Free Republic
Browse · Search
Religion
Topics · Post Article

To: taxcontrol
It was the Bishop of Alexandria, the tradition of Mark not of Rome or Peter, that sent forth the 27 books of the New Testament. In his Easter letter of 367, Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, gave a list of exactly the same books that would formally become the New Testament.

True. In 367 Athanasius wrote to the churches in his diocese an Easter letter which is now regarded as the first authoritative statement of the canon of the New Testament. He included several disputed works such as Second Peter and the Book of Revelation, but he excluded The Didache, The Epistle of Barnabas, First Clement, and The Shepherd of Hermas, which had long been regarded as equal to the apostolic letters. He wrote: "In these [27 books] alone the teaching of godliness is proclaimed. No one may add to them, and nothing may be taken away from them." But his pronouncement was not universally accepted even in Alexandria. Twenty years later, the Alexandrian scholar Didymus the Blind still regarded as authoritative the books that Athanasius excluded, and there were many such examples all over the Empire, both in the East and the West, but by 395 all such dissent had been silenced by the emperor Theodosius. [Church History Institute]

83 posted on 03/01/2015 11:57:40 AM PST by zot
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies ]


To: GreyFriar

Ping to post # 83.


84 posted on 03/01/2015 12:00:22 PM PST by zot
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 83 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Religion
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson