Evidences Class
21 Questions (probably less) in 45 Minutes
1. What does “canon” and canonical mean?
• Greek “Kanon” and Hebrew “Qaneh”
• Reed (English word “cane”)
• Measuring stick – Standard or rule
• List of books received as Holy Scripture
• All teaching had to bow to its authority
2. I’ve heard that the emperor Constantine
established the N.T. canon. Is this true?
Only in Dan Brown’s imagination.
3. I’ve also heard that church councils
established the canon. Is this true?
Only in Dan Brown’s imagination.
Fixed a list of canonical books.
• Council of Carthage – 393 A.D.
• Council of Hippo – 397 A.D.
But There Were Other Canonical Lists …
Athanasius recorded the first complete
list of our 27 books – A.D. 367
Eusebius (325 A.D.) grouped in 4 categories
Accepted
4 Gospels
Paul’s Letters
Hebrews
1 Peter
1 John
Revelation
Widely Accepted
James
2 Peter
2 and 3 John
Jude
Spurious
Acts of Paul
Barnabas Letter
Shepherd of Hermas
The Diadache
Apocalypse of Peter
Rejected
All others
4. If it wasn’t a church council or
Constantine, who decided?
You’re not asking the right question.
No church council established scripture
as being authoritative. It was
authoritative because it came from God.
2 Timothy 3:15-17 (ESV)
and how from childhood you have been
acquainted with the sacred writings,
which are able to make you wise for
salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
All Scripture is breathed out by God and
profitable for teaching, for reproof, for
correction, and for training in
righteousness, that the man of God may
be competent, equipped for every good
work.
2 Peter 3:15-16 (ESV)
And count the patience of our Lord as
salvation, just as our beloved brother
Paul also wrote to you according to the
wisdom given him, as he does in all his
letters when he speaks in them of these
matters. There are some things in them
that are hard to understand, which the
ignorant and unstable twist to their own
destruction, as they do the other
Scriptures.
1 Corinthians 2:9-13 (ESV)
But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear
heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has
prepared for those who love him"— these things God has
revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches
everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a
person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which
is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of
God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not
the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God,
that we might understand the things freely given us by
God. And we impart this in words not taught by human
wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual
truths to those who are spiritual.
1 Corinthians 14:37-38 (ESV)
If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or
spiritual, he should acknowledge that the
things I am writing to you are a command
of the Lord. If anyone does not recognize
this, he is not recognized.
1 John 4:6 (ESV)
We are from God. Whoever knows God
listens to us; whoever is not from God does
not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit
of truth and the spirit of error.
2 Peter 3:1-2 (ESV)
This is now the second letter that I am
writing to you, beloved. In both of them
I am stirring up your sincere mind by
way of reminder, that you should
remember the predictions of the holy
prophets and the commandment of the
Lord and Savior through your apostles,
There is a difference between the
canonicity of a book and the authority of
that book. A book’s canonicity depends on
its authority … The letter had authority
from the moment it was written. It was
accepted as canonical because of its
inherent authority. No church council by
its decrees can make the books of the
Bible authoritative. If the words indeed
came from God … they possessed their
authority long before any church council
considered them authoritative.
Adapted from Neil R. Lightfoot
5. Isn’t the Catholic Bible different
than ours?
Yes and No.
Catholic Bibles contain the same 66
books as our Bibles. Often they will
contain an additional 15 books written
between 200 B.C. and 100 A.D. Only a
smidgen was written after Christ (4
chapters in 2 Esdras).
6. Isn’t it right that Catholic doctrine
depends on the Apocrypha?
Absolutely not.
These are Jewish books … Not Catholic
books. They mostly consist of Jewish
history, additions to the book of Daniel,
warnings against idolatry, etc. There is no
reference to confession, the so-called
mass, transubstantiation, the priesthood,
praying to Mary, etc.
7. How do you know that the Catholic
Apocrypha isn’t Scripture?
Jesus didn’t consider it Scripture.
Luke 24:44 (ESV)
Then he said to them, "These are my
words that I spoke to you while I was still
with you, that everything written about
me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets
and the Psalms must be fulfilled."
Jesus identifies the Tanekh as being Scripture.
8. The what?
Tanakh – Hebrew Scriptures
Torah – The Law
Neviim – The Prophets
Ketuvim – The Writings (Psalms)
Ketuvim
Neviim
Torah
Genesis
through
Deuteronomy
Joshua / Judges
Samuel / Kings
Isaiah
Jeremiah
Ezekiel
12 Minor Prophets
Psalms
Proverbs
Job
The Five Scrolls
Ezra / Nehemiah
Chronicles
Even though the New Testament is
written after the Apocrypha …
The New Testament never quotes
the Apocrypha. The New
Testament quotes the Old
Testament on nearly every page.
9. What books are included in the
Catholic Apocrypha?
Judith
Esther (Part 2)
1 and 2 Maccabees
1 and 2 Esdras
History of Susanna
Bel and the Dragon
Prayer of Manasseh
Wisdom of Solomon
Letter of Jeremiah
Wisdom of Jesus
(Son of Sirach)
Tobit
Prayer of Azariah
10. But I thought Jude quoted from
the Apocryphal book of Enoch???
But not the Catholic Apocrypha !!!
Pseudepigraphal - Writings falsely ascribed
Jude refers to events written in the
Assumption of Moses and the Book
of Enoch. Neither is a direct quote.
11. What about those suppressed
New Testament books like the
Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel
of Judas?
Only in Dan Brown’s imagination.
Apocrypha means “things hidden” or
“works that were not divinely
inspired or authoritative.
Dan Brown Says:
The earlier gospels were outlawed,
gathered up, and burned … Fortunately
for historians some of the gospels
Constantine attempted to eradicate
managed to survive. The Dead Sea
Scrolls were found in the 1950’s hidden in
a cave near Qumran in the Judean desert.
And, of course, the Coptic scrolls in 1945
at Nag Hammadi.
Gnostic Gospels
 Mary
 Phillip
 Thomas
 Judas
• Written in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Centuries
• Not authentic
• Few copies (none in the Dead Sea Scrolls!!!)
From The Gospel of Thomas
Peter: Let Mary go away from us because
women are not worthy of life
Jesus: Lo, I shall lead her to make her
male, so that she too may become a living
spirit, resembling you males. For every
woman who makes herself a male will
enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Number of copies …
Author
Homer
Herodotus
Thucydides
Plato
Caesar
Tacitus
Book
Iliad
History
History
Gallic Wars
Annals
Book
New Testament
Date Written
800 B.C.
480-425 B.C.
460-400 B.C.
400 B.C.
100-44 B.C.
A.D. 100
Earliest Copies
c. 400 B.C.
c. A.D. 900
c. A.D. 900
c. A.D. 900
c. A.D. 900
c. A.D. 1100
Date Written
A.D. 50-100
Earliest Copies
c. 114 (fragment)
c. 200 (books)
c. 250 (most of NT)
c. 325 (Complete NT)
Time Gap
c. 400 years
c. 1350 years
c. 1300 years
c. 1300 years
c. 1000 years
c. 1000 years
Time Gap
50+ years
100 years
150 years
225 years
No. of Copies
643
8
8
7
10
20
No. of Copies
5366
12. Who were the gnostics?
"Gnosticism" is the name given to a group of
related religious ideas that were popular around
the time when Christianity was getting its start.
In general, Gnostics claimed to possess knowledge
that others did not have, and they emphasized
knowledge over faith. (The Greek word gnosis
means "knowledge.")
Eusebius points to Simon the Sorcerer as
the first heretic (might be legend).
Some Gnostic Ideas
 The God of the Old Testament is
different than the God of the New
Testament
 Illicit sexual relations were a way of
getting closer to God (Jude 8)
 Celibacy (1 Tim. 4:3)
 The Gospels are not reliable
 Jesus was not God (Jude 4)
 Jesus did not come in the flesh (2 John 7)
The New Gnosticism (Dale Robbins)
 The Da Vinci Code
 The Gospel of Judas
 The “Historical” Jesus
13. What about all the copy
errors? Wasn’t the transmission
just like playing telephone?
The Wrong Idea
Colossians 4:16 (ESV)
And when this letter has been read among you, have it
also read in the church of the Laodiceans; and see that
you also read the letter from Laodicea.
2 Peter 3:14-16 (ESV)
And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as
our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to
the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when
he speaks in them of these matters.
3 Different Text Groupings
Western Text
Byzantine Text
Alexandrian Text
14. How certain are we about the
New Testament text?
• 97-99 percent certain
• 400 words
• 40 verses
• Little doctrinal significance
15. I’ve heard that Mark 16:9-20 is not
in some Bibles?
Codex Vaticanus
Codex Sinaiticus
Alexandrian Text
But ….




Codex
Vaticanus
All other Manuscripts include
Latin Vulgate
Irenaeus mentions in the 2nd Century
Curious space in both Codex Vaticanus
and Sinaiticus
16. I’ve heard that there is some
dispute about Matt. 19:9. This seems
to have doctrinal significance.
Matthew 19:9 (NKJV)
And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except
for sexual immorality, and marries another,
commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is
divorced commits adultery."
 Not in the two earliest manuscripts
though it is present in some early MS
 Matt. 5:32 includes the disputed phrase
17. What about John 7:53-8:11 (the
woman caught in adultery)?
 One early manuscript (Codex Bezae)
 No other manuscripts till the 8th Century
 Included in Luke in some manuscripts
18. What about 1 John 5:7?
1 John 5:7 (NKJV)
For there are three that bear witness in heaven:
the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and
these three are one.
 Only 4 or 5 very late Greek manuscripts
 Erasmus was very stubborn about
including it in his Greek text
 Watch the NKJV – NU and M text omit
19. How many horsemen did David
capture, 1700 or 7000?
2 Sam. 8:4; 1 Chron. 18:4
20. How many baths, 2000 or 3000?
1 Kings 7:26; 2 Chron. 4:5
21. Was Ahaziah 22 or 42 when he
began to reign?
2 Kings 8:26; 2 Chron. 22:1
Undoubtedly copyist errors.
Numbers were tough in Hebrew.
14
Used letters
for numbers