Did the church give us the bible?

Question

The bible didn't pick out it's books itself, right? A bunch of bishops came together and decided through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit which books would be in the bible, meaning the church gave us the bible... why do a lot of christians disagree with this?

Answer 1

Yeah......almost 400 years after the supposed death of Jesus.

Answer 2

There were many books. St. Jerome and other scholars studied them and determined which books would be included in the Bible. This was in the 3rd century. Some books were labeled apocrypha with means doubtful. They were not included.
Now, Protestants removed about 7 books from the Old Testament canon as no Hebrew manuscripts were extant. However, Catholics and Protestants have the same books in the New Testament.
In some of the Catholic Bibles prior to Vatican II,
the titles of the books are different than the KJV, but they are the same book.
In the New Testament the Book of Revelation was called the Apocalypse.
I believe the new versions of the Bibles are better researched than the Catholic Bible prior to Vatican II and the KJV. The translators have better contact with Hebrew sources and scholars and are able to get a better understanding of the original texts.
I might mention that Solo Scriptura is no where in the Bible. So that is an oxymoron.

Answer 3

The first council of Nicea in 325

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Council_of_Nicaea

Basically, over the preceding 300 years MANY gospels and epistles and other adventure stories of Jesus and his friends had been written, any there were many little groups of followers of Christ with quite different ideas on who or what he was. Not all agreed that he was divine, or just a gifted man, or an ancient spiritual god-warrior. There was disagreement on the trinity. etc.etc.

Constantine forced all the different bishops to get together and decide on the holy cannon. What was in...what was RIGHT OUT !! There were compromises made, pet stories thrown out, arms twisted, deals made. Four Gospels were decided on as the "proper" number for mystical reasons, (matching the four points of a compass ) So they chose the 4 that were the least dissimilar....ahem. The Revelations almost didn't make it in the final cut.

That became the first "bible". A people's , "catholic" bible.

Everything else became heresy, and the heretics were hunted down and killed, and their writings destroyed. This was the birth of what became the Catholic church.

You wouldn't recognize many things in that original bible. Remember, the King James version didn't come out until well over a 1,000 years later. There was an entire millennium for different versions of the bible going around before the one that most Fundamentalists consider THE Bible.

Isn't history fun?

Answer 4

The Holy Bible is and always will be Catholic in origin. However, no council ever commenced to decide what goes where.

Sacred Scripture came about gradually over time. It wasn't until around the time of St. Athanasius (3rd century) when the Church recognized what they considered the inspirational Word of God. Throughout the early church many Christians read the letters of the Apostles and even a few apocryphal books, The Shepard of Hermes, St. Ignatius of Antioch's letters, St. Polycarps letter, the Didache etc. Scripture, at least the New Testament wasn't really finalized and "set in stone" until St. Jerome wrote his famous Latin Vulgate.

Answer 5

The catholic church says they have all the books and the "other" churches chose what books they wanted to accept.
Ok, number one - the church isn't a building, its the ppl.
Number 2 - most of the books that the catholic church has in its Bible they never use or read from.


Number 3 - the KJV is so similar to the NIV, there is no problem there

The christians that raise the most fuss are the catholics when they say that the other Bibles don't have "all" the books.
The ppl of all the different churches ARE the Church.

I grew up catholic so I know what the catholic church says. But I changed churches to a church where I feel at home.

Answer 6

Dunno...because that's what happened. The Church is organic...a Body, with Jesus Christ the Head and all Baptized Persons as the members - given life on the First Pentecost by he coming down of the Holy Spirit.

In Council, with the Bishops (the guarantors of the Resurrection by Apostolic Succession) - the Church is still and always filled with that same Holy Spirit.

Answer 7

Since the beginning, and I do mean 'the' beginning, there has been 'alternative' views of what the truth is. The devil has been lieing for a long time. Especially since the time of Christ, have his lies been so persuasive. There were many cults that arose shortly after the death of the Christ. The job of the bishops was to wade thru the sea of apocryphal books to find the true books to put in the Bible.

Answer 8

No church created the canon, but the churches and councils gradually accepted the list of books recognized by believers everywhere as inspired.

The first 5 books are the Torah, or Jewish law. The rest of the Old Testament was probably not finally fixed much before the birth of Christ, by the Jewish religious authorities.
The New Testament was determined at around the 4th century, by Christian leaders and scholars.

Answer 9

Partially correct.In that a bunch of bishops did get together and decide which books to include.Strange how the stories showing jesus to be less than a deity were left out

Answer 10

Let us discuss the Bible. You look at Eastern Orthodoxy and see many things Orthodox Christians do and believe which are not specifically mentioned in the Bible. You then wonder how we can justify doing and believing these things. This discrepancy exists because the Orthodox accept other authorities as sources of Truth in addition to the Bible. But before I explain about these other authorities, I wish to research this belief in the Bible. When I first began to study Orthodoxy, I was bothered by the question, why should I believe that the Bible is the Word of God? Why should it contain the books that it does? Why not other books, or should all those it includes be there?

You see, I discovered that the Christians of the first several centuries had differences of opinion as to which books of Scripture were from God and which were writings of mere men (perhaps holy, wise men, or perhaps false and heretical books, but nevertheless not divinely inspired writings). For example, even in 300 A.D. there were questions about the validity of the books of James, II Peter, II and III John and a definite division of opinion about the Apocalypse (the Revelation of John). There was a book called the Gospel according to Peter in existence. There is the letter called the Didache, which is the letter from the first century sent by the Apostles after they met in council at Jerusalem (see Acts 15:1-32). There are letters from Sts. Polycarp and Ignatius, disciples of St. John the Apostle, just as Sts. Mark, Matthew and Luke were disciples of various of the Twelve Apostles-and yet those three gospels were included in the Bible but not the letters of Sts. Polycarp or Ignatius. Yet I have read their writings and do not think that they were denied admittance to Holy Scripture because they were strange or because the authorship was doubted; rather they seem very good and holy letters, yet they are not regarded as Scripture. And these are just some of the books and letters which might have been considered Holy Scripture. So who judges which books are human and which divine?

Historically, I can tell you that the reason you read and revere the collection of books known as the Bible is because of the decisions of church councils which were held to decide this issue (in addition to other issues). Local councils were held in 58-65?, 364, and 419, and councils of the whole church took place in 691 and 787 A.D. They made their decisions which together with the Church’s confirmation and emendation became the established Word of God. Much later, when the Protestants rebelled against and separated from the Roman Catholics (1400 A.D. on) they kept most of the doctrine about Scripture even though they discarded many other doctrines. Thus you were taught that these books are the Bible, God’s communication to mankind. This is historically why Protestants believe the Bible to be God’s Word.

So it was these councils which decided with the Church’s approval what constituted Holy Scripture. What criteria did they use? Basically, there were two criteria: (1) who wrote the book (and how certain it was that the alleged authorship was valid), and (2) whether or not the teachings of the book agreed with apostolic tradition (also called Holy Tradition). I do not imagine that you would object to the first criterion. As for the second, in the early Church the canon of Scripture was not completely set-heresies were rampant and the Church was often in turmoil. Some people invented strange new doctrines and terrible heresies and started their own "churches," seeking to deceive if possible even the elect (Matt. 24:24). These heretics would sometimes write their own pseudo-apostolic books to try to lure the faithful away from the true Church. Therefore, Christians had to judge the correct way to believe and act by the oral as well as by the written teachings of the apostles as they were passed from one generation to another. For the apostles taught that Christians were to obey all that they taught whether by word or letter. St. Paul writes, Therefore brethren, stand fast and hold to the traditions which you have been taught, whether by word or our letter (II Thess. 2:15); Now I praise you, brethren,... that you keep the traditions as I delivered them to you (I Cor. 11:2); and, The things you have learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, practice these things (Phil. 4:9). Some would argue that these oral traditions were ultimately included in one or more of the writings of the New Testament. If this were so, then why would God leave us these purposeless instructions in Holy Scripture? These three verses would then be totally superfluous. No, these verses must refer to teachings of the apostles given in unrecorded sermons, as well as to the lessons taught by their manner of living. It is in accordance with these traditions that the validity of the books was judged.

These were the criteria used. Now what about the method used to determine the contents of the Bible-a council of bishops meeting to judge a doctrinal issue? This is the very method the apostles taught should be used, and the Bible itself bears witness to this.

In Acts 15:1-32, we are told there was a doctrinal dispute over whether Gentile Christians should have to follow the Jewish rites. The apostles met and decided they should not and sent a letter to all the Churches informing them of their decision. Thus a doctrinal dispute was judged by a council of the apostles. "But that council" you may say, "was composed of apostles. What entitles bishops to do this?" It is historically certain that the apostles taught that the bishops they set up in each city were to do the work that they themselves had been doing; that is, the bishop should preside over the services, appoint elders (presbyters or priests) in each church, consecrate the people chosen to be deacons, and to meet in councils to decide doctrinal and other disputes, etc. Thus when a doctrinal dispute arose, bishops would gather to decide the issue. This is-the tradition we have and follow. This is the foundation for believing that councils are an authority Christians must obey. This authority is established by Scripture and attests to the validity of the Scriptures. It is established by God to winnow the wheat from the chaff of new problems, questions and heresies.

The Old Testament canon of Scripture is that of the Septuagint, which was the Bible of the apostles. Other Christian communions through the years have deviated somewhat from this apostolic canon which the Orthodox Church still uses. The canon of the New Testament was developed over the early centuries of the Church. Its first known listing in its final form is the Paschal Letter of St. Athanasius of Alexandria in A.D. 367.

Answer 11

Because if they admit that then they must also admit that Catholics are Christians and in the Bible we were never commanded to divide the body of Christ. The inventor of Sola Scriptura also wanted to remove Hebrews and James from the New Testament.