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sophiaserpentia) wrote2005-12-01 05:12 pm
sophiaserpentia) wrote2005-12-01 05:12 pm
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My fourth homework for Prof. Koester's class regards the Canon Muratori and the development of a normative, authoritative canon.
The Canon Muratori was one step of many in the development of a body of authoritative and normative Christian scripture. It was written ca. 200 CE in Greek by an unknown author, probably in the western church.
It was written at a time when members of the church were beginning to reflect seriously on the relationships between faith, church, and scripture. This debate began in the latter half of the second century CE; it could perhaps be said that it has never been truly settled, since different denominations have to this day different scriptural canons, but for most of Christendom this debate has been over since the fourth century CE.
Prior to this, as Schneemelcher (1991) writes, the idea of sacred scripture was reserved mainly for the Jewish scriptures, "the Law and the Prophets," and authority was reserved for the Lord or the Holy Spirit. By the middle of the second century CE, though, it was clear that there was nothing to stop any theologian from making doctrinal assertions and claiming to have the support of the Lord's authority and of Jewish scripture.
This became particularly troublesome to many bishops when it began to appear that the cohesion of the church itself was threatened by movements like the Marcionites and the Valentinians. The Marcionites, as it were, "set up shop" in direct competition to the church after being expelled. Marcionite congregations sprouted up throughout the Roman Empire and offered a competing interpretation of Jesus' life and teachings. Marcion rejected the Jewish scriptures and promoted instead a body of new Christian scripture, made up of abridged editions of the Gospel of Luke and eight of the Pauline epistles. As such, it appears that Marcion was the first to argue that Christian scripture was an authoritative source.
The Valentinians operated mostly inside Christian congregations, creating a church within the church of the "spiritual elite." Furthermore, they presented a direct challenge to the organizational authority of the bishops, promoting their own teachings, baptisms, and practices whether or not these were authorized by the residing bishop.
It was these organizational challenges, more than a desire to enforce doctrinal conformity, that sparked the debate which led eventually to the development of the canon.
Elaine Pagels, in Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas (2003), argued that Bishop Irenaeus of Lyons played a forceful role in promoting scriptural authority as a tool against "heretics". She points out though that his goal is not to eliminate doctrinal variance so much as to counter what he fears are divisive forces threatening the stability of the church.
For Irenaeus, authority on matters of Christian teaching and practice comes to us from the Lord by way of the Gospels and other Christian scripture. The centerpiece of this argument is the authority of four gospels, those of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. In this way he argues against the Marcionites, who used only an abridged gospel of Luke; and against the Valentinians, who of these four relied perhaps primarily on John, but used other additional scriptures to promote their teachings. He is also turning Marcion's idea of specifically Christian scripture on its head, and using it to his advantage.
Irenaeus was also interested in countering the practice of the Valentinians and other Gnostics in their use of scripture as inspiration for new visionary works. This esoteric usage of scripture was not uncommon throughout the East (for example, the ma'asey merkavah of Jewish mysticism employed the book of Ezekiel as inspiration for mystical visions). However, from the standpoint of organizational authority, there was nothing to be gained by new visionary revelation in Christianity, and everything to be lost. The Montanists, the Manichaeans, and many other new movements sprang up, and over time they threatened to drain the church of members, leaders, authority, and resources. So, following Irenaeus, scripture began to be seen as normative – teaching had to agree with scripture to be seen as valid.
It is argued that the willingness of various theologians to "cut and paste" from Christian texts shows that they were not seen as authoritative. Even the gospels were not immune; first of course was the revising of Mark's Gospel by the authors of Matthew's and Luke's Gospels; after that was the compilation of various gospel harmonies such as the Diatessaron of Tatian, and the abridged version of Luke's Gospel which Marcion used as the "Gospel of Paul." This argument could be disputed – consider for example the Documentary Hypothesis, which holds that the Torah was created after the Babylonian exile by redacting texts from four or more different sources; if Jewish redactors did not refrain from modifying texts they held sacred, why should we presume otherwise of Christians? Nonetheless it does seem that Christians came to reject revisions to texts they considered sacred. This suggests that an attitude of utter receptiveness towards sacred texts – as opposed to dialogue with them by esoteric visions or redaction – was a significant part of the canonization process.
The Canon Muratori, written 20 years after Irenaeus published Against all Heresies, proposes that Christian writings are authoritative if they represent first-hand accounts of the apostles. The author writes of the apostles that their "number is settled" (line 79), suggesting that there can be no more revelation. This standard excludes books like the Shepherd of Hermas, which was written "quite lately in our time in the city of Rome" (lines 74-75), from being read "among the apostles" (line 80), that is, as doctrinally-normative scripture.
However, even in this text the standard is not applied evenly, since the Wisdom of Solomon is included here within the Christian canon, though it is not apostolic in origin. This unevenness reflects a degree of uncertainty regarding a large set of texts whose inclusion in the canon was debated for two hundred years – the catholic epistles; the Revelations to John and Peter; the epistles of Barnabas, Clement, and Ignatius; the Acts of Paul; the Shepherd of Hermas; the Didache; and others. These "apocryphal" texts were not considered heretical, but were seen as useful or even authoritative; however, they did not seem to carry the same weight as the gospels and the works of Paul. As Schneemelcher writes, for centuries these texts rested in a third category – they were not quite sacred or authoritative, but they were not rejected outright either; he supposes that this implies there was for a long time no clear boundary between canonical (as we think of it today) and non-canonical.
The Canon Muratori also lists texts which are to be excluded from all use – those of Marcion, Valentinus, Basilides, and Miltiades. No justification is given here, as none seems to be needed.
The Canon Muratori was one step of many in the development of a body of authoritative and normative Christian scripture. It was written ca. 200 CE in Greek by an unknown author, probably in the western church.
It was written at a time when members of the church were beginning to reflect seriously on the relationships between faith, church, and scripture. This debate began in the latter half of the second century CE; it could perhaps be said that it has never been truly settled, since different denominations have to this day different scriptural canons, but for most of Christendom this debate has been over since the fourth century CE.
Prior to this, as Schneemelcher (1991) writes, the idea of sacred scripture was reserved mainly for the Jewish scriptures, "the Law and the Prophets," and authority was reserved for the Lord or the Holy Spirit. By the middle of the second century CE, though, it was clear that there was nothing to stop any theologian from making doctrinal assertions and claiming to have the support of the Lord's authority and of Jewish scripture.
This became particularly troublesome to many bishops when it began to appear that the cohesion of the church itself was threatened by movements like the Marcionites and the Valentinians. The Marcionites, as it were, "set up shop" in direct competition to the church after being expelled. Marcionite congregations sprouted up throughout the Roman Empire and offered a competing interpretation of Jesus' life and teachings. Marcion rejected the Jewish scriptures and promoted instead a body of new Christian scripture, made up of abridged editions of the Gospel of Luke and eight of the Pauline epistles. As such, it appears that Marcion was the first to argue that Christian scripture was an authoritative source.
The Valentinians operated mostly inside Christian congregations, creating a church within the church of the "spiritual elite." Furthermore, they presented a direct challenge to the organizational authority of the bishops, promoting their own teachings, baptisms, and practices whether or not these were authorized by the residing bishop.
It was these organizational challenges, more than a desire to enforce doctrinal conformity, that sparked the debate which led eventually to the development of the canon.
Elaine Pagels, in Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas (2003), argued that Bishop Irenaeus of Lyons played a forceful role in promoting scriptural authority as a tool against "heretics". She points out though that his goal is not to eliminate doctrinal variance so much as to counter what he fears are divisive forces threatening the stability of the church.
For Irenaeus, authority on matters of Christian teaching and practice comes to us from the Lord by way of the Gospels and other Christian scripture. The centerpiece of this argument is the authority of four gospels, those of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. In this way he argues against the Marcionites, who used only an abridged gospel of Luke; and against the Valentinians, who of these four relied perhaps primarily on John, but used other additional scriptures to promote their teachings. He is also turning Marcion's idea of specifically Christian scripture on its head, and using it to his advantage.
Irenaeus was also interested in countering the practice of the Valentinians and other Gnostics in their use of scripture as inspiration for new visionary works. This esoteric usage of scripture was not uncommon throughout the East (for example, the ma'asey merkavah of Jewish mysticism employed the book of Ezekiel as inspiration for mystical visions). However, from the standpoint of organizational authority, there was nothing to be gained by new visionary revelation in Christianity, and everything to be lost. The Montanists, the Manichaeans, and many other new movements sprang up, and over time they threatened to drain the church of members, leaders, authority, and resources. So, following Irenaeus, scripture began to be seen as normative – teaching had to agree with scripture to be seen as valid.
It is argued that the willingness of various theologians to "cut and paste" from Christian texts shows that they were not seen as authoritative. Even the gospels were not immune; first of course was the revising of Mark's Gospel by the authors of Matthew's and Luke's Gospels; after that was the compilation of various gospel harmonies such as the Diatessaron of Tatian, and the abridged version of Luke's Gospel which Marcion used as the "Gospel of Paul." This argument could be disputed – consider for example the Documentary Hypothesis, which holds that the Torah was created after the Babylonian exile by redacting texts from four or more different sources; if Jewish redactors did not refrain from modifying texts they held sacred, why should we presume otherwise of Christians? Nonetheless it does seem that Christians came to reject revisions to texts they considered sacred. This suggests that an attitude of utter receptiveness towards sacred texts – as opposed to dialogue with them by esoteric visions or redaction – was a significant part of the canonization process.
The Canon Muratori, written 20 years after Irenaeus published Against all Heresies, proposes that Christian writings are authoritative if they represent first-hand accounts of the apostles. The author writes of the apostles that their "number is settled" (line 79), suggesting that there can be no more revelation. This standard excludes books like the Shepherd of Hermas, which was written "quite lately in our time in the city of Rome" (lines 74-75), from being read "among the apostles" (line 80), that is, as doctrinally-normative scripture.
However, even in this text the standard is not applied evenly, since the Wisdom of Solomon is included here within the Christian canon, though it is not apostolic in origin. This unevenness reflects a degree of uncertainty regarding a large set of texts whose inclusion in the canon was debated for two hundred years – the catholic epistles; the Revelations to John and Peter; the epistles of Barnabas, Clement, and Ignatius; the Acts of Paul; the Shepherd of Hermas; the Didache; and others. These "apocryphal" texts were not considered heretical, but were seen as useful or even authoritative; however, they did not seem to carry the same weight as the gospels and the works of Paul. As Schneemelcher writes, for centuries these texts rested in a third category – they were not quite sacred or authoritative, but they were not rejected outright either; he supposes that this implies there was for a long time no clear boundary between canonical (as we think of it today) and non-canonical.
The Canon Muratori also lists texts which are to be excluded from all use – those of Marcion, Valentinus, Basilides, and Miltiades. No justification is given here, as none seems to be needed.
no subject
heh
Can't you just hear it? "No no no now you've completely misinterpreted my actions. I'm not having you drawn and quartered because you're introducing doctrinal variance ... but you represent a divisive force and I simply cannot allow you to threaten the stability of the church. I'm sure you appreciate the position you've forced me into."
huh huh huh ... "Dissent, go ahead ... but don't be effective!"
Reminds me of the "4 I's" of consultation: invite, involve, inform, ignore.
no subject