of Formation the New Testament Dr. John Tyson I. The NT as a rebirth of Prophecy: The OT canon was not closed until late first century A.D. but among pious Jews it was generally believed that genuine prophecy had ceased with Ezra. [cf. IMacc. 4:66; 9:27; 14:41, etc.] Prophecy in the OT sense was essentially connected with the delivering of revelation (messenger mode). Moses was esteemed the greatest prophet, and the Law (Torah) the greatest teaching. (Note: it was thought of as being essentially proclamatory, NOT predictive. In his deeds and his teaching, Jesus demonstrated that a new age of prophecy (or revelation) had begun; it was precisely for this reason that many pious people (who did not recognize Jesus as the messiah) were convinced he was a new prophet or the return of one of the great OT prophets (cf. Mat. 16:13-18). Jesus presented and understood himself as One how stood in continuity with the message (and not just the messenger). Jesus too was conscious that he had been granted a prophetic/revelatory commission (Lk. 4:18ff, and Mk. 2:10). Jesus struck some obvious parallels to Moses (Mt. 5-7), and yet also clearly demonstrated superiority to Mosaic teaching. The early church, as evidenced by the sermons of Acts, understood itself as an inauguration of a fresh outpouring of God's spirit and revelation (Acts 2:14-19 = Joel 2:28-32). Hebrews 1:1-2 connected and distinguished the "New revelation" from the "Old." From its inception the NT witness was primarily an oral or spoken witness. Jesus wrote no books, the only occasion we see him writing at all (Jn. 8:8) was a single word drawn in the sand. The earliest records of Jesus' words were written some forty years after the event. Hence the normative witness for the first generation Christians was: 1. the words and deeds of Jesus as remembered and taught by the apostles (who had been with Him); thus the NT places much store upon apostolicity as authentication; 2. the OT interpreted as pointing to Christ (Acts 8:26-40; cf. 3:17ff; 7:1f). 3. church prophecy (ICor. 14). 4. occasionally apostolic letters (from Paul) stand in the place of apostolic visits (ICor. 4:16-21; IThes. 2:9, 17-18). But letters are NOT the mode of preference. II. Written Documents replace Apostolic Evangelists: With the apostles facing severe geographic limitations and martyrdoms, it became necessary to set the witness of and about Jesus into a fixed, written form. The apostles were regarded as the keepers of the Jesus tradition: cf. ICor. 11:23; 15:3; 7:10; 12, etc. For this reason the gospels are assumed to be either (Mat., authored John) or sanctioned (Luke-Paul; MarkPeter) by apostles. It is clear that this movement from an oral to a written gospel witness was very self conscious on the part of the NT writers (cf. Lk. 1:1-4). Because Jesus had disciples (the Apostles) and used disciplining as a method for communicating His witness in its entirety, the Apostles continued this process (Luke was Paul's
disciple for example). There is good reason to believe that this spoken tradition handed down from the apostles through at least three generations of disciples (Jesus John Ignatius of Antioch & Polycarp of Smyrna Irenaeus of Lyon, etc.) also had considerable authority in the early church. It survived in creeds, hymns, liturgy, etc. III. The use and collection of NT writings: The use and eventual collection of Paul's epistles provided the model for using the gospels and other writings. This process of collection was hastened through the emergence of heretical documents and canons. Paul saw the potential for the application of his letters by the NT church (IThes. 5:27; Col. 4:16). The apostolic and post apostolic church followed up on his model and viewed Paul's writings as normative for the whole church (cf. IITim. 1:13; 2:1-2; 3:10-17; II Pet. 3:15-16). Within the NT we are given no clear picture of how the process of selecting and collecting documents deemed authoritative was carried out. It is clear that some documents were saved, others were not (ICor. 5:9; Col. 4:16). It is also clear that many books which claimed apostolic authorship were deemed to be spurious. Among the second generation Christians (and the disciples of Jesus' Apostles) the process of selecting and collecting became a more conscious one. Ignatius of Antioch, for example, noted a clear difference between those documents which came from the apostles and those which did not. But non apostolic books like Didache, First Clement, and The Shepherd of Hermas were also accorded wide authority in the church. With Marcian heretical canon (ca. 150) the church began to deal with the canon question more directly. With the emergence of Gnostic documents formal NT canon lists began to appear. The Muratorian fragment (ca. 170) is the earliest extant list and it contains most of the current NT. The writings of Irenaeus (ca. 140-202) evidence the broad acceptance of a functional canon of inspired books, with the recognition that several remained under dispute. Among the disputed books were: II Pet., Jude, Heb. John, Revelation. Debate continued, while a consensus was formed. Canon formally closed in 367 A.D.