Jan 1, 2022

Medieval Christian Theologians on the OT Canon

 


Here is documentation for some theologians from the medieval/Middle Ages period who held to a shorter canon in Scripture:


Primasius of Hadrumetum

"In one way, fore and aft, because the Church everywhere bearing fruit is broadened; it walks in the light of the face of God, and, his face revealed, gazes on the glory of God. In another way, fore and aft, he implies that the six-fold wings, which number twenty-four, are the books of the Old Testament, which we take up on canonical authority of the same number, just as there are twenty-four elders sitting above the thrones" (Commentary on the Apocalypse of John, Book 1, Chapter 4)

[Found in PL 68:818]. 


Alcuin

"While the testimony fitting to your error has failed your perversity in the prophets of God, you have established for yourself to speak of a certain new prophet: Have mercy, Lord, on the people called by your name, and on Israel whom your have named your firstborn! You have also added to this opinion such an interpretation: Equality itself, you say, is not in the divinity, but in the humanity alone and in the taken-on flesh, which he received from the Virgin. Behold the fraud in the name of a prophet! Behold the perversity in the interpretation of this idea. And not in vain is it fitting that the new scholar find for himself a new prophet. Just as King Jeroboam departing from the true worship of God established for himself new gods, that he, lost, might lead astray the people subject to him; concerning this it was forecast much earlier in Deuteronomy: He abandoned God who made him and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation; so you, departing from the true God and the proper Son of God, have established a nominative God and an adopted redeemer Son for yourself, whom our fathers did not know. But you have left the God who freed you and forgotten the God your redeemer. In the book of Jesus son of Sirach this aforementioned idea is read, which blessed Jerome and Isidore judged, without doubt, to be among the apocrypha, i.e. doubtful scriptures (Alcuin, Adversus Elipandum Toletanum, Liber Primus XVIII. Translation by Benjamin Panciera, The Medieval Institute, University of Notre Dame).


[Found in PL 101:253-254]


Richard of St. Victor

"Holy Scripture is contained in two testaments, namely the Old and the New. Each testament is divided into three subsections: the Old Testament contains the law, the prophets, and the hagiography. The New contains the Gospel, the apostles, and the fathers. The first subsection of the Old Testament is the law, which the Hebrews call thorath holds the Pentateuch, that is the five books of Moses. In this subsection the first is Beresith, which is Genesis; second Hellesmoth, which is Exodus; third is Vagethra, which is Leviticus; fourth Vagedaber, which is Numbers; fifth Elleaddaberim, which is Deuteronomy. The second subsection is of prophets and contains eight texts. The first is Bennum, that is, Son of Nun, who is called Joshua and Jesus and Jesus Nave. The second is Sathim, which is Judges; third Samuel, which is first and second Kings; fourth Malachi, which is third and fourth Kings; fifth Isaiah; sixth Jeremiah; seventh Ezekiel; eighth Thereasra, which is the twelve prophets. The third subsection has nine books. First is Job, second David, third Masloth, which in Greek is Parabolae but in Latin is Proverbs, i.e. of Solomon; fourth Coeleth, which is Ecclesiastes; fifth Sirasirim, which is the Song of Songs; sixth Daniel, seventh Dabreiamin, which is Chronicles; eighth Ezra; ninth Esther. However, they are twenty-four in number in all. There are other books also besides these, such as the Wisdom of Solomon, the Book of Jesu, son of Sirach, the Book of Judith also, Tobias and the book of the Maccabees, which are read, in fact, but are not written in the Canon "(Richard of St. Victor, Tractatus Exceptionum: Qui continet originem et discretionem artium, situmque terrarum, et summam historiarum; distinctus in quatuor libros. Book II, Cap. IX. De duobus Testamentis. P.L. 177:193. Translation by Benjamin Panciera, The Medieval Institute, University of Notre Dame).


[link from Google Books]


John of Salisbury

And so I was glad to take up for your sake the questions propounded, and reply to them, with allowance made for my present opportunities and urgent affairs, not as I would, but as best I can for the while. The questions were: what do I believe to be the number of books in the Old and New Testament, and who were their authors…On the number of the books I find in my reading diverse and numerous opinions given by the fathers; and so I follow Jerome, teacher of the Catholic Church, whom I hold to be the surest witness in establishing the basis of the literal interpretation. Just as it is accepted that there are twenty-two letters in the Hebrew alphabet, so I believe without doubt that there are twenty?two books in the Old Testament, divided into three categories. The first contains the Pentateuch, that is the five books of Moses, which are divided into this number to represent the different sacraments,' though the historical subject?matter is admittedly continuous. These are Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The second contains prophecies and is completed in eight books. The reason why they rather than the others should be called prophecies, although some of them seem to narrate straightforward history, while others, like Daniel and the Book of Psalms, while describing prophecy, are not reckoned among the prophetic books, was not among the questions put to me; nor does my limitation in time or parchment permit me to expound it now, nor yet the impatience of the bearer. Among these, then, are numbered Joshua, and Judges, to which Ruth is also attached, since the story told in it was set in the days of the judges; also Samuel, whose story is completed in the first two Books of Kings, and Malachim, in the two following. These are followed by Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel-reckoned one book each-and the book of the Twelve Prophets. The third category consists of the Hagiographa, containing Job, the Psalter, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, Daniel, Chronicles, Esdras and Esther. And thus the total of the twenty-two books of the Old Testamen is made up, though some reckon that Ruth and the Lamentations of Jeremiah should be added to the number of the Hagiographa, and thus the total increased to twenty-four. All this is to be found in the prologue to the Books of Kings, which St. Jerome calls the armour-plated front of all the scriptures he himself made flow from the Hebrew source for the understanding of those of Latin speech. The book of Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Judith, Tobit, and the Shepherd are not reckoned in the canon, as St. Jerome also asserts, nor the Book of Maccabees either, which is divided into two, of which the first has the savour of Hebrew eloquence, the second of Greek, as its style proves. Whether the book called the Shepherd anywhere survives I do not know; but it is certain that Jerome and Bede bear witness that they saw and read it. To these are added eight books of the New Testament; they start with the Gospels of Matthew, of Mark, of Luke and of John, and the fifteen Epistles of Paul gathered in one book. Although it is the common, indeed almost universal, opinion that there are only fourteen Epistles of Paul, ten to churches, four to individuals, if indeed the Epistle to the Hebrews is to be reckoned among them-and Jerome, the teacher of teachers, seems to impute it to him in his preface to it, when he demolishes the arguments of those who maintained that it is not Paul's. But the fifteenth is that which is written to the church of the Laodiceans, and although it is rejected by all authorities, as Jerome says, yet it was written by the Apostle; nor is this conclusion based on other men's opinions, but on the sure foundation of the Apostle's own testimony. He recalls it in the Epistle to the Colossians in these words: 'And when this letter has been read among you, have it read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and see that you have read to you also the letter of the Laodiceans.' There follow seven canonical Epistles in one book, then the Acts of the Apostles in another, and finally the Apocalypse. It is the well-known and undoubted tradition of the Church that this is the number of the books which are accepted into the canon of the Holy Scriptures; which enjoy such great authority among all men, that no place is left in sane minds for doubt or contradiction, but that they were written by the finger of God. A lawful and just warning, and condemnation as a sinner, falls on him who in the mart of manners and speech, especially in the forum of the faithful, does not accept, openly and publicly, the silver currency of this divine utterance, tried by the fire of the Holy Spirit, purged from all earthly dross and stain by a sevenfold purgation. Let faith find a sure resting place in these facts and in those things which find their proved and just support in them; since he is an infidel or a heretic who dares to reject them (John of Salisbury, The Letters of John of Salisbury, W.J. Millor S.J. and C.N.L. Brooke, editors (Oxford: Clarendon, 1979), Letter 209, pp. 317, 319, 321, 323, 325).















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