The Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew

by Bart D. Ehrman

  The Muratorian Canon and the Criteria of Canonicity

  Given these motivations for forming a set canon of Scripture, how did proto-orthodox Christians go about deciding which books to include and which to exclude? One of the best ways to follow their line of reasoning is to consider the earliest surviving canonical list, the Muratorian canon, a fragmentary text that has been subject to considerable debate in recent years.

  This "canon" is a list of books that its anonymous author considered to be part of the New Testament Scriptures. It is named for the eighteenth-century scholar L. A. Muratori, who discovered it in a library in Milan. In 1740 Muratori published the manuscript that contained the list, not so much to provide access to the various documents that it contains—which are principally treatises of several fourth-century and fifth-century church fathers—but in order to show how sloppy copyists in the Middle Ages could be. In a treatise of Ambrose, for example, the scribe inadvertently copied the same thirty lines twice. What is worse, the second copy of these lines differs from the first in about thirty places— at least one mistake per line. Who knows how poorly the scribe worked when we don't have his own copy with which to correct him?

  In any event, the Muratorian canon is part of this poorly transcribed manuscript. Most scholars date the manuscript and its ill-suited scribe to the eighth century. The text is in Latin, truly awful Latin, but is a translation of a Greek original. The debates of recent years concern the date and location of the original. The common view of the matter since the days of Muratori has been that it was written somewhere in the vicinity of Rome in the second half of the second century, possibly during the time of Hippolytus. Recent scholars have tried to argue that the text is better located in the fourth century, somewhere in the eastern part of the empire. But the arguments have not proved altogether compelling. The beginning of the text is lost. There can be little doubt, however, about the books it initially described, given the way the fragment itself starts:

  ... at which nevertheless he was present, and so he placed [them in his narrative]. The third book of the Gospel is that according to Luke.

  The author goes on to describe who Luke was, and then to speak of the "fourth of the Gospels," which "is that of John." This list, in other words, begins by discussing the four Gospels, the third and fourth of which are Luke and John. It is fairly clear that it began by mentioning Matthew and Mark, the latter of which is only allusively referred to in the partial sentence that begins the fragment.

  Thus the Muratorian canon includes the four Gospels that eventually made it into the New Testament, and no others. After discussing John, the canon names the Acts of the Apostles and then the Epistles of Paul, mentioning seven to seven churches (Corinthians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Galatians, Thessalonians and Romans), two of which (Corinthians and Thessalonians), the author tells us, Paul wrote twice, and then four to individuals (Philemon, Titus, and two to Timothy). This canon, in other words, includes all thirteen Pauline epistles. It explicitly rejects, however, the epistle "to the Laodiceans" and the one "to the Alexandrians," both of which, it claims, were "forged in Paul's name to further the heresy of Marcion." These, it indicates in a memorable image, "cannot be received into the catholic church, for it is not fitting that gall be mixed with honey."

  The list proceeds to list as acceptable the epistle of Jude, two epistles of John, the Wisdom of Solomon (a book that obviously did not make it into the New Testament), the Apocalypse of John, and the Apocalypse of Peter, indicating that some Christians are not willing to have the latter read in church. It maintains that the Shepherd of Hermas should be read, but not in church as Scripture, since

  Hermas wrote [it] very recently, in our times, in the city of Rome, while bishop Pius, his brother, was occupying the [episcopal] chair of the church of the city of Rome, (lines 73-76)

  In other words, the Shepherd is a recent production (near to "our times") and is not by an apostle (but the brother of a recent bishop). Hence it cannot be included in the canon.

  The list concludes by mentioning other rejected books:

  We accept nothing whatever of Arsinous or Valentinus or Miltiades, who also composed a new book of psalms for Marcion, together with Basilides, the Asian founder of the Cataphrygians (i.e., Montanus)—

  There the list ends as it began, in midsentence.

  When the totals are added up, this proto-orthodox author accepted twenty-two of the twenty-seven books that eventually made it into the New Testament. Not included are Hebrews, James, Peter, and one of the Johannine Epistles (he accepts two of the three that we have, but does not indicate which two). In addition, he accepts the Wisdom of Solomon and, provisionally, the Apocalypse of Peter. Finally, he rejects some books, either because they are heretical—the Marcionite forgeries of Paul's letters to the Alexandrians and the Laodiceans and other forgeries attributed to Gnostics and Montanists—or because they do not pass his criteria for canonicity.

  What are those criteria? As it turns out, they are the same four criteria used across a broad spectrum of proto-orthodox authors of the second and third centuries. For these authors, a book was to be admitted into the proto-orthodox canon of Scripture only if it was:

  (a)

  (b)

  (c)

  (d)

  Eusebius and the Canon in the Early Fourth Century

  The debates over the contour of the canon raged long after the creation of the Muratorian list in the late second century. Almost all the proto-orthodox eventually agreed that the four Gospels, Acts, the thirteen Pauline Epistles, Peter, and John should be included. But there were extensive disagreements about other books. For some of the books (the shorter catholic epistles) the debates were relatively muted, as not many people were concerned. But other books, such as the Letter to the Hebrews and the Revelation of John, generated considerable disagreement; these were large books, and it mattered whether they were to be considered canonical or not. Was Hebrews' apparent claim that those who had fallen from grace had no chance of restitution to be accepted as a divinely inspired teaching (Heb. 6:1-6)? Was Revelation's teaching that Christ reign here on earth for one thousand years (Rev. 20:1-3) to be taken seriously? The public debates over these books tended to focus on authorship: Did Paul write Hebrews? Did John the son of Zebedee write Revelation? But the substance of the debates was over doctrine: Can we accept such a stringent ethical view as Hebrews' or such a potentially crass millenarian view as Revelation's? And what about the Apocalypse of Peter or the Epistle of Barnabas?

  That the issues were not quickly resolved is evidenced by later writers standing in the proto-orthodox tradition. Writing a century and a half after the Muratorian canon, for example, Eusebius shows how debates over canon were still very much alive. At one point of his ten-volume work, Eusebius states his intention is "to summarize the writings of the New Testament" (Church History 3.25.1). To do so, he sets forth four categories of books. The first he calls "acknowledged" books, meaning those books accepted by all sides within the orthodox tradition (the only one he is concerned with at this point): the Four Gospels, Acts, the (fourteen) Epistles of Paul (he includes Hebrews), John, Peter, and "if it really seems right," he says, the Apocalypse of John. Here, some scholars have noted, Eusebius undercuts his own categories, since the Apocalypse, one of his "acknowledged" books, is not universally acknowledged; Eusebius goes on to say that "we shall give the different opinions [about the Apocalypse of John] at the proper time."

  His second category involves books that are "disputed," meaning writings that may well be considered canonical but whose status is debated. He includes in this group James, Jude, Peter, and John.

  Eusebius then names books he considers "spurious," a word that typically means "forged," but that in this context appears to mean "inauthentic, although sometimes considered canonical." These include the Acts of Paul (recall what Tertullian said about Paul and Thecla), the Shepherd of Hermas, the Apocalypse of Peter, the Epistle of Barnabas, the Didache of the Apostles, an
d the Gospel according to the Hebrews. Somewhat oddly, Eusebius also includes in this group, "if it seems right," the Apocalypse of John—odd because one might expect it to be listed as "disputed" rather than "spurious."

  Finally, Eusebius provides a list of books that are heretical: the Gospels of Peter, Thomas, and Matthias, the Acts of Andrew and John. With regard to the books of this category, Eusebius comments,

  To none of these has any who belonged to the succession of ecclesiastical writers ever thought it right to refer in his writings. Moreover, the character of the style also is far removed from apostolic usage, and the thought and purport of their contents are completely out of harmony with true orthodoxy and clearly show themselves that they are the forgeries of heretics.

  These books are not, in other words, catholic, apostolic, or orthodox.

  The Canon at the End of the Fourth Century

  It was another sixty years—years of back and forth, hard-fought debates within the orthodox camp—before anyone came up with a definitive list of books to be included in the canon that matched our list today, in the famous Athanasian letter of 367 ce. Even the powerful Athanasius could not settle the issue once and for all, as we have seen. But his list corresponded well enough with what most other orthodox Christians of his day were saying that it eventually triumphed. The greatest orthodox theologian of antiquity, Augustine of Hippo, threw his weight behind the list and pushed its acceptance at the Synod of Hippo in 393 ce. We no longer have the text of the proceedings of the conference, but we do have that of the Third Synod of Carthage, held four years later, which summarized the earlier proceedings:

  Codex Sinaiticus, the oldest surviving manuscript of the entire New Testament. This fourth-century manuscript includes The

  The canonical Scriptures are these [there follows a list of the books of the Old Testament]. Of the New Testament: the Gospels, four books; the Acts of the Apostles, one book; the Epistles of Paul, thirteen; of the same to the Hebrews, one Epistle; of Peter, two; of John, apostle, three; of James, one; of Jude, one; the Revelation of John. Concerning the confirmation of this canon, the church across the sea shall be consulted.

  And so the canon appears to be settled in North Africa, but the church in Rome still needs to be consulted on the matter. In some parts of the Church, it was settled somewhat differently. But for those within the orthodox tradition, the tradition that stands at the root of most forms of Christianity familiar to us today—Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Protestant—the matter was for all practical purposes resolved. Proto-orthodoxy had triumphed and was simply working out some of the issues at the margins.

  To be sure, the theological debates of later centuries were at least as heated and, in the eyes of their participants, as monumental as anything that went before, even if to our eyes the issues became increasingly circumscribed and the differences between combatants increasingly minute. But these later debates could all presuppose and build on the outcome of the disputes of the earlier Christian centuries, as proto-orthodoxy became orthodoxy, and theologians moved forward to refine their views.

  Chapter Twelve: Winners, Losers, and the Question of Tolerance

  The historical significance of the victory of proto-orthodox Christianity can scarcely be overstated. The form of Christianity that emerged from the conflicts of the second and third centuries was destined to became the religion of the Roman Empire. From there it developed into the dominant religious, political, economic, social, and cultural institution of the West for centuries—down to the present. Christians living in the midst of these conflicts could not have imagined how important their outcome would be for the shape of western civilization. The repercussions are still felt today, in ways that even we may have difficulty understanding.

  The Significance of Victory

  Throughout this study I have tried to hypothesize what it may have been like if some other side had "won." If the Marcionite Christians had gained ascendancy, would people still ask, "Do you believe in God?" Or would they ask, "Do you believe in the two Gods?" Would anyone except scholars of antiquity have heard of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and John? Would we have an "Old" Testament? How would the social and political relations of Jews and Christians over the centuries have been affected? Would Christians who rejected the Jewish God and all things Jewish feel a need to polemicize against and attack Jews? Or would they simply ignore Jews as not presenting any real competition to their own claims of the knowledge of the other God, who saved them from the creator? Would anti-Semitism be worse, or would it be nonexistent?

  If, on the other hand, Ebionite Christians had gained ascendancy, would Christianity have remained a sect within Judaism? Would Christians today worship on Saturdays instead of Sundays? Would they keep kosher? Would these Jewish-Christians have wanted or been able to convert masses of people to their message of salvation, when conversion would have required men to undergo the operation of circumcision? Would Christianity have been anything but a footnote in the history of world religions?

  We can probably say with some certainty that if some other side had won— Marcionite, Ebionite, some form of Gnostic—there would have been no doctrine of Christ as both fully divine and human. As a consequence, there would have been no doctrine of the Trinity. How would that have affected the intellectual life of the Middle Ages, the development of scholastic modes of argumentation, the modern Christian debates over the relationship between divine revelation (say, of religious mystery) and human reason (which cannot comprehend the depths of mystery)?

  These questions affect everyone, not merely those who call themselves Christian. The beliefs, practices, and institutions of Christianity have played an enormous role in western civilization as a whole, not just for members of the Church. Take the New Testament itself, for example, considered by most people throughout the course of its history to be a single book, with a unified message that serves as the ultimate basis for this religion's faith and practice. The New Testament has been and continues to be the most widely read and revered book in the history of the West. It continues to inspire belief, to stimulate reflection, and to provide hope to millions. It is preached from the pulpit; it is studied in the university; it is attacked by skeptics; it is revered by believers. In the United States it is widely considered to have been a foundational document for the founders; it is quoted on the floor of the Senate to justify acts of war and at peace rallies to oppose the use of military force; its authority is cited by both opponents and proponents of the right of a woman to have an abortion, by both opponents and proponents of the death penalty, by both opponents and proponents of gay rights. It was used to justify slavery and to abolish slavery. It has been used to justify capitalism and socialism. It has been used for good and for evil.

  But where did this book come from? It came from the victory of the proto-orthodox. What if another group had won? What if the New Testament contained not Jesus' Sermon on the Mount but the Gnostic teachings Jesus delivered to his disciples after his resurrection? What if it contained not the letters of Paul and Peter but the letters of Ptolemy and Barnabas? What if it contained not the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John but the Gospels of Thomas, Philip, Mary, and Nicodemus? Or what if it did not exist at all?

  On an even more fundamental level: If some group other than the proto-orthodox had won, how would our approaches to reading texts and our "natural" ways of thinking differ? Most people, for example, take a commonsensical approach to the task of reading. We know what words mean, we see how words are used in a text, we notice the grammatical connections of the words, and by reading them in sequence in view of our knowledge of the language we reconstruct what an author meant. But what if this "literal" way of reading a text had been marginalized as an inadequate mode of interpretation? What if the religious and intellectual traditions passed down through the centuries, traditions that determine how we read and make sense of texts, indeed, of our world, what if these traditions supported the primacy not of literal readings but of figurative ones,
where the assumption is that the real meaning of a text is not the literal one, that words have secret meanings available only to those who have special insights, for example, as given from above? Would we be able to read a newspaper the way we do today?

  In considering the importance of the victory of proto-orthodox Christianity, we should also reflect on broader historical implications. A case can be made that this victory was one of the most significant events in the social and political history of western civilization. Had it not happened, one could argue, the vast majority of people in the world who adhere to Christianity—some two billion by some recent estimates, the largest religion on the planet—would still be pagans, adhering to one or another polytheistic religion. The history of western civilization as we know it, from late antiquity through the Middle Ages, to the Renaissance, the Reformation, and into modernity, would never have occurred.

  The grounds for this argument have to do with the conversion of the Roman Empire. Probably no ten-year period was more important for the fortunes of Christianity than 303-13 ce, well after the conflicts we have been discussing had been resolved and proto-orthodoxy had established itself as the dominant form of Christian faith. That decade near the beginning of the fourth century saw a shift in Roman imperial policy away from a massive proscription and persecution of Christians to the conversion of the Roman emperor himself and the beginnings of an enormous bestowal of imperial favors on the Christians, which ultimately led to large-scale conversions and to the declaration of Christianity as the official state religion some decades later.