
[00:07:24] And it's important for us as Christians to adhere to what the evidence bears out is that there was a variety of different perspectives. Some viewed that these particular documents that we have in the Old Testament were not scriptural. Some viewed these other documents that we don't have in our Old Testament that they we're scriptural. And we have evidence for that. We have to be honest with the evidence. So there is some rigidity and there is some fluidity. You have to have both of those features. I think the evidence bears that it's not only fluidity and it's not only [00:08:00] rigidity, both, some rigidity and some fluidity in that process of recognizing the Scripture that God has given. Now, remember, we've already introduced the concept of God determines Scripture. He's the one that makes that choice. Not me. Not you, not anyone else. But the church and Israel has to go through that process of recognizing what God has already determined to be Scripture. And in that process and that process of recognizing there is some rigidity and there is some fluidity. Not a free for all. But not fully fixed either.
[00:08:37] Where Does the Idea of Scripture and Canon Come From?
[00:08:37] JC Schroeder: So hopefully that makes sense. And hopefully this sets us up well, for now thinking through where does this idea of Scripture and even a cannon come from? Can we have a great relationship with the Lord? Could the Lord reveal himself and we didn't need Scripture. Yeah, maybe. Maybe there's some multi-verse where that [00:09:00] is a reality. Maybe, maybe not. Uh, so we have to ask yourself the question, where does this idea of scripture even come from? Are the documents that we have in Scripture are these just writings, religious writings that people had about their experiences had about their meditations. And that later people came, uh, came along and said, wow, these aren't really great. This has got to be from God. And so it's something that is imposed on the text that is not intended to be. Or is this something that is more organic to the very idea of these writings? Now I'm going to show you my card is a little bit, I think it's more of the latter.
[00:09:43] Now the reason why I would say that is that this idea of Scripture finds at its heart with how God acts towards his people. Now, what's so powerful of the biblical God, [00:10:00] of the one true God, Yahweh, and how he relates to his people is that he is fundamentally a speaking God and a relational God. Our God is not a God who is distant, a God who only speaks through emissaries. He speaks to his people. And he desires to be in a relationship with his people.
[00:10:23] When Israel is at Mount Sinai after the Exodus, God makes a covenant with his people, what we now call the Mosaic covenant. Now in the process of God making this agreement, this covenant with his people, what does he do? He gives them the 10 Commandments. And the very first thing that has ever written down in human languages that comes from God himself is written by God himself. The text says that it is written by the finger [00:11:00] of God. Now that doesn't mean that God has like a dremmel finger. You know, He carves it in there. It's by, by his power, right by God's power. He inscribes these tablets with the 10 Commandments.
[00:11:14] And this sets a precedent for the idea of Scripture, that it is not just a human's meanderings and meditation's about God, but it is God revealing himself to his people. That God is the main agent, speaker, writer to his people. Now what we see later, and we'll come back to this in a moment, is that God will also use prophets to speak to his people. But the first instance he's setting the he's setting the foundation, that he is the author of Scripture by the very first piece of Scripture, the 10 Commandments, which he creates.[00:12:00]
[00:12:00] And what's I find very interesting is that the format that God presents this covenant and creates this relationship and agreement between him and his people is a specific type of structure. This is called a Hittite treaty code. This was a specific type of format for making agreement between two kings. One would be a more dominant king, called a suzerain king. And one would be a lesser king, called a vassal king. Using this treaty was quite dominant in the ancient Near Eastern world in the ancient Middle East. So this is something that Moses and Israel would have been familiar with after the Exodus.
[00:12:47] Now what's interesting is that this particular covenant follows a specific type of structure, a format, and it typically would include five things. I'm going to list them here just really quickly. It's going to [00:13:00] have number one, a preamble. It's going to have number two, a historical prologue. Number three, it's going to have stipulations, number four, sanctions, giving blessings and cursings. And in the final one is the most interesting which we'll come back to in just a moment. Now I do want to note that this is not my own research. I'm getting a lot of this from, uh, from this particular section from a book called The Heresy of Orthodoxy by Kostenberger and Kruger, which has really influenced my thinking on the issue of canon. I highly recommend it, and uh, Kruger is a really great scholar on, uh, primarily New Testament Canon, but a really good overall book for thinking about this idea of canon.
[00:13:43] Now, these five things that are included in this covenantal format are all features that we find in the covenant that God makes with Israel in the Mosaic covenant. And even Deuteronomy as a whole book is broken up [00:14:00] in this particular format. It has this preamble talks about the relationship between God and Israel. Uh, it talks about the prologue of how God has redeemed Israel out of Egypt. It talks about things that they should do and should not do, talks about the result of that is going to be these blessings, and if they fail to do that, the curses. And then finally this fifth element, which I hid from you. Sorry. The fifth element in the standard format was a deposit of written text of the covenant. So when two Kings were making this agreement, a stronger king and a lesser king were making this agreement, they would have all these features and then each king would get a copy, a written copy of this covenant. And they would take that copy and they would take it back with them. So they'd have here's the terms. And they would take that back to their homes and place them in their most holiest place, in [00:15:00] their temple. Hm.
[00:15:03] Now God gives a written form of the Mosaic covenant. First with the 10 Commandments. And then he reveals further to Moses with the first five books of the Old Testament of the Hebrew Bible, the Torah. And where does Moses take that text? He takes it and places it within the Tabernacle inside the Ark of the Covenant. So this matches a lot of the expectations of the people in that day of how God enters into their perspectives and in their culture and reveals himself to them. So this idea of writing, and the use of Scripture, and this beginning of this authoritative text, starts with this idea of God entering into this covenant [00:16:00] relationship with his people. So, this is not coming out of thin air. It's not coming out of how, uh, you know, meditations by spiritual gurus. Or just like, isn't this interesting, uh, information and other people came along and made it into something more than it actually was. This is God making the first step to his people.
[00:16:22] Now, this sets the whole trajectory for the rest of the Hebrew Bible for the Old Testament canon. And it's not going to be just God speaking or God writing on stone tablets, he's going to use prophets as his spokespersons to, to be his mouthpiece for him. And so he does this first with Moses as a prophet. Moses is viewed as like the great prophet. Right. And so.
[00:16:50] He takes this and becomes again, this model for the subsequent features of the Old Testament, of the Hebrew [00:17:00] Bible, of what that looks like that. God is going to speak. And he's going to speak through his prophets and that is going to be considered Scripture. So that's the start, this idea of Scripture, where, where canon, where this idea of canon comes from, it comes from the very mind of God, revealing himself to his people in their own environment and him engaging in this relationship, this covenantal relationship with them.
[00:17:28] Outro
[00:17:28] JC Schroeder: That's all we have for today. We'll pause part one and pick up part two to complete the topic of the Canon of the Old Testament in the next episode, along with the New Testament canon in the episode after that, all Lord willing. Be sure to check out the show notes if you want to check out further resources about the canon of Scripture. If you enjoyed today's episode, please give a review on Apple Podcast or Spotify. It really does help others find this material. You can also [00:18:00] sign up to receive episodes, emailed directly to you at bitesizeseminary.com. And you can connect with me there or on Facebook or Twitter. All of the links will be in the show notes. Thank you for your time and we'll see you next time. Thanks for listening.